I want to ride my chocobo all day!

Prompto wished he could say that he'd slept easier last night, having finally contacted Liz, but he was kept awake by his own racing thoughts, his newfound desire to make this all right again, to get Insomnia back, to get Fandom back, and his worries that, even if they did, what then? Everything had changed so suddenly, so completely, and all he knew was he just wanted to go back in time and fix everything….

The tremors didn't help. Eos rumbling beneath their feet, which they said was because of the Disc of Cauthess, nothing unusual about it except the frequency and the intensity of it. They were used to the earthquakes, but they usually didn't happen so often, or so strong. And every single time the ground tremored, Noctis found himself hunching over with a searing pain stabbing into his skull. Sometimes, there wasn't even a tremor for him to wince with a headache out of nowhere, and it was starting to cause a good deal of concern.

( Of Waterfalls, Gods, and Creepy Old Men. )

"Well, we'll just have to watch our backs," Gladio said.

"The whole way," Noctis agreed and, seeing the headlights in front of him go bright, turned to follow as Arydn pulled into a rest stop. Considering the darkening sky, it wasn't really that much of a surprise.

"The Archaean isn't going anywhere," Ardyn pointed out smoothly, once they all exited their respective vehicles to see what the pit stop was all about. "I suggest we bunk down for the night. I'll be happy to foot the bill for our accommodations, and we'll proceed bright and early in the morning."

Not a single one of them was happy about this particular suggestion, but neither of them could deny that there was truth in the fact that a trip to the Disc at night was a fool's errand. So there it was. Staying the night in a reststop caravan with a creepy old potential stalker.

Things just kept getting better and better.

[[ NFB for distance, of course, and cribbed mostly from Chapter 3 of Final Fantasy XV, "The Open World," with a LOT of adjustments because the dialogue in this one is rough, good GOD ]]

It didn't take long for the guys to parse together why Prompto seemed particularly distracted and glued to his phone (much more than usual, anyway!) These past few days, and it didn't take long for them to realize why this sudden message from Yang about her tournament was going to be a problem. So they got together and tried to figure out if there was anything that could potentially distract Prompto more than his ex's fighting tournament.

And the answer to that was chocobos.

It satisfied Ignis, too, since it meant they could run practical protocols on attempting to travel outside the city 'undercover' and without drawing attention to themselves.

So far, they'd done a fair job, too, but it wasn't that hard, when, out of uniform, they really did just come off as a bunch of nerdy city boys getting out to the countryside for a few days.

Plus....CHOCOBOS! Between racing on the track, riding around the area, and even getting shots of the Disc of Cauthess, Prompto had been successfully distracted from his phone. For a while, anyway. It was no surprise that he woke up before Noctis, although Ignis and Gladio were already up, the former working on breakfast outside the caravan where they stayed, the latter doing some morning exercises (much to the appreciation of some early morning workers). So Prompto just had to wait for the right moment to slip right past them, drifting over by the chocobo pens, and, when he figured he'd slipped away enough to avoid being noticed, went to reach for his phone to finally catch up with what he had missed.

Only to find nothing there in his pocket.

"Oh, no!" he realized with dread clenching his stomach. "My phone!"

It...it must have fallen when they were out riding!

"Son of a---!"

It was going to be such a pain trying to find it out here!!

[[ because my boyo is still very squishy and must be protected, at least until Saturday mwa ha ha. NFB for distance, but definitely open for communique, even if you'll have to go through another chocobro to reach Prompto atm! ]]