Chapter Six

"Shadow? Shadow! Hel-lo!"

I banged on some of the rusty metal of the ruins, then walked a little further.

"Shad-"

Something slammed into me, shoved me against the wall, and twisted my arm behind my back.

"You called?"

"Lemme go, you psycho! If I'd come here to fight, I wouldn't be making so much noise, you think?"

Shadow, still walking around in Poltergeist's shell, released me and stood with his arms crossed. "I'm going to give you five minutes."

"I'm going to need longer than that."

"Condense it."

I took a deep breath. "How do you do that Zinger thing that you did the other day?"

"I'm not teaching you how to possess things."

"I don't want you to teach me how to do it. I want you to tell me where you learned it."

"Need a bedtime story?"

"This is important!"

I must have looked really desperate because, despite the shrouds over his face, I could tell his smirk was fading. "I learned it in Doma Castle. What's so important?"

Wasn't Wrexsoul from Doma?

"Tell me more."

Shadow folded his arms. The look he was giving me was nothing short of intense. "I, Relm, Terra, and Cyan Garamonde went to Doma to spend the night. While we slept, Cyan was attacked. We followed him into some kind of... inner nightmare... and found this..." He motioned with his hands, as if struggling for words.

"Wrexsoul."

He nodded.

"Go on."

"Wrexsoul attacked us in Cyan's dream, and he incapacitated everyone except me by... possessing them with the Zinger attack. I watched him. I memorized it. And when he started to do it to me, I cut him off and slit him from his neck to his gut."

"Woah, woah. You can injure him?"

"If he's visible and tangible. So tell me, Palazzo... how do you know Wrexsoul?"

I spilled everything. I couldn't afford not to.

"Quite the predicament you've gotten yourself into."

"Myself? Excuse me. If Wrexsoul wins, I'm the only person who'll come out of it non-assimilated."

"Which leads me to wonder why you care. You'll pardon me if I don't believe that you're doing this out of altruism."

"I don't want to lose."

"I suppose that's the closest thing to an ethical motivation we're ever going to get out of you. Especially considering that it's your fault Wrexsoul exists in the first place."

"I know. I killed a bunch of people in my hostile takeover, they formed 'Disgruntled Spirits Incorporated' and named themselves Wrexsoul, and now they've got a grudge against me."

"That's not exactly the case. Someone told me a story, about suicide. Want to hear it?"

"Oh, do I get a bedtime story after all?"

"In Doma, a lone ghost began to cannibalize his brethren, and Wrexsoul was born."

"Wrexsoul himself told me that much."

"Didn't you ever stop to wonder who that lone ghost was?" Shadow leaned against the wall. "Hundreds of years ago, before Doma became a prosperous nation, it was a small village, led by a retainer named Murasaki. He was just, and fair, and honorable, and all those things everyone thinks a leader should be. But he had one problem."

"DID?"

"He thrived on battle. Any petty dispute that arose between Doma and its neighbors became an excuse for him to go to war. He'd even go about inventing conflicts simply so he would have a battlefield to play on."

"Sounds like a perfectly normal guy to me."

Shadow ignored my commentary. "Doma always won because, in addition to his aggressive tactics, he was a brilliant warrior and strategist. Too brilliant, in fact. Soon, he'd eradicated or assimilated every nation on the continent. The lack of battle threw Murasaki into a depression, and he killed himself."

"The end."

"No such luck. Before he died, he made a vow. A vow that, the second war spilled Doma blood on Doma soil, he would return to fight that war."

I slapped my forehead. "Don't tell me."

"That's right. When you poisoned the water supply, you became the first man to kill a citizen of Doma in wartime since Murasaki's death. You revived Murasaki. But he came back to an empty, ravaged castle- and because he'd committed suicide in it, he could not leave it. Desperate for some way out, he began to devour lost spirits. He hoped to dilute himself enough to leave Doma castle. He never did; it was me who eventually freed him, by killing him."

I thought. "So you're telling me that Wrexsoul is really this Murasaki character."

Shadow shook his head. "He's long since lost all sense of self."

