Shadow Slave

Sunny did not fully understand what the sorcerer meant by saying that the new heart needed time to settle. Physically, he felt fine… great, even. Both of his hearts were beating steadily in his chest, powerful and dependable like relentless machines. However, he had not put them under any strain since the battle with Nightmare, so there was no way of telling how they would behave in a crisis.

Remembering the frightening pain of having his heart give out, Sunny decided to take the immortal's word for it and allow himself to rest.

He needed rest, anyway.

While his body had healed, the mind was not that resilient. Sunny felt that his mental state was not in the best of shapes… however, strangely, it was not as bad as he would have expected.

After the hellish two months he had spent in the Red Colosseum with Elyas, their subsequent escape, and the young man's death, Sunny had beem numb and apathetic for a long time. He had gone through the motions of pursuing a simple goal without much emotion, hiding in the darkness as he traveled across the Kingdom of Hope, too hurt and defeated to feel anything.

Already in a damaged and vulnerable state, he had been then thrust into the harrowing succession of nightmares and forced to experience one hideous torment after another. At this point, Sunny could have broken… but instead, unexpectedly, he had found himself full of rapacious determination.

That determination had banished the suffocating lethargy and allowed him to endure countless nightmares and continue to fight, until there were none left. It was as though the two ghastly experiences clashed and counteracted each other, leaving him in a semblance of a healthy state.

Or maybe it was just the matter of suffering a bitter defeat by Solvane's hand, but then refusing to give up and clawing his way to victory in the battle against Nightmare. That victory, costly as it had been, ignited his tortured spirit despite all the suffering it brought, the same way that the previous defeat had extinguished it.

Well… healthy was a strong word. Perhaps functioning was more suitable.

He could still feel barely closed wounds in his mind, which sometimes made their existence known. And added to that was the invisible, insidious poison of Hope…

Yes, a week or two of rest did not sound too bad. Sunny had a feeling that later, there would not be such an opportunity again.

…After their breakfast conversation, Noctis offered to host him in the luxurious residence. However, Sunny felt that sharing a living space with the eccentric sorcerer would have been very conducive to peaceful restoration, so he politely refused. In the end, he settled in spacious quarters on the opposite side of the ring of menhirs, close to where his small room had been in the future.

His new one was larger and much better furnished. It was comfortable, beautiful, and safe. However, Sunny didn't like to stay inside the room for too long… being surrounded by its stone walls reminded him of the dungeon of the Red Colosseum too much, so he spent most of his days in the inner garden of the Sanctuary.

The people living in the former Temple of the Moon did not seem as perturbed by seeing a horned demon walk among them as the humans of the waking world would have been, especially since they knew that Sunny had arrived with Noctis himself… however, they were still tense and apprehensive around him. In the end, Sunny found himself being avoided at all costs, which suited him fine.

Not wishing to disturb anyone unnecessarily, he tended to remain in a corner of the garden where very few people ever appeared… coincidentally, it was the same place where he used to sell soul shards in the future. His favorite stone, sadly, was usually taken by the leper whose body and disfigured face were covered with dirty bandages.

Oh, well… life couldn't always be perfect.

The first time Sunny sat down on the grass a few meters away from the leper, he spared the four-armed monster a short glance, lingered for a few moments, and then said in an ugly, grating, hoarse voice:

"...What kind of a creature are you?"

Sunny looked at the leper, not really wishing to engage in a conversation, then reluctantly produced the emerald amulet and answered.

"A demon. What kind of a creature are you?"

The leper smiled, causing a bit of yellow puss to sip from beneath the bandages covering his face.

"...A cripple."

Sunny studied the man, then made a grimace and asked in a sullen tone:

"I won't catch whatever it is that you have, will I?"

The leper let out a creaky chuckle.

"...No. I'm not diseased. Just… burned."

Sunny tilted his head a little, then shrugged and turned away.

So, the leper was not a leper. His body was just severely burned, and judging by the fact that the rags covering the bandages seemed to have been pristine white once, he had probably come to the Sanctuary from the Ivory City. Sunny wasn't sure that he wanted to know how a citizen of the Sun God's stronghold ended up with those burns.

…The memory of their lord's torture was still fresh in his mind.

They haven't spoken after that, remaining in indifferent silence.

Looking at the empty corner of the beautiful garden around them and the distant figures of humans going about their lives, Sunny couldn't help but remember his first day at the Academy. Back then, two outcasts — Cassie and himself — had been segregated from the rest of Sleepers in a similar fashion.

Suddenly in a somber mood, he put the amulet away and thought:

'Some things never change, don't they?'

…Of course, he would have preferred to be in the company of a beautiful oracle instead of a hideous cripple. That was only fair, considering that the cripple would have without a doubt preferred company of someone like Cassie to that of a ferocious-looking demon, as well.

With a sigh, Sunny threw these thoughts out of his head and closed his eyes, trying to meditate.

Two weeks… that was all the time he had to prepare himself for the encroaching hell of an obliterating war.