Final Purification
Full summary: The power vacuum left in Yevon's wake invites the reign of a new, charismatic autocrat that blinds Spira to Yuna's triumphs. Now scattered and imprisoned under false charges, Yuna and her guardians are powerless to stop the rise of the Unsent Army—a war machine fueled by the unforgiving might of the restless undead. With their waning strength, the Fayth manifest their dreams into flesh one last time to prevent another 1000 years of suffering.
Notes: I'm treating this as though FFX-2 doesn't exist since I've always felt that it never quite captured the spirit of the original game. In essence, this is my alternative to that story.
I like to keep things as canon as possible, so no OOC to be found here hopefully. There's no specific genre selected for this because the story in its entirety incorporates a fair share of most FFN-listed genres.
Special thanks to Atiaran for acting as my beta.
With all that said, enjoy!
Have you ever felt like there was something important you had to do, but couldn't figure out what? If you stand still long enough, you go mad with the nagging sensation that you're wasting precious time. It eats at you all day long, pounding from within your skull like a heartbeat pumping restlessness all throughout your thoughts. What to do? What to do? You think of everything under the sun, but nothing fits the puzzle. All you want to do is run…run right out the door and never stop running because your feet know where to guide you.
I'm still running. There's no end in sight, but I know I have to run. It's my job—my sacred duty.
Who am I? That's not so much the question as: what am I?
I'm a dream. I keep the world running with me. Without a dream, the future can't exist. People yearn for a better tomorrow, and strive to realize it. Progress is made to achieve everything envisioned. But when the dream is fulfilled and no other rises to take its place, the world stops. People cease in their desire for a new tomorrow and the world, forced into a standstill, decays all around them.
That's why I have to keep running—for their sake as well as mine.
But some people resist change. They'll do anything to maintain the status quo and keep hold of their power, even while they watch everything perish under their ironfisted grip. Dreams have no place in a world reigned by recurring nightmares.
Listen to my story. Everything depends on you.
Chapter 1
Hidden from the world high in the mountains, a fortress that had withstood the test of time saw much attention after the Eternal Calm's commencement. Untouched by Sin, the structure built over one thousand years ago served as a secret prison for Yevon's most dastardly and dangerous heretics. Terrorists and usurpers occupied most cells, save for the ones on the lowest level. There, where the sun never shone and the stagnant, filth-ridden air bordered a toxic gas that maddened the minds of any without a protective mask, the hole-in-the-wall cells served to house those accused of the highest crimes.
When the machina elevator opened its doors in the dungeon's farthest depths, a squad of armored soldiers stomped out hauling their chained prisoner: a ragged, broken woman who had long ago lost the strength to resist. Down the dank corridor they marched, giving the woman an occasional beating with the butt of their rifles whenever the cuts she incurred to her bare feet along the way hindered her movement. A cacophony of howls and screams echoed from the torture chamber, and the stench of death and other filth grew more potent the deeper they traveled within dungeon.
They at last arrived at the woman's designated cell. A guard shoved her in, and the prisoner fell to her knees, scraping them against the rough ground as she forced herself back to her feet. Disoriented by the pain and the maddening smells churning her stomach, the prisoner stumbled back towards the door only to earn a hard slap across the face by an armored hand.
"Get back in there, wench," sneered the one guard.
Now lying flat on the ground, the prisoner whimpered a weak and shaky "please", to which the guard laughed.
"Look here, boys; the murderer wants some sympathy!"
The other guards laughed too.
"Well she'd get some from Maester Mika…if he weren't dead." The guard kneeled next to the prisoner's teary face. "And why do you think the most compassionate man in all Spira's dead, eh?" He grabbed the prisoner by her sweat-soaked hair and lifted her head up close to him so that she stared straight into his gas mask. "Because you killed him."
The prisoner's head dropped, banging and scraping her chin against the ground. She wanted to protest, but her strength left her. How many times in the past had she tried to convince them of the truth? All words failed, and the grunts were the last people to listen to reason.
"Have a pleasant stay, Lady Yuna," the guard jeered before slamming the metal door shut and locking it.
