Author's Notes: This was written as a birthday present for snarechan. She requested that I write Yuna and Lightning being sort of BFFs, but it morphed into this instead. Laguna and Vaan just refused to let the ladies hog the spotlight. It takes place during Dissidia 012 when they're all heading off to stop the flow of manikins into the world.

Killing Time

Once, not long ago, Yuna sat beside a campfire at the end of the world and steeled her resolve to cast her life away for the good of all people, so that they might experience peace.

And now…

The campfire, the company, and even the world itself were different, but her goal remained the same. She and her companions were still several days' journey from the door to the Rift that they sought to destroy, but she couldn't help making the comparison.

Yuna wondered at her penchant for walking calmly toward her own demise, although this time, previous experience suggested that perhaps they might come out of it alive. She didn't remember all of the details of her last journey, but she knew that she was supposed to have died… and that she hadn't. She and Tidus and their companions had somehow broken a seemingly endless cycle, much like the one the warriors of Cosmos were now struggling against.

If it could be done once, surely it could be done again, couldn't it?

Yuna hoped so.

She looked around at the others, all of whom were engrossed in the familiar task of cleaning and preparing their various weapons. They had eaten a meager meal not long before, and this was just the next step in their usual pre-sleep routine.

Except for Yuna; her 'next step' was to watch them. The only weapon she had was her staff, and it didn't require anywhere near the kind of maintenance that Laguna's machine gun, or Vaan's swords and axes, or Lightning's gunblade all did. She felt vulnerable, sometimes, with only her summoning to rely on. The Aeons were powerful, of course, and it took a great deal of strength to summon them, but Yuna often wondered where she'd be without them. She had no blade to sharpen, no gunpowder or bullets to replace… and so she sat, with her legs tucked under her and her hands folded in her lap, and observed her friends' activity in silence.

Silence didn't tend to last long, though. Not with this group.

"You're looking pretty glum, considering we're not fighting at the moment," Laguna said, breaking Yuna from her thoughts as she realized he was addressing her.

Vaan rolled his eyes.

"Of course she's glum. The Emperor took off with Jecht and her boyfriend's unconscious. What's not to be glum about?"

Although Yuna didn't react outwardly to the nonchalant commentary, it still stung a bit to be reminded of all that. Laguna shook his head in despair, and Lightning's perpetual scowl deepened.

"One of these days that mouth of yours is going to get you killed," she informed him pointedly.

"Just telling it like it is," Vaan said with a shrug, then reclined backward with his hands behind his head, thereby missing the exasperated looks the others were giving him.

"Actually," Yuna spoke up finally, getting everyone's attention, "I was just thinking about what would happen if I couldn't summon my Aeons anymore."

"We'd get our butts kicked, for starters," Vaan put in helpfully. Laguna swatted at him.

"Why? Do you think you're in danger of that happening?" Lightning asked, ever serious.

"No, no," Yuna said hurriedly, trying to put her companions at ease. "It only struck me because of the four of us, I'm the only one here not cleaning or prepping a weapon."

Three pairs of eyes darted to their respective equipment, seeing her point.

"What about that staff of yours?" Laguna asked. "I bet that'd hurt the old noggin if you gave it a good whack!"

Yuna smiled faintly.

"I suppose that's true. Although I'm not sure how well it'd hold up against some of our harder-headed foes…"

Laguna chuckled.

"You've got me, there!"

Yuna's gaze fell on Lightning, who was glaring down at her gunblade with what passed for contemplation.

"I didn't mean to worry any of you," Yuna began to apologize, but Lightning surprised her by getting to her feet.

"Come on," she said roughly. When only Yuna stood to follow, she added, "All of you."

"What? But you said we could rest here for the night," Vaan protested.

"Upsy-daisy, before she starts taking pot shots at us," Laguna cautioned, and Vaan grumblingly complied.

"Leave everything but your weapons," Lightning instructed, then headed off, clearly expecting to be followed.

The three remaining warriors glanced at each other and exchanged shrugs before trooping after her. She stopped them near the face of a nearby cliff, then motioned for them to back up several paces. That accomplished, she spun around without preamble and fired several shots into the stony surface, making them all jump. Even from their current distance, they could all see that her bullets had struck within millimeters of each other.

