A/N: So when I get stuck on the long-ish fic that I really want to finish right now, I mess around with this one. It was supposed to be another one shot, but this actually seemed like a good place to take a break. So now it looks like it'll be a two shot. It's really the next bit I can't completely make my mind up about anyways. And I am a really slow writer. *despairs*

Special thanks to Bryler, though, whose way super kind words are kind of what spurred me on to cough up the last 800 or so words on this. Seriously. Thank you.

Um...lots more swearing in this one. Because you know. Boys. *shrugs*

Hope you guys like it! :)

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"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!"

"Stop squirming."

"I can't help it, man, it fucking hurts!"

"Well I can't take it out, if you don't. Stop. Moving."

To emphasize his point, Noctis grasps the blond's face firmly between his hands. Now that it isn't thrashing about anymore, he can actually see what's going on. Prompto's left eye is blood red and watering like a broken water main. The prince has no idea how exactly he's supposed to find and remove the stuck contact lens from his best friend's eye, and he's kind of uncomfortable with pulling their faces so close together in an attempt to figure it out, but it's what Ignis had instructed him to do before he'd rushed off to the Regalia to grab Prompto's contact solution or eye drops or whatever. Gladio, being the sadistic bastard he is, just stands off to the side and enjoys the show.

"I have no idea what I'm doing," Noct huffs.

"Yeah, you're telling me," Prompto agrees entirely too readily, his voice strangled by pain.

The brunet bristles. "Hey, I can have Gladio take care of it if you want me to. Can't promise you'll have an eye left to see from, though."

"Ngh! Really not sure I'll still have an eye with you helping. Where's Ignis when you need him?"

"If you want to wait for him to get back from the car, be my guest."

"Well, you're not exactly doing anything to help, Noct, so I'll probably still be here writhing in pain when he gets back! So either do something, or let me go!"

Noctis is actually very close to doing something. That thing being to slide his fingers down the blond's face and wring his scrawny neck, but he imagines it might be bad form to kill off the one person he had personally invited to join his wedding party, so he refrains. He takes a deep breath to calm himself, because if he's going to have to stick his finger in Prompto's eye, it's probably best that he isn't angry when he does it. He tilts the blond's head into the light so that he can see, but the eyelid is jammed shut.

"Open your eye, Prompto."

"I can't," the other man grits out. He's gripping the sleeves of Noct's shirt, and the prince thinks that Prompto is trying to shove him away, now. He knows his friend is in pain, but it kind of pisses him off anyways, since he's just trying to uphold his best friend-ly duties. He doesn't often get the chance to show the guys what they mean to him. They're all usually too busy trying to save his royal ass. Gladio's words, not his.

"Stop being a baby and just open your goddamn eye," he snaps.

Yeah. Exactly what they mean to him.

"Hey, Noct," Prompto begins, and his tone is mocking. "Ya ever get soap or something in your eye and it stings so bad you can't open it? Well this is kind of like that. Just a lot fucking worse!"

They're practically snarling at each other by this point, and it doesn't help that when Gladio finally speaks up, it's only to tell them to get a room.

"Shut up!" They both snap at him.

"You know what? I'm sick of this," Noctis says, and he shoves Prompto off the back of the rock they'd been perched on. He doesn't think the two of them have ever wrestled before, and the blond turns out to be a lot stronger than he'd anticipated, but he's also half blind and in pain. So after a few moments of struggling, Noct finally manages to use his knees to pin his friend's arms to his sides. He leans over until he can pry open Prompto's eye with the thumb and forefinger of one of his hands.

"Ow! What the hell are you doing?" Prompto yells. He's trying to wiggle his way out from underneath him, but Noct just tightens his hold.

"I don't fucking know!" Noct shouts back, but it's mostly just in retaliation for Prompto screaming in his ear just now.

Prompto is fighting Noct the whole way, and finally he just grabs hold of the blond's upper eyelid and tugs it upwards. Now, Prompto is calling the prince all sorts of colorful names that he probably shouldn't be able to get away with, but Noctis has always hated being treated like something special when, as far as he's concerned, he's really not. So he ignores it.

"Got it," he says at last, his voice much less triumphant than it ought to be. He leans back until he's sitting on Prompto's stomach and peers down at the little blob of goo that has caused them both so much grief. Squishing it between his fingers very nearly makes him gag. "Gross..."

Soon enough, though, his ass is shoved into the dirt as Prompto breaks himself free.

"Hey, is that any way to thank the guy who's just saved your eye?"

Prompto swipes the lens from his fingertip and waves him away. "Yeah, yeah, my hero, knight in shining armor, blah, blah, blah whatever.

"Hmph." So ungrateful.

"You missed it, Iggy. They put on a pretty good show. Broke my heart, though. I was waiting for them to kiss."

