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Prompto is used to picking up the pieces and puzzling them back together again. He’s been doing it most of his life, jamming them where they (mostly) fit and praying to the Astrals that they stay there. And on the days that he’s feeling a little less humble, he’d almost dare to say that he’s gotten kind of good at it; he can fall apart and rebuild before anybody— even Noct, most of the time— realizes there was ever a piece out of place.
But there’s never been this many pieces before.
And none of them have ever been Ignis'.
If he’s being perfectly honest, he didn’t even think Ignis had pieces. Most of who Ignis is as a person suggests he was just born with the picture all put together already and he’s been following it, composed and steady, his whole life.
The aftermath of Altissia has changed a few things about that picture, mostly by way of the fact that Ignis can’t see it anymore. Prompto hopes he knows it well enough, embroidered it into the fibers of his soul, that he can still follow it, even if the sight doesn’t come back— it will, they keep telling themselves. It will. But… Prompto’s not so sure their luck hasn’t reached its limit.
Not that Ignis has let it slow him down, despite all their (many) protests.
Which seems to be the case even as Prompto wanders down the hall to his room, guided only by the hall lamplights as he goes in the late hour of the night. He knocks on the door, heavy enough that it’s clearly heard, and then slips inside to the sight of Ignis, hunched over the desk in the corner, one pale, yellow light spilling out across the otherwise dark room. It’s difficult to make out much of anything, but, then again, that matters little to Ignis.
“Hey, Iggy… I uh— brought you some tea.”
Ignis turns to him and Prompto realizes then that he still isn’t used to the sight of the bandages and half-healed scars that span his face, because the pang of empathy that punches him in the guts is far too hard to ignore. For a moment, he’s left breathless, guilt and grief strangling his lungs. Desperate to keep it from reaching Ignis, Prompto draws a breath and pushes it to the side as he moves to the desk. Carefully, he places the mug down next to Ignis’ hand with an audible thump, then nudges Ignis’ fingers towards the handle as he pulls away. He feels relief seep into his body when Ignis wraps his fingers delicately into the smooth curve.
“How is Noct?” Ignis asks after a moment, hand tightening on the mug.
Prompto pauses. “I’ve been sitting in there for a few hours; Gladio is there now, but he’s still sleeping. ...Like you should be.”
“I’ve no need,” Ignis replies. His hand tightens on the mug but he doesn’t drink from it. “It’s still early.”
“...Iggy, it’s one in the morning.”
There’s a pause. Ignis’ constructed facade breaks just long enough that Prompto catches a glimpse through the cracks. Prompto sees him glance towards the wall where the clock ticks, and then stop, realization flashing on his face. He runs a hand through his hair— it’s upright, as his normal style would have it, but it’s beginning to fall out of place. A lot of things are beginning to fall out of place. The picture isn’t whole; if it ever was, it certainly isn’t now, and the pieces are getting further apart. It’s jarring and dark, watching the fractures form in such a smooth being.
“Ah.” It’s almost invisible, but his shoulders droop, his fingers falling away from the mug as he sets it down on the table. “My apologies. Must have… lost track of time.”
Prompto flips the subject around quickly, forgetting the clock on the other side of the room and forgetting the way the window near the bed lets in only darkness. “Same old Iggy, huh? What’d you get distracted by this time?”
Ignis seems to relax, just slightly, and Prompto makes a mental note. Strategy one: efficient. Carefully, Ignis reaches to his right, hand closing over a tape recorder that sits silently on the very edge of the desk desk. Prompto wonders if he put it there on purpose, as not to lose it in the vast expanse of wood that stretches, unseen. Ignis clicks a button and a voice flares to life, garbled by static.
“— retreating to the North. Infrastructure damage assessments still continue, but casualties are estimated in counts of —”
With a sigh, Ignis clicks the recorder back to silent, and Prompto is grateful it’s before the body count. He knows the number already— Ignis isn't the only one who has been playing news updates— but he's not ready to hear it again. He wonders, for just a very brief and morbid moment, if Luna is included in that count. He doesn't know which answer to that question is better, and he doesn't want to learn.
“I was updating myself on the news and attempting to strategize our next move, though it will all be dependent on Noctis’ decision... when he wakes.”
“Right…” Prompto says, quietly. “You can get some sleep too, y’know. Call it a night?”
Ignis shakes his head. “I’m afraid my mind needs a bit more time to settle.”
"Want me to keep you company? I can change your bandages," Prompto offers. He glances around the room, eyes settling on a small med kit that rests on the bedside table. Wordlessly, he goes to collect it, bringing it back to Ignis and setting it on the desk with a heavy, telling thump before he can protest. "C'mon."
"Prompto, you don't have to— this can wait until morning."
