Endurance Mechanics
Feb. 20th, 2024 05:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seleniasTitle: Endurance Mechanics
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion & Mid
Rating: gen
Word Count: 2022
Notes: Inspired by Mid's final questline and this dialogue in question. I think Mid would very much like to put Dion under a microscope and poke him a little.
-
“Your father,” Dion starts. He curls his fingers over the edge of the work bench. The room smells like a forge but its cleanliness means a different craft. These are not connections he’s ever had to make. “I did not understand his intentions then — I refused to. The very idea that the mothercrystals were the source of our blight — it was unthinkable.”
Mid doesn’t look up. The shop is empty of all but them, and light slants down the staircase in the late afternoon creating a mauve haze. He understands why the children who have flown past him during his solemn and lonely watch had called it a dungeon. It’s not where one would go to visit without wanting something first. It was good that she had sought him out instead as every dusty corner in this safe space felt a dull reminder that he was a trespasser. Her braid swings as she flutters around to a shelf for paper and sharp sticks of graphite — tools he’s not seen since his days in Whitewyrm, before joining the dragoons. Books cover every surface and a small fire burns at the far edge of the room. It is, despite its affairs and clinical necessities, warm.
“Well, Dad’s never been good at reigning in his lightnin’ y’know. Once he’d set his mind on something he’d steamroll forward, the rest be damned! That was a joke we had early on, with the Enterprise you see. It was Dad’s copy in attitude and subtlety.”
Dion smiles despite myself. He’s never been one for the sea when his eikon was made for the skies. “I was much younger when we met. I believe he wounded my pride more than my sense of reality.”
“Yeah? Bet you got a few good hits in then,” Mid’s laugh is a wild, startling thing. She talks like her father is an old comrade or friend despite his proclivities and it pulls Dion back, briefly, spitefully, to a time in which that setting had felt the same for him. His Radiance had commanded him in battle before, all their courtly performances traded for the necessity of forging forward and inspiring confidence — he’d pulled Dion under his arm in his youth and they’d shared plans and ideas that later sloughed from memory and hardly seemed real at all. Those years fled swiftly like a spring thaw and are not easy to recall with clarity anymore. Dion knows he’s a traitor to all his good intentions and His Radiance too, possessed by spirits long brewing within. Dion doesn’t deserve to reminisce or be here at all, sharing space with her genius and calling old ghosts to surface — though Ramuh’s is not so easily shook and lives in every nook, cranny, and person in this place — but she had asked him for his company. He cannot fall further than where he’s landed; he only must make peace with her, though he refuses to ask for what his own guilt inspires: forgiveness.
“What do you think now that you’ve seen the place? Bearers everywhere with the imperial brand and whispering things like you can’t hear — I’d half wondered if Clive had gone crazy when he brought you here. Of course you seem plenty nice, if rigid as Greagor Herself, but one can’t help their upbringing. Point is, you seem like a good guy and you’re doing a huge service for the Rosfields — I like that. So I assume you’re not bothered helping bearers when you’ve got your own bloody eikon to deal with. Two sides of the same gil and all that, yeah?”
Dion breathes. Her eyes pin him in place, sure and smart, prodding at his veneer to reveal the ugliness beneath. He feels hoarse. “Of course not. I — there was never time available to me to make my opinions heard — I was not a part of the court except as permitted and we are all Greagor’s servants—”
She waves her hands to cut him off. “Point is, you are as good as they say.” Dion swallows, taken aback. He does not feel it. Mid’s smile is wide but his chest is set to crack. That dark reality had mostly escaped him beneath other more dangerous concerns. These people are survivors under the banner he was conditioned to follow and their turmoil and its complexity was a dull blade in a drawer of them he could not afford to touch. He could hardly spare a thought. It does not make him good. Not much can. “A real, fairytale prince here in our Hideaway, eh? Glad you exist.”
“That — you need not…” Dion feels faint. “May I sit down.”
