shroudcryptid

[shroudcryptid]

o77

“Damn.” A somehow familiar voice says, out of the endless pale desert. Elidibus thinks he’d been to a desert, once. He must have. “You swived yourself up good, didn’t you.” 

It’s a dream. He knows this. Knows it more than he knows... What was it, that he’d known? 

...It’s not important, then. 

It’s with surprising eagerness that he turns towards the voice, with a heart light within his chest. To his confusion, however, it’s not the mask of either of his surviving brethren that greets him. Instead, the figure reclining upon the sands looks like one of the new, sundered, barely alive creatures. Just yesterday, Elidibus had seen a similarly looking one bash another unfortunate creature over the head, with a rock, of all things. Over naught more than food...

This one, though. Perhaps it is wishful thinking, a product of his dreaming soul, because this one can see him. Can look at him with fond, wistful eyes, as if they know him. What did that say about him, Elidibus wonders. Merely that he longs to be surrounded by actual people? 

“What manner of hope are you?” He muses out loud. “Are you mine? Or another amalgam of those roiling dreams within Lord Zodiark....” 

Unsaid is that he suddenly wants it to be the first.

The figure’s eyebrows raise, and their amused smile says that they’re humoring him. That they have secrets for him to dig free from their stubborn flesh. 

“You called me your guiding star, once.” They say, and the way they look at him is much like Lahabrea and Emet-Selch do. Looking into him, searching for something familiar, as if he’s become a stranger to them, even though he’s right there, right in front of them. Unlike his brethren, however, they seem to recognize what they find. Something that brings an odd, sorrowful look to their face. “But I don’t think I can be that for you right now. Not on your current course.”

“Mm.” Elidibus says. “Of course. So many stars fell.” 

Their eyes widen at that, and then, well, they’re clearly thinking about something. “I guess they did.” They say, thoughtfully. Their hand moves to a pocket in the side of their un-Amaurotine garb, and they toy with something. 

Elidibus stares at the features of their face, bemused by the almost-there thoughts in the back of his mind. They’re so familiar. Perhaps, if he just stares at them a little longer, he’ll manage to grab a memory to keep. A fragment of Amaurot’s warmth. Of a life that was his own. Something for only him.

…..What a selfish thought.

He sighs, quietly, and nonetheless walks towards them. Lowers himself to sit at their side, as they’re watching him with a dependable, if sad, smile. 

In front of them, the dreamscape has turned to a beach. Waters softly lap at its pale shore, sand swirling lightly in the wake of small waves. 

Elidibus’s fallen star pats his adorned shoulder lightly as they sit there. A notice. He turns his head back to them, and then his eyes go wide in surprise behind his mask, as they wrap the arm fully around him and pull him in, to rest upon their shoulder. 

They’re soft, and warm, even though the layers and new adornments upon his robes. He sighs, softly, even though this is a dream. Although, if it’s a dream, then maybe....

With a careful hand, he reaches up and takes off his mask. Stares at the back of it as it comes off. Turns it around in his hand, and feels oddly unnerved by staring at what is, for all intents and purposes, his face. 

“Ah, there’s my Themis.” His star says above him, fondly, and- And something clicks within his mind. 

“Themis.” He says, feeling the word in his mouth. “My personal name is... Themis.” 

Pale, fluffy hair falls free from his cowl, spills around his shoulders. Hair that was not there mere moments ago. Elidibus, now also Themis, stares out at the warm, starry sky. A sky filled with stars, without the dimness following the final days of Amaurot. 

And then, he turns, looks up at the face of the person he rests against. A face that, while lacking Amaurotine features, is beloved nonetheless. “You.... I met you. You helped me find a path forward, and protected me while I worked....” 

“Hah! Is that what you remember!” They laugh out loud, and he feels it in their chest, against his own. How odd. How nice. “Yeah. We were friends. I think.” They add on at the end, voice suddenly quieting. 

Thoughts still whirling, Elidibus turns sharply, arms reaching around them to be the one pulling them closer, a reversal of earlier. He buries his face in their chest, maskless forehead pressed forcefully against their collarbone. Feeling their breath, their startled gasp. As if he held them tight enough, then he could keep them this time. “The memories of that time we spent together are precious beyond words. Do not... Please do not assume I would look upon you, would know you, and think of you as anything but a dear friend. Please. Even if I cannot reassure you, cannot... Remember...” His voice trails off, a bitter taste in his mouth. 

For some reason, that wrings an unhappy laugh from them. Fisted in the cloth at their back, his hands tighten. 

“...What if I don’t remember, either? What if I don’t recognize you?”

As with many times before, it sounds as if they know something he doesn’t. He’s not sure what, or how, it could be here and now, but he goes with it, follows them down the trail of thought. “The thought feels absurd, but... I cannot imagine that I would not be drawn to you, were we to meet anew.”

They suck in a breath, but against the cloth of their top, his lips curve into a smile. “And you are quite good at digging out the heart of matters. I cannot imagine that, nor your character, would change...”

They’re shaking against him, and Elidibus knows not whether it is laughter or tears. He hugs them tight nonetheless.

“I... Will remember this, for you, then.” They say, sounding incredibly tired. “Will remember your trust in me.” 

“Good.” Elidibus says, muffled against their chest 

Their arms wrap around him, and he lets himself relax into them. Relax into their warmth, that odd bubble of love and determination that they carry with them.  Somehow, even the omnipresent distant whispers are quieted, as if the distant dreamers upon the moon can feel it, too. Can feel it through him. 

He doesn’t know how long he stays there, with them, in their arms, holding fast to them. Dreams are strange like that. 

What he does know is that when he blinks awake, he no longer feels like fractured crystal, ready to shatter once more at the lightest touch. And that, for some reason, there are tears in his eyes. 

