I can hear the waves crashing in my ears, the water around us mixing with the blood covering my arms. I'm holding my hands on his chest, as if somehow keeping the red liquid inside his body will keep his spark from flying out of his body. He tries to speak but the noise comes from the hole in his throat like some obscene whistle.

Just stay quiet, just stay quiet.

I can't help and I don't know why. I had power once, even besides the power granted from the things we kept in our heads. Now I look inside my heart and the blue light isn't there anymore. The girl is knelt next to me and flicking her head back and forth between us like a metronome, can't you do something can't you help can't you can't you can't you. It mixes with the gunfire still whirling over our heads into some insane healing chant that doesn't work. I tell him to stay with me but I don't have the strength to keep him here, and he's dragged down and away, and I take my bloody hands off his chest.

They take us off the beach hours later and we leave the sand and blood behind us. Two on our own feet, one carried out in a bag. Four others not carried not at all. All the trip back she stares at me over the heavy bag that lies on the floor between us. I know what question she wants to ask me but I pray she doesn't because I have no answer, none at all.

And for what?

I try to call it up once more, back at Garden, safe and warm in my quarters where no-one can see. There's a spark, maybe, for a second. Then nothing, and no matter how much I try I can't call it up. Maybe I left it back on that beach, stripped away by the ghosts of the people I led there and left behind.

And for what?

It's a beautiful night.

We're sitting low in the water off the coast, the waves rolling in from the deep sea and smashing against the smooth metal of Garden's shell. The ocean is thrown up into the air drop by drop, the moon behind it shining through every pearl and covering the ballroom in a curtain of shimmering white light. I can hear the tinkle and chime of glasses tapping together, gentle laughter and the content small-talk of people who have to work together all day and then see each other the rest of the time and don't mind at all. The long party is winding down at last, the pictures taken and the guests departed.

Outside the huge glass panes I stand in front of the world is quiet, the crashing of the waves far below reaching us this high up as only a pretty lightshow and a wafting breeze. Violence deep down and far away reaches the surface as nothing more than a ripple. The feeling is one I'm familiar with.

I'm not happy. In the last week, the last month, maybe the last year. Like a creeping feeling in my mind and heart I just can't shake. The small things started first. My pen-hand would shake a little marking the fifth-dozen report that week. I'd lose focus and find myself staring out over the landscape when I should have been listening to whatever Xu or Nida was telling me. And always, always I'd feel that little creeping noise in my head that told me something wasn't right. This wasn't where I should be. I'd taken myself from missions where I could, but eventually it would happen somewhere that mattered. The last week I'd stayed in Garden for the lead-up to this reception, and nothing I'd tried helped.

Now I'm here in the only place I can call home, surrounded by the people I loved most in the world, and I felt sick to death.

"Waves getting to you Quisty?"

I turned to see Selphie walking over to me with a smile on your face. "I still get a little seasick sometimes."

"You want to come back over? I've got food I hid from the Galbadian delegates."

"In a minute. I- hey!"

Selphie wrapped an arm around my shoulders. "C'mooon, this is our night!" I had to brace myself to stay standing as she tried to swing around and pull me towards the centre. "We got it this time, I know it Q. Peace and love!"

The fifth peace in as many years. Like gruesome clockwork that breaks down with the regularity of the tides and can only be repaired with blood. The treaty was signed tonight and it had been handshakes all around, but I know the contracts will start coming in in a half-year or less, and it doesn't matter what was said tonight, I'll still watch as our landing-craft go off to deter or uproot whatever islet or town Galbadia will be staking their claim to. As for love? Love wasn't a subject I liked to look at. I could feel anger somewhere down in my stomach, closer than it used to be. I had to get rid of it somehow before it overwhelmed me, and the training centre was already shut. Maybe a drink would help. "Sure, why not?" I let Selphie drag me away from the ocean and the moonlight, back into the warmth of the ballroom. I can see the table everyone is sat around, talking together like we have for a thousand nights.

"Hey there. Thought you left a while back?" Zell asked as I drew up a chair.

"Just getting some air," I replied as I sat down. "Looks like you're already working on cleaning up what the guests didn't eat, how considerate of you all."

"Shame to let good stuff go to waste." Zell shoved a breadstick into his mouth like it was a cigar, and grinned. I smiled back. Selphie was right, it did feel better here. Even if only for a little while. "Think it'll work this time?" the young mercenary-hero asked through a mouthful of bread.

Selphie waggled a finger. "Nuh-uh, no more shoptalk tonight." She looked harried and I could see her fingers tapping away on the table. Nobody had worked harder than Selphie to make sure this came off. Cid and Squall had brought the warring states to the table, but the rest of us had made sure the table was there. Or at least, most of us. Irvine being away hadn't helped her mood, and for the last month she'd teetered between furious energy and exhausted overwork. Whenever the man got back from whatever mission or assignment Garden had him on, he was going to be deep in trouble.

