Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Tommy has decided that he is never stealing something that looks like it was misplaced by the top one percent again.

To be fair, he can't exactly be faulted for what happened. It isn't like he’d intended to bend time and reality by resetting the time on a fucking pocket watch. He’d been tired that day. Worn from a twelve-hour shift as a night auditor and security detail at a local mall (which was totally illegal given he wasn’t the legal age of adulthood yet, but the fake documents he’d used to score the job hadn’t failed him yet), Tommy’s day had started bad and ended worse.

God, at least his daily battle with the alleyway birds was successful this time. He’s actually beginning to think that they’ve both formed a truce with each other. They didn't even try to dive-bomb him today when he left the building. Maybe the various plastic trinkets he’d left them actually worked out in his favor?

The sun was already peeking up over the horizon and the crisp summer air feels almost comforting as it tickles his face in passing where he’s standing just outside the back exit of the building complex. It's not really quiet given the steady run of engines and the faint honking from past the highway, but it's good enough. A break. A brief moment of reprieve. Tomorrow is another day.

Finding the watch had been an accident.

The sidewalk was mostly clear thanks to most people being crammed into cars on their way to work, but there'd been a glint of something unnaturally shiny near the dumpsters as Tommy had locked up the back door to swap places with the morning shift. He’d looked at it out of curiosity, mostly because there were sparse times in which one of the stores in the shopping mall would toss out products that had gone over their sale dates for whatever reason. Trends died a lot, and a lot of it ended up garbage.

It sucked, sure, but it was good for someone like him (world’s finest garbage eating rat). Yeah, everyone knows that Tommy Innit makes dumpster diving look cool and sexy. Just ask the birds.

Unfortunately, Tommy also knew how many things were laid out as bait for anyone unfortunate enough to want a quick wad of cash, and he wasn't really looking to die today. He had much more important things to do. He can't afford to have another bad thing happen to you this week. He’d say he just wanted to rest, but he’s unfortunately married to the grind and she demands his every waking moment.

Perks of being a seventeen-year-old with nowhere else to go. 

Tommy turns back to face the entrance of the back alleyway to walk away and avoid his uncertain demise in snatching whatever is glimmering by the dumpsters, only to see one of the birds he usually argues dramatically with perched on a nearby pile of broken down boxes. It tilts its head at him, head moving to preen under its wings before it chirps.

It's kind of cute, in a creepy omen-of-disaster way.

The opinion is revoked the moment the crow shoots off in the direction of his face and he shrieks, instinctively ducking to avoid it. “What the fucking shit? I’m neurodivergent and a minor, you bitch!”

The bitch in question only caws infuriatingly, sounding all the more like it has the audacity to mockingly taunt him with its cackle. When he turns around to see if it flew off (and also to potentially turn it into a feathered scarf), he sees it standing on top of the dumpsters just over the shiny glint he’d spotted before.

That's... odd. Tommy really doesn’t like the feel of that. 

It almost feels like it's trying to lead him to it, but that would be insane. It's not like the bird is trying to get him to take it. He’s probably just gone a few too many days without sleep.

On the other hand, if whatever was hidden down there was actually worth something...

God, he wanted to leave this life behind so bad. He wanted a chance to live. If it was something particularly worthwhile, he could sell it to a thrift store or a pawn shop. He could add to his hidden savings and get that stupid apartment he’d been looking towards instead of having to float between the local safe house, the gym showers, and the food pantry. It was hard enough avoiding anyone with peering eyes as is, but Tommy dreamed of the day he’d have nothing holding him back.

He’d always wanted to be something more than this, but life had just... gotten in the way.

Again, and again, and again, and again.

Tommy knew that he used to have so much potential. Where did all of that go?

Probably down the drain alongside his parent’s lives. He doesn’t remember them much, just that they’d been kind. He’d been little when they’d been murdered. Rumor had it that he’d died too and had to be resuscitated in the hospital, but he doesn’t remember much of that. He was only four at the time, after all. He’d been placed into the system after that, just another failed kid in a sea of nameless faces. He’d run away at twelve after the last house he’d been put in broke his nose and locked him in the basement when he’d been feverish. 

Once he’d gotten out, it honestly hadn’t been much better. The food was scarce and it was exceptionally difficult to forge false documents, but at least he was free to fuck up his life on his own terms rather than on everyone else’s. Thus, Theseus Innes became Tommy Innit, and his old name had been all but forgotten.

So maybe he’d been a bit selfish in thought. Maybe he’d been a bit more impulsive than he usually would. Desperate people do desperate things, after all. Including theft, though he’s done far worse than that. He can still taste the rot between his teeth.

The alley behind the mall was stiff and rank with the stench blowing through the air from the dumpsters. The wind doesn't really feel as nice anymore when it's drafting it all upwind towards him. Tommy’s pretty sure that he could see a half-dead rat and a puddle of unidentifiable liquid near the bins too. Lovely.

Thankfully, whatever he spotted wasn't near either. Well, it was near a rotting strawberry-banana shake from The Groovy Smoothie splattered across the pavement, but he’s going to elect to ignore that detail. As long as he’s not in front of the security cameras, he’ll deal.

The bird watches him closely, not spooked away despite how much closer he is to it. In fact, it almost seems to look down at the glimmering object below him before meeting his eyes with unnerving awareness once more.

Tommy Innit can’t say that he’s unnerved by a lot of things, but he is officially freaked out. Like, a lot.

His foot shifts backwards slightly, but he doesn’t look away from the crow still observing him. He doesn't really feel like he should be here anymore, and the songbird has too much intelligence behind its eyes to be anything natural.

The bird, however, doesn't seem to like his motion to retreat. It puffs up, letting out a harsh cawing noise that dissolves into clicking. Tommy would say he has to hold back another scream at the sound, but he is the world’s manliest man and has never screamed out of fear in his life.

"Shit! Don't do that!" he hisses after unintentionally jumping at the sudden noise. … Yeah, jumping was all it was. Either way, he isn't a fan of how it's pitched an octave higher than he usually speaks, so he immediately begins insulting the thing. "That was so uncalled for. Never do that to me again. This is why you’re the ugliest bird I’ve ever seen. You look like an angler fish with wings, you fucking twat."

Tommy pauses for a moment to exhale slowly in an attempt to calm the way his heart definitely hasn't sped up, the crow only tilting its head at him. It almost seems to be amused by its success in scaring him, and that only serves to make him more petty as his voice turns bitter. "Fuck you, asshole. You're fucking ugly, and I don't respect birds that look like a wrinkled nutsack given life."

...But he doesn’t try to step away again. He’s not getting into another brawl with another passerine today (even if he can admire the crow's spite), and the bird in front of him doesn't really look like the crows native to where he lives, either.

It's strange enough that he silently chooses to pick the battles he knows he can win.

Tommy crouches down instead, eyeing the corvid warily before sticking his hand next to the puke-inducing pile towards the bottom of the garbage bin nearest to him. Thankfully, his fingers brush against something metal instead of something sticky.

He swipes up his treasure, some kind of old-timey watch by the feel of it, while pretending to put a stray piece of plastic in the garbage bin. Wordlessly, he slips the accessory into his pocket smoothly before beginning the trek back to the communal fitness center down the street.

He needs to shower anyway and this would be a good excuse to wash the thing and see how much he might be able to get for it. ...Even if it means he has to put up with the severe lack of cleaning in the gym bathrooms to do it.

The crow cackles triumphantly as Tommy walks out of the alley. He shoots it a glare from over his shoulder, bristling when it cackles eerily one last time. He glances forward momentarily to ensure that he isn’t about to eat shit running into something, but when he looks back again the crow is gone.

He didn't even hear it fly away. Somehow, he gets the feeling that he isn't the one who won that encounter. He isn't really sure he likes the dread that follows the thought as he walks quicker away from the alley.

... Honestly, Tommy doesn't really remember the walk there, or even getting into the gym bathrooms.

He does, however, remember taking the watch out of his pockets with shaky fingers, breath held stiffly as he’d dabbed at it with a wet paper towel to wipe off the dirt and grime caked onto the metal. He cringed when he felt small pebbles from the pavement scraped against the mangled skin around his cuticles. Tommy’s nails were painted an absolutely blasphemous neon pink at the moment (the only color not out of stock at Dollar Tree), and while it looked cheap and was currently chipped in various places, it kept him from biting his nails and at the skin around them (hence the slow healing of his mutilated fingertips).

But the unappealing color staked across his nails isn't what's holding his attention. No, Tommy’s much more focused on the fact that the watch he’s currently holding is made of gold. Like, the kind that his friends used to ogle in the windows of jewelry shops when he was younger.

He froze in place upon seeing it, because he knows how to differentiate between something fake and something real, and this is solid fucking gold. His mouth goes dry at the realization. Suddenly, his fingers are shaking more than they'd been previously… and then he feels a bit like he’s dying, because if he can find a place to pawn this off he can actually have a life that might actually be worth living.

The thought is as nauseating as it is exhilarating.

Tommy carefully finishes washing the watch before shoving it in his pockets with a habitually paranoid look over his shoulder to ensure no one saw it even though he’s completely alone in the bathrooms at the moment. It's justifiable, given how rampant theft is around these parts. He doesn’t want to lose his only ticket to freedom.

But... well, fuck.

Does it even work?

Tommy tucks himself safely away in a bathroom stall before he takes it out of his pocket again, standing tensely as he inspects it for any errors. It seems to be in pristine condition, other than the time being a bit wrong. It's set an hour behind, which is kind of weird. Maybe whoever had it before him forgot to reset it after Daylight Savings Time.

Figures he would have picked up a faulty watch— good luck in Tommy’s life tends to be about as bright and unachievable as the theoretical pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. Either way, he isn't exactly a leprechaun, and as much as he wishes he was as rich as one, it's probably a good thing since he definitely can't pull off the thick beard those things have.

The two hands of the watch are frozen too, but he’s certain he can figure out that part easily enough with the help of YouTube through a public computer at the library.

Tommy Innit is an innovator, after all. An absolute master of technology and machinery. (He struggled for five minutes consecutively to change a video file to an MP3 file a few days ago.)

Tommy frowns, his finger brushing against the crown. At least it's an older version. It's definitely authentic, too. He likes ancient things and cool trinkets and it helps that this watch is much easier to differentiate from a fake with how much heavier it is than the pocket watches manufacturers would distribute today. There isn't a single piece of plastic within its parts, too— just metal and glass.

He can’t help but breathe a sigh of relief when the crown twists easily, working to adjust the hands with as much focus as his sleep-deprived self can muster. He manages to turn the hands, accidentally moves them a bit too far.

And at the end of everything, he’s just tired. He can still get through it, really, even if he has another shift tonight, but hopefully...

His eyes stray to the watch again, his fingers still on the crown as he twists it absentmindedly. Maybe with this, he can quit his job and find a new one that he enjoys, or sign a lease on that apartment room, or get out of this piece of shit town and find somewhere new and free of the things holding him back. Even go to college, if he can manage to forge the documents for it. That might have a better ending than the alternatives.

When he first ran away, part of him thought that he’d have a better shot at life on the streets than in a home. In a way, he was right. In the same way on the opposite end of the spectrum, he was completely wrong. There was no childhood to be found here. Maybe he could’ve pretended to have one before, but here it was lesson after lesson. He wonders if he still has a chance to experience any of it before he inevitably hits eighteen.

At least college would be a fresh start. Tommy knows that he’s crafty enough to pass the exams. He’s good at learning and memorizing things when he actually wants to be.

He exhales, trying to calm his nerves before he lets go of the watch's crown.

…And watches in horror as it continues to aggressively spin clockwise instead of snapping back into place.

Tommy frowns, attention diverting from his surroundings entirely as he peers down at it more closely. He reaches forward again tentatively, unsure if he’s broken it more than it already was, hesitating briefly before stopping the crown's spinning with two tentative fingers.

When he looks up again, his world has melted into itself.

Colors blur together and shapes mold together into things that feel wrong, and glimpses of places and people he’s never seen before pass by him in an array of shimmering lights.

Tommy inhales sharply at the sight, unable to mask his growing panic as everything in front of him becomes distorted. There's a sense of nausea building in his gut both at the sudden disorientation and the mind-numbing fear that comes with it. There’s part of him that thinks he’s experiencing some sort of acid trip. A much larger part of him reminds him that he’s never fucking touched the stuff. 

He squeezes his eyes shut, hoping to dispel the sight, but it doesn’t do much of anything at all. Everything still keeps spinning uncontrollably, and he’s still holding the watch despite time slipping through his fingers like sand. Does time even exist here? Does anything exist at all?

A startled noise sounds in his throat at the scene before him, and he stumbles backwards to try and lean back against the stall he’d been standing in, only to find there's no longer anything there. He’s falling through air, but it's not really air with all of the things and objects and creatures and people he can see but not touch.

Tommy can't help it. Even big men have their moments, and this definitely qualifies as his. He screams.

He flings his arms forward with so much force that he’s able to feel the way they tug at their respective sockets, one moving to shield his face from the wind now harshly whipping against his cheeks and tearing through his hair while the other blindly grasps ahead of him at something, anything.

But nothing seems to stick, and he vaguely thinks he might just continue to fall and drift with no real direction forever as the visions before him continue to swirl and combine and morph more and more and—

Maybe he cried. Maybe he didn't. Maybe he tore his way through the seams in an attempt to find solid ground. Maybe he didn't do anything at all. He doesn’t seem to exist in a way that he can accurately grasp conceptually at the moment. In fact, Tommy doesn't seem to exist at all.

His head feels almost like it's splitting apart, and he can feel something innately apart of him snap away from wherever it had been intertwined with his soul—

— as he spirals,

and spirals, 

and spirals,

— and he thinks for a moment that maybe his head really did cleave in two, that maybe he’s not really even alive anymore at all—

Before suddenly, just as soon as it began, it stops.

Like it hadn't ever happened in the first place.

Tommy’s hyperventilating where he’s now once again standing on tangible flooring, desperately trying to even out his breathing from the absolute rollercoaster of agony he’d just been involuntarily thrown into moments before.

He looks up, just to affirm that he’s alive—

And the world before him is so much more than it's supposed to be, but also hasn't changed in any way at all.

////

Elsewhere, or perhaps in the same place and just in the wrong reality, a frantic time traveler scrounges around the outskirts of the mall he'd landed by. It wasn't his fault that the watch fell out of his pocket, really!

He'd been in such a hurry to figure out his purpose in the world he'd been sent to that he'd forgotten he'd lost it in the first place until now.

The issue is that he can't find it. He was so sure it had ended up near the back dumpsters where he'd crashed on top of the bins upon arriving (and then had to spend two hours picking all of the gunk out of his hair and off of his clothes), but he hasn't found it.

Why hasn't he found it yet?!

Someone didn't take it, did they?

Oh, oh, that would be so fucking bad.

Exxdii had been angry with him lately in a way that gods tended to be. It typically wouldn't be an issue, given that Karl was a god in his own right, but the fool's bargain he'd been roped into was still binding. Exxdii didn't like failure, and he didn't like mistakes either.

Fuck, Karl had just wanted to break the curse slowly incinerating his fiancé's heart. He just wanted to be able to be happy. They'd already lost Quackity to...

Well, it was best not to call upon the name of Madness. He seemed happy, at least, and Karl understood why he left, but it still hurt to see the man he'd loved sharing wicked grins and hushed whispers with the monster that had massacred millions of other deities' followers.

...Even if the bargain Karl himself had made was what had caused him to forget his own lover and drive Quackity off in the first place. The person Karl sees in him now is crueler than the magician ever knew him to be, but it was also somehow so much more vibrant. It hurt to know that risk and ambition thrived more in chaos than comfort even though it checked out logically.

Regardless, Soot was a goddamn pariah that Karl would mutter anathemas about until he faded from existence entirely, however sophisticatedly charming and silver-tongued the bastard may be. Fitting for the god of music and madness, but intolerable for anyone else to put up with.

That is, if any of them could even be considered true deities in the first place. Monster was a much better term for what they were, especially Madness. The only one Karl tried to be more wary of than insanity was The Woolgatherer. It was always unnerving when he remembered how cruel the seemingly unassuming personification of melancholy and desolation could be.

None of which matters, because if he doesn't find this fucking watch, he won't live long enough to worry about running into any of the other living gods to begin with.

He sighs from where he'd been kneeling next to the dumpster. There's some kind of smoothie from hell seeping into the fabric of his pants and the whole alley reeks of mold and spoiled milk. It's a cheery day to be alive, really. Oh, and there's also half of a human arm sticking out of a black bag near a hole dented in the bottom of the bin that Karl doesn't get paid enough to bother gifting proper burial.

... And of course, the lack of anything even remotely gold.

Karl almost bursts into tears.

He's nearly about to give up and accept his inevitable heavenly smiting when he feels the sharp yank in his chest in the a direction far, far away from the mall he's outside of. It's the same feeling he always gets when the watch is being used, and even if he's not the one using it, he can still feel the energy shifting as someone fiddles with the dial on the crown—

He's grabbing ahold of the threads of reality that he can still feel around him, forcing up the effort to pull himself between the seams before he can really even form a solid thought regarding the action. He's been sentient long enough that he doesn't flinch at the odd sight of reality warping around him and ultimately spitting him out in a bathroom.

Just another typical Tuesday.

Either way, it was disgusting where he was now. Maybe the bathroom was for a gym? A school locker room? Karl doesn't really know and it’s also not what he's here for anyways.

The point is that he's now in a bathroom.

A bathroom that is currently bending back into place as the magic unleashed within it fades back into nonexistence. Back into a perfectly normal bathroom with not a single thing out of place (if you can count horrible bathroom conditions as something considered pristine).

A bathroom with no person... and no watch.

... And comes with that the slow understanding that he might have just fucked up his only real opportunity at shattering the magic that was currently eating Sapnap alive. He failed again, and now there was likely someone innocent caught in the crossfire, too.

Yeah, Karl is so fucked.

////

Tommy is still in the gym bathroom, somehow.

The biggest difference he can spot when he finally shoves himself out of the stall is that the posters on the walls are wrong.

The lights work a little too well, the sinks look brand new, and it smells somewhat crisp instead of the usual stench of sweating bodies and musk. There's no one in here with him, but that’s probably just because it's still early in the morning on a random Tuesday. ... And also because this place suddenly looks like it actually costs money to get into.

There's an odd clenching in Tommy’s gut at the realization that something is very, very wrong. He covers his mouth with his hand on instinct, trying to hold back the bile creeping up his throat as the horror of his situation dawns upon him. He does his best to keep his breathing even, and he presses his forehead against the stall door as he slides the lock on it shut again blindly. Tommy has bigger things to worry about, he can't afford to panic now.

He doesn't know what to do or what's going on and the watch is no longer in his hands.

So if a quiet sob tears its way past his lips, there isn't anywhere to attest to that. If he has a panic attack on the floor of the now-sparkling gym bathroom, there isn't anyone around to judge him for it. And when he picks up the pieces of himself that had shattered against the tile and wipes the evidence of his agony off of his face, there isn't anyone to tell him that he doesn't have to cover it all up, either.

Tommy holds his head high when he walks out of the gym building, the easy smiles and poised normalcy second-nature to him by now. It was amazing how easy it was to blend into places if you practice mannerisms enough. Tommy’d waited until the puffiness of his eyes and the accompanying redness of his cheeks and nose went down before stepping outside. Masking confidence, although a cheap trick, has always and will always be incredibly effective.

One cannot outwit that which they do not know, after all.

Thus, no one looks twice at Tommy when he leaves, even with his casual clothing and winded appearance. He could be just another middle-class fuck leaving the gym after a workout session, after all. There isn't any real reason to question someone's presence somewhere when they don't seem out of their depth in the environment. Rolling with the punches means coming out on top.

The streets don't make him feel much better in terms of understanding what's going on, given that the buildings either seem too old or too new, and the twenty-four hour McDonalds he usually goes to on the way to his shifts isn't in its usual spot on the corner. There's some shop called The Vanifold there instead, which frankly looks so stupid that the sight of it temporarily snaps Tommy out of his panic.

Did some prestigious cunt really call something visibly modeled after a type of car 'The Van-ifold'?

It might be the worst pun he’s ever seen in his many (few) years of living, and he owes the maker his life for the sheer idiocy required to actively force him back to reality. Tommy can appreciate The Vanifold in the same regard that one might appreciate a suicide hotline.

And well, at least the ugly thing distracts him from forming the awareness that certain people on the streets around him are distinctly not human.

The way Tommy’s breath catches can be easily explained away by the sudden chill of the wind. None of this is possible. His mind continues to reel downwards, even if he’s functioning normally externally. It’s not even that he’s like… animal racist (speciesist?). 

For the first time in his life, Tommy might actually feel glad that most of his panic attacks are internal and easily masked.

Everything around him is just logically impossible and he’s starting to backtrack on the sentiment that he's never done acid if only to try and rationalize the absolute trip he’s on right now. Fucking christ, is he high? He didn't take anything— God, he stays away from anything harder than weed after seeing what substances had turned a few acquaintances in various shelters into. Tommy knows he didn't take anything, so maybe there was some sort of coating on the watch? Something absorbable through skin?

But that doesn't really make sense either, he thinks to himself as he nods in the direction of a man with foxlike ears and clawed fingers. Behind him is someone who looks oddly like a golden shark (teeth to match). Tommy refuses to look twice as he continues walking.

At this point he isn’t even sure where he’s going, but he can't really think clearly paired with the feeling of his heartbeat in his ears slowly drowning out the sounds around him.

Tommy can't think of any other explanation for seeing creatures that look human but distinctly not. None of this makes sense. Fuck, what the hell has he gotten himself into? Was this the watch's fault? How was he supposed to know that?

He takes a deep breath, then another. He pauses in the shadowed alley beside a sweet smelling shop labeled Puffy’s Pastries, taking a moment to get his wits together. Everything was fine. He’s literally the god of deflection, surely he could figure out a way to work with what he has. He’s been doing that for years, after all. This was just another obstacle stopping him from being successful. As someone married to the grind, that was simply unacceptable. 

He needs to think of the basic needs of survival. He’s stranded somewhere he can’t really recognize with no one to rely on, but only one of those things is technically new to him. And honestly, he could probably figure out his way around if he squinted. This world was a prettier mirror of his own. It was similar and different all at once, so there was bound to be at least some overlap. 

So he can successfully deflect both of those issues at the moment. Wonderful. Onto the next order of business. 

Tommy needs money. It only takes a moment of peering around to note that an old pawn shop he used to frequent miraculously still exists, so all he really needs to do is snatch something good enough to trade for cash. 

Honestly, he’s not too worried about that bit. He’s been pickpocketing for a while, and even if he’s currently scared shitless, he’s been in plenty of situations where the concept of being caught was the most horrifying outcome in existence. He just needs to people watch for a bit and find a good target. Once he does that, he can steal something good, trade it for cash, and successfully get out of this mess! 

Well, not really. But it’s a start. 

Eventually, Tommy spots someone he deems a viable target. It’s a man with gray skin like stone, his limbs and face littered with sparkling gemstones (are they fucking diamonds?). He’s chatting absentmindedly with another man who looks batshit terrifying, but Tommy is willing to ignore that bit if it means he can snag the gold chain hanging out of the first man’s pockets. He doubts the man meant to leave it visible, but it really just works to his advantage in pickpocketing him. 

