Archive of Our Own

Sunday feels it, the very moment Aventurine dies.

There’s no such thing as the death penalty in the Penacony Dreamscape. The effects of the Harmony would have restricted Aventurine from waking up in the real world of his own accord, so Sunday would have had to do it himself. He could have dragged Aventurine out of his room in chains, and then executed him in the real world. Or turned him into a Dreamworld circus Meme, so that Sunday could make him dance for his pleasure.

He pictured Aventurine’s eyes boring into him - cataloged the ring of colors, the glowing hue, sharp, focused, haunting. Sunday wondered, if after he was done with him, there would be a body to bury. They could blindfold the corpse to ship back to the IPC, and then he could keep Aventurine’s eyes in a jar on his desk.

It was then both disappointing and surprising when the thread of Aventurine’s life - the leash that Sunday held onto to keep him bound to the oath of the Triple-Faced Soul - seemed to vanish to a dead corner.

The connection between them was still there, pulled taut over an impossible distance, the other end disappearing into an abyss of which Sunday could not see: A darkness that even Xipe’s blessing could not illuminate, which meant:

He had succeeded, the madman, in finding a way to the space beyond the Dream. Death in neither the Dreamscape nor Reality. 

Sunday doesn’t have time to ruminate over it, before the insolent hound (Gallagher) comes barging into his office mere seconds after the curtains fall over Aventurine’s “performance”. The desperate dog is too eager to be patient, and bites the hand that has pardoned it.

And Death pierces Sunday through the heart.

Sunday is falling between the layers of the Dream when a thread of Harmony tugs at his fingers. With no other anchor, he grabs onto it and pulls.

He grits his teeth and follows the signal in his hold. He flies sideways through the Dream, and his world tips into darkness. 

Then,

Blinding light. 

Sunday opens his eyes in a sea of infinite monochrome.

Belatedly, he realizes that, beyond the Dreamscape, he has no other connection to any of his followers, except for the one that had just been banished beyond. Aventurine.

So this must be where that Galaxy Ranger (Acheron) sent him. 

He can’t hear his own breathing, or the echo of his voice, or his own footsteps. Sand laps at his ankles, the texture indiscernible. It sifts through his fingers like water, and feels neither warm nor cold. 

So this is the Sea of Nihility. A realm from which many men of lesser willpower emerge mad, should they make it through at all. 

He wonders where Robin is. He prays she has fallen into the dreamflux, or at least somewhere that remains retrievable by Xipe, and he will get her once he leaves this place. He is already mad - there is little left to lose. With that resolution, he begins marching forward. 

There’s someone else in the Sea of Nihility. It’s pretty clear to Sunday who he should expect, given that there’s only one individual around here that he holds a nebulous connection to, and yet this realm beyond space-time takes him by surprise anyways:

“Hi, mister! Wow, are those wings? And a halo? Mister, are you an angel?”

It’s Kakavasha, the child he saw through Aventurine’s eyes.

He read up all about the last Avgin the moment Aventurine stepped onto the boarding platform of Penacony’s runway. Pictures, of the pretty boy in shackles, as he’s dragged down the hallway of the courtroom. Muzzled, gagged, blindfolded. An Avgin’s words have compulsion abilities. An Avgin’s voice has a mesmerizing quality. An Avgin’s eyes have psychedelic properties. 

The child is in bedraggled clothes, and his haunting eyes shine bright in the darkness of the Nihility. This is not the version of Aventurine he expected to find, but it gives him hope - if the visions of the Harmony still persisted in the Sea of Nihility, then it’s evidence that this realm is not entirely isolated from Penacony. He can still make his way back.

“If you’re here, then he must be around here somewhere…” Sunday mutters. The IPC dog was cunning, Sunday doubted he chose to die without contingencies. Unless he really was that suicidal?

The kid cocks his head. “Hm? Are you looking for someone?”

“I’m looking for my…” He deliberates. “Sister.”

