Chapter Two

Three-hundred sixty five days.

That's exactly how long it took for Zidane to open his eyes for the first time again. It was a breezy spring day. The sunbeams coming through the thickets of trees were pleasant and warm. The shadows washed across the small cabin and the young man was instantly disoriented. His body was resonating with pain he had never know before, as if he had broken every bone inside of him. Zidane struggled to move and he breathed deeply, his lung rattling and wheezing. His fingers dug into the quilts tucked around him. He tried to make reason but he couldn't think straight. The thoughts came to the forefront just as quick as they disappeared, leaving him grappling for reason. Noise, that sounded distant and muted, sprung up to his right, but Zidane couldn't seem to tell himself how to move. He only continued to burn with excruciating pain and give into it entirely. There was more noise. Quiet thuds. Something grinding. Distant sharp noises that triangulated into his ears. The only thing Zidane could begin to understand was that he was in danger. He couldn't move if he were being constrained. Wherever he was, he had to get out. Zidane ground his teeth together, as still, he realized he was not in control. His vision was cross and fuzzy, but there were figures coming to lean over him. With effort, he was able to turn his face into his pillow. What had they done to him? It felt as if a baseball bat, full of sharp metals, had come down on him. He should have been mush painting someone's walls. Zidane's skull vibrated harshly and he rattled beneath the quilts that were beginning to feel heavy.

"Shit, shit...!" Freya stamped her foot as she reached for him and peeled the blankets back. Heat emanated from his body that pushed at itself from the inside but, otherwise, remained motionless on the bed. "Temperatures rising, heart rate is through the roof." Zidane recoiled at the touch of her cool hand against his neck. "His pulse is off the charts, he's under stress. He could go into cardiac arrest." Steiner stood readied, but he awaited a command. His brain was quickly out pacing him - Steiner fought to remain still and attentive for the dragoon, whose own anxiety level was rising unsteadily. "I... I need aspirin root crushed, immediately. Right there, that table. Mix it with the purple dust beside it" Freya pressed herself against the side of the bed as Zidane fought to gain more control despite the taunting pain that inflicted him. "Zidane, Zidane -" Freya put a knee on the bed and came over him, pressing her hands against his chest. "It's me, Freya. Everything is fine. You have to stay still. Zidane - come on, look at me. You know me." She cupped his cheek now, looking at his foggy, confused eyes. For a moment, Freya didn't think she even recognized who she was gazing at. She couldn't see an inkling of her friend in that beat. "Steiner, is it finished?" Freya tore her eyes away from his, fear riveting beneath her skin. But she swallowed roughly, willing herself to keep a gentle pressure on him as his squirming became stronger and the rattling of his lungs became weaker.

"Ready - ready," Steiner dropped the pestle and it rolled off the desk, thudding loudly to the ground.

"Okay, good," Freya grabbed the mortar from his hands and then nodded her head towards the door. "Bucket of water, quick. It's right outside the door."

Steiner's belt beat against his black trousers as he carried out Freya's demand. "It's warm."

"Oh, I don't care, dammit!" Freya shouted as she began scraping the powder together. "We just need him to take it!" Steiner hauled the bucket into the room and poured it into a cup, uncaring of spilling it across the floor. Freya worked fast, dropping the powder into the drink. It swirled and dissolved quickly. "Hold his head up, I'm just going to pour it in."

"Okay, Zidane," Steiner climbed onto the side of the bed. "I am just going to elevate -"

"He doesn't know or care what you're doing," Freya said as she straddled over Zidane, the glass of water ready. "He's panicking. He'll have a seizure before too long."

"How fast does it work?"

"What is this, twenty-one questions?" Freya raked her ashen hair from her face. "It's aspirin and sleeping weed. It'll be quick. Now do it, Steiner. Please."

The young man gurgled as Freya poured directly into his mouth. It felt painful as a friend to do. As Freya looked down at his miserable face - tinged red from his high fever, now sporting six unique scars that dashed his eyebrows and furrowed away from his lips - she felt the lowest she possibly ever had. Zidane was in pain. He was helpless and confused and frenzied. He was not himself. She knew that look in his eyes. It was a look that did not understand anything. It was delirious with a need of flight, absolutely no fight left within. And she was the enemy in that gaze. Her very own worst enemy. After he had stilled again, his head falling limp against his pillow, Freya breathed for the first time in nearly a minute. And when she released that breath, out came with it a ragged cry, as if she had burned herself. The tears glided off her cheeks as she hunched over Zidane, shaking deeply. Steiner was silent, standing now.