He takes a deep breath, trying to ground himself. He’s got this. Surely nothing bad can come out of this. He’s committed theft a million times before and it’s been somewhat okay so far. There was that one time he had to run from the cops after a high-class lady started sobbing over her cashmere, but it wasn’t a recurring theme with his escapades!

Yeah, Tommy’s got this in the bag.

He steps forward, moving like he’s just walking down the street. He’s sure to peer at the shops around like any tourist would before ultimately moving closer to his target. He’s gotten close enough to reach out and touch the man, his fingers twitching with the urge to snag whatever gold is hanging from his pocket when suddenly a hand clasps around his own, quickly dragging him in the opposite direction. 

The culprit can’t be any older than Tommy is, but he moves with a panicked sort of purpose that momentarily stumps him enough that he doesn’t immediately protest. Then, of course, he realizes that the boy totally fucked up his steal and becomes enraged. 

“What the fuck?!” he demands, keeping his voice hushed in a yelling sort of whisper. “You absolute bitch! I was in the middle of something! Something clearly beyond you since you think yourself a right bastard! What are you, some sort of wrong–”

The brunette who’d foiled his plans and subsequently put a dent in all of his hopes and dreams has the audacity to cover Tommy’s mouth with his hand. He’s led them to an alleyway, which Tommy must admit he isn’t entirely confident about. The boy still seems too anxious in his insistence to be harmful, though. …Were those goat horns poking up through his hair? No, that wasn’t quite right. It was much more accurate to call them ram’s horns. 

The amber-eyed boy had odd fingernails too, with his hands ending in dark, tough material that felt hooflike in place of human fingernails. His eyes had rectangular pupils as well, much like that of a goat. Tommy is fortunately too fed up with everything happening to him to be freaked out over it. 

Tommy licks his hand instead, grinning when the boy recoils in disgust. “Yeah, that’s right, bitch. That’s what you fucking get for screwing up my perfectly constructed plans for thievery. Why the hell did you do that, again?”

“Shut up! Are you stupid?!” the boy hisses, shaking off his hand like it’d rid him of Tommy’s germs. Impossible, of course. Everyone knew that getting a disease from Tommy would last a lifetime with no possible cure. To think otherwise was simply foolish, truly. “You were about to rob Skeppy! Do you have some sort of death wish?”

It’s only then that the boy’s words catch up to Tommy and he promptly decides to shut the fuck up for no particular reason (and definitely not because he’s realized that this guy knows a thing or two about the guy he was about to pickpocket). “What.”

“Skeppy!” The boy stresses again. He says it like it’s some sort of taboo word that people should only whisper. “His boyfriend is the literal God of Darkness? Nightmares? All things horrifying, even? The last time someone tried to do anything remotely bad to Skeppy, he publicly dissipated them into shadows. It was, like, all over the news.”

“What.” 

What the fuck.

“What do you mean a god?” Tommy demands, skeptical and also slightly horrified. What kind of fucking universe was this? “Like the big man in the sky? That guy back there looked like a glorified twig. Very lanky. Not very godlike.”

The boy just stares at him like he’s grown a second head. “You don’t know about the living gods? Just what kind of rock have you been living under?”

“Hey!” Tommy immediately complains, because despite being in a world he can’t recognize in the slightest he is still the most important person ever and incredibly relevant. “I’ll have you know I haven’t been living under any rocks! Just cardboard boxes. I’m homeless, bitch. You’d really pick on someone without a house? Rude. Heathonistic, really.”

“I’m homeless too and I still know about them, idiot,” the ram-horned boy says bluntly. 

“Oh. Well, you can’t blame a man for trying.”

He stares at Tommy again, this time for much longer. “Where are you from?”

“What?”

His eyes narrow a bit more, which is interesting to watch given the abnormality of his pupils. “Where are you from? You’re obviously not from here if you don’t even know the dangers of the living gods. I can’t think of anywhere else that wouldn’t have that sort of information. Even farther out in Kinoko there’s been sightings.”

Tommy opens his mouth to respond but ultimately falls quiet. He doesn’t know nearly enough about this world to provide a decent cover and he can’t exactly pretend like he does when he doesn’t even know what he’s doing in the first place. Instead, he just sighs bitterly and looks away, taking a step back from the boy. “Just leave me alone, man. You’re being too fucking pushy.”

Unfortunately, the boy doesn’t seem dissuaded. There’s a certain spark of intrigue in the way he seems to ponder his response, but he ultimately pauses and reflects on Tommy’s reluctant form before saying anything else. He actually looks a bit guilty now. Good. “Sorry, it's a force of habit. You can never really be too careful, yeah?”

The lightheartedness in his tone falls painfully flat. 

“I’m Tubbo,” the ram(?) hybrid, now dubbed with a name, tells him. 

He holds out his hand like an offering, and Tommy can recognize when someone with a similar background to himself is trying to make amends in an unconventional manner. Right now, he looks kind of like how Tommy used to when he would accidentally upset Clem or the other less experienced street kids back home. 

Which honestly felt a bit degrading, but he can appreciate the effort where it’s made. Especially since he’s given him something as meaningful as a name. Everyone back home knew you didn’t do that unless you were trying to do something good. It probably wouldn’t end up as anything other than a wreck regardless. 

Tommy huffs but accepts the handshake. “Tommy. Tommy Danger Innit. And if you forget it, I’ll have to punt you. Likely into the sun so that you can never make such a grievous mistake again.”

“Your middle name is Danger?” his newfound friend asks him, looking like he was torn between considering it a joke and being actually somewhat impressed. He can’t really blame Tubbo for it. The name was pretty cool, and everyone should be in disbelief that someone as incredible as him exists at all. 

Tommy just grins, electing to spare Tubbo from his ramblings. “There aren’t any existing records saying it isn’t that I haven’t fabricated.”

It was mainly a jab meant to garner shock, but Tubbo’s matching grin leads Tommy to believe that maybe they’re a lot more similar than he’d originally thought to believe. Only a madman would look at him like that and not manage to be completely terrifying. 

It’s only further proven with the way the brunette tilts his head as if re-examining him, his teeth glinting despite being somewhat blunt. “I think I like you, Tommy Danger Innit. We’re going to be good friends.”

For once, Tommy can’t help but agree. 

“Do you have anyplace to crash?” Tubbo continues, as if insinuating that he could give Tommy someplace to lie low for a bit was completely normal and not at all suspicious. 

Tommy looks at him blankly. “What the fuck do you think? I just told you I’m homeless, dipshit.”

Tubbo just snickers. “Jeez, just when I was about to ask if you wanted to come back with me. There’s an abandoned mall nearby that I raided a while back and turned into my home. It’s pretty cool if you want to check it out.”

Tommy can’t help but find this entire ordeal incredibly dubious, but he also isn’t really in a place to decline. He’s still trapped in a world he knows nothing about, and at least this way he can milk answers out of Tubbo without seeming too suspicious. “What the hell, okay. I’ll agree. Out of the kindness of my heart.”

"Don't worry," Tubbo tells him with an eccentric nod as he begins leading Tommy out of the alleyway. "I cleaned up a lot of the shops to make it better. I even made a system to collect rainwater and a few battery powered lamps made out of wires and old metal lying around."

"You made that yourself?" he asks, mildly confused by the sentence's phrasing. And also the fact that apparently his new friend is a fucking genius. Sure, Tommy had crafted his own documents, but it was another ballgame entirely to invent shit out of scraps. 

Tubbo just nods in affirmation. "Yeah, I found these books on mechanics and technological development in one of the old stores near the basement a while ago, and I've always liked tinkering with stuff. I'm working on a time bomb next."

“That is the most devious thing I have ever heard of and I support you wholeheartedly,” Tommy tells him. He’s always wanted to see one of those go off. Once, a couple of years ago, some of the others who lived near him got the brilliant idea to make pipe bombs and set them off in the local park. They’d had the cops called on them, of course, and Tommy had always been disappointed that he’d missed the commotion. 

It isn’t much longer until they reach the mall. It’s almost exactly as Tommy remembered, except for the run down walls and broken windows half boarded up. There’s mold or some sort of weird otherworldly fungus creeping up the main entrance, so Tubbo takes them to the back. Coincidentally, he uses the same door that Tommy typically uses to exit the building after his shifts. It’s odd, the sense of something that isn’t quite deja vu but isn’t necessarily not that rushes over him. He’s standing in the same place he’d been this morning except in a completely different reality. 

If he smoked, he would definitely need a fucking cigarette right about now. 

Tubbo waltzes inside, pointing out different shops and which places he’d hooked up power to (going into a concerning amount of detail regarding how difficult it had been to figure out rerouting the pipes in the bathroom for plumbing), but Tommy can’t quite bring himself to pay attention. 

He’s tired, he realizes. It’s been a long day in an already exceedingly long life, and none of this was something he could’ve predicted happening to him. He’s in a slightly better place than he was before, but he doesn’t exactly trust the boy he’s now residing with. The watch that got him here is gone and he has no idea how to get home, much less anyone he trusts to tell about this entire mess. Maybe Tubbo someday, but that day is nowhere near close to now. 

It makes sense then, that he doesn’t eat much for lunch even when the ram hybrid offers him a half-stale sandwich he’d cooked up with various things he’d stolen over the last week. 

Instead, Tommy politely excuses himself, all of the energy he’d had flying out of the window as he lays down on one of the couches in an old Dollar Tree that Tubbo had turned into a comfortable sleeping space. There’s three couches in total and an old mattress shoved between two of them, the last couch at the mattress’ head. Tommy takes the third and uses a blanket that looks suspiciously similar in theme to a children’s animated TV show he used to watch to lay over himself. 

He doesn’t really care about much of anything when he finally falls asleep.

Chapter Text

Tommy is in a field of wildflowers. There's a couple of poppy petals curled within his palms as he lies against the grass. It's not nearly as uncomfortable as it should be, but he still feels the need to leave.

Something is wrong, a muffled voice in the back of his mind whispers to him despite no evidence of the words being present.

He looks at his surroundings, but the field doesn't seem to end in any direction he turns. It's just an infinite array of wildflowers and soft grass that feels almost too unreal to accidentally cut him with its blades. He can spot so many things here, too. Anemones, candytuft, foxglove, marigolds, snapdragons, hellebores, begonias, sunflowers, and more poppies, but nothing beyond that.

All of them seem to be healthy, which distantly strikes him as odd. Out of everything Tommy can see, the only dead flowers are the arnicas hidden beneath the foxglove and snapdragons. He registers after a moment that both of the latter seem to have strangled the arnicas instead of growing around them.

...What did those flowers mean again? Tommy was never fluent in the language of flora and fauna. He was too focused on surviving to learn bitchy victorian flower language. It's probably not important anyways. At least, he hopes so.

Petals fall from his hair when he turns his head, and he picks a few out, inspecting them to see what they are. He drops them the second he places the names of them in his mind, these types being some of the few that he could actually recognize their effects on people. 

Monkshood and soapwort fall from between his fingers and flutter prettily towards the ground below. Tommy wipes his hands off as quickly as he can manage with a silent mental note not to put them near his face or mouth. Monkshood was deadly, after all. He’d watched a younger kid eat a blossom years ago and die a horrible death. It was hard to forget something like that. He stares at where the flowers have fallen for a moment, frowning at the innocent way they lie against the grass.

He was supposed to be doing something, wasn’t he? Leaving, maybe?

No, that doesn't seem right.

There isn't anything here that's putting him in danger, and the flower field is pleasant to be in. He can afford to stay a moment longer.

"... Is there someone here?" a voice calls out with unnatural softness, snapping Tommy from his contentment. His head whips towards the noise, and he sneezes when the movement causes a stray soapwort blossom to fall near his nose. The person speaking doesn't seem to mind, but he's definitely spotted Tommy from his place across the field.

…Tommy does his best to quiet the thoughts urging him to run before the otherworldly figure reaches him.

It doesn't take him nearly as long as Tommy expects for him to reach him though, so running probably would've been useless regardless of his decision. The man is startlingly inhuman in the way he's far from Tommy one second and peering down at his face the next. Tommy couldn't exactly tell with how far away he'd been before, but the individual now before him is tall. Much, much taller than any human would be.

Something tugs at the back of Tommy’s mind urgently, like he’s forgotten something important, but he ignores it in favor of shifting back slightly. The ghostlike creature hovering around him just follows the movement, rendering it pointless.

Yes, looking at it now, he definitely isn't anything Tommy knows of.

There's a slightly translucent tint to his skin, kind of like a kind of frog Tommy learned about in a book he’d snatched from the public library back near... near... where had he learned about it? Was it important? It doesn't feel like it is.

The translucence of the entity’s complexion isn't even the strangest part about him, given that his skin is also unnaturally bleached of color and faintly tinged a pale blue. The flush prominent across his cheekbones and at the tip of his nose is blue as well, though darker in shade.

His eyes are completely white, though. Swirls of navy and cobalt leak from the corners of both of them, dripping past his cheeks and dissolving before they hit the grass underneath him.

There're two small wings at each side of his head, all of which were fully translucent and colored a glittering shade of royal blue. The same type of wings are replicated on his back, though there's only two of them there and they're much bigger than their decorative counterparts. The phantom-like appendages currently rest under him, creating some sort of cushion to rest upon as he floats leisurely in front of Tommy, fussily picking out the flowers still stuck in his hair.

Forget-me-nots are riddled all throughout his own, and the freckles splattered along his face glow like ultramarine stars.

A part of Tommy that feels almost disconnected from himself whispers to him that he should be scared right now, that he should be wary of the entity in front of him with amber brown hair and a smile like sunlight. Somehow, that part of Tommy feels overdramatic when paired with the image before him.

This person wouldn't hurt him, would he? Not when he looks at him so kindly.

"I was wondering when someone new would show up," he hums, drawing Tommy from his thoughts. His blank white eyes look up at him this time, face coming impossibly closer to his own as he pokes Tommy’s nose affectionately. "You must have just gotten here, huh?"

He frowns when he notes the dilated appearance of his pupils and the way Tommy’s still slightly swaying on his feet. "Oh, you're a bit more disorientated than I wanted you to be. ...Maybe I should ask her to use less opium next time. It's never as fun when they don't know what's happening to them. Mortals are always so troublesome when it comes to the right dose."

The last three sentences don't seem to be directed towards Tommy, even if he looks troubled while saying them. He twirls a strand of Tommy’s hair around his finger, leaning his head on his shoulder. It feels almost similar to attention from an older sibling, but then again, Tommy's never had an older sibling (or any memory to compare the feeling to).

"Not much of a talker, are you?" he asks mirthfully, tilting Tommy’s head towards him with a soft brush to his chin. He laughs with quiet mirth, but there's something vitriolic in it that reaches beyond the poppy-induced haze Tommy’s currently in. It's enough to unsettle him even under the guise of serenity. "Or maybe it's just the flowers. I bet you feel nice, at least."

Tommy blinks in an attempt to clear his head, only to immediately get dragged back under by the tranquil environment surrounding him. It feels like a load of bullshit and also nothing at all. 

The figure huffs petulantly, scolding Tommy with a light tone when he nearly loses his balance and falls over in an attempt to step away from him. "Now don't do that! You're much too tired to walk away anyways, right?"

The hands now holding Tommy upright shift to cradle his face. He wants to protest— Tommy knows he doesn't like touch to begin with, that no amount of physical contact has ever been kind to him or made him feel comforted— but he’s too exhausted to muster up any words. He’s so tired. When did he even begin to feel that way in the first place? He can't remember.

In fact, he can't seem to remember much of anything at all anymore. It doesn't seem like a bad thing, though. He can't be upset that he doesn't remember if he doesn't even know what he’s forgotten. If it was something important, then surely it would've stuck.

Tommy feels two fingers brush across his cheekbones, and his eyes flutter shut as he slumps forward, further towards the touch. It’s kind. It feels kind, at least. When was the last time he’d felt something like that? A long time, probably. Time doesn’t really seem to exist here, but he knows that anyway. 

The person before him, whoever he is, laughs brightly at the action. It doesn't sound delighted as much as it does amused. "There you go. That's not so bad, is it? Just rest. There's no need to worry about anything else."

The words almost seem to echo in his mind, and though Tommy’s eyes are closed, he can still hear the way the figure hums and feel the way its hands shift around him. There's an odd, almost uncomfortable feeling in his chest as something intangible seems to reach into it, and he makes a noise of discomfort.

"Shh, just a moment longer," the murmurs around Tommy whisper. The voice doesn’t seem to be coming from any specific point near him. Around is definitely the right word for his tone, if only because it seems to echo in every direction simultaneously. "You won't feel a thing after, I promise. Just sleep. You can do that for me, can't you, sunshine?"

Tommy nearly falls asleep the second after he says that, the uncomfortable tugging slowly becoming more prominent as he grows more distant from his own body, only to stop abruptly with the sound of the quiet gasp that slips past the entity’s lips.

"Oh," he breathes, sounding like he's made both an important realization and a grave mistake. "Oh, this just won't do. I didn't know that it was you. I'll fix everything, don't worry."

A hand cards through Tommy’s hair, tugging at the strands tenderly in an attempt to turn his attention back to it. "I know you want to sleep, darling, and I know I told you to, but I need you to stay awake just a moment longer. Can you do that? Just a few seconds longer, and then you can sleep. Please just let me fix this, first."

It sounds almost pleading. Just a tinge more panicked than it should be. Tommy wonders what could’ve gone wrong, and he tries to stay awake, he really does, but the darkness sweeping over his vision takes him under before he can even really attempt to listen to the creature’s words.

His last conscious thought that correlates to his surroundings is the sudden drop in temperature around him that accompanies an animalistic hiss of frustration coming from the entity when Tommy slips under completely. The voice quickly fading into the background says something, his tone much more insistent beneath its softness this time, but Tommy is already gone.

His eyes open again blearily sometime later, a drowsy haze anchoring his limbs in place. He’s lying down now, he realizes. His head is in the person's lap, and it’s staring down at him in a concerned fashion. He can see the individual’s outfit better now that his face isn't taking up Tommy’s entire field of view. It's easier to look up at his clothes than his face with how tall he is, anyways. Tommy likes easy things right now. 

The creature is wearing a flowy dark blue cable-cocoon cardigan with patches stitched in various spots over it. All of them are yellow, some new and some faded. It looks like he's wearing a yellow sweater beneath it, too. Tommy can't see the pants or the shoes he's wearing from where he’s lying, but he can see a slender tail swishing behind the man occasionally, hairless except for the coarse tuft of ultramarine fur at the tip. It almost reminds him of a cow, except much longer and much more blue in color.

Tommy likes cows. He isn’t sure where the information comes from, but he knows its true. It makes him like the thing in front of him a bit more than before, even if it’s only subconsciously. 

Its wings are extended around the two of them, somewhat blocking the rest of the field from view and keeping the space around them a bit darker than the rest of the environment so that the sun doesn't burn directly into his eyes. There's an odd shade of blue leeching into the color of the figure’s cardigan, and it takes Tommy a moment to register that it's blood.

Tommy hadn't noticed the tear in the creature’s abdomen before, but it's obvious now that he’s looking at it clearly. It cuts diagonally through his chest, tearing through both layers he's wearing. The lines separating the wound and the fabric of his clothes seem to blur together, melting into each other until it's impossible to tell where one starts and the other begins. The slash itself seems to glow a pretty shade of sapphire, giving off faint light and melting into the yellows and blue of his cardigan. It looks like the bleeding is impossible to stop, given that the wound isn't closed.

Tommy faintly wonders if it still hurts. Or if its killing him. 

Tommy can see the moment he registers his consciousness, the entity’s amber eyes widening and the wings drooping weightlessly around his pointed ears unfurl in what Tommy can only assume is relief. "You're awake! I really thought I hadn't been fast enough for a moment there. I don't know what I would've done if you hadn't woken back up. I swear that— I promise I never would have even tried to do any of that if I had known you were—"

He cuts himself off, looking pained. The liquid dripping down his face grows more intense, and Tommy processes belatedly that it's his tears. He continues after a moment, voice evening into its usual gentleness once more. "Well, I suppose all that really matters is that you're awake and not... I'm just glad things work both ways here, is all."

He laughs again with quiet tenderness, but it sounds sad. "Silly mortal, don't you know not to sleep in places you haven't been to before?"

Tommy blinks at him slowly in response, which seems to delight him rather than deter him.

"I'll make it up to you, okay?" he promises in a soft voice full of reverence. The hand Tommy hadn't even noticed was still gently carding through his hair brushes against his cheekbone again, but it's more of an affectionate motion in passing than one he's trying to maintain. "You won't remember any of this, and when we meet again, it'll be better. I'll make it better next time, I promise."

Whatever that means. 

Tommy blinks again, and his eyes must have stayed shut longer than he’d intended, because when he opens them again he’s sitting up instead of lying down. His shoulder rests against the entity's, and one of its wings is wrapped around him in a way that keeps him upright despite looking like it isn't very strong at all.

He's not looking at Tommy, instead focusing on the flower crown of ipomoeas he's twisting together with nimble fingers. Tommy shifts, managing to find enough energy to turn his head, and he blinks in surprise at the way the field has changed.

The flowers he’d seen before are gone, replaced by daisies, zinnias, jonquils, queen anne's lace, dwarf sunflowers. Even the arnicas he’d noticed strangled to death by the other flowers that had been near them now grew tall and healthy. There was even the added bonus of juniper berries discarded around the grassy floor despite there not being even a single tree in sight. It was beautiful. It was comforting in a way it hadn’t been before, in a way that he hadn’t even noticed was lacking. 

The creature takes notice of his wakefulness when he moves, turning to look at Tommy with an adoringly saccharine gleam shimmering in his eyes. "Awake again?"

Tommy glances down at the flowers on its lap. He hadn't noticed the ones peeking out from under the figure’s clothes and weaved into the feathers covering his wings. For a moment, Tommy thinks he sees rhododendrons and spider lilies somewhere throughout the array of colors, but then his gaze refocuses and he can't spot them anymore. 

Weird. 

The voice in the back of his mind that had been screaming for him to run before he’d passed out assures him that he probably just saw them incorrectly. It feels closer, almost different. Almost like it doesn't belong to Tommy at all—

...

What had he been thinking about, again?

Oh, the way the flowers had changed around him and the ones tucked into the entity’s clothes. All that were nestled between the folds of his sweater and cardigan now were mallows, tulips, the forget-me-nots Tommy had noticed before, and rosemary blossoms.

Rhododendrons seem like they would be far too dark in meaning for the guy, anyway. He’d been nothing but nice to Tommy, after all. Kindness was hard to come by these days. 

...What did those flowers even mean again? He knows that he had read something about them once, but the memory slips from his grasp before he can latch onto it.

"I'm starting to think that you're a little too observant for your own good, you know. It takes just a bit more effort to keep you from piecing things together too quickly than it does the others that have come through here," the phantom tells him idly. It sounds reminiscent of a lilting hum.

He picks a flower from the ground nearby. It's a marigold. Perhaps the only one that had remained in the space around them both after it shifted.

