Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Until the End of Eternity, and Longer ❯ Chapter Seventeen ( Chapter 17 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Disclaimer and et cetera.

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"Until the End of Eternity, and Longer"

by: Banshee Puppet

Chapter Seventeen

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`Deling City. . .again. It hasn't felt like home since Jace left and Mrs. D passed away, but I still like it here,' Laguna thought as he looked back at the city as he and his comrades climbed into their van to head to the nearest base. From the sounds of things, they'd have a new mission lined up for them when they got there, and they'd only just got off the last one.

"Now I'm as much for monster-bashing as the next guy, but this is getting ridiculous," Ward complained through half-lidded eyes.

"Right? Almost makes you wish for a war, doesn't it?" Kiros half-joked through a yawn.

"Never say that!" Laguna nearly jumped out of his skin. "It's asking for trouble. Let's just hope it's an easy mission. We're pretty low-ranking, so they wouldn't put us on anything too dangerous, right?" he said hopefully.

"If you think of it in terms of rank, you might say we're pretty low-ranking so we're also highly expendable," Kiros commented bitterly.

Laguna cringed. He hated to think about that aspect of the military and Kiros knew it. He only threw it in Laguna's face when he was exhausted, as he was now. Rolling his eyes at the apparent belief in his friend's eyes as the man frowned slightly, Kiros said, "but you're probably right, anyway."

"Ah. Mr. Loire, I presume? I've heard some interesting things about you," General McDavin said as the trio stood before him at tired attention. "At ease," he said, as if he'd forgotten to say it earlier and waved his hand absently in a casual gesture.

"Y-you have, sir?" Laguna asked, not sure if he was supposed to or not.

"Oh yes, any number of things. Actually though, I've had something meant for you in my possession since last spring," the General said as he pulled an envelope out of his desk drawer. "This letter came to me by the most peculiar means. For Laguna Loire, as per Galbadian Military Forces, western branch. Someone with little information as to your whereabouts must have seen this as something rather important. I must say, I've been quite curious, though I didn't suppose we'd ever actually meet, Lieutenant Loire."

Laguna held out his hand and accepted the letter with quivering fingers. He didn't dare hope, but also, he knew there was only one person who would send him a letter, or have reason to. `Jace.'

He peeled back the seal, which barely held, (old glue in desert heat this long, it was bound to happen that way) and pulled out the single sheet of paper, which was beginning to yellow where it had been creased for almost a year, or longer. It must have been an old letter when the General first received it, but why? The location of the western base of the Galbadian Military was common knowledge, it should not have had any difficulty arriving here. In the top corner, the date informed him that the letter had been written only three months after she had left Deling City, and her signature at the bottom showed that her hand had not completely healed yet. Still, the handwriting was hers, strained and careful, but definitely Jace's handwriting with the overly tall capital letters and sweeping strokes of the pen, the would-be-dots that were really more like dashes over the i's and the crooked crosses that made her t's look almost like x's. You almost had to be specifically trained to read this handwriting, but at the same time, it was dramatic and elegant even in it's haste.

He read the first lines:

*Dear Laguna,

I hope this letter finds you well. Heck, I hope this letter finds you. Irvine and I are in a small village somewhere in eastern Centra, I think. It's a bit behind the times and doesn't even have it's own mailing address, if you can believe that, but I like it here, it suits me. Tell mom that Irvine loves that stupid duck blankie, and I can't seem to get him to go anywhere without it! I'm not sure whether to thank her or give her a good slap!. . .*

He couldn't finish the letter there. It was too emotional for him, and he'd be damned if he was going to start sobbing in front of a General. He told himself this even as a few tears fell from his eyes and he folded the letter up, collecting himself as best he could before putting the paper into his pocket.

"Are you alright, Lieutenant Loire?" the General asked.

"Y-yes sir," Laguna gulped. "It's just. . .a letter from my kid sister."

"I take it you're very close then."

"Y-yes sir," Laguna said. "May I be excused, for a bit?" he asked, trying to fight back tears at knowing that Jace was okay, and his desire to go hide somewhere and read the letter to his heart's content where he could cry as freely as he wanted.

