Warmth
DISCLAIMER: Don't own FF:U, nope. Wish I did. Then I could bring all the people I liked back and make sure "After" got out to the U.S. But I don't. So don't get mad at me.
Part I
Downward Spiral
In a way, I had been dying ever since I had been brought back to life.
Never, not once, did I care about my own life during this short-lived incarnation. I could die and I would have no problem with it. Just toss another carcass on the pile that Chaos has been building up, sure, who cares if it's mine or not? Only thing was, if I was dead, I wouldn't be able to protect you.
You were the only connection I had with life, except for that brief time when Kiri was brought back by Chaos' necromancer. And you hated me. Because you were the only thing important to me, that diminished my own worth quite a bit. Your Magun was the only article of hope I had left, and when I learned that it was broken... the thin thread was cut. I gave myself up to despair. There was not even a slim chance of victory. I only continued to fight because there was nothing else for me to do. I could not give myself up to evil, or even surrender. It would mean betrayal, and that was something I could never do.
Emotions began to dull swiftly after that. I was safe with Chaos because I couldn't feel as well as many others. The protective urge, the occasional flare of anger, the low deep hatred, the sorrow for my dear brother's life... that was it.
All that time, I thought that it was just normal for someone who's lost everything they love.
And then.
One day, running my hand along the smooth walls of the Chaos castle, I realized that I could not feel its smooth surface, nor its coldness. I could not feel my own clothing against my skin. Rubbing the tip of my finger against the thin ribbed surface of one of my Mist bottles' caps, I realized I could not feel that either. To my numb hands, my swordsman's calluses and the soft skin at the base of my throat produced the same sensation. No sensation. Gripping the blade of the Maken and squeezing only brought a tiny stab of pain, not the agony I should have felt, had felt before.
My sense of touch, all that time, had been slowly failing me.
Not until that fatal blow did my eyes start to betray me.
It's gotten harder and harder and harder to focus my sight on any one person or thing, and impossible to see as clearly as I once had. If I don't strain my eyes everything is just a mix of blurred color and pervading darkness. I'm doing all I can just to keep my eyes on you...
This binding, the very last use I can make of my dwindling power, is what's going to kill me. Not blood loss. Not whatever's been draining away at me all this time. My soul chafes... rebels... Chaos is the antithesis of everything I am... I cannot survive this contact for much longer. I'm not strong enough to prevail. I will be the one to succumb to the crawling evil that even now is unraveling my very soul.
The pain is coursing through my/our form as I try to hold it back from attack. The pain. I thought I could no longer feel pain like thisprobably because it's damage to the soul/spirit/mind rather than hurt to the body...funny, really, it never actually hurt until now when I was wounded...
My thoughts scatter. Even now Chaos is reaching into my mind, starting with rage at the hastily cobbled plans I have concealed all this time, at the depth of my feelings for you... for Kiri... for you...
All I can do... to scream to you what you have to do...
But you already know...
So tired... hurt... just want... to sleep...
No...
From far off I can hear the firing of the Magun... I know you've done it, know that against all odds this world will be saved... your brilliance filters through my darkening vision as I lose my control...
and is the light above me as consciousness deserts me, leaving me spiralling down and down into the depths of Chaos
