Lightning tightly gripped the seatbelt straps that ran down her shoulders as the interplanetary plane hit turbulence. She'd never had any personal offense against flying, but she was starting to regret her decision to go on this mission more and more with each jerk that the aircraft endured.

"You're one of them Saviors of Cocoon, aint'cha?" the soldier seated to her left asked as he loomed over to stare her in the face.

"And if I am?" Lightning returned offhandedly, leaning her head back against the seat. She was more focused on keeping down her breakfast than entertaining the man beside her.

"Oh, nothin'," the soldier replied, still leaning forward to examine Lightning's face. "It's just none of ya struck me as the fightin' type. Just thought y'all were all about smiling for cameras and hangin' out with celebrities and whatnot. You know how to use that gun ya got there, precious?"

Lightning's eyes narrowed as she turned her head to give the soldier a derisive look. "Would you like a demonstration?"

"Okay, you two," a female soldier sitting across from them piped up over the chuckling of the first soldier. "Especially you, Knolls." She looked to the soldier seated next to Lightning. "She's new. Give her a break. Don't pay him any mind, Hollywood." The soldier now looked to Lightning. "Knolls can be a pain in the ass, but he means well. I'm Private Walker. Nice to meet you."

"Pleasure," Lightning replied dryly.

"Have you ever rode a planetary to Pulse before?"

"No."

"No problem," Walker said with a smile. "Here are the basics. We're going to get a lot of turbulence for a while, but it's when the turbulence stops that things really get tough. We're going into the Gamma region of the planet, which we know has a heavy Pulsian military presence. So once we break into Pulsian air, we're probably going to get on the radar. That means the ship only has a few minutes before the Pulsians gather some of their autobots, weaponry, and wyverns and try to crash us. So when the red light up there comes on, that means it's time to put your helmet on and enter your pod. The captain puts in our coordinates, shoots us and the pickup pods off as well as some decoys, just to confuse the Pulsians, and then the ship leaves Pulsian air while we prep for a bumpy landing. Once the mission is over, we either send for an immediate evac or head to the predetermined pickup coordinates we were given earlier. The pickup pods should be there and ready for when the ship comes back around. Got it?"

"Sounds straight forward enough."

The aircraft caught another shaking fit and all of the soldiers held onto their seatbelts.

"Uh oh!" Knolls called as a red light flooded the cabin. "Almost go-time!"

Lightning rolled her eyes and reached between her legs to bring up her PSICOM helmet. As she snapped the helmet in place, watching as a bunch of numbers and graphs immediately flashed across her visor, she couldn't help but feel a strange twinge of déjà vu. The last time she had worn a full suit of PSICOM armor, she had been trying to infiltrate Sanctum headquarters to take PSICOM down. Now, four years later, here she was. Putting on the helmet again in an attempt to help them.

"Pods up!"

Lightning's seat leaned backwards as a heavy, metallic casing closed over it. All of the other noise in the aircraft was immediately shut out once the pod had finished encapsulating her, and as she looked out the pod's small window, she could see that most of the soldiers across from her were now relaxing in their own pods, glad to finally be in them.

"THREE…" The captain's voice called through a radio receiver in the small capsule, "TWO… ONE."

Lightning's stomach dropped. She was falling. A sudden kick jerked on at the back of the pod. Her back pressed tightly against the seat as the small transportation device zoomed forward. Through the window, everything passed by at first as a bluish-white blur, but the view immediately turned green before Lightning's body roughly jerked forwards before being thrown back into the seat by her safety belt.

The pod had stopped.

Lightning took a few minutes to compose herself, taking in long, deep breaths as she stared at the smoky pod window.

"Hollywood, you alright?" Walker's voice asked through the helmet radio.

"I'm fine," Lightning breathed after she had found the button to turn her radio on. Her hands were shaking. "Just getting my bearings."

"Hang tight. I'll help you out."

A loud hissing sound accompanied by a sudden burst of light filled the pod as the front of the capsule slid open. A fully armored PSICOM soldier stood over the pod and leaned down to pick at the buckle of Lightning's safety belt.

"Buckle seems to be jammed, but no worries," the soldier—Walker—said as she continued to pull and yank at the safety belt. "Your body probably won't mind you sitting for a bit longer anyway. The trip's rough for everyone on their first time."

Lightning mumbled in response, but she had lost track of conversation the moment that the capsule had slid open.

"So this is Pulse…" she said under her breath as she looked past Walker's helmeted head to study her surroundings. She had heard a lot of stories about the world below, and had seen pictures in textbooks and documentaries, but none of them did it justice. Lightning could honestly say that she had never seen such a clear blue sky, such bright green grass, or such tall, colorful flowers. Their pods had landed in a small sort of alcove between some large stony cliffs, but even the elemental swirls of the rock formations were captivating compared to many of the things she had seen on Cocoon. Something about this world just hit her as raw and natural… and she had to admit, even to herself, that it was a beautiful thing.

