The men standing before him tear what remains of Ignis Scientia's heart to shreds. Not literally, not yet, but that will come soon enough. Well, perhaps not quite soon enough, but soon all the same. The thought, that realization, curls the edge of his lip and straightens his back and just nearly draws a chuckle from his throat. Nearly, but not quite. His head turns, inclines toward the sea and toward the island set not far upon it, and it's a meaningful glance even if this lot doesn't realize it yet.
This lot. Hell, he feels like he could reach out and touch them and it would pull him back some thousand years; like it would pull him back to humanity. There's a certain sensation, a roiling through belly and veins, when the scourge unsettles itself and courses and rebels against what better sense he's managed to retain. It's a feeling that reminds him what and where and when he is. All appearances to the contrary, he is not looking again on his friends. He is not face-to-face with his long gone lover.
"Answer me. Who are you?" There lies a certain desperation in that voice that is as familiar to Ignis as the shape of his face and the cold burn of his eyes. He's taken aback once more, though a few dozen centuries' practice prevents him from betraying as much.
"Do you know the story of the Chosen King?" Ignis's head tilts toward the trio before him now, "Who returned light to a dark world and delivered his people from endless scourge?" He isn't speaking past them, nor is he ignoring the new king's question, though it will still be some time before the retinue realizes as much.
"Everyone knows the story," it is the man who is not Gladio who speaks, gruff and unrelenting as a hundred fathers before him. He places himself between Ignis and the king and crosses arms against his barrel chest, "it's why we're here. Kinda seems like you already know that, though-"
"-Clarus. Enough," Ignis smiles properly at the new interruption. He can't put a name to the man, but he can guess at the role. He can impose himself on the companion, dozens and dozens of lifetimes ago, and he can appreciate the hiss in his voice.
"No matter. The Pilgrimage has been the rite of many before you. No sensitive information is being compromised," except, of course, the sensitive information that Ignis is standing before a king; a Chosen King at that, though he questions whether that piece of information is one yet shared. Ignis has fought long to keep so many signs to that end subtle, but that fight- all of his fights, blessedly- are near to an end. An increase in daemon activity, nights that seem to roll in quicker than they've any right... he remembers it all too well. A burden he hates to place on another, but one he can only pray will at last end here.
"Then why are you messing with us? We have a ship to catch, so if you don't mind-" Ignis steps aside when the young king-both unknown and so painfully familiar-moves to pass him down the pier. He holds the same short smirk while he weathers the glares of king and shield both and he attempts to display some surprise when the advisor lingers behind them.
"The Chosen King fought alongside his friends to free Lucis from the Empire and then to free the world from the Betrayer King. The old prophecies said he would bring the dawn and end the scourge, but that didn't happen," there is a venom in that voice that Ignis is startled by just as much as he is intrigued. He has, it seems, underestimated at least this one of their number. He knows the words that will follow- not precisely, but in their spirit and at their core- and he closes his eyes against them.
"King Noctis was crossed by his closest friend and the world was damned again, doomed to relive the cycle of scourge and darkness, until the crystal would choose a new champion. That's the story you want to hear, right?"
"Want is not precisely the word I would settle on," Ignis sighs his response and he opens his eyes to find a pair burning into him.
"I know what my king might face. I'll be standing by him until the end if he does. I do not covet the ring or the crystal. I don't need any history lesson to know I won't repeat it. So tell me. Who are you?"
Ignis ponders the words, he holds the stare, unblinking and unmoving. There won't be any simple stepping aside here, though he would expect-would hope-for nothing else. He knows the spark in those eyes and some distant part of him, some part that still resembles humanity, aches over it.
"I am a man of great consequence. I fear you already know."
---
"I'm pretty sure you're allowed to drop the titles now," Noctis smiled at his own tease and the expression turned Ignis to absolute liquid in his arms. He drew the other man closer, fingers kneading at the warmth hidden in the curve of his spine, running to splay across over-defined ribs and sinewy muscle and a body that hadn't known such touch in a full decade.
