Lightning opened her eyes to see she was in the same world of light as she was during her dream. Lightning sat up and looked around to see nothing was different from before. She quickly looked at her back to see the white feathered wing was there again on her upper right back. Lightning looked up as a feather floated down in front of her face. She saw the woman who looked almost exactly like her from her dream floating down in front of her. "Hello Lightning." the woman greeted after landing and folding her wings.

"Who are you?" Lightning asked.

"You'll find out eventually." the woman replied as she kneeled in front of Lightning. She extended out her hand to Lightning the same as she did before. This time without hesitation, Lightning took the woman's hand. The woman pulled Lightning forward and brought her into a hug, much to Lightning's surprise. Even though the person was a complete stranger to Lightning, the hug felt like it was right to her. Lightning couldn't help but feel a familiar feeling from the woman, as though the two were connected somehow.

"I'm sorry Lightning. Right now I don't have the strength to protect you and Serah." the woman said as she began crying.

"Wait, how do you know Serah?!" Lightning asked. The woman released Lightning from her hug.

"Keep her safe and be a good girl." the woman said as Lightning watched her cry for unknown reasons. A bright light shined from the woman's body which transported Lightning back to reality.

Lightning gasped as she awoke with a jolt. She quickly calmed herself as she could tell she was in the resting room of the Shera. Lightning lightly gasped as she felt something warm by her right hand. Lightning looked over to see Cloud asleep while leaning on the side of her bed with his face next to her hand. Lightning smiled as she felt joyful that Cloud never left her side during her time of pain. She reached her hand up and gently placed it on Cloud's cheek as she watched him sleep.

"Mom, don't go." Cloud said in his sleep which surprised Lightning. A single tear slowly rolled down Cloud's cheek as he slept. Lightning reached up with her thumb and gently wiped away the tear from Cloud's cheek. This gesture made Cloud open his eyes to see a smiling Lightning with her hand on his cheek.

"Are you okay?" Lightning asked.

"Uh, yeah." Cloud answered with a hint of blush on his face. Lighting removed her hand from his cheek and sat up.

"I'm the one who should be asking you if you're okay." Cloud said as Lightning sat up.

"Don't worry I'm fine." Lightning replied. "What happened?"

"I don't know. There was a white light glowing in your stomach and it was hurting you a lot. You gave all of us quite a scare." Cloud answered.

"Sorry about that." Lightning apologized.

"Don't worry about it. The important thing is that you're alright now." Cloud replied. Lightning then remembered the mysterious boy they were fighting.

"Hey, what happened to the guy we were fighting?" Lightning asked.

"He's resting over there." Cloud pointed to the bed across from Lightning's. As Cloud said, there lay Noctis, who had they fought just a little while ago.

"So how long have we been out?" Lightning asked.

"Almost two hours." Cloud answered.

"So what are we going to do with him when he wakes up?" Lightning asked.

"Well first we'll ask him a few questions. How he answers will decide if we'll let him go or not." Cloud answered.

"I see." Lightning said before she yawned.

"Are you still tired?" Cloud asked.

"Yeah, a little." Lightning answered as she rubbed her eye.

"You can go back to sleep then. I'll be right here if you need anything." Cloud said.

"Thank you Cloud." Lightning replied as she laid down and was back to sleep in seconds. As she slept, Cloud looked back at Rubi who was sleeping a couple beds away, still recovering from her stab wound.

"This just keeps getting weirder and weirder." Cloud thought as he watched the three sleep.

An hour later, Lightning awoke from her sleep to see Cloud sitting on the side of her bed. He was groaning in pain and he was tightly gripping his left arm with his right hand. Lightning sat up and placed her hand on Cloud's shoulder to get his attention. "Is it the stigma?" Lightning asked.

"Yeah." Cloud grunted as he continued holding his arm very tight. Lightning gently placed her hand over Cloud's left arm, but as soon as she did, the pain suddenly went away. Cloud released his arm, as did Lightning.

"It must hurt a lot." Lightning said.

"Yeah, but Denzel's is worse than mine." Cloud said.

"Don't worry, I'm sure you'll find a cure somehow." Lightning replied.

"I hope you're right." Cloud said. The two could hear groaning coming from their left. The two looked the right to see Noctis was waking up. As if on cue, the cloaked man teleported into the room just as Noctis opened his eyes. He groaned as he sat up and fully opened his eyes. He gasped when he saw Cloud, Lightning, and the cloaked man. He brought his arm up and was about to summon one of his weapons, but the cloaked man stopped him by raising both of his hands up.

"Take it easy. If we wanted to kill you you'd be dead already." the cloaked man said. Seeing he was right and that they had no intention to fight, Noctis lowered his arm.

"Who are you guys?" Noctis asked.

"Putting it simply, we're the good guys." the cloaked man answered.

"So, who are you?" Lightning asked as she got off her bed.

"My full name is Noctis Lucis Caelum, but I'd prefer if you'd call me Noct, or Noctis. Either one's fine with me." Noctis answered. "Why are you guys after the black crystal?"

"We need it if we're going to stop the resurrection of Astroth, the god of war and destruction. If his servants, the Acolytes, get a hold of the black crystal, as well as the other items needed, there is nothing anyone can do to stop him. He'll rule over this universe as he tried to do three thousand years ago." the cloaked man said.