[shroudcryptid]

FFXIV Rarepair Week- Day 5- Blade

When the Warrior ascends from the depths of the Aitascope, walking out into bright, if synthetic, sunlight once more, there’s a deep sorrow in their eyes, and a crystalline blade of utmost luminescence at their hip. Their friends surround them supportively, if with expressions varying from confusion to shock. 

In the days to come, the sword does not leave their side. It is either upon their hip, or in their hand, fingers wrapped around the hilt, the oddly warm pommel against the palm of their hand. Even during sleep, it is with them, wrapped in a makeshift scabbard and held close, as if it were a person to hug. 

During the fight with the Endsinger, there is a moment when they flinch back. And yet, it is as if the sword itself rises to block, to protect them. And when they open their eyes, there is an instant. A mere instant. Where they see a pair of pale, ghostly hands, wrapped around the hilt, besides their own. 

Not too long later, it is those same ghostly hands that press a device into limp, exhausted fingers. Ghostly lips that press a kiss to their forehead, even as against all odds, the red button mysteriously presses itself.

[shroudcryptid]

“Damn.” A somehow familiar voice says, out of the endless pale desert. Elidibus thinks he’d been to a desert, once. He must have. “You swived yourself up good, didn’t you.” 

It’s a dream. He knows this. Knows it more than he knows... What was it, that he’d known? 

...It’s not important, then. 

It’s with surprising eagerness that he turns towards the voice, with a heart light within his chest. To his confusion, however, it’s not the mask of either of his surviving brethren that greets him. Instead, the figure reclining upon the sands looks like one of the new, sundered, barely alive creatures. Just yesterday, Elidibus had seen a similarly looking one bash another unfortunate creature over the head, with a rock, of all things. Over naught more than food...

This one, though. Perhaps it is wishful thinking, a product of his dreaming soul, because this one can see him. Can look at him with fond, wistful eyes, as if they know him. What did that say about him, Elidibus wonders. Merely that he longs to be surrounded by actual people? 

“What manner of hope are you?” He muses out loud. “Are you mine? Or another amalgam of those roiling dreams within Lord Zodiark....” 

Unsaid is that he suddenly wants it to be the first.

The figure’s eyebrows raise, and their amused smile says that they’re humoring him. That they have secrets for him to dig free from their stubborn flesh. 

“You called me your guiding star, once.” They say, and the way they look at him is much like Lahabrea and Emet-Selch do. Looking into him, searching for something familiar, as if he’s become a stranger to them, even though he’s right there, right in front of them. Unlike his brethren, however, they seem to recognize what they find. Something that brings an odd, sorrowful look to their face. “But I don’t think I can be that for you right now. Not on your current course.”

“Mm.” Elidibus says. “Of course. So many stars fell.” 

Their eyes widen at that, and then, well, they’re clearly thinking about something. “I guess they did.” They say, thoughtfully. Their hand moves to a pocket in the side of their un-Amaurotine garb, and they toy with something. 

Elidibus stares at the features of their face, bemused by the almost-there thoughts in the back of his mind. They’re so familiar. Perhaps, if he just stares at them a little longer, he’ll manage to grab a memory to keep. A fragment of Amaurot’s warmth. Of a life that was his own. Something for only him.

…..What a selfish thought.

He sighs, quietly, and nonetheless walks towards them. Lowers himself to sit at their side, as they’re watching him with a dependable, if sad, smile. 

In front of them, the dreamscape has turned to a beach. Waters softly lap at its pale shore, sand swirling lightly in the wake of small waves. 

Elidibus’s fallen star pats his adorned shoulder lightly as they sit there. A notice. He turns his head back to them, and then his eyes go wide in surprise behind his mask, as they wrap the arm fully around him and pull him in, to rest upon their shoulder. 

They’re soft, and warm, even though the layers and new adornments upon his robes. He sighs, softly, even though this is a dream. Although, if it’s a dream, then maybe....

With a careful hand, he reaches up and takes off his mask. Stares at the back of it as it comes off. Turns it around in his hand, and feels oddly unnerved by staring at what is, for all intents and purposes, his face. 

“Ah, there’s my Themis.” His star says above him, fondly, and- And something clicks within his mind. 

“Themis.” He says, feeling the word in his mouth. “My personal name is... Themis.” 

Pale, fluffy hair falls free from his cowl, spills around his shoulders. Hair that was not there mere moments ago. Elidibus, now also Themis, stares out at the warm, starry sky. A sky filled with stars, without the dimness following the final days of Amaurot. 

And then, he turns, looks up at the face of the person he rests against. A face that, while lacking Amaurotine features, is beloved nonetheless. “You.... I met you. You helped me find a path forward, and protected me while I worked....” 

“Hah! Is that what you remember!” They laugh out loud, and he feels it in their chest, against his own. How odd. How nice. “Yeah. We were friends. I think.” They add on at the end, voice suddenly quieting. 

Thoughts still whirling, Elidibus turns sharply, arms reaching around them to be the one pulling them closer, a reversal of earlier. He buries his face in their chest, maskless forehead pressed forcefully against their collarbone. Feeling their breath, their startled gasp. As if he held them tight enough, then he could keep them this time. “The memories of that time we spent together are precious beyond words. Do not... Please do not assume I would look upon you, would know you, and think of you as anything but a dear friend. Please. Even if I cannot reassure you, cannot... Remember...” His voice trails off, a bitter taste in his mouth. 

For some reason, that wrings an unhappy laugh from them. Fisted in the cloth at their back, his hands tighten. 

“...What if I don’t remember, either? What if I don’t recognize you?”

