Archive of Our Own

By the time he kicks open the door to his dorm, it’s pitch black outside. His mom forgot he was moving today, so of course he missed all the Official™  move-in day hullabaloo and had to explain to the front desk person that he is in fact enrolled and he is in fact not an idiot. 

(He’s pretty sure they didn’t believe him on that second thing.)

Whatever. He’s here now. 

And the room is… small. 

There’s barely enough room for the single lofted bed and the desk shoved underneath it, and suddenly he’s grateful that he only has one medium sized moving box worth of stuff anyway. 

Hey, at least it’s a single! He’s heard a thousand horror stories about randomly assigned college roommates and he’s glad he won’t have to deal with that. 

But because the universe can’t let him have just this, crunchy music notes drift into the room, coming from beyond the closed bathroom door in the corner. They’re really, really loud, even through the closed doors. Prompto frowns, dropping his messenger bag next to the desk— his desk, now. He walks over to the en suite bathroom, another blessing he was all too happy to receive word of in his incoming student paperwork. He knew he’d have to share it with someone else, but it’s a small price to pay for not having a roommate. 

Astrals, the music is loud. And angry. Lots of guitar, and bass, and maybe something that could pass for singing but is mostly screaming. 

Prompto stares down at the door handle. Is it, like, bad manners to walk into someone else’s room from their shared bathroom? Should he… knock? It would freak Prompto right the fuck out if he heard knocking coming from the bathroom, so maybe that’s not the best idea. 

Hm. 

He continues to stare down the door, contemplating how best to approach the situation. It’s almost midnight, and classes start tomorrow, so he wants to ask his… bathroommate? (is that a thing?) to turn down the tunes, but…

And then he remembers that actual doors exist. It wouldn’t be creepy to knock on someone’s actual front door instead of trying to communicate from their shared shitter. 

Duh, of course. 

He berates himself for being so dumb that he couldn’t remember doors for the entire 11 steps it takes to get to his… bathroommate’s (this is such a stupid word, he has to think up something better soon) door. He stares at the door for a second, letting the muffled aggressive guitar riffs wash over him. The plaque next to the doorframe has a nametag in it, much like Prompto’s own. On it is the name Noctis, scrawled in absolute chicken scratch. 

Huh, no last name. 

Whatever, he’s just here to ask the guy—Noctis—to turn down his damn music on a school night. 

(Jeez, you’d think he was seventy four, not twenty four, with that kinda thought.)

So he steels himself, taking a deep breath, a last glance at the name plaque to make sure he has the name right— Noctis— and then knocks on the door. Three quick taps. 

He waits a few seconds, nothing. 

He knocks again. Maybe Noctis didn't hear him over the absurdly loud music. He waits a little longer, nothing. 

Oooookay…. He's about to knock a third time, louder so he's maybe heard over the music. He glances around the hallway nervously. It's super late and it is a school night… but ultimately getting Noctis to turn down the music is doing everyone a favor, right? Even if he has to be a little loud himself first. 

You gotta break a few eggs to bake a cake, or whatever the saying is. 

Prompto raises his closed fist, knuckles a scant few centimeters from the wooden surface, and takes another steadying breath. 

Of course, of course, because the universe is Prompto's best friend always looking out for him, as soon as his hand comes into contact with the door with a frankly absurd amount of force, the music cuts out as the song ends, leaving utter silence as the only cushion to the deafening knocks. 

Well. There's no way this Noctis character didn't hear him, this time. 

Noctis, and every other person in a ten mile radius. 

Sick, exactly what Prompto needs. 

A few excruciating seconds pass by. Prompto can practically count his heartbeats with how quiet it is around him. 

Thank all the Six, the door finally opens before Prompto has time to dig a small hole right here in the hall to crawl into and die . 

His internal celebration ends quickly, because the person who opens the door—Noctis, presumably—is hands down the hottest human being Prompto has ever laid eyes on. 

Even with that clearly annoyed expression on his face and a eyebrow arched in irritation, this man is drop dead fucking gorgeous, holy Six. Lean stature, messy dark hair, the deepest cerulean eyes that Prompto could probably (if he was more literate) compare to the depths of the ocean or some shit, and cheekbones that could cut god damn diamonds. Eyelashes that could surely hold entire seas in their length, and the softest-looking lips, just this side of peachy. 

He decidedly ignores the stutter in the middle of his chest, plastering on the brightest smile he can muster in the face of a literal (okay maybe not literal, but who's to say?) demigod. “Uh,” Prompto stammers out, because he is the most eloquent guy on the planet. “You’re, uh, Noctis?”

The guy’s eyes narrow. Prompto really, really puts a lot of effort in trying to stop his heart from hammering right out of his chest because those clear blue eyes are brilliant and piercing and, Prompto swears, can see straight through his soul. “Maybe. What’s it to you?” 

And, oh gods, his voice is like fucking silk, all smooth and baritone and Prompto wants to take a nap while wrapped in it. But he has a mission right now. So he keeps a smile plastered to his face and says, “I’m Prompto. Looks like we’re neighbors!” He excitedly points to his open door. “Bathroommates!”

The guy, Noctis, blinks at him, deadpan. “Suitemates.”

“Uh?” Prompto tilts his head. 

“There’s a word for sharing a bathroom. Suitemates.”

“Right…” Prompto trails off, still a little confused. It does sound better than bathroommates, at least. “A-anyway, I, uh, just wanted to introduce myself, since we’ll probably be running into each other!”

“Uh huh.” 

They stare at each other for a few silent seconds, and Prompto swears he can feel sweat start to bead at his neck. When Noctis moves as if to close the door because he is clearly done with this sort-of-conversation, Prompto slaps his hand against the doorframe. “Wait! I, uh, also…” Noctis glares down at Prompto’s hand like it’s personally offended his mother or something. “Uh, mind turning down the music like two notches? It’s a school night and all, haha.” 

Noctis stares and stares and stares, eyes narrowed all the while. Prompto feels itchy. “Are you a narc?”

“Of course not,” Prompto says immediately, a little too fast. Like a total narc. 

Eyes narrowing ever squintier, Noctis nods slowly. “Sure, man. I’ll turn down the music if you’ll get your hand off my door.”

Heat tinges the tips of Prompto’s ears. “Right! Yeah, totally! Of course!” He removes his hand from the doorjamb, using it to scratch the back of his neck nervously. “Well, I guess I’ll see—”

Before he can finish his sentence, Noctis closes the door in his face none too gently. 

That went well.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He doesn’t see his suitemate for the entire first week of classes. Maybe not too surprising, with the absolute insanity that is apparently normal for university. 

He can’t keep up with all these 18 year olds. Prompto hasn’t felt old, like, ever, because he’s still in his early 20s, but listening to the conversations of all the first years around him in all his classes makes his head spin. They’ve been out drinking until 2am every night? Before their 8am lectures? Prompto has been lucky to make it until 10pm before passing out at his desk. 

That’s what he gets for taking six years between high school and college, he guesses. 

(Not that he’d had much of a choice, really. He needed to save up for tuition since his mom sure as hell wasn’t gonna be able to pay for four years of university on her shitty hourly wage at the local diner. But that’s neither here nor there, at this point.)

On Friday—sweet, sweet Friday that honestly couldn’t have come fast enough—Prompto tosses his backpack to the ground as soon as he unlocks the door to his dorm, marches to his bed, and barely manages to repress the urge to shove his face into his pillow and scream. All his professors seem nice enough, but the syllabi with the ten tons of due dates and exam schedules make stress radiate through his skull. 

He feels his phone buzz in his pocket and groans. If it’s his mom asking how the first week of classes went, he might very well call her and cry over the phone for an embarrassing amount of time. He’s not keen to have his suitemate hear all of that mess through the extremely thin wall they share. 

(Prompto may or may not have learned how thin the wall is that first night, when he was able to hear Noctis’s snores at 3am.)

Never one to ignore his mother, Prompto reaches into his pocket to pull his phone out. Thank gods, it’s a push notification from King’s Knight about the fall event starting today with a special—a special dungeon! Prompto’s eyes widen. A special dungeon only open for half an hour that promises ultra rare loot! He sits up, thumb hovering over the shortcut to the app, when he hears it. 

Softly, muffled through the wall, the sound of the King’s Knight menu music. 

But he hadn’t opened the game yet, so… 

Noctis. Noctis plays King’s Knight!

That’s his in!

Prompto practically jumps out of his bed, tossing his phone onto his desk without a care. He starts digging through his desk drawer. He wants to find something—a peace offering, or something—to give to Noctis. He’s literally on hands and knees for this guy, and he doesn’t even know ‘im. He doesn’t know why he wants to be friends with Noctis so badly. Or, like, even acknowledged by the guy. Maybe it’s because he always knew his neighbors growing up, no matter how briefly he and his mom stayed at any one apartment complex. Maybe it’s because he has some innate need to be liked by everyone he meets.

