Chapter Text
Act I
The old man sits by the cherry tree
Does he spare any dreams for me?
Gralea, Niflheim ⊕ 12.13 M.E. 745
Cor hates the cold. The biting chill, the numbness in his fingertips. The fact that he has to wear at least three layers every time he goes out.
Living six months in Gralea is enough for him to confirm that, yes, the weather is shit.
But Ilya Kovach hates the cold too—and he could use that to his advantage.
The morning shift of the Adamas maintenance and security detail starts like this:
A five-thirty alarm perforates the cocoon of six blankets and three doses of sleeping pills, but Cor’s on his feet by the second beep.
Breakfast—a half-eaten pizza crust and a glass of milk.
A little fussing in the bathroom. His hair’s now grown long enough he can easily tuck it behind his ears, not bothering to brush. And the beard suits the general indolence he’s going for.
The swiftness of his routine is encouraged by the fact that Cor sleeps in his work clothes every night. (For warmth, he tells himself. Curse the damn draft that cuts through his flimsy 108th floor apartment, and his pathetic habit of just throwing his pile of blankets on the ground next to the front door—quicker to alert of any intruders.)
A brief run-through of the room—‘apartment’ is a generous term; Cor’s shower and kitchen sink are actually one and the same. He won’t relax until he’s checked that all of his security measures are intact—the motion tracker, the cam above the fridge, the service pistol under his bed. Not that he expects he’d be followed or tracked to a place listed as ‘mildly habitable’ in some ad he’d grabbed his first week in. Hell if anyone expected to find ‘the Immortal’ holed up in some shithole in the smack-center of Gralea, but here he fucking is. Half-frozen and half-feral.
His final act is to steady himself against the spackled wall, holding his breath just till it starts to hurt the back of his throat, slap on his nametag, and remember just who it is he’s supposed to be this day.
Ilya Kovach likes to hitch a ride with Lars Hersten, another lackluster, soul-sucked pissant on his way to clock into the machine, but as far as company goes—he could be worse. He’s greeted on the inter-precinct metro bridge with a customary snort, the pat on his back pushing them both forward, and a sly, “You look like shit, Kovach.”
“Barely slept.” Better to weave in traces of truth. Makes for a better cover. He shrugs, easing into the crammed metro car and shivering intensely despite his many layers.
Lars snickers at him. ”Still cold, lightweight? Woulda thought you’d be used to it by now.”
“Shut up, my blood’s fuckin’ curdling over here,” Cor grumbles, slipping into the Gralean dialect with effortless frigidity. It helps that it’s rough in both its language and its expressions. He’s got just enough raspiness from that old wound to have him sounding right at home in a city built by ruffians and carbon-breathers.
“This is nothin’ compared to up north.” Lars playfully shoves against his shoulder as his free hand slips into his pocket, offering a cigarette. Yeah, he could be worse. “Can’t get a decent hooker that isn’t about to lacerate you with her frozen tits. Unless you’re into that kinda thing.”
Cor takes the smoke, finding solace in the transient warmth of the lighter against his fingertips. He warps his words around it, “I’ll pass.”
Snorting again, Lars lights his own cigarette from the end of Cor’s. “Suit yourself, country boy. Ain’t no way this’ll be the coldest you’ve felt, not after Vernhard ships your sorry ass out to Ghorovas.”
“Don’t fucking remind me.”
“Doesn’t help he’s got it out for you. Thinks you’re some kinda pussy cuz you can’t take a little nippy weather. You sure your mama never fucked a Lucian, Kovach?” More shoving against his shoulder; Cor uses the smoke to hide his reaction. “You’ve got thin blood, my friend.”
“Piss up a rope.” Cor pushes off of him, shunting into a corner to sulk in peace.
A fifteen-minute commute takes them to the heart of the city. Cor always finds that the deeper you travel into Gralea’s central nervous system, the bleaker it gets. Maybe it’s just the shadow of Zegnautus, suffocating them all with its looming presence. Too bad that’s exactly where they’re headed.
The Adamas depot clings to the underbelly of Zegnautus Keep’s central spire like a stubborn louse. Insignificant, perhaps, to the grandiosity of the empire’s most esteemed megafortress, the work is nevertheless essential. Routine maintenance on each level of the spire’s frames. Interior services to keep the thing stable and the elevator in acceptable condition. None of their business ever finds them in the fortress itself, no they don’t have the clearance for that.