As with many times before, it sounds as if they know something he doesn’t. He’s not sure what, or how, it could be here and now, but he goes with it, follows them down the trail of thought. “The thought feels absurd, but... I cannot imagine that I would not be drawn to you, were we to meet anew.”

They suck in a breath, but against the cloth of their top, his lips curve into a smile. “And you are quite good at digging out the heart of matters. I cannot imagine that, nor your character, would change...”

They’re shaking against him, and Elidibus knows not whether it is laughter or tears. He hugs them tight nonetheless.

“I... Will remember this, for you, then.” They say, sounding incredibly tired. “Will remember your trust in me.” 

“Good.” Elidibus says, muffled against their chest 

Their arms wrap around him, and he lets himself relax into them. Relax into their warmth, that odd bubble of love and determination that they carry with them.  Somehow, even the omnipresent distant whispers are quieted, as if the distant dreamers upon the moon can feel it, too. Can feel it through him. 

He doesn’t know how long he stays there, with them, in their arms, holding fast to them. Dreams are strange like that. 

What he does know is that when he blinks awake, he no longer feels like fractured crystal, ready to shatter once more at the lightest touch. And that, for some reason, there are tears in his eyes. 

[shroudcryptid]

“Darkness…” The Warrior hears, distantly, a quiet and crystalline chime of a sigh. With back straight, they take quiet, confident steps into the room. Around them, grotesque vilekin eggs bulge, but their eyes are locked upon the figure in the room’s midst. 

Shadow in the shape of a man, it stands, facing away from them. It’s muttering something, although even they, with their sharp hearing, cannot quite make it out. 

It…. He….. They know not which, but the robed shape turns to face them. It chuckles, and then breaks into a rasping laugh. 

“Warrior of Light.” It says, voice like a wind howling through a lichyard. It takes a step forward, towards them.

And promptly collapses forward in on itself.

The Warrior startles, jumps backward, boots skillfully finding purchase in the muck. And then, when their instincts don’t go off, they warily, tentatively creep towards the prone figure. 

As they approach, it twitches, and they startle again- Before quickly realizing the figure’s face had landed facedown in a puddle of vividly green goo.  

Without thinking twice, they rush forward, grabbing at the figure’s robed shoulders and rolling them over, out of the puddle. With their sleeve, they wipe clear the person’s nose, and then mouth and eyes. 

Pressing fingers beneath the robed neck, their eyes widen as they don’t detect the beating of a heart. Hurriedly, they grab at their belt, discarding their sword as they fumble for a single handed wand. Their aether flows through it easily, sinking down into the body, until- There. Aether touches upon a stalled and confused heart, sinks in and sparks, until something catches, and a tentative thud-thud starts up once more. 

Focus fading, the Warrior sighs, rocks back on their knees. Their gaze, absently upon the figure’s chest, moves upwards, back to the face and that red mask. 

Something…. Something about that face is familiar. The jawline, perhaps….? The messy stubble doesn’t ring a bell, but they can’t see the full thing….

Eyes narrowing in thought, they reach over, and tug at the mask. It’s secured surprisingly well, but they are nothing if not determined, and….

It comes free.

Thancred’s slack face rests beneath their hand. 

[shroudcryptid]

It is, in the end, just another scorching day in Eastern Thanalan. Claudien, only barely accustomed to the heat, had pulled on his protective robe and hood that morning while the sun yet only threatened to peek above the distant cliffs, and the chilled night air took residence in the looseness of the pale cloth.

His work upon that scorching day is also like any other. His research, really, because this trip to Eorzea’s shores has truly shown him how Sharlayan’s advances have improved life for its people. Ul’dah’s mammets do not carry the heaviest crates, here, to ward off accumulative damage to spines. Instead, that task is left to people- people who largely cannot read, and cannot say no, unless they wish to forfeit their morning's bread.

Back in Sharlayan, it was hard not to have heard of Louisoix Leveilleur. For entirely different reasons from what any any Eorzean passerby would eagerly gush about, their eyes lighting up. No, back in Sharlayan, his ideology is still a matter of great debate. Great, frequent, fervid... No small few had gotten themselves escorted from the Last Stand- or debate halls, even- over passions growing too hot. 

Claudien didn’t have many thoughts on the matter, though. Not more than a stray acknowledgement or two, and a distant awareness of how the growing tide of disapproval had made it so much harder to get official papers for this trip. Such sluggishness from the forum in approving the permits and the escort, despite how time sensitive this research was...!

Deep in thought, Claudien turns from the cliffside, letting his feet carry him back towards the great bridge. Just a little more observation of that one aetheric phenomenon, and then he could finally unravel some more of the aetherial sea’s mysteries...!

He’s interrupted by his thoughts by the jarring impact of what appears to be walking into a brick wall. His momentum carries him abruptly against it, and he finds himself off balance, stumbling backwards. Resigned, he clutches tight his notes, to keep them from blowing loose in the breeze-!

Much to his surprise, someone grabs at his arm, keeping him from tumbling over. Blinking, mouth open, he finally looks at what’s in front of him. 

It’s an adventurer. Yet another of that ubiquitous Eorzean persuasion, plentiful on the streets of Ul’dah and wandering in packs, bristling with weaponry and full of scars, always on the look for their next ten-gil job. Seeing this one, though, drags Claudien yet further from his thoughts of aetherial formulas and subterranean aetherways. There something different about this one. Something memorable, perhaps. 

For one, something about their face is familiar. The set of their eyes, the colors.... It’s as if seeing them brings to mind glimpses of a forgotten dream from last night. Some place, some turn of events... something of them pulled at the back of his mind. 

Second, was that those eyes should be bright, should be burning with drive and inextinguishable life. They should have kindness in them, should be looking at him with fondness and support. 