Hell, maybe it’s because Noctis is really, really fucking hot. 

Whatever the reason, he wants to get to know Noctis. If their first conversation is anything to go by, Noctis doesn’t want anything to do with Prompto. 

So Prompto will bribe him into being friends. It’s not beneath him. 

(Not to mention that being so much older than most of his peers makes it super hard to make friends. But if Noctis is also rooming in graduate student housing, he’s probably closer to Prompto’s age than most of the people in his classes.)

(Probably, anyway.)

He quickly realizes that he is a broke college student currently without a steady source of income, so all that’s at the bottom of his desk drawer that’s doubled as his pantry are the nearly-expired granola bars he’d snagged on clearance and the metric fuck ton of Cup Noodle his mom gave him as a parting gift. 

Well. College students live on instant noodles, right?

Prompto grabs one of the Cup Noodles—Spicy Chile Chicken, his personal favourite—and tucks it under his arm. He finds a pad of sticky notes with a little illustration of a chocobo in the bottom corner and jots a note with his name, his King’s Knight ID, and a very dumb, very bad doodle of himself throwing a peace sign. It’ll do. 

He sticks the note to the top of the styrofoam cup of MSG-riddled goodness as he steps out of his room. And then he comes face-to-face with Noctis’s door. That small plaque still displays his suitemate’s name, Noctis, a little ominously. 

(It’s not ominous, not actually, but he… really wants to know this guy. His wrists itch and his chest tightens thinking about hanging out with Noctis, and it’s super weird and he’s not at all in the right mind to analyze why he’s feeling this way right now.)

Prompto takes a steadying breath. It’s giving him major deja vu, repeating the motions he went through less than a week ago. 

(Again, ominous.)

Friendship bribe firmly gripped in his hand, Prompto takes one last breath and knocks on the door. 

He can hear the sound of the King’s Knight fight music drifting from the space under the door. It doesn’t pause, but Prompto does hear rustling, like someone is moving around in bed. For some stupid, stupid reason Prompto really can’t explain, his heartrate picks up a little at the thought of Noctis rolling out of bed to answer the door. 

But the door doesn’t open. Not immediately, and not in the excruciatingly long thirty seconds that he definitely counts inside his head. 

Hm. Maybe he didn’t hear?

For the second time in a week, Prompto raises his closed fist to knock on Noctis’s door multiple times in a row. 

Not at all creepy, or anything. 

And again, he hears the sound of bedsheets rustling. But no one comes to the door. The King’s Knight battle music continues to play. 

Message well received. 

(But not taken to heart!)

Prompto sets down the Cup Noodle in front of the closed door, making sure the sticky note is well-affixed to the lid. Satisfied, he raps on the door one last time, a short, quick knock, and says loud enough to be heard but hopefully not loud enough to disturb anyone else in the hall, “I, uh, left a snack.”

In an act that could not possibly be taken as cowardice, Prompto rushes back to his room, swipes his phone from his desk, and flings himself into his bed. He clicks open King’s Knight to start the limited time event—which he’s already lost ten entire minutes of—and steadfastly ignores the weird thrumming in his veins as he strains to hear the muffled fight music coming from the room next to him. 

~~

Twenty minutes later, the game kicks him out of the dungeon. He sees he has two in-game notifications. 

He clicks on the mailbox icon and can’t help the grin that spreads across his face. 

(new) Here’s your event reward!

(new) noct_gar has added you as a friend. Accept request?

~~

They play no less than six games of King’s Knight together over the weekend. Prompto hears Noctis’s door open and close a few times, but more often than not he can hear his neighbor moving about the room at all hours of the day. At night, Prompto can hear the soft shuffling of Noctis getting comfortable in his bed, and he continues to pretend that the rapid thump thump thumping of his heart against his ribcage doesn’t mean anything.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Monday morning, when Prompto walks into the bathroom to brush his teeth, he sees that the door into Noctis’s room is slightly cracked. He passes it off as a weird mistake. Maybe the door didn’t latch, or Noctis didn’t wanna be too loud shutting it if he had to take a midnight piss or something. 

Weird, but whatever. 

As he turns on the tap, Prompto gently shuts the door from the inside. 

~~

It can’t be a mistake. 

Not the third or the fourth or the tenth time. 

Every time Prompto goes into the bathroom now, the door is slightly open. Sometimes light from Noctis’s desk lamp filters in through the crack. Sometimes Prompto hears Noctis snoring. Other times, he hears Noctis typing away at a mechanical keyboard. 

So Prompto starts leaving his door ever so slightly cracked, too. 

~~

On Thursday night (technically Friday morning, but in Prompto’s mind, it’s not tomorrow until he’s slept), he gets a raid invite from noct_gar. He guiltily side eyes the biology textbook sitting on his desk as he clicks accept.

Once the lobby loads, an in-game notification pops up in the corner. Prompto clicks on the red bubble and is mildly shocked when a small chat window opens up. 

noct_gar: surprised ur awake

chocobro15: wish i could say the same for u

Prompto hears a sharp bark of laughter through the bathroom, slipped through the cracks in the doors. He grins. 

noct_gar: ready to kick some ass?

chocobro15: always

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The second week of classes goes marginally smoother. He’s used to waking up at 7:30, fast-walking (not sprinting, not after that time a fucking campus cop stopped him and gave him a fucking ticket for running too fast) to the dining hall to scarf down rubbery egg substitute, and fast-walking again to the classroom building that is the furthest on campus from his residence hall, because of course it is. The antiquated online system used by all of his professors makes sense to him now, even if the mobile site is a nightmare and a half to deal with. He even remembers his entire timetable and the locations of all his classes. 

You could say Prompto is basically winning at this college student thing.

He’s feeling so good about it that he orders his one budgeted takeout meal of the month as a treat for being such a well-adjusted adult. And damn, the salty, greasy not-at-all-authentic Chinese food is a huge step above the bland, plasticy food served by the dining hall on campus. 

Blessed by the Astrals on this fine Friday evening.

He flips open his laptop. MoogleFlix just dropped a bunch of new anime series and he could definitely use some hot 2D-animated dudes to help him decompress. 

(Not in that way, pervs.)

(...Not tonight, anyway.)

He’s half-heartedly scrolling through the pages of title screens and two-sentence blurbs about the new shows, feet kicked up on the rail at the foot of his bed and piping hot chow mein seeping heat into his skin through his hoodie, when he hears a knock. 

Coming from the bathroom. 

Prompto whips his head around to stare at the bathroom door. It’s cracked, like it has been for the last week. Light spills out from the edges, except where Prompto sees shadows. In the shape of feet, if he had to guess. 

“Uh.” He sits up a little, propping the carton of food between the wall and his pillow. “...Yeah?” he calls after a second. 

“Wow.” That voice, as smooth and silky as Prompto remembers, even muffled as it is by the door. “I just realized this is really awkward. I’ll use the actual door.”

Prompto has never vaulted himself from such a height as he does right then, practically flinging himself from his lofted bunk. He rips open the door and once again comes face to face with the most gorgeous human Prompto has ever laid eyes on. Who is in his bathroom. Their bathroom. The university’s bathroom, technically, but theirs for the academic year because they pay resident fees.

“Uh,” Prompto starts, because eloquent, remember? “Nah, dude, it’s totally fine. I almost did the same thing the first night I moved in. Haha.” Totally cool, Prompto. Totally cool. 

To recap, Prompto has so far: 

1. Pounded on Noctis’s door in the middle of the night, literally.
2. Twice.
3. Left a 200 gil hypertension-in-a-cup snack as a gift and run away. 
4. Confirmed he almost talked to a complete stranger through their shared bathroom.

At this rate, Prompto would be surprised if Noctis so much as continues to invite him into his King’s Knight party, even if Prompto has come in clutch with the ranged attacks more than once. 

But Noctis cracks a smile—it’s like, half a smirk, really, and all crooked and it stupid, stupidly makes Prompto’s heart do a stuttery thing—and then he laughs. Full and hearty and just a tiny bit raspy and it goes straight to Prompto’s solar plexus, like a punch to his core. “Weirdo,” Noctis breathes out between chuckles. 

Heat rises to the tips of Prompto’s ears. A grin spreads across his face anyway. “Hey, you’re the one who actually did it. So who’s really the weirdo?” 

“Fair enough.” Noctis’s smirk ticks up a notch. 

“I hate to break up this super awesome bathroom conversation we’ve got going on, but, uh, what… what are you here for?”

