Heavy is the Head that Wears the Solemn Crown

Thirty-Four - A Festive Respite

Tommy

The city outside of Gemini's palace was bustling with numerous festive activities. The streets are lined with booths offering different goods and services. The people behind the table call out cheap prices and one-time-only deals. Performers hung around the main square, playing their instruments with the vigor of a toddler. Dancers in masks and bright costumes were jumping around like they had been set on fire. Mages with literal magic bursting at their fingertips casted spells to make spheres to illuminate the darkening party and explosions that shoot high into the sky. Children hold sticks that flicker with short-living sparks, and adults cheerfully call out to one another. Throughout it all, crystals glow with such intensity that it seems like they are using the happy atmosphere as their fuel source.

Tommy is part of the crowd like a singular piece is part of a puzzle. He stands in the midst of it all with a bag of chocolates in his gloved hand, his other hand grabbing handfuls to place in his mouth. He watches two dancers twirling around each other in the complimentary colors of red and yellow. The way they move makes them seem like a singular flame. It becomes impressive when Tommy recalls that they had been wearing blue and white at the beginning of the performance, and their outfits had seamlessly transformed into a different color as the time passed. The crowd surrounding the dancers was enraptured with the performance, waiting to see how their dresses would revert back to their original state.

Tommy kept his eyes at the two performers, but his mind couldn't have been further away. He had come out to enjoy the Winter Festival. He snuck away from Pogtopia's headquarters when no one was paying attention because he wanted to see how the country celebrated the oncoming winter. Business Bay had a temperate climate, so it was never a big deal when autumn became winter. They didn't celebrate the changing of the seasons, but they had other holidays that fell around this time. Tommy was hoping to see some semblance of his homeland by sneaking out. He did find what he was looking for: it felt like Business Bay.

He hadn't realized how terribly sad that would make him. He was in a foreign land, experiencing a homely feeling, but he was stricken by the sensation of hiraeth. He could never return to his home. Even though the land still existed, it was occupied by Oceania. Some of the people of his village remained, but they had sworn allegiance to an enemy nation in order to preserve their own lives. Tommy's best friends were all dead. He and his sister were all that remained of their home, and Tommy couldn't stand the thought. He wanted to return to the place that had raised him. He didn't want to celebrate L'Manberg's stupid festivals and attend the godforsaken balls when everything he loved and cared about was dead and gone.

Not everything was, though, Tommy remembered. He would like to optimistically point out that he and Kristin remained, but his thoughts had delivered him to the memories of Wilbur and Techno. They were two people Tommy had never met before; he barely knew about them from scattered rumors and legends brought down the Mellohi river. If the war hadn't happened, he never would have met them. They would have never thought about a blonde general in some backwater nation too young to have any power. But they did meet, and a lot of things have happened since. Tommy was plagued by memories that weren't his and emotions he didn't want. These two strangers were enough to bring Tommy to his knees, and he hated being weak. His only consolation was that his existence placed them off-balance as well. They were just three souls united by something far too complex to really put into words. Even if they could describe it, they had no time to really think about it.

Other thoughts he didn't have time for included his biological sister and the implication of his wings. Beau was back at the camp, and his wings were folded against his back beneath his cloak. They were both out of sight, but they very much were not out of mind. Tommy kept going back to that moment in the camp when they were told they were family. Tommy never cared about his past until he realized that he had a complicated one. He was someone before he wandered into Misstrixten village.