Alright, new fic. This one is going to take a while to write and get up...(sorry if this comes out wrong, my 't' is acting up.)...cause it's kinda long. I'm no sure how long, exactly, yet, but I'm thinking LONG.

Elliott: Aren't you already doing a chapter fic? Shouldn't you leave this until you finish Siblings?

Yeah probably. This one will also be a little darker than my other fics, I'm thinking. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Golden Sun. And I'm only saying that once for this fic. I doubt Camelot gives a damn about me anyway.

The assembled Adepts, five of them, yelled at Felix almost in unison. "You're doing what?!" Felix played with his hair nervously, but other than that, he seemed unfazed.

"I'm leaving," he repeated firmly. "I don't belong here anymore. Certain people-" he looked pointedly at Garet- "have made that quite clear."

"Felix, you're still my friend. I…I mean, sure, I didn't trust you before, but that was before. I trust you now; you're still the same person deep down, andI don't want you to leave," said Garet.

"Not everyone is mad at you. It's only about one in ten, I'd say," Felix's mother, Sarah, told him. "And they'll come around."

"Please, son, don't go. You do belong here; you belong with your family," said Felix's father, James.

Felix was silent for a moment. Then he repeated himself. He was leaving Vale. Not that day, or the next, but soon, perhaps next week. He was not going to be shaken on this subject.

Jenna stared silently at her brother, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. She opened her mouth to speak and closed it again, several times. Finally she closed it tightly and fled, bending her neck so that her hair obscured her face. Felix opened his mouth slightly, wanting to call her back. But she wouldn't listen. He knew why she was upset; she didn't want him to leave again, she didn't want to be alone again. Hopefully, she just needed time, to get used to the idea.

He'd said what he had to say, as unpleasant as it had been. He turned to go, walking back up to the recently built house his family stayed in. He could sense the stares of his friends and parents on the back of his neck, but he paid them no heed. They'd get used to it. He'd left before, and they'd lived. If only he could believe they would understand…

But they wouldn't. He wanted to explore the world again. That was his main reason. Life in Vale had changed; some villagers openly shunned him or were plain hostile. But that wasn't the main reason. He could live with that, unpleasant though it was.

He wasn't done adventuring yet. His family would never understand that. His father was more down-to-earth, more sensible. His mother was given to bursts of emotion, and he knew she would worry herself sick if she knew he was still journeying. And Jenna…

Jenna would have supported him, would have told him to be happy. She would have tried, as she was now, to hide her hurt from him.

But she would be hurt. He was hurting her right then. He felt it too; the bond between the siblings was tight. That was what he would regret most. But she had their parents; she had Isaac, Garet, Kay… all their friends. And leaving would prevent him from ripping that pathetic blacksmith wanna-be in half when he eventually proposed to her. He could barely stop himself from doing it right then, whenever he saw the idiot. He wasn't really abandoning her…

Was he?

Isaac tapped at the shutters on Felix's bedroom window, softly at first, then louder, fearful of waking Jenna or her parents. He wanted to speak to Felix alone, so Felix wouldn't clam up as he did in a group. "Felix," he hissed, after getting no response. There was silence for a moment, and Isaac heard rustling and the almost-silent pad of Felix's feet on the wooden floor. Felix whispered his reply through the wooden shutters.

"Who's there? What do you want?"

"It's Isaac. I want to speak to you. In private." There was a pause, long enough to make Isaac wonder if Felix had returned to bed. As Isaac began to think of calling him again, the latch on the shutters clicked and they opened just a crack, enough for the two friends to make eye contact. Felix's eyes held a question.

"I don't want to argue. I just want to know why." Felix hesitated before nodding and opening the shutters wide enough for Isaac to climb through. The two of them faced each other. Felix motioned to a chair and Isaac sat down. Felix sat down on his bed. There wasn't much else in the way of furnishings, just the chair, the bed and a wardrobe. There was nothing in the way of decoration. It was almost as if Felix had never intended to live here.

"I told you why," Felix said immediately. "I don't belong here. Nobody really wants me here, I'm just not accepted." He sighed. "I wasn't at all, never since we came back."

Isaac frowned and leaned forward. "Bull. That's not the Felix I know. You don't give a rat's ass what other people want, or what they think of you. Except for Jenna," he amended thoughtfully. Felix smiled slightly.

"And you," Felix added. "I can't have you thinking you're better than me."

Isaac smiled back, but he didn't fall for the ruse. "And me, alright. Don't change the subject. Why are you leaving?" Felix's smile fell.

