iwillshieldhim | The World We Fought For [for fieryknowledge]

Entry tags:

The World We Fought For [for fieryknowledge]

It was oddly calm in those last moments, a peace that came over him as he fought purely on muscle memory against the massive giant trying to smash him. Somewhere behind him, he could hear Prompto, not just the sound of gun fire, but it sounded like he was screaming, over and over, as he fought. Wordless angry shouts that if he had the time to think, to care beyond second to second of just surviving, would have torn him apart. The sound of pain, of loss, of anger. He'd lost track of Ignis, always so silent, and he feared the worst. He tried to look anyway, find his love in the chaos. Make sure he was still-

Second to second, he shouldn't have looked away. The giant found its opening as Gladio's eyes scanned the wreckage, trying to spot Ignis in all of it. The fear in his heart settled when he spotted the other, still up, still fighting, even as the massive blade slammed under his guard and sent him flying to hit the ground hard. A spike of pain screamed in his shoulder, but he barely noticed.

They had turned their back on Noct to let him die, walking forward to their fates knowing they would do the same. All they had to do was hold on long enough, just long enough to let him truly become the Chosen King. Gladio had accepted what would come, and while he thought Ignis knew, in a way, he was content with this. He had protected Noct until the end. Ignis might still live.

The giant raised its blade, and try as he might, Gladio couldn't get his own blade to lift. It wouldn't be possible on that broken shoulder. He stared up at his death, then let out a breath. ...I kept my promise.

I love you, Iggy.

Let there be light.

It came across the skies like a needle thrust into the heart of the darkness itself, a shaft of light so brilliant and golden that it hurt the eyes. The giants roar hurt almost as much, stabbing into his head until he was forced to close his eyes.

unconscious

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Gladio knew it was coming. His hand was right there, cupped to the side of Ignis' face, his thumb stroking over the prominent cheekbones. "I got you. Stay with me, Iggy." If Ignis passed out, he knew it was going to get rougher rapidly, but he wouldn't blame his lover. "Stay with me. Just keep focused on my voice."

He would keep it up, murmuring anything that came to his mind to try and get Ignis to stay conscious until the pain became bearable. ...It hadn't gone so well with him, but this pain wouldn't be over so quickly. "Just need to get this cleaned up and stitched. ...Get some of that crazy potion in you and you're going to sleep the worst of it off, after that."

It didn't take long for his knuckles to go white as he gripped the edge of the tub as hard as he could. His breath grew shallow and harsh, hissing through clenched teeth as he tried to keep any sound of pain from escaping. He knew that soaking the wound would be best, but there was no way he could stand it that long so even as he leaned himself against that grounding touch along his cheek, his other hand moved to damn near dig into the wound to try and get it cleared out as quickly as he could manage.

The wash of pain made his head swim and his stomach roll and if he'd had anything in it, it probably wouldn't have remained there for long, but three decent sweeps of the wound and he stiffly asked Gladio how it looked. Oh, he hoped it was clean enough now...

Gladio made sure to keep a hand on Ignis so that if the other went, he wouldn't fall in any particular direction, his hand sliding down to Ignis' shoulder. He looked closer at the wound, telling Ignis to briefly bring his knee up to bring it out of the rapidly changing water, and nodded. "It'll be enough." It had to be; he was fairly sure Ignis wasn't going to stay conscious much longer if it didn't.

"If I leave you here long enough to grab the needle and thread, will you stay with us?" Because he wasn't about to leave Ignis to crack open his head or worse.

His thigh was throbbing again but that was a good deal better than numb. Numb meant more nerve damage and he would honestly rather have the pain. He managed a shaky nod as he worked to settle his breathing back down to something normal before he reached up to absently pat at Gladio's hand before letting himself lean back just a bit.

"I'll be alright."

"...Better be." He brushed his fingers through Ignis' hair gently before he went to go get the equipment they needed. There was a pause long enough to actually touch Noct again, to make sure his friend was still breathing, still warm, and a second touch to Prompto who only curled in closer to Noct. ...Both of them.