“Yeah, right here!” Mid shoves a stool at him and Dion deposits himself ungracefully, watching through bleary eyes as she unrolls a spread of machinery who’s brilliance is lost on him. Engineers in Twinside were considered the most respectable in the realm for their endeavors aboard Fallen foundations — Dion can see it here, knows Cid’s daughter has made plans that likely rival their own. “Bet you thought I called you down to here to guilt trip you, eh? My bad, my bad! See, I’ve a project of mine and I think you’re perfectly suited to shedding some light for me — er, no pun intended. Well, maybe. In its simplest form I will require wings to make it complete. And I hear yours are fantastic!” Mid leans in close, smiling. She falters. Dion feels his composure slipping and straightens his spine; even in the library, listening to Harpocrates spear him with truths Dion knew then he could disappoint still. “…You have more to say?”
Dion strokes his fingers along the table then retracts his hands to his lap. Everything is too little and too much in these days he faintly hopes may be his last. “I am sorry I did not have the wisdom to hear your father all those years ago. I suspect matters would be different and the plight of this world would not be as grave.”
“There’s no use speculating,” Mid says. She scratches her chin, stained fingernails hooking in her scarf, a youth’s fidgeting. She cranes her head, all limbs and no grace, but he respects her role in this place and her words will not go unheard. “There’s still Ultima, y’know. No accounting for him, or anyone else for that matter. And Dad had his pride too, right. He couldn’t always admit when his plans were shit. Drake’s Head might’ve been his first attempt, but maybe this tragedy only would have started earlier and we’d all be worse off.”
Dion feels his mouth twitch. The image still comes to mind, sometimes — how hot his anger when he’d struck the walls of Oriflamme’s Sanctum with searing light. Sorrow is swift on its heels, scratching at him; he’s still never learned to aim his rage where it truly belongs. “He was not happy to see me when I arrived,” Dion murmurs. “Nor I him.”
Mid mimes a long cigar between her fingers, and props herself against the desk, arm resting on an imaginary sword. “Princeling,” she sneers. “Did it go like that?”
He closes his eyes, then raises them to the light burning above. “I expect his child would know,” he says. “It’s as you’ve said.” Mid quiets.
For a few moments, silence reigns. There are no comparisons he can draw between the agony of her loss and his own, but he can wield it for what purpose he should serve — he’ll cut Ultima from the sky as penance and they’ll both see Cid’s journey finished. That’s how he must settle the score. It’s all he has left to offer. As to what she needs of him — he can only avail himself in what capacity remains. He hopes it’s enough.
“Wings,” Mid starts again. She clears her throat and gestures at her rolls of paper, recharting their course. “I’ve been wanting to build a flying ship. Ideally, it’d take you boys straight to that ugly eyesore in the sky — and I reckon, with some lofty examples I might build her faster —” Dion raises his hand to stop her. The pieces fall into place. He’s charmed and defeated at once. He could nearly laugh but sighs instead.
“Forgive me, but mine are limited,” Dion says carefully. “I cannot manifest for you, or I will not have the strength for our journey I’m afraid. But I could tell you that there are many dragonets who roam free who’s wings are much better suited for studying. They are swift, light, easy to discipline, and though I would not encourage it, would make an ideal subject for you. There are surely dragons that still roam some unblemished fields in Sanbreque. Granted, they are sacred beasts—”
“Great,” Mid says. “I’ll get Clive to catch one for me.”
Dion blinks. “Then I will speak with him and share what knowledge I can.” He quiets. Mid may have the answer she needs, but Dion feels less than satisfied. Her drive to be involved is not invisible to him, nor the frantic energy she wields to protect her heart from the incoming damage. This is grief at its most useful. “You are a brilliant engineer and I hope your project comes to fruition. I would like to see it. I am sorry too that I cannot guarantee your family’s return when we depart — however, I will make sure they arrive and we all do what we must.”
