Leo held his face in his hands and took slow, deep breaths, his mind feeling like two halves of a river that had been separated by a dam, now freshly rejoined and still roiling at their connection point. Things that he had learned over the past year that had up until now held little meaning to him suddenly had vast pathways leading back through his mental history, the enormity of them only now becoming apparent.

The Empire... had fallen. Vector, his home, had been wiped off the face of the planet, supplanted by Kefka's grotesque monument to himself. His Emperor had been assassinated, his beloved people had been exterminated or scattered to the wind, his fellow soldiers had been hunted down and picked off by Kefka's wrathful light from the heavens. The once lush and beautiful landscapes had been reduced to desolate wastelands inhospitable to life, with the entire world in a terminal state simply waiting to die. And he... he'd had his love of his country exploited the entire time in order to enable those atrocities.

It had all been too much for him to bear before... and so he simply hadn't. His mind had shut down in that moment, certain that there was no way for his life to continue on. But... his life had continued on, just without any of that connected to it. He had lived a life of ignorance, but also of emptiness, cut off from all the people who had given his life meaning before.

But the true ending of Orco e Delphina had shown him that it was possible to bear that loss and still move forward. That even though the goals he had been focusing on had all failed spectacularly, those weren't the entirety of his life. Things that he had done in pursuit of those goals affected and helped other people, and their successes lived on. He had failed to save the Empire, but he had succeeded in helping the people continue to survive in the aftermath of its fall. He had failed to stop Kefka, but people he'd left an impression on along the way were eager to give him a chance to remedy that. He had failed to save Terra from a decade of torture, but now...

Now she was right here with him, having single-handedly pulled him back from his mental void. But the Terra who was sitting with him now was in conflict with the uncertain, emotionally inexperienced girl from his memories. He had held great affection towards her back then as well, but at that time he saw her as a dependent in his care, not as a...

The heat in his cheeks flared as he pressed his face more firmly into his hands. Oh god, what had he been doing ? He had brazenly flirted with her. He had sensually embraced her. He... he had kissed her! ...Only on the forehead and hand, yes, but still... he knew where his thoughts that he hadn't yet acted on had been roaming and they hadn't stopped there. Without the memories of his adult life experiences it was like he had reverted to some love-struck teenager.

His heart fluttered in his chest. Love-struck...? N... no, that was a wholly inappropriate feeling for him to have given their difference in emotional maturity. He would absolutely never intentionally take advantage of her, but he had been afraid that if he even suggested that he was a viable romantic partner for her that her trust in him coupled with her inexperience would result in him inadvertently grooming her. But... that unease was based on both his and Terra's emotional states from a year ago. After the fall of the world, his emotions had faltered while Terra had grown into a self-sufficient and emotionally stable young woman all on her own. The emotional gap that his past self had used to insist upon a chaste distance between them no longer existed.

General Celes had seen this coming from the very start. Somehow, she could tell that underneath everything, he'd held a flicker of yearning for Terra's emotional growth to mean that someday he'd have someone he could rely on for emotional support as well. He'd latched onto that support so hard when they were reunited in this world, oblivious to the life experiences that would have prevented him from doing so before. But now that he remembered them, he knew that those life experiences were what made him into the person he was now so he couldn't just ignore them. But at the same time, as Orcus's true ending had shown him, bad experiences in his past didn't have to define his future.

Even so, he still couldn't articulate to himself exactly what the nature of his relationship with Terra was at this point or what he even wanted it to be. Well, he did know one thing he still wanted: support. She'd helped him feel so safe and assured these past few days and now that he'd pulled back to a more modest distance to reassess himself, he realized just how desperately he wanted to feel that way again, especially now that the feeling of utter despair that he'd been blocking out for the past year was beginning to claw its way up his neck as the recognition of the loss of the home and its people that he loved had begun to sink in.

"Terra...?" he finally choked out, his head still bowed and pressed into his hands.

"I'm right here, General," she replied attentively, leaning towards him.

His chest clenched and he swallowed, his muscles starting to tense. The memories of her as an inexpressive, emotionless pawn of the Empire still haunted him. Even after her release, he remembered how she continued to struggle with expressing and empathizing with her emotions as well. These memories still gave him slight pause, but... even back then he had genuinely believed that she had the fortitude to grow and overcome the injustices of her childhood. And the woman sitting next to him now had made such amazing progress in doing so that it was more the sudden leap in competency from his memory's perspective that drove his reservations than any actual doubts about her current capabilities. But if he truly didn't want her past to permanently cast a shadow on her life, then he had to overcome it just as much as she did, and interact with her as the person she was now rather than the person she was then.

