And here, ladies and gentlemen, is the somewhat-overdue epilogue... I appreciate your having read through Choice, all your reviews, and so forth. Take care of yourselves and maybe I'll see you next time. Mengde out.
An hour later, and the Addled Impasse was silent.
Auron could almost hear the echoes of conflict, hollow screams that were ultimately without substance. He looked about at the nothingness that surrounded him and felt it as clearly as he'd felt Saïx's fist grinding into his face. Was that all the man had been, then?
Sheets of energy rippled through The World That Never Was, and Auron instinctively recognized the imminent collapse. He gazed out the window and saw that Kingdom Hearts had been shattered. The giant moon was no longer there.
He opened another portal and stepped through, materializing in the void above the Altar of Naught. It was not difficult to stay aloft through force of will; the world was collapsing and the overtaxed threads of reality were snapping. Sora and his friends were down there, and even as Auron watched, a portal opened at the behest of a blond-haired young woman who stepped through and motioned at the group to follow her.
There was only reason that The World That Never Was would be coming apart, and it was an obvious one. Xemnas had lost control of it, or at least had no more reason to maintain it. Undoubtedly Sora was bound for a final confrontation with him – Auron could detect the Nobody's immense aura approaching, a threat clear as day. None of those gathered on the Altar of Naught noticed, and the guardian was not surprised in the least. The only reason he could detect Xemnas was because the man was only shrouding his approach from his attackers.
They would deal with him. Auron could not protect Sora from destiny.
He stepped back into the realm of darkness, leaving the dying world behind, and a moment later was back in the Underworld. He could feel the barriers cracking here, too; the dead were disappearing, going back to their original worlds that had been eaten up by the tides of darkness. A good deal of time had also passed in the second he'd spent in the realm of darkness – it had been destabilizing and time had speeded forward like a needle skipping over a record. Auron didn't pretend to understand what was happening, but he felt it could only be for the best.
The stairway out of the Underworld shimmered temptingly, and Auron ascended it, gazing up at the light piercing into the blackness until he emerged into the day. Hercules, Megara, the hero's trainer Philoctetes, and the winged horse Pegasus stood in front of the newly-restored Olympus Coliseum, admiring their handiwork.
"Auron."
Time ground to a halt and Auron turned to see two familiar faces.
"It's not possible," he breathed.
"Not probable," Braska corrected him. "What can I say? I don't believe I understand it either."
Both the summoner and Jecht were wreathed in pyreflies, their ethereal forms flickering and wavering. Auron looked down at himself and saw that he, too, had become transparent, as though being reminded of how fleeting his existence was. "What's going on?"
"Dunno, but I say we take advantage of it," Jecht said. "Can you feel it, Auron? Spira's back. We can leave, go back to where and how we were. I got no idea how that punk kid managed it, but drifters like us are being given a ticket home. Seems to me that he and his gang are probably getting their tickets, too."
An image flashed into Auron's mind: Sora swimming towards a beach, a red-haired girl awaiting him expectantly, hand outstretched…
"Braska…" he started.
"I know," Braska said. "I'm s-"
"Don't apologize," Auron cut him off. "You did the only thing you could, given the circumstances. You could never have known the consequences, and it looks as though it's all going to work out at any rate." On an impulse, he stepped forward and put a hand on Braska's shoulder. "I know how you felt. I did the same thing, after all."
Braska smiled, pained. "Of course. Thank you, Auron."
"I'll make sure she knows," Auron promised. "She will not walk into the trap unprepared." He turned to Jecht. "And I'll continue to keep your son safe."
"You better. Kid's got a bright future, I'd say."
Whatever Hades had done to restore him to life, Auron felt it wearing off. His body was dulling, becoming cold again as it had always been since outside Bevelle when he'd died. Spira pulled at him, calling him back.
"Before we go," he said, "I have another question for you, Braska. Do you remember what Saïx did?"
Braska shrugged. "Fragments. I remember that for someone who had no emotions, he was remarkably skilled at portraying them."
"I meant, do you remember what he did to bring you back? How did he do it? I'm sure Sora killed him, so how did he reconcile his existence and restore your being?"
"My heart was absorbed by Kingdom Hearts after my Heartless was killed, that much I'm sure of," Braska replied. "So it was just a matter of taking it back, I think, but it was more than that. It was my heart, not Saïx's, and taking it into himself would have been impossible if he hadn't made a choice."
"What choice?"
The summoner closed his eyes, searching. "I remember it clearly. He asked for his heart, and Kingdom Hearts obliged him as he faded to nothing. In his last moments, he chose to believe that it had all been a joke, as it were, that his existence was nothing but a momentary distraction in my own, and that he was, essentially, me."
Auron stared for a long moment as the implications clicked in his mind. "In other words…"
"He lied to himself. There was nothing else to it. It certainly wasn't real, what he chose to believe, but choosing to believe it made it real."
The guardian nodded contemplatively. "That would make sense. For a being like Saïx, the truth of whose existence was nothing more than a lie… I suppose it was easier for him to blur the line between the two extremes." He looked up. "I will be seeing the both of you."
"Stay true to yourself," Braska said, his expression showing the slightest hint of amusement.
"See ya," Jecht added.
They were gone, and Auron was facing the Coliseum again, with the clock resuming its steady march forward. He looked up at the sky and decided to follow time's example.
This is my story, he thought, and it's time to resume it.
With a small smile, Auron turned and faded away, passing out of everything in the world and returning to Spira.
The next chapter of his story awaited him.