[Part of him had known. Not all along, not from the start. But the more sunlight began to irritate him, the more things lost their taste and a kind healer became quicker and quicker to anger--he'd known something was wrong.]
[But he didn't stop. He couldn't. As long as Ardyn Lucis Caelum had the power to save even one person out of millions, he would have sacrificed everything. He did sacrifice everything. If he'd been afraid, he couldn't remember. If the savior had ever hesitated, ever faltered--...no, that wasn't possible. To question if what he was doing was 'right' would have rendered it all meaningless and invalidated every single life saved at his hand.]
[Even if it had all been planned and orchestrated--hadn't he still saved people? Didn't that still mean something?]
I can not claim to understand the workings of the Six by any means, apart from Ifrit himself.
[Burn it, he'd thought. Burn it all to ash, that's what they get. Ungrateful humans, the descendants of people that would never have lived if not for the man they condemned and forgot, the line descended from his brother to end in a child who never asked to be a piece of this game...he'd wanted it all destroyed.]
...Yuuri.
[And now here he was, neither savior nor Accursed, willing to sacrifice himself for this group and this group alone. He moved and knelt down in front of Yuuri, gently pulling her hands away from her head.]
I never...thanked you, for everything. For all you've done these past months.
[ It's not fair; none of it is. Ardyn hardly needs Yuuri to tell him just how tragic and terrible his own life is but she feels like she might just explode if she keeps it in her chest. For whatever the man calling himself Ardyn Izunia did for those two thousand years he spent waiting for Bahamut to let him die, that didn't mean Ardyn Lucis Caelum had been worth throwing away like he had been. And that can't have been the only way to do it. Two thousand years of pain and darkness can't have been the only way to wipe the world clean of a plague.
She starts when he touches her. She hadn't been expecting it but really, he was hardly going to sit there idly while she wound herself up. She forces herself to try and calm down -- she can't be the one being comforted here when Ardyn is the one needing to be supported. But still, she finds herself balking. ]
I-- everything I've...? I mean-- I've-- I've tried to help but it... I'm sure it hasn't been enough. There's not enough I can do for you all.
[He'd said the worst of it already, struggled through venting agonizing memories to Church while trying desperately to anchor himself in the present. This was driving him insane, in the literal sense. For as short as a human life was to him Ardyn had doubts he'd be able to hold out for whatever remained of one. And yet it was a little easier now to admit to more of the story, to speak of the Accursed's fate without suffocating beneath the weight of the unknowable, terrible dark. Just a little easier, knowing the family he didn't deserve was there carrying it with him.]
That's not true at all.
[The hands that held Yuuri's now had killed an innocent Oracle, brought ruin upon a planet, and dismantled so many lives for the crime of existing, yet now they were nothing but the warm, living touch of someone who had once used them to bring salvation. Beneath fingerless gloves was skin calloused by the hilt of a sword and by countless scars taken from others long before he'd ceased to be human.]
[And even now, the shard of crystal and image of Bahamut himself was worn openly on his right hand.]
You've spent all this time struggling to keep us together even as you've carried more than anyone should. I'm sure you think most of us haven't noticed, but I certainly have. You were one of the first I confided in a month ago when I was fearing what I would turn into, and you didn't even flinch.
If it wasn't for every single one of you fighting to salvage whatever there was to salvage in that monster, then I wouldn't be here right now. If you and all the others hadn't so stubbornly insisted you would never turn on me, I would never have cracked enough to think I should have demanded my humanity returned to me.
One doesn't have to be a chosen savior to be able to save others. You, Junpei, Leonard, everyone--all of you saved the life of whoever's speaking to you now. Brought something human out of two thousand years of hatred and darkness. How could you ever truly claim that to not be enough?
[ It's never enough. It's nothing that anyone has ever said or even implied they felt but something Yuuri carries in her heart anyway. These people -- her family -- have all done so much for her just by being with her. She can never repay them for what they've all done without even trying. She has to give them everything just to even the scales.
She opens her mouth to say as much or something like it but finds that she can't make the words come out. Because... something about that suddenly rings wrong after the talk they'd just had. After she'd been so furious on his behalf about him being expected to give, give, give and get nothing but pain in return. If she's so angry about that burden being placed on a king then why should she expect something like that from herself? They certainly don't expect it from her.
Her hands tighten a little on Ardyn's. ]
We pulled you out of all that dark but we could only do it because you were reaching back. I don't know if you wanted to be saved, back when this all started. But I know one thing. I know you wanted to help us.
[ It's not a matter of give or take. It's not a matter of equal shares or working yourself til you're sick to convince yourself that maybe that's enough. Because that's not how it works. And because if you feel like you're falling behind, one of us will pull you. And if you feel like you can't go on then one of us will push you.