Cor finds most days he’s just a glorified janitor.
Which is fine for him. But Ilya Kovach had left his small town outside of Cartanica coming to the big city with the thought that maybe he could’ve made something of his life. The ‘Gralean Dream’ that’s shoved down the throat of every wide-eyed neophyte with more than his life’s worth of nationalism. Maybe he’d thought he’d be living it big—fancy penthouse with a view, making lots of money, devoting himself with a purpose towards the empire’s glory. The proverbial slap in the face should’ve tipped him off on the first account—his view is of a shit-stained billboard advertising government-issued energy drinks, his salary leaves just enough at the end of the month so he might contemplate the benefits of a frozen artificial-garula steak, and his grand purpose—that is, scraping carbon stains off the side of some two-thousand-foot pillar with only a flimsy wire keeping him from plummeting to his sweet, sweet death—yeah, it might be all that ‘nationalism’ keeping Ilya from severing the wire himself.
And gods, does he hate the cold.
First shift on the Zeg and he’d already asked his superior if he could borrow a second jacket. The sneer he’d gotten, the look of disgust.
“If you wanted coddling, shoulda just stayed in Cartanica, cunt.” His boss, Magnus Vernhard, empire-scum extraordinaire, amazingly never took a liking to him. A pity for Ilya. But for Cor—that might actually get him what he wants.
Six months undercover and hell, he was actually starting to feel sorry for the poor character he’d created. Thankful that his relatively bland features make for a perfect plain-sight disguise—Cor found he had to put very little work into making his cover believable. Misery isn’t hard to exaggerate, especially as his mission doesn’t offer much in way of pleasure.
Weeks spent scouring the city, picking up pieces of paltry intel. A whisper about bureaucratic changes. Some Solheimian discovery that was being kept under wraps. After Lucis had gotten word of the Imperial Army’s near decimation at the hand of some unknown entity, it’d been Cor’s objective to determine if now was the time for the Kingdom to make its move. Discovering the truth of the matter had been easier than he’d thought—seemed the hot gossip on the street did little to conceal the fact that the Glacian had been stirring up shit in Ghorovas. Having the army practically obliterated, Cor had assumed that things might be looking a little desperate for their enemies. But one bit of intel had him believing otherwise. A research grant issued to one Verstael Besithia. And with that, it had been clear that Cor’s target had changed.
And that Ilya might be in need of a reassignment.
“Vernhard’s gonna give you shit if he catches you slacking off in the boiler room again,” Lars says as the two workers make their way through the security checkpoint into the first level of the spire.
“Vernhard can, respectfully, go fuck himself,” Cor grumbles, and so it begins.
The actual workday is mostly uneventful. Menial labor, a few lazy reprimands to get your asses moving, boys. Cor amuses himself with the idea that if he’d actually put in his full potential, this whole operation might be running a lot smoother. But Ilya is a bit of a slacker, he’d decided. And the marshal was on holiday.
Mid-shift break sees them all gathered in the storehouse, a depressing collection of a dozen or so men loitering about, some squatting on the dusty concrete, as Graleans are inclined to do. Magnus Vernhard likes to sprawl his sizeable bulk on the inoperable sideloader, tossing spare bits of drivel to whoever’s unfortunate enough to be nearest. Cor usually takes the time to shove his hands under his three layers, trying to warm up, if not sharing hits off a cigarette with Hersten again.
This time, though, Vernhard’s being particularly vulgar, and Cor has a hard time drowning him out.
“Seen that pretty little thing in all the tabs again. Reckon Glauca was a fool fer just leavin’ a nice piece of meat like that behind.”
A few of the workers snicker. Cor grits his teeth.
“Wouldn’t mind a little blondie like that ta play with. Think the mad scientist can cook me up a new toy in his labs, custom-made? Though I’d like him ta get her down to the last detail—”
“Fucking sick,” Cor mutters before he can really help it.
“What’s that, Kovach?” Vernhard lifts his chunky neck to angle him a hard look. “Got a problem?”
Cor just levels him back a sneer of repulsion, “She’s fourteen.”
Maybe a random Cartanican wouldn’t turn his nose at the thought of some crude musings at the expense of the young oracle Lunafreya, but Cor has a very hard time keeping in character. He’d known the girl from a past… assignment, and he’s liable to keep her dignity intact. Besides, it’s just more fuel to get Vernhard to hate his guts.
