takingaim | And Then He Falls [for regalblaze]

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ten years later

And Then He Falls [for regalblaze]

Of everything that have ever been asked of him, of everything that the last thirty some odd years of his life has demanded of him, nothing has ever been harder than requiring him to stand there and watch his best friend start the long walk up those stairs into the Citadel, knowing that Noctis is going to his death. It's a thousand times harder than having to turn around and look to the massive Giants coming out of the ground, knowing all too well that they might be dying here in giving Noctis enough time to save the damn world. Whatever world might come out of this. What will it matter when Noctis is dead? Maybe this is just a final stand, enough time to live to see the dawn. Somehow, he's both the most afraid and the most determined he's ever been, leaving him in some horrible emotional flux that might almost come across as calm if it wasn't for the tears streaking down his cheeks.

But he holds his gun at the ready, looking solidly forward.

"Last one to kill their giant buys the first round," he calls out, a half-hearted joke as the ground finishes ripping open and the giants stand there.

"Deal," Gladio replies, bringing the massive great sword around in front of him, his eyes more determined than Prompto had ever seen him, but only the faint light shining gave away the tears.

Prompto looks over at Ignis, steeling himself, prepared to do everything to help protect Ignis and without a doubt that Gladio would do the same. He feared for Ignis, really for both of his friends, because with Noctis gone... he is, was, their lives. His, too.

Maybe it's just the death of all of them, no matter what outcome befalls them.

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[ooc: don't worry at all! and good luck with the move!]

Ignis' head is tilted forward, thinking about the Prophecy he heard before. It indeed sounded like Noct was the strongest person if you could believe that thing. "Or he was the only one able to use the power of the Crystal without it destroying him." He remembers king Regis and how his health deteriorated as the ring and the power of the crystal he was getting slowly sapped his life out.

"It's alright," and Ignis really means it. Now that initial bolt of sadness is gone, what remains is anger. And he's angry too. One wrong word from an outsider and they might regret witnessing the dawn. "It does feel as if Noct was left to pick up the pieces behind and fix things he wasn't responsible for." Yet... it was his duty that he embraced during ten years within the Crystal. And Prompto, Gladio, and Ignis need to accept it.

No matter how unfair it is.

[ooc: Thanks! I'd say hopefully things will calm down with the move, but we have unpacking, new stuff to get, THREE LARPs coming up between the two of us... it gonna be a crazy May/June. But fun!]

It's something that Prompto would like to think he's accepted during the ten long years without Noctis. They all knew the truth, in the end, what would need to happen. If pressed, Prompto couldn't even have told when he realized what the truth was, but he would have bet that unconsciously, he knew even before they had lost him to the Crystal. It feels like everything, sometimes, comes down to that Crystal.

"...to the hells with the Crystal," Prompto whispers, but in the silence of the empty Citadel, it's loud enough to hear clearly. "It took Noctis away." At his side, there's a quiet creak of leather as his fist tightens up unconsciously. "It decided to take him away for ten years and left the world to rot for it. It let the Scourage get worse. It let people die. It- It took him, for whatever reason it decided it couldn't just do it on its own." Even his jaw begins to hurt as he clenches it.

It's the kind of rare anger few have ever truly seen. In the years between then and now, Cindy had, once or twice, on nights when Prompto couldn't take it any more. Nights when she had gone for the secret stash of liquor and they made themselves forget, just for a little while.

Ignis can't blame Prompto for the anger he's feeling. Ever since he found out in Altissia what kind of an end is waiting for their King, he felt as if his hands were tied. And, when he couldn't dissuade Noct from his intention of carrying on with the task, the lock has been put where the chains were on his hands. There was nothing they could do or say to change Noct's mind.

And when it came down to the Crystal- it was both their savior and doom. No, it wasn't enough. And Noct wasn't enough either. It took generations of Lucis Caelum to banish the darkness. If the Prophecy is right.

