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I must get to the crystal.
Noctis, all of seven years, feels the strange weight of heavy feathers settle on his small shoulders.
He’s been grounded for all of two days. It’s better, though, that Iris is safe. Whatever punishment they would have given him was going to be much lighter than Iris’ anyway, so it didn’t really matter.
Noctis eyes the door speculatively, tapping his pen against wood grain, also knowing that Ignis would stare at the ink splotches disapprovingly made him smile. There were probably two guards at the end of each hallway in addition to Gladio, who was standing outside the door.
There was a latch just behind the two red books on his bookshelf that opened to a stairwell under his desk.
I have to finish my assignment.
I must get to the crystal.
Noctis feels his fingertips crackle slightly, sparks slightly scorch the paper under his hand. A strange well of energy makes his blood run hot. Hotter than he’s ever felt. Was he having a fever?
He presses the heel of his palms to his eyes.
Not a fever then. His eyeballs usually felt like fire when he had fevers.
Noctis purses his lips, walks over to the bookshelf and pulls the latch.
How strange, he thinks to himself as he descends the stairs.
His magic sparks again, this time the familiar trails of blue magic tugged at his skin, floating in the air like dust particles on long undisturbed spaces.
The passageway, he knows, leads to the open floor of the citadel for aerial extractions. His father has whispered it in his ear once when he’d had dreams of earthquakes splitting the ground. Father said that these passages were never told of to anyone but royalty, not even their closes aides, because the biggest fear in a kingdom is never outsiders, but traitors. It was a long-held sentiment decreed by a Warrior Queen of old who demanded the Citadel be safe after two of her children were murdered in their sleep.
He doesn’t know how long he walks, but eventually he finds himself not caring if anyone sees him or finds him gone from his room.
The shine of the sun bats at his skin after a small passageway. Noctis’s eyes snap to a balcony on the other side of the building, the shining column of the crystal ever present.
The magic pulses once, and his ears ring as if a bell tolled right beside him, loud and overbearing.
Oh shining one!
The voices, a cacophony of voices, as if in a crowded room, rings at his ears.
His fingertips spark again, the blue light particles tugging at him sinks into his skin.
How greedy! You must not take!
It’s not like he’s doing this on purpose!
You must get to the crystal, o shining one!
Noctis thinks the crystal needs to shut up and just leave him be.
And.
Ah.
He remembers a fable that his nanny had told him once.
It was of a mighty oak, standing tall and proud amidst a raging storm only to be taken down. Once the tree had fallen, it sees the reeds gently bending to any slight gust of wind. It had seen the reeds as pathetic and weak, and yet.
“How do you stay standing, when I, strong and mighty could not weather these winds?” The oak had asked.
One reed had replied. “We follow the wind as it blows and bend, it is not anything special.”
Yet the oak, defeated, thinks. Yet it is indeed special.
Noctis… isn’t special.
“What do you want?” Noctis asks aloud, planting his feet.
There was no answer and Noctis could only huff in frustration.
He phases through a wall, on the opposite side of the door to the crystal and no guards stopped him. No one had seen him.
The crystal was bright and shining like a beacon and Noctis could barely look at it.
Oh Shining One!
Our Star!
Little moonlight
Ah.
That, then.
How strange.
The crystal looked like an egg.
Of what?
He feels the light of the crystal sink into his skin.
Eos! Eos! Our Shining One!
And something cracks
Eos feels his skin strange. It’s too small, too contained, too little to be his.
The shining light slowly slipping through the cracks in his vessel aids him, but it is not enough.
His eyes turn to the world and sees the light of each living being, the lights of the people have nowhere to go home to. The empty, malicious darkness that eats away at any light it sees, and the bright blessing of Solus from the skies. Noctis knows that the shadows are alive. Eos knows that the light isn’t fragile like a shattered crystal, nor this crystal the only source of light for this Star. Noctis realizes that this peace is not truly peace.
Who trespasses this domain!?
“Silly child,” Noctis says, his voice strange and unfamiliar. “Those of dragon-kin are not made to be kind, yet this cruelty… Bahamut, you must yield.”
You… HOW DARE YOU!? Eons! Eons pass, and the scourge will take us, and your hand. You rescinded your hand!
Noctis reaches for the crystal. “Cowards do not need excuses for their lack of courage. You hide under this crystal’s light and preach from your perch, child. Do not speak of eons to me.”
No, you will not—the crystal—!
Under Noctis’s hand, the crystal…
S H A T T E R S
The earth shakes.
Noctis knows, as the fine dust scatters, that the light must be anchored deep in the earth, connecting to all the smaller lights that have yet to be touched by darkness, so he reaches and connects them all.
When the Wall falls, Clarus first thinks Regis must be in danger.
Niflheim troops aren’t anywhere to be found. All the sensors and reports indicate the nearest Niflheim troops to still be at the unbroken front lines. There was no other reason, however, seeing Regis whole and hale…
“The crystal.” Regis gasps. “It’s… shattered.”