It's as simple as that, isn't it? Because that's just what family does. ]
Back home, no--I was a long-dead lost cause. Anything that was ever human within Ardyn Izunia had been crushed out and replaced with something twisted and wrong; a cataclysm fueled by the spiteful memories of a dead healer. He didn't want to be saved--at least, not 'saved' in the way you're talking about.
[All that he'd done, all he'd manipulated and influenced behind the scenes--from Insomnia's invasion to Altissia's fall to leading Noctis straight to the Crystal--it had all been leading to one purpose.]
['Only once the Crystal and King are no more...can I know redemption.']
[Salvation and redemption to Ardyn Izunia meant forcing a child of twenty--no, thirty--to be left with no option but to cut down one to save many. To die alongside him, the last two remnants of the Lucian bloodline.]
...I can not say if I wanted to be saved or not in these past months. I think I must have, at one point or another--but I knew I didn't deserve it. I still don't. It should be Noctis here in my place; if either of the last remnants of the Lucis Caelum dynasty should be saved, then it should have been him that lived.
[Ardyn went distantly quiet, stare lowered to their hands for a moment--briefly he was back in Insomnia, rain falling from a blighted sky. 'This time, you can-']
[He shook his head, pulling himself out of his own memories and looking back up to Yuuri.]
...But I didn't have a choice. It seems I never do, when it comes to matters like this. I had no option but to act as pawn to the Astrals because I once wished only to protect others, and the rest of you simply refused to allow me to again crush out that resurrected memory of that human and his blind selflessness. None of you let someone who only knew betrayal simply forget how to trust again.
This family is so much more than I should have. But it's mine regardless.
... I don't think... after everything that's happened I don't think it's about "deserving" things or "what we should have".
[ Her voice is a little halting and unsure. Even as she feels the words out she's not sure what it is she's trying to say. Because if it was about what anyone deserved then they never would've lost Mai. They wouldn't have Kip with them. It feels good to talk about getting justice, giving the network what they deserve but the more Yuuri thinks that word over the less she likes it. ]
Whatever we 'should have' doesn't matter anymore. What we have is... all this. This ship and this family. And I don't think any one of us is ever going to let any of it go. We're yours and you're ours. Deserving or not.
[ She smiles. It's small and tired but it's as sincere a smile as she's ever given any of them. ]
[It was difficult--no, impossible for Ardyn to let go of the desire for vengeance. Someone should have paid for what they had all gone through and all those they'd lost, and as far as he was concerned someone would. Was it right to want bloody revenge on the network? The exalted savior of Lucis would disagree. Vengeance caused more problems than it solved; destroy them and risk something worse rising to take its place. Yet the Accursed would demand fires lit and blood shed, trample the network so soundly underfoot that all across the stars would look to the example and never dare tread the same path.]
[...It was difficult to prioritize what he wanted and what might someday be necessary; Ardyn was only human, after all.]
I don't know if I can completely agree with that. Not after what I've done--I'm the last person deserving of a second chance, no matter what the rest of you think.
But I already tried to discourage all of you once, and we all saw how well that went--at least two of you want to fight a god the size of a building in my defense. Possibly three, if we're to include you. Accursed scourge of an entire planet, and that barely got any of you to blink, much less turn on me.
[Despite the honest but pessimistic wording, a smile drifted across Ardyn's face.]
...You know, when I said I never had children, that wasn't a suggestion that applications were open. [He shook his head, hands gently pulling away from Yuuri's in favor of holding his arms out to her just slightly--hesitant, like he wasn't sure what he was doing.] But I'm immeasurably grateful for the family that so stubbornly adopted me.
[ It strikes her somewhere new in her chest to hear that word again. Family. She's been throwing it around so readily and easily ever since she'd realized that's what they were but all of a sudden she realizes all over just how strongly she feels the same: that she could not ever express how grateful she is for this ragtag group of people.
She has no idea what happened to her parents. She still isn't sure of what might have happened to Ruu. And the School Living Club, as fiercely as she loved it wasn't a family -- it was more pack than anything else, a group of people thrown together and surviving by the skin of their teeth because any other choice meant death. It's never occurred to her before but she realizes now that all of them had been orphans in some way or another.
Had been, is the key word. She doesn't quite know when or how it happened but there's suddenly a father in her life again. A father who laughs and smiles and puts his arms out for a hug and doesn't talk to her, look at her like she's a guest in her own home who makes him nervous.
Yuuri steps forward and throws her arms around him in a tight, fierce hug. Compared to Ardyn, she's pint-sized but there's a whole lot of strength in those arms. ]
... me too. I don't know where I'd be without any of you.
[ She gives a shaky little laugh. ]
I think we both surprised ourselves a bit, though.
[ You remember the sweater and the yelling, Ardyn. ]
I won't lie and pretend it isn't slightly jarring every time one of you calls me that. Of all the things I've been, I don't believe 'father figure' was ever anywhere on the list.
