Actions

Work Header

Rating:
Archive Warning:
Categories:
Fandom:
Relationships:
Characters:
Additional Tags:
Language:
English
Stats:
Published:
2025-07-18
Words:
1,359
Chapters:
1/1
Comments:
25
Kudos:
57
Bookmarks:
4
Hits:
279

Extraordinarily Handsome

Summary:

Gladio sets down his fork and looks at him with perplexed amusement. “Is there something on my face?”

After undergoing a procedure to restore his vision, Ignis meets Gladio for dinner. And what he sees is breathtaking.

Notes:

This was only supposed to be like 400 words, then it turned into 1,300. I've written about Ignis getting his sight back before, but it was more on the angsty side, less the fluffy side. I got this image of Ignis and Gladio out for dinner and Ignis being absolutely enamoured with Gladio's appearance after not seeing it for so long, so here we are. It can be taken as shippy or gen—your choice!

(Plus, I needed a break from the pain of Bitter Truths. It's coming! Promise!)

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

The most surprising thing to Ignis about getting his eyesight back, two years after the dawn, is how unfamiliar and fresh everything seems. The azure of the sky, the verdant green of the trees, even the crimson of the fire hydrants standing stalwart on Insomnia’s sidewalks. When he was blind, time dulled their colours in his memories, rendering the recollected world a patchwork of vague shapes in black and white.

These details are small things, of course. The more jarring changes are those he finds in his friends. In his mind’s eye, they have always been their younger selves. Prompto, excitable and anxious, but brave nonetheless. Iris, cheerful in the face of adversity. Talcott, yet a child. Gladio, scarred and formidable, hiding all his vulnerabilities beneath a gruff bravado.

Prompto was the one who took him to his surgical appointment and brought him home again, and so his face was the first Ignis saw. To say it was a shock would be an understatement. He was still Prompto, but everything about him was subtly different, from the style of his hair to the goatee on his chin to the leanness of his cheeks. The sight of him after so many years brought tears to Ignis’s eyes. He took Prompto’s face in his hands and simply looked at him until Prompto coughed in awkward embarrassment.

He has not yet seen Gladio, who was away on a Duscaean camping trip with Iris and her son at the time of Ignis’s procedure. They returned last night. Ignis is set to meet him for dinner this evening at their favourite steakhouse near the Citadel. Since rebuilding Insomnia, they have shared a meal there at least once a month—not to discuss work, but for the mere pleasure of one another’s company.

When he steps into the restaurant, he is all nerves, excitement and apprehension winding together into a bright, vibrant knot in his heart. Will Gladio look the same as he remembers? Will he be familiar, or will he be a stranger?

There is but one way to find out, he decides as the maître d’ brings him to an empty table at the back of the steakhouse. Ignis sits in the seat facing the door and drums his fingers impatiently on the table as he waits for Gladio to arrive.

At last, he appears. Despite all the years that have passed, Ignis recognizes his form instantly, the way he holds himself tall and proud. He recognizes, too, the mahogany of his hair and the scars striating his face. And those amber eyes, glowing with an inner light, widening in awe as Gladio approaches the table.

“Holy shit,” Gladio says, sitting across from him, an expression of genuine wonder on his face.

Ignis merely stares at him. This version of Gladio is familiar, much like the one in his memories, but the river of time has shaped his face like he’s a god carved from marble. It takes all Ignis’s willpower not to reach across the table and trace the curves of his cheekbones and the hollows of his cheeks, to stoke the beard trimmed with a barber’s precision along his jaw.

“You’re actually looking at me,” Gladio says.

Ignis chuckles and glances down, adjusting his fork so it aligns with the edge of the linen napkin folded on the tabletop. “Yes, I suppose I am.”

“And I’m looking at you,” Gladio says. “We’re looking at each other. Goddamn. It’s been … twelve years?”

“It has,” Ignis confirms.

“Surreal, huh?” Gladio says. He folds his arms on the table and leans toward Ignis. “How do you feel?”

“Excited,” Ignis says. He looks at Gladio again and meets his eyes. “Amazed. Occasionally overwhelmed.”