His companion doesn't seem pleased by the imperfection, and it turns to shimmering lights in the air that then crumble to ash the moment they're out of Tommy’s field of view. "Maybe it's a little selfish, but part of me hopes the other one doesn't run across you. He missed you more than words can describe, and I kind of want to be the one with something to keep this time. He always breaks the things he loves now that we’re separate. I'm much kinder than that."

The ghostly thing sounds almost resentful near the end, but the negative emotion that flickers across his face is gone as soon as it appears. Not fast enough that Tommy couldn't catch it, though. The sight makes him frown. This doesn't really feel like the right place to be upset. It's far too peaceful here.

"Sorry," the phantom murmurs, "I forgot how easily things bleed together in this place. The Inbetween can be so fickle with emotions. I'm not upset with you, sunshine. I'll make sure he doesn't do any damage, I promise. I can hide all of this, and then it'll all be alright. I won't let you go mad."

The reassurance seems to soothe a part of Tommy that he hadn't even been aware of, and there's a nagging feeling that he wouldn't typically feel that way that gets lost in the wave of comfort that pushes itself into the forefront of his mind.

He still feels weird, even if the sudden wave of calm is quickly diffusing that. Tommy  opts to focus back on the flowers in the entity’s hands instead of thinking too hard on it.

"It's for you," it offers with a slight gesture towards the ring of flora on his lap, as if it was meant to be obvious. He raises the now complete flower crown— when did he finish it, again?— lifting it until it rests around Tommy’s head. It tilts over his face lopsidedly, but the figure just adjusts it with a quiet titter about the color suiting him. "I wanted to do something to make up for everything before I sent you back, and this was the easiest way to pass the time while you slept."

He hums again, a tune Tommy might have once heard but will never fully know again, before his fingers sink back into Tommy’s hair. It has clawed fingertips, he notes to himself internally. The kind of claws one might find on a shrike or a mockingbird, though the way they're cautious of his skin belies their sharpness. "I'd rather not send you back at all, if I'm being honest. It would be so much nicer to just keep you here with me. I've been meaning to look for you, after I found out that..."

He sighs, abandoning the sentence he'd trailed off on before starting up again. "But I know I can't salvage this visit. It's better to start again when I know what to expect, isn't it? I don't want you to remember me like... that. I'm much nicer when I'm around people dear to me."

He twirls a strand of Tommy’s hair around his finger again, leaning his head against his shoulder casually. The action actually looks kind of uncomfortable, given that the guy has to be at least seven feet tall. For some strange reason, Tommy can't bring himself to try and shift away. It's odd. Wouldn't he normally—

No, he wouldn't. 

"I was supposed to come find you, not the other way around," he chides affectionately, never really pausing his rambling. He leans down, pressing his lips to Tommy’s forehead delicately before pulling back. It’s the same sort of familial affection from before, but this time it doesn’t feel as tense. This time it just feels brotherly. 

Tommy would even go as far as to pass it off as a loving gesture if it weren't for its next words.

The phantom laughs quietly to himself when he looks over Tommy’s face like there's something new about him all of a sudden that he takes joy in, and then he continues. "I won't give you your dreams back, but I'll take good care of them. You'll never have a nightmare again if I have them, you know. But I'll still give you this to make up for before. A gift to the mind to make up for the absence of what I've taken from you."

There's a warmth stemming from the odd feeling Tommy’d noticed before that almost seems to be melting comfortably into his body after the creature’s sentence completes. The white of its eyes almost seems to glow in tandem with the sensation bleeding past Tommy’s muscles and bones and into his being. It feels weird, but not necessarily bad.

Somehow, Tommy’s eyes see a bit more clearly when the sensation fades. He’d opened them again in confusion once he’d been able to, not particularly knowing when they had even shut in the first place. He can already feel them start to grow heavy the longer he tries to keep them open.

"Oh, you're tired again," the entity murmurs to himself with a small frown tugging at the corners of his lips. He immediately reaches out to tug Tommy closer again, his head falling back against its shoulder as one of its wings drapes over him similarly to a blanket. "You can sleep now, I made sure it's safe. I'll send you back, right to the exact spot where you fell asleep at."

He can already feel himself fading back into existence, if that’s even possible at all. 

"Don't worry, I'll make sure you don't remember any of this. I'll find you when you fall asleep again, but for now it's time for you to wake up." The god’s hand brushes through Tommy’s hair one final time, and then the scene around him fades with the lingering scent of ipomoeas following him back to consciousness.

////

Tommy wakes up in a cold sweat with no memory of how he even fell asleep to begin with. He’s still on the same couch he’d taken refuge on after the shitshow with Tubbo. He can’t really remember his dream, either. Only that it had been weird and that he’d met someone… oddly enchanting. Which was bullshit, considering Tommy has high standards and isn’t usually taken aback by much of anyone. Thinking about it too hard made returning to consciousness almost feel like walking through fog.

When he finally pushes himself into a more seated position, he can almost swear he sees some sort of flower fall out of his sleeve. He tries to track it with his eyes, but it's gone before it even hits the floor. Maybe he’d needed sleep more than he’d thought he did.

He’s about to go find Tubbo when a near-blinding pain bolts through his chest and into the rest of his limbs when he moves too quickly, making him cry out quietly as he looks down at the area reflexively. Of course, he’s still wearing his shirt, so he shoves the fabric over his head with trembling fingers to try and figure out the source of the agony. The dull ache persists throughout the entirety of the action, occasionally worsening to send jolts of pain further through his limbs. 

Tommy was expecting a bruise. What he found was much worse.

There's... it's blue. Why the fuck is his chest blue? It would be more accurate to call it a rapidly-healing wound, but that doesn't take away from the fact that there's an odd ultramarine colored substance oozing from a tear in the center of his chest. It doesn't feel lethal, and he’s fairly certain he isn’t dying, but it's still worrisome all the same.

...It almost looks like the blue is trying to piece him back together. 

He decides not to think about it. 

He raises a finger to the lesion tentatively, fingertip brushing against the opening of the cut. It doesn't hurt nearly as bad as it should. Jesus... what the fuck was this? He didn't have it before falling asleep. It almost looked like someone tried to carve into his chest with a rake or something. 

The thought is not at all comforting, especially when he has no recollection of where the wound came from to begin with.

...Tommy dutifully decides to put that snippet of worry into the back corners of his mind. He can come back to it when he decides to process the growing list of anxieties regarding where he currently is. He’s raised himself to survive first, ask questions later. For now, he doesn't need to worry about any of that. He’ll figure it out as he goes, and right now? He needs to get out of this room.

Standing is a bit of a challenge, but Tommy manages well enough with a few quiet curses slipping past his lips the second his legs feel like they might give out beneath him.

He breathes. He tells himself to grasp at his bearings, as distressing as they may be. He hasn’t forgotten the breakdown before he’d passed out, and he likely never will. How can Tommy just accept that he’s in a place he was never supposed to stumble across? And because of a fucking watch? 

Now that he’s slept (and hasn’t just gotten done with pulling several all-nighters and a horrible shift that felt never-ending), reality feels a lot closer than it did before. It’s harder to ignore the anxiety pooling in his gut. 

Part of Tommy is terrified to leave the room he’s in. It would be so much easier to stand here and rot for a few more minutes. At least then he could delude himself into thinking that this was just a really strange coincidence.

The other— much more logical side of him, the one that survived this far— knows that staying here will do nothing for him. It's only delaying the inevitable, and he needs to be proactive in order to change his circumstances. Moping won't do anything. If he’s going to get out of here, he needs to do it himself. If he has to carve a way through time and space a second time to do it, then he will, even if he isn’t sure how at the moment. Tommy would rather go to hell than accept whatever bullshit fate has planned for him.

He takes another deep breath and gathers the remaining fractured pieces of himself before walking back out the door. Tubbo lives in the mall (or what’s left of it), so even if Tommy slept through the rest of the day and the succeeding night, he’d likely still be around. If not, then he’d return soon. Hopefully. God, he hopes Tubbo didn’t just fucking dip on him. 

Either way, walking back up the broken escalators almost feels like defeat.

Thankfully, Tubbo doesn’t seem eager to make a big deal out of his disappearance and the redness around his puffy eyes that follows his return. Apparently discovering a giant slash across his chest and dimension-hopping took more of an emotional toll on him than he thought. 

"Bitch!" Tommy declares, determined to draw attention away from his misery as he walks towards Tubbo’s seat amongst a pile of blankets near an old concessions booth. "You should’ve woken me up. This is a betrayal of the utmost degree, you hear me? You will die in seven days unless you—"

"Dude, it’s like, ten in the morning," Tubbo interjects. To be fair, it probably is. 

He plays up his predictable outrage by his newfound companion’s words, opening his mouth to rebuke him with something even more ridiculous when he decides that it’s not really worth it. He doesn’t have the energy to try and make a bunch of petty remarks yet. Sue him. 

“Bitch,” he repeats under his breath, huffing as he flops down onto the blankets. It’s comfortable and he’s relieved that his chest is fully healed. It means that the action doesn’t cause unholy amounts of agony within him. “Anyways, are we gonna fucking steal shit today or what?”

“Just who do you think I am?” Tubbo asks him, fully serious in his offense. Tommy pauses for a moment before the ram-horned boy breaks into a wide grin. “We need to make something for a distraction first. How do you feel about those bombs, again?”

Holy shit, okay. This is something Tommy can get behind (and also use to deflect and avoid everything going on in his life right now). He’d half thought that Tubbo had been joking earlier when he’d mentioned bombs, but if he’s serious then Tommy is absolutely on board. It’s more fun than anything else he could cook up on his own. “Hell fucking yes.”

Tubbo nods, satisfied. “Good, good. I have some made already. Nothing lethal, of course. For now. Mostly just smoke bombs and smaller explosives to cause a scene. We can grab stuff in the chaos. I have places that are my go-to since they’re high in crime anyways. You don’t mind the risk of dying, right?”

He says it so simply, like he’s asking Tommy for his opinion on pineapple on pizza instead of whether or not he was willing to lose his life. Tommy can honestly appreciate the dedication to the grind. He sees it in himself. “I am always willing to lay my life down for the sake of my lovely wife, the grind.”

“The grind isn’t a person, though?” Tubbo questions, not questioning Tommy’s dedication at all. Tommy can admire that as well. 

"Tomato, to-mah-toe. She is to me. No need to get prissy about it, bitch."

All in all, it doesn’t take nearly as long as Tommy thought that it would for Tubbo to have everything ready. He was waiting over by a broken down emo store, idly wondering if the video game themed soda that was hidden behind a knocked-over shelf was still consumable. He was about to grab it and test it out when the ram-horned boy returned, sparing them all from Tommy’s try at potential food poisoning. 

“So,” Tubbo starts as he beckons for Tommy to follow him. “The area I’m going to is in the lower districts of L’Manberg. No one from law enforcement really goes down there anymore since Risk ‘n Ambition moved in. There’s no point in trying to stand up to something like that, so it turned a bit lawless.”

“Risk and Ambition?” Tommy parrots, confused as to what the hell Tubbo is talking about. He says the words carefully, too. Tubbo’d said them like they held some sort of weight and he wasn’t about to risk not walking on eggshells around the subject.

“The god,” Tubbo elaborates, giving him a weird look. “I forget that you don’t know much of anything about them. They call that one Q. We don’t know much about him other than the fact that he started up a casino called… Las Nevadas, I think? Rumor has it if you go in, you don’t come back out.”

Tubbo pauses, as if thinking over his own words.

“I’m inclined to believe it. I’ve seen it happen before.”

He doesn’t continue the thought and Tommy doesn’t have the heart to pry. Whatever it was that happened, it seems like a sensitive subject from the way Tubbo’s fingers curl into a fist at his side. There’s a faintly bitter gleam in his eyes now, so Tommy tries to shift the subject. 

“There’s more, yeah?” Tommy questions. “Who are the others? Are they around here? …And why here, anyways?”

“There’s more than I can count,” Tubbo huffs. “But the main ones are the ones everyone should know about. There’s, um… I guess I’ll start with Death.”

“Death?!” Tommy demands, suddenly hyperaware that of course there would be a death god. It would be illogical for there not to be one. He hadn’t really given any of this much thought, though. Sue him for being delusional.

What could a god like that even do? They could probably do some freaky shit like kill anyone they touched or drain the energy from everyone around them. Either way, it wasn’t a particularly nice image to think about. 

“Yeah,” Tubbo affirms, like it’s completely normal. Tommy figures that for him it actually is. “Apparently it’s a shared title, but no one’s ever seen his partner. He usually stays around Blood and Madness. They’re both worse than he is, I think. Death has a pretty good reputation, but the other two are known for violence. One of the other gods told someone once that they’re both searching for something, but nobody’s ever figured out what it is.”

“What can they do?” Tommy asks, definitely not hesitant to ask the question. He would never be terrified of something much stronger and more powerful than him. He was the world’s biggest man and could not be brought to his knees by anything. 

“Death can fly. He has these huge black wings. He’s also been rumored to send his crows as omens. I don’t think he does much hands on, but the rest of his domain is probably covered by whoever shares his title,” Tubbo begins. He sounds like he’s done research into it more than just what the public says. Tommy opts not to comment on that. “Blood and War are both the same guy. I don’t know much about him other than that he carries a sword around and people who run into him and live come out scarred for life. Madness is kind of elusive, too. I’m pretty sure he can drive people into his domain if he speaks to them a certain way.”

Tommy is not naive enough to refrain from piecing together that driving people into his domain is just kind-wording for Madness making people go insane. Which was unfathomable to Tommy in its own right and just as terrifying. 

“Not a big fan of that,” Tommy admits. It’s an understatement. “Any others I should know?”

Tubbo contemplates a moment. “There’s Life, but he’s not been spotted directly. Also Time, who’s supposed to be one of the good ones. He helps people out sometimes, telling them advice and whatnot. He hasn’t been around in years, though. …Who else? Oh, there’s Flame. He’s married to Time, I think? Could just be a rumor. And there’s Revenge, too. She makes deals with people if they interest her enough. The only other one I can think of that’s widely known is The Woolgatherer.”

Tommy isn’t sure why the last name peaks his attention. He pauses Tubbo to ask what he feels is important, even if he can’t place why. “What’s that one? The last one? The wool fucker.”

“The Woolgatherer?” Tubbo asks in confirmation and Tommy nods. “...Well, everything about him is just hearsay, but he’s almost like an urban legend. There’s too much known about him for him to not exist, but there also isn’t more than a handful of people who claim to have seen him. Everyone who has is… altered, too. Something about opium?”

For a moment, Tommy swears he can smell poppies. But then the moment is gone and he’s back to walking down the bustling street of the city with Tubbo again. He feels nauseous now, so he decides not to press further. “I don’t think I like that, either. The guy sounds like a right bastard.”

Tubbo snickers. “Yeah, no one really likes them. Just forced to live around them. We’re here though, if you want to get started.”

The area they’re in isn’t nearly as shitty on the eyes as Tommy had expected it to be. It’s lively, even if there aren’t too many people around. There’s faint sounds of laughter coming from a brightly lit building nearby. The building is taller than anything else in the area and covered in neon lights, the ones on the sign coming together in the shape of a poker chip. 

LAS NEVADAS, it says in bold letters. Tubbo is pointedly avoiding looking at it. 

“We can do it a bit further down,” he decides. “We just need to set everything up first. We can pick our targets after.”

Tubbo pretty much abandons him after telling him the basic area he should scout out and a signal that they could both use to know he was ready, so Tommy decides to just explore. There’s a couple of interesting shops in this area, particularly the ones named Glatt’s Big Man Gym and Church of Prime. 

He peeks into both, with the former being a ripoff gym modeled after some guy everyone clearly hated. It had a caricature of whoever it was with an eight pack and giant biceps. Tommy takes a moment to mourn the stranger’s dignity.

The second building was a beautifully crafted church with purple and white accents near the pews. His gaze lingers on that for a little longer, feeling an odd pull towards it despite there not being much of anything that would typically catch his interest inside. …He forces himself to tear his eyes away from it.

Neither of them had any viable targets. Searching the other shops nearby proves the same result. In fact, he’s almost about to leave to another part of the area when he spots him. 

He’s tall and brunette with a bitch face and the ugliest trench coat Tommy has ever seen. He’s the perfect target, even with the addition of the man next to him. The second guy is much scarier, even with his bubblegum pink hair. It’s the blood red eyes that scan his every surrounding and the way he’s built like a literal tank that puts Tommy on edge. Even so, it doesn’t deter him. He’s always liked a bit of a challenge. Maybe he’s just a really buff nerd. …And the prize that the former has on his person is a sparkly green emerald attached to a golden chain at the side of his waist. 

Either way, Tommy’s picked out his target (even if he was really just being judgmental over the guy’s questionable taste in clothing and bitchass round glasses). He wanders back over to where Tubbo had ditched him, moving one of the trash bags near a dumpster at the back of a shop to the other side. It was a bit disgusting, but Tubbo had deemed it an intelligent way of nonverbally communicating that Tommy had found a target without Tubbo needing to walk all the way back from where he was working. 

Tommy, being the exceedingly humble and even more kind person that he was, didn’t tell Tubbo off for it. You know, since he was such a fantastic team player. 

Tommy’s only warning before shit hits the fan is a manic cackle in the distance before an abandoned stall near the middle of the market explodes. Immediately, screams ring out in the immediate area around it. One person in particular bursts into tears. It immediately gets worse after that. 

When Tubbo has said he would be causing small explosions, Tommy thought they would be a lot smaller. 

He had severely underestimated how batshit crazy the guy was. It was fucking awesome. Tommy was suddenly very glad he’d befriended the boy instead of punting him during their first meeting. 

Of course, now there were terrified people shrieking throughout the entirety of the market’s streets and a medium size crowd running in any possible direction to try and get away from the source of the explosives (and the fire that was quickly spreading because of the initial blast), so Tommy mentally got back on track and looked towards his targets again. 

They weren’t running, but they weren’t standing around and watching the action either. The brunette was leading the pink-haired one in Tommy’s direction, not because of anything that had to do with Tommy himself but just to get away from the crowd. They’re too busy talking to each other to notice him directly. 

Tommy almost couldn’t stop himself from smiling. It was the perfect opportunity, especially since the fuckers were too caught up in their conversation to pay him (or what he’s about to do) any mind. 

He was already walking towards him, his hands out of his pockets as he feigns acting like he’s trying to head further down the market’s path to escape the commotion. When he passes the brunette, his fingers easily slip the emerald into his pocket. He’s careful about the chain, shoving it in as he continues walking casually. It was easier than it should’ve been, but Tommy certainly isn’t complaining. 

He keeps walking a few more paces before ducking back into the alley he’d split off from Tubbo in, leaning against the brick wall with a content sigh. Life was so fucking pog. The bastards hadn’t suspected a thing, and his steal was sure to be worth something big. 

When Tubbo finally shows, Tommy immediately holds up the emerald, letting it swing from the chain with a shit-eating grin. “Look what I fucking got, bitch! Stupid assholes didn’t notice a thing. Both looked dumb as shit, anyway. One of them had the ugliest trench coat I’d ever seen and—”

Tommy cuts himself off at Tubbo’s lack of reaction. Instead, the boy is staring at the gem dangling from his fingertips with a look of abject horror. 

“Tubbo?” Tommy questions, voice losing its enthusiasm. He suddenly has a very, very bad feeling about something. 

“Tommy, we need to get rid of that right now,” Tubbo breathes. It’s somewhat of a horrifying admission. His next words only make it worse. “How did you even manage to get that? Fuck. Fuck! Tommy, when I said to pick a target, I didn’t mean to steal from a god!”

If Tommy had less survival instincts and couldn’t tell how serious Tubbo was, he would’ve laughed. It’s half ridiculous to think about. Trench coat bitch? A god? It seems like a silly thought. Then Tommy remembers his companion and the energy he’d given off and feels a lot less amused by the realization. 

“I fucking what?” Tommy demands, even though he heard Tubbo perfectly well. 

He looks at the emerald again, debating whether or not he should just chuck it as far as he can. The thing just feels cursed now, its weight reminding him of everything wrong in this world. It isn’t a good feeling and Tommy would much rather be back at the mall, digging through broken down stores. He really did have the worst luck.

“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” he hisses, shoving the pendant back into his pockets. “I didn’t know they were off limits! They looked normal! It wasn’t like they had a giant red arrow above them saying hey, look at me! I’m God!”

“A god, not God,” Tubbo corrects despite his clear stress. Tommy doesn’t dare comment on it. Not when his insides currently feel like they’re waging war on each other. 

It’s in the midst of their crisis that true tragedy strikes. It starts with faint footsteps, but voices soon follow after. “... here. … some kid… the market.”

There’s not much either of them can make out, but it’s enough that Tommy’s friend looks incredibly wary. Said friend freezes fully when the voices get a bit closer. Tommy, despite it being a terrible time to psychoanalyze, notes that it’s probably due to enhanced hearing. 

Tubbo’s still staring in the direction that it’s coming from with a dawning expression of horror. He shoves Tommy further down the alley, suddenly looking like he’s about to witness something terrible. 

“Go,” he hisses. When Tommy opens his mouth to ask what the fuck’s going on over the worsening pit in his stomach, Tubbo just shushes him subtly and pushes him further away. “Hurry! Just go! I’ll meet up with you later.”

Usually Tommy wouldn’t be so trusting as to listen, but frankly, he’s been through a lot these past few days and things don’t seem to be getting any better. He’ll gladly take a few seconds to run away and try to de-escalate before looping back to make sure Tubbo is okay. He’s not dumb enough to think he can talk his way out of something at the moment. 

So, with a guilty conscience and a small weight in his pocket, he turns his back to Tubbo and books it. 

He feels like shit the second he’s running, but Tubbo also explicitly told him to get away from that area and Tommy tries in vain to diffuse the unease prickling at his skin with the thought. He doesn’t even realize he’s fully panicking until he’s a ways away, palm planted against the back wall of a random building as he struggles to regulate his breathing. 

In, he tells himself, and out. 

In and out. In and out and in and out and–

This isn’t fucking helping. 

He decides to try and focus on the world around him instead, counting five things he can see, starting with the gross slime covering the corner of the wall he’s supporting himself with, a blonde man with a bucket hat in the distance who’s chatting happily with a lady selling flowers, and his own shirt. He continues until he’s done with the full exercise, freaking out in the midst of it a couple of times before finally feeling grounded. 

Usually, Tommy Innit does not have full blown panic attacks. This was a lie created by the American government to try and downplay his extraordinary life-living capabilities. Typically, Tommy just has minor breakdowns that send him into a dissociative spiral. It’s less bad, but that’s also because he has incredibly low standards for his day-to-day life. 

Either way, he’s calm now, which means he is suddenly terrified for Tubbo. Tubbo, who he’d run off on when there was clearly something about to happen. Something that had freaked Tubbo out enough that he’d decided to play bait. There’s enough unknown variables in regard to the situation to make Tommy’s gut twist anxiously. 

He tries to get a better glance at his surroundings, determined to make his way back over. Tubbo is probably fine. He sounded– scared, like he didn't know if he’d survive–  like he had it covered. Tommy wants to trust that he’s alright. He’s probably overthinking, probably catastrophizing. Then again, he did steal from a god. Maybe catastrophizing was just being realistic in this case. 

