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[FFXIII-2] echo, second (3369 words)
Title: echo, second
Fandom: Final Fantasy XIII-2
Character/Pairing(s): Noel Kreiss, Sazh Katzroy, Oerba Dia Vanille, Oerba Yun Fang
Rating: PG-13
Warning: character death? But it doesn't stick. Edge of Tomorrow inspired.
Summary: Noel gets to know the l'Cie and gets some training in.
Continued from the first part.
They called Lightning Farron a lot of different titles. Only her friends called her by name, Noel grew to understand, while other soldiers addressed her Colonel and saluted and then whispered about the Angel of Valhalla, the Warrior Goddess, the moment her back was turned. And even then, he was given to understand that even 'Lightning' wasn't her real name. It was just the name everyone use.
"Don't worry about it," Serah told him several times with hesitant smiles. It took Noel quite some wheedling to learn that it was Lightning who slaughtered the majority of the fal'Cie the day of the invasion. Dozens, Vanille whispered to him. While the rest of the team worked hard together to bring one down, Lightning would be off bringing down another, and then another, and then another.
It had been an exceptionally bloody day.
She was a caustic woman whose words were sharper than her sword, who preferred the train with Oerba Yun Fang, preferred to be surrounded by training simulations rather than her fellow ally soldiers (so long as the soldiers weren't the core group). From what Noel could tell, Colonel Lightning Farron had no patience for anyone other than the small group of... (L'Cie, Serah whispered to him once, close to his ear as if she were afraid someone else would overhear. She didn't explain what it meant, but her expression was enough for Noel to understand he wasn't to repeat the word around) people she fought with.
And even within the group, there were only two people who received her patience and casual tenderness.
"Ever shot with one of these before?" Sazh Katzroy asked him casually as the older man loaded the guns in his hands, movements fluid as water while the two of them stood before a table filled to the brim with different armaments. Noel shook his head, feeling queasy. He didn't like the guns Cocoon people wielded. It was cold, cruel, and far too apathetic. He was a hunter, taught all his life to appreciate the life that ended due to his tribe's need for food, taught to respect the creatures who challenged him, who wounded him. Scars are trophies, Noel had been taught, the map of a life that indicated perseverance and experience. To fight a creature, to fight an enemy, was to reach out and feel their strength between the gaps of his fingers — to feel their speed in the wind of his hair. Even those with bows and arrows had to fight, had to scramble and run when half a dozen arrows would not pierce through thick hides.
A gun, however... he had seen how just one bullet could potentially bring down an animal. How a man could stand dozens of paces away, unseen even, and kill without acknowledging the strength of his enemy. The creature would never be able to fight back, never acknowledge defeat to a warrior greater than it.
On a general basis, Noel disliked guns.
"No." He told the other man simply. "And I don't want to."
"And that's alright," Sazh replied back casually, surprising him. "Odds are, you might never need to. Hell, it'd be great if you never had to. You stick to what you know best, that's my motto. But then, there may be the off chance when one of these might save your life and on that off chance, I'm going to teach you how to shoot one of these things correctly -- into the enemy, and not accidentally into your own foot."
It was a compelling argument, and Noel resigned himself to listening as Sazh pulled apart several of the guns, explaining parts, explaining what went where and why, explaining the difference in clips and bullets and what fit where. Thinking upon it, he thought it just the slightest bit strange that this man was the only one to use a gun.
"It's because half of us aren't fighters." Sazh answered his unasked question, sliding together one of the guns and handing it to Noel, handle first. "Don't worry — safety's still on for this one, and it fires nothing but duds, anyway. We're going to test your aim and how you handle the backfire, not get other people killed."
Noel accepted the gun gingerly, but couldn't help the distaste in his expression at the feel of cold metal within his fingers. "...Thanks."
"No problem." The older man said with a shrug. "You wanted the story with us, right? Best you get it first time around, anyway. That way there's no awkward misunderstandings next time, and we won't have to explain it again."
