The Grace of God
Chapter Five
THE
RAIN HAD stopped by morning. Celes woke with a serious crick
in her neck from a light, uncomfortable sleep where she had dreamt
she was back in Vector. She rose, muzzy-headed and confused at both
her sleeping quarters and still-sleeping company. It was only when
she looked out over the top of one boarded window that she realized,
with a heavy feeling, that the day before hadn't been a dream.
At breakfast (such as it was; Locke had gathered an arrangement of food that could be described as "whimsical") they mapped out a plan.
"If the Facility here is similar to the one we knew," Edgar began, struggling to open a tin of sardines, "it'll be almost impossible to get in. It was sheer luck that we managed it last time."
"The main doors will be heavily guarded," Celes agreed. "We'll have to try another way."
"What about the north entrance?" said Terra, who was cutting off a piece of honeydew melon with Edgar's knife. "I think it's older."
"Hmm. You're right, it is. It's... it was, rarely used except for deliveries."
"Then there we go," Locke said brightly, around his third cream puff. He had confectioner's sugar on his nose.
"It's not as easy as that," Celes said. "There are magical wards."
"Can they be dispelled?"
"Yes, but..." She had been about to say, Yes, but we can't cast dispel, before she remembered that one of them could. She focused on the cold cooked potato she was slicing.
"Yes," she amended. "Terra, you'll have to be on point, then."
They worked out the rest quickly. After the wards had been disabled, they could enter one of the processing rooms, and then Edgar would try to shut down the mechanical cart delivery system, causing a distraction. Past that, they would do what they had always done: the best they could.
They spoke little as they prepared. In the chilly bright air of the morning, the impossibility of the situation they were in suddenly felt very real indeed. As she laced up her sleeves, Celes recollected what the book had said: that this world would eventually consume their own. This world of the Empire, like a sickness insidiously sprawling, invading even realms beyond. She bit down on a shudder of disgust.
It was lucky the weather was still unseasonably cold. Otherwise the scarves she and Terra layered over their hooded cloaks would have been unbearably warm, not to mention conspicuous. As it was, when they reached the city proper, they were indistinguishable from the rest of the bundled-up crowd.
"I can't believe this Vector is so big," Edgar said quietly as they walked. "Or maybe just that it has so many people. Is it just me, or does it seem like the whole city is awake?"
"Vector always seemed like that," said Terra.
"Yes," said Celes, but she was uneasy. Even if the city had, in this world, doubled or even tripled in size since she saw it last, she couldn't imagine the streets being this crowded so early in the morning. It was barely light outside, and yet the still-damp sidewalks were teeming with people, all hurrying along in the same direction, as if there was to be a parade or event somewhere.
Locke suddenly stopped short in front of her.
"What is it?" she began to ask, but then she became fully aware of her surroundings. The masses of people had all stopped and were gathered in the street, muttering to each other, clapping together gloved hands numb with cold and stepping from one foot to the other as if in great anticipation. Celes couldn't understand why, until she realized where they were: in front of the Imperial Palace, its doors wide open, the red banners bearing the seal of Gestahl unrolled and shuddering in the wind.
"What's going on?" said Edgar from behind her.
On the great raised dais from which the Emperor had so often issued proclamations, there stood five or six troops at full attention, rifles by their sides. Leading them was a fine-featured, dark-haired officer in a cape and breastplate of blue and silver whom Celes did not recognize, and beyond them was a young man, pale and trembling, with his hands bound behind his back.
"Citizens of Vector," the dark-haired officer announced, his voice carrying over the suddenly quiet crowd. "You witness this morning the administration of justice. Thomas J. Mann, you have been convicted of desertion from the armed forces of His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Gestahl. Your sentence is death, to be carried out this morning."
The crowd clapped and cheered their approval.
"Public execution," Celes muttered in disgust. "There were always proposals for them -- I never thought they would be put into practice."
"We don't need to see this," said Edgar, bowing his head. "Let's go."
"Wait."
Terra was staring up at the platform. She had pulled down her muffler, and Celes could see her face was slack with shock. "Look."
There, far to the left, seated on a throne so far back he was almost in the shadows, was a most familiar man indeed. Emperor Gestahl, straight-backed, his moustache perhaps a little longer and little more streaked with gray, watched the assembled throng before him with an arched eyebrow, apparently more interested in its reaction than in the events taking place not thirty paces from him. Against all expectation, Celes felt a jolt of elation at seeing him alive again. It was more in emotion than in thought that she remembered him, this man who had been so much like a father to her.
"We knew he would be here," she said, her voice faltering only slightly. "We just have to accept it, and --"
"No! The sword; don't you see?"
Celes looked closer. Beside Gestahl's throne was a magnificent pearl-hilted sword, bare and unsheathed, resting in an ornamental gold stand decorated with classical designs and fleurs-de-lis. Unusual, to be sure -- the Emperor, in her world, would never have armed himself, thinking it distasteful when there were dozens of guards about ready to die for such mundane concerns. But when she noticed, as she squinted, a barely perceptible blur around the sword's edges, a faint corona of grayish light, she realized at last.