"Hey guys! Looky what I found!"

"EEEPP!"

Lightning paused her sight-seeing to look across the alcove where one soldier, undoubtedly Knolls from his voice, was holding onto a brown, bulbous looking creature.

"Whattaya think? It's kinda cute, right?" Knolls asked, tightening his grip around the creature as it desperately wriggled to get free.

Although no one could see it due to her helmet, Lightning's lip curled up in disgust. That thing was nowhere near cute. It was about as big as a medium-sized dog, but so much rounder with a leafy tree branch growing out the top of its head like an antenna. It's mouth was disproportionately big compared to the rest of its body, which made Lightning dislike it even more because of all the loud squawking that was coming out of it.

"EEEEEEPPPP!"

"Can you put that thing down?" Walker snapped, turning away from Lightning's buckle for a brief moment to glance at Knolls. "It's too loud. It's going to give away our position."

"No way! I'm thinkin' of taking it back with us. My kids'll love this."

"Really? How in the hell do you expect to get it back on the—"

"GGGRRRRROOOAAAARRRRRR!"

All of the soldiers in the alcove froze on hearing the deep bellow that had sounded from somewhere in the near distance.

"What was that?" Walker asked, her helmet tilted up to the sky as her attention was once again taken away from Lightning's jammed buckle.

But what it was that had made the loud bellow wasn't what bothered Lightning. She was more concerned about where it was. One hand reached down to the gunblade case at her waist, but the thing was empty. Light's head quickly shot down to see that the weapon had fallen out of its case during her bumpy landing to rest on the pod floor (and out of her reach due to her busted buckle).

"I need my gunblade," the pink-head stated as her head darted back up to face Walker. "Get my gunblade. Now."

"One sec…" Walker's helmet was still tilted up to the sky. "Everyone, weapons out and keep your eyes peeled for feral beasts."

"EEEPP! EEEEPP! EEEPP!" The round creature in the soldier's arms squeaked even louder and wriggled even more violently.

"Seriously!" Walker's voice had now grown exasperated as she turned to Knolls. "Put that thing dow—"

"GGGRRRRROOOAAAARRRRRR!"

The alcove darkened as something gigantic barreled over the top of one of the stone cliffs, effectively blocking out the sun for a split second. As light soon flooded back into the space, the earth beneath everyone's feet quaked, and Lightning's body rattled inside her pod.

"GRRRRRRRRRRAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

All eyes were suddenly drawn to the humongous beast that had landed on the other end of the alcove. It was a gigantic, almost blob-shaped monster that was covered in moss, grass, and algae. It had a wide, gaping mouth that split across nearly its entire body and housed a row of sharp fangs.

"GRRRRROOOOAAAAARRRRRR!" The beast stomped its stubby legs, shaking the ground, as wild vines lifted from its back to wildly gnash back and forth through the air.

Lightning's hands unthinkingly grabbed at her seatbelt straps and started yanking at them, her head shooting towards Walker. "GUNBLADE!"

"They need help!" Walker shouted, looking back towards her fellow privates who were now rushing the beast with their weapons raised.

"I'm stuck in this damned pod! I need help!" Lightning nearly exploded back at her.

"I'll get you out, I promise! Just sit tight for one more sec!" were the last words Lightning heard before Walker had pulled out her gun and sprinted towards the beast.

POP! POP! POP!

Lightning anxiously watched as the PSICOM privates raced around the beast, firing their weapons. But just as if they were toy soldiers, beast shot one of its vines to smack each private, one by one, across the alcove until the only soldier left standing was the one with the ugly, brown, yapping creature in his arms.

"KNOLLS!" Lightning screamed, instantly gaining the obviously jumpy soldier's attention. "Knolls, get me out of here!"

Knolls' body twitched forward and halted, as if he were fighting an internal dilemma on whether to help her or make a run for it. Within another split second, he had obviously made his choice and dropped the bulbish creature to race forward in Lightning's direction. "Whatta I do? Whatta I do?" he fretfully huffed out as he neared Light's pod.

"Grab the gunblade on the floor. Hurry!"

"Gotcha."

Knolls immediately dropped down on his knees to snatch up the weapon, giving Lightning a clear look ahead at the vicious monster that should have still been advancing towards them… but wasn't. Instead, it was leaning its head down for the ugly, brown creature that Knolls had been holding onto to nuzzle. It was then that Lightning finally realized how alike the two creatures looked.

"Here it is!" Knolls announced as he excitedly thrust the gunblade into Lightning's chest.

"MEEEEPPPPP!" The small brown creature yelped and jumped up to run behind the greener, bigger beast on hearing Knolls' voice carry across the alcove.

