#⁍ too great oppression for a tender thing. ( luna. )

[mercuryxbullet]

( ooc. ) tag dump.

[gwiiyeoweo]

“Wake the fuck up, grandpa. We’ve got gods to kill.”

Noctis looks upon him with a wicked grin, the moonlight outlining his silhouette with a fine silver and casting a shadow across his face. But the way his eyes glow, a deep and ominous magenta that cuts through the darkness, makes Ardyn think of him the great oppressing villain instead. And beside him, the ever-merciful Oracle, only smiles along sweetly.

Pairing: Noctis & Ardyn, Lunafreya & Noctis, Lunafreya & Ardyn Rating: Gen

“Wake the fuck up, grandpa. We’ve got gods to kill.”

Ardyn wakes up to a light smack on his cheek, just hard enough to leave a light sting across his face. Either he’s hallucinating or it’s just another horrid nightmare, one of the countless that have plagued him since his imprisonment in this stone tomb. How many times has he awakened to such a scene? Seemingly waking up to a voice and the sensation of another’s hands on him, only to open his eyes to ever darkness and the cold stale air? To feel the chains digging into his flesh and the holy iron piercing into his innards.

So he doesn’t bother opening his eyes, knowing there’s only disappointment should he expect anything other than silence and emptiness.

Until he hears a sigh. Until he hears a woman’s soft song.

Until the chains rattle and the stones quake, and he feels warmth ghost over his skin.

When he wakes out of his daze, there’s no pain piercing through his flesh or the ache in his bones. There’s certainly still a fatigue, yes, that weighs down his body, but the agony is no longer. Relief is an understatement, and he almost wants to cry. He doesn’t know whether to consider this a new, terribly cruel nightmare that’s given him false hope, or a dream that’s arrived as a short mercy. 

So Ardyn opens his eyes, and he thinks he sees Aera and Somnus above him. They both look younger — a funny thing, knowing he’s been imprisoned for at least a dozen years — though Aera’s hair is longer and Somnus looks far, far younger between the two of them. It’s almost cruel, considering how realistic this dream is, and some part of him wants to weep upon seeing them like this. Aera, who he knows is dead, cradling him in her arms with all the warmth of life in her skin. Somnus, who condemned him to this prison in the first place, looking upon him with genuine concern.

How Ardyn misses those days, longs for them.

“Should I smack him harder?” Somnus suggests, and Ardyn thinks that must certainly be his brother, even if the voice is different. The unease is still on his face, however, etched into the corners of his mouth and the set of his eyes. 

“Noctis, please.” Aera, despite the exasperation in her voice, is soft as always. Though the pitch is different. Has all the years robbed him of their memories, so that he can no longer remember the tone of their voices? 

Ardyn wonders what cruel power decided to have its fun with him. Giving him the illusion of freedom — chains released and iron removed — and his family and love returned to him. But the fog in his mind keeps him from going any further than that, and he doesn’t even have the mind to wonder who this Noctis is. He can’t even offer up any resistance except for weak grunts as Somnus hefts him bodily along, both staggering out the long rocky corridor that leads outside his prison.

But when he’s carried out of Angelgard, witnessing the soft lights high across the night sky and breathing in the sea salt air, his heart stops itself thrice over. The first time, it’s at the realization that this isn’t a dream but reality. The second, when he sees Somnus and Aera properly under the bright moonlight, and sees they are not Somnus and Aera after all. 

And the third, after they’ve properly introduced themselves, when they claim to herald from a time and space not too different yet wholly distinct from his own.

“I don’t think you got the memo yet,” Noctis says, stroking his chin. But he pulls his hand away and stares at it, feels for his chin again and mutters something about not being thirty anymore. 

Ardyn doesn’t really understand the notion behind that, but he really has no time to try considering he’s still trying to wrap his head around everything else that seems far more important and life-altering.