Mid smiles and leans forward on her arms, twirling her pencil back and forth, but it’s not happy. Below, her plans are large and expansive and entirely unreadable to him. What studies he enjoyed belonging to as a boy who still fancied himself a member of the court and his father’s son have long since drifted away. He may have retained his skills of recognizing talents in others, he thinks, but he knows the last decade has seen him shaped into a blade fit for cleaving Valisthea to pieces. Ultima had proven it. But now, he should only like to command himself.
“I’ll be honest, Fancy Pants. I was kind of hoping I would hate you. My Dad used to say Sanbreque was only a step above Waloed with their iron grip — and that’s a shitty margin to consider — but you’re too bloody nice! I’m honestly glad for it though. If anyone will give Clive a fighting chance, well, I’ll expect it’ll be you. That’s a relief in the end. Us normal people can’t do much except—” She gestures hopelessly at the table, “—this. Thanks.”
“They will have what safety I can afford,” Dion says, soft, and finds he means it. He doesn’t wish to disappoint anyone else. He doesn’t wish to see any more families twice spurned, even a community of strangers.
“Now go on,” she says and waves her hands at him, chasing him off his perch. Dion collects himself with more grace than he’d felt on the descent. “I can’t work with anyone hovering.”
“Then I will not linger.”
Clive’s boots can be heard on the stairs and they both turn to greet him. Dion’s grown familiar with his activities, his comings and goings and pressed upon conversations on the docks. Lately, he’s always been accompanied by his brother and Lady Warrick when he departs. He thinks he must be poor company if Clive has not requested his aid — or maybe it’s only that it’s unnecessary and he must have goodbyes of his own to make.
Dion imagines it will be his last flight and his own farewells have been cruel and clinical as necessary. But if it’s not to be—
“Miss Telamon—” she makes such a face Dion coughs to veil a laugh, then corrects himself brusquely, “Midadol. When this is all over, ask me again. I would be glad to help Cid’s daughter. My wings will be yours.”
“Excuse my interruption, but I wouldn’t go promising her anything, she’ll take more than you bargained for,” Clive warns, casting his eyes between them in suspect, but Mid’s answering cheer gives Dion some relief that his hopes to see the end are not entirely misplaced.
Fandom: Final Fantasy XVI
Characters/pairing: Dion & Mid
Rating: gen
Word Count: 2022
Notes: Inspired by Mid's final questline and this dialogue in question. I think Mid would very much like to put Dion under a microscope and poke him a little.
-
“Your father,” Dion starts. He curls his fingers over the edge of the work bench. The room smells like a forge but its cleanliness means a different craft. These are not connections he’s ever had to make. “I did not understand his intentions then — I refused to. The very idea that the mothercrystals were the source of our blight — it was unthinkable.”
Mid doesn’t look up. The shop is empty of all but them, and light slants down the staircase in the late afternoon creating a mauve haze. He understands why the children who have flown past him during his solemn and lonely watch had called it a dungeon. It’s not where one would go to visit without wanting something first. It was good that she had sought him out instead as every dusty corner in this safe space felt a dull reminder that he was a trespasser. Her braid swings as she flutters around to a shelf for paper and sharp sticks of graphite — tools he’s not seen since his days in Whitewyrm, before joining the dragoons. Books cover every surface and a small fire burns at the far edge of the room. It is, despite its affairs and clinical necessities, warm.
“Well, Dad’s never been good at reigning in his lightnin’ y’know. Once he’d set his mind on something he’d steamroll forward, the rest be damned! That was a joke we had early on, with the Enterprise you see. It was Dad’s copy in attitude and subtlety.”
Dion smiles despite myself. He’s never been one for the sea when his eikon was made for the skies. “I was much younger when we met. I believe he wounded my pride more than my sense of reality.”
