#this monster was 14000 words long y'all

[saltymog]

Chapters: 28/? Fandom: Final Fantasy XV Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Noctis Lucis Caelum, Ignis Scientia, Gladiolus Amicitia, Prompto Argentum, Iris Amicitia, Aranea Highwind Additional Tags: Drama, Action, Angst, Friendship/Love, Canon-Typical Violence, Post-Game, Time Travel, Thirty-Something Chocobros In Their Twenty-Something Bodies, Because they called Umbra, Evil Bahamut, PTSD, Noct acting like this is fine, big bro gladio, Ignis and Prompto just trying to fix things, roadtripping, bros being bros, boattripping, Plot With the Occasional Slice of Life, Hurt/Comfort So here he was again. Come full circle. 

The Sword of the Father in his hands. Again. 

Offering himself up to die. Again.

Noctis stood in the center of the throne room, staring up at the dais. It looked much as he remembered it from the final hours of the Night. Even more like what Bahamut had shown him of his father’s and Clarus’ last moments, before entropy had had its way. That gaping hole in the corner still opened straight out into the sky—repairing it had obviously never been very high on the Imperial to-do list, even in this new, daemon-reduced timeline. 

The throne rose above it all, as empty and distant and aloof as it had always been. As a child, Noctis had hardly recognized his father in that seat—had never been able to find the warm, playful man he thought he knew in the stiffly formal demeanor of the king who occupied it. And here it waited, vacant, poised to accept a king once more, now for the very last time.

He didn’t want to do this.