Fang staggered, quickly and aimlessly, through the dark hall. Her head and chest still ached from the hard blows they had received in the elevator, but she couldn't worry about that now. She had to keep moving. She had to get further away from those… those monsters. They were sluggish in movement and Fang knew that she could easily outrun them, but there was just some type of aura about them that gave her the creeps. Even if they were merely in the vicinity, it felt like they could make Fang's insides freeze, and her whole being would just become overrun with remorse. She couldn't remember a time when she had ever felt so simultaneously sad, frustrated, and lost.

Fang paused to catch her breath after stumbling into a wall. She thought she could still hear the strained moans of those things behind her even though she hadn't seen one since she had scrambled away from the elevators. She had to keep moving though. She didn't think she could survive another hit from—

BOOM!

Fang shrank back against the wall at the loud blast that sounded not too far from where she was standing. In the back of her head, there was a small voice telling her to run, but her feet just remained planted to the marble floor with her eyes set on the smoke that flooded the hall ahead of her.

A few light coughs were choked out from the gray cloud before a familiar form emerged from the smog.

"Vanille?" Fang pushed against the wall so that she was standing straight up.

A few feet ahead of her, the redheaded Gran Pulsian turned her head to stare at her best friend before her eyes widened in recognition. "FANG!"

The next thing Fang knew, she was staggering backwards again from the force of the skinny, redheaded girl flying into her chest.

"Fang! You're here!"

"Of course I'm here." Fang tightened her grip around Vanille and buried her face in the younger girl's shoulder. "You didn't think I'd just leave ya here, did ya?"

"Who are—Fang?"

Fang loosened her grip around Vanille and looked up to see Sazh stepping out from the smoke cloud with a slightly startled look on his face. "Pops," she greeted as a relieved smile worked its way to her lips. "You don't know how glad I am to see ya."

"Heh. Like I haven't heard that one before. What the hell happened to you?" Sazh walked up to give Fang's armored shoulder a squeeze. "Someone finally get fed up with that mouth of yours? You've got a knot the size of Pulse on your head."

"Gran Pulse," Fang corrected as Vanille reached up to gingerly place her hand on Fang's forehead to heal her. "Wait. Where's Dahj? Did PSICOM not take him?"

Sazh's eyes dropped to the floor. "Nah. They did."

"We've been looking for him," Vanille explained when Sazh didn't continue. "We weren't really expecting to find you first, but now you can help us! If we keep going in that—"

"No, no, no!" Fang cut in, her face quickly paling at the thought. "We can't go that way. We shouldn't even be standing here now. There's monst—no. Fal'Cie! There's a fal'Cie somewhere in the—"

"Fang, we know."

"What?" Fang's brows deeply furrowed as she looked down at Vanille. "How? Did ya see it?"

"Um… not exactly." Vanille slowly pulled away from Fang and looked over her shoulder. "Sazh?"

Fang's eyes jumped from Vanille to Sazh. The older man sighed and rolled his eyes before hooking his finger into the collar of his shirt and pulling down just far enough for the top half of the brand on his chest to be visible.

Fang's jaw slightly hung as she gaped at the mark. "Sazh… I'm so sorr—"

"There's no use in apologizing now," Sazh gruffly dismissed with the wave of a hand. "The only thing that matters is that we find Dahj and get out of here. Okay?"

"Yeah. Sure," Fang numbly nodded. "How do we do that?"

"We follow Sazh," Vanille answered. When she was met by yet another confused look from Fang, she took a deep breath and continued. "When Sazh turned, he had some pretty vivid visions. He thinks they're clues to finding Dahj."

"What?" Fang's eyes widened in alarm as she quickly focused her attention on Sazh again. "I know ya haven't been part of the l'Cie club that long, but there's one pretty big rule that we tend to live by. Wanna know what that rule is? DON'T TRUST THE FAL'CIE! We can't wholeheartedly walk right into one of its traps!"

"They have my son!" Sazh growled back. "And you're the last person who should be trying to pull the trust card after everything you've gotten us into!"

Fang's eyebrows slightly knit in the middle and her lips curled downward. She seemed to be racking her brain for something to say, but soon gave up and just let her shoulders droop in silence.

"Look," Sazh huffed out in a long, doleful sigh, "I get it. You're scared. I am, too. So just think of how scared Dahj might be. Help me get him out of here and you can consider us square, okay?"

Fang still looked tentative about the plan, but nodded in agreement anyway. "Okay. Sounds more than fair enough… So what did ya actually see in your visions?"

"Well," Sazh began, scratching the back of his head, "The whole time it was like I was having some kinda outer body experience, if you get what I mean. I was in the detainment cell, and then I was in the hallway. I made two lefts, a right, went through a—well, let's just say I followed a certain path. Next thing I know, all I see is glass. I'm surrounded by it. And in my ears, all I can hear is… well… not really hear. But it was like in my head, the name Dahj kept repeating. Then the glass shattered… And I saw Vanille crying. That's when I regained my senses."

"So ya didn't actually see Dahj?"