"I wouldn't dare disrespect my king," Ignis retorted, a smile hidden in the length of Noct's hair, in the kisses he peppered over his forehead and against the line of his jaw. This moment was impossible, a fact that sat heavily in Ignis's mind. Ten years of struggle against a destiny set for thousands before. Impossible, and still they managed their way here, to the royal chambers and to the long abandoned bed and to each other's embrace after a near lifetime apart.
"Your king," Noctis repeated. He pulled back enough that he might press their foreheads together, share a spark in his eyes and a jolt at the brushing of their lips, "who's life you happened to save. And who's bed you happen to share. Gonna go ahead and decree you can save those 'Your Majesty's." "A fine reward for my service."
"I can probably come up with a finer one if you give me a few," Noctis laughed again and he drew back, just by inches, just to sweep his eyes over Ignis. His fingers ran reverence along his jaw and down his throat. A frown crossed his face for a moment there though, forefingers circling against a pulse point in a sort of examination, "I didn't even manage to leave a mark."
Ignis's expression dropped there as well and his fingers moved to cover Noct's, then to press over that same point. No extra sensitivity, no distant ache of a future bruise. Even the heat at his skin was no greater than what his body would produce by nature. He could all but still feel the attack of tongue and teeth at the point, could all but picture the dark mottling that had been created countless times in the past. Strange. Troubling, in a way that Ignis wasn't keen yet to pinpoint.
"Perhaps you've lost your touch," he opted to continue the line of teasing, even as something tugged at his mind, some warning he couldn't place reason to. He won a chuckle from the words and the sensation of wet heat running again at that spot.
"I'll just have to try harder. Good thing I have all the time in the world."
---
"You're following us."
Ignis doesn't think he'll ever quite manage to get past the familiarity in that voice. The Amicitia line runs strong, he finds himself reflecting, in more way than one. A little shave along the sides, an opened shirt, and Ignis is sure there would be little distinguishing between this shield and the one he stood beside so long ago.
"Coincidence, I assure you," he doesn't hide the lie when he says it. He's antagonizing, and the anger crossing the man's face seems to please the black current in Ignis's veins. He absolutely despises it, despises himself, though he thinks he hides it well. He hides it behind a sharp tongue and a short smirk, and eyes that look a thousand years past Clarus. Even the name amuses him, one tangentially tied-unknowingly, inadvertently-to that soon-repeated past.
"Bullshit," Ignis appreciates the brevity just as much as the barely-contained vitriol buried in it. Good, he thinks make it work for you. He recalls the tension between Gladio and Noctis, the difficulties that likewise arose. He recalls too, though, the way that it bolstered Gladio's resolve, the way it focused him even if primarily out of spite.
They stand looking at the water again, though from quite the opposite perspective to their last meeting. Ignis has always had a soft spot for Altissia, even if it scarcely resembles the one he briefly knew when he would have been standing here with Gladio himself rather than some shadow thereof.
"You should be with your king," Ignis points out, after some silence falls between them. The tension is thick and, in perfect honesty, it's quite spoiling a rare moment of peace. He wants to reminisce. He wants to remind himself of things that haven't been in so very long. Like this, all he can think of is the fact that this place-almost exactly this spot-is where he had made that decision, where he had destined himself to return in this way.
"He's at the altar. There's nothing I can do there," the frustration isn't directed at Ignis this time, present though it still is.
"I suppose not," he agrees, shifts more of his weight against the railing before him, "you're worried. You think he'll be denied the blessing?"
"More worried that he won't," that response is properly startling, nearly knocks Ignis off balance. He turns his gaze, turns his face to a frown.
"Words ill-befitting a sworn shield."
"Bullshit. Again. You know what's happening here. Artis wasn't wrong about you, was he?" The question isn't a question. It makes Ignis snap more thoroughly to reality, to the present. To the fact that he really is staring down his end days. All of their end days if that trial at the altar doesn't proceed as planned.
"I get quite the impression he's rarely wrong about anything."