Noctis looks up in time to see Gladio pass Prompto's camera over to a confused looking Ignis.

"See for yourself."

The brunet chunks a small toiletry bag at the group's youngest member ("Ouch! Ignis!"), and takes the camera in hand. His eyebrows steadily rise as he scrolls through the taller man's photos.

"Oh, dear," he says at last, and when he lifts his gaze from the screen to smirk at the prince, Noct comes to the decision that all three of these assholes are fired. "Let's take care that compromising photos such as these not fall into the hands of someone like Vyv, shall we?"

Gladio roars out a laugh, and Noct is just about to tell them both to go to hell when the most pitiful whine of distress he's ever heard emanates from the ground next to him.

"Something wrong?" He asks.

Prompto's face is buried in the crook of one arm as he holds out his rogue contact lens. Noct has no desire to touch it again, but if there's something wrong with it, he can't tell by the looks of it.

"I'll say it again: Something wrong?"

Prompto lets out another high pitched whine before dramatically exclaiming, "It's ripped, man! Stupid, giant bird with it's stupid, giant wings flapping stupid, giant clouds of air and dirt into my eyes!" He's holding the lens in front of his face, now, almost as if in reverence. Not quite finished with his ranting, he chokes out, "Rest in peace, little guy. I did my best! Gah! Why did it have to be you, though?"

Gladio looks unimpressed, Ignis is actually rolling his eyes, and Noct isn't sure whether to comfort his friend or smack him over the head for his antics. He settles for a cross between teasing and comforting—he thinks—pokes his finger into the side of the blond's face, and says, "Can't you just get another one?"

"Noooooooooooo," Prompto moans as he slaps away Noct's hand. "This was my last pair."

"Why didn't you mention it before now?" Gladio asks. "It kind of sounds like an important thing to bring up."

Prompto sighs. "We were kind of in a hurry to leave Lestallum when I noticed it, and I didn't want to hold you guys back just because I have shitty genes."

Noct can't help it. He takes this moment to smirk up at his advisor. The older brunet clears his throat.

"No offense, Ignis."

"Mm, none taken."

Ha! Liar.

Ignis is silent for a moment, then says, "It's quite irresponsible not to have a backup of some sort. Is there nothing you have that can tide you over until we make it back into town?"

Prompto looks as though he has an answer to the question that he really doesn't want to give, but Noct is already planning to make him to wear an eyepatch for the duration of the trip. With the gun and the boots, he'll look just like a pirate. There's a bruise on his rib cage that says it serves the blond right. Then again, knowing Prompto, he'd probably enjoy it way too much.

Noct looks over and sees that his friend is having a similar thought. He holds a hand in front of his blind eye and removes it a couple of times before frowning and deflating completely. "In the side pocket of my camera case," he reveals dully.

Noct notices the black case hurtling towards him just in time to keep it from smacking into his face. He scowls up at a smirking Gladio, who just shrugs and replies, "Your best friend, your best problem."

"Thanks, man," Prompto says, his voice just as gloomy as before. "Love you, too."

"Ah, cheer up, buddy." Noct elbows the blond lightly as he rummages through the case. "We'll get you back to town and taken care of before you know i—whoa. You are way more blind than Specs is."

The world is distorted so violently through the lenses of Prompto's glasses that it makes Noct dizzy and turns his stomach. He pulls them away from his face and has to blink a few times to clear away the strain from behind his eye sockets. "Ugh," is all he can say as he holds the frames out to the man next to him.

"Heh, I know, right?" Prompto's voice isn't quite it's usual chipper timbre, but it's the most cheery he's sounded since before they'd been dive bombed by that giant ass bird. "I'm completely useless without corrective lenses. Hang on a sec. I need to take out this other one."

The prince watches in fascination and disgust, thanking the stars that he doesn't have the same so called shitty genes. He doesn't think he has it in him to do that every day. He'd probably just stick with glasses like Ignis.

"Dude. You leering at me like that? Is kinda creepy."

Noct scoffs, amused, and dangles the glasses in front of Prompto's face. "Whatever," he says. "You can't even see if I'm looking at you or not."

"No, but I can feel it. And that is so much worse."

Prompto finally takes the frames from him, and Noct rises to his feet. Prompto doesn't put them on straight away, though. He just frowns down at them as though wearing them is the absolute last thing he wants to do.

"Hurry up and unblind yourself so we can go," Noct says, nudging his friend's thigh with his boot.

"Hey, you guys think you can just lead my blind self back to the car?"

Noctis digs his toe in more forcefully this time.

"Ouch! Okay, okay, fine! Look. Done. I'm going."

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A/N: You're never gonna guess where the nearest optometrist is. ;P