#without any other alternative to mitigating civilian casualities

[secret-engima]

Nox keeps giving the media meltdowns. How's that, y'know, working out for him? And what's the general reaction around the Citadel crew to the media circus? Also, how do people feel when they realize exactly how /powerful/ Nox is?

Hmmm for the most part, Nox is ... ambivalent to how many times he sends the media into a tizzy. He’s got memories of 2k worth of royalty and scandals, he remembers the invention of media networks and sometimes dreams of the invention of the flipping printing press. There is literally nothing they can say about him that he doesn’t already have memories of somehow. Honestly, it’s .... alternately tiring and hilarious to him. He kinda wishes people would take a chill pill, but on the other hand, since Regis would never force him to deal with the media circus unless Nox willingly agreed to it, he doesn’t particularly care. At least until he wants to- you know- leave the Citadel and go literally anywhere in Insomnia and Then It Becomes A Problem (Nox misses the days he was just a nobody with earrings and baggy clothes. So much). Though, since he knows that nothing he can do or not do will calm them down, he does occasionally indulge in intentionally poking them with a proverbial stick.

By Citadel crew I’m uncertain to if you mean Regis and Co + Chocobros or the long-suffering Citadel press corps, so I will just do both-

-Regis feels So Very Sorry for his eldest. He knows he couldn’t keep Nox a secret forever, but he honestly had ... hoped it wouldn’t get this bad. He’s afraid for a while that the media things will depress Nox or make him afraid to leave the Citadel/angry at being Regis’s son, but Nox just rolls his eyes at everything and ignores the media hounds with catlike ease (by which I mean he spaces out into the distance with a neutral expression and occasionally does the human version of pushing things off other things to distract them).

-Clarus knew this was coming. He knew it was going to get so much worse when Axis’s existence came out (it did). He ... would feel bad about this but this is just- royal/celebrity life. This is a slightly more hysterical version of normal. Honestly it’s the noble society he’s more worried about (he realizes quickly that his fears are unfounded, for a kid who’s been unknown for years he can verbally tear nobles to shreds with the best of them. Clearly a talent inherited from the Izunia side of his heritage).

-Cor hates the media. Always has, always will. No time for it. Not after all the stuff they threw out about him becoming a Crownsguard and then alter their role in cementing his hated Immortal title. Is fully waiting and ready for Nox to get mad enough at the media to condone Cor going out and doing Something Stupid And Maybe Bloody about it. Unfortunately, Nox never does, so Cor has to just sit and seethe and occasionally laugh evilly over Nox’s latest trolling behavior.

-Noctis doesn’t even know about the media storm for   y e a r s. He’s the bby Crown Prince, you really think anyone is gonna let this kid watch the news channels and the gossip talk shows? No sir. Not on Ignis’s watch. Noctis DOES hear about it at school though, with students bugging him about it and even TEACHERS side-eyeing him like they expect something Dramatic to happen. Noctis eventually gets sick of it and punches another student in the face probably. Ignis is scandalized, Regis tries to gently explain that no, Noctis cannot throw someone in dungeon because they said nasty things about Nox and no he is not explaining what those nasty things mean.

-Ignis is ashamed to look back and realize that he once bought into about 80% of the media meltdown over Nox. Now that he knows Nox better, he knows that none of it is remotely true and the world is not going to turn Game of Thrones on him. Now he’s ... very insulted on Nox’s behalf, but understands that it is not his place to intervene (though he does give patented Frosty Looks at any reporters that come sniffing around the Citadel forever after).

-Gladio does not watch conventional TV. He watches action blockbusters that have explosions, documentaries on wildlife/camping/hunting/sword-making and Iris’s favorite show about magical girls and talking, rainbow colored Chocobo companions when she makes the puppy eyes at him. That’s it. Is ... nominally aware of news and social media having fits over Nox but Does Not Care so long as they don’t bother Nox and nobody actually tries anything against Noctis’s big brother.

-Citadel press corps kinda hates Nox’s guts. On one hand, he is a Model Prince because he doesn’t go out and get drunk, doesn’t have wild parties, doesn’t have any actual scandals that they need to cover up or spin positively. On the other ... refuses to do press conferences. Refuses to do interviews. Refuses to do anything to help them mitigate the media meltdowns that his mere existence causes (and the events of the Music Drabble I have yet to write, OH BOY do they hate him for that). Just- hides in the Citadel and only makes appearances when it’s a mandatory ball/gala/thing or when he’s accidentally unleashing another media Meltdown. Agrees to one (1) private interview when he’s 18 and even then it’s ONLY if he can talk to some random, unknown rookie who runs a gossip column. They, by turns, want to strangle him and praise his existence, but at least he isn’t as bad as Regis and Clarus were in their day.

