Noct was oddly quiet on the boat ride to Altissia. Any attempt Prompto or Ignis made to glean information about his late night walk to the water was met with a sullen glare and the now familiar mantra of “I don’t know.” After an hour of this, Prompto gave up and proceeded to make friends with a group of fellow travelers on the port side of the boat. Ignis had to discreetly break up a game of poker before Prompto swindled them out of their life savings—the blonde had an uncanny ability for picking up social cues. It wasn’t cheating, exactly, but Ignis had learned long ago that sore losers didn’t care much for the fine details. He preferred to keep his friends alive, if at all possible.
Leaving Prompto with Umbra to sulk, Ignis made his way to their silent companion. Noct shrugged when Ignis indicated the seat next to him, but he didn’t look away from the water when Ignis sat down.
“Penny for them, Noct.”
Noct huffed and twisted his finger around a silver chain at his neck. Ignis could see the lump of whatever hung from it under his shirt, dragging at the fabric, and wondered—not for the first time—just what it was that the man felt he had to hide.
“What you said on the balcony.” Noct’s gaze fixed on the distant shore. “About it happening again.”
Ignis frowned. “I was in a panic, Noct,” he said.
“You called me Noctis.” The young man turned to him, and Ignis remembered the way the color of his eyes had seemed to change last night, when the tight fist of fear had closed over his heart. “You don’t really think I might be…”
You aren’t, Ignis thought. But I wish you were.
“You never know,” he said out loud. “Stranger things have happened.”
Noct smirked. “Sure have.” He lifted his hand and touched Ignis’ chin, a strangely intimate gesture that had the older man straining to keep his breath steady. “Iggy. I…”
No. Ignis stood, aware by Noct’s crestfallen expression that the look on his face must have been forbidding indeed. “I should check on Prompto,” he said.
“Yeah,” said Noct. “Of course.”
Ignis picked his way across the deck, and felt the young man’s gaze burning into him, opening him up to all the lies and pain and deception to whatever soft, shivering core lay beneath. Ignis looked up at Prompto sitting with his legs dangling over the side of the boat, and let the sight of his friend, the closest he had to a brother, ground him. The guard he kept over his heart clicked in place. His purpose was clear again. He couldn’t let himself be distracted by a young man with the eyes of a prince and a mouth like a sailor, not when there was Prompto to protect.
It was such a familiar argument that Ignis could almost convince himself.
“Luna!” Prompto shouted, skinny arms spread wide. “There’s the most beautiful pen-pal in the world!”
Lady Lunafreya, daughter of the Queen of Tenebrae and Oracle to the dead kings of Lucis, clapped her hands in delight as Prompto vaulted her garden fence. She was a well put-together young woman in a white and black pencil skirt with a flowing, semi-sheer top, and she looked so genuinely pleased to see them all that even Noct rose from his perpetual slouch. She laughed and wrapped her arms around Prompto’s shoulders.
“Don’t you flatter me,” she said, in the same lilting accent as Ignis’. “I’m a married woman, now.”
“What?” Prompto released her with exaggerated shock, and grabbed at her hands. “Who took you from me, Lu?”
Luna kissed him on the cheek. “Don’t act surprised. You’re the one who introduced us.” She looked up at Noct and Ignis, who were hanging back in the awkward way of all third wheels, and beckoned to them. “Come in, please. I just made coffee.”
“Coffee would be wonderful, thank you,” Ignis said, and pushed Noct ahead of him as they all filed through the door. Umbra kept trying to lunge between Noct’s legs, and he and Ignis spent a good minute trying to keep him from wriggling past them.
“My apologies,” Ignis said, when Luna saw them standing at the door. “Noct has a dog, and—“
“Oh!” Luna smiled at Noct warmly. “So do I. Does yours play well with others?”
“I think so, your, uh, Oracleness,” Noct said, and staggered back as Umbra barreled past him, paws scrabbling on the soft, plush carpet of Luna’s apartment. He tried to grab the dog by the collar, but Umbra danced out of his grasp, slid under a chair, and rocketed into Luna. The Oracle went tipping backwards onto the couch, and Prompto fell over an ottoman in his attempt to catch her.
Ignis made a choking sound.