He manages to find the street he’d run from, able to spot what was going on where he’d left Tubbo despite still being a distance away from it. The sight he sees there is nauseating. 

There is a bystander, likely a shop owner from the keyring that dangles from his singed belt and the pissed off look on his face as he crosses his arms disapprovingly. Directly beside him are the two gods Tommy stole from. The pink haired one has a sword longer than Tommy’s arm pressed against Tubbo’s throat, his other hand holding the boy by the collar. The other god has a hand on Tubbo’s shoulder, holding the boy in place. The latter looks downright murderous, even through the charismatic smile plastered to his face as he talks sweetly to a stock-still Tubbo.

Even as far away as he is (and without being able to hear what they’re saying), Tommy can tell that Tubbo is probably about to die. Both gods look incredibly displeased, and Tubbo looks stuck somewhere between terrified and sick to his stomach. However he’d tried to get out of the situation, it clearly hadn’t been good enough. 

Not when Tommy can see a small trickle of blood dripping from the pressure of the blade pointed to his neck. 

God fucking damn it Tubbo, he berrates mentally. Perhaps he’ll apologize for mentally being a dick later, when Tubbo is no longer being held at sword-point. 

For now, though… 

Stupid fucking bitch. 

He’s moving before he can even think. Tubbo, despite being a suspicious son of a bitch and dumb as shit for thinking he could play a decent martyr, deserves better than this. Dying is a horrible, horrible thing. Tommy has seen more of its saccharine embrace than anyone his age should, and he knows it. It makes the possibility of it taking someone he’d grown fond of all the more daunting. 

He’s closer now, cheeks slightly flushed from running as he finally grabs their attention. He can’t really breathe, but he isn’t sure if it’s from adrenaline or fear as he raises his voice. He ignores any and all horrified looks Tubbo sends his way. 

“HEY, FUCKFACES!” Tommy yells despite the shake to his voice. Part of him can’t fathom that he’s doing this. He’s never been the self-sacrificing type, not really. He was always putting survival first and avoiding any possibility of death for the sake of making it to a better future that might not exist. But Tubbo is right there, and even if Tommy doesn’t know him very well, he’d given him something that Tommy hadn’t had in a long time. Kindness, a home, a friend–

Even if logic and survival tried to scream at Tommy for doing this, for playing hero for a boy he doesn’t even truly know, the fact remains that Tubbo does not deserve to die here in a way as demeaning as this. 

He can see the second their attention shifts to him, the pink-haired tank of a man slackening his grip on Tubbo’s collar as the one with the trenchcoat stills entirely. Tommy raises the chain high into the air, letting the emerald drop from it and swing slightly from the momentum. The sword that the first man has is removed from Tubbo’s throat entirely.

It’s not the attention on him that’s unnerving. That would be too obvious. It’s the way they’d frozen for a moment before looking over, as if they heard his voice and recognized it but doubted its existence. The brunette actually looks shocked when his gaze snaps to Tommy’s figure, his clawed fingers curling into fists so tightly that dark blue blood drips onto the ground beneath him. The color is so dark that it almost looks black. The pink haired man just looks calculating through his surprise. 

Yeah, fuck this. 

Tommy doesn’t let them get the first move in before he turns on his heels and runs. 

It’s no surprise that they give chase immediately, and though Tommy is confident that he can outrun them since he’s been running for essentially his entire life, he isn’t expecting the shout that comes from behind him. The voice is pained, like they’re after something that they’d thought to be long lost, and it’s a name that no person in this world should know. Not in correlation to him. 

THESEUS.

Tommy can’t stop the panic that jumps from his stomach to his throat or the way he immediately stumbles. No one knew that name. Even in the world he’d come from, Theseus Innes had died the second Tommy was put into foster care. The name had been buried alongside his parents and he had scorned it since. So how did these people know it? How did these people know to call him that? 

Part of Tommy wonders if they could see into his soul, but he doubted it. The man had screamed the name like he knew him, but that was impossible. It was a thought that made Tommy nauseous enough that he forced his legs to move faster despite the extra energy it expended. 

He can feel the way his feet slam against the pavement, the harshness of his breath as he tries to avoid hyperventilating. He can’t stop here, not when he hasn’t found a way home, not when Tubbo is relying on him to escape, not when he doesn’t know if he’ll survive this–

He weaves between buildings, occasionally looping around the same areas to try and lose his pursuers, but a quick glance behind him only reveals that they’re gaining on him instead of being left in the dust. His eyes widen and he coughs in his panic after choking on his own spit, taking a left into a narrow alley. 

It’s a dead end. Of course it is. All stories surrounding heroic sacrifices have an end like this. 

He doesn’t have much time and he knows it. There’s not much leeway in making a decision, and Tommy’s eyes dart from side to side in an attempt to formulate an escape plan. He’s just about ready to call it a day and accept his untimely demise when he spots the trash chute. 

Now, Tommy prides himself on being a fairly clean person. 

He also prides himself on being alive. 

He dives towards it, ignoring the increasing volume of the footsteps following after him as he pries the lid open (ignoring the way it nearly twists his nail off in his efforts to unhinge it), looking down the chute and into the darkness below. He looks behind him again, at the two people still chasing him with increasing vigor.

The pink-haired man looks almost furious, but it doesn’t seem murderous like it did with Tubbo. The brunette just looks insane. Not in the eyes-wide manic smile sort of way portrayed in media, but unhinged in a specific type of desperation that Tommy has only ever seen in survivors of something awful. It’s terrifying and real enough that his choice is already made.

For a moment, he’s frozen. They look almost human but also distinctly not. Even if they had looked entirely normal, there was still a presence in the air that demanded his attention and told him to run, run, run. It was powerful in a way that Tommy had always hated. 

His pursuers slow, the brunette holding up his hands like he’s trying to pacify him. 

“Tommy,” he breathes, and Tommy’s skin crawls at the awed adoration in the way his name is said. 

“What the fuck,” he whispers, but it’s not really directed at them as much as it is himself. He can’t bring himself to move. Why can’t he move? An exit is right there. 

“Toms, it’s me,” he continues with a tentative step towards him, as if that should mean something to Tommy. As if Tommy should know him when he knows damn well that he’s never seen this bastard in his life before having to fucking run from him. 

Everything about the situation before him felt wrong. It felt even worse watching the pink-haired man linger behind the one in the trench coat, like he was confident the latter had everything covered and was just on standby in case he didn’t.

Tommy’s hand on the lid twitches. The brunette notices the movement immediately, and Tommy can see his pupils shrink into slits despite his soft expression. “Why are you running? Do you not remember?”

Even as stressed as he is by this, Tommy can hear the underlying question in his words. Don’t you remember us? Remember me?

Tommy does not know him. The reminder makes him feel like he’s breathing in slime. The trash chute creaks lowly as Tommy’s weight shifts the lid a bit further open. The pink-haired man narrows his eyes at the action, his foot coming forward with purpose like he’s about to march Tommy’s way. He doubted he’d be able to stop himself from being frozen if the man did. 

Thankfully, the other one seems to deter his companion and save Tommy from that fate. “It’s okay, sunshine. It’s just us. Why don’t you just come over here and talk?”

The words feel laced with something, and if Tommy were anyone lesser, he would’ve caved under their weight. Against all odds, however, it feels like there’s something blanketing him from their effects. Nothing tangible, and nothing he knew much of anything about, but something that was still distinctly there. 

He takes a step towards the duo, if only to give himself an extra second to think. The brunette’s expression crumples into relief, and Tommy’s hand tightens around the lid he’s gripping onto like a lifeline. He doesn’t have any longer to stall and he knows it. 

The brunette opens his mouth to speak again, but Tommy’s done with sticking around for something that makes him feel like he’s about to throw up. 

He doesn’t hesitate this time as he rips the lid off and tumbles headfirst down the chute. 

There’s a hiss of something animalistically enraged that he can faintly make out as he crashes his way down, abandoning his potential killers in favor of bathing in trash. He’s glad he chose the option that reeks. The sound that had echoed down after him was petrifying to hear. He couldn’t imagine facing it physically. 

It’s the horrifying realization that they act like he’s something to be caught that makes him understand they will not give him up this easily. 

He isn’t sure he likes the dread the thought gives him. 

Chapter Text

When Tommy finally lands, his face smashes into the ground painfully. He cries out, having been unable to hold out his hands to brace his fall. It was probably for the better. He could’ve broken them if he’d done that. He raises his fingers to his chin instead, prodding at the area that had hit the ground alongside his body. There’s something sticky coating them as he pulls his hand back to look at it, and he grimaces at the scent of iron that accompanies the revelation that he was bleeding. 

He looks around next, trying to place his surroundings with a wince. The room at the bottom of the trash chute is surprisingly clean. At the moment Tommy’s in a square room with little light. There’s a couple of bags of trash having cushioned his fall (what kind of crazy bastard throws away six pillows that are still fully fluffed?) and the distinct scent of rot encompassing him. There’s no immediate exit that he can spot, at least, until he notices the circular hole in the wall at what he could only assume was chest-height from where he was still lying on the concrete floor. 

There’s no where it could lead other than the sewer. The thought is unappealing, but Tommy can literally feel his jeans beginning to soak through from the contents of the mysterious puddle near him. Gross. There’s also the matter of the entities who’d been chasing him. 

He looks up, wincing when he sees how far he’d fallen. It doesn’t matter now. He’s fine. He’ll persevere. He always does. He’s hesitant to stay in this area, too. There’s no telling whether or not they were crazy enough to climb down after him. The emerald still resting in his pocket suddenly feels like it’s burning.

He fishes it out, glaring at it harshly before throwing it across the room. It clinks as it hits the wall opposite to him, and Tommy feels a bit better as it clatters against the ground. It’s not broken, but he’s satisfied with taking his rage out on it. It was a treat he deserved.  

Tommy forces himself to his feet, ignoring a sudden sharp ache in his side that he can’t identify the cause of. He’s already decided that he needs to move and find another place to rest (and a way out of here). There’s no use in failing his goal now. 

He limps his way over to the sewer tunnel’s entrance, hoisting himself up the best he can and falling unceremoniously to the other side. He groans as he hits the floor a second time in twenty-four hours, cringing when he feels something stinky and wet splash against his shirt. 

He can’t say he’s ever been fond of the sewers, especially since his growing height made it impossible to do anything other than crawl through the main tunnels. Typically there would be large square-like spaces on the crossroads of different tunnel networks, and those would be his reprieve. At least then he wouldn’t have to hunch over all the time. His back was already killing him as-is. 

Tommy’s not entirely sure how long he crawls forwards for. It could’ve been five minutes or two hours and he wouldn’t know the difference. Time always works differently when you’re alone in the dark. In his experience in the foster system, he was used to hiding in closets and waiting things out. Back then, he’d been small enough to get away with it. 

After running away, he’d spent some time in the sewers, too. They were easier to navigate while he was younger and climbing out hadn’t been much of a problem. It had been a quick and easy way to hide from police and others who’d searched for him during the initial months he’d been alone on the streets. 

It always feels like the blink of an eye in the grand scheme of things. He can’t remember some of the major parts of it. His brain gets foggy and his memory fails him whenever he tries to linger on a particularly harsh winter or an experience with an adult in the dark of night that left him anxious for the next week and a half. 

He still remembers glimpses of sinking his teeth into rotting flesh, though.

He’s pulled from his thoughts by an odd glow at the end of the tunnel he’s crawling through. It’s purple in nature, like sparks from a fire but in a stunning shade of violet instead of orange. He’s wary of it immediately but continues forward anyway. Tommy Innit is so much of a little bitch as to be dissuaded by some purple sparks.

He’s confident in his decision up until two glowing eyes appear alongside the purple magic. It’s clear whoever (or whatever) it was had just turned around to face him at the tunnel’s end, but it’s still enough to freak him out. A lot. 

“What the fuck?” Tommy shrieks on impulse, instinctively trying to scramble back and slamming his head against the top of the tunnel. He whines at the impact, hand flying up to touch where his skull had smashed against the concrete. He manages to crawl a bit further backwards even through his pain (and very nonchalant panic). “Who the fuck are you!”

It’s more rhetorical than anything else, but the strange person at the end of the tunnel responds anyways, their voice echoing towards him awkwardly. “Uh… I’m Ranboo.”

Ranboo. Fucking Ranboo. A bitch name for a bitch individual. Tommy’s too-tired mind provides more variations to lighten his mood. It’s unintentional but it gets the job done and Tommy smiles to himself as he mentally drags the guy. His name sounds like Ranboob. Ranbitch. 

Tommy is pulled out of his spiteful mental tirade by the person’s continued speech. “... Why are you in the sewers?”

“Why am I in the sewers?” Tommy repeats, appalled by the audacity of the question. He huffs haughtily, faux arrogance masking the tremble to his hands that isn’t visible in the dark of the tunnel. “I have every reason to be down here, each too valid and logically sound for you to process. Why the fuck are you in the sewers?”

Ranboo is quiet for a moment. His next words are painfully tentative. “Well, I’m still not really sure why you’re here but, um, I live here…?”

The end of it is phrased like a question, as if the guy didn’t really have any idea whether or not he lived in the fucking sewers. You know, like a wrong’un. Then again, Tommy can’t really judge when he also lived in the sewers at one point. Sometimes a man– or any other gender since Tommy isn’t a sexist– just has to do what a man (or any other gender) has to do. 

“Well,” Tommy says, more of a way to shift the subject from how uncomfortable his new friend feels about living in the sewers. “You think you could help me find a way out of here? I’m trying to get back to Prime Path.”

Prime Path is what Tubbo had called the main road leading to the mall. Tommy figured it had something to do with the Church of Prime he’d seen earlier. He still isn’t entirely sure if Prime is another god or just the name of the religion. …Wouldn’t it technically be considered odd to worship gods if they could be your next door neighbor? Did it make prayers blast into their heads like a radio you can’t turn off? 

He had some things to ponder later. 

“I can try,” Ranboo responds at last, grabbing Tommy’s attention. “Directions are hard, man. You should probably come over here, though. That tunnel has to be cramped. And… well, it’s probably really gross, too.”

This may be one of the strangest encounters Tommy has ever had, including the time he met a woman who believed that the local birds of his own world held the key to immortality, but he isn’t complaining. Experiencing something unpredictable was doing wonders for his mental health in terms of distracting himself from the horrors of his current life. 

Tommy follows Ranboo’s request anyway, crawling forwards until Ranboo hurriedly stops him to warn him about the drop down. After standing next to the boy in the dim lighting that Ranboo’s eyes give off, Ranboo looks Tommy over and nods in the direction to the left. “I think that Prime Path is that way.”

“You think,” Tommy repeats, unimpressed. Now that he’s standing next to the guy, he can vaguely tell how fucking tall Ranboo is. They tower over Tommy, reaching what Tommy would estimate to be around eight feet. He must’ve really taken eating his multivitamins as a kid seriously. 

“I’m, like, eighty percent sure,” Ranboo tells him, not sounding even remotely close to eight percent sure. Still, it’s better than any other information Tommy has gotten, which is none, and Tommy can appreciate the help when it comes to him. He’s capable of being grateful when life calls for it. Sometimes. 

“You, my good man, are a godsend,” Tommy tells Ranboo, fully serious. Ranboo looks faintly panicked for a moment as he processes the words, but Tommy’s turned around before he can catch it. “Thank you. May you find many, many wives and may all your endeavors have kind closure.”

“I don’t think it’s worth that much,” Ranboo says pointedly. He sounds embarrassed by the praise. “Just a thank you would’ve been fine.”

“Well. Too bad, bitch,” Tommy tells him with a dismissive wave of his hand. It’s a bit odd how at ease he feels with Ranboo this soon, but he’s tactically avoiding any emotional processing of that. He’s not so lonely that even with Tubbo’s newfound companionship he still craves kindness. He’s not. 

“I hope you find your way home,” Ranboo calls after him when he crawls into the tunnel to the left. Without the light from his eyes, Tommy is once again unable to see shit. He’s crawling further away when Ranboo calls out to him again, this time more insistent. “Wait, what’s your name? I gave you mine!”

“Tommy!” he calls behind him. 

There’s no sound of affirmation, just the sound of a harsh breeze of wind despite no gusts being present in the sewers. The sudden silence is daunting, and when Tommy looks behind him, back to the small opening in the sewer tunnels where he should still be able to faintly see the red and green glow of Ranboo’s eyes, Tommy can’t see anything but darkness. 

The dark seems to continue forever with no sign that Ranboo was still around. The smell was definitely worse in the left tunnel, too. Tommy turns back, slightly unsettled by the stranger’s sudden disappearance.

It’s like no one had ever been there at all. 

…Yeah, Tommy’s going to elect not to think about that, either. 

Thus, with nothing keeping him in place, he continues onwards. He isn’t sure how long he’s down there. It’s similar to how it had been before, where he’d been crawling and crawling while time had lost its meaning to him. He can only focus on the way the concrete scratches against his palms and the occasional pile of something wet and slimy that he’ll stick his foot into. 

It’s disgusting, and Tommy can’t help but wonder if he would’ve preferred death at the hands of the two gods that had been chasing him to something like this. At least then he wouldn’t be covered in what he hopes is just trash slime. If Tommy has somehow managed to also cover himself in shit he’s going to start crying. 

Well, as long as he was alone. He would never stoop so low as to cry in front of someone else. 

He continues crawling blindly, figuring that he can climb up and out of the sewers once he reaches another opening in the tunnels near a storm drain. It stinks worse near the opening, likely due to whatever has fallen down into the space he’s in from above. He’s almost relieved to be this close to freedom. Maybe this hadn’t been a terrible move on his part. 

Of course, it would have been a much better idea if Tommy could see. 

And since he can’t, he had nothing to warn him when the tunnel came to an end and he tumbles headfirst towards the ground. There’s a brief moment of weightlessness within it that sends shock into his core, but he doesn’t have time to react. It would’ve been a softer fall if his face hadn’t smacked against the pavement a second time that day. 

His chin is probably busted to hell. 

Tommy wants to curse out the gods that doomed him, but he’s not even able to groan in pain before he’s out cold.

Which… that should mean he’s no longer conscious. 

Except, for some reason, he can still think. It’s like he’s figuratively walking through a fog, the inky blackness in his mind just an ocean to cross before reaching… before reaching something. He isn’t sure what that something is yet, but a gut feeling in his stomach tells him that it’s important. 

He pries himself out of that state of mind through sheer will. 

His eyes are still closed, but he can tell that his surroundings have changed just based on the feel of everything around him. It smelled like amber and rainwater, and he could hear a fire crackling softly nearby.

He’s somewhere comfortably warm, surrounded by contentment. It feels like he’d just drank a cup of hot chocolate– which he’d had before, contrary to popular belief. There were plenty of places that offered free hot cocoa or coffee in the reception area. That was besides the point, though. The point was that he didn’t typically get to feel this level of safety or comfort.

It was alien to him, and that meant that something was wrong. 

When Tommy opens his eyes, he can tell that he’s still dreaming. He’s in a comfortable cabin-like setting, one that has cozy blankets on the couch he’s lying on and a table covered in flowers and a half-finished hand woven patchwork blanket. He can practically taste apple cider thanks to the smell of it coming from a kitchen to his right, the entrance of it lit by the light in the room. The place feels like nothing he’s ever experienced before. Tommy couldn’t recall the last time he’d been somewhere this relaxed.

Even so, he’s tense where he’s lying, shifting to sit up slowly to try and avoid any possible attention. He’s not sure who lives here, or where here even is, but he doesn’t trust it.

“You’re awake!” Tommy hears much too close to his ear, startling him enough that he instinctively flinches from where he’s seated. It gives him a weird sense of deja-vu, but that doesn’t make sense. Tommy’s certain he would know if he’d met an entity like this before. 

The creature is tall and phantomlike, wearing a shitty patchwork yellow cardigan and a sweater and pants in a similar style of fashion. He floats leisurely above the ground, resting against the two wings spread out from under his back. He’s almost dreamlike in appearance with the way his visage seems to shimmer in place. There’s a purple hyacinth in his cardigan’s pocket, and Tommy’s eyes linger on his chest. Not because of anything weird, but because he could’ve sworn there was supposed to be something else there. A tear, perhaps? One that cuts deep and bleeds blue so dark it almost looks black?

…Maybe you should stop thinking about that. 

Tommy blinks, refocusing his vision. The entity looks confused and slightly worried by his lack of response, the glossy dark blue liquid dripping endlessly from his eyes quickening in intensity. He has wings around his head as well right behind his pointed ears, Tommy notes. Wings on his back, too. They’re all feathered and colored various shades of blue, ranging from paler tones to colors as dark as midnight.

Tommy’s still taking a moment to process what the fuck he’s seeing, given he’s never seen anyone like this in his life even with the newfound discovery of hybrids. When he finally feels able to speak, he responds warily. “Who are you?”

The phantom speaks, seemingly charmed by his words despite Tommy’s clear hesitance. His tone is as vibrant as it is enchanting. He peers uncomfortably closer with an easy glide forwards, causing Tommy to lean back and shift further away on the couch. He’s not very comfortable with the guy leaning over the armrest at him, however unreal he may appear to be. 

“You can call me the Woolgatherer,” he tells Tommy, and Tommy unfortunately manages to instantly place where he’d heard the name before. Tubbo had warned him about this guy. According to his friend, the entity was some sort of god. And an urban legend to boot, if Tommy was to believe the other things Tubbo mentioned. “At least until I find a nickname for you to call me instead.”

“The Woolgatherer,” Tommy echoes. He’s even more tense than he’d been before. “The god?”

The ghostlike deity seems surprised, as evident by the small ‘o’ shape his mouth makes for a moment. It’s the kind sort, though. His shock soon melts into a more pleasant expression and he looks at Tommy as if he’s just said something with the specific purpose of enrapturing all of his attention. If Tommy hadn’t been looking at him directly, he probably would’ve missed it. 

“You’ve heard about me,” it breathes with widening eyes, looking fascinated by the concept. Tommy is slightly fascinated by the way he’s so expressive in his eyes without having irises or pupils. “I hadn’t thought that mortals knew much about me. Then again, time works very differently in places like this. Perhaps it's been longer than I thought…?”

“What do you want with me?” Tommy interjects, not really invested in whatever the ghostlike deity has going on in terms of interests regarding humanity. He doesn’t like the idea that he was simply dragged to a god’s realm with no real reason. “Why am I here?”

“You came here yourself,” The Woolgather informs him breezily, his voice as calming as falling rain. Tommy’s perceptive enough to know that the way his muscles relax slightly aren’t his own doing. The god is oblivious to his displeasure, looking delighted by the fact that Tommy knew of him instead. It shifts where it’s floating, making itself more comfortable in its place above the ground. “You came here through the dreamscape. I found you in the Inbetween and helped you cross over. It wouldn’t have been very fun to get stuck in a place like that. Shouldn’t you know better?”

It makes a bit of sense, he supposes. He had been in that weird dark space that seemed impossible to get out of. Had that been The Inbetween? What did the place even signify? Why would a place like that exist? 