"You really believe that I'm just going to — relive all this over and over again?" Noel asked, lowering his arm. He could still feel the weight of the gun, though. "That's a lot of strange you're just accepting."
"You would too, if you wake up to Serah telling you just how many different ways you can die in a day. And then she tells me everything I'm going to say, everything I was going to ask or do." Sazh shrugged. "You'll probably be able to do that with us soon. After that, well, we're used to strange. It's not really all that weird once you're used to it. The new normal, even."
Noel wasn’t sure he wanted that to be his new normal.
“Either way,” Sazh continued. “We’ve learned to roll with the cards we’re dealt. We’ll all get through this, one way or another.”
They spent the next hour in a side room, Sazh dialing into a speaker system and asking Hope to activate several of the training programs Lightning liked to use. Noel was taught to familiarize himself with handguns, rifles, shotguns, semi-automatics, and all the range they had with heavyset solid bullets to energy beams.
“You don’t have to use it,” Sazh routinely told Noel whenever the teenager looked sick with himself. “But you’ll have to carry it around. Better to be safe than sorry, after all.”
—
After that, Vanille took him aside and gave him the run-down for the armor Cocoon soldiers used.
“We all have to wear it time to time,” she said lightly even as she helped him strap the chest armor on, and then knocked on the solid piece. “It’s not too bad. You won’t even need my help the next runthrough.”
“You guys didn’t wear it for the fight,” Noel grumbled, rotating his shoulder to find a more comfortable position. He wasn’t used to the amount of fabric or the weight on his limbs. While it wasn’t heavy, it was still an unsettling feeling.
Vanille smiled guiltily. “We didn’t have the time. Besides, it was just our fight and it was just the one! We all wear this outfit when we’re supposed to be leading the soldiers. Makes for good morale, that’s what people say, when they can see those who wear the same thing winning against the enemies.”
“Vanille.” At that word, the both of them turned to see Lightning standing silhouetted against the open door of the bunker they were in, frowning at them. “Is he ready yet?”
“Almost!” Vanille called out cheerfully, and then tightened a strap that made Noel wince in protest. The Pulsian girl gave him a sympathetic smile and then returned her attention to Lightning. “He’s all yours.”
Noel felt his mouth dry. “You’re going to be the one I train with?” He didn’t mean for the end of the sentence to to break, but in the short time he spent on the base, just about everyone had expressed their awe of the soldier: strong, fast, cool, smart, and beautiful. Serah had informed him not to tell anyone else on the base about what he could do… just let them assume that he was being incorporated into their team somehow. Vanille backed up the story by clinging to him as much as she could, to emphasize just how attached she had grown to him.
“Let them think she’s taken a shining to you.” Serah told him. “And that’s why you’re with us all the time.”
It was a strange thought, to suddenly be in the middle of all that attention, but Vanille shined in her role as she guided him around. She told him various stories of the group in the past ten years, and about growing up with Fang in Oerba. They were the first to encounter the fal’Cie, the first to be turned before they were whisked away to Cocoon and met the others.
“Everyone’s been through a lot,” she revealed without losing her cheer. “But the worst was a long time ago, and we’ve all moved on as much as we can. It’s been a long time since we’ve had someone new come in.”
“Why didn’t you just come back?” Noel questioned her. “We were at war with Cocoon, why didn’t you guys come back and just — explain everything to people? Help us?”
It was only then that the gleam in Vanille’s eyes dimmed, and she put her hands on her hips and tilted her head, leaning closer as she cleared her throat and then said in a tone that made it very clear she was imparting important information, “It was never about Gran Pulse or Cocoon. It’s always been about family.”
She drew back after those words, regaining her cheer. “Besides, we did come back! We’ve been back plenty, actually, but it’s not like the council wants to hear about us getting along with Cocoon. They’d rather stay angry because of what happened, so we stopped trying after a while.”
That was right before she dragged him into the first bunker from before the fight with the fal’Cie, and insisted on teaching him more about the armor he was supposed to don.
Now, it was Lightning assessing him from where she stood several paces away, expression unreadable.