A low grumble emanated from the big beast's throat and its dark beady eyes lifted to fasten themselves on Knolls. One of its chubby legs moved back and forth against the ground. It was preparing for something, and whatever it was that it was preparing for couldn't be good.

"GRAAAWWWWWRRRRR!"

"MOVE!"

Lightning's reflexes acted in hyper speed as the woman pushed Knolls away with one hand and lifted her gunblade to point directly at the face of the huge beast that rushed towards them with the other. The popping of incessant gunfire filled her ears as she held her finger down against the gunblade's trigger.

"RREEEEAAAAHHHHH!" The beast swerved, but never stopped running, as bullets littered across its face. "WAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" It let out one last screech before wildly bucking forward, dead into the side of Lightning's pod.

Lightning's stomach jumped for the second time that day as she once again felt herself soaring. She was surrounded by sky. Then branches and leaves.

BOOM!

A sharp pain shot into her side from the impact.

CRACK!

The world word was out of sync. She was still moving, at an extremely fast pace, but where to she had no idea. Everything was rolling by too fast. Her body tumbled and rocked, a new, more acute pain entering her with each impact. Until finally, with one last bang, her pod came to a halt.

"I think these earrings would look lovely on you, Ragnarok."

Fang stared intently into the mirror as she sat in one of the dressing rooms in the New Paddra Ampitheatre. Her eyes were locked on the attractive young woman who leaned over her shoulder, her cheek hovering dangerously close to Fang's as she dangled an earring up to the ear on the opposite side of Fang's head.

"They make your eyes look like they're sparkling." Fingertips traced down Fang's earlobe to gently caress the side of her neck until they were lightly resting on her shoulder.

"But no one will see them. Or my eyes." Fang was still staring at the girl through the mirror, a subdued smirk barely visible on her lips. "I'll be wearing the mask." She lifted her hands to accentuate her point, twisting her forearms a bit so that the strands of shimmery blue material that covered and hung down from her skin shook.

Today was a somewhat big day. It was a festival day of sorts, celebrating the end of a prosperous wet season. For the occasion, right after dusk there would be a children's production for the reenactment of the 'Great Escape', the Gran Pulsian evacuation from Cocoon four years ago. In the reenactment, Fang would be reprising her role as Ragnarok and wearing a full bodied suit made out of thousands of thin, stringy tassels as she did so.

Hot breath brushed across the warrior's cheek as the girl leaned closer. "I know, but I'm more interested in how you'll look after the show."

"Hmm…" Fang finally turned away from the mirror to look directly into the girl's face, which was only mere centimeters away from her own. She slightly tilted her head to feign innocence as she asked, "And why would ya be interested in that?"

The girl sweetly smiled and moved forward to close the small distance between the two. She captured Fang's upper lip between her own, holding them together for a brief moment before pulling away. "Let's just say…" she replied in a husky whisper, "I have my reasons."

Now it was Fang's turn to smile as she closed the small gap between them again to softly pick back up where their lips had previously left off.

"Ahem…"

So into the moment was she, that Fang neither heard the dressing room door open nor the brusquely cleared throat from the doorway. She just emitted a low, content hum and mindlessly lifted a hand to brush her fingertips over the girl's collarbone, letting her digits glide across the girl's skin until they reached the collar of her blouse, right above the cloth's top button.

"AHEM!"

Both Fang and the girl simultaneously jumped away from each other at the loud interruption.

"What the—" Fang let slip, still in slight shock as the girl stood, stiff as a board, staring towards the dressing room doorway with a horror-struck look on her face.

"General Caius!" the girl squeaked, causing Fang to inwardly groan without even having to look at their interrupter. "I was—I was just preparing Ragnarok for her—"

"Out," the gravelly voice that Fang had grown to at times respect or loathe growled from the doorway.

"Yes, sir."

Fang rubbed her hands over her face as she listened to the hurried footsteps of the girl rushing out of the room, the door slamming behind her. A short moment passed before Fang could now hear the clicking of boots approaching the back of her chair.

"Ya know," Fang began, tiredly pulling her hands away from her face but still not bothering to turn around to grant eye contact to her new visitor, "In many places, it's considered good manners to knock."

"Is it true that you're the one who brought that wretched beast to our city?" A shadow fell over Fang as the voice spoke, and she knew that Caius was standing right behind her. She had successfully avoided the man for the past twenty four hours after skipping one of their mandatory meditation sessions yesterday, but she knew it would only be a matter of time before he would find out about the dragon and come looking for her.

"That wretched beast has a name," Fang replied in an unperturbed, even tone. "And that name is Sazh."

"You impudent little..." The voice had now turned into a hostile snarl and Fang's stomach whirled as her chair was quickly jerked around so that she was now staring directly into two angry, purple eyes. "The fools and whores that you entertain all day might find your insolence charming, but it is becoming a thorn in my side and a danger to this entire community."