The General nodded, giving him a peculiar look. "That's fine. Why don't the three of you return after dinner tonight. I'll have your next mission ready for you then."

The three men saluted and began their way out, Kiros stopping at the doorway and saying respectfully. "Please excuse the Lieutenant sir. His sister and nephew have been missing for the past two years. It takes it's toll on a guy."

The General nodded. "I would presume so," he said before Kiros saluted again and disappeared through the doorway.

"What kind-hearted young men," General McDavin whispered. "I only hope they're also very strong young men, because they have a trying mission ahead of them."

General McDavin sighed slightly. He knew better than anyone that the deserts east of Deling City would be hard on anyone but those few tough settlers who'd been out there, somewhere in between the sandstorms, since-probably, the beginning of time immemorial. He hated to send young boys out into that, but there just wasn't anyone else to send. Everyone was pretty concerned with Esthar and Adel these days, so promising low-ranking officers would simply have to do for pretty much everything else.

"Out cold again, huh?" Laguna frowned slightly, but it was more amusing now than sad as he slung Squall into a better position in his chair so that he didn't fall over.

Rinoa sighed, brushing some of his long bangs from an uneasily sleeping face. "Ellone must be sending them back as soon as she has the energy for the return trip," she frowned. "You must have scared her pretty badly, Laguna."

"Maybe, but this is a little overboard."

Irvine had toppled over onto Selphie's shoulder, his hat tumbling into her lap. She squeezed his hand gently. "My poor cowboy is getting one hell of a history lesson," she said. "But I think it's good that Irvy gets to know where he comes from now. Most of us don't know, so it seems more important."

"Family is a funny thing," Zell commented. "I always had Ma n' Pa, and we've got each other n'stuff, but it's not the same thing as knowing where your blood comes from."

`Zell, once in a while, just occasionally, you say something really smart,' Rinoa thought, but she didn't voice this. Instead, she smiled slightly and said, "I wonder where they are now."

`Where is this?' Squall wondered as he saw Laguna looking around what appeared to be some sort of metal compartment full of crates, a cargo area of sorts it seemed.

Laguna flung himself up onto a large wooden crate and fished the letter out of his pocket again. The shipping area was pretty abandoned when there wasn't anything coming or going, and there wasn't anything due to move until tomorrow, so he figured this would be a good place to hide himself while he found out what had been going on with Jace and Irvine.

*Dear Laguna,

Laguna paused, imagining Jace chuckling as she wrote that line.

*I'm sorry I missed you the day I left, but, well I guess mom told you what happened with Max calling and all, and I know you probably want to hear what happened after I left Deling City. Well, Irvine and I headed North or, intended to head North, actually. It started out as North, whatever the case. I figured I could travel along the beach and find one of those little shore towns, take a boat out to Trabia or somewhere like that, but…well, you know…I got a little lost. I never did have the best sense of direction, after all. Anyway, by the time I realized we were in a bit of trouble, stuck out in the middle of nowhere in the Centra Desert, it was really pretty pointless to turn back and go another way. We were too far in and turning back would only be traveling further into the desert, especially since I didn't know which way was up, or which way I should even go to get out of the desert if I knew which way was up anyway. So we just kept walking. I really hate blood soul's by the way! Pesky little things don't know how to die proper! It's a damn good thing my aim is perfect, you know, or we'd have been in some trouble. Anyway, I'm not sure how long we went on like that. A few days I guess, maybe a week. A sandstorm picked up pretty much out of nowhere and I thought we were totally done for when I saw this place, just barely, all these tiny steepled roofs and such, like a village. I was sure it was a mirage, desperation playing tricks on me, or the sun, or the desert heat, or any of a number of things. But we made it through the storm and found the tiniest little village built on a pretty little oasis with a big lake full of fish. And it's the desert, so it's warm all year round. The summer's are pretty hot it seems, but I can get to liking it.

Anyway, the place is called Bella Maure and we're staying in this little loft room above the local tavern. The landlord, Kennedy, is a real peach of a guy, and as long as I help with the cleaning and such, we get to stay pretty much for free. The sandstorms keep the monsters away too, which is nice, because I swear, I've been hit with enough thundagas to last me a lifetime and then some. It's a miracle I don't glow!

