It was done. It took over a year, and thousands of lives, but it was done. Kefka was dead. It was all over.
We were all aboard the Falcon, me on the couch and everyone doing their own things. We hadn't parted ways yet, and in all likelihood, we weren't really going to. Oh sure, Edgar had to hang around his castle, and I promised the kids that I'd return to Mobliz, but for the most part, we had no real homes to return to or families to stay with. The closest thing we've had to those things were each other on this ship. I wasn't sure exactly how it would work out, but I knew that we'd be hanging around each other for a long time to come.
And that fact was going to be pretty much set in stone over the course of the day. We were flying to Figaro Castle, where Edgar promised a big celebratory feast.
Across the room, I saw Edgar, Celes, and Locke in conversation. It was hard to hear them over the other conversations going on. From the look of it, Edgar was telling some kind of story. The dumb grin on his face probably meant that it was about some girl he 'met'.
"Nice!" Locke finally said loudly, and he and Edgar exchanged a high five while Celes rolled her eyes.
Men.
Locke then apparently made some kind of lighthearted apology for his gender to Celes. Celes crossed her arms and shook her head, a small smirk on her face. Locke paused, then got onto his knees, holding his hands up at her and begging forgiveness. Celes looked down at him, her smirk wide now.
"Kiss my foot!" She said, holding a foot up.
Locke grabbed her shin and foot in both hands and gave it a big kiss.
At this point, they realized that not only Edgar, but everyone on this level of the ship was looking at them. Blushes quickly reddened their faces. Locke got to his feet.
"...we are rehearsing for a musical." He sputtered.
Everyone watching either smirked or laughed, Sabin going so far as to applaud. Locke looked at everyone, then shrugged and gave a bow.
Celes, meanwhile, was apparently too embarrassed to look at anyone. With her head down, she moved to leave the room. Locke quickly caught up with her, walking side by side with her and putting a hand on her opposite shoulder. Celes looked at it, smiled, and placed a hand on his as they left the room.
Everyone went back to whatever they were doing. I glanced at Edgar. He was the last to stop watching them leave. From the look on his face, it almost seemed like he was... jealous? He couldn't be; I'd never seen him show even the slightest interest in Celes. Well, he did once try his usual 'your hair is like a sea of gold, whose beauty is still not even a fraction of yours' claptrap, and got a nice handprint on his face for it, but beyond that, he didn't seem to think of Celes as anything more than a friend and ally. But his face didn't lie. There was a want there.
Edgar glanced at me, noticing that I was staring at him, and he quickly looked away.
Before I could say anything, Sabin suddenly sat next to me. He was taller than me, but because he was so huge, he sank into the couch so deep he had to look up at me.
"Enjoy the show?" He asked with a smirk.
"...you look a lot like this guy I know, but he's like two feet taller!" I replied.
Sabin laughed and gave me a playful shove. I tried to shove him back, but it was like shoving a wall. He didn't budge. He just crossed his arms and laughed.
"How is it that your brother is my size and you are Hercules?" I asked with a smirk.
"I spend my time working out. He spends his time trying to woo girls." Sabin replied.
I noticed movement in the corner of my eye. Edgar was walking towards us.
"Yeah, that's right, we're talking about you, move along." Sabin replied with a smirk.
Edgar walked right up to him. "As King, I smite you." He replied, hitting a light chop on Sabin's forehead.
"...I think a fly landed on me, Terra!" Sabin said to me, mocking him.
"Leave me out of this." I said, smiling.
Edgar grabbed his cape and quickly moved it in front of him, covering Sabin. He grabbed Sabin's head in his hands, tightly wrapping the cape around it.
"Stay away from this one. When his weight makes him crash through the floor, you'll fall through too." He said.
"I'll drag you down with me!" Sabin said through the cape.
Edgar smirked, let go of Sabin, and left the room.
Sabin and I were alone in the room now, save for Shadow, who was looking into the room over the balcony.
The look Edgar gave Celes and Locke was still bugging me. What if he really was jealous of Locke and I just never picked up in his infatuation with Celes? I still wasn't really sure what love in the romantic sense was, after all.
"Something wrong?" Sabin asked.
"Oh, nothing, really." I replied. "It's just that I swear, Edgar looked jealous of Celes and Locke."
Sabin gave me a funny look.
"Really?" He asked. "I've never noticed him show any real interest in Celes."
"That's what I thought, too. That's why I was confused." I replied.
"Well, don't worry about it. I'm sure you just read him wrong." Sabin said, shrugging it off.
Well, that was good. Edgar seemed like a nice enough guy, aside from his girl hunger, and I'd have hated it if he turned out to be low enough to try to steal girlfriends.
"Can I ask you something?" I asked.
"...philosophers have been asking 'what is love' for thousands of years. If they can't come up with a decent answer, I can't, and neither can you. You'll know what love is when you find it." Sabin blurted out.
