Lightning used the back of her hand to wipe away the beads of sweat that threatened to roll down her forehead and into her eyes. The weather had been abnormally hot all day, a record high for this time of year. It was actually kind of weird because they usually always had very controlled weather. A teacher in one of her earlier periods tried explaining the phenomenon to them in class. Apparently if there was a big irregularity on Pulse, Cocoon could be affected as well, even with the all the technology for weather control, since they both shared the same atmosphere.

But of course, even though it was scalding hot outside, her PE teacher had forced her class to leave the air-conditioned gymnasium in favor of sending them to the school's undersized baseball diamond out back to play kickball.

"Whooo! Goooooo Lightning!"

Lightning attempted to spread a pleasant smile across her face on hearing the voice that plagued her during most of her waking hours. For some naïve reason, she thought she'd be able to find some relief from the ever-present Alyssa Zaidelle during class time, especially since they didn't have a single class together.

She thought wrong.

While they didn't actually take any classes together, they did both take their physical education and arts credits at the same time. Lightning took PE while Alyssa worked on yearbook. This basically meant that the class president had the time and means to stalk Lightning while she was in gym. Lightning sighed at the thought and turned to give Alyssa, who was sitting in the bleachers near the area where a few cheerleaders were stretching, a little wave. "Serah better make the fucking team and cherish it," the pinkette grumbled to herself.

Out the corner of her eye, Lightning caught sight of something bright orange moving in the direction of the gymnasium. She slightly turned her head away from Alyssa to get a better look at the fluorescent object making its way along the side of the field: a cooler. However, now that she was looking in that direction, it wasn't actually the cooler that was garnering as much of Lightning's attention as the tanned girl who was carrying it.

If there were any clouds in the sky blocking the sun, they must have all faded away at that moment because Lightning felt her face and chest grow extremely warm as the heat beat down on her more immensely.

Lightning had first noticed Fang and the rest of the track team not too long after her class had come outside. They had been walking back and forth along the field and to and from the gym, packing equipment into a van parked behind the baseball diamond. She guessed that they had some sort of meet or something that they were preparing for. At that time, Fang had been donned in the track team's warm-up sweats. However, lugging all that equipment around in the heat must've made the girl uncomfortable because now she was simply walking around in a tight, and quite revealing, spandex uniform.

The drastic change of clothing definitely caught Lightning off guard. She knew that the Pulsian was fit, but actually seeing so much of her body exposed at one time made 'fit' seem like an understatement. Almost everything (because the uniform didn't do a good job at hiding her shape at all) on the girl seemed to be perfectly sculpted. From her slender neck, to those toned arms, and even down her slightly curved back to her—whoa. Lightning quickly averted her eyes as if she had witnessed something illegal.

However, as much as she willed herself to stop looking and pay more attention to the game, Lightning's gaze kept wandering back to Fang's direction. When she realized that she was staring again, she quickly snapped her head forward. Why did the cooler have to be such a distracting color? She slowly turned her head a bit more to glance in the cooler's direction one last time. If the cooler had initially caught her attention, it was now Tammy, a girl with short brown hair who was chatting next to Fang, who kept it.

The clouds must have dissipated again because Lightning could feel the temperature in her face and chest slowly rise again as she watched the two. Tammy walked casually alongside Fang with a smile on her face as Fang continued to tote the cooler. When they reached the van, Fang placed the cooler inside and sat on the trunk's edge, patting the space next to her for Tammy to join. The Pulsian smiled and said something that had Tammy laughing as she took the offered seat.

Lightning watched them through narrowed eyes. Tammy had come to class with a doctor's note excusing her from gym today, so instead of toiling away in the hot sun like the rest of them, she was sitting around socializing with Fang. Nothing looked wrong with her. What made her so unfit that she couldn't just run around a few bases today? The note probably wasn't even real. It was all probably just a rouse… The pinkette's jaw tightened as she continued to stew over how unfair it was that Tammy was getting over the system. Finally, she let out an annoyed huff and turned around to once again face forward. All the while, Alyssa watched Lightning's actions curiously through squinted eyes from her seat in the bleachers.

