DISCLAIMER: Final Fantasy VI and its characters are wholly the properties of Square Enix. This story is written purely for entertainment and not profit.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: There are only three characters left to cover (but there will be more than three chapters in order to wrap up the story itself). First up is the one primarily regarded as the main character of the game. Enjoy!

Resolutions

Written by daBOSSz

Chapter 7: Terra

M3 followed Terra's lead into the throne room, where the five guests who had arrived by airship were already waiting. Loud greetings were immediately heard between everyone, and the incredible amount of joy was apparent as a large number of hugs were exchanged.

Having already done her greetings with both sets of arrivals, Terra simply stood back and smiled. It was a moment they had all been eagerly anticipating for half a decade, and she was simply going to take it all in. Whatever name they were called—Returners, rescuers, saviors, heroes, the strangest group of friends that history would ever know—all that mattered to twenty-four-year-old Terra Branford at the moment was that their family was finally together under one roof again.

Taking charge of caring for an entire city of orphans had made Terra more observant over the past five years, and the unique greeting gestures that were used between the different members of the family did not escape her eyes. She watched as everyone jumped into Umaro's arms to bear-hug the yeti just the way he liked it. She watched as Sabin practically grabbed Gogo and pulled him in to pat his back while the mime mimicked the monk's gestures with perfectly mirrored symmetry and ferocity. She watched as Gau and Relm danced with Mog in their own playful beat, each trying to emulate the others in movement and style. In so many ways, these greeting gestures alone now brought tender emotions out of Terra that she never would have comprehended five years ago.

Edgar had told her earlier in the day that he was uncertain of just how close everyone remained with each other. It took less than a minute for Terra to confidently assert that their closeness would not be a concern.

Like the others in their family, Terra had to traverse a long road throughout the past half-decade. The love she had started feeling for the orphaned children of Mobliz had given her a second chance to continue her existence as a human, and she made good on her promise to return to the ruined city after using the last of her esper powers to help the group escape from Kefka's tower. Upon arriving back in Mobliz, Terra was greeted by Duane, who informed her that the village had felt her last bits of magic and used the added strength she bestowed upon everyone to provide Katarin the extra encouragement she needed to give birth.

When Terra met the child for the first time, she was overcome with the emotion she had just started to understand and almost fainted from the overwhelming situation. It took a few days for her to fully realize the significance of the child's birth as a symbolic gesture that the cycle of love and life would not be destroyed the way Kefka intended. She did not know it at the time, but it was the first sign that told her the planet would recover.

Without hesitation, Duane and Katarin chose Terra to be the godmother of their child and asked her to suggest a name. Unfamiliar with the process, Terra consulted with Edgar and explained the significance of this birth to him. After some consideration, the Figaro king offered what he called the "perfect" suggestion: Janus.

"It means 'transition' and 'new beginnings,'" Edgar explained to her. "It's perfect for a baby who entered the world at the same time as its rebirth."

Terra trusted Edgar's words and revealed his suggestion to the new parents, who chose to settle on the name. Baby Janus quickly warmed his way into the hearts of the other orphans, which further helped Terra understand just how powerful of an emotion love truly was. Despite Edgar's words of caution that some of the children would become jealous of the attention Janus was receiving, Terra was surprised and relieved to find that jealousy never became an issue; every child took turns helping Duane, Katarin, and her care for the baby. To Terra, it was nothing short of a miracle how such a tiny, innocent life could bond a large group even tighter together, but it was just another concept about love that she gradually learned.

As Janus grew from newborn to toddler, the others in Mobliz grew up as well. Duane and Katarin matured into responsible young adults; the former was no longer the same hot-tempered teenager who feared the unknown, and the latter had become increasingly better at taking charge of the orphans when Terra was not experiencing one of her best days. The younger children were hardly ever an issue, even as they entered the pre-teen phase of their lives; whenever any type of conflict arose, there was literally an entire village to intervene and resolve the conflict before it escalated.

These changes gave Terra more opportunities to devote herself to tasks that did not always involve babysitting the entire population. She began training to fight without magic, learning different combat techniques from Cyan and Sabin when they paid her visits and using these new skills to defend Mobliz from the occasional monster attack. She invited Mog, Umaro, and Gogo to perform for the orphans, whose eyes always lit up with excitement whenever M3 was present in town. She took time to check in on the others, increasing her travels to Thamasa after finding out about Strago's illness and Relm's decision to pause her artistic pursuits in order to tend to his needs.

Perhaps her most important move for Mobliz was securing its protection through Figaro. Knowing she was caring for the orphans, Edgar made sure to watch over Mobliz from the moment he returned to Figaro Castle, supplying her and the city with much-needed essentials even while he was rebuilding his own kingdom. Once Figaro had strengthened again, Terra moved quickly to request for Figaro's soldiers to guard Mobliz and was met personally by Celes when the general led a small contingent to the city. Although Mobliz was not a formal part of the Kingdom of Figaro—the city had no official leader, and Terra never wanted to hold such a position—it was now well-protected enough by Figaro's troops for Terra to no longer worry around the clock about its safety.

Terra had felt guilty for asking so much from Figaro and openly swore on multiple occasions that she would find a way to pay the kingdom back, but both Edgar and Celes insisted that such a gesture would never be necessary.