"A danger?" Fang asked disbelievingly, craning her neck back to get a full view of Caius's face. The man indeed looked angry. His square jaw was visibly clenched and his brow deeply furrowed. He looked even more menacing from the full-bodied black armor he was wearing and the way that his long, purple hair cast a grim shadow over half of his face. However, as unsettling as Caius's anger always made her, Fang steeled her face as well, not wanting to show the man any of her unease. "How is this a danger? IT'S A TAMED DRAGON. D'you know how big of an advantage this could be?"

"The biggest advantages are to be had during meditation sessions!" Caius exclaimed back. "You still don't understand the complexities surrounding how chaos and order affect this realm, and thus you don't know how to properly control it! And as volatile as you are, running off to fight dragons is one of the more imbecilic activities for you to be doing!"

"I don't see what the big deal is," Fang shrugged off. "I used your damned chaos method when taming the dragon. I got real experience with it. That's better than sitting out in the middle of nowhere, chanting with you about chaos over and over again. I got the dragon and I did the meditation. It's a win-win."

"You still can't wrap your thick skull around it all can you?" Caius growled. "You are nowhere near ready to be using the chaos method in the field! You aren't even ready to take walks by yourself to the nearest waterhole! What if you had messed up? What if the dragon had bested you and you lost your temper? What if you had been killed?! Then everything would have been ruined!"

"Is that some sick, twisted way of you saying ya care about me?" Fang asked, folding her arms. "I'm touched, but in case you're forgetting, I am at the helm of this whole war ship. The people look to me when things go wrong. A village gets plundered, my name gets called. Crops get burned, I'm the one who's asked for grain. They didn't feel secure, so I got them a dragon. I'm the one who the people come to! And when they do, I don't need to ask for your permission to help them."

"YOU—" Caius bellowed, lunging forward to get into Fang's face again and slam his palm on the surface of the dresser behind her, "—would do well to remember your place. Until you master your meditations, you are nothing more than a pretty distraction for the people to focus on while I get all the real work done. Nothing but something to sing and dance on a stage for them while I manage a war." Caius's eyes drifted down from Fang's face to roll over her costume, as if to drive his point home. "Don't you forget who's really in charge."

"Do ya mean you?" Fang asked icily. Her face was starting to heat up and she was beginning to feel a slight ache in her chest. "Or are ya talking about Yeul? You know. Young girl. Yay high. Blue hair. Kinda sickly looking. Owns a bunch of hoops that you like to jump through—"

"ENOUGH!"

Fang's breath caught in her throat as she was yanked out of her chair to hover in front of Caius, the man's fist tightly grasping the collar of her costume. There was an ugly grimace on his usually cool face and his eyes spelled death, but Fang's attention was not on the man's enraged face. It was instead directed at Caius's free hand, which was cocked back in a punching position right above Fang's head. Around the fist was a strange, dark aura. Something that looked surreal in its own, distorting reality and strangely blending everything—colors, shapes, and everything in the background behind the fist—together as if Fang was staring into some strange type of mirage.

"I could end you…" Caius rumbled in a shaky whisper, "If you weren't so important to everything… If the timing didn't need to be perfect… I could. Right here. Right now."

The cold, creeping feeling of fear ran up Fang's spine as she continued to stare at the anomaly happening in Caius's hand. She had only witnessed Caius use this power twice before. Both times, Caius had been irreconcilably angry. Both times, Fang had returned home wishing that she had never gone on those particular missions… wanting nothing more than to say that she had never been apart of the irreparable damage that she just felt in her gut had broken some sacred rule in the universe. But despite her fear, she kept a steady face, not wanting Caius to think that he could intimidate her. "Then I guess," she grit out, trying her best not to let her voice shake, "ya just have to let me go then. Don'tcha?"

Caius glared at Fang for a few seconds before lowering his hand and roughly shoving her back into her seat. "I don't know how well you remember our first meeting years ago," he said in a low voice as he dusted his hands off before running them down the front of his armor as if to recompose himself, "when I found you and your fellow Cocoon refugees wandering the fields outside of Oerba. Despite all of your power, you were broken. You all were broken. You were the mighty Gran Pulse warrior who had been prophesized about, but there you were. Nothing but a miserable shell filled with hate and self-loathing…"

Fang looked down to her feet as Caius spoke. She remembered all too well what she had been like in the immediate months after she had initially transformed into Ragnarok.

"…but still, we took you in. We were determined to see your potential through, and you didn't disappoint. As broken as you were, you realized what was best for your people. You made a decision—an agreement—to be their beacon of hope. To be what the people needed in order to help them rebuild their lives. How do you expect to be that beacon when you're off chasing silly whims such as taming dragons?"