“Psssh,” the man spits out, taking a sip of that piss-smelling energy drink that half the workers run on. “Jealous, Kovach? Want someone ta warm your frigid bones, eh?”
More snickering. Vernhard’s laugh sounds like a gutter being plunged.
“I reckon she’d be too good fer ya, though. Needs a real… experienced touch. Plus, I always say, the younger they are the sweeter the taste—”
Without caution, Cor throws himself at the man.
He’s got enough hold on his facade to keep from just taking him out in one hit—gods know he has the combat experience—but Ilya Kovach doesn’t. So instead, he starts sloppily hammering at the guy’s face wishing for all he’s worth that he could just snap his filthy neck.
“Oi, Kovach! What the fuck?!”
Now an honest-to-gods commotion, the lethargic workers actually spring into action, half of them lazily cheering him on, the other half attempting to pull him off. They get a few good hits in, bashing at Cor’s head like a pack of thugs. Deciding that Kovach must have little to no stamina, Cor relents, letting himself be peeled off the boss and held by his arms.
“Well, well! Seems like ya got a little fire in ya after all.” Vernhard unexpectedly packs quite a punch, slamming a meaty fist into his stomach.
Doubling over and spitting blood from his mouth, Cor just growls, “Fuck you.”
“If you don’t get off your knees, Kovach, I’ll give ya something to warm your belly with.” The man makes a vulgar gesture with his belt buckle, sputtering out that disgusting laugh.
Trying his hardest not to lose his composure, Cor shakes off the arms holding him down.
“You’re gonna regret that, boy,” Vernhard hisses as he shoves Cor’s face one more time. Then he raises his voice. “Get back ta work! That means all of ya!”
The energy seems to fade as the rest of the workers grumble back to their stations, one or two giving Cor a swift kick from his position on the ground. Surprised at the hand helping him to his feet, Cor just mutters something under his breath as Lars gives him a steely once-over. “You just had to make it worse, didn’t you?”
“Shut up.”
A devastating blow to the hopes and dreams of one up-and-coming Ilya Kovach, upon receiving the summons and subsequent reassignment notice, Cor does his best personation of a disgruntled and pissed-off employee. Catching the greasy, filthy gaze of Vernhard one last time, he doesn’t even have to act as he locks his jaw, temper testing its boiling point.
“You’ll be expected at the Annex by tomorrow. Gonna need a lot more layers than that in Ghorovas.”
“I’ll manage.”
It was a fortunate thing, really. The newly commissioned facility built with Besithia’s research grant had been seeking out contractors for a private maintenance crew. It says a lot about the man’s practices—rather than rely on government controlled military staff, Besithia would exclusively hire off-the-books, so as to keep his shady ‘experiments’ under wraps. The posting is a literal death sentence for anyone hoping to get a decent gig out of this line of work; regardless of the dismal weather conditions, oftentimes horror stories were passed down about employees gone missing, perhaps experimented on. Besithia, the ‘mad scientist'—it’s clear even his countrymen have no love lost.
Clearing out his locker, eyeing the somewhat pitying looks of his coworkers, Cor squares his shoulders with something like acceptance. He’d hoped he wouldn’t leave such a final impression here; maybe he did get out of hand with literally attacking the boss. But the thing about covers is that, most times, they were just people who could slip in and out without any real impact on their environments. Cor’s sure that in the coming weeks Vernhard will have a new sucker to butt heads against, Hersten will find another hand to trade smokes with, and the workers at the Adamas maintenance and security detail, Zegnautus branch, will likely forget that such a man as Ilya Kovach even existed.
So Cor returns to his shit-hole apartment one last time—and he sheds his skin in a way. First the layers: three thick sweaters and his standard-issue maintenance jacket. Then he slips under the milk-warm spray of his sink/shower, letting the expanse of his goose-bumped skin just… unfurl a little bit. A check in the mirror—hollow eyes and hair that’s longer than he’d ever kept it before. A hand ghosting over his naked neck before throwing on a sweater again, quickly, and using the last of his frozen ‘garula’ steak to nurse the black eye that promises to be spectacular in the morning light.
He dismantles his security measures dutifully and without second thought, then compiles a thorough report in the painstaking code he and Regis had designed all those years ago—a letter that will be postmarked to the ‘Sunny Sojourns’ timeshare membership p.o. box in western Altissia (turns out Graleans like to holiday in Accordo, go figure).
