"Lieutenant General Curtiss, here are the files you asked for."

"Thank you," Jade said without looking up from the paper he was reading. "Kindly place them on top of my table."

"Yes, sir!" Jade heard the soldier shift on his feet, followed by an uncertain pause—probably because there was nowhere to place the said files—then the sound of papers being carefully stacked on top of another set of documents.

The sound of fading footsteps and the closing of a door told him that the soldier had left. Leaning back in his seat, he stretched for a moment before slouching back, raising his eyes to the ceiling of his office as a familiar tiredness swept over him.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, mentally willing his breathing to steady as he tightly clutched the paper he was reading earlier. Willpower usually did the trick, especially in dulling the otherwise fiery pain that engulfed him every time his lungs took in air. The same pain that forced him to accept this promotion—keeping him away from the field and holed up in this room as a paper pusher.

Following the revolt caused by the return of the supposedly dead Princess Natalia, Malkuth was vindicated by Daath in an international court. Kimlasca was ordered to pay billions worth of war damage to Malkuth, which the soon-to-be-queen Natalia gladly took charge of. Grand Chokmah certainly had seen better days, Engeve would take a while to grow crops, and St. Binah had some way to go before becoming the stronghold it once was, but it was a start, nonetheless. And the most important part was that little by little, people were coming back to the devastated towns, willing to rebuild their lives. The people of Daath and Yulia City, especially Anise and Tear, were vital in encouraging people to come out of hiding, and there was very little resistance in the part of the populace once Anise worked her charms on them and Tear sang her hymns with all her heart. Or so Anise reported in a letter, but in Jade's opinion, the fact that two young and charming ladies managed to smile, despite the ordeals they have seen and undergone, was the simple encouragement that Malkuth's citizens needed.

"Jade!" His eyes flew open and he was greeted by the sight of Saphir, wearing a lab coat over his shirt and pants as was his usual, entering his office. Saphir's brows were creased in concern as he made his way towards him, not without a moment of panic crossing his face as he tripped over some stacked books.

Catching his balance, Saphir stumbled towards his desk, heaving slightly as he clung on to the edge of the table. "Are you OK? Do you need me to call the doctor?"

"There's no need to do so," Jade replied, keeping his tone as neutral as possible. "In fact, it would seem that you're in need of one more than I am."

Saphir flushed red at the statement as Jade's gaze fell on his wrist, which was bleeding from a fresh paper cut courtesy of his earlier stumble. "Well, you should take better care of yourself!" he said, covering his wound with his other hand as he glared at Jade indignantly. "I wouldn't have lost my balance if it weren't for the fact that I was worried about you!"

"I didn't ask for your concern," Jade replied tightly.

"As your aide, it is my job to worry about you and help you however I can!"

Jade let out a heavy breath. Day in, day out—if it wasn't Peony being a nag, it was Saphir being the dreadful combination of a stalker and a mother hen. For some reason, the latter was good at picking up the time when he was feeling under the weather more so than his usual. When that happened, he wasted no time in getting to where Jade was—an ability bordering on magical—even if there was work to be done in the realm of replica research, which was now a joint effort among all nations spearheaded by Jade, though Saphir took charge more often than not, given his current physical state.

After the incident at Baticul—or the "Baticul Revolt" as the press had taken to calling it—Jade found himself making good on his promise to see a doctor thanks to Peony's machinations, despite the fact that Jade hadn't quite forgiven the former for the stunt he pulled in Ortion Cavern. In an ironic twist of fate, it was Dr. Shu who delivered his death sentence, the way he did Tear's, then Luke's. The amount of tainted fonons he absorbed was nothing compared to Tear's, however, his miasma contamination had been exacerbated by the fon slot seal and essentially trapped the said fonons within him, slowly damaging his internal organs as well as lodging themselves deep in his fonslots, even when he broke the seal a long time back.