"So, Lyss." Alyssa broke away from staring at Lightning to raise her brows at one of the cheerleaders who had paused from her stretches to call for the other girl's attention. "What is the deal with you and Lightning, anyway? I thought you said you didn't like her."

"I don't," Alyssa replied bluntly, once again glancing back and forth between Lightning and Fang. "But in order to stay on top of the social hierarchy, I have to be friends with her. At least until I find a way to knock her back down to where she belongs."

The cheerleader took a quick peek at Lightning from over her shoulder. "I don't know… She's gotten pretty popular and it doesn't look like she knocks around easy. How do you plan on going through with that?"

"I don't have anything definite now, but let's just say I have a bit of an idea." Alyssa's eyes settled on Fang, who was now handing Tammy her cell phone with a playful smirk on her face.

"Well, looky who's up next! Farron!"

Lightning clenched her jaw even tighter as she looked towards the mound. Gadot was leaning forward, holding the ball behind his back with one hand. A wide grin was plastered across his face. Lightning took a couple steps forward so that she was only standing a few paces behind home plate.

On her last turn, she had kicked a pop fly that had immediately gotten her and another one of her teammates out. From the jeering, you could've sworn that Gadot had pitched a no-hitter at the World Series.

"Yayyyyyy! Lightning!" Alyssa screamed from the bleachers.

From her spot on the back of the van, Fang looked up from her conversation with Tammy to observe the action on the field with slight interest.

"So Farron," Gadot asked, now softly tossing the ball up and down in one hand, "Do we really need to go through all the work or should we just switch positions now?"

"Just roll the ball," Lightning growled.

"Are you sure—"

"GADOT! It feels like hell's anus out here! Just hurry up and roll the goddamn ball!" Lebreau shouted from far left field.

"Lebreau! Language!" the gym teacher, who was seated in the shade of the dugout yelled. "And Gadot, she's right! After the fourth inning, we're heading in. So hurry up and roll the goddamn ball!"

"Alright, alright… sheesh," Gadot grumbled as he bent over and shoved the ball forward.

It was a terrible roll. It was approaching home plate at a high speed, but the thing was bouncing like crazy and spent just as much time off the ground as it did on. Lightning ran a couple of steps forward from her place behind the plate before thrusting out her foot and connecting with the ball while it was in a weird mid-bounce position.

A loud POING sounded as foot collided with ball. The sphere shot forward at an alarming speed, flying horizontally about three feet off the ground, like a bullet. If Lightning had been paying any attention at all to what was happening on the field, she would've noticed the two infielders who jumped out the way to avoid getting hit by the projectile. But all she really cared about right now was running the bases and shutting Gadot the hell up.

She had just about gotten to second base when the ball started to make its journey back to the mound. "Nuh uh!" Gadot called, running to the direction of home plate. He didn't want his team to simply stop the play by giving it to him on the mound. He wanted to get her out. Himself. "Pass it to me!"

Lightning could hear nothing but cheering as she rounded second and quickly made her way to third. When she hit the third base, she could see the ball soaring in her direction through her peripherals. She rounded the plate and a scowled when she saw Gadot standing at home, his eyes in the air waiting for the ball to come his way. Her teammates were now yelling for her to turn around and go back, but it was far too late for that now.

As she ran, she could feel a slight build-up forming in her chest and the wind seemed to be picking up around her. Hell, at this point it felt as if she was damn near being propelled by the wind. With every swing of her arms as she ran, she could feel another powerful gust form at her side.

"Hurry up! Here! Here!" Gadot called, waving his arms and jumping at home plate.

She could now make out the ball soaring over her head to home. She could still make it! No, she would make it! Her scowl deepened and a hand slid forward to block her eyes as her body leaned back and she slid towards Gadot and the plate. The wind crazily whirled about her for only a moment, simultaneously driving her forwards while pushing upwards at her back as it neared the ground, before gathering and lashing outwards toward home plate.

