Hey guys, new update here. Enjoy and review and to answer Light's question, yes i had put myself as a character in the story, after all, i did the same for the prequel.

Anyway, Enjoy

Chapter Twenty-One

Run or die

The elevator arrived at the surface of a large opening in the middle of the Eden with the buildings all around them. The sunlight was shining brightly as Lightning, Éclair and Basch walked out of it, looking around themselves for sign of the Army but they were none.

"That's odd," Basch said softly.

Éclair had to agree with him. If the Army was looking for them, then where were they?

"Let's go before they arrive," Lightning said, quickly walking forward.

They walked across the large place but before they could get out however, a large shadow passed over them causing them to look up toward the sky.

"Shit," Basch swore.

A large Sanctum warship was hovering right above them and they were sending out a lot of machines all around them and even more soldiers were running from the side with their weapons aiming straight at them.

"Any ideas?"

"None," Lightning said holding her gunblade in her hand.

Then a voice was speaking to them.

"To think you would ally yourself with the enemy Lightning Farron. What will your sister say?"

Lightning looked up at the voice.

"Rygdea," she swore under her breath.

"Get ready to fire on my mark," Rygdea continued, "They have harmed our Primarch. This is an execution."

The trio can hear the guns cocking around them, and Éclair swallowed thickly feeling her hands shaking a little.

Then an explosion drew their attention toward one of the building, the blast was strong enough to knock a few soldiers to their back, and Éclair can feel her eyes narrow in confusion.

"Who…?"

From where the explosion had happened, soldiers were coughing and disoriented from the blast. Then a person stepped out of the smoke, dressed all in black with a coat upon his body and the person launched himself toward the soldiers punching them and taking them down swiftly.

"C'mon Tifa," he said.

A young woman stepped from the debris, carrying a rocket launcher on her back quickly ran forward and pulled the large weapon out and aimed it toward the craft that was hovering right across them and pressed the trigger.

With a hiss, the shot fired out and slammed against the side of the craft creating an explosion pushing the ship sideway.

"All right Paine, time to bring the rain," Tifa said, speaking through the radio in her ear.

"Right on," Paine voice said over the radio.

From behind Éclair, Lightning and Basch a small unfamiliar ship appeared from the Eden skyline and was now opening fire upon the soldiers who were quickly taking hit and then the large ship that had been damaged from the earlier was hit the most from the hits.

"Pull up," Rygdea was saying, "Pull up now."

Basch and Éclair had started to attack them as Basch used his gun and Éclair used her magic to take down soldiers. Lightning was firing at the soldiers with her gun blade in gun mode and she swiftly switched to her blade mode to cut down any soldiers that were still close to her.

Then she turned to see the small unfamiliar ship was landing and a hoverbike come flying toward them with two people upon it, and landing right beside them. A dark haired young man was driving it, dressed in a black coat and dark pants and was even wearing boots. The girl behind him was dressed similarly but without the coat simply in a black outfit.

"Haha, yeah," the young man said, getting off, "AVALANCHE send the Sanctum running back to their mommies."

"Zack, Tifa," Basch said looking confused, "What are you guys doing here?"

"Well, your brother has something to do with it," Zack told him giving him a smirk.

Basch frowned in confusion before the ship side opened and Vaan stepped out with a smile.

"Hey ya miss me?"

Éclair walked forward, shocked.

"Vaan, what…?"

Then Paine's voice came from over the speaker.

"I don't want to break up the reunion but we need to move…NOW," she said.

"We got company," Zack said, looking behind them.

More soldiers were coming toward them, all of them armed.

"C'mon let's go," Basch said.

They all got inside the ship and Zack closed the door behind him as the soldiers opened fire upon them. Inside both of Lightning's and Éclair brand flared bright blue drawing the people around them attention.

"What on earth…?" Tifa said.

Then the ship gave a lurch and all of them had to hang on to something.

