This is, essentially, a character study. I think. I know I'm 20 years late to the game but it bugs me how often I see people just completely reject this ship out of the gate. When people say that they are bad for one another or don't understand or relate to one another I'm just like... BUH? I think this comes a lot from studying the characters in a vacuum, as if their lives and worlds are not interrelated very closely. So this is me working through it on my own terms.
I think a lot of people like to gloss over Celes's past and paint her as some sort of innocent. She never once denies what she did in Maranda. (Whatever "it" was-- it's never said outright, but it was pretty heinous) Locke had to have been aware that she'd done it. She shares responsibility for what happened to Rachel because, even though she was young when it happened, she was a very important cog in that Imperial machine. The fact that he saves her is owed to something much greater than her simply reminding him of Rachel. People just seem to think Locke saw "pretty girl in distress" and that's it. I take offense to that on both their behalves.
So anyway. I have a place I want to go with this. We'll see if I actually get there. Here's the first installment.
Final Fantasy VI - Locke x Celes (sorta)
G-rated, 1362 words, not schmoopy (yet-- I like schmoopy and make no guarantees down the line)
The group was much more quiet as they left Zozo. Locke, as was his fashion, blazed the trail. Idly, he remarked on how the roads had changed since he first came up that way, in his youth. Though they did not say so, they knew the time period of which he spoke. His exile from Kohlingen, the year he spent in solitude when Rachel turned him away. Celes wondered if that was when he picked up his “trade.”
Locke had so much buried inside that head of his. He played at nonchalance, but Celes knew that seeing Terra in pain disturbed him. She knew because, as they sat at the Jidooran inn that evening after dinner, he continually spun the butterknife around his fingers.
For her part, Celes was in an altered state of mind as well. Knowing that living things had suffered so that she could wield her power… it did not sit well with her. The Emperor she had so long admired and obeyed had injected her with the pain of innocents. And to what end? The sight of Terra in that strange, altered state, crying out in pain… What differentiated her from Celes? Under slightly different circumstances, it could be her lying in that bed, could it not? Under slightly different circumstances, she could have become mad like Kefka. What made her so exceptional? What burden was she carrying now, as the only whole recipient of this tainted blood?
She would return to the Empire, and get the answers she sought.
“He said she’s gonna be okay,” Locke remarked, eyes trained on the silverware glancing over his fingertips.
Celes looked up from her glass. The brothers Figaro had already retired; the wife of the innkeeper was the only one who remained, cleaning dishes off of the dining room tables.
“You’re concerned.” Her tone of voice made it sound like a simple observation, but Locke knew it was an invitation. Or, at least, Celes assumed he did. Their relationship thus far had been littered with many of these tiny conveniences. Never had they outright discussed the fact that he could continue conversations when she didn’t answer. She enjoyed hearing him work out problems, because she could piece together his thought processes that way. And thus, she came to learn when a wink was not a sign of confidence on his part, and how his fingers spun daggers all the more quickly when his brain was tackling the big things.
The Rachel-sized things. The Terra-sized things. What size cutting implement would he spin if he had a Celes-sized problem?
“You knew her, didn’t you? When you were in Vector. She was there too.”
“I knew of her. I saw her. We did not speak. Our paths never crossed in such a way.”
“Did you know about the slave crown?”
Locke had explained the circumstances in which he found the girl. Celes found his tale to be consistent with rumors she’d heard, and believed him. “No, of course not. It was not my information to know.”
“She didn’t remember anything,” Locke said. “Barely even her own name. That crown took everything from her. Her entire life.”
Amnesia. Celes remembered. And now, having been to Kohlingen, she understood why Locke was so protective of her. “The Empire stole that from her… Like they stole Rachel’s life.”
Looking away, Locke didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. All things considered, Locke had been incredibly accommodating of Celes. Knowing what she did now, about Rachel, about how the Empire had murdered her… Locke had been under no obligation to fetch Celes out of that cellar like he did. If anything, her suffering should have been a salve to him.
Edgar warned her that Locke was broken. But he was broken in such a beautiful, compelling way. She’d seen plenty of broken men in her day—the thousand-yard stares, the violent rages, the addiction. Instead Locke wanted to save the world, to protect every baby bird. It was a ridiculous notion, of course. Likely a suicidal one, but the way he swaggered, she almost believed it possible. His addiction was more subtle, his rage more focused.
“I… I heard about the men she killed,” Celes ventured. “Riding the armor. They said it was an accident. That something went haywire.”
Locke finally met her eyes. “You don’t sound so sure now.”
“I never was. But... I feared her. The rumors that she was a witch—those weren’t simply tales among civilians. In Vector, they whispered about her, and her power. I didn’t care if they kept her locked away. I thought her a monster.”
The offense that carved itself into Locke’s brow was actually a relief to see. This girl was not simply a copy of that other, the one who lay silent in bed in Kohlingen, face so peaceful after many years of slumber.
No, Locke had not been afraid of Terra, even in that bestial form. A form that they knew could level houses. He watched her flit around the room with concern, pulling her into his arms and returning her to bed. To him, she was no monster.
To him, Celes was no monster. Though she was. She had been. For all she feared Terra’s actions while under the influence of Kefka, she had gone to Maranda and murdered children without compunction. No slave crown sat upon her brow. No, she simply murdered under the force of her convictions, of her belief in the Emperor. But when she sought answers for why that carnage was necessary, she received none.
“She’s not a monster. Just the thought of being one—you saw the pain on her face. She’s not proud of the things she’s done.”
“Neither am I.”
The response slipped so easily from her that Celes was shocked. The color drained from her face, and the knife stopped spinning, sliding easily into the thief’s palm. Was her guard so easily dropped around him now?
Reaching across the table, he placed a hand on her own. “I know you’re not a monster,” he said. “You’ve more than proven yourself to me.”
Celes looked down at those long fingers, dark and calloused against her own skin. Words did not immediately spring to her lips; she simply traced the lines of his veins with her gaze, scrutinizing how they joined with light, fine scars in a network. His history was written plainly on that hand; a life he’d pulled kicking and screaming from the depths of despair.
After a moment, Locke pulled away. It seemed that he felt he’d overstepped by touching her, but she did not have the wherewithal to correct him.
“We should get an early start tomorrow,” Locke said, getting to his feet. He was stating the obvious and they both knew it, but Celes simply smiled in the most gracious fashion she knew how. With a nod, she rose as well.
As they both walked toward the rooms, Celes reached out to grab his sleeve. “Locke—“
He turned to her, brow raised expectantly. What did she even intend to say? There was so much she wanted to ask him, even wanted him to know. That she was young, but she was no fool. That she could feel love, that she could feel regret and pain, that her heart ached at the thought of all she’d been blind to. Cid had told her once that when she left the innocence of youth behind she’d never be able to reclaim it again. Her childhood had ended when she became a magitek knight, but she had still lived in a sort of naïve daze that no child these days had the luxury of entertaining. That Locke had clearly shed at the age of fifteen. Though she was already a hardened soldier at that age, she did not truly understand war, or loss, or even the world outside of Vector. She did not pretend to understand why Rachel’s body still lay in Kohlingen. She did not pretend to understand Locke. To do so would be insulting to him, and to all that her world had stolen from his.
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