I miss you and mom a lot though, and my guitar! I left it at Max's and hell if I was going back there to get it! Well, poop on that! I guess I'll just have to deal with it. With a little wood I can probably figure out how to build myself a little acoustic number, but I'll miss that soul whine that only an electric guitar can really achieve. In the past, ya know, like I always say. No point in dwelling on it. I'd give you some coordinates to visit me, if I had them, but it seems Bella Maure is the type of place you can't find unless you're chasing down a storm, or one's chasing you. The people in this village-they spend their whole lives here, never expecting to go anywhere else, to see anything but the sunset over a horizon of endless sand, the same sunset they see every day. It sounds like such a boring, solitary life, doesn't it? A year ago, that's what I would have believed, but now, I watch that sunset every night, a sunset that's always the same, and all I can think is, "I'm finally home." Every night I go to sleep with Irvine in the cradle by the window and think, "please, let me wake up tomorrow to the sun peeking through the broken blinds, hit the same worn spot in the mattress that I hit every morning and have the same tangled spring poke me in the hip, let me wake up to Irvine's big blue eyes peeking at me blearily as the sun wakes him in that instant he doesn't realize it before he starts crying and the smell of freshly ground coffee hits my senses from downstairs as Kennedy begins to make his way through the tavern, pulling back the curtains to let the light in, sweeping the floor as I come downstairs and telling me that my usual breakfast is sitting on the bar. Please, Hyne, let me wake up every morning in this same stupid little bed." The same breakfast every morning, even that. Even that. Hyne Laguna! It all feels like some fevered dream. The one thing I thought I never wanted, and it's become the only thing I can't seem to live without. I'm happy here, really happy, for the first time since we were kids goofing off at the carnival. I guess I'll always miss you a little but, I just wanted you to know that you shouldn't worry about me. And also that I'm really sorry I'm not there to protect you, like I promised, but we'll always have forever, you and I. I'll never forget-I swear it.

Love,

your sis,

Jace Kinneas

Laguna stared at the signature and his hands shook, his eyes growing warm. . .and angry. `Kinneas,' his mind snarled, the old hate coming back for a brief moment as he remembered everything that fucked up man had put Jace through.

And he started to cry. So much that Jace had said in the letter made no sense to him, and wouldn't until much later. Praying to the gods that she'd wake up every morning to the same sunrise in the same bed, going to sleep to the same sunset and loving every dull moment. . .that just didn't sound like Jace at all, and he wasn't sure he understood it himself.

After a long few minutes of uncontrolled and hysterical sobbing that had started out as just the barest whimper, he collected himself. "Jace, I want to see you," he whispered, looking up to the ceiling with blood-soaked eyes and saying, "Hyne, where is she? Where's my little Jace?"

He raked his eyes over the letter again taking what hints he could on her location out of it. The name of a village that would do him no good since he doubted anyone outside of it had ever heard of it. Deserts of Eastern Centra, that was a pretty large area, but she'd traveled from Deling for maybe a week or so, you could only go so far on foot in that amount of time, even if you were running, right? And the last bit, the fragment that gave him some hope, was the sandstorm. He was sure with a little coaxing he could get some old weather data for around that time and find out where the storms had been. Better yet if he could get a small plane or some such and fly over the area until he spotted the steepled roofs she wrote about, but that last one would be nearly impossible. Anyway, he tucked the letter safely away. For now, he had a new mission to trouble over, didn't he? And he should definitely apologize to that General for his unprofessional behavior, or whatever. Lieutenant or no, Laguna had yet to get down all this military protocol nonsense. He knew it was there and that he was supposed to adhere to it, but knowing and doing were two very different things for the mostly careless young man.

He got up, gunblade slamming absently into the crate, wiped his eyes, and headed out.

In spite of the extremely bad, extremely dangerous mission and the fact that the trio was extremely under-qualified for it, Laguna couldn't help but bounce around with joy at the thought of it all.