"A little warning would have been nice Paine," Vaan yelled.

"It's not me," Paine yelled back.

Zack approached her seat.

"What do you mean it's not you?"

"The ship is flying by itself," Paine told her.

The silver haired girl was pulling against the control but they weren't moving from their position.

"What the hell…did you press on something?"

Paine shook her head.

"I didn't touch anything," she said, gritting her teeth.

The Pulsian ship tore through the sky narrowly avoiding the oncoming buildings.

"Where the hell is it taking us?" Vaan asked.

"I don't know," Paine told him.

Then the ship gives a nasty lurch.

"W…What the hell was that?" Éclair asked.

"We're getting shot at, that's what," Paine yelled.

Lightning give a glance out of the window and noticed the ship that was following them. She narrowed her eyes slightly, recognizing it instantly.

"Rygdea," she said.

The following ship continued to fire after them and the ship started to spin around, dodging the coming blasts.

"Damn," Paine yelled out.

The ship took hold of itself again and turned around heading back toward the city…more ever heading straight back toward the city passing right by the Sanctum ship that was following them causing the said ship to head sideway to avoid a collision.

"Holy…" Zack yelled.

Éclair was holding upon where she was seating and glanced toward Lightning who was simply seating into the corner her blue eyes seemed to be fixed upon the front of the ship, looking focused.

"Paine, pull up, you're going to crash into the building," Tifa said.

Paine took hold of the ship's control and started to pull them toward her but the control wouldn't budge.

"I…I can't," she said.

"Everyone, hang on to something," Vaan yelled.

They saw a building was coming straight for them, and Éclair felt a new type of fear as they headed straight for it and she closed her eyes waiting for the inevitable crash that was about to happen…

But it didn't come.

Confused, Éclair reopened her eyes to see that the ship was lowering itself unto the ground and went out of power. She can hear everyone's breathing around her and then someone got the guts to talk…

"What just happen?" Zack asked.

Vaan stepped forward his eyes looking through the large structure that they could see around them. It had a high ceiling, and all metal but the things looked hundreds of years old and they can see the rust upon the metallic structures with their eyes. High above them they can see a lot of metal crisscrossing each other and finally the ceiling where sunlight was coming from.

"Where exactly are we?" he said.

"Want to step out and see?" Tifa asked, "We're not going to see anything by just staying there."

The group walked out of the place, all of them glancing around. Lightning thought had stayed behind them walking slowly. Vaan had glanced back toward the Colonel and looked toward Éclair before returning her glance toward the Colonel again.

"What is it?" Éclair asked him.

"I…I just realize that you two look remarkably alike," he said.

Éclair glanced back at the Colonel.

"I realized that also when we first met," she said.

Then the woman returned her gaze toward him.

"Why did you come back for me?" she asked, "I told you that this little adventure was off."

Vaan glanced at her.

"It didn't make any sense for you to die," he said, "I realized something back then. You said the Fal'Cie chose you to destroy Cocoon right."

Éclair nodded.

"But why would they want to destroy Cocoon?" Vaan asked her, "What would they get out of it?"

Éclair blinked slightly at that.

"I don't know," she said, "But I think it got something to do with Primarch Dysley."

That drew everyone's attention.

"Primarch Dysley?" Zack repeated, not able to keep the confusion out of his voice, "What had happened? Was it that the cause of the alarm today?"

"The Primarch can use magic," Éclair said, "and I don't think he is human either."

"You really want us to believe that?" Tifa asked her.

Basch turned his gaze at her.

"She is telling the truth," He said, "I shot him at point blank…"

"You shot the Primarch?"

"It was the only way to get Éclair out of here," Basch snapped, "But he reappeared in this…light and he starts talking about things this Orphan and a prophecy."

"A prophecy?" Tifa repeated.

"A prophecy about Cocoon's destruction," Lightning finished for him, speaking for the first time since she was here.

Everyone turned toward her.

