lazybox | izunia lucis callout

[Prompto flinches at the word stab, like he has been. Stabbed, that is, by the word itself--or all its associated memories. Still, Ardyn's voice--Ardyn's supposed dream twin's voice hasn't gotten any louder, so he hasn't gotten any closer, and Prompto does, eventually, dare to lift his eyes again, darting and nervous.

Okay. Wait. What?]

...Whhhhy are you doing that?

[What is this nonsense dream at all supposed to be about, why is not!Ardyn (?) (he's still not convinced about the 'not!' part of that) changing his clothes in the middle of the street? Someone please help him. Luna, Pryna, Space Freud. Anybody.]

[Hey it's not like he's stripping or anything!

...Izunia possibly just has a little more experience manipulating his image of himself than Prompto does, and the dream is reflecting it by showing him as... Somewhere in the middle between himself and Ardyn, apparently. He finishes adjusting the scarf and looks at the sleeve of the coat before shrugging.]

It's something of a long story and wouldn't make you any less incredulous to tell it, so suffice it to say I figured I may as well be more comfortable.

[If he's not being Ardyn then he's going to wear his own clothes???]

[After a moment, Prompto finally feels safe enough to move, taking one half step away from the wall--though not towards Izunia, of course, just away--and wrapping his arms around himself so he can grip his elbows.]

You're. Really sticking to that twin thing? Is that what you mean by a long story?

[He still looks like he's ready to bolt at the slightest sudden movement, the smallest change in the air.]

[Izunia's eyes follow him - if Prompto looks close, they're a sort of hazel, not Ardyn's unnatural yellow - but that's the only part of him that really moves in Prompto's direction at all. He's instead opted to fuss with trying to straighten the cuffs of his shirt.]

Considering that it's true, of course I'm 'sticking with it.' That's not even the half of it, really.

[He does consider it. It's the kind of thing that's just crazy enough to be true; they say that's stranger than fiction, right? He stares down at his own chest, trying to figure any angle Ardyn would have to offer such a super weird lie, then surreptitiously pinches his own arm.

When that doesn't wake him up, he smacks both his cheeks simultaneously. Yup, okay, no dice.]

I finally lost it. I'm completely gaga bonkers.

[He covers his eyes and slumps back against the wall, but he's given up on a conversation that makes sense, at least.]

What's your name, then? If you're not Ardyn.

Izunia.

[Yeah that doesn't sound like something totally fucking made up at all. The look on his face says that he's completely aware of what Ardyn used as an alias and knows what it sounds like.]

...Lucis Caelum.

[Fuck it if he's gonna do this he's going to just. Do all of it.]

[Prompto just stops. And stares at him, spreading his fingers so he can look through them and truly absorb how absolutely ridiculous this is.

He closes his fingers up again. Make a sound like the air hissing out of an improperly popped balloon, small and pitiful. Then he just lets himself slide down the wall to sit on the ground, groans pathetically, and flops over, hands still pressed tightly over his face.

Prompto Argentum has reached capacity, he is Done.]

...

[Well. He's certainly. Expressive in his disbelief.

No wonder Noctis likes him. If Prompto was a woman, Izunia might be tempted to argue that he should be married into the line immediately, because it's gotten downright somber lately. That's what people would expect from 'Ardyn,' after all.

Instead he's just. Having to deal with a kid who clearly doesn't believe a word of it and this. This isn't even the truly ridiculous part, yet.]

I did say it wouldn't make you any less incredulous. Please sit up?

[He whines, literally whines like a child, rolls onto his back, and stretches his legs out so he can kick his heels moodily against the road.]

Why can't I ever get mysteriously spirited away to somewhere that makes sense? I wanna go back to Florida. Uggghhh.

[He rolls over one more time to put his back to 'Izunia,' just for a moment, but he does eventually acquiesce to sitting up and facing him like a big boy.]

Okay, I get it, everything everyone's been telling me is true, can I go back to, like, languishing in a swamp now? No offense, but I don't wanna hear about your brother's super tragic saintly past anymore, I get enough of it like every day from the other dead guys.

[... The hell is a Florida?]

I somehow doubt you've gotten the full story if you didn't know about the family resemblance, but... okay?

[He says it like he's never used theword before in his life. Being two thousand years old, it's possible he hasn't.]

Don't look at me, this is the first time I've said more than two sentences to someone who wasn't a relative in a very long time.