"Fang…"

"I know. I know. I'm not arguing." Fang lifted her hands defensively. "I'm just saying…"

Sazh gave her a hard look.

"…that it doesn't matter," Fang quickly pieced together. "If there's even the slightest chance it'll lead us to Dahj, we're taking it. Where to from here?"

Sazh was still boring into Fang with a look of skepticism but he just shook it off and nodded. "This way. Follow me."

Lightning cautiously made her way down one of the empty halls, the hilt of her blade tightly gripped in one hand and the radio tightly gripped in the other.

"How close am I to maximum detainment?" she asked in a low voice after bringing the radio up to her lips and clicking a button on the small device.

Static. "Not too far," Hope's voice replied.

Lightning clicked down on the button again. "Really?" She peered around the dark hall suspiciously. "I was expecting more—or any—type of PSICOM presence. This place feels deserted."

Indeed, the further Lightning traveled into Eden's fortress, the scarcer the PSICOM presence became until she was hard-pressed to spot any PSICOM soldiers at all. The only thing that seemed to surround her was silence, accompanied by some strange, cold feeling that intensified within her with each step she took closer to the max detainment cells. It was something akin to a prickly ball of ice expanding in her stomach.

Static. "Y'all," Rygdea's voice called through the radio, "Can we limit all airwave communication to those who ARE cooperating with the mission?"

Lightning rolled her eyes and ignored the jab as Snow's voice quickly followed behind Rygdea's. "Lightning, I don't get what the big deal is. You sound upset that there aren't any PSICOM goons breathing down your neck."

"I'm not upset," Lightning retorted after clicking down hard on the radio's button. "I'm suspicious. Which way next?"

Static. "Uhmmm," Snow hummed. "I think the next door on your left, but it looks locked. Let's see… if I click this and pull this up here… uhhh…"

"No! Not that one!" Hope yelped from the background.

Lightning immediately stopped walking. "Snow, what did you just do?"

Static. "Soooo, Lightning… Remember that time when you said it was kinda weird not having PSICOM soldiers everywhere?"

"Get to the point."

Static. "I might have accidentally sent a group your way."

"What?!" Lightning hissed.

The exclamation had barely left her mouth before she heard a set of doors sliding open from somewhere at the other end of the hall, followed by the clacking of boots on the marble floor.

Static. "Light," Hope called through the radio. "If you keep moving forward, there should be a lift around the corner to your right. Get in it! It's not a straight shoot to max detainment, but I can lead you through a safe enough detour. Once you get out of there, we should be able to lock enough doors to trap the soldiers in this area."

"Check these two branches and the next two up that way!" a voice down the hall called.

"Okay." Lightning ran down the hallway until she came to the next intersection. She took a right and slammed her hand into the button pad for the lift. "But make sure that Snow doesn't touch anything."

"Then we go through here," Sazh instructed, making a sharp turn through an opening to his right.

Fang and Vanille lagged a few meters behind, both looking around in awe at their surroundings.

"It's like the place starts looking more and more expensive the more we walk," Fang said beneath her breath as she tilted her head upwards to examine the ceiling.

"Yeah." Sazh stopped and folded his arms as he waited for the two Gran Pulsians to catch up. "Makes me think that I chose the wrong line of wor—what the hell?!"

"Huh?" Fang's head dropped back down to spy the bright red, transparent wall that now blocked the opening that Sazh stood behind. "What's that?"

"Hm." Sazh took a step closer to the shimmery barrier and placed his hand against it. From the other side, Fang watched as his palm flattened against the surface as if he was pushing against glass. "It's your standard force field mechanism. Someone's locking the doors. They must know we're coming."

"That's convenient," Fang grumbled. She looked around for any other close-by openings. "Did the fal'Cie give ya any alternate routes in your vision."

"No," Sazh replied in a dull voice. "But I do know that I'll be heading down seven floors then going east til I get to this room with a huge red and gold door. Think you two can figure out a way to get there?"

"I'm sure we can manage," Vanille said, reaching for Fang's hand. "We've got each other's backs. You'll be okay?"

"I'll be as okay as I can be right nowwwwatch out!"

The popping of gunfire pierced the air, quickly followed by a loud zapping sound as a bullet crashed into the force field between them and Sazh. Fang spun around to see a group of PSICOM soldiers running towards them.

"They're back," she uttered nervously, holding tighter to Vanille's hand and back stepping a bit to the side.

"Don't just stand there! Scat!" Sazh shouted. "I'll try to distract them. Just meet me at the spot. GO!"

Fang and Vanille broke out into a sprint down the hall, almost as if Sazh's last shout had physically pushed them. "This way!" Vanille cried as she quickly turned a corner that did not have a bright force field covering it. "I think if we make a left up—AUGH!"

From seemingly out of nowhere, a lone PSICOM soldier vaulted into Vanille from one of the connecting hallways, tackling her straight to the ground.

"HEY!" In an instant, Fang was yanking the soldier up by his shoulder and cocking back her elbow to throw a punch straight to his helmet, merely causing the soldier to stagger back a step or two.