“It’s the barrier between the dreamscape and Limbo,” The Woolgatherer says conspiratorially as if reading Tommy’s mind. He shakes his hands in an offshoot attempt at jazz hands in an attempt to sell the vibe. The thought makes his skin crawl, but the sensation is quickly stifled by Tommy’s attempts to remain calm and rational. 

The entity holds out a cup– one Tommy hadn’t even realized it’d been holding– and looks from it to Tommy, expecting him to take it. He leisurely floats closer to Tommy as he holds it forward, glancing between him and the cup with growing insistence. It seems more fussy than it is pressuring. “You should drink something. The transition between them can be… taxing at times. We wouldn’t want you to feel uncomfortable now, would we?”

Tommy just stares at the drink, unconvinced. There could be poison or some shit. Or opium, if Tubbo was right. The entity puts it down on the couch side table when Tommy refuses to take it. “Why are you helping me?”

The phantom contemplates his answer for a moment, head tilting to the side slightly. It’s kind of eerie when paired with his appearance. It makes him look more monster than person, but perhaps that’s true of what he is anyways. Had Tommy been under the all-encompassing comfort of the atmosphere, he doubted he would’ve noticed anything at all. “I meet everyone who comes to the Inbetween from their dreams. The same is said for anyone who ventures to Limbo. Those are my domains. Isn’t it right to help them?”

“What about the people who’ve come back changed?” Tommy challenges. The ones Tubbo had mentioned were altered by something similar to opium. The ones who had most definitely not been helped. Tommy might as well ask about it now, since the fucker seems insistent that he means well. 

There’s a moment where the entity looks enraged by something in Tommy’s words, but it’s smoothed over before Tommy can discern whether or not he’s seeing things. The Woolgatherer’s voice is colder when he replies. “They made me less inclined to be hospitable.”

… Tommy tries not to linger on how terrifying the response is.

The deity’s expression softens at Tommy’s blatant discomfort, and it reaches out a hand towards him as if to brush its fingers against his cheek before withdrawing. It looks rather saddened by its need to step back again. “I wouldn’t do that to you. You haven’t done anything wrong. You’re only a child.”

Caution flies to the wind at his words. Tommy, no longer held back by a filter fueled by tentative wariness, fires back at him heatedly. “What the fuck? Fuck you, bitch! I don’t need your pity hospitality! I’m eighteen, not a child!”

He’s lying. From the way the deity looks at him with an unimpressed expression and his mouth pressed into a thin line to hide his laughter, he knows it too. 

“Even if you were eighteen, you’d still be very young compared to something like me,” The Woolgatherer hums cheerfully, unphased by Tommy’s language and hostility. “I don’t mean it as an insult. What’s a few decades in comparison to several millennia?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Tommy mutters. With the amount of shit he’s seen, he has a right to see himself as an adult. It didn’t matter that he was technically still a year off by legal standards, not when he’d done things most people would rather die than commit to in order to survive. 

The god just laughs softly, leaning closer again. Tommy’s starting to think he might not understand personal space, or that maybe he just doesn’t care if it means he’s in closer proximity with the people or things that have his attention. He’s close enough that the liquid making up his tears drips onto the cushion directly beside Tommy. “Such a child, sunshine. It’s alright. I won’t treat you any less for it.”

The words feel kind, and for a moment, Tommy wants to feel comforted by them. But then the moment ends and he remembers that he doesn’t trust this guy in the slightest (and that he probably shouldn’t get so comfortable in the presence of a god).

“You’re not like the other gods I’ve met,” Tommy blurts without meaning to. It was unintentional but now that he’s said it, it’s also a test. 

“No?” The Woolgatherer inquires, eyes crinkling at the edges in his mirth. “How so?”

Tommy isn’t quite sure what to say. He doesn’t exactly want to come out and say that they were probably trying to kill him, but he also doesn’t know what the other two gods he’d run from actually wanted. Their goals had shifted once they realized that Tommy was the one with the emerald, for whatever reason, but he still wasn’t sure what it was they shifted to. 

“I think they wanted to kill me,” Tommy says lightheartedly, only half-joking. 

Instead of seeming amused or disapproving, there is a very short moment in which The Woolgatherer doesn’t emote in regard to Tommy’s words at all. There’s nothing unpleasant about his expression, per say, but Tommy’s gut tells him that this is not a good expression for this particular deity to have. 

“They did, did they?” it asks him in a light tone. It’s quieter than Tommy expected it to be. Far too reserved to be anything but alarming. It sounds more like he’s contemplating it to himself in a way that Tommy would even go as far as to call resentful. 

Thankfully, the negativity in its body language dissipates within the next few seconds. His voice is once again saccharine in its sweetness within the blink of an eye. Tommy has to take a moment to wonder if he’d made the phantom’s initial response up. “I wouldn’t worry about it too much. Most of them are too busy in their own domains to bother with mortals for too long.”

He reaches out again, this time not drawing back before placing a hand on Tommy’s shoulder. He’d moved from standing at the arm of the couch to behind it, his height still far exceeding Tommy’s as he peers over at him. Tommy stares back, trying to ignore the small part of him that insists that this isn’t the first time he’s met the phantom. 

Perhaps he just thinks that because of his current reaction, though. The inconsistency lies in the way he feels a sense of serenity at the contact instead of panic. …Which is most definitely a sign that this guy is a freaky ass bitch, but he also hasn’t done anything directly to Tommy and seemed to be near-anger at the thought of Tommy being hurt, so Tommy’s willing to give him a bit of grace. 

Only a little, though. 

Tommy moves away, frowning at the blue handprint on his shirt. It’s cool to the touch, kind of like aloe vera but in the same shade as the deep ocean. “What the fuck is that shit, anyway?”

“Oh,” the phantom lilts, looking between Tommy’s face and the handprint. “That? It’s only blue. Think of it like a byproduct of my domain. It keeps things… tangible.”

“Tangible?” Tommy repeats dumbly. 

The Woolgather smiles at him affectionately. Tommy doesn’t have a clue why it looks at him with so much adoration, and it kind of makes him comforted in a way that makes him feel entirely uncomfortable at the same time. “It gets worse the more power I use to maintain something.”

He motions to the cabin around them, then back to Tommy. “Everything here is created. It draws from me, but that’s not to say it isn’t real. It takes energy to maintain it. We wouldn’t want you to collapse back into the Inbetween, would we?”

It’s as cool of a concept to him as it is terrifying.

“It has other properties,” The Woolgatherer informs him. He moves from where he’d been, still floating but now resting against his wings as he’d been when Tommy had first arrived. It makes him look much more whimsical, if Tommy is being honest. “Anything made or produced by a god does. But I wouldn’t worry about those, right now. They aren’t too important anyways.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Tommy demands, unconvinced despite being a fan of general joy and whimsy. He may be giving the god some slack, but that didn’t take away from the fact that he was acting like a shady motherfucker. “You’re not giving me much reason to trust you, bitch.”

“Not much reason to trust me?” The Woolgatherer repeats, looking a bit dejected. There’s a certain displeasure in the way the wings behind his ears curl around his cheekbones. He seems contemplative as he continues to speak. “Well, that just won’t do. I have so much to offer. What would you need for you to know that I’m genuine?”

Tommy hesitates, unsure. He’s not entirely sure what it's offering him and he doesn’t want to answer wrong. He finally settles on an answer that’s vague enough to make him feel alright. “Tell me something I shouldn’t know.”

The Woolgatherer’s all-white eyes seem to glow at his response, and he hums noncommittally as he puts a finger to his chin. He sways slightly, his tail curling around one of his legs as he stretches slightly. “Hmm. Well, that shouldn’t be too difficult.”

Tommy isn’t entirely sure what he’s trying to think of, but thankfully he responds before Tommy has to wait too long. Tommy wonders if he already knew what he was going to say or if he truly spent two and a half minutes trying to think of the best possible piece of information to give him. Regardless, where Tommy had been hoping for something to help him, the words that spill from The Woolgatherer’s lips only serve to make him feel dread. 

“One of your friends does not have the plans for you that you think he does,” the deity states. It’s said carefully, slowly, like he’s ready for Tommy to refute what he’s saying. His tone is softer than it's been the entire time Tommy’s spoken to him. “I’ve seen into his dreams. The boy with the ram’s horns and the blood of our own. Has he told you about himself? About who he is and what such things mean?”

“What the fuck?” Tommy demands, much more on guard than he’d been before. There’s really only one person that fits the bill, but there’s no way this fucker is talking about Tubbo. It definitely sounds like Tubbo, though. It’s not like he has many more friends. Well, unless the weird cryptid he met in the sewers counted. Even so, Tubbo is the only one he’s seen with ram’s horns. “Tubbo? You think Tubbo is secretly evil?”

Maybe the god hadn’t specified that Tubbo was evil, but he’d definitely questioned Tubbo’s intentions for Tommy, which is simply unforgivable. It’s absolute blasphemy. There isn’t any way that Tubbo would do something bad, not to him. Even if Tommy hadn’t met him more than a week ago, he knew that Tubbo wasn’t like that. He’d saved his life, after all. If anything, Tubbo fucking owed him. …That is, if Tubbo didn’t think he was dead. 

“You’re fucking lying,” Tommy spits. It’s vehement in tone and carries all of the bitterness he feels at the idea that his only friend in this world would betray him. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t. “Fuck you. I’m not falling for that shit. You’re fucking lying to me. Tubbo wouldn’t do that. I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Tommy,” the Woolgatherer says softly, his voice a quiet plea for Tommy to pacify his anger. It doesn’t work for shit. He shifts to move closer, but Tommy throws out an arm to prevent him from coming towards him. 

“No,” Tommy says firmly. It hides the way his voice wants to shake. Tommy has known plenty of betrayal, after all. It had been cold the last time something like that had happened. A winter that he didn’t like to think about. One with gnashing teeth and frozen limbs and no food. He will not be betrayed again. Not like that. “No, fuck you. Wake me up. I don’t want to fucking talk to you anymore.”

The phantom doesn’t say anything this time, only reaching for him, and Tommy shrieks out a few curses in the entity’s direction as he scrambles back. The Woolgatherer just looks melancholic as it continues to watch his movements. Somehow, it feels fitting. It reaches forward again and this time Tommy isn’t able to back away fast enough to escape the hand that brushes against his forehead. He crumples forward at the touch, mind collapsing on itself as he slips away with no effort to the god. 

“Wake up, Tommy,” the Woolgatherer tells him with a sad smile. Its echoing voice is the last thing that Tommy can sense as he returns to consciousness. There’s an edge to it as it continues talking, one that Tommy thinks he isn’t particularly meant to hear. “I’ll be waiting for you to come back, sunshine. You’ll see eventually.”

Tommy does not know the anger that follows his absence in Limbo. 

////

It’s not nearly as bright as it should be at this time of day. The shadows around two specific figures seem to curl and twist as if having a mind of their own, and the younger of the two paces back and forth while the older watches with idle impatience. 

“You should’ve let me go in after him,” the younger hisses, cutting through the quiet of the alley. His voice is sharp and clearly displeased as he kicks a rock nearby, sending it flying into the metal of a nearby trash bin. The material caves entirely at the movement, creating a giant hole that completely belies the size of the rock.

Which, the statement was said in the first place because to put it simply, Wilbur Soot is having an exceptionally bad day. Unfortunately, his brother is far too aware of this. Technoblade knows to hold him back from doing what he’d just said. The two gods have had years to know each other’s habits and tricks, after all. Such is the nature of immortality.  

When Wilbur first had the emerald stolen from him, he was ready to fry the mind of whatever insolent mortal thought themselves good enough to rob him and be done with the exchange. It wasn’t often that he was trifled with anymore due to his brother’s presence having a particularly negative effect that caused humans to avoid him and Wilbur. To have someone try to go as far as to steal from them despite that was unforgivable. 

Even so, nothing could have prepared him for the thief in question to be Tommy. 

Tommy, his little brother. Tommy, who had been dead for well over seven centuries. 

Nobody in the Empire spoke about the third prince anymore. Philza had practically ensured that Tommy’s name was kept out of the people’s mouths when he’d lost his youngest. People were able to leave offerings to a shrine dedicated to his memory, but anything past that was well beyond what was considered treason. 

Wilbur tries not to think about what had happened, about the pain and the anger that had coursed through his veins when he’d tried his best to reach his youngest brother’s cry for help only to find him mangled beyond repair. Those that were responsible had stayed alive long enough to endure the same torture and then a fate far worse afterwards. He could still remember the satisfaction he’d felt in unraveling their minds and turning them into things entirely unrecognizable to themselves. 

And yet somehow, all this time later, Tommy had been in front of him again. Standing right before him and Techno with both the same blinding snark and startling audacity he’d always carried with him. Wilbur couldn’t recall his exact emotions when he’d seen his emerald in Tommy’s hands, but he’d known that it had felt right.

It wasn’t often that his mother sent his family signs. She was forced to stay in the godly realm, past the Inbetween and into the layers between life and death. Should she cross over, reality itself could unravel. It was a byproduct of being the literal incarnate of death. To exist on the same plane as Life would be to kill it. 

But this… this had to be her work. How else would his little brother return to their lives? Sure, his soul had been different, like he had been pulled from someplace very, very different. It was entirely probable that he wasn’t even their original Tommy to begin with. If the humans that had killed him had gotten their way, there wouldn’t have even been a soul to revive in the first place. 

Still, even if it was a different version of him, it was still Tommy. In what world was there a Tommy undeserving of their love? Such a world simply didn’t exist. To see him here, alive, meant that he was returning to them (even if not in the same form).

Which, clearly this Tommy didn’t know who they were. It was obvious in the lack of recognition when he saw them and the way he’d immediately turned to run like they’d ever dare kill him. It was hurtful, if Wilbur were to be entirely honest with himself. The connotations within it hurt more. This Tommy didn’t have a him or a Techno. The fact may have even made him happy since there was no one he was truly stealing from should this be the case. 

It’s unfathomable to think that there’s a world where Tommy isn’t family, but it's fine if only for the fact that Wilbur will ensure that he’s family now. 

“You’ve been pacing for a while,” Techno notes dully, a hand reaching out to grab Wilbur’s arm in order to still his movements. The pink-haired man’s eyes narrow when Wilbur only attempts to yank his arm away. “We should go back. Phil’ll be worried.”

“Fuck Phil,” Wilbur hisses despite not meaning it at all. Techno seems to recognize that it's a reaction out of frustration rather than malice and sighs. 

“You don’t mean that,” he says instead of arguing. The tone is monotonous and dry, but Wilbur can still hear the care in it. Anyone who spends more than five seconds around the older deity can. 

“Did you see him?” Wilbur demands, whirling to face his brother. His face is shrouded in grief. “He’s filthy. He looks like he doesn’t eat. He’s wearing clothes that’re ratty and too big for him. He didn’t–”

He cuts himself off with a growl of frustration, the sound much more monster than man. His brother looked like a certified street rat, which was completely fine because it was him, but it was something he never should have had to experience. Perhaps the fact that he hadn’t recognized Wilbur cut deeper than he originally thought. If he had, it at least would’ve meant that someone had been looking out for him throughout it all. 

“Wilbur,” Techno presses, reaching for him again. This time his grip is iron tight. He waits for his brother to turn to him, looking him in the eyes before he continues. They glow like hot coals, and Wilbur sees for the first time since they saw their youngest brother that Techno is just as upset as he is. “We’ll find him.”

Technoblade had always expressed emotions in opposition to how Wilbur did. Wilbur was explosive and he knew it. He was recklessly impulsive and when he was angry, everyone felt it. Technoblade, on the other hand, internalized everything. It was hard to tell when he was upset. The only cue one really had in terms of feeling with him was his anger. It was cold and calculating, often resulting in the death of a few dozen men and Techno retrieving whatever it was that set him off in the first place. 

Neither of them were like Wilbur’s disregarded twin, but that was fine. Wilbur didn’t particularly like The Woolgatherer and he knew the feeling was mutual. They couldn’t get along, not when each had what the other hated. It was near unfathomable to think that they’d used to be the same person. 

Wilbur could never be more grateful to his mother for cleaving his soul in two, even if the consequences were ones he detested. 

“I’d still rather go after him now,” Wilbur pushes, head turning to look at the trash chute. It would be disgusting but the reward was well worth the effort. It would be easier to find him in the dark where his human eyes couldn’t see. What if he got lost? What if he couldn’t find a way out and died down there before they could even reunite with him?

Techno hums, pulling him further away from the chute as he begins to walk towards the main road. “Not now. He doesn’t recognize us, Wilbur. There’s no avoiding a fight if we go after him now. Would you prefer he comes back to us restrained? You’ll never gain his trust that way.”

“I can just–” Wilbur begins, only to be cut off.

“Thrall him?” Technoblade interjects, unamused. “It didn’t work when you tried it before. There’s no use in risking it again. Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster, Sun Tzu.”

Wilbur shifts uncomfortably, trying to pry Techno’s hand off his shoulder to no avail. “Don’t quote The Art of War at me, asshole. The idea is worth it.”

“It’s not,” Techno assures, and Wilbur just sighs in defeat. His brother has already made up his mind, and even Wilbur knows better than to argue. It’s worse than talking to a brick wall when trying to convince Techno of something he’s entirely against. Techno looks back at him, sensing his upset. “We will find him, Wilbur. It’s only a matter of time. There isn’t anyone in the world that can run from a god. He’s our brother, but he’s still mortal. Remember that.”

There’s a flash of a body in Wilbur’s mind, mangled and bloodied. He knows his brother is nothing but mortal. He knows it all too well.

He will not make the same mistake twice. 

Chapter Text

Tommy wakes up with a sharp inhale. His palms are sweaty as his hands fly to prop himself up. Truthfully, he has to take a moment to breathe normally. 

He can still remember his dream, as weird as it had been. He instinctively raises a hand to his forehead, a shaky breath leaving his lips at the sight of blue lightly dusting his fingertips when he pulls back. It had been real, then. There was no other explanation for the way that The Woolgatherer’s magic had followed him back to reality. …If it was even magic at all.

“Tommy?” Tubbo asks, and Tommy promptly goes through the five stages of grief before realizing he’s somehow back in the mall. He doesn’t remember coming back to it, so he’s not really sure what happened with that– if the god from his dreams had returned him to his makeshift home or if someone else had instead. Not that there were many options save for the cryptid he’d found in the sewers. 

He’s in the room he’d fallen asleep in the day prior, haphazardly seated against the couch with his arms propping him upright. Tubbo is standing near the entrance to the room, looking at him with concern and slight wariness. If Tommy didn’t know any better, he’d say that Tubbo’s eyes lingered on the blue that was sure to be on his forehead with slight caution. 

“Tommy?” he repeats. Tommy blinks a few times before managing to pull himself together enough to give a response. Thinking feels a bit like walking through fog, but he manages well enough. 

“Tubbo?” he rasps, his voice feeling gravelly due to the glass of water he was in desperate need of. He glances around his surroundings again, swallowing to try and give his mouth more moisture. It doesn’t work very well. “How did I… When did I get back?”

He tries not to think about what The Woolgatherer had said about his friend. That Tubbo’s intentions towards him weren’t what he thought they were. Surely that was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Tubbo had been nothing but nice to Tommy and Tommy had saved Tubbo’s life. There was no real reason for Tubbo to betray him. Everything would be fine, surely. Totally. He ignores the doubt pooling in the pit of his stomach. Nothing bad would happen, he was sure of it. 

Tubbo looks uncomfortable by the question Tommy had asked. He opens his mouth before closing it again, seeming conflicted. When he finally responds, it’s slow and careful in the way it’s presented. The hesitance only serves to make Tommy feel more anxious. 

“I found you outside the mall, over by the dumpsters,” Tubbo explains after the short pause. “I figured you’d passed out after managing to run back.”

He stares at Tommy, expression unreadable. Tommy suddenly feels like maybe, just maybe, this isn’t about him returning to the mall at all. He’s about to open his mouth to ask what was going on when Tubbo continues, shaking his head in an attempt to cut Tommy off. “I can’t believe– you shouldn’t have– ugh. Fuck. Why did you do it?”

“What?” Tommy asks, unsure of what he’s talking about. He could very well be talking about his stunt in running from the gods, or he could be talking about stealing from the gods in the first place, or he could even be talking about returning to the mall in general. The last one makes Tommy feel a bit nauseous upon thinking of it. 

“You risked your life for me,” Tubbo elaborates after a painfully drawn out silence. “You distracted them so I could get away. Why? You could’ve… Tommy, you could’ve died. There’s a million things that were wrong with that plan and you just did it anyway. Why did you do that? There was no reason to.”

The small part of him still focused on The Woolgatherer’s words is immediately forgotten at Tubbo’s response, or perhaps it just no longer mattered. He may have been reckless in doing what he’d done to save Tubbo, but he still stands by his thought process in knowing that Tubbo hadn’t deserved the fate he would’ve gotten if Tommy hadn’t stepped in. He’d had a sword pressed against his throat, for fuck’s sake. Thinking about what could have happened if Tommy hadn’t stepped in, about the image of Tubbo choking on blood while two entities of extreme power stood over him and just watched…

“No reason?” Tommy echoes, irate with Tubbo’s lack of self-preservation. It’s almost unfathomable, and Tommy has to ignore the part of him that tells him he would say the same thing. “No reason? You were going to die!”

Tubbo looks appalled by the statement. “That doesn’t mean–”

“No,” Tommy cuts in. He looks at Tubbo head-on, completely serious as he continues. It’s rare Tommy ever talks to someone like this, like his words are something to be considered greatly instead of ones meant to be heard in passing. “Tubbo, you are my friend. You’ve done a lot for me, even if you didn’t know shit about where I came from or what I was doing before this. I wasn’t just going to watch that prissy pink bitch spill your throat onto the streets like you didn’t mean anything to anyone. What you did meant something to me. I had to do something.”

It might very well be the most honest thing Tommy has ever said, which is saying a lot. Tommy, in all his glory, cannot remember the last time he considered someone a friend. Maybe that was why it was so easy to see Tubbo as one. Said boy looks like he doesn’t know how to respond to it either, so Tommy just sighs. “Just forget about it. It’s over now anyway. It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Fine,” Tubbo states, but it doesn’t sound certain. He seems to shift gears instead, focusing on the present rather than the shitshow that’s been the last twenty-four hours. Tommy is almost relieved by his next question. “Are you… okay?”

“What do you mean?” Tommy asks, furrowing his brows. He wouldn’t exactly say he’s doing bad, but it’s hard to be doing good with the amount of shit that's happened in the last few days. He was still reeling from the situation in general, much less the finer details. There was a lot the question could unpack. He wasn’t exactly sure where he would even start.

“You looked like you were having a nightmare,” Tubbo says pointedly, and Tommy can’t help but recoil slightly at the immediate reminder of The Woolgatherer and what it had said to him.

Tommy purses his lips with a short exhale. He’s not exactly inclined to tell Tubbo what happened in his dream, so instead he responds with a quiet, “Something like that.”

Tubbo hums, seemingly unbothered by the curt response as he flops down beside him on the couch. He sighs heavily, looking up at the ceiling. Tommy can’t help but feel like the conversation is suddenly a lot more personal. “Yeah, I get it. I get them too. Too much happened back then, you know?”