A long time passed and Yuna continued to lie motionless on the cold, soiled ground. At last she slowly pushed herself up, stumbling at first but finally able to sit. Raising her pale, shaky hands, she pressed her palms together and bowed her head in silent prayer.
"Please…help me…"
There was a rhythm somewhere in the background. Like a heartbeat ticking away under layers of the city's normal reverberations, he could hear the beat forcing an unnatural order within the chaotic street. Everywhere, people were shuffling past him chitchatting, either to each other or on their phones, and blaring music out of their headphones loud enough for everyone to hear. Lampposts crackled with the latest holographic displays, and newscasters of all kinds added to the mesh of blurring noise with their talks of Blitzball, interviews, and traffic updates.
But Tidus deafened himself to all the hustle and bustle, choosing to focus on the haunting rhythm pulsating through life itself. He stilled his body, ignoring the people who bumped into him. Only the rhythm and beat mattered. They vibrated through his whole head, at first like a small tremor, but then, the longer he concentrated, rumbled like a full-blown earthquake. Then, like ground splitting open into a chasm, his perception of reality tore in two and the resulting rift allowed his true memories to resurface.
"Someone's sleeping," Tidus realized. His mind clouded and resisting his attempts to focus. But the more he struggled to think, the louder the subtle sounds of a million slumbering people grew until the haze in Tidus' mind began to wane.
For what seemed like an eternity, Tidus hadn't been able to remember his identity, nor could he recall the treasured memories of his past adventures. Days had passed, as he led a mundane life under a different name as if he were an amnesiac enlisted for the witness protection program. Believing himself hydrophobic, he stayed away from Blitzball, keeping company only with the barkeeper at the nearest pub and the old lady whose cat always tipped over Tidus' trashcans.
His life as Tidus, Blitzball player and son of Jecht, had eluded him for the longest time. But now with each sleepy inhale, he recovered a face from his past; with each exhale, a daring battle. The time he spent in Spira soon came flooding into his mind, even if he couldn't remember everything quite yet.
"Hello again."
And then the world stopped.
Everyone froze as if modeling for a still-frame. An eerie silence blanketed the city, but Tidus' heartbeat didn't follow suit. It raced, pounding against his chest as his wide eyes fell on the little boy dressed in exotic, indigo robes.
"It's been a long time."
"You…" Tidus took a step closer to the boy, hunching over to better look at the face veiled behind the cloth hood. "I know you…"
"I should hope so."
"But why—how?"
"It's very important that you remember everything yourself."
"Can't you just tell me?"
"If I do, the spell will never be broken."
"Spell?"
"Yes," the boy nodded before vanishing and reappearing behind him a few feet away. "Now…let's start simply. Do you remember your name?"
"Of course I do. I'm Tidus, star player of the Zanarkand Abes!" he said with pride, placing his hands on his hips and striking a pose to show off his well-toned muscles. "Want an autograph?"
"No, thank you," the boy chuckled. "Can you tell me how you came to this city?"
"I was born and raised here." It was an automatic response, like a program that overrode his common sense. He remembered hearing about the fate of Zanarkand—remembered the tales of its destruction and rebirth through a dream—but he could feel a mental barrier still forcing back all of his personal experiences. It blurred the lines between fact and fiction, anesthetizing his conscious thought to further the delusions of a fabricated identity.
"I mean, how did you really come to be here?" the boy pressed.
There was a pause. Tidus wanted to laugh and say, "No, really. This is my home, little guy. Don't you get it?" But he didn't.
In that moment, when he stopped to fight the numbness in his head and to really consider the question, a chain reaction tipped the thoughts in his mind like a row of dominos. One thought crashed into another until the outline of a faint memory left its impression in his mind like a picture-in-picture TV screen. He saw the boy standing before him, and at the same time, saw him again in his mind's eye.
But the two images didn't match, even though he recognized them as the same person. There in his mind, swamped amidst the hazy bog of memories that ebbed with the endless rhythm of a million sleep-filled breaths, he saw a dragon—the king of dragons—Bahamut, and it all came crashing through the dam of lies to smack him upside the head with an invisible hand.
"It's you! You're the Fayth!" Tidus jumped, landing back on his feet with his knees bent as though anticipating another phantom strike. "This is your dream," he said in answer to the earlier-posed question. "You dreamed me here."
