Disclaimer: I don't own Bravely Default, all rights to the owners.

Here we go. Last chapter. I predict a lot of talking in this one. Even more than usual I mean.


"Yew?"

After a month of not hearing anything, waking up to someone's voice is rather nice (if not a bit startling). It also takes Yew a second to remember he's not in the tent, hence the wooden roof over his head and the lack of anyone but Tiz in the room.

Yew can also hear far more than Tiz. Even his own breathing and heartbeat are audible at the moment. After so long of not hearing anything, his hearing is still sensitive. His vision too. The morning sunlight is being blocked by curtains, but Yew still doesn't want to look at it.

"Yew?"

"I'm awake." Yew says. His voice comes out in a rasp.

"I can see that." Tiz says. Considering the man is literally right next to him and looking him in the eye, it really was redundant for Yew to say that. "Are you feeling fine?"

"I think so." Yew says as quietly as he can so as to not strain himself.

"Good. We've still got the blindfold and earplugs if you need them." Tiz reminds him, and gestures to the bedside table.

"Thanks."

"Do you want me to bring breakfast up to you? It'll be noisy down in the common room."

Yew thinks about it for a second, then nods. "Yes please."

Tiz doesn't say another word before exiting the room, leaving Yew to sit in dim light, staring at their two-bed room and listening to the noise coming up through the floorboards and from his own body.

He can hardly believe he's alright. It almost doesn't feel like he should be alright. He did something monumentally foolish and only succeeded in proving his uselessness, and he's only alright because the others went to unreasonable lengths to help him.

He needs to apologize to them. He needs to seriously reconsider if he should even be on this mission at all. Her Holiness won't be served well by an incompetant captain of her guard. Maybe he shouldn't have his position at all…

His thoughts are interrupted by a knock on the door. It's probably a quiet knock, but it sounds loud to him. Without a second thought, he hops out of bed and opens it, expecting food.

And food it is, but Tiz isn't the one carrying it. Instead, Yew is met with the beautiful, intimidating sight of a certain silver-haired, pale-skinned, red-eyed lady. The very same one who has been caring for him for the last month.

Out of the corner of Yew's eye he can see Tiz peeking around the corner, nodding at him, and then going back downstairs. Yew doesn't know what that's supposed to mean, but he does not appreciate it at all! He's not prepared for this! He was barely prepared to talk to Tiz, much less Magnolia!

"Yew?" Magnolia's voice is soft, clearly trying not to hurt his ears. He almost trembles upon hearing her after so long without her voice. "Can I come in?"

Yew realizes he's still blocking the door and scrambles out of the way. "Uh, yes, of course!" His voice cracks from trying to speak to loud, not helped by its general disuse.

He thinks he hears a snicker that sounds like Edea as he closes the door behind Magnolia, and a subsequent admonishment from Tiz, and it doesn't help his nerves at all.

Magnolia sets the tray of food down on a small table. There are two chairs, one for each side, and seeing as Magnolia brought food for the both of them it's clear he's stuck with her company for now unless he wants to outright tell her to leave, which he doesn't.

Yew picks at his food, trying not to shoot glances at the woman sitting across from him. He hasn't seen her in a month, and that absence makes him appreciate his sight and the things, and people, he can see all the more now.

(He really wishes he had time to comb his hair or change into new clothes right now. Magnolia looks immaculate whereas he probably looks like a messy dog.)

"Yew…" Magnolia whispers, putting down her utensils. Yew swallows the piece of bread he was eating and waits anxiously for her to continue. "You seem nervous, are you alright?"

"I'm fine." Yew says, staring at the table. He's well aware he doesn't sound at all convincing.

"Are you sure? Am I being too loud, are your eyes still bothering you?" Magnolia asks. "We bought some more eye drops if it would help."

"No, no, I'm fine." Yew repeats. "Really Magnolia, you don't need to worry. You've probably done enough of that over the last month."

"Do not be absurd. If there is something wrong, tell me." Magnolia says earnestly. "That is what partners are for, non? You would do the same for me, yes?"

'Partner' is a strange way of saying 'teammate' or 'friend', but Yew isn't going to argue semantics. "Of course, but-"

"But nothing! What is the problem?" Magnolia insists.

Yew makes the mistake of looking up and meeting Magnolia's determined eyes. His conviction withers in the face of that. "I, uh, well…"

Magnolia leans forward, listening intently, and Yew averts his eyes again.

He mumbles out the words as quickly as he can, half hoping that Magnolia won't hear them. "I was just thinking that maybe I get in the way more than I help. Not just when I was afflicted. I mean all the time."

