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xadoheandterra · 5 years

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Series: The Burning of Solheim Title: The Path Untrodden Fandom: Final Fantasy XV Chapters: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII Characters: Prompto Argentum, Ignis Scientia, Cor Leonis, Gladiolus Amicitia, Noctis Lucis Caelum, Gilgamesh, Monica, Cid Sophiar Tags: 10 years older!Prompto, Cid ain’t taking your shit, Introspection and Revelations, Prompto breaks everyones hearts, Gilgamesh Knows Something, Cid Is Special Summary: Solheim was the height of civilization long enough that their ruins were ruins over 2000 years ago, and still had the power to function in the time of the King of Light. They should’ve realized something was very wrong the minute Prompto remarked on the lights being on, and yet no one was home.

Cid took one look at the gathered people from where he lounged with a mug of coffee and uttered a short, “What the hell, kid? I thought ya up an’ stopped draggin’ yer ass into bullshit twenty years ago.”

“Fuck you,” Cor said bluntly in response, dropped into a chair, and grabbed Cid’s mug of coffee and drowned it.

“At least tell me the old girl’s still runnin’ right,” Cid harrumphed tiredly while the kids exchanged glances.

“The Regalia is fine,” Cor said.

“Six hours from Ravatogh?” Cid huffed, even as Cor gestured for everyone to settle down and Monica disappeared behind the half-wall of the kitchen to grab drinks. “Ain’t never taken six hours jes t’drive down from that hell pit.” Cid glanced at the group, and then side-eyed Cor a second later before he said, “Although I’d be surprised she fit you all well an’ good.”

“We didn’t break the car, dammit,” Cor grumbled.

“I’ll be the judge o’ that one, brat. Now give me back my damned coffee,” Cid reached out for the cup but Cor kept it deftly away and drained the last of the dregs before he handed it back with a curled smile full of teeth. Cid huffed, then accepted the new mug from Monica with a, “Thanks, sweet’eart.”

Monica calmly passed out drinks for everyone, although she skipped Cor who frowned and looked half-a-second ready to demand a cup for himself, then thought better of it. Cid snorted. Clarus chose well when he made that girl in charge of the boy, and he shared a bit of a commiserating glance with her as she settled herself down, took a sip out of her own mug, and then settled it between her knees. “So.” She looked at them each in turn, enough to make all the boys squirm and Cid found himself with his own sharp grin at the thought.

Yes, Clarus chose well, Cid could admit. At least that kid had a decent head on his shoulders—and the sting of loss still felt a bit like a bitter thing; each of them boys were his, even if they hadn’t spoken in a good almost twenty-odd years. Cid sighed heavily and quickly tore the room’s attention from Monica, who would undoubtedly dither about the whole mess and he’d rather get to the root of the first problem before anything else.

“Well?” Cid said, tone short and leading. “You okay, boy?” He looked at Noctis as he spoke, but the words were for both Noctis and for Cor really. The last time he’d seen Cor the man had blown through Hammerhead looking like death warmed over, covered in cuts and more blood on the outside instead of his insides. He’d taken stock of the few curatives Cid kept around, already gone stale without Regis’ magic to hold them together, and then waltzed right back out of Cid’s life.

Noctis frowned, brow furrowed, and eyes narrowed at some point not on Cid’s face, which was all well and good, sure. At least the boy seemed to be thinking about shit, which was good, but that didn’t tell Cid anything worthwhile, really. Lucis Caelum’s were a hard bunch to read for normal folk, and sometimes you had to just drag the truth out of them like fighting with a wet couerl kitten hissin’ and spittin’ lightning in your face.

“Ya don’t jes up an’ recover from a broken bond,” Cid said slowly. “An’ while I can see Cor’s little stray all well an’ good, that don’t mean shit unless you speak up boy.” Cid ignored the way Monica jerked her head in his direction; if the women wanted to be blind about the little Niff stray then that was her problem. Cid had no reason to ignore the truth bare in his face.

“I—” Noctis started, but the words cut off and Cid nodded sharply.

“You ain’t the first t’go through this shit,” Cid said after a moment. He stared down at his coffee with a frown. “I remember yer granddaddy an’ the wreck he was after he lost his Shield an’ Hand.” Cid breathed in deeply; he hadn’t liked remembering Mors back in those days, and he didn’t like remembering Mors in that aftermath even now. The Mors after the death of those closest to him—where the only reminders had been Regis and Clarus after all was said and done—lead to some shit decisions and choices.