The Fayth smiled. "That's right."
"But…how?" Tidus furrowed his brows in contemplation. "Man…my head's all foggy-like. Didn't I do something to set you free? I thought you were supposed to be resting now…"
"Try to piece together what happened the last time we met."
Tidus caressed his chin, reviewing the final events before he'd faded from existence. "I smacked my old man around some—I remember that," he said, intentionally omitting the bit where he cried as Jecht died in his arms. "And then we faced off against you and your friends."
"We?"
"Yeah, the other guardians and me."
"Can you name everyone who was with you? Picture them in your mind as you describe them."
"Why? I remember them just fine now."
"It's necessary to break the spell."
"Well, okay," said Tidus with a nod. "Wakka and Lulu, who kind of acted like everyone's big brother and sister; Auron, the high and mighty 'Legendary Guardian' who thought he knew it all; Rikku, the crafty thief and chemist who could make a bomb out of the most useless items; and finally, Kimahri Ronso, the big blue and silent type who was good with a spear, and even better with a fearsome roar."
He saw them there in his mind's eye. Their adventure in its entirety played like a video on rewind, starting from the moment he said his last goodbyes, and cycling through every last detail of their journey—all the laughter and sadness; the good times and the bad; the fun games and the ferocious battles—until it stopped at the moment when he first met the Al Bhed at the Temple of Baaj.
"That's everyone?"
"Yup."
"You're certain?"
"Hey, it's like I said: that's everyone who was there."
"Who were you guarding?"
Tidus' mouth went dry. "What?"
"You and your friends were tasked as guardians. Ergo, you must have been guarding someone—a person who was there amidst the chaos. Who was it?"
"I…" He hesitated as he saw the faded image of a woman's smile flicker in and out of his mind's eye before it retreated behind what remained of the damaged mental barrier. "It was—she was…someone special, but…" Clenching his fists, he let out an annoyed grunt. "I can't remember!"
"You must remember. If you don't, you'll lose her forever."
"This is crazy!" Tidus shouted. "I can remember everything we did together—going on the pilgrimage, flying on the airship, telling stories by the campfire, beating Sin—everything! But when I think about her, it's like there's nothing there. I'm drawing a complete blank!"
"That's because out of all your experiences, her memory is what you cherish most," the Fayth explained. "Keep trying; don't give up."
Tidus pulled at his hair, squatting over to shake his head in irritation. "Grr…why is this happening to me? Why?" Closing his eyes tight, he forced back a stream of tears. Whoever that woman was, the mere thought of forgetting her pained him in ways that he couldn't understand.
"Think about her, Tidus," the Fayth goaded. "Really think about her. What was she like—her voice, her demeanor, her touch? Who was she to you and why do you cherish her so?"
Another crack tore into the already battered roadblock in his head, and the face of the unknown woman peeked in through the opening. The smile returned with more clarity, and it conveyed more than happiness. Brushing past the surface, Tidus could see a deep sadness that pained him all the more. He wanted to make her happy—truly happy—without understanding why. He could see her face, most prominently the pair of kind eyes to match her smile. She wore a dress unique to her homeland, woven from the finest silk in all of Spira as proof of her lineage and status.
The more he studied her, the more solid she became until the blockade that shielded her fully collapsed. He heard her voice laugh, worry, and cry; he heard her give inspiring speeches and informative explanations; and then he heard her say the three words that justified the pain in his heart.
"Yuna!" Tidus stood and wiped the tears from his eyes. "How could I forget Yuna?"
"And who was Yuna?"
"The summoner I swore to always protect. We beat Sin together, and now, I'm sure all of Spira's rejoicing under her rule and Eternal Calm." He paused and then added in a low, saddened voice, "She means everything to me, and I'll never see her again…"
There was a moment of silence; then the Fayth teleported to the dead center of the road's apex. "Good, good," he said, prompting Tidus to turn around in the direction of his voice. "I sense that you truly remember all there is to remember. Now the spell is broken."
"What's the deal with that so-called spell, anyway? I didn't suffer much other than a serious case of amnesia…"
A wicked smile twisted across the boy's darkening face, giving a clear view of his sharp fangs. "The Fayth cast the spell to protect you from me."