"...no, no, it's not that." I said with a smirk.
"Oh, sorry." He said. "I've kind of been rehearsing that answer ever since I noticed you asking people about it."
"...you're not good at improv?" I asked.
"I am not." He replied. "What is it, then?"
"Well, I was just wondering if Edgar has always been like this." I said.
"What do you mean? You mean following women around with his tongue hanging out?" Sabin asked.
"...yes, that." I replied, yet another smirk coming across my face.
Sabin laughed. "You know, it's funny. When we were teenagers, he went after women just as much, but I guess he was a lot rustier."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"He got shot down all the time." Sabin replied. "He came out with his 'w-want to do something sometime?' and was all romancy about it, and never got a date. Then, he changed his strategy to... this."
Huh, that was interesting. I really didn't remember much about my life, and I had no experience with teenage dating, but I thought that it was the younger people who only wanted women for one thing, and started wanting romance when they got older. Why was Edgar working the other way? Were my ideas wrong?
"...you're going to ask him about this, aren't you?" Sabin asked.
"I might." I replied, a little embarrassed.
"You've gotta let this 'love' thing go, Terra. You'll know it when you find it." Sabin said.
"But how will I find it if I don't look for it?" I blurted out before I could stop myself.
Sabin looked me over.
"...you're falling for Edgar?" He asked.
I felt a blush cover my face.
"No, that's not what I meant!" I protested, looking away from him to hide my redness. That was true, it wasn't. I just wanted to get as many opinions about this kind of thing as possible. Maybe love was too abstract a thing to get real answers on, but Sabin didn't realize that I was in the worst position of all to understand it. The things even he knew, I probably didn't. And since I was 20, I really needed to figure this stuff out.
"Your lips say no, but your cheeks say yes." Sabin said with a smirk. "I look forward to having you as a sister in law."
"Stop it!" I protested, shoving him. Again, he just laughed, not budging.
"I'm just teasing you." He said, giving me a playful shove of his own. I, of course, was almost knocked over from the force of it.
I smiled and stood up.
"You are too strong." I said, smirking.
Sabin flexed his arms and kissed his biceps. "No such thing." He replied, returning the smirk.
I walked out of the room the same way Edgar left. He had walked down a hallway nobody ever really used, since it mostly led to storage areas. The doors were all closed, save for one. I walked up to it, and Edgar was there. It was a small room, mostly full of boxes containing tools and various potions and elixirs. Edgar was idly going through them.
"...anything good?" I asked.
Edgar jumped in surprise.
"Not really." He said with a shrug. "I'm just looking for anything that could make our dinner better, but eh, not really."
"That's too bad." I replied. "But I'm sure you've already got everything we need, right?"
"Oh sure, everything and more!" Edgar replied happily. "I'm just, you know, bored. Not much to do on this thing once the thrill of being so high up gets old."
I smiled and nodded. Falling from the sky from one of these things, and then almost being eaten by that Doom Gaze monstrosity, really killed all the thrill of flying.
I looked Edgar over, unsure about how I should go about asking him anything. Sure, we were close friends by this point, but you don't just come out and say 'why do you hunt women so?'.
"Something wrong?" Edgar asked.
I felt my face turn red a little. "No, nothing." I replied. "I'd just... like to ask you a bit of a personal question, if you don't mind."
"'What is love?'" Edgar asked.
"...no, it's not that!" I replied with a laugh. It was a relief that he asked that. I felt the blushing go away. "Sabin assumed that, too! What's with you two?"
"We're related." Edgar asked with a smirk. "What is it, then?"
The embarrassment quickly returned. I couldn't think of any other way of asking this.
"Sabin told me you didn't always... you know... go after so many women." I said, feeling myself turn beet red. "I'd just like to know... why you do now."
Edgar clearly wasn't expecting the question. His eyes widened a little, his face full of confusion.
"...what brought this on?" He finally replied.
"I don't know... I'm just trying to learn about these things." I replied, just barely keeping eye contact.
Edgar looked at me, then didn't seem to look at anything as he thought the question over.
"I don't suppose you'll be happy with 'I like women'?" He asked.
"...no, I wouldn't be." I replied. "Besides, I know you, and you're definitely not THAT kind of guy."
Edgar smirked. "Thanks for the vote of confidence. But alright, you want the truth?"
"Please." I replied.
"Alright, it's really quite simple." Edgar said. "See, when I was younger, I was... I tried to woo women like Cyan would. It was really pathetic, now that I see what Cyan is like."
"You be nice." I said with a smirk.
"Oh, nothing against him." He replied. "But no girl I went up to would give me the light of day... I don't get it. Everyone always says 'be nice and be yourself and girls will like you', but that didn't work at all. It seemed like only the jerks who treated girls so badly somehow managed to get the dates."
"...but that doesn't make sense." I said.