“Eighteen hours before we ship out,” she finally told him, although Noel couldn’t understand the significance of her words at that moment. “You’ll be training with Fang until she says you’re good enough to not be a liability. And then I’ll take over your training.”
“I’m not a liability.” Noel interjected immediately, feeling a pulse of irritation run through his veins. Yes, they were amazing fighters and he could openly acknowledge that, but none of them (except maybe Serah) had ever seen him fight before!
“Fang will decide that.” Lightning told him, and then left him and Vanille in the bunker again.
Noel attempted to uncurl his fists, wanting nothing more than the chase after the soldier and demand that she allow him a chance to prove himself before immediately shuffling off as some low tier grunt. Deep down, he understood the need for all the tests, all the coddling, but above that was the raging turmoil of grief and anger and abject loneliness about being shoved into a situation where everyone else know each other, and he was the outsider.
Except he really was the outsider in this situation.
“Don’t worry about her,” Vanille told him gently, as gentle as Serah had been mere hours ago. “This is actually her giving you a chance. It means she likes you, really!”
“If that’s the case, she sure doesn’t show it well.” Noel murmured, not meaning for Vanille to hear the words. She giggled anyway, and he let out a loud sigh even as he raised a hand to rub at the back of his neck. Better to know when he was defeated, anyway. He’d just have to show everyone what he could do, what he’d been trained to do since childhood. “Ah, it’s not worth it.”
“She’ll figure it out soon enough, right?” Vanille concluded for him, and then pushed at his back to move him out of the bunker. “Don’t worry, if that’s the case, Fang’s going to love you!”
—
It turned out Noel wasn’t even to go up against Fang yet, but a simulation provided by Hope (“They call him Doctor Estheim around the base,” Vanille whispered to him between simulations, “And we’re supposed to as well, but I think only Lightning and Serah ever does it, and only sometimes.”) that generated monstrous forms into the room Noel was, dozens of creatures that had two arms and two legs and the shape of heads but that was where the similarities to humanity ended.
“They’re called Cie’th.” Fang informed him helpfully from where she stood behind a bright yellow line, grinning at him. “And they’re all over Gran Pulse now, yeah? They’re the grunts we have to take out.”
“I thought fal’Cie were the grunts.” Noel shot back even as he tightened his grip on his swords, eyes narrowing in thought as he tried to see through a pattern a movement. New monsters meant he didn’t know their strengths and weaknesses. He would have to tread carefully the first time until he figured out these strange beings.
“Oh, hey are.” Fang laughed out. “But these things? These’re what happens to people around the fal’Cie who don’t get their shots from Drs. Serah and Hope!”
Those are… people?
One giant crystalline arm swiped at him, and Noel ducked into a roll, moving himself out of the way even as his tried to comprehend what he was just told. Now that he looked closer, he could see screaming faces stuck within the bodies, could see the giant red eye staring out at him.
“Now aint’cha glad that’s what everyone here gets first thing?” Fang called out. “Imagine having to fight hundreds of these things while you’re ducking the attentions of a fal’Cie!”
Noel darted out from one of the monstrous forms, using the heavy crystal bodies to launch himself into the air and bring his sword down heavily onto the torso of one of the monsters, shouting in triumph as the metal managed to pierce through the crystal skin. Harder shell, then, but just the same as all other beasts on Gran Pulse.
The roar of pain caught him off guard even when it shouldn’t have, but it was mostly because Noel had a hard time seeing the creatures as… animals, he supposed. As things that might feel pain like the creatures that resided upon the plains of Gran Pulse. Despite that they moved, he had a hard time categorizing them as living beings.
The Cie’th moved, swatted at him, forcing Noel to withdraw before it could toss him to the ground. He left his large sword buried in the crystal of the being’s back, and brought up his short sword defensively, holding it in place with one hand to more effectively stab than slash, the other hand bracing himself off the ground, ready to push off into a quick dash.
