Surprises (Working title)

Chapter 1

A/N: No beta- I'll die before I proofread my shit.

Even with Ignis blindfolded and handicapped, he can still avoid the swipes of Gladio's greatsword, retaliating with vicious precision and grace. Something Gladio can only hope to achieve but knows it's far from possible with his physique, of course he's in perfect shape but he's built for being a shield and therefore is bulky and large, muscular and heavy compared to the agile and flexible build of his sandy-haired friend.

"Hey, can we take a breather? I wanna ask you something," Gladio said between heavy breaths, parrying the thrust from Ignis' lance. The Advisor haled his advances and pulling the blindfold up to his forehead, staring curiously at the Shield-to-be.

"Of course. What's on your mind?" The curiosity was mirrored in his voice, the heavy accent hitting Gladio's ears like music.

The elder sat down with a thud, his greatsword falling beside him with a loud clang, Ignis pulled the blindfold off and let it fall to the mat, abandoning his lance beside it with more care than Gladio. "I uh- There's a thing at school and I was wondering with you'd wanna come, Noct and Prompto are coming so thought I'd invite you too," The larger boy kept his gaze trained on the floor as he spoke, barely audible to the other boy.

"Unfortunately I have a prior engagement. Besides, I doubt the school will take kindly to students from other institutions attending," Ignis' voice was unwavering as his stare, studying his companion as if trying to deduce a motive for such a question. "Nah I get it, thought it was a long shot. It ain't so important you and I gotta be present so didn't think you'd come," The disappointment, however hard Gladio tried to hide it, was as clear as day to Ignis and he felt a little guilty for declining.

After a moment of silence the pair mutually agreed to finish their sparring session, not through words but through the silence and slight hostility. Gladio just watched Ignis leave to the locker room with a longing stare, young and hopeless. Though Gladio is flirtatious with both men and women at the best of times so that gives Ignis no reason to think of his interactions with the Shield as anything more than playful banter or purely platonic, and Gladio is having an internal conflict about how he actually feels about his best friend, it's safe to say he loves him completely but whether it's friendly, brotherly or romantic is a mystery. Needless to say, Gladio is utterly confused about what he feels and what he wants.

The event that the young Shield was referring to was the winter school dance, a themed one to be precise, the theme this year happened to be masquerade and both Noctis and Prompto were ecstatic about making their masks, given they could just buy one that looks nicer than the monstrosities they created. Much to Ignis' dismay when it came to cleaning Noct's apartment, glue and glitter everywhere, ribbons stuck in odd places and paper cuttings scattered around the entire apartment like Noctis had been walking while being creative.

"Hey Gladdy, what's up? Lil early for you to be finished training isn't it?"

"Uh yeah, Iggy and I decided to finish up early, Iris you gotta stop playing matchmaker alright?"

"What? Why? What happened?"

"Nothin', look I'm gonna be home in a sec, mind grabbing my stuff outta my closet? I'll talk to you about it later,"

"... Alright... See you in a sec,"

Iris was the one that told Gladio to ask Ignis to the dance, she noticed her elder brother's internal struggle, add that with how much he blabs on about the younger boy while he's at home and it's like they're already a couple. They certainly bicker like an old married couple and act like the mom and dad of the retinue. She's known Ignis as long as Gladio has, often seeing the Advisor around when she went to visit Gladio, play with Noct or when her father brought her along for a while. The boy always aimed to please and overworked himself, even as a child, younger than 17 that is. The caffeine addiction also started when he was younger, to compensate the lost hours of sleep due to too much school work, studies for his future role and more as he grew older and more responsible. Gladio took it upon himself to make sure his best friend went home, slept and ate enough, as well as get the odd day or two off to chill and be a normal person. Those days became rarer and rarer however.