Man, it's only day 12 and I'm already tired. I gotta try to write some stuff ahead of time this weekend because I got home from work then had to finish this chapter and now I gotta post it before I go to sleep.
Like. I'm having a grand fucking time with this and I'm absolutely going to keep it up for as long as I can manage (hopefully all throughout October!) buuut it's certainly more exhausting than I anticipated, lol. Even when I've got pre-written stuff, it takes me around an hour to clean up and post everything (not just on FFN but also on Tumblr and AO3).

Anyway! It's already Iggy's turn again. Enjoy!

No. 12: "I haven't slept in days but who's counting?"
Red | Insomnia | "I'm up, I'm up."

Warnings: PTSD flashback

While Ignis is used to functioning on little sleep, he's never actually had trouble sleeping. His lack of sleep used to come from long nights spent in front of his laptop, mechanically working through the quiet hours when no one tried to call him or otherwise ask anything of him, allowing him to make progress far more quickly than during the day.

Work through the night, get just enough sleep to survive, substitute the missing hours with coffee. Rinse and repeat.

When he did go to sleep, he was usually out within minutes, his body desperately putting itself into rest mode the moment he finally allowed it.

It was not exactly pleasant, of course, but he would take that lifestyle in a heartbeat over the insomnia he seems to have developed after Altissia.

He spent most of the first week after his injury asleep, exhausted from painkillers and his body's efforts to heal itself. By the second week, he worked himself back into a more normal sleep schedule, only allowing himself to sleep during the night despite his friends' attempts to get him into bed whenever he started to flag.

And then, once he was healed enough that his body no longer grasped at any opportunity to rest, the nightmares set in.

Ignis isn't an expert in psychology, but after Noct's accident as a child, he would hide himself away in the Citadel's library and devour any and all books on psychological trauma and recovery thereof in order to help Noct get better. Now, everything he had read in those books so many years ago came back to his mind, but truth be told, even without the books he could have figured out that he's probably somewhat traumatised from the events at the altar.

So the nightmares that plague him are one thing that keeps him from restful sleep, but even on the rare nights that he doesn't wake up soaked in sweat and trembling with adrenaline, he finds himself tossing and turning, unable to fall asleep. He's not certain why that is, he's certainly exhausted enough, but he suspects the blindness makes it harder to tell night from day and possibly messes with his circadian rhythm.

He doesn't mention his struggles to the others - Astrals know they've all got enough on their plates - but in such close quarters, it's only a matter of time until they start figuring it out. He can only pray that he doesn't wake up screaming one night - he's not sure he could stand the humiliation.

Sleeping on the train is difficult even under normal circumstances. The thundering sound of the wheels running across the tracks for hours and hours on end makes it nearly impossible to fall asleep. The others remedy this by using either earplugs in Gladio's case or earphones with calming music in Prompto and Noct's case, but Ignis cannot stand the thought of surrendering yet another of his senses. Additionally, lying down while the train moves makes him feel motion-sick, so he spends most of the nights half sitting up, dozing until a nightmare starts to grip him, and then he wakes with a start only to do it all over again until morning comes.

By the time they reach Cartanica and make their way down to the abandoned mine, Ignis is almost glad for the chance of pace and a chance to stretch his legs. Of course, he faces an abundance of other challenges almost immediately, and the shame and humiliation of stumbling and falling into the mud burns worse than any of the bruises he collects in the process.

Prompto is a gift sent to him by the heavens. He sticks close to Ignis the way he has been doing since Altissia, and while Ignis hates that he needs him close in the first place, for the first time he doesn't feel irritated by the constant hovering. No, he's eternally grateful for the boy and the feeling of Prompto's arm under his hand is the only warmth he feels in this waterlogged hellhole.

They eat cup noodles for dinner, which may just be the most cruel punishment from the Astrals yet, and then when no one's in the mood to look at Prompto's photos, they quietly pile into the tent.

It's been a terrible, exhausting day, and the others fall asleep quite quickly, even Prompto who hates making camp in what he and Noct refer to as dungeons - closed-off areas crawling with many of the same enemy types, a description that certainly fits the place.