“This what you train yourself on?” Noel called out to Fang as he pushed himself off the ground, running toward one of the attacking Cie’th and then whirling in a circle at the last moment, slashing at thick crystalline skin even as he ducked past its movements, jumping up to grab onto the handle of his sword and yanking it out of the still screaming wounded Cie’th.
“Kid, this is what I have for breakfast.” Fang taunted. “You’re not at training yet! And don’t you worry your pretty little head, I’m not pulling out any stops here. Serah said you’ll be fine even if you die, so you can consider this a lesson.”
“What?” Noel exclaimed, even as he grunted as one of the Cie’th (with wings, damn it) managed to slash him across the back, leaving him dazed by the pain because this was real, this wasn’t just a hologram, wasn’t just some weird technology Cocoon developed —
“Pay attention now!” Fang called to him even as Noel ducked out of the way right into the path of another Cie’th that was raising its giant arms to smash at him. “Because this isn’t a game, you know. For you, this is going to be life and death.”
—
It took him thirty nine minutes to defeat the group of Cie’th. Noel knew this only because Fang clucked her tongue at him afterward and nodded to the timer up near the ceiling which had been running from the very first moment the creatures appeared.
“You could use some work with your reaction time.” She told him bluntly, grinning at his glare. “And your magic. Not cut out to be a healer, are you?”
“Sazh said,” Noel panted out and paused, lifting one bloodied arm from where it was resting on his knees to wipe away at the trail of blood still running from his nose which had only minutes ago been broken. “He said most of you guys weren’t warriors.”
And despite the battle he had seen earlier, Noel had been inclined to believe the older man for some reason. Maybe because he hadn’t seemed the type to lie, or maybe because of the way the man laughed and invited him for lunch ‘away from that group of crazies — they’ll have your head spinning in no time, and I should know!’
“Old man would be right,” Fang agreed as she finally walked into the training room. She spent that past session just leaning against the doorway with one leg over the other and her arms crossed, flinging comment after comment about what he was doing wrong and what needed improvement. She walked up to him, and rested the sharp point of her staff against the ground, waiting patiently until Noel finally looked up at her. “But I’ll admit: you’re not half bad. So where did you say you were from, Noel Kreiss?”
“I didn’t.” He said, and accepted her hand to help him up, grunting as his bones protested at the movement. But he wasn’t a hunter just for the fancy title, and steadied himself the moment he was on his feet again. “I never even told any of you my name.”
“Must have missed that detail.” Fang said with a shrug. “Serah’s very good with her plans.”
“I’m from Paddra. Originally.” Noel offered, but then shook his head, breathing out a heavy sigh and running fingers through his hair, attempting to undo the tangles that sweat and dirt had left behind. “It’s all gone now.”
Fang was quiet for a moment before she reached out and grabbed at his shoulder in a comforting gesture. It took Noel a moment to remember that Oerba was gone as well, that the Gods had laid waste to a good portion of the world already, as well as a good portion of Cocoon.
“We’ll get those bastards.” She told him, and then let go and stepped away. “So work hard, and you’ll be on the team to get a front row seat at the end of the world.”
“Hope,” she called out to the empty room as Noel watched her warily. “Let’s get a chimera in here, yeah? Start out with two, and we’ll work our way up.” To Noel, she said, “Congratulations. We’re going to bump this into a training session now. Get ready for stage one.”
Then she turned and started to walk away, waving a hand casually at him as a distant beeping came through.
“Wait,” Noel called out, suddenly panicked. “Stage one, what do you mean?”
The doors slid closed behind her, and Noel barely made two steps before he could hear the hiss of serpents behind him. He turned slowly, ignoring the ache of his tired muscles, and saw two… creatures, slowly stalking up to him. Each had three heads, two which stood above the third like snakes playing at being horns. It was a beast unlike any he had ever seen before, more an amalgamation of beasts.
Warily, Noel brought up his swords, took a moment to assess his situation, and charged.
—
He woke up with a jerk on a pile of crates, the sirens blaring in his ears as a voice in the speaker system called for soldiers to assemble and the stomping of boots rang around him.
For a moment, Noel just lay there and mentally cursed Fang’s name in every way he knew how.