“Oh, fuck,” Noct said, all of Ignis’ careful training forgotten. He ran to Umbra and knelt, holding his collar as the dog tried to lick at Luna’s shins. “Shit, I’m so sorry, he never does this…”
Luna was silent. Noct looked to Ignis and Prompto in a panic.
“Look, I’ll—I’ll walk him out. I’m sorry, I ruined this. I’m so sorry, Specs.”
“Noctis.” Luna laid a hand on the top of Noct’s head, and he stared up at her. “You are Noctis, aren’t you?”
Luna glanced down at Umbra, who was trying his best to rub half his fur onto her legs, and back to Noct.
“I believe,” she said, “that we should all have some coffee, first.”
In the end, it was Ignis who made the coffee. Luna’s hands kept shaking, and every time she looked at Noct, her face would go pale and she’d lose track of her words. She finally calmed down when they all sat in a loose circle, clutching a motley collection of mugs and cups.
Ignis had to admit that the Oracle’s apartment wasn’t as grand as he expected. It was small, but comfortable, and the décor was an unusual blend of soft pastels and what looked like retro diner signs. There was a toolbox next to one of the doors, and a yellow jumpsuit hanging up on a hook by the entrance to the garden, where Umbra was rolling about with a white, pointy-eared dog that could have been his twin. Luna kept glancing their way as she sipped her coffee, and finally let out a shaky breath and turned to the men in her living room.
“I have good news and bad news,” she said, at last. “The bad news first, dear Prompto. Clarus Amicitia has refused to see anyone claiming to be the prince. He was nearly fooled several times, and I fear he—He’s given up hope. His son, Gladiolus, is not so hardened, which may be a help, because I…” she turned her gaze to Noct, and held her mug in both hands to steady it. “He does look like the prince.”
“Noctis,” she said, and Noct looked up guiltily. He hadn’t taken a sip of his drink—Ignis suspected that he’d taken the coffee just to be polite. “Are you comfortable answering a few questions?”
“Sure,” he said, and glanced at Ignis’ disapproving glare. “I mean yes, thank you.”
Luna’s smile was bright, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Very well,” she said.
Noct answered all her questions well enough, even if he did stumble over some of the names. Luna was surprisingly gentle with him, quick to reach out and touch his knee, or his hand, as though she needed a reminder that he was there. That was a comforting thought—Ignis had worried that the debacle with the dog had ruined everything.
Except… it seemed as though it had almost done half the job of convincing Luna. That was unusual. Ignis watched the Oracle thoughtfully, trying to read her as Prompto would, watching for signs of distrust or disbelief. None came.
“One last question,” Luna said. “It may sound like a silly one, but bear with me. How did you know my dog’s name was Umbra?”
There was a stark silence in the Oracle’s living room.
“Pardon?” Ignis said.
“Your dog?” Prompto choked.
“That’s not… that can’t be possible,” Noct said. “I found Umbra when he was a puppy, maybe a year old. He didn’t have a collar—He was trapped in the bushes in the back of the orph—where I lived.”
“I know my messengers,” Luna said, with a finality that had all three men shift in their chairs. “Umbra. Pryna. Come here.”
Both dogs padded around the couch, sitting on either side of the Oracle with their tongues lolling. Umbra had grass stains on his fur, but Pryna looked immaculate and commanding.
“But the door’s closed,” Ignis said. “They were just outside, I was watching them.”
Luna nodded. “You know that an Oracle's messengers take many forms, Mr. Scientia. I sent Umbra to find the prince of Lucis eight years ago.”
Ignis’ face drained of all color. On the couch, Noct was running his finger under the chain at his neck, looking for all the world like he was in another place and time, unaware of the others around him.
“You know,” Noct said, in a quiet voice, “This is going to sound weird, but now that I think about it… I always wanted a dog. Dad… Dad wouldn’t let me keep pets, so my friend and I used to sneak out the window in the throne room…”
At his place by the fire, Ignis sloshed coffee over his hands.
“Why did I just—?” Noct whispered. He twisted the chain. “That’s strange. Why can’t I remember his name? I could swear he was there, when it happened. I told him I’d come back for him, but I never—“
Ignis rose with a clatter of china. Noct, Prompto, and Luna stared at him as he strode to the door, yanked it open, and stepped out into the warm air of an Altissian springtime.