Instead, they’re hollowed. Dim, with grief. 

It doesn’t drown out his thoughts about the implications of the aetherways. But it’s the most brainspace that anything other than his research love has taken up in years.

He’s finally found them, he thinks distantly, the blue crystal around his neck burning warm. He doesn’t know why he was looking for them, but they’re finally here, finally in front of him.

They’re…. They’re letting go of his arm, and turning to leave. 

No, Claudien thinks, lips parting to call out. No- Don't vanish again, don’t leave him to watch the death and flames burn higher and higher around him-

Archon thoughts fading utterly into blank static from another life, he grabs at their shoulder. “Wait!”

Silently, they turn back towards him, look down at his hand upon them in… confusion, perhaps. Staring at his hand as if it were its own entity, bewildered at how it had gotten to be upon their shoulder.

Not that Claudien notices this. The static behind his eyes has him, and beneath his skin, a trickle of blood is working its way down one nostril. 

“I…” He doesn’t know how to make them stay. How to spark what he needs in them, to bring back that life to those shellshocked eyes. “…Water.”

They stay, quiet. And so he lifts up his own waterskin, first foe them to take, and when they do not do more than stare at it, he raises it to their cracked lips. 

They sip, when he raises it to spill into their mouth. Unresisting. Looking like another heatsick soul beneath the Thanalan sun, who’d long since gone hollow with resignment to a sorry fate.

“That look doesn’t suit you.” Claudien says, matter of fact. “Lets go get some shade. I’ll watch over you.” 

After getting them to take another swig from the waterskin, he takes their wrist, and starts leading them back to camp. 

They don’t resist in the slightest.

[shroudcryptid]

It’s by no means the first time Venat has wept, since the sundering. Not the second, not the dozenth, nor the hundredth.

What makes this time unusual, as she curls her permanently shimmering legs to her chest, is that she doesn’t fully clasp her hands upon her knees. No, there’s some space between them. Enough for her unnaturally pale fingers to weave strands of aether between them. Strands that slowly take shape of a person, with a tail coming out from where the base of the spine would be. 

She pokes details in- the eyes, the ears, the shape of the hair. Under her hands, it takes on a wash of color, as well. 

Staring at it, through eyes still blurred with diamond-like tears, Venat swipes a wrist, and the newly formed concept multiplies in size, until it is of a size to reach her chest.

She stares at it for a moment, trained eye used to spotting instabilities in concepts- And then, satisfied that it won’t explode in her face, reaches out and pulls it close in a hug. 

The soft embrace quickly turns into a tight, emotional squeeze, with her face resting in the crook of its neck, tears getting the newly formed fabric damp.

Shuddering under the sheer weight of loss and despair, Venat weeps once more, clinging physically to her sign that the future is worth it.   

[shroudcryptid]

There’s sensation upon the body’s head. It’s…. Not bad. Perhaps even pleasant.

Elidibus slowly opens the body’s eyes, blinks liddedly as the smeared world around him spins into focus.

There’s… an arm in front of his face. Ah. So it’s a hand upon his head, stroking his hair and leaving warmth in its wake.

He has been gifted pain beyond mortal tolerance, of recent, but as for succor… It has been far, far longer. Perhaps that was something he’d had, in that foggy time before the world had shattered.

Elidibus blinks again. Some mortal is saying something. It lacks the aetheric vibrations that would be truly understandable. It can’t be important, then.

There’s an odd sensation in the body’s dulled wrists. Vibrations, perhaps. Are the bindings being moved? This could be his chance…

But he is so, so tired, cut off from all but a trickle of his aether, and the chilling drugs still flow sluggishly through the body’s veins. 

Sensation under the body’s blood-sticky chest and legs, and then a twist of gravity. He’s being lifted, and… held against something warm. Burning hot, after the cold metal he’d been strapped to for days. 

“Nnnhhh…” Falls from the body’s mouth. The chest falls, letting out air in a quiet sigh.

“….’re not Zen….” The sound comes again. 

Warmth like sunlight, against his cheek and chest, sinking in…. Elidibus finds control of the body sinking away from him again, the eyelids growing weighty. 

The world quiets around him.

[shroudcryptid]

Themis’s finger traces over their lip, following the upwards curve below their nose. It’s a different texture than that of an Amaurotine. Tougher, and yet soft with the beginnings of fur. Obligingly, their lip gives way to his finger, jaw lowering to let him at their long, sharp canines. 

His smile spreads as he traces over their shape, pulls back their lips to observe how far back the row of teeth go. “….Fascinating. Such a functional, yet elegant design…” He reaches forward with intent, presses the pad of a finger against the bladed tip of a canine. They’re staying perfectly still, and yet he presses down upon the tooth-

There’s a slight pinch, and Themis watches, fascinated, as red oozes from his finger, coalesces into a round droplet. “So sharp... I can see how efficiently these would serve as a weapon.” 

He continues to watch as the drop of blood trickles down his finger, and drops onto their lip. Their tongue flicks out to swipe at what must tickle them, and he sees them go statue-still after it blooms upon their tongue. They’re so very aware of his hands in their mouth, and how the slightest twitch could, apparently, slice him to ribbons. 

So much power, and yet they’re as tame as a proper familiar in his hands. All for him.

Themis chuckles, and lets the pad of his thumb investigate the spines upon their trembling tongue. 

[shroudcryptid]

“Elidibus!” Azem calls from a distance, dragging a flushed, stumbling, and futilely protesting Emet-Selch along by the waist. “Are you busy?”

The figure, pale in coloring yet with rosy cheeks under the sun, turns to meet her, eyes widening at the approaching kerfluffle. “I… No, I have nothing imperative to have done by the end of the day-?”  Their words cut off as she reaches them, grabs at their hand, and the three of them are swallowed up by an orange flash.

