Disclaimer: Final Fantasy X, Spira, blitzball, and all related characters and locations are owned by Squaresoft, with the exception of a few original characters who will be noted as such. This is a work of fanfiction, meaning that it is both created by a fan for no purpose other than entertainment, and it is fiction, meaning that all characters and events are purely fictonal and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
If you're sharp, you might have noticed that I changed the part titles; I think Overdrive modes worked significantly better than Overdrive names from FFX.
Author's Note: The narrator of this story is Al Bhed, and some dialogue and idiomatic phrases have not been translated into English. Translations of all Al Bhed phrases can be found at the end of the chapter in which they appear.
Green Eyes in Overdrive
by flame mage
round 8: Sufferer
**********
Those shiny red brick paths are like the walk from the locker room to the blitz sphere--even a short distance feels like a hundred miles. In Bevelle, though, it's not the anticipation that makes it seem like that; it's the dread.
The gun in my back was starting to get old, but the guard-person looked like he would probably be pretty good at firing point-blank into my spinal cord, so I didn't waste my breath complaining. No one else said anything either, so we had this eerie silence hanging around us like a fog, and all around us were the regular noises of the city. Once I tried to see Naaga over my shoulder, but right away I heard the meaningful click as the guard tapped his finger on the trigger and I kept walking. With every step I kept thinking, this guy has a kid. They probably all have kids. These are just regular guys, and if this one shoots me he's gonna go home and eat his wife's pot roast and tuck his daughter into bed. Somehow it just didn't seem right.
It was easier to think about what was going to happen next to him than to me. I kept thinking about that until I could almost smell the pot roast all the way to the temple.
I couldn't say for sure where we went. I remember going into the temple and the fact that the fear kicked in right as those huge shining doors shut behind us and I knew there was no way out. After that, the only things left in my mind are darkness and walking and apprehension like you wouldn't believe.
There was a long, long staircase down, just like there had been a long, long staircase up on the outside. Then there was a maze of hallways like tunnels that must have stretched on for a mile. The only sound was the clicking of our feet on the floor. My back ached where the gun was pressed into it.
Finally, after what seemed like forever, the guards finally stopped and I could make out the silhouette of a huge pair of doors. "Through here lies judgement," one of them intoned. I nearly choked trying to hide my laughter until I realized he wasn't kidding. He seriously wanted us to go in there, and he wasn't going in with us.
He let go of my wrists and backed away. Like machina dolls, the other guards did the same thing. And one by one, Miyu, Bickson, and Naaga stepped forward, rubbing their wrists, and just stared at that huge door.
I started to size up our chances of making a successful break for it, but they were pretty damn slim. All five of the guards were armed to the teeth, and Geezer was still standing there smugly, looking like he could run pretty fast for help if he had to. But there was something strange about them. For some reason, they all seemed...afraid.
"Move! Your fate awaits you!" the head guard-person yelled, gesticulating wildly with the barrel of his rifle. I decided not to ask any questions. Whatever it was, we were going to meet it one way or the other.
*****
Inside, it was even darker than it had been in the hallway, but right away I got the impression that there was a high ceiling. Our footsteps were echoing. The floor sounded hard, like stone or something. Every time one of my heels clicked on it I felt another stab of fear. Pang. Pang.
There was grime caked on my goggles. I could have taken them off and cleaned them, but I got the impression that the room was almost pitch dark, and I reasoned that bad vision was infinitely better than no vision. Still, I was in a bad mood already, and stumbling around like a mole didn't help matters in the slightest. "Dammit," I muttered to whoever was next to me, possibly Bickson, "what gives here? Isn't this supposed to be the biggest temple in Spira? Can they not afford incandescent lighting or something?"
And like magic--or a lightswitch, if you're like me and don't happen to come from a completely backwards and religiously maniacal society--the lights came on.
