lazybox | Get in time traveller

[Altissia. The ring, burning into his finger, burning into his skull, and he knows the price without asking, knows before it's paid. The thing you value most, isn't that always how this works in fairytales?

Ravus. Noctis. Ardyn, and that little revelation barely enters his mind at the time, the familiar glowing signature of a warp in an unfamiliar color. The prophecy, the visions that hang in his mind, a last wish from a woman who spent her life to ensure it, Lunafreya's final message to ensure that Noctis would survive.

The last clear words he can remember clearly, You've a calling to fulfill, and then Prompto and Gladio's voices, concerned, in a blur...

And then nothing. Just the feeling of a ring's power, setting him alight from fingertips to crown -

It's still in him, that power. The ring of the Lucii binds to its wearers for life, knotting strands of light into their souls, be they kings or anyone else.

(He had expected to die. Living is harder.)

And in the depths of his unconsciousness, in the place where he knows the things that he hasn't had time to consider, Noctis and Ardyn and prophecy and all of that terrible weight -

From there, from the connection of the fire in his soul that will never go out, that can only be smothered and locked away in the dark, a voice says, what would you give to change fate?

And, of course, he answers, Anything.

----

In another world, Ignis Scientia wakes in Altissia, his face scarred, his vision burned away, and continues on.

In this one, Prompto Argentum enters the room just in time to see a flare of purple flame lick along his friend's body and leave nothing behind, not even a char mark on the wrinkled sheets.

And Ignis?

Ignis wakes, with a groan and a hand pressed to his face, in the back of a cart that trundles to a stop to pick up another passenger, a young healer with cheeks not yet sunken by pain and eyes not yet yellowed by plague. He wakes bereft, on some fundamental level, of the touch of magic that bound him to Noctis, the hum of energy that bound retainer to prince...

He wakes with the imprint of a ring on his finger, the memory of agreeing, and not the damnedest idea where he is.]

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You...did anything change? Did any of it...matter at all?

...He remembered. It wasn't enough to convince him to turn from the path of destruction, but I haven't given up hope yet.

...it's my fault. When you disappeared, I just...I didn't know what else to do, Ignis. I had to go back to what I'd been doing, else this world and everyone in it would only suffer more.

Ardyn. I understand. It's okay. I still don't know what the right choice is.

It isn't. It's the furthest from 'okay' something can possibly be, and you damn well know that.

...In the time I just left, Niflheim was to the point of getting only a few short hours of weak daylight.

Could that happen in the here and now, were you to stop your work? I don't know, but I don't like the thought, either.

I-I don't know. I don't think there's any way to tell, I...I'm not sure.

Keep track of the daylight. If it begins to change unseasonably, you know now what that means.

[He leans in to kiss Ardyn again.]

I missed you. I find I can't say it enough. The you in the future is hardly the same, after all.

I missed you more than words can even express. Without you here I felt as if part of myself was simply gone with no chance of ever being recovered.

I know. I'm sorry. Without you... It was very much as though my very ability to restore myself was somehow disrupted. I couldn't bring myself to relax at all.

I'm the one that needs to apologize. I'm sorry you've only come back to find me having made an utter mess of things.

We're not out of time yet.

[That's something that is rapidly becoming his mantra, in some ways.]

Though I suppose we now know that it's impossible to know how long I'll remain this time...

Don't...say that. Even should it be true, it's more than I can bear to see you gone once again.

[Ardyn pressed closer, fingers curling in Ignis' shirt as if he could keep the tactician there so long as he held tightly enough.]

...I love you.

[Ignis smiles faintly, and leans into the embrace, gently pressing a kiss to Ardyn's forehead.]

If there is but one good thing about time travel, it is that I can say with absolute certainty that you will see me again.

Promise me. I...I'll wait for as long as I must, if I truly am condemned to inhumanity. So swear to me that you'll find me again.

There's no need to promise what I've already done.

[And this time it's a full kiss, though brief.]

...I love you, too.

[A shaky and hesitant smile slowly broke out across Ardyn's face as they broke apart, brightening slowly at the admission.]

I'm sorry I'm so much trouble.

You are worth every bit of it.

[...Look did you expect him to say that you aren't trouble, because, that would be lying, mr caelum.]

That might be the kindest thing anyone's ever said to me. Or if not that, then certainly the one that means more than anything else I've ever heard.

[Much has he appreciates the sentiment, that's a little sad, in some ways.]

Then I'll just have to keep making such meaningful moments for you.

...this one's already off to a nice start.

[He snuggled right up close to Ignis, trying to hide a slight wince when he moved what was apparently the wrong way.]

Good.

[He wraps an arm around that snuggle, perfectly content to just lay there for a time and let some of the tension out, but also...]

Repay it by not pushing yourself so hard.

I'll be fine. It's only a few scratches, that's all.

At least make the attempt to go to bed before the fever makes you collapse in the future.

[Nuzzle.]

[Ardyn was quiet at that, long enough that it might have been easy to assume he'd fallen asleep. But in fact he was lost in thought, pressed against Ignis as though he were the only thing grounding the would-be savior in reality.]

...what if I really did stop? It...the Astrals are sworn to protect this star, that was the whole reason the war began in the first place. Wouldn't it...wouldn't it force their hands? They'd have to do something to stop this, even if it meant making one of us Chosen however prematurely.

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warmgaze - 2018-05-27 03:51 (UTC) - Expand

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