"Who told you that?!" Magnolia asks, her voice instantly sharpening to anger. "Was it Edea? Her master? I will have very strong words for-"

"No, no, neither of them! No one!" Yew squeaks. "It was me, just me!"

"Oh." Magnolia deflates. Even though he's not looking, Yew can hear it. "Did we say something? Do something? I can assure you we implied nothing of the sort while you were afflicted. We had no intent to make you feel unwanted."

"It's really not your fault." Yew assures her, finally looking back. It's just that you're all so skilled. Tiz can do anything, Edea is a master swordswoman, and they're both Heroes of Light, and you, you fight ba'als! Reality-warping monsters! You're a master with spears! And I… carry the tent."

"Yew." Magnolia's tone is gentle and concerned, and somehow that's worse than her scoffing at his worries. "You cannot compare yourself to masters as a relative novice and expect to measure up. Me and Edea have years of training over you, and had to adapt to incredible opposition before. Adversity does, to an extent, breed excellence. You can't look down on yourself for not having fought a god or a multitude of monsters from another dimension before."

"That doesn't mean I'm not dragging the team down." Yew insists. "The team is limited by what I can handle."

"That is not true at all." Magnolia frowns. "You helped me fight a ba'al just the same as Tiz and Edea. The ba'al was not something you could have handled, but we fared just fine."

"But I still got us in trouble against a mere three sandworms." Yew reminds her. "We would have been able to continue if I didn't get hit by a curse, and I was already causing trouble by insisting on being up front before that."

"Perhaps." Magnolia says. "But you were unusually reckless that day. You can't judge your usual performance by one bad day. On a related note, what was the problem that day? You never told us."

"Well..." Yew mumbles, ashamed. "It was the same thing. I thought I wasn't being useful, so I found a map and tried to take the lead, just to prove I could do something. I know no one said anything about me not being helpful, but it felt like it was only a matter of time before you all figured out that anyone could carry the tent and I didn't have too much use beyond that."

"Nonsense. You're our tactician, are you not?" Magnolia says. "Combat capable or otherwise, your help is sorely needed. The rest of us are not nearly as adept at identifying weaknesses or developing battle plans as you."

"Maybe." Yew says quietly.

"There is no 'maybe' about it." Magnolia insists defiantly. Yew is thoroughly embarrassed that she insists on defending his honor, even against himself. "If you cannot see it, then trust my word on it. Trust Tiz's word. Edea's too. We see your capabilities."

Yew doesn't know how to argue with that. He can doubt himself easily, he knows what he does wrong, but doubting the others is harder. They're smart, strong, and competent. It's hard to imagine that they're simply so blind that, even when he points it out, they still can't see what's wrong with him. He can't imagine Magnolia being so willfully ignorant.

But it's possible. Unlikely, but possible.

"I-" Yew gestures vaguely, not quite sure what he's going to say to change her mind. So instead he doesn't. He gives up. Today was supposed to be about thanking his friends for what they did, not foisting his personal issues onto them. "Okay…"

"You don't actually think that." Magnolia accuses instantly, and Yew flinches.

"I- well- not, but I don't want to make this your problem-"

"Yew!" Magnolia says, clearly irritated. "Did we not just talk about being partners?"

They did, didn't they? "B-But-"

"But nothing!" Magnolia says indignantly.

"Sorry." Yew says quietly, shrinking into his seat.

Magnolia seems to realize that she's almost shouting, and visibly takes a moment to calm herself. "No, I am sorry. I just- you-" She groans in frustration, apparently at a similar lack for words as he was a moment ago.

But rather than let that dissuade her, she finds another way to express what she means. She gets out of her seat, walks over to him, and leans down and pulls him into a hug.

"I want you to be alright." Magnolia says quietly into Yew's ear, and if his heart rate hadn't spiked enough from the hug alone it certainly has now. "Please, talk to me."

Yew's throat seizes up and his eyes water just a bit. When did the crystals decide he deserved to have Magnolia in his life? "I- I am alright Magnolia."

"But you're not." She whispers, not letting him go. "You think there's something wrong with yourself, with your performance, and I just don't see it."

"You think too much of me."

"Or you think too little."

"I'm not as good as all of you."

"I disagree, and even if you're right, you're also quite a bit younger than us. You have room to grow, to learn."

"I'm only five years younger at most." Yew grumbles. "Edea is only twenty one."

"Erm…" Magnolia seems to think better of whatever she was going to say, and says something else instead. "Either way, my point stands."

"Maybe." Yew agrees reluctantly.

"Absolutely." Magnolia pushes.

"Fine." Yew says. "You're right."

"Good." Magnolia hums.