"Ummphhh!"

An icy gust of wind brushed past Fang and into the soldier, throwing him across the hall and forming an icy claw that trapped him against the wall.

Fang took a deep breath and looked down to the floor where Vanille was sitting up, her hand still outstretched in the soldier's direction. Fang lifted her brows and rolled her eyes to create a dramatically relieved expression before leaning over Vanille and offering her a hand. "You alright?"

"Yeah," Vanille nodded. "Just got the wind knocked outta—Fang!"

Fang straightened up and spun around.

POW!

A sudden pain blasted into Fang's chest.

POW! POW! POW! POW!

Fang's body jerked as more pain shot into her chest. She could barely register the armored soldier that was steadily walking towards them with his gun lifted at her.

POW!

The whole room shifted as Fang fell backwards. It felt as if there was so much weight driving into her chest, she could barely breathe. She was just taking quick, rapid, and painful heaves of nothing as her back crashed to the floor.

"NOO!" a high-pitched voice shrieked from behind her.

Fang's eyes rolled up as everything dimmed around her. A pitch-black cloud of almost liquid-looking smoke drifted over her head and continued to glide over her body. She lifted her head to look down past her toes as the dark cloud engulfed the soldier, stopping him dead in his tracks. There was a muffled gargle followed by a long wheezing sound before the dark cloud suddenly burst and the soldier crumpled to the ground. Fang tilted her head back to see Vanille leaning forward on her knees, one hand planted on the ground while the other trembled slightly in the air, palm facing where the soldier had been standing.

"Augh!" Fang choked. She tried to sit up, but the pain in her chest was too much, so she just decided to roll over. "Augh! Augh!" She took in a deep breath of air. "Fuckin' holy hell…"

"Fang, slow down."

She now felt Vanille's hands on her and could see the bright green glow from a healing spell as the pain in her chest slightly began to ease up.

"Are you okay?"

"I think." The words still sounded as if they were being coughed out. "The armor's bulletproof, but it doesn't stop it from hurting like a bitch. What about you? What spell was that? Don't think I've ever seen that one before."

"I-I don't know." Vanille slid her hands away from Fang and climbed to her feet as Fang finally sat up. The older girl looked down at her armor, where a number of bullet holes had littered her chest plate, while Vanille timidly walked over and knelt beside the fallen soldier.

"Never thought I'd ever be this appreciative of a PSICOM uniform," Fang mumbled. She dug her fingers into one of the holes and pulled out a flattened bullet, bringing it close to her face to examine before tossing the thing over her shoulder. "But we should keep moving. I don't know where in the hell those two came from, but that other group probably heard the gunshots."

"He's dead."

"What?" Fang placed her hands against the floor and pushed herself up. Vanille was still kneeling over the soldier with her back facing Fang. Both of her hands were placed on the soldier's chest, emitting a pale green glow. "Van, you probably just knocked him out. He's under so much armor, how would ya even be able to tell?"

"When I'm healing, I can feel—just—I can tell! He's dead!"

Fang's jaw slightly gaped. "Vanille… I'm—"

Fang stopped in mid-sentence when she heard muffled yelling from around the bend further down the hall. Her head perked up anxiously, trying to gauge how far away the shouts were coming from, before quickly looking back down to Vanille and the soldier.

"Vanille, I'm really sorry, but the rest of 'em are coming. We've gotta go."

"I just killed someone!" Vanille snapped, finally turning away from the soldier to fiercely glare at Fang through red, tear laden eyes.

"And there's nothing you can do for him now!" Fang returned. "But if we don't move, we might end up the same way! C'mon!"

Fang reached down to grab Vanille by the bend of her elbow, but the smaller girl pulled away. "Oh gods…" she groaned, gazing at the floor with a far off look in her eyes, "I think I'm going to be sick…"

"Van, we don't have time for—"

Fang paused when she heard a metallic slithering sound lightly screech across the hall. A small, silver canister slid from around the corner, skidding across the marble floor before rolling to a stop a few steps away from them.

BOOM!

Everything flashed white. A loud ringing sound rattled between Fang's ears. She didn't remember falling or being blown backwards, but she was definitely on the floor. Her head felt as if it were on the verge of exploding, and the yelling PSICOM soldiers that were undoubtedly running towards them from the other end of the hall didn't do anything to help.

"Wait! Hold you fire!" one of them shouted. There was a pause. "Don't take another step forw—ahhhh!"

Fang heard another loud boom. She felt the building shaking beneath her as her head rolled around against the hard floor. She even heard the sound of begging PSICOM soldiers. She heard it all until it all suddenly stopped.

Her vision was doubling. Or tripling. Maybe even quadrupling. The ceiling moved around and no line remained static. It was almost like she was staring through a kaleidoscope. She now heard the light clicking of boots on the marble floor. When they stopped, a distorted face was leaning over her, staring down at her. Her vision hadn't cleared to the point where she could see the face clearly, but she was sure as hell about one thing. On top of the person's head was an unmistakable bed of pink hair.