Saphir leaned back against Jade's desk, with Jade eyeing a nearby stack of papers warily as it shifted precariously when Saphir put his weight on a side of his desk. "It's a good thing that old coot decided to come out of retirement, else I'm pretty sure you would have taken his job."

"And that 'old coot' has a name, Goldfish Droppings."

Fortunately for Saphir, Jade was saved from having to make a brisk retort when the devil himself entered the latter's office. On the other end, it caused the former to look upon the newcomer with undisguised horror, cheeks burning bright with embarrassment.

"Field Marshal McGovern! I would like to ask you to refrain from such inappropriate names."

To which the Field Marshal merely laughed at. "I could say the same for you, m'boy."

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, Field Marshal?" Jade asked, mustering his best smile as he stood up to greet him, though it may have come across as a grimace if the Field Marshal's hearty chuckle was anything to go by. "If I may offer you a seat…?"

"There's no need. Nephry and I were simply wondering if you had any plans of attending the ceremony. She's waiting by the docks as we speak." He smiled fondly at the thought, as if reminiscing a pleasant memory.

This time, a genuine smile broke across Jade's face. The Field Marshal was one of the few survivors of the annihilation. His son had not been so lucky, as with many other Malkuth military officers, who either died in action or were immediately killed upon capture. At the time of the siege, he was vacationing at Keterburg, and upon hearing news of it, immediately sprang into action to defend what he can.

News about Keterburg's resistance had been greatly suppressed. Easily enough, considering that Keterburg was in relative isolation from the rest of the world and that Kimlasca was the only one to control communication in and out of the place. However, what most of Kimlasca did not know was that they were never able to truly subjugate the place, thanks to the joint efforts of McGovern and Viscount Osborne, who were able to repel the invading forces thanks to tried and tested military tactics which took advantage of the latter's terrain knowledge.

He'd never admit it, but he was proud of his sister for surviving the assault on their hometown while fighting all the while. She certainly had come away from the fearful child that she was, and recently, her guardedness around him. After the assault on Malkuth, she seemed to be much more eager to talk with him and spend time with him in general, instead of avoiding him as was her usual. He had a sneaking suspicion that the Field Marshal had something to do with it, though he had no opportunity to confront his superior with the matter, considering everything that needed to be done.

Regardless, he agreed with Saphir. The Field Marshal was a competent and fair individual, and there was no one more fit for the job than he. The title was not merely for show, and Jade could truthfully say that Field Marshal McGovern was one of the few people he looked up to and would trust with such an important job—the job of leading what remained of Malkuth's military force.

"Unfortunately, I don't have any plans of doing so."

"Is that so, is that so…" The Field Marshal's expression gave way to that of alarm upon sighting the crumpled paper in his hand. "But Jade, my boy, is that how you treat official correspondence from royalty nowadays?"

"Oh, I must have forgotten. Must be old age catching up with me." Nonetheless, Jade straightened out the letter on his desk and tried to keep the distaste out of his expression as he averted his gaze from it.

"Jade, you aren't even half my age. You can start saying that once you've hit your fifties. Regardless, are you definitely sure about this?"

"I am very much sure. Please send my regards to Nephry, in any case." Much as he wished to forget the contents of the letter, he already committed it to memory, which made it all the more unpleasant.

Dearest Lieutenant General Jade Curtiss,

You are cordially invited to Luke fon Fabre's coming of age ceremony. This will take place on Loreleiday, Lorelei-Decan 48, ND2020, at the Fabre manor at Baticul.

Best regards,

Duke and Duchess Crimson Herzog fon Fabre

Despite the overwhelming evidence against him and his admission of guilt, Duke Fabre managed to walk free on the grounds of insanity. Normally, such treason would have been met with execution, but his punishment was nothing more than indefinite house arrest and the seizure of all his assets, part of which was used to pay for war damages. Though if Jade were to hazard an opinion on the matter, Duchess Suzanne fon Fabre's condition was greatly taken into account, and having her remaining family taken away from her would surely send her over the edge. At first sight, the event of her untimely demise should not cause political instability considering how Natalia was guaranteed to outlive her, however, the fact remained that some of the old fashioned nobles in court considered her as the "real" first-in-line to the throne thanks to the revelation of Natalia's true heritage. Not to mention, Natalia had not been showing any interest in picking out a consort, so having the line of succession preserved proved to be important in Kimlasca's political climate.

