[no one gets (air)left behind]

[founderinglight]

[The police have taken your Mastermind, and the spaceport is yours, it seems, for the time being, without any further interruptions.

Except...

Why is there another ship parked at the door? (The door, it should be noted, furthest from the police cruiser.)

There's one more person who intends to put on an appearance today, it seems.

-> Investigate?]

[[Welcome to the Airleft Bonus Continuity CMO and catchall post! For those who aren't familiar, the TLDR of Airleft is "Airlocked, but a bit to the left." The short version is that this one time, at Space Mall, Church and Ardyn ran into someone very familiar... Running basically the shittier version of Armigod. Wanna meet space dad's actual bro? Now's your chance.]]

Comments

[motherfucking_ghost]

...We definitely have to go back to Eos just so we can go fistfight Bahamut. [they can bring Akira, he's used to shooting god in the face]

Why the fuck. do you have. thirty-six. ritual. executions. Is this a fucked up death-worshipping Lucian thing. What the fuck.

[burninglight]

Gilgamesh didn't-?

[...didn't betray him. Didn't abandon him. Leaving was the only defiance against the gods he could have done--had they cursed him for it, too? So the pair of them would live eternal, yet ever separated by one side's spite?]

...I don't remember, Leonard. But I suppose...the desire for vengeance is a quality we share.

[He held fast to Church as his only lifeline, gold eyes narrowing and scanning Izunia carefully. Every inch, every microscopically small expression and movement...even if he didn't remember, Ardyn was sure he would know if the other half of his soul was lying.]

He lied to you. He lied to all of us. What you killed...was the last human fragment of your brother. All your efforts did was let hatred and fury take over whatever as still human, and saw all sanity withered away on the Fulgurian's miserable prison.

But why? Why take my name, why not just tell them the truth?

[founderinglight]

Six gods times six, we did a lot of things in thirty-six in the era when people remembered the gods as more than legends.

[Face in his hands again. Ardyn's close examination will reveal only a man in deep pain.]

I told you. You were the one who should have been king. Even in my madness, I was lucid enough to realize that the name of the Founder King would be remembered forevermore. I wanted that name to be yours.

[motherfucking_ghost]

...Nothing can make up for what you did. What any of you did. Not after all this time.

[burninglight]

[The hand that took Church's was shaking, gripping tightly as if he desperately needed the strength to say what came out next.]

I won't forgive you. I can't, even if I wanted to. ...But I don't think you're lying, either.

What I was...what I turned into...needed to be killed. But it wasn't you who had that power.

[founderinglight]

I couldn't lie to you if I wanted to.

[It would go against the grain of his soul in a way that would make him splinter even further.]

...I didn't think anything of it, when I put the Ring on that first time and started that long chain of kings. I didn't consider - where it would end, beyond putting an end to the nightmare you were.

Not until Aurora.

[Not until he was a father himself did he understand what he was dooming not only himself, but all his line and especially Regis to watch, when Noctis brought the dawn.]

She was the first thing I cared about, after you.

[motherfucking_ghost]

[He's gripping that hand back just as hard. They ground each other, when nothing else feels real.]

Least you cared about something, good fucking job.

[burninglight]

...easy, Leonard. I want to hear what he has to say.

Was that her name? Your...daughter? [It was hard--impossible--to keep the bitterness out of his voice. Knowing Izunia had lived his brother's life in however many generations had been spent locked away and forgotten on a miserable island.]

I don't know every single monarch of Lucis by name, I'm afraid. I rather missed a few after you.

[founderinglight]

My daughter. The Daring.

[He finally smiles faintly, leaning back instead of forward into his hands.]

You know, Yuuri is so much like her that I'd think her yours by blood if I didn't know better? Just much shorter - Aurora got our height. Six feet if she broke an inch.

[And not yellow-eyed, obviously.]

That was when I... "woke up" doesn't seem quite right. But when I realized what I had been doing. Before Aurora I was just.. going through the motions, doing what I could to keep the kingdom together.

Of course, by then, I'd already sunk years into the deception, and if it came out, then it'd be a single, much less fussy execution for me, in all likelihood. And I couldn't - couldn't leave the weight of the Ring to an infant girl. So I just kept going.

You know the general path of history from there.

[motherfucking_ghost]

Couldn't leave it to your queen or whoever, either, huh? Nah, that would've been too easy.

[burninglight]

...doesn't work like that. She wasn't of the bloodline, it would never have worked for her.

[Ardyn sighed, pressing his free hand to his eyes.]

So...what? Am I supposed to thank you for living my life while you abandoned me?

[founderinglight]

Have I said anything of the sort, Ardyn?

[A matching sigh, an unconsciously mirrored gesture.]

The ball's in your court, as they say.

[motherfucking_ghost]

[A tug on Ardyn's hand.] Let's get out of here. We don't need to be here.

...The fuck are you wearing, anyway? [Yes he's just now noticed.]

[burninglight]

...from the look of it, a handmade Lucian royal raiment.

[founderinglight]

I'm fortunate enough to not have needed your measurements.

[It's said a little too flatly and sadly to be a joke.]

[motherfucking_ghost]

The fuck is a raiment, it looks like a half-cape.

[burninglight]

You're both idiots.

[founderinglight]

Idiots who love you in our own fucking idiotic, maladaptive ways.

[motherfucking_ghost]

Your face is maladaptive.

[burninglight]

Children, behave, I am in no mood for this right now.

[founderinglight]

I'm not a child, Ardyn, I'm only five minutes younger than you.

[Two thousand years old a child he is not. Talk to your eight year old.]

Regardless, it's your question, Ardyn. In my heart, I want the same thing I always have.

...There is one more thing.

[motherfucking_ghost]

There's always one more thing.

[burninglight]

No kidding.

What is it, Izunia?

[founderinglight]

Do you remember the theory I posited to you in the Denny's as to how I'm here at all?

[He's understand if not, it was an offhand comment at three in the morning.]

When you died, I... got a very good indication that my assessment was correct. I lost physical form and the only reason I didn't disappear entirely was by drawing from Noctis' latent connection to the Ring, and even that was strained almost to nothing by the time you were, I assume, uploaded to the simulation. I'm hardly eager to test it the other way, but the most likely scenario is that I'm only a part of this world as long as you are.

[motherfucking_ghost]

[He stares at Izunia. Then looks at Ardyn.]

Was that English? Did that make sense to you?