"Too late. Already here with supplies.” He practically chimes the reply, in a tone far more eager than the situation warrants, but any ounce of hesitation leaves room for further argument. “Besides, it’s one a.m.— you think I have anything better to do?”
“I suppose you could be sleeping.”
“So could you.”
Ignis gives way. It's a triumph and a crushing blow all at once, especially as he dips his head to concede and Prompto finds him looking so, so vulnerable that it hurts.
“How was the tea?" Prompto asks as he begins to pull out fresh bandages. Ignis hasn’t barely even drank any of it, but it’s a question— any question would do— and it will keep his mind off of how bone-deep tired Ignis looks in this too-sad light. "Any good?"
Placating him, Ignis takes another sip before answering. “It’s very nice, Prompto. Thank you.”
“Sure thing. Hold still— I’m gonna take the bandage off.”
Prompto keeps his hands steady as he undoes the bandage over Ignis’ eye. The scar, bursting from the sealed socket like flames licking at Ignis’ skin, is healed almost entirely. The scarring is unusual at best, silver in its color, with a supernatural, magic sheen that makes Prompto sick down to the very bottom of his stomach. It isn’t the look alone, but the implications and the thought of Ignis suffering whatever it was he faced upon the altar is all too much.
“How does it look?” Ignis asks, hesitantly enough that it’s obvious he doesn’t want the answer.
“They’re good,” Prompto replies without missing a beat. “Healing right up. Vision’ll be back in no time and everything’ll go back to normal.”
Mostly.
Ignis flinches, understanding the unspoken. It’s obvious there is a story far larger, holding the truth to the scars that span Ignis’ face and telling of what happened on the altar, that Ignis will not say aloud. Something remains untold, plain to see on whatever map Ignis is still dutifully following, but invisible against Prompto’s scribbled picture. It’s not Prompto’s place to ask, so he doesn’t, but he holds still while Ignis grips white-knuckled at the mug in his hands.
His face tips towards the mug, still and calm until it isn’t, where the build up happens so quickly that Prompto doesn’t have time to prepare. He has no way to stop the way that Ignis’ normally smooth and composed features twist into something pained and raw. He can only scramble, frantically trying to stop the cracks that are forming right under his hands.
“I-I apologize," Ignis murmurs, voice choked and so very not-Ignis. “I shouldn’t be—”
“N-no, it’s okay, Iggy," Prompto says quickly, flying into damage control. He gently pries the mug from trembling fingers, setting it on the desk before taking Ignis’ hands again. “It’s okay.”
Ignis shakes and Prompto simply holds him. He squeezes his hands, trying to keep him steady and patching cracks as they form. Carefully, he kneels down in front of the chair, fingers still intertwined with Ignis’, and hopes to the Astrals it’s enough. It doesn’t feel like enough. Not as tears drop onto their hands and not as Ignis begins to sob, quiet, tired, and broken.
“It’s okay. I’m right here. It’s okay.”
Nodding, Ignis stifles another cry, and raises his hands, still wrapped under Prompto’s, and presses them firmly to his lips to silence his cries. Prompto feels him shaking with the effort to restrain himself, feels him breathing hard against their knuckles. Over and over.
Prompto waits, letting Ignis stitch himself back together again, reforming the picture Prompto can’t see. It might be entirely different; he can’t tell. But Ignis’ harsh breathing slows and he finally drops his hands, letting Prompto pull away just slightly; he keeps his fingertips hovering against Ignis’ wrist, letting him know he’s still there.
“Prompto?” Ignis asks after a moment of catching his breath.
“Yeah?”
“May I selfishly request one more thing?”
“Sure, Iggy— anything.”
Ignis swallows, taking a moment to find the words. Prompto watches as he moves his mouth and jaw a few more times before finally settling on what he wants to say.
“When Noctis wakes,” he says with a deep, trembling breath, “I needn’t worry him with my condition, physical or mental. I ask that you simply pretend that things are as normal, this moment aside. Can you do that— for his sake?”
Prompto is no stranger to hiding the weakness. The request, although it sends a painful shiver through his ribs, is understandable. But to let Ignis suffer, in silence and darkness, is too much. He shakes his head and then speaks up.
“Fine. But you have to be honest with me,” he demands, finding his tone far too commanding against Ignis, of all people.
“Excuse me?”
“If we— if you keep pretending everything is fine around Noctis— I get it, Iggy— I do— ‘cause we have like, a mission and that’s important— but... you have to let me help you when you need it. Okay?”
“For the mission’s sake--”
“No, dude,” Prompto is incredulous. “For yours. For you , okay?”
There’s a look of genuine surprise on Ignis’ face— faint and almost-hidden, but Prompto catches it and it says enough. It urges him to hold Ignis’ wrist a little more firmly and Ignis, as if spurred by the touch, nods quietly.