"You sacrificed your last remaining strength to keep us all alive," Edgar would remind her multiple times throughout the years. "You didn't even know if you would make it, and you selflessly guided us out of Kefka's tower. We all survived because of you. If anything, we're the ones who owe you."

Such high praise from the King of Figaro was difficult for Terra to accept, and it turned out to be another piece of the puzzle known as love that she gradually grew to understand over the years. Edgar's unconditional kindness toward both her and the children of Mobliz was unprecedented, and as much credit as she was showered with for keeping the once-hopeless town alive, Terra knew it would have been impossible to prevail against such odds without Edgar's constant aid.

Edgar personally visited Mobliz as often as possible to make sure she and the orphans were all right, but when he could not, he would send Celes in his place to both check up on Terra and Figaro's Mobliz garrison. As shaky as her history had once been with Celes, Terra was eternally grateful for the general's company during and after Kefka's demise. Their relationship only grew closer, and soon, the two women had become sisters in every sense of the word except by blood. They bonded over practically anything and everything: shared histories of remorse for serving under Gestahl, adapting to life after magic, and even increased understanding of romantic love through both Celes' firsthand experience and Terra's unpolluted perspectives.

Thoughts of Celes widened Terra's smile, and she quickly realized that she still had some unfinished business to tend to. She turned away from the reunited crowd in the throne room and headed back through the halls down the castle's east wing, eventually stopping once she reached the door leading into Celes' temporary private chambers. As she opened the door and walked in, she caught sight of Celes' eyes in the mirror, and the bride quickly tilted her head around to return the smile that Terra never dropped.

"Are they all here now?" Celes asked her.

"Yes, M3 just arrived," Terra answered.

"Oh, I can't wait to see those three!" Celes declared. "Are they going to come in here to see me?"

"They didn't say anything, but I'm sure they will," Terra assured, much to Celes' delight.

Terra resumed her work in helping Celes get ready for the ceremony. Unlike the others, Terra had traveled to Figaro the previous day at Celes' personal request to take part in the preparations. She had left Duane and Katarin in charge of the orphans, responsibilities that they were now more than equipped to handle.

Terra admired her best friend immensely. Unlike herself, who had been enslaved to carry forth the Empire's bidding before she was rescued, Celes had been fully conscious of Emperor Gestahl's actions and chosen to stand up to him when he crossed a threshold that she could not tolerate. Because of this, Celes had to wrestle much harder with her guilt from the past, but she overcame it all to become one of the world's top generals once again. This time, she successfully passed her compassionate personality onto her troops, a personality that Terra had gotten acquainted with thoroughly well.

In addition to all of this, Celes had also opened her own heart to find and accept Locke's love, refusing to let neither her nor his past cast any darkness over the future they planned to build together. It had not been an easy road, and Terra had been present during a rough patch when Celes' guilt threatened to tear her apart from Locke, but Celes' strength prevailed in the end, and it was this same strength that guided her to this blissful day.

Terra never thought much about whether or not she would ever have what Celes had found and forged. She knew that her own struggles with understanding love throughout her life kept her behind others in regards to matters of the heart, but she had seen time after time how love truly did overcome every obstacle. She personally experienced this lesson when her bonds with the orphans in Mobliz kept her alive despite losing her esper half after Kefka's defeat, and in the past five years, she continued to witness events and occasions in which this lesson was repeatedly reinforced.

Love prevented Celes and Locke from drifting and falling apart, even when the gravity of their pasts persistently pulled them in opposite directions. Love kept Duane and Katarin together despite having to forgo a significant chunk of their childhood when the burdens of adult responsibilities were thrown at them faster than they could have ever wanted. Love kept Strago fighting against the impossible and Relm glued to his side to care for him around the clock, even when she was still a child battling with the traumatic realization of her father's true identity. Love bound the hearts of both Relm and Gau to each other in a way nobody could have predicted. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, love was what maintained the closeness of their mismatched family half a decade after their journey had ended.

No, Terra still did not understand everything about love, but if there was one belief she was now fully confident in, it was that love truly was the strongest force in existence. Although she had plenty of evidence to support her confidence in this belief, she needed nothing more at the moment than the sight in front of her to prove it: her best friend, despite all the hardships endured, was in a wedding dress ready to ceremoniously cement her permanent commitment to the man who held her heart.

As Terra finished tying Celes' wedding corset around her back, she could not stop herself from wrapping her arms around her sister and pressing their cheeks together. She held onto Celes, merely letting the elation of the day sink in: their family was reunited, her best friend was marrying the perfect man for her, and she herself continued to feel loved in a way she once never imagined she would ever understand.

"I love you," Terra whispered in Celes' ear. "You deserve this so much."

She felt Celes' face curl upward into a wide grin as the bride's hand came up and softly landed on Terra's other cheek. She closed her eyes and simply allowed herself to soak in the moment.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Wow, I have to admit that this chapter took longer to write than I originally planned. Terra's character has always fascinated me because of just how multidimensional she is, and I don't feel that I can perfectly capture her in a way that addresses every layer of her no matter how much I try to. It's even more challenging when I have to decide whether or not to factor in the loss of her esper side in a post-Kefka world and how that should be done. In the end, I decided to give her a more upbeat resolution; having gone through the experiences and sacrifices that she has, I feel she more than deserves this positivity.

Anyway, what do you think? Please feel free to leave me your feedback. As always, I love hearing from you!