Chapter Text
The Regalia is just like he remembered.
It’s been ten years since he last drove it. (Ten years, or maybe just a month?) Before they’d left for Altissia. Either way, it feels just like yesterday; either way, it feels like a lifetime ago.
It feels like coming home.
He slides into the driver’s seat and leans forward, resting his head on the steering wheel and breathing in the scent of leather, the feeling of safety, of being with his father—of being with his friends. A home in his childhood. A haven on the road.
This car he sits in was destroyed, finally beyond repair, ten years ago. A couple of months from now. But the memories . . . they’re all still there.
Who knew he’d have time to make a few more?
He’d gone to sleep in an underground bunker just outside the Citadel, fingers twined in Umbra’s fur, friends trying to steal a few hours of sleep on the other bunks. Now here he sits, the night before the Dawn at last, in the beautiful morning light of a world doomed to a decade of ruin.
He hopes it will heal, once he’s gone. That, in a few years—a few years from then, not now —Caem will have this same sweet smell of sun-warmed grass, mixed with salt-braced sea breeze.
It’s good to remember how the world used to be. How it can be again.
His friends are coming down the hill. They’re talking in low, nervous tones that make his heart clench. Yesterday, they were ten years older, wearied by the weight of carrying a world through the darkness and marked by unfamiliar scars. The three-day trek from Hammerhead into the heart of Insomnia had given him enough time to adjust, it turns out. Enough time to make them all look so unspeakably young now.
They’ve sacrificed so much already, and the months and years to come won’t be kind.
He drags in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Steels himself to see this day through. Maybe he should be angry with the Astrals for messing with him now , at the end—
But he can’t find it in himself to shun the gift of one more day together in the sun.
The car ride is quiet. For once, Gladio finds it unnerving, rather than miraculous.
Scruffy-beard-Noctis keeps sneaking sideways glances at them all, and he’s not the only one returning the favor. The radio’s down low, and he can only catch bits and snatches of melody from his seat in back. It’s all so mundane, so normal; could just be another Tuesday out on the road, except for the man in the driver’s seat.
Noctis had insisted on leaving Caem immediately, without alerting the others. Leaving Iris without a word is greasy guilt deep in the pit of Gladio’s stomach, but he knows it’s for the best that they lay low. Especially since at least three of them still have no idea what was happening.
(And, fine. Especially since Iris somehow managed to have a crush on Noct as a skinny, sulky little twig with stupid hair, and he didn’t wanna know what would happen if she saw him actually looking regal. )
“Your Highness,” Ignis says, breaking the silence along a curving slope of highway. “That is, Your—”
“Noct,” Noctis says, cutting off that speculation.
“Noct, then,” Ignis agrees. “Can you tell us what’s happening?”
Noct’s lips press together and he blinks in the bright sun, considering. The movement makes the squarer cut of his jaw more obvious, and it’s definitely . . . weird. Gladio averts his eyes to watch the rocks and roadside grasses whoosh by instead.
“I remember this happening,” Noctis says at last, keeping his eyes on the road. His voice is deeper and lower than it should be, and it’s especially jarring after hearing his voice cracking at awkward moments just yesterday. “Or the aftermath, I mean. Tomorrow, he’ll be—ah, I’ll be back just like I’m supposed to be.”
“Are you entirely certain?” Ignis presses, sounding anxious. “It seems as though you’ve been roughly doubling in age every day, and at that rate, tomorrow could be—”
“I’m absolutely certain,” Noct cuts in, interrupting Ignis firmly; Ignis blinks in surprise, but nods respectfully. “But from what I can remember, you’re short on cash right now, yeah?”
“Thaaaat’s an understatement,” Prompto trills nervously. “Got about enough to split an order of Kenny’s fries.”
“So,” Noctis says, leaning away from the wheel to turn towards them with a wolfish smile that has only ever meant trouble from the younger version of himself, “Let’s tackle a few hunts.”
They start with the easiest hunt Ignis had written down in his little black book, and it’s over almost before it begins.
They creep up on the pack of reapertails through the same tall grasses where Noctis had played an ill-advised game of hide-and-seek with Prompto and Gladio a few days earlier. Ignis just hopes they have no need of Ramuh’s aid this time around.
As it turns out, Noct has no need of anyone’s aid.
He lets Prompto pick off one of the seven repeartails while they’re still out of range, then sends the Engine Blade flying through the air to strike its target dead, barely flickering into existence before he’s onto the next warp-kill. One, two, three, four, five, six—the rest fall before anyone else can get within striking distance.
“C’mon,” Noct says, smirking as he rises from one knee and dusts himself off. “Let’s go grab the reward so we can get you guys some potions and take on some real challenges.”
Gladio’s been gaping next to Ignis, but the words snap him back to reality, and he crosses his arms and grins. “I like the sound of that.”
“Ooh, I don’t!” Prompto volunteers. “I like easy.”
“Easy, eh?” Gladio jokes, going to mess up Prompto’s hair; Prompto squawks and ducks away.
“I’m not even going to touch that,” Ignis says primly.
Noct just throws his head back and laughs.
The next hunt’s harder. Not that it matters.
They’re fueled up on potions and, yes, Kenny’s fries (at Noct’s insistence, giving Ignis a gnawing sense of dread that he still has not outgrown his . . . gustatory proclivities).
Noct manages to put down half the herd of Scourge-twisted spiracorns all on his own, while the rest just sit back and pick off stragglers.
Ignis wishes he could just sit back and watch the way this older Noctis fights. He’s all brutal, elegant power.
He wonders where it all came from.
The third hunt’s more of the same. It’s almost getting monotonous, Ignis thinks. The only real thrill is how much more profit they pocket on each hunt when they aren’t using curatives.
That false sense of security comes back to bite them on the fourth hunt, when all chaos breaks loose, and Ignis desperately wishes he had come up with a plan.
It’s not that they aren’t a match for the kingatrices. They’re more than a match for the feathered foes, though they do inflict nasty poison and Ignis can’t seem to avoid it for more than two minutes.
No, the problem is that there are far too many of them. Which means that while Noct phases and slashes through the birds, the rest of them are running around like headless chickatrices.
Ignis brings his polearm down in a wide, arcing slash, though the movement makes his stomach slosh and the world spin.
“Iggy, you’re not lookin’ so hot,” Gladio yells.
“If I stop every time these blasted things poison me I’ll never get a hit in,” he snaps back, feeling irritable at the indignity of this ridiculous fight; the kingatrice he’s fighting warbles in pain as he stabs at it, though he can feel his grip weakening.
“Can’t pour from an empty cup, Iggy!” Prompto calls, then rapid-fires a series of ear-splitting gunshots.
“Come again?” he asks, even as Noct warps to him and puts a steadying hand on his shoulder. The touch sends healing magic washing through him, tingling through to his fingertips, stronger than any he’s ever gotten from a battlefield save. It also stops the churning in his stomach.
Hmm.
“You know,” Prompto continues. “Put on your own oxygen mask, all that, rememb—ahhhh !” He cuts off as the bird he’s fighting flaps its wings up in his face, and Ignis jumps over to skewer the creature straight through.
“That’s the last of them!” Gladio calls.
“When did you learn to do that, Noct?” Ignis asks Noct as he turns and dismisses his lance into the armiger.
Noct just smiles with a shrug, and Prompto wheels towards him.
“C’mon, buddy, you’re literally from the future, can’t you give us some hints or something?”
“Nope,” Noct says, popping the “p.”
“You’re no fun,” Prompto whines.
“Guess some things never change,” Noct snarks back. “But one thing I can tell you—”
“It’s gonna be something stupid, isn’t it? Like that you’re still better at King’s Knight than me?”
“—is that we are going to have to go back and kill that death daemon in the graveyard if you want your Noctis back in the morning.”
Ignis feels his eyebrows rise. He’d almost forgotten about the daemon and all of his investigations once Noctis had taken over their direction.
Noctis solemnly turns his gaze on their shocked faces, one after another, before lingering on Prompto. “Did you just admit I’m better than you at King’s Knight?”
Prompto opens his mouth, then apparently thinks better of it and snaps it shut.
Noctis looks a little smug.
There’s a little village near the graveyard.
They hadn’t stopped by before; Prompto doesn’t think there’s anything to stop for, really. Just a graying stretch of road with a couple dozen homes on either side.
This time, though, they park at the Alstor Slough Crow’s Nest where they’d originally gotten the tip. Noct talks with the tipster a bit more, and he admits there’s a weird . . . something up by the graveyard, sometimes, chasing away those who visit and becoming a legend that scares the local kids. No one’s ever been attacked before, though.
Noct thanks him and makes idle small talk about business for a bit. It’s . . . yeah, it’s weird. Noct’s been way chattier with strangers out here than back home (especially his weirdly prescient fishing buddy), but this feels more like Gladio’s territory. Setting people at ease, giving them attention, finding out what they need to know.
The whole thing is weird. Prompto kind of feels like he’s going to vibrate out of his body, honestly, with just how mind-bendingly weird it is, and after the week they’ve had? Well. That’s saying something.
Because seeing Noct like this — all mature and kingly , for all he dodges that question — kind of makes him weirdly proud? But it also kind of fills his heart with dread.
Because he sees the way Noct looks at them, sneaking glances with a thoughtful gaze, like he can’t believe what he sees when he looks at their faces. And what does that mean? What does literally any of it mean?
Whatever future Noct’s come from, though, he’s clearly enjoying the break. So Prompto tries to keep it light.
But it’s hard when this grimmer, older Noctis makes him afraid for what’s ahead.
After they settle up at the Crow’s Nest, they walk down the road to the town. A couple of people peer at them through windows, and an old man painting a shed lifts a hand in greeting, but no one stops them as they walk up a little path worn by feet and time through waving green grass. It leads to the little cemetery on the hill where they’d first come for that quick, easy hunt.
It’s late afternoon, and the single tree on the hill casts long shadows over the graveyard.
“What do you think we gotta do to call it out?” Prompto asks nervously, scooching a little closer to Gladio, who tolerates it.
“Hm?” Noct says, from where he’s reading a headstone. “Oh.”
He closes his eyes, and the shadows seem to grow deeper; when he opens them, they’re rimmed in violet.
And the daemon appears, spawning in mid-air: red-eyed horse and rider all in one, with churning mechanical chariot wheels behind and a ghostly aura.
It is, Prompto decides, spooky as all get-out.
It comes crashing down with a clatter of hooves on the hard-packed earth, sending them all jerking backwards and out of its way.
Prompto’s firing as he backs up, aiming for the glowing red eyes of horse and rider; then he ducks behind a tombstone as the horse charges and swings its head towards him, glinting scythe protruding from the beast’s forehead.
But Noct’s warping in front of it in the next moment, darting in among the clattering wheels to strike at the mechanics, and then back out, even as Ignis flings daggers and Gladio closes in from behind, waiting to deliver a devastating blow.
Prompto fire-fire-fires in a steady cadence, hoping Noct’s presence is enough to distract the creature.
It’s not.
The horse rears, screaming with a voice like a human’s, and then charges straight for Prompto.
Noct’s in front of him in an instant, pushing him out of the way (he goes flying on his ass into the dirt, not that anyone’s watching to give him shit for it) and holds a greatsword aloft, blocking the crash of hooves that send sparks flying off the steel.
And then Noct shoves back , sending the creature sprawling backwards.
“You will not touch them,” Noct snarls, stalking closer, and his eyes blaze into violet.
It’s an entirely different picture than when Noct usually summons, falling to his knees, clutching at his head, weak for hours afterwards. No, right now he’s standing upright, shoulders squared and fury radiating off of him.
No Astral appears in the sky.
But a single enormous blade, as wide across as the Regalia, comes flying down from the clouded sky and skewers the daemon into the ground, where it dissolves in a bubbling puddle of sick black-and-purple miasma.
Bahamut, the Bladekeeper.
The sky lightens as it fades, ashes flaking into gold, and Prompto could swear he hears a child laugh.
For a moment, they all stand in the golden sunlight, which has come back out from behind the unnatural clouds.
“Uhm, who was that?” Prompto asks, then glances at Noct, who’s already shaking his head. He rolls his eyes dramatically. “Fine, keep your secrets, mysterious old man.”
“I will, thanks,” Noct replies with a grin.
“Is it gone for good?”
They all turn.
The speaker is a woman, maybe in her 40s. She’s clutching a bouquet of wildflowers in one fist; she is pale and trembling.
“Was this creature known to you?” Ignis asks, gaze sharp as he takes a step towards her.
She averts her eyes, bites her lip, and nods. “The Eligor, some call it. It’s . . . Not always here, but it shows up. Sometimes. Enough that most people don’t come ‘round to visit anymore.”
Ignis opens his mouth to ask another question (probably wondering why no one had bothered to warn them about the freaky death daemon that liked to pop out in the graveyard), but Noct beats him to it.
“It’s gone,” Noct says, voice gentle. “Who are you visiting?”
Ignis glances at him with surprise and steps backwards, harsh questions clearly dying on his tongue.
The woman swallows. “My daughter.”
“Show me?”
She looks uncertain, but winds through the rows of headstones all the same, stopping briefly at a few to lay a single flower from the bunch by the headstones. The whole bouquet, however, she lays atop a grave with a small, simple marker:
CLARA
741-746
Prompto’s mouth presses into a firm line against the sadness of that. Only five years old, and gone for ten years now.
The woman straightens and takes in a shuddering breath as Noct stands behind her, solemn and watchful. All his youthful awkwardness is gone, now; it’s just Noct as Prompto’s always known he could be, kind and and concerned, full of care for the people he meets. The guy who would hike halfway across Eos to make sure a shipment of beans would make it on time to a small restaurant that really needed it.
But now, he’s steadier. Willing to be. To hold witness.
“She died in a daemon attack,” she says. “You’ll find others here. Mostly children. The lights . . . they went down too long, and it was hard to get everyone out. We weren’t ready for how fast they came.”
“What was she like?” Noct asks.
The woman laughs a little, like a sob. “Trouble. Always trouble, and always laughing. Too clever for her own good. I know she woulda been somebody, you know? But I’ll never get to see, now.”
“I’m sorry,” Noct says, like he means it. “She should be here, still.”
The woman nods, jerkily, and turns towards Noct with a single flower still between her fingers; she steps towards him and tucks it into a buttonhole on his jacket. “But now, I can at least come and see her grave more often. Stay awhile. Been hard, not having that. So thank you.”
Noct dips his head as she steps back. “It was the least we could do.”
They leave her there, sitting beside the grave, and begin the walk back to the haven without needing words to decide so.
“I can’t even imagine,” Gladio says, shaking his head, once they’re far enough away.
Prompto can’t either. “Living in Insomnia, we never had to worry about that. Not with the Wall.”
“It’s hard to fathom such a loss,” Ignis says.
“One day, the night won’t be something to fear,” Noct says softly, fingering the flower in his lapel.
It sounds like a promise.
After dinner, while Gladio gets a fire going and Prompto looks through his photos from the day (none of Noctis, who insisted it would break his 20-year-old self’s brain), Ignis finds Noctis at the edge of the campsite.
“I know this must be very strange,” Ignis says. “Being back here, like this.”
Noct’s low laugh has a little extra gravel in it. “Honestly? In some ways, it feels just like yesterday.”
The sun is starting to set, powdering the stripes of clouds hanging low to the horizon in shades of pink and purple. They stand, together, watching.
“Ignis,” Noct says, after a while. “Do you . . . have any regrets? Things you wish you could go back, do differently?”
“You’re wondering whether you should tell us what comes next.”
Noct’s soft smile tells Ignis he’s not surprised Ignis has read his mind. “Do you?”
Ignis considers.
Would he do things differently, if he could go back? If traveling through time was an option—and oh gods, is it an option? Clearly some kind of magic’s at play here—
“Iggy,” Noct prompts again. Softer, older. Confident.
How can he regret whatever they’ve done if this is the King that Noctis becomes? The same Noct, but assured, confident, softly regal? Unless there is a way to chase away the grief that haunts his face . . .
“There are things I wish were different,” Ignis says. “Events I wish had not happened.”
“Choices you wish you hadn’t made?”
“Cooking that garula meat we scavenged,” Ignis admits, and is pleased that Noct barks out a laugh.
“Yeah, well, it was a close thing, but we pulled through,” Noct says. “We . . . we always have, no matter how bad things get.”
Ignis hums, waits. If he’s being honest? Yes, he’d like some insight from the future. Some warnings about what to avoid, some short-cuts to make their life easier.
But Noct draws in a breath, watches the sun dip below the horizon. “There are things I wish were different, too.” He places a hand on Ignis’s arm. “But what I really want you to know . . . you should know how much it meant to me, that you all stood by me, even then. Even . . . now.”
“Especially now,” Ignis says around the tight pressure in his throat. “And always.”
“Always,” Noct echoes.
“Still, I’m glad I could see who you grow to be,” Ignis says, and Noct’s hand clenches painfully around his arm for the briefest of moments.
“Me too,” he says.
The sun dips below the horizon.
The next morning dawns bright and early.
Noct, predictably, does not.
Each of them stops to peel back the sleeping bag he’s got covering his face, just to confirm he is, in fact, back. Gladio goes one step further and jerks the entire sleeping bag off in one fluid motion; Noct grumbles and goes back to sleep on the tent floor.
The three of them eat breakfast (steak and eggs, courtesy of their refreshed funds) and try to decide what the hell they should tell Noct.
“It sounds like he knew about the whole de-aging thing,” Prompto says. “He said we’d told him, so he won’t remember . . . but that means we did tell him, which means we will tell him, right?”
“What if we didn’t?” Gladio asks. “Kinda brain-melting, and he doesn’t have a lot to spare, if you catch my drift.”
“First, rude, and second, do you wanna tear a hole in the space-time continuum?!”
“That isn’t what that means,” Ignis sighs. “But regardless, Noctis has already given us the answer. We tell him what happened, but not about yesterday.”
Gladio frowns. “Doesn’t feel right.”
Prompto squints into the distance. “He told me not to take pictures, yesterday. That he wouldn’t be ready to see himself . . . like that.”
“Well,” Ignis says. “There you have it, from Noct himself.”
As if summoned, Noct chooses that moment to stumble out of the tent, shielding his eyes from the sun with one hand and clutching his phone in the other.
“How’d we get steak?” he asks, and then glances down at his phone. “And what the hell happened to my phone?”
The three of them trade eye contact until Noct clears his throat. It's Prompto who finally says: “Well, buddy, have we got a story for you.”