A Heart Of Fire (Final Fantasy XV)

Chapter 13

Prompto, Gladio, and I sat in the room of the apartment we stayed at for the night, waiting for our prince to wake from his deep slumber. Ignis had stepped out a while ago, leaving us to await his return before we headed out for our boat to Altissia. I sat in an armchair reading a history book by the giant glass plane that allowed us a view of the resort while the other two did whatever to keep them occupied.

As I turned to the next page in my book, I hear a soft yawn from where Noctis was sleeping, and looked up to see him sit up in his bed.

"Morning, sleepy-head," I greet with a smile.
"Mornin'," he replies as he gets up from the bed. "Where's specs?"

"Should be back any minute now," Gladio says. Just as he says so, the door to our room opened, revealing Ignis with a straight, but very sullen, expression. In his hand is a newspaper, filled with articles and small pictures about this morning's news.

"What's that look for?" Noctis questions as our attention turns to Ignis, but all he does is silently look at Noctis as he hands the paper off to Gladio.

"It's in all the papers," he mutters, looking away from Noctis' puzzled face.

"What is?" he Noctis asks apprehensively. Ignis says nothing as he avoids his gaze. Whatever it was that got Ignis in a distraught mood, it must be very serious. I stood up from my seat and walked towards Gladio with a nasty feeling the pit of my stomach. I watched as Gladio read over the page and watched his face turn to that of shock and disbelief.

"Gladio?" I call softly. Gladio says nothing. Prompto walks over and reads the newspaper in Gladio's hands.

"Insomnia...falls?" Prompto reads in shock. My eyes widened in horror. Insomnia falls? I thought to myself. But..how?

"It...can't be," I muttered sadly, leaning on the back of one of the armchairs. I slowly turn my head up towards Noctis and saw the same shocked expression that we all had slowly turn to that of anger.

"This your idea of a joke?" he says in an unamused tone.

"I need you to calm so I can explain," Ig is says calmly, but it only irritated Noctis more.

"I'm as calm as I'm gonna get!" he exclaims angrily. Ignis takes a breath before proceeding to tell us what happened.

"There was an attack," he says slowly. "The imperial army has taken the Crown City." Gladio then read the printed text out loud.

"As treaty room tempers flared, blasts lit the night sky. When the smoke about the Citadel had cleared, the king was found...dead," Gladio says, pausing to most likely processes what he had just read.

We were left speechless. None of us knew what to say. To hear that not only the Crown City, our home, has fallen into Niflheim's hands, but also that our king is dead. There had to be a way that it wasn't true. There just had to be. It couldn't be true...

"No, wait, hold on..." Noctis mutters, unable to comprehend what he had just heard. I frowned sadly at the look on his face. The frustration and worry was evident on his face as his eyes stared at the floor beneath his feet.

"We had no way of knowing," Ignis says sadly.

"What?" Noctis says as he quickly turns back to Ignis. "Knowing what?"

"That the signing was last night, that Insomnia--"

"But the wedding! Altissia!" Noctis interrupts with an exasperated breath.

"I know, that was the plan," Ignis stops him, "Yet the reports of the invasion are all the same. How could every headline in the kingdom be wrong?" Ignis points out, which only made me feel even more unsure that this was all just a fabricated lie.