Sunlight spilled across the training grounds outside Narshe, glinting off stable rails, helmet crests, and the gold-brown feathers of the chocobos milling about. Moss exhaled slowly, steadying the faint churn in his chest. The pulsing wasn't sharp today more like a slow tug, a reminder. They're close again… closer than they've been since the first time they met. Maybe staying near Narshe is the safest choice, for everyone.
He dragged his palm across his shirt as if smoothing the beat flat. It didn't work.
But for once, he wasn't left alone with it.
Serra approached at almost a skip, her satchel bouncing, her experimental aether-tracking device humming in her hands. "Good morning, Moss!" she chirped, her voice bright enough to cut through the cool air. "You look… well, actually you look pale. Did you sleep poorly?"
Moss blinked. "Fine enough."Not really.He nodded toward the device. "That thing still reacting to me?"
"Oh, absolutely," she said without hesitation. "Which is terribly exciting! I mean—alarming! Strange! Concerning! Possibly dangerous! But also exciting." She held the device up near him, and the guiding crystal inside gave a weak pulse in response. "See? Nothing around you, no outside pockets of aether, no ambient anomalies in the ground or air. Yet you're making it respond. How curious!"
Her eyes glittered with scientific glee.
Moss rubbed the back of his neck. "I… can tell you what I know. It's not much."
Serra leaned in immediately—inches from his shoulder. "Yes, yes, do that!"
He shifted back out of sheer reflex but she stepped right with him, utterly unaware of personal space. Moss sighed and relented.
"It started when we ran into the Eidolon Titan," he began quietly. "Right before it appeared…something inside my chest pulled tight. Like a hook, but deep—and not really painful. I kept feeling echoes of it. Sometimes strong. Sometimes faint. Always pointing somewhere."
Serra's mouth opened in a delighted gasp, her eyes widening until she forgot to blink. "Fascinating! Sensory premonition? Aetheric resonance? A spiritual link? You might be responding to an Eidolon like a tuning fork does to sound; no, no, more personal than that. Perhaps proximity stimulates a sympathetic aether vibration, oh this is marvelous!"
"M-marvelous isn't exactly the word I'd choose."
"But you're unique, Moss!" She clapped her hands, lifting onto her toes with excitement. "Do you know how many years—decades—scholars have tried to document consistent Eidolon reactions? And here you are walking around casually with built-in detection."
"Lucky me," he muttered.
Her enthusiasm didn't waver. She stood beside him while he watched the chocobo knight trainees, her shoulder brushing his every so often as she leaned closer to make notes. Serra wasn't flirting, not intentionally. She was simply too absorbed in observing him, charting every minor flicker of reaction the device made, every wince in his chest.
But from across the paddock, someone else noticed.
Rynne clutched a saddle strap as she watched from the stables, her earlier confidence from the patrol fading from her expression. She stared at Serra leaning so close to Moss that their sleeves nearly touched. Serra's face was bright with fascination. Moss looked flustered but not resisting.
Rynne's shoulders drooped.
She turned away without saying a word.
For most of the afternoon, Moss helped the fresh recruits who'd begun volunteering as chocobo stable-hands, kids who'd never held a bridle properly, farmers who wanted a reliable skill, a pair of ex-miners who simply wanted work that didn't involve dust and collapsed tunnels.
"Not like that," Moss said gently, guiding a young man's hands as he tried to brush a chocobo's wings incorrectly. "Feathers grow outward—go with them, not against."
"Oh, sorry, sir!"
"Just Moss is fine."
Serra remained at his side for a surprising amount of the day, her device occasionally buzzing and sending her into little frenzies of scribbling. She asked him everything—from what the pulsing felt like minute to minute to whether he sensed anything when he pet a chocobo (he didn't), to whether physical exertion worsened the tug (it sometimes did).
At one point she got so absorbed she leaned fully into his arm without noticing, peering over a page of notes while talking at a rapid clip.
Moss tried not to die of awkwardness.
Lyra watched the scene from a stablepost and muttered, "Well, well. Looks like our fearless Moss has another to add to his romantic drama."
Dole snorted. "Which one has the lead? The starry-eyed chocobo girl or the aether-obsessed scientist?"
"We should egg them on ,so we can watch him struggle," Lyra chuckled.
Moss did not hear that, mercifully.
But Rynne did. She stiffened, cheeks reddening, and stepped out of sight.
Evening settled quietly over Narshe. Lamps flickered to life, and the distant mining bells signaled the end of shifts. Moss retired early, exhausted not from work, but from conversation—and from the persistent, low throb in his chest.
He lay on his cot and closed his eyes.
He slept.
For a time.
Then.
Thump.Thump-thump.THUMP-THUMP.
Moss jerked awake with a gasp, gripping his sternum. The sensation was no longer faint. It hammered against his ribs as if something inside was trying to punch free.
His breath shook.
Not good. Too strong. Too close.
A shadow hovered above him.
Moss flinched.
"Oh! Good, you're awake," Serra whispered excitedly, bending so close her hair brushed his cheek. "My device started spiking—just a little, but enough—and I knew it must be reacting to you again."
"Serra?"
"So I came to check on you! And yes, your chest is glowing like aetherfire on the readings, isn't that thrilling?"
"It's… one word for it."
He pushed upright, still clutching his chest as the invisible tether tugged him eastward. Strong. Urgent.
Serra watched him with wide, eager eyes. "You feel it, don't you? Something is calling you."
"Calling or warning," Moss muttered. "But yeah. It wants me to go."
Serra's face brightened like a child handed a research grant. "Then I'm going too."
"What? No. This could be dangerous..."
"I know," she said earnestly, "but you don't understand, this is unprecedented. You're unprecedented. If an Eidolon is reacting to you, then I must...must study this in real time. Besides…" She softened, just barely. "If you're walking toward danger because of this bond, someone needs to go with you. Let that be me."
Moss hesitated, breath sharp with the pounding in his ribs.
He thought of Titan.He thought of the dream-like pull.
And he thought of the others, Cid, Dole, Lyra would be dragged into danger again just by being close to him.
He shook his head. "Fine. But just us. I'm not risking anyone else."
Serra beamed. "Excellent! I have my satchel ready, notes prepared, spare crystals, extra ink—oh this is going to be incredible."
"Let's hope not," Moss muttered.
They stepped outside into the moonlit air. The pull in Moss's chest tugged steadily—eastward.
The same direction he'd felt it the day before.
Serra fell into step beside him, clutching her humming device. Moss led her toward the stables, where Bran lifted his head the instant Moss approached. The chocobo gave a soft, low chirp quiet, obedient.
"Easy, boy," Moss whispered, stroking Bran's neck.
They saddled him in near silence, moving with practiced care. No lanterns. No chatter. No alerting the others.
Moss mounted first and extended a hand. Serra took it without hesitation, swinging up behind him. Bran shifted his weight, feathers rustling softly, then stilled.
"Ready?" Moss murmured.
Serra nodded, excitement bright in her breath against his shoulder.
With a gentle squeeze of his heels, Moss guided Bran out of the stables and into the pale moonlight. The chocobo moved like a shadow quiet, deliberate, carrying them past the sleeping buildings and beyond the village lights.
They slipped unnoticed into the night.
And together, riding double on Bran's steady back, they headed toward the dark line of the eastern woods.