Tension Resolved

A/N: Ever played Final Fantasy XIII cranked up, in the living room, with awesome surround sound system cranked up and completely, utterly worried that people would think you're playing something of dubious nature instead?

With Vanille, I do. All. The. Time. Oh and, R&R plox.

"Kyaaaah!"

"Mmmhhh."

"Oooh..."

"Aaahn!"

Lightning jabbed at the last coeurl with vengeance, did a backflip, landed, then stared pointedly at Fang. She sheathed her blade and said, "you missed." Then, "Fang." And again: "Fang."

The taller woman was probably not even aware of Lightning's presence. Or the fact that they currently occupy the same universe. Because predictably, her attention was wholly riveted on Vanille, who was occupied in patting her fur pelt up and down for stray dust.

Lightning tried again, this time stressing the word several shades deeper. "Fang."

"Yeah?"

All that shouting in the Guardian Corps wasn't entirely wasted, it seemed.

"You missed," she said.

"I did," Fang said, then resumed staring at Vanille.

"You nicked me. Very close to an artery."

At that moment, Vanille began running towards the Snow and Hope – arms akimbo and hips swaying.

"Fang?" Lightning said, not having the energy to stress another word.

A moment later, when Vanille's figure had disappeared into the distance, Fang turned to her with a slightly hazy look. "Huh? Oh, sorry about that."

Lightning sighed. "Pay attention, next time."

"I will," Fang said, uncharacteristically timid (or flushed, Lightning thought, or... but then she shook the thought away before it could form something more disturbing), running her hand (nervously?) back and forth the length of her spear. "I'm sorry," she said again. Hesitated. "It's just..."

"Just?"

"Look. The river? I think I'll jump into it. And lie down for a while."

Lightning was about to comment about drowning when Fang broke into a jog and disappeared behind some trees. The river lied in another direction. Lightning recalled the way Fang was holding her spear and found the sudden urge to think about something else very, very hard.

The first time her arm became the chewing toy for a giant wolf because Fang became oddly deaf to her orders to switch to sentinel now Fang, now damn it, and causing Lightning, for once, to curse, she almost switched her out for Snow.

The second time it happened, this came out of Lightning's mouth: "Snow. Where's Snow? I want Snow."

And after two days together fighting alongside Lightning and Vanille, Snow told Lightning he wanted back in with Sazh and Hope.

"I'm a happily married man," he said, fists clenched. "I will remain faithful to Serah and Serah only. In body and in mind. Forever."

Lightning was treated to an ear numbing monologue about his true love to his Serah. By the eighth redundant sentence about love, she decided to uppercut him.

She decided that the whole event was quite unfortunate, because if he had thrown in the usual chauvinistic speech about hero this and hero that, he would have met a knife, instead. If only.

"I- I can't," Sazh said after his fourth day as the first string team. "She's... how old? Fourteen?"

"Five hundred. Nineteen."

"But she looks fourteen. And I'm not that kind of man, okay?" The last sentence was said into his hands. "I mean, I have a son." Then he whipped out a photo Lightning had seen at least several dozen times. "I don't stare at her. I don't listen to her. And I certainly don't have dreams about her every night."

"Sazh..."

"I'm not a pedophile!"

Lightning refrained from saying that technically, she was of age. Just in the off-chance Fang could hear them. It would be counterproductive to have a member of her party killing off another member.

Hope was all right. But protecting two fragile cannon glasses (and Hope even more so than Vanille) didn't quite appeal to Lightning.

One step forward, three steps backward.

"I wonder if you can create a silence spell," Lightning said one evening, a roasted thigh of a bird that looked like a cross between a squirrel and a guinea pig in one hand.

Hope frowned. "Silence?"

"Yes. To mute."

"Magical spells? Like Fog?" He gestured towards the solitary figures of Fang and Vanille sitting on a log at the other end of the camp. "Why ask me when it's their specialty?"

"Not that silence. I meant words. A spell to mute the speech."

Hope bit into his piece of dubious bird and pondered. "Sorry," he said after a while, "I don't think I even know how to create spells. Why don't you ask Vanille?"

"That's the whole point."

"What?"

"Do you know another way to mute someone? Any other way."

"Gag them?"

Lightning considered that, but quickly dismissed it after a glance at Vanille. While she would happily do it to Snow in less than a heartbeat, she couldn't possible gag a creature as sweet at the orange haired girl. It would be akin to punching a puppy and then shooting its master. It would also be quite redundant to have a caster unable to cast spells.

"Or a jab to the throat," Hope said again.

"...are you repressing something, Hope?"

"Not really."

"I think I'll take my knife back."

Lightning coerced Snow into giving a few inches off his trenchcoat to fashion earbuds from, then spent the next few days creating a sign language for battles.

After a few testing battles, she decided that while Fang was visibly less distracted, both her and Vanille kept their looking at Lighning for a visual cue of the next command, often times ignoring the actual monsters. Or sometimes forgot to until one or all three of them were flat on the ground.

The idea was vetoed out in less than an hour.

"Vanille, can you just not?"

"Mmh? Just not what?"

"Just not make those sounds."

"Huh?"

"Nevermind."

Lightning had almost given up on having Vanille as the medic when they stumbled upon a ruin of a house. Strange, she never saw something so intact during her brief stint in the plains – most of the ruins they found were no more than moldy stones lying around each other.

This, however, had a roof. And walls. And doors.

Doors. Lightning thought she would never see a door again. But here, was a door. And a room.

What was her problem? Fang. What was Fang's problem? Vanille. What was Fang and Vanille's problem? Unresolved sexual tension.

Serah had dragged Lightning to enough romantic chick flicks that she immediately knew what to do.

She stood in front of the room, door ajar. "Fang? Vanille? Come here, please."

Vanille bounded energetically towards her, and when Fang – with her more leisurely pace – caught up moments later, Lightning went behind them, and then very unceremoniously pushed them into the room.

"Resolve the tension," she said. And slammed the door before they could so much as recover from their stumble. She immediately jammed her gunblade against the door and walked away, ignoring the bangings and shouting.

"What are they doing?" Hope said, cocking his ear. "Fighting?"

Snow and Sazh had since long ago fled. ("Gonna, uhm, hunt ah- those hor- pointy looking beasts," Snow had stammered before scrambling off. Lightning was thoroughly amused.)

"Use this," said Lightning. And handed Hope a pair of earbuds.

Things went surprising smooth from then on. Fang had returned into her immense focus in battle, tearing things left and right, Vanille had stopped making oddly... persuasive noises, and Lightning spent less time avoiding friendly spears or lying on the ground.

Of course, there were offsets. Fang and Vanille disappearing slipping into dense foliages for periods of time, for one; having to be very careful if she decided to traverse into said dense foliages, for two; and having to unintentionally listen to Snow and Hope's talk about birds and bees, for three. But overall, she considered it a mission: situation improved.

She felt the edges of her lips lifting into something resembling a smile. Serah would definitely have approved. She would tell her all about it when they meet.

End.