"I just don't…I don't feel comfortable here anymore. Think about it. Just because Vale's buildings were destroyed doesn't mean that its rules have been. If I stay here, I'll be holed up here for my entire life. After this mess, there's no way I'll ever get permission to leave…and if I left without permission, I'd be watched like a hawk when I came back. I feel trapped here, like an animal in a cage."

Isaac listened to his friend intently, feeling part of him agree with Felix. "Felix," he said, "I understand what you're feeling. Sometimes… I think that too. But Vale is our home. Are you just going to turn your back on the people who care about you?"

"You said you didn't want to argue," Felix said. Isaac fidgeted in his chair. "But… sometimes I do feel like that, and I know it will hurt you all. But I'll visit as often as I can. I'm not abandoning you. And if I do stay here, it'll be as if I'm turning my back on our other friends; Piers, Mia, Ivan,…Sheba…" He paused and went on hastily, "All the people we met on our travels. I promised to visit them again. Besides," he whispered, suddenly energetic, "I've seen the world, Isaac! Deserts, jungles, frozen wastelands…hell, we went inside a volcano! A volcano! I want to see everything I missed before. The whole thing! Every last bit and wonder!" He seemed to realise what he was doing and stifled a laugh. Even though it was too dark to see, Isaac was sure he was blushing. "Sorry, didn't mean to make a speech. But I can't turn my back on that, Isaac. I'm sorry. I just can't."

Isaac spent a while sorting out his thoughts, deciding what to say to Felix. "This time…I can't say I feel the same way at all. Once is enough for me. I understand that you might feel that way, though. You're the adventurous one. All I want is to live my life, have a home, a family-" he glanced up at Felix, wondering if he would sense with whom-" and if I can have that, I don't care if I never see another desert again."

Felix narrowed his eyes at Isaac and Isaac wondered fleetingly if he'd given the wrong message to Felix. Then Felix shook his head and Isaac relaxed.

"You're a simpler soul than me, Isaac. Maybe you're lucky. …Did you learn what you came here to learn?" Isaac nodded, resigning himself to the idea of Felix leaving. They bid each other goodnight and Isaac left the room the way he'd come in. "Besides," Felix said, almost as an afterthought, "what I told the others was the truth. I know I don't usually care what people think of me, but disapproval is one thing, and outright dislike and hostility is another. Some people won't even talk to me."

"It's a few against many, Felix.'

"Only takes one to make your life miserable."

"Well…Felix, at least tell your friends and family the truth about why you're leaving. The way you're doing it, they're going to feel guilty for not being there for you when you need it. Especially Jenna. This is breaking her heart." Felix winced visibly.

"Re-breaking," he said to himself, thoughtful. Isaac could see the pain on his face. Jenna was, as far as Isaac could tell, the most important thing in Felix's life. He could barely deny his sister anything. "I'll think about it. Promise," he said, and closed the shutters. Isaac heard the latch click into place and sighed. If that was the reason…then there was nothing any of them could do. If Felix's desire was to travel, then it wasn't right to hold him back.

And yet… he had said that he wasn't happy in Vale, that the villagers shunned him. Blamed him for the destruction of the village, or still saw him as a traitor? Did it matter? If Felix had made his mind up, there would be no stopping him. Isaac returned home, snuck back in through his bedroom window (he was an expert at that) and fell asleep, troubled thoughts still running through his head.

If only he'd been able to stop Felix from being washed down stream during the storm… his friend would never have been treated like this…he wouldn't be shunned by the people he'd grown up with…Jenna never would have lost her brother…

Alchemy would not have returned and the world would still be rushing forward to its doom. The voice spoke in Isaac's dreams. Isaac didn't know where it came from, if it was a hidden part of his own mind, seeing the situation logically, or a separate entity altogether. In its words was an inescapable truth.

There would have been another way to restore Alchemy. The Proxians would have managed it somehow…without the pain he and his friends had gone through…

They wouldn't have. Remember speaking with Master Hama? Karst and Agatio never reached the aerie of Mars. Would Saturos and Menardi have fared differently?

Maybe the four of them would have…

They would not. You know this. …There would have been a way, though…

If only…

Caught up in the turmoil of his mind, Isaac tossed and turned all night long. In his sleep, his hand strayed, from time to time, to his chest, as if it pained him, although as young and healthy as he was, there was no reason for it to do so.

The next day, Isaac, Felix and Garet were meant to finish building the roof of the town hall, a new addition to the town. However, when it came time to start, only Garet was there. It was almost an hour after that that Isaac woke up, not at all refreshed, and another half-hour before he managed to get down to the hall. Garet waved a hammer at him.