“I’m looking for my sister, too!” Kakavasha says, excited. “And my Mama, and my Papa… maybe we can look for them together!”

Sunday pockets the knowledge that Aventurine has a sister for later. One that is undoubtedly deceased, given his status as the last of his kind, but would no doubt make useful emotional ammunition. He smiles at the kid, which is enough encouragement for him to take off running in a random direction, and Sunday follows at a brisk pace.

The kid stops intermittently to look over his shoulder at him, and then starts again, and nothing around them changes, just the endless sift of dark sand over his shoes and the black hole on the horizon that grows neither bigger nor smaller. There is no way to keep time except for the erratic pitter-patter of Kakavasha’s footsteps, tick, tick, tick-tick, tick, tick-tick-tick-

He is almost ashamed to lose his temper faster than the child. “Get back here! Stop running. We’re getting nowhere.” 

Kakavasha trots obediently back to him and extends a small hand. It’s filthy, palm scuffed and knuckles dirty, like the rest of him. Sunday stares and stares until Kakavasha drops his hand.

Immediately he thinks he should have taken it. This is an illusion of Xipe in the sea of Nihility, and Kakavasha is looking for his sister. But the kid has already turned away from him, headed in another randomly chosen direction, a skip in his step. 

Ah, but Aventurine had always been lucky. (Or perhaps the blessing of the Gaiathra Triclops does not reach him here? And it will lead them to their deaths.) With little other option, Sunday continues to follow.

The silence, punctuated by Kakavasha’s footsteps and occasional kick into the waves (childish) (he’s a child) gives Sunday ample time to brood. 

…He cannot believe he’s here, wallowing in his defeat at the end of the world. Aventurine was just a minor setback, no - he cannot believe he’s let his guard lapse long enough for that insipid hound to kick his Master! 

Sunday had, of course, been watching Aventurine through the illusions’ eyes. There he presented Aventurine with three faces - the past, the future, and himself in the mirror. Xipe had dug into his mind and wrung the illusions out of his deepest fears, and Sunday watched him run circles around in Penacony. 

There before the altar (the stage) he confessed his sins, and Sunday almost cursed himself when Aventurine told Aventurine? the truth. Of course, Sunday thought, he was foolish to believe even for a moment that Doctor Veritas Ratio would have betrayed his companion for something as petty as a Stellaron. The man was enamored. Sunday could have gotten Ratio to do anything he wanted with Aventurine’s 16 hours in his palm - it was just a shame that Ratio held none of the cards he needed. 

Gambling metaphors. A sour taste on his tongue.

Too distracted by that spectacle, he had been. Gallagher’s actions had slipped by him.

No matter, he was now a wiser man, and he will come back from the exile of death to take back his order.

Kakavasha tramples on Sunday’s peace of mind. “I’ll make you a wager, mister!”

Sunday hums non-committedly. Vices start young. “What do you want?”

“The crown on your head.” Kakavasha points, with the demanding air of a spoiled child. His fingernails are grimy. 

Sunday grimaces. “And what do you think you can trade for it?”

Kakavasha smiles back. “The way out.”

Sunday stops walking. “Where have you been leading us all this while, then?”

A grin, and wriggling fingers.

“Fine,” Sunday says, through gritted teeth. “Tell me, and I won’t kill you.”

The damn kid says, “Who’s going to tell you if you kill me…?”

Sunday tries to summon the wrath of Xipe to smite lying, thieving children, but nothing comes to his fingers. He shuts his eyes and assesses the reality of the situation, because Kakavasha will eventually grow to become Aventurine, but he is currently the height of his knees and more importantly an illusion that Sunday can see the floor through if he focuses hard enough.

He says, “Fine.”

Kakavasha looks delighted, and he’s socially aware enough to not offer Sunday a hand to shake. “Alright! The way out is dormancy.”

Sunday scowls. “What.”

