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Fang leans her hip on the rusted railing and kicks her feet against the base of a post to dislodge the grit from her shoes. There was a time when walking the streets of Oerba was a lesson in patience and dexterity; people rushing to work or to meet with friends or visit the stalls of farmers and hunters passing through with their wares. Now it’s a hazard of a different kind, with Cie’th and crumbling ruins and a thick layer of damned crystal dust. It’s relentless in its determination to rub the soles of her feet to the bone. It’s everywhere, covering everything from one horizon to the other, and it’s doing its best to cover the six of them too.
Vanille pauses up ahead to wait, noticing Fang’s current predicament, but the others are seemingly oblivious to her plight. Never mind she decides, and with one final tap, she sets off again to catch up, recognising a losing battle when she's in one. Her feet can endure, even if her sanity can't. She nudges Vanille with her shoulder when she reaches her and carries on, only realising a few steps later that Vanille hasn’t moved.
“Something wrong?” she asks.
Vanille toes the dust with her boots, marking it in crisscrossing lines as she speaks. “They’re really all gone...aren’t they?”
Fang huffs out her frustration; it’s not Vanille’s fault that she’s picking at the very thread she’s been trying so hard not to snag. By now the others have noticed they’re behind, and Fang waves them off when they gesture at her.
Better to do this now, just the two of them, than drag the whole group down in their sorrow.
“Yeah, they are,” she says, and she reaches out to grasp Vanille by the shoulders. Vanille ducks her head, the tears sliding down her cheeks and landing in fat little drops on the arid ground. Fang feels a sob catch in her throat, the memories of then crashing hard on the shores of the landscape now. She pulls Vanille tightly into her body and wraps her up in her arms.
A moment. They can spare that.
“It’s been a very long time,” Fang whispers into Vanille’s hair, swallowing down her own pain as best she can.
“We’re...the last?” asks Vanille.
Fang searches for the words, but it's Hope who answers, the rest of their ragtag team approaching quietly with expressions of reverence and concern.
“You don’t know that,” he says quietly, placing one gloved hand on Vanille’s back.
“Could be that there are people still in other places,” adds Sazh. “Gran Pulse is huge, after all.”
“Yeah,” says Lightning. “But even if there aren’t, if you’re truly the last, the people of Gran Pulse live on in you.”
Vanille wipes her eyes with her hands, leaving white smudges of crystal behind.
“We were supposed to be their salvation,” she says. “We were supposed to save them all.”
“We did,” soothes Fang, her heart aching under the weight of Vanille’s anguish. “Whatever has happened since, however much of what we believed wasn’t true, we did what we could."
“No one could have asked for more,” says Snow. “And whatever happens, we’re all with you.” Snow squeezes Fang’s arm. “Both of you.”
Fang looks around at their friends. Lightning and Sazh nod in agreement.
“What he said,” says Hope, and he hands Vanille a fabric handkerchief to clear her face of sadness and smudges.
Sazh steps back and looks around, cupping his hand over his eyes as he peers at the horizon. “We should rest here for the night,” he says, and when Fang looks to the sky and sees how low the sun has fallen in the sky, brighter and warmer still than the fal’Cie sun of Cocoon, she agrees.
“We’re close to home,” she says, and Vanille seems to perk up at the thought of home, no matter that it might not even be still standing.
“So this is where you lived?” asks Sazh when the rambling Cie’th are defeated and they are free to explore the main square.
“Yeah,” says Vanille, and she takes Fang by the hand and pulls her into their former home. Fang stops in the doorway and takes a deep breath. Everything is much as they left it. Familiar comforts and signs of lives lived...it’s like everyone has simply stepped out for a while and will return with the dusk. Vanille fawns over Bhakti, no worse for wear than the day they received their focus. The others move around, taking in the living space and the clutter; blankets folded on beds, outerwear hanging by the door, picture frames of people long gone.
Hope finds a picture of her and Vanille on a counter. Fang can’t remember when it was taken, but she seems distracted, looking off into the distance while Vanille’s waving at the camera. They look happy, unburdened by a focus or the knowledge they have now—that things were never as they seemed as far as the fal’Cie were concerned.