Right. Like, two thousand years, right? Nnnggghh.

[Maybe his face can just live in his hands for the next two thousand years.]

If Pryna really brought me here, I guess she's trying to tell me you're real. I don't think I could dream this up. I mean, I don't usually time travel in my dreams. Do you?

About that long, yes. And I haven't had a dream in nearly that long, so I can't say I really remember.

[At least now that Prompto has apparently accepted it, the conversation flows... Well it's still rather stilted, actually, but there's less 'please believe this I swear it's true.']

[Okay, yeah, not a dream. That's not the kind of dialogue his dreaming would give this guy. Prompto sighs loudly and then wraps his arms around himself, rocking slightly as he looks around.]

What is this place, anyway? Is it... really Insomnia?

[Because, while time-travel in his dreams would be pretty weird, mashing up the home he loves with the magitek he hates? That's something his brain would totally come up with to torment him, yeah.]

Of course it is. This is... Hmm, about three hundred years after the Founding, probably.

[He uses the lamp post to briefly boost himself up to get a better look.]

Maybe four hundred, but magitek was falling out of favor by then.

[Prompto shudders and huddles closer in on himself.]

Good.

[Izunia watches that reaction fire a minute, then finally shakes his head.]

The Insomnia I called home was a very different place from the one you know, I imagine.

The population density seems way lower than what I'm used to, yeah.

[...But, okay, maybe if he keeps talking he'll get distracted from how creepy this is, a whole city powered by magitek. His city. Noct's city.]

We've got a lot more buildings by my time. Taller ones. After a while I guess we mostly built up instead of out, 'cause of the Wall.

[Ardyn and Izunia's city, too. It's not hard to figure out who is responsible for magitek coming back after so many centuries, when you think of it like that.]

The whole world had a much smaller population then, not just Insomnia. The Astral War wasn't exactly good for population growth, and it was a long time before Eos recovered.

Your brother's not doing it any favors in my neck of the century, either. The population, I mean. Or Eos.

[Prompto curls up completely, forehead pressed to his knees.]

Think most of Niflheim's gone. Just for starters.

...I know. Most of Insomnia, too.

[His consciousness might have been limited to the ring, but Nyx Ulric gave him a very good idea what he would find, in the Insomnia of now.]

[That hurts, for some reason. Maybe because he never saw it himself, except from a distance on that hill. Maybe because it felt like he was never his time to grieve, what with Noct and Iggy and Gladio there, too, losing so much more than he'd ever had.]

...Guess my parents are probably dead. I mean. They never called or anything.

[Maybe it hurts because right now, hearing that voice say it with so much love, so much history, he thinks, maybe it was never mine to begin with, and pulls his legs in tighter.]

Though I guess they were never really my parents, either, so whatever. Maybe that's why they didn't.

...If blood was the only way to love someone, no one would ever get married.

[That may not seem directly relevant but he promises that it is.]

I'm sorry. For whichever reason it is.

No, I know that. It's just.

[Of course he knows that, because he loves Noct and Gladio and Iggy so much he could die. Would die. Wouldn't even think about it. But here, everything's upside down and backwards, and a guy with Ardyn Izunia's face is trying to tell him he's sorry for his parents' disappearance from his life.]

I don't know, I guess it's just that I'll never know how much they knew? Like, if they were trying to protect me, or they were ashamed, or if they just... got handed a random baby, here, he's yours, and got kept in the dark about me, too. And all of it's his fault, and I just...!

[He takes a loud, deep breath, then lets it out slowly.]

He didn't even try to apologize. He said he'd come get me and Luna and everybody, and--and I guess Noct's okay with him? But I don't know what to believe, like... if he actually even cares. Or what I'm supposed to do with that if, now, all of a sudden he does.

[It's hard to know what to say to that, especially when Izunia doesn't know which of his brother's many, many sins is responsible for this. He leans against the lamp post again with a sigh.]

I don't have any answers for you, there. I haven't been able to see what goes through my brother's mind in a very long time.

[He sighs and pulls - a pen? - from the Armiger, for something to twirl between his fingers as he thinks.]

Perhaps it's simply that some sins are too big for an apology to ever make it better. I don't know.

...That could be it. I guess.

[He goes quiet and closed-off again, but after a time, finally picks up his head.]

When you say you used to see what goes through your brother's head, do you mean that literally, or?

[ARE PSYCHIC TWINS REAL?]

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