“The impossible in the Dreamscape is not death, but rather dormancy,” Kakavasha says. “That’s the answer.”

“...Great,” Sunday says. “And how is that useful?”

“...I dunno,” Kakavasha says. 

“And who gave you that useful piece of information?”

“That’s what was written in the letter. Mister Aventurine seemed to find it useful.”

Sunday reassesses. At least the kid is good for some information retrieval. So Aventurine had come by here, after all, and had received a strange message that had given him some sort of epiphany. It’s unfortunate that he lacked the rest of the context. 

The kid was still eyeing the back of Sunday’s head with a disgusting look on his face, so Sunday says, “This is my halo. It’s a body part. It’ll only come off with my head.”

Kakavasha scowls. “No fair. You tricked me!”

“Fair’s fair. You didn’t show me the exit, you gave me a silly riddle.”

“But I want it.”

“Well, then you’re going to have to kill me, hm?” Sunday strides forward, a little smug knowing that Kakavasha is too poor to have anything sharp or shiny in his pockets, and too short to reach his neck. Pitter patter of feet chase after him, and he sidesteps a dramatic swing of a leg that has Kakavasha flipping over like a pancake.

“If you’re done throwing a tantrum,” Sunday says.

Kakavasha juts his chin out and throws a balled-up fist of sand towards him.

Time does not pass in the Nihility, so they could have been walking for five minutes, or hours, or days. Sunday keeps a steady pace and the child lags and wanes and grumbles. Sunday knows logically that the Sea of Nihility, as seemingly-endless as it feels, is not an entirely futile journey - people have made it out. He will be one of them. Falling into the trap of hopelessness and despair is how lesser men lose themselves here.

Still, it is a relief when something changes in the distance - when Kakavasha excitedly points out what seems to be a blurring of a silhouette against the stark whiteness of the black hole in-center (his eyes are adept at staring straight down the sun).  

A landmark? A disturbance in the Nihility that may grant him passage? Anything was better than Nothing.

Sunday begins elated, and then, as he and Kakavasha approach the anomaly, the excitement melds into annoyance. (The discovery is still better than Nothing, or he might have really gone insane.)

“Figured you were around here somewhere.” It’s Aventurine, full-grown, alive? (Tentatively.) He has an infuriating smile on his face like he’s made a lucky deduction about Sunday’s whereabouts. It’s a less clever guess given the young halovian child he has propped up against his shoulder, with the pale hair and wide golden eyes.

Unlike Kakavasha, Sunday has been aware of the existence of mirrors and cameras since his childhood. So there was a younger version of him too, having manifested in the Nihility as what is no doubt some divine retribution (perhaps IX felt the need to humble him), that just so happened to run into the only other person in a field of endless emptiness. What a mocking parallel.

Kakavasha waves. “Hello!”

“Enjoy your time with big Sunday?” Aventurine says, as Kakavasha leaves Sunday’s side to tug at Aventurine’s jacket in a wordless demand to be picked up. Aventurine does so. Young Sunday recoils to put distance between him and the newcomer, his wings flaring out behind him for balance, and Sunday thinks about grabbing himself from Aventurine’s vice-like grip only if he didn’t have to close the distance.

“Hi!” Kakavasha says, sticking a hand out that goes ignored.

Young Sunday wrinkles his nose. “Hi.”

“Be polite, or you’re going to end up a racist, elitist bully,” Aventurine cajoles, and the child snarls at him, hands bunched up in the lapels of Aventurine’s ridiculous jacket collar. He’s decked out ostensibly like a peacock, in rather garish colors too, like someone who’s been given a paintbrush for the first time - a desperate need to fill the gaps with clutter, like too many diamonds embedded in a mess of a ring. 

“You haven’t figured the way out?” Sunday says, even with that stupid riddle?

“Hey, I know about this place as much as you do,” Aventurine says. “Even less, I’d wager. Isn’t this purgatory in between the slices of your world? Shouldn’t you be in more control than I am?”

