Title: Ship & Harbour
Prompt: Why don't you try something including Snow? I'd die to know how he'd react if some relationship did form between Noel and Serah. How would those three characters deal with it? (from MiniAcorn)
Rating: T
Words: 1701
Commentary: This is set partially during the paradox ending "The Future is Hope". Clearly, I've taken some author's liberties with how this ending plays out. I hope you enjoy!

Pure bliss, Serah decides, as she lies back, this is absolute bliss.

She cranes her neck to look at the man beside her, and as it happens he has also craned his neck to look at her. She smiles and wriggles up the bed so their mouths can meet in a kiss. She runs her fingers through his hair, soft and smelling of the shampoo they share. She lets out a low groan into his mouth, and he responds by kissing her harder. He always knows just how to kiss her, he always knows just where she wants to be kissed. Now, he tilts his head and flicks out his tongue, sending tingles shooting down her spine. She presses herself against him, letting him know exactly how much she wants from him. His arm comes around her lower back.

"I think I love you," she whispers to him.

A pause. "You think you love me? C'mon, Serah, baby."

That's not Noel's voice. Her eyes snap open. She regards the figure of Snow in her bed - their bed, Noel's and her bed - with shock and revulsion.

"You love me," Snow says. "Now, let me show you how much I love you."

She jerks awake, breathing heavily. She sits up, fast, giving herself a headrush, and regrets it because it hurts and doesn't even help dispel the nightmare.

The mattress beneath her shifts, and she knows Noel has woken, too. "Nightmare?" he guesses accurately. He sits up with her.

She mashes the heels of her palms into her eyes. She answers, "Yeah."

One of his arms is at her back. He waits, knowing she'll elaborate.

"I- I think I have to find Snow. Tell him about us."

Noel takes one of her hands in his. His other hand goes to her knee. "I'm with you," he pledges.

They travel the timeline looking for Hope's graviton cores. They pick one up in every place they visit, Mog swirling and shining bright pink light to reveal the precious power sources. As they land in each new place, she tenses, and it's obvious to them both that she's scared to find Snow there. Even though she knows it has to be done, even though the dream hasn't bothered her since that one night, it lingers on her mind.

She could bite her fingernails, knowing how this is affecting Noel. He puts up a good front most days, but sometimes he slips and kisses her a little too hard, sometimes she catches the possessive flicker in his eyes when they see a tall blonde. She hates the thought of hashing it out with Snow, but she hates doing this to Noel even more.

He doesn't deserve this, she knows. She's the one who tore the necklace from her neck, and she's the one who went to him with her lips chewed raw, pressing them to his own.

They've turned in for the night in the Academy-sponsored hotel in Academia, their unspoken base, where they've been staying for the past month or so. The bed already fits the contours of their bodies. She rolls over to him and slips her arms around his torso. He stirs, then flips so that they're facing each other. He opens his eyes.

He always reminds her of how right they are together when he looks at her. He looks at her like she might break, looks at her like she's his harbour, looks at her like she's a swimsuit model, looks at her like she's the only other person around.

She looks right back at him. Though she's sleepy, she hopes she looks at him even half the way he looks at her.

Alyssa holds the artefact up to them, an offer balanced on her open palm. Serah notices Noel's staring - his intuition flickers.

She tries to figure out a polite way to decline when very suddenly the police force of Academia rushes in and has Alyssa on her knees. They're a blur of flashing metal and giant guns, so it doesn't take much for the new arrival to stand out-

After weeks of searching and several dead ends, there he is: Snow. He's talking to them, but none of his words register. Instead, she feels the presence of Noel at her side. She gives him a quick glance. His breathing is deliberately even.

A hand on her shoulder. Not Noel's - this one is gloved. Hope's. She looks up at him. He's not looking at her, but at Snow. Hope's words are cutting, and it occurs to her that Hope is reprimanding Snow. Hope really is an adult now, going head-to-head with Snow, and - she's certain of this - he's winning. Hope's hand never leaves her shoulder. Noel's breaths never falter in their steadiness. With Hope and Noel on either side of her, she feels as if... she were a protectorate.

