Apart from Being Sexy, What Do You Do For a Living?

Characters: Lightning and Gilgamesh

Word Count: 2,249

Warnings: Language, sexual references, lewd pickup lines, and my broken sense of humour.

Additional Notes: So this is going to be as corny and as cracktastic as the title implies. Bad innuendo, terrible pickup lines, lewd grins… all in a day's work for Gilgamesh. When I heard the lines Gil had when Lightning faces off against him, my mind immediately went to the cracked-up plot bunnies and decided to do this. Since I'm boring, I had the guys over at ff_land come up with the worst pickup lines they could think of. So to eotheod, freija, thedrowned, tjemd4, ireth_oronra and sai_salamander, this is for you!

"Stop staring, or I'm gonna fall for ya." – Gilgamesh, Lightning vs. Gilgamesh intro quote

It was just luck that she found herself on the grassy lawns of the Interdimensional Castle that day. After a horde of manikins had ambushed them while travelling in the World of Darkness, she'd managed to escape. That had been half an hour ago, and Lightning had been incensed to find that she'd somehow been separated from her companions Squall, Bartz and Zidane.

Great. Just… great, Lightning thought with a scowl as she strode quickly along the side of the Interdimensional Castle, not sure of where she was going but needing to vent some of her anger somehow.

Sure, Zidane, why not give the map to Bartz? 'What's the worst that could happen?' Tch. I bet Klauser ended up losing it and just didn't want to say anything.

Shielding her eyes and squinting at the portal to the Castle, she swore softly to herself. Eden only knew when those three idiots would find their way to this rendezvous point, so she might as well just kick back and wait, she decided with a hint of venomous sarcasm, as she continued to march up the lawns of the castle.

Whatever. She was going back to the Sanctuary, because those three could take care of themselves and frankly she was sick of Squall's sullen silences, Zidane's flirting and Bartz's general idiocy. Maybe Kain or the Warrior would be around, they were certainly better company than the three amigos –

"-goddamnit dangnabit bastard sonuva bitch tower – why I'll show you to mess with me! Take that! THAT! HOW 'BOUT THAT?"

With that slew of expletives, the peaceful silence of the Rift had been shattered.

What on earth is the commotion all about? Lightning's eyes narrowed, and she quickly drew her weapon. The voice sounded nothing like any of the Cosmos Warriors that Lightning knew of, which meant… it had to be one of Chaos' pawns.

From the sounds of things, it was coming from the other side of the Interdimensional Castle. Huh. She'd thought she'd been alone, in this empty representation of the Rift. Clearly not.

As she leaned around the castle's corner, her blazefire saber switched to gun-mode and the hair on the back of her neck prickling with wariness, she quickly assessed the situation.

A bear of a man, dressed all in red. White and red face paint. Bristling with weapons. Still hopping about on one foot, and howling in agony. Smashing the blunt side of a sword into a fragment of tower, which seemed to have materialized itself right next to where this man had been standing.

Inevitable conclusion – yet another idiot.

"Stupid castle, who the hell decided to keep relocating the pieces! Stubbed my damn toe on that damn tower!" the man roared, to no-one in particular, and Lightning closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.

Against all of her better judgement, she lowered her weapon and approached the man in red. He didn't seem to notice Lightning's presence as she stopped behind him, because he was still bashing his sword against the tower fragment. How charming, she noted venomously.

"It's just what it does in this area. The pieces move and vanish," Lightning told him flatly, resting a hand on her hip, and raising a dismissive eyebrow at his foolish antics.

"Of course that asshole Exdeath would –" The smashing of metal against stone screeched to a halt as the man froze, mid-swing. He looked behind him, blinked, did a comical double-take and then turned to face her. His foot seemed to have been completely forgotten. "Oh, hello."

Lightning's skin crawled at the purr in the strange man's voice, and she levelled her blade at the strange man. Few men didn't take her seriously, not when she had live steel bared at their throats. This one would be no exception.

"Who exactly are you?" Lightning demanded roughly, and the man just drew himself up haughtily, pounding his chest with one of those huge, white hands.