"The Ancestors that doomed the World- Noct tried to give us what little peace he could. We must cherish it and never lose the sight of what was given to us." He's trying, desperately, not to give into the anger he's feeling himself. Because he's sure that's something Noct wouldn't want them to do.

Prompto's known Noctis, even if from afar at times, most of his life. There's three words he would have used to describe Noctis before any others - determined, lazy, and stubborn. Not that the lazy part would have been meant as an insult, because once Noctis' mind is set on something pretty much nothing will stop him, not even himself, but if he didn't have to do something, or he could find an easier way... he was the first to do so.

"I don't intend to," Prompto's says fiercely, the change in his voice suggesting he's staring right at Ignis for suggesting he might otherwise. "It doesn't mean this isn't all- all-" he finds himself surprisingly unable to curse in front of Ignis, even after all of these years apart from him and learning to do so with the hunters that came through.

Then there's a metallic thud - Prompto kicking the elevator wall as it glides silently down into the bowels of the Citadel. He says nothing more until the doors open, only then stepping out and being ready to give Ignis a guiding hand.

"Good," Ignis nods, feeling the annoyed gaze at him. "Because I will need you to help me keep it that way for everyone else as well, as I mentioned earlier." They were the only ones that know the truth behind all of this. The sound of the boot kicking the metal perfectly describes Ignis' frustration as well. Everything that he has to push down and keep bottled up because, aside from Gladio and Prompto, no one would be able to understand.

"Thank you," he says softly as Prompto helps him out of the elevator and into the damp, musty smelling corridor. It was more than obvious that no one came down here in years. Ignis' sense of smell could pick up the stuffy scent of mold, water dripping somewhere and general dampness from being underground.

If his memory serves him right, the room should be to the right and down the hall. Big, black marble door, engraved with gold, like everything else. The room itself should resemble tombs of the Ancestors they visited. Only this time... it would be Noct lying on the table, sword in his hand.

"Gladio is there?" Ignis doesn't hear him move.

For such a big man, when Gladio wanted to, he could move surprisingly quietly. However, right now, Prompto doesn't see him, not until they continue down the way enough with Prompto's every anxious nerve on end because this is dark, someplace every instinct honed after ten years in the dark says a daemon should exist. When he turns to the massive, open doors, he can see Gladio there, his back to them, looking down at Noctis' body laid carefully upon the stone table like a sacrifice upon the altar.

Exactly what he had been, Prompto thinks bitterly.

Their footsteps drag Gladio out of wherever his mind had taken him, and only Prompto would be able to see the faint wetness on his cheeks glinting, the crimson around the edges of them. He wonders if he can ever remember Gladio properly crying in all of the years they've known each other and isn't sure he can place a time, but it isn't like the big guy to show emotions readily. They briefly share an exchange of looks - one that promises Gladio that he won't spill a word of what he's seeing.

"Gladio's here," he says roughly after a moment, looking anywhere but the body of his best friend. It does look like all of those tombs, and like he had thought up there in the resting room, completely wrong for Noctis. Completely right for his dark, angry mood, but this is everything Noctis never would have wanted, other than maybe a dark place to sleep.

"...Yeah, Gladio's here." There's nearly no sign of what Gladio had been doing in his voice except for maybe the slightest rough catch, but that could be contributed to the rain, the fight for their lives, the exhaustion. "So, we got a plan yet?" It's joking, but there's nothing joking about it, and he can't even give up the damns to care that he's failed in it. Ignis has always been the man with the plan, and Gladio's been fine in letting it be just that.

Stepping into the tomb room send a chill down Ignis' back. He hated this place. He hated it before when he was still in training and learning the Citadel and its rooms and he especially hates it now because it has become a home to one person that shouldn't be dead. The images of how the room looks like flash through Ignis' mind and he has to force himself to will them away.

He can sense Gladio's presence now that he's inside and gives him a short nod. Walking around him after giving him a pat on the shoulder, Ignis moves to stand next to Noctis' upper body. Maybe losing his eyesight was a blessing after all.

