This story should be short. I'm aiming for less than 10 chapters. It's an idea I had when I first tried to figure out what sort of stories I wanted to write over FFXV. It's been sitting in my head for sometimes. And when I can't write on Unexpected, I tend to write on other FFXV fics. Since I went back in time right after the train ride, let's say it's my approach of yet another twist they could/should have think about. I don't want to spoil it. But the title says it all. The fic will focus on Noctis and Ignis, while having Noctluna at his core. Enjoy…
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Calling Umbra
Prologue – Despair
Luna was gone. The light at the end of the tunnel. The gentle words in their notebook, always ready to pick him up. His princess. When he closed his eyes, he could almost see his dream again. Could it be called a dream? Hadn't it been a nightmare? What would have happened if he'd manage to reach her?
The blue flowers dancing all around her, a raging sea of petals. She was slipping away, fading. She was gone. Like the tears in his eyes. He still ached all over and sometimes, it was hard to breath. As though he was still drowning. As though he could still see her, at arm's length, reaching out for him, a gentle smile on her face. He'd just wanted one touch. The right to look her in the eyes and to have her looking back for more than a second. To feel her gaze on him. Have a taste of her smile. To caress her hair and maybe, just maybe hold her closer than friendship allowed.
His heart ached and bled. His mind was nothing but confusion. His body moved, almost on autopilot. He couldn't smile when Prompto tried to joke. Couldn't hide the hurt when he saw Ignis fumbling around with his cane. And he barely controlled the anger he felt every time Gladiolus chided him for being too slow or too brooding.
His Luna was gone. Leviathan had forged the covenant with him, but at what price? Hundreds of people had perished, Ardyn had stabbed the Oracle, Lunafreya was…
He wanted to crawl back in his bed and howl in pain with Umbra held close until his throat would be too numb to utter a sound.
Remembering the dog made him realize something. For an instant, the pain receded. The train shook around him and he instinctively looked for Ignis, hopping the man hadn't fallen from the sudden movement. His advisor looked fine, well, as fine as he could be. Noctis tried to follow his previous line of thoughts. Their dog. Her dog. The last of the pair. What if he called Umbra?
If I go back and warn her…
Could it be that simple? Umbra could take him back to Lucis, but maybe also to Altissia before the tide mother was even summoned. This mean he could still see her. This mean she could still be waiting.
Does it even work that way?
He needed to talk to her. Face to face. They'd been separated for 12 years. Writing back and forth. Missing each other. And all he'd get was a knowing look?
I can't let it end like this.
…
When the train finally stopped, the guys were shocked to see Noctis leading them right back towards the tracks.
"Why do you think we made this whole trip?"
"I just want to test out something, Gladio, alright? The mines aren't going anywhere."
"But…"
Noctis halted and turned on his heels, glaring back at his shield's angry eyes.
"You keep asking me to act like a king. I don't want to order any of you around, but if you refuse to follow, I'll command you to."
"You know being a king is more than just…"
Noctis snapped and grabbed his collar, yanking him down to his level.
"I'm sick of hearing it, man. Follow your king or find a corner to sulk in until we get back."
Gladiolus bared his teeth while Prompto dared asking the question that was already on Ignis' mind.
"Getting where?"
"We've never tried it before, but…" He wondered how he could explain the powers a simple dog held. Gladiolus would never believe it, despite everything else they'd seen.
A passerby made Ignis stumble, the advisor not moving out of his path quickly enough and seemed ready to pick up a fight before to realize the state the man was in. Noctis' fists clenched even tighter at the sight. How fair was that?
The man had already given up his entire life for him, and now…
"It's easier if we just try it. You guys follow me."
The walk didn't last long, despite Gladiolus mumbled complains about delaying the inevitable, Prompto making sure no one else bumped into Ignis on their way to the train's chambers.
"You want to rest up? We've been doing nothing but…!"
"I don't think that's what Noct have in mind," Iggy objected.
And soon enough, the soft bark of Umbra appearing in front of Noctis proved him right. Gladiolus crossed his arms, while the prince scratched the dog's neck.