"The dragon was a needed—"

"The dragon was a personal escapade and you know it!" Caius loudly cut off in a stern voice. "On that day, you stood in front of everyone and surrendered your old identity as the rash and careless Oerba Yun Fang in order to become Ragnarok for the people. And because of that, it is the people who you belong to when you're outside. But don't you ever forget that you also made the decision to train in the art of chaos. So when you're out of the public eye…" Caius's voice dropped sinisterly and Fang looked up from her feet to notice that he was intensely glaring at her through narrowed eyes. "…you belong to me."

Fang's could feel her face slowly beginning to contort into an angered scowl.

"So go ahead and do whatever needs to be done to help you cope with that. You can continue to keep burying yourself in fame and women for all I care, but you will not jeopardize our mission by going out on personal field trips that have the power to ruin everything."

Caius and Fang held each others' angry gazes for a few seconds before two timid knocks sounded on the door. "Ex…excuse me?" The girl who had previously been in the room with Fang slowly opened the door to peek her head in. "General Caius, Yeul is outside and would like a word with you."

"Of course she would…" Fang snorted, ignoring the contemptuous look that Caius shot in her direction from the comment.

"I'm on my way," Caius responded coolly, as if he had not been teetering the homicidal line just a few seconds ago. "Ragnarok, we will continue this conversation later."

Fang didn't answer, but silently watched Caius as he exited the dressing room, giving the girl a curt nod as he passed her on his way out. Once Caius was out of sight, Fang released a deep breath that she didn't even know she had been holding.

"Ragnarok?"

Before Fang could even look back up towards the girl, she felt her hands on her, circling around her neck in a light embrace.

"I think you're a great leader…" Lips gently pressed into Fang's neck. "And that you make great decisions." The kisses slowly began to trail down. "And that we are lucky to have such a strong, passionate—"

"What do you want?" Fang softly asked. She leaned to the side in order to pull her neck away from the girl's lips, giving her a clearer look into the girl's eyes. The girl had obviously heard the conversation between her and Caius. How couldn't she? It wasn't like they were whispering at each other the entire time. And Fang was well aware of the grand allure of wanting to have a romp with Ragnarok. Whether it was the thrill, the bragging rights, or just to sate some small curiosity, there was always something that most girls wanted when they came to Fang. But for this girl to still push like this, after hearing Fang get belittled so badly as well as hearing herself being referred to as a whore… there must've been something else she wanted. Something besides a thrill or bragging claims.

"Excuse me?" The girl's voice sounded like an even mix of shock and fear.

"You can just ask me," Fang said, trying to put on an assuring expression. "Ya don't have to go through all of this."

"What? I'm not—" the girl began, going into an immediate panic, but with the way that Fang was knowingly staring at her, she knew it was of no use. She took a calming breath and closed her eyes. "It's my cousin," she finally stated. "He was living outside of Palumpolum when we all evacuated, but he didn't cross through the Palumpolum portal. He was dating this Cocoonian girl then. I don't think he wanted to leave her…"

Fang just quietly nodded along as she listened.

"…And I'm used to getting updates from him from correspondence. He said he was good at blending in and knew how to avoid Guardian Corps and ID chip checks, but it's been months since I've heard from him and I'm afraid… What if they found out he's Gran Pulsian? He could be in one of those horrible camps or-or even worse. Ragnarok, do you think… Do you think maybe you could go up there? That you could save him?"

Fang arched a surprised eyebrow at the request. She had been asked a lot of things in the past few years, but she had never been asked to go back to Cocoon.

"I mean… never mind. It's a stupid idea. And I know General Caius would never let you—"

"Hey." Fang halted the girl's rambling by firmly taking her hand in her own. "Caius does not own me," she stated as she looked the girl dead in the eyes. "And if I can find a way, I will go back to Cocoon, and I will free our people."

The girl's face dropped in surprise. "I… I… thank you, Ragnarok. Thank you sooo much. Is there, um, anything that you need? Or anything that I can get you right now?"

"Some privacy would be nice," Fang admitted, turning forward to look at herself in the mirror. "I'd like a moment to just get ready for the performance."

"Oh… okay." The girl slowly lifted herself up to back away from Fang's chair. "But really, I can't thank you enough, Ragnarok. Really. I can't."

Fang just silently nodded along with each of the girl's thank you's until she heard the door shut and the room go silent.

As she sat and stared at herself through the mirror, all Fang could think about was Caius. Her face started heating again and her breathing picked up as she pictured his face, so close to hers, saying that she belonged to him.

Just wanting to hit something, Fang growled and swatted an empty bottle that was sitting on the edge of the dresser so that it went flying across the room before smashing into the opposite wall. How could Caius have the audacity to tell her that she wasn't being the beacon of hope that the people needed? It was his strict rules that had nearly doused a girl's hopes just a moment ago.