"You're up," she barked, nodding toward Laguna, who pointed at himself with a, 'Who, me?' "See if you can hit the same spot on our target."

"Ha!" he scoffed. "You've got to be kidding. A master marksman like me can hit that for sure."

And he emptied several rounds from his own gun into the face of the cliff.

Lightning moved in to inspect his handiwork.

"Passable," she allowed.

Vaan smirked at him.

"Oh yeah? Let's see you do better, Mister Smarty Pants," Laguna challenged.

"You're on."

Vaan produced his own firearm, a rifle, seemingly out of nowhere. Laguna raised an eyebrow.

"That's quite the antique."

"Antique this," Vaan said, firing. None of them had to check the stone to see that he'd missed the others' shots by a fairly wide margin.

Laguna grinned triumphantly.

"Shut up," Vaan grumbled.

"Didn't say a word," Laguna sang.

"Both of you, quit clowning around," Lightning snapped. Then she turned to Yuna. "Now you try."

Yuna blinked at the proffered weapon, currently folded into its gun form.

"I don't know…" she said, suddenly feeling uncertain. She'd never used a gun before, and besides which, something in her fuzzy memory was rebelling against the idea for whatever reason. The word "machina" came to mind, but she wasn't sure of its significance.

"Come on, Yuna; you can do it! Your ol' pal Laguna believes in you!" Laguna prompted. "I bet you'll get closer than Vaan did, anyway."

As the pair went back to bickering, Lightning shoved the gun unceremoniously into Yuna's hands and pulled her by the arm into position across from the defaced side of the rock wall.

"You've never done this before, I'm assuming, so you should probably use both hands. Like this," she instructed, adjusting Yuna's arms. "And you'll want to widen your stance, to offset the recoil."

The contraption was heavier than Lightning made it look, and it was far from comfortable in Yuna's hands, but she had started this, so she supposed she ought to finish it. She still had her misgivings, but she also couldn't help the amused quirk of her lips as she continued to follow Lightning's prompts. It was kind of exciting, really, to try something new, even in the midst of all that they were facing. Lightning walked Yuna through aiming and firing in her usual no-nonsense manner, then stepped backward out of the way.

Yuna took a deep breath, sighted carefully along the barrel, hesitated for a split second, and then pulled the trigger.

The kick-back was stronger than she'd expected, and she would have toppled over backwards if Laguna hadn't caught her under the arms. She thanked him and lowered her borrowed weapon as Lightning moved to check where she'd struck.

"Right on target," she reported, and if Yuna hadn't known any better, she'd have thought she caught a hint of pride in the other's voice.

Laguna clapped her on the shoulder, beaming openly with pride himself.

"Well, well! Looks like we've got quite the up-and-coming crack shot on our team! Who knew?"

"Yeah, yeah. Congratulations. Can we go back to camp now? I'm starving," Vaan complained.

"Starving for attention, maybe," Laguna sniped. "But seriously, how can you be starving? We just ate an hour ago!"

"That wasn't dinner, was it? I thought it was just a snack!" Vaan protested, dismayed, and Lightning pinched the bridge of her nose in aggravation as the two faced off yet again.

Yuna offered her back the gunblade, but Lightning shook her head.

"You hold onto it for now. If I take it back, I'm gonna put a hole in both their heads," she ground out.

Between Laguna's and Vaan's bickering and Lightning's death threats, Yuna couldn't hold it in any longer, and she started giggling. Despite her best efforts, she was presently overtaken by a full-blown fit of laughter.

"Uh oh. Crazy girl with a gun," Laguna said, backing away with his hands raised, which only made her laugh harder.

"This is your fault, you know," Vaan informed him. "You're the one who told her she was looking glum. Now she's lost her marbles."

Yuna doubled over, the gunblade clattering to her feet as she clutched her sides, laughing hysterically. Her trio of friends stood around her in various states of uncertainty and waited for her to calm down.

Several moments passed before Yuna managed to gasp, "Thank you! I… really… needed that…"

"Uh… sure, no problem," Laguna said on everyone's behalf. He rubbed the back of his neck, giving her a nervous once-over. "Are you gonna be okay?"

