I got unbelievebly bored of this while writing, so i'm not even bothered to edit this, so for the rare few that do read it, you will probably find plenty mistakes. I haven't even finished it, I don't like the ending, as this is based off a bunch of XIII dreams i had and put them together, in one of them it turned into a nightmare, because the Hylian loach got involved (don't ask i have a problem with that fish it won't stop appearing in my dreams) so i hate the ending and are putting it up unfinished because i will be annoyed having something that took me such a time to write and not even putting it up.

3

"I'd pick the ninth song"

"Really, heh, my mum liked that one"

"That so, I've just always liked it. I can remember listening to it when I was a kid, Serah hated it; she liked the 7th"

Lightning and Hope were inside an old abandoned building where they believed might be close to the middle of the city. Their pursuers had led them here, they had gained enough distance to loose them though; they had gone right pass the room where they hid.

Hours had passed, so they knew for sure they were gone. The duo was exhausted so they continued to hide in the small room. After the first hour Lightning had memorised ever detail that was possible for her sight in a room such as this one with only a small amount of light creeping through the closed windows and cracks in the wall.

The floor had a checked brown and white tile floor covered in layers of dust with cracks littering all over. The walls were brown where the paint had been long gone and white where it still remained. Steel rafters were in places touching the ground from where they were half connected to the roof, weight having bent them over in a pointed curve. All of it covered in layers of thick dust just as the floor was, but even more as it had not been disturbed for years even.

Lightning had taking a look around in it's darkness after she had been sure no one knew of their existence in the building. She was surprised to find an old record player. It still had a record on it; one she remembered an old woman had played many times back when her parents had been alive. She had let her and Serah listen to it whenever they wanted to. The 10 songs it played had been embedded in her mind since that time. She had heard the melodies only a few times since her childhood, but each time it gave her a sweet sense of nostalgia. She had also found out that apparently, hope's grandmother had had the same old record, who gave it to her daughter Nora when she began to go deaf. So hope could remember each song just as well as she could, better even. It was a strange coincidence she found it. Her favourite song was the same as Nora's as well, another coincidence.

Lightning had dusted the record; she had made the decision to play it. She kept it at a low sound so she could hear if anyone was coming, as the songs might alert someone of their presence, she was sure nobody was in here anymore, but you could never be too careful in situations such as this.

She was glad that it was just her and Hope here, she enjoyed his company, though she wasn't all that sure why, she had, at first, she hated to be near him. But in her situation having someone weak to protect an annoyingly large amount of times, can get to be bad. She didn't think it was because he had gotten stronger and no longer needed the protecting he was being given, maybe, she could because, if anything, he was a friend now?

She still wasn't sure of that being the reason either just the same as anything else that could be the reason; it wasn't like she really had anyone that she had called a friend before, she had acted way to cold to people for them to want to be near her.

They had spent what had felt like an hour listening to the music, it was calming, hearing the sweet songs, and sitting in the corner with there backs against the wall, just listening. Lightning had almost forgotten the last time she had felt so calm. Hope had a much better memory of the last time he had, the time when he had watched the fireworks with his mother, before the catastrophe of the purge had began.

After all that time, they still stayed hidden, as they were still not in the best condition and this was a better time than others to rest, so they stayed in the small dark, dusty old room.

Lightning had gotten up some time ago when it was starting to hurt sitting on the ground, Hope had done the same thing awhile after her. Somehow that had escalated to what they were doing at the moment, which was for whatever reason they were doing it, was Dancing.

Hope was telling Lightning things about his childhood as they did. He had had a happy life up until now, he had been going to school, getting decent grades, not the best but he could manage to pass so that was good enough. He had been living in a large apartment with his parents that had a small yard out front, you could have a clear view of the sunset as it went down, him and his mum had spent many times together sitting out front talking as they watched the gold disappear over the edge of the horizon, turning to purple before deepening to black as the stars came out. He had never gotten along with his father, so Hope didn't mention much about him. So other than that, and the current going ons, Hope had had a good life.

Lightning had told Hope of some things that had happened to her when she was a child, she didn't say as much, or in the same detail. But Hope wasn't concerned with what she was not saying, so all was fine. She mentioned that she was different before her parents passed away, but she had changed afterwards (which as he already knew the change counted her name as well), from what might have been a mix of grief and her want to protect her little sister. She had never had it extremely bad excluding her parents deaths to be honest. When she was really young she had found a lake with massive fish, of all shapes and colours, some had got to the size of sharks. She admitted that she had been terrified of them at first; a girl that lived near there didn't help, as she mentioned that if she was to fall in one would eat her, she was very descriptive of that fish. Most fish there were of a green or black colour, but it was orangey brown with black patterns up and down its sides. The girl had also informed her that it was the heaviest and longest fish there. Despite being utterly terrified, Lightning told Hope, that she was stupid enough to come up with the goal of catching it, something that she had never done. Her parents had died before her goal was accomplished, so she moved away from the area and never went there again.