"So he doesn't just have a grudge." I laughed. "He came back because he wanted to fight! That's funny!"

"You'll laugh yourself into Hell."

"Sorry, sorry. But are you sure this is true? That your source didn't elaborate just a bit?"

"My 'source' was Wrexsoul. He likes to talk about himself."

"I guess his fairy tale hasn't given you any insight into beating him."

Shadow's eyes narrowed dangerously. "There are people out there, among the living, that I care about. For their sake, I'll help you stop Wrexsoul. I have an idea. But, as I've already told you, I can't leave the ruins. I need you to do something for me."

"Okay."

"Find Relm," He said. "Tell her to come to the entrance of the ruins. I'll meet her there."

"Like she's going to want to come with me."

"Give her this." He reached into a pile of skeletons, pulled out a bit of metal, handed it to me, then put both hands on my shoulders and glared. "Don't let her come into the ruins. And watch her back. If she so much as scrapes her knee on a misplaced rock, I will make you suffer for all eternity."

I had half a mind to tell him that the delightful little urchin had taken out the Tools section of my Organic Tower by herself and that she was a hundred times more equipped to traverse the ruins than Natissa and her crew had been, but I didn't. I figured he wouldn't be asking me to run this errand if he didn't know that. "I got it. You can let go now."

He gave me a shove, then walked away across the skeletons, mumbling something about 'being reduced to this'.

You and me both, asshole.

***

As I suspected, and as Wrexsoul had planned, the rampaging Prometheus had completely undone all the progress Natissa and Edgar had made the day before. They poured over the maps in complete silence, stopping only to bestow murderous looks on one another and the large hole in the wall of the inn. Relm and Branford hovered a few yards away from the table, but they didn't involve themselves in the tense, wordless negotiations that were taking place.

I waited until Relm excused herself and Interceptor to the kitchen to get a drink, then I followed her. I looked down at the thing Shadow had given me. It was a ring, set with a red stone way too deep to be ruby. It didn't look like something that would convince Relm to go traipsing off into the ruins with me of all people, so I decided on a different tactic. I dropped the metal thing right next to her, causing Interceptor to bark, growl, and vault about.

Relm knelt, picked it up, and gave a small yelp.

I leaned close to her, whispered as softly as I could, and hoped like crazy that after a month, she'd forgotten what my voice sounded like. "Go to the entrance of the ruins."

"T-the ruins of Vector?" She said, speaking in an even more hushed tone than my own.

"The ruins of Kefka's Tower."

I didn't know then what significance that bit of jewelry had to Relm, but it- paired with my disguised, disembodied voice- spooked her considerably. Without a word to Branford or Edgar, she ushered Interceptor out the back door and left town.

***

Where do dreams go?

That was one of the questions that had pecked at my brain, right up to the moment of my death. A man named Clyde Arrowny once had a dream. He dreamed that someday he'd be able to forget ignoring his best friend's dying request. He dreamed that he could have a normal life and family in a normal little town that got next-to-no visitors. He dreamed that he could drop his black reaper shrouds and be a real father to his little girl. He got so fed up with this dream's elusiveness that he took his own life.

But the dream didn't die with him. I could tell something was up the second Relm skipped into Shadow-geist's view.

She halted when she saw him, though Interceptor kept running. The dog leaped onto Shadow's stone knee. Shadow patted his head, then motioned for Relm.

"Oh. Shadow." She took a few more steps forward. "Where the hell have you been? We've been looking all over for you, and-" She squinted. "You have wings."

"Wings of stone." He leaned lazily against the ruins' entrance and gave Interceptor a rough scratching behind the ears. "You're making my dog fat."

"He likes fried rice."

Shadow nudged the dog. "I can tell."

"Like I was saying, why haven't you come to see us? I thought you got past your 'dark, mysterious stranger' phase. Gogo's been doing some really silly impersonations of you, and you haven't even been there to stop him; and Sabin was trying to tell us about your fight with Siegfried on the Phantom Train, but he thinks he doesn't do it as well as you; and Locke and Celes wanted you at their wedding, but we didn't know where to send the invitation." Relm ran out of breath, paused, then held up the ring. "Was it you who... sent this?"