Actually, just one. Waaaaay above our heads. I blinked and craned my neck upward toward the light at the top of the room and immediately figured out that "room" really wasn't the best word. "Cavern" was. Or anything that implied a really freakin' big space with a high balcony hanging almost overhead. What we were seeing was basically a spotlight. It was focused on the dead center of the balcony, on an old man in long robes.
By this time, I'd had about enough for one day of really old men in stupid clothing, but at least I recognized this one. "Hey, Miyu!" I whispered, poking her in the side. "This is that Mika guy that made all those boring-ass speeches at the tournament, right?"
"Grand Maester Mika," she corrected me in a whisper, sounding awe-struck. Slowly, she removed her mask and bowed until I thought her body would break in half from bending so far. "The leader of all Yevon!" she hissed to me as she came back up.
"Oh. Okay then. Great," I muttered unenthusiastically. I planted my hands on my hips and didn't bow. I'd expected Naaga to do the same thing behind me, but when I looked at Bickson, he was standing up at full height with his head high. He was not bowing even to his own Maester.
"Welcome. Welcome to the High Court of Yevon," Mika's tinny little voice said. It probably passed for a yell for him, but even the echo effect didn't strike fear into my heart. He just didn't look all that awe-inspiring, even when you had to stare up at him. I noticed he didn't bother bowing either--to any of us. "Are you prepared for your sentence?" he asked.
"Our sentence?" Bickson repeated. "For what?"
Mika harrumphed, like that should be obvious and he was irritated that we were wasting his time like this when he could be watching blitz or taking his medication. "For your crimes."
Bickson sighed. "Yes, I think we all comprehended that part. What crimes?"
"Treason against Yevon." We musta looked pretty blank, because he added, "There are those things which should not be known. Which should not be *made* known. Were you not given ample warning that your actions would not be tolerated?"
"But...is this not the High Court of Yevon?" Miyu asked. "Will we not receive a fair trial before the Maesters?"
The old man laughed. "No."
"Why?"
"There are three reasons. First, because you are a Crusader. You are one of the fallen. You and your brethren were, if you will recall, *excommunicated* from the holy sight of Yevon. Second, because you are content to consort with the Al Bhed. In doing so, you have shunned Yevon once again, and therefore you will receive no mercy from a court which serves Yevon." Oh, great, pin it all on the green-eyes. Third..." he spread his arms out wide. "...this is all that is left of the High Court of Yevon, and all that is left of the Maesters. Justice will be done."
"Waiddaminute. I don't think you're getting this, old man," I interrupted. "The only things I wanna know are where my players are and why someone's trying to kill Bickson. If you got some reason why that stuff's a crime, hey, dish."
"Impudent child!" He was obviously trying to thunder, but it just wasn't working for him. "When I disbanded the Spirals years ago, I thought it was clear that they were to be forgotten!"
"It's true, ain't it?" It hit me. "That's why you disbanded the team, because you wanted to cover it up. That stuff about the Spiral of Death Reppi said--it's all true. It has nothing to do with anybody's crimes. Sin's never gonna go away, and there's nothing you or the summoners or anyone else can do about it."
He was laughing, a high, cold sound. "You speak the truth, Al Bhed. Sin dies and is reborn. One summoner buys us a few years, but in the grand span of time, the Spiral of Death is endless. Yevon has never been anything more than a device to give the people hope and allow the power to remain absolute and where it should.
"Reppi was aware of that. She challenged Yevon, challenged us, and for that she paid with her life. As," he smiled, "will you."
"So is it true that you set us up too?" Naaga asked. There was a kind of childish desperation in her voice, and I realized she was stalling for time. I wasn't sure if she got all the stuff about sentences and disbanding, but she knew a bad thing when she heard it. "The sphere and all?"
"Yes. When you fled Luca, it became obvious that you would not succumb to inelegant techniques in the vein of petty murder and kidnapping. It became necessary to lure you in. It became necessary to show you the truth." He sounded like some kind of small bird. Why did all the Yevonite geezers these days have such girly voices? "Feel that triumph, pitiful wretches, of being the only ones who will ever know that truth," he snarled. "It dies with you."