"You're late!" he yelled through a mouthful of nails. "Where have you been?"

"I overslept," Isaac said, getting to work. "I had some…" He paused, remembering the chaos of his dreams. "I had a bad dream and didn't sleep too well."

Garet shrugged. "At least you're here. Felix hasn't shown up yet either. You know if he's coming today? Or is he packing or something like that? Oh, no, wait, I know! You two had a tearful farewell last night! Hiding in the shadows, exchanging last kisses…" Garet struck a pose, did a bad impression of Isaac and Felix (with high-pitched voices) saying goodbye and crying. It ended with a parody of the two boys kissing, and as Garet began to mime groping, Isaac punched Garet on the shoulder.

"Shut it," he said, laughing, and ducked a punch Garet threw back at him. "Seriously, Garet, I'll bet he's talking to his parents. Or Jenna," he added, remembering the look on Felix's face the previous night. Garet nodded.

"Yeah. I bet they've got some painful goodbyes to say." They worked like that until lunchtime, trading comments or quips back and forth, or working in an amiable silence broken only by the rap of the hammers.

At lunchtime, Isaac announced an intention to go find Felix and see what he was doing, and if he intended to come and help them. Garet waved at him impatiently, his mouth full of food, and Isaac began his search. He looked all over Vale for nearly an hour, excepting Kraden's cottage which was, once again, built at a distance from the town. For a very good reason, that reason being situated below Kraden's nose and above his chin. Isaac didn't really understand why nobody liked to talk to Kraden. The old man was quite interesting. …Wait a minute.

If you wanted privacy, where would you go? Somewhere that isn't a popular place to be. And where in Vale fitted that description?

Isaac smiled. Kraden's cottage. Or near it, anyway. He set off for the old man's home as quickly as he could.

They were easy to find. The siblings were hiding behind a large stack of logs Kraden used to fuel his fires. Isaac could hear their voices, low and indistinct. Reluctant to interrupt them, Isaac turned to go before curiosity seized him. Had Felix taken his advice? He shouldn't be eavesdropping on his friends, though.

It's not eavesdropping if you're supposed to be there. It's just…overhearing. An honest mistake. Ivan's words came back to Isaac with a mischievous smile almost as scary as Ivan's own. Part of him objected- this was a private conversation!-but Isaac had already made up his mind. He poked his head into Kraden's cottage and asked if he would like some more wood for his fires. Kraden said yes, how considerate of you, Isaac.

Two minutes later, Isaac was halfway up the woodpile, pulling logs from the top as silently and slowly as he could, and concentrating intently on Felix and Jenna's conversation.

"But, I don't see why you have to leave for good…"

"It's not for good. I'll come back and visit. Besides, you'll be fine. You won't be alone, like before. You'll have our parents, Isaac and Garet-"

"I will not be 'fine'. I am losing my brother again. Felix…Felix, I just found you, after so long. How can you want to leave?"

"I said, I'm not comfortable here. I want to see the world again."

"Which is more important than your family?" There was a very uncomfortable pause. Finally Felix spoke again. Isaac had forgotten the wood at this point.

"No, but…I just…I need to start living my own life, Jenna. I can't live with my parents forever. This is the path I'm choosing." His voice had turned firm. It softened again. "I'm sorry that this is hurting you."

Jenna was silent. Then she spoke, still very quiet. "Fine, Felix. If this will make you happy, if it's the life you want…go ahead. You had better come back and visit soon." Her voice was choked, as if she was trying to keep back tears. There was silence from them. Isaac frowned. Damnit, this wasn't right. Those two… This shouldn't have happened to them. Why did they have to separated, when they were so close? It would have been better if it had been someone without anyone so close to them, instead of Felix…someone…

There would have been a way.

…more like him…

If…

He shook his head to clear it, and sighed.

"I'm so sorry, Jenna…and you Felix…

"I should have been able to save you back then."

Isaac froze. His body was…glowing. But he wasn't using Psynergy, and this wasn't the brownish-green, earthen colour of his Psynergy. This light was a golden aura, surrounding him, so bright as to rival Sol itself.

A burning pain lanced through his chest and, reeling in pain and shock, Isaac toppled off of his perch to collapse on the ground, the concerned voices of Felix and Jenna the last things he heard as he sank into darkness.

"Isaac? What happened—"

"Isaac! Isaac, wake up—"

What do you think? Read and review!

Elliott: Magic word?

Ugh. 'Please.' I can't believe a figment of my imagination is lecturing me.