-It- would take a long time for people to really know how powerful Nox is. Like- out in the wilds of Lucis proper? There ARE people who know he’s way stronger than he lets on (the Hunter Corps and their families that he’s saved a bunch of times, plus everybody in Hammerhead who politely pretended Cid wasn’t housing the Nif Chancellor and his LC nephew for two years). The Hunter Corps, out of everyone, have the best idea of just what Nox is capable of, because they’ve ... put together a few things over the years. Like how Nox usually crops up in the area a day or so before a Niflheim base gets shredded/blown up/otherwise Wrecked™ for seemingly no reason. But his Real Power? That ... I’m honestly not sure how that would come out.

-But hypothetically, sure, let’s say something happened that made Nox go Full Fury on some poor hapless Nif soul (or army, probably an army). I’m gonna picture ... a Incident with a Kingsglaive held area. Nox is out there for like an official inspection or something, one of the Very Few media things he ever agrees to, when there’s a full on attack. While the poor Media People who are live streaming this freak out and the glaive get ready for a slaughter, Nox just- real calmly orders the glaive to Stay In the Base and keep an eye on the media people. Calmly walks out the base gate without so much as a by your leave and starts limp-striding his way toward the Impending Invasion of Death, Axis right at his side, just as calm (Axis knows what’s coming after all). Some glaives try to follow him because Obviously only to smack face first into - a Wall. A genuine magic Wall like the one encircling Insomnia.

-The entire Lucian nation plus whatever non-Lucian channels manage to pick this up get a livestream view of Nox raising a mini Wall around the base to keep everyone safe, then casually strolling out toward the Invasion force and just-

-Decimating it.

-About halfway between the invasion force and the base, Nox stops and raises a hand to the sky, a sword appears in his grip, and everyone present can feel magical pressure suddenly build-build-build until the air turns blue (the Wall keeps everyone inside safe from the intensity of the pressure except Axis, who doesn’t need it, he is Nox’s Shield and Nox will never hurt him). The Nifs release their war Behemoths on the field, gunships are coming in for the kill, and then-

-His sword sweeps down and the world shakes under the force of the pure energy wave that rises from his blade, sweeping across the distance between him and the enemy and either breaking, scattering, or straight up disintegrating anything in its path. An imperial dreadnought splits in half and then breaks into dozens upon dozens of pieces, the war-beasts caught in the path of the wave are just- gone. So are the MT units and gunships.

-Ever seen the upgraded armiger attacks from the Royal Version of FFXV? Yeah, picture those, but cranked up to eleven. Or just picture those and then imagine being an ordinary civilian seeing that for the first time. Ghostly blades whirling around Nox’s form, defending him from bullets and debris only to lash out as literal waves of energy or a death laser.

-Needless to say, Nox destroys that invading force single-handedly in a display not unlike the legends of Ragnarok or Armageddon, all while holding a Wall around the base. He then calmly turns, walks back to the base, asks if everyone is okay, and upon getting the all clear-

-Collapses. Straight up flops over into Axis’s arms while on national live television because someone forgot to eat anything today and spent most of the previous night fretting over nightmares or something (the rest of the world assumes he pushed himself way too far with that display, but really he could have done more if he hadn't already been tired/hungry and Axis knows it).

-For once, the media meltdown isn’t punctuated by frenzy but by a very, very fragile, frightened silence.

-It’s been ... a long time since a Lucis Caelum has Truly unleashed their power on the field and Nox is no ordinary LC.

-Clips of Nox’s stunt circulate for months, are analyzed by historians and doctors and talk show hosts for precedents and health risk and just sheer What levels. Social media ranges from cheering Nox on to snidely wondering why LCs aren’t doing that more often to a huge outpouring of concern for the prince who just fought off a literal army and then collapsed like he’d been decked in the head. The Hunter Corp all pool their resources together to get this idiot kid a care package, Cid probably comes over from Hammerhead to yell at him while Cindy bear hugs and cries all over his clothes.

-In Niflheim ... a lot of people are reevaluating their stance on the war. Because if that is what just one Lucis Caelum can do, then what’s going to happen when there are two of-age princes who are not chained down by the Wall?

-A lot of nobles in Lucis are also reevaluating their stances on the illegitimate prince, because UMMMMMM that’s the kind of thing that only happens in blockbuster dramas, and Nox did it in real life. More than that, he knew he could do it, as evidenced by how calm he was when he gave the order for everyone to stay.

-Lots of internet conspiracy/theory people try to figure out just how powerful Nox is and if he’s an anomaly in the bloodline because seriously can all LCs do that????

-A lot of people, for a lot of different reasons, are very, very scared of Nox now. Either because they still believe that GoT is inbound and that just put the kibosh on a lot of their rebellion daydreams or because Nox is already a wild card and now he’s proven that he’s a supremely dangerous wildcard.

-So basically, still a meltdown, but this one much, much quieter and more reverent.

-Assuming I ever do something like this in Nox versa canon, because I’m not sure I will.