"One whole year..." Freya's voice was raspy, her face hidden behind a curtain of hair. "It's time we'll never get back. It's time we're still losing."

"He will get better. He's come so far."

"The kind of rehabilitation we're looking at for Zidane it's... it's monumental, Steiner," she lifted her gaze now. Her lack of sleep was evident. Her eyes were overwhelmed. "The next few times he wakes up... it's going to be exactly like this. He is still in such bad shape that he can't even handle being awake."

"The first sign of clarity, we go back," Steiner stepped towards her.

"Back? Where?" She shook her head, as if everything ceased to exist beyond Black Mage Village.

"To Alexandria. To Her Highness."

The dragoon seemed a mix of exasperated and stunned by Steiner's proposal. "We're looking at months, even still. Dagger cannot hear a word of Zidane."

Steiner pressed his lips together for a moment, calculating his words carefully. "Has this not gone on long enough?"

Tears of frustration bubbled up in Freya's eyes now as her insides tore themselves in two different directions. There was her way or the highway. But there was something else in the way - something right in the middle - that muddled her down. No path seemed right. What was this clarity Steiner was thinking would come? She thought the empty glass in her hand might shatter. "I have to do this right, Steiner. I've known Zidane practically my whole life. Don't rush me. I'll make mistakes and... well," she drew her shoulders back in an attempt to compose herself. "We don't want that, okay? For the sake of him, for the sake of Dagger, and for my goddsdamn sake, okay?!"

"I... I understand, Freya," Steiner nodded. "I will not leave your side in this. I am in your debt eternally and I intend to honor that."

Her wet eyelashes fluttered for a moment. "I know. It's your code."

For the next few weeks, the sweet smell and refreshing air of the welcomed spring was long forgotten. The village was tense with extra care and caution given to Zidane. At night, Freya led medical classes on signs and symptoms and treatment - everything she could possibly remember from her days at the Academy. During the day, she checked in with Vivi, who still monitored Mikoto and furthered research on the logs despite Doctor Tot's grim warning. Mikoto was tired of the fevered states. They left her with headaches and distressing fatigue. But her fear of letting the committee down was too great for her, so she never fought the episodes. Mikoto was painted in bruises, a fresh one on her cheekbone. The episodes were beginning to cause black outs and she often crumpled to the floor the moment the words stopped flowing. Her friends, the other committee members, were beginning only to feel like absent onlookers from Mikoto's curse. No one said it, but they also wished they'd stop happening. Even Vivi, the most dedicated to understanding. In the afternoons, Freya took her shift sitting in Zidane's room. Sometimes she sat silent and straight as an arrow for six hours, her eyes never leaving him. Other times she paced, almost impatiently, for something to happen. And on days where fatigue reared its ugly head, Freya ranted at him.

I'll never forgive you for this.

Throughout the rest of spring, the Core Works received numerous letters from Queen Garnet. She worried for them, that perhaps she was selfish enacting this query. It was too soon, she acknowledged. It was time to come home. They had families and friends that missed them, homes to be lived in, and lives to keep living. Garnet expressed her utmost respect of them. To Freya's dismay, she wrote I know you did everything you could. Maybe the dragoon thought she was selfish, too, on some days when she still refused to send word to Alexandria. There still was no mental clarity. Only a man who awoke in pain, dread, and confusion. It was like someone else entirely was controlling his body. And the fear of that quickly outweighed the selfishness for Freya. Surprisingly, she received a letter postmarked from Burmecia just before the onset of summer. It had been written by Puck and was practically illegible. If only he hadn't skipped out on all of those prose and practice classes. Puck reported that reparation payments had finally been pushed through shortly after the new year and supplies were underway. He also told her that Fratley was in Burmecia, helping daily with recuperations. This warmed her heart but also made her ache horridly. If only she had stayed a little longer, she thought. Perhaps she accepted Garnet's task too quickly. She and Fratley were making progress. But maybe now it was all for nothing.