With that, she releases him from her grip. For a moment Magnolia stands over him, and Yew is once again reminded how stupidly attractive she is. It's almost hard to imagine that he spent the last week or so being cuddled (or perhaps coddled) by her.

He's also reminded that he should be thanking her for everything she's done. "Magnolia, I meant to thank you for dealing with me over the last month."

"Dealing with you? You make it sound so horrible." Magnolia huffs. "You were hurt, I- we- took care of you. Besides, it wasn't all inconvenient. I happened to quite like spending time with you."

"And I you, of course." Yew says in a rush, not at all wanting to give the impression he didn't. As much as the circumstances surrounding it sucked, being able to spend so much time with Magnolia was incredible. Yes, sure, all the touch put him on edge, but he hadn't been so close to someone in a long time, and it felt… nice. That's woefully insufficient a term to describe it, but Yew doesn't have a better word to use, if only because he doesn't know how to describe it.

"Then I accept your thanks." Magnolia says with an almost gleeful smile.

With all of that out of the way, they finally start their meal in full. The following conversation, had between bits of food and sips of drink, is mostly a question-and-answer session with Yew figuring out exactly what happened over the last month and Magnolia asking about his more peculiar actions that the group couldn't figure out.

"So everything was based on your worry about being in the way?" Magnolia asks, surprised. "All that fuss about the dishes and your constant nervousness were about that?"

"Mostly." Yew admits sheepishly.

"And the nightmares?"

"...that too." Yew admits quietly.

Magnolia blinks in surprise.

"I'd rather not talk about it." Yew mumbles.

Magnolia doesn't push it. It's one thing to insist on talking about what just happened over the last month, and another to poke at someone's past, and she respects that distinction. "Okay."

Yew nods his thanks.

"What about your hand thing?"

Yew pauses. "My hand thing?"

"Yes." Magnolia raises her hand, squeezes, twists it to face downward, and opens it.

Ball it, crush it, drop it, forget it. Oh crystals, she noticed. There's no way he can explain that without sounding creepy, can he? What's he supposed to say? "Well, uh, my father taught me something to deal with thoughts that were… problematic."

"It's a coping mechanism?"

"Yes!" Yew says, eagerly grabbing at Magnolia's simple explanation so he doesn't have to out himself as weird. "Yes, exactly, nothing more."

"Do you want to talk about that? You were apparently coping quite a bit." Magnolia says, clearly worried.

"No!" Yew says, well aware that his voice is unusually shrill. He does not, under any circumstance, want to explain that sometimes her touches make him feel weird or that he catches himself thinking about her body too much. She'd never forgive him, and he can just imagine her asking about those times he accidentally grabbed her thigh. "No, it's fine!"

"Are you sure, you sound scared-"

"Totally fine! Just a coping mechanism! Nothing more!" Yew insists desperately.

Magnolia is very obviously unconvinced, but again, she doesn't push it, and Yew couldn't be more relieved. "If you ever want to talk about it-"

"You'll be the first." Yew says, feeling very unsure about that. He can't really imagine Magnolia reacting well to him admitting his strange thoughts. After all, if Magnolia was thinking about him like that, he… uh… well maybe that wouldn't be so bad…

No, no! Ball, crush, drop, forget!

(Magnolia looks quite concerned to see him doing that, and Yew reminds himself to be more subtle in the future.)

With their meal done and their conversation over, Yew realizes that he's sort of ignored Tiz and Edea all morning (he hasn't even seen Edea yet today). Well, sure, Tiz clearly set this up, but still, Yew shouldn't be ignoring them for so long.

With that in mind, he and Magnolia exit the room, only to find Edea scrambling away from their door with a disappointed Tiz staring at her from a few steps away.

Magnolia is the first to speak, and she addresses Tiz. "How long was she listening?"

"A few minutes. I held her back as long as I could." Tiz says calmly.

"You wanted to listen too!" Edea huffs while standing up.

"But I didn't." Tiz says.

"Yeah, because you're boring."

"I think you mean I have restraint."

"Careful there buddy." Edea squints. "I am the model of restraint."

Yew snorts, and quickly hides his face behind Magnolia as Edea's head slowly swings towards him with an indignant glare.

"Just not when it comes to food." Magnolia says, having much less shame than Yew in teasing their friend.

"Look, food is important, and just because you all have no taste-"

"I think we do and you don't, because we haven't burned it away with five pounds of spice." Tiz mutters, and again Edea swings her indignant glare around.

"Anyhow." Magnolia smiles. "We were just coming down to find you."

"I need to thank both of you!" Yew says quickly, before he can forget. He bows at the waist. "Thank you Sir, Miss Lee, for keeping me safe."