Fandom: Final Fantasy XIII-2
Character/Pairing(s): Noel Kreiss, Sazh Katzroy, Oerba Dia Vanille, Oerba Yun Fang
Rating: PG-13
Warning: character death? But it doesn't stick. Edge of Tomorrow inspired.
Summary: Noel gets to know the l'Cie and gets some training in.
Continued from the first part.
They called Lightning Farron a lot of different titles. Only her friends called her by name, Noel grew to understand, while other soldiers addressed her Colonel and saluted and then whispered about the Angel of Valhalla, the Warrior Goddess, the moment her back was turned. And even then, he was given to understand that even 'Lightning' wasn't her real name. It was just the name everyone use.
"Don't worry about it," Serah told him several times with hesitant smiles. It took Noel quite some wheedling to learn that it was Lightning who slaughtered the majority of the fal'Cie the day of the invasion. Dozens, Vanille whispered to him. While the rest of the team worked hard together to bring one down, Lightning would be off bringing down another, and then another, and then another.
It had been an exceptionally bloody day.
She was a caustic woman whose words were sharper than her sword, who preferred the train with Oerba Yun Fang, preferred to be surrounded by training simulations rather than her fellow ally soldiers (so long as the soldiers weren't the core group). From what Noel could tell, Colonel Lightning Farron had no patience for anyone other than the small group of... (L'Cie, Serah whispered to him once, close to his ear as if she were afraid someone else would overhear. She didn't explain what it meant, but her expression was enough for Noel to understand he wasn't to repeat the word around) people she fought with.
And even within the group, there were only two people who received her patience and casual tenderness.
"Ever shot with one of these before?" Sazh Katzroy asked him casually as the older man loaded the guns in his hands, movements fluid as water while the two of them stood before a table filled to the brim with different armaments. Noel shook his head, feeling queasy. He didn't like the guns Cocoon people wielded. It was cold, cruel, and far too apathetic. He was a hunter, taught all his life to appreciate the life that ended due to his tribe's need for food, taught to respect the creatures who challenged him, who wounded him. Scars are trophies, Noel had been taught, the map of a life that indicated perseverance and experience. To fight a creature, to fight an enemy, was to reach out and feel their strength between the gaps of his fingers — to feel their speed in the wind of his hair. Even those with bows and arrows had to fight, had to scramble and run when half a dozen arrows would not pierce through thick hides.
A gun, however... he had seen how just one bullet could potentially bring down an animal. How a man could stand dozens of paces away, unseen even, and kill without acknowledging the strength of his enemy. The creature would never be able to fight back, never acknowledge defeat to a warrior greater than it.
On a general basis, Noel disliked guns.
"No." He told the other man simply. "And I don't want to."
"And that's alright," Sazh replied back casually, surprising him. "Odds are, you might never need to. Hell, it'd be great if you never had to. You stick to what you know best, that's my motto. But then, there may be the off chance when one of these might save your life and on that off chance, I'm going to teach you how to shoot one of these things correctly -- into the enemy, and not accidentally into your own foot."
It was a compelling argument, and Noel resigned himself to listening as Sazh pulled apart several of the guns, explaining parts, explaining what went where and why, explaining the difference in clips and bullets and what fit where. Thinking upon it, he thought it just the slightest bit strange that this man was the only one to use a gun.
"It's because half of us aren't fighters." Sazh answered his unasked question, sliding together one of the guns and handing it to Noel, handle first. "Don't worry — safety's still on for this one, and it fires nothing but duds, anyway. We're going to test your aim and how you handle the backfire, not get other people killed."
Noel accepted the gun gingerly, but couldn't help the distaste in his expression at the feel of cold metal within his fingers. "...Thanks."
"No problem." The older man said with a shrug. "You wanted the story with us, right? Best you get it first time around, anyway. That way there's no awkward misunderstandings next time, and we won't have to explain it again."
"You really believe that I'm just going to — relive all this over and over again?" Noel asked, lowering his arm. He could still feel the weight of the gun, though. "That's a lot of strange you're just accepting."