It’s upon a pile of pillows that they fall, having appeared a malm or so above the ground. Azem’s cackle is bright, and not drowned out in the least by the indignant squawk and startled laugh from her paramours, even as her face ends up buried in the cloth of someone’s robes. 

“There you are.” Comes Hythlodaeus’s voice, and Azem lifts her head to find him reclining upon the edge of the picnic blanket, leisurely feeding himself grapes. “So nice of you to drop in, my dear.  And oh, what’s this, you’ve brought a Hades and a Themis?” 

Grumpily, from somewhere beneath her robes, yet not struggling in the least, comes- “-didn’t ask whatsoever if I was free. No, you simply grab me and go-“

“Yep!” Azem says, delightfully, and to her side, Themis’s mask has already vanished from their chest, the better to nuzzle into her neck, and add on to the weight upon the still faux-grumbling Hades. “Hey, bring those over here, will you? And y’know, my hands are busy, you should feed me them.”

Bright grin mirrored upon his lips, Hythlodaeus moves to join them. 

[shroudcryptid]

The soul is born into a body. It’s years before it can realize that simple truth, with its infant, and then child brain still budding into something capable of abstract thought. 

The child knows she’s waiting for something. Waiting to come into her own, waiting to be at the time and place to have an effect upon the star. Knows she’s waiting for someone to shine a light on where she is needed. The night will be dark beyond belief, but somewhere out there is the star that will illuminate her path. 

By her eleventh year, she’s drawing praise and respect from teachers, professors, and nearly all who interact with her. They praise her maturity, her impartiality, her calm insight. She has a truly bright future ahead of her, everyone agrees. 

Across the continent, a war escalates, spirals out of control, and storm clouds sweep across the world’s skies. 

The girl does not live to see her twelfth year. 

The soul is pulled into a fetus again. It doesn’t live to be born, its mother struck by lightning.

The soul is born again, in a once-beautiful city. The people here are shielded from the lightning, even as it ravages the world outside. 

But the shield will not hold forever. The child is too young to understand the complex words of his parent’s tongue, even as their voices are tense with worry. 

The child crawls, and then takes his first steps far before the parents would have expected him to. His soul is dense and strong, after all, with imprints writ deep upon it. Here and now, they drive the need to be ready, to be ready. 

His parents are happy and so proud of him, even through the fear and stress. 

Barely a day later, their city- the city of Alexandria- tears itself free from their storm-ravaged shard, a bubble bursting free to float in the void. 

The soul lives until his thirties, this time. Long enough to have climbed the ranks of government, to take a judiciary seat beneath Queen Sphene himself. His is an influence for calm, for measured decisions that benefit those involved and those around them. He watches Queen Sphene’s declaration of a new King with soft disapproval, for all that he remains an anchor for her to talk to, to pour out her worries onto.

There is naught else he can do. Nowhere he can escape to, no one he can in turn ask for help. This is the only path to survival for their people.

He knows this, even as it feels wrong. Should not the people’s salvation come from the people themself…?

It’s a few years after Alexandria crashes into the source that the man dies. It’s a horrible tragedy, everyone agrees. And the worst part of it? His regulator had been so brutally damaged by the accident that, even as he lay dying, nothing of him could be saved. 

Sphene still intervenes, manually creates an echo of him from the appropriated memories of the living. It’s not exactly right, missing some quintessential aspect of him, and yet… She still summons him to sit quietly, listening without bias as she settles her thoughts, makes her decisions. 

Over two decades before the Warrior of Light steps foot in Heritage Found, the soul is born anew into Solution Nine. 

[shroudcryptid]

It’s to another day in darkness that the Ascian awakens. A day, they call it, for all that no sun shines in the rift between worlds. No wind rustles leaves, no morning mist sweeping over the grass, nor dew to feel upon the soles of their feet. 

The chunk of crystal that the unsundered chose as their lair floats through the void, endlessly. There is naught for it to come across, naught to come across it in return- save for the handful of souls that, slowly, are forgetting what it was like to feel alive. 

The Ascian that once called themself a Warrior of Light does not wish to forget. Does not wish to forget the days they truly lived, waking up around campfires, surrounded by the slowly waking forms of those they loved. 

Lacking flesh as they are, the bindings upon their soul are bared to any with the sense to see. In the winding hallways of the Ascian’s retreat, it is as much a badge of their identity as their mask is. An intricate black, wrought with details beyond that of the true generic black mask. 

The mask of Azem. Azem, the betrayer. Azem, the penitant. 

As they trudge through the halls, seeing other shades flinch from their path or stop and stare, they wonder what the previous Azem had thought while leaving. Whether it had felt like setting down a weight, and breaking free into the great open world. 

They get as far as imagining the previous Azem bursting free out of a great set of doors, out of a great, collumned, *silent* hall and into a vibrant and alive woodland, before one of the bindings coiled around them flickers to life and burns.

Quietly, they sag against the corridor wall, and shove the thought away, out of reach. Eventually, when naught but the in and out of their chest remains in their mind, the binding quiets. They drag themselves upright, to trudge onwards once more. 

.

The room given to them is the same as it’s been for the past decade. Draped in dark finery, suitable for one of the Convocation itself. Those who forged the God that saved the world deserve nothing less, for all that the sundered men have forgotten them. 

The Ascian known as Azem does not know how much the Convocation chambers may differ from what once was. What they do know is that if they spend too long in the silence of theirs, they start seeing their dead friends in the corner of their eyes. 

Growling under their breath, they roughly strip the blankets from their fine bed, throw them over their shoulder, and stalk off down the hallway in search of the Thirteenth’s living quarters. 