"Please..." he finally whispered. "You have been... lightening my burden all this time, but now I am faced with a weight that I cannot bear alone. I... I need..."

She nodded, understanding his needs without them needing to be vocalized further. She reached out a hand and hovered it next to his head, but paused and confirmed, "May I... hold you?"

He let out a shudder of a breath, but nodded into his hands. Terra lifted the armrest that had been separating them, removing that obstruction between them, then gently placed the hand that had been hovering by his head against his cheek. He inhaled audibly at the touch, but she maintained the contact, gently tugging his head towards her. He was still stiff, unable to release his own tension enough to lean over. In that case, she came to him, lifting herself up on her knees on her seat and leaning over to wrap her other arm around his shoulders and press the side of his head against her neck.

She rested her cheek against the top of his head and squeezed him gently, still feeling the trembling tension in his muscles. Letting out a breath, she couldn't help but feel like... she'd done this to him. Moments earlier he had been enthusiastically watching his favorite opera with her, eyes glimmering with excitement. But now he was on the verge of breaking under the strain of his revived memories that she'd been working all this time to unearth, going against the advice that Shadow had given her for this exact reason.

But... Leo had wanted to remember, too. And he knew that it would probably hurt. But he trusted her to be here to help him bear that burden, and thus it was a risk he had been willing to take. He knew he'd have to climb that cliff like Orcus did and stare into that black abyss, but she would have to be the one to show him how to get back down.

Nuzzling his hair, she took a deep breath and whispered, "We're all still here... Me, Celes, Locke, Edgar, Sabin, Cyan, Shadow, Setzer... you've left an impression on all of us and we've all been wishing for your safe return. You need to mourn for what you've lost, but you also need to understand how much you still have. That you still have somewhere to go and people who love you. Your river didn't end at that cliff, it just flowed into something new. This world still has a future, and we want you to be a part of it..." She hesitated slightly here, but resolved herself in her choice of words and finished with a soft, "... Leo."

That last word pierced through his immobilizing tension and went straight to his heart. Leo... yes, that was his name. Even without the Empire, even without his title... he was still Leo. A man who held a deep love for his people... a man who found joy in serving and nurturing them... a man with a profound passion for music... And even when he had lost his memories and experiences he had never lost any of that, only the name that had encompassed them. A name that through Terra's words now felt reawakened and fully embodied by him. His memories may have been fractured but "he" had continued to exist uninterrupted the entire time. The enormity of his loss was daunting... but it wasn't all-encompassing.

His tension disrupted, he shuddered and collapsed against her. She was briefly surprised by the sudden weight but was still able to support him. She held him by the shoulders and moved back into a sitting position in her seat, gently guiding him down to lean against her and rest his face on her shoulder. His breaths were trembling and uneven, and she could feel wet tears coating her skin.

She wrapped her arm around his back and nuzzled the side of his head, slowly rubbing his back. As much as it hurt to see him in so much grief... she also knew it was necessary. Tears brought buried pain to the surface where it could be confronted and dealt with rather than perpetually eating away at him from the inside. That was probably why... she could feel her own eyes watering as well.

She held him for quite some time while he quietly wept against her shoulder, his body progressively slackening and sagging more heavily into her. There were so many things she wanted to say to him to reassure him, but... right now was his time to grieve and reflect, and it wasn't her place to interject her own thoughts any further until he requested them. So all she could do was remain a silent companion with a secure arm around him to keep him as comfortable as possible.

After a while he finally took a long, deep breath and shakily pushed himself up, sagging back into his own seat and wiping his hands over his face. He leaned his head back and dropped his arms, exhaling and absently gazing at the crystal chandeliers that adorned the auditorium ceiling. His eyes were still red and puffy and his cheeks and nose were wet, but now he felt like he could at least begin to process the events of a year ago. He felt completely drained, but that just meant that now he had room in his heart again for something other than despair.

He wordlessly slid his hand over the seat towards Terra and turned his palm up with a slight beckoning twitch of his fingers. Understanding his request, Terra clasped his hand with hers, and he gave it a reassuring squeeze back. "Thank you..." he finally whispered in a hoarse choke.

She nodded. "I'm just glad that I was able to help you. I couldn't bear seeing you missing a piece of yourself... but I also couldn't bear seeing you in pain."