Mors without his Shield and his Hand had been like a man without his conscience. Cid accepted the job to keep watch over Regis and Regis’ lot because of that. He saw what Mors became, and hoped to keep Mors’ boy for becoming his daddy. He thought he succeeded for a while, only for Regis to spit it all in his face at the end. Cid tightened his grip for half-a-second on his mug of coffee.

“Cid…” Cor said, voice soft—and just the barest hint of pain that thrummed under it. Cid looked to Cor and the way the kid looked stricken. Cid knew he never spoke of it—of how Mors changed, of how the broken bonds had utterly ruined a man he’d up and respected and almost swore his own Oaths to—just as Cid knew Cor never spoke of his time as Mors’ bodyguard, his Shield in all but title.

“What?” Cid huffed. “I’m old, Cor. Ain’t no beatin’ ‘round it, and ain’t no reason to keep hidin’ it after what you boys said.” Cid turned his gaze back to Noctis. “Well, little King?”

Noctis swallowed, and heavily said, “I’m fine.”

“Bullshit,” Cid said sharply, but Noctis merely straightened his spine stubbornly and repeated himself. Cid shook his head and grumbled, “Too much of yer ma in ya,” under his breath before he turned his gaze onto the one armed behemoth and the Cor’s little Niff. “An’ you, boy? Whaddya say fer yerself? Ain’t no Shield or Hand, but that shit hurts don’t it?”

Cid watched how Prompto nibbled at his lip, and then glanced over at the behemoth beside him who seemed to be trying dissect Cid with his eyes. He dismissed the man a second later because he could see it on the boy, clearly, where he couldn’t see it on Noctis because Lucis Caelum’s were a special brand of stupid. He waited for Prompto to take in that shuddering breath, waited for the young man to settle himself.

“I had time,” Prompto said, voice soft. At his side his behemoth tightened the grip onto Prompto’s wrist and Cid glanced to him.

“I can see that, but I ain’t askin’ ‘bout yer tie to yer King,” Cid said, and his words were only marginally soft because as much as this kid was Cor’s stray Cid could see himself plain as day in that freckled face. He’d once been as young, refugee in a strange city-state with Niff-blond hair and freckles to his face. It wouldn’t surprise Cid in the least to find that Prompto came from some prominent Niff family somewhere—he had that touch about him. Cid waited for the boy to stiffen, then glance to Cor with surprised eyes. “No Cor ain’t said no word ‘bout nothin’. It’s plain on yer face, boy. So?”

“Cid,” Monica interrupted, and Cid wanted to cuss her out but refrained when Dustin came up behind her. There went any chance of getting any of those boys to speak up, least of all the behemoth who seemed to contemplate Cid’s words with the weight and gravitas they didn’t exactly hold, but implied. “You are speaking of things that—”

Cid growled and shoved himself to his feet with an angry huff. “If yer too damned blind to see that boy for who ‘e is it ain’t my problem. I’ve said my piece.” Tiredly Cid began to shuffle himself out of the shack. “Ya know where t’find me.”

Gilgamesh stood and muttered his excuse to the party shortly after Cid left, and Monica let him go with barely a thought. She wasn’t so foolish to consider the idea that she could contain the famed Blademaster, if that was whom he claimed to be. Cor only survived that mess through the fact that the man let him go, and Monica knew that well enough. The fact that the man had taken Gladio to the famed Proving Grounds—which were nothing more than a slaughterhouse in Monica’s opinion—already left her with the frustrating understanding that the man could very well be so. Instead she focused her attention on the other who claimed to be Prompto Argentum.

Ignis had reported upon Prompto Argentum’s untimely demise; Monica had taken to the ruins at the behest of Cor to ascertain the situation with the mercenary Highwind as a guide. She’d seen enough to doubt the boy would return ever again. The fact that the King definitely suffered from a sudden shattered bond, and she grilled Cid on the effects of that when Ignis reported in, left her with the solid opinion that Prompto Argentum was dead. Who this imposter was Monica couldn’t discern, but she doubted that Prompto Argentum had been a one time creature. Cor found the babe in a lab of all things, after all.

“I would like to know how you’ve decided upon the validity of…your identity,” Monica said, tone careful so as not to upset the current reigning Monarch—young, blissfully young and left to his own devices for so long—let alone Cor who seemed determined to believe the lies of this man; this potential threat from Nifflheim.

Cor frowned, pressed his lips together, and said shortly, “You know of the identifying characteristics on the boy, Monica.”

Monica looked at Cor. “You verified it, then?”

“Still the same,” Cor nodded, and Monica wanted to punch the man. Didn’t he—

The imposter sighed heavily and interrupted the tirade that tumbled through Monica’s thoughts. He looked at her with eyes that didn’t fit her face. Old, discomforted, weary sort of eyes that almost reflected purple in certain light, but were bright dark blues in others. He looked at her and said with utter disdain, “This is about—my—tattoo.”