Sunday’s expression flattens. “You and I are both aware that this is an anomalous scenario to find ourselves in. We are no longer in the Dreamscape of which I have reign over. Unfortunately, in the heart of IX, Xipe’s influence struggles to reach. What has Qilipoth been doing for you?”

“Touche,” Aventurine mutters. “Well, my side of the plan worked. I got what I wanted. I don’t suppose you did, given that you’re…”

Sunday gets the feeling that Aventurine would have gestured to him, had he not have his hands full with the children. He waggles his eyebrows for a similar effect.  

Sunday folds his arms. “And yet we are in the same boat. You do not want to remain here. Neither do I.”

Aventurine says, “What makes you say that?” Like he’s baiting him. He expects Sunday to flounder over the philosophies of Aventurine’s will to live (granted, he has little), but the evidence is obvious when you consider that the path towards the center of the Sea of Nihility never seems to get shorter, and yet they’re both still walking towards it like a pair (quartet) of idiots.

Sunday points out, “Because you’re on the same path as I am, trying to look for the exit.”

Aventurine looks less amused without a victory. “Yeah, a little bit too anticlimactic for the end of a race, huh? I always thought I’d be executed with a grand ball of lightning and fire.”

You were, Sunday thinks, and viciously pictures the split-second captured on the big screen, of the business end of Acheron’s sword sliding through Aventurine’s Preservation-granted armor like butter. He says, “What a shame.”

Aventurine grins at him, all sharp teeth and glowing eyes. Great, now there are two of them staring holes into him. They’re almost as bright as the light behind them. He forces himself not to look away, because that would be admitting too much. Back to the task on hand, “How do we get out?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Aventurine says. “We have to break the rules of the Dreamscape and attempt the impossible.”

“Dormancy,” Sunday says flatly.

Immediately Aventurine turns to Kakavasha. “Giving out my secrets for free?”

“Mmn,” Kakavasha mumbles, “I wanted the shiny thing on his head.”

Young Sunday’s hands fly up to his halo with a gasp. Aventurine laughs. “Greedy! Even I wouldn’t dare.” All he gets is a giggle.

The conversation must disturb his younger self, with the prospect of losing his head. One of his ankles tap at Aventurine’s hip like he’s a horse. “Put me down.” Aventurine does so, and he trots to Sunday’s side, but not any closer than Kakavasha ever stood beside him. Aventurine squints at them, amused.

Sunday thinks, How did Aventurine convince him to be picked up? He doesn’t have an answer.

“Achieve dormancy. How do you suppose we go about doing that?”

“You tell me, Emanator of Xipe.”

Sunday sighs. “The dreamscape is in a constant flux. The mind is ever in motion, thoughts fluid like water. If it comes to a standstill, the Dreamscape will cease to function. But that will never happen as long as a single thought is there to power it.”

“Doesn’t the Dreamscape get maintenance days…?”

“Our engineers are incredibly effective.”

“Maybe that’s what the Watchmaker’s grand plan is,” Aventurine muses. “To stop all the clocks in Penacony.”

Sunday pauses in his tracks. “...You’re right.”

“Hm?” Aventurine hums curiously. “I mean, great, thanks, but-”

Sunday nearly opens his mouth to rationalize his thoughts - Aventurine would be a good sounding board. No, it was too much to explain, and it’s none of the IPC’s business, especially not if it will give them a deeper look into the inner workings of Penacony’s gears. Sunday shakes his head. “Nothing I can’t handle when I get out of here.”

“Feels like I should get some credit for that plan you just got,” Aventurine says.

Sunday steels his shoulders. Time is linear. There is only one path forward. “The only way out is through.”

“Who knew the illustrious Sunday could out-stubborn Death itself?” Aventurine quips, and falls into step next to him.

