Final Fantasy VI: Cold Fire
Point Me to the Sky Above

Notes: 04/12/17
This has been rewritten from the ground up to give better clarity and such.

It had been some time since the final battle atop Kefka's Tower. Twelve months? Fourteen? Timekeeping had been lost on Edgar. He had been too busy not only in getting Figaro back on track after his extended absence but in assisting what few nations were left in this dead and dying world. It seemed that if one helped save the world from the brink of destruction, then suddenly everyone wanted to be a commonwealth of one's nation. 'Twas a good thing. With everyone lending a helping hand, there were more resources to be shifted were needed.

Edgar glanced up from his paperwork and out the nearby window towards the womanly-figured statute in the courtyard below. Its erection had been to honor the now deceased Celes Chere, the week after she had been interred within the Sandstone Crypt, Figaro's royal tomb. Typically, such an honor was reserved for the royal family, a close friend of said family, or one who provided a great service to the nation. In her case, she had fallen under the latter two, though Edgar had always considered her as a Daughter of Figaro.

No one had argued the point when he had suggested the Crypt for her final resting place. In fact, nearly everyone had been present at the resting ceremony, Sabin, Locke, Setzer, even foul-mouthed Relm. Stories were shared, drink was had; 'twas the Figaro custom. The only person who hadn't been there had been Terra. Locke had wanted to send search parties out for her, but Edgar had disagreed with that motion. His belief had been, and still stood to this day, that if she had wanted company, she would have been present and sharing in their grief. She had been closer to Celes than any of them and thus needed more time and the space to come to grips with the horrible reality in which they had lived.

A flash of green in the normally yellow backdrop forced him to bolt out of his chair. Speak of the devil! Had he just seen her? Had Terra finally returned? With haste, he made his way through the castle's vast corridor system and made sure to avoid anyone who would trip him with conversation. There was no time for talking! This was time for an old friend!

The brisk walk had been uneventful, much like the state in which he had found the courtyard. A quick search, high and low, revealed nothing beyond the ordinary. Had he experienced a hallucination? A mirage mayhap?

"Edgar."

Edgar froze stiff as a board upon hearing the breathy soprano that had come from behind. It was a voice that he knew all too well, yet there was a difference. The tone had turned dark, much darker than the sarcastic brooding he remembered. This was brooding without the witty, dry humor. Despite the change, it was a voice that brought a smile to his lips.

"Terra." He spoke softly to avoid drawing unwanted attention from any passersby nearby. Upon turning and facing her eye to eye, he couldn't help feeling mortified on the inside. Her voice had not been the only attribute of hers that had changed.

The light that had once made Terra's green eyes bright had been snuffed. They were now dark and sunken as if she had stopped sleeping regularly, that is if she had slept at all. Her once shimmering emerald curls, now hanging to her thighs, were dull and lackluster. The six inches of dirty-blonde roots certainly didn't help appearances and gave the impression that nothing green could live in this harsh world any longer. But the worst had been her weight. It didn't seem possible for a person of just skin and bone to be alive as she was, but there she was, standing before him, just the same. It was if she had died ages ago and had yet to find out.

Edgar flashed a concerned smile before bowing in greeting. "It is good to see you, my dear," he said. She responded in kind but lacked the emotion and spark in her eye that normally accompanied her infectious smile. "Was your journey long? Are you famished?"

"I'm fine, Edgar," she said softly with a half-hearted laugh. "Thank you."

There were millions of questions that suddenly came to mind. How was she? What had she been doing all this time? What had she seen? Where had she been? What had she learned? Why had she not stayed in touch? Instead, he chose a question of which he already knew the answer. "What brings you to Figaro?" With a laugh, he added, "Surely not to see me?"

"I want to see Celes."

As he had thought. "Then let us not dilly-dally," he said. "Allow me to inform the chancellor that I shall be away from…" He stopped his talking and his walking upon noticing that she was not following. Further investigation revealed that she had disappeared altogether. He allowed himself a brief moment of confusion, before opting to forgo the chancellor and head straight for the Sandstone Crypt. There was something not right about this encounter.

His journey beyond the castle into the desert brought him upon the once oasis of the Sandstone Crypt. The unmarked path, set in the sand by the ancient Figarians, was one known only by the royal family. Both Edgar and his brother Sabin knew the location as shown to them by their father years prior. He, in turn, had been shown by his father, and so forth. After burying the late King Stewart Figaro, Edgar had hoped to never return to this place until it had come time to light the path for his children.

Celes…

He had made the right decision in laying her to rest here. She had done great service for the Kingdom of Figaro—no, the world. Despite her rough exterior, she had been the closest thing to a saint if he had ever met one. She was beaten out by Terra and her naturally sweet disposition by only a minimal margin. Both had deserved more than what life had given them. Life was cruel, though, and, if one truly was unlucky, the sheer amount of lemons thrown could be overwhelming and crushing, no matter how much lemonade was made.

Edgar was both surprised and not when he discovered Terra waiting for him at the crypt's entrance. There were three possibilities on how she had managed to find the secret location, dumb luck, Sabin, or she had been present and out of sight that night over a year ago. He was willing to bet Figaro's entire fortune on that one. It would seem that Celes' departure from the world had caused Terra to depart from the light as well as everything else.