Noctis shifts his weight to his right foot, the only indicator that he’s not feeling as smug as he looks. “Thought I’d ask you in person for a round in King’s Knight.”

“Oh.” Prompto tilts his head. “Yeah, for sure, man.” 

Noctis’s smirk softens into a smile, still wide and bright but… softer. 

“Did you wanna…” Prompto jerks his head back in the direction of his room. Join me?

Noctis leans in a bit, eyeing Prompto’s room wearily, and he’s close enough that Prompto catches a whiff of whatever cologne he wears. Spicy and sweet and warm. 

And, damn his eyelashes are so, so fucking long. 

Prompto is so, so fucked. 

“Do you have food?”

“Uh.” Prompto points up at his bed. “Yeah, from that Chinese place a few blocks away.”

Noctis cocks his head, considering. “Sure,” he says, voice cool. 

Six, Prompto could listen to that voice all day. He cracks a grin and steps away from the door, motioning with a hand for Noctis to follow. He climbs the ladder up to his bed with the intent of taking the food down to the ground level. “This King’s Knight season has some kick ass rewards, right? I’m so glad I’m in a party now—” As he reaches for the overflowing container of sesame chicken, he feels the mattress shift under weight. Weight that isn’t his. 

He looks behind him sharply. Noctis is crawling into his bed behind him. 

He has one knee perched atop the crumpled up comforter, one hand steadying himself against the side rails, and he’s looking completely nonchalant about climbing into someone else’s bed. A stranger’s bed. They’ve said, like, ten words to each other. And now Noctis is in his bed. 

“Uh.” Prompto stares wide-eyed at Noctis. “Hi?”

Fully settling himself onto the bed, Noctis’s brows crinkle. “Hi?”

“You’re in my bed,” Prompto blurts. Like a complete moron.

“...Yeah?” Noctis tilts his head, a few strands of hair falling in front of his eyes. He scoots so his back is resting against the wall, his legs sprawled in front of him, feet dangling off the edge of the bed. 

Prompto is still crouched on all fours with a hand reached out to gather his stuff, and Noctis is getting all comfortable in his bed. This is absolutely not what he thought his Friday night would entail. 

Apparently as settled as he’s gonna get, Noctis pulls his phone out of his pocket and starts tapping away, presumably opening up King’s Knight. 

It’s so utterly ridiculous. Prompto getting shitty takeout to celebrate a successful week of university at the ripe age of 24, a complete stranger sitting in his bed like they’ve known each other since grade school, on a random Friday night in September. It’s so ridiculous that Prompto can’t help but burst into nearly hysterical laughter. Clutching his stomach, he says between laughs, “Dude, you’re so weird.”

Noctis huffs, lowering his phone into his lap. “Is that a problem?” His voice is cool with a sharp edge. 

Prompto quiets for a second and sees the tension that’s wound up Noctis’s shoulders. It’s obvious that Noctis is trying to come off like he doesn’t have a care in the world, like he wouldn’t be bothered if Promptis did find it a problem, but there’s an undercurrent of anxiety that Prompto understands all too well. “Nah, dude,” he reassures. “I like weird.”

It could be his imagination, but he swears he sees a faint flush spreading across Noctis’s cheeks. 

With a cheeky grin, Prompto offers a carton of fried rice and the extra pair of chopsticks the restaurant had given him.

(He’d tried to not take offense to the implication that he’d ordered enough for two people.)

(Which, maybe he had. But now there are two people, so it all worked out anyway.)

Noctis stares down at the food like Prompto is offering up an alien’s head on a silver platter or something. King’s Knight menu music plays softly between them, muffled by the fabric of Noctis’s jeans. “You don’t have to—” 

Whatever he’s about to say next gets cut off by the outrageous growl his stomach lets out. 

“Pft.” Prompto shakes the container of fried rice. “C’mon, man. There’s plenty. I’ve also got sesame chicken and chow mein—but most of that is already gone, sorry—and green beans with water chestnuts and, like, a thousand fortune cookies.”

Noctis eyes him suspiciously. The heat from the food starts to burn his palms but he keeps that smile plastered on his face through it. Slowly, painfully slowly, Noctis reaches out and grabs the cardboard container. He picks open the top, cracks apart the disposable chopsticks. “Thanks,” he mutters, voice pinched, like it’s the most excruciating thing to thank someone. Or take their food. Prompto doesn’t know the guy well enough to read him. 

“No worries, dude.” Prompto leans back, pulling his phone out of his pocket and thumbing through his apps until he reaches King’s Knight. 

“You’re in undergrad?”

Prompto looks up from the loading screen.

Noctis is looking down at his desk, where his Intro Biology and Freshman Comp textbooks are strewn haphazardly. 

“Oh, uh, yeah. This is my first semester.”

“But this is… graduate housing.” Noctis looks back to Prompto, still clutching the fried rice container in his hands like a lifeline. “And there’s no way you’re 18.”

Chuckling lightly, Prompto shoves his chopsticks into the styrofoam container of steaming chicken. “Observant, ain’tcha?”

Noctis scowls. “You’re making fun of me.”

“Nah, just joshin’. I’m not 18. I’m 24. Took a few years off after high school to work. Gotta pay tuition somehow, y’know.”

It doesn’t look like Noctis knows at all. He nods anyway, albeit unconvincingly. “Sure. What’s your major?” He shovels a mouthful of rice into his mouth, and Prompto watches helplessly as a few grains fall into the bedsheets. 

Knowing he’ll have to sleep in the crumby mess later is almost enough to lower Noctis’s level of hotness. Almost. “Art. Photography, eventually, but I have to get through all these bullshit prerequisites first.” Prompto taps the Invite party member button on screen and clicks on Noctis’s ID. “What about you?”

“Psychology,” Noctis replies, but it’s a little muffled with the food still in his mouth so it sounds a little weird. “Masters.” And that’s that.

Prompto nods. “Sounds cool. And hard. Wanna wreck some noobs?”

“Only always.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

They leave the bathroom doors completely open now. 

Friday nights are reserved for King’s Knight raids with thighs squished together atop Prompto’s bed, too. Noctis will inevitably slink into Prompto’s room, usually with a can of potato chips tucked under his arm and a fleece blanket wrapped around his shoulders, and Prompto will slam closed whatever textbook he’s been pretending to read from, and they’ll get crumbs and stray spilled droplets of store brand sports drink all over Prompto’s sheets. 

Tonight, though, Prompto’s eyes keep slipping back to the clock at the corner of his computer screen. Less than a minute passes by between each sweep of his gaze. And then, probably a literal million glances at the digital numbers ticking by infuriatingly slowly, it’s already 9:34pm and Noctis still hasn’t come into his room. 

Weird. 

Even for that guy. 

Prompto kicks his toe into the edge of his desk, frustrated. Thinking. If he leans back in his chair, he has a clear view into Noctis’s room, but it feels weird to peep into the guy’s space without explicit permission. 

He still hasn’t been into Noctis’s room. 

He takes the eraser end of his pencil between his teeth. 

Fridays are for firsts, right? That’s like, their thing?

Prompto takes a steadying breath so large his shoulders shrug exaggeratedly. Before he can chicken out, he pushes himself away from his desk and walks over to the bathroom. He can see straight through to his neighbor’s room, can take in all the chip bags strewn about and the pile of laundry nearly spilling over the threshold into the bathroom. 

But no Noctis. 

Hm. 

With the last shred of bravery the hellish semester has mercifully granted him keeping for the time being, Prompto steps through the bathroom— 

—and sees Noctis hunched over a cupped hand, his ass half-hanging off the too-narrow-for-a-human-body windowsill, with a lighter in his other hand. 

Noctis startles slightly, glancing up from his extraordinarily sus position. Prompto blinks at him. 

“Uh,” Noctis says, a little breathless. He removes his thumb from the lighter, lowering both his hands. “You said you weren’t a narc. Sure hope you meant it.”

“Nah, man. It’s cool. I just—” Prompto scratches the back of his neck and swallows thickly. “Just, you usually come over before this hour, so…”

Noctis nods. He shifts his precarious position on the windowsill so he’s facing Prompto a little better. “You, uh, wanna join?” He nods his head down at where his hands have fallen into his lap.

Prompto grins. “Hell yeah. I’ll totally joint you.”

It’s Noctis’s turn to blink up at him. 

“Shit, that was so bad.”  

And then the most marvelous thing happens. Noctis laughs, unlike the snorts and half-hearted chuckles he normally supplies during their late-night game sessions. Bright and big and warm enough to make Prompto’s chest feel like it’s on fire, and he hasn’t even taken a hit yet. 