Meanwhile, Gadot reached up to snatch the ball out of the air and smiled victoriously as he brought it down. He glanced up at the approaching runner and his smile immediately disappeared. All he could see was a huge cloud of swirling dust coming his way. "What the—" he didn't even have time to finish his exclamation before he was knocked back by a powerful gust of wind and engulfed in the cloud.

The whole class stood around in shock and confusion as the ball bounced out of the dust cloud that lingered around home plate, successfully hiding the two students that had been caught in it. "Safe!" the gym teacher yelled, not really caring for the weird weather anomaly that had just occurred in the middle of his field.

Back near the track van, Fang slowly stood up with widened eyes, staring in the direction of the baseball diamond. She had faded out of the conversation with Tammy the moment she had seen the wind dancing around Lightning's body with each swing of her arm, as if she were orchestrating it. It wasn't until she saw the powerful blast of wind that had been thrown in Gadot's direction that she had snapped back into her senses. "Excuse me," she said in a low voice, not even bothering to look in Tammy's direction, "I'll be right back." With that, she took off into a cautious jog towards the diamond.

Back on the field, Lightning could see nothing but dust. She could taste nothing but dust. And all she could hear was her and Gadot's coughing. Her body felt more relaxed, as if she had released some sort of pent up energy… Had she? She remembered feeling the wind at her back and sides. She hadn't thought of it much as it was happening, too caught up in the moment of the game, but now she remembered how her every movement seemed to control the flow of the wind... And how badly she had wanted the wind to carry her to home plate and knock Gadot off his high horse.

Before she could think any further on what had happened, she felt a hand roughly grab her elbow and pull her to her feet. Next thing she knew, she was jogging away from the diamond and back towards the direction of the gym. Her vision was still fuzzy from the dust, but she could slightly make out the dark, messy head of hair that was leading the way with a heavy grip still around her arm. Fang?

"Hey! Where do you think you're going?" she could hear her gym teacher shouting from behind, but it didn't slow Fang down at all.

Once again, Alyssa eyed the two girls as they ran around the corner of the gym to a spot where the people on the field couldn't see them. She tapped her chin thoughtfully as one of the cheerleaders stared at the area on the field where dust was still clearing out. "I wonder what that was about."

"What in the bloody hell was that about?" a similar question was hissed at Lightning as Fang rounded on her from their spot behind the gym.

"Wha—"

"I thought you said no weird-goings-ons! Let me guess? You were always able to summon Mother Nature to your every beck and call?"

"What are you talking about?" Lightning rubbed at her eyes. She was having trouble understanding and she couldn't fully concentrate with all the dust still irking her.

"What am I talking about? I'm talking about you throwing tornado bombs at Gadot! And then ya let me stand there the other day and blubber like a fool when I asked ya about it? Is it because ya think all the slapping didn't make me feel crap enough?"

"Wait…" Lightning stopped rubbing at her face and looked toward Fang with wide and confused eyes. "I-That really was me? You know how I did that?" she asked in a shaky voice.

Fang froze. This wasn't the usually stalwart girl that she sometimes bugged in passing. Her whole demeanor had changed. She looked… frightened. And more than anything else, confused. Fang groaned and ran a hand through her hair. "Shit... You don't know." Fang started pacing back and forth a few steps, racking her mind for the right words to continue the conversation with.

"Don't know what? What's going on?" Lightning asked, her eyes following Fang as she paced and her speech becoming more frantic.

Fang paused from her pacing to give Lightning an apologetic look before averting eye contact and focusing on her own shoulder. "How bout we start from here." She reached up and pulled down at a black, nylon sleeve that covered her upper arm where her bandage used to be. Lightning winced on seeing two big cuts across her skin that still looked as if they were in the healing process. More interestingly though, between the scars was a marking. The same marking shared between her, Snow, and Hope. "Do you have one of these?" Fang asked, eyes intently trying to gauge Lightning's face for reactions.

"The police brand?"