"You would too, if you wake up to Serah telling you just how many different ways you can die in a day. And then she tells me everything I'm going to say, everything I was going to ask or do." Sazh shrugged. "You'll probably be able to do that with us soon. After that, well, we're used to strange. It's not really all that weird once you're used to it. The new normal, even."
Noel wasn’t sure he wanted that to be his new normal.
“Either way,” Sazh continued. “We’ve learned to roll with the cards we’re dealt. We’ll all get through this, one way or another.”
They spent the next hour in a side room, Sazh dialing into a speaker system and asking Hope to activate several of the training programs Lightning liked to use. Noel was taught to familiarize himself with handguns, rifles, shotguns, semi-automatics, and all the range they had with heavyset solid bullets to energy beams.
“You don’t have to use it,” Sazh routinely told Noel whenever the teenager looked sick with himself. “But you’ll have to carry it around. Better to be safe than sorry, after all.”
—
After that, Vanille took him aside and gave him the run-down for the armor Cocoon soldiers used.
“We all have to wear it time to time,” she said lightly even as she helped him strap the chest armor on, and then knocked on the solid piece. “It’s not too bad. You won’t even need my help the next runthrough.”
“You guys didn’t wear it for the fight,” Noel grumbled, rotating his shoulder to find a more comfortable position. He wasn’t used to the amount of fabric or the weight on his limbs. While it wasn’t heavy, it was still an unsettling feeling.
Vanille smiled guiltily. “We didn’t have the time. Besides, it was just our fight and it was just the one! We all wear this outfit when we’re supposed to be leading the soldiers. Makes for good morale, that’s what people say, when they can see those who wear the same thing winning against the enemies.”
“Vanille.” At that word, the both of them turned to see Lightning standing silhouetted against the open door of the bunker they were in, frowning at them. “Is he ready yet?”
“Almost!” Vanille called out cheerfully, and then tightened a strap that made Noel wince in protest. The Pulsian girl gave him a sympathetic smile and then returned her attention to Lightning. “He’s all yours.”
Noel felt his mouth dry. “You’re going to be the one I train with?” He didn’t mean for the end of the sentence to to break, but in the short time he spent on the base, just about everyone had expressed their awe of the soldier: strong, fast, cool, smart, and beautiful. Serah had informed him not to tell anyone else on the base about what he could do… just let them assume that he was being incorporated into their team somehow. Vanille backed up the story by clinging to him as much as she could, to emphasize just how attached she had grown to him.
“Let them think she’s taken a shining to you.” Serah told him. “And that’s why you’re with us all the time.”
It was a strange thought, to suddenly be in the middle of all that attention, but Vanille shined in her role as she guided him around. She told him various stories of the group in the past ten years, and about growing up with Fang in Oerba. They were the first to encounter the fal’Cie, the first to be turned before they were whisked away to Cocoon and met the others.
“Everyone’s been through a lot,” she revealed without losing her cheer. “But the worst was a long time ago, and we’ve all moved on as much as we can. It’s been a long time since we’ve had someone new come in.”
“Why didn’t you just come back?” Noel questioned her. “We were at war with Cocoon, why didn’t you guys come back and just — explain everything to people? Help us?”
It was only then that the gleam in Vanille’s eyes dimmed, and she put her hands on her hips and tilted her head, leaning closer as she cleared her throat and then said in a tone that made it very clear she was imparting important information, “It was never about Gran Pulse or Cocoon. It’s always been about family.”
She drew back after those words, regaining her cheer. “Besides, we did come back! We’ve been back plenty, actually, but it’s not like the council wants to hear about us getting along with Cocoon. They’d rather stay angry because of what happened, so we stopped trying after a while.”
That was right before she dragged him into the first bunker from before the fight with the fal’Cie, and insisted on teaching him more about the armor he was supposed to don.
Now, it was Lightning assessing him from where she stood several paces away, expression unreadable.