[But he put his arms around her all the same; still hesitant, doubting and second-guessing if he was taking the right approach. Doubting if he was what Yuuri and Junpei and Clarith thought he was or needed him to be, after everything. Doubting, even now, if he was human enough for this. But in another lifetime, before ages in darkness and solitude, he'd had a family. Had people he loved dearly--parents, brother, Shield--people he would have once sacrificed everything for.]
[...People that discarded him, and who he discarded in turn.]
[There had, possibly, been part of him back then that envied his brother as Izunia must have envied him. Wasn't it so much preferable to stay in one place, with a loving family and no constant traveling, no endless struggling and slow, gradual descent into raging madness? Had his little brother held any idea how Ardyn had never dared admit to wanting that?]
[Deserved or not, maybe it really wasn't too late. Hesitant or not he held on to Yuuri like he fully intended to protect her from a million threats in a thousand worlds.]
...it'll be different this time. [He said that half to himself; never again, just as he'd promised Queenie. No more betrayal, no more family going behind each other's backs and throwing away the time they'd spent together.]
[As much as the concept still left even Ardyn unnerved, he could trust these people--his family--and believe that trust would not be cast aside.]
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no subject
[But he didn't stop. He couldn't. As long as Ardyn Lucis Caelum had the power to save even one person out of millions, he would have sacrificed everything. He did sacrifice everything. If he'd been afraid, he couldn't remember. If the savior had ever hesitated, ever faltered--...no, that wasn't possible. To question if what he was doing was 'right' would have rendered it all meaningless and invalidated every single life saved at his hand.]
[Even if it had all been planned and orchestrated--hadn't he still saved people? Didn't that still mean something?]
I can not claim to understand the workings of the Six by any means, apart from Ifrit himself.
[Burn it, he'd thought. Burn it all to ash, that's what they get. Ungrateful humans, the descendants of people that would never have lived if not for the man they condemned and forgot, the line descended from his brother to end in a child who never asked to be a piece of this game...he'd wanted it all destroyed.]
...Yuuri.
[And now here he was, neither savior nor Accursed, willing to sacrifice himself for this group and this group alone. He moved and knelt down in front of Yuuri, gently pulling her hands away from her head.]
I never...thanked you, for everything. For all you've done these past months.
no subject
She starts when he touches her. She hadn't been expecting it but really, he was hardly going to sit there idly while she wound herself up. She forces herself to try and calm down -- she can't be the one being comforted here when Ardyn is the one needing to be supported. But still, she finds herself balking. ]
I-- everything I've...? I mean-- I've-- I've tried to help but it... I'm sure it hasn't been enough. There's not enough I can do for you all.
no subject
That's not true at all.
[The hands that held Yuuri's now had killed an innocent Oracle, brought ruin upon a planet, and dismantled so many lives for the crime of existing, yet now they were nothing but the warm, living touch of someone who had once used them to bring salvation. Beneath fingerless gloves was skin calloused by the hilt of a sword and by countless scars taken from others long before he'd ceased to be human.]
[And even now, the shard of crystal and image of Bahamut himself was worn openly on his right hand.]
You've spent all this time struggling to keep us together even as you've carried more than anyone should. I'm sure you think most of us haven't noticed, but I certainly have. You were one of the first I confided in a month ago when I was fearing what I would turn into, and you didn't even flinch.
If it wasn't for every single one of you fighting to salvage whatever there was to salvage in that monster, then I wouldn't be here right now. If you and all the others hadn't so stubbornly insisted you would never turn on me, I would never have cracked enough to think I should have demanded my humanity returned to me.
One doesn't have to be a chosen savior to be able to save others. You, Junpei, Leonard, everyone--all of you saved the life of whoever's speaking to you now. Brought something human out of two thousand years of hatred and darkness. How could you ever truly claim that to not be enough?
no subject
She opens her mouth to say as much or something like it but finds that she can't make the words come out. Because... something about that suddenly rings wrong after the talk they'd just had. After she'd been so furious on his behalf about him being expected to give, give, give and get nothing but pain in return. If she's so angry about that burden being placed on a king then why should she expect something like that from herself? They certainly don't expect it from her.
Her hands tighten a little on Ardyn's. ]
We pulled you out of all that dark but we could only do it because you were reaching back. I don't know if you wanted to be saved, back when this all started. But I know one thing. I know you wanted to help us.
[ It's not a matter of give or take. It's not a matter of equal shares or working yourself til you're sick to convince yourself that maybe that's enough. Because that's not how it works. And because if you feel like you're falling behind, one of us will pull you. And if you feel like you can't go on then one of us will push you.
It's as simple as that, isn't it? Because that's just what family does. ]
... We saved each other. All of us.
no subject
[All that he'd done, all he'd manipulated and influenced behind the scenes--from Insomnia's invasion to Altissia's fall to leading Noctis straight to the Crystal--it had all been leading to one purpose.]