The plan, huh?

"There is..." Ignis starts slowly, his hand coming to grip on the edge of the marble table, "...only one task left for us to do." His head tilts toward Gladio- the Shield knows what he's talking about. There is no way they can avoid talking about this no matter how painful it is.
"Prompto and I think that hill overlooking Galdin Quay would be suitable. Your suggestion, Gladio?"

Ignis isn't alone in hating this place; Gladio definitely has for all of the similar reasons and Prompto is learning it with vengeance right off the bat, for the only time he has, possibly will ever, known it is with the shrouded figure laying cold on the marble ahead. He knows there will be nightmares of this place, of that body getting up and talking to him, what it must look like beneath the heavy material. It hurts, standing there and staring down at it, like a blade sliding into his heart and turning.

For Ignis' touch on Gladio, there is only a quiet grunt of response, but between friends who have known so much of one another over the years, it speaks volumes. It's a verbal pat in return, it's an acknowledgement, it's a gratitude that he's not down here alone getting angrier at himself and the Astrals.

Gladio has to think back so many years to those times in Galdin Quay, when the sunshine his skin hasn't known in years poured like honey across the water and sand, when the scent of salt and water and something delicious cooking brushed up against his nose, when laughter - theirs, others - could be heard mixing with the sound of gulls and waves. It had been an easier time, a happier time, a place where they teased Noct about fishing and pulled up the second biggest fish Gladio had ever seen, all while cheering and hooting. It's a place that makes him think of the past and of better times, infinitely better than the dark, horrid place it's become in the last remaining years.

"Yeah." There's a bitterness in the back of his throat at how difficult that single word is to get out. "That sounds like the perfect place."

Ignis doesn't have to have eyesight to see just how oppressive this place is. The weight it holds just standing in the room makes it very hard to breathe. Ignis doesn't dare to even imagine how his King looks on the marble stone in front of him, for the only image in his mind is that of a young prince, smiling at him because he just put maybe a bit too much of chili pepper in Gladio's noodles.

That's how he wants to remember him. Not on the cold stone.

Ignis gives Gladio a nod. It really is a perfect place for their King, the bringer of light. Noct seemed to like Gladin Quay a lot if their trips to the small port and vacation place were any indication. The sun, fishing spot, that damn cat that ended up following him all the way to Caem.

"We should look into people that can help us build it," Ignis says quietly. They will have to make a trip to Lestallum to, hopefully, find architects who can do it. Despite the fact that neither of them wants to step away from this place and the guarding duty.

Gladio is thinking right along the same lines as Ignis. "Then that means going back to Lestallum." But his eyes travel back to the figure still upon the stone. They couldn't just leave-

"...Go, and I'll stay here with him." There's a rough catch in Prompto's voice from hours of fighting, screaming, the screams that want to make their way out of his throat right now, but his gaze is firm as he looks over to the others. Ten years has changed everything and yet nothing and yet everything. "We don't have a lot of time."

And it has nothing to do with the condition of the body - Prompto doesn't even know that the magics of the tomb (do they still work, given everything that's happened, the last of the line gone) would mke sure of that - but everything to do with the fact that change is coming. To Insomina, to Lestallum, to the world. They don't have a huge opening before those builders they'll need will be involved in everything else everyone else will need, not just a dead man only a small handful know saved the world.

Ignis nods, dearly hoping that they can find someone to help them. But when Prompto says that he wants to stay here is what makes Ignis a bit worried. He doesn't want to sound as if he's coddling him, but he's seriously terrified what staying here would do Prompto's mental health. Staying in this tomb... even without his eyesight, the oppression, the rage this place wakes in Ignis cannot be good for Prompto at all.

And he hopes that Gladio will support him on this as well.

"I would stay if I didn't have to go as a Hand to the King. I'd like you to come with me, Prompto." He will be angry, Ignis can feel it, but he is seriously concerned for him.