Then he sits on the floor of his questionable apartment, realizing for the first time that it was carpeted, not some moldy tile as he had assumed all these months. Huh. And he bunches up the blankets to give him some semblance of warmth.
He really does hate the fucking cold.
Cradling his aching head, the thought comes into his mind like an unwelcome gust: a warrior must commit to their decisions.
Hadn’t he been doing just that? Personal sacrifices be damned, the man thinks he’s at least deserving of some fucking credit. But, thinking objectively about it—gods, he really has been dragging his feet. Months searching for useless rumors. A cover he nearly blew because he couldn’t keep his emotions in check. Cor only hopes his stint in Ghorovas breeds more success, because honestly… deep down, he just wants to fucking go home.
If an opportunity does not arise, then go out of your way to find one.
That damn voice...
If Cor didn’t impose such a strictness in his own scruples, the words would likely be carved into his skin alongside every scar that had taught the lesson. A body built and bred for this. No attachments. No sentiments. He may have found it easier back when he was younger—when he was just some no-name, no-voice teenager with a meteor-sized chip on his shoulder. Slaying on command. Surrendering any thoughts of personal desire. (Would he still have tasted sweeter then?)
But now—Cor Leonis is tired.
So he tries to sleep. Upping the dose of his sleeping pills day by day (he swears they water them down here, they must do). His headaches have resurged as well. Blistering in at the worst of times. Like that fucking voice. Cor shuffles his pile of blankets, flopping unceremoniously into them, trying not to feel like a pathetic piece of shit.
Regis would get his message, he’d know there was dirt to be found in Ghorovas. With Besithia. No matter that half a year of Cor’s life had been uprooted. That he’d slaved himself on the side of a skyscraper, groveling for scraps. No matter that his thirty-fourth birthday was six days ago and he’d spent it crammed in an elevator shaft with nine other sweaty guys and at some point, they’d started seeing who could last the longest with their arms and legs stretched across the gap and he didn’t even fucking win (Ilya Kovach wouldn’t have the arm strength, realistically).
He would have to just suck it up. That’s what he’s always done. That’s why Cor Leonis is as much of a fabricated character as Kovach. The puppet you send when you want shit taken care of, no questions asked.
True strength of a warrior becomes apparent during difficult times.
“Just shut the fuck up,” he mutters out loud, before wrapping his hands around his throbbing head and willing himself to turn it all off—the voice, his misery, this fucking skin. Just so he could fucking sleep.
You cannot hide from yourself.
The man who would call himself Cor Leonis, if the name still fits, curls into a ball on the 108th floor of an apartment complex in Gralea, in the heart of Niflheim, cold and alone. And, after several hours, he gives up on the idea he’d get any sleep, burrowing in his nest of blankets in front of the shitty tv-set watching re-runs of some Gralean gameshow, re-reading his missive eighteen more times until he’s finally talked himself out of scrapping it and just sending an s.o.s to get him the fuck out of here, before spending the next gods know how many hours tracing the funky patterns on the carpet with his finger, holding onto one saving grace—he’ll have plenty of time to sleep on the train-ride tomorrow.
First Magitek Production Facility- Annex, Niflheim ⊕ 12.29 M.E. 745
The boy known as ‘Prompto’ awakens at 6:32 a.m.
A thought strikes his mind before he even realizes it: Something is wrong.
Ordinarily, his day would begin like this:
The boy would rise at exactly 7:00 a.m. A brief personal hygiene act would follow—approximately three minutes in the washroom attached to his sleeping quarters; to flush his system of liquids or waste, then to cleanse his skin and the interior of his mouth to eliminate unwanted bacteria.
His next task is a growth calculation. Using the measuring devices installed in his chambers, the boy is required to step onto the height calculator, adjusting it to his specifications. 135.2 centimeters. Next, his weight. 81.8 pounds. The assistants often reprimand the boy over this number. Prompto is unsure why; the number for his weight increases more substantially than his height. Surely this is an improvement? Recording the numbers on his health chart, he would also provide a brief description of his rest cycle.
He would then present himself at the door to his chambers. The supplements supplied with a bottle of water routinely delivered through the small grate at the bottom of his door.
Then he would wait for an assistant to come—usually they would administer a quick sustentation assessment, a blood test, a few routine questions. Then his shots. Three quick needles into his arm full of strange, tingly liquid. If he’s lucky, they won’t require a neurological test.