"Light?" Fang murmured. She dazedly reached up to touch the pink and felt a gentle grip take hold of her wrist before her consciousness finally gave out.

Lightning snuck from column to column, carefully looking around to continually survey the area before taking her next step. Positive that there was no one in earshot, she lifted the radio to her lips and clicked down on its button. "Where am I exactly?" she whispered.

Static. "One of Primarch Dysley's galleries," Hope's voice replied. "I figure if you go straight through there then—"

"Shhh!" Lightning hushed and pressed herself against one of the columns. "I see someone."

Lightning wiggled her fingers before fastening them around the hilt of her blade. Towards the back of the large room was a line of crystalline sculptures, and there was definitely a strange man kneeling down in front of one at the end of the line.

Static. "Lightning, we're not getting any kinda signs that there'd be soldiers—"

"He doesn't look like a soldier," Lightning cut Snow off in a harsh whisper. "He's wearing a green jacket and he's got an afro. That's definitely a grooming violation… He still seems fishy, though. I'm gonna check him out."

Lightning slipped the radio back into her belt and cautiously looked around one more time to make sure that it was only the two of them in the room. When she was certain they were alone, she quietly crept up behind the man, slowly pulling her blade further and further out of its case as she moved. When she was just about close enough to reach out and touch him, she pulled the blade fully from the case and pointed it forward so that the tip lightly poked the back of the man's neck. "Put your hands where I can see them."

The man didn't react at all. He just continued to stare forward at the particularly small figure in front of him.

"Did you hear me?" Lightning twisted her blade so that the tip screwed further into the man's neck. "I said put your hands where I can see them, or I'll—"

"You'll what?" the man asked, still gazing forward. "Kill me?"

Lightning's eyes curiously narrowed on the back of the man's head. He definitely wasn't a soldier, she could tell that much. Maybe if he had been, she would've felt more comfortable in bluffing that maybe she would, but the way this particular man had asked… it had taken her aback a little bit.

"Haven't you all taken enough from me already?" the man continued miserably.

Still keeping the blade pressed against the man's neck, Lightning's eyes darted past his bushy head of hair to study the figure in front of them. It was conspicuously the smallest figure in the room, a tiny crystal sculpture of a small, afro-headed boy. Her eyes then jumped back to the man, going back and forth as she began to notice certain similarities between the man and the sculpture. They looked so alike. And even though she kept reminding herself that it was just a figurine, every time she looked into the small statue's eyes, she got this eerie feeling that someone was staring right back at her. In the back of her mind, she could hear Vanille's voice from when they had snuck into the hidden room of the Vestige, reading them the story about how successful l'Cie succumbed to a deep crystal slumber… It didn't make much sense, but she still found herself uttering, "That's your… son?"

The man remained quiet at first, but then he sighed and answered, "Yeah."

Lightning's eyebrows creased as she once again switched her gaze from the back of the man's head to the little, crystal boy.

"It's strange. When I first saw him here, I thought, 'Nah. Can't be. They're just trying to pull one over on me.' But once I got close enough… Once I touched him… I knew. I knew immediately."

Lightning lowered her blade and took a step back.

"What?" The man lightly huffed, never turning around to face the girl. "Change of heart?"

"I'm not PSICOM," Lightning answered. "And you don't seem like much of a threat."

The man humorlessly snorted.

"So your son… He was a l'Cie?"

"Guess so."

Lightning's brows creased even more. There was something off about this whole situation. "Was he turned at the Vestige?"

The man shook his head. "No. Probably was turned here."

"Here?" Lightning quizzically stared at the back of the man's head. "That's impossible. That would mean a fal'Cie is here."

"Trust me." The man finally turned to look back at Lightning, his eyes moving up and down her body as he critically took her in. His already morose face dulled even more when he realized how young the girl who had just held him a knifepoint was. "I witnessed someone get turned firsthand upstairs. There's a fal'Cie here."

Lightning's stomach twisted. Things just kept getting worse. "So all the crystal figures here…" She turned her head to look down the neatly arranged row of crystal statues. "It hasn't been ages since the last fal'Cie encounter. There must've been a fal'Cie around here for some time to do this. Do you think the Sanctum knows…"

Lightning's voice trailed off when her eyes landed on a certain crystal structure a few figures down from the one she currently stood in front of. The kneeling man stared at Lightning with only slight curiosity as she slowly dragged her feet to a crystal statue that she hadn't noticed earlier because she was so preoccupied with the man.

"No…" she breathed. Her eyes had widened exponentially and were frantically running over the statue's form.

"Aye. Soldier girl. Everything all right?" the man asked.

Lightning reached out to lightly touch the statue's dainty, outstretched crystal hand. Her eyes traveled past the hand, up the statue's arm and to its face. The air around her thickened as she studied the statue's terrified facial features, features that so closely resembled her own. She wanted to believe that it was just a trick, some sort of prop put up in this gallery just to throw her for a loop, but just as the man had said earlier… the moment she touched that hand, she could vaguely feel someone trying to reach back out to her.

