#me busting in with my destiny 2 headcanons on how rezzes via the light work: hi

[vaniccio]

sea’s wol challenge — xix. apart

Thancred doesn't pull his punches. 

Ardbert has known this since day one. And while he's glad the scion isn't holding back, he also can't help but feel like there's something else being worked out here given the ferocity of the attacks. 

He lifts his arms to parry another blow. The impact of the gunblade hitting his axe sends sparks flying and rattles his teeth all the way down his spine. But whereas Thancred excels in mobility, Ardbert wins out in strength, and with a direct hit like this he knows he has the advantage. He sets his jaw, plants his feet, and forces his opponent back.

“Got something you want to discuss?” he asks in the lull that follows. 

Thancred arches a brow. “Thought we already are.” 

Ardbert exhales and adjusts his footing. "Right, then."

The spar drags well into the afternoon.

. . . 

Later, as they retire to the shade of the town’s towers, he considers what might be souring the air between them. He hasn’t insulted anyone—at least not to his knowledge—and they’ve since put the scuffle at the Dravanian Forelands to rest. 

While he ponders if he’s unknowingly committed some sort of Eorzean faux paus, Thancred settles in the space at an arm's length to his right. The man wipes the sweat from his brow, pulls out a canteen, and takes a long swig of it. The silence settles heavily in the space between them, charged and tense in a way that has Ardbert coiled as though he’s gearing for a fight.

"I haven't had a spar like that in some time," Thancred finally says, gaze fixed on a cluster of jutting crystals in the hills ahead. "You certainly know how to put someone through their paces."

Ardbert exhales slowly as some of the tension leaves him. “The feeling’s mutual.” A brief pause. “I can only imagine what you’d be like had you the Echo as well.”

“Ah. A blessing I would surely pass on given the choice. Fainting mid-battle doesn’t sound appealing in the least, thank you kindly.”

That pulls a small smile from him. Perhaps he’s misreading things? "T'is a fickle gift—if one would call it that."

"Most would."

He can sense the man working towards something, talking around the subject. Could practically hear the question sitting at the tip of Thancred’s tongue. He just can't figure out the end goal here, and can’t pinpoint the cause of the hesitation to begin with. 

And after another painfully prolonged silence, he sighs. "You've a question to ask. Ask it."

Thancred gives him a sidelong look and a wry smile. "Please. I'm trying not to be a boor."

"To spare my sensibilities?" Ardbert snorts. "Just ask and be done with it."

"If you so insist." Thancred clears his throat. "What is it like? The resurrection part of the Echo, I mean." He hazards another careful, measured glance at Ardbert. "If you care to share. I understand it can be a private matter."

How do you explain the Echo to someone who doesn't have it? Some parts are self-explanatory and easily relatable, he figures—such as the second wind and burst of strength it grants. But returning from death? The sensation of being woven back together, piece by piece, until you resembled the shape of who you were prior? It was all much more than simply waking from a dreamless slumber.  

"It depends," Ardbert says slowly, leaning forward on his elbows. "The recoveries differ depending on the severity of injury. Some take mere moments to return from. Others… are not so simple to shrug off."  

Thancred weighs his answers with a solemn look. "Do you remember them all?"

"No."

He goes silent at that. Ardbert doesn’t blame him. The implications of missing memories isn’t something he cares to think about either—out of necessity more than anything. Remembering trauma isn’t a pleasant experience. Not for the mind. Not for the body. And as someone who’s passed through death, full and true, he knows better than most what sorts of scars that experience can leave on a person. 

Moments like that leave their mark. They dig deep into the psyche despite the Echo’s insistence of spiriting it all away, and to this day Ardbert finds himself flinching to some deathblows more than others with no rhyme or reason to it all. 

He sighs deeply and turns his head to the setting sun and its warmth, gaze distant and pensive. "Care if I ask a question of my own?"

"By all means. Fair’s fair."

"Why the curiosity? If you’ve no interest in it all."

From the corner of his eye, he can see Thancred mull over the question. "Because," he eventually starts, and there’s a tired note there now, “I find that despite not truly wanting it, I sometimes wonder at how much more I would be able to do. How much more capable I would be." He pauses then, as if weighing the next words carefully. "And... at times, how I’d be able to traverse the shards as you and Mihren do."

And like a gear sliding into place, it all clicks. The frustration. The hidden note of envy. 

"The girl from the Crystarium," Ardbert notes quietly. "You miss her."  

The smile Thancred gives him is weary—but true. "Perhaps," he murmurs. "But we all miss someone.”