"But Balthazar stopped him right?" Noctis asked.

"You know about Balthazar?" the cloaked man asked,

"I know the whole story. It's one of the legends we have around here. I wanted to see if you did to. That's how I knew if I could trust you guys or not." Noctis answered.

"Do you trust us?" Cloud asked.

"Yes I do." Noctis answered.

"Then will you help us get the black crystal?" the cloaked man asked.

"To tell you the truth, I couldn't even if I said yes. Even though I have to guard it, I was never told where it was." Noctis answered.

"Well that's pretty stupid." Lightning said.

"Tell me about it." Noctis agreed.

"Well if the legend's true, it should be somewhere on the planet right?" Cloud asked.

"Most likely. I'm sure we'll end up finding it eventually." the cloaked man assured.

"Well, sorry for the misunderstanding back there. Let me make it up to you guys." Noctis said.

"What did you have in mind?" Cloud asked, curious.

"You and everyone else come back to my building tomorrow at seven thirty PM. You'll see." Noctis answered.

"Alright. Cloud, you and everyone else can go. I'll stay here instead. I've got some things to take care of." the cloaked man said.

"It's your call." Cloud replied.

"I should be heading back now. I don't want people to think I've gone missing." Noctis said.

"Sure thing." Cloud replied. He escorted Noctis out of the ship and Noctis walked off towards the building. As Cloud walked back inside the ship, he couldn't help but feel that the dark power emanating from the black light inside Noctis seemed familiar to him somehow. This power however wasn't Sephiroth's. It was something much darker. Cloud returned inside the ship, deciding thinking about it wouldn't do him any good. Though Cloud was curious to know how Noctis was going to make up for the misunderstanding.

The Next Day: 7:30 PM

When seven thirty came, Cloud and the others returned to the building where they met Noctis. Cloud was surprised that the place was completely restored to normal, and all the dead bodies were gone, especially the blood stains. "This guy must have money to spare." Cloud thought as he and the party entered the building. Everyone looked around in shock as the inside of the building looked very bright and decorated. "Holy cow! This guy must be totally rich!" Zell exclaimed as he looked around at the decorated insides of the building.

Cloud and the party met up with Noctis in front of the large flight of stairs. Instead of the clothes he was wearing earlier, Noctis was wearing fancy black dress clothes. "Well we're here." Cloud acknowledged.

"Glad you could make it." Noctis greeted.

"So are we like going somewhere, or something?" Yuffie curiously asked.

"Yeah, but I can't have you guys going dressed like that." Noctis commented.

"So what are we supposed to do?" Rikku asked.

"Let me take care of that." Noctis said as he snapped with his right hand. Suddenly out of nowhere, several extremely tall and massively built guards appeared and picked up everyone with their arms.

"Hey, what's the deal?!" Tidus demanded.

"Don't worry about it. They'll just make sure you guys wear something more appropriate for where we're going." Noctis answered before the guards carried everyone off. The guys were taken to one room while the girls were taken to another. After waiting for about thirty minutes, the party came out of the rooms now wearing more appropriate clothes. The guys were wearing the same dress clothes Noctis was wearing, and the girls were all wearing fancy dresses.

"Let's go." Noctis motioned for everyone to follow him which they did. When they got outside, there was a large black limo parked out front. Everyone walked towards and got into the limo and it drove off to wherever it was taking them.

"Hey Squall, isn't this fun?" Rinoa asked.

"Whatever." Squall replied which made Rinoa giggle since that was his usual attitude in these kinds of situations. As the car rode on, Squall suddenly felt very light headed. Everything started to become blurry and sounded muffled to him. His sight was soon overtaken by darkness and he lost consciousness.

When Squall opened his eyes, he saw he was in a majestic looking city. The buildings were white and all kinds of plants were growing around. Squall looked at himself to see he was wearing his normal clothes again, but for some unknown reason, there was a black feathered wing coming from his upper right back. "Okay, this is weird." Squall thought as he looked around. There were what appeared to be angels flying, or walking around everywhere. Squall was confused, when suddenly he sensed a strong presence in front of him. He looked to see a girl lying on the ground in front of him.

Her clothing consisted of a red pleated skirt with black lace and a white sleeveless dress shirt, with a semi-transparent sweeper in the same style of shirt over it, with thigh-highs, and boots. She had pink hair which looked very similar to Lightning's hair, except hers was a little darker and in a different style. Squall also noticed she also had a white feathered wing coming from her upper right back like his. Squall quickly ran over and held the girl up to see if she was okay.

The girl groaned as she opened her eyes to see Squall holding her up. "You okay?" Squall asked.

"Y-Yeah." the girl answered as she sat up and Squall let go of her. "Where are we?"

"You got me." Squall answered. Squall stood up and offered her his hand. She took it and he pulled her up.

"Thank you, uh..."

"Squall. Squall Leonhart." he answered.

"Thank you Squall." the girl said.

"What's your name?" Squall asked.

"Serah. Serah Farron." she answered.

"Well Serah, let's see if we can find a way out of wherever this place is." Squall suggested.

"Sure Squall." Serah agreed and the two walked off to find an exit from the mysterious city.

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Well Final Fantasy XIII is coming out next Tuesday so hopefully that'll increase the update rate. We'll see.