"My God," she whispered. "Illumina."
At once it all came back to her. That frenzied feverish night when they'd hacked through Kefka's tower, clawing their way through the nightmare he had created for them to destroy. They had brought it with them: Illumina, the unaccountable incandescent weapon that had pulsed with what seemed to be a consciousness of its own. Who had been wielding it -- her? Terra, Edgar? She could not remember. And then left behind in their escape, forgotten, as the Statues crumbled and dragged it into this foreign world. The sight of it here made her sick with worry, as though it were a child who had been lost.
"That's it, isn't it," Locke whispered to her. "What we came to find."
She could only nod. On the dais, the dark-haired officer finished his speech and gestured to the armed troopers with a flourish.
"Locke, wait," whispered Terra urgently.
He had begun to push his way through the crowd.
Celes grabbed him by the arm. "What are you doing?"
"I'm going up there to get it."
"Don't be idiotic, Locke," Edgar said incredulously. "With half of Vector watching?"
"I can climb up from the back. No one will see me. And what better distraction is there?"
"You can't really mean --" Celes was at a loss for words. "You don't really mean to --"
"When's the next opportunity going to be?" Locke demanded. "Will it be sometime in the next three days? Look -- no one's guarding him now. This might be our only chance."
It was true, Celes had to admit, that the Emperor probably would not be this vulnerable again anytime soon. But to try to steal a sword under his very nose was madness.
"I still think -- Locke!"
He had slipped through the throng almost without her noticing. She tried to follow after him, but after a few paces realized it was futile: there were simply too many people, not to mention Imperial guards. She would just give him away all the faster.
"I hope he knows what he's doing," she heard Edgar say behind her.
She didn't reply; she couldn't. She could only hold a knuckle to her mouth and watch.
"Ready," he heard a voice bellow as he reached the top. It was that dark-haired officer, his sword drawn and pointed to the prisoner.
Here was his chance. He crawled toward Gestahl's throne. There were, as he had thought, no guards here, and he knew that, against the Palace's mottled facade, he in his dark and muted clothes was all but invisible.
"Aim!"
His heart was beating in his throat now, but he had entered a state of mind where he did not notice, where the world had narrowed to a narrow tunnel at the end of which waited the sword.
Locke drew closer to the throne. He could hear the Emperor's deep, steady breathing. Not an armspan away was the Illumina.
He waited there, motionless, until he heard what he had been waiting for.
"Fire!"
There was a gasping cry, and then the cracking sound of several guns going off at once. Locke winced, closing his eyes, but he forced them open again when he heard the tremendous response from the crowd. Through their raucous cheers and applause, he slid the sword silently from its frame.
He drew back just as silently. The Illumina felt warm and familiar in his hand, and he had to struggle not to laugh out loud in relief.
That had been one for the history books, he told himself as he crept back toward the wall. One of the Locke Cole top ten. Maybe it even beat out that slice of pumpkin pie he'd filched from his aunt's dinner plate when he was six. Then again, maybe not; that one had been a tour-de-force...
There was a sudden noise behind him. He spun around, Illumina at the ready, but he slackened his grip when he saw who was there. It was Celes.
Locke opened his mouth, maybe to ask a question, maybe to say her name, maybe just in surprise. Whatever the reason, it was enough to slow him down, to rob him of a few precious seconds where he could have realized that he had been wrong. The Emperor had not been unguarded, and the woman in front of him was not Celes. But by then it was too late; she had shoved her sword into his chest, and everything, everything, happened at once.
There was a sudden scream from the crowd -- it sounded like a name. It was the voice, however, and not the words, that caught the general's attention. Something about it was eerily familiar. She looked out into the direction from which it had come, and caught a glimpse of a woman fighting her way forward, a glint of blonde hair --
Then there was a tremendous flare of rose-white light, and something blazing and sinuous streaked through the sky and slammed into her, knocking her breathless, sending her sword clattering to the ground.
Holding her side, General Chere forced herself up, only to freeze at what she saw.
Crouched over the man was a monster wrapped in pink and white fire, its eyes red-yellow slits, its flesh aglow and flaring. Before she could react, it took the bleeding man into its arms and shot into the sky with astonishing speed.
For a second General Chere could only stare after it, her mouth agape. Then the world moved into action again.
"Deploy the IAF!" she ordered the dark-haired officer, retrieving her sword. "Tell them to head east. Protect his Majesty!"
Those nearer the dais, who had seen the monster, fought their way out with the brutal force brought by panic; those on the edges, bewildered and frightened, only clung to each other and watched. Soon, however, people were pushing and being pushed in all directions, some tripping and falling, all screaming in the crush and the mounting hysteria.