"Then why the hell aren't you trying to stop us? If you're really... him, why don't you fight?" The confusion, the frustration, it's entirely understandable. Ignis doesn't think it should make him smile, but damned if it doesn't. He shakes his head and he turns his eyes back to the sea.
"Artis isn't wrong, but his perspective is... somewhat lacking. I could hardly blame him for it. There's only one view from where he stands. It's unfortunate, though. Dangerous, really," Ignis shakes his head and he makes an absolutely dramatic show of sighing. That much is the truth and it's one he fears they might all yet be damned by.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Never mind that. The important thing is that you stay your path. These are dangerous times, don't you think?"
"Yeah, because of you," Ignis laughs aloud at that accusation and he shakes his head once more.
"Unfortunately so. Don't forget that."
--- "How long did you know?" Ignis was nearly staggered back physically by the words, by the accusation beneath them. He should have expected nothing less, but it still hurts him, still kills him in every way but the one that it should-that it might, if he's not careful.
"I've had my suspicions, however-"
"-No. No avoiding the question, Ignis. How long did you know what it was doing to you? From the very start?" it wasn't simple rage in Noctis's voice. If it was, perhaps this would have been easier. Perhaps Ignis could have stepped away and accepted his fate without the sudden sensation of his soul being rent from his body. It's hurt, though. Betrayal. It's a thousand little emotions, a million moments where Ignis could and should have stepped back.
When did he know?
It wasn't an easy question to answer, whatever Noct implied. It had come in little signs, subtle warnings, vague sensations of unease and dread and, eventually, realization. It had come with bruises that didn't form and injuries that closed on a dime. It had come with dark corruption flooding his eyes when he woke and pumping thick through his heart, heavier with each day.
"I knew something was wrong for a while. As to what that was, I only came to understand in the past few weeks. I was searching out a way to confirm the suspicion."
"A while. How long is that, Ignis? How long did you stay with me while this was eating you? While the world was dying for it?" Ignis winced again and he let his head drop. His eyes stung, but the pain was somehow distant, too. Like he was grasping, gripping, trying to hurt more than hurting properly. Like he was losing-perhaps he had already lost-some part of himself to the corruption.
"It doesn't matter how long. It changes nothing," Ignis shot his response back sharp and deadly, with eyes narrowed and darkened, whether by that corruption or by his own emotion he couldn't rightly say. Was there any difference now? If so, he was sure there wouldn't be for long. Which meant he had to go, he had to leave, before it was no longer an option. Before he was nothing more than a shadow, bent on destruction. Bent on perpetrating the exact act he had been so willing to die to avoid.
"Like hell! We could have already stopped this. We-"
"-No, your majesty. We couldn't have. And we won't," his voice remained harsh and he stepped back, stance defensive, ready to avoid any strike, "everything I did was to save you, to ensure that you had a life to return to. I fought ten years for you to have a place in the world you saved. The prophecy... I was wrong. I couldn't stop it, I couldn't change it. Not the way I thought. But if you think that after all this, I'll still let you die..."
Ignis saw the moment the realization hit Noctis. It widened his eyes and pressed him a step back. It drew sparks of light and a sword into his hand and for just a moment Ignis considered staying, allowing it to happen. It was the right thing to do, wasn't it? He would still have won Noct those extra months in the end and they would have still saved the world for whatever generations would come.
But his mind flashed back. It flashed to the warmth of Noctis in his arms and his heart fluttering between his ribs when they shared their smiles. It flashed to Noct in his teens, struggling to cope with a title he had never asked for, a destiny so weighty even without the knowledge of a hasty and necessary end. He considered the warmth of sun on both their shoulders, saw himself chasing memories with dozens of failed variations on a recipe, watched his body lying prone before the altar in Altissia.
Perhaps it was that corruption, or maybe just the simple necessity of the situation, but Ignis moved faster than he knew he could and drove the butt of a dagger near the base of his skull. He caught him before he could fall limp and unconscious and he pressed his lips one final time to his forehead before he laid him down and fled for the sake of his king's life.