"Pfah! You're saying you don't know me? Me? The Great Gilgamesh?" he demanded, pausing in his tirade to look at her. She offered him no reaction, except to cock her gun. "He of the Morphing Time? Greatest Swordsman in all of Ivalice…? Riftwalker? Alleyway Jack? …doesn't ring a bell at all?"

Lightning scowled, not lowering her weapon, or her guard. "I've never heard of you before."

"That's impossible!" the man – Gilgamesh or whatever he wanted to call himself – told her with an air of finality, nodding furiously. "A fine – and I must say fine lady like yourself – should always know of the best specimen in men!"

Lightning frowned, staring at Gilgamesh as he crossed his arms in front of his barrel-like chest. Was he implying that he was anything other than completely ridiculous? Even Snow or Bartz would have laughed at the front this fool was putting up.

Suddenly, the big man began to waggle a finger at her. "Stop staring, or I'm gonna fall for ya. It's your last warning, sunshine!"

Sunshine…?

Wait, what? Lightning shook herself, and watched in horror as a very goofy grin began to spread across the man's painted white-and-red face.

"Hrmph, too late!"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

That grin made her think of Snow at his most love-stricken. Or maybe of Squall, when he was pretending he didn't miss his little sorceress girlfriend, Zidane whenever he saw – well, anything that could remotely be called a female. Yuna, when she mentioned her idiotic, brainwashed boyfriend. There was really only one thing that stupid grin could mean, and the very idea gave Lightning the chills.

Oh no. No. She was already moving as Gilgamesh laughed, and he seemed to pick one of his weapons at random – some sort of red sword. She launched a flurry of Ruin spells in his direction, cursing as he comically dodged and weaved through the storm of magic. Taking advantage of his disorientation following the dodge, Lightning flashed in, her blazefire sabre arcing for his neck.

He blocked her blade squarely, that foolish smile never leaving his face.

"How about I show you how to handle a real sword?" Gilgamesh asked her, as he grabbed another sword – this time a ridiculously long katana – and brought it in a sweeping, half-moon strike that was designed to force her back, make her yield ground. Lightning clenched her teeth and somersaulted over Gilgamesh's wide swing, charging her weapon with a thunderstrike and bringing it in a horizontal slice across his chest.

The man seemed to snap backwards at the waist, the lightning-charged blade passing harmlessly over his chest. Lightning swore as one of his huge hands shot out to grab her wrist, but a sharp twist wrenched her free again.

Somersaulting backwards to put some space between them, Lightning worked her fingers carefully. The joint would bruise, no doubt about that. As big of an idiot as this man seemed, he was still a threat and she'd have to start taking him more seriously.

Gilgamesh smirked, thrusting yet another one of his many swords at her. "Your body maybe strong and curvaceous, but you will lose this night!"

A threat with a really bad impression of how to pick up a woman, Lightning amended with a silent sigh.

She rapidly switched her dualweapon to gun-mode, but the man – regrettably – dodged her slew of bullets, changing his latest random sword for a long naginata. It increased his reach exponentially, and Lightning had to stay on her toes as Gilgamesh whirled the blade around him in a deadly show of martial finesse.

"Yes indeed, I am a master staff handler." Gilgamesh clicked his tongue, winking at her. "Care to show me your technique?"

Lightning rolled her eyes as he tripped over his spear then, before darting forwards to slide under his wide-flung, desperate strike and firing at his head at point-blank range. Impossibly, the man brought his next sword up to block the bullet. Whirling to bring her blade slicing diagonally across his huge chest, Gilgamesh blocked her again, locking the blades before Lightning could dart away.

He leered down at her, using his greater height to force her to yield a step.

"Sword fighting is just like everything else: it's all in your thrust!" he told her, matter-of-factly, as he knocked her back another few steps. He posed for a moment, puffing his chest up and making a 'v for victory' sign.

"Would you just shut up and fight?" Lightning demanded in exasperation, taking advantage of the man's sudden preening to summon Odin's blades. She darted forward, and her resulting strike hit the man in red – hard.

Gilgamesh staggered as the rose-petals from Odin's attack faded, but Eden he was still coming. Was the man indestructible, stupid, stubborn – or some unholy mixture of all three? Gilgamesh was shaking his head, and as he swung his axe for her head, he shouted,

"Stop throwing petals at me or I'll really deflower you!"