"Like a kid in a candy store," Ward commented to his braided friend as Laguna babbled on happily. "Who'd `a thought Laguna would like sand this much." Raising his voice, he said, "Hey Laguna, ya know this isn't a trip to the beach, right?"

Laguna stopped his excited babbling about the deserts of East Centra, and sandstorms, and blood souls and belhemels and grinned back at his friend. "Well of course not silly!" Laguna chirped. "There isn't any WATER in the desert! P'cha! Didn't they teach you anything in school Ward?". . . `three, two, one. . .and liftoff,' Ward thought as Laguna, pretty much on cue started his giddy rant again.

Kiros frowned. "How long have we known each other, man?" Kiros asked suddenly.

Laguna had to put some serious thought into that one. "Two `r three years I guess, why?" he answered.

"Long enough for me to know that you're not as excited about blood souls as you pretend to be. What's really in East Centra that's got you so worked up?"

Laguna's expression dropped and he began to fidget nervously.

`Thought so,' Kiros noted mentally, giving Ward a smug look. Ward just shrugged.

`Busted,' Laguna thought, and the mental note carried over in his expression and demeanor.

"Well, ah, see. . ." Laguna began to stutter, unconsciously extricating the letter from underneath his uniform. "It's just. . ." he continued.

"Man, just spit it out!" Ward protested. "The way you're goin' on you'd think your girlfriend was out there, or something."

"My sister," Laguna blurted out suddenly, and his friends' expressions dropped in self-chastisement. `Of course,' the thought pretty much simultaneously. After a nervous pause, Laguna said, "see, this letter says Jace is out there in a village hidden by a sandstorm, and I thought we might stumble upon it somehow, and I'd get to see her again."

"Laguna, the chances of us accidentally stumbling onto one of those nowhere villages is like one in ten-thousand," Ward reminded his usually jubilant friend, hating to be the bearer of bad news.

"So you're saying there's a chance!" Laguna almost squealed in his giddiness.

"Not exactly what I. . ." Ward began to say.

Meanwhile, Kiros was looking at Laguna's smiling face and thinking, `three, two, one. . .lift off. Earth to Laguna Loire, come in Laguna Loire. No such luck Houston, looks like our astronaut is gone for good, one hundred percent, totally spaced out.'

Yes, again on cue, Laguna had begun ranting happily this time about Jace and Irvine and the letter she wrote him, and. . .and. . .and. . .this one time. . .'

Ward and Kiros groaned. It appeared to be story-time, again, and they listened absently as Laguna repeated one of his favorites, chuckling as the details and order changed even more with each telling. Kiros decided to shake Laguna back down to earth by asking, "wait, when did Jace get a horse?"

Laguna floundered a bit in his story, loosing track of where he was and blinking his confusion off at Kiros. "What're ya talking about? Jace never had a horse," Laguna frowned, as if wondering if she had, and he'd forgotten and, for that matter, what in the wide world he'd said to make Kiros bring it up. Speak first, think later. It was a personality flaw, but Jace never noticed much, since she was the same way, and as a result, Laguna was only just beginning to realize that this was a problem. Breaking that bad habit could take. . .well. . .years, or longer even.

"Nevermind," Kiros chuckled at the momentarily thoughtful look and Ward all out bellowed a harsh crack of laughter, finding it all way too funny to contain.

In reply, Laguna just pouted at the pair, saying finally, "you're teasing me again, aren't you?"

"What was your first clue?" Ward snickered.

Jace blinked awake, meeting sleepy blue eyes. She smiled, feeling the usual spring poking into her hip and rubbed her temple slightly as she looked around the room.

"Ma-muh?" the little boy squeaked.

"Hm? What's up baby boy?" she asked, pushing herself up onto her elbow and brushing long bangs out of Irvine's eyes.

"Okay?" he asked, a concerned expression on his face.

"Ah yeah, I'm fine kiddo. The fairies are with me right now, that's all. They're pretty goofy, but mostly very quiet," she told him.

"Faiwies?"

"mhmn. It's hard to explain. They try to make you do silly things sometimes. Well, maybe one day you'll have fairies too," she teased. "Ready to go down for breakfast?"