“Yes,” Monica said succinctly, surprised by the imposter’s cleverness to pick up what Monica had insinuated—that she believed the tattoo was not a good way to verify one man’s identity.

The imposter nodded, then straightened out of the slight slouch he’d been in. It gave him two more inches in height and made him impressively confident in his presence. From what Monica knew of Prompto Argentum the boy would’ve hunched further, drawn away from showing his confidence unless Noctis had encouraged him in some way. Another mark against the man, Monica felt, and she tucked it away so that she could use it to explain how utterly idiotic Cor was. The boys it was expected—they were young and new to the war and its intricacies. Noctis and his retinue had been raised behind the Wall and away from the conflict, so how could they know?

“Tattoo’s distort,” the imposter began, tone even, and Monica paused surprised that he would admit such. He stared directly at her as he spoke and a shiver ran down her spine. That was the look of a killer. “Over time they fade, and as skin changes so does the tattoo.”

Monica glanced to Cor, to see if he understood—and yes, the wide eyes and relaxed muscles told Monica that he’d finally started to see. With the next words the man’s brow furrowed in thought and Monica looked back to the imposter who still—stared—at her.

“Given that I’ve had this one since a child,” the imposter raised his covered right wrist, his left clenched tightly against his thigh, and the man’s gaze slid from her to it. Everything tightened about him, coiled down into a tense sort of ball even as he sat up straight. His brow pinched and his lips turned down slightly as he stared at his wrist, turned it this way and that. “It should’ve changed, right?” He glanced to her and waited.

Monica didn’t say a word, but she nodded sharply; curious to see where this explanation planned to go.

“Yet it’s the same,” the imposter said, voice quiet. “The ink is still as dark as it was when I was five. The lines and numbers are still as crisp and legible.” Here the imposter’s gaze flickered to Cor, and then to the retinue and the King. He looked uncomfortable, Monica thought, and a fissure of guilt settled into her gut.

The imposter sighed and began to tug off his glove to Monica’s surprise. “The truth is this is not a tattoo,” he said, and revealed the barcode stamped onto his wrist. As he said the lines were still a pitch black, straight and legible as the day Cor brought him back to Insomnia. “I’ve tried to get rid of it, you know?” the imposter refused to look at anyone as the mark bared free on his skin.

King Noctis sat up straight, spine stiffened in surprise and gaze utterly locked onto the brand on the imposter’s wrist. Gladiolus, Monica noted, slouched just a bit further and kept his gaze off to the side. Ignis sucked in a cut of sharp and quiet gasp, lips parted and eyes wide as he stared and stared. None of them had actually known about the mark—except perhaps Gladiolus. He’d always been a rather smart one, Monica remembered.

“Burned it, cut into it—tried to mar the skin of it,” the imposter murmured. “I was stopped from outright skinning myself, once.”

King Noctis looked stricken. Monica felt just the little bit sick. He’d tried to skin himself to get rid of the mark? It was a good ploy for sympathy, but the sickening thought of it settled wrong with her. She could easily imagine the bright little boy terrified of the mark on his skin trying to skin it off as a child. She didn’t like the thought.

“No matter what I did the skin refused to be damaged,” the imposter looked right to her. “Burns would heal back to perfectly normal skin. Cuts would not leave scars no matter how deep. It’s…” The imposter sighed heavily and closed his eyes. “I know I was made and not born. Figured that one out these past ten years.”

“It hasn’t been ten years since Prompto Argentum died,” Monica said sharply; she couldn’t stand the way the room seemed to be thick with horror and guilt. Although if she were honest ten years could account for the differences. The imposter looked like Prompto in the way a relation might—or someone older, perhaps.

The imposter snorted. “For you? No. For me? It has been ten long years.” He looked at her again, gaze inscrutable. “I spent time studying Solheim, you know. I’d go into the ruins and look at the marks left behind and learn.”

Curiosity burned within Monica’s veins. It shot up from her lungs and into her spine. They knew so precious little about Solheim; Lucis had a longstanding law that Solheim was meant to be left alone. Supposedly the Draconian had given the command to the Founder King, or so the people of the Citadel whispered whenever anything Solheim was brought up. Given that Nifflheim seemed content to follow in Solheim’s blasphemous ways—building magitek of all things—people wondered on the law a lot more often in recent years.