After being cleared, he’s then sent to his duty—the nursery. Where for the next eight hours, he’s given the authorization and responsibility to oversee the care of eleven four-month-old infants.
Most of the work is just handling the nourishment and sanitation. But he always takes the time to hold each child individually; the assistants had told him that was important. That the subjects might expire if they are lacking physical contact. He doesn’t mind; it’s his favorite part anyway.
The rest of his day is spent going over his academic courses. Usually spent alone in his room. That is also fine. Most days he thinks his schedule is perfectly sufficient.
Today is different.
The second thing that strikes him as odd, besides his early awakening, is the flashing red light outside his room he can see from the small window above his door.
There had never been a light like that before. The hall is usually empty; except for when the assistants or his friend visit.
Peering from his position—supine on the firm mattress, head placed in the center of his pillow—Prompto squints his eyes in the direction of the light.
It blinks.
He blinks back.
He watches it blink twenty-six more times before sliding out of his bed, creeping over to the door.
He’s… curious. Could this light be why he was prematurely awoken? Some new kind of sensory response test?
So caught up in the mesmerizing light, the pounding on the door makes the boy jump. He lets out a squeak, suddenly fearful that someone will have seen him out of bed, awake at the wrong time, not doing what he’s been ordered to—
“Hey! You awake?” The voice sounds like a hiss through the other side of the door, but Prompto immediately recognizes it. His friend.
“Yes,” he says, and instinctively gets down on his knees to crouch next to the grate at the bottom of his door.
Caerulus is leaning towards the grate too, but it’s not like he usually does. Usually, he is sprawled against the door, right side of his face pressed close to the bars. It had become a bit of a routine, as well, although not one sanctioned by the assistants—but Caerulus had often come to visit; to just sit by his door and… talk to him. It had been odd at first, but Prompto had found that he looked forward to those times. Caerulus always tells him the best stories, and it makes him feel… something he doesn’t quite have the word for. But he had decided that he likes it. The company. Even if Fiolett came instead; he just liked having someone to talk to that wasn’t an infant.
So he crawls a bit closer, eager to hear from his friend, despite the odd hour. “Do you have a story for me?”
“What?” Caerulus makes a sound like a puff of air caught in his throat. “Wha—no. No, this is hardly a time for stories, kid.”
“Then what is it the time for?” It is now 6:35 and the red light is still blinking. He can see it flicker off of Caerulus’s face, or at least the glimpse he can see of him through the grate.
“Kid, the whole place has been put on lockdown. Have any guards come down here at all?”
“No. It’s just you, Caerulus.” Perhaps the older boy would be bringing Prompto to his duties today. Another oddity. But he wouldn’t mind if Caerulus took over from the assistants; he likes him much better.
“Kid. Prompto.” The boy nods. Yes, he likes when Caerulus calls him this. He’s the one who had given him the name in the first place. Their little secret. “There’s been a breach in sector eight. This is… I’m going to get you out, alright?”
“But, no one has told me to leave my room.”
“I’m telling you, kid. You didn’t hear anyone else in the hall, did you?”
“Just you, Caerulus.”
“Fuck’s sake,” the older boy makes a weird sound again. Sometimes Prompto tries to replicate them, the noises. Little huffs, chuckles. It even makes Caerulus laugh usually, and he likes when Caerulus laughs. But he feels this is not the time to be making odd sounds. “I didn’t think it would come to this but… shit, now’s a good a time as any.”
Caerulus makes another sound, then there’s the beeping and clicking of the security lock.
“Fucking shit,” Caerulus says. (Sometimes Prompto tries to imitate these strange words too; that really makes Caerulus laugh). “Did they change the passcode on this?”
“Yes. Every week.”
“Godsdammit, I don’t—”
A brief moment of frustrated sounds, more tinkering with the lock, more beeping and noises—Prompto can’t see the older boy from this perspective, so he just watches the red light blink some more.
Then suddenly Fiolett is there, crouching down to peer through the grate. Prompto nearly squeaks again, startled by the other boy’s appearance.
“Lookie here,” Fiolett says. “All locked up and left alone. Would be a pity if someone were to come and snatch you up.”
Prompto does not like Fiolett. He’s weird and makes his skin start to feel stretchy, like how when the assistants take the boy for those shots that make his body hurt inside for hours. Plus, Fiolett never tells him stories, or makes funny sounds, or laughs.