“Might not be feeling so hot,” Prompto said. “I’ll get him.” He pattered after him.
“Noctis,” Luna said, in the careful, tentative way one would speak to a wild animal. “May I see what you have on that chain?”
“Oh,” Noct said. “I guess.” He pulled out the black ring from its hiding place and lifted it up. The small crystal inlaid in the band winked in the lamplight of Luna’s living room, casting spots on the walls, and Lady Lunafreya dropped her mug of coffee on the clean white floors.
“Dude,” Prompto said, grabbing Ignis by the shoulders. “Dude!”
“Let me go, Prompto,” Ignis said. He twisted out of his friend’s enthusiastic grip, but Prompto wasn’t having it. He lunged after the taller man and pulled him back by the suspenders. Ignis squawked at the indignity, but Prompto just grabbed him by the collar and hung on.
“Did you hear that?” he asked. “We never told him about you. So how’d he know?”
Ignis looked askance. “I don’t—It could be a coincidence.”
“A coincidence how? The guy has Luna’s dog, he remembers you, there was that shit at the Quay… Bro. I think we actually found him.”
“I know,” Ignis said. “That’s the problem.”
“Oh,” Prompto said. “This is you being clueless again, isn’t it?” He smacked Ignis on the shoulder. “Get with it, dude! You like him! He likes you! He’s the first guy in the whole fucking Citadel who remembers you, and he—“
“He’s the prince of Lucis,” Ignis snapped, and Prompto deflated at the fury in his voice. “The king of Lucis, I suppose. He has a destiny thousands of years in the making, and I would just be—I’d simply be a distraction.”
Prompto opened his mouth to protest, but Ignis pushed away from him, not minding the way one of his buttons popped loose under Prompto’s fingers.
“We’ll get him to Clarus,” he said, finally. “We’ll let him go. And then we’ll find our way to Tenebrae. Like we planned, Prompto.”
He squared his shoulders, took a steadying breath, and opened the door to Lunafreya’s apartments again. Prompto watched him go, and dug his hands in the worn pockets of his jeans.
There was a roar overhead as an MT transport carrier darkened the sky, passing over the sloped roofs of Altissia and towards the Imperial base at the edge of the water. Prompto scowled at it, watching its progress for a time, and then turned to follow his friend into the safety of the apartment.
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timeasmymeasure
FILL 7/? Re: Anastasia AU
Date: 2017-02-23 04:29 pm (UTC)Leaving Prompto with Umbra to sulk, Ignis made his way to their silent companion. Noct shrugged when Ignis indicated the seat next to him, but he didn’t look away from the water when Ignis sat down.
“Penny for them, Noct.”
Noct huffed and twisted his finger around a silver chain at his neck. Ignis could see the lump of whatever hung from it under his shirt, dragging at the fabric, and wondered—not for the first time—just what it was that the man felt he had to hide.
“What you said on the balcony.” Noct’s gaze fixed on the distant shore. “About it happening again.”
Ignis frowned. “I was in a panic, Noct,” he said.
“You called me Noctis.” The young man turned to him, and Ignis remembered the way the color of his eyes had seemed to change last night, when the tight fist of fear had closed over his heart. “You don’t really think I might be…”
You aren’t, Ignis thought. But I wish you were.
“You never know,” he said out loud. “Stranger things have happened.”
Noct smirked. “Sure have.” He lifted his hand and touched Ignis’ chin, a strangely intimate gesture that had the older man straining to keep his breath steady. “Iggy. I…”
No. Ignis stood, aware by Noct’s crestfallen expression that the look on his face must have been forbidding indeed. “I should check on Prompto,” he said.
“Yeah,” said Noct. “Of course.”
Ignis picked his way across the deck, and felt the young man’s gaze burning into him, opening him up to all the lies and pain and deception to whatever soft, shivering core lay beneath. Ignis looked up at Prompto sitting with his legs dangling over the side of the boat, and let the sight of his friend, the closest he had to a brother, ground him. The guard he kept over his heart clicked in place. His purpose was clear again. He couldn’t let himself be distracted by a young man with the eyes of a prince and a mouth like a sailor, not when there was Prompto to protect.
It was such a familiar argument that Ignis could almost convince himself.
