I don't own the rights to the plot or any of the characters from Final Fantasy XIII. The only thing that one could say I technically own the rights to is my original character.

And here it is: The awaited encounter with the Hope's mysterious girl. Yes, I finally reveal her name in this chapter. I've dragged the suspense out long enough, readers!

I'll try my hardest to keep my reviews regular through the summer...but I don't want to make any promises since I completely obliterated the last time frame declaration that I set up for myself. Maybe it's better if I keep such things with an air of ambiguity.

Chapter 4: A Long-Fated Encounter

For the next two weeks, Hope went into the city every morning look for her. Without fail, he would arrive at dawn, when the first of the town's shops would open their doors for the day's business, and leave just before twilight. When the next week's Farmer's Market came and went, Hope was disappointed but refused to lose faith and give way to depths of pessimism. He diligently continued to make the journey into town, spending the entire day watching the very spot where he first saw her.

"Hope, this is nonsense," Lightning had said three days ago, showing up at the house early enough to catch him on his way out to New Bodum. "You've fallen behind in your training to chase after what could be just a phantom of your imagination."

Hope hadn't said anything in response. His eyes and jaw set with determination, he brushed past her towards the front door. His right hand grasping the handle, he had just begun to turn the knob when Lightning tried once more to speak reason.

"Hope," Lightning said, her voice softening with deep concern for him, "she could be dangerous. If she truly has all of this impossible power at her disposal, you have no idea what she could be capable of. She could kill you."

Hope had turned his head slightly, but again he said nothing. Releasing an apologetic sigh for his mentor and friend, he had continued out the door.

It was a quiet Tuesday, and Hope was seated at the now-familiar outdoor patio of Junon's Coffee Shop. Despite the languid sips he routinely took of his cappuccino, je kept his gaze alert. He had memorized that spot by now where she had stood what now seemed like an eternity ago, becoming as familiar with the surrounding area as he was with back of his own hand.

Suddenly, the smallest of movements from the shadows of a nearby abandoned alley caught his eye. A wave of hopeful excitement pulsed beneath his skin, but suddenly he recalled his training with Lightning.

"Never lose your concentration," she had said. "The second that you give away your intentions of pursuit, you've lost the advantage and are now going head-to-head with an opponent who could potentially exceed your limits in strength and speed."

With all the control he could muster, he casually turned his head to the side. He pretended to look at a nearby group of individuals perusing the local shops. After a few moments had passed, he glanced towards the alley, and he was sure his heart had skipped a beat and his brain had ceased to function.

She was there.

And she was watching him.

Forgetting all of Lightning's lessons of self-control, Hope sprang to his feet, a movement that instantly had her whirling around and retreating in the opposite direction. In a case of sheer fortune, the street was unusually empty, allowing for the silver-haired teen to race off in the girl's direction without having to worry about the possibility of a historical repetition of his previous blunder at the Market.

She was fast, impressively so, but Hope's training with Lightning had rendered him quick on his feet. She darted into adjacent alleys and in between fences, all the while Hope right on her trail. His pursuit led him to the Eastern borders of the city, and into a lush forest. The citizens of New Bodum, if he could recall, had named it the "Troian Forest" in honor of the legendary ancient, matriarchal kingdom from the early days of Pulse.

Hope continued to pursue the mysterious girl, continuously becoming more and more aware of the need to act in stealth. But the rapid and sudden changes in elevation began to evolve into a formidable obstacle as he sprinted onward. To make matters worse, fatigue was beginning to rear its ugly head. Feeling an odd sense of déjà-vu to his haunting dreams, Hope pressed onward through the pain and exhaustion. He couldn't let her slip away, not again.

As he sprinted further into the forest, the dampened soil within presented him with the most magnificent of gifts: foot prints. Slowing his pace ever so slightly, he crouched down and began to follow their path. So overcome with joy, Hope had failed to notice the abrupt loss of crunching leaves that the girl had been leaving in her wake.

When the tracks unceremoniously disappeared, Hope dug his heels into the wet soil and screeched to a halt. He observed the nearby ground and saw no reasonable explanation for such an event.

"Please don't tell me she can also disappear into thin air," Hope silently pleaded. However, it would have made no sense for her to suddenly reveal this power after so long of a chase, right?

The sudden noise of something colliding with the earth came from just behind Hope. Before he could turn his head to investigate, a hand roughly grasped his hair and jerked his head backwards. Before Hope could so much as yelp from the painful sensation, something cold and sharp pressed against his neck and silenced his cry. Looking down, his eyes widened and his heart raced as he closed in the large hunting knife resting against the skin of his neck.

Hope swallowed thickly, the action pressing his throat further into the blade to the point of almost breaking the delicate skin. Instinctively, he raised his arms in a gesture of surrender.