"Huh?" Tidus watched in horror as a dark, foreboding aura encircled the demon-fanged child like a tornado and lifted him several feet off the ground. The once indigo robes inverted to crimson and the boy's eyes sparked with a lightning yellow hue.
"You've unwittingly shed your own protective barrier, fool," the demon mocked in its new, eerie baritone voice.
"You're not a Fayth!" Tidus shouted in anger, sliding his feet apart in preparation for the inevitable fight. "Who are you and what do you want with me?"
"I am but a servant bound to fulfill the desires of my contractor—one who wishes the dream of the Fayth dead. And now that you've allowed me unrestricted access to your soul, foolish Tidus, I will break you."
The impostor flicked his hands up, clapping them together before his face to press the two palms together. Tipping his head forward, he chanted a spell of his own that concentrated a field of blue-tinted energy into his hands. The chanting increased in speed and volume, and the energy field lashed like a whip towards Tidus.
The star athlete's honed reflexes kicked into gear, lunging him out of harm's way. He dived and he dodged all across the highway, but wherever he fled, the blue energy followed close on his heels until it lassoed around his ankles. A jolt of pain akin to a high-voltage electrical shock surged through his whole body, forcing him to the ground. His entire body burned like a sun and his solid form grew transparent while the pressure building in his head threatened to knock him unconscious. All the memories and feelings he regained blanked from his mind, leaving nothing behind except the echoes of his own screams.
With his victim crying out his last breaths, the unnamed demon chanted faster to rid himself of the pitifully weak and whiny man. So engrossed in his spell was he, that he failed to notice a shift in the atmosphere. Whirling above the streets, highways, and buildings was a blanket of thick, turbulent clouds that thundered and roared as prelude to an oncoming storm.
A bolt of lightning struck across the sky, piercing an opening through the clouds and giving way to a falling object. It plummeted towards the highway with impeccable speed, burning with a fiery red aura as it continued in its descent. Streaking down from the heavens, the object crashed into the road creating a gaping crater just five hundred feet from where Tidus writhed in pain. Shockwaves rippled through the asphalt and dissolved the frozen pedestrians still cluttering the roads.
The sheer force of impact broke the demon's concentration and liberated Tidus from its damning spell.
"Who dares disrupt me?" howled the enraged demon.
"I do."
Emerging from the swirling dust and debris, Auron rose to his feet with sword in hand. After pushing his silver-rimmed sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose with his free hand, he jumped out of the crater and stalked closer to the imposter Fayth. When he neared Tidus, he stopped just before the unconscious body and kneeled over to nudge him awake.
"Don't interfere, or you will suffer the same fate," the demon warned, but Auron paid him no mind.
Infuriated by the lack of response, the fiend summoned a chunk from the dark aura still coiling around him and launched it at the meddler. The ball of darkness streamed through the air, and in one fell move, the man jerked his arm to shield his head. Upon impact with Auron's golden bracer, the darkness dispersed without damage.
With a groan, Tidus opened his eyes a crack and rolled over flat on his back to look up into the face of his savior. At first, he couldn't register what he saw through all the blur and haze, but after blinking away the fog, his body jerked back in shock of the sight.
"Auron!"
"Run."
"Wha—"
"I said run!" Auron interjected, grabbing Tidus by the collar and forcing him to his feet.
Without another word, Tidus spun on his heel and ran as fast as his legs would take him, leaving Auron behind to face-off with the imposter Fayth.
"You will suffer for intervening!" roared the demon, its eyes erupting into flames as its body quadrupled in size. It shed its human-like skin and took the form of a giant, crimson wraith.
But the true, ethereal form of the creature didn't deter the mighty guardian. With an amused smirk behind his tall, grey collar, he grabbed his katana with both hands and focused his energy into the blade. Multicolored wisps bounced all along the blade until they whirled around it like a cyclone. Taking a giant step forward with his right foot, Auron slashed his katana down vertically, inciting four orbs of energy imprinted with ancient texts to spout from the blade and charge into the wraith. The awesome might of the Banishing Blade trembled throughout the wraith, and it howled into the sky as its body burst into pyreflies and scattered into multiple directions.