“Luna!” Prompto shouted, skinny arms spread wide. “There’s the most beautiful pen-pal in the world!”
Lady Lunafreya, daughter of the Queen of Tenebrae and Oracle to the dead kings of Lucis, clapped her hands in delight as Prompto vaulted her garden fence. She was a well put-together young woman in a white and black pencil skirt with a flowing, semi-sheer top, and she looked so genuinely pleased to see them all that even Noct rose from his perpetual slouch. She laughed and wrapped her arms around Prompto’s shoulders.
“Don’t you flatter me,” she said, in the same lilting accent as Ignis’. “I’m a married woman, now.”
“What?” Prompto released her with exaggerated shock, and grabbed at her hands. “Who took you from me, Lu?”
Luna kissed him on the cheek. “Don’t act surprised. You’re the one who introduced us.” She looked up at Noct and Ignis, who were hanging back in the awkward way of all third wheels, and beckoned to them. “Come in, please. I just made coffee.”
“Coffee would be wonderful, thank you,” Ignis said, and pushed Noct ahead of him as they all filed through the door. Umbra kept trying to lunge between Noct’s legs, and he and Ignis spent a good minute trying to keep him from wriggling past them.
“My apologies,” Ignis said, when Luna saw them standing at the door. “Noct has a dog, and—“
“Oh!” Luna smiled at Noct warmly. “So do I. Does yours play well with others?”
“I think so, your, uh, Oracleness,” Noct said, and staggered back as Umbra barreled past him, paws scrabbling on the soft, plush carpet of Luna’s apartment. He tried to grab the dog by the collar, but Umbra danced out of his grasp, slid under a chair, and rocketed into Luna. The Oracle went tipping backwards onto the couch, and Prompto fell over an ottoman in his attempt to catch her.
Ignis made a choking sound.
“Oh, fuck,” Noct said, all of Ignis’ careful training forgotten. He ran to Umbra and knelt, holding his collar as the dog tried to lick at Luna’s shins. “Shit, I’m so sorry, he never does this…”
Luna was silent. Noct looked to Ignis and Prompto in a panic.
“Look, I’ll—I’ll walk him out. I’m sorry, I ruined this. I’m so sorry, Specs.”
“Noctis.” Luna laid a hand on the top of Noct’s head, and he stared up at her. “You are Noctis, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know,” Noct said. “I was hoping you’d tell me.”
Luna glanced down at Umbra, who was trying his best to rub half his fur onto her legs, and back to Noct.
“I believe,” she said, “that we should all have some coffee, first.”
In the end, it was Ignis who made the coffee. Luna’s hands kept shaking, and every time she looked at Noct, her face would go pale and she’d lose track of her words. She finally calmed down when they all sat in a loose circle, clutching a motley collection of mugs and cups.
Ignis had to admit that the Oracle’s apartment wasn’t as grand as he expected. It was small, but comfortable, and the décor was an unusual blend of soft pastels and what looked like retro diner signs. There was a toolbox next to one of the doors, and a yellow jumpsuit hanging up on a hook by the entrance to the garden, where Umbra was rolling about with a white, pointy-eared dog that could have been his twin. Luna kept glancing their way as she sipped her coffee, and finally let out a shaky breath and turned to the men in her living room.
“I have good news and bad news,” she said, at last. “The bad news first, dear Prompto. Clarus Amicitia has refused to see anyone claiming to be the prince. He was nearly fooled several times, and I fear he—He’s given up hope. His son, Gladiolus, is not so hardened, which may be a help, because I…” she turned her gaze to Noct, and held her mug in both hands to steady it. “He does look like the prince.”
“Noctis,” she said, and Noct looked up guiltily. He hadn’t taken a sip of his drink—Ignis suspected that he’d taken the coffee just to be polite. “Are you comfortable answering a few questions?”
“Sure,” he said, and glanced at Ignis’ disapproving glare. “I mean yes, thank you.”
Luna’s smile was bright, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Very well,” she said.
Noct answered all her questions well enough, even if he did stumble over some of the names. Luna was surprisingly gentle with him, quick to reach out and touch his knee, or his hand, as though she needed a reminder that he was there. That was a comforting thought—Ignis had worried that the debacle with the dog had ruined everything.