"You would kill us?" Miyu asked. Even in the half-light I could tell she was shaking--hard. I got the feeling she was doing the same thing as Naaga, just wasting time, trying to delay the inevitable. "Your Grace...we can help you if you spare us. We can be of service to you."
"How?" If anyone else had said it, like Seymour, it would've sounded smug, like something said by a cat that has a mouse caught between its paws and wants to toy for it for a while before dinnertime. This cat didn't have a smug bone in his body, however, so it had the same high-pitched monotonous whining sound as everything else he'd ever said.
"We have seen things! We know things!" the Crusader cried. "We are useful to you because we have seen the faces of Spira and of Yevon from the surface, and therefore we may know things you do not. For example, did you know that many of your priests use machina technology?"
"Yes, of course." He laughed, like it was funny.
Miyu paled. "But...the teachings! The teachings say that machina are--"
"The teachings are worthless, child," he cut in smoothly. His voice dripped sarcasm. "Even your dirty green-eyed friends here could have told you that. You, in fact, should have known it; as a Crusader, you yourself abandoned the sacred tenet of holy Yevon that dictates that such machina is unclean and should never be touched. The teachings are designed to keep the masses quiet, to let them think that there is hope for redemption. Yevon is a pure, beautiful myth."
"But that can't be true," Miyu protested. "Yevon is a tradition that stretches back one thousand years! All the teachings...all the temples...you...what was it all for, your Grace? What have we spent our lives believing in?!"
"Nothing," was the cold reply.
In that moment, I watched Miyu's face crumble. It seemed like everything she'd sacrificed, everything she and the man she'd loved and all the hundreds of thousands of others over the ages had believed in and fought for and died for, had all shattered into dust at her feet.
Bickson was totally calm.
I wondered what was going through his head and tried to come up with an analogy that would give me some idea. What would happen to me if someone told me Home had been built by the Maesters, or that Al Bhed really were the cause of Sin and the Yevonites were right after all? What would it be like to finally learn the truth? But as hard as I tried, I couldn't understand it, and I was watching Miyu crumple, and after a while I couldn't stand it anymore. "Enough of this crap already!" I burst out. "What's our sentence, old man?!"
The wrinkled lips parted again in a tired smile. "The Via Purifico."
Miyu's eyes widened and she sank to her knees like she'd been transfixed. "Oh, dear and holy Yevon," she whispered. "No, your Grace, please, no..."
"What's up with her?" I hissed at Bickson. "Why's she freaking out?"
For the first time, Bickson had the same expression on his face. "The Via Purifico. It's like a prison." He was talking in short, clipped thoughts, like he was chipping his words out of a block of ice. "I've heard the stories...they say it's hell, Linna. Infested with fiends. We'll be unarmed. There'll be no food. We'll die there, slowly. No one's ever made it out alive."
"Then how do they know what it's like?" Naaga asked, tugging on his glove.
"Shut up," he muttered, beating me to the punch.
"That means you don't know."
"Hey, look, punk, it's a legend! I don't know where it comes from, okay, but it's true!"
"Ahm...excuse me, your Grace," a timid voice said from the doorway. It was a woman in long green robes, bowing like Miyu had. "The Lady Summoner Yuna is here to see you."
"ENOUGH!" Mika bellowed tinnily. "You waste my time! Guards! Seize them!"
Immediately, the doors flew open and the guards rushed back in. There were more of them this time, and within seconds we were completely surrounded. A heavy pair of gauntleted hands wrapped themselves around my waist. I flailed wildly, trying to get a hit in, but the guards were all so heavily armored that even bashing them with my Golden Arm only succeeded in bruising my knuckles.
Miyu was hanging limply in one of the guards' arms, like she couldn't--or no longer wanted to--fight anymore. Her eyes were hanging half-open. Another guard grabbed her legs and the two of them began carting her off.
"Linnie!" Naaga wailed. "Linnie, please, help me!" She was being dragged, and as I watched, one of the guards picked her up and slung her over his shoulder like a rag doll. Her fists beat helplessly against his back. "Linnie!"