"Are you telling me that the Primarch knew about it?" Vaan said, his surprise visible on his face, "Your Focus."

"Seems like it," Éclair told him.

"This is messed up," Paine murmured.

"Can it be stopped?" Zack asked.

Éclair shook her head.

"I don't know."

Lightning walked past them.

"So what do we do next?" Zack asked, looking around.

"Find a way out of here," Lightning told him, coldly, "Unless you have another brilliant idea?"

Zack looked at her, but kept his mouth shut.

Then the woman turned around and walked off.

"What's her problem?" he said.

No one answered her as they started to walk after the soldier.

"Trust a soldier to keep her cool during all of this," Basch said.

"Aren't you one of them?" Vaan snapped at him.

Before Basch could answer, the younger Bartholomew walked off.

Lightning decided to walk away from them. She still couldn't believe that her entire life had changed in a mere few hours. Just this morning, she had believed that she was going to deliver the Pulsian to the Primarch and get back to her life…but the Primarch had used magic…after Lightning was sure he was shot dead by Basch.

But the Primarch was still alive.

The man she had trusted above anyone had thrown her away like she was nothing and had branded her a fugitive and with that mark against her skin, she was an agent of the enemy.

There are no other alternative.

She came to a stop in her walk.

You either complete it or you die.

"There is no hope," she whispered.

She can feel as if something was suffocating her from the inside and she couldn't draw breath…

"Are you okay," a voice said from beside her, as a hand was placed on her shoulder.

Lightning was snapped out of her daze, suddenly glanced toward the girl beside her.

"I'm fine," she said.

"Are you…"

"I said I'm fine, now back off," Lightning snapped at her, slapping the hand from her shoulder.

The girl stepped back from her, with both of her hands raised in surrenders. Lightning simply continued to walk toward the direction they had to go until they noticed that a light was displaying in front of them, bathing the surrounding in a soft sapphire blue light.

The entire group looked up toward it, approaching it cautiously.

"What is that?" Tifa asked, probably asking the question most of them were thinking.

"A gateway," Lightning said.

"Gateway?" Vaan repeated, frowning slightly, "To where?"

"Pulse," the soldier said.

"This will take us to Pulse?" Éclair asked, surprised.

"This place must be the Ark," Lightning said, looking around a little, her blue eyes taking in the rusty place around them, "This was how the expedition to Pulse was sent out of Cocoon. But shortly after, the Sanctum closed the Ark off, burying it under Eden…but even when they hid it, it would seem that they couldn't close the Gateway."

"More Pulse magic huh," Paine murmured.

Basch was looking behind them.

"If we go back, the Army will be waiting for us," he said.

"Are you telling me you guys are willing to go to Pulse?" Paine asked, looking around them all.

Vaan chuckled.

"My great grandfather went to Pulse and he describes it as an untamed wildlife," he said, looking at the Gateway, "Time to see it for my own eyes."

"Pulse or bust," Zack said, "I vote we go…at least, no one will be trying to kill us there."

They all seem to agree with that and then the same ship that had brought them to the Ark in the first place lowered itself beside the group and the ramp opened and the group walked inside of it. The ramp closed behind them and the Pulsian ship powered up and then rose from the ground and then flew straight into the Gateway.

All the while, none of them had noticed the small white owl that was perched above them, observing the entire encounter before taking off.

The party flee Cocoon...into the world below of Pulse. Now that their home is turned against them, will they find the answer they are looking for? And will Colonel Lightning befriend the group or will she crumble in her despair?

Next time: Pulse

AN: Wow, twenty-one chapter in this one already? Seems just like yesterday i started this Saga. Both Farron Sisters and Final Fantasy Reverse XIII are my proudest work apart from EVANGELION FIGHTER and the Hunter and Vampire Series. I'm glad that i brought this story for you guys, and i hope you will stay still it done.

Jacques0 out.

R&R