“Yeah? Bet you got a few good hits in then,” Mid’s laugh is a wild, startling thing. She talks like her father is an old comrade or friend despite his proclivities and it pulls Dion back, briefly, spitefully, to a time in which that setting had felt the same for him. His Radiance had commanded him in battle before, all their courtly performances traded for the necessity of forging forward and inspiring confidence — he’d pulled Dion under his arm in his youth and they’d shared plans and ideas that later sloughed from memory and hardly seemed real at all. Those years fled swiftly like a spring thaw and are not easy to recall with clarity anymore. Dion knows he’s a traitor to all his good intentions and His Radiance too, possessed by spirits long brewing within. Dion doesn’t deserve to reminisce or be here at all, sharing space with her genius and calling old ghosts to surface — though Ramuh’s is not so easily shook and lives in every nook, cranny, and person in this place — but she had asked him for his company. He cannot fall further than where he’s landed; he only must make peace with her, though he refuses to ask for what his own guilt inspires: forgiveness.
“What do you think now that you’ve seen the place? Bearers everywhere with the imperial brand and whispering things like you can’t hear — I’d half wondered if Clive had gone crazy when he brought you here. Of course you seem plenty nice, if rigid as Greagor Herself, but one can’t help their upbringing. Point is, you seem like a good guy and you’re doing a huge service for the Rosfields — I like that. So I assume you’re not bothered helping bearers when you’ve got your own bloody eikon to deal with. Two sides of the same gil and all that, yeah?”
Dion breathes. Her eyes pin him in place, sure and smart, prodding at his veneer to reveal the ugliness beneath. He feels hoarse. “Of course not. I — there was never time available to me to make my opinions heard — I was not a part of the court except as permitted and we are all Greagor’s servants—”
She waves her hands to cut him off. “Point is, you are as good as they say.” Dion swallows, taken aback. He does not feel it. Mid’s smile is wide but his chest is set to crack. That dark reality had mostly escaped him beneath other more dangerous concerns. These people are survivors under the banner he was conditioned to follow and their turmoil and its complexity was a dull blade in a drawer of them he could not afford to touch. He could hardly spare a thought. It does not make him good. Not much can. “A real, fairytale prince here in our Hideaway, eh? Glad you exist.”
“That — you need not…” Dion feels faint. “May I sit down.”
“Yeah, right here!” Mid shoves a stool at him and Dion deposits himself ungracefully, watching through bleary eyes as she unrolls a spread of machinery who’s brilliance is lost on him. Engineers in Twinside were considered the most respectable in the realm for their endeavors aboard Fallen foundations — Dion can see it here, knows Cid’s daughter has made plans that likely rival their own. “Bet you thought I called you down to here to guilt trip you, eh? My bad, my bad! See, I’ve a project of mine and I think you’re perfectly suited to shedding some light for me — er, no pun intended. Well, maybe. In its simplest form I will require wings to make it complete. And I hear yours are fantastic!” Mid leans in close, smiling. She falters. Dion feels his composure slipping and straightens his spine; even in the library, listening to Harpocrates spear him with truths Dion knew then he could disappoint still. “…You have more to say?”
Dion strokes his fingers along the table then retracts his hands to his lap. Everything is too little and too much in these days he faintly hopes may be his last. “I am sorry I did not have the wisdom to hear your father all those years ago. I suspect matters would be different and the plight of this world would not be as grave.”
“There’s no use speculating,” Mid says. She scratches her chin, stained fingernails hooking in her scarf, a youth’s fidgeting. She cranes her head, all limbs and no grace, but he respects her role in this place and her words will not go unheard. “There’s still Ultima, y’know. No accounting for him, or anyone else for that matter. And Dad had his pride too, right. He couldn’t always admit when his plans were shit. Drake’s Head might’ve been his first attempt, but maybe this tragedy only would have started earlier and we’d all be worse off.”
Dion feels his mouth twitch. The image still comes to mind, sometimes — how hot his anger when he’d struck the walls of Oriflamme’s Sanctum with searing light. Sorrow is swift on its heels, scratching at him; he’s still never learned to aim his rage where it truly belongs. “He was not happy to see me when I arrived,” Dion murmurs. “Nor I him.”
Mid mimes a long cigar between her fingers, and props herself against the desk, arm resting on an imaginary sword. “Princeling,” she sneers. “Did it go like that?”