Snow makes a dismissive gesture, not hearing Hope. Either that or he doesn't want to listen. He tells them to come outside, not waiting for them to follow.

She feels distinctly uneasy standing outside of the Academy headquarters, where Snow has parked his motorcycle illegally. Hope scowls upon seeing this, but says nothing. As they walked the corridors to get here, he asked her if she was feeling alright. She thinks that Hope knows more than he lets on.

"I've got to stop Caius wherever I can. I've got thirteen different eras to visit," Snow tells them, pumping a fist.

"Where's Lightning?" Noel asks. It takes her by surprise - they're the first words he's spoken in a while.

As Snow answers, she realizes Noel was asking for her.

Then Snow turns to her and extends a hand. "Serah, come with me, okay?"

She stares, dumbfounded, at his palm. Her eyes dart over to Noel, who is looking right back at her. His arms are crossed, and she can see the tension in his forearms - clenching his fists. He gives her a nod. And that look.

She takes Snow's hand. "Let's talk."

His motorcycle is still roaring, even after she has dismounted and told him she doesn't want to get married. "Serah," he starts, arms crossed over his torso and shaking his head, "What's gotten into you?"

Nothing, she wants to say. He asks her like she doesn't know what she's talking about, so she wants to be inflexible and combative. Then she calms down, and dives into deeper waters. She thinks about how best to answer.

Her knee-jerk answer wouldn't have been correct. No, it wasn't nothing. She had changed. She had stopped waiting around, stopped giving herself permission to do nothing. She'd seen how good she had it, shielded always from the world by Lightning or Snow. When she became a l'Cie she had a taste of how unfair the world could be, but now she was seeing it every day in her travels. People lived in worlds of constant warfare. People died all the time, and they stayed dead. If she had the power to make even one life better, how could she sit by and do nothing? No, it was the farthest thing from nothing. What had gotten into her was resolve. Resolve and strength and wisdom and experience! She had flourished, become a person capable of anything. And it was all because-

"Noel," she says. "It's Noel."

The engine of Snow's motorcycle snarls. Snow scratches his head. "Serah, I know it's easy to feel sorry for the guy-"

She shakes her head. He doesn't get it, and he won't get it if she doesn't spell it out for him. He hasn't even noticed that she's not wearing the necklace anymore, after all. She fixes him with a stern look. "It's not pity, Snow. It's love."

Noel is still waiting outside the headquarters when she returns. Her eyes land on him immediately, and they hold fast as she descends from the sky on Snow's bike. Noel gravitates toward them, his fingers drumming his thigh nervously.

When Snow touches down she makes an effort not to jump off too quickly. She doesn't want to wound him more than she already has. "Be safe," she tells him.

He nods. Then he tips his chin up to holler to Noel across the stretch of pavement, "Hold onto her." Even at that, she feels her hair begin to stand slightly on end.

Noel raises a hand in acknowledgement, but his eyes are on her. The roar of the motorcycle is the only thing that tells her Snow has left. At that, she gives herself full consent to run to Noel like a girl in a movie. She doesn't have to see herself to know that she's smiling like one, too.

She flies straight into him. His arms come around her fast. He exhales into her hair, and she feels him shudder, the tension from the past few weeks lifting away from them. She doesn't even realize she's laughing until she's already stopped.

"It's over?" he makes sure.

"It's over," she confirms. She thinks that she wants to kiss him now. But first... "I should've told you this a long time ago, Noel," she says, looking into his eyes, smiling. "But-"

"I love you," he says.

She blinks.

He tries not to grin. "Is that what you were going to say?"

Her eyebrows come down over her eyes, and then Noel really is grinning. "Did you just do that?"

"Say I love you? Yes," he answers.

"No, scoop me by saying I love you first, and then rub it in my face?" she asks him, edging on incredulous.

He puts a hand to her cheek. He tries to sound light-hearted, but it dissipates through sincerity. "Hey, I was afraid you might not come back. You've got to give me something."

She fits her fingers between his. Even though she knows he thought this, it's painful to hear it out loud. "I was always going to come back."

He gives her that look. Only this time it's less like she might break and more like she's a swimsuit model.

So she inches closer to him, says her I Love You, and kisses him right on the mouth.