"Naaga!" I screamed, thrashing desperately to get free. The arms around my body only tightened. I twisted my torso around and clawed at the guard's face, but the armored helmet prevented me from doing even the little damage my glove and Golden Arm would have cut into his face.
"Linnehmmmm!" Naaga's voice was muffled suddenly as a glove clapped hard over her mouth. She cried out in pain and my muscles almost spasmed at the sound. "Rnnneeehm!" she was still crying as they carried her away. "Ssssydddjmmmsmmmm!" Cyja sa. Save me.
But I couldn't save her.
Next to me, I heard a grunt of exertion as Bickson slammed a foot with all his might into the chest of one of the guards. He was being pressed in a hammerlock from behind, but he was still kicking like he was treading water in Baaj. I caught a glimpse of one wild blue eye as I strained to face him; his face had the look of a wild animal that knew it was about to die.
I couldn't say why. It was trite and stupid and like something out of one of Naaga's lame romance spheres. Maybe I had that same feeling like a beast that sensed its own impending death. But for some reason, nothing in the world seemed more important in that split second than touching Bickson's hand.
I'd spent more than ten years playing blitzball. Thousands of hours spent in that sphere. Countless passes, countless shots, countless tackles. In all that time, I'd never pushed my muscles as far to the limit as I did straining to reach him. In the same instant, we both quit fighting to survive and started fighting for one last tiny contact.
His fingers must have been less than an inch from mine when they dragged him away.
"Bickson!" I heard my voice screaming. "Bickson! E muja oui! E fyhdat du damm oui...Bick...hu!" But he was already gone.
I remember the pain and the red-hot pressure behind my eyes as tears sloshed inside the rim of my goggles. I remember the sound of beastial screams that must have been mine, although I wasn't making them of my own free will. I remember lashing out at anything I could reach, losing control of my limbs and my mind, fighting with everything I had left in me.
After that, I remember nothing.
**********
Translations:
"Cyja sa." - "Save me."
"E muja oui! E fyhdat du damm oui...Bick...hu!" - "I love you! I wanted to tell you...Bick...no!"
If you're sharp, you might have noticed that I changed the part titles; I think Overdrive modes worked significantly better than Overdrive names from FFX.
Author's Note: The narrator of this story is Al Bhed, and some dialogue and idiomatic phrases have not been translated into English. Translations of all Al Bhed phrases can be found at the end of the chapter in which they appear.
Green Eyes in Overdrive
by flame mage
round 8: Sufferer
**********
Those shiny red brick paths are like the walk from the locker room to the blitz sphere--even a short distance feels like a hundred miles. In Bevelle, though, it's not the anticipation that makes it seem like that; it's the dread.
The gun in my back was starting to get old, but the guard-person looked like he would probably be pretty good at firing point-blank into my spinal cord, so I didn't waste my breath complaining. No one else said anything either, so we had this eerie silence hanging around us like a fog, and all around us were the regular noises of the city. Once I tried to see Naaga over my shoulder, but right away I heard the meaningful click as the guard tapped his finger on the trigger and I kept walking. With every step I kept thinking, this guy has a kid. They probably all have kids. These are just regular guys, and if this one shoots me he's gonna go home and eat his wife's pot roast and tuck his daughter into bed. Somehow it just didn't seem right.
It was easier to think about what was going to happen next to him than to me. I kept thinking about that until I could almost smell the pot roast all the way to the temple.
I couldn't say for sure where we went. I remember going into the temple and the fact that the fear kicked in right as those huge shining doors shut behind us and I knew there was no way out. After that, the only things left in my mind are darkness and walking and apprehension like you wouldn't believe.
There was a long, long staircase down, just like there had been a long, long staircase up on the outside. Then there was a maze of hallways like tunnels that must have stretched on for a mile. The only sound was the clicking of our feet on the floor. My back ached where the gun was pressed into it.