“You will see them again.” Elidibus says, absently, petting their back as he reads. “You will. Tis all the more reason to let yourself trust in our work.” 

They groan, softly, against the cloth of his neck, having nosed in carefully around the spikes. “....What if they hate me. What I did last week....” Muffled as it is, their voice goes even softer. “I keep thinking of it. Warm, and how it burst in my hand... Don’t want them to see me like that....”

“Do not fear.” Elidibus says, calmly, so confidently that they would believe him if he said the sun on the source had turned blue. “You have done no more than was needed, to see them again. The wrongness of this world stains us all. But...” He looks down from the book, at the messy hair tickling his chin, at the chest and arms wrapped in a hug around his own unmoving form. “If these memories weigh too heavily upon you, I can help. Is that what you would like?” 

Quietly, the head shakes. 

“As you wish.” His clawed glove continues its soft, soothing motion upon their trembling back. “You know that you have only to ask.” 

.

It’s a while before they put the pieces together, and another while before they find the voice to say it aloud. When finally they do, it’s a statement, not a question, and they’re curled upon an ornately patterned couch, watching that white robe at his desk. Hooded, even here, in only their presence. 

They’ve seen various sundered among the convocation remove their masks. Seen the faces that they remember having in their shard’s last life. 

“It’s nice. That you don’t measure me against... Azem.” Subtle as the movements of his aetheric form are, the Once-Warrior knows his attention has snapped to them. That you don’t find me lacking.” 

They watch him. Watch him clearly weigh denial of what they both know they know, versus the vulnerability of letting down his pretenses for the first time in years upon years and reaching back to them.

“It is... only fair. To return that what which you cannot help, damaged as you are.” 

Their eyebrows raise, letting the jab hang in the air, before- “Emet-Selch’s words don’t look any better in your mouth, than in his. You don’t see me saying crap like that.”

“Yes, it is known that you still sympathize with the sundered.” 

They hiss, roll over on the couch to face its back, and pull a pillow over their head. That it hides their despondently flattened, unhyur-like ears is a bonus to not have to look at their friend, in all his brittle rigidity and gnarled vulnerabilities. Maybe the other them would have known what to say. Maybe they would have been better with words, or in general. But the person they are is just…  Tired.  

Hours later, when they wake from the nap that their flesh allows them, there’s the softness of a blanket around them, keeping them warm. 

.

During a meeting one time, Lahabrea proposes sending Azem on a dangerous mission. It would not be certain loss of their current shard, but, well, others and their skill sets would be far better suited to the situation. Unfortunately, those others are currently all occupied with their own tasks.

Azem isn’t surprised that Elidibus immediately objects. What does take them aback is that Emet-Selch stands in yelling protest at the same moment. 

.

“No.” Elidibus says, matter of fact. “I know that I knew you. And in this.... How funny it is, to not be alone.” A pause, and from behind that sharp red mask, his voice goes uncharacteristically soft. “It is... hard to contemplate. But I am the distilled essence of what I what was, all of me rendered down until all that remained was necessary for my duty. And you are the stubborn embers of a soul so bright, that even shattering and death could not put you out...”

The one that was once a Warrior of Light looks away, arms crossing in unease. They do not reply to Elidibus’s claims. It’s been so, so long since they didn’t feel lost in the darkness. And... They can’t help but feel he was kinder, once. More perceptive, more trustworthy. Distilled.... Was not the word they would have used. 

“It is alright that you have doubts.” He says, smiling at them. “But the convocation is together again. After thousands upon thousands of years, our circle is complete, and Hydaelyn grows weak. We’ll bring them all back, every single one, and we can be happy again. You can be happy again. Perhaps we can even take those chains off.” 

The Ascian known as Azem does not say what they thought. Those very chains would not let them.

[shroudcryptid]

Kan-E-Senna stands firm, the whispers of the Elementals bolstering her from behind. She is not alone, they tell her, in flashes and images. The forest stands with her. 

A second boar crashes from the undergrowth, baying furiously at the voidsent. With its whole weight, it crashes into the abomination, knocking it off balance. 

Kan-E-Senna flinches at the subsequent wet schlick, and the roar turning into a short-lived squeal, but seizes the chance anyways, earth reaching up to bite one of the monster’s ankles. It screams, gaze turning to her with rage and cold violence in its eyes. Immobilized, it still moves to throw one of its blades at her, and with widening eyes, she lifts her staff to call forth a shield, in the hope of at least lessening the blow-

Another beast collides with the voidsent, this one going straight for its throat. It screams a horrid, gurgling sound, and drops the blade to scrabble at the creature barely the size of its head. 

Kan-E-Senna breathes, and shifts her staff to aim at the squirming center of mass, held down by the earthen manacle. Another breath, another heartbeat, and- 

A lance of stone pierces its dark heart. 

Slowly, the creature goes still, hands falling from trying to pull the last piece of the Twelveswood’s will from its bleeding throat, and limply feeling at the object in its chest, before toppling over. The ground itself shudders from its weight, and Kan-E-Senna’s hands tense around their white-knuckled grip on her whorled staff. 

The whispers of the Elementals kick up again. Sending impulses back and forth to each other, notices of intent of actions to cleanse the remaining taint. Kan-E- Senna, only mortal, takes a moment to breathe. 

There’s motion from the form again, despite the Elemental’s treatment of it as dead, and she flinches, raising the staff again-

It takes her a moment to realize it’s naught more than the head of the last beast. Head in the shadows and eyes reflecting dull light, it had looked as another voidsent itself. 

Large eyes blink at her, and it rises, slinking off towards the trail back up the ravine. It moves predatorially, fluidly and coeurl-like, which makes it all the more surprising when it passes into a moonbeam and she sees it walking upon two legs. 