"Someone you know?"

Lightning slowly nodded. "My little sister."

"Sorry to hear that. When did she turn?"

"I don't—she didn't." Lightning bit the inside of her lip as she rubbed the crystallized Serah's fingers, as if the action could actually comfort the girl. "I mean, she—she shouldn't even be here. She's supposed to be with…" Still holding Serah's hand, Lightning leaned back to look down the line at the rest of the crystallized figures, but there were no other familiar faces. "Where's my dad?"

The cool relief of a healing spell coursed through Fang's body. She rolled her head to the side and opened her eyes. She was standing up, or being held up, in what looked to be a small, empty room. She tried to take a step forward, but found that she couldn't move.

"Hm?" Her eyes dropped to look down her body. Three thick, leather straps had tightly bound her to a wide, marble column. She tried wriggling her wrists, and then her ankles, but there was no give at all. Whoever tied her up must've been a pro.

"So you finally decided to join us, Yun Fang," a familiar voice rumbled.

A shadow rolled around from the other side of the column to hover over her. The girl looked up to meet a pair of red-rimmed, steely blue eyes peering down at her.

"Colonel Farron," Fang croaked. "Fancy seeing you here."

"Yes. I feel we have a weird habit of running into each other at the most opportune moments, don't you agree?" The colonel gave Fang a sinister smirk before backing away.

Fang squirmed uncomfortably in her tightly bound position but instantly stilled as she watched the colonel take a step back. She hadn't noticed before because he had been standing so close, but now her eyes were magnetically drawn to the elaborate brand that was etched across Colonel Farron's neck. "You—you're a l'Cie."

"Please…" Vanille's voice came out as a weak whimper from the other side of the column. "Please no more…"

"No more?" Fang's eyes widened in alarm. "No more what? What's going—rahhhhh!"

A hand landed on Fang's shoulder and a hot, fiery rush surged through Fang's veins, ripping through her insides like a flaming blade. The hand soon lifted, and the moment it did, the surge stopped. The hand then found its way to Fang's chest, its touch immediately accompanied by a brief healing spell.

"That," the colonel said, putting a particular emphasis on the word, "is what has been going on. Isn't that right, Dia Vanille?"

"Holy shit…" Fang breathed, her chest deeply heaving in and out. Colonel Farron had disappeared from in front of her but she could hear his footsteps clicking against the floor as he moved around the column.

"AHHHHHHH!" The room was suddenly filled with Vanille's loud wailing.

"STOP! STOP IT!" Fang jerked and pulled at her restraints, but it was of no use. "Leave her alone! If you're mad about me and Light, leave her out of it! We're all l'Cie! We should be on the same team! If ya wanna take out some anger, take it out on me!"

Vanille's shrieking stopped and was replaced by cold, hard chuckling that bounced off the walls of the empty room. Fang could once again hear Farron's footsteps as he made his way back around the column.

"You have one thing slightly right." Farron came to a stop in front of Fang again. "This is about 'Lightning'." He lifted his hands to use air quotes as he said his daughter's nickname. "But it has nothing to do with the clichéd teenage rebellion phase that she's going through with you."

"Phase?" Fang asked, scrunching her eyebrows. "How would you know? Have ya even talked to her about—ahhhhh!"

A short tap to her shoulder and a short shock to her system.

"I've been in this business a long time," Farron coolly claimed. "A person who isn't sure about how much time they have left will do crazy, uncharacteristic things. I once met a man who had been imprisoned in an enemy stable for a week." Farron paused for dramatic effect and let his eyes distastefully drop down to Fang's face right before he continued. "He fucked a sheep. But I guess those are too hard to find around Bodhum, so my daughter settled for the next best thing."

Fang growled and grit her teeth. She could feel her face heating up and her eyes dangerously narrowing on the colonel.

"Oh? Did I offend you?" Farron asked, mocking surprise at the angered look on Fang's face. "Hmph." He smirked and once again leaned over Fang, so close that their noses were nearly touching. "Then maybe you can help me understand how a sheep wouldn't be better than some prong-tailed beast."

The heat in Fang's face was growing hotter. He was so close. Close enough for her to… yes. She audibly growled as her fingers shot forward, the leather strap that bound her wrists to the column giving her just enough leeway so that she could grab his thigh and dig into it with a tight squeeze. She wanted so bad to hurt him. She wanted more than anything for something to seep through her fingers and into his thigh to cause him pain… but it was just a hope, because even she hadn't forgotten that quickly that she was wearing a cuff that blocked her from using her powers.

"Pathetic." Farron callously knocked Fang's hand from off his thigh and took a step back. "I thought this would be more of a challenge. Facing the two who will form the mighty Ragnarok… But all I'm stuck with is a foolish l'Cie who can't use its powers, and a broken one who just refuses to." Farron's eyes lifted as if to look through the other side of the column where Vanille was tied up as he finished the last part of his statement. "But I won't complain with easy."

"You know about Ragnarok," Fang growled through a tightly clenched jaw.