For Steiner, his symptoms of being homesick were on full display. He asked a Genome who learned to paint to cover the walls of his cabin in a mural of Alexandria, which Steiner spent hours finding the right drawing of in a book. He had owls taking letters to Beatrix daily. She had sent back a cloth flag at some point, which Steiner hung outside his door. Even though he had been raised without any kind of god, Steiner took the time to mutter something in hopes that someone would hear him. Just make Zidane right. Make all of this right. Life was nothing but a long line of limbo for the Core Works as the logs continued to grow and become overwhelming. Vivi was waning on those logs. They aged him just as they did Doctor Tot. By the beginning of summer, Vivi spent more time visiting Zidane, and convincing Mikoto to take a sleeping aid as a way to stop the link. Steiner worked alongside Vivi to earn credits for his Alchemy classes and they put their minds together to think of a medicine they could make to stop Mikoto's episodes.

Bullheaded, Doctor Tot would say of them. They trusted me with the most holiest of tasks for the new world. And yet, they still waited three months to take my advice.

By mid-summer, it was hot, dusty, and dry again. Freya realized maybe she did like being cold better. She dressed in a white tunic that day, sweat stained from blistering heat. Beads of sweat gathered on the nape of her neck where a thick ashen ponytail cropped out from her head. Her hair had grown much longer and she longed to cut it. Freya unpinned a shirt from the clothesline and folded it with little care, dropping it into a wicker basket set on the ground beside her. She moved down the line, grabbing one of Steiner's tunics. It was the menial chores, like laundry, that humanized the dragoon. After so long, learning to have Black Mage Village to be her home, Freya wondered how she'd ever mix back into civilization. She was a misfit, but in the village, she belonged. They were all misfits. Her nation, her own blood, was about to begin the healing. Freya felt like she should have been there. She needed to be. If she didn't, what did she fight for after all?

She plucked the basket off the ground and began down the narrow weaving boardwalk between the huts. As she passed Steiner's hut, she peered in the open door to spy him at his desk, hunched over it, as he pondered over different elements in a book. Next, she passed two Genomes who had discovered the game of hopscotch. They had used rocks to etch white lines into the boards and hopped along, waving their arms in balance as they reached for their rock. Freya nodded towards the Black Mage who was busy whittling a little figure of Bobby Corwen for his owner as a gift. She stopped at the first closed door she found and slowly pushed through, where she took the clean linens to the nearby desk. She checked the mortar to see how much aspirin and sleeping weed there was. Whoever had been there last hadn't made any. Freya swung the basket from the desk and turned for the cabinet. She gasped sharply and dropped it, however, when she saw Zidane laying on his side, his eyes open.

"Zidane," Freya dropped to her knees beside the bed. "Can you hear me? Are you alright?"

His eyes moved to her and there was a hint of recognition in his pupils, as if he were finally processing things. Slowly, he licked his lips and took his time looking at things. Freya only watched him, her heart hammering in her chest. Clarity. Clarity...! CLARITY.

"Where am I?" His voice was hoarse, his lungs coated in molten dirt.

Freya reached for him. She touched his arm simply because she needed to in that moment. "The Black Mage Village." After a beat, she sat on the edge of the bed, gaining his full attention. Zidane was exhausted. Dark rights formed around his sunken eyes. His scars were fleshy, pink, and silvery in the light. He looked more war beaten than any man Freya had ever seen before. So many questions were barraging her lips, but she only stared at him, unbelieving he was looking right back at her. Her lips were slow to move. "Do you know who you are?"

"Was I... that far gone?" Zidane was somewhat breathless, but he still managed a smug grin with his chapped and cracked lips. "I just gotta look at you..." Zidane whispered. "And I remember myself."

The dragoon stood up and placed her hand over her mouth. "Oh my gods," she finally exclaimed. "You're... you're going to live Zidane...!" He only stared at her quietly. She didn't know whether he was confused or simply too weak to talk. Freya shook her head as she came back to the bed. "Zidane, it's been over a year - nearly eighteen months."

"Wait... what?" He felt clammy and cold despite the thin layer of sweat covering his face. "You're... lying." Despite the aches in his muscles, Zidane furrowed his brow.

"It's a long story and I promise to catch you up," Freya told him. "But I've got to tell Dagger. The Queen's been waiting for you."