"Naturally." Edea says, flicking her hair. "If you're really thankful-"

"Don't worry about it. We don't need thanks." Tiz cuts her off.

"Tiz!" Edea groans.

"You aren't making Yew pay for a meal." Tiz says sternly.

"I'll pay." Yew offers. "I owe you both."

"Damn straight. I cut breakfast short to spy- uh, I mean I'm still hungry! I could go for some sausage!"

"You already had ten…"

"So if you two are finished your totally-not-a-breakfast-date, I'm still hungry!"

"Edea…" Tiz sighs.

"Fine, fine, I can wait until lunch."

Tiz rolls his eyes, and turns to Yew. "It's good to see you're alright Yew. We were worried about you. Magnolia put in a lot of work to help you."

"I know." Yew admits. "I could tell the difference between you all."

"Really?" Edea asks curiously. "How?"

"Edea has metal gauntlets and is the least gentle, Tiz has thick gloves and is fairly gentle, and Magnolia has soft gloves or just uses her hands and is the most gentle."

"Ahh." Edea says, her eyes twinkling in amusement. "Of course she is. Now that I think of it, you had a lot of fun with Magnolia, didn't you Yew?"

"I don't know what you mean." Yew mumbles, looking away.

"Was I not fun?" Magnolia asks, concerned. "I really did try to find ways to keep you entertained."

"No, no!" Yew says, waving his arms. "Uh, you were great Magnolia! Amazing, really!"

"You two looked like you were enjoying time with her." Edea says with a malicious grin. "Playing b?tons, or snuggling, or sitting in her lap-"

Yew's face is quite red. "I- uh- I mean-"

"-or getting a massage," Edea continues. "or playing with her hair-"

"Okay! I get it! I remember!" Yew squawks. "Magnolia was great! No need to go into excruciating detail!"

Rather than being embarrassed, Magnolia looks quite happy with herself. She proudly preens her hair as Edea mentions it, and has been smiling all while the other girl talks.

"B-By the way Sir," Yew says, hoping to change the subject before Edea can embarrass him more. "I meant to ask for your help."

"Oh?" Tiz stands up straighter. "What do you need?"

"I wanted to ask after your training regime." Yew says. "I'm a bit behind everyone it seems, but I think anything Edea or Magnolia do might be too, uh, extreme, for me."

Magnolia frowns like she's going to argue, thinks about it for a second, then shrugs and nods. Edea just scoffs and says "If you want to get strong you have to go hard!"

"I can help with the basics." Tiz says. "But really, I'm not an expert at anything. If you want to learn combat then Magnolia and Edea are the way to go, and you could ask Agnès about magic."

"Yes! I would be happy to assist you!" Magnolia says quickly, and Edea rolls her eyes in amusement. "I know how to use all weapons to some extent. Even if you're not using spears, I can help your general combat skill!"

"I'm really not sure I can keep up with you." Yew says nervously.

"We can start simple. I'm not going to have you do what I do right away." Magnolia promises.

Yew really doesn't understand why she looks so eager, but he supposes it doesn't matter, and he's always had a hard time saying no to Magnolia. If she's eager to help, he can only accept and hope he doesn't make too much a fool of himself or prove too incompetant. "Okay."

Magnolia beams, and Yew smiles nervously back. As long as she's happy.

"Maybe we can get out of the hallway now?" Tiz suggests. They're all still standing just outside Yew and Tiz's shared room.

The group moves on, with Edea and Tiz bringing Yew up to speed about anything Magnolia forgot to mention. Yew listens intently, and chimes in to inform them what the strange boulders monsters they fought were, and affirms everyone's suspicion that the sandstorm isn't normal.

"Sandstorms don't work that way." Yew explains. "They're the result of wind gusts normally, and while one area could remain windy for a long time, it wouldn't go in a funnel like that. That sounds more like a tornado, but with a tornado you'd expect to see dark clouds, and you said the sky was mostly cloudless, right?"

"Yep." Edea affirms.

"Something is definitely up then." Yew says. "Almost certainly magic."

The discussion of what that could mean and what they should do about it takes up most of the morning after that, as the only reason they can think of for the magical sandstorm is the Glanz Empire. Their mission to find the Wellspring Gem will have to wait.

Yew does remember one thing, as the group runs around the city gathering supplies for another outing (they don't know exactly what's going to happen, but they're sure they're not staying in Al-Khampis for much longer), he takes a detour to a shop specializing in astronomy to buy that telescope. Yes, he could probably put this off, but he'd rather not. He'd rather get the telescope before he second-guesses himself into not getting Magnolia anything at all.