Prompto grins, hoping it’s enough to explain away the heat suddenly risen to his cheeks. He walks over to the window. Propping his elbows on the sill, he asks, “Is this enough to keep the smoke detectors from going off?”

“Dunno.” Noctis shrugs, flicking the lighter on once more. He expertly lights the joint between his fingers. Smoke curls in front of his face. “Didn’t wanna risk it, so I pried mine off the wall.” He takes another puff, another, and then offers it up to Prompto. 

Chuckling, Prompto plucks the joint from between his fingers. “Damn, I didn’t realize you were such a bad boy, Noct.” He sucks down a hit of what has to be very expensive weed—easily the best he’s ever tasted, but whatever he swiped from his mom’s purse back in high school was probably never the highest of quality— before he realizes that he called Noctis a nickname. 

He freezes and tries his hardest not to choke on the smoke burning its way down his throat. 

They’re close enough to, like, share food and play video games together and apparently smoke drugs totally against their residence agreement, but nicknames are like… intimate. Close. Personal. 

(Even if he might have been referring to his inside-his-head-Noctis as Noct for weeks.)

He allows himself a completely not guilty side eyed look at Noctis. 

Thank the Six, Noctis has a barely-there smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Noct? I like it.” He takes the joint back from Prompto, their fingers brushing for a delicious instant. “Never had a nickname before,” he says nonchalantly, with his lips already wrapped around the rolling paper between his forefinger and thumb. It shouldn’t be, but it’s the hottest thing Prompto has ever seen someone do. 

Fuck. Prompto is so fucked. 

~~

They end up sprawled on the floor. The skin on Prompto’s lower back is sweaty where his shirt has ridden up enough for the hardwood to touch him. Noctis’s head is beside his own, their feet pointed in opposite directions. 

Prompto’s phone is still in his room, King’s Knight completely forgotten for the night. 

Whatever fancy strain of weed Noctis sort of told him the (way too long) name of an hour ago has worked fucking magic.

Not on him. On Noctis.

The normally quiet, ever-elusive, super awkward guy that curls up on Prompto’s bed in an oversized sweatshirt and droopy eyes sure as shit has never talked this much. Not to Prompto, at least. 

About video games. They don’t make ‘em like they used to. The classics. About anime. Subtitles are the only reason I learned to read. About which fast food place in town has the perfectly salted fries. Insomnia. It’s a coffeehouse first but fuck, they make a good potato. (Prompto only laughed for, like, thirty seconds about butt fuck, after which point Noctis jabbed him in the ribs but was grinning all the same.) About the car accident he was in as a kid that gave him enough medical bullshit to deal with during undergrad that it took him 6 years to get his degree. There’s only one good counselor in the office of disability accommodations, I swear. About how his older cousin taught him how to get his fingers under the smoke detector when they roomed together his sophomore year. Gladio told me my dainty, princess hands finally came in handy.

They both, of course, dissolved into intoxicated giggles about hands being handy.

And now, Prompto has front row seats to stare at Noctis’s profile. 

It’s one of those images that burns itself into Prompto’s retinas, makes his fingertips itch to grab a pencil and a sketchbook. All creamy skin and sweeping lashes and rosy cheeks and smooth, silky hair— 

“Hey,” Prompto says, louder than he intended, startling even himself. “Did you know you look like Sasuke Uchiha?”

Foot, meet mouth. 

(There’s something there with meat mouth but Prompto is too mortified to laugh about it.)

Whatever serenity that’s enraptured Noctis so thoroughly for him to look as peaceful as he has for the last five minutes Prompto’s been staring at him dissipates. He snaps his eyes open, shooting Prompto a look that could kill. 

Because he is a complete and total moron who doesn’t know when to stop, he tries to recover. “I mean, like, the hair. Your hair. Looks like Sasuke’s hair.”

Which isn’t any better, really. So when Noctis narrows his eyes—the deep blue ones that hold entire fucking storms in their depth—to glare at Prompto, it’s honestly well-deserved. 

“It’s not a bad thing!” Prompto sits up abruptly, ignoring the way the room spins around his hazy periphery. “Sasuke is the reason I realized I’m gay—” 

Without breaking furious eye contact, Noctis slowly raises himself on his elbows. 

“I-I mean, I’m not gay.”

Noctis raises one eyebrow, like he did the very first time he opened his door for Prompto. 

“I-I also had the hots for Tsunade—y’know, with the giant tits? Six, shit, I—I’m bi, y’know? So not, like, gay gay.”

For three horrifying seconds, Noctis continues to stare at Prompto. 

And then he completely collapses into a mass of chuckles and raspy gasps for air.

“Dude,” he manages between breaths. “You should’ve seen your face.”

He’s still laughing when he crawls over to his desk and pulls his backpack off the chair. He points to a two-inch metal button pinned to the top flap.

A rainbow flag. 

“I’m mega gay.”

~~

And so, Friday nights turn into Blaze and Chill Nights. (Prompto brings themed snacks. Flaming Hot Cheetos and mint LifeSavers. Takis Fuego and mint chocolate ice cream sandwiches. Firehouse Subs and iced honey buns. He thinks it’s hilarious, and Noctis laughs only after they’ve smoked to the end of the joint split between them.)

King’s Knight weekly raid nights move to Saturdays, after they’ve spent all day in one or the other room with laptops and textbooks and highlighted notes and color-coded flashcards strewn across the floor.

Gay gay becomes an inside joke. 

(Well, it’s a tool for Noctis to make fun of him every second he lets his guard down.)

(Prompto doesn’t mind.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

<< dude
<< do u think u could like
<< beat goku

Prompto hears the sound of rustling sheets, muffled through the wall he’s pressed against. Only a few seconds pass by before Noctis responds. 

>> in a fight?
>> also it’s 3 and u have class at 8

Prompto grins. 

<< yes in a fight
<< can’t sleep

>> fair
>> what are the conditions of the fight

<< ??

>> like
>> i could beat him if i had unlimited time and resources to train
>> or if he had really bad food poisoning

He can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of his chest. 

He hears a soft chuckle through layers of plaster. 

And then, more rustling, followed by the sound of footfalls against the floor. Prompto clicks his phone locked and shoves it under his pillow with the intent of staring at the ceiling until his alarm goes off in a few hours. 

The footsteps grow louder. 

His bed frame shakes slightly. 

“Scooch over.”

Prompto bolts straight up, staring incredulously at the darkened silhouette of none other than Noctis clambering over the bed rails. “What the fuck?” he whisper-yells. 

Prompto can barely make out the motion of Noctis rolling his eyes. “I said, ‘scooch over.’”

Dutifully, he does. 

Noctis squeezes himself into the tiny space left between Prompto’s body and the wall. He plops himself down on the extremely small mattress, tugging the comforter from Prompto’s vice grip. “I get cold. Share.”

Like this whole situation isn’t the fucking weirdest, Noctis pulls the blanket over his shoulder as he rolls away from Prompto, settling in to—to, what? Fucking sleep? Here, in Prompto’s bed?

“Don’t be weird,” Noctis mutters. “Just close your eyes.”

Dutifully, he does.

~~

Like everything else with Noctis, the sleeping in each other’s beds becomes a regular thing. 

He doesn’t even know what possesses him to press himself into the sliver of space between Noct and the side rails of Noctis’s bed two days after that first time. All he knows is that it was close to 4am and he was still listening as Noctis tossed and turned, and then he remembered how quickly—and deeply—he’d slept when Noctis crawled into his bed and. Well. The rest is history, like they say.

It’s ridiculous. The university-issued beds are hardly big enough for one person to be comfortable. Neither of them are particularly large, but they aren’t exactly small , either. And Noctis runs so fucking warm, like a god damn furnace even though his hands are cold as a corpse’s during the day, that Prompto sweats through his ratty sleep t-shirts. 

Noctis never says anything about his pit stains in the morning, though. Just like Prompto doesn’t utter a word about how Noct’s bedhead makes him look even more like Sasuke Uchiha. 

Prompto ignores that teeny tiny voice in the back of his head that begs him to question why everything with Noctis comes so easily, makes him smile all goofy, feels so, so right.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

October spreads across Capital University like a blanket woven in orange and red and yellow and all the pumpkin spice flavoured everything you can imagine.

He’s at the corner store a few blocks away from the dorms when he realizes he didn’t put on his leather cuff this morning. The delicate red lines branching around his wrist capture his attention as he reaches for a bag of salt and vinegar chips.

Midterms have been a real bitch. Enough to make him forget to put on the thing he’s been wearing since he was 16. 

It’s not like he has to wear the bracelet. He doesn’t have to hide the mark from the world. 

But he likes knowing that he has the power, the control, to decide who gets to see. 

It feels… Intimate, showing this part of himself to anyone passing by.