"Driving is still impossible for me and I dare say Gladio is worse than you when it comes down to it." Ignis will dig out any and all excuses he can think of just to bring him along. They all need time to grieve but Prompto- he will never come to terms with this if he stays at the tomb, hoping something will change.

[ooc: Just as an FYI, I'll be gone Wed-Sunday at a LARP, so I'll be MIA until then! ^_^]

Ignis can't see what Gladio can, the changes in Prompto's face as Ignis speaks. At first, there's a certain kind of anger, set in the pinch of his brows and the narrowing of his eyes, something he's not used to seeing in Prompto and enough to startle him, but it doesn't last long. It turns into something that might be surprise, he's not entirely certain, before melting into a tight-lipped understanding.

Gladio has been friends with Ignis for far, far too long to not pick up on the fact Ignis is trying to get their softer-hearted friend out of this place, and even if it means he needs to stay behind as guard, he will. "Oi, Gladio is standing right here," in a half-joke at the crack at his driving. "...go ahead with him, Prompto. Besides, I know the Citadel. I can try to get some things together here."

"It'll be more than a day," Prompto finally says into the silence that follows, waiting for his own decision. "We can't leave Gladio alone here for that long."

He doesn't need to say that he doesn't mean Gladio as much as Noctis, but Gladio's added into that as well. None of them deserve to remain silent in this-

I should be proud of him.

It's the thought Gladio has after what comes next, because Prompto has his gun out faster than he can even turn, aimed and ready, when a familiar voice speaks up.

"I'll stay with Gladio."

Cor.

[ooc: Hope you had fun!]

Ignis expected firmer, louder opposition to his suggestion, and was surprised when none of it came. Maybe Gladio gave Prompto a look, signaled something, but Ignis was relieved that Prompto was at least considering coming with him. And Gladio did have a point- he did grew up here and knew the Citadel as well as Ignis did. It could be arranged to become a temporary refuge center for people returning to the City- but they need to handle their King before allowing something like that.

Arrvial of Cor stopped Ignis from trying to persuade Prompto. He shouldn't be surprised that the older man is here. His support will be very helpful.

"Marshal," Ignis nods. "Thank you for coming."

[ooc: Home from the LARP! Exhausted but it was GREAT fun!]

From the sound of it, Prompto sure is surprised that Cor is here. Ignis can't see the relief in Prompto's eyes when he realizes who he's looking at, or the slight sag of Gladio's shoulders that had been unconsciously up near his ears in tension, but Cor misses neither. He misses little, even if there is now a touch of grey in his hair. Iris wouldn't let him, for a moment, miss anything.

"No need. ...I would have been here sooner, if I could." The distance had been too far to close in the time they had given him to respond, something that sits bitterly in his stomach as he looks on yet another King he has outlived, another he was supposed to protect, but none of it shows in his face. "I'll watch over him."

Yet his tone... it's subtle, but what seems like an offer is in reality a question - do you trust me to watch over him? Not in a doubt of skill but he hadn't been here. When he was needed for this final fight. They have the right to deny him that or even send him in their place.

Ignis knew that it was only matter of time when Cor would join them and it really does put his mind at ease. The thought of leaving Gladio by himself- Ignis didn't like it, but it would've been worse to leave Prompto. And now with Cor here, the shield won't be alone.

"Thank you, Marshal," Ignis nods to where he can hear Cor's voice coming from. And Ignis too doesn't like being alive while his King is dead. Someone he was supposed to die for. But he swore to always respect Noctis' wishes and decisions- they come before anything else.

"We will come back as soon as we can," Ignis reassures. "We will also send some people this way to bring you food. Prompto? Shall we?" He's sure that his friend wants to go and come back as soon as they can.

"Before we leave," Ignis pauses as it just hits me, "Marshal, do you know where we can find transportation to Lestallum?" Talcott is all the way in Hammerhead and he's not sure if anything works around Crown City.