“I’ll bet,” Gladio murmurs.

They gaze at one another for a few silent moments, searching one another’s faces as if they are meeting for the first time, until the intensity of the connection becomes too much to bear. Ignis clears his throat.

“Shall we order?” he says, though he already knows what he wants. There’s no need to consult the leather-bound menu on the table in front of him. He gets the same thing every time, a seafood paella brimming with lobster and shrimp and redolent with saffron.

“Sure.”

Gladio signals a passing server and they put in their order: a glass of white wine for Ignis, along with the paella, and a beer and a ribeye steak for Gladio.

They talk while they wait for their meals. Ignis catches Gladio up on what’s been happening in President Leonis’s executive office, and Gladio tells him about the canoeing expedition he, Iris, and his nephew undertook during their trip. All the while, Ignis tries not to stare at him, only holding eye contact for a moment before looking away again. It’s been so long since he’s had to think about this particular social courtesy that it’s no longer second nature to him.

Eventually, their food arrives. They dig in, and while Gladio is occupied with his plate, Ignis takes the chance to truly admire him. The restaurant’s soft incandescent lighting gives his face a golden glow and brings out the auburn highlights in his hair. There are more lines at the corners of his eyes, but they crinkle beautifully when he grins. Occasionally, he’ll look up from his steak and catch Ignis gazing at him; he’ll offer a smile, then return to cutting a piece off his steak, chatting animatedly.

It’s only when Gladio finally sets down his fork and looks at him with perplexed amusement that Ignis realizes he’s been staring.

“Is there something on my face?” Gladio asks.

“No.” Ignis averts his eyes for a moment, but only a moment, as it seems he cannot get enough of looking at the man who stood by his side through the worst days of his life and who stands by him still, even though they no longer depend on one another for their very survival. “It’s just…”

“What?”

Ignis shakes his head. “It’s nothing.”

“Can’t be nothing. You keep looking at me like that.”

Ignis continues to gaze at him, his lips parted. “Like what?”

“I dunno. Like…” Gladio gestures vaguely at him. “That.”

“I apologize. It’s just…” Ignis trails off, then laughs ruefully. What is he so afraid of? Gladio has never been one to throw a compliment back in the giver’s face, no matter who said it or what it was. “I forgot how extraordinarily handsome you are.”

Gladio blinks. And then he chuckles and leans back in his chair with a grin like the cat that got the cream. It only serves to make him yet more beautiful—the soft curve of his lips, the glimmer of genuine pleasure in his eyes. And to Ignis, it brings an unexpected, fresh regret, that he didn’t get to see Gladio grow into the man he’s become.

All the same, he clears his throat. He wouldn’t want Gladio to get the wrong idea. “I’m sure you hear that all the time,” he says.

“Yeah.” Gladio picks up his beer bottle and takes a long draught. When he returns it to the table, he quirks an amused eyebrow at Ignis. “But maybe it means more coming from you.”

Ignis swallows, unsure what Gladio’s getting at. “Oh? Why is that?”

“Guess I care about your opinion more than anyone else’s.”

“Is that so?”

Gladio shrugs a shoulder and drapes his arm across the back of the empty chair beside him. It puts his bicep on display, the fabric of his fitted T-shirt sleeve pulling taut over the muscle. Yet another thing Ignis has forgotten: that Gladio’s physique is as lovely as his face.

“Yeah, it is,” Gladio says.

“Well…” Ignis smooths down the linen napkin draped across his lap. He’s still not quite sure what this conversation means or where it’s going, but he’s more than willing to follow it and find out. “I have more opinions of that kind, if you’d like to hear them.”

Gladio grins. It dimples his cheeks. Ignis doesn’t remember him having dimples, but it may be the most charming thing he’s ever seen.

“Hit me with ’em,” Gladio says.

Notes:

If you enjoyed this, please consider dropping me a kudos or a comment. 🙏 Engagement keeps my writing tank full and I'd love to know what you thought. 💖 Thanks for reading! 🙌