"I know about everything now," Farron stated. He once again reached out a hand to place against Fang's chest to send another quick surge spell through her body. Fang's back arched against the column as the dark energy traveled through her, her coarse yells soon rising into a high-pitched shriek as the colonel continued to zap her.

"You see," Farron began as he finally pulled his hand away from Fang, "I made a deal with the fal'Cie. It ensures the safety of my children as long as I find you and teach you a lesson."

Fang's body involuntarily trembled. She felt delirious but the feeling soon passed as one of the colonel's hands rested on her stomach to quickly heal her.

"But… why?" Fang groaned once she had the strength to speak again. "You found a cure…"

"A cure?" Farron laughed. "There is no cure! At least not any more, there isn't. The fal'Cie made sure of that. He had those poor scientists imprisoned and me delivered here before proceeding to give me an offer that I just couldn't refuse. You for my family."

"Had 'em imprisoned?" Fang asked, confused. "Wait… I-I don't understand."

"Ughh, do I have to spell everything out for you?" Farron sighed. "It's the primarch. The primarch is the fal'Cie."

"What?" Fang breathed in disbelief.

"Funny, isn't it? All throughout history, Pulsians have been playing slave to the fal'Cies. I guess even relocating to Cocoon couldn't stop that. And your people took such pride in the stories about how they put their foot down and refused to ever let a fal'Cie boss them around anymore… How often do you think the primarch sat back and laughed at them while he sat on his throne and you all scraped by?" Farron lifted his hand again and wiggled his fingers.

"Touch me," Fang snarled, "And I'll rip your hand off."

Farron froze with a slightly intrigued look on his face. "Oh," he said slowly. "Don't do this?"

Farron cupped Fang's cheek and the pain rushed through the girl's system again.

"Etro, this feels much better than I thought it would," Farron said, pulling his hand away from Fang.

But the pain didn't stop.

Neither did the uncontrollable shaking.

"And finally, I get a reaction," Fang could hear the colonel saying as she clenched her jaw even tighter.

Fang wasn't sure if the excruciating feeling of something tearing through her insides had ceased or if it had just shifted into something else. Her blood boiled and her limbs tingled. Her entire body throbbed. Her bones felt as if they were growing heavy and her skin felt as if it were stretching. But worst of all was the pushing feeling. The horrible feeling as if something was inside of her, trapped beneath her skin and pushing from the inside, trying to get out… but it couldn't. No matter how hard it pushed and tried, and Etro knows it was trying.

"Ahhhhhh…." Fang let out a labored moan. She felt as if she were about to explode.

A strange sound—a mix between a shriek and a roar—echoed from the other side of the column. She couldn't see it, but Fang could feel it perfectly. From the other side of the column, Vanille's body involuntarily was reacting to her pain. She was starting to transform without her.

"Well, this is getting a little lop-sided." Farron walked from around the side of the column after studying Vanille. Fang hadn't even noticed that he left. "Slow down for a moment. I can't have one of you going off without the other." Another hand landed on Fang's shoulder, and immediately her body stilled, almost as if she had been paralyzed. Along with control of her body, she also lost the extremely prevalent feeling of pain coursing through her system. From the other side of the column, she could hear Vanille taking in rapid, huffy breaths. Human breaths. Whatever power the colonel had used to freeze Fang was obviously enough to stop Vanille's transformation.

"Now…" Farron gave the two Gran Pulsians a moment to settle before removing his hand from Fang's shoulder and dropping his eyes down to the suppressor cuff around her wrist. "Let's try this again without the accessory."

"No, no! Wait! Ya don't know what you're doing!" Fang wriggled her arm in hopes that it would come free so that she could hide her wrist from the colonel.

"I don't know what I'm doing?" Farron asked icily. He sounded offended by the statement. "Do you know what happens to l'Cie who don't fulfill their focus in time?"

Fang clenched her teeth and forced her eyes up to meet Farron's.

"Ohhh, you do… You've seen those wretches, haven't you? Tortured souls who do nothing but despair and cling to an unattainable focus… I'd rather my daughters live the next hundred years in a crystal prison than turn into one of those."

"You talk about us… but you're no better," Fang grit out. "You're as much a slave as anyone else was. But you're the kind who looks at his shackles and thinks they're bracelets."

"Excuse me?" Farron paused to give Fang a disdainful glare.

"It's the primarch. A man you've worked for for how many years? Who you've met on how many occasions? I bet he's even asked you about your family before, hasn't he? After all of this, you trust him to keep Light safe? You think he gives a damn about her life? He knew Lightning was a l'Cie and still sent you and the rest of PSICOM after her. Now he's convinced ya to help him destroy the world because now all of a sudden he cares about your family?"

"My daughters will be alive—"

"Will they?!" Fang shot back. "On what world will there be to live? Both of ours will be going to shit! How can ya even trust him to keep his end of the bargain? You're supposed to be protecting your people and your family, but instead you're letting a fal'Cie, who's already fucked everything up enough, call the shots!"

"And you would do things differently?" Farron asked in a low voice.