"Yes, please extend my most sincere regrets at being unable to attend." Jade tried his best to look apologetic, though he was fairly sure he came off as unconvincing to the Field Marshal. "Besides, I already have a prior commitment and it would be in poor taste if I were to back out of it all of a sudden."

Nonetheless, the Field Marshal nodded sympathetically. "Very well, I will pass on the message. Do you have any letter you'd like me to deliver to our hosts?"

"Yes, which Saphir will finish in five minutes."

"W-what?" Saphir's eyes widened in shock as he pointed a finger to himself. "Me?"

"Yes, you." Jade raised a brow at Saphir. "It's just a simple letter, extending my condolences and expressing my most heartfelt regrets at being unable to attend this esteemed ceremony at the Fabre manor."

Glaring at Jade, Saphir whirled around to face him and banged his fists on his table, unmindful of the papers that slid off the desk. "But I'm not your secretary! Besides, you already know what to write, so why don't you do it yourself?"

"As I recall, assisting me is part of your job description," Jade said pointedly, somewhat enjoying the reaction he was getting out of Saphir. "as you were kind enough to remind me, my dear aide."

"Fine! You win!" Saphir stormed out of Jade's office, muttering something under his breath that sounded like 'underappreciated' and 'overworked' and leaving Jade alone with the Field Marshal.

"Are you sure it's OK to leave him like that?"

"It's fine." Jade shrugged noncommittally. "Besides, he gets it done anyway, despite all his grumbling."

The Field Marshal glanced at him dubiously. "If you say so."

Jade found himself collapsing back in his seat as a wave of exhaustion overcame him. Feeling his chest constrict, he hastily opened his desk drawer and brought out some pills. He popped one in his mouth and with some difficulty, managed to swallow it. A few labored breaths later, he found his heart easing up and with it, his breathing returning to normal.

Alas, that was not the only thing that came with it, for the Field Marshal was eyeing him with great concern.

"Now I see what His Majesty meant. Jade, you should really take a few days off."

"Unfortunately, the world isn't going to solve its problems while I'm out like a light." Jade smiled weakly at him. "As you could probably tell, I… don't have much time left."

"And you'll have even less time left if you continue pushing yourself like this."

"Then tell me, who is going to solve the energy crisis looming in the horizon?" Jade said, trying to keep the agitation out of his tone as he pressed a hand to his forehead. "Find out what we can do for the replicas that remain with us? Make sure that nothing like Kimlasca's assault ever happens again?"

"All of us," the Field Marshal replied firmly. "This isn't your burden alone, Jade. You need to trust in your comrades a lot more, as they have trusted in you."

Jade took a calming breath. "Perhaps." But deep down, Jade knew that the Field Marshal was right. There was the latter taking care of military affairs, Guy handling the reformation of the House of Lords, Saphir assisting with fomicry research, and Peony being the glue that kept everyone together. Not to mention, Anise, Tear, and Natalia were more than willing to help when they can.

He could only hope that it was enough for the world.

The Field Marshal was the one who broke the silence that fell over them. "I suppose I should head off Goldfish Droppings before he returns to your office. I'm guessing you're planning to rest a little before your commitment later, and I'm sure you can do without his presence at the moment."

Jade nodded gratefully as the Field Marshal turned towards the door. Pausing before the knob, the other turned slightly to face him. "Though if you don't mind me asking, what are your plans for this evening?"

Jade's gaze flitted for a moment towards the colonel uniform folded on his sofa, smiling in anticipation of a long-awaited reunion among a certain field of selenias.