"Grrrr!" Fang's hands shot up to grip her head, which had suddenly began to throb to the point where her vision was starting to blur. "Not… now…" she breathed to herself when that familiar ache started ripping through her chest. She tried her best not to keep thinking about it… to get her mind off of Caius and chaos, but the harder she tried to get it out of her mind, the more it came jumping to the forefront. She dug her nails into her scalp and tightly shut her eyes, taking deep, shaky breaths until the ache in chest began to subside. The worst was over. She wouldn't fully transform, but there was still so much steam she had to blow off. So much pent up anger that she just needed to let loose.

Her eyes flew open and she was at once met by her reflection in the mirror. The eyes that stared back at her weren't fully her own and her body looked tense with her muscles and veins seeming more pronounced than usual. "Arrrrggg…" She could feel all the pent up energy moving through her, bubbling up until it had nowhere to go. Until she had no choice but to kick her head back and, "RRRAAAAAAAAAAAA—"

"—AAAAAAAWWWWWWRRRRRR!"

Lightning quickly ducked down behind a large nearby stone that was jutting from the ground. After her bad run in with the giant plant-blob near her landing spot, she had spent a good amount of her time either fighting or running from a number of monsters, from a pack of goblins to even a group of large flowers that had come to life and started attacking her when she had neared them. But even with all of the monsters she had already faced today, none of them had sounded as fierce as the beast whose roar had just belted across the terrain.

"Whoooo!"

"Yaahhaaaa!"

"Yayyyyyy!"

Lightning's brow ruffled on hearing a chorus of shouting and cheers erupt through the air, immediately following the roar. She peered from behind her rock, but saw nothing but more mountainside and plateau.

More cheers erupted, but this time Lightning was able to gauge the general direction. The noises seemed to be coming from further up, from behind a thick line of trees. She surmised that the people making the noises were located there. She was also sure that she was on the outskirts of some Pulsian colony. Cocoonians would never get this loud on Pulsian soil and an area this high surrounded by so many rocks and trees seemed like a prime defensive location, a location that the Pulsians undoubtedly got first dibs on. Part of her wondered whether she should just slowly continue hiking down the trail. However, another part of her reminded her of the throbbing ache in her side and how she didn't know her current location, therefore making it hard for her to find the pick-up point. If she was going to traverse the Pulsian wilds alone, she should at least try to snag some food, water, or medical supplies from this settlement before heading out.

So with that in mind, she forced herself to work through the pain as she hiked upwards until she was crouching behind a new stone, peering from behind the blockade to spy a large crowd that was seated in front of what looked to be an outdoor amphitheatre.

By now, the whole area was filled with cheering, clapping, oooohhs, and ahhhhhs. Lightning squinted as she watched a number of tiny bodies hop and skip across the stage. Even from her distance, she could clearly see that some of the children were wearing PSICOM uniforms made from cardboard with one child standing on a platform above the rest, dressed as a mini primarch in long, white robes. Running rampant around the rest of the stage, fighting the children in the PSICOM boxes, were other kids in what looked to be cultural garb, wielding toy axes, guns, bows, and spears. As each PSICOM child fell to the ground, the attacking Pulsian one would run through and disappear behind one of the many shimmery sheets that were placed across the stage. Lightning leaned forward more to get a better look at the scene. Were those supposed to be portals? Was this… a play about the day that they attacked the Sanctum?

"ROAR!"

As if to answer her question, a new actor jumped out from backstage, and Lightning immediately felt ill. On stage, now running around amongst the other characters, was someone dressed as Ragnarok. The costume was long and intricate, made out of an innumerable amount of shiny blue threads that shook and shimmered with every move the Ragnarok made. The costume was topped with a large blue and orange mask, set in an angry grimace with bared teeth. From the actor's size, Lightning could tell that this role had been given to an adult, who playfully ran around the stage chasing the remaining PSICOM kids before snatching up the child dressed as the Primarch and holding the youngster over his head as he made more roaring sounds.

The audience seemed to think it was the cutest thing, but Lightning couldn't help but feel offended. They were celebrating it. They were down here celebrating a monster who tried to destroy her planet and everyone on it… A monster who had stripped Lightning of almost everything she had ever truly cared about and fell from the face of Cocoon before it could finish the job…

"Oi, what are you doing way back here?"

Lightning whipped around on hearing a man's voice directly behind her. She had been so mesmerized by what was happening on the stage that she hadn't even noticed someone approaching her.

"You'd get a much better view if you just—oh crap." The man's eyes nearly bulged out of his head when the soldier turned around.

That's when Lightning realized…

Shit.

She hadn't taken off her PSICOM armor.

"COCOON!"

All of the noise from the stage immediately stopped as the man's voice rang out across the quad.

"PSICOM FROM COC—"

Lightning shot a foot forward, ignoring the pain in her side, to swipe the man's legs out from under him. He hadn't even hit the ground before she was on her feet and sprinting towards a nearby thicket. If she could get to the trees, maybe she could find a hiding spot. Maybe she could lose them.