Ignis, while just as exhausted as the rest of them, finds himself unable to fall asleep yet again. There are too many foreign sounds, something he notices a lot more now that he's down one of his senses. And his brain cannot seem to shut down. It's stuck on a loop, replaying the day's events over and over again. His pathetic display, his uselessness in battle, his dependence on Prompto's guidance. It's frustrating and humiliating and he hates every second of it.

Eventually, he does manage to doze off, not quite asleep yet but nearly there, but then a drop of water hits the tent, and then another one, and soon the rain is pouring down, rapidly pattering on the fabric of the tent.

And suddenly, Ignis is no longer in the tent with his closest friends. He's in Altissia, desperately trying to save Noct, even if it means sacrificing himself in the process.

The city burns, and Ignis burns with it, perceiving nothing but pain, endless, scorching pain worse than anything he has felt in his life, and he knows he has to stand tall and bear it, for Noct's sake.

"Specs, hey," a voice urges next to him, and it takes a moment to get through the blaze Ignis is caught in, but it's unmistakably Noct.

"Ignis? Ignis, can you hear me?"

Ignis' eyes - eye, really - shoot open, but of course, he can't see anything.

A hand is touching him, gripping his arm tightly enough to ground him, just on the verge of painful. The rain is already letting up, probably just a passing cloud, and the drops hitting the tent have slowed enough that they don't sound anything like Altissia anymore.

"N-noct?" he asks, tripping on the word. His throat feels dry and he's sweaty and shivering.

"Yeah, it's me. You okay?"

Noct is whispering, so the others must still be asleep. No need to keep anyone else from getting some rest just because he cannot hold himself together.

So he says, "Fine," then winces at how clipped he sounds, and adds, "Go back to sleep, Noct."

Noct, while usually not one to refuse the chance to sleep, doesn't release Ignis' arm.

"Do you need to go outside for a bit? Get some fresh air?"

The words to decline the offer get stuck in Ignis' throat. He knows he shouldn't accept, knows he shouldn't keep Noct from sleeping, knows he should be able to deal with… this on his own. But the thought of Noct going back to sleep, leaving him alone in the dark once more - Ignis can't bear it.

"Perhaps," he says, his voice hoarse. "Just… just for a few minutes."

"Course," Noct replies and guides him out of the tent. He's clumsy, almost too gentle like he's afraid to touch him, and it's a stark difference from Prompto's guidance he's grown used to, but Ignis is just glad that he's here, touching him, grounding him and chasing away the terror.

By the time they're outside, the rain has almost completely stopped. Noct quickly dries off two of the camping chairs and then makes Ignis sit down.

Immediately, it's easier to breathe. The use of the word fresh to describe the air in the mine can be debated, but it's better than inside the tent.

"I apologise for waking you," Ignis says, miserably. He wonders what it was that woke Noct of all people.

"Don't worry about it," Noct waves him off. "You, uh. I think you were having a bad dream?"

That… isn't too far from the truth, and Ignis isn't keen on elaborating what that actually was - not a dream but some sort of trauma response, most likely triggered by the rain.

"You weren't like, screaming or anything," Noct hurries to clarify. "Just, kind of breathing fast and irregularly and you were shaking, and then you wouldn't respond to me at first."

Ignis tries and fails to come up with something to say and finally settles for, "I see."

Noct falls silent then, and for a while, they just sit. Ignis' racing heart calms down eventually, and then he starts shivering from the cold rather than nerves.

When Noct notices that, he ushers Ignis back into the tent. He curls up in the same position he was in before Ignis woke him up, but his hand finds Ignis' and holds on, fingers laced together even once Noct is no longer awake.

Ignis eventually follows, finally falling into a deep, dreamless sleep

All of my Iggy fics for this series have been exploring his post-Altissia life, it's just SO interesting! But I've got other things in store for him, I promise.

Thank you for being here, I wouldn't even be doing this without y'alls support :3

Have a lovely day and stay tuned for uhhhh *checks notes* Gladio!