Celes took no notice. She shoved the bodies in her way to one side, advancing through the throng with single-minded intent, her vision blurry and her breath coming fast and shallow. She felt something tugging at her cloak and pulled away, hard.
"Celes!" It was Edgar.
She didn't even pause.
"Celes, stop -- you have to stop --" He stumbled after her and grabbed her shoulder.
"Don't touch me, Edgar," she said, jerking out of his grip.
"You can't go after them, they'll recognize you."
"I don't care."
"Celes, you can't possibly fight them all -- they'll capture you, and then they'll capture me, and -- Celes, wait, please!"
She whirled around at last. "Don't presume to give me orders, Edgar." She was shouting, though she didn't realize it. Her voice shook. "You saw. You saw what she did to him. He could --" The word caught in her throat.
"Terra's with him, Celes. She can heal him; she's the only one. If you try to save him now, everything will be lost, do you understand?"
She stared at him, breathing harshly. Her eyes burned.
"He's with Terra, Celes. We have to trust her. She won't let him die. She'll bring him back."
The crowd was beginning to thin out around them. She said nothing.
"It's the only way to save him, Celes," Edgar said quietly. "We have to go back."
He wasn't moving. Fingers fumbling, she parted his jacket. His white undershirt was saturated and cold with blood. She lifted it gently.
The sight of the broken and bloody flesh there was almost too much for her -- not like this, not on Locke. She closed her eyes and opened them again, resolutely. Then she whispered the strongest cure spell she could remember.
At first, nothing happened. It took her a second to realize -- she was slightly faint from the magic, from the drain of it -- and she tried again, her lips numb and clumsy. Finally the wound glowed white-green, and the skin there began to knit itself together.
Terra sat back, bringing one bloodstained hand up to cover her eyes. If she hadn't been able to use magic here, if she hadn't been able to cure him...
She didn't want to think any further. The spells had exhausted her, and for a minute she could only sit there, not thinking.
"Terra."
She opened her eyes to see Locke looking up at her. His eyes were frightened, his lips pale, almost white.
"Terra -- am I...?" His voice was barely more than a whisper.
"Shh, no, Locke, you're all right," she answered him, but her breath had caught in her throat. He should not look like that, not after being healed. Discreetly she raised his shirt again, and saw with horror that the wound there was reopening, the flesh splitting slowly apart, blood pouring out in a stream.
The sword -- the sword that woman had stabbed him with. It had been Ragnarok.
Terra could have cursed herself for not realizing it sooner, but in the confusion -- in the dizzying exhilaration of her transformation, she hadn't felt it for years -- she had not recognized the mark of Ragnarok. She had not remembered that it left a virulent wound that could only be healed by one person: the one who had inflicted it.
"Terra, I," Locke whispered, trying to take her hand. It was as though he knew he was dying, and was reluctant to let her know. His eyes were beginning to close. "You'll tell Celes -- tell her. Please..."
"No, Locke, I've healed you, you're fine," she told him, grasping his hands in her own, but she was already weeping. "You're fine, just rest, don't be scared, I'm here with you."
At last he had given up his struggle, and he didn't answer her. In the distance Terra could hear sirens, shouting, the whirr of propellers -- the Imperial Air Force was looking for them.
Seconds seemed to stretch into days. At last she bowed her head and pressed her lips to Locke's cold hands. Then she stood up.
In the shadow of an old tenement building was the creature, standing on two legs like a human being. At its feet lay the would-be thief -- still, lifeless. The General approached with caution.
Suddenly, and to her astonishment, the monster spoke.
"Take his body if you must." The voice was deep and rasping, inhuman. "But this Returner belongs to the Espers."
General Chere stilled. "What did you say?"
The creature was silent, its yellow eyes glittering.
With a light motion of her hand, the General signaled to one of the soldiers behind her, one carrying a complex metallic weapon. He fired, and struck the creature in the shoulder.
Terra gasped and staggered back as the bullet hit her. No -- it wasn't a bullet; it was some kind of steel dart. She tried to pull it out of her shoulder, but it had somehow burrowed in, past the reach of her fingers.
Dizzily she fell to her knees next to Locke. The dart was ensorcelled with something: mute, osmose, some spell that would simply prevent her from casting magic were she a human but that, in this state, made her feel as though she were fainting, not getting enough air. Her head swam as she tried to look up.
"Take it to the Facility," she heard the General say. Soldiers took hold of Terra's arms, and dark spots appeared at the sides of her vision -- their gloves, too, must have been coated with silencing magic. But she would not close her eyes until she saw -- she would keep them open by sheer force of will, if need be.
As they dragged her away, she watched General Chere take a long look at Locke's motionless body, blood still trickling from his chest. She slowly knelt next to him.
Terra's vision was dim now, and she knew there were only seconds left. Still she strained to see. But there was nothing, nothing but a faint green flicker from the woman's hands at the very last; and by then Terra knew her mind simply could not bear to separate what it wished to see from what was real: that Locke was dead, and she had failed.
The world went dark.