Cutting it a bit close to the deadline, but this is my fic submission for kuro_pantsu's MWS-wide request for fanworks primarily featuring Team Chaos members. Gabranth is the main character, and all of the other major characters are Team Chaos ones...save for Shantotto (but really, she definitely has more chaotic viewpoints than even some of the Team Chaos members do--so I think she kind of counts still, haha! XD). :D

Username: Yin (of breyzyyin)
Class: White Mage
Title: Lost Time
Summary: During one of the earlier cycles in the conflict, Gabranth encounters and ends up befriending a younger Chaos Warrior who harbors a tragic secret.
Characters/Pairings: Gabranth, Raffaello, Ultimecia, Shantotto, Garland, and Kefka...plus a whole bunch of other characters are mentioned too. No pairings. Central focus of the story is the friendship/big-brother-little-brother bond that develops between Gabranth and Raffaello, and there is also a friendly rivalry dynamic between Gabranth and Shantotto in the final portion of the story too.
Notes: I admit, Dissidia has never been one of the FF verses I've felt completely comfortable with writing for...despite my attempts at trying to do so at least every once in awhile. XD I suppose this fic could almost be looked at as my AU take on why Gabranth starts deciding that he really no longer wants to be involved in the conflict anymore in the DLC story portions for Dissidia 012 (since so much of the earlier cycle portions aren't really mentioned heavily). I also always thought Raffaello's unique backstory would make for an excellent plot point in the Dissidia-verse (heck, Kefka even mentions him when he battles Yuna! XD)...which is probably why I got inspired to write this piece in the first place. XD I apologize that it probably doesn't fit in as much with some aspects of the Dissidia mythos...which is why I'm leaning more towards calling it slightly AU in the long run.

Also, KUDOS to the writers who come up with Shantotto's dialogue: I love her as a character, but it is HARD to come up with rhyming lines that actually make sense in conversation points. I didn't do a great job with her the first time I attempted to write her in a fic, so this time I went back through her lines after writing the story with the help of a rhyming dictionary--and I still feel like some of her dialogue might be a bit off, but I think overall it's better this time around than my previous endeavor. I can only imagine how talented and creative the FFXI writers are for always coming up with such winning phrases for the Tarutaru speech, my hat's off to them. ♥
Word count: 7,720
Rating/warnings: PG/PG-13. Death of a major character. Tragedy. Angst. ...This is actually quite a different story from my usual fare. 0_0; No real spoilers for either Dissidia games...but spoilers do abound for FFXII and Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo's Dungeon.

( Why do you think I was trailing you in such plain view? It’s not because you’re interesting with all that moping you do! )