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Wilbur Soot was having a perfectly good day.
He didn’t have a shift at the gas station, so he woke up in the afternoon. He drank his tea in the kitchen, greeting his kind little brother who already made breakfast for him. As it was a weekend, they were both free to spend the day together.
That’s why they’d left the house to go to the park.
That’s when his day was spoiled.
Tommy had stopped in front of a man who was reading a book, a man whose attention suddenly moved up from said book—Sun Tzu’s The Art of War —at the same exact moment.
“Technoblade.” Wilbur had never heard such vitriol in his little brother’s voice before.
The man inclined his head in a distinctly old-fashioned greeting. “Theseus,” he responded in a flat voice. The tone could’ve been mistaken for dismissive, if not for how the man—Technoblade, apparently—was glaring at Tommy just as intently, eyes scanning him repeatedly as if expecting him to take out a weapon at any moment.
The two didn’t speak any further, seemingly content to hold this ridiculously intense staring contest in a public park. Somehow, despite still sitting on the low bench, Technoblade seemed on equal footing.
Wilbur spoke up, patience running out. “Excuse me? Tommy, who is this?”
Instead of responding, Tommy’s eyes narrowed further. “Well?”
Technoblade folded his book closed, standing up. The motion would’ve been more intimidating if both Wilbur and Tommy weren’t taller than him. He had a looming presence, despite the book in his hand and his wiry glasses giving him a nerdy appearance.
“You can call me Dave,” he introduced himself. His grin was tall as if he was used to having larger canines.
“Dave Technoblade?” Wilbur wondered what kind of ridiculous name that was.
“Dave Watson,” he corrected.
“Right. Let’s go, then, Wilbur,” Tommy finally spoke again. “I want to check if the playground’s empty!”
So-called ‘Dave Watson’ snorted. “The playground ?” Technoblade sounded mighty judgemental for a man whose glasses had nose pads. “You’re going to have to make a little more believable of an excuse to get away, Theseus.”
Wilbur, alarmed by just how creepy that sounded, took Tommy’s arm to pull him away, as Tommy tried to offendedly get up in Technoblade’s face to shout at him. “That’s ageist, you prick! Big men like me can still love the playground!”
Technoblade stopped their escape. “Wilbur, right?”
“How do you know that?”
“Theseus told me.” Tommy flinched at the address.
Wilbur looked down at his brother, arm now nestling the boy under his shoulder. Tommy was resolutely looking at the grass under their feet. He gritted his teeth. “His name,” Wilbur said, “is Tommy.”
Looking over his shoulder, he couldn’t see a change in the man’s expression. “Right.”
“Why did he call you Technoblade?”
“It’s my”—Technoblade looked to be listening to something that no one else could hear—“gamer tag,” he explained as if he’d never heard the word gamer in his life. “We met playing, uh, Hypixel.”
Wilbur looked back at Tommy. “Really?”
Tommy nodded, albeit reluctantly. “I have an account called Theseus. We play Skyblock.”
“Skyblock,” Wilbur repeated. His eyebrows furrowed. “I thought all your accounts were called TommyInnit.”
Technoblade snorted from behind them.
Tommy frowned and looked at the floor. He looked more miserable than the day his favorite vintage music disc fell into the fireplace and melted. “Can we go home, Wil?” his voice was low, almost a whisper.
“Right, then,” Wilbur decided that unveiling this mystery would come later. His little brother was more important than his curiosity. Something in his soul said that this was not the last he’d see of the man who called himself Dave. “Let’s go home, Toms.”
They could always have another day out.