Someone scrounges up a meal, someone else unearths some candles, and then they all sit cross-legged around the table on cushions that have lost much of their padding over the centuries, making small talk to keep the weight of their journey at bay. Fang and Vanille aren’t the only ones here feeling out of place, but Fang is grateful that everyone else is willing to do the heavy lifting right now. It's hard to think, hard to find the words to describe her feelings; harder still to find the words to ease Vanille’s.
It’s Hope who puts a smile on her face, once again driving her thoughts from what they've lost to what they still have when he finds another photo of them. The frame had fallen down the back of a shelf, and the shattered glass drops to the floor as he pulls it out. He stares at it for a moment and traces the image with gentle fingers before placing it squarely on the table in front of Vanille.
“You and Fang,” he says to her, “you’re something other than friends, aren’t you?”
It’s not an accusation, though for a moment Fang worries Vanille will take it as one. But she smiles wistfully at the photo of their joining. No doubt the memories of their pledge to each other are as clear in her mind as they are in Fang's.
“Yeah...” says Vanille, and she picks up the frame and removes the photo. “I should have told you, but—”
“No more apologies,” says Sazh, and when he holds out his hand, Vanille gives him the photo. “You have taken far too much on your shoulders lately, little lady.”
Lightning and Snow lean in to look, and Snow's smile is a little melancholy.
“Hey,” says Fang. “None of that. You’ll be reunited with Serah.”
“I know.”
“She’s waiting for you,” says Hope.
“For all of us,” says Lightning.
Sazh hands the photo back to Vanille. “You should take this with you.”
Vanille looks at Fang, who nods, then folds the picture and tucks it in a pocket. She tries to hide a yawn behind her hand, but it's contagious and it spreads through the whole group, weary from so much walking and so many battles.
As the rest of the group tidy up and prepare to rest, Fang slips out to patrol the village, a short loop to make sure there are no surprises in the night. Cocoon shines bright in the sky over the ruins of her former home; a nest of vipers that has turned out to be anything but. Though the differences between Gran Pulse and Cocoon are vast, there is so much more that could unite them were there any more of her people left. She would like to believe that Sazh is right and that there are descendants of her people somewhere on the planet, but in her heart, she doesn't hold onto any hope. She and Vanille are the last survivors of a dying race.
It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but Fang has never been one for regrets.
When she returns, everyone is in bed asleep. Sazh and Snow spread out in their respective bunks; Hope tucked in Lightning’s arms; Vanille pressed up against the wall, leaving room for Fang to slide in behind her. She stirs when Fang slips an arm over her, turns into the embrace and presses their foreheads together.
“Everything okay?” she asks sleepily.
“Yeah,” says Fang, keeping her voice low in deference to their sleeping companions. “We’re safe for the night.”
Vanille kisses her sweetly on the mouth. “It’s nice to be here, even for a little while.”
Fang strokes a hand down Vanille’s back. “Do you remember our first time together?”
“Of course I do! You were covered in grease. You left handprints all over the sheets.”
“All over you as well, if I remember rightly.”
Vanille flushes in the moonlight and ducks her head. “Fang!” she hisses. “You can’t just say things like that...anyone could hear!”
“That’s never worried your before.”
“No, but our friends are...they’re different. To everyone before.”
“Hmmm,” says Fang. “They are a little on the bashful side.”
Vanille muffles her giggle against Fang's arm. Across the alcove, Snow's breath catches in a snort, and he turns over on his mattress, the bunk far too small for someone so tall and broad. His arm flops out, reaching down to the ground and swaying gently by Sazh’s head in the bed below, but neither man is disturbed by them.
Right above Fang and Vanille's bunk, Lightning's breath is deep and even and Hope is snoring gently. Fang feels a wave of much affection for them all.
“They’re good people,” she says.
"Yeah," replies Vanille, her voice thick with the draw of sleep. "I'm glad we met them."
Fang pulls her in closer and waits for the dawn, her partner in her arms and their friends surrounding them, safe and sound for the night. Tomorrow will bring what it brings, and they'll be ready.