“Wait.” She calls, impulsively, the sight of the other called beasts giving their lives still bright behind her eyes. “Are you.... injured?” She doesn’t know if it can understand her or not, whether it was a miqo’te once or never at all. The Elementals had summoned it as a beast, after all. 

It halts there, and she can see just enough to see it flinch at her words. 

Well.

Summoning her bravery again, Kan-E-Senna walks towards the denizen of the Twelveswood, and at its low growl, tells the closest Elemental that she’s performing maintenance upon part of its defences, and that it needs to let her. It freezes up at the impulse that Kan-E-Senna knows it’s getting, and that’s enough time for her to step fully into range, and raise her staff for a second-order Cure. 

Regardless of the creature’s desire to be left alone, its wounds drink it up thirstily. A couple cracked ribs, she notes, and heavy bruising upon the furred skin where the Voidsent had gotten its hands upon it. 

It’s then that she realizes the Elemental’s hold upon it is no longer active. Quickly, she steps back, expecting the lashing out of an animal whose space has been invaded, only to look back and see that it remains still. Staring at her. 

For another moment, they both stay there, eyes meeting each other. And then it turns and melts back into the shadows. 

Sighing, Kan-E-Senna closes her eyes, and takes a moment to breathe in the cool night breeze. The Elementals will direct scavengers to dispose of the matter left behind. Her work is done. 

With sure steps, she heads back to Gridania. Aware of, but not afraid of, the rest of the Twelveswood’s denizens that live on either side of her path.

Perhaps a moon later, she notices a trailing presence while traversing the winding paths in the east. Kan-E-Senna has a full entourage of Wood Wailers with her, and yet, she suspects more than a few of them would fall, should it come to that. So, she keeps her silence. 

The next morning, the first of her Wood Wailers to step out of their fortified treetrunk leaps back in shock, a raspy yelp coming from behind his mask. 

Sloppy, she thinks, as she shoots upright from her morning meal, reaching for her staff. He’ll be sent to silence training, if he survives whatever this is. 

A Stoneskin sinks into her front guard’s aether as she bursts from the trunk, ready for combat- Only to see a hulking foe defeated.

Or, perhaps, she realizes, never a danger to them. The creature, a great beastkin, has clearly been dead some few hours. And, as she looks to its side, she finds a trail of blood. 

The creature had been moved here, already dead. 

Mouth agape in confusion, she stares at it… And feels a presence in a thick, tall tree above her move.

Eyes snapping upwards, she meets the gaze of the Miqo’te-like beast from before. 

Its eyes are just about all she can see, the rest of it efficiently hidden behind twisting branches. For a moment, they stay like that, the creature perched up there, and Kan-E-Senna staring into red eyes, so much warmer and alive than anything so close to the color of blood should be, 

Its fanged maw opens, and it hisses down at her, although… Not aggressively, nor in fear. No, it’s like a creature that knows how to do naught else. 

In a flash, it’s shrinking back and vanishing into the thicker between trees, while her guards are still looking around for the source of the hiss. Kan-E-Senna feels it as it moves away, and finally out of her sensing range.  Far faster than she’d expect anything to be above the ground. 

Turning back to their camp, she waves her guards to calm and follow. The felled beast is large enough she has to walk around it, and its horns and bristly pelt are even more impressive when she has the time to take them in.

“Send for a cart.” She says, as they pass it. “It would be wasteful to leave a gift behind.” 

[shroudcryptid]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Elidibus/Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV) Characters: Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Elidibus (Final Fantasy XIV) Additional Tags: Nonbinary Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Ambiguous Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Food as a Metaphor for Love, Cuddling & Snuggling Summary:

It's standard fare for an adventurer. Interrupt the murder ritual, beat up the guards, carry off the damsel in distress. Something seems a tad off about this one, though...?

[shroudcryptid]

Prologue for an ex-Ascian WoL AU. WoL+Elidibus.

It’s to another day in darkness that the Ascian awakens. A day, they call it, for all that no sun shines in the rift between worlds. No wind rustles leaves, no morning mist sweeping over the grass, nor dew to feel upon the soles of their feet. 

The chunk of crystal that the unsundered chose as their lair floats through the void, endlessly. There is naught for it to come across, naught to come across it in return- save for the handful of souls that, slowly, are forgetting what it was like to feel alive. 

The Ascian that once called themself a Warrior of Light does not wish to forget. Does not wish to forget the days they truly lived, waking up around campfires, surrounded by the slowly waking forms of those they loved. 

Lacking flesh as they are, the bindings upon their soul are bared to any with the sense to see. In the winding hallways of the Ascian’s retreat, it is as much a badge of their identity as their mask is. An intricate black, wrought with details beyond that of the true generic black mask. 

The mask of Azem. Azem, the betrayer. Azem, the penitant. 

As they trudge through the halls, seeing other shades flinch from their path or stop and stare, they wonder what the previous Azem had thought while leaving. Whether it had felt like setting down a weight, and breaking free into the great open world. 

They get as far as imagining the previous Azem bursting out of a great set of doors, before one of the bindings coiled around them flickers to life and burns. 

Quietly, they sag against the corridor wall, and shove the thought away, out of reach. Eventually, the binding quiets, and they drag themselves upright to trudge onwards once more. 

“You will see them again.” Elidibus says, absently, petting their back as he reads. “You will. Tis all the more reason to let yourself trust in our work.” 

They groan, softly, against the cloth of his neck, having nosed in carefully around the spikes. “....What if they hate me. What I did last week....” Muffled as it is, their voice goes even softer. “I keep thinking of it. Warm, and how it burst in my hand... Don’t want them to see me like that....”