They walk in silence for the next few seconds minutes hours days weeks months years spirals of thought. Kakavasha falls asleep on Aventurine’s shoulder. Young Sunday counts his steps quietly to the beat of mother’s old lullabies. 

Aventurine breaks their silence, because he’s no good at leaving well-decorated emptiness alone, like his ugly gold stacked rings on his slender fingers. “Do you know I was once invited to be a Masked Fool?”

“I can’t imagine which one of you would have been more insufferable to deal with,” Sunday mutters.

“Hey, I probably wouldn’t have impersonated your dead sister,” Aventurine says, and that gets a wince out of Sunday, who had been trying very hard not to think about her.

He snaps back, “I’m sure you’d develop a complex about that.”

Aventurine falls uncomfortably silent.

Young Sunday, heretofore in quiet observance, says in a small voice, “Robin is dead?”

Sunday swallows hard and says nothing. Aventurine shoots him a look.

“No,” Aventurine says, when it’s clear that Sunday has no intention of replying. “She’s just missing, the same way that the both of us are missing. But we’re not dead, right?”

They are, Sunday thinks, and then has to shake his head to rid of the fuzz behind his ears. They are not. The Nihility must be getting to him. 

“Mm,” Young Sunday says, but he sounds unconvinced. “Are we going to find her, then?”

“Sure,” Aventurine says, way too chipper. “We’ll find her if we can.”

If we can. They’ll never find her. Sunday shakes his head again.

When his vision refocuses, Aventurine is giving him a peculiar look. “You doing alright?”

Young Sunday sniffles, “She really is dead, isn’t she? What if we n-never find her?”

Aventurine looks between them, and his face twists. “Oh great. You’re losing your mind.”

Sunday scowls at him. “What do you mean?”

“If anything losing my mind has taught me, it’s that your ghosts have no reason to lie about your insecurities. Sunday, I need you to believe that we’re going to find Robin.”

Ridiculous. “I know we will,” he spits, and shoves past Aventurine.

Aventurine has woken Kakavasha up and set him on the ground, because he needs both hands for Young Sunday, one to pat his back as he quietly cries into Aventurine’s neck. Sunday’s heart twists uncomfortably at each sniffle but he looks forward. The only way out is through. He can’t falter in his steps.

Aventurine’s voice almost makes him trip. “Sunday.”

“What.”

“Tell me about Penacony.”

Sunday breathes in through his nose. “About what?”

“Anything. I didn’t get a tour when I arrived, you know.”

“Look around,” Sunday says sardonically, one hand gesturing to Nothing.

Aventurine sounds a little amused. “If I was a tourist, where would you take me?”

“I wouldn’t take you anywhere.” Sunday says. “I will recommend the Moment of Dusk’s elaborate shopping streets to encourage your contribution to Penacony’s economy.”

Aventurine lets out a bark of laughter. “What do you think I would buy there?”

“Ugly clothes.”

Aventurine snickers quietly. “You can just say you prefer them off.”

Sunday thinks of the pair of his bloodhounds pressing their gloved hands to the flat of Aventurine’s stomach, the front of his shirt riding up as his hands rise above his head, the first time they attempted to search him. He had spent the whole encounter looking coy, so Sunday took the rest of his luggage. Sunday says, “I assumed you wore those disgusting colors to confuse people during strip searches.”

“Perhaps,” Aventurine sings. 

Young Sunday mumbles, “I don’t like green.”

“Oh?” Aventurine says. “What color do you like, then?”

“Purple.” 

“I’m a fan of purple, myself.”

“Mm,” Young Sunday says. “Like your eyes.” Sunday does not trip.

“Oya?” Aventurine says, voice lilting with amusement. “Some people say my eyes look more pink. Do you like my eyes? Do you want one of them to use as a paperweight, you little sadist?”

Young Sunday says, “Hm…”

“I’ll make you a wager!” Kakavasha chirps. “One of my eyes for your crown. Halo! A body part for a body part!”