Out of seemingly nowhere, another man jumped in front of Lightning with a gun raised, but Lightning would make quick work of him. Without missing a step, she leapt in the air and swung her leg over once again to kick the weapon out of the man's hand and lower a fist to quickly jab him across the face as she came down.

"Augh…" Lightning hissed as she stumbled on her landing, the ache in her side feeling more prevalent than ever. She didn't have time to worry about that now, though. She had to get out of there before more—

"Nuh uh." She couldn't even finish the thought before someone new had blocked her path… the Ragnarok who had just been on stage. The actor was still donned in his—or better yet her, now that Lightning was close enough to see how all the strands clung to a female silhouette—costume, mask and all, but in one hand she gripped a tall, red spear. Unlike the last man to jump in Light's way, the actress wasn't in a tense, fighting stance. She just stood there, body looking as relaxed as it could be in that ridiculous costume with her head curiously tilted.

Lightning grit her teeth and swiftly reached down to snatch her gunblade from its case to swing upwards in the actress's direction.

CLANGGGG!

Just as quickly as she had attacked, the actress had twisted his spear to block the blade with a collision hard enough to make Lightning stagger back a few steps. So the actress was quick… and strong. Maybe she wouldn't be as big of a pushover as Lightning had first expected.

An almost electric silence surrounded them and Lightning suddenly became aware of the giant crowd of Pulsians who begun to circle them. No other aggressors moved forward. Everyone seemed perfectly fine with just gathering around to whisper amongst themselves, almost as if they were watching an after class fight in a schoolyard. Lightning gripped her blade even tighter, not exactly knowing where she should be focusing her attention or whether she should expect any surprises. If she had been paying close enough attention to the Ragnarok, she would've noticed the actress turn her head to look off past the crowd to the tall man with purple hair who stood next beneath a far off tree with his arms folded against his chest and a stern, disapproving look on his face. She may have even heard the low growl of discontent that rumbled deep from the actress's throat as she turned back around to face Lightning. But out of the corner of her eye, Lightning would catch the actress's quick lunge forward, and quickly dodge just in enough time to avoid being stabbed by the tip of that red spear.

A sharp pain shot up Lightning's side as she slid to her left. The actress straightened up before loosening back into that casual standing position again. Through the dark, jeweled eyes of the mask, Lightning could feel the actress's eyes examining her, wondering how she could have dodged the attack so quickly.

"Ragnarok… Ragnarok… Ragnarok! Ragnarok!"

Lightning cursed to herself as the surrounding crowd began to chant and the actress took a slow, cautionary step to the side, causing Lightning to mirror the move until the were slowly circling around the small space, each with their weapons raised. Every few steps the actress would lash out with the spear and every time, Lightning would effectively block each attack while trying to squeeze in one of her own.

As strong as the actress apparently was and as blatantly injured as Light was, the actress still wasn't trying to overpower her. She was toying with her. Taunting her. Lightning could feel it. She had interrupted their stage production and now this 'Ragnarok' was trying to put on a production of her own… and Lightning hated her for it. From the offensive play, the dumb costume, the hideous mask, and the treating her like some type of circus cat, she had had enough. If the Ragnarok wanted a show, she'd give her one…

Noel Kreiss watched from his seat on the edge of the amphitheatre stage as Fang continued to engage the lone Cocoon soldier in battle. At first he had felt bad for the soldier, seeing as she was obviously alone and wounded. It was just bad luck that she had stumbled upon their city, and even worse luck that she had done so when both Fang and Caius were in a mood. It must be rough following orders that you think are right for your homeland and then ending up in this type of situation… but despite all that, Noel was finding it hard to feel that much sorry for the soldier now.

Something must've happened in that circle that must've just made her snap. Knowing Fang, she could've made some snide remark to piss the soldier off, but whatever it was, it had done the trick. The viper was darting this way and that… hopping, sliding, and jumping with her blade at the ready, giving Fang quite the run for her money in battle. It was actually quite a good show, although he knew that Caius probably wasn't finding this interesting at all. The man had little tolerance for entertaining those who he considered enemies…

"Hey, Noel!"

Noel perked up on hearing the familiar voice and turned his head to smile at the latecomer.

"Vanille," he greeted, watching as the girl approached. "How goes it?"

"Goes well," Vanille replied, giving Noel a tired smile where her eyes did more work than her lips. "I knew I'd be late, but I didn't think I'd miss the show completely."

"You didn't miss it. At least, not exactly…" Noel's voice wavered a bit as he tried to think of a good way to start explaining the new turn of events. "Fang's picking a fight with a Cocoonian."

"Really?" Vanille's olive colored eyes lit up as she turned her head towards the crowd. "What are the odds?"

"I would say ten to one on Fang, but I dunno. The Cocoonian is keeping up pretty well."