There's a thoughtful sound from the Marshal as he thinks it over, then, cautiously, "can either of you drive a cycle?" Figuring if Ignis is capable, he can instruct Prompto.

"I can manage." Prompto sounds surprisingly certain, and he is. Years in the darkness means without something like the Regalia, he's had to make due with what Cindy could help him keep going.

Cor nods, knowing that would be enough. "Then take my ride; it's out front. I'll remain here with Gladio until you're return."

Prompto looks over to Gladio, their eyes meeting, before Gladio nods. "Go. We'll keep watch here." Besides, he had some catching up to do with the Marshal.

A motorcycle- that sounds like a proper plan and a way to send them off to Lestallum. If it is just two of them traveling, it will also be the fastest way as well.

"Thank you, Marshal, Gladio," Ignis thanks Cor once again and gives Gladio a nod of farewell. They will see each other again soon enough. Ignis makes his way to the door and heads toward the elevator as if wanting to run away from the oppressing temporary tomb for his King. He's counting on Prompto to follow after him.

He will leave the driving to Prompto. What bothers Ignis now is where to find an architect. Supplies. Transportation. Talcott and the rest... they need to break news to them. Iris will be broken like them. It is not something she should hear over the phone though. Stopping in front of the elevator and waiting for it to arrive, Ignis tilts his head towards Prompto.

"...Apologies. I know that you wanted to stay..."

But... Ignis couldn't let him be all by himself there.

And indeed, Prompto does follow. He is silent, until the moment Ignis speaks to him, but even then it's just a quiet, "don't." No, he didn't want to stay, but he knows that right now, there's a limited amount of time to do what they need to do before things get even more crazy. He doesn't want to leave, either, because they're leaving behind Noctis. It doesn't matter that he's dead... for the last ten years, he's been gone and yet not.

Some part of Prompto wants to hold onto that, the belief that Noctis is just a small brush of reality away. It sustains him better than the broken pieces of his heart fallen on the floor of his soul.

He steps into the elevator when it opens, waits for Ignis to enter, pushes the button, then leads his head against the cool metal. His whole body hurts, right down to the core, and it has nothing to do with bruises or blood-dried wounds from their last fight. "...to Hammerhead, first?"

The things aren't going to go much crazier than they already did. Or, at least Ignis truly hopes so. He just wants to bury his King in peace and in alight place- he deserves so much more than that, but it's the only thing they can give him. And Ignis will be damned if he doesn't make sure it happens.

He remains quiet when Prompto asks him to, not really having anything else to say on the topic. Prompto already knows what Ignis thinks. The movement of the elevator is barely registered in Ignis' brain and all he wants to do is slump against the wall for a while. And rest.

But there will be time for that.

"Yes. We should... inform the others of what happened," Ignis nods. "Perhaps they will be able to lend us more comfortable ride than a motorcycle." Not that he has anything against the bike, and he's really thankful to Marshal but, without his eyesight, Ignis doesn't feel confident on it.

"Never been good at driving a car," Prompto mutters, almost a joke, but the heart is missing from it. It feels like the heart is missing from his chest, so maybe everything's just matching it, now.

When the elevator gets to the bottom, Prompto steps out and hesitates, having to remember back, before cautiously stepping in the right direction to be able to leave. There's a part of him screaming to go back, that after so short of a time how can they be leaving Noct?!, but they're not. Noct left them, taken from them, and he's never coming back this time. All that hope that had kept him afloat for ten years hadn't popped yet and it would be so much worse when it did.

Out front, he... stops. The brilliant sunlight cascades over the broken city, over the buildings that stood in various stages between untouched and completely shattered, over empty window panes and touched items long left behind by the fleeing and the dead. This... this is what Noctis died for--

No. There's no one here, except them. This isn't what Noct died for. He died for the people, scattered to the four winds.

Or them. Just them. Prompto isn't certain what had been in Noct's heart at the end except for the photo he had taken with him.

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And Then He Falls [for regalblaze]

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