"Hey, at least you were back for this one, right?" Zell asked, oblivious to the small wince from Selphie. Either he shared my own doubts or, more likely, just wasn't thinking about the words coming out of his mouth. Either way he'd hit on something the rest of the table seemed intent on not digging at. "You sticking around this time?"

"For a while," I said. "Just to check everything's still working."

"See I told you she'd miss us," Selphie said authoritatively. Squall just snorted with amusement and I couldn't help but laugh.

"Absence makes the heart grow fonder." I nearly jumped out of my skin and shifted around in the chair to see Xu standing behind me. I had no idea how long she'd been standing there for. Being able to slip silently in and out of crowds and rooms was a good skill for a mercenary, but Xu's stealthy movement could be more than a little eerie. The brunette turned to look at her Commander. "Can I borrow Quistis for a few minutes?"

Squall only nodded, the excitement that covered the rest of the half-empty ballroom seeming to slide through him without leaving any of itself behind in him. I knew why of course. He always did…revert…a little whenever Rinoa was gone. The shell he'd once hid inside may have been broken but old habits died hard, and whenever his fiancé was away he became just a little more subdued and monosyllabic.

Xu looked down at me. "Do you mind?"

I shrugged. "Sure." Xu just cocked an eyebrow at me and I stood. "I'll be back, save some of that for me alright?" I told the others at the table.

"No promises," Selphie and Zell said almost at the same time, and burst out laughing as I walked away.

"So what was all that about?"

"All what about?" I asked as we walked through the dark halls towards the centre of Garden. With the doors shut the sounds coming from the party inside sounded like they were far, far away, and the frosted glass of the doors made it look like a sea of constantly-moving shadows.

"Come on Quistis. Maybe the Gang back there can't spot it but I can see it clear as day."

There's a saying from Balamb that Cid told me once; you need to make sure your feet lie on solid ground if you want to have your head high up in the clouds. When we were drinking once Xu had told a much shorter, more brutal one from her hometown of Dollet; a blade without a handle will only cut your fingers off. Cid had built Garden out of stratospheric ideals, and SeeD was a razor-sharp edge. Xu and her section of the organisation was the handle, the feet. She and her silent staff kept the Garden and its machinery flowing smoothly while the rest of us were off fighting for those grand ideals Cid liked to talk about. I'd known her since we had both started SeeD at roughly the same age and we'd kept that friendship even though our paths had split apart almost immediately, me to the front-line and her something more silent. I was almost as close to her as the adopted family I'd left behind in the ballroom. "I'm just a little tired is all," I said as we entered the darkened concourse. At night Garden was practically empty, only those on punishment detail and Garden staff walking the halls.

She didn't buy it, not for a second. "Then by the way you've been acting you've been tired for weeks. You barely cared that we signed this treaty today Quistis. You didn't seem to care about the party afterwards. You certainly don't look like you care why we're out here tonight now." She stopped mid-stride to look at me, arms crossed like an instructor at a hesitant pupil. "This isn't you."

I knew she was right but…no. There was no 'but'. She was right. I didn't care, and I hated myself for it. I sat down on one of the benches that lined the curving walkways and looked up at her. "I can't feel it anymore."

"Feel what?"

I held out a hand and tried to find the power there, but as usual there was nothing. Where there should have been blue light dancing on my palm there was just the cold breeze of Garden's processed air. Xu looked confused for a second, and then… "Oh." She tapped a hand against her arm. "Since when?"

"Since the beach." I didn't have to tell her which one.

"That wasn't your fault," Xu said instantly. "If anyone was to blame it was Galbadia. Again." That was a sore point for her, as it was for me.

I waved the raised hand at her; I know I know. I'd heard it before, from Cid and Xu. Certainly none of us had been to blame. But the blood had still washed across my hands and nobody else's. "Since then I've felt nothing." In more ways than one. Suddenly the dam cracked, just a little, and without knowing how I got there I was staring down at the floor with my head in my hands. When I spoke there was a crack in my voice I detested but couldn't smooth out. "God Xu, I don't feel anything."

I felt like a wretched creature.

Xu sat down next to me on the bench. She didn't put her arm around me, she knew I'd hate pity like that. Always too proud for my own good. "You know what? You need to get away from here," she said.

"I tried that," I said bitterly.

"I mean really away, not just outside these walls. Away from SeeD."

"How?" I asked, not expecting an answer. I'd thought about it a couple of times. Thought about just handing papers and leaving. But I knew I'd be running away from Garden, not running to someplace else. I'd joined so young I couldn't even remember anything before SeeD and Balamb anymore. This place was my home. I'd never even gotten to the stage of asked for the retirement forms.