"No, not those odds! I mean—here. Look what I got!" And just like that, in that strange way that was so characteristic of Vanille, the young orangish-red haired woman no longer looked tired but instead had turned giddy with excitement. She reached into a satchel that hung down near her waist and pulled out a thin tablet. "I was able to trade for this with General Piquely today."

"That Cocoonian guy you visit all the time?" Noel asked in an unsure voice, knowing that 'visit' was a very general term for whatever it was that Vanille was actually doing. "You two are trading stuff now?"

"Well, I guess you can say that," Vanille said thoughtfully, still proudly staring at the tablet in her hands. "He decided to get handsy today even when I told him to stop. So that's when I started the trade. I gave him cholera and in return took this tablet."

"What?" Noel's face dropped. It always stunned him how Vanille could sound so cheery when talking about such horrible things. "You gave him—"

"Calm down, Noel, I was able to fix him. Geez…" Vanille shook her head as she pulled herself up to sit on the stage next to the flabbergasted boy. "But guess what this is for. Go ahead. Guess."

"It, uh…" Noel looked at Vanille apprehensively before reaching out to lightly touch the tablet's edge. It didn't look any different from any other tablet he had seen. "It plays solitaire?"

"No, silly!" Vanille giggled, pulling the tablet back so that it was sitting in her lap. "It's one of those dynamic file cabinets! It can help us identify active PSICOM soldiers on Gran Pulse."

Noel just stared at her with an uncomprehending look on his face.

"Ugh… here. Let me show you." Vanille rolled her eyes and typed in the strings of pass codes she had gotten from the general weeks ago. "So for instance, one way is that we can hold it up and point it towards the soldier like this and once it gets locked onnnn… oh my gods…"

"Huh?" Noel had actually been paying close attention to the device in Vanille's hands. He found it cool that from their distance, all Vanille had to do was point it at the battling soldier and in almost no time, the name, rank, and picture of a young woman with pink hair had popped onto the screen. "Doesn't that mean it worked?" he asked, worriedly looking to Vanille who was staring incredulously across the way at the armored soldier as if she had seen a ghost.

"That's… Lightning?"

"No, the sky's pretty clear," Noel assured her, not understanding what was going on at all.

"No, no, no. THAT'S LIGHTNING!" Vanille exclaimed back with more conviction, her voice sounding excited and panicked at the same time. "Oh no… Fang's gonna try to kill Lightning!"

Lightning rolled across the ground and lifted her blade to block another strong downwards blow from the actress's spear. They had been going back and forth like this for a little while now and Lightning knew that she wouldn't be able to physically outlast her opponent in her condition, especially at the rate that the fight was escalating. The actress was getting tired too. She could feel it. It'd only be a matter of how quickly the other woman could find an open shot before she'd try to make a final blow. That's why Light had to make it first, and she knew exactly how. By hitting the actress with something that she'd never expect… the gun that her blade could transform into.

She was well aware that if she took the actress out, the rest of the crowd would probably submerge on her. Her chances of making it out alive were slim to none, but if she had to go, at least she could take the smug son-of-a-bitch in a Ragnarok costume down with her.

She swung and ducked, watching as the actress gracefully stretched and glided across the ground to parry and retaliate. All she needed was for one more…

CLANGGGG!

Their weapons struck again, and using all the power she could muster, Lightning pushed back as vehemently as she could.

"STOP!" a shrill voice called from the crowd.

Lightning had used the push to jump back far enough. There still wasn't much space between her and the actress, but it was enough for her to flick her blade so that the top half began to convert.

"STOP! I NEED… TO GET… THROUGH!"

The actress was now rushing forwards to close the gap, spear lifted and at the ready. It was now or never. One of them was going to win this battle right now and one was going to pay the ultimate price.

"FANG, STOP! IT'S LIGHTNING!"

Lightning's finger had just found the trigger when a red headed young woman burst through the crowd of people into their fighting circle… and Lightning's finger froze as if it had turned into stone.

"Vanille?" Lightning's world felt as if it had stopped and she wasn't even in a fight for her life anymore. That was Vanille. She had found Vanille. Vanille was there, alive and well, standing right in front of her.

"That's Lightning Farron!" Vanille cried out of breath, looking straight past Lightning and at the actress instead.

"Lightning Farron?"

And Lightning's stomach immediately curled, her blood turning into ice. That voice… It sounded so different but still so the same. It couldn't be…

Her helmeted head slowly turned away from Vanille to look back at the woman she had been fighting this entire time. The tip of the actress's spear was scarily close to Light's visor, but the woman's body remained perfectly still as the fierce dark eyes of the Ragnarok mask stared down at her. "Fan—augh…"

Fang's eyes widened in shock as Lightning's body suddenly crumpled to the floor. Behind where she had been standing now stood Caius with an outstretched hand that was still crackling with one of his incapacitation spells. His eyes were settled on Fang with a purely disinterested look on his face.

"You were taking too long."