5/20/2016: Revised and rewritten at the same time as Chapter 1 for the sake of continuity.

Chapter 2: Shadows

A beautiful dream.

The words chased themselves around like foxes in her head over and over. The simplicity of the phrase was daunting, and yet it was because it was so simple that it scared her. She'd already tried to convince herself it was harmless, but it was pointless - there were too many things that it could possibly mean and the amount of negative far outweighed the positive.

No, Lightning knew and understood it was a threat.

She'd tried to figure out what it meant, but in all reality, each scenario that she'd come up with was already worse than the one before it. What do I have to wake up from? It was true that they -now- led relatively peaceful lives. The ending to their journey had not been without sorrow, because Fang and Vanille were crystallized within Cocoon's shell, a sacrifice that she could not forget, but apart from that, there had been little that had come to disrupt their lives. So was that the illusion the man had mentioned?

She'd also tried to find the man who'd spoken to her. She had the names of the people on her floor, but realistically Lightning knew it was pointless. HQ employed too many units and she couldn't even be sure that the man had been a soldier. He could've easily been an administrator or a government worker because the new government was still liaising with the army for provisions and territory as well as attempting to explore Cocoon's crystal shell.

As she climbed the small slope leading up to their house on the edge of town, she was now presented with a new problem. Do I mention this? I mean, what am I supposed to say? "I felt threatened by something someone said to me?" She had a feeling Snow would laugh it off. And wistfully, she realized that the Lightning before Cocoon's fall might've as well. I didn't believe Serah. I didn't believe any of that... but it was a mistake. Easily still one of the worst regrets of her life, the memory of icy dread holding her to the spot as she realized her sister hadn't been lying to her was enough to convince her to take at least some aspect of those words seriously. Even if I don't believe there's a serious threat, it could mean that someone's after us, right?

That meant that making sure the people she cared about remained safe. That part, she could trust Snow with.

Lightning checked her chrono. It was 1945, long past her usual arrival time at home and she realized with a jolt Serah might've come out looking for her. The last time she needed to stay at base longer than expected and hadn't called her sister beforehand, that was exactly what Serah had ended up doing. She tried to speed up her climb on the still-muddy hill - Engineering hadn't put down concrete on most of the city yet.

Lights spilled out onto the dark lawn before she'd even completely crested the slope: clearly, someone had been watching from the window.

"Yo sis! You're late!" Snow's greeting practically echoed off the adjoining woods.

She stalked up to him quickly, Serah peeking anxiously out from behind his bulk. "I'm aware," she replied drily.

He crossed his arms, perhaps trying to imitate her. "Hey sis, I know you're a busy person, but we've talked about this before. You're making Serah worry about you, and that's not cool."

She leveled a glare back at him and held it for a few moments. Snow held her gaze equally, and she knew the stubborn man well enough to know that he probably wouldn't let her in until she apologized in some fashion. "I didn't mean to make you worry."

Serah smiled gently up at her as she ducked around Snow's shoulder during his motion to move out of the way. "It's okay." Her expression quickly turned into a frown as her sister inspected her features. "Have you eaten?"

"I'll be fine." Feeling as though her feet were made of lead, Lightning made her way to the couch as Hope popped up from behind the vid screen display. Rubbing her fingers against both sides of her nose, she felt him sit next to her.

"Hey, Light, did something happen at work?"

Sometimes, she hated how easily he read her. Perceptive kid.

Still, she hesitated before opening her mouth. "Yeah, I guess you could say that."

At her words, Snow poked his head out of the kitchen, a sandwich stuffed in his mouth. Chewing rapidly, he made an attempt at a large swallow. Unsuccessful, his next words came out through the low muffle of bread. "Wha 'appen?"

Lightning almost rolled her eyes before she stopped herself. Any other night, she might've found it amusing to poke fun at Snow. She sense Hope tense beside her. "Someone bumped into me at work today." Picking her next words wisely, she thought about them for a few seconds. "He... said something to me. He told me that we were living in a beautiful dream, and that it was time to wake up soon."

Snow's expression changed from playful to serious in the span of a heartbeat as Serah wrapped her arms around his waist. "What do you think that means?" She found her own concerns in his ice-blue gaze and realized that he'd understood in an instant.

"It could mean a lot of things," she replied.

Hope shifted slightly in the seat next to her. "Did you see who it was?"

"No. There were a lot of people in the corridor. By the time I looked around, he was gone."

Snow took a few steps forward to sit on the stool in the adjacent dining room. "You think he's after us?"

"Probably." Lightning shrugged. "Sure sounded like it."

Serah was still clinging to Snow's right arm. "But... a lot of people don't really like us, right, Sis?" But there was no fear or uncertainty in her sister's voice; instead, there was just curiousity. With a pang, Lightning realized that Serah had changed too. Her experience with the fal'Cie had made her brave, unafraid of the future and certain that whatever would come, she would be able to meet it unflinchingly.

"True, but this was different. I don't know... he knew who I was for sure. I can't think of any other reason why he'd say something like that without implying that something's going to happen."

"Could it be the fal'Cie?" Snow was cracking his knuckles, his expression intense in anticipation of a fight. "Then we'll bring the fight to them."

"You want to go looking across Gran Pulse for a fal'Cie?" she countered. "I don't."

"What?" he snapped back. "You want to sit around waiting for whatever this is to happen?"

Of course, Snow probably wouldn't mind just looking for the man himself. It was one of the things her sister admired most about her husband - his willingness to charge forwards no matter what the circumstances with the belief that he could change things for the better.

"No, I don't," she argued. "I just think we should be smarter about it than that."

She saw Snow open his mouth, but he didn't get to say anything before all the lights in the house flickered off.