It might be some stupid starry-eyed teenager bullshit to care that much about his soulmark, but he does anyway. 

He pretends he isn’t rushing to gather the rest of the snacks to fuel tonight’s Blaze and Chill session (with the guest appearance of Ella Enchanted, a legend in cinematography that Noctis swears is a horrid movie and Prompto is determined to prove him wrong about). He checks off from his mental list the disgusting pickle chips Noct loves and Prompto hates to find crumbs of on his pillowcase, the two-for-five energy drinks in mango and a flavour that’s maybe green apple, the too-sweet apple pies Prompto has been dreaming about for the last week. 

He tries—and fails, mostly—to keep his right wrist behind his back while he checks out at the speed of light. It makes him self-conscious, makes him feel naked. Exposed. The probably underpaid and definitely tired cashier looks unimpressed while Prompto struggles to open up his wallet and pull out a few paper bills with one hand. 

The three blocks back to his dorm have never felt so far.

There’s ostensibly lots of things that would make people stare at him. The bright hair. The row of studs on the shell of his ear. The lip piercing. The way he dresses like a video game character from the wildly popular mid 2000s children’s fantasy series he can never remember the name of. But right now, as he all but sprints through the main courtyard on campus, he can’t help but imagine everyone’s eyes are glued to his wrist, wondering what his soulmark could possibly mean. 

Their guesses are as good as his. 

He barely notices when he passes the nice RA that lives down the hall, the blonde one with a smile that’s kind and eyes that hide some kind of mischief he’d like to get to know sometime. He half-heartedly smiles and waves at her, a hand already jammed in his pocket to dig out his key to the front entrance of the building. 

The door slams against the wall when he finally makes it to his room but he doesn’t really notice. He unceremoniously drops the bags from the corner store on the floor, quickly scanning his room. 

There, on the dresser. 

He doesn’t exactly lunge at the dresser to grab the leather cuff sitting atop the particle board, but it’s a close thing. 

The leather is warm, a worn comfort he’s all too relieved to feel against the thin skin of his wrist. 

“Yo, you good? I heard slamming.”

The smooth timbre of Noctis’s voice is—yeah, it’s welcome, it always is—but it’s fucking startling and Prompto is maybe a little frayed around the edges from knowing his soulmark has been exposed all day. So, he can’t help but jolt at the sound of his suitemate’s voice, dropping his leather cuff onto the linoleum floor.

“Shit.” Prompto bends over at the same time Noctis does, both of them reaching for the dropped bracelet. 

Their fingers brush, and that stupid tingly, static electric feeling slithers up his fingers from the point of contact. He watches in abject horror as Noct’s hands wrap around the cuff before Prompto can get a hold of it. 

They stand again, and Prompto can hear the moment Noctis sees the red ink on his wrist. A moment of vulnerability punctuated by a sharp intake of breath. Prompto avoids his gaze. 

Noctis coughs awkwardly. He holds out the leather bracelet to Prompto, who takes it as gently as his shaking hands allow. 

Another awkward cough while Prompto quickly latches the closure around his wrist with practiced ease. 

“I, uh.” 

Prompto is still staring down at the floor, watches Noctis shift his weight from one socked foot to the other. 

“I didn’t see what it is, promise.”

Prompto snaps his eyes up to Noct’s face. 

He’s got a finger curling into the short hairs at the nape of his neck. He looks sincere, without his typical smug smirk playing at his lips, sans sharp eyes that normally pierce right through Prompto’s core. 

It’s all Prompto can do to quirk a barely-there smile and breathe out, “Thanks.”

“I’m a jackass but I wouldn’t look if you didn’t want me to.”

That gets a small chuckle from Prompto. “You’re not a jackass, man.”

“Nah, I am.” Noct doesn’t look put-out about it. He crooks a grin. “I keep mine hidden, too. It feels really… intimate, or whatever, to me.”

Morbid curiosity urges Prompto to look Noct up and down to look for it, but he suppresses it. There’s still that calm understanding swimming in Noct’s eyes, so different than the way he normally looks at Prompto and he doesn’t wanna fuck it up. It doesn’t take much mental fortitude to remember all the hoodies even in the late summer heat, the thick sweatpants he wears to sleep, the ever-present mis-matched socks, and to realize.  

Prompto smiles for real, bright and tugging at his cheeks. “Me too.”

Noct lowers his eyes to Prompto’s hand—his left, the one without the cuff—and cocks his head. It’s the thing he always does at the start of all their hangouts, like an initiation—like he’s asking for permission, even though Prompto’s verbally given him blanket consent to casual touching. 

(They’ve been literally sleeping in the same bed at least four times a week for over a month now.)

And when Prompto doesn’t push back, doesn’t tell him no, Noctis reaches out and pulls Prompto toward his own room by the wrist. “The raid waits for no one, Prom.”

Prompto’s smile morphs into something bigger, something that pulls all the way from his abdomen, as he lets himself be dragged into the absolute pigsty that is Noctis’s living space.

It’s the first time Noct calls him by a nickname. 

(It’s definitely not the last.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He walks out of his last midterm of the semester feeling like a total zombie. Dragging his feet, slouched back, pallid skin, ten ton bags under his eyes—the whole nine. It’s a great look, he’s sure. He makes it back to his dorm and immediately heads through the bathroom into Noctis’s room without so much as dropping his backpack off at his desk. 

Prompto shoves his hand between the mattress and the bedframe, feeling around until—aha! Score! He pulls out a small plastic bag half-full of high quality herb. 

Fuck yeah. Perks of having a suitemate with connections to the botany department. 

(The RA, Luna? I’ve known her forever. She’s a Ph.D. botany student. Grows this in her room.)

He haphazardly tosses his messenger bag into the corner before quickly assembling a half-assed joint at the desk. He slides a finger under the ‘tamper proof’ stickers on the sill and lifts the window, situates himself on the surface of the desk so he can blow the smoke directly out with as little a chance of setting off the smoke alarm as possible. Pulling a lighter from his pocket, he lights up, takes a puff, and sags in relief. 

Sweet, sweet Mary Jane, taking away the pain of his first semester of midterms. 

Fuck, he has 7 more terms to go before graduation?

Prompto stares out the window as he smokes. There isn’t a spectacular view. A few well-kept bushes between this building and the resident hall next to it, nothing more. But hey, it’s better than the windowless basement lecture hall he just sat in for two hours, staring down at a test he’s only 50% sure he knew enough material to answer a third of the questions. 

Fuck biology. 

(Ha. Because things have to fuck to live.)

He gets halfway through the joint before he starts to feel it, the decompression. Thank gods, this is exactly what he needed. 

He hears the telltale sound of a key turning in the lock but doesn’t spare a glance at the doorway, expecting Noctis to be back from his last midterm exam any minute. Taking another drag, he leans his head back against the wall. 

“You are not my son,” a voice that is definitely not Noctis’s says. 

Prompto whips his head to the door and sees—holy shit, there’s no fucking way—he’s only seen this guy in pictures at the bottom of those school-wide emails that get sent out every couple weeks about the state of the university or some tragedy or whatever holiday with the subject line A message from the vice-chancellor.

But there’s really no way the man standing in the doorway to his suitemate’s dorm is the fucking President of the fucking university. There’s just no way. 

Because Prompto is decidedly not Noctis, but he is decidedly smoking drugs in the dorms. 

“Um,” Prompto manages, once he can muster up some sort of sound through the thick haze currently sticking to the edge of his conscience. 

The man who is not Noctis but whom Prompto refuses to believe is President fucking Regis fucking Lucis Caelum chuckles heartily, eyes roving over the room. Over the miscellaneous chip bags littering the floor, the empty takeout containers stacked next to the door, the crumpled up syllabi cluttering the linoleum flooring in front of the desk, the half-burned candles permanently stuck to the wooden surface of the nightstand. “You’re Prompto Argentum, first year mature student, Arts Faculty, yes?”

It’s all Prompto can do to nod numbly. Dumbly. The President knows who he is.

“Well, it is great to meet you. Could you let Noctis know I dropped by?” The clearly-drug-induced hallucination of President Lucis Caelum bends over to pick up the few pizza boxes by his feet. “Oh, and please remind him that candles are not allowed in the dormitories, would you?”

Again, Prompto nods. He’s pretty sure he’s projected into a different plane. Or an alternate reality. Maybe one of those parallel universes he’s heard YouTube conspiracy theorists babble about when autoplay gets the best of him. 

The man in the door smiles lightly before walking out of the room, shutting the door behind him. 

Prompto blinks. He turns his attention back to the outside world. He contemplates taking off the screen in the window and flinging himself to the ground, three stories below. 