"On your knees," a sharp voice commanded, putting a downward pressure in the hand against his scalp. His heart accelerated even more at the sound. Even when charged with a tone of cold malice and anger, Hope would have recognized that voice anywhere.

It was her.

His moment of hesitance drove the girl to increase the pressure of the blade against his neck to drive home the severity of her order. The action finally proved enough to cut into a small portion of Hope's neck. He gave a sharp hiss in pain, but did not further delay sinking his knees down onto the dampened soil.

The girl stepped out from behind him, looking down at Hope with a calculating gaze. His fear and apprehension all but instantaneously vanished and his face once again morphed into a look of pure, unabashed astonishment.

He took in every detail of her appearance with a type of greedy desperation. She wore a white tank top that ended just above her hipbones, giving a small glimpse of her stomach. Black cargo pants rested roughly an inch below the bottom hem of her shirt, cutting off a few inches below her knees. She wore black, athletic boots, the kind built for long treks across the vast Pulsian wilderness.

A two-inch leather strap stretched diagonally across her front starting at the crook of her neck near her right shoulder and ending at the left curve of her waist. Poking out from behind her right shoulder was the top of what appeared to be a matted black crossbow (which would explain the quiver of gray arrows attached to the brown belt she wore). There were also several leather sheaths positioned at various locations on her body. The one used to house the butcher knife currently clutched in her hand was attached to one of her belt loops. Hope noticed a smaller one sitting just above her shin, the leather strap wrapping around the bend of her knee. It was obvious to him that this girl was quite prepared for a wide variety of offensive attacks and threats.

The girl's face was a mask of cold indifference, but Hope could see another emotion shining faintly in her eyes. For some reason unknown to Hope, it seemed as though the girl was also quite surprised to see him.

"You're following me," she stated, breaking the silence. She continued to hold the hunting knife close to his neck, not allowing her apparent disconcerted state to waiver her concentration. Her silver eyes were unforgiving, silently challenging him to deny her words. From somewhere in the more sarcastic realms of his mind, Hope heard Lightning's voice telling him that he could learn a thing or two from this girl. He swallowed thickly and slowly parted his lips to speak.

"Y-yes," he stammered. The girl's eyes narrowed with suspicion, and she pursed her lips into a tight line. Her hand gripped the dagger's hilt more tightly.

"Why?" she drawled. Hope opened and closed his mouth several times, each time the words escaping him. How could he possibly explain to her without sounding like someone who was completely off their damn rocker? Or...without having this scenario end with that menacing blade being lodged into his throat?

"You…you'll think I'm crazy," he breathed out.

"Better crazy than dead, hmm?" she replied flatly. Hope gave the slightest of nods, fearing any additional movement would drive the blade deeper into his neck and open the already-existing wound more fully.

"R-right," he stammered. His eyes once again fell to the hunting knife, the shining blade reflecting the bright rays of the sun directly into his eyes. He looked back up at up at her, his expression voicing silent request that his speech failed to give. Exhaling sharply, the girl pulled the blade away from his neck. Before Hope could so much as sigh, however, she had repositioned the blade so that its sharp tip rested near millimeters away from his chest. Directly above his heart.

"Try anything and this goes straight through your ribcage. You'll die just as quickly this way, I can assure you. Now, start talking," she demanded. Hope was unsure of where to start. Formalities seemed superfluous at a time like this, but his shock-induced brain refused to give him anything else to go with.

"Uh…my-my name is-" Hope began.

"I know who you are," she sharply cut him off. Hope furrowed his eyebrows and cocked his head to the side.

"You know who I am?" he parroted. For the most fleeting of moments, the girl's stern expression fell completely and she stared at him blankly. She shut her eyes for a moment, squeezing them tightly, before quickly shaking her head. Her eyes opened, and the severe glare returned.

"Your father is Bartholomew Estheim, is he not? Governor of District 4?" she inquired, though it sounded more like a statement than a legitimate question. Hope nodded slowly, still quite aware that the girl was holding a knife in a lethal position over one of his most important of vital organs. Before he could speak, the girl continued.

"He's in the papers a lot. Sometimes they publish pictures of you as well. Also, weren't you one of those six l'Cie wreaking havoc on Cocoon in the days before The Fall?" Hope flinched involuntarily at her words. He began to fear that she was one of those individuals who loathed the former l'Cie for knocking Cocoon from its former glory amongst the heavens. For a moment, he wondered if she was going to kill him just for that reason alone. Maybe Lightning was right after all.

Whether or not she noticed Hope's body tense with distress, she broke the silence for a third time and spoke again.