“Eighteen hours before we ship out,” she finally told him, although Noel couldn’t understand the significance of her words at that moment. “You’ll be training with Fang until she says you’re good enough to not be a liability. And then I’ll take over your training.”
“I’m not a liability.” Noel interjected immediately, feeling a pulse of irritation run through his veins. Yes, they were amazing fighters and he could openly acknowledge that, but none of them (except maybe Serah) had ever seen him fight before!
“Fang will decide that.” Lightning told him, and then left him and Vanille in the bunker again.
Noel attempted to uncurl his fists, wanting nothing more than the chase after the soldier and demand that she allow him a chance to prove himself before immediately shuffling off as some low tier grunt. Deep down, he understood the need for all the tests, all the coddling, but above that was the raging turmoil of grief and anger and abject loneliness about being shoved into a situation where everyone else know each other, and he was the outsider.
Except he really was the outsider in this situation.
“Don’t worry about her,” Vanille told him gently, as gentle as Serah had been mere hours ago. “This is actually her giving you a chance. It means she likes you, really!”
“If that’s the case, she sure doesn’t show it well.” Noel murmured, not meaning for Vanille to hear the words. She giggled anyway, and he let out a loud sigh even as he raised a hand to rub at the back of his neck. Better to know when he was defeated, anyway. He’d just have to show everyone what he could do, what he’d been trained to do since childhood. “Ah, it’s not worth it.”
“She’ll figure it out soon enough, right?” Vanille concluded for him, and then pushed at his back to move him out of the bunker. “Don’t worry, if that’s the case, Fang’s going to love you!”
—
It turned out Noel wasn’t even to go up against Fang yet, but a simulation provided by Hope (“They call him Doctor Estheim around the base,” Vanille whispered to him between simulations, “And we’re supposed to as well, but I think only Lightning and Serah ever does it, and only sometimes.”) that generated monstrous forms into the room Noel was, dozens of creatures that had two arms and two legs and the shape of heads but that was where the similarities to humanity ended.
“They’re called Cie’th.” Fang informed him helpfully from where she stood behind a bright yellow line, grinning at him. “And they’re all over Gran Pulse now, yeah? They’re the grunts we have to take out.”
“I thought fal’Cie were the grunts.” Noel shot back even as he tightened his grip on his swords, eyes narrowing in thought as he tried to see through a pattern a movement. New monsters meant he didn’t know their strengths and weaknesses. He would have to tread carefully the first time until he figured out these strange beings.
“Oh, hey are.” Fang laughed out. “But these things? These’re what happens to people around the fal’Cie who don’t get their shots from Drs. Serah and Hope!”
Those are… people?
One giant crystalline arm swiped at him, and Noel ducked into a roll, moving himself out of the way even as his tried to comprehend what he was just told. Now that he looked closer, he could see screaming faces stuck within the bodies, could see the giant red eye staring out at him.
“Now aint’cha glad that’s what everyone here gets first thing?” Fang called out. “Imagine having to fight hundreds of these things while you’re ducking the attentions of a fal’Cie!”
Noel darted out from one of the monstrous forms, using the heavy crystal bodies to launch himself into the air and bring his sword down heavily onto the torso of one of the monsters, shouting in triumph as the metal managed to pierce through the crystal skin. Harder shell, then, but just the same as all other beasts on Gran Pulse.
The roar of pain caught him off guard even when it shouldn’t have, but it was mostly because Noel had a hard time seeing the creatures as… animals, he supposed. As things that might feel pain like the creatures that resided upon the plains of Gran Pulse. Despite that they moved, he had a hard time categorizing them as living beings.
The Cie’th moved, swatted at him, forcing Noel to withdraw before it could toss him to the ground. He left his large sword buried in the crystal of the being’s back, and brought up his short sword defensively, holding it in place with one hand to more effectively stab than slash, the other hand bracing himself off the ground, ready to push off into a quick dash.
“This what you train yourself on?” Noel called out to Fang as he pushed himself off the ground, running toward one of the attacking Cie’th and then whirling in a circle at the last moment, slashing at thick crystalline skin even as he ducked past its movements, jumping up to grab onto the handle of his sword and yanking it out of the still screaming wounded Cie’th.