"Good boy. I need you to take us back, Umbra. How far back can we go?"
Turning his head around, Umbra sat down, the white marks in his fur shining for an instant.
"What the…?"
Noctis blinked and saw two paintings in his mind. One was of Altissia, before that Leviathan strike. One was of Lucis. For an instant, he wondered if he could go far enough to save his father too, but the painting turned clearer and Insomnia was a crater of smoke on the map.
Altissia, he thought bitterly. This time I won't fail her.
Gladiolus and Prompto were both feeling disoriented as the travel happened. One instant, they were standing in the noisy train station, and one blink later, they opened their eyes on Altissia's radiant streets.
Water was running in the canals, gondolas passing by, the sky bright and the sun up high. It was nothing like the destroyed city they remembered. But the most disoriented of them had to be Ignis, who was suddenly missing his cane and could open both eyes. The light felt too strong, but after blinking madly, the advisor raised one shaking hand to his face. The scars were gone. And the darkness with them.
"What sort of magic is this?"
Noctis had turned on himself, taking a good look around and smiled as he realized that Ignis was back to his old self.
"It really worked. We've travelled into the past!" he marveled.
"What?!" Gladiolus exclaimed.
"It's something Umbra can do." He tried explaining.
"Travelling through time?" Ignis whispered. "Why would our own state change?"
Prompto shrugged, raising his empty hands in helplessness.
"Why didn't we try it before?"
"I never saw the use. And there's a limit to how far Umbra can take us. But since your wound only happened after Altissia's destruction…" Noctis told his advisor only to be interrupted by Gladio.
"This makes no sense. We have to be hallucinating."
"But if it's real, doesn't talking of the future put everything in jeopardy? Or can we influence things? And what about events? Can we change our bets at the coliseum on a specific day?" Prompto mused.
"Money is the least of our concern. I don't know what the rules are…" Noctis admitted.
Ignis crossed his arms, trying to contain his excitement at seeing again. The sky looked so blue. He didn't dare to close his eyes even for a second, but the question that followed needed to be asked.
"If we go back to the present, I'm still going to be blind, right?"
Noctis swallowed, registering the very light tremble in his friend's voice. This had to be torture for him.
"I don't know, Ignis. I wished I had the answers, but I can't go back now. I came here for a reason."
Understanding dawned on the three men.
"Lady Lunafreya." Prompto whispered, his eyes darkening.
Gladiolus rolled his shoulders, eyeing their surroundings dubiously. He felt out of his element and his anger was kicking back, almost impossible to control.
"We can't turn back time."
"What's wrong with you?! This is my chance to make things right! Luna didn't deserve what happened to her."
"Yeah, and so did Iggy's uncle, Prompto's parents and my old man. Will you go back for them too?!"
Umbra was still standing close by and whimpered at the violence of the accusation, his ears lowering on his head. Noctis felt his throat tightening.
"If I could I would, but Insomnia will still have fallen if we go back to Lucis."
"Because your dog can take us back to Lucis too?!" Prompto asked.
They were all overwhelmed and starting to gather quite a lot of attention from the passerbys.
"We should take this somewhere else," Ignis cautioned them.
It was a pity he was still the most rational of them, considering the fact he was miraculously sighted again.
"We should go back to the present to make sure we know how this whole thing works first. I don't want to stay stuck." Gladio observed.
"Or we could fall in a never-ending loop. You remember that movie we saw last year?" Prompto added.
"Guys, stop! We're not jumping back and forth and…"
"Noctis!" Ignis cut him off. "I understand that talking things over is the last thing you want to do right now. But we need to find our bearings. And I'd rather have this conversation in private."
They rented a room in the Leville, Umbra apparently refusing to leave them. The dog sat by Prompto's feet during their two hours talk.
The newspaper Ignis had picked up on their way in was the date of their arrival in Altissia. Looking through their stock, they noticed the weapons bought after the catastrophe were still in their possession. That alarmed Noctis, but the guys managed to keep him quiet long enough to get a few answers from him. Luna hadn't given him much details about this power Umbra had. She'd insisted it might help him in revisiting places he'd missed as he rushed along his travels.