“I will… Thank you, Prompto.”
Prompto does not sound like himself, not even for how much he tries.
He sits on the bottom bunk of their too-cold, too-echoey quarters of the Keep and chirps, voice too-tight, about the bruises on his arms and how well they’re healing. There’s a joyless laughter in his voice as he talks about the cut on his temple that may just “become a cool scar like yours, Gladio”. And for however much he tries to smile through it, that smile fails to reach his voice and the only thing Ignis has to judge him by, even as he talks about the bruises on his wrist and grins, “kinda kinky, right?”.
For once, Ignis is almost relieved he can’t see the damage. The bruises are hidden behind the black cloud that still blankets his vision— a blanket that, despite all their hopes, has not improved. But the lack of the illusion Prompto puts off just leaves more room for Ignis to call the bluff. Prompto’s voice is wrong, in a tired, broken sort of way. Past the melody he sings while he sits on the bed discussing his bruises as if they’re medals won, Ignis can hear the scratch in the record, the skip in the track. It pulls on his heart strings like harp wires, hoping to fill in the song where Prompto has let it fall away.
Sleep is not in his favor that night, even well after Gladio and Noctis have clambered up the iron ladders of their bunk beds and laid down. Ignis lies awake for a disillusioning amount of time, listening to the distant groans of metal in a fortress long-dead and counting on a clock in his head. On the lower bunk to his left, Prompto rarely remains still, continually rustling in his blankets before throwing them off entirely and sitting up. He remains there, shifting occasionally, when the hour mark on Ignis’ mental clock reaches 3am.
When Noctis and Gladio are finally asleep, breathing low and even, Ignis unburies himself from the covers, stands, and ventures to Prompto’s bunk, cane rapping gently on the metal bed frame.
“May I?” he asks quietly.
“Sure,” Prompto answers, shifting over. Ignis settles himself on the edge, settling the cane near his leg and folding his hands in his lap. Next to him, Prompto moves again, knee bumping against Ignis’ leg, though he makes no motion to move away, as if secretly attempting to leech warmth or comfort or familiarity. It’s another checkmark on Ignis’ ever-growing list that Prompto needs far more help than he’s letting on.
“How’re your eyes?” he asks before Ignis has a chance to say anything more. The question, unlike every other facade he’s put on tonight, is genuine. It spears Ignis in the chest with guilt, made worse by the solidarity he feels, putting others— the mission— Noctis — in front of all concerns for himself.
“They’re stable,” Ignis replies, and it’s all he can reply. The truth is nothing helpful, simply the despairing fact that they’ve gotten no better, and likely won’t.
Uncharacteristically, Prompto is silent. The joking has stopped, a noticeable tension falling between them as Prompto, presumably, struggles to find the words to reply. When several more minutes pass and nothing has been spoken, Ignis softly clears his throat.
“Are you all right, Prompto?”
“Great now that you guys are here,” Prompto chirps.
Ignis frowns. “Are you sure…?”
There’s a very long pause, in which Ignis hears little but Prompto breathing beside him. There’s the occasional dip in the bed, Prompto shifting uneasily as he fidgets. Ignis is patient, hands in his lap as he waits for Prompto to find the words, assuming there are any he has to share at all. Finally, he hears Prompto put his head in his hands, breath smothered by his palms as he breathes against them wetly.
“ No .”
Ignis nods, wordlessly reaching around to put his hand against Prompto’s shoulder, fingers splayed out warmly over the span of his back. He wishes— Astrals , he wishes— that he could do more in the way of physical comfort, but Prompto’s smallest flinch at the initial touch hints at a trauma deeper than bruises, even if he does sink into the touch after a moment, and Ignis knows better than to push.
“You don’t have to be,” Ignis replies. “...It’s all right.”
As if he’d been waiting for the permission to break, Prompto hunches over and begins to cry. The bed trembles with the weight of his silent sobs, held in the back of his throat where he is inevitably restraining them in an effort to avoid waking Noctis and Gladio. It’s a remarkably quiet breakdown, the kind with heavy, trembling shoulders and shuddered breaths and nothing more. Ignis remains quiet through it all and lets him break, hand steady on Prompto’s back as he slowly crumbles.
For all his complaining about miniscule chores, all his whining in dungeons, the theatrics seem to be just that; Ignis can’t actually recall a time he’s watched Prompto cry. The realization rattles him, making the silent weeping beside him more poignant— more real. It’s suddenly clear how much he’s taken Prompto’s chipper demeanor for granted, brushing it off as childish or inappropriate. Instead, he’s been ignoring a sun that shines even while it burns up its own core.
