21 June, 756:
(One month after)
The crystal had a life and soul all of its own. It spoke only to the King of Lucis, but Reina knew its voice with uncomfortable familiarity. She would never forget the booming tones—the words resounding as if they came from within her own head, rather than some external source. At fourteen she had heard it name her brother as its Chosen, though that had happened nine years before. And that night, holed up in a repurposed shack in Caem, she heard that voice once more.
Spring, 756:
(Three months before)
There were different sorts of dreams. Some were indistinguishable from life; dreams in which she saw through her own eyes, she acted and interacted, just as if she was really there. In a way, she was there, it just hadn't happened, yet. Those were the most disorienting. She could fall asleep one night and wake the following morning, live through horrors and tragedy, only to wake again and find that none of it had yet happened even though it had very clearly occurred for her. Usually they were short, but once or twice she had woken to discover that whole weeks of her life had never happened.
Then there were the others. The ones that took her to places she had never been at times she had never been in them. Dreams where she became unstuck in time and drifted at the whims of the Gods to observe people and places and events like some ghost floating through memories.
The crystal hung in the center of the Citadel, protected by the very technology it helped to create. From there it projected the Wall—covering all of Insomnia in a shroud that had yet to be penetrated. The room was guarded night and day by the Crownsguard, but the only person permitted to enter was the king. The only living person who knew precisely what lay beyond the doors, besides King Regis, was his daughter, though she had never been inside.
Time was a peculiar thing. Reina crossed it in her dreams as another person might cross a room. Or, more accurately, she was drawn through it as if caught up in a current too strong to fight. The dreams took her where they would and she had no choice in the matter.
On that day in late spring—there were blossoms falling from the trees in the courtyard below, visible through the sweeping corridor windows—Reina hadn't stood beside her father outside of the Crystal Chamber. But she did now; it was so sharp and real that she forgot about time. She opened her eyes to see the doors swing open for them—for him. The king stood beside her, just as he should have been. If she had been cognizant of it, she could have placed the exact year just by looking at him. But she wasn't thinking about that. She was feeling that warmth of seeing him again—because it wasn't a dream, not really—it was real. A time and a place and an event that had actually happened. She was looking at her father, real and alive, just at a different time.
"Father." Her lips formed the word but no sound came out.
His steps faltered just inside the door and she reached out to take his arm automatically, after so many years of doing it. But she couldn't reach him, couldn't touch him. She had no hands, nor arms. If she'd had eyes, they might have clouded at the realization that she had to watch her father limp—even with the aid of his cane—without being able to do anything for him. But she didn't have eyes, either. She was consciousness without a body.
He was real. She wasn't.
The doors closed behind him with a certain finality. He didn't look back; his gaze fixed on the massive geode hanging in the middle of the room. It was larger than a single person—larger than the king, and certainly would have been larger than Reina, if her body had been there. Light shone from within, not reflected but generated, and there was a life about it, as if the whole stone pulsed and breathed.
"Lucis burns. We are scorched on our borders; our people die. How long will you wait?" In spite of the stutter in his step, the king's voice held strong and true: confident and commanding.
:Human kingdoms and lifetimes do not concern me.: The voice was not a physical thing; less a vibration in air and more a ripple in knowledge.
"That you have no regard for human life is clear enough." There was a bitter note in his voice when he spoke again. Reina knew without guessing that he was thinking about Noctis' life.
:He is not ready.:
"He will take up my mantle. He will be what you need him to be." The conviction was evident without seeing it on the king's face as well, but Reina didn't need either to understand how much her father believed in Noct.
:Not yet. The Chosen must take up all the power of his line, distilled from his forefathers—stored—and passed on to him. But there is one more life that must feed his power before Ascension can begin.:
Wherever—or whenever—her stomach was, it lurched uncomfortably. The Astrals seemed to have a bad habit of never speaking plainly, but she could gather the meaning of the crystal's words this time, even without looking at her father. She looked anyway.