Terra smiled with fatigue as he approached. "Thank you," she said barely above a whisper.

Edgar responded in kind and decided not to broach the subject. Some things were better left alone. He pushed a button hidden in the center of the door and watched in awe as it rumbled itself upwards. He then turned his attention to the darkness with a scoff. "And here is me with no torch," he lamented. "Silly king!"

Without a second thought, Terra pushed ahead into the darkness, a tiny ball of flame hovering within her palm. "Allow me," she said.

For a moment, Edgar questioned whether reality was real or a dream. Magic had disappeared after Kefka had been slain. The magicite that Terra had been holding then, including that of her own father, had turned to dust. Her magic had vanished right at that crucial moment that she had tried to save Celes from the bony hands of death. Had it been a ruse? If so, why? What would she have gained from such a thing?

As if she had heard his thoughts, she offered an explanation. "Magic is returning."

"Why? How?" The curiosity was strong in his words as was the darkness threatening them.

"Kefka and the Empire failed to realize that this world and the life within it require magic to live. When Kefka became a god, he siphoned enough magic through the Goddess Statues to cause a drought in the world. That's why the sky is no longer blue, the plants have withered brown, the wind lazily breezes, and the water has stilled. It had nothing to do the Warring Triad or the imbalance between the three of them."

Edgar couldn't help raising an eyebrow at this fascinating story. "So, magic is returning because you killed Kefka?"

"No." Well, that had been shot down rather quickly.

"It is returning on its own, then. Like a self-healing wound."

"No, Edgar. I'm the catalyst for the new era of magic. It'll return when I die."

"Come again?" The statement had been shocking to say the very least, yet Terra was not one to go around telling tall tales. She had to have gotten this from somewhere. "How did you come across this information?"

"The Goddess Statues told me when I tried putting them back into place. I still don't fully understand what they had meant by it, but it has to do with me being a half-esper," she stated as if she making a declaration that she breathed oxygen.

The two walked in silence as Edgar worked up the courage to ask his next question. It wasn't that he was afraid to ask; he was afraid of the response. "So, am I correct in assuming you are not just here for visitation?"

In the dim light of her fireball, Terra's tired eyes began glinting with wetness. She choked back a hushed cry before whispering, "I'm all out of love. I'm just so lost without her. I've tried to go on, but-"

"Have you considered that you have not given yourself enough time to heal?"

"The needs of the many outweigh the few. I…" She paused to sigh in defeat. "This was an easy decision to make, but it wasn't made lightly. There were so many things I wanted to do with her. I wanted to travel the world at our own pace, visit the esper world to learn of my heritage, discover where my mother was from, and then…raise a family. The moment Celes perished, so did my dreams. And while two women can't bear children, I now have a chance to be mother to the world and nurture it back to how it should be. I don't want to leave you, Sabin, or Locke but this is something I must do."

Edgar remained silent. He had nothing more to say at this juncture. It was clear that Terra had spent the last year thinking about a great deal of many things.

After some time, they finally arrived at the sarcophagus of one Celes Chere. Through the viewing window set in the stone lid, it appeared as if she were merely sleeping and would wake any moment. A fleeting sentiment for sure. Looks were deceiving and hiding just how severe her injuries had been.

"I assume you wish to be laid to rest with her?" he asked. He hadn't wanted to as he'd lost too many friends and even his father because of the Empire and its rabid dog Kefka. Celes had been the most recent devastating loss; now it would be Terra by her own admission. While he understood her reasoning, that understanding did not make things easier to grasp.

Digging up Celes' bones was not something he relished in either.

Terra nodded and enveloped him in a tight hug. Surprisingly, her fire was neither hot nor damaging. It simply was as if it were just light. "You're the only one I could trust with this, hey," she said with a hitch. "Both Locke and Sabin would try to talk me out of it."

"Yes, well, I cannot speak for Locke, but between myself and my brother, I have always been the more rational and level-headed one. However, I will say that I do not agree with this, Terra. There must be another way."

"She's an angel now," she said with the look of faraway eyes. "And now it's time for her to take me away to be at her side." The fire in her hand brightened to the point of near blinding and spread throughout her body. It showed no signs of stopping until it engulfed her completely. "Celes, please, point me to the sky above. I can't get there on my own."

Edgar yelled Terra's name in surprise, but it had been too little, too late. As quick as they had come the flames went out in a puff of smoke, leaving nothing but ash and a small glowing stone of emerald and rose. Magicite. He had seen espers become this stone before. It had been unsettling then, but knowing that this stone had once been one of his closest friends was flat out disturbing. He held it close to his breast and couldn't stop the sad smile from flooding his face. Despite the fire that had created it, it wasn't warm to the touch. It was warm to the soul. That warmth was Terra's personality and presence, the pure essence of her soul.

Please, don't ever forget me…or her.

