#i get these visions of heid just being entitely like 'stay away nocits' and noctis approaching anyway

[cwarscars]

Heidegger was angrier than usual – at least that was what he'd overheard some of the infantrymen saying – so everyone was staying clear of him.

Well, everyone except for Noctis since the boy had never feared him the way everyone else did. Sure, he was intimidating as hell, and he was strict, but he'd always been good to him.

When Noctis stepped into the man's office, he was momentarily speechless. He looked more sad than angry. It smelled like he'd been drinking, too. Noctis was worried about him.

"You okay, Sir?"

// because the picture set you tagged me in gave me feels.

he's down three quarters of a bottle; no longer responding to a sip with a grimace and a breath - now, he drinks as if to drown; wishes to choke on the sweet burn of alcohol. fails to do so.

atop his desk sits a couple of photo frames, a smiling father and his children - a man and a wife embracing. before him he sees his family and yet, that's all there is now, isn't there? only photographs. an ache in his heart and a pain in his chest, a memory that stings more than damp lids.

unfortunately for heidegger, his eyes can't look elsewhere; he watches the pictures as if to hope that they'll move. as if he expects to hear his daughter's voices, his wife's forgiveness. perhaps the booze has a hand in such a hope, perhaps it's the very thing that encourages a tear to edge down his cheek.

why had she left him? taken the kids and ran-? what had he done? what hadn't he done? all he'd tried to do was be the best he could. dedicate himself to the cause; fight for shinra, for them. and this is how he'd been repaid? nought more than a note. awakened in a hospital bed, bandages over his body - an unbearable agony.

oh, how he'd pined for them since.

years spent, a failure.

and yet - noctis had helped him; seen him through. taken place neath the broken wing of a man so eager to be a father once more. looked to heidegger as no one else would; given back to him the love he'd so desperately wanted to once show his own.

if only he'd have been better - if only-

the door edges ajar, a shadow taking the room; heidegger quick to hide his bottle back in the desk drawer. he watches with pressed lids, eyes red with sorrow - a choke between his breath and a shout.

"what're you-" he spits, realisation hindering his tone when it becomes obvious who stands behind the question "...ah-" his voice becomes quiet "noctis."

a quick turn of his head sees him eyeing the distance outside; the midnight blue of the clouds lacing around the steel of the plate. truly, he doesn't take in the sky - only wishes to look anywhere but his boy.

he can't see him this way.

heidegger shan't show weakness...even as it drips down the curves of his cheek, the ragged mar beneath his eye wet with lament. were one to listen closely, they'd perhaps hear the mourning in his breath.

"please-" his voice cracks, a rare weakness that the general wishes he wouldn't show. skulked away in the darkness, he attempts to hide himself beneath the black of shadows "i'd rather you not see me like this."