He nodded.

"Where'd you... I mean, this was mother's..."

Shadow turned his back to Relm, and I could see his face contorted in absolute agony. For a second, I thought he was going to scream, but when he turned back to her, he was wearing his usual poker face again. "Don't have time to talk. Needed you to come. Wrexsoul's after you; you're all in danger. Come out, Kefka."

I reappeared.

"Omae!"

"Feeling's mutual, rodent."

"What's he doing here?"

Shadow crossed his arms. "Explain."

I related the story to Relm.

"So," Relm said, "Terra wasn't seeing things. You really did save her life."

"Don't go spreading it around." Rumors involving whipped cream were one thing, but this nicey-nicey stuff could do serious damage to my reputation. "I only did it because I had to."

"And you torched Albrook."

"Are you surprised?"

"No. But why are you telling me all this?" Relm turned to Shadow. "Why didn't you send for Edgar? I mean, he's the king, he has more say than I do. Or why not Terra, she's stronger than I am, and-"

"You're the only person who can do what I'm asking."

"What do you want me to do?"

Shadow motioned Relm closer, then leaned over and began to whisper in her ear. At first, she looked skeptical, but slowly a grin spread over her face.

"What a great idea! I don't know why I didn't think of that!"

"Neither do I."

"Baka."

Shadow laughed. "You said it."

Her face fell. "But... what if she won't agree to it? What if Edgar won't? It's so trivial compared to what's at stake."

"Edgar doesn't want his subjects being killed; Natissa, from what I've heard, is arrogant. They'll agree to it."

"Natissa's good. What if I lose?"

"Then you lose. The war will still be avoided."

Relm turned to leave.

"Relm?"

She turned back, wide-eyed and hopeful.

"You know I wouldn't ask you to do this if I didn't think you could pull it off. I have faith in you."

She smiled weakly, then walked away. Interceptor bounded after her. Watching her leave, shoulders unnaturally stiff, I started to "get" what had just happened.

"You'd best get going, too," Shadow said, "Just in case Wrexsoul tries anything."

I watched Shadow turn his back and sink to his knees, then I floated after Relm. Of all the people I'd ever met, Shadow the heartless assassin was the only one I'd come even remotely close to respecting. I wasn't going to stick around and watch him cry over his own cowardice.

Once she was well into the surrounding ruins of Vector, far enough away that Shadow could neither see nor hear her, Relm punched the wall. She punched it again, so hard that Interceptor yelped and leapt backwards. She hit it again, and again, until her knuckles bled from the impact. Then she began to tear the wall, and her other already-broken surroundings, into pieces.

"Kusotare!"

I ducked out of the way of a flying metal shard. Relm glared at me, then at Interceptor. The dog and I were wearing the same expression. She threw her hands in the air. "Does he really think I don't know?"

She sat and wrapped her arms around her knees, looking straight ahead, on the verge of tears but refusing to cry.

I didn't say anything. I left her there and waited at the edge of Vector's ruins.

Apparently, Clyde's little girl had been doing some dreaming of her own. And the reality of the situation- that the both of them were too stubborn and ashamed to yield first- was a painful realization that they had yet to make. Perhaps that was all that kept their dream from dying.

Sickening. Asinine. Pathetic.

***

Have you ever been so terrified that your breath froze in your mouth?

Have you ever been so furious that your heart felt seconds away from combustion?

Have you ever been so despondent that you couldn't stop laughing?

Haven't we all.

If you're digging into me, trying to find something to love, stop. There's nothing there. If you want to find a valid reason why I set fire to a castle in the middle of a desert, thinking there would be no way to extinguish it; or why I thrust my sword through the stomach of the only man who'd ever been nice to me, laughed when it broke through the back of his coat, and licked his blood from my fingers like cherry syrup; or why I turned the Light of Judgement on Mobliz and watched a hundred people dissipate into ashes when they threw themselves over their children; then wake up. Sooner or later, you'll have to look at me.

Here I am.

Look at me.

I'm only as far as your mirror.