['Only once the Crystal and King are no more...can I know redemption.']
[Salvation and redemption to Ardyn Izunia meant forcing a child of twenty--no, thirty--to be left with no option but to cut down one to save many. To die alongside him, the last two remnants of the Lucian bloodline.]
...I can not say if I wanted to be saved or not in these past months. I think I must have, at one point or another--but I knew I didn't deserve it. I still don't. It should be Noctis here in my place; if either of the last remnants of the Lucis Caelum dynasty should be saved, then it should have been him that lived.
[Ardyn went distantly quiet, stare lowered to their hands for a moment--briefly he was back in Insomnia, rain falling from a blighted sky. 'This time, you can-']
[He shook his head, pulling himself out of his own memories and looking back up to Yuuri.]
...But I didn't have a choice. It seems I never do, when it comes to matters like this. I had no option but to act as pawn to the Astrals because I once wished only to protect others, and the rest of you simply refused to allow me to again crush out that resurrected memory of that human and his blind selflessness. None of you let someone who only knew betrayal simply forget how to trust again.
This family is so much more than I should have. But it's mine regardless.
no subject
[ Her voice is a little halting and unsure. Even as she feels the words out she's not sure what it is she's trying to say. Because if it was about what anyone deserved then they never would've lost Mai. They wouldn't have Kip with them. It feels good to talk about getting justice, giving the network what they deserve but the more Yuuri thinks that word over the less she likes it. ]
Whatever we 'should have' doesn't matter anymore. What we have is... all this. This ship and this family. And I don't think any one of us is ever going to let any of it go. We're yours and you're ours. Deserving or not.
[ She smiles. It's small and tired but it's as sincere a smile as she's ever given any of them. ]
no subject
[...It was difficult to prioritize what he wanted and what might someday be necessary; Ardyn was only human, after all.]
I don't know if I can completely agree with that. Not after what I've done--I'm the last person deserving of a second chance, no matter what the rest of you think.
But I already tried to discourage all of you once, and we all saw how well that went--at least two of you want to fight a god the size of a building in my defense. Possibly three, if we're to include you. Accursed scourge of an entire planet, and that barely got any of you to blink, much less turn on me.
[Despite the honest but pessimistic wording, a smile drifted across Ardyn's face.]
...You know, when I said I never had children, that wasn't a suggestion that applications were open. [He shook his head, hands gently pulling away from Yuuri's in favor of holding his arms out to her just slightly--hesitant, like he wasn't sure what he was doing.] But I'm immeasurably grateful for the family that so stubbornly adopted me.
no subject
She has no idea what happened to her parents. She still isn't sure of what might have happened to Ruu. And the School Living Club, as fiercely as she loved it wasn't a family -- it was more pack than anything else, a group of people thrown together and surviving by the skin of their teeth because any other choice meant death. It's never occurred to her before but she realizes now that all of them had been orphans in some way or another.
Had been, is the key word. She doesn't quite know when or how it happened but there's suddenly a father in her life again. A father who laughs and smiles and puts his arms out for a hug and doesn't talk to her, look at her like she's a guest in her own home who makes him nervous.
Yuuri steps forward and throws her arms around him in a tight, fierce hug. Compared to Ardyn, she's pint-sized but there's a whole lot of strength in those arms. ]
... me too. I don't know where I'd be without any of you.
[ She gives a shaky little laugh. ]
I think we both surprised ourselves a bit, though.
[ You remember the sweater and the yelling, Ardyn. ]
no subject
[But he put his arms around her all the same; still hesitant, doubting and second-guessing if he was taking the right approach. Doubting if he was what Yuuri and Junpei and Clarith thought he was or needed him to be, after everything. Doubting, even now, if he was human enough for this. But in another lifetime, before ages in darkness and solitude, he'd had a family. Had people he loved dearly--parents, brother, Shield--people he would have once sacrificed everything for.]
[...People that discarded him, and who he discarded in turn.]
[There had, possibly, been part of him back then that envied his brother as Izunia must have envied him. Wasn't it so much preferable to stay in one place, with a loving family and no constant traveling, no endless struggling and slow, gradual descent into raging madness? Had his little brother held any idea how Ardyn had never dared admit to wanting that?]
[Deserved or not, maybe it really wasn't too late. Hesitant or not he held on to Yuuri like he fully intended to protect her from a million threats in a thousand worlds.]
...it'll be different this time. [He said that half to himself; never again, just as he'd promised Queenie. No more betrayal, no more family going behind each other's backs and throwing away the time they'd spent together.]
[As much as the concept still left even Ardyn unnerved, he could trust these people--his family--and believe that trust would not be cast aside.]
I'm not-...we're not alone anymore.