Finally, after what seemed like forever, the guards finally stopped and I could make out the silhouette of a huge pair of doors. "Through here lies judgement," one of them intoned. I nearly choked trying to hide my laughter until I realized he wasn't kidding. He seriously wanted us to go in there, and he wasn't going in with us.
He let go of my wrists and backed away. Like machina dolls, the other guards did the same thing. And one by one, Miyu, Bickson, and Naaga stepped forward, rubbing their wrists, and just stared at that huge door.
I started to size up our chances of making a successful break for it, but they were pretty damn slim. All five of the guards were armed to the teeth, and Geezer was still standing there smugly, looking like he could run pretty fast for help if he had to. But there was something strange about them. For some reason, they all seemed...afraid.
"Move! Your fate awaits you!" the head guard-person yelled, gesticulating wildly with the barrel of his rifle. I decided not to ask any questions. Whatever it was, we were going to meet it one way or the other.
*****
Inside, it was even darker than it had been in the hallway, but right away I got the impression that there was a high ceiling. Our footsteps were echoing. The floor sounded hard, like stone or something. Every time one of my heels clicked on it I felt another stab of fear. Pang. Pang.
There was grime caked on my goggles. I could have taken them off and cleaned them, but I got the impression that the room was almost pitch dark, and I reasoned that bad vision was infinitely better than no vision. Still, I was in a bad mood already, and stumbling around like a mole didn't help matters in the slightest. "Dammit," I muttered to whoever was next to me, possibly Bickson, "what gives here? Isn't this supposed to be the biggest temple in Spira? Can they not afford incandescent lighting or something?"
And like magic--or a lightswitch, if you're like me and don't happen to come from a completely backwards and religiously maniacal society--the lights came on.
Actually, just one. Waaaaay above our heads. I blinked and craned my neck upward toward the light at the top of the room and immediately figured out that "room" really wasn't the best word. "Cavern" was. Or anything that implied a really freakin' big space with a high balcony hanging almost overhead. What we were seeing was basically a spotlight. It was focused on the dead center of the balcony, on an old man in long robes.
By this time, I'd had about enough for one day of really old men in stupid clothing, but at least I recognized this one. "Hey, Miyu!" I whispered, poking her in the side. "This is that Mika guy that made all those boring-ass speeches at the tournament, right?"
"Grand Maester Mika," she corrected me in a whisper, sounding awe-struck. Slowly, she removed her mask and bowed until I thought her body would break in half from bending so far. "The leader of all Yevon!" she hissed to me as she came back up.
"Oh. Okay then. Great," I muttered unenthusiastically. I planted my hands on my hips and didn't bow. I'd expected Naaga to do the same thing behind me, but when I looked at Bickson, he was standing up at full height with his head high. He was not bowing even to his own Maester.
"Welcome. Welcome to the High Court of Yevon," Mika's tinny little voice said. It probably passed for a yell for him, but even the echo effect didn't strike fear into my heart. He just didn't look all that awe-inspiring, even when you had to stare up at him. I noticed he didn't bother bowing either--to any of us. "Are you prepared for your sentence?" he asked.
"Our sentence?" Bickson repeated. "For what?"
Mika harrumphed, like that should be obvious and he was irritated that we were wasting his time like this when he could be watching blitz or taking his medication. "For your crimes."
Bickson sighed. "Yes, I think we all comprehended that part. What crimes?"
"Treason against Yevon." We musta looked pretty blank, because he added, "There are those things which should not be known. Which should not be *made* known. Were you not given ample warning that your actions would not be tolerated?"
"But...is this not the High Court of Yevon?" Miyu asked. "Will we not receive a fair trial before the Maesters?"
The old man laughed. "No."
"Why?"
"There are three reasons. First, because you are a Crusader. You are one of the fallen. You and your brethren were, if you will recall, *excommunicated* from the holy sight of Yevon. Second, because you are content to consort with the Al Bhed. In doing so, you have shunned Yevon once again, and therefore you will receive no mercy from a court which serves Yevon." Oh, great, pin it all on the green-eyes. Third..." he spread his arms out wide. "...this is all that is left of the High Court of Yevon, and all that is left of the Maesters. Justice will be done."