"Police brand?" Fang's brows ruffled at the words. "Who told you it was a police brand? What even is a police brand?" She could feel her body tensing a bit on wondering if it was something that Colonel Farron had told her.

"Snow called it that. Said something about it being a way to mark us as fugitives if we ran away." Lightning's eyes were glued to the mark.

"Heh. So big guy is marked too… sounds like an explanation he'd come up with." Fang had softly chuckled her words, but the feeling behind them still sounded empty. "But no, it's not a police brand. Although, it's a vaguely similar concept. Do ya remember the script Vanille read at the Vestige? About the Gran Pulse fal'Cie?"

"The bed time story?" Lightning asked, finally tearing her vision away from the mark on Fang's arm to look her in the eyes.

"Uh, yeah…" Fang nervously rubbed at the back of her neck. "So the thing is, it wasn't actually a fictional story. And it's kinda what happened to us at the Vestige. Me and Vanille think that the thing we ran in to there was a Gran Pulse fal'Cie, and during the scuffle it branded us all as its l'Cie. So now it looks like all of us kinda have special l'Cie powers."

"What?" Memories of the struggle against that thing in the Vestige started surging back to the forefront of Lightning's mind. That couldn't be possible. There weren't even any Cocoon fal'Cie left, so the idea that there was a Pulse fal'Cie hiding out in the back room of a building on Cocoon seemed ridiculous! But the being was like nothing she had ever seen before and it had so much power… "So what you're saying is," Lightning began, her words taking lives of their own and her mind not wanting to wrap itself around any of this at all, "is that we were attacked and basically enslaved by a Pulse fal'Cie?"

"It's probably more like indentured servitude." Lightning shot Fang a nasty look, which made the taller girl recoil. "Uh… never mind."

Lightning placed a hand to her head and began pacing herself. She was starting to feel dizzy and her heart was beating so quickly that she thought it would burst out of her chest at any second. "That can't be true. This can't be real. Didn't the end of the story end with monsters or something? This doesn't even make sense! How am I supposed to explain having, having powers to my dad? Shit! My dad! We can tell my dad! He'd know some way to figure this out."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Fang's eyebrows skyrocketed and she reached out to grab Lightning by the shoulders in an attempt to settle her down. "No! Bad idea! HORRIBLE idea! Worst possible idea!"

"And you have a better one?!" Lightning smacked Fang's hands away from her. "You're the one who started all of this! My dad works with the military! He knows doctors and scientists and has connects! He can figure out a way to help us!"

"No, your dad works with the military! He has guns, and knows people who have guns, and the ones who don't have guns have test tubes and needles and probes and other shit that they stick up people's asses that are probably scarier than the guns!"

Lightning eyed Fang derisively and shook her head. "I'm his daughter! You think he'd let me become some type of lab rat before trying to help me? Well, you're wrong. And I'm going to prove it; I'm telling my father." Lightning spun around to leave. Her cell phone was tucked away in the locker room. If she went to it now, she'd be able to call her dad before anyone else could return to the gymnasium and overhear the conversation.

"Wait! Just slow down." Fang's hand gripped Lightning's arm a little bit above her wrist. Lightning made a move to yank it away, but couldn't. She physically couldn't. The place on her arm where Fang was grabbing her felt tingly and her limbs immediately grew heavy. Her eyes felt heavy as well and her heart had stopped its assault on her chest, which was now taking in slow, deep breaths. She tried to move her head. Turn her body. Even roll her eyes back in Fang's direction, but the movements felt strained and took too much effort. It felt as if her whole body were operating in slow motion, so she just continued to stand with her eyes looking forward, taking in those long, steady breaths.

"You're his daughter," Fang's voice slowly dragged through the air, her accent sounded more pronounced than it ever had to Lightning before. "But think about it. You've been marked by a Gran Pulse fal'Cie, who are apparently known for creating super soldiers to fight against Cocoon. That officially makes all of us enemies of Cocoon. This goes way past all of his connections."