He hides the telescope in his backpack for the moment, not wanting to interrupt their supply run. The group is then subsequently distracted by rumors that one Professor Norzen has recently returned to Al-Khampis, and they spend the afternoon trying to get a meeting with him in hopes that his magical expertise can lend insight into the sandstorm (to no avail, as the man is quite busy, so they decide to come back at night).

That leaves Yew a few precious hours after dinner before they must make the terrifying journey to the main building and past the horrible horrors that stalk the nights of Al-Khampis, and it's in those few hours that he takes the chance to hand over the telescope when Tiz and Edea are busy arguing about the necessity of desert.

"H-Here Magnolia." Yew whispers, so as to not draw the attention of the others just a few paces down the hall. He takes out the telescope kit (not the most compact, but that's fine, they can keep it in the tent) and hands it to the curious lady.

"What is it?" Magnolia asks, cracking open the kit. Her eyes widen a bit in surprise. "A telescope? Why?"

"A-A gift." Yew says nervously. "For helping me all last month. I-I know you're probably going to say you don't need one, but I wanted to, so, uh, here you go. I was thinking it could be useful if you wanted to see the moon up closer, since you can't go back right now."

Magnolia looks a strange combination of excited and solemn as she extends and studies the telescope. "It's so different from those we had on the moon." She murmurs, testing the weight. "More bulky for sure."

"I could have gotten something smaller, but I figured it would be kept in the tent anyways." Yew explains. "So I got something stronger at the expense of bulk."

"I'll put it to good use." Magnolia promises, carefully putting the telescope away.

"You can use it however you want." Yew says. "Good use, bad use, it's up to you."

"Hey!" Edea suddenly cuts in. "Why don't I get a gift!?"

"Uh…" Yew hesitates. "I bought you lunch?"

"That's different from a telescope!" Edea complains.

"I did more than you." Magnolia huffs smugly. "So I get a better gift."

"I'm pretty sure it's because you're his-" Edea grumbles, only for Tiz to elbow her in the side and cut her off.

"We've got a few hours until we need to sneak into the main building." Tiz says, bringing them back to business. "And I think we should focus on you, Yew."

"M-Me?" He squeaks.

"You haven't fought for a month, we need to make sure you're still in fighting shape." Tiz says, not unkindly. "To make sure nothing has been thrown off by your affliction. We don't know what we'll find tonight."

Yew does not look forward to having all their eyes on him, especially with his worry that he wasn't pulling his weight being what caused this, but this is probably for the best. "Okay."

Somehow, it's that impromptu training session that gives Yew a sense of closure on his whole ordeal. He is less competent than his companions. That's just fact, and it shows as Yew runs through stretches or warm-up routines with his rapier, even more so when they do actual light sparring. It's a bit humiliating to lose every single match, but with the others helping to point it out Yew can see where the others are better and how they are better. It's not a nebulous skill gap built on sheer awesomeness or something technically correct but unhelpful like 'experience'.

And not only that, with his mind cleared he can make his own observations. Notes on exploitable weaknesses of the others that they hadn't noticed, but agree with when he points it out, and Magnolia's words about him being the tactician flicker through his mind again. He has his place, even now.

It just took getting hit with a curse for a month, having to rely on someone else for long enough to open up to them after the fact, and Magnolia vehemently disagreeing with him when he did open up, to realize it.


And I think that's a wrap. Endings have never been my forte, but I did my best to tie up most of the plot threads without dragging things out too much.

It took all my willpower not to put a kiss in this last chapter. God I wanted to, but I didn't. I couldn't justify it without Yew realizing Magnolia thinks they're closer than they actually are. Yew is stupidly dense, but even he would figure that out.

I really liked how I did Tiz in this fic. I know that sounds odd considering the story isn't even about him, but I really had a lot of fun with Tiz. Magnolia was by far the hardest character to write and the one I'm least sure that I wrote as intended, and I think that's because I didn't quite know what I wanted her to be at the start. Rather than her more awkward in-game portrayal I like Magnolia to be a bit more overtly flirtatious and confident and not shy about what she wants, and it took me a while to settle on what exactly that looked like (especially since she sort of couldn't be flirtatious given Yew's situation the whole time, so I had to flesh out the other aspects of her I had in mind like how her military training affects her actions, how seriously she takes Yew being her fiance, and a bunch of other small things I'm probably not remembering). Yew wasn't too hard to write. As I might have mentioned before, he's very close to an archetype I write frequently, so I have practice with his sort. Edea… is Edea. She's never hard to write, and always a treat.

Either way, this fic was fun. Glad I wrote it, and hopefully you all enjoyed it too.