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He feels his feet touch down on the ground again.
Sunday's senses are still fuzzy - everything is vague, indecipherable. A blurry mess of noise and light and relief that he succeeded. In his hand lies his Supplicant Mask: he looks into its eyes, and it stares back at him emptily. He is grateful for its existence - without it, could he have managed to Tune such a large number of people? Would he have succeeded, or would he simply be another name on the list of casualties? Another name in the history books, saying "Arcadian Calendar Year 1999: Supplicants Fulwish and Sunday were killed on the same day, during the same battle". It would not be factually accurate. He doubts they would care.
Twisting his head slightly to the side, the world blurs again, halos of glaring light searing into his eyes. It looks like how Penacony looks when you squint at the scenery, he thinks, for a fragmented second, and then straightens up again. As his vision focuses - ah, yes, and there they are. Blade is saying something, but Sunday's ears are ringing too loudly for him to hear anything: the words of two hundred thousand screaming, laughing people still a fading clamour in his ears.
Aeons. That sort of happiness, the kind he could taste on the tip of his tongue... it is fake in the way of those synthetic-tasting, 'fruit' flavoured sweets. It is fake in the way that SoulGlad burns your throat with how plastic it tastes. Too sweet.
Too good to be true.
For a moment, Sunday stumbles, and then catches himself. Nobody is looking at him right now: all eyes are on Blade, and he cannot blame them. Sunday understands what he has just done better, perhaps, than a few people here: though he will not speak for Dan Heng. (The fears of two hundred thousand people. Their terror and the sickly-sweet taste of Abundance and Shuhu. That name will be seared into his brain for a long time now, he thinks.)
If he's honest, he's still coming down from the high of Elation. He glances down at the mask again. Once again, it does not do anything but sit and stare. Sunday doesn't know what he expected. Still nobody has turned to look at him yet; he is thankful, in a way. His face feels too heavy to smile, to nod and say it is alright and no, he is not tired.
Sunday is so tired. He only realises this now, but as soon as he does, it's all he can do to not fall to his knees on the floor - body straining under its own weight to keep him upright, limbs feeling like lead. Even, he notices, the breaths he take are deeper than usual, shoulders and chest weighted as they accomodate the exhaustion he feels. It's like the fatigue sinks into his bones, and he forces his head to stay upright.
-At some point, they moved, apparently.
This is odd. Sunday had not noticed this, but now Stelle is looking at him with anxious eyes and an expression that cares. And he knows, too, there is no point in lying to her fully; by now, he knows she can tell by the crease between his eyebrows and the downwards twitch of his lips he is tired.
He lets out a small laugh. It feels heavy, but the exhaustion is less weighted than it used to be, less dry and brittle, like it could snap under the slightest pressure. Like one more straw would have broken it and left it in tiny shards. It's a relieved sort of tired - it feels accomplished and full and whole.
It's been a long time since Sunday has felt whole. He likes it.
Wetting his lips slightly with his tongue, he finds the words he means to say. Somehow, they taste ambrosia-sweet. "I never imagined tuning could be so fatiguing," he says softly, and Stelle laughs slightly in the same sort of tired way that he does. She's been through a lot today too, he realises. "Fortunately, I succeeded." At first he berates himself internally for being full of himself - then the sensation fades into peaceful satisfaction.
Stelle chuckles again, and it's brighter this time. "Thanks, Sunny," she says fondly, and he's grown used to the nickname now after her incessant use of it.
He places a hand on his chest and speaks in his warmest tone, barely realising it. "Saying thanks?" Sunday's head tilts to the side slightly, and his wings flutter around his head. "You're making us sound like strangers." He watches her eyes crease in a wide smile, and the next laugh she does is hearty.
It only now occurs to him how much time he's really spent with them.
He has not had friends before, he does not think. There's something refreshing about the experience. He wouldn't give it up for the world.
There's a pause. "...Are you okay?" Stelle asks. Despite the easy tone of it, there's something heavy behind the words: the thick taste of worry like salt, dissonant. He hums quietly in response at first, and debates: truth or falsehood?
Eventually, he decides. "I'm fine -" Something easy enough to be palatable, and then something more weighted. "Linking everyone's thoughts together... reminded me of Ena's Dream." His dream, he does not say. The words hang in the air unspoken. They glow like lanterns. "The world is truly full of wonders," he continues, as if there is not the same amount of wonder in his voice. "This time, I used my tuning to defend the right to suffer."
Perhaps he has come a long way after all. Is pride the right word for what he feels? "I feel like I'm no longer flying alone, but walking the earth together with everyone. It's grounding, and reassuring."
It feels robotic, reciting these words, but they come surprisingly naturally to him. Speeches - ornate language decorated with trills and mordents and grace notes form on his tongue with all too much ease, but speaking from the heart - words about his true feelings, admitting faults and wounds and mistakes - hesitate on his tongue. An unfinished cadence.
He lowers his hand from his chest as Stelle huffs a warm sigh, shaking her head with a smile on her face. "Always so poetic," she rolls her eyes, and he chuckles slightly in return. "Then, what are you gonna do next?" The Trailblazer asks, curiosity audible - as if that wasn't obvious from the start.
Ah, but of course. Mostly obvious, perhaps. He doubts she remembers his debt, even though now everything's over it's suddenly at the forefront of his mind.
"I think it's time I headed back to the Express for a rest," he admits. "I've got a feeling I'm in for a lecture from Mr. Yang." Sunday can already picture the disapproving look on his face - the slight shake of his head and the wrinkle of his brow, looking over his glasses as he tells him off for being reckless, and then remarks on 'today's youth'.
Whatever that means. But the mental image is amusing, and he projects it for a moment into Stelle's mind. She laughs out loud, and he lets himself do so too. A moment of respite after work. A chance to have stillness, in between the chaos - and is the eye of the storm not still a moment to breathe anyway?
Then, there it is. "Sometime soon, I plan to pay my respects to the fallen of the Synwish Syndicate," he says, solemn this time. For a moment, his eyes flutter closed, before his lashes part again. Blue to magenta fade. It's all so pink here. The Syndicate deserve that much, after all. "I want to tell Polwave that- I've fulfilled his request." Ah. Supposedly he cannot grieve for a man he barely knows, but apparently he manages it.
He looks at Stelle again, making eye contact - amber eyes meet with golden-blue, and the set determination in his expression changes to a softness that has begun to come easily to him nowadays. Hums and smiles and nods to whichever Express member comes by; inclining his head politely (in what he knows just about counts as a bow by practice and calculations) to any people visiting, except for that time Lady Bonajade decided to take a look around. That time, he relocated himself to observe the Archives. "See you later, Stelle," he smiles, and she grins back in that bouncy way that she does.
Once she's left to chat with Himeko, he lets his shoulders sag in the bone-deep exhaustion that hits his body suddenly again, fatigue gripping it like a vice. Sunday tips his head back slightly, gazing at the stars - the very stars he never dared to touch for risk they would burn him, the stars he did not hope he would ever see. And now they fall into his grasp, tumbling towards him. You have to work for what you get; and Sunday supposes he did, really.
Despite everything, he is still here. And perhaps that counts for something.