Young Sunday says, “Hmmmm…”

Sunday mutters under his breath, “Don’t buy the first thing you see or you’ll end up in debt to the IPC.”

Aventurine lets out a bark of laughter.

No body parts exchanged, the four continue on their fruitless journey. Aventurine spends it chattering about useless tidbits of stories to Kakavasha, about death-defying acts (Aventurine, Sunday decides, should be studied in a laboratory, had his beloved Doctor not gotten to him already) and planets of rot coated with dripping gold. Sunday ignores every single innuendo. Eventually Young Sunday feels enticed enough to start asking questions as well, long after he’s demanded to be put down again, and occasionally the children get spurts of energy to chase each other around.

Ah, they’re both brothers of sisters. They’re currently negotiating on an odd game that has something to do with the sifting gradients of sand. 

Sunday says, “Tell me about your sister.”

Aventurine doesn’t look at him. "What's there to tell? She's dead, just like the rest of my people. You already know that.” A beat. “Stalker.”

“Am I to believe that you didn’t employ similar methods of research about me?”

“Yeah, I read the news and followed your social media accounts, not subpoenaed old court documents. That's so weird. Are you obsessed with me or something?” 

Sunday ignores him. (It’s a more difficult feat than expected - there’s little else to capture his attention.) He turns to the children, arguing about sand grains. He looks down at the colorless piles sifting through their fingers. He thinks about the beach. He and Robin went to the beach, once. 

A bump at his foot. Sunday moves away, scowling at the intrusion into his personal space. It’s Aventurine. “Keep talking, stupid.”

“What-”

“That’s how people go insane here. They lose themselves in their own minds. Xipe must really want you out, to have conjured up a companion for you.”

And Aventurine gets that privilege as well? “Robin and I went to the beach once.”

“I’ve never gone to a beach,” Aventurine admits. “I hate sand. There’s nothing to see.”

That, Sunday can agree with. "Well, supposedly the intersection of the ocean and the sand is meant to be beautiful. Usually considered the main attraction." 

Aventurine hums. Silence lapses between them. The children shriek, but they’re just play-fighting. Young Sunday has pushed Kakavasha. Sunday winces, because he can comfortably assume that Kakavasha, a full head shorter and arms as thin as sticks, will still win in a brawl between them. The next few moments are spent watching Sunday be proven right.

“I’ll bet you on who wins,” Aventurine says. 

“Are you mad?” Sunday says.

Kakavasha ends up on top and he encircles a little hand around young Sunday’s halo. “Oh,” he says, disappointed. “It’s really attached.”

“Get off me! Ow, don't yank it!”

“How do I get one of those?”

Sunday says, “Be born a Halovian. Get off him.”

Kakavasha sticks his tongue out. Young Sunday resumes screeching.

“Who’d ya think would win between us, now?” Aventurine whispers to him over the cacophony. 

“We already know who dies first,” Sunday mutters to him. Aventurine laughs, and they split the kids up before anyone does any real damage, illusion or no.

They do not tire in the dreamscape, but Aventurine continues to indulge Kakavasha so his feet stay off the ground. Young Sunday looks expectantly at him, so Sunday brushes the sand off his hair and clothes before picking him up too. He tugs at his halo, like he’s trying to reassure himself that it will remain on.

But other than that, Nothing continues to happen. Young Sunday drifts in and out of restlessness, Kakavasha acts as if being carried over endless sand dunes is no great disturbance in the world. Sunday wonders if Nothing can continue until the end of time. If this is dormancy, then they are already trapped in it, and will be doomed to spiral unless there is another disruption.

…Why are they going off some cryptic words?

“Who showed you that riddle? About dormancy?” Sunday demands.

Aventurine falters in his step, which is unusual. One hand comes to rub the back of his neck which seems to redden even though no color changes. Sunday watches, a little enthralled, a little disgusted. 

"Ahaha… does that matter?"