He sighed, shutting his eyes and hanging his head forward. His weight rested a little more heavily upon his cane.
"I have been prepared to give my life in defense of this kingdom for many years. I will give it for Noctis more readily still."
"No! Father—you can't!" Reina shouted—or tried to, at the very least. If she made any sound, the king never heard it.
Everyone always spoke about his death like it was an inevitability, but in the solitude of nighttime Reina had allowed herself to dream. She could transfer energy to her father, exchange her lifeforce for his. He hated it, but maybe, just maybe… she could share the burden of the ring, at least in some sense. And with her help, he might have lasted, even if Niflheim persisted. Selfishly, a part of her had hoped that even if Noctis was destined to leave her behind, she would be left behind along with her father.
Now that hope was gone, as well. Her conscious mind, tangled up in time and memories, forgot that it was already too late, that this was years in the past, that her father had already left her behind. It wasn't a dream—it was real life, and she was there, experiencing it at that moment. Time meant something different in dreams.
:You must, if ever he is to succeed.: The booming not-voice broke through Reina's rising panic, but did nothing to calm it.
"He will," the king said, more to himself than anyone else. He turned, moving unsteadily away from the crystal; Reina followed, but time was falling away again. The world dripped and blurred together. Time passed, seasons changed. When the current stopped and spat Reina out on the shore, choking and gasping, it was a time she had been before, an event she had witnessed time and time again.
17 May, 756:
(The day)
"No… No, no, no!" she screamed it as if the words would stop the inevitable.
She watched lightning arc from the king's hand and strike the towering Niflheim general in his magitek armor. She watched Glauca crash against the wall, which showered stone.
"Father, please! Go!"
But he couldn't. He had to die because if he didn't, Noctis would never be able to fulfill his destiny.
The general recovered and this time when the king threw lightning, it struck his blade—absorbing and grounding rather than shocking.
"No…!" Reina cried. She couldn't move, couldn't stop watching, couldn't stop anything.
Glauca thrust forward, the king's magic rebounded, striking the wall instead and throwing him off balance. He had no cane and no daughter to catch him or shield him. And she would have. If her body could have stopped the horrible descent of that blade, she would have thrown herself in front of it. But she didn't have a body, and even if she had it would all have been for naught.
The oversized blade thrust straight through her father. Reina was screaming wordlessly; she couldn't find a single word anymore—there was only terror and horror, that awful pain of loss all over again.
"Father! No!"
Reina. A familiar voice crossed time and space to reach her. Reina's breath caught in her throat. Look at me, Reina. Just me, nothing else. See me.
"Father..?"
21 June, 756:
(One month after)
Cid had called while they were in Hammerhead to announce that the ship was ready to sail for Altissa, so they made for Caem. It had been a cheerful enough evening; Iris and Talcott were eager to show them around, and Reina's good humor from Hammerhead seemed to persist. She wasn't really her old self, still, but at least she didn't look so empty. That stupid hammer had really done something for her.
They retired for the night a little bit later than was probably wise, considering the hour at which they were supposed to leave in the morning. Reina had ended up sharing a room with Iris while Noct and the others slept in the adjacent room. It was as nice of a night as he could have hoped for. No tent, soft beds, minimal monster battling during the day, and good company. It might have gone on being a good night all the way until morning. But it didn't.
It had been a very long time since Noctis had been awoken in the middle of the night by one of Reina's nightmares. Nearly four years since they had shared a bedroom, and a few before that since she'd had that sort of dream.
His mind didn't immediately connect the dots. He woke in a dark room; Reina's screams were muffled by the wall between them. He was upright and stumbling out of bed before his brain caught up with his body. It seemed there was an immediate impulse to run to Reina's side when she cried out.
"Noctis." Ignis grabbed his shoulders as he headed for the door and very nearly ran into it, instead. "Reina—"
"Yeah, I know." Noct pulled away from him and lurched out through the door, finally finding his balance. In the room next door he found Reina still abed, thrashing and tangling herself in her blankets. Iris stood nearby, wide-eyed. She looked up when the door opened.