He let out a weak breath. "There was admittedly a lot more pain there than I had been anticipating... it was almost overwhelming." He bowed his head and squeezed her hand again. "But... I think what saved me was your ability to draw out so many positive emotions first." He slid his other hand to his chest. "My country... my people... my home... this beautiful world... this is a pain that will likely never fully ease... but instead of needing to struggle to find joy again in the midst of such a tragedy, you made sure it was already there." He let out another sniff. "If... I had become aware of all of this while I was still alone and unable to rely on others, I am certain that it would have utterly broken me..."

He turned to face her, his eyes still glistening with tears, but also with appreciation. "Back in Thamasa you saved my life... here in this new world you saved my soul... I feel I will never be able to express sufficient gratitude for what you have done."

She looked down at her lap bashfully. "I... didn't do it for the thanks, so you don't have to worry that you're not thanking me enough. I did it because you mean a lot to me. Seeing you suffering made me feel distressed, and seeing you overcome it and regain a bit of happiness felt so fulfilling. You've done so much for so many people that I wanted to make sure you were just as well taken care of."

The pit in his chest warmed, but there was still a chill pain of enduring guilt there as well. Swallowing, he turned to face the stage where the crew was dismantling the scenery. "Terra..." he whispered hoarsely. "I... I have certainly done what I can to be of service, but with you I am afraid I have been negligent..."

Terra cocked her head. "What do you mean? You've been nothing but supportive of me the entire time I've known you, and I owe so much to your encouragement."

"But I have known you for much longer than the Thamasa mission," he said, shaking his head. "You were held a physical and emotional prisoner in the Magitek Research Facility for eighteen years, along with the captive Espers who continuously had their very life forces drained to power our soldiers and weapons... I was completely aware of all of these things... yet I did nothing. There was no physical force stopping me from doing so. I could have broken you out of that facility at any time. But I... chose not to."

He leaned forward, sinking his face back into his hands. "You have grown and overcome so much, but the only reason you even needed to do so was because I abandoned you. And knowing that, after everything you have done for me, I feel so... unworthy of it all..."

Terra felt her heart sink at his confession. He'd expressed his guilt over his culpability in what happened to her before on the boat to Thamasa, but at that time he had couched it in terms of ability rather than desire. But from her own experiences, those didn't necessarily have to be mutually exclusive. This powerlessness that he felt... she had a feeling she knew what it was and why he had chosen the way he had.

"General..." she began, then shook her head and went for the more personal "Leo..." She saw his shoulders twitch at her calling him by name, and wondered, "If you think that I should resent you for not rescuing me... would you also resent me if I told you that I had deliberately chosen not to look for you for this past year up until now?"

He raised his face from his hands and looked at her, perplexed. "You... were not aware of my condition or location, though, and said that you were occupied with other people..."

"And so were you," Terra reasoned. She pulled the last letter given to her by Lola out of her sash and looked at it. "I've been reading the accounts of just such a person who was in your care. One of your people who you loved and desired to serve. A person who still nevertheless ended up being hurt." She held the letter out to him and said, "I think you should know what his thoughts were about that."

Leo looked at the piece of paper in her hand for a moment before hesitantly reaching out to take it. With trembling fingers he awkwardly unfolded it, giving Terra one last apprehensive glance before beginning to read it.

Dear Lola,
 I'm sorry I haven't written in quite some time. This letter is being dictated as I lack the strength to hold a pen. I hope that writing you will allow me the strength to eventually recover.
 After my last letter, General Leo was abruptly called away from the base again, and Kefka immediately ordered us to poison the Doman water supply to kill them all, including our own POWs. I and many others refused, and were met with swift retaliation. I was able to escape, though badly injured, but most of the others weren't so lucky. I was swept down a river to the Veldt where I ended up in the town of Mobliz where I am writing to you from now.
I'll continue to make the request of anyone who visits my bedside to assist me in writing you and keeping you up to date. I don't want you to feel distressed at my condition, but I also don't want you to blame the general for leaving the base and allowing this to happen. Kefka is responsible for his own actions, regardless of the general's presence. And I'm certain that whatever prompted the general to leave, it was to save someone, which I can't resent. There's only so much weight he can bear alone and eventually he's forced to choose what he can hold. Therefore my main regret is never stepping up to help him bear that burden. I hope someday someone does. He doesn't deserve to suffer for Kefka's actions and I hope he's all right.
 For now, though, I ask for your support to aid in my recovery. I'll write again whenever I'm able. I love you, Lola.
 Wes

Leo squeezed his eyes shut and held his hand to his mouth, tears running down his cheeks anew. But these weren't tears of sorrow this time, but of affirmation. The Doman Genocide had been one of his greatest regrets. He had suspected Kefka of plotting something and yet had still left in an attempt to save General Celes from execution. A departure he had later learned to have been set up by Kefka himself and was nothing more than a diversion. So many people died because of that decision...