It was Freya's twenty-third birthday when the Alexandrian airships came to the Outer Continent for the first time in over a year and a half. Their droning engines and harsh winds were forgiven by Freya and Steiner, who had the taste of home on the tips of their tongues. For Vivi and Mikoto, it would be a bittersweet goodbye. They would remain in the Black Mage Village to continue to work for Garnet. Steiner would finish school in the meantime and maintain correspondence with Vivi. Freya would continue working to help Zidane in recovery. Sleeping aids helped Mikoto regain her strength, but there was still no answer for the quantity she would receive on any given day. There were highs and lows and a stack of papers nearly bursting a hut at its seams. But there was a drive behind them to continue. Almost like a morbid fascination. The information they did have was invaluable. And the next bit to come was always unnerving. It was their purpose now, though. Everyone needed one in the free world.

Zidane was still in a lot of physical pain when the airships arrived. To his dismay, he had to be taken in a wheelbarrow that he didn't want to admit made him want to cry from pain. Once he was resettled on a cot in the lower observation deck of the airship, the other passengers wasted no time in preparing for flight. Zidane watched out the window as the ground began to lift away from him. The vibration of the ship pinged through his body. His mind was still a scrambled mess. Zidane felt completely upside down. Whatever he thought he knew, he couldn't count on. He thought he had died. Zidane believed he had died. But how was he here, feeling the weight of the world again? The ocean filled his sight now and he could only wonder about those eighteen months. Where had he been? Where was his mind?

They arrived in Alexandria in the dead of night, greeted by a team of doctors and nurses who asked them to report to the infirmary. Less embarrassing, the Alexandrian staff had a cart with wheels for Zidane. Steiner and Freya were seated on stools in the middle of the room where nurses began checking their hair for lice or other mites. Zidane was transferred to a bed where he groaned in protest from barely arranging his pillow. Fevers, chills, rashes, lesions? Freya and Steiner were cleared by the nurses and next the doctors were eying them. Do you feel any need to hurt yourself or others? Have you experienced vertigo in the past forty-eight hours? Have you disassociated? As they were given the okay to they leave, Freya asked to stay and proclaimed herself to be his caretaker.

"No, no, the Queen has requested to see you," the nurse told her. "I can look after the young sir."

"The Queen? Right now? It's two in the morning."

"She's waiting for you, that's what I was told."

Though the Queen was only seventeen years old, her developed presence could not be reckoned with. Garnet exuded confidence and spoke calculated, standing behind every single word. Her onyx hair was grown out once again, but she kept it braided tightly, falling in thick plaits down her back. Her heart shaped, olive face and warm, dark eyes greeted Steiner and Freya brightly. She hugged them both and squeezed their hands. Freya blurted it out suddenly, but thanked Garnet for sending the reparations to Burmecia. Garnet smiled. We're all sick of politics. Garnet did not visit Zidane that night. When her meeting with Steiner and Freya had ended, Steiner pulled her aside and spoke quietly about the state of the Zidane. Covered in scars. He doesn't realize it yet. After eighteen painful months of waiting, Garnet found herself having to prepare to face him, anyway. It had gone on so long, Garnet carried the guilt of not having been there. The Queen did not sleep the first night half the committee had returned to her castle. Instead, she spent the remainder of darkness nursing a bottle of wine in her private chambers. There was so much she did not understand or have answers for. And she felt incapable of asking. The Steiner and Freya who walked into that room were not the same she asked to go away. Garnet couldn't ask them to explain. She knew there wouldn't be an answer anyway. They didn't know.

Days turned into weeks, however. Steiner took the train to Treno daily to attend his classes and make headway and gain insight on a cure for Mikoto. Freya visited Zidane in the infirmary daily. By the end of summer, he could sit up in bed on his own, but he still couldn't stand without support. It was a frustrating time for the young man, which Freya tried to make easier. She tried not to amp him up too greatly and have him do tasks she knew he was more than capable of doing. He got a few more wins this way. But for the rest of summer, Garnet did not come visit him. She felt intrusive, sheepish, and guilty. Zidane didn't ask Freya questions for a while. He didn't even know what to ask. But eventually, it was little things - how did you find me? Is it really 1801? Where's Dagger?