`Hyne, I hope not!' Irvine thought as he watched the scene, not quite missing the irony when he realized that instead of having fairies, he was one.

Little Irvine nodded at his mother as she lifted him up into her arms after pulling on her boots.

"How's the diaper kiddo?" she asked.

The boy shrugged. "Okay," he answered. He was too young to say too many words yet, but he picked them up quickly, making Jace think he'd be a regular blabbermouth when he got older, and at the moment, the favorite in his limited vocabulary seemed to be "okay." It was right up there with "tofu", actually, though she couldn't, for the life of her, figure out why Irvine seemed to like the word "tofu" so much when he obviously had no love of the food it represented. Lately, everything that pleased him had become "okay" and everything he didn't like would get a wrinkled nose and the word "tofu". Her little boy. . .quite the character, really. But he understood well enough what she meant when she spoke to him, giving her a frown and the word "huh?" when he didn't. And Irvine was getting big. He'd be two years old next month.

As she carried the boy, who had only just begun to learn how to walk, down the stairs, she said with a smile, just a certain odd feeling she had, "Let's mark Kennedy's calendar today," she said. "I think I'll mark it as "a good day." What about you Irvy?"

Irvine appeared to put some serious thought into that before he finally decided, "chichi day".

Jace beamed at the little boy, "Chicobo day it is. We'll write it in yellow and everything. It'll be fierce flawless."

"Fierce Flawless," Irvine's muffled voice repeated with vaguest familiarity as he stirred back into consciousness, Squall blinking awake also, from the same time, but somewhere quite a distance away.

"Jace used to say that all the time," Laguna said softly so as not to startle the young cowboy. `Hyne, he really is so much like her,' Laguna thought.

Squall's eyes widened, blinking, trying to figure out if what he was seeing was really there. But she was still there when his eyes had focused. Jace, the ghost version of Jace that he remembered from the other night.

She was standing behind Irvine's chair, looking down at him and gesturing as if to brush the stray hairs from his face, and frowning slightly, as if in some sort of emotional pain, and Squall realized, it was because she couldn't touch him. All she could do was watch. Jace Kinneas, who lived every day of her life reduced to watching. Of course that would make her sad.

As if feeling eyes on her, she turned her head toward Squall, and her expression furrowed and widened, shock on her transient features that seemed to shift with the reflection of light. He could only make out what parts of her were in shadow, her left arm, the right hand which had absently come up to her jacket collar, shoulders, head, and portions of her torso, but she leaned forward slightly, sqinting at him.

"You can see me?" she asked.

Squall nodded.

"Can you hear me?" she asked.

Squall nodded again.

"Why?" she asked.

Squall shrugged.

Her expression was a sort of confusion that was mostly a mixture of something somewhere between hope and horror. She was about to speak again when Rinoa touched Squall shoulder. "Squall," the girl asked.

"Shh!" he hissed.

The harsh gesture made Irvine jump, disrupting Jace's image as it faded away into the full light from the window.

Squall sighed. "Sorry Rinoa. I was just. . .I thought I saw something."

Bringing his mind back to the most recent journey, he reached into his jacket's inner pocket. Sure enough, there it was. . .the letter. But he noticed something different about it, it was yellowed, faded at the edges, looked as if opening it too quickly would tear it and it would shatter into so much dust. But the Leviathan card had looked almost brand new. Confusion setting in, he dropped the letter onto the table and reached into the pocket where the card had been. It too seemed to have aged a bit, just some crinkling at the edges, but so much wear? It made no sense. The card hadn't left his pocket in two days.

"Irvy, what's that in your lap?" Selphie asked.

Blinking down, he saw the remnants of a faded blanket with little yellow ducks on it.

"Hellfire!" he whispered. "It's my blankie! But it looks so. . ." he looked wide-eyed at Squall, the only one who he was sure would understand what he meant.

"Yeah," Squall answered.

`Something's happening. And I don't know if it's good or not,' Squall thought.

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okay, that's all I have written. . . more to come. . .

R&R please.