They went on and on, telling each other stories from each others childhood, all the while continuing to dance together.

It occurred to them that some time had passed since they came here, and it was best to get a move on, night was the best time, they could sneak along in the cover of the dark.

Lightning peered out the door, no one; she looked either side of her, still no one, good.

She glanced back at Hope who was awaiting to hear whether it was safe or not, he showed slight signs of panic, obviously he was still scared of having to fight so much, he wasn't as near bothered by it now anymore, the battles were a distraction from the pain and confusion that had been consuming them both, but having to fight while injured was not something either wanted.

"It's safe" she announced.

She noticed how his muscles un-tensed as the words left her lips.

"That's good, but where are we supposed to go?"

That was a good question, Lightning had been thinking too much on simply getting away from here that she had neglected to think out where they would head out to afterwards.

She thought that out, she still didn't know where anybody was, so they couldn't go to them, and they didn't know any places that were safe. Then it hit her, she felt the corner of her lips curve into a grin.

"I just remembered something, that place I mentioned, the lake; it's not far out the city. It was hard to get to, so I don't think that soldiers would have infiltrated it hoping to catch us, it should be safe"

She saw Hopes expression change, he was finding something funny about what she had just said.

"What?" she was getting annoyed by that expression he had,

"You don't just want to catch that fish do you?"

"What! She felt her face go a bright red and turned away fast, embarrassed to let him see her like that.

"Of course I don't want to catch that stupid old loach right now; I just thought it would be a safe area!" Lightning had her hand in front of her reddened face, her attempt at hiding it.

"I was just wondering"

"We're far from the right situation for me to be thinking that!"

Lightning checked outside again before darting outside the room, Hope followed after her.

111X111X111

Snow had got himself lost in the middle of a building, he was trying to find Serah; she had been with him for awhile, but decided to go and disappear every time he caught her; she somehow disappeared again, he couldn't leave without her so he was left running around, fighting a soldier or two, more running, kill a flan, more running, basically going in loops.

He wanted to yell out, but that had chances of alerting enemies, and if Serah was nearby, it would not only let them know where he was, but they would have better chances of catching her as well, and that was the last thing he wanted to happen to his fiancé.

He took a look around the corridor; he had passed by this way already damn it. The grey walls and darkened windows were getting familiar. He paused and took a look out the windows, there were heaps of stars in the sky, very unusual for a city to have, but Snow had accidentally destroyed the main power lines, but hey that's what people get when you decide to fight someone near power lines, they might get destroyed, and you might get electrocuted.

Shifting his sight away from the windows, he continued down the black corridor searching for Serah.

111 X111X111

Serah at the moment was sitting at the top of the building Snow was snuck in. She had wanted to see what the city looked like from the top, bad time she knew, but it was too tempting, the best part was that there wasn't anybody up here, they must have thought that the L'cie wouldn't go up here because than they would get stuck and had a better possibility to get captured. Turns out that they were smart enough to know that just because they were seen as monsters they were aware that they still had brains, well some really, she highly doubted that all the people were aware that L'cie had brains, they were way too terrified.

The moon was high in the sky, it was a full moon tonight, with many stars scattered about, shining silver.

Serah heard steps coming from behind her fast; she twisted her head to see Snow come up the stairway. He looked as if he had just run a marathon he was so puffed out.

"Took you long enough" she giggled and gave him a hug.

"Don't do that again" he was almost begging her.

"Okay" she agreed than dashed back down the stairway into the building and off the roof

He hurried after her but when he got to the bottom he found that she was again, gone.

"How is she doing this?" she yelled out. He was surprised himself that nobody came, perhaps he had eliminated them all already from when he had been coming up.

Again, he started to search for Serah.

111X111X111

As he was doing so he ran into Vanille, five times, each time she ran off without him even being able to say anything. He had ran into Sazh twice, he asked if he had seen Serah, but apparently hadn't seen anybody, both times he had left a massive group of soldiers would come running, they must have been after him, and Snow was left to deal with them. He still hadn't seen Serah once since he had seen her for those couple of seconds on the roof top.

By the end of all his searching he was getting annoyed he had to admit. Eventually he did run into someone, it sure wasn't Serah, it was fang, who by the looks of things, was completely drunk.

"Ah!" She pointed at him, "Frosty the snowman, where's Vanille?" she tilted her head to the side like a confused puppy.

Frosty the Snowman? Silence.

"I have no idea you drunk Puppy"

"Alright bye" she slapped him on the shoulder and ran off.

She didn't notice she got called a drunken puppy instead of her name, okay, yeah, she is drunk.

By day time Snow had found Serah twice, who again did her disappearing act, he was now running around the streets dodging everybody he saw. He had ran into Vanille a further seven times, who he had predicted was running away from the drunk Fang, he had ran into Sazh one more time, who was being chased by a Behemoth, who Snow had to defeat. And found Fang again, hiding in a corner complaining that her head hurt, shouldn't have gotten drunk.