“I’m always left alone, Fiolett,” Prompto says (even though Fiolett doesn’t know him as Prompto, no that’s just between him and Caerulus).
Fiolett makes a clicking sound with his mouth, but then he rises and there’s more beeps.
“You’re lucky, sapling. Filched the code off that weasel down in administration.”
There’s a singular beep and the door to his room is open.
This is wrong, the boy thinks again. Prompto is not authorized to leave his chambers for any reason besides his duty and assessments.
It doesn’t help that Fiolett is there on the other side, looming over him with that fixed, red-tainted sneer.
But then Caerulus is grabbing his arm, tugging him into the hallway. “Come on, kid. This may be our only chance.”
“But what about—”
“No time! We have to go!”
Caerulus pulls the boy along down the hall. It is still too early for the diurnal activities to commence, Prompto thinks. Perhaps the assistants would be waiting for him elsewhere, and Caerulus is taking him to them. Then he could get his supplements and have his blood test and his shots. Then the day would be like it was supposed to be.
But it's clear after a bit that Caerulus isn't taking him to the assistants. As they skirt along the edge of the corridor, a strange sinking feeling in the boy’s stomach has him fearing he may be sick. The two near the end of the hall, where Prompto would usually take a turn up ahead, towards where the nursery is, but Caerulus leads him past it.
“The subjects,” he says nervously, tugging on the older boy’s sleeve. “Will I be required to offer care to them now?”
Caerulus pauses, hand gripping too hard on Prompto’s arm. The look on his face is strange; the boy doesn’t know how to describe it. But then Caerulus is shaking his head. “Don’t worry about them. They’ll be fine.”
How could the subjects be fine if Prompto was not there to care for them at approximately 7:20 every morning? The boy is suddenly terrified of the thought of them all alone. Surely he will be reprimanded for not providing the daily nurture routine for the eleven subjects. It is his duty to perform acts of infant health and sanitation care, that’s what the head researcher had assigned him with when he’d been moved into the annex.
Prompto is just about to voice his concerns when Caerulus gasps, wrenching him into an alcove, a pillar next to one of the doors to the refectory, and he places his hand over the boy’s mouth.
Several seconds of hushed silence followed by the telltale sound of footsteps making their way towards them make the boy tense up with fear. Caerulus stares down at him, his one visible eye catching the red tint from the blinking light, making him look wild and creepy, like some of the test subjects that Prompto had glimpsed that one time he’d been brought to sector three.
The noise from the hall passes, but Caerulus doesn’t remove his hand.
Instead, he squats in front of the boy, head bowed. His voice is quiet when he talks. “Listen to me, kid. This is serious.”
The boy nods, his mouth still covered.
Caerulus rifles through the pockets on his jumpsuit. He thrusts something into the boy’s hand. A folded paper. “Take this. I’m going to have to meet up with you at the depot, so for this first part, just follow what I’ve written. I need you to be brave, kid. And I need you to do exactly what I say.”
Another nod.
“Good. If you have the chance to run—run. Ok?”
The boy is confused. Run? To where? Maybe it’s written in the paper. He begins the unfold it, but Caerulus catches his face with his hand, pulling it towards his.
“Hey, listen! I know you can run fast, I’ve seen you in the simulators, right? If you get outside, you need to run as fast as you can to the depot at the edge of the base, ok? Like… like Prompto, remember? From all the stories I told you. Prompto who was fast as lightning.”
The boy nods more vehemently. He wants to be like Prompto. From the stories. Prompto was a real hero.
“Listen, and this is important—don’t talk to anybody. Ok? Especially strangers. Not a word until you find me again, alright?”
This time, Caerulus removes the hand off his mouth, but Prompto doesn’t quite know what to say. Would he be getting a new assignment at the depot?
“Fuck,” Caerulus makes that huff sound again. He brings both his hands up to run them over his face. “I’ve got to do something first, but I promise I’ll meet you at the depot, alright?”
Prompto doesn’t respond. He just stares.
“This is it. I’m going to get you out of here, kid. Gods know you fucking deserve it.”
Prompto doesn’t know what gods is. He’s heard Caerulus mention it before, but then again—Caerulus mentions a lot of things that Prompto doesn’t understand.
Like this whole conversation.
Still wracked by confusion, Prompto feels something else slip between his hands and then Caerulus is crouching low, talking quickly again. “Here’s a key card to get you through the gates. I just need to… handle something first, then we’ll reconvene and get the fuck out of here.”