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timeasmymeasure
Ignis/Noctis Ignis is the new Accursed [FILL 1/3]
Date: 2018-02-21 10:17 am (UTC)Not literally, not yet, but that will come soon enough. Well, perhaps not quite soon enough, but soon all the same. The thought, that realization, curls the edge of his lip and straightens his back and just nearly draws a chuckle from his throat. Nearly, but not quite. His head turns, inclines toward the sea and toward the island set not far upon it, and it's a meaningful glance even if this lot doesn't realize it yet.
This lot. Hell, he feels like he could reach out and touch them and it would pull him back some thousand years; like it would pull him back to humanity. There's a certain sensation, a roiling through belly and veins, when the scourge unsettles itself and courses and rebels against what better sense he's managed to retain. It's a feeling that reminds him what and where and when he is. All appearances to the contrary, he is not looking again on his friends. He is not face-to-face with his long gone lover.
"Answer me. Who are you?" There lies a certain desperation in that voice that is as familiar to Ignis as the shape of his face and the cold burn of his eyes. He's taken aback once more, though a few dozen centuries' practice prevents him from betraying as much.
"Do you know the story of the Chosen King?" Ignis's head tilts toward the trio before him now, "Who returned light to a dark world and delivered his people from endless scourge?" He isn't speaking past them, nor is he ignoring the new king's question, though it will still be some time before the retinue realizes as much.
"Everyone knows the story," it is the man who is not Gladio who speaks, gruff and unrelenting as a hundred fathers before him. He places himself between Ignis and the king and crosses arms against his barrel chest, "it's why we're here. Kinda seems like you already know that, though-"
"-Clarus. Enough," Ignis smiles properly at the new interruption. He can't put a name to the man, but he can guess at the role. He can impose himself on the companion, dozens and dozens of lifetimes ago, and he can appreciate the hiss in his voice.
"No matter. The Pilgrimage has been the rite of many before you. No sensitive information is being compromised," except, of course, the sensitive information that Ignis is standing before a king; a Chosen King at that, though he questions whether that piece of information is one yet shared. Ignis has fought long to keep so many signs to that end subtle, but that fight- all of his fights, blessedly- are near to an end. An increase in daemon activity, nights that seem to roll in quicker than they've any right... he remembers it all too well. A burden he hates to place on another, but one he can only pray will at last end here.
"Then why are you messing with us? We have a ship to catch, so if you don't mind-" Ignis steps aside when the young king-both unknown and so painfully familiar-moves to pass him down the pier. He holds the same short smirk while he weathers the glares of king and shield both and he attempts to display some surprise when the advisor lingers behind them.
"The Chosen King fought alongside his friends to free Lucis from the Empire and then to free the world from the Betrayer King. The old prophecies said he would bring the dawn and end the scourge, but that didn't happen," there is a venom in that voice that Ignis is startled by just as much as he is intrigued. He has, it seems, underestimated at least this one of their number. He knows the words that will follow- not precisely, but in their spirit and at their core- and he closes his eyes against them.
"King Noctis was crossed by his closest friend and the world was damned again, doomed to relive the cycle of scourge and darkness, until the crystal would choose a new champion. That's the story you want to hear, right?"
"Want is not precisely the word I would settle on," Ignis sighs his response and he opens his eyes to find a pair burning into him.
"I know what my king might face. I'll be standing by him until the end if he does. I do not covet the ring or the crystal. I don't need any history lesson to know I won't repeat it. So tell me. Who are you?"
Ignis ponders the words, he holds the stare, unblinking and unmoving. There won't be any simple stepping aside here, though he would expect-would hope-for nothing else. He knows the spark in those eyes and some distant part of him, some part that still resembles humanity, aches over it.
"I am a man of great consequence. I fear you already know."
---
"I'm pretty sure you're allowed to drop the titles now," Noctis smiled at his own tease and the expression turned Ignis to absolute liquid in his arms. He drew the other man closer, fingers kneading at the warmth hidden in the curve of his spine, running to splay across over-defined ribs and sinewy muscle and a body that hadn't known such touch in a full decade.