After watching the dispersed pyreflies fade from sight, Auron shouldered his katana and ran after Tidus. The two met up further down the road, where Tidus leaned his weary frame against a nearby lamppost to catch his breath.
"What's going on, Auron?"
"It isn't safe to talk just yet," the guardian said. "Look." He nodded towards the horizon, where a swarm of pyreflies flew in and morphed into various ghosts and wraiths. They flocked together and flew towards the two warriors with their ghoulish screeches and shrieks echoing into the night air.
Tidus wiped the sweat from his brow and staggered off the lamppost. "You've got to be kidding me."
"You must recover quickly."
"Hey, I almost bit the big one! Cut me some slack."
"No rest for the weary." Auron slid his feet apart and readied his katana.
"What am I supposed to do—punch them to death?"
"Use this." With his free hand, Auron handed a spare sword to his companion.
"Just like old times, huh?" Tidus gave an expert twirl of the blade and crouched into his own fighting stance. "That's more like it!"
"Brace yourself; here they come!"
The mob of wailing spirits flowed in like a giant wave, splashing straight into the two warriors and encircling them in a giant dome of phantom fiends. Swords slashed through the air to parry the onslaught of claws and bewitching spells, and one by one the spirits began to fade into pyreflies. Tidus and Auron fought back-to-back, seldom moving too far from the center of the ring until the numbers thinned enough to allow them more elbowroom.
By the time they narrowed it down to the last handful of fiends, Tidus' reflexes had slowed by a dangerous margin, leaving him a prime target for the remaining ghouls. They levitated skyward away from Auron's reach and concentrated all their power into one final attack aimed at Tidus. Connecting their claws together, the ghosts formed a circle high above the heads of the vulnerable warriors and began chanting the spell for instant death.
"Run!" Auron shouted, but it was too late. No longer able to fend off his weariness, Tidus collapsed to one knee, using his sword as a crutch to keep himself from toppling over altogether.
"I need rest…" Tidus panted as dark bolts of static crackled around the fiendish ring. The grim reaper had been summoned, and he set his merciless sights on the wounded and vulnerable dream.
Acting fast, Auron once again took his katana into both hands. Praying silently in his head, he summoned forth a great air current that raged around him with increasing velocity. When the rushing winds bloomed into a giant cyclone that reached towards the heavens, Auron spun his whole body around to give it an extra powerful edge before launching it towards the ring of ghosts.
The tornado in all its fury sped to engulf the fiends and their spell, sucking them all into its vortex. To seal the deal, Auron grabbed his cask of sake from off his belt and chucked it into the tornado, sending the whole thing up in flames and effectively destroying all the fiends.
When the fires died down and the wind slackened, Auron turned his full attention to Tidus. "Can you stand?" he asked, placing a hand on the weary man's shoulder.
"I think so." Forcing all his weight onto his sword, Tidus hoisted himself up and hobbled a bit before regaining his balance.
"We need to keep moving."
"Moving to go where? This place can't be real, so I don't see any point in running around if there's no way out."
"There is a way, but we must search for it."
"Just what I need: an exit that likes to play hide and seek…" Tidus let out an exasperated sigh and shook his head. "Lead the way."
The two hadn't gone more than a few yards before a large fireball hurtled into the road and set their escape path aflame. "There is no escape!" boomed an all-too familiar voice.
"Not you again!" Tidus groaned as the crimson wraith emerged from the wall of fire. "What's with ghosts not wanting to stay dead?"
"The only death you will find here is your own!" Digging his claws into the asphalt, the crimson wraith dragged them along the crumbling ground until molten lava spewed from the cracks. The whole highway rumbled and quaked as more streams of orange lava gushed out to incinerate everything they touched.
"Whoa!" Tidus tumbled over from the sheer magnitude of the quakes, and rolled smack into a melting rail guard. With most of his energy still drained from the earlier near-death experience, he could do little more than stumble away from the heat source and collapse behind Auron.
"Dream of the Fayth," the wraith bellowed with the eerie voice that sent chills down Tidus' spine, "your destiny is rewritten and your continued existence is denied."