Snow had found hard not to laugh a little at her, it was her own fault that that was happening.

As he had snuck around a corner, he caught a glimpse of Familiar pink hair. Bingo, he had finally found her.

111X111X111

Lightning and Hope had successfully snuck out of the city without much trouble, only had to fight a Behemoth and a small amount of Soldiers. Now they were well on their way to their destination. Lightning was leading him through passageway after passageway of trees. No wonder she had said that it was hard to get to, this place is a maze, how does she still remember how to get to this lake? Hope could barely tell the ground from everything else all he saw was green, green and even more stupid green.

He was amazed when he saw something other than the foliage that they were surrounded with, a door, upon a hill off in the distance, the brown was distinct from everything else and he saw it clearly.

"Light? What's with the door?"

"Hmm" she turned her head, "it leads to the lake" she said it like it was normal.

"Why does a lake have a door" it was not normal in the least.

"There is a rock wall all around the lake, a small cave is what leads to it, and it's behind the door"

Why did she have to find this so normal?

They reached the door and Hope could swear he was just about to faint from exhaustion, but he was forced to move on, Lightning opened the door and led them inside.

The lake was massive, way more than what Hope had been expecting, not to mention that he could see the fish from up atop the hill, they were that freaking gigantic.

"Yeah ok this place is freaky"

There was islands lotted about the lake, but they were nothing but rock, there was nothing on them, they were like pointed stone hills jutting out from the water, that probably what they were.

Lightning started walking out to the waters edge, Hope followed her to see what she was looking at, she was kneeling when he got there, her attention was focussed on one fish, an insanely huge orange one.

"That the fish?" he asked

"Yep, that's the Hylian loach"

111X111X111

It had been a stupid idea of snow's to choose the moment he did to go after Serah, now him and her, were stuck up a pole with an army of soldiers below them, he didn't even want to go through the details of how it happened it was so stupid. It wasn't easy clinging to it like this; he weighed too much from him to be able to stay here for long, he could all ready feel himself slipping. But than a miracle happened, in a flash of bright light, the soldiers were gone. He slid off the pole and Serah went down after him.

"How the hell?"

"Yay it worked!" She cheered happily throwing up her arms,

"What worked?" Snow questioned

Serah went sneaky eyed for a second, "nothing…."

And of course, again, she disappeared.

"God damn it"

111X111X111

Lightning was still rather focussed on the Loach, Hope thought it was funny, but for good reasons he forced himself not to laugh. He was sure that even in their situation, she still wanted to catch it, well if someone had the chance to fulfil a childhood goal they would do it wouldn't they?

"Hey, who's there?"

Hope looked up to see who had yelled, slight fear of it being an enemy, both him and Lightning were not in the condition for more fighting. Luck was on their side because it certainly wasn't an enemy, it was something much weirder. Oh for god's sake lightning should have jumped at the sight of it, this thing was not normal.

On top of the hill, was a humanoid Chocobo.

She ran down, leaped over the water and landed behind them; she gave them a quick look over, deciding what she thought of them.

Her sight took an extra look of lightning,

"Hey, are you that girl that used to come here a lot?" she gave a quick grin "are you here to catch the Loach, you'd fail again I know it."

"I'm not here to catch that old bastard!"

"Really?" she knelt down

"Yes"

"Really" she knelt closer,

"YES"

"Really?"

In the end the Chocobo-girl had tempted Lightning into, yes, go Loach fishing. She was sitting near the waters edge with the fishing rod held firmly in her hand. She had caught three fish so far, but none were even a type of Loach.

Hope sat further back from her, he was laying down resting; he looked at Lightning from time to time, watching her get more frustrated.

"If it's getting on your nerves than why don't you just quit?"

He received a glare.

"I'm not a quitter Hope,"

"But you don't even have to do this"

"What if I want to?"

Hope stayed silent after that.

After an hour of fishing, she finally got the Loach's attention, the exact one she wanted.

Hope heard her mumble the words, bite it you bastard multiple times.

After all that waiting, it bit her line.

She jumped back when it almost pulled her in, it was so strong, reeling in the line wasn't enough; she had to walk slowly backwards to assist in catching it. It was hurting her arms all the strain on them, Hope was sure that it wasn't even possible to catch a fish like that, if Lightning was having so much trouble with it than how could someone more normal do it?

But his thoughts were proved wrong as she lifted it well out of the water, Hope got one second to take in its sheer massiveness before he was rolling out of the way before he could get crushed.

"Holy crap it's huge!"

The damn thing must have been as long as a Behemoth.

"Ow" He could see Lightning next to it, Feeling exhausted.

She was laying on the rock, mumbling about her currently sore arms. Hope did laugh at that, for he had never seen her like that even once before.

yay, now i don't have to worry about this stupid thing and can write the other things that i want to write.