When fall approached, the annual Festival of Spirits in Alexandria was to be held. Garnet hoped it might have been a moment to address the citizens on the progress of the Core Works. Freya had never wanted to wiggle out of a conversation so much in her life. There's really nothing to tell them, Freya had said. We have information we don't understand. And Zidane can't even walk to the bucket and pee on his own, so maybe he shouldn't go. And so the festivities came and went. Steiner did spend the night out with Beatrix, relishing in the beating drums and cobbled together homemade costumes. Freya stayed at the castle with Zidane, where she laid on the bed beside him and read him some folklore she found in the library. When it became winter, together they watched the snowflakes drift down.

"Yule's coming up," Zidane said, folding his hands over his stomach. His voice was permanently ashy. "When are you gonna go home?"

"When you're better," the dragoon replied, keeping her eyes on the falling snow.

"You can't just stay here because of me."

"What're you gonna do about it? You know how many times I had your dick in my hands?" Freya arched her eyebrows at him.

He sighed with a rattle, falling back against his pillows. "Didn't see you complaining about it." They were quiet for a beat. "I want to go outside and be cold."

"Why?"

"To remember what it's like to be cold," he told her.

Freya shook her head. "It's too many stairs. And I'm not carrying you."

"Well, I want to walk," Zidane ground his teeth together as he pulled himself up.

"It doesn't work like that."

"Let me just try a bit more," with some effort, he swung his legs off the side.

"There's such a thing as overdoing it," Freya warned as Zidane prepared himself. "Okay, I'm not going to catch you."

"Oh, you're just gonna let me spill and bust another pretty scar into my face?" Zidane was smug again, though it might have been the widest grin he could muster.

"Goddsdamn you," Freya said, climbing off her stool.

The day of the annual Yule Ball hosted at the Alexandria Castle was the closest Queen Garnet had ever been to the infirmary. It was just minutes before her expected announcement and she paced nervously in the hallway. Garnet was dressed in a strapless silver gown with a sweetheart neckline and a slender neck covered in pearls. Her dark hair was piled atop her head, glistening with jewels. Yule was supposed to be a time of merriment, of forgiveness, recognition, and warmth. But the queen felt she hadn't lived up to any of that. For over a season, the man she owed her entirety to was laid up in bed, damaged by her. Why didn't you stop him? Why couldn't you stand up for yourself? Garnet couldn't will herself to go in.

Freya spent Yule with Zidane. Steiner proposed to Beatrix.

And soon, 1801 became 1802. In early spring, Freya received another letter postmarked from Burmecia. This time, it was from the king. More supplies had just arrived and he asked for her leadership in the construction of the new Burmecian Academy. She was touched by the letter as she read it out loud to Zidane, who had progressed to doing slow and steady squats beside his bed to regain stamina. Zidane was able to smile brighter now. With all the bruises cleared away, the scars weren't so terrible to look at. At least, they didn't glare at Freya much anymore. He raked his blond hair from his face as he paused from his tiring task.

"You have to go, Freya."

"What about you?" She peered over the top of the letter.

"What about me?" He shook his head. "It's the king. He's asking for you."

The queen asked for you and then never set eyes on you. Freya sighed and stood up. "You've still got a long road to recovery."

"Look at me, I'm standing," Zidane pointed out.

"You're holding onto the bed post."

"It's casual."

"We certainly couldn't beat that wit out of you, could we?" Freya crossed her arms over her chest.

Zidane seated himself on the edge of the bed, knowing her scrutinizing eyes could tell he was fatigued. He leaned back on his arms now and looked at her. "I'm gonna get out of here, okay, Freya?"

"And then what?"

"I don't know," he shrugged but then cringed when his shoulder tweaked. Lamely, he rubbed at it. "I've lost a lot of time. And... I gotta make things right with Dagger." The two rarely spoke about the queen. Not after the first season passed. She stayed well away and busy. Zidane couldn't deny it tore him up inside, but he had to remember, a lot of time had passed. He was changed, too, he understood that. Zidane looked as if he had been sliced and diced and then glued back together. And Garnet, well, she was even more important now. Maybe everything he remembered was simply a lucid dream. He hadn't learned to trust himself again. Zidane licked his lips. "I'll be fine. I'm out of the woods." Freya sat on the bed beside him slowly, folding the letter between her legs. "What's stopping you? The Freya I know wouldn't waste a single second for her people."