“Solheim had a way to create life,” the imposter settled, voice shifted to a steady cadence as he set his arm down and seemed to forget about it entirely—except no, his left moved over to grasp at his wrist in a tight grip. “There was a time, brief, that their population dwindled. War, or famine, or divine wrath of the Six it was unclear.” His gaze turned a little distant. “I couldn’t quite figure the meaning of the words. They were—a little off center to typical Solheim linguistics. Potentially a series of loan-words of some sort…” A second later the imposter shook himself out of his thoughts. “At any rate they found a way to create life—to bring about an infant without a mother’s womb or a father’s seed.”

A surprising notion, Monica noted, and how like Nifflheim to follow in the footsteps of Solheim. They too created life—although Monica hadn’t been certain before. As far as she or Cor or anyone thought Nifflheim had merely been experimenting on children. A barbaric, horrifying reality that sickened all of Lucis that knew. To think they could be growing children to experiment on…Monica wanted to throw up. It felt like her stomach was up in her throat and she hated it.

“I don’t find it so surprising that Nifflheim could’ve have discovered the means themselves, too,” the imposter said. “Whatever was done to make me though—whatever they did it—the barcode—” King Noctis sucked in a sharp breath and Ignis looked ready to fall over, “it refuses to be damaged. The skin heals, and it grows with me. The best that I can determine is that this is my skin—this barcode and that somehow—somehow I was designed so that it couldn’t be damaged.” The imposter looked directly at her, and then let go of his wrist and offered it. “Go ahead. See what I mean.”

Monica froze. He wanted her to—what? Try and damage the wrist, the barcode that was on display before her very eyes? She could catch sight of the lettering, just a faint bit of—N-iP01—before Noctis stood up with his teeth ground together and face horribly pale.

“Enough Prompto!” King Noctis said, tone sharp enough that Monica straightened her back stiffly and fought the urge to just stand at attention. Monica could see the way the imposter froze, how the muscles in his back tensed up the slightest bit before he leaned back and looked directly at the King with a pinched face, but one that listened to the Command in the voice without protest. Monica watched the way the imposter took back his wrist and settled his hand down in his lap.

“I apologize,” the man murmured.

King Noctis nodded his head, and then shifted his gaze to Monica and pinned her to her seat with it. “If you refuse to believe Cor, or my retinue, of Prompto’s identity that believe me Monica.” Monica felt a protest bubble up in her throat, and the King must’ve noticed it too because he narrowed his gaze and continued to speak, tone just a smidge cold like how King Regis would get sometimes. “I know each and every bit of my retinue, Monica. I know their very souls. They are bound to me intricately. Do you really think I could be tricked so easily as to Prompto’s identity?”

Monica pressed her lips together, glanced to the imposter, and then back to the King as she puzzled this out. “There is so much we don’t know about Nifflheim’s capabilities,” Monica started, but the King cut her off.

“I know his soul,” the King uttered, tone short. “I feel it against my own—the way my magic is shared with my retinue; how it settles into their bones.”

A sudden thought struck Monica. If the King could feel the imposter then—she whirled around at Cor. “You let him make an Oath?!”

Cor shook his head. “No. I—” He glanced to the King, and then fell quiet before he could say anything else. Monica felt a gaze at her back and turned around to see King Noctis’ eyes taking on a slightly pinkish hue as he ground his teeth together, enraged.

Shit.

“The only Oaths I have,” King Noctis said, voice even although Monica could feel the rumble of fire and lightning just off to the edge under the words, “were made at the Citadel.” He eyed her; Monica felt the slightest bit of relief as that meant the imposter didn’t have a tie to the King. They could handle this. She only needed to get to the bottom of why they trusted someone show heavily—different. “My Oath with Prompto returned one week after it was torn away from me.”

Monica froze. She looked at the King and fumbled her words until she said, “That’s—” Could they even do that? Break and then rebind without—without say-so?

“Impossible?” the imposter—Prompto—the imposter uttered. “I was taken away by fucking Solheim magic—possibly magitek really. Some weird time travel bullshit. Hell, I got to meet the Founder King for all of five minutes—arrogant ass that he was—honestly are all Lucis Caelum’s arrogant or lazy or something?”

“Shut your mouth,” King Noctis said, although there wasn’t any heat in it and the oppressive pressure in the room seemed to ease. His eyes returned to their normal grey blue and Monica felt like she could breathe. Prompto—the imposter—waved a hand at the King negligently.

“Oh come on you’re an arrogant ass too,” the impos—Promp—Monica couldn’t figure out what to call him now. Her thoughts tumbled around and she felt—Gods was this what Cor dealt with when he came back and drank because King Regis wanted to spend time with him? No wonder the man ignored his duties half the time and Monica had to drag him into work if so.