Auron had heard enough. Holding his blade like a baseball bat, he charged the wraith and swung into its abdomen hard enough to launch it clear into the horizon. "That should buy us some time," he said, walking fast towards Tidus and helping him to his feet. "We must hurry."
No sooner did Tidus move to use Auron as a crutch for their escape when the earthquake tore the highway in two. Bits of road broke off and fell into the city miles below while the support beams fractured to further destabilize the ground. The cataclysmic collapse of the whole metropolitan highway filled the hollow city with echoes of its destruction.
Forcing all his pain aside, Tidus gritted his teeth and sprinted to safety with Auron running right beside him. But his weary mind started to hallucinate the more his adrenaline pumped and he saw a flat road where there was none. Without realizing it, Tidus ran clear off a caved-in edge. He fell, arms flailing in a desperate attempt to grab at a jagged piece of concrete or a loose-hanging cable. But everything smacked against his open palm in vain and he continued to plummet to his end until a strong hand grabbed hold of his forearm and yanked him back to the upper-level.
"Auron…!"
"Stay still," the guardian ordered as he grabbed Tidus by the collar. Auron had jumped after him, leaning over the edge of the broken highway and supporting himself only by wrapping his legs around a protruding steel rod.
After many slow and agonizing seconds, he had hauled Tidus back up and out of immediate danger. But the two weren't allowed much time to rest; the crimson wraith reemerged and swooped down from the sky to finish his mission.
"The time has come," said the wraith. "This world will bury you!"
"Don't you ever give up?" Tidus muttered. He shifted his expectant gaze towards Auron. "What now?"
Taking a moment to gauge his surroundings, Auron looked around the still-crumbling road until a flash caught his eye. Just a few hundred feet away, he noticed a different sort of crack tearing through the city. It was a three-dimensional rip in the fabric of reality—one that emitted a bright, golden light. He'd found their exit.
"There," he said, nodding towards the rift.
Tidus followed Auron's eyes and squinted at the light. "Are you serious?" But Auron didn't reply; he took off for the rift. "Hey!" Not wasting a second, Tidus followed while the crimson wraith continued to hover in the sky charging its energy for the final blast.
When they reached the crack in reality, Auron stepped to the side and eyed Tidus. "Go," he instructed.
Tidus cocked his head to the side to examine it, squinting his eyes to try and peer through the blinding glow. "Is it safe?" In place of a reply, he received a rough shove to the back that sent him stumbling into the rift.
"What have you done?" The wraith erupted in fury, its whole body exploding into flames like a Mi'ihen Bomb. It raised its clawed hand up high, conjuring up a fireball ten times larger than the last and launching it straight at Auron.
Once again grasping his katana like a bat, Auron eyed the ball as it hurtled towards him, and then in one fluid motion, struck it straight back at its pitcher before dashing off into the rift himself.
Tidus fell through an endless, pitch-black void until he came to a sudden stop. Suspended in nothingness, he found he could walk as if his feet touched solid ground. He looked around for any signs of movement or life, but could see nothing beyond the ethereal, golden light emanating from his body.
He started to walk in a random direction, hoping to at least find an exit. But a sudden voice stopped him.
"Look sharp; there isn't much time," said Auron as he appeared behind Tidus, his body also glowing with a golden aura.
"Well that's a nice way to greet someone!" Tidus huffed. "How about some answers for a change? What's going on and where are we?"
"This is the last connection between the dream world and Spira, now that Sin is no more," said a new voice.
Tidus jumped when the transparent and glowing frame of the young Fayth appeared before him. He was kneeling, clutching at his chest while struggling to keep his head raised. The amount of pyreflies floating around his body was greater than Tidus remembered, signifying the Fayth's struggle to stay whole.
"You really never give up, do you?" Tidus tried to reach for his sword, but realized it had been lost during his trip through the rift.
"Relax," said Auron. "He is the true Fayth."
Tidus' eyes widened. "Hey, you're hurt!" He rushed over to the Fayth's side and knelt beside him. "What happened to you?"
"There isn't much time. The other Fayth and I have been forced from our rest. The Farplane's been corrupted by a dark magic that we're unfamiliar with, and it's taken everything we've had just to piece you back together again."