Except… it seemed as though it had almost done half the job of convincing Luna. That was unusual. Ignis watched the Oracle thoughtfully, trying to read her as Prompto would, watching for signs of distrust or disbelief. None came.
“One last question,” Luna said. “It may sound like a silly one, but bear with me. How did you know my dog’s name was Umbra?”
There was a stark silence in the Oracle’s living room.
“Pardon?” Ignis said.
“Your dog?” Prompto choked.
“That’s not… that can’t be possible,” Noct said. “I found Umbra when he was a puppy, maybe a year old. He didn’t have a collar—He was trapped in the bushes in the back of the orph—where I lived.”
“I know my messengers,” Luna said, with a finality that had all three men shift in their chairs. “Umbra. Pryna. Come here.”
Both dogs padded around the couch, sitting on either side of the Oracle with their tongues lolling. Umbra had grass stains on his fur, but Pryna looked immaculate and commanding.
“But the door’s closed,” Ignis said. “They were just outside, I was watching them.”
Luna nodded. “You know that an Oracle's messengers take many forms, Mr. Scientia. I sent Umbra to find the prince of Lucis eight years ago.”
Ignis’ face drained of all color. On the couch, Noct was running his finger under the chain at his neck, looking for all the world like he was in another place and time, unaware of the others around him.
“You know,” Noct said, in a quiet voice, “This is going to sound weird, but now that I think about it… I always wanted a dog. Dad… Dad wouldn’t let me keep pets, so my friend and I used to sneak out the window in the throne room…”
At his place by the fire, Ignis sloshed coffee over his hands.
“Why did I just—?” Noct whispered. He twisted the chain. “That’s strange. Why can’t I remember his name? I could swear he was there, when it happened. I told him I’d come back for him, but I never—“
Ignis rose with a clatter of china. Noct, Prompto, and Luna stared at him as he strode to the door, yanked it open, and stepped out into the warm air of an Altissian springtime.
“Might not be feeling so hot,” Prompto said. “I’ll get him.” He pattered after him.
“Noctis,” Luna said, in the careful, tentative way one would speak to a wild animal. “May I see what you have on that chain?”
“Oh,” Noct said. “I guess.” He pulled out the black ring from its hiding place and lifted it up. The small crystal inlaid in the band winked in the lamplight of Luna’s living room, casting spots on the walls, and Lady Lunafreya dropped her mug of coffee on the clean white floors.
“Dude,” Prompto said, grabbing Ignis by the shoulders. “Dude!”
“Let me go, Prompto,” Ignis said. He twisted out of his friend’s enthusiastic grip, but Prompto wasn’t having it. He lunged after the taller man and pulled him back by the suspenders. Ignis squawked at the indignity, but Prompto just grabbed him by the collar and hung on.
“Did you hear that?” he asked. “We never told him about you. So how’d he know?”
Ignis looked askance. “I don’t—It could be a coincidence.”
“A coincidence how? The guy has Luna’s dog, he remembers you, there was that shit at the Quay… Bro. I think we actually found him.”
“I know,” Ignis said. “That’s the problem.”
“Oh,” Prompto said. “This is you being clueless again, isn’t it?” He smacked Ignis on the shoulder. “Get with it, dude! You like him! He likes you! He’s the first guy in the whole fucking Citadel who remembers you, and he—“
“He’s the prince of Lucis,” Ignis snapped, and Prompto deflated at the fury in his voice. “The king of Lucis, I suppose. He has a destiny thousands of years in the making, and I would just be—I’d simply be a distraction.”
Prompto opened his mouth to protest, but Ignis pushed away from him, not minding the way one of his buttons popped loose under Prompto’s fingers.
“We’ll get him to Clarus,” he said, finally. “We’ll let him go. And then we’ll find our way to Tenebrae. Like we planned, Prompto.”
He squared his shoulders, took a steadying breath, and opened the door to Lunafreya’s apartments again. Prompto watched him go, and dug his hands in the worn pockets of his jeans.
There was a roar overhead as an MT transport carrier darkened the sky, passing over the sloped roofs of Altissia and towards the Imperial base at the edge of the water. Prompto scowled at it, watching its progress for a time, and then turned to follow his friend into the safety of the apartment.