"I wouldn't dare disrespect my king," Ignis retorted, a smile hidden in the length of Noct's hair, in the kisses he peppered over his forehead and against the line of his jaw. This moment was impossible, a fact that sat heavily in Ignis's mind. Ten years of struggle against a destiny set for thousands before. Impossible, and still they managed their way here, to the royal chambers and to the long abandoned bed and to each other's embrace after a near lifetime apart.
"Your king," Noctis repeated. He pulled back enough that he might press their foreheads together, share a spark in his eyes and a jolt at the brushing of their lips, "who's life you happened to save. And who's bed you happen to share. Gonna go ahead and decree you can save those 'Your Majesty's."
"A fine reward for my service."
"I can probably come up with a finer one if you give me a few," Noctis laughed again and he drew back, just by inches, just to sweep his eyes over Ignis. His fingers ran reverence along his jaw and down his throat. A frown crossed his face for a moment there though, forefingers circling against a pulse point in a sort of examination, "I didn't even manage to leave a mark."
Ignis's expression dropped there as well and his fingers moved to cover Noct's, then to press over that same point. No extra sensitivity, no distant ache of a future bruise. Even the heat at his skin was no greater than what his body would produce by nature. He could all but still feel the attack of tongue and teeth at the point, could all but picture the dark mottling that had been created countless times in the past. Strange. Troubling, in a way that Ignis wasn't keen yet to pinpoint.
"Perhaps you've lost your touch," he opted to continue the line of teasing, even as something tugged at his mind, some warning he couldn't place reason to. He won a chuckle from the words and the sensation of wet heat running again at that spot.
"I'll just have to try harder. Good thing I have all the time in the world."
---
"You're following us."
Ignis doesn't think he'll ever quite manage to get past the familiarity in that voice. The Amicitia line runs strong, he finds himself reflecting, in more way than one. A little shave along the sides, an opened shirt, and Ignis is sure there would be little distinguishing between this shield and the one he stood beside so long ago.
"Coincidence, I assure you," he doesn't hide the lie when he says it. He's antagonizing, and the anger crossing the man's face seems to please the black current in Ignis's veins. He absolutely despises it, despises himself, though he thinks he hides it well. He hides it behind a sharp tongue and a short smirk, and eyes that look a thousand years past Clarus. Even the name amuses him, one tangentially tied-unknowingly, inadvertently-to that soon-repeated past.
"Bullshit," Ignis appreciates the brevity just as much as the barely-contained vitriol buried in it. Good, he thinks make it work for you. He recalls the tension between Gladio and Noctis, the difficulties that likewise arose. He recalls too, though, the way that it bolstered Gladio's resolve, the way it focused him even if primarily out of spite.
They stand looking at the water again, though from quite the opposite perspective to their last meeting. Ignis has always had a soft spot for Altissia, even if it scarcely resembles the one he briefly knew when he would have been standing here with Gladio himself rather than some shadow thereof.
"You should be with your king," Ignis points out, after some silence falls between them. The tension is thick and, in perfect honesty, it's quite spoiling a rare moment of peace. He wants to reminisce. He wants to remind himself of things that haven't been in so very long. Like this, all he can think of is the fact that this place-almost exactly this spot-is where he had made that decision, where he had destined himself to return in this way.
"He's at the altar. There's nothing I can do there," the frustration isn't directed at Ignis this time, present though it still is.
"I suppose not," he agrees, shifts more of his weight against the railing before him, "you're worried. You think he'll be denied the blessing?"
"More worried that he won't," that response is properly startling, nearly knocks Ignis off balance. He turns his gaze, turns his face to a frown.
"Words ill-befitting a sworn shield."
"Bullshit. Again. You know what's happening here. Artis wasn't wrong about you, was he?" The question isn't a question. It makes Ignis snap more thoroughly to reality, to the present. To the fact that he really is staring down his end days. All of their end days if that trial at the altar doesn't proceed as planned.
"I get quite the impression he's rarely wrong about anything."