"Is this because Yuna performed the sending on Yu Yevon?"
"No." The Fayth's voice grew shaky and strained. "Someone…someone has disrupted the flow. I'm so very…weak…"
Tidus wanted to put his hands on the boy's shoulders—to support him somehow—but everything passed straight through the transparent spirit. "Tell me how I can help!" he said frantically. "Quick!"
It took a long time for the Fayth to respond. His form grew fainter and the pyreflies streaming around him increased in number. "The ultimate weapon is inside of you—you who share in our dream," he sputtered with what little remained of his strength.
The Fayth melted into the darkness, leaving Tidus confused and frustrated.
"What happened to him?"
"The Fayth is weak," said Auron. "He has used a great deal of energy in directing me to your location and then forging our escape."
"But why? Why did he and the others risk so much to bring me back?"
"You will see soon enough."
Tidus shot up to his feet and threw his hands up in the air. "Not again—not at a time like this! Why do you have to be so cryptic? Didn't you hear him? This is serious, Auron!"
"There is not enough time to explain. With the Fayth gone, there is nothing to anchor us here. We, too, will fade."
"Fade into where?"
"Where else?" Auron's body turned transparent.
"Wait, you can't go! I still don't know what's going on!"
"We will meet again, soon. Until then, find Yuna and guard her."
"Yuna? What does she have to do with this?"
But Auron didn't answer. Like the Fayth before him, his frame lost its glow and the darkness swallowed him.
"Hey! Don't leave me hanging like this! Is Yuna in danger? And how come you're still alive? Hey!"
Tidus continued to shout into the infinite expanse of the void until he, too, began to fade. Yet right before he vanished, a familiar voice called for him in the distance.
"Dream of the Fayth, know this: there is nowhere you can hide from me! No matter your alias, no matter your weapons, no matter your allies—I will crush you and sentence you to a fate worse than death!"
Tidus scoffed. "Keep dreaming, buddy."
His light faded, and the blackness enveloped him like a blanket. Unlike when Sin had sucked him into its inter-dimensional gravitational vortex, Tidus felt his body calm and at peace, rather than struggling to maintain its equilibrium throughout Sin's erratic flight. A gentle sleep washed over him and he closed his eyes for what seemed like but a few minutes when a sudden splash forced him awake.
Flailing his arms and gasping for air, Tidus coughed up several spurts of fresh water before steadying himself. The trip through the void had sent him crashing into the middle of a deserted lake where the pale sun sat low on the horizon. Several mossy ruins jutted from all corners of the area where various birds fixed their nests. They chirped and they cackled, eyeing Tidus as he first gauged his surroundings and then swam for land.
"Doesn't anything ever change?" he wondered as he did the breaststroke to shore.
He was halfway there when a giant fish with blood-red eyes and sharp fangs jumped out of the water, flipped its tail in the sky, and dove back in with a hefty splash right behind Tidus. It circled around him underwater and tried to bite him, but the athlete put his skills to the test and kicked the fiend.
Diving under water, Tidus practiced his tackles on the flesh-hungry fish. He rammed himself into it and sent a couple more kicks flying straight into its eyes before torpedoing himself out of there. Tidus breached the surface just as two more fish joined the fray, and he swam even faster towards the nearest shore.
The fiends gained on him, jumping out of the water and crashing just behind him. The waves they created veered Tidus off course and pushed him towards an aging tower of rubble. He smacked into the tower with a grunt, and the force of impact shook several crumbled stones off its sides. That gave Tidus an idea.
He waited for the fiends to close in, watching as they raced towards him under the clear, blue water with fangs brandished. Then, balling his fists tight, Tidus started punching the unstable tower. His leather gloves gave him little protection as he pounded the rocks free and sent them hurtling down towards the oncoming group of fish. Large, cracked blocks of stone plummeted into the water, traumatizing Tidus' pursuers long enough for him to flee.
Heart racing and knuckles aching, Tidus finally touched land. But before he could take a moment to calm himself, he heard someone shout in a harsh, commanding voice. Then, a small, pineapple-textured device landed at his feet. Smoke exploded from both its ends, and when it cleared, Tidus found himself staring down the barrels of four rifles.