“Doesn’t mean you have to say it,” Noctis whined and dropped back down into the couch. “C’mon, Prom.”

“Don’t call me Prom,” Prompto said.

“I always call you Prom,” Noctis pointed out, dry wit and humor.

“Yeah but like—” Prompto seemed to struggle for his words, and then shrugged. “Only for certain times and places, Noct. Only you.”

Noctis waved a hand, smiled, and then glanced to Monica. “You get it now, right?” he said. “The bond snapped back. This is Prompto.”

He was, Monica thought faintly, utterly correct. The way the King eased in the blond’s presence was the way the King had always eased in the blond’s presence. Prompto Argentum seemed to just know what to say or do to get the King to relax; to stop the rather legendarily known fury that buried itself deep into the Lucis Caelum line—a protective instinct, maybe, that made them prone to acts of violence in revenge for a slight.

Still Monica felt shaky as she said, “I understand.”

The last person Cid expected to come down and find him had been the tall behemoth that clung to Cor’s kid with a worrying intensity. Yet still the man stepped off the edge of the elevator not even fifteen minutes later, and by Cid’s estimate that hardly left enough time for the ensuing conversation that needed to happen upstairs. Cid eyed the man from where he lounged on his ratty old couch, settled with a decent cup of brandy and a picture filled with memories.

“They jes let ya go, did they?” Cid questioned when the man stepped forward, the slightest hint of a hesitance to him.

“My presence they need not for the conversation above,” Gilgamesh uttered, and then tilted his head toward one of the chairs. “May I?”

Cid snorted and tipped back a sip of his glass with a grumbled, “Got yerself full o’ questions, then.”

“Indeed,” Gilgamesh sighed heavily and settled himself down into the chair. “You spoke of Oaths and Consequences.”

“Yeah? Ain’t that hard t’understand.”

Gilgamesh looked down and Cid leaned himself back to regard the stranger. Taller than any man Cid had the pleasure to meet, Gilgamesh honestly looked like he stepped out of some ancient period drama. He wasn’t human, for all he pandered to it—Cid could read that plan. Something Other, like the Messengers that followed around the Oracle’s lot. Yet somehow this being bound himself in Oaths so restrictively tied to the Lucis Caelum line. They tightened like vices around the man, quieted what would normally be loud—choked him in regrets. Cid sighed heavily.

“Ask yer damned questions,” Cid grumbled tiredly and Gilgamesh looked up at him.

“You spoke of the loss of a Shield and Hand, and the Changes this wrought,” Gilgamesh uttered, and drifted forward slightly as he peered at Cid with almost glowing reddish eyes. “I ask you of these Changes—of these Consequences.”

“You ain’t lost no King,” Cid pointed out, and he let a grin cross his face at the utterly blank response he got in return.

“Have I not?” Gilgamesh uttered, voice empty.

“No,” Cid nodded. “Ya ain’t. But ya’ve witnessed one; th’ aftermath an’ madness of it.”

Neither said anything as Gilgamesh lost him into thought and understanding. Cid felt himself a bit pleased about it all; he could see the way memory moved about the man in a way it didn’t about others—how Gilgamesh near utterly relived the moment in contemplation. Cid didn’t know what happened or when, but he could see the moment when the being put together the words into a coherency that most people disregarded.

“Ah,” Gilgamesh murmured. “Yes. A madness it is.”

“An’ what’re ya gonna do ‘bout it?” Cid asked, pointedly. “Let it run its course?”

Gilgamesh hummed and said, “What would you suggest, Prorok?”

Cid barked off a laugh; he said with a grin, “Ya know what’s right ‘n wrong, seelenreisender,” he said, and the words that came from him were rougher than he’d used in a long, long time—yet they came to him as easy as breathing. “Ya gonna sit there an’ let another dictate it t’ya?” When Gilgamesh eyed him, surprised, Cid scrubbed a hand through his beard. “S’what’s wrong in this world,” Cid muttered disdainfully. “Mors ain’t seen passed it, an’ Reggie refused t’—listenin’ like someone on high’s gonna give ‘em all th’ answers. Pah!”

Gilgamesh looked away, and Cid waited for the response—and when the man uttered, “We Forge our own Paths with each breath afore the Gate,” Cid smiled a bitter, vicious sort of thing, and waited for the man’s next question to come his way.

#fanfic #final fantasy xv #ffxv #noctis lucis caelum #prompto argentum #cid sophiar #gladiolus amicitia #ignis scientia #cor leonis #monica ffxv #gilgamesh ffxv #fic: the path untrodden #fic: the burning of solheim

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