He came back to Ignis, putting stuff on the counter near the tub, making sure the other was still with him. "...they deserve so much more time together than the world's gonna give them." Prompto went ten years without Noct; it wasn't fair.

Ignis could argue that life wasn't fair but he wouldn't. Not when he completely agreed with Gladio. Unfortunately, he knew he was right. Insomnia needed its King if it had any chance to rebuild after the long night.

He murmured and shifted a bit restlessly in the water, his skin prickled with something more than just temperature.

"Is it wrong of me to think that maybe we should disappear once we all have a chance to recover a bit? This is home, but... he deserves a life of his own. They both do."

So do we went unsaid because as always, Ignis thought of everyone else first.

Silence. Physically and verbally. Then, after a few long pause, Gladio said quietly, "no, because I've had the same thought. In the end... it comes down to what he wants to do. If he wants to be King, then... I'll still be here with him." But something in his voice suggested exactly what he thought.

That Noct didn't really want to be King.

"Cindy, Talcott... they're the only people alive who know Noct came back."

They could all disappear, really. Though Gladio wouldn't willingly leave his sister behind entirely and he knew Prompto wouldn't his father, either.

They both knew that Ignis would remain by Noct's side if he chose to stay but he privately wondered if he would out of a sense of duty and not really because he wanted to. Still, that was a discussion for another time, after Noctis was awake and aware because damn it, he would be if Ignis had any say about it.

With a shaky sigh, he reached up and pushed a damp hand through his hair and turned his head toward Gladio.

"Something to decide after we're all recovered, then. All of us."

"...Yeah. Once we've recovered." They wouldn't have that long. ...Maybe there was a way, though. "I'm gonna put a call into Cor. Tell him we need time. If anyone can keep this city locked down for a while, it's him." The people returning wouldn't be immediate, but they needed the snoops to remain away as long as possible.

Because eventually, chaos was going to occur. Looting. Worse.

He took a breath and sat down on the toilet as he carefully started to disinfect his hands, the needle, even the thread itself. "Do you want to do this, or want me to?"

Calling Cor was something Ignis hadn't thought about which showed how distracted he was at the moment. Gladio's idea pulled a murmur of agreement from him even as he let his head droop forward a little in an effort to relax himself a bit.

"... I could try, but I'm not sure how long I'll last and I don't want to risk slipping a stitch."

Brutal honesty from the man that could gloss over damn near anything.

It broke Gladio's heart to hear Ignis talk like that, but they both knew it was true. Not that Gladio felt completely up to speed right now, but between the two of them, he believed they could get the job done. So, with a nod, he reached down and started to carefully wash Ignis, just using one hand and the water in the tub. It was getting filthy, but it was warm and better than using nothing at all. He had to work to avoid Ignis' back though, other than a few drips falling across the burns. The other had to tilt his head forward and that got a bit of a clean, then Gladio took enough time to do the same to himself, brisk and basic, not caring if he dripped across the floor or soaked his pants.

"Let's get you out of the tub and we'll tackle the stitches." He offered his arm to Ignis, knowing that he couldn't get the other out easily with one arm but once Ignis was up he could scoop up his lover.

Getting him out of the tub wasn't easy at all, but they managed. There was a moment where he just clung to Gladio the best he could, a quick flash of a much younger, much less sure of himself Ignis passing in his expression. There was no mistaking the fear there, but the resolve remained the same.

"... Prompto's going to hate it when we have to clean him up."

Gladio couldn't wrap his arms around Ignis, between his shoulder and Ignis' burns, so he laid their heads together in the next best thing he could do. They got Ignis onto the toilet and Gladio frowned to see the thigh wound bleeding again, but st least it looked cleaner and less angry.

"He's going to hate every second of it, but... he's got Noct back. He'll put up with it." Kid was tougher than he looked. Besides, he was pretty sure Prompto had gone through some shit in his life that he wouldn't even talk about but certainly had nightmares about.