On the ride back to the coast, where he can make out the outline of a tall tower — a dead lighthouse, according to Noctis — there’s plenty of time for Ardyn to get filled in on this “memo.” It’s a fantastical story, albeit a tragic one, of a prince and his retinue travelling to meet his fiancée, only to discover his kingdom and his father have met an untimely end and that his bachelor road trip was only the beginning of a grim spiral towards death. 

It’s a story of how Ardyn, gone mad from centuries of imprisonment and betrayal of those he once loved and the gods he worshipped, promised a reckoning upon the world. 

More than half of this was going over Ardyn’s head, despite how much he wants to understand. He thinks he gets the gist of it — most of the prophecy part anyway — though some part of him is in denial that he really would become this embodiment of evil the two claim him to be.

But by the time they near the coast, he can see it. See his descent into madness from years of isolation, experimentation, fear and anger and betrayal. 

When they reach the underground dock and both Noctis and Luna help him down and across, Ardyn almost doesn’t believe them. Not because of the tales they speak, but because despite everything their Ardyn has done to them, they don’t regard him with venom or malice or a demand for retribution. Luna fetches him an extra blanket, and Noctis goes off for only a moment to return with water and unrecognizable food. 

Ardyn takes it all with gratitude anyhow, wraps the blanket around him tighter and downs the glass in one go, even if he half-expects it to be poisoned because such kindness really should not be given to someone that wanted to doom the world. 

Which makes him wonder. Which makes him realize. 

‘Ah, ’ Ardyn thinks, in resignation, ‘they’ve come to end me. Before tragedy strikes.’

It’s logical. It makes sense, far more sense than having them treat their would-be enemy with such tenderness. They probably just want the peace of mind of giving him a tranquil death, some last reprieve before sending him off. 

Still, that’s kind of them. It’s far better than spending centuries dying and dying and dying in a rotten tomb.

“So yeah. Long story short, we got the short end of the stick,” Noctis sums it up, taking the seat across from Ardyn. “You and me were in for some double-suicide thing because Bahamut said so, Luna died because you were being an asshole —”

“In Ardyn’s defense,” Luna interrupts, voice awfully mild despite the fate she suffered — or would suffer — at future(?) Ardyn’s hand, “I would die regardless due to the covenants. And this Ardyn isn’t quite yet the same one we knew.”

“ Yet. Anyway, and if I didn’t manage to kill you? Dragon dick had a back-up plan to zombie-fy Luna and literally vaporize the entire world. So yeah, good-bye humanity that I was apparently supposed to save.”

“And… now?” Ardyn asks, hesitant, then motions a hand to himself, “You've come to nip the bud, I assume.”

Noctis stares at him, then widens his eyes just a fraction in surprise. He turns to Lunafreya, who shares the same expression, and they exchange silent words and sweeping eyebrows. It doesn't take long for them to separate, when Luna turns her head and hides her smile behind her hand, her stifled laughter still evident despite her efforts. Noctis is much the same, though he doesn't even try hiding his face. 

Ardyn isn't as amused as either of them however, and his confusion must show because Noctis quickly recovers and goes for an explanation. 

"No, gods, no. I can't believe you — what would be the point of us getting you out of Angelgard in the first place? There are quicker ways to kill a man y'know. Don't tell me you were this naive back in your day." Noctis shakes his head, but the amusement in his eyes remain. 

Ardyn still doesn't get it. If they're not here to kill him, to stop him before this foretold darkness comes to pass, then why are they here? The prophecy must still exist, the Scourge is still within him — he can feel it crawling and slithering underneath his skin — and no doubt the gods would have his soul banished if they can help it. And no doubt that they'll use every little trick they can.

"I don't understand," Ardyn says slowly, wondering what they would possibly need him for if not for his death. "If you're not here for me, then for what have you come here for?" 

Noctis looks upon him with a wicked grin, the moonlight outlining his silhouette with a fine silver and casting a shadow across his face. But the way his eyes glow, a deep and ominous magenta that cuts through the darkness, makes Ardyn think of him the great oppressing villain instead. And beside him, the ever-merciful Oracle, only smiles along sweetly. 

“Like I said: we’ve got gods to kill.”