"Then why the hell aren't you trying to stop us? If you're really... him, why don't you fight?" The confusion, the frustration, it's entirely understandable. Ignis doesn't think it should make him smile, but damned if it doesn't. He shakes his head and he turns his eyes back to the sea.
"Artis isn't wrong, but his perspective is... somewhat lacking. I could hardly blame him for it. There's only one view from where he stands. It's unfortunate, though. Dangerous, really," Ignis shakes his head and he makes an absolutely dramatic show of sighing. That much is the truth and it's one he fears they might all yet be damned by.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Never mind that. The important thing is that you stay your path. These are dangerous times, don't you think?"
"Yeah, because of you," Ignis laughs aloud at that accusation and he shakes his head once more.
"Unfortunately so. Don't forget that."
---
"How long did you know?" Ignis was nearly staggered back physically by the words, by the accusation beneath them. He should have expected nothing less, but it still hurts him, still kills him in every way but the one that it should-that it might, if he's not careful.
"I've had my suspicions, however-"
"-No. No avoiding the question, Ignis. How long did you know what it was doing to you? From the very start?" it wasn't simple rage in Noctis's voice. If it was, perhaps this would have been easier. Perhaps Ignis could have stepped away and accepted his fate without the sudden sensation of his soul being rent from his body. It's hurt, though. Betrayal. It's a thousand little emotions, a million moments where Ignis could and should have stepped back.
When did he know?
It wasn't an easy question to answer, whatever Noct implied. It had come in little signs, subtle warnings, vague sensations of unease and dread and, eventually, realization. It had come with bruises that didn't form and injuries that closed on a dime. It had come with dark corruption flooding his eyes when he woke and pumping thick through his heart, heavier with each day.
"I knew something was wrong for a while. As to what that was, I only came to understand in the past few weeks. I was searching out a way to confirm the suspicion."
"A while. How long is that, Ignis? How long did you stay with me while this was eating you? While the world was dying for it?" Ignis winced again and he let his head drop. His eyes stung, but the pain was somehow distant, too. Like he was grasping, gripping, trying to hurt more than hurting properly. Like he was losing-perhaps he had already lost-some part of himself to the corruption.
"It doesn't matter how long. It changes nothing," Ignis shot his response back sharp and deadly, with eyes narrowed and darkened, whether by that corruption or by his own emotion he couldn't rightly say. Was there any difference now? If so, he was sure there wouldn't be for long. Which meant he had to go, he had to leave, before it was no longer an option. Before he was nothing more than a shadow, bent on destruction. Bent on perpetrating the exact act he had been so willing to die to avoid.
"Like hell! We could have already stopped this. We-"
"-No, your majesty. We couldn't have. And we won't," his voice remained harsh and he stepped back, stance defensive, ready to avoid any strike, "everything I did was to save you, to ensure that you had a life to return to. I fought ten years for you to have a place in the world you saved. The prophecy... I was wrong. I couldn't stop it, I couldn't change it. Not the way I thought. But if you think that after all this, I'll still let you die..."
Ignis saw the moment the realization hit Noctis. It widened his eyes and pressed him a step back. It drew sparks of light and a sword into his hand and for just a moment Ignis considered staying, allowing it to happen. It was the right thing to do, wasn't it? He would still have won Noct those extra months in the end and they would have still saved the world for whatever generations would come.
But his mind flashed back. It flashed to the warmth of Noctis in his arms and his heart fluttering between his ribs when they shared their smiles. It flashed to Noct in his teens, struggling to cope with a title he had never asked for, a destiny so weighty even without the knowledge of a hasty and necessary end. He considered the warmth of sun on both their shoulders, saw himself chasing memories with dozens of failed variations on a recipe, watched his body lying prone before the altar in Altissia.
Perhaps it was that corruption, or maybe just the simple necessity of the situation, but Ignis moved faster than he knew he could and drove the butt of a dagger near the base of his skull. He caught him before he could fall limp and unconscious and he pressed his lips one final time to his forehead before he laid him down and fled for the sake of his king's life.