~~

He doesn’t. Fling himself out the window, anyway. 

(He does, however, realize that President Lucis Caelum had called Noctis his son.)

~~

Instead, he waits patiently for Noctis to get back from his midterm. 

By patiently, he means sucking down the last dregs of the weed he’d rolled and then pacing the 11 feet of walking space in the room. Back and forth, back and forth, until he’s sure he’s practically walked holes into the floor. 

It’s a literal eternity later when the lock in the door turns again. Every part of Prompto is screaming, hoping desperately that it’s actually Noctis this time. 

Astrals, it is. Thank fuck. 

He doesn’t give Noctis a single second to set down his stuff. He launches himself at Noctis, hands gripping his shoulders and holy fucking shit , how is he so ripped? Prompto tucks away this bit of information, hides away the tactile memory of firm muscle between his fingers, obvious even through the fabric of Noctis’s worn Capital University sweatshirt. 

(When does he even work out? All he does is eat hot chips and take naps and drink Bang energy and sometimes go to class.)

“What the hell, Prom?” Noctis sniffs the air. “Did you smoke without me? Bro, that’s the good shit I’ve been saving for exams—”

“Dude, why didn’t you tell me your dad is the fucking president of the fucking university.”

Something weird happens with Noctis’s eyes. They turn, like, steely and cold and closed off. Like they were the first time Prompto knocked on his door. Prompto feels his muscles tense under his fingers. “Does it matter?” Noct grits out, less like a question and more like a threat. 

Prompto shakes him by the shoulders. “Dude! Of course it matters!”

With the strength Noct keeps hidden beneath baggy sweatshirts, he wrenches Prompto’s hands from his shoulders. “Really? I thought you were different,” he spits. 

It’s the first time Prompto has seen him mad. Like, roiling. The tips of his ears are pink, cheeks flushed in frustration, mouth pinched at the corners. Prompto is so, so confused. 

“What do you want, then?” Noctis brushes the fringe from his eyes. “To be put on the Dean’s List? Some scholarship you’re after?” 

That makes Prompto really confused. “Dude, what are you talking about?”

Noctis scoffs, cuts Prompto with the sharpness of his hardened stare. “C’mon, what do you want? Everyone wants something from me.”

And then, even through the thick haze clouding his perception, he sees it. He sees Noctis for real. 

He’s not just a guy stumbling through grad school, he’s the son of the president of the university. He was never just a student. His last name carries weight, a burden like a boulder. Beneath the scowls and lazy facade shrouded in black skinny jeans and messy hair, he’s exhausted. 

Of course bastards with a cutthroat competitiveness that fuels academia would ask Noctis of favour after favour. Of course he wouldn’t have willingly written his last name on the placard on his door for the entire hall to see. Of course he was reluctant to let Prompto in after 6 years of people taking, taking, taking. 

The brash introduction, the stilted social awkwardness of someone who hasn’t had a real friend in their adult life. It makes sense, now.

“Noct,” Prompto breathes out. “I would never—gods— use you like that.” 

Noctis stays staring at him with narrowed eyes, dark and glinting like a blade, but his shoulders have already started to unwind, a thread coming loose.

“You’re like…” The words fall from his lips easily, “You’re my best friend, Noct.”

Prompto hasn’t really thought about it before now, but he is, isn’t he? The sleepovers, the constant proximity, the inside jokes, the late nights spilling secrets over baskets of fried pickles swiped from the dining hall. None of his high school buddies, none of his coworkers—shit, not even his cousins—ever did those things with him. 

It happened so suddenly but so quietly, like an assassination. A perfect heist. Once Prompto wedged his way into Noct’s life, Noct took over. Inserted himself so completely into Prompto’s everything until it’s all Prompto knows from the moment he wakes up to the second he falls asleep.

“You’re my best friend, Noct,” he repeats firmly. “I wouldn’t use you like that.”

Raising his chin resolutely, Noctis huffs. “Why does it matter who my dad is, then?”

“Because!” Prompto waves his hands. “You probably, like, grew up on this campus right? You’ve gotta know all the best spots around here. I bet you know all the haunted buildings. The secret places!”

Just like that, Noctis lets go. Throws his head back, lets his backpack fall to the floor, and laughs. “Dude, there’s no haunted buildings .” He grins wickedly. “The whole campus is haunted.”

~~

Noctis rolls another joint with more finesse than Prompto could ever hope to have. They sit on the window sill and regale the horrors of their respective midterms and breathe clouds of smoke through the mesh screen. Noctis’s neighbor bangs on the wall when they fall into a giggle fit over Prompto filling in self-deprecation on a question about rabbits eating their poop. 

And it’s like the floodgates have opened. It’s more than the relaxing effect the weed has on Noctis when he talks about taking his first steps down Main Mall, about sitting in the back of lecture halls to do his middle school algebra homework, about his two cousins with deans for fathers constantly getting into stupid teenage hijinx while the three of them came of age surrounded by frats.  It’s more than the haze of a much-needed high when Noctis’s smirks morph into warm smiles and his touches melt into the softest caresses along Prompto’s knee. 

It can’t possibly be more than the fuzzy feeling of a second joint when Prompto’s heart pounds in overdrive against his chest as Noctis dozes against his shoulder, their fingers threaded together in his lap.

Couldn’t possibly be anything besides a normal, blazed Friday night.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The thing about Noctis is that he’s the prettiest fucking human being alive. 

Prompto knows he’s hot. Not even peripherally—it was the first thing he noticed about Noctis. He’s known for the last several months of their burgeoning friendship that Noctis is exactly the type Prompto didn’t realize he had. But, like, fantasizing about your best friend railing you and then playing King’s Knight right after is par for the course as far as Prompto’s concerned. 

Thinking that your best friend’s profile is the most beautiful culmination of facial features, wanting to kiss your best friend’s lips because his mouth has the most precious cupid’s bow notched into the top? That’s new. 

He wouldn’t have even noticed if there wasn’t a constant stream of people asking Noctis out any time they venture out of their dorms. 

At the cafe in the life sciences building, a girl stuttering through a coffee date invitation. Noctis coolly declining with a less-than-subtle glance down at the pride flag on his bag, the girl’s eyes lighting up in understanding and a passing compliment about his eyebrow shape. At the horribly overpriced pizza joint on campus, a guy sliding a napkin with his number scrawled on it over the countertop. Noctis crumpling it up and tossing it in the trash, and the guy tutting What a waste of such a pretty mouth. Under the big tree in the central courtyard, a girl offering dinner in thanks for Noctis giving her directions to the history building. Noctis dismissing her with a flick of his wrist, and the girl mentioning his long, nimble looking fingers. 

He knew Noct is hot, but now he understands just how fucking beautiful he is. 

And it sucks.

It sucks when they’re pressed together in Noctis’s bed with plushies piled on either side of them and Prompto can’t stop the way his palms sweat while he’s trying to show up some fools during a raid. It sucks when Noctis casually hooks his foot around Prompto’s ankle while they share a mountain of fries for lunch on Tuesdays and Prompto is so distracted by it that he squirts ketchup all over himself. It sucks when Noctis falls asleep with his head in Prompto’s lap and the nostalgic romance of Spirited Away plays from Prompto’s busted laptop and he barely resists the urge to run his fingers through that damned Sasuke hair. 

It sucks and it’s not fair and it fucking hurts when Prompto stops himself from leans in to kiss him because the way Noct looks at him when they’re alone in his room is too earnest.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

They don’t talk about their soulmarks again, until they do. 

It’s a normal Wednesday night for them. Noctis is laying against his approximately three thousand oversized Squishmallows stacked at the head of his bed, his laptop resting on his chest. (Prompto has told him a million times that he’s gonna screw up his neck and spine alignment permanently if he keeps this position up, which has only ever earned him a raspberry and the occasional middle finger.) He’s presumably half-assedly reading whatever papers his advisor has sent him for the week, totally not switching back and forth with the inevitable Twitter tab also open in his browser. Meanwhile, Prompto pretends to absorb the words on the pages of his biology textbook. Something something osmosis, something something negative water pressure. Frankly, he’s pissed at the amount of physics in this stupid chapter—he chose biology instead of physics for his science requisite because he doesn’t like physics, so why the hell is there so much physics involved? It’s unfair, so of course it's perfectly natural recourse for him to scroll through his Instagram feed, liking all the dog pictures that appear on his phone screen. 

It’s when he sees a five-picture post of one of his old coworkers snuggled up beside another woman, an arm slung over her shoulder while they both show off their soulmarks captioned Finally found her! <3 that he remembers the conversation he and Noctis had a few weeks ago. If you could call it a conversation, anyway. 