He does. For a moment, Tommy thinks back on what he’d been doing before coming here. It had been pretty shit. Sometimes it had been okay scraping by to live another day– it had felt more like surviving than fighting for his life, even if it wasn’t exactly living. Other times it had been a waking hell for weeks on end. He can think of one time in specific he’d almost wished he’d given up entirely, but he quickly brushes past the thought. There’s no point in lingering on frozen winters and old ghosts. “I know. Some of it never really leaves. Fucking branded into your memory and shit.”

He knows the feeling of ripping into skin is something he’ll never really forget. 

Tubbo nods along, seemingly understanding more than Tommy had meant for him to. Tommy can’t help but hope that he’s thinking too far into it, but thankfully Tubbo’s response seems to prove that he was. “I still think about my dad. He was a real piece of shit. Left me more problems when he finally died than he gave me when he was alive.”

“Your dad?” Tommy echoes, tilting his head slightly. The moment they’re having is making him realize how little he really knows about Tubbo. Then again, Tubbo knows just as much about him. Still, it’s interesting to hear about Tubbo’s family. He hadn’t been sure if he’d always been alone or if it had been circumstantial. 

Tubbo hums again but he doesn’t elaborate. It seems tired and slightly worn, so Tommy takes it as a cue that he doesn’t feel like breaching more of the subject at the present moment. 

“My parents were good, I think,” Tommy confesses. He hasn’t breathed anything about them in years, and talking about them after so much time has passed feels foreign and wrong. “I don’t remember much of them. They’re dead, too. I was in foster care for a bit afterwards, but I ended up ditching. Stayed on the streets for years on my own and that’s how I ended up here.”

There’s a lot of context lost between the sentences that he would likely never be able to tell another living soul. Not the harshness of the colder seasons or the hunger that used to claw at his stomach every night. Especially not the things he was forced to act out in order to survive. Either way, he probably didn’t need to say anything more. Tubbo had lived this kind of life for a while. He knew more than most would in that regard, even if he couldn’t understand everything. 

“My dad used to beat the shit out of me,” Tubbo tells him, far too passive for what he’s saying. Tommy looks over at him in slight surprise due to the abruptness of the topic, waiting for him to continue. “He was always angry. Nothing was ever… good enough for him. He had to be the best or he couldn’t be anything at all. It was almost like…”

Tubbo trails off, looking pained. Tommy half expects him to stop, but he just shudders out a sigh and continues despite his discomfort. “Well, he wanted me to be something I’m not. It… nearly hurt a lot of people. I’m glad he’s gone, I really am, but I’m still stuck with his shitty legacy. I think I would’ve killed him myself if his fiancé hadn’t gotten to it before me.”

He falls silent after that, looking frustrated. It’s a lot to unpack. Tommy had certainly had moments where he’d wanted to kill his foster parents, especially the ones that had detested his foul mouth and lack of respect, but he couldn’t imagine wanting his birth parents dead. Not when they already were and it had stolen everything from him.

Instead of replying, Tommy just sighs, turning his head to face Tubbo. It’s true that he can’t really understand how Tubbo feels given that he never really had actual parents to treat him like shit, but he does understand the struggle of someone who’s meant to take care of you going against those values. He also knows when to drop a subject that will only lead to a downward spiral. 

“Let’s do something else,” Tommy decides, saying it as a declarative notion rather than a choice. The conversation is starting to bring up things he’d rather forget, and he’d prefer to keep his mind off of the lingering taste of blood that still takes over his senses at times. He looks down at his clothes, wrinkling his nose. He’s been in the same ones since he’s gotten here, which means he’s in desperate need of new ones. “You got any spare clothes, big man?”

Tubbo huffs, but there’s no ire behind it. He seems relieved by the subject change which calms Tommy in turn. “Yeah. There’s a bunch in some of the stores. They’re not the most classy options around, but they’re clothes.”

That’s completely fine with Tommy, and thus the two begin venturing through the mall in hopes of finding a change of clothes for him. 

After what feels like an eternity of searching, they end up grabbing a red t-shirt, some ratty jeans with a few moth holes near the cuffs, and a half demolished pack of socks. It was actually a lot better in terms of choices than Tommy had expected, but then again, Tubbo had also tried to get him to wear a sparkly white Justice shirt with the words “GRL PWR” and a bunch of neon hearts. Needless to say, Tommy had declined. 

He could definitely rock it, but he wasn’t exactly jumping at the opportunity to be a poster boy for pre-teen girl swag. 

They’re still walking through the mall when Tommy notes a room off to the side with a large map and a couple of notes strewn about. He steps closer, intrigued by the personal touches that contrast the majority of the broken down shops around the mall. He can recognize some of the metal parts on the ground as pieces from Tubbo’s projects, and he walks towards it without fully listening to the rant Tubbo’s been on for the past ten minutes. 

The map pinned to the far wall is of the whole country. In theory, Tommy should recognize it. It’s supposed to be a mirror of his world, after all. But the longer Tommy looks at the map, the less he knows. The layout of the land is completely different than anything he’s familiar with and the bordering countries have names he’s never heard of. Tommy’s pretty sure he’d know of hearing of the Antarctic Empire before. 

There’s a few others nearby, like Kinoko and Logstedshire, which are also completely foreign to him. The map details the majority of Essempi, which is where Tommy assumes they are now. Near the middle there’s a large plot of land labeled as L’Manberg territory. Tommy can faintly remember Tubbo mentioning it as having multiple districts, so the large territory makes sense. If he’s remembering correctly, they’re in the middle districts now and had gone to the lower ones in order to steal. 

Silently, Tommy reviews what he knows. It’s nice to do that once in a while, it keeps him sane and present. It might be a symptom of dissociation, but he can’t really find it in himself to care. It’s easy enough to pinpoint what he’s aware of within his circumstances. The facts come to him with little difficulty. 

He’s in another dimension that’s somewhat similar to his own. This dimension has gods and goddesses that walk the world as if it’s normal. He’s currently in Essempi, down in the middle districts of L’Manberg. There are two gods after him and one that seems to be visiting his dreams. Overall, he’s never felt more out of his own depths. He’s never felt so alone, even with Tubbo beside him. 

…He quickly disregards the thought. 

“You okay?” the boy in question asks, and Tommy looks to him from where he’d been staring at the map. He hadn’t even registered that Tubbo had stopped talking. He’d been droning on about the inventions he was planning out while they’d been walking the mall’s halls. Now he just stares at Tommy with concern and slight curiosity. 

“Fine,” Tommy affirms despite it being a bitter lie. He can’t bring himself to face his own faults, so he immediately deflects instead. His next words are a lie, but he’s not exactly keen on telling Tubbo about the whole cross-dimensional travel thing. “Just wish I’d taken a geography class.”

Tubbo steps closer and before Tommy can even question what he’s up to, points to part of the map. “This is Kinoko Kingdom. They’re on good terms with Essempi, mainly because the ruler here is good friends with the king there. It’s where Essempi gets most of its food trades.”

Tommy’s a bit taken aback by his sudden assistance, but the surprise quickly melts into fondness. Tubbo, Tommy decides, is a good friend. Maybe he was doing the bare minimum in explaining the map, but it still meant something that he did it to begin with. Tommy turns his attention back to the ram hybrid, who’s currently continuing his spiel. 

Tubbo’s finger traces the map, moving down and across diagonally before landing on the country bordering Essempi opposite to Kinoko. “The Antarctic Empire is… lesser known. Not because no one knows they exist. They’re just secretive. I honestly think the only reason Essempi deals with them is because they trade good weapons and potions. The Empire is ruled by the God of Death. No one goes in that expects to come out.”

“Death. What a guy,” Tommy muses blandly. He can still remember what Tubbo had told him about the deity. The guy sounded fucking terrifying, so Tommy elects to shift his focus to the last bordering country instead. It’s much smaller, but the way Tubbo hadn’t brushed on it makes Tommy more curious. “What’s that one? Logstedshire?”

Tubbo falls silent in contemplation. He seems ambivalent regarding the nature of the place which confuses Tommy, but he eventually seems to make up his mind enough to elaborate on his thoughts. “Logstedshire is… Well, most people think it’s a grave.”

“A fucking what,” Tommy deadpans, completely unconvinced. Maybe he’s a fool, but it doesn’t seem logical for an entire country to be a grave. Which meant that either Tubbo was full of shit or someone was very, very important. Tommy can’t imagine what it’s like to be important enough to be memorialized like that. 

“A grave,” Tubbo repeats. His voice is quieter the longer he speaks, but Tommy doubts that it’s personal as much as it is a taboo topic. “There’s two princes of the Antarctic Empire and both are gods. But supposedly, centuries ago, there was a third.”

Tommy, obviously, hadn’t known this. He hadn’t even known that the God of Death had ruled over the Empire until about five seconds prior. A third prince wasn’t really inconceivable, but the way Tubbo phrases it makes it sound like the third prince was long gone. “The third one was a god too? Then how is he dead?”

Tubbo shrugs and Tommy automatically assumes that he was correct in his assumption. “I don’t know. Some people seem to think that he wasn’t a god, that he was mortal. The story goes that the youngest prince was kidnapped ‘n taken to Logstedshire, and that the other royals didn’t get there until it was too late. In retaliation, the country became a mass grave for everyone who resided in it due to the mercenaries there angering Death. Others say it was made into a grave for the third prince only as a way of remembrance and that the citizens of the Empire are invited to leave offerings there in his honor. I was never sure what version was the right one.”

“Huh,” Tommy muses. A god that’s dead seems contradictory, but maybe he just doesn’t know enough about the gods here to know otherwise. “Imagine dying as a god. I would never, personally.”

Tubbo actually snorts out a laugh, nudging him with his elbow. It seems that Tommy’s undefeatable method of lightening the mood was once again successful. “Yeah, right. I’ve known you less than a week and you already tried to sacrifice yourself for me. If anyone was going to find a way to bypass immortality and die, it would be you.”

Tommy gapes at the reply, entirely in shock and half-amused by the insult. “Why the fuck would you say that? You bitch, you absolute buffoon. If anything, the fact that I survived should prove that I would never die in such a way.”

His words are drawn out long enough that they’re still audibly lighthearted and Tommy is relieved to hear Tubbo laugh quietly at his words. The boy quickly adds onto the bit, bumping his head against Tommy’s arm much like a ram would. “Sorry, didn’t think that throwing yourself at the Gods of Blood and Madness was a sign of peak survival instincts.”

Honestly, Tommy hadn’t had a goddamn clue who the gods were, but hearing that they were the ones Tubbo had explicitly warned him against was a bit jarring. To think that he was so close to the presumed sons of Death was… well, he didn’t like that. It didn’t help that he’d sort of insinuated that Madness and Blood stayed in the Antarctic Empire since it was a long way away to travel, which only served to confuse him more. If that was the case, why the hell would they have been here? 

Perhaps they could teleport. That was a terrifying thought. 

“What the fuck?” Tommy states with furrowed brows. He elects to voice his concerns since Tubbo is much more knowledgeable in regard to the world they live in than he is. “I thought those were the princes of the Antarctic Empire, or whatever. If that was them, then why the fuck were they all the way over here?”

“Maybe to deal with Las Nevadas?” Tubbo hypothesizes. It’s a fair assumption based off of what Tommy has already heard. “I mean, it’s not a crazy thought to think that they were making business agreements with Risk and Ambition, especially since Madness has been seen in his company pretty frequently.”

“Wild,” Tommy hums in affirmation. “You think they’re a thing?”

Tubbo just snorts. It seems off, somehow. The way his fingers twitch into a fist as he responds is more telling than Tommy thinks he means for it to be. “Fuck if I know. There’s not enough public information to be sure.”

Tommy’s about to ask why his tone had changed when Tubbo directs his attention back towards the entrance to the map room. “You want to check out the rest of the mall? You haven’t really seen all of it yet. There’s an entire basement.”

It’s the most blatant topic change that Tommy’s ever seen in his seventeen years of living. Thankfully, he knows social cues well enough to pick up on the fact that Tubbo is deflecting the subject for a reason that was likely unpleasant. If he were a lesser man, he probably would’ve pushed. However, he also knows how upset he’d be if Tubbo tried to push some of his own secrets and thus decides to drop it. He can be kind, sometimes. Only sometimes, though. 

And well, after a while, Tommy splits off from Tubbo to explore on his own.

It’s not intentional, mostly just a byproduct of Tubbo overexplaining the rooms with his projects and Tommy wandering off to try and find something cool to snatch for himself. What? Sue him, he wants to have his own personal belongings here. So far he’s racked up a singular set of clothes and a piece of lint. A very sad collection, if you ask him. 

The search for cool trinkets was going worse than he expected. There was only so much to find in the mall, especially since Tommy had a vague idea of what stores had used to be there thanks to his working there in his own world. Which means that in his search for collectables, he stumbles across the door to his old security office. 

It’s weird to think that far away, in another life, he’d walked through it and went into a shift nightly despite his young age. When he’d scored the job he’d been relieved that his fake ID had worked in the first place. Maybe it had just been luck, or maybe the harshness of the years had weathered him into something unrecognizable as a teenager. It was near impossible to wrap his mind around the fact that he’d be eighteen in less than a year. His childhood was as foreign to him as his parents were. 

Regardless, it’s weird to think that the routine he’d fallen into before was entirely screwed up now. He never thought that he’d be in a situation like this, but then again, he’d never thought a situation like this to be possible in the first place. 

The door before him is weathered with age but still strong in its sturdiness. The sign is faded and half-bent out of place, but he can still make out the faint letters. It used to say something along the lines of DO NOT ENTER: EMPLOYEES ONLY. Now it just says DO–NT—P—EE. He wasn’t planning on it. 

He reaches for the handle, just to peek inside and see what was different. He twists it, somewhat eager to find out, only for it to get stuck. It’s locked. Why is it locked? 

There was a chance that Tubbo hadn’t bothered to open it when he claimed the mall as his own, or maybe he used it as a storage area of sorts and didn’t want an animal or something to get in and ruin things. 

Either way, Tommy doesn’t pay it much mind. 

At the end of the day, Tommy trusts Tubbo, which is why he does not give the locked door a second glance as he goes to find his friend. He does not consider that maybe it was locked for the sole purpose of keeping him out, especially since every other shop and room is readily available if Tommy ever wished to explore them. Tommy trusts Tubbo, and by the time they’re together again, he doesn’t think much of the locked door at all. 

This will prove to be a horrible mistake. 

////

Tommy ends up finding Tubbo again a while later, who immediately drags him into some sort of communications system he was creating out of scrap parts. Tubbo explains that he’d been considering doing something like this for a while but never got the chance to really test it due to living alone without a partner to assist. Tommy, like the wonderful friend and mediocre lab rat he is, decides to help out of the goodness of his heart. 

Which is how he finds himself clear on the other side of the mall anyway, kicking random objects on the ground in an attempt to entertain himself while he listens to static coming out of a small speaker on the walkie-talkie-like object. It doesn’t really look like a comm he’s seen before, but then again, Tommy is notorious for having extremely shitty life experiences that nuke him from seeing the joys of living that other people typically would. 

Maybe it’s just a really shitty looking music speaker with a microphone shoved into it. Tommy definitely wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. 

“Just go to the far end of the mall and let me check if these work,” Tubbo had told him. “That way, if we get separated again we have a way to still communicate. These are small enough to fit in our pockets, so we wouldn’t have to worry about being indiscrete.”

It’s a great idea in concept, but in practice it’s incredibly boring. He’s seen dirt with more intrigue than standing around and doing nothing. He’s waiting for Tubbo to say something, but he can’t tell if he’s been waiting for five minutes or two hours. 

The lack of mental stimulation makes it easy to notice when the scraping sound starts. 

It’s quiet and somewhat muffled, but something is undeniably nearby. It’s not strange since Tommy is right next to the exit to the mall, but it’s still creepy. Especially when he’s still on high alert after his escape not even a few days ago. Even the thought of the two deities that had been chasing him managing to find him sends a cold sort of fear down his spine.

By this point, he’s decided to forgo Tubbo’s mission and enlist himself on one of his own. Primarily to find out what the fuck is making that noise, if only for his own piece of mind. He tries to convince himself that it’ll be worth the stress (especially if something is actually wrong), but the longer he contemplates how to go about things the more anxiety pools in his gut. 

What if they actually had found him? Surely they would’ve just broken in and carried out whatever it was they’d been planning on doing before. There was no reason for them to draw things out meaninglessly. 

Faintly, he can hear Tubbo’s voice crackle over the speaker, but he ignores it as he steels himself and creeps towards the door. The scraping sound gets louder the closer he gets, and once he’s in front of the door he presses his ear against it to listen to it better. He can hear faint muttering at this point which only further solidifies that whoever is on the other side is a person and not an animal. 

Tommy forces himself to swing the door open before he can regret it, holding the speaker (that has now gone quiet) in his hand like he’s ready to throw it upon being provoked. 

The fighting stance and suddenness of the door opening seems to scare the shit out of the stranger, who looks at him with eyes wide in alarm.

Tommy can’t believe what he’s seeing. “Fucking Ranboob?”

“Uh,” the guy in question says awkwardly. “Hi.”

“What the fuck?” Tommy questions, motioning from himself to Ranboo and then to the dumpster he’s standing in. He waits for an explanation, and when he’s only met with silence reiterates his concerns. “What the fuck?”

Out of all the things he could’ve come across, seeing the guy he met in the sewers knee-deep in the dumpsters behind the mall was not one he was expecting. Ranboo is still staring at him. He looks entirely like he no longer wants to be there, but he also seems to understand that an explanation is warranted as he slowly begins to speak. “I… Well, I wanted to make sure you were okay? I mean, you were passed out in the sewers when I found you, and I brought you back here because there was a guy who was pacing and muttering about his friend not being back. …I wasn’t sure if I was assuming right, but I guess I was if you’re still here…?”

At least the mystery of how Tommy had gotten home was solved. 

“Your forehead has blue on it,” Ranboo supplies helpfully. Tommy scowls and immediately goes to rub at it with the bottom of his shirt. 

“Fuck off, man,” Tommy mutters once he’s figured he got the majority of the blue off. In his defense, he’d completely forgotten about it. “I’m fine, thanks for asking. Why else are you here, again?”

Ranboo is about to respond when a different voice rings out, this one much more irritated. “Tommy, what are you doing outside? I thought we discussed staying in until everything dies down. Going out randomly does not quantify as laying low and– Who the fuck are you?”

Tommy turns to Tubbo, who looks torn between being livid and confused where he stands in the doorway. He’s holding the comm in his hand, which makes Tommy glance down at the one in his pocket somewhat guiltily. “Tubbo, meet Ranboo. The guy I met in the sewers and apparently my savior. Ranboo, meet Tubbo, my lovely best friend who would not kill you under any given circumstance.”

The last part is definitely a jab, if only for the fact that Tommy believes Tubbo has a core value that includes no witnesses. 

“I’m your only friend, Tommy,” Tubbo sighs, reaching out to grab his arm and drag him back towards the inside of the mall. “And we need to get out of the open. I don’t feel like having a sword to my throat again anytime soon, so maybe we should play things safe.”

“I’m Tommy’s friend,” Ranboo interjects, making Tubbo pause. After saying it he seems to backtrack immediately in fear of being shut down. “I mean… I think. Sewer buddies, and all that. …Haha.”

Tommy is a bit appalled by how awful he is at social interaction, but he decides to be a good person and take pity on the poor guy. Especially since he’d been socially inept enough to say haha out loud as a word. “Yes, exactly. Ranboob is my friend, Tubbo. We should take him with us and spare him the fate of dumpster diving.”

“It’s Ranboo, actually.” Everyone ignores the comment. 

Tubbo looks unconvinced, so Tommy uses logic instead. “Do we really want him outside? It’ll draw attention to the mall. We want to keep things locked up, right? Having someone dive through the dumpster like it’s the world’s grossest public pool isn’t exactly good for being incognito.”

The ram hybrid still looks skeptical, but he relents and drops Tommy’s arm. “Fine. But if he does anything, he’s back on the streets.”

It’s a bit jarring to see Tubbo act like this, especially when he’d been so kind to Tommy when they’d first met. Though, he supposes he can sympathize with the caution given everything that’s happened. Still, it only serves to make Tommy nervous that he’s somehow making a mistake. Surely it’ll be fine. Totally, 

They’re back in the main section of the mall with the couches Tommy’s been sleeping on before anyone talks again. Ranboo looks entirely out of place given his height and gangly posture, but it could also very well be a byproduct of Tommy essentially kidnapping him without waiting for his say. Tommy honestly isn’t sure if Ranboo is even capable of saying anything against either of them with how much of a doormat he seems to be. 

“So Ranboo,” Tubbo starts, saying his name like it’s an insult in itself. “How did you meet Tommy, again?”

“Uh… he was in the sewers,” Ranboo starts. “He asked what I was doing there, and I said that I lived there, because I do. He asked how to get back to Prime Path and I pointed him the right way. I left after that, but I, um, saw you by the mall.”

“You saw me?” Tubbo asks, clearly not expecting the information. 

Ranboo freezes like a deer in headlights, seemingly trying to discern if he possibly said something wrong, but he continues after registering that it was primarily surprise in Tubbo’s tone. “Yeah. I left the sewers because I like to explore? I like to find stuff. I hadn’t been to the mall in a while, but sometimes there’s cool stuff in the trash, and I saw you walking back and forth. You were muttering about Tommy not being back and I remembered his name so I went to go find him since he hadn’t made it. He was knocked out in one of the tunnels, so I brought him back here. For you. Yeah.”

“Oh come on,” Tommy groans. The reminder of his major fail at getting out of the tunnels isn’t exactly invigorating for him. “That makes me sound so uncool. It’s not my fault it’s dark as shit down there.”

“It’s a sewer,” Ranboo tells him. “There’s not supposed to be light.”

Thankfully, Tubbo cuts in before Tommy can argue with the poor bastard. “Why were you here today? You brought him back, but why come back?”

“We’re friends,” Ranboo reiterates, but it sounds more like he’s testing the words on his tongue. He nods. “Yeah. We’re friends. I wanted to make sure he was okay. Also, your garbage has cool stuff sometimes. It was kind of a win-win for me.”

Tubbo looks like he’s going through the five stages of grief at Ranboo’s response, which only serves to make Tommy delighted. He didn’t know it was possible to get under Tubbo’s skin this easily. 

“I say we keep him,” Tommy declares, ignoring Ranboo’s startled response of ‘like a pet?!’. 

Tubbo looks like he’s about to kill someone over Tommy’s decision, but he doesn’t refute it. He’s probably internally figuring out all of the ways he can exploit Ranboo for personal gain while he stays with them. 

And thus, the two musketeers become three. (Kind of.)

Chapter Text

Tubbo was making bombs.

Well, he was attempting to. It was more accurate to say that he was trying to keep Tommy’s attention on him while Ranboo quietly watched them both from the corner of the room. In all honesty, it was kind of hard for Tommy to focus on Tubbo’s methods when he could tell that the former sewer inhabitant was purposefully excluded from the activity. Especially when said sewer inhabitant was too pussy to say anything about it. Poor Ranbitch just resigned themselves to looking at the two of them with sad, wet eyes and little hope for the world. It was honestly a bit pathetic. 

