"And you put this together and then this, and…Voila! A nicely built sword!"

"Cool! Hey, dad?"

"Hm? What is it, Lyra?"

"Will you teach me how to fight with swords and other stuff?"

He smiled, ruffling her hair. "Sure thing, kiddo. I'll teach you everything I know."

"…yra. Lyra…Wake up, Lyra!"

"…ou don't think she's dead, do you?"

"Don't be so negative! Oh, look! She moved! Lyra, can you hear me?"

I opened my eyes slowly, the first thing I was able to register was that I was on the ground and that I was cold. I sat up and shook my head, taking in my surroundings. We were in some type of…crystallized place, though I didn't deny the fact that it was breathtakingly beautiful. The one thing I didn't like about it was that it was terribly cold, something I disliked. I can't help it, I was born and raised in a warm place! "Where are we?"

"Lake Bresha," Vanille said, holding a hand out to me. I took it and allowed her to help me up so I could walk around a bit.

"Lake…Bresha? But…why is it like this now?"

"When we fell, the lake must've turned into crystal." Afro said, staring up from where we had fallen. "Help me out here! I mean, did the fal'Cie do this? How in the world did we end up here?"

"How should I know?" Lightning asked, seeing as how the question was directed to her.

"We're alive," Vanille said in surprise, falling down to her knees, "How?"

"Serah!" Trench Coat suddenly exclaimed, all of us staring over at him. "No one survives a fall from that high, not without a miracle. Serah saved us!"

"Serah? Listen. It's all your fault she got-" She wasn't able to finish, due to the monster coming up behind her and catching all of our attentions. Before it could squish Lightning, Snow jumped in front of her and blocked it's arm, his arm suddenly glowing as he punched the creature and killed it. He stared down at his arm in shock.

"What…did I just do?"

Hope stood up next to me. "You used magic!" More creatures were coming now. "You used the power of a l'Cie! The fal'Cie curse us. We're l'Cie now!"

Trench Coat, Lightning, and Vanille took out the rest of the monsters before everything was calm again.

"So we really are l'Cie."

Afro let out a sigh. "Look's like it."

"You too?" Trench coat asked, looking at Vanille and I. I nodded, lifting up the side of my shirt to reveal the mark on my side, Vanille lifting up part of her skirt to reveal the mark on her side. "Okay."

"L'Cie to the last." Lightning said as we all gathered in a circle. Hope fell to his knees.

"Why me?" He mumbled, before sending an angry look at Lightning. "I don't even know you! But you have to go and attack that thing? Just leave me alone!" He looked at Trench coat. "It's your fault-it's your fault my-! You could've-!" He stood up and glared at Trench Coat angrily. "All of this is your and Serah's fault!"

That definitely hit a nerve. "Watch it!"

Hope fell to the ground and backed up, bumping into Lightning instead. He crawled away and held his head in his hands, cowering away. I walked over to him and knelt down next to him, glaring up at Trench coat, who sighed looking away. "Sorry."

Vanille put a hand on Hope's shoulder giving him a reassuring smile. "Everything's gonna be all right. You'll see."

He looked at me and I smiled, nodding in agreement. "She's right. It'll all be okay…"

Vanille helped him and began to drag us away to explore, the others following behind us. I zoned out and wasn't really listening to the conversation topic going on, until Lightning spoke to me. "Did you see anything?"

I realized she was talking about when we were falling. "Hm? Oh! Yeah, I did! It was big, humongous! And….it was really scary too…" I said, mumbling the last part to myself, clasping my hands together and holding them to my chest.

"W-wait a minute. Hold on now. Did we all have the same dream?"

"Ragnarok…"

The pictures from earlier flashed through my mind again and I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut.

"So, we all saw the same dream. We all heard that same voice."

"You mean that was our Focus? But how are we supposed to know what to do from that?" Hope asked.

"That's the tricky part. The dream is the only hint the fal'Cie gives us. Figuring out what to do with it-that's our job." Vanille explained, and I sighed, walking off a ways and sitting down somewhere, hugging my knees to my chest and resting my head on top of them. Someone suddenly grabbed me and pulled me to my feet and began to drag me along, that person being Vanille, Trench Coat in front of us.

"Say, kid," Trench Coat said, looking down at me. "Can you fight?"

I would've laughed, had the mood called for it, "Why do you ask?"

"You look kind of-" I cut him off by punching him in the arm, earning a bit of laughter from him as he reached up and rubbed the spot, grinning at me slightly. "Stronger than you look. Some punch you've got."

"I guess…." I mumbled, looking at the ground. This guy…he reminded me of my older brother…

He was exactly like him.

"Weird, isn't it? Of all the messed up ways to meet…Might as well make introductions? I'm Snow-Snow Villiers. Short stuff?"

Hope glanced at him quietly. "Hope. Hope Estheim."

"What about her?" Vanille asked, pointing to Lightning. He informed us who she was, but that Lightning really wasn't her real name. Her last name was Farron. "I'm Vanille!"

"Sazh Katzroy. Good to meet you." Afro said.

"What about you?" He asked, gesturing to me. "What's your name?"

"M-my name's Lyra….Lyra Gaines, Mr. Snow."

He chuckled. "Actually, it's just Snow."

I simply nodded and gave him a small smile, "Right…nice to meet you, Snow…And everyone else."

I felt myself being dragged away again by Vanille, who was giggling happily as she skipped along, Hope not too far behind us. Vanille let me go to turn back to face the rest of our misfit group and wave her arms around at them.