After much deliberation in the thick darkness, Edgar broke the seal on the sarcophagus and carefully placed the gemstone shard that was Terra under the stiff hands resting on Celes' long unmoving chest. There was a brief flash of light before it went dull once again. With that, the feeling of warmth faded and Edgar knew that he was truly alone once more. He fumbled with the stone lid in the darkness, numb and lost in thoughts and memories of his fallen friends. That light had been as if Terra had thanked him one final time before moving on to whatever awaited her in the next life.

When he finally crawled out of the crypt and into the light, he was surprised to find that the oasis that had dried and withered after the end of the world was green once more. Its water flowed once again as if the last three years of drought had never occurred. Absolutely amazing! He hadn't doubted Terra, but to see the change so immediately was astonishing!

A call of his name brought Edgar's attention towards the direction of the castle. There, he saw his brother Sabin waving his hand and approaching at a quick pace. Edgar raised a hand in greeting, before turning back to the reflective surface of the pond.

He remembered the crystal clarity from his boyhood; to look down and see the sky and its cloudy denizens as if he had looked up, nowhere else in Figaro did such a place exist. The wind, which had been non-existent, now blew through, letting him know that it was still around.

"There you are, Brother!" Sabin said as he came to a stop near the water's edge beside Edgar. "The chancellor was worried sick and sent me out looking for you!"

"I felt it neces'ry to visit an old friend," Edgar said. He hated lying to his flesh and blood and so decided that basic facts that weren't lies would do the trick. "I am certain ol' chancy lived well during my absence."

Sabin slapped Edgar on the shoulder and guffawed loud enough that it echoed throughout the desert. "You'd been gone an hour, and the old man looked as if it'd been a decade!"

Edgar nodded with a crestfallen smile. That certainly sounded like the chancellor. Everything was a disaster, and there never was enough time to fix said disaster. Despite the annoyance, the royal family was attached to the old coot. He was a good man, served the kingdom well, but was just a touch crazy.

"So, how's Terra?" Sabin's demeanor had switched to serious quickly and without warning as if a lever had been pulled.

Edgar slowly turned to look at his brother. "How… How did you know about Terra?"

Sabin shrugged. "She'd been spotted in the courtyard by the guard captain. Knew immediately who she was on the description. I assumed that she finally came to face Celes."

"Your assumption is indeed correct," Edgar said with a sigh.

"So, has she come back for good?"

There had been a hopefulness that Edgar dreaded crushing. It simply was a not question that he wanted to answer. "I am afraid Terra has gone once again. Whether she returns or not I cannot say."

Sabin's face fell far from grace. He and his melancholy nodded and slouched ever so slightly. "The look in your eyes tells me she won't be. I don't agree with her decision, but honestly, I dunno what I'd do in her situation."

"Neither would I."

"I'm also assuming that the oasis coming back to life is her doing as well?"

"You assume much. That can be dangerous if often done."

"You're easy to read. Celes wasn't the only one to accuse you of being a terrible liar." Sabin grinned a cheeky grin. "Word of advice, don't ever play poker against Setzer."

"Very funny, but I feel the issue lies not with me, but with your ability to perceive the world around you."

"I know. It's scary accurate sometimes."

Edgar put an arm around Sabin's monstrous shoulders and resumed his gazing into the crystalline pond. For the briefest of moments, he thought he had seen a reflection of Terra and Celes smiling and waving at them from the opposite bank. A quick look up revealed that they were truly well and gone, never to return, martyrs to allow the rest of the world lives of peace. Hopefully, those two would have the peace they deserved in the afterlife.

Keeping his tears of sadness at bay, Edgar once again turned to Sabin. "Well, since you have correctly assumed the situation at hand, you can share in my burden. With her passing, magic is now flowing back into the world. That knowledge must remain in this crypt."

"I can't tell Locke?"

"You especially cannot tell him. This knowledge dies with you and I, Sabin. I do not want another War of the Magi. I do not want another Kefka or Gestahl. MagiTek must be a science that will disappear and be forgotten after the passing of our generation. Celes' death shall not be in vain nor will Terra's sacrifice. Human beings are fickle creatures that are on their best behavior when ignorant of things that should not concern them. This will be Figaro's most guarded secret; a secret so secret that no one in the castle will be aware of it."

Sabin nodded and smiled a taut smile. "To my grave, Brother," he said with a seriousness that rarely meshed with his carefree demeanor. He extended his hand and Edgar took it in his own. "They'll have to dig up my bones to get it out of me." It was a sentiment that he shared and a promise he was determined to keep not only for himself or future generations but for the two friends who had perished for the rejuvenation of the world. However, as they shook hands, Sabin's smiled faded. "Edgar, I want to know. What were Terra's last words to you?"

Edgar smiled at the memory of the warmth he had felt from the magicite; Terra's final heartfelt message. "It was not so much what she had said, but what I had felt in my heart." He finally allowed the dams holding back his tears to break before looking to the sky above. "Her departure from this world may lay among lies and secrets, but I shall never forget her, Sabin, and neither should you."

More stories in the FFVI: Cold Fire Universe:
Rust Never Sleeps
An Angel of Snow
Who Gives Healing to the Healers?
Point Me to the Sky Above
Rust Never Sleeps Remix: Alternate and Deleted Scenes

On Archive of Our Own:
Prayer of Revenge