But they... forgave him. Even at the banquet prior to the Thamasa mission the Doman warrior Cyan had acknowledged that he did not hold him at fault, but Leo had been unable to accept that. But even his own men whom he had abandoned were telling him... that it was okay...

Terra lightly placed her hand on his arm and affirmed, "Before I met you, I thought that loving someone meant that you would never hurt them. Because of all the distress I'd caused people and my inability to protect them, I was certain that meant that I was incapable of love. When I awoke in this world, I found vulnerable people who desperately needed my help, and I chose to stay and protect them over looking for you and the others. I felt so guilty and conflicted over my decision that I could barely muster the power to do anything because I was afraid it was the wrong choice. But... I came to understand that it was love that had made me stay. And that even though I regretted leaving you alone for a year, I didn't regret choosing to stay with them, because I made that decision out of love."

She rested her cheek on his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his arm, squeezing it. "You love your people and chose to protect them over me. No matter how much I might have suffered, I can't fault you for that, because you didn't abandon me, you just chose to save what you loved."

The arm she was holding suddenly wrapped around her waist and pulled her against him, his other hand coming around her back to hold the back of her head and firmly pull her face against his neck. He squeezed her tightly, pressing his cheek against the side of her head. With a sniff and a shuddering breath, he insisted, "Terra, I do not want you to ever think that 'you' and 'what I love' fall into two separate categories."

Terra made a little squeak of surprise at the sudden embrace. Unlike the gentle hug from back in Jidoor, this one was firmer and quite a bit more desperate. It was a moment later that his words caught up to her and she understood their meaning, which caused her entire body to warm. From his actions alone she had already come to the understanding that he felt love for her just as he did all his people, but for him to now be this explicit about it... There was a pleasant fluttering in her belly and she couldn't help but return his embrace, wrapping her arms snugly around his chest and shoulder.

"And I'm so grateful for your love," she replied softly. "If it wasn't for your encouragement of my feelings and self-worth a year ago, I... don't think I would have been able to overcome everything that happened to me. I only knew how comfortable and validated you made me feel... and I wanted the power to be able to make others feel the same. It was because of you that I first understood what it felt like to be loved, and it helped me to learn to recognize it in myself." She squeezed him a little tighter. "And now that I can recognize it... I know that I feel it for you, too."

He gave a small smile, tilting his head to rest his cheek against her. "I am also grateful for your love... and that you were able to discover it for yourself as I always believed you could." The only lingering concern he had was what form that "love" took. The love that he had shown her a year ago had been a platonic, fraternal love, and if she had been using that as a baseline then it was possible that she was reciprocating the same. However the love that he had shown her over the past few days had been... of a decidedly different nature. If that was the type of love she was reciprocating, then...

Leo unconsciously gripped his fingers lightly against her hair and clothing. He still hadn't been able to settle on what sort of relationship he would actually be comfortable with. Insisting they go back to a platonic relationship after he'd already reveled in the taste of a romantic one felt disheartening, whereas proceeding more completely into a romantic one felt like he was overstepping himself. The platonic relationship from before had been enforced, though, whereas the romantic feelings he'd felt during the time he had no memory of that enforcement had sprung up naturally. But raw feelings alone without adequate reflection and rationalization could easily lead to regrettable decisions.

He needed more time to think, and time to get himself back into more emotional stability so that he could make that decision with a clearer head. He released Terra and sat up, rubbing his hands over his face and shaking his head out with a sniff. "I could use a change of scenery. An open acoustic hall is perhaps not the most ideal place to be discussing private emotional matters such as these."

The two of them rose and exited the auditorium balcony, Leo squinting and adjusting to the brighter lighting of the lobby once they passed the threshold. The Impresario was there to intercept them and exclaimed, "Ah, there you are, I was worried you had left already. So, how did you enjoy the performance? This one was a challenge for our actors and musicians as well since it's not one we usually perform."

"It was amazing!" Terra replied eagerly, though she had no frame of reference to which she could compare the quality of the performance. "It was unlike anything I've ever experienced before, and it was honestly... just what we both needed."