“Do not fear.” Elidibus says, calmly, so confidently that they would believe him if he said the sun on the source had turned blue. “You have done no more than was needed, to see them again. The wrongness of this world stains us all. But...” He looks down from the book, at the messy hair tickling his chin, at the chest and arms wrapped in a hug around his own unmoving form. “If these memories weigh too heavily upon you, I can help. Is that what you would like?” 

Quietly, the head shakes. 

“As you wish.” His clawed glove continues its soft, soothing motion upon their trembling back. “You know that you have only to ask.” 

[shroudcryptid]

shortfics from prompt exchanges/attacks, featuring a nameless wol

14) Overgrown

The Miqo’te slinks through the ruined door, eyes wide and ears perked for danger. Scattered motes float in the few rays of sunlight that have made it down, down through the canopy to shine through the gaping holes in the cabin’s moss roof. 

There’s a quiet that hangs heavy in the once-dwelling, not only of sound, but of emotion. No one has been here for years, they think, and slowly untense, spine straightening. 

Their gaze passes over the trinkets and rough wooden carvings on the shelf. When they leave, an hour later, it is only with a newfound hempen tunic, and a blanket of the like to line their nest with. 

36: total control

The ice heeds her call perfectly. The Warrior snarls a curse as they leap aside from yet another falling icicle, and then rolling to dodge the following swipe of her frost blade. The strength of a god, and with the vision and drive of a singularly determined will… There was none of the capriciousness that they’d learned to expect from the previous primals. No bottomless hunger, no grandiose, tempestuous wrath. No, Iceheart was undisputedly in complete control. 

How dangerous, what will happen when this gets out. How completely, utterly thrilling, they think, a wild grin stretching across their face. 

50: accost

The Warrior staggers up the stairs towards their destination. “It’s so close….” They say, wheezing out a breath. “Can I make it….. Augh……”

The weight upon their left pauldron reaches out and thwaps their head, grabbing at their hair. The Warrior winces, because truly, they did not hold back…

“Yes you can, it’s right there!” 

“So…. Far…”

They tilt over, very carefully slumping against the railing in a way that doesn’t crush any fragile young limbs. But the small girl clinging to their belt and standing on their shoe doesn’t know that, and shrieks excitedly as the wrought iron railing gets closer. 

On their other side, small hands grab onto cloth and metal, to better cling to. One especially careless hand grabs on their hair and pulls, and once again the Warrior fights back a wince.

The kid clinging to the back of their shoulders doesn’t seem especially excited, instead burying his scaley face in their neck. He does, however, sniffle against their neck. 

“Ouuugh…..” They say, straightening back up, and setting off towards the sweets stall again. “What candy are the little monsters getting today….”

“Mmn not a monster.” The boy snuffles into their neck, and their ears twitch as a wet residue is left behind. 

“Okay. What candy are the monsters and brave little dragon getting today?”

“Pixieberry stick!” The girl on their shoulder yells, and starts tugging at their shoulder. “Pixieberry stick pixieberry stick pixieberry stick pixieberry stick-“

“Apple tart….” The Drahn kid says quietly, underneath the continued chant. 

“Caramells!” The boy on their other shoulder says, and the kid clinging to their hip on that side echoes him. On the other side, the young girl giggles, perhaps too young to follow. 

Approaching the stall, the Warrior’s lips quirk up as the stall owner notices their imminent arrival, with their eyes widening comically. 

[shroudcryptid]

on erenville and long hair

Dumplingway’s hands are soft and gentle as they run through the dark lengths of Erenville’s hair. It flows and falls through his fingers, and when he raises his hands to catch the light upon the locks, it gleams, silvery highlights eyecatching and beautiful.

His lover’s head rests upon his shoulder, heavy with weariness from another day spent trekking through Shaaloani underbrush in search of survey specimens. In the growing evening, his warmth is apparent and welcome.

A mischievous spark lifts Dumplingway’s mouth, and his hands, unchanged in speed and casualness, now move with purpose.

Hours later, Erenville awakens to find the weight of his hair shifted- and when he feels with his hands, finds the careful texture of a braid, with wildflowers interspersed, conveniently plucked from an adjacent bush. 

[shroudcryptid]

Themis+WoL, vaguely DT cuddling fluff.

The other is taller than him. Noticeably so. Strong as well, enough to stand tall against any of the Unsundered. Strong enough that Themis had revellee in the thrill of bringing his all to bear against them, to draw upon every single mote of his body and aether to stay standing before their onslaught. To dance with them is a thrill, and Themis still holds great pride in himself in designing and forming shapes that had sufficiently structured his aether, that he had been able to draw out the glimmering, glorious focus running just beneath their subtle exterior.

Hah. Subtle, he thinks with a smile. His star certainly is not subtle in their love of colors and designs. And yet, they do not draw vainglorious attention while going about their daily chores. They could, he has no doubt. But they do not. For all of their unabashed joy and unusual intentions, they fit perfectly into the world around them. 

Somehow, this remains true, even millennia later and with not another soul remembering those beautiful islands in which they had met.

Themis sighs quietly at the distant, misty flash of bottomless sorrow, nuzzling into their hair from behind. It’s thick and wild, smelling of the herbed oils he’d worked into it while washing out the day’s dust and grime. 

He has never much been a traveler, for all that he’d found such insight and joy from accompanying Azem. Furthermore, his shape’s corporeal aether is thin, unsuited for the rigors of travel and combat alike. Merely keeping himself from being drawn back into the aetherial sea before he can undo the remnants of Athena’s meddling in his soul is… difficult, to say the least.

And yet, to have this time with his dear friend, to be waiting in their inn room at day’s end, to be able to see them again…

It is rewarding beyond measure.