“Kid, this is what I have for breakfast.” Fang taunted. “You’re not at training yet! And don’t you worry your pretty little head, I’m not pulling out any stops here. Serah said you’ll be fine even if you die, so you can consider this a lesson.”
“What?” Noel exclaimed, even as he grunted as one of the Cie’th (with wings, damn it) managed to slash him across the back, leaving him dazed by the pain because this was real, this wasn’t just a hologram, wasn’t just some weird technology Cocoon developed —
“Pay attention now!” Fang called to him even as Noel ducked out of the way right into the path of another Cie’th that was raising its giant arms to smash at him. “Because this isn’t a game, you know. For you, this is going to be life and death.”
—
It took him thirty nine minutes to defeat the group of Cie’th. Noel knew this only because Fang clucked her tongue at him afterward and nodded to the timer up near the ceiling which had been running from the very first moment the creatures appeared.
“You could use some work with your reaction time.” She told him bluntly, grinning at his glare. “And your magic. Not cut out to be a healer, are you?”
“Sazh said,” Noel panted out and paused, lifting one bloodied arm from where it was resting on his knees to wipe away at the trail of blood still running from his nose which had only minutes ago been broken. “He said most of you guys weren’t warriors.”
And despite the battle he had seen earlier, Noel had been inclined to believe the older man for some reason. Maybe because he hadn’t seemed the type to lie, or maybe because of the way the man laughed and invited him for lunch ‘away from that group of crazies — they’ll have your head spinning in no time, and I should know!’
“Old man would be right,” Fang agreed as she finally walked into the training room. She spent that past session just leaning against the doorway with one leg over the other and her arms crossed, flinging comment after comment about what he was doing wrong and what needed improvement. She walked up to him, and rested the sharp point of her staff against the ground, waiting patiently until Noel finally looked up at her. “But I’ll admit: you’re not half bad. So where did you say you were from, Noel Kreiss?”
“I didn’t.” He said, and accepted her hand to help him up, grunting as his bones protested at the movement. But he wasn’t a hunter just for the fancy title, and steadied himself the moment he was on his feet again. “I never even told any of you my name.”
“Must have missed that detail.” Fang said with a shrug. “Serah’s very good with her plans.”
“I’m from Paddra. Originally.” Noel offered, but then shook his head, breathing out a heavy sigh and running fingers through his hair, attempting to undo the tangles that sweat and dirt had left behind. “It’s all gone now.”
Fang was quiet for a moment before she reached out and grabbed at his shoulder in a comforting gesture. It took Noel a moment to remember that Oerba was gone as well, that the Gods had laid waste to a good portion of the world already, as well as a good portion of Cocoon.
“We’ll get those bastards.” She told him, and then let go and stepped away. “So work hard, and you’ll be on the team to get a front row seat at the end of the world.”
“Hope,” she called out to the empty room as Noel watched her warily. “Let’s get a chimera in here, yeah? Start out with two, and we’ll work our way up.” To Noel, she said, “Congratulations. We’re going to bump this into a training session now. Get ready for stage one.”
Then she turned and started to walk away, waving a hand casually at him as a distant beeping came through.
“Wait,” Noel called out, suddenly panicked. “Stage one, what do you mean?”
The doors slid closed behind her, and Noel barely made two steps before he could hear the hiss of serpents behind him. He turned slowly, ignoring the ache of his tired muscles, and saw two… creatures, slowly stalking up to him. Each had three heads, two which stood above the third like snakes playing at being horns. It was a beast unlike any he had ever seen before, more an amalgamation of beasts.
Warily, Noel brought up his swords, took a moment to assess his situation, and charged.
—
He woke up with a jerk on a pile of crates, the sirens blaring in his ears as a voice in the speaker system called for soldiers to assemble and the stomping of boots rang around him.
For a moment, Noel just lay there and mentally cursed Fang’s name in every way he knew how.