Another noise coming from the hall, this time behind them, makes Caerulus whip his head up, alarmed.
“Shit!” He places his hands firmly on Prompto’s shoulders, looking… resigned. Then he forcefully shoves the boy out of the alcove and down the hall towards sector six.
“Go! Now’s your chance.” Caerulus then starts backing up from him, eyes wide. “I promise I’ll meet up with you later, but you have to go now, kid.”
Prompto is still confused. Even more so when the voices from behind them start to louden, but he does what Caerulus says.
He runs.
Clutching the folded paper and the key card in his hands, Prompto doesn’t stop running until he meets the security gate that divides the sectors.
The boy had never had the authorization to enter sector six. He stands in front of the barred entrance, uncertain. Ever so carefully, he unfurls the paper that Caerulus had given him. It’s a crudely drawn map of the interior of the annex. There are several arrows pointing out a trail. Prompto spots his location on the map, sector six, and sees that the arrow cuts inside and through a service exit towards the annex’s main exit point.
Caerulus had said to do exactly as he said.
Caerulus isn’t an assistant or a researcher or even a member of staff security. But Prompto will follow his orders.
So he slots the key card into the notch and slides through the gate when it opens.
Sector six is a lot like sector three. Research and experimentation.
Right away, the boy tenses. There’s a noise from the main chamber up ahead. Caerulus’s note says to follow this main passage and take a right through a smaller corridor, but Prompto has to pass the main chamber to get there.
The noise is like a kind of whimpering sound.
The boy is afraid.
Be like Prompto, he remembers. Prompto from the stories. The hero who traveled all over the world, making friends, saving people.
The boy breathes deeply, then moves in front of the chamber.
As he does, the sound intensifies. A low, guttural wail.
The boy just covers his ears with his hand, hastening forth without thinking about it.
“Please…”
He stops short.
“Please… help me.”
His skin does something weird; it kind of shivers, almost like it’s trying to rearrange itself, to force his body away.
The boy just stands completely still in front of the chamber.
“Please.”
This time there’s a swelling moan. Like the person making the sound had been trying to keep quiet, but the sound just… explodes.
He shouldn’t look. He should move. He shouldn’t look to see what’s making that sound.
But he does.
There’s half a person lying on the floor of the research lab.
Where their legs should be is a puddle of black liquid.
Where their eyes should be are two pincer-like hands trying to crawl through the sockets.
Prompto would scream, but his voice is caught in his throat.
“Help! Oh gods… help me… gods, help me, help me… oh gods…”
The person on the ground screeches, the two pincers starting to dig into the sides of their face.
The boy can’t move.
But then there’s another sound.
Crying. A baby crying.
Prompto suddenly shakes his head, thinking he’d misheard. But he hears it again. The warbling cry of an infant, coming from the same room as that… as that person.
He forces his eyes away from the terrible sight to find the source of it. And he does.
One of the test subjects is lying on the center lab table, hooked up to a bunch of wires.
This is wrong. Again the thought rips through the boy’s mind, this time almost painfully. A subject should not be here in sector six. No. The subjects are all interred in the nursery. Where he watches over them every day. Where he holds them close so they don’t expire. This is very, very wrong.
Before he can stop himself, Prompto rushes into the room. The person—creature—on the floor shrieks, desperately reaching out to him, screaming help me, help me, slipping in the filth puddled around them.
The boy tunes them out, focused solely on the infant on the table. The baby is unclothed, strapped down and wailing incessantly. Not concerned about what the wires are for, Prompto rips them out, causing the baby to cry louder.
Now that he’s got it in his arms, he does a quick assessment. The subject is unit N-iP01357. This one likes a lot of attention; Prompto usually spends at least two extra minutes coddling it each day.
The creature makes another grotesque sound; from what Prompto can tell, a large amount of black liquid seems to be gushing from its mouth.
He stands there. Holding the infant.
Uncertain.
Scared.
Be like Prompto, he thinks. Fast as lightning.
Tucking the baby into his jumpsuit—he runs.
He runs as fast as he can. Like Caerulus said.
N-iP01357 cries out loudly, but the boy focuses on securing the route labeled on the folded paper.
He wants to put as much distance as possible between them and that… that thing.
He wants to get away.
There are other noises now besides N-iP01357 crying. Loud blaring sirens. And the red light flashes all the while.