Fang just stared at him with a fierce look in her eyes. "Let me go, and together, all of us… we can kill the fal'Cie. No world destruction. Free the scientists. Get everybody cured."

"What?" Vanille softly asked.

"It was our plan from the beginning, remember? None of us are becoming one of those things," Fang said decisively. "None of us. Colonel, let us go, and I promise. We'll go straight to the primarch and make sure he never destroys another family ever again."

The expression on Farron's face looked quite conflicted. He definitely seemed to have his doubts about the fal'Cie, but he also seemed more than skeptical about Fang. "And why should I trust you? You've done nothing but lie and scheme behind my back, as well. What makes you so different from the fal'Cie?"

"I guess..." Fang paused, hesitant to answer, before releasing a deep breath and looking the colonel earnestly in the eye. "The fal'Cie doesn't think it might be in love with your daughter."

A deep scowl formed on Farron's face.

"I know you don't approve of us, but the fal'Cie doesn't care about what happens to Light. I do. I know ya know I do. If we pull this off, the fal'Cie can't hurt your family anymore. I go back to Gran Pulse, the scientists find a cure, the portals get torn down, and you never have to see me again. If it doesn't work out, I'll be wearing the cuff the whole time. You can just blast it off, have me turn, and fulfill your deal. It all works in your favor."

Farron folded his arms and continued to stare at Fang as he considered the idea. Finally, he sighed and reached behind him to pull a pair of clippers from his back waistband.

"You, uh… ya just walk around all day with those shoved in your pants?" Fang asked as the colonel took a step closer.

He stopped to give her a derisive look and she forced an innocent smile.

"Sorry. I'm shutting up," she apologized as the colonel proceeded to cut through the leather straps that bound her to the column.

"And trust me…" Fang warily watched as Farron walked to the other side of the column to begin cutting at the looser parts of the straps that held Vanille. When she was positive that he was preoccupied, she bent down to unfasten one of her armored boots.

"…you won't…"

Vanille instinctively rubbed her arms once the first two straps had been cut loose. She felt dirty, rotten, and violated in so many ways. It was a comfort to run her hands over her skin and feel just that—skin—instead of the tough, leathery blue replacement that the organ had begun to stretch into when the colonel had earlier incited Fang.

"…REGRET IT."

Vanille gasped at the loud pang that was immediately followed by Colonel Farron toppling over and falling to the ground. Behind where he had been standing was Fang, gripping a shiny boot above her head with both hands. "That oughta buy us some time," she sighed with relief. She quickly dropped down into a crouch to roll the unconscious colonel over and grab his clippers so that she could continue cutting Vanille free.

"What did you just do?" Vanille asked, wide-eyed as she stared at the unconscious man on the ground.

"I trust that man about as far as I can throw him," Fang replied. She cut through the last bit of the strap and got to her feet as Vanille stumbled forward, finally free. Fang then held the clippers up to her face to study. "And he looks like a very heavy man." She looked down at the cuff on her wrist, then back to the clippers. Seemingly pleased with the tool, she shoved the clippers into an empty space on her belt and then put her boot back on.

"Well…" Vanille said nervously, darting her eyes from Colonel Farron to Fang. "What you said earlier about the fal'Cie… are we really going to… to kill more—"

"Hey." Fang stepped into Vanille and pulled her into a comforting embrace. "You're not gonna have to kill anyone, okay? I promise ya that. Now let's find a way out of here." And just that quickly, Fang had Vanille by the hand and was leading her out the room and down the hall, frantically searching each intersection for something that struck interest. "Sazh said he was seven floors down, right? We need an elevator."

"But Fang," Vanille continued, not being able to pull her mind from the conversation in that room, "You promised Lightning's dad, too. How are we gonna stop the fal'Cie?"

"Elevator!" Fang called in a sing-song voice as they turned down another corner. She excitedly slammed her hand on the 'down' button while Vanille expectantly stared at her, waiting for an answer. However, Fang now seemed determined to avoid all eye contact. She even pulled the clippers out of her belt and began twirling them around in her hand.

"Fang." Vanille grabbed Fang by the elbow and spun her around so that they were facing each other. "What's the plan for the fal'Cie?"

Fang sighed and pulled her hands behind her back. She looked down to the floor before finally shaking her head and looking up to meet Vanille's anxious stare.

"You do want to kill it…" Vanille breathed in realization. "Fang, you just said—"

DING!

The doors to the elevator opened as Vanille stood, gaping in disbelief at her best friend.

"You didn't see those monsters, Vanille," Fang simply replied. "I don't trust Colonel Farron, but he wasn't entirely wrong. Any fate is better than that, and I won't let any of you become one of those things."

"But you promised—"

"I promised," Fang cut in, placing a hand on Vanille's shoulder and pushing her back into the elevator, "that you wouldn't have to kill anyone, and I'd never let anyone try to force that on you."

"But you can't face a fal'Cie by yourself!"

"Listen," Fang calmly turned to the elevator's control panel and clicked a button. "Don't worry about me. I just want you to find Sazh and Dahj, get to Light, then go home."