The scene around them continues like that for a while, the room quietly filled with sounds of Tubbo’s tinkering until Tommy, fed up with the growing amount of awkwardness in the room, sighs heavily and pushes back in the chair he’s seated in. It spins him around as he does so. He hums to himself loudly while draping an arm over his face in a lazy fashion. “We need to find something to do where my arse doesn’t feel like it’s going numb.”

Which was entirely fair of him to say, in Tommy’s opinion. They’d been sitting for what felt like hours. Thus, it was perfectly justifiable for Tommy to feel such a way. That, and the fact that if he has to look over at Ranboo’s wilting expression one more time, he might actually start to feel bad for the guy. 

“We’re doing this, though,” Tubbo says in a hurt tone, sounding slightly offended. 

Unfortunately, Tommy has already decided that it’s not his problem. As one does when faced with trials of great woe. How else would he have gotten all of his many, many wives to follow him in his glory? 

“Yeah, for hours,” he fires back, glancing down at Tubbo’s work. It’s absolutely brilliant, but being stuck doing the same task for an extended amount of time is hard for him to do. Learning how to make explosives was fun at first– that was, when he’d only watched Tubbo do it a couple of times– but by now Tommy has memorized the basics and is looking to strategically expand his horizons. And also find something more entertaining to do.

“What do you want to do, then?” Tubbo asks. The boy is frowning where he’s seated, one hand still on part of his project while the other drums his fingers against the table. It appears that he’s visibly waiting for an answer. 

Tommy falters, not having thought this far, but Ranboo seems to have something in mind. (Tommy mentally thanks his lord and savior for this interjection, as he is currently pulling several blanks.) 

They speak up tentatively, wringing their hands together like they expect to be immediately shot down. Which, in their defense, Tubbo might very well try. It has become abundantly clear that while Ranboo does their best to maintain peace, Tubbo really doesn’t like the guy. “We could go to the festival. I, uh, heard about it a couple days back. It’s a celebration, I think? For the God of Life, or something. I think there was going to be food and games there, if you guys want to check it out…?”

Now that peaks Tommy’s interest. He’s heard of festivals and fairs, of course, but he’s never been to one. The entry fees were always too expensive and when he was younger and attempted to sneak into them, he was always bombarded with ridiculous questions like “where are your parents?” and “aren’t you a bit young to be by yourself?” and “are you seriously attempting to steal things from the prize corner?”. Needless to say, everyone there hated fun and joy. It would be nice to experience one for real. 

The thought that he could experience one for real is enough to give him something to look forward to. It would be awesome, wouldn’t it? Especially in the company of his two friends (who also happened to be the only people he really knew in this world).

Tommy is so excited that he forgets to respond, which unfortunately gives Tubbo enough time to crush all of his hopes and dreams. 

“We can’t,” the ram hybrid interjects, simultaneously drawing Tommy from his thoughts and ruining any possible spark of joy he could’ve felt. He looks annoyed, which Tommy can somewhat sympathize with. The boy really seemed to like making bombs. It’s upsetting that his love for the activity is getting in the way of Tommy’s desperate need for enrichment time. “We need to stay out of public. Or did you forget what we told you about actively being in hiding?”

Tubbo, thankfully, had given Ranboo a brief rundown of why they weren’t leaving the mall at some point before noon. Much to Tommy’s infinite amusement, Ranboo had reacted with an expression of horror that far exceeded any of Tommy’s expectations upon learning that he had actively goaded immortals into chasing after him in an attempt to save Tubbo. 

“Man,” Tommy scowls, disappointed by the harsh and cruel reality he lives in. “What a fucking buzzkill. It was a good idea, boob boy. We’ll get ‘em next time. Preferably for something equally as joyous.”

“Don’t call me that,” is all Ranboo says, purple magic sparking near their face. Tommy can only assume that it’s their way of flushing in embarrassment. It’s kind of funny to watch, if he’s being entirely honest. Instead of doing something even more entertaining, Ranboo looks at the floor again, their brows furrowed in contemplation. “But, um, I could get us there without being seen. To the festival, I mean.”

Tommy, for a brief moment, is confused as to what they could possibly mean. The festival, wherever it was, was sure to be in the middle of an incredibly public area, surrounded by some sort of security that would be difficult to pass by inconspicuously. It would be impossible to get there unnoticed, unless…

“Wait a second!” Tommy proclaims, struck by inspiration and consequently cutting off his cryptid friend. “We could use the fucking sewers! They go everywhere, right? We could use those to get there! That way we don’t have to actually go out!”

It’s absolutely genius, with utterly no possible way for Tubbo’s bitchass to deny such a brilliant–

“We don’t know the sewer systems well enough,” Tubbo refutes. Whether he’s annoyed by Tommy’s insistence or by the suggestion in the first place, he can’t tell. “There’s no easy way to tell where we’re going, either. It’s not like we have a map. I don’t trust us enough to be able to tell where we’re going accurately to entertain that idea.”

“Ranboo knows the sewers well enough,” Tommy blurts, only to immediately feel bad for the way Tubbo glares at them like they’re plotting to murder them or something. 

Ranboo, the unlucky son of a bitch, flinches back at the sudden attention, their gaze drilling holes in the wall past the two of them in a valiant effort to avoid eye contact. “Or we could.. You know… Do it the other way.”

The suggestion seems like more of an attempt to avoid Tubbo’s homicidal tendencies than something they were actually confident in proposing. Tommy can’t help but admire their attempted tenacity. Truly an impressive survival tactic. 

“The other way?” Tubbo presses, visibly unimpressed. The ram hybrid is slouched in his chair now, arms crossed and eyes glimmering with a promise of something manic and slightly unhinged should Ranboo say anything he deems blasphemous. 

Tommy, on the other hand, can’t help but be intrigued. He motions for Ranboo to continue with one hand, leaning forwards where he’s seated to really commit to the bit.

“If you guys trust me for a second, I can get us there,” Ranboo tells them. It’s the sketchiest thing Tommy has ever seen in his life, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t curious enough to be compelled to listen. He immediately takes one of Ranboo’s hands, looking back at Tubbo pleadingly. 

Tubbo, to no one’s surprise, doesn’t immediately reach for Ranboo. He just stares at them with narrowed eyes and a slight scowl. He looks to Tommy after a few seconds, who still hasn’t moved from where he’s silently begging Tubbo to concede. The staring competition goes on for a few more seconds before Tubbo eventually huffs in resignation and glares at Ranboo with the heat of a hundred suns. 

“I don’t trust you,” he declares. It’s said more as a statement than anything actually dangerous, though there’s still a lingering warning in his tone. Regardless, Tubbo reaches out and grabs Ranboo’s other hand. 

Ranboo, to his credit, takes the thinly veiled threat in stride. He looks back at Tommy in thanks, eyes bright and slightly mischievous, and then the world around the three of them twists. 

For a very brief moment, Tommy is taken back to when he was in the bathroom with the watch, witnessing the world around him spiral out of existence and into something new. It makes his breath catch in his throat before he realizes that this, whatever it is, is entirely different. 

The main difference is that Ranboo’s magic is cold. It doesn’t really feel wet, but there’s an almost slimy consistency to it as Tommy’s vision becomes encompassed completely in deep purple and then in a brilliant array of black and dark blue and sparkling white. For a few seconds, it looks like they’re surrounded by the very universe itself. Stars flicker like fireflies in the deep void of the abyss, and even though Tommy doesn’t really exist as a person in the dark space he’s in, he can still feel the wondered awe that suffocates him as he takes it in. 

But then the moment is gone and Tommy is back on the ground, feeling as though he’s just witnessed something no mortal should ever have the privilege of seeing. This time he’s outside, surrounded by faint laughter and bright colors. They’re in a darker corner of the street, conveniently shielded from the view of the civilians that are gleefully walking through what looks like the most joyous celebration Tommy has ever seen. 

“You can teleport,” Tubbo notes faintly, looking slightly disoriented by the circumstances. There’s a certain level of distrust in his words, but it’s overtaken by curiosity that’s near palpable. 

Tommy, absolutely starstruck, turns to Ranboo with wide eyes. “You can teleport!”

He says it as loudly as he can whilst his tone is hushed, not wanting the people somewhat nearby to overhear his admiration. Such a thing was for his friend’s ears only. The people of the world needed to earn Tommy’s astonishment, thank you very much. 

Ranboo just looks flustered by the amazement in his voice. “Well. I didn’t remember I could until a few hours ago. But yeah. I guess I can.”

It helped that Ranboo had already explained his issues with memory when they’d all been together at the mall. Tommy is certain that if he hadn’t done that, Tubbo would be interrogating him about his lack of knowledge regarding himself. The concept of knowing enough about oneself to have a sense of identity but not to know what that identity truly is confuses Tommy slightly, but he’s done his best to try not to dwell on it. Ranboo would remember whatever it was that he needed to know in time, surely.

Tommy looks at Ranboo, then Tubbo, then towards the festival they’re now standing in. It might very well be the coolest thing Tommy’s ever seen. It officially marks today as a good day despite the tensions he can still sense between his two friends.

“Do you guys want to check things out?” Ranboo asks, gesturing towards the bustling crowd. They look a bit put-off by the amount of people. Tommy sends them a reassuring glance before puffing out his chest and grinning widely.

“Fuck yeah I do, Ranboob. Let’s go! We have prizes to win and bitches to woo!” he declares, marching into the heart of the festival without any moment’s hesitation. “C’mon, Tubbo!”

It becomes apparent very quickly what the festival is for. There’s a few vendors talking about it and how it was a celebration dedicated to the God of Life, Exxdii. He ruled over the existence of those living and general good fortune, appearing in the image of an angelic green figure with hundreds of eyes and a freaky looking mask. He was said to be generally looked upon with reverence and thanks due to his role in people’s lives. 

Well, supposedly. Tubbo didn’t seem too keen on taking the story seriously, so Tommy figured that there was likely more to the story and that the festival was lowkey a bunch of propaganda. 

It was certainly fun propaganda, though!

Especially once Tubbo found the minigames being hosted. They got lucky in finding that there weren’t any tickets required, the games quite literally being played for the love of the game. Much to Tommy’s surprise, his friend made an immediate beeline to the high-striker game called The Sun God’s Wrath (a shitty title, if you asked Tommy, but whatever). Tommy ends up yanked behind him with Ranboo trailing after awkwardly. 

“I always win these,” Tubbo gloats, grinning with manic glee as he looks at the game. The vendor, a man with a bald head and two-toned glasses, hands him the mallet with an intimidated expression. “I love hitting things with hammers.”

It was the opposite of Tommy, who was usually the one being beaten with hammers. Hopefully Tubbo wouldn’t turn said mallet unto him. That would fucking suck, especially after being dragged around behind the boy. Tommy’s surprised he didn’t yank his arm directly out of its socket. 

Tommy, doomed to watch Tubbo defeat The Sun God’s Wrath, stands to the side with Ranboo, who’s looking at Tubbo with fascination and slight horror. An entirely fair reaction, given that Tubbo is currently staring at the target like it’s personally ailed him. Tommy wouldn’t be surprised if he breaks the game entirely. 

“Is he always this violent?” Ranboo asks. “I mean, good for him, but isn’t that a bit concerning?”

“Nah,” Tommy immediately says, unconcerned with Tubbo’s behavior. “He hasn’t tried to kill you yet, so we’re probably good.”

Ranboo nods in understanding, then pauses. “Wait, he actually wants to kill me?”

They’re both interrupted by a loud crack of rubber against rubber, followed by the victorious ding of a bell. Tommy looks back to Tubbo, only to find that the game is in shambles and the bastard in question is holding the mallet up in his hands triumphantly. “BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME, FUCKERS! TUBBO SCORES AGAIN!”

The poor vendor, who stares at the scene with horror and resigned silence, finally speaks after several lapses of deafening quiet. “...Just take a prize. And please for the love of the gods, don’t come back.”

Tubbo whoops again, turning to assess the assortment of stuffed animals hanging from the wall behind the bald man. Ranboo stares at the remains of the minigame. “Please tell me he doesn’t actually want to kill me.”

Tommy looks at the shattered amalgamation of rubber and wood solemnly, then back at Ranboo. “Best of luck, my good bitch. I fear even someone as great as me can’t save you from your fate if you’re already a doomed man.”

“That is… the most ominous thing I’ve ever heard in my life. Please never speak again.”

The three of them end up on the search for another game to play (with Tubbo now banned from playing anything strength related), and Ranboo ends up playing something that somewhat reminds Tommy of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey, except with a sheep instead of an ass. The sheep’s fur is a startling shade of blue, too, but when questioned about the animal, the person running the game just shrugged and mentioned that one of the new gods had used one as a familiar at one point. 

Tommy, plagued by visions of blue staining his chest, decided not to ask anything further. Thankfully, Tubbo decides directly after that he wants to get food, which provides a wonderful distraction. 

Without any money, they can’t exactly order a feast, so Tommy ends up forcing Ranboo to awkwardly distract someone at a cotton candy cart while he and Tubbo snatch three of them and book it in the opposite direction. It was a little funny, especially since Ranboo couldn’t act for shit and ended up saying about two sentences before running after their retreating figures. 

Now the three of them are hunched away in the shade, idly eating their spoils of war while Tubbo assesses their surroundings for any possible threats. Ranboo even seems a bit more content now that Tubbo has calmed down around their presence, so Tommy takes to observing those around them while his mind wanders. 

Until he sees him. 

A specific and entirely indescribable kind of dread pools deep in Tommy’s stomach at the sight of the man across the festival grounds.

It isn’t the general demeanor of the man that’s unsettling, nor is it his apparel. Tommy doubts that a green hoodie and trousers could possibly be all that intimidating, even if it’s this man in particular that wears it. It isn’t even the porcelain mask that hangs off the loop of his belt that takes Tommy off guard, despite its somewhat menacing appearance. 

No, it’s the fact that Tommy recognizes him. 

Because it’s Dream that stares directly at his group from across the bustling street. 

It shouldn’t be possible. Dream is… Tommy doesn’t want to think about it. He can’t think about it without wanting to spew the cotton candy he’d just eaten all over the pavement alongside blood and gore. Either way, Dream shouldn’t be here. Dream should be worlds away, frozen in an alleyway. Not in the middle of the festival he’s attending, not in this world. Suddenly, Tommy feels very, very ill. So ill that it takes him another moment to realize that Dream isn’t staring at Tommy at all– Dream is staring at Ranboo instead. 

Ranboo, who is completely oblivious to it despite being sensitive of other people’s eyes on them.

“Anyways, that’s why I stopped committing casual arson for spare parts. That old lady was pissed about her car, holy shit,” Tommy faintly hears Tubbo droning on, but he can’t bring himself to look away when Dream is right there– why is he right there–

“Tommy?” Tubbo asks, placing a hand on his shoulder. Tommy turns to look at him, unaware of how he’s become deathly pale. Tubbo’s brows furrow as he takes in the jarring shift in Tommy’s expression, eyes trailing to where he’d been looking moments before. Then, as soon as he sees who Tommy had been looking at, he freezes. Tommy can’t imagine why. It’s not like Tubbo knows him in this world, right?

“Ranboo,” Tubbo says with sudden seriousness. They look over at him with eyes innocent to the terror in his tone. “We need to leave.”

“What?” Ranboo asks, looking over at Dream, only for his eyes to widen. His voice goes oddly soft and entirely meek. Tommy looks back over, seeing the man in question begin to walk over towards them. “...Oh.”

Tommy isn’t entirely sure what happens after that. He knows that Ranboo must’ve teleported them out because he feels the strangeness of their magic wash over him, only to disappear seconds later, but he can’t focus on anything around him. He can’t even focus on the sound of his own breathing, which has grown erratic and short of breath. 

He doesn’t feel real. Nothing around him does. He can’t grasp any thought except for the ones revolving around the stupid man in green, the one that should be buried and gone, the one that Tommy never should have had to see again. It should’ve been impossible. Sure, there had been a chance that he existed here, Tommy was in an alternate reality, after all, but the probability should have been so low that Tommy would’ve never met him. 

Especially not like this, when everything had been going well for once. Of course, Tommy should’ve known that good things never last. They aren’t meant to, not for someone like him. He had learned the same lesson time and time again. It shouldn’t have been a surprise that it was coming to claim his life once again. 

“Tommy,” someone says, and he can feel them try to wrestle his hand away from where he’d been clutching his chest. When had he started doing that? He can taste blood in his mouth as he continues clenching his teeth, but it’s hard to stop even when he finally acknowledges that he’s doing it in the first place. His surroundings are so faint, so distant in comparison to the looming reminder of Dream, Dream, Dream–

“Tommy!” the same voice hisses, this time much more insistent. He feels a hand curl around his wrist and he instinctively flinches, only for the individual to place it against their own chest. “Tommy, breathe. Follow me. In for four, out for six. Are you ready? Come on.”

“I can’t,” Tommy manages to say through gasps. “I can’t breathe, I can’t–”

“Follow me,” the person instructs. They sound worried. Tommy tries to match their breathing as they inhale but fails, choking on a sob instead. The boy in front of him doesn’t seem deterred. “You got this. You outran a god. You can definitely manage to breathe.”

He repeats his deep inhale and this time Tommy feels the way his chest expands from beneath his palm. He copies it shakily, exhaling with Tubbo and repeating the pattern several more times before he manages to stop hyperventilating. Tubbo, who looks at him with concern and not irritation, smiles at him hesitantly when he finally manages to take a shaky breath on his own.

“What the fuck,” Tommy finally croaks, familiar with panic attacks but unfamiliar with the result of this one. The ram hybrid sits in front of him on the floor, hand still covering Tommy’s over his own chest. Ranboo crouches next to the two of them, visibly troubled in the way his tail swishes anxiously from side-to-side. 

“You back, big man?” Tubbo asks softly. Tommy just nods. He doesn’t think he could do much of anything else at the moment even if he wanted to. Thankfully, Tubbo seems to pick up on it and continues to assess the situation calmly. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Tommy opens his mouth. Then closes it. Then opens it again. He takes a deep breath, making sure to center himself so that he can think clearly. When he eventually decides to speak, his voice is raspy. “I don’t know if you’d believe me.”

Because how could they? He isn’t from this world. There’s no easy way to explain what had just happened, especially when Tubbo and Ranboo had both seemed to recognize Dream of their own accord. He couldn’t just tell them that he knew the man from another plane of existence entirely. That he was from another world and didn’t know how he got here or how to get home. He couldn’t even admit the last part to himself. 

“I’ll believe you,” Ranboo says, and Tommy is slightly surprised that it’s him that says it and not Tubbo. “I, um… I’ve seen a lot of weird things. I doubt you could outdo them. Not to, like, diminish your trauma or anything, that’s not what I meant, wait–”

“I’ll believe you too,” Tubbo interjects, saving Ranboo from potentially wrecking the point they were trying to make. “You risked your life for me, remember? You don’t have any reason to lie to me. Especially about something that made you react like this.”

It’s the nicest shit Tommy’s ever heard. He doesn’t deserve it in the slightest. 

“I don’t even know how,” Tommy says in an attempt to deflect, avoiding eye contact with the both of them. It’s frustrating and it makes him feel like a total pussy. Something that someone like Tommy Innit should never have to endure the pain of feeling like. “It’s nothing. It’s fine. Was just reminded of my late wife whom I miss dearly. There’s nothing to worry about.”

When Tommy looks back over, Tubbo looks like he’s just bitten into a lemon and Ranboo just looks sad. He isn’t quite sure how to react to that. It’s fairly foreign to him– the idea that they might actually care. It’s comforting in the way that anything uncomfortable is, despite the natural paradox of the feeling. He kind of wishes that they wouldn’t. 

“You had a panic attack,” Ranboo says quietly. They seem hesitant to push the matter but insistent on at least showing that they care that it happened. “That’s not nothing.”

It kind of makes his skin itch and suddenly it doesn’t feel very comforting at all. It feels unfamiliar. Tommy hates anything that’s foreign to him emotionally. It isn’t that he doesn’t appreciate their care, because he does, but the fact that it feels genuine and real makes him feel almost like he’s backed into a corner. A ridiculous notion, since that isn’t their intention at all. 

Well, time to deflect.

“I have never had a panic attack in my life,” Tommy insists, doubling down. 

They both look completely unimpressed by his answer. Tubbo even seems frustrated, if the growing furrow between his brows is anything to go by. He opens his mouth to refute Tommy’s words, only to be rudely interrupted by Tommy roughly inhaling snot back into his nose. 

The action is a devastating blow on the point he’s trying to make and Tommy internally curses his own failures. “Okay, fine. Maybe I did. But this is the fault of everyone else’s failures and not my own.”

The ram hybrid had looked irritated by his deflection before, but now there’s something Tommy can’t quite place that’s settled into his expression. Tommy can’t tell if it’s closer to understanding or sympathy. The thought of Tubbo pitying him is enough to form a knot in his stomach. 

“You don’t have to talk about it,” Tubbo finally tells him, ignoring Ranboo’s pained noise of disagreement. “I get it.”

It’s only then that Tommy remembers what Tubbo told him about his father and comes to the conclusion that it’s very likely that he gets exactly what Tommy is feeling, even if he doesn’t understand what Tommy is going through. It makes the anxiety pooling in his gut lessen. He decides to offer up a piece of himself that he doesn’t quite want to admit is vulnerable. “I want to tell you. I just don’t think you’d believe me. I just think it sounds like shit I pulled out of my ass.”

They both stare at him blankly, and Tommy can faintly imagine that they’re both telling him to shut the fuck up since they were already there to listen. He eventually just grumbles and relents to their silent judgement. “But fine, since you’re both a pair of needy bitches. I’m not from here.”

There’s a small bout of silence. 

“Well, yeah,” Tubbo says as if it were obvious. “You didn’t know about the gods. It’s kind of hard to do that, you know, unless you’ve lived under a rock your entire life.”

Tommy sputters for a moment, going to tell them that that’s not what he meant and that he wasn’t fucking finished yet (and also that they were total dickheads, making light of his horrible eternal suffering and crippling anxiety), only for Ranboo to cut him off. You know, like a little bitch.

“He didn’t know about the gods?” they ask, sounding almost befuddled by Tommy’s unwilling ignorance.

Tubbo turns to glare at him. “Not the point.”

“Right, sorry.”

“No,” Tommy continues, tone a bit more jagged. He feels bitter, but that seems to be a common theme when he thinks about his circumstances. “That’s not what I meant. Just fucking listen, dickheads. I’m going to tell you a story.”

So he does. He tells them about working a late night shift at the mall, ignoring Tubbo’s look of curiosity, and he tells them about finding the watch and thinking he’s struck gold. He tells them about taking it to the bathroom and all that came after, about blinking back into existence in a world that he couldn’t quite recognize with nothing to his name and no way to get back home. He tells them everything right up until the point he’d met Tubbo in the first place. 

Then he explains that the stupid bitch in green, the cursed teletubby motherfucker, is someone that he’s met before in another life– in another world entirely. Not in detail and not enough to cause him to go into another spiral, but enough that they now knew that he was bad news to Tommy. He always would be. 