"How long can we stay?" Gladiolus asked
"I don't know." Noctis sighed.
"Does time stop in the present when we go back?" Ignis inquired next.
"Yes, from what I've gathered."
"What about time here? Is this like an alternate reality of the past?" Prompto suggested.
"No. At least I don't think so."
"How else can you explain that we still have those weapons and new potions?" Gladio pushed forward the idea.
"You might already have Leviathan ready to be summoned." Prompto sighed.
"Even if I did, I'm not summoning that… thing." Noctis snarled, ready to run off into the street
"Way to disrespect a god."
The talk went on, making the prince dizzy. They kept on suggesting crazier theories and for the nth time, he wished Umbra could talk back and answer in his stead. The dog had to know the limits of this whole travelling in time thing. After one hour and a half of this, Noctis finally lost his nerves.
"Guys, stop beating around the bush. You're all trying to prepare me in case this can't work, but my mind is made up already. We can at least try. Is it so selfish to want a chance to save her?"
His voice almost broke and he gritted his teeth, excepting Gladiolus' angry reply. Much to his surprise, it was Ignis that answered him first.
"No, I don't think you're being selfish. But I can't help but be worried about this. Those powers are suddenly really convenient. Is it really Umbra, or could it be the chancellor messing around with you, like he did back in the train?"
"I swear, I didn't suddenly make this up. Umbra could have taken us back in time at any point… At least, from the moment we'd reached Cape Caem..."
"Then why did you keep it from us?" Gladiolus shot back.
"Because I didn't want to look back when I was this close to seeing her!" he retorted, his fist hitting the side table hard enough to make the glasses jiggle together.
Prompto wrung his hands, his leg jumping nervously while Gladiolus looked away, finding it too hard to see Noctis' pain. Ignis ran one hand through his hair, not caring for how messy that would make it look.
"We need to find the limits of this thing." He started. "And as much as I don't want to tell you this, you can't get your hopes up, Noct. We have no way of knowing the events of the last covenant are going to take place again if we stay."
"Couldn't we run into ourselves? Like our past selves?" Prompto asked.
"Highly improbable, otherwise, I would still be blind. If anything, we've merged with our past selves' bodies. I can't believe I'm saying something as ludicrous."
"So what, you want me to take you back to the present because this is too much to process?!"
"Yes!"
"No!" came their opposed answers.
"I think we should go back at least once," Ignis suggested. "If only to confirm a few things."
"So what, we get a mission done around here, go back to the present and come right back to see if the mission is still completed or something?"
"I feel a headache coming." Gladiolus complained, getting up from his chair. "But I think this is the most logical thing you've said in a while."
Noctis wanted to protest, but his friends had just learned that time travel was possible. It was normal that they didn't want to jump into things without knowing as much as they could. Last time they'd done so, half a city was destroyed.
"You're not going to knock me down and drag be into that mine once we go back?"
"I know I've been a pain in the ass lately, but I'm not about to sink that low. Especially if I see that time really stops in the present. Although I won't let you run away. We're not spending years here."
"If I can just save Luna, it will be enough."
How to do so was an entirely different story. But he would see it through to the end. This time, he wouldn't let her drown. He'd rip into the first secretary's manor estate if he needed to. He'd come back as many times as it would take. If he could be selfish about one thing, it had to be this.
To be continued…
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The die is cast. Now, the big question is, will Noctis be able to see Luna? And how could it change things? Do you want this story to follow canon and be a bittersweet angstfest… Or do we stray from canon, while still going through the angstfest? I think I don't mind either way. I have Unexpected and Stranded to see Noctluna staying alive. So I want to have your opinion over it. Like that survey SE made for the next updates and dlc (don't get me started on that thing, there should be an all those answers option) I'd like to know which option you'd prefer. So here is the full question:
Do you want Noctis to be able to save Luna by calling Umbra or not?
Be sure to let me know. ;)
Next chapters will be longer. If you think I forgot to address any potential question about the time travel, be sure to mention it.