She turned to Leo, who bowed respectfully and said, "I am grateful for the opportunity to have finally seen this production in person. It has been a favorite of mine for years however my recording had been missing the ending and therefore my experience of it had been incomplete until now."

The Impresario rubbed his hands together. "Well, I do hope it didn't let you down. Many people aren't particularly fond of the ending which is why it never gained much popularity."

"Wha...? How could people not like that ending?!" both Terra and Leo stumbled over each other to say in shock at that revelation.

"Why, because the hero doesn't get the girl, of course," the Impresario replied as though it should be obvious.

Terra and Leo looked at each other, then back at the Impresario, regarding him flatly. "That's so petty," they said in unison. Terra then stepped forward to continue, "Orcus's story isn't about him finding love with Delphina. It's about him growing as a person and coming to understand that the things that he had been relentlessly focused on aren't the only things important in the world. And so when he lost both Cetus and Delphina in the end he could still see things worth living for. In a world as devastated as ours, I think that's an important message of hope that we all need!" She blinked and looked bashfully back at Leo, wondering, "At least, that's what I got out of it. Did... I interpret it right?"

Leo had been distracted listening to her passionately defend his favorite opera, so was caught slightly off-guard when she addressed him instead. Flushing slightly, he stammered, "Oh! Well... the beautiful thing about music is that it means different things to different people. That it has stirred feelings in you is enough, whatever they may be."

"Oh..." she said thoughtfully. "Well, in that case, now that I'm more familiar with it I'd like to know more about how it makes you feel, then. I know it's your favorite so I'm sure there's a lot of details that I missed."

He flushed harder. He almost never had the opportunity to discuss his personal interests due to having been on perpetual active duty for more or less the last decade and most every interaction with other people was within context of his position as general. Certainly, he'd socialize with his subordinates to get to know them and help them feel more comfortable but he rarely interjected anything about his own hobbies unless explicitly asked about them, which Terra had done a year ago. People who visited him in his office would sometimes take note of the music he had playing, but only as a courtesy rather than a prompt to start a discussion. Such casual discourse tended to be outside the bounds of the purpose of his office meetings as it was. So when Terra had asked him for more details about his musical interests on the boat and there had been no reason of propriety not to talk about it, he had kind of started to ramble to get his pent-up enthusiasm off his chest. And now that he was again in a situation where his rank and position didn't matter and he'd just finished actually getting to see his favorite opera in person including the ending that had been eating away at him for years and he just had so many feelings about it and now the person he may or may not be romantically interested in eagerly wanted to talk to him about it, too, and...

Okay, breathe, he reminded himself. His emotions were still a jumble and he couldn't let himself get carried away, but at the same time his mind taking refuge in his hobbies instead of dwelling on the implications of the dark memories lurking in the back of his head was probably a good thing. So all of that culminated in him belatedly replying with a breathless "Sure."

Terra grinned pleasantly and held out a hand to him. "Then let's find a place to talk."

Notes:

- Now that Leo has his memory back, I wanted to start pulling in some of the characterization and motive that was given to him in Dissidia to bring his depiction here more in line with it (though I'm still not going to make him as serious as Dissidia does. If there's a conflict between FF6 and Dissidia, FF6 always wins out, and FF6 says he can laugh, dammit). And his storyline in Dissidia revolves around him falling into an existential crisis after being brought back post-game and finding out that Kefka had destroyed his home and the rest of the world and not knowing what to do with himself anymore. So he asks Terra to beat him up a couple times while he figures himself out, then eventually agrees to join her. :P
- This chapter basically illustrates why I found myself needing to go with the amnesia subplot despite finding them kind of cliche: I wanted to keep Terra's post-Floating Continent storyline as it was in canon so that she could gain her emotional maturity through protecting the children, but that also meant that she'd be unavailable to help Leo for a year, and thus I needed to keep him in a sort of "emotional stasis" until she could find him. I could have gone the coma route like with Celes, but I wanted him to actually be doing things in the World of Ruin prior to Terra finding him. It was also so that Leo's view of Terra, which had previously been clouded by memories of seeing her as a tortured child, could be given a forcible hard reset and he could see her as the person she was now without all that baggage. And also one other major thing that he needed to reassess with a new perspective that will be coming up in a few chapters.
- Leo: "omgomgomg the girl I like likes the thing I like!"
- Chapter title is an instruction to play "tearfully".