So I found a post by @yourscientistfriend that mentioned Prompto’s barcode has his genetic data on it and that, among other things, he’s A) not build to live long, and B) at high risk for neuro-degenerative diseases, and I’ve been absolutely ripping myself apart with that information and I just….
In his forties, Prompto started to forget things. Little things, like his keys or his phone or his earbuds.
“Typical Prompto,” Gladio had shrugged, smile wry but fond.
Ignis had allowed the worry to be shrugged off, perhaps because yes, Prompto had always been a bit scattered, but perhaps also because he didn’t want anything to be wrong.
When Prompto lost his camera, spending nearly a full day in utter panic—“The pictures, Iggy! I had pictures of Noct on—I have to find—Iggy, I don’t know where I last had it!”—before finding it in his darkroom, Ignis began to push harder, the concern rooting deep in his gut.
But memory goes with age, and gods knew they’d lived hard lives. And it was easy to assume it was merely that, as the months trickled by and Prompto seemed to be only mildly more forgetful with each year.
And then late one night in October, when the chill had hit Neo Insomnia with the first cruel stroke of winter, Prompto’s neighbor called, and Ignis found his friend shivering in the cold, wandering around his own block, lost and dazed and unsure of where he was.
The incident was brief, but it was terrifying. After that, they took steps. Gladio and Ignis made a point to check in several times a day, and while it wasn’t perfect it seemed to work well enough. For a while, Prompto was okay.
They lost track of him for half a day, phone calls unreturned, texts unanswered, and when Gladio visited to check on him, he found Prompto a few miles down his usual jogging route, staring disoriented at the park’s artificial pond as though he didn’t know how he’d gotten there.
And, when Gladio pushed his voice past the lump of fear and apprehension and relief that he’d found him to ask why Prompto was there, his friend responded slowly, hazily, “I…I’m not sure?”
So they hired a nurse to stay with him most of the day, and Ignis and Gladio visited often. After a while, Ignis had practically moved himself into Prompto’s room. His evenings were spent researching, because there had been treatments for this—good ones—before the Fall, before the Darkness that left so much to rust and ruin. Much had been recovered in the Restoration, but not enough. Not nearly enough.
For a few years, they found a rhythm. The nurse stayed longer, and Ignis and Gladio were a near constant presence. And Prompto seemed to carry on just fine, interrupted by episodes few and far between of absence but still so often their Prompto that Ignis—foolish, foolish—allowed himself to lull. It was okay, he told himself. Prompto was okay.
Gladio would never admit to the hitch in his breath, would never tell a soul of the tear Ignis discreetly wiped away when they had to sell the house. It was too big, too empty without Prompto’s brightness to fill it up. Ignis moved into Gladio’s, larger but cozy and warm and the walls seemed to echo with the laughter of children long grown.
They visited Prompto as much as they could. The nurses were kind, gentle. And there were good days.
Days when Prompto was alive and shining and present, chattering about the pictures he took in the courtyard, the food—“Not nearly as good as yours, Iggy, of course.”—and they could let themselves forget that anything was wrong.
But there were bad days, too. Days that got worse and more frequent as time went on.
Days when Ignis would visit and Prompto would break down at the sight of him—“Oh, gods, no—Iggy, your eyes, what happ—Iggy, no, no!”—and Ignis would hold him and murmur soothing nonsense against the silver streaks in his blonde hair, tucking him close like a child and trying desperately not to clutch him too tightly. Those days were hard, because Ignis wasn’t allowed to stay. The staff didn’t like when Prompto got so worked up, so distressed; they didn’t like sedating him.
Or days when Gladio would sit next to him and talk and if the conversation was a bit stilted that was okay because Prompto recognized Gladio, didn’t think he was Clarus or some stranger. Until Prompto asked, so hesitant and unsure, if Noct was going to visit him.
“Sorry, buddy,” Gladio said, voice gruff and thankfully only a little shaky. “Not today.”
“Oh…I…” And Prompto smiled, sad and trembling at the edges, and gave a short, self-deprecating laugh. “Yeah, I… I get it.” Just a pleb, hung in the air, unspoken and raw.
Because Prompto didn’t always remember leaving Insomnia. He didn’t always remember late night confessions in motels when everyone was trying to sleep or gentle ribbing astride chocobos as they trekked for days on end from campsite to campsite. He didn’t remember the train, or Gralea, or the truth and its acceptance—his acceptance. He didn’t remember.
And Gladio ignored the sharp twinge in his chest, tugging beneath the heavy, heavy weight that always rested there when he thought of Prompto. He wanted to pull him close, reassure him that Noct wasn’t rejecting him—couldn’t, would never—but he had to be careful. Prompto’s anxiety was unpredictable nowadays, and in this state a hug could sooth as easily as it panicked.
So Gladio settled for a gentle pat on his shoulder and changed the subject.
And then there were the deceptive days, too, and Ignis thought he hated them the most. The days when Ignis was sure, so sure that it was a good day. When he let himself hope. When they would talk and chat and everything seemed fine.
“Ah, that’s right. I’ve brought you Daggerquill rice,” Ignis said, rising to set the tupperware carefully on the table.
“Oh, wow, thanks! That’s my favorite!”
And Ignis could hear the smile in his friend’s voice, as sunny and carefree as when they were young, even as he felt his stomach plummet. Still, he clung to hope—so foolish, Ignis thought, why would he never learn?—and responded hesitantly, quietly. “Yes, I know. …Prompto, do you know who I am?”
Prompto laughed. “Of course I do!” And Ignis hoped. He hoped that Prompto was just being silly, joking around like he usually did, that the bubbly response had been a playful jab.
Until he couldn’t. Until Prompto continued, bright and happy and absent, “You’re the nice man who brought the meat pie yesterday!”
Last week. The Meldacio meat pie was last week. But the thought was distant and vague in the pained clamor of his mind as Ignis focused on breathing. When would he learn? How many times would it take?
“Prompto, it’s Ignis.” And he couldn’t recognize his own voice.
“Hmm?” Confusion, and then, excited and happy, “Oh, hey, that’s my friend’s name!”
But for Gladio, the worst days were the silent days.
Prompto sat in the chair in his small living space, flicking through the same set of pictures on his camera over and over. He didn’t respond. Gladio could talk to him, touch him, playfully nudge and ruffle his hair. And Prompto blankly let it happen, never looking up, never responding, absent in his own body.
Empty inside, like a doll or…
Gladio couldn’t make himself stay long, those days.
There were nights when Ignis and Gladio stayed up later than they should. The grandchildren were safely home again, and the Amicitia household was quiet. They sat in the den and nursed snifters of expensive alcohol, and they talked.
They talked about the trip and before, about wrangling Noct and Prompto from the arcade, about prying them out of the tent in the early morning, about begging them to just wear their damn seat-belts, for gods’ sake.
They didn’t talk about the Altissia, or Gralea, or the Darkness, or when they helped their lost king steal back the dawn and for a few glorious days they were together and whole again.
They didn’t talk about Prompto, about how they were steadily losing him in stumbles and leaps like sliding sand between fingers, about how his memories were seeping out of him, fading like a photo left too long in the sun.
They didn’t have to, really. The grief was too heavy, thick and unwieldy, and so long as that pressure held their lungs tight, they didn’t have to—couldn’t—speak of it.
Until, someday maybe, they could.
…I-I…just…oh my god…oh, oh my god…
thank you, thank you so much for submitting this but I’m gonna need a moment to gather the scraps of my shredded heart…