"Whatever, it doesn't really matter anyway. Wasn't your fault that some deranged falC'ie decided to turn you and those others into slaves," she mused with a shrug.

"Are you…a l'Cie?" he blurted out. The girl furrowed her brows.

"What, just because I have a little empathy for your past predicament automatically means that I'm in the same boat?" she clipped out. Hope immediately regretted his decision to ask her. His eyes widened in alarm, and he shook his head. The motion proved to be another mistake, as he felt the cut on his neck stretch open from the exertion of his skin. He winced slightly as he felt the small drops of blood ooze out from the wound. Lowering her eyes to the injury, Hope noticed a look of apology flicker across her face before she raised her gaze back to his eyes.

"Enough with the small talk. Answer me: what are you doing following me?" the girl barked out. Hope stammered slightly, still not knowing how he was going to explain all of this to her.

"Well, here goes nothing. Lightning, I sure hope you were wrong about that whole her-killing-me theory," he mentally resigned. Taking a deep breath, he began the only way he knew how: with the honest truth.

"I've seen you…in my dreams," he said slowly, intently watching her face. Following her pattern of the most ephemeral of expressions, the girl looked positively stunned for a brief, shining moment. Her jaw slacked and fell open, her eyes almost comically widened.

Almost…because she was still pointing a deadly blade directly in front of his heart. That significantly diluted any amusement the situation had to offer.

The expression disappeared as quickly as it appeared. Her eyes narrowed once more, but her eyes still rang with a shining light of panic. He took her silence as an indication that he should continue forward with his already-botched explanation.

"It's been the same dream for months now, and you're always there. Don't ask me if I'm positive about that aspect, I know it's you. For awhile, I didn't even think you were real, but when I saw you at the market two weeks ago…like I said, I-I just knew it was you. I tried to approach you, but I…uh, I tripped, and when I got back up you were gone. I've been coming into town every day ever since, hoping to see you again. And today, there you were. I'm really sorry if I startled you, but I just had to follow you. You've got to understand me, you've got to believe me!" hearing the desperation fueling his words and leading toward the point of madness Hope stopped himself to pause. Slowly, he released the remaining air in his lungs with a shaky breath before inhaling to begin anew.

"I…I need your help. I know you can help me. You…you can…I just know it…I…" Hope tried to continue, but he couldn't find the words. He slowly lifted his gaze back up to the girl. There was nothing fleeting about her expression anymore: the look that garnished her face was now one of pure bewilderment. The arm holding the blade to his chest lowered a few degrees. Shaking her head vigorously again to clear the expression, she turned back to him and gave him a no-nonsense stare.

"Okay…I've come up with only two possibilities: One, you're absolutely, textbook insane. Two, it's quite possible that you suffered a recent head injury, and it's causing you to suffer from hallucinations," she declared, speaking slowly and clearly as if she were addressing a three-year-old child. Hope gave an exasperated sigh and moved to stand up, his eyes flashing with aggravation.

"I'm not delusional-" but his rant was cut off almost as soon as it began. The motion had driven the girl to once again raise the blade to his heart, her eyes narrowing dangerously.

"I did not say you could move!" she snapped at him, her lips curling into a snarl. Hope felt his survival instincts kick in and he froze his movements.

"Okay, okay, okay," Hope relented, raising his hands once again in a surrendering fashion. However, the apology was too little, too late. The girl was apparently done listening to him.

"Listen. I don't know who you think I am or how I'm capable of helping you, but you're wrong. I'm not who you're looking for, and I can't help you. So do yourself a favor and just forget about me." Hope began to panic, shaking his head frantically as he began to stammer incoherently.

"Forget you ever saw me," she emphasized as she noticed Hope's attempts at cutting her off with a rebuttal. "Okay? Just forget it." Finally, she lowered her weapon into its sheath before turning around to begin her retreat. Hope's entire being was frantic. He had to do something; he couldn't just let her walk away.

"Wait!" he called. To his surprise, she paused. Somewhere in the depths of his frenetic mind, he knew he wouldn't convince her to stay and talk to him. He resigned to the fact that she was going to leave him, but he couldn't let her leave just yet…not before…

"At least tell me your name," he beseeched with the utmost desperation. She turned her head slowly to the side, giving him a profile view of a contemplative expression slightly shadowed behind cherry-colored hair. Her sterling eyes were downcast as she internally deliberated her course of action.

"Please. I just…I need to know," Hope whispered, his eyes silently pleading with her. The girl sighed, pulling her lower lip in to rest between her teeth.

Then, fueled by what could only be the divine mercy of the ancient Goddess Etro herself, the girl answered his plea.

"Layla," she said quietly. "Layla Harvey."

And with that, she walked briskly onward and disappeared into the multitude of trees.