"Waiddaminute. I don't think you're getting this, old man," I interrupted. "The only things I wanna know are where my players are and why someone's trying to kill Bickson. If you got some reason why that stuff's a crime, hey, dish."
"Impudent child!" He was obviously trying to thunder, but it just wasn't working for him. "When I disbanded the Spirals years ago, I thought it was clear that they were to be forgotten!"
"It's true, ain't it?" It hit me. "That's why you disbanded the team, because you wanted to cover it up. That stuff about the Spiral of Death Reppi said--it's all true. It has nothing to do with anybody's crimes. Sin's never gonna go away, and there's nothing you or the summoners or anyone else can do about it."
He was laughing, a high, cold sound. "You speak the truth, Al Bhed. Sin dies and is reborn. One summoner buys us a few years, but in the grand span of time, the Spiral of Death is endless. Yevon has never been anything more than a device to give the people hope and allow the power to remain absolute and where it should.
"Reppi was aware of that. She challenged Yevon, challenged us, and for that she paid with her life. As," he smiled, "will you."
"So is it true that you set us up too?" Naaga asked. There was a kind of childish desperation in her voice, and I realized she was stalling for time. I wasn't sure if she got all the stuff about sentences and disbanding, but she knew a bad thing when she heard it. "The sphere and all?"
"Yes. When you fled Luca, it became obvious that you would not succumb to inelegant techniques in the vein of petty murder and kidnapping. It became necessary to lure you in. It became necessary to show you the truth." He sounded like some kind of small bird. Why did all the Yevonite geezers these days have such girly voices? "Feel that triumph, pitiful wretches, of being the only ones who will ever know that truth," he snarled. "It dies with you."
"You would kill us?" Miyu asked. Even in the half-light I could tell she was shaking--hard. I got the feeling she was doing the same thing as Naaga, just wasting time, trying to delay the inevitable. "Your Grace...we can help you if you spare us. We can be of service to you."
"How?" If anyone else had said it, like Seymour, it would've sounded smug, like something said by a cat that has a mouse caught between its paws and wants to toy for it for a while before dinnertime. This cat didn't have a smug bone in his body, however, so it had the same high-pitched monotonous whining sound as everything else he'd ever said.
"We have seen things! We know things!" the Crusader cried. "We are useful to you because we have seen the faces of Spira and of Yevon from the surface, and therefore we may know things you do not. For example, did you know that many of your priests use machina technology?"
"Yes, of course." He laughed, like it was funny.
Miyu paled. "But...the teachings! The teachings say that machina are--"
"The teachings are worthless, child," he cut in smoothly. His voice dripped sarcasm. "Even your dirty green-eyed friends here could have told you that. You, in fact, should have known it; as a Crusader, you yourself abandoned the sacred tenet of holy Yevon that dictates that such machina is unclean and should never be touched. The teachings are designed to keep the masses quiet, to let them think that there is hope for redemption. Yevon is a pure, beautiful myth."
"But that can't be true," Miyu protested. "Yevon is a tradition that stretches back one thousand years! All the teachings...all the temples...you...what was it all for, your Grace? What have we spent our lives believing in?!"
"Nothing," was the cold reply.
In that moment, I watched Miyu's face crumble. It seemed like everything she'd sacrificed, everything she and the man she'd loved and all the hundreds of thousands of others over the ages had believed in and fought for and died for, had all shattered into dust at her feet.
Bickson was totally calm.
I wondered what was going through his head and tried to come up with an analogy that would give me some idea. What would happen to me if someone told me Home had been built by the Maesters, or that Al Bhed really were the cause of Sin and the Yevonites were right after all? What would it be like to finally learn the truth? But as hard as I tried, I couldn't understand it, and I was watching Miyu crumple, and after a while I couldn't stand it anymore. "Enough of this crap already!" I burst out. "What's our sentence, old man?!"