Xu could read my thoughts like I was an open book. "There's a way." She reached into her jacket and took out a small datapad. "This came in today. Not a mission." She handed it to me. "Don't look at this tonight. Go and sleep, I'll clear your schedule for tomorrow. If I was a believer in Hyne I'd swear to Him Quistis you look like you need it. Take a look at that and get back to me in the afternoon alright. I see you awake before noon I'll frog-march you back into your apartment and tranq you to sleep."

I grabbed it as we both stood. For a second neither of us moved, just two quiet statues in the semidarkness of the Garden. Then she stepped forward and hugged me, something she had never, ever done before. I was too shocked to respond.

She stepped away after a second and the emotion was gone again, only a small smile on her face. "Just…keep it together, alright? The world needs people like us to keep it from breaking down."

Assuming I could keep myself patched together in the meantime. I took her advice though. I tread the path from the concourse back to my SeeD apartment without stopping for anything, and I was asleep as soon as my head touched my pillow.

"Esthar?" I had no idea what to think of it.

Xu nodded as I handed back the datapad. "They've asked for us to send a team to look over their Rebirth plans. I was going to send one of Nida's groups but…" She didn't say anything else.

I was tempted. I loved Esthar. Ever since we'd first gone there during the War there had been something…pristine…about it that had just called out to me. Like a hothouse flower locked away in its own little world and left to bloom while the rest of the plants around it fought in the dirt. Not that the reality was anywhere near as rosy. A country ruled over by a mad sorceress that had bent the populace to her will and everything she had done to keep it under her control. After the War I had went back for a day with Squall and Rinoa, and Kiros had showed me the endless lists of missing and lost from her reign. For all that though President Loire was doing his best to turn the ideal of progress Esthar represented into a reality.

"It's overseeing the crews there, helping fix chaos the Pandora caused." Xu went on. "Rebuilding, re-housing, finding out what necessities are broken and fixing them up again, anything else Esthar needs to get back on its feet." God bless you Xu, you knew me well. "No treaties or arguing, just helping put things back together."

I smiled. "You didn't have to do this just for me-" I began, but was cut off.

"I know you, Quisty. I even think I know what your problem really is." I doubted that but stayed quiet. "Just get away from these noisy brats that like to play at soldiers, go somewhere with people who actually want your help." She scribbled something down on the datapad and tossed it back in my lap. A contract, signed and sealed, only needing the name of the dispatched SeeD. "Get away from here before it ends up breaking you."

I signed it, before I could think of any reason to stop myself. I handed it back and caught another rare smile from my old friend. "Two emotions in two days Xu, is that a record?" I teased her.

"Go be a smartass on another continent already."

"Only three days?" Squall asked as we stood on the platform. With the treaty just signed there would probably be a breather before one country accidentally insulted another, and the Commander found his workload eased a little. He'd insisted on seeing me off. "Thought you'd be staying longer."

"You know how it is," I replied non-committedly. "Always some other place to be."

"You sure you're alright?" he asked.

"They're sending someone over in an airship, if-"

He cut me off. "You know what I mean Quisty."

Quisty. Squall almost never called us by our old Orphanage names. "Am I really so transparent?" I asked, almost a whisper. God, what if everyone knew? I thought I'd been keeping myself together so well.

"Only if you're watching closely," he replied.

We stood there together in silence for a minute, as above us a pale green dot shimmered into the distance, and began to grow. Not the Ragnarok then, one of the smaller models. "You should go and see Rinoa," I said suddenly. Squall just shrugged. I resisted the urge to sigh at him. We were both too old for that now. "I know you miss her. Just take a SeeD boat and go to Timber. Call it diplomatic exchanges or something. You think anybody will care?"

Squall didn't look at me, just kept his eyes on the approaching airship, and I knew he was thinking just that. Why he didn't go I had no idea, and I wondered if something else lay underneath his hesitance. I risked a glance down at his hands clasped in front of him and saw him rubbing his finger, the one with the ring on under the glove. Maybe it was just none of my business, but somehow Squall would always be my little brother. "Maybe I will." He turned and smiled. "Thanks."

I couldn't reply, the roar of the engines slamming the air around us like a hurricane as the Hrist touched-down on the Garden's outskirts. A few students were taking pictures from the windows as the door slid aside to reveal a man in the shining white dress uniform of Esthar's military. I picked up my bags and crossed the black tarmac, already hot from the engine-wash. "Take care of the place while I'm gone!" I shouted at my errant Commander and family.

Squall waved. "Take care of yourself while you're over there!" he shouted at me, as the door slid shut, and the light of the sun and green fields of Balamb were blocked out by the solid steel Esthar technology.

"Ready to go ma'am?" the gleaming soldier asked.

I smiled, and it was almost genuine. "Whenever you're ready." I felt the lift-off seconds later, and the roar of the engines beneath me turned into a thin hum as the craft turned, and headed back home with me in it. I could have sworn there was a slight pull for just a moment as we started moving, like some thin wire snapping as I left. Or hands losing their grip on me.

I went east.