Fang eyed Lightning's face earnestly as she finished her last sentence. There was no malice or chastising tone to her voice. On the contrary, the girl had never spoken to Lightning so delicately. She released her grip around Lightning's arm and the Cocoonian immediately felt her breathing start to pick up to a normal pace. "Look," Fang had already started to continue to pick up where she had left off, "You may have some big guardian angel on your side, but me and Vanille have no one. If the wrong person finds out about this, we're screwed. And not just us. Everyone on the reservation. Your dad's a big shot and all, but there are bigger and badder fish in the sea who might do the same to y'all too..."

Lightning still had yet to say a word, which made Fang feel uneasy. She wanted to know what the pinkette was thinking, how she was really taking this. She let out a soft sigh and looked at the ground before continuing her spiel, hoping that something would strike a chord within the other girl. "I know I've been doing a horribly crap job at it, but a long time ago, I made a vow that I'd protect my family. And I swear to all the gods, I'd tear down the sky and this bloody world with it if that means keeping Vanille safe. The more people who know about us, the harder it's gonna be protectin' her or anyone around us. Isn't there something you feel you need to protect too?"

Lightning let out a deep breath. There was. Serah. Although there was that nagging feeling in the back of her head that she should still tell her dad everything, there were parts of Fang's speech that did make sense for the opposing argument. She had seen firsthand how viciously the law treated Pulsians. What would they do if they found out that there was a group of Pulse 'super soldiers' running around? Her dad could try to protect them, but how far would that go? If he was caught, he'd certainly be punished for treason, and where would that leave Serah? "Okay," she finally relented. "I can't say that I totally agree with this… but I won't tell him."

A grateful light lit up in Fang's eyes at the words. "But," Lightning said, looking to Fang expectantly, "you do have some plan to fix this, right?"

"Me and Van have already started looking into it. Ya see, when we first got branded, everyone should've gotten a focus. We're pretty sure that solving that puzzle is the key to getting us outta this whole mess."

"That's the grand plan?" Lightning asked, her voice dripping with skepticism.

Fang shrugged apologetically. "It's the only plan we've got so far."

Lightning groaned and rubbed a hand over her face. Her resolve on not telling her father was starting to wear off already. Fang must've sensed that as well because she once again put her hands on Lightning's shoulders to try and settle down her before calmly looking her in the eye. "Hey. I know I haven't really given ya much to work with so far, but I need… I just need ya to trust me on this, yeah? And if we try my plan and it doesn't seem to be working out, then I promise that we can go to your dad without a fuss. Okay?"

Lightning nodded. Although she was still on edge, she did feel a bit more at peace with the situation at the moment. "Yeah. Okay."

Fang lightly smiled, although the expression looked pained. She opened her mouth to say something else but was immediately cut off by a loud yell from somewhere else outside.

"LIGHTNING!"

"Shit. Either we're switching to outfield or my turn must be coming up again," Lightning grumbled. "I should probably get back before I somehow manage to flunk PE."

"Heh. Yeah, that'd be the real tragedy in all of this…" Fang chuckled, looking off in the direction where the PE teacher's voice had sounded. "But we should meet up sometime soon. All of us. We need to get a game plan rolling on how to handle this."

"Okay. When?"

"Has to be soon." Fang pulled her nylon sleeve back over her arm and rubbed it as she thought. "How bout after school tomorrow. I'll be free after track practice, and the bleachers next to the football field would be a perfect place to meet. Or are you still too punished?"

"I could get away." Unless her father came home early again, which was unlikely to happen so soon, she was sure that she could stay that late unnoticed. It'd give her more training time in the gym anyway.

"Good. I'll let blondie know, and you can spread the word to little man."

Lightning nodded in confirmation and turned to go.

"Oh, and Lightless?"

Lightning paused for a moment to look back over her shoulder at Fang. "Hm?"

"I know it's hard, but please. At least put a lil' effort in trying not to accidentally kill Gadot."

Lightning made a soft chortling sound. "I'll see what I can do. I've had enough years of practice at it."