"Yes; I'm fine," she assured him, staggering to her feet. She grasped at a hazy memory of the words she had spoken to Tidus back when he had first become her Guardian, and she repeated them now as she wiped tears of mirth off her cheeks: "I want our journey to be full of laughter."

"I'm all for that," Laguna said cheerfully. "Whaddya say, Light? Vaan? Gonna let us hear a few chuckles?"

Lightning gave him a deadpan look, and Vaan rolled his eyes. Yuna hid a grin behind her hand.

"Can't say I didn't try," Laguna apologized to her with a shrug, then turned and headed off.

"Hey, genius – camp is that way," Vaan called after him, pointing in the opposite direction when the older man turned around.

"Oh, right. I knew that!"

As the two of them drifted back toward the campsite, Yuna offered Lightning's gunblade back to her again, struggling to hold back another fit of laughter at the duo's antics.

"I appreciate the lesson, but I think if I'm going to learn this properly, I should probably start with a smaller gun," she said sheepishly.

Lightning took the weapon back this time and nodded curtly.

"You're probably right. But you did well; you should keep at it."

Yuna smiled.

"Maybe I will."

Yuna's eyes flickered over the selection of spheres in the display case.

"Are you sure this is a good idea? I don't know if any of these are really… me…"

"Don't be such a party-pooper, Yunie!" her cousin protested. "If you're gonna be a Gullwing, you've gotta get used to using dresspheres!"

"There must be something here you think you could battle with comfortably," Paine added from her spot in the shop's doorway.

"Why can't I just use the Songstress one? I already have it, after all…"

"That's all well and good for defense, but what about offense?" Rikku argued, throwing several punches at the air for emphasis. "Are you really gonna make me and Dr. P do all the heavy-lifting ourselves?"

The force of her pout was enough to get Yuna to reconsider, and with a resigned sigh, she went back to her perusal. A glint of blue on the bottom shelf caught her eye, and she knelt down to study it closer.

"That's a Gunner dressphere, Lady Yuna," the shopkeeper informed her helpfully. "It comes with two small pistols; they're quick, accurate, and are a great choice if you like to keep your distance."

Yuna couldn't quite pinpoint why, but her gut was telling her that she wouldn't have much trouble learning to use this dressphere at all. Just to be sure…

"May I try it on?"

"Of course! There are a couple of targets out back if you want to test the firepower as well."

The shopkeeper retrieved the sphere and handed it across the counter to her, then led the trio to the firing range. Yuna clicked it into place on the garment grid Rikku had given to her, and a flash of light and a moment later, her entire ensemble had changed. Rikku pointed to the design emblazoned on her top and gave her a knowing look, which she pointedly ignored. The twin pistols felt strangely comfortable in her hands, despite her certainty that she'd never held them before in her life, and she felt a distinct sense of déjà vu as she raised them into position to fire, spacing her feet apart without even thinking about it.

She emptied all twelve rounds into the target in rapid succession, and every one pierced the center ring.

"Ooooooooh," Rikku said, applauding gleefully from behind her.

"Aaaaaaaaah," Paine drawled to compliment her. Rikku gave her a playful shove, and Yuna's sense of déjà vu increased tenfold.

She thought about the sphere Kimahri had sent Rikku to show her, and about the journey that lay ahead. It would be emotional, and undoubtedly difficult, but she had to be strong, and this dressphere business was all a part of that. And there was no denying the fact that she'd been through her fair share of difficult journeys… or was it just the one…?

Yuna shook her head clear of the faint non-memory and chalked it up to the dressphere's previous owner. Rikku had said something about the dresspheres retaining their users' memories and personalities, after all.

Ignoring her companions' banter, she turned to the shopkeeper with a smile.

"I'll take it!"

End Notes: So. I feel like I just made logic out of nonsense. It makes me happy. Hopefully you got a kick out of it, too! As I was starting this fic, I got to thinking about these four and how all of them but Yuna have a gun in their arsenal, and then about how Yuna's default job class in FFX-2 was Gunner. And I thought, why guns? Well, now we know why guns.

Comments and criticism are most welcome!