Maybe it was because Kuja was nearing his death, but last time I checked, I wasn't able to run sideways on a wall. Or a whole lot of those other crazy stunts I pulled while I was trying to reach him. It would have been really, really awesome if it wasn't for the fact that I was gonna die. Or at least get my tail smashed. Or something. It was bizarrely invigorating, facing death out of shear… ah, stupidity, as some would have put it. It feels different than when you're doing it to save the world or something.

Now that I think about it, it probably took only about three minutes for me to reach Kuja – maybe less. But damn, it sure didn't feel like it. It was either eternity or a split second – and I don't really know which. Jumping, ducking, climbing, dodging – I didn't really think about my actions, I just acted. Well… except for that one part where I got cocky and was standing on the moving roots (backwards) and used it like a moving sidewalk to get to Kuja… and I almost got killed… but whatever.

My memory of talking to Kuja is kind of… fuzzy, some how. I can barely remember what we said… I remember… pain. The emotional kind – and… Wait… I can remember… some of it… I had just reached the center, and something made me jump, and I fell… and all of a sudden, it was like time stopped, because right in front of my was lying Kuja – dying in a bizarrely peaceful moss-covered notch in the tree. Our eyes met. Then… time started back up. Damn, it hurt. It was a really long fall – I didn't think about it then, but most people – not even me – should be able to just get up with barely so much as an "ow". Yeah…

"U… Ugh…"

"…?"

"Phew… Still alive…"

"I guess that was pretty crazy."

We talked for a while, after I climbed back up to him. We… I… barely had a chance to say anything. The last thing he said to me…

"After you guys beat me, I had nothing left… nothing more to lose."

"Then I realized what it means to live…"

"I guess I was too late."

Then he died. Great note to end on, huh? Yeah… so I'm a little bitter here… but can you blame me…? Ugh. I'm not sure why I even feel guilty, I mean… Oh forget it. Shut up Zidane, you can angst about it later, okay? Okay. Good. Moving on now… I won't deny it. When he died, I freaked out. It was like being a little kid, who had picked up this beautiful glass statue in a store… and then dropped it, right in front of the storeowner, and having it shatter into a million tiny fragments… utterly unrepairable. And I just could not get over the thought – Was this my fault?

"Hey! Don't you go dying on me, alright?"

I knew it was stupid… I knew he was dead. I couldn't feel him anymore. But then, when I heard that horrific crashing sound… and I saw the branches coming towards us- me – I leaped over him, and covered him body with my own.

Then... everything went black.

When I first opened my eyes, I wasn't aware of it really. It was kind of like… you know how it is, when you wake up really abruptly, at like 4 in the morning, for no apparent reason? And you aren't really aware, though you're awake? It was kind of like that. I hung there limply, a broken doll hanging from ancient wood. Most of the roots and branches were gone now – broken off, and fallen below – shattered like stone on the ground, having slid out of me… but leaving no holes. I blinked suddenly, and looked around me without moving my head, some awareness leaking back into me. It was… gray, and dark. The Iifa tree was, without a doubt, completely dead. It even smelled dead – an eerie, awful smell that reminded me of the Mist. A shiver ran through me… and I tried to move. …Which turned out not to be such a great idea. A horrific wave of pain so intense that I screamed out loud, screamed and thrashed and kicked, rose up in my like a tidal wave, consuming my mind completely. The pain got worse – horribly worse, and I looked down through a haze of agony and saw with no small amount of horror the branches that went clear through my body. They went through my chest, my legs, stomach, arms – there was even one through my neck…! I screamed again.

It was like a nightmare.

I couldn't comprehend how I was alive- how I was still living despite the fact that a large part of my body had been destroyed… I started coughing up blood, and my wounds started to bleed. I couldn't feel my heartbeat.

I didn't have one. There was a root that had gone straight through my heart, and had crushed it.

I felt something well up inside me, a screaming hot fear and rage that burst out of me in an explosion of red and pink light… There was a roar of sound that started out dull and soon became so loud that I could feel the very tree shake a little. There was a pause. Then I opened my eyes again – but now… Now I wasn't… quite the same. I felt… unattached, to reality. I was aware as I burned the branches that were in me, knew as the fire licked at my own skin and I ignored it…. Ignored the pain from the burning heat and the branches that made me almost faint in agony if I moved. It was like I wasn't there. It was like I was watching someone else, while floating outside my body. It was me, though. I guess the shock of waking up like that sort of… broke my mind temporarily…

Anyway… I'm pretty sure that the light was me going into Trance – I have a tendency to get a little… weird, mentally speaking, when I Trance. Plus, the color was familiar, though a lot more intense…

… The blood on the branches… looked as if it had dried months ago. Which it had.

I didn't think about it at the time, understandably.

Time started to blur for me. I was only vaguely aware when I burned the last root holding me in place, and I fell, collapsed onto the platform where I had talked to Kuja for the last time. Everything started to go dark… and vaguely, I wondered if I was dieing – after somehow living through all that, I was just gonna keel over from… Well. But then I saw the familiar pink flash, and then the light fading… and I mentally sighed in relief – all I was feeling was the Trance wearing off.

I lay there for a long time, in the exact same position I had landed in. There was so much pain… but it had turned into more of a dull throb now – I guess my body was going into shock…

I went into spasms, like having a seizure – I jerked randomly and my eyes rolled back in my head – I couldn't feel or think, and god, it hurt…

And then, suddenly, it was over.