You have got to be kidding me. A twitch began to grow in Lightning's eyelid as she pivoted and sliced her blazefire sabre across the man's ribs. It skittered harmlessly off of Gilgamesh's body armour, and she ducked the next rapid swing from the spear Gilgamesh suddenly held.

"Oh ho ho ho. I know you're playing hard to get, missy, but just stop dodging around so I can –"

"Club me over the head, so you can drag me back to your cave?" Lightning finished for him roughly, and the man paused.

"Well, if you want to put it that way, I'm more than happy to oblige you! But for Gilgamesh it's Morphing Time!"

There was a flash. Lightning blinked at Gilgamesh, desperately trying to work out if she was seeing things or not. Either way, suddenly the man in red didn't have just two arms – he had eight. Each holding a copy of that enormously long katana of his. Eden, she hoped she was just seeing things, because that had to have been the most frightening thing she'd seen all day.

Gilgamesh chuckled, making a great show of flexing every single arm. "Like what you see, eh? You know what they say, eight hands eight… weapons."

Lightning choked at what he was implying, feeling her face grow hot very quickly and finding herself unable to look the man in the face. Eight – Eden, eight of them?

"What, that one is no good?" Gilgamesh asked, dropping the pose and scratching the back of his neck sheepishly. "Too creepy, then, I got it. Okay, how about this one? I have this many hands for a good reason!"

"Right…" Still scrambling to hold on to her dignity, Lightning snarled as she launched herself forwards, meeting Gilgamesh's swords strike for strike, her blade moving in a blur as she tried to counter eight weapons at once. Gilgamesh was laughing loudly as he intercepted a cut that aimed for his head, before he ducked away and hurled a flurry of eight hand grenades in her direction.

"Those bombs aren't the only things that want to blow up on you!"

Lightning didn't even think, and hurled herself to the side as the grenades detonated. Loose grass and dirt showered down on them, and the acrid smoke burned her lungs. Asshole.

This whole charade wasn't going to end anytime soon, she realized with dismay as she saw Gilgamesh running towards her again. He was going to keep coming until she either accepted his proposition or one of them was dead on the ground.

There were no points for guessing which option she was favouring, anyway.

But something had to give, and by the time they'd exchanged another few rapid blows and his bizarre ExMode had faded, Lightning had decided on a working plan. The man was more than cocky – why not use it against him? So when Gilgamesh fired off his next insanely inappropriate proposition – something groan-worthy like "Hey, wanna come check out my big bridge?" – she pretended to actually consider it.

"Maybe I do," Lightning told him, in what she hoped was a seductive voice, while mentally hammering her head against the castle's walls for even considering a moronic plan like this. She'd clearly been spending too much time with Laguna, if she really believed this would work… Lightning lowered her weapon to her side, in a show of good faith.

Gilgamesh, currently standing on one foot with his sword raised above him for a massive overhead strike, froze at her words. He looked at her once, and then twice, blinking. He actually seemed confused for a moment.

"Wait, what was that?"

Lightning cursed silently, and repeated in that same, painfully sultry voice, "I said, maybe I do wanna come check out that big bridge of yours."

Surely there has to be a better way to do this. You weren't thinking hard enough, soldier.

Gilgamesh, however, looked completely stunned by her seemingly positive response. He blinked again, lowering his latest randomly-drawn sword and letting it vanish in a flurry of sparks.

"What, really? You actually wanna – ha ha, take that, Necrophobe! I totally can get laid!"

As the man began to moonwalk and dance to some sort of internal victory fanfare, Lightning slipped behind him, summoning her magic for an enhanced strike. Without further preamble, Lightning slammed her thunder-charged punch into the back of Gilgamesh's tasseled head. The man crashed to the ground in a tangle of limbs.

Satisfied that the man was completely out cold, Lightning cracked her knuckles and walked away from him in utter disgust.

"Not even in your dreams," she told him in a low voice.

If this wasn't Final Fantasy, I'd actually be a bit concerned for Gil. But seeing as it is Final Fantasy, and this is Gilgamesh, I wouldn't worry about how he bounces back. Lightning just had to go and give him hope, didn't she?