“Given that it’s the only hint we’ve been basing our assumptions of this place on, then yes, I would like to know if they are a credible source.” Sunday hopes Aventurine did not pull it out of his own ass. He trusts that man as far as he can punt Kakavasha. The kid will more likely stick to the bottom of his shoe like a barnacle.

“It’s…” Aventurine says, and mumbles a name. There’s nothing for the words to echo. Sunday opens his mouth to ask, but Kakavasha says, “Who’s Ratio?”

Great. Sunday can be sure the message was given in earnest, at least, but he had been hoping for the Self-Annihilator, whose job description would at least have been to understand the mappings of Nihility.

Aventurine sounds bashful. “Hey, I trust him!”

“Much good that led to,” Sunday snarls.

Aventurine snaps, “What’s your problem?”

Sunday does not know how to articulate his frustration, other than, Veritas Ratio is hardly what he would call a reliable source. He recalls the man’s furious expression as he described the Topaz Cornerstone, which Sunday had mistaken for ire against his colleague. Ratio must have been thinking of shanking him. How noble. 

“How can I be sure that this is not a plot by the both of you to keep me trapped here?” Sunday says.

“Excuse me!” Aventurine exclaims. “How would I even know you would have also been dragged down here?”

That is true. Gallagher is presumably unengaged with the IPC. That changes little about Aventurine’s allegiances. Sunday does not want this conversation to continue. “We have to part ways.”

“Ouch,” Aventurine says. “After all that time we spent journeying through eternity together.”

“Yes. You are a hindrance. There are only two of us here, so only two chess pieces to move. Since your prolonged presence has not aided in the matter, then the solution must be your absence.”

“Cold,” Aventurine says, “But a fair deduction. A coin toss for which direction we continue in?”

Sunday glares.

“Alright, alright,” Aventurine says. “Kakavasha, anything to say to Sunday and Junior before we go?” 

Kakavasha’s eyes glow. He shakes his head. Young Sunday chews on the inside of his cheek and hides his nose inside Sunday’s wing.

Aventurine says, “Well, good luck with getting out. Little Sunday, hope you don’t grow up to be as much of an insufferable prick as your older self.”

Sunday scoffs, and turns to leave, but then- 

“Are we friends?”

Young Sunday. He’s looking at Aventurine, and Kakavasha, and then he turns back to himself. He repeats the question. Sunday is surprised. Who would want to be friends with-...

A bark of laughter. Aventurine steps forward, closer, and his gloved hand comes to ruffle the top of Young Sunday’s hair, with something that can almost be mistaken as fondness. “What, we don’t look like friends to you? Friends bicker all the time. Right?”

There’s a pause that Sunday realizes he is supposed to fill. He does not want to lie. “We are not-” He says, and it dies on his tongue, when Kakavasha’s hand comes up to touch his wing, which flicks away. They’re too close. 

Aventurine is too close. There is no body heat to share, this aeons damned null-temperature space - except it feels like there is something burning between them, and it’s all that Sunday can do to stop himself from seeking any bit of sensation to distract himself from-

The kids squirm away, uncomfortable with the heat, and Aventurine steps closer - his arm brushes Sunday’s hand -

Xipe sings, the thread of Harmony swells, louder. 

Nihility is monochrome bright, Aventurine’s eyes are blurring neon signs speeding over Penacony streets, screaming color. 

Aventurine’s voice sounds breathless to his ears. “Sunday-”

Sunday brings him forward and kisses him.

Song roars in his head. It’s not enough. Color speckles at the edge of Sunday’s vision, and when he squeezes his eyes shut there’s blue-pink-purple blooming under the static of his eyelids, but it’s not enough.

Aventurine’s mouth is hot against his, moving in ways unconducive to the pulsating shapes at the corners of his eyes that Sunday is trying to mimic, and belatedly he realizes Aventurine is speaking. “T-the kids…”

The children are watching them through the gaps in their fingers, Kakavasha unabashedly, young Sunday in deep color. Sunday says, “Get lost, you two.” In the next blink they’re gone. Well. They don’t need to be here anymore, and with Sunday finally feeling Xipe’s control seep back into him, it was only a matter of time.