"It's been a long time," Freya said after a brief silence. "And I think..." She was slow to look at him. "I'm scared to let you out of my sight."

"Oh, Freya, come on," Zidane shook his head. "You said it yourself, it's over."

You should be dead, though. How can it be over? Freya's eyelashes fluttered as the intrusive thought dissipated. It was only a quick flash, but it compelled her. She leaned forward and gently pressed her lips to Zidane. The dragoon didn't know why she did it. She had never felt that way for Zidane. But something about that ache in her heart, the desperation for a small win just for herself, kept her lips against his. And after a moment, Zidane simply accepted it for what it was - a desire to feel something. For the first time in a while, he felt the rush of something. The exhilaration of kissing someone, the fluttering of the heart - Zidane was starved of many forms of contact. It didn't feel wrong to him in the least. He did not feel guilty for welcoming it.

Finally, she tore away and paused, gazing back down on the letter. "When you can make it to the garden, I'll leave."

And so for spring, Zidane was tireless in his endeavors to yank all of his senses back to him. On the morning of Garnet's birthday, he caught a glimpse of her crossing a hallway above him. Her long black hair was damp, a white cotton gown flowing behind her. She didn't see Zidane and simply disappeared around the corner. He was too winded to pursue, however, and he fell against the railing, only able to will her back in his mind. He watched her birthday gala from the window that night wondering if she had seen him. Zidane glanced at his arms as the fireworks flashed through the wall length windows. His skin was riddled in scars. Some were long and windy, as if someone had dragged thorns through him crudely. Others were short, angular, and sharp. To hell with looks, it's what's on the inside. But... was anything still there? He couldn't deny he felt objectively different. Like a piece of him was missing. He couldn't pinpoint it, though. Zidane missed Gaia and the life he'd had before. He remembered the elderly woman who lived in a townhouse on the street he grew up on. She'd told him he was going to break hearts and amount to mediocrity. Instead, Zidane had had his heart broken and ascended to he didn't know what.

By the beginning of February, Zidane was walking decently with the assistance of a crutch he held on his left side. The three flights of stairs to and from the infirmary winded him the most. He was frustrated with himself. It had been three months since Freya's king had written for her and, still, she couldn't bring herself to step away from him. Though they talked endlessly to pass his recovery, there were still unspoken boundaries they never crossed. Sometimes Zidane just wanted to ask what the hell happened to her. She was still the unyielding woman he had always known. She was still knowledgeable and modest. But she was changed. She seemed weary to everything out the little bubble they had constructed. Zidane feared she put too much of herself into him just because she was afraid he was going to die and it would be all her fault. But it wouldn't have been, he wanted to argue. He couldn't rely on large portions of his memories, but he knew without a doubt, this was entirely on him. Zidane didn't know what compelled him. Every time that blistering orange sunset bled into his closed eyes, coupled with the idling whirl of steam engines, all he could do was watch motionless, on complete auto-pilot, as Garnet's fingers slipped from his and all his friends walked past him. Maybe Zidane knew what happened to her. Him.

It was a cool spring evening when Zidane and Freya entered the Alexandrian Garden. The honeysuckles were beginning to perk up and diffuse their lovely scent. The roses and tulips were opened brightly to catch the last rays of sunlight. Zidane leaned against his crutch for a moment, listening to the bubbling of the nearby fountain. "Here we are... the garden," he said, watching as the dragoon admired the nearby flowers. "And I'm still on my feet."

"What's your point?" Freya tugged at the heather gray tweed of her half jacket.

"It's time to go back to Burmecia."

"We're barely at the entrance," she shook her head.

"Freya," the crutch scratched against the stone brick as Zidane turned towards her. His face was tense, his dark brow set boldly over his eyes. "You can't keep doing this."

She didn't flinch at the sternness in his tone. "Someone has to and, besides, I think I'm quite good at it."

He looked exasperated now, his blond hair falling across his forehead. "What is it? Do you know something I don't?" She was quiet and Zidane's brow furrowed. "Freya..."

She licked her lips. "It's not that I know more than you. It's that I don't know anything at all. Do you even know?"