The wrinkled lips parted again in a tired smile. "The Via Purifico."
Miyu's eyes widened and she sank to her knees like she'd been transfixed. "Oh, dear and holy Yevon," she whispered. "No, your Grace, please, no..."
"What's up with her?" I hissed at Bickson. "Why's she freaking out?"
For the first time, Bickson had the same expression on his face. "The Via Purifico. It's like a prison." He was talking in short, clipped thoughts, like he was chipping his words out of a block of ice. "I've heard the stories...they say it's hell, Linna. Infested with fiends. We'll be unarmed. There'll be no food. We'll die there, slowly. No one's ever made it out alive."
"Then how do they know what it's like?" Naaga asked, tugging on his glove.
"Shut up," he muttered, beating me to the punch.
"That means you don't know."
"Hey, look, punk, it's a legend! I don't know where it comes from, okay, but it's true!"
"Ahm...excuse me, your Grace," a timid voice said from the doorway. It was a woman in long green robes, bowing like Miyu had. "The Lady Summoner Yuna is here to see you."
"ENOUGH!" Mika bellowed tinnily. "You waste my time! Guards! Seize them!"
Immediately, the doors flew open and the guards rushed back in. There were more of them this time, and within seconds we were completely surrounded. A heavy pair of gauntleted hands wrapped themselves around my waist. I flailed wildly, trying to get a hit in, but the guards were all so heavily armored that even bashing them with my Golden Arm only succeeded in bruising my knuckles.
Miyu was hanging limply in one of the guards' arms, like she couldn't--or no longer wanted to--fight anymore. Her eyes were hanging half-open. Another guard grabbed her legs and the two of them began carting her off.
"Linnie!" Naaga wailed. "Linnie, please, help me!" She was being dragged, and as I watched, one of the guards picked her up and slung her over his shoulder like a rag doll. Her fists beat helplessly against his back. "Linnie!"
"Naaga!" I screamed, thrashing desperately to get free. The arms around my body only tightened. I twisted my torso around and clawed at the guard's face, but the armored helmet prevented me from doing even the little damage my glove and Golden Arm would have cut into his face.
"Linnehmmmm!" Naaga's voice was muffled suddenly as a glove clapped hard over her mouth. She cried out in pain and my muscles almost spasmed at the sound. "Rnnneeehm!" she was still crying as they carried her away. "Ssssydddjmmmsmmmm!" Cyja sa. Save me.
But I couldn't save her.
Next to me, I heard a grunt of exertion as Bickson slammed a foot with all his might into the chest of one of the guards. He was being pressed in a hammerlock from behind, but he was still kicking like he was treading water in Baaj. I caught a glimpse of one wild blue eye as I strained to face him; his face had the look of a wild animal that knew it was about to die.
I couldn't say why. It was trite and stupid and like something out of one of Naaga's lame romance spheres. Maybe I had that same feeling like a beast that sensed its own impending death. But for some reason, nothing in the world seemed more important in that split second than touching Bickson's hand.
I'd spent more than ten years playing blitzball. Thousands of hours spent in that sphere. Countless passes, countless shots, countless tackles. In all that time, I'd never pushed my muscles as far to the limit as I did straining to reach him. In the same instant, we both quit fighting to survive and started fighting for one last tiny contact.
His fingers must have been less than an inch from mine when they dragged him away.
"Bickson!" I heard my voice screaming. "Bickson! E muja oui! E fyhdat du damm oui...Bick...hu!" But he was already gone.
I remember the pain and the red-hot pressure behind my eyes as tears sloshed inside the rim of my goggles. I remember the sound of beastial screams that must have been mine, although I wasn't making them of my own free will. I remember lashing out at anything I could reach, losing control of my limbs and my mind, fighting with everything I had left in me.
After that, I remember nothing.
**********
Translations:
"Cyja sa." - "Save me."
"E muja oui! E fyhdat du damm oui...Bick...hu!" - "I love you! I wanted to tell you...Bick...no!"