He slowly knelt down and grabbed the anti-septic and a towel, making sure the skin he had to puncture again and again was clean and dry. "Once Noct's done his beauty sleep, then.. then what? We are in shit shape to travel... might be able to find a car, though." He wanted to keep Ignis thinking about anything other than his thigh as he got the needle and thread ready.

"True enough. Love does have a habit of making someone stronger than they believe."

He'd already resolved to do everything in his power to see that Prompto and Noctis were as happy as possible. If this truly was a second chance, there would be no squandering it. Not for any of them. It might not be easy, but they'd done harder things.

The idea of Gladio's pulled a quick, wan smile to Ignis' lips as he let his head tip back while his mind wandered a little.

"Another road trip. We could stay at Galdin Quay for a while. There's that haven just off the beach... I imagine it's beautiful now that the sun's up again."

That statement made Gladio wonder - had Ignis gotten through the beginning of his blindness because of their love? No, he decided a moment after that thought. Ignis was a strong man in of his own right; he would have gotten through no matter what. ...A little help from his friends probably came in measure, though.

He could remember that haven well. Tucked up there because they couldn't afford the caravan, never mind the hotel, it had been paradise in his book. A roaring campfire, the sound of the ocean all around them, the sand and grass right at their feet... he let out a quiet sigh of memory. "Yeah," he said warmly as he carefully drew the skin together after tying a firm knot in the thread. The black, strong material would look ugly against Ignis' skin, but better than the open wounds.

"You remember what you made there the first time?" They had took on a hunt of some big ass crabs, and the meal Ignis had made that night out of their meat had been beyond compare. The first pinprick came of the needle, and Gladio began to sew the first channel shut as delicately as he could, trying to remember how Ignis always did it.

It had certainly helped, even if Gladio had been a handful of his own just after Altissia and the rest of them shaken to the core. Ignis had been strong long before that, had found himself and his own self-confidence at a young ago though there were still moments when that wavered.

That memory was a welcome one. There'd been a peace there that Ignis hadn't felt in many other places. Watching the water as he enjoyed the warmth of the fire and the companionship of his family around it. Of course he remembered. Hells, he even remembered how to make it and quietly promised himself that he'd find a way to do it again if he could.

"Th- the curry. I thought it might've been too heavy at first."

As he spoke, he started to tense up a bit, trying to breathe his way through the pain.

Gladio... tried, hard, not to think of Altissia too much. It still gave him horrific nightmares, things he never wanted to think of again. Like finding Ignis among the rubble, the bloody smear that had been his face, the utter stillness of his body that had made him think he'd been too late. He still didn't know exactly what happened, but he never would stop the guilt that rose when he should have been there. Evacuees should never have been more important.

"No, it was perfect. That whole thing about... what, complimenting the crab?" See, Iggy? He at least sort of listened when you talked about cooking. It always made him smile in the past when Ignis would get into the depths of something he was passionate about, even if he didn't always follow.

Gladio knew there was nothing else he could do except do the best job he could while not taking too long, either. So he worked the best he could with one hand, growling quietly for Ignis to keep his hands in place to keep the flesh together.

Ignis had never told Gladio what had happened and he never would. Not when the truth would only pull up helpless, pointless anger in his lover. There was never a 'right time' for that and there never would be.

He managed a shaky smile for Gladio, his hands almost slipping as they tried to hold fast so Gladio could work as quickly as he could manage. At this point, he was almost willing to sacrifice some of his mobility and use a potion on the damned wound just to make it stop hurting-

"I'll teach- I'll teach you how to cook it next time."

He knew how bad this was, however he wasn't going to let Ignis sacrifice anything more when they already were this far. So he kept going, finishing off the first channel and completing it with a slightly rough knot, using his teeth to cut the thread with some effort.

"You sure you wanna try teach me cooking? I mean, I'm not Noct," who tended towards burning anything he tried to cook, "but I'm never gonna be you. Hell, Prompto's better at cooking than me." It was almost a joke, but he started on the next channel as soon as Ignis' hands moved over to it.

