Week 4

[airlockedmods]

[After everything that this case was, you probably don't want to deal with anything else. But you wake up on Sunday, just like before, with some new memories, and some new stores to check out.

Let's see what this week brings.]

Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday

(( Don't forget to check in, and check your memory regains! You can also stop by the gacha machine and Xander's office hours. ))

Comments

drunkbucks

[nightcure]

[ He remembers... well. Alexander dying, because he'd been too curious. That had stung. He remembers Diego and Albel, and so much more. It's not quite enough to get him drunk, but.

He lets out a light sigh before he fills up a large cup of water and sets it by Ardyn, then gets to making some tea. ]

Did I ever tell you how stupid that wing thing is?

[burninglight]

[Ardyn tilted his hat back with a light laugh; drunk enough to take the edge off the constant stress, but not enough to be completely out of it.]

There was a time or two I pretended not to notice Ravus behind me and hit him with it. 'Oh, High Commander, forgive me, you really should announce yourself just a bit louder.'

[nightcure]

[ Oh. Noctis tries to keep his face composed, because the thought of Ardyn whacking Ravus with that ridiculous wing is... hilarious, to say the least. ]

Wow. No wonder he was so pissed off all the time.

[burninglight]

Oh, no, he was just like that. Terrible sense of humor, though I suppose I'd be furious too if I lost an arm due to being an imbecile.

[A shrug.]

So, to what do I owe the pleasure today?

[nightcure]

[ He bites his tongue against anything he's tempted to say. It's not the time. What he does instead is take that bottle. ]

First, I'm cutting you off. Drink your water, Ardyn.

[burninglight]

My mother's been dead for millennia, and I'm a little old to be accepting substitutes.

[On the other hand, he's too tired for an argument, so he'll go along with this.]

[nightcure]

Yeah, well, I'm not in the mood for being your mom. I'm making some tea, by the way.

[ Little shit. Noctis sets the bottle beneath his chair. ]

Slept like shit, huh?

[burninglight]

Oh, I slept spectacularly after that, by standards of how well one can sleep after seeing one's own equivalent about to commit mass slaughter.

[nightcure]

[ He rolls his eyes. ]

So talk to me about it. Maybe it'd help.

[burninglight]

Oh, what's to talk about?

[He took off the hat and set it aside, running a hand through his hair--still tied back, like that was some muscle memory he couldn't shake.]

It doesn't matter anymore.

[nightcure]

Seriously? I'm not buying that. If it's made you lose sleep, I call bullshit on it "not mattering anymore."

[burninglight]

[Ardyn shrugged, leaning back in his chair and taking a second to realize he couldn't actually fold his arms with the wing attached to one.]

...The last thing that Soma Cruz ever did was to look at me and say 'goodbye, my brother' in a language I thought none other even spoke. And when I think about that, I'm forced to realize that if anyone else dared to call me that I would have wished them dead on the spot--but not him, and I don't understand why.

And when I think further upon the matter, I have to acknowledge that we were very much the same. One who never asked for such a fate, with a monster living in their head and countless ages tangled in their mind like a tremendous knot of too many threads that can't be pulled free.

...I saw that same face in the mirror far too many times, Noctis. The same black eyes, the same callous indifference for life, and without thinking I knew I had to be the one to do something to stop it.

[nightcure]

You can take the wing off, you know.

[ ... but anyway. Noctis is quiet as he listens, and when Ardyn's finished, he gets up. Pours them both a cup of tea, sets the cups and tea carafe between them. There's cream and sugar. ]

You were prepared to go down fighting, weren't you. And you didn't want anyone else to get hurt.

[burninglight]

We both know even I wasn't going to be able to kill that thing with a half-sharpened sword and mortal abilities. [He reached over to detach the oversized accessory as he spoke, secretly relieved for the excuse not to make eye contact.]

...My aim was going to be at least wounding the damn thing while the rest of you had some chance to regroup. From there I rather had some semblance of faith you could take it down. But I didn't expect to walk out of that room.

[nightcure]

[ Thank god. Noctis breathes out a sigh as he nudges the cup closer to Ardyn. He takes a sip of his own tea, partly to give himself time to think. ]

... Finishing what you started, huh. [ His voice is quiet, and he's looking at Ardyn as he says it. ] For someone who's been alive for so long and probably knows a lot of stuff, you're an idiot.

[burninglight]

You've proven yourself quite skilled at finishing what I inevitably screw up.

[Too flat to sound like the joke he'd wanted it to, Ardyn picked up the cup of tea with a very slightly unsteady hand.]

...I know. Touko and Varric alike already lectured me for it, I just...reacted. I wasn't thinking past 'give everyone time to escape' and 'hurt it before it kills you'.

[nightcure]

Doesn't mean I wanted to finish that.

[ He crosses his arms. ]

Good that they let you have it. [ He thinks about what he knows of Ardyn's past. It doesn't surprise him. ] I would've come back, you know. Once I'd gotten everyone to safety. Pretty sure those who knew how to fight would've had your back.