There are noises from behind too. From the main research lab of sector six. Screams of terror mixed with that… unnatural, terrible sound.
“Oh my gods! Holy fucking shit, is that Valeri?!”
“Guards! Get a lockdown on sector six ASAP!”
“Holy fucking shit…”
People yelling. Loud, loud banging. The wail of the siren. N-iP01357 crying.
Prompto just runs.
He whips past a couple of guards without really registering it.
“Hey? What the—?”
“Is that a fucking kid?”
He just runs.
Caerulus said not to talk to anyone.
Caerulus said to run.
The boy makes it to the main exit gate of the annex. He’d only been here once before when the assistants were giving him a test on sun exposure.
He’s about to slip the key card into the slot when something grips his arm tight.
“Oi! What the hell?”
There’s a security guard shaking him, holding him in place.
Prompto doesn’t answer. He’s not allowed to talk to anyone.
“You’re not supposed to be out here. How the hell did you get out of your cell?”
The man looms over him. Tall, scary. He's got one of those electric sticks on his side. And he’s hurting his arm. He’s stopping Prompto from inserting the key card and he’s hurting him.
The boy wants to scream again. Especially when the guard yells out, “Looks like we got a prison break on top of this cluster-fuck,” and a few other guards make their way towards them.
Without thinking, Prompto swings his foot into the guard’s kneecap. The man yells loudly, bending down and loosening his hold, just enough—
Prompto rips away, running down the opposite hall.
“Hey! What the fuck?”
“Somebody stop him!”
This is wrong. This is wrong, wrong, wrong.
He attacked a guard. He’s not in his room like he’s supposed to be. It's 6:49 a.m. and he’s holding a subject and he’s running through the facility and he’s scared.
This is not how his day is supposed to be spent.
But Caerulus said to run.
Fast as lightning. Fast as Prompto, the hero.
The boy can hear the sound of several guards in pursuit. They’re much bigger than he is. He is only 135.2 centimeters—but he never measured today, he remembers with panic. So he could be more.
Regardless, the boy continues to dash down the stretch of corridor, terrified at the thought that he wasn’t following the arrow lines on Caerulus’s note anymore. He’s not following the rules. He’s not doing what he’s supposed to. He never measured himself. He never filled in his chart. He never—
The boy suddenly finds himself at the end of the hall. Nowhere to run.
He stops still.
The steady sounds of footsteps only escalate. There’s nowhere for him to go. This isn’t where the arrow pointed. How is he supposed to find the exit? How is he supposed to meet up with Caerulus at the depot?
N-iP01357 makes a gurgling sound against his chest.
Prompto closes his eyes, head dropping.
He doesn’t know why, but he feels like he might cry.
But then there is a hand on his shoulder. Warm, and not as tightly gripped as that other guard.
“What are you doing here?” the voice that’s attached to the hand says. Deep and low, almost like a whisper.
The boy doesn’t open his eyes. He doesn’t answer. He’s not supposed to talk to anyone.
Screeching of boots and cut-off yells—the party of guards will no doubt swarm upon him any minute now. Then he will be sent to the disciplinary administrator, and most likely be subject to several bouts of corrections (he hates those). Then he will be sent back to his sleeping quarters, where tomorrow he will rise at precisely 7:00 a.m. and proceed with the rest of his routine as if nothing had occurred any differently.
But that’s not what happens.
What happens is:
The man with the hand on the boy’s shoulder shifts, so that his presence stands between the boy and the guards.
Then he says: “Don’t look, kid,” even though Prompto’s eyes are still closed. He squeezes them tighter.
Then there are a bunch of sounds.
Screams.
Loud bangs.
Thumps hitting the ground.
Heavy breathing.
The boy keeps his eyes closed. He holds N-iP01357 closer to his chest.
Then he senses that man come close again, crouching in front of him.
“Hey,” the man says. That low, mild tone.
Prompto opens his eyes.
And sees:
A man with blood on his face. Long brown hair tucked behind the ears. Blue eyes.
He does not know this man. But his large hand is warm on his shoulder. And he says:
“Do you want to get out of here?”
And the boy nods.
“Ok. I’ll getcha out of here.”
Then the man rises, walking forward, stepping around the fallen bodies of six dead security guards, and he turns his head around to look at him, something like a smile on his curious face.
He says:
“Are you coming, kid?”
And Prompto follows.