His head was bent now, each breath a slow hiss of protest as he worked to remain as still as he could when all his body wanted to do was pull away. Still, this was something he could manage and he knew that Gladio would work quickly, for his sake.

"Well... it's good you've... got me around to cook for you then."

His voice was low now, his breathing quickening.

"I'm damn grateful. If we had to live off my cooking, I'm pretty sure we'd all starve." The fact that Ignis could cook with nearly anything had probably saved them more than once in the last ten years as food became scarce, until people had figured out green houses and lights and other things to try and keep the survivors fed.

He hated the fact he was hurting Ignis to save his thigh. It didn't mean he stopped, working down the second channel.

"Besides... who else could deal with Noct, as picky as he is? He needs you." No matter what came out of the next few days, they were all going to need each other. Badly.

There was a low, shaky laugh from Ignis. Gladio wasn't as bad as he thought, but learning to make do in a world with no light would've been a challenge to anyone. That was why he'd done his best to stay by settlements, knowing that he was needed.

He was starting to sweat now, his hands growing paler and paler as the seconds ticked by. The hissing had stopped, replaced by a low groan of protest.

"I'll get him to ea- eat carrots one day. I swear it."

It hadn't been easy in every sense those words could exist in. Gladio had often gone out with hunting parties, unable to stay in one place too long. Every time he tried to settle down for any length of time, eventually his anger would get the best of him and he would do something stupid, say something stupider, and leave. Always to return, always coming home to Ignis, but... sometimes it had been for long periods. Ones where he stayed at Havens and worked to try and control himself but always felt less in control until he worked through whatever was bothering him then... or his anger worked itself out.

He only prayed that Ignis would be able to handle the last one as he tied off the second channel, then decided to hell with it. This was going to be the worst job, probably the ugliest of the scars, but he couldn't do this at all without Ignis to hold the skin together. So this time, he was going faster.

"If anyone could, it's you. Prompto sure isn't helping you, though, even if that kid will at least anything you put in front of him like he's starving." He licked his lips, tasting salt (blood? sweat? he wasn't sure anymore) and focused not on the shake in his lover's hands or voice but what was right in front of him.

Those times had been the hardest. Hearing those familiar steps walking away, leaving him unsure if they'd return. Sometimes, he wondered if some daemon had felled his lover, and others he wondered if it was his own anger. There were times when he was sure that he wasn't coming back at all, and not because he'd been killed. Everyone in the settlements knew then, when Ignis withdrew from their tight-knit little communities, what was going on. In time, he adapted. He learned to live without his sight and in time, he learned to fight without it. He worked to defend who he could and save the ones he couldn't, but it all seemed so hollow.

It still seemed hollow, as if he were waiting for something else to be taken from him. For those achingly familiar footsteps to walk away again, never to return...

Ignis had gone silent now, his fingers trembling as they worked to keep the gaped skin closed so that Gladio could fix them in place.

It wasn't kind of him. Really, he wouldn't have blamed Ignis if the other had drawn away from him completely for being the ass he was. He tried. Fuck, he had tried. Sometimes it just... came out. The rage that was always there inside of him, burning just under the surface, and Ignis did so damn much, so much more than he knew, to keep it where it belonged. Until not even that was enough.

It never stopped him from loving Ignis. Every time he returned home, he tried to show that. In the desperate way they came together, in the sweetness of his hands and mouth and voice, in the rough snap of his hips and the marks he left on pale skin. He never was great with his words when it came to this sort of stuff, so he showed how he could.

"Almost done, almost done..." His speed showed in the decidedly uglier way the stitches were being left behind, but it was enough to close the skin, to reduce the horrible amount of scar tissue that would have been left if they chose not to go with the stitches.

When he was done, he used some of the clean water from the sink and wiped everything clean, then sat back and looked up to Ignis. That... wasn't even the worse part. The burns would be significantly so. And he didn't even realize he himself was breathing hard thanks to being bent over, the pain-pressure put on what were now bruised, not broken, ribs, thanks to the concentrated potion.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject