I could feel my body being healed and whished them to stop. I recognized Suki’s chakra and Kai’s…Raiju’s too. What are your problem guys? I wondered. Can’t you just let me sleep? I felt all the wounds heal instantly, but there was still a pain in my body. It was my own heart. It wanted desperately to live. It was annoying.

“What is there to live for?” I asked myself inside the comfort of my own head.

The answer came easy enough, Kai. If it was so easy then why did I still feel the need to die? Kai was old enough to take care of himself. Plus he had Maki and Suki to take care of him. My mind continued to try to find something else that I was needed for….What was my purpose?

Then it hit me. My purpose was simple. It had always been there. It was never about being a piece in the game. It was never meant to be something deep and profound. My purpose was to enjoy the game. Not to be a piece. I was the one moving the pieces. And the purpose was to enjoy the game. Everything seemed to come into focus then. I had given up the part of me that moved the pieces. And I wanted it back. I wanted control of my own life back. It was what I truly wanted.

Death had never been far off, but in the seconds I had pounded on Death’s door, I understood what I wanted out of life. What irony…I felt myself come alive for the first time in what felt like forever. I breathed in the air that made my lungs sing with happiness.

“Kai,” I whispered realizing that I still had little to no chakra, “I’m sorry Kai.”