"I can't wake her," Iris said, eyes bright with unshed tears as she held back her own fear. "I-I tried."
For the first time the reality of the situation settled into Noctis' mind. Maybe it was because he had woken up a little more, or maybe it was actually seeing Reina in the throes of a nightmare. Maybe it was the fact that seeing Iris like that reminded him more than a little of himself, years ago. The fact was that he never could wake her, either. Every time she screamed, trapped in a dream she couldn't escape, it had been their father who had come to the rescue. Noctis had been helpless—worthless. Only Dad could wake her. So what happened, now that he was gone?
Noctis ground his teeth together and stepped forward, fighting back doubt. If he couldn't then no one left alive could, and he didn't want to think what it meant for his sister.
He sat on the edge of her bed, eyes focused only on Reina, and reached out to take her shoulders as he called to her, just as he had watched their father do countless times when they were young.
"Reina." He put as much command into that one word as he could muster. He wasn't asking for her attention, he was demanding it. She didn't punch him in the nose; she stilled under his hands as he gripped her. His mouth formed the words that their father had always said: "Look at me, Reina. Just me, nothing else. See me."
Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused. "Father…?"
Any elation Noctis might have felt at success—at having finally done what only one other person had ever done before—was crushed by her first word. It was always their father who woke her. Noct had used his voice, his words. And for a brief, fleeting moment he had given her that terrible hope again. He wished more than anything that he could have followed the next part of the script.
Just me.
He didn't say it. He couldn't say anything at all. Eventually Reina blinked and focused on him. The wide-eyed hope faded as reality settled back in.
"Noct…" She breathed, shutting her eyes and dropping her head back onto her pillow.
Just Noctis.
There were tears on her cheeks already; new ones joined them as she lay there just trying to breathe.
"Your Highness? Is everything alright?"
Noctis turned to look over his shoulder. The rest of the household was standing in the doorway or just inside. It was Monica who spoke.
'Alright' wasn't the word Noctis would have used to describe things, but at least Reina was awake.
"Yeah…" He said. It occurred to him that it had been nearly eight years since the last time Reina had woken like that—most people close to the royal family had heard rumors that Reina sometimes dreamed the future, but how many people remembered what that looked like, anymore?
"Sometimes she has… dreams." Noctis said, by way of explanation. "You alright, Rei?"
Reina was still lying with tears streaming silently passed her shut eyelids.
"Yeah," she said, her voice hoarse. It was the sort of 'yeah' that was so obviously a lie that it wasn't even worth calling out.
A hesitant pause followed as those gathered at the door tried to decide whether or not to accept the lie and leave, or try to offer unwelcome help. Eventually they settled on the first. Monica quietly excused herself and left; everyone else followed one by one.
"Come on," Noctis said, gripping Reina's shoulder. "Come sleep with me."
She always followed Dad to bed after those outbursts. He doubted she would sleep again, that night, but it was better than being alone, surely.
Reina nodded mutely. She detangled from her blankets and they went; Noctis bid goodnight to Iris on the way out, giving her an apologetic look. In the room next door they both settled into one bed. Reina was quiet for a long time, lying with her arms wrapped around Noct's neck, but she didn't sleep.
"What did you dream..?" Noctis asked at length, his whisper somehow startlingly loud in the quiet room.
She didn't answer immediately, but Noctis waited without prompting. He wondered idly if the other three people in the room were still awake and listening. It seemed likely.
"I watched him die," Reina said at last; her voice was soft but it didn't catch. Like she was so broken that not even that could draw a sob from her anymore.
To think that just the day before they had laughed so hard that it hurt.
Noct held her a little tighter. It was bad enough that he was dead, bad enough that she'd had to watch it. But it seemed the same vision visited her over and over, now. He couldn't do anything but hug her and hope she could get some sleep.
She didn't.