It was pretty obvious Noct didn’t want to talk about it, not really. But… 

Prompto has never been known for his chill, anyway. And his own soulmark has been tingling weirdly for, like, months now and he kinda wants to take off this damn cuff, at least while they’re hanging out in the dorms,  just let it all out there because he trusts Noct. 

So he clears his throat not at all awkwardly and says, “Hey, Noct.”

Without sparing a glance at Prompto, Noct responds, “Hey, Prom.”

Prompto snorts. He shifts in the shitty university-issued desk chair. “Remember how I asked about your soulmark a while ago?”

This is apparently enough to get Noctis to draw his attention from his laptop. He sits up a little, cranes his neck over the rail of his lofted bed to peer down at Prompto. “Uh, yeah.”

“W-well,” Prompto starts, and shit this is weird, right? Super weird. It’s a weird thing to ask. But he’s already here, already made things weird so he might as well. “W-what does yours look like?”

Noct’s brows furrow. “Why?”

Heat rises to Prompto’s cheeks. “No reason, really! Just curious. I keep seeing a lot of my friends finding their soulmates—we are that age, after all, y’know how it is I’m sure—”

Like the ass he is, Noct stares blankly at Prompto while he flounders. 

“A-anyway, it’s been on my mind. Just… curious.”

Noct keeps looking down at him, not saying anything, keeping his gaze steady on Prompto’s face like he’s looking for something, searching. 

“You totally don’t have to tell me if you’re, like, self-conscious about it or something, dude—”

“It’s on my ankle. The chemical symbol for mercury, Hg.” 

“Uh,” Prompto manages, because what the fuck else is there to say?

“Totally random, right?” Noctis sighs, shutting his laptop and setting it on the mattress. He sits up, running a hand through his already mussed hair. A few strands stick up in the back, in that Sasuke Uchiha way that Prompto thinks is cute but wouldn’t dare mention again. “I have no clue what it means. Mercury isn’t a common name or anything. People aren’t exactly swimming in mercury these days, either.”

“The only thing I know about Mercury is that it’s bad when it’s in retrograde.”

Noctis blinks at Prompto. Once, twice, three times. “Dude,” he breathes out. “That’s the planet Mercury, not the metallic element mercury.”

“Oh.” Prompto feels the heat in his cheeks crawl down his neck. “Y-yeah, man. Totally knew that. It was a joke. For suresies.”

“Did you just say ‘for suresies’?”

“If I said no, would you believe me?”

The two look at each other for a few beats before they burst into laughter that has Noctis’s neighbour banging on their wall to shut them up after too long. 

As they catch their breath, studying completely forgotten for the rest of the night, Noctis crawls down the ladder attached to his lofted bed. He sprawls on the floor, seastar style, limbs all spread out. Prompto slides out of his chair to join Noctis, back pressed into the cold linoleum floor, and stretches out his arms and legs to match his friend’s position. They stare up at the ceiling, just existing together for a few moments of reprieve. 

“What about you?” Noctis asks quietly, voice barely above a whisper, but loud all the same in the calm of his dorm room. 

Prompto turns his head to respond, only to see Noctis’s steady gaze already on him. “What about me?” 

“What does your soulmark look like?”

Oh, right. That. He lifts up his right arm, splays his fingers in the air. “It’s some plant or something, wrapped around my wrist.” He shakes his arm for emphasis. “I dunno what it is. One of my old classmates thought it might actually be seaweed, but I’m not sure.”

“Dude, if it’s seaweed I could totally identify it for you. Lemme see.” 

“Really?” Prompto sits up. “Are you into seaweed or something?”

Noctis slowly, slowly lifts himself into a cross-legged position across from Prompto. “Bro. I’m a psychology major,” he says, except the way he says 'psychology' is all weird again, like the first time they talked at the beginning of the year. 

“Uh, yeah, I know that, but I don’t understand what seaweed has to do with psychology—”

“ Psychology? No, dude, I’m a phycology major. With an ‘f’ sound.” Noct leans forward a little, squinting. “Fi-col-o-gy,” he sounds out slowly. “Phycology, the study of seaweed.”

Uh. Prompto tilts his head in confusion. What?

“Well, technically, it’s the study of algae , but there’s a debate with oceanographers about whether the single-celled phytoplankton are considered proper algae, so—”

“Dude!” Prompto interrupts Noct’s weird rambling, because what the fuck? “I seriously thought you were a psychology major! But if you’re in, like, hard science, can you help me with my bio final? It’s killing me, man!”

Noctis chuckles, and it’s that sound that makes Prompto’s ears perk up and the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end and stabs a little lightning bolt right into his ribcage and he has to tell himself that it’s a perfectly normal reaction to hearing your best friend laugh. “Sure, buddy, I’ll tutor you. But first, let me see your soulmark.” He reaches a hand out to grab Prompto’s wrist, but before his fingertips touch skin, he stops himself. Hesitantly, he says, “Unless you don’t want me to.” 

It’s such a Noct thing to do, Prompto can’t help the smile that spreads across his face. He shakes his head as he starts to unbuckle the clasp on the cuff that normally conceals his mark, hides it from the world—not because it’s bad, or anything, or because he hates it, but because it feels… intimate. Like a big part of him, his story. But it’s Noctis—it’s Noct, his friend, his best friend and he wants to share it with him, on his terms. So he does. He takes off the thick strip of leather, offering his wrist to Noctis. 

Noct sends Prompto a small smile, one of those little ones that reach his eyes even if his lips don’t move much. He scoots forward a little more so he can take a better look. As soon as he lowers his eyes to Prompto’s bared skin, he sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth, eyes widening. 

“Wh-what? Do you know what it is?” Prompto asks, panicked at Noctis’s harsh reaction. 

Nodding numbly, Noct says, “Yeah, I do. I’m gonna…” He reaches out slowly, circles his fingers around Prompto’s wrist just above the thin red and pink and brown lines twisting over his skin. He lowers his head a bit, raising Prompto’s arm closer to him gingerly. It’s so gentle, so soft, Prompto can’t help the fluttering of his heart in his chest that he hopes isn’t noticeable in the veins under Noctis’s grip. Noct runs the pad of his index finger over a few of the branches etched into Prompto’s wrist, twisting Prompto’s arm a little to get a better look at the whole thing. “ Microcladia coulteri.” He keeps looking at it, staring almost reverently.

It’s… unnerving. Prompto feels his pulse race ever faster. He can feel Noctis’s warm breath spreading over the thin skin of his wrist with how close he’s looking at it. “Micro what?”

Hearing Prompto’s voice must knock him out of whatever stupor he’s in. Noctis lifts his head, meets Prompto’s gaze, searching, searching, searching. “Microcladia coulteri,” he repeats, like it’ll mean something to Prompto the second time. “Commonly called delicate sea lace.” He spares another glance down at the mark, swipes his thumb over one of the pink-tinted tufts positioned over Prompto’s tendon before he lets go. 

“Woah,” Prompto lifts his arm, rubbing his left fingers over the soulmark. “So it is a seaweed! I thought it was some kinda flower or something.”

“It only grows on other seaweed, never on rocks,” Noctis says, distantly, like he’s not actually talking to Prompto. He’s scowling at the ground instead of facing Prompto properly. “It’s a red alga. Easily confused with Plocamium pacificum. Hard to find unless you’re looking for it,” he continues like he’s reciting a grocery list. 

“Uh, you okay, Noct?” Prompto asks slowly, the way you’d talk to a stray alley cat you don’t want to scare away. 

Noctis visibly swallows. “Y-yeah.” He meets Prompto’s eye for a split second, immediately averting his gaze back to the floor. “I just remembered I have an early meeting with my advisor in the morning. I’m gonna turn in a bit early.”

“O-oh. Yeah, man, sure. I’ll just…” Prompto abruptly stands, wiping non-existent dirt from his sweatpants. “I’ll get out of your hair.” He grabs his school stuff from Noct’s desk, cradles his textbook against his chest. “See you tomorrow?”

Still staring at the ground, Noct nods. “Yeah, man.”

~~

Except he doesn't see Noctis the next day.

When he wakes up and saunters to the bathroom to take his morning piss, Prompto sees that the door leading into Noctis's room is shut. They'd been keeping their respective doors open for months now because Noctis is a clingy shit with separation issues. (Not like Prompto more often than not is the one to traipse into Noctis's room first, snacks and quickly forgotten study materials tucked under his arm.)

He doesn't think he's seen the door shut except for when he's actually using the toilet since September.

It's the first sign that something is wrong, but it's not the last. 