He turns back to Aventurine, whose face is contorted in pain, both hands on the side of his head, ah, the initial curse has returned. "Agh-! Sunday, please-” 

It’s a shame, but Sunday is nothing but fair. He got his answers in the end so he withdraws the Harmony from Aventurine’s body, and watches him sag against him in relief. He must be grateful because he kisses back when Sunday leans in again. 

Skin to skin. It’s disgusting but the colors have never glowed brighter. Aventurine’s bare wrist brushes his neck when a hand comes up to tangle in his hair. It sends an unpleasant full body shudder down to his toes. Maybe it sends a wrong signal that diverges to his dick. A second hand to his neck on the underside of his wing.

Presumptuous. Sunday wrestles him to the ground. He wins. 

Aventurine pulls Sunday over his lap and drags him horizontal and time does not pass. Time passes. Somewhere in the recesses of Sunday’s mind, there’s a ticking clock counting down the Moments. There’s a finger itching at the metal studs in his ear. Sunday grasps Aventurine’s hand and pushes it somewhere else - it lands on his waist. The ticking grows louder - a clack of their teeth, Aventurine’s breath over his lip, his stupid number of rings hitting the metallic clasp of Sunday’s belt - Sunday bats his hand away, brings it back to his face (cold) (skin) (disgusting) (a horrific mix of colors). He takes off his glove and touches Aventurine until there’s nothing between them, and Xipe’s connection finally clicks.

Sunday opens his eyes back to Dewlight Pavilion. The Harmony ebbs away from him, and he feels his faculties come back to him - one by one, his threads of control snapping back into place, encircling around his wrist. It’s briefly overwhelming to be thrown back into color, but the world rights itself with the forceful snap of pieces back in place.

Aventurine is sprawled underneath him. He’s unconscious. Still breathing, given the slow rise-fall of his chest. Sunday checks himself in the reflection of his desk, he’s alive, he must be, and he doesn't know how long has passed, but any time wasted is long enough. 

He casts a glance at Aventurine. He can’t leave him here. Would it be too uncouth to stuff him in a closet? Too… scandalous? He can already imagine the headlines, their kiss-bitten lips, ruffled clothes, hair with fingers run through.

(On hindsight, the same result could have probably been reached had they just held hands.)

Aventurine stirs. “Ngh… Sunday?”

Sunday scowls. His migraine has not gone. “Shut up if you want to live.”

“...Technically I’ve already served my death penalty, right - ow, ow, ow!”

“Surely these aren’t the tightest chains you’ve been in,” Sunday scolds, binding him to a chair. 

"My, how dirty! What next, are you going to throw me in your basement now?"

“If you behave, I won’t have to. Once I round up the circus animals, I’ll be back for you.”

“Ominous,” Aventurine mutters. “And then? What do you have planned for me after that?”

Sunday hasn’t decided yet. “Remember, the world thinks you’re dead, and if you piss me off I’ll make sure it stays that way.”

“God, you’re such a sadist. I hope you die again and stay mad. A janitor will find and untie me eventually. But where would you have been without me, huh? Still running in endless circles in the Nihility crying about your sis-”

Bad timing to kiss Aventurine again on the beat of the word Sister but Sunday no longer wants to hear his grating voice. Aventurine looks a lot shyer when they part. “Take a guy out to dinner first…”

“I’ll feed you once I win.” Sunday pats his cheek, because he already knows Aventurine will get out of his binds, one way or another. “Blue Hour, the day after, 7. You're paying."

“Assuming the clocks don’t stop on Penacony?” Aventurine says weakly.

“Please,” Sunday says. “Penacony is already frozen in its Moments. So I’ll be very mad if you’re late.”