"Hey! Come on, Come on!" I couldn't help but giggle quietly as I watched Vanille grab Hope's hand and lift it up to wave it around with her own. Once more, we all began to travel further into Lake Bresha, me not really paying attention to anything, unless we ran into some monsters and had to fight. I kept my gaze to the ground and in front of me pretty much the entire time, and my mouth shut. I had nothing to say, so why try speaking to anyone? Not like it mattered.

Maybe I should just go mute….

"W-whoa!" I exclaimed as I felt myself being dragged forward again by Vanille, looking up to see that Snow was kneeling in front of some crystal stalagmites, and I realized why.

That girl that had been turned to crystal, Serah, was wedged in them.

"We'll help!" Vanille told snow, handing me a piece of what appeared to be broken debris, getting to work on helping Snow, me moving right behind her to help.

"Thanks," Snow grunted, continuing to try and free Serah, Sazh moving to help out as well. Hope looked like he was going to join in, but he stopped as Snow stood up and turned around to look at Lightning, who was beginning to walk away.

"Lightning?" we all stopped to listen, "You're just gonna leave her?"

"PSICOM will be here soon. If they find us, we're all dead. You think Serah would want that? You think you know how she feels?" She began to walk away again, Snow speaking once more.

"If I leave her, then I'll never know," Lightning stopped again to listen, "We'll be fine. I can handle anything they throw at us. No one will die. I'll protect Serah. And Cocoon!"

Lightning turned back with a dangerous look on her face as she stomped back to Snow, and I figured she was gonna hurt him in some way…

Turns out, I was right. She slugged him, and he fell backwards into Sazh, knocking them both onto the ground, eliciting a gasp from Vanille.

"Does she look protected to you?"

Snow got back up and moved back to Lightning, only to get punched in the face by her again.

"What can you possibly do?"

"Whatever it takes!"

My thoughts drifted back to a few days ago as the words reached my ears.

"Matt! Don't do it!"

Warm hands gripped my shoulders and green orbs bore into my own soft brown ones, the intensity making something within me panic.

"Mom and dad need help…and since I'm the oldest, I have to go and rescue them."

"But those soldiers will kill you!"

Matt's grip on my shoulders tightened to the point where it sort of hurt a little. "Listen to me, Lyra. I will do whatever it takes to help my family…even if it means having to risk my life."

"Mattie…"

"…-OVE!" I felt myself being knocked down to the ground, shock overtaking me. I looked up to see Hope on top of me, before he helped me up and moved back as far away as he could, dragging me along with him. I wanted to ask him what was wrong with him, when I noticed the giant monster that had shown up.

As we stayed hidden, watching as Lightning, Snow, and Vanille fought the large monster, Hope spoke up to me.

"Who's Mattie?"

I felt myself stiffen, realizing I must've said my brother's name out loud during my reminiscing.

I didn't answer the question, since the battle had stopped and the monster had fallen, causing me to run over to them to escape anymore persisting questions from Hope. It's not that I didn't want to tell him, I just didn't want to talk about my brother to someone I had only just met recently.

Lightning began to move off, and Snow jumped in front of her to block her way. "You're leaving?"

She didn't respond, and Sazh stepped forward, his tone sounding honest and sincere.

"We want to help Serah too," he looked over at the crystallized Serah and groaned, placing his hands on his hips, "But without tools…we could be digging for days."

"So," I began, everyone looking over at me in surprise, since I hadn't really spoken a lot since we had all joined up, "what you're saying is that basically, we can't do anything to help her?"

He nodded in response, "The army's on our trail. For now, we've got to keep moving. For now." Sazh repeated when Snow sent him a look.

"So I just abandon her, and save myself?" Snow shouted angrily, his voice echoing through the lake.

"What about your Focus?" Lightning said suddenly, causing Snow to stop from saying more. "What happened to banding together and saving the world? Isn't that what you promised? Now you want to forget it all and die right here? Snow? You're nothing but talk." She walked away from him with that, stopping when he called her.

"Lightning! I'll do whatever it takes. I'll finish this Focus…and keep Serah safe. That's my promise."

"Great job so far." She began to leave, and Sazh approached Snow and gave him a halfhearted smile.

He grinned, "Stay out of trouble."

Sazh made a noise of agreement and patted his shoulder as he walked by, "You too."

Only us three children remained in front of Snow, Vanille mumbling quietly, Snow grinning at us and pointing to the direction Lightning and Sazh had gone in. "Get going."

Vanille listened and began to head off in the same direction, Hope running after her, stopping to talk with Snow. "Snow…"

Snow grinned and pointed after Vanille. "Save it for next time, kiddo. You'll get left behind."

"But…"

"It's okay, Hope. Light will take care of you. We'll meet again."

"Yeah…Count on it." He took off, leaving me standing there still.

"Say, kid…better hurry after them or you'll get left behind."

I nodded, "I know. But first…I wanted to thank you."

He was obviously confused, "Huh?"

I smiled up at him, "I was in the group of people that you helped earlier. Because of you, you helped me get my freedom back, somewhat. So…thank you. And, um…Miss Serah is very lucky to have a guy like you watching out for her."

I apparently must've shocked him, since the look on his face was one of surprise. I thought he wasn't going to say anything, but then he suddenly smiled, ruffling my hair.

"You're welcome, kid. And thanks. That means a lot to me."

"Lyyyyrrraaaa!" I looked to see Vanille waving at me to hurry up.

"Coming! Um, don't die, okay? I like you a lot, since you remind me of someone!" I took off at that, running to join up with the others, leaving Snow behind.

A/N: Ahaha, I know what you're all thinking. Sorry, I've been extremely busy, namely school being one of them. I hate it and it sucks ass...so yeah, review and stuff! LATER TATERS!