Prompto brushes his teeth, goes to his regular Thursday classes with only the stale granola bar he swiped from the bottom of his desk drawer in his stomach. When lunch rolls around, Noctis doesn't show up at the dining hall like normal, doesn't slam down his tray of chicken strips and soggy French fries next to Prompto while bitching about whatever stupid thing his advisor said to him that morning. Prompto even buys Noctis's favourite caffeinated beverage from the cafe next to his last class—not coffee, because it's fucking gross, dude —and knocks on Noctis's door like a stranger to let him know because he still hasn't opened the en suite bathroom door into his room. Prompto settles with leaving the drink in front of Noctis’s door and a text that says u ok? bought ur sugary fav to make it all better and hopes for the best. 

It's weird, going through the whole day without a peep from Noctis. Noct, who octopuses himself to Prompto in the middle of the night when he's feeling anxious before a big deadline; who sometimes crashes Prompto's afternoon classes because he's bored and hadn't seen Prompto all day; who brings greasy-but-delicious takeout to Prompto and basically shoves it down his throat because he knows how easily Prompto forgets to eat when he's stressed; who is always scooching closer to Prompto, always has an arm slung around Prompto’s neck, always always always invading Prompto’s personal space. 

Nothing. 

Prompto slips under his covers that night with worry in his veins and a foreboding feeling clinging to the back of his neck. 

~~

The next day doesn't bring the improvement Prompto was hoping for. 

The morning starts with the bathroom door still firmly shut. Prompto strains his ear at the door, trying to hear any kinda sound from Noctis's room to no avail. When he leaves for class, he sees the boujie energy drink he'd left in front of Noct's door still there, untouched. 

Which could, of course, only mean one thing. 

Noctis is dead.  

.

.

.

Or like, really really sick. Unable to move. 

It’s the only plausible explanation for him not immediately scarfing down free caffeine offered to him. 

He contemplates skipping class and trying to hunt Noct down, but it’s the last session of the semester and he really, really needs to be there for this review if he wants a chance at passing bio. Besides, he reasons, he doesn’t know anywhere else Noct would be. 

So he goes about his day, pretending the whole time that he isn’t picturing his best friend lying cold and lifeless on the floor of his room. By the time he makes it back to his room after the shittiest rendition of Thai curry a la dining hall dinner, he’s pictured Noctis in no less than 36 different poses of death. 

He knocks on Noctis’s door again. The front one, and the bathroom one. Nothing. He contemplates trying to open them but… but it’s not that bad yet, right? Like, going one day without seeing someone isn’t enough to break into their place. 

(It wouldn’t really be breaking and entering if the doors are unlocked though, right?)

(Prompto doesn’t know much about the law, so he doesn’t try.)

He settles into his desk, prepared to wallow for the rest of the night. 

~~

Two hours later, Noctis bursts into his room through the bathroom door. It scares the daylights out of Prompto—he's sitting at his desk, half heartedly studying for his stupid history final, and then the bathroom door flies open, banging into the wall unceremoniously. 

Prompto jumps out of his fucking skin. "Dude! What the hell, man?!" 

Noctis ignores the incredulous stare Prompto is giving him, marching over to Prompto's desk. He slams his palms down on the surface, right over the crumpled up loose leaf pages sprawled everywhere, and leans in soclose to Prompto’s face, he can practically taste the RedBull on Noctis's breath. "Your name, dude!" he shouts, like that makes any sense. 

"My name?" Prompto takes in Noct's features—the deep purple bags mottled under his eyes, the twitch at the corner of his mouth that's that's indicator of too much caffeine and not enough sleep. "Have you slept?"

"Ever in my life? Yes." Noct leans even fucking closer to Prompto. Their noses are basically touching and Prompto steadfastly ignores the way his heart is in overdrive at the proximity. "Your name, Prom."

"Uh." Prompto sits back a little, trying to regain some breathing room. "My name? Prompto Argentum?" 

"Yes, yes, exactly." Noct (blessedly) stands up straight, extracting his hands from Prompto’s desk. "It's Latin for…?"

"I don't know Latin, Noct."

"Of course not, it's a dead language." Shaking his head a little, like the way parents do when correcting their child for saying something wrong but cute, Noct starts pacing the abysmal length of Prompto’s room. "But I looked it up! And it means quicksilver. Roughly."

Prompto tilts his head, confused as fuck. 

"Prompto, y'know, like pronto? Fast, hasty, chop-chop? Quick." Noct looks at him like he's the crazy one. "Argentum is what gave me the hint, actually. I knew I'd heard it somewhere but couldn't remember. But, duh, of course, I'd seen it on a periodic table! Back in undergrad I was curious about all the weird symbols—Au for gold, Sn for tin, all those—so I looked them up. And Ag is the chemical symbol for silver because the Latin word for silver is argentum ." He pauses in his pacing to point at Prompto. "Ergo, Prompto Argentum equals quicksilver."

"Um," Prompto says after a long moment of silence. "Okay…?" 

"Ugh! Do you not know what quicksilver is?" 

"I—no? Should I?" 

Noctis stomps over to Prompto and grabs his hands, snatches them between his own. "Quicksilver is another, like, nickname for mercury. The liquidy metal stuff? Quicksilver. Because it's slippery and silver, dude!" 

It makes sense, all the words Noct is saying. But he's still so confused what this has to do with him. 

Noct shakes their clasped hands. "My soulmark, Prom."

"Your soul—" Prompto cuts himself off, eyes widening as it dawns on him. 

It’s on my ankle. The chemical symbol for mercury, Hg.

Oh.

Oh.

Prompto meets Noct's intense gaze, sees past the obvious exhaustion printed into his skin, really looks into pools of cerulean. It seems so obvious, now, as he searches Noct's eyes, searches for answers. Because they've always been there. He just hadn't been looking. 

"Noct," Prompto breathes out. "I…" 

A small smile ticks up at the corner of Noct's mouth. He swipes his thumb over the leather cuff covering Prompto's soulmark. "Microcladia coulteri. It's the organism my research is about. I picked it because it—" He pauses. Takes a steadying breath. "It's important to me. I can tell you about it another time, but, uh…" 

Prompto grins knowingly. "You haven't slept in a couple days, have you?"

Noct’s smile turns sheepish. “I may have been in the lab for… a while.”

“A Normal Amount of time, I’m sure,” Prompto teases. 

“Totally.” 

The silence that befalls them is… 

Different. Soothing, almost. Comfortable. But loaded, all the same.

Prompto doesn’t know what to say for, like, the first time in his life. 

The quiet is cut short when Noctis yawns, the back of his hand pressed against his mouth. “Fuck,” he curses. “I think I might pass out standing right here.”

Ignoring the sudden lightness filling up his chest like a hot air balloon, Prompto chuckles and says, “Go to sleep, man. We’ve got…” He swallows thickly. “We’ve got lots of time. To talk. Or figure it out. Or whatever.”

Noctis gives him a smile unlike all the others. Warm. Loaded. Sincere. Fucking blazing. The kind of thing painters say inspired their greatest works. 

Just for Prompto. 

Prompto couldn’t wipe the grin off his face no matter how badly he might want to. No one could convince him to. Shit, he thinks he might be stuck this way forever. 

He has the image of something important to Noctis on his wrist, and Noctis has his name on his ankle. 

Fuck. 

They’re soulmates.

“We’re soulmates,” he says, because he can. 

“We’re soulmates,” Noctis parrots, because it’s true. 

“Holy shit.”

“Holy shit.” 

Noctis sways on his feet. Prompto reaches a hand out to steady him. “Dude, go to sleep already!”

Noctis mumbles something that Prompto doesn’t quite catch. 

“What’s that?”

Haughtily, Noctis repeats, “Don’t wanna be alone.”

“Why Noct.” Prompto rests his chin in his hand. “Are you propositioning me?”

“Oh fuck off.” Noctis rolls his eyes. “Like we wouldn’t have ended up in the same bed tonight anyway.”

Realizing the innuendo, Noctis flushes but makes no attempt to cover it up. 

Prompto smiles at him. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll cuddle with you.” Prompto punctuates it with a wink, and Noctis groans.

~~

They do. Cuddle.

For approximately twenty seconds, and then Noctis starts snoring into Prompto’s neck and turns into a clingy octopus who’s more interested in swallowing its prey whole than gently snuggling a friend. 

No, not a friend. A soulmate. 

Wow, that’ll take some getting used to. 

Soulmate. 

Soulmate soulmate soulmate soulmate.

It repeats in his head, stuck on a loop, over and over and over until he’s not sure what the word means anymore. 

“Stop thinking,” Noctis grumbles into Prompto’s skin. “I can smell it from here.”

“Rude.” Prompto’s smiling, anyway. 

“Sleep. We have lots of time to think later.”

Prompto’s smile grows two sizes. “Yeah, we do.”