[burninglight]

...Why? I don't--why would anyone risk themselves for my sake, especially you?

[nightcure]

Because we're in this together.

[burninglight]

[His only reply at first was a short sound that might have been a half-formed bitter laugh. What was friendship and trust really worth, in a place like this? They had all gotten along and coexisted in that mansion, and twice it had failed them. Why should that change now, why should anything change? Friendship and betrayal were just two sides of a single coin, and that was the nature of things.]

...I'm not worth that and you know it.

cw suicide juuust in case

[nightcure]

[ If Noctis were younger, if Noctis were still consumed by anger and pain and hatred for the man sitting across from him... he'd have agreed. Ardyn is the reason Luna's dead, after all. Ardyn's the reason Noctis watched, helpless, as he drove that knife deep into Luna. He'd watched as Insomnia fell, and he'd turned Ravus into something consumed by rage and wanting to die, but which had fought Noctis nonetheless. He's why Ignis put on the ring in order to protect Noctis. He's the reason Noctis pushed Prompto off the train, the reason Prompto felt worthless because of it...

But Noctis is not younger. He'd like to think he understands Ardyn, at least on some level. He understands why Ardyn chose to waste himself away to heal those touched by the scourge. He understands why Ardyn chose vengeance, chose to wait two thousand damn years until Noctis was ready to kill him.

He doesn't agree, but he understands. And maybe Noctis's feelings seem irrational, and maybe sometimes he's still angry about what Ardyn has done to the people he loves, but. ]

I think anyone willing to risk their life to give others at least a fighting chance is worth more than just a senseless death.

cw: even more suicidal ideation

[burninglight]

[For a too-long moment, Ardyn didn't answer. Calm even with unsteady hands, he took a drink from the cup of tea in front of him before setting it down.]

[Once there had been someone who stood tall and said 'better me than anyone else.' Who ignored all warnings because there was simply no other course of action. Stop his work as healer, let the plague's grip on the world tighten, save one life at the cost of countless more? Unthinkable, cowardly, unfitting of he who would be king.]

[Once there was a monster, unable to know anything but his own hatred. Incapable of love and attachment, forsaken by even the light of day, something that manipulated and killed as he saw fit because mortal lives were made to end by design, and death was what the planet and its people deserved for throwing away their savior. Someone condemned to the dark, screaming and raging at a world that left him behind, lashing out at everyone and everything that so much as tried to approach with a hand extended in aid. Why should he trust something like that? No one would understand. No one would want to. No one ever could.]

['Curse you kings and your iniquitous Crystal-]

[Once there was a person who had forgotten who and what he was. Styled himself a healer-king, yet with blackened blood and deadened emotions struggling to function like he thought humans did. Like the savior he thought he was, the one a group of lost and frightened captives needed to support them.]

['...You were right. I'm not human anymore, am I?']

[And now here he was, some crossroads between them all. Human and yet inhuman, the tangled threads of two thousand years' memories all but strangling him. Trapped between wanting to die and needing to live, self-sacrifice and bitter cruelty.]

[Ardyn could only call up a bitter, pained laugh in response, head dropping into shaking hands. The scarf around his neck felt like a terrible weight now that he knew why he'd kept it, why it was something he felt so out of sorts to have been missing. It was the trademark of someone long dead, worn by the shambling corpse of a healer animated by ageless hate.]

...I don't know if I'm that person. Don't--don't argue, not this time, I-...

[A deep breath. Focus, concentrate, turn uncertainty into some semblance of the eloquence he'd maintained throughout countless centuries.]

I'm not 'myself'. I don't know who this person is that you're speaking to; I'm not the savior, I'm not the Chancellor, I'm-... I need this to end, and yet I know I can't allow it to until I understand who it is that's awaiting his death this time.

[nightcure]

[ He doesn't argue. Nor does he really say anything at first. He just... watches. Watches as Ardyn tries to hold himself together. He's not sure what exactly is going through his head right now, and he won't pry. But Noctis can try and talk some sense into him. ]

Who you are is... Ardyn. [ He shrugs. ] If anyone expects you to be anything or anyone, that's kind of screwed up. [ He pauses. ] Good thing about a place like this is that you've got a lot of time to figure that out. And people who want to help you.

[ He sips at his tea. Noctis knows who he is, and he's comfortable with that, but he remembers a time when he was less sure. When he was younger, when he first started out... he wasn't quite sure who he was.

He does not envy Ardyn for what he's going through. ]

So. Are you going to take this time to figure out who you've become? Or who you want to become?

[burninglight]

...I don't have a choice. Ducunt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt.

['Fates lead the willing and drag the unwilling'.]

I'm still alive, so it falls to a matter of either allowing myself to give out and fall apart, or trying to salvage whatever might remain before I shatter entirely.

[nightcure]

On the plus side, at least you've got people who'll help pick up the pieces if that happens.

That's one of the good things about having people who care about you.