"No," Zidane said after a few beats, straightening up. "There's nothing there."

The intrusive thoughts were back, ripping through the fabric of Freya's suppressed psyche. "You should have died. I don't know how or why you're alive. You're a miracle, Zidane. And I want to know so - I can't leave you, alright?"

"That's a shit answer," he shot back. "You just witnessed a miracle - you should be taking your life to the next level. Not settling right next to me."

"Maybe you didn't stop to consider you're someone I don't mind settling in beside."

The dragoon continued to stay in Alexandria. By that point, the planning for the union of Beatrix and Steiner had begun to take shape. A simple garden wedding with a reception in the royal ball room. Garnet insisted on them using the castle in whatever capacity they pleased. It was the least she could do. When Beatrix had thanked her but insisted on the simple ceremony, Garnet smiled and folded her hands together. It's whatever you'd like. I want you to have everything you need. It was no way to make up for everything they had done and it was certainly no pardon for the parts of their service she continued to not confront. For almost a year, the most important thing she thought she had lost lurked amongst the halls of her castle. It was like a ghost standing in the corners of her mind. Garnet didn't know what to say. She loved him, but, in the end, she didn't think she was any good for him. His life was not worth hers. It was well inflated past hers. Without him, she never would have become the queen. There would have been nothing left to serve over. Zidane had single handedly stood between her and the very edge of destruction - the very edge of the world as they knew it. How was that to be put into words? Garnet had spent so long daydreaming over the work in her study, dreaming of their reunion. But as she pulled herself away, she knew she was only hurting him more. It was all very frustrating, she ended her case right there.

But at one in the morning, in March of 1802, Queen Garnet couldn't sleep. The moon was full that night, peering through the windows of her chambers. The milky moonlight never sat right with Garnet. It reminded her of something that used to petrify her. Now, it panged with the loneliness of a lost time she discovered. She didn't think much as she pulled herself from bed, pulling her gray robe from the chest at the foot. The marble floors were cool against her bare feet as she walked the familiar halls. The luminous circles of light put off by the torches just barely touched each other as Garnet's hand met the glossy railing and she turned down a flight of stairs. Her braided hair beat against her back, but her heart paced faster in her chest. She stopped out the door and paused, hugging herself. Daydreams don't pan out. Daydreams are stupid.

Garnet pushed the door open and was relieved to find the clinic completely dark. There were several beds all bathed in that damned milky moonlight. They were all empty, however. There was only one singular occupied bed. She spied Zidane's familiar face, relaxed with sleep. In the light from the moon, his scars glowed along his jawline, splicing through his eyebrow. His blond hair had been hastily cut at some point, falling in jagged layers just beneath his ears. It seemed more ashen now. Garnet was soundless as she lowered herself onto the stool beside him. Every muscle in her body was taut as she scanned him. He seemed so changed - like he had lived through lifetimes and seen atrocities long lost to history. Her dark eyes lingered on him intensely. What if he had never agreed to Baku's scheme? What if he hadn't jumped off that balcony the moment he did? There were so many things that could have gone so horribly wrong, yet he never let them. Maybe that's why she stayed away. Sometimes she couldn't comprehend what they had gone through. Zidane had saved her in every way someone could be saved. Someone like him couldn't exist in her mind, though. He was the protagonist of a fairytale from her childhood - the one who did everything right. And yet, he was laying in front of her, making good on the promise she continually failed to acknowledge.

Slowly, she leaned forward and her lips barely parted. "I still choose you. I never stopped choosing you."

His bold blue eyes suddenly pierced the darkness as he gazed towards her, unmoving in his bed. "I wasn't much to choose from."

"You're everything," Garnet's voice was soft and tender. "I have to accept that."

"What are you saying?"

"I want you to choose me," she paused for only a moment. "I'm not sorry. I'm ready, Zidane."

He stared at her for a few beats. The moonlight soaked into her porcelain skin. The eyes seemed so familiar but there was something different inside of them. Gone were the smoldering ashes of someone down and out. Instead there was a fire. "I'm not too fucked up for you?"

"You don't know the half of it."

"I don't know what happened."

"I don't either," Garnet told him.

He nodded slowly. "Maybe it doesn't matter."

"I don't think it does anymore."

Neither one of them believed that for a moment, though.