"Tell me about it." Edgar grumbled. "Those guys kept lying to the girls, kept cheating on them, kept blowing them off to drink with their buddies, and it seemed like no matter how nice I was, it was always those guys who the girls flocked to."
This made no sense at all. Why would any girl want a guy like that? What were they thinking? If that's what love was, I wanted nothing to do with it. On the other hand, Edgar kept describing these stupid women, but I'd never met anyone like that.
"But... I've never met a woman who liked to be treated like that." I replied.
Edgar sat on a box. "Well, I guess people are stupid when they're young." He said.
"So... how did that make you start acting like you do now?" I asked.
"...you make it sound like I'm such a terrible person!" He protested.
I quickly held my hands up. "Sorry!" I protested. "I didn't mean to!"
"Oh, it's alright." He replied.
"Is it a sore spot?" I asked, sitting down beside him.
"Well, it is and it isn't." He replied. "See, I gave up trying to be nice, and instead, tried using the cheesy lines I always use."
Edgar looked at his feet, suddenly looking sad.
"...what's wrong?" I asked, sliding closer to him.
"It's just that... well, it sort of worked for a while. I got one or two dates that didn't go anywhere longterm." He replied. "But the thing is... well, you've spoken to a few women about me, right?"
I thought back through our adventures. The only time I could think of was a year ago, when I spoke to some women in Figaro Castle. I remembered one of them saying something like 'Edgar likes to shower affection on the girls here, but most of us are smart enough to ignore him.' That's when Edgar himself walked in, and you could cut that awkwardness with a knife.
"...yeah, once or twice." I said.
"Well then you know what they think about me now." He continued. "As Sabin puts it, I'm 'the lecherous king.'"
He looked at me, and his expression was one I'd never seen on his face before. Sadness. Not the sadness he showed over the world ending or when Sabin got hurt bad in a fight, but an... emotional sadness.
"You remember that one day, where Lysandra said that smart girls avoid me?" Edgar asked. "Well, it's true. My reputation precedes me wherever I go. It's only the women like that one Cyan called a 'licentious howler' who are wooed by me anymore."
"...why not just stop using your lines?" I asked.
"I don't know what else to do." Edgar said simply. "I tried being nice and being myself, but I just got shot down over and over. With my method now, sure, I still don't get any long term relationships, but at least I get SOMETHING..."
"...so... you... you do what you do now, just to... band-aid your loneliness?" I asked.
Edgars' face turned red, and he quickly looked away from me.
"Sorry, sorry!" I stuttered. "I'm just trying to understand!"
"I know, I know..." He said quietly. "I guess this doesn't really put love in a good light for you, does it?"
"It's confusing, yes..." I said. "I don't understand why any woman would choose that kind of guy over someone being honest and nice."
"Well, don't try to understand it. I've spent a lot of years trying to and it's gotten me nowhere." Edgar replied, finally looking at me again. "I desperately need a Queen, but more importantly, just once, I'd like to know what it's like to..."
"...to be in love." I finished.
Edgar quietly chuckled.
"What a coincidence, eh? Seems like we have the same problem." He said.
I'm not sure how I would have perceived Edgar if I knew of his reputation before I met him, but since I got to know him before I really learned about it, I knew that he was a perfectly nice guy at heart. It was too bad that other women didn't have that same benefit. If they could only get to know him before they heard about him, they'd surely stop being so judgmental.
I slowly felt something building inside me. Pity, yes, there was a lot of that, but there was something else. Having this moment with Edgar, getting to know him this much more, I felt... closer to him. I suddenly wanted to learn more about him, to spent more time with him...
"Edgar..." I started, looking at the floor. "Let's say you wanted to try being nice and yourself again, when trying to woo someone. What would you say?" I looked at him.
"...why?" Edgar asked.
"Just... I'm curious." I slowly replied.
"Alright..." Edgar said, slowly shifting more towards me. "I guess what I'd say is... hello, my lady, I'm sure you know me as King Edgar. What's your name?"
"...and I guess, the woman would say something like... 'yeah, I know. I'm Terra.'" I said, quickly doing a motion like I was shrugging him off."
"Right." Edgar said. "And then I'd say... well, I'd need to try to redeem my reputation, right? So I guess... look, I know what everyone says about me, and I guess way too much of it is true. But I'm trying to put all that behind me. I've known you for quite some time now, and if you'd give me a chance, I'd love to take you out somewhere. You'd have to forgive me for this or that, since I've never really been on a proper date... heck, even how I'm asking right now is pretty weird, right? But what I want is to start having a mature relationship and maybe finally find my queen, and from what I know about you so far, I'd love for that queen to be you."
Both our faces turned red.
"But Edgar... that wouldn't really work... since I don't think you'd know the girl that much if you'd just met her." I stuttered, leaning closer.
"Well... the girl I'm asking right now, I do..." He replied quietly, leaning in himself.
And as our lips touched and we shared that kiss, I realized that Sabin was right. I would indeed know what love was when I found it. And I just did.