The Far Edge of Fate (Final Fantasy XV)

CHAPTER 25 - HURTS LIKE HELL

hi sorry my laptop broke and i just got it back.

hope your holidays were pleasent and those with shitty family, congratulations on making it through, i'm proud of you!!

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The train car swayed back and forth.

Aaralyn sat with her legs crossed and one arm folded under her bicep ("The pretzel pose," Prompto had tried teasing her), her gaze turned toward the passing landscape through the train cart window.

She couldn't bring herself to call Niflheim 'pretty'. The landscape was a vast and unchanging desert with a few spare cacti here and there with endless mountains that loomed above thick clouds. The only thing that was at least a little nice was the occasional rock formation, but those only happened every hundred miles.

The ride from Altissia to the Imperial lands had been suffocatingly quiet. Aaralyn wasn't sure if anyone had said anything since they'd said their farewells to Nyx and Ravus and gotten back on the boat. It had been stifling as Noctis drove the boat to the Niflheim ports and used their false passports (courtesy of Ravus) to get them in. It was starting to drive Aaralyn nuts. Even Prompto was quiet and she knew him to never be able to stomach long silences.

Awkwardly, Aaralyn turned to eye him across the aisle. He was sitting by the window, messing with the cap of his water bottle. Autumn sat across from him, head bowed and fidgeting. Aaralyn couldn't see her face but imagined it was pretty similar to how it had been for the past few days—stricken with grief and guilt.

Beside them sat Gladiolus and Cassielle, the latter of whom was trying to take a nap, curled into Gladiolus's side with her eyes closed. Her boyfriend was surly, with his arms folded over his broad chest and wearing a scowl that seemed permanently affixed to his face. The guy was like a ticking time bomb nowadays—snappish and commanding, taking charge where Noctis faltered and Ignis left a void. If only he weren't being a massive prick by doing so.

Beside her, Noctis sat holding her hand and staring blankly at the seat in front of them. They'd been using each other as pillows the entire trip, but her boyfriend had been as quiet as the rest. Honestly, she couldn't blame him. A lot had happened in Altissia—between Ignis giving himself up as a prisoner, Lunafreya's death, Nyx's injury, and the revelations about her, team morale was lower than it had ever been.

Across the way, Prompto finally popped the cap off of his water bottle to take a drink. He immediately made a face and wiped at his mouth, making a little 'eugh' noise with his nose wrinkled.

"Bad taste?" Aaralyn asked him, desperate for any kind of conversation aside from the low hum of the other people in the cart.

"Yeah," Prompto squinted through the opening into the bottle. "Imperial tap water sucks ass. Lukewarm and look—floaties! Floaties in my water!" He tried to gesture his bottle at Gladiolus, but he was entirely unamused. Prompto gave up pretty quickly, pulling his hand away. "Gross," he said, peeking into the water again.

"Give it here," Aaralyn shifted a little (Noctis grunted as he was forced to move his head off her shoulder) and reached out. "Floaties are your problem, but I might be able to freeze it for you."

Prompto lit up and immediately tossed the bottle her way. She caught it in her free hand and weighed the bottle in her palm, wondering if what she was about to try was even going to work. She hadn't tried this trick in a long time—since before the Glaives fell apart—but once she'd managed to coerce Crowe into showing her how to freeze their water bottles. Ever since then, she'd gone around freezing her water with a well-controlled ice spell at any given opportunity to keep things cool. Her water bottles, melting ice cream, anything, really. It had driven her mother nuts. It had got to the point that she'd done it so often that the trick was as natural as breathing, but now that it'd been a long time since she'd had access to her magic and even longer since she'd done it, she had no idea whether or not the trick was still feasibly.