"Witnessing a miracle."

Trivia

For organization's sake as well as preserving the flow of the story now that it is completed, I have removed all my author's notes from this story's previous chapters and moved any relevant trivia to this section. Some might be added as I remember things, but for now, this should do.

~ The story closely resembled my initial draft, up until Chapter 6. From then on, a lot of the contents have been changed (especially chapter 8). I even had to write the epilogue from scratch in order to reflect the changes involved. Basically, it's these rewrites that caused the big delays between chapters, besides my lack of inspiration.

~ With regard to Peony and his bum of steel, I take no credit for the names of the artes he used. Kongman from Tales of Destiny was a nice reference for martial artes.

~ The "Goldfish Droppings" nickname came from Tsuioku no Jade (Recollections of Jade), a spin-off manga detailing the game's Nebilim sidequest and Jade's past.

~ My personal challenge for this fic was to pick a "villain" from the existing cast members, instead of writing an OC for the sake of this story. Tear actually came up in the list of potential villains, with the line of reasoning going "love makes you do desperate things". However, the level of scheming present in this story seemed beyond her, so I scratched her off the list. That's when I decided to stick with Duke Fabre as the villain, in a manner of speaking.

~ This fic has fanart of Jade's dress! I'd like to share some wonderful art done by wonderful people. These are interpretations of my rather vague description of Jade's disguise in this fic, and I feel blessed and touched that such talented artists decided to give his dress design a swing!

Design by MyselfSquared: dimensionslip*tumblr*com/post/82793963195/
Design by EirlysTylluan: dimensionslip*tumblr*com/post/86100432669/

Afterword

And it's done! I can finally say with pride that I've actually gone ahead and finished one of my multi-chapter stories. With that, I could say that this writing experiment of mine was a success, even if it took me more than a year to complete. I've had an awful tendency of leaving things half-finished back when I was younger, so finishing this fic is something of a big deal to me, ahaha.

I have already detailed how this fic came about in the linked post in my profile, so I hope you allow me to focus on other topics for the moment. For those wondering what's next, I'm not sure what to say, really. I toyed with the idea of writing a sequel while rewriting my draft and even drafted the first chapter and outlined some ideas, but my lack of time to actually write the whole thing makes it somewhat unlikely. That, and I really wrote this story with no intention of writing a sequel to it.

On the subject of writing, I am currently working on a Tales of Xillia 2 and Tales of the Abyss crossover story. Whether it has any relation to this fic or not remains to be seen, since I'm in the process of outlining the plot at the moment and not much stuff are final yet. Though I might publish a pilot chapter of this soon, as a way of gauging interest for it.

But if you're on the lookout for more Abyss stuff and/or want to contact me outside this website, you are free to visit me at dimensionslip*tumblr*com, which plays host to my other activities such as making silly graphics, coding themes, and scanlating whatever catches my fancy.

In closing, I'd like to take this opportunity to extend some words of thanks.

Firstly, I would like to thank the wonderful Eirlys Tylluan, who not only stuck with me as I raved and ranted while writing this story, but was kind enough to beta read the last chapter and epilogue of this fic. As if that was not enough, she also did some wonderful art of this fic, as linked above.

I would also like to thank the people who beta'd the earlier chapters, namely thehiddenshadow (Prologue, Chapter 1-2), jadedchrome (Chapter 1), and Droplet of Sour (Chapter 3).

Of course, I'd also like to thank everyone who read this story, especially those who took the time to review and favorite/follow this piece of fiction. To say that I greatly appreciate it doesn't do it any justice—I'm really, really happy whenever I get a notification to that effect. In fact, reviews are more than enough to make my day, as well as the PMs I got on Tumblr telling me that they liked my story.

So yes, please continue reviewing and/or giving me feedback even if this story's already marked as complete. :D

In that regard, I hope you guys stick around for whatever I have in store for the future. Thank you again for taking the time to read this story.

Forever grateful,

DimensionSlip