“Oh, Prompto…” he murmurs. “I’m so sorry.”
Prompto laughs, all breathy and incredulous, a hitch in his quiet voice as he asks, “What the Astrals for?”
“I fear I haven’t offered you the same amount of support that you have given in return. Admittedly, given your demeanor, it’s quite easy to forget the depths of your suffering… Insomnia was your home as well.”
“Nah…” Prompto sniffles, shoulder flexing beneath Ignis’ fingertips as he brings his arm to his face to scrub away whatever tears are left. “Insomnia was never really home —”
“The circumstances of your birth don’t invalidate Insomnia as—”
“No, I mean— Insomnia’s a place… You guys— Gladio, you, Noct — that’s what’s always felt like what home was supposed to be, growing up.”
Ignis mulls the words for a moment, realizing that Noctis has always been his center base, the place in which he returns when the world around him starts to grow dim or blurred. Following Noctis has always been the spark on the homecoming torch. It’s why the fate of losing him is more terrifying than the Fall of Insomnia itself.
“I understand entirely,” he says, sliding his hand from Prompto’s shoulder to his knee. In unspoken understanding— and Ignis is grateful for it— Prompto reaches down to take his hand and squeeze. “Wherever our paths lead, know you’re always welcome beside us. Your place is with Noctis, just as much as Gladio and I.”
Ignis hears the choke in Prompto’s voice as he speaks up again, his hand tightening where it’s intertwined with Ignis’. “Okay,” he says, voice perking in a quiet, broken smile. But it’s enough for now. “Okay— yeah. I-I’ll remember that. ...Thanks, Iggy.”
“All in due return, Prompto.”
On the broken steps outside the Citadel, Ignis feels sunlight touch his face.
The dawn has since arrived, one week passed, and with major preparations in place, body of his King laid to rest, and the world slowly restitching itself, he takes what feels like the first real breath. The weight of ten-years darkness has still not fully lifted from his shoulders, peeling away like a sunrise itself rather than the sudden flicker of torchlight. It’s a heavy thing, all thick and stubborn, and even with the new dawn, there is still a darkness behind his visor that he cannot blink away.
He’s tried, in vain hope— one sacrifice for another: a body in the ground and perhaps, should the gods be so kind, a sight restored.
But they have never been so lucky.
Ignis lowers himself to the cold marble steps, dusting away small chunks of rubble as he goes, and sits with his head between his knees while a tightness overtakes his chest. It’s a vise that makes him dizzy; his vision would be swimming with it, if given the chance. He struggles to take another breath, the first merely a cruel preview of what he thought he’d have in the break between his loss and his grief.
He hears the footsteps behind him— and knows exactly who it is— before he feels the hand on his back, splayed out and a little too rough in its touch despite all its intentions. Eager— is the better word, he thinks. Rushing to help. As always.
“I gotchya, Iggy.”
Ignis breaks, folding into Prompto’s arms as the grief crushes his lungs and the remaining shreds of his composure. Around him, Prompto does the same, arms holding tight as he rests his head atop Ignis’ and lets his own reservations go. They shake against each other, Ignis’ tears finding their way onto Prompto’s jacket, Prompto’s dripping into Ignis’ hair. Breathing is not easy, but it is better with a lifeline to cling to, and for a while, they simply hold each other, sunlight feeling too-warm on their skin as they catch their breath and manage to finally straighten up.
Prompto adjusts himself on the steps next to Ignis, but he keeps his hand on Ignis’ wrist, their knees bumping together.
“Glad that part’s over with,” Prompto chokes out a laugh, wiping at remaining tears on his face. “What’s next? Depression and then acceptance, right? Give us another two days and it’ll all be good?”
It’s a pitiful attempt at humor and they both know it, but it’s an attempt. They barely laugh, silence settling between them, lighter than Ignis would expect. There’s a breeze, gentle under the sunlight that now feels oppressive in too many ways, and it ruffles Ignis’ hair back where small strands have fallen out of place in the breakdown.
“Healing isn’t often linear,” Ignis manages after a moment, raising his visor to wipe at his own eyes. “I suspect this will be a fairly long process, for the city, and for us...”
“Right,” Prompto replies. He inhales deeply and then exhales again through his nose. “Should we get to work, then?”
Ignis pulls off a glove and slides his bare hand over Prompto’s. His fingertips brush against Prompto’s, feeling the worn and calloused skin that had become a familiar map to him in the aftermath of losing his sight. Things are different now, and he’s very aware of all the small, battleborn scars that weren’t there ten years earlier; graphed by fights and hardships under the cover of nightfall, not even for the promise of a happy ending.
“For once,” Ignis says, shaking his head, “I think we can afford to take a moment.”
“And that’s okay with you?”
“It will be, given time.”