He closes his eyes, then raises them to the light burning above. “I expect his child would know,” he says. “It’s as you’ve said.” Mid quiets.
For a few moments, silence reigns. There are no comparisons he can draw between the agony of her loss and his own, but he can wield it for what purpose he should serve — he’ll cut Ultima from the sky as penance and they’ll both see Cid’s journey finished. That’s how he must settle the score. It’s all he has left to offer. As to what she needs of him — he can only avail himself in what capacity remains. He hopes it’s enough.
“Wings,” Mid starts again. She clears her throat and gestures at her rolls of paper, recharting their course. “I’ve been wanting to build a flying ship. Ideally, it’d take you boys straight to that ugly eyesore in the sky — and I reckon, with some lofty examples I might build her faster —” Dion raises his hand to stop her. The pieces fall into place. He’s charmed and defeated at once. He could nearly laugh but sighs instead.
“Forgive me, but mine are limited,” Dion says carefully. “I cannot manifest for you, or I will not have the strength for our journey I’m afraid. But I could tell you that there are many dragonets who roam free who’s wings are much better suited for studying. They are swift, light, easy to discipline, and though I would not encourage it, would make an ideal subject for you. There are surely dragons that still roam some unblemished fields in Sanbreque. Granted, they are sacred beasts—”
“Great,” Mid says. “I’ll get Clive to catch one for me.”
Dion blinks. “Then I will speak with him and share what knowledge I can.” He quiets. Mid may have the answer she needs, but Dion feels less than satisfied. Her drive to be involved is not invisible to him, nor the frantic energy she wields to protect her heart from the incoming damage. This is grief at its most useful. “You are a brilliant engineer and I hope your project comes to fruition. I would like to see it. I am sorry too that I cannot guarantee your family’s return when we depart — however, I will make sure they arrive and we all do what we must.”
Mid smiles and leans forward on her arms, twirling her pencil back and forth, but it’s not happy. Below, her plans are large and expansive and entirely unreadable to him. What studies he enjoyed belonging to as a boy who still fancied himself a member of the court and his father’s son have long since drifted away. He may have retained his skills of recognizing talents in others, he thinks, but he knows the last decade has seen him shaped into a blade fit for cleaving Valisthea to pieces. Ultima had proven it. But now, he should only like to command himself.
“I’ll be honest, Fancy Pants. I was kind of hoping I would hate you. My Dad used to say Sanbreque was only a step above Waloed with their iron grip — and that’s a shitty margin to consider — but you’re too bloody nice! I’m honestly glad for it though. If anyone will give Clive a fighting chance, well, I’ll expect it’ll be you. That’s a relief in the end. Us normal people can’t do much except—” She gestures hopelessly at the table, “—this. Thanks.”
“They will have what safety I can afford,” Dion says, soft, and finds he means it. He doesn’t wish to disappoint anyone else. He doesn’t wish to see any more families twice spurned, even a community of strangers.
“Now go on,” she says and waves her hands at him, chasing him off his perch. Dion collects himself with more grace than he’d felt on the descent. “I can’t work with anyone hovering.”
“Then I will not linger.”
Clive’s boots can be heard on the stairs and they both turn to greet him. Dion’s grown familiar with his activities, his comings and goings and pressed upon conversations on the docks. Lately, he’s always been accompanied by his brother and Lady Warrick when he departs. He thinks he must be poor company if Clive has not requested his aid — or maybe it’s only that it’s unnecessary and he must have goodbyes of his own to make.
Dion imagines it will be his last flight and his own farewells have been cruel and clinical as necessary. But if it’s not to be—
“Miss Telamon—” she makes such a face Dion coughs to veil a laugh, then corrects himself brusquely, “Midadol. When this is all over, ask me again. I would be glad to help Cid’s daughter. My wings will be yours.”
“Excuse my interruption, but I wouldn’t go promising her anything, she’ll take more than you bargained for,” Clive warns, casting his eyes between them in suspect, but Mid’s answering cheer gives Dion some relief that his hopes to see the end are not entirely misplaced.
