so i've been thinking abt this au idea where prompto comes out of zegnautus keep as some kind of magitek cyborg. like, just ardyn fucking with him and the others a bit more, pushing the whole "prompto's an mt" thing to the max. thoughts?
okay okay it’s been 8000 years since you sent this but let’s gooooo
We all know that the whole section from Zegnautus is wild and did a number on Prompto. One thing that I believe defines the growth in his character is when they’re all together again and Prompto confesses that he’s one of them, that he was supposed to be an MT. That’s him taking charge of his own self and putting it out there that he is who he is, and he’s hoping that the rest of the group will accept it, even though he’s terrified during the process.
But...he still looks like himself. The fact that his appearance didn’t change meant he had the opportunity to decide for himself whether he was going to admit it or continue hiding that part of him. In this case, if Ardyn and/or Verstael had physically modified him in a cyborg-like manner, that would take out that choice factor pretty significantly. There’s not much to confess after the three (well...two) of them rescue a Prompto that now looks half magitek. Hell, he’d probably feel awful about it, and deciding to go back to them would have been that much harder for him in that discussion with Aranea.
And then there’s Noctis. Boy already feels so guilty about the events of the train. He’s gonna blame himself for the torture that Prompto endured all alone out here, from the second he shoved him off the train onward. He literally cast him out, albeit accidentally. But Prompto doesn’t know that. The discoveries about himself and the modifications he goes through in this au hit hard, and he would feel much more deserving of that fate of being outcast. When Noctis is confronted with this, he feels like he’s to blame for Prompto’s hurt, even if he wasn’t the one that directly caused most of it. He’d work twice as hard to make up for it, giving him all the reassurances that he is Prompto and they all care about him so, so much.
It might take a while longer (not that there’s a whole lot of time between the keep and Noct being monched on by the crystal), but Prompto wants to believe that he’s sincere. The fact that he’s going through so much effort to make him feel better about himself doesn’t go unnoticed.
And hey, depending on the level of mechanical additives that Prompto has now, he could figure out how to get them removed. If not, he can and will find a way to work it to his advantage in battle.
As always, if anyone has anything to add on, please do!!