"But—but you also promised! You said we'd stick togeth—"

"And that I'd protect you."

Vanille felt a hand roughly push her down to the elevator floor before hearing a medley of loud buzzing and popping sounds. When she looked up, Fang was pulling her hand away from the elevator's control panel. She looked down at Vanille and gave her a weak smile before hopping backwards out of the elevator just before the doors could slide shut.

"NOOO!" Vanille scrambled over to the shiny metal doors and banged on them. "FANG!" she cried. "Don't leave—" Vanille paused when she felt something hard digging into her hand. She lifted her hand from the elevator floor and held up a silver suppressor cuff that looked as if it had been sliced cleanly through with a set of clippers.

DING!

"There's an elevator in here?!"

Vanille was still staring at the cuff when the elevator doors opened and she could hear a familiar voice shout at someone.

"Vanille?"

Vanille finally looked up to see Lightning come to jogging stop a few meters in front of the elevator. Sazh came skidding behind her, but when he noticed Vanille, his expression was less surprised and more angry.

"Vanille…" he growled.

The man reached into his waistband and pulled out one of the guns he had taken from the PSICOM soldiers earlier.

"Wai—whoa!" Lightning jumped back in shock at the sudden appearance of a firearm. She quickly raised an open palm in Sazh's direction. "Calm down! She's okay! She's with me!"

"This is all because of you!" Sazh shouted, ignoring Lightning and keeping his gun aimed directly at Vanille. "Because of you and Fang, they turned my boy into crystal!"

"Fang? How do—You two know each other?!" Lightning exclaimed, keeping her hand raised and ready to fire a spell into the man at any moment.

"They turned him into crystal?" Vanille squeaked, tears rolling down her face. "I'm sorr—"

"No, no, no! Don't start with the apologizing again!" Sazh reprimanded with nothing but fire in his eyes.

"Can you just put the gun down!" Lightning snapped at him in return. Her hand started glowing with the beginnings of a fire spell.

"No, Sazh is right." Vanille sniffled and slowly rose to her feet. She took a deliberate step out of the elevator and held out her arms, exposing her chest as a clear target. "It is my fault. And I deserve it. Shoot me."

"What?!" Both Sazh and Lightning uttered at the same time.

Lightning's head spun. She couldn't tell who she should be reprimanding more, but just decided to go for the older man with the gun. "And you're Sazh?! What are you doing?! Aren't you like a second father to her?!"

Sazh still had his gun aimed and ready, but from the look on his face, it was obvious that he had lost a lot of his conviction. "Yeah," he finally relented, lowering his weapon. "I am. And I guess now would be a better time to cling to family instead of shoot them…"

Lightning kept a stern eye on Sazh even after he lowered his weapon.

"Speaking of clinging to family, where did Fang go?"

Lightning's brows perked at the name and her head flung in Vanille's direction. "You found Fang?"

"I… yeah," Vanille somberly nodded. "We, uh, we found out that the primarch is a fal'Cie and Fang got worked up and…" Vanille took a hard swallow. Instead of finishing her statement, she just opened her hand to reveal the clipped suppressor cuff.

It only took Lightning a second to catch the hint.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me, Fang," she grumbled and swiftly snatched the radio out of her belt. "Snow. Hope. We've got a problem. Fang's cuff is off and she's heading towards the primarch's chambers. I need the quickest route there."

Static. "Primarch's chambers? Why there?" Snow's voice asked back.

Lightning thought for a moment before clicking down on the button. She wasn't sure whether it would be wise or not to expose what she knew over the radio where all the Cavalry could hear… But fuck it. "She's going after a fal'Cie."

Static. "What?"

Static. "Excuse me?" Rygdea's voice was now on the line.

Static. "Lightning, hold on! We'll give you directions and meet you halfway," Hope was now saying.

Static. "Just wait one damn minute! I want to hear your sources!" Rygdea barked.

Static. "There's a door in the southwest corner of the gallery. Go through it."

Lightning tucked the radio back into her belt and made a move towards said corner.

"Wait!" Vanille jumped to follow her. "I'm coming with—"

"No!" Lightning pivoted and planted a halting hand into Vanille's chest. "It's too dangerous to have you two together and you know it."

"But—"

"You," Lightning turned to Sazh, successfully cutting Vanille off in the process. "Can I trust you to not flip out again?"

"Yeah, you can trust me," Sazh replied with the nod of his head.

"Good. There are a bunch of open portals in the courtyard that lead to Gran Pulse. Make sure she gets there safely. And if I hear that you harmed one hair on her head, I swear to Etro and Lindzei, you'll be sorry."

"Sure. Got it. Get to the portals," Sazh brushed off. "Vanille, help me lift Dahj. We're not going anywhere without him."

"But Lightning, you need to know—"

But Lightning hadn't waited around long enough to hear Vanille out. She had already sprinted out and was running through the door in the room's southwest corner.

Vanille shook her head and sighed. "She doesn't need me to change."