They’re both deathly quiet as they listen. When he finally finishes, Tubbo looks like he’s going to throw up. Tommy can’t imagine why. His storytelling abilities weren’t that bad. 

He stands abruptly, taking a step back like he suddenly can’t stand the temperature of the room. Tommy watches his hands clench into fists and then unclench a few times, the look on his face something negative that he isn’t quite able to describe. If he had to guess, it would be a mixture of something queasy and dreadful. Tommy can’t imagine why, but he doesn’t like the feeling it gives him. 

“I need a second,” is all Tubbo says before leaving the room. 

Whatever bad feeling he’d felt before amplifies by thirty and Tommy instantly knows he’s somehow fucked things up. He isn’t even sure how, but Tubbo leaving is undeniable proof that he’d said something wrong. He feels panic clutch at the inside of his throat, twisting his guts into geometric patterns and clawing up its way through his chest. As if sensing how quickly he was losing it (and probably also able to see the visible panic in his face), Ranboo places two hands on his shoulders, drawing Tommy from his spiral before it can proceed any further. 

“I believe you,” they tell him quietly, and it’s enough.

It’s not perfect. Tubbo is gone and Tommy is next-to-certain that he’s ruined something innately valuable that the boy felt towards him, but Ranboo is still with him. The fact that they seem willing to pick up the pieces anyways matters more than words can possibly describe. 

“You do?” Tommy questions with a doubtful glance towards them. His heterochromic friend avoids eye contact but remains by his side. Tommy feels a bit better than he did before. Still like shit, but not detrimentally so. 

“Yeah,” Ranboo says. “I do.”

Tommy goes quiet for a while, the silence not having any specific weight to it other than a slight tinge of what could almost be lamentation. It’s a subtle sort of thing, the type that makes Tommy feel like they’re processing something that might already be lost. 

“I think I fucked up with Tubbo,” Tommy states eventually like it’s fact. He feels like shit. Of course Tubbo wouldn’t have believed him. He probably wouldn’t have believed himself if he were Tubbo, either. The whole thing sounded batshit fucking crazy. Tommy’s just wounded that Tubbo’d been too pussy to say it to his face. 

“Maybe give him a sec?” Ranboo suggests. It's a strained suggestion, but Tommy can appreciate where it comes from nevertheless. “It’s… It’s not good he’s gone, but it gives me time to say something that you should know. … I’m sorry, Tommy, this is my fault.”

They sound so genuinely torn that for a moment, Tommy isn’t sure what to do. 

Then he manages to formulate a well-crafted and sentimental response that perfectly encapsulates how he feels about the bullshit Ranboo just said. “Did you hear literally any of what I told you? I’m from another world and freaked out over a guy that I didn’t think would exist here, dipshit. Literally how could that possibly be your fault?”

Ranboo looks slightly taken aback by his bluntness. 

“No, not about that. Listen to me? Just for a second,” Ranboo says while his ears droop pathetically. His tail curls around his leg as he continues talking, the words coming across like an unwilling confession. “It’s my fault he was there. At the festival.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Tommy asks (very eloquently) as Ranboo retreats into themselves. Tommy doesn’t think he’s ever seen anybody look so guilty. Or so horrified by their own admission, like there’s something much deeper to this that they aren’t willing to give up just yet. 

Ranboo doesn’t waste any time in responding. Said response is one that Tommy couldn’t have predicted, even if it was still somewhat of a big reveal with all things considered. 

“I’m a god, Tommy.”

The statement hangs in the air for a moment, and Tommy doesn’t know what to feel. It doesn’t really feel like a betrayal, not paired with what Tommy knows about Ranboo’s memory and with the few happy memories they’ve shared with each other. It doesn’t even really feel like a surprise, even if the weight of the subject is still quite heavy. The guy can literally teleport through the abyss and looks like a ten year old’s DeviantArt OC. 

“So?” Tommy ultimately says in response. “I’m from another world. You’re not special.”

Ranboo looks relieved by the lack of disgust in his voice. They open their mouth to say something, then close it again. They seem to be reminded of why they’d revealed their apparent immortality in the first place, wilting back into themselves. “No. That’s, um, not really the point. Dream is bad news, Tommy. If he was awful in your world, he’s terrible here. I was in his care for a… I think it was a while. I didn’t remember until a bit ago. …A recent bit ago, I mean, not a long bit ago.”

“I can take him,” Tommy says, only half-joking. It’s lighthearted in its intended use of brightening the dull mood of the conversation and giving Ranboo something to be amused by, but part of Tommy thinks that he genuinely has a shot at sticking it to the little green bitch. Just for the sake of avenging Ranboo, of course. If he can handle the Dream of his world, he can definitely handle the Dream here. How much harder could it be?

“He’s a god,” Ranboo tells him quietly, instantly crushing any hope that Tommy could flawlessly defeat him in battle. “You outran some before but Dream… he’s different, okay? He’s the God of the Hunt. He likes to win.”

The words aren’t innately threatening, but Tommy can’t help but be intimidated by them nonetheless. Something about the way Ranboo says it, like Dream would do anything to get what he wants, doesn’t sit right with him. It reminds him of a time he’d rather not think about, when he’d wrestled with the man in the middle of snow and ice just to try and get out alive. In that moment, he’d decided that he never wanted to meet someone similar. This, unfortunately, would definitely count. Especially if the fucker now has immortality up his sleeve. 

“He messed with my domains,” Ranboo confesses, and the jarring way it's admitted has Tommy’s attention snapping back to them. “Mind and Memory. He got into my head. …I don’t know how or even what he wanted from me. It was, um, well– I wouldn’t exist right now if some of the other gods hadn’t gotten me out. I think that’s where I was before the sewers. With them, I mean. Not Dream.”

The realization that Ranboo could’ve possibly never met Tommy if Dream had been successful in whatever it was he’d been doing is nothing short of horrifying. Tommy isn’t sure what to say for a moment. Does he try to provide comfort even though he’s absolute shit at it? Does he make a joke? (That just seems insensitive at this point, given everything).

“Tubbo knew him too, I think,” is what Tommy ends up saying. Tommy isn’t sure how yet, or why, but it’s a definite truth. He sighs, clarifying the observation further. “Like, with the way he reacted when he saw him. I think Tubbo knew him, too.”

“I don’t know how,” Ranboo admits. “You already know how my memory is. Usually I have my book to help me remember things, but I don’t exactly… know where that is right now.”

That fucking sucks, but its fine. Tommy’ll help Ranboo figure out where his book is another time. For now…

“Should we go find Tubbo?” he asks. He isn’t sure if it's even a good idea. Tubbo had left on his own accord after Tommy dropped the bombshell that was his unfortunate life circumstance. He isn’t sure if he even wants to confront him after that, especially when he doesn’t know how Tubbo feels about the whole thing. 

“I think it might be good to talk to him,” Ranboo affirms even though they sound unsure about the matter. It’s good enough for Tommy, who constantly borders between the world’s greatest optimist and the universe’s greatest nihilist. In any case, Tommy just wants his friend back. 

They split up after that, with Ranboo staying behind in the main area while Tommy walks off in search of Tubbo. 

It’s Tommy’s idea. He isn’t entirely certain that Tubbo is completely fine with Ranboo’s presence and he also figured it would be a good idea to speak to him one-on-one about everything. It was a foolproof way to make sure that they both had the space to freely say what they needed to say about everything. Tommy was a genius, truly. 

He’s quiet as he walks down the halls of the mall, peering into shops he knows Tubbo frequents occasionally in an attempt to locate the son of a bitch. He even stops by the workshop, convinced that maybe Tubbo had walked off to create more abominations in an attempt to destress. But no matter where Tommy searches, Tubbo isn’t there. 

It gets to a point where Tommy’s convinced that he’s searched everywhere. It isn’t until he’s about to give up and walk back over to Ranboo that he remembers the existence of the locked security door. He’s hesitant at first, unsure if it would even be a good idea to check it. The door had been locked before and Tommy doubts that it would just so happen to be open for him now. It’s definitely a longshot by far, but he ultimately decides that it’s worth checking out. For Tubbo. 

He makes his way back downstairs, casually stepping over the occasional piece of trash as he walks down the broken escalator and towards the famed DONT PEE sign. 

Perhaps the first hint that something was wrong was the fact that he could tell that it was open. He’s not entirely sure why, but something tells him that going inside would be a bad idea. It’s a ridiculous notion, given that it’s just a room and Tommy desperately wants to find Tubbo to make things right, but it unsettles him nonetheless. 

He approaches it slowly, letting his feet drag as he nears it. He reaches out, nudging the metal door further open with one hand. The hinges whine at a decently audible volume as he does and he jumps at the sound, cursing under his breath. Gathering his courage, Tommy peeks inside the room. 

Tubbo isn’t there. 

He frowns, stepping further into the room just in case he’s missed him. The room is bleak but cluttered, filled with rows and rows of notebooks and journals. It has a musty smell to it when Tommy breathes in, reminiscent of an old library left to rot. (Or so Tommy assumes. It’s not like he frequents abandoned libraries.) It’s still weird, though. Some of the books look hundreds of years old. Tommy isn’t sure how Tubbo managed to find tomes like that, but he figures that it’s possible that they don’t belong to him at all. 

The table that Tommy knew as a security desk in his home reality is strewn with pens and empty bags of chips. For some reason, it feels like it holds importance. The centerpiece of the room, if you will. He steps closer, peering at a journal that was left open face-down against the wood. 

For a moment, Tommy feels like he’s probably snooping in an area that’s personal to Tubbo. Then he comes to the conclusion that his nosiness outweighs his aversion to prying, so he really doesn’t give a shit. Sue him, curiosity killed the cat and all that.

He flips it over to look at the page it was opened to, something ugly curling in his gut as he does. It’s a personal diary. One that he was tentative to dig into until spotting his name on the page several times. It wouldn’t have been so startling if not for the context he immediately began to uncover. 

His hands begin to tremble and he reads with shaky fingers, feeling almost as though the dread he’d felt earlier had become a self-fulfilling prophecy as he does. 

I found a boy today. It’s weird with everything that I’ve figured out so far. The god of time is missing right now from what I’ve heard. Given that Dream and Exxdii have been busy plotting together, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were involved. 

His name is Tommy. He doesn’t know shit about anything happening here. He hadn’t even heard of the gods, which is next to impossible. Even the heretics warn their children, and even if they didn’t, someone else would’ve. His clothes are weird, too. He seemed lost. I think he might be a byproduct of whatever’s going on. If not, it’s definitely ironic timing.

It almost feels too perfect. I don’t want to think that he could be the same as Theseus, but everything I’ve managed to figure out so far leads to the possibility, especially with Madness’ sudden appearance in Quackity’s casino. They look the same, but it’s been so long since anyone’s seen the guy that I feel like I could be making ties where there aren’t any. 

I’ll keep my entries updated as I go. He’s staying with me now. 

The entry is brief and makes little to no sense to Tommy from an outside perspective. He doesn’t want to think about the implications of what Tubbo is saying. The idea that Tubbo had known from the second they met that Tommy was inherently different is somewhat startling. It feels a bit like their entire friendship had been fabricated from the start. 

That’s not even mentioning the snippet about Theseus. According to Tubbo, it had been hundreds of years since Theseus had died. The entry, however, had made it seem like Tubbo knew what he looked like. Was there a portrait? Something similar? It’s jarring when paired with the knowledge that one of the gods had known to call Tommy by that name. He doesn’t like what it implies, especially since he knows that their brother is fucking dead. 

The next few entries don’t make things any better. They’re short, almost clinical, and they outline the fact that Tubbo, for some reason, has sought to gain the favor of a few of the gods for a long, long time. Something about his father, though Tommy can’t fathom how badly the man must’ve fucked up in order for the gods to be after his ass. He mentioned Blood and Madness specifically, though, which only furthered Tommy’s horror. 

Nothing, however, compared to the betrayal he felt upon reading that Tubbo had planned to give him up. 

Tubbo, the same Tubbo that had given him a place to stay and a shoulder to cry on, had been planning on handing him off to gods that had tried to chase him down. Well, they hadn’t done that at the time the entry had been written, but still. 

All off of the basis that Tommy was the same as Theseus. Tubbo had figured it out before Tommy had even said anything. Not that he was apparently a dead guy, of course, but that Tommy had come from a different reality. Sure, he hadn’t known whether or not he was right, but he had been confident enough that he’d been willing to trade Tommy for a blanket of safety from whoever was after him.

It hurts. Especially since Tommy had risked his life for the boy. There’s so much in the journal that Tommy doesn’t understand, but he knows damn well that Tubbo’s plot to give him up to the same people that had ended up holding a blade to the boy’s throat was certain. It may not have been his current goal anymore, but it had been at one point or another. 

In all honesty, Tommy doesn’t know what to think. Part of him feels like he has only half of the context, does it really matter when he knows for certain that their friendship was based on a lie? All because of a resemblance that wasn’t even Tommy’s fault?

It’s a mortifying thing, to think that someone he had genuinely trusted had just been using him. He hardly even notices that he’s clenching his teeth until he hears his own jaw creak from the force. What is he even supposed to do? Clearly, things didn’t turn out that way. Tommy had foiled that in his mistake of grabbing the emerald. Tubbo didn’t seem like he was still trying to give Tommy up, but he couldn’t be certain of that. It definitely didn’t take away from everyone else. 

And who the fuck was Quackity?

An acquaintance? An accomplice? What did he have to do with the God of Madness? 

Tommy forces himself to take a deep breath, struggling to inhale all the way. Should he leave? He has nowhere else to go. The mall is the safest place for him, only now it doesn’t feel like a safe place at all. What the hell is he supposed to do? This wasn’t supposed to happen, something like this wasn’t supposed to be his reality. He can feel panic making its way back into his system at full-force and this time he can’t even trust Tubbo to talk him down from it. 

He’s reminded of The Woolgatherer’s warning and suddenly feels like a total fucking idiot. It had been right. The god had warned him and Tommy had been too stupid to listen. Was there really anyone else to blame other than Tommy himself? Maybe if he’d asked the deity to elaborate instead of defending Tubbo’s non-existent honor, he wouldn’t be here. 

Fuck, does he try to confront Tubbo? What if he lies about this? About everything? He’d been lying before, surely it wasn’t that much of a stretch to think that he’d lie again in order to pacify Tommy. He doesn’t want to think that Tubbo would do such a thing, but then again, did he really even know him at all?

He’s so caught up in his panic that he doesn’t notice that someone else has entered the room until they speak.

“Tommy?”

Tommy turns, the movement jerky and uncoordinated. He still has the journal in his hands as he stares directly at the cause of his anguish. He can’t bring himself to speak, even as their name rings clearly in his head. 

Tubbo.

Chapter Text

For a moment, Tommy just stares. It’s as if time itself has slowed down for the sole purpose of letting the moment fester. Tubbo looks between him and the journal in his hands, something pained painted across his face. He looks torn between regret and sorrow. Tommy can’t imagine why. 

For a few seconds, it’s silent. 

Then the moment passes and all he can feel is rage.

“You lying son of a bitch!” Tommy seethes violently, stepping towards Tubbo with a promise of pain exploding from his words. “How much of it was fake, huh? How much of everything was made up to fucking use me? What did I ever fucking do to you to deserve that?”

Tears burn hotly at the corners of his eyes, and suddenly Tommy just feels the need to leave. He has to get out of here, it doesn’t matter where to. He can’t be around Tubbo, who practically admitted in his notes to using him. He can’t stay in this mall, where the home he’d deemed safe was actually a false haven. He can’t stay in this fucking world because there are literal gods after him for reasons he doesn’t even want to consider at the moment. 

He has to go home. Somehow. It doesn’t matter the method. It doesn’t matter if it fucking kills him. He just needs to be away from all this bullshit and somewhere that doesn’t feel like it’s cleaving his heart in two just by existing there. 

He can hardly remember the last time he’s felt betrayed like this. There’s one moment that comes to mind, but it pales in comparison due to the fact that he’d actually, genuinely trusted Tubbo. He’d had fun with him. He’d confided in him. He’d risked his life for him. 

“Tommy, I can explain,” Tubbo tries, but it’s the most cliche line in the book and Tommy isn’t going to bother with another word out of his mouth. Especially when he’s clearly just trying to pacify him. “It was– I was wrong to consider any of that, okay? You don’t understand. I thought it was–”

“Fuck you, Tubbo,” Tommy spits instead of letting him finish. “Fuck. You.”

Tubbo opens his mouth to try and make another bullshit excuse but Tommy is faster. 

“I trusted you! I trusted you and I didn’t mean anything to you! I could’ve died for you, Tubbo! So, no. You don’t get to say shit. You’re a fucking liar and I hate that I cared about you.”

He’s quiet as Tommy continues to throw insults his way, looking horribly accepting for someone Tommy wanted so desperately to loathe. 

Tommy tries to still the shaking in his hands, the slight tremble to his voice. It’s an awful thing, whatever writhes in his chest like a bullet about to fire. His next words spill from his mouth before he can bother trying to stop them. “Whoever you’re trying to bribe, I hope they fucking kill you for whatever it is you’re running from.”

He can’t bring himself to take the words back, even as Tubbo makes an unintentional sound that almost sounds like a whimper. Instead, he shoves past the boy and out of the room, tossing the journal onto the desk roughly as he does so. He doesn’t turn back, even as Tubbo calls his name pleadingly. From the sound of it, the ram hybrid wasn’t chasing after him. 

Good. Let him rot. Dickhead. 

He keeps walking. He isn’t sure how long or how far. He can barely even remember walking back up the broken escalator to where Ranboo had been waiting for him, hardly able to process much of anything at all through the numbness seeping into his core. 

When he does see Ranboo again, it takes a substantial amount of effort not to burst into tears. He doesn’t know how he manages not to as he recounts what had just happened to the god, tells him what he had found in Tubbo’s study and the argument that had just taken place. He’s stuck between feeling the most miserable he’s felt in years and being unable to feel anything at all. It’s a damning sort of nothingness, the sort that feels like it’s eating him alive when nothing appears to be wrong outwardly.

Part of Tommy wonders if he’s having an anxiety attack. It would definitely be a merited reaction. 

“We need to go,” he breathes eventually, choking on the last word despite his best efforts. Tears still sting at his eyes, but he refuses to let them fall. It’s about as doable as holding back a river’s floodgates, but he doesn’t want to cry over Tubbo. Not when Tubbo no longer deserves the tears. 

Ranboo stares at him, visibly at a loss for words. He’s not sure anything could have prepared them for what he’d just revealed to them. Maybe it was for the better that because of Tubbo’s betrayal, the boy never learned of Ranboo’s true identity. Tommy doesn’t trust what Tubbo would do with the information, given his innate distrust for them.

“Go?” Ranboo echoes at last. They look hesitant to leave, likely unable to tell if Tommy is completely rational at the moment due to the freshness of it all, but Tommy gives them a look that makes it clear that he’s not asking. They lick their lips as if hesitantly tasting their next words. “...Right. Go.”

Tommy still doesn’t know where. He has no idea if Ranboo remembers those who’d saved him or where he’d been before this based on the little information they’d told him earlier, so he doesn’t know if they’re even a viable option. He wants to ask, but the more he thinks about talking, the more the words seem to stick to the inside of his throat. It’s an effort not to choke, whether on bile or the sickening weight of the fact that his only safehouse was never really safe in the first place. 

The reminder damns him all over again. 

“I can’t fucking stay here,” Tommy chokes out again, gesturing wildly to his surroundings before his hands find solace in digging his fingers into his hair. The sharp pain that the action sends through him serves as both a method of grounding and distraction, giving him a brief escape from the whirlwind of emotions overtaking him. “I can’t do this. …I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to fucking do, Ranboo. He was supposed to be my friend. I have nowhere else to go. I have nothing here. What the fuck am I supposed to do?”

He’s surprised to feel Ranboo’s sharply clawed fingers brush over his own, carefully drawing them away from his now-sensitive scalp and back between the both of them. The touch, though it had taken him off-guard, wasn’t unwelcome. It’s oddly comforting even as it sickens him. He had never received much comfort. Even though Ranboo and… and Tubbo had given it to him before when he’d had a panic attack, it wasn’t something he would ever be used to. 

Tommy shudders out another breath, refraining from breaking off into what he knows would be an ugly sob. 

“It’s… It’ll be okay,” Ranboo tries to soothe. They look deep in thought for a moment, obviously trying to remember what they could in order to best help him. “There was a shop…? I think it was a shop. The people who helped me used to buy potions from her. I don’t know how to get to them, but we could talk to her instead? Maybe she can help.”

It’s a shit plan, but it's a start. Tommy’ll take what he can get at this point. 

He nods, forcing himself to take a few lungfuls of air. He continues until his breathing steadies, if only a little. He still feels like utter crap, but at least he’s not freaking the fuck out like he’d been before. It’s a relief to know that despite everything, Ranboo still cares. They’re painfully awkward about it and most certainly don’t have a clue what they’re doing, but they’re trying. Trying is good enough. 

“Well? What the hell are you waiting for? Can we teleport there? Do you know how?” Tommy asks. He doesn’t want to risk walking. The threat of everything else he has to worry about still looms in the background, a noose still loosely wrapped around his neck while he walks towards the gallows. He doesn’t want to speed up the process of it pulling taut. 

Ranboo furrows their brows in consideration, opening their mouth to speak when the sound of distant footsteps rings out from deeper in the mall. 

Tubbo had obviously stopped standing still in a daze and decided to go after Tommy. To apologize and grovel again or to do something else entirely, he wasn’t sure. Regardless, the thought of seeing Tubbo again was enough to make the nausea that had subsided return in full. The same sentiment that he’d shared before echoed through him again. We need to go.

Tommy’s despaired gaze snaps to meet Ranboo’s (who immediately averts his eyes to the floor), and Ranboo holds out a hand for him to take. Tommy immediately recognizes the escape route as it's presented to him, a warped reflection of the way they’d reached out to him before going to the festival.

He still can’t see Tubbo, but he can hear him as he takes in the sight of Tommy and Ranboo standing beside each other. There’s panic in the ram-horned boy’s voice as he shouts out to them, footsteps growing nearer as he screams, “Wait! Tommy, don’t! I know you’re mad right now, but you can’t go with them! They’re apart of–” 

Tommy doesn’t give Tubbo the opportunity to finish whatever lie he was about to spew as he takes Ranboo’s hand and grips it like a lifeline (which, maybe it is) and once again feels the world shift around him in the same way it had before. 

It’s different this time, somehow. There’s still an endless void of stars, and he feels the same feeling of weightlessness, the lack of anything real, but this time it’s warped, almost rushed. Tommy attributes it to the way Ranboo had hurried to get them both out of there, especially since the deity gasps for air the moment they’re back in the real world. They’d collapsed onto their knees and Tommy immediately crouches after grasping his bearings, trying to make sure that they aren’t hurt. 

“‘M fine,” Ranboo says after a few seconds of catching his breath. “Just… haven’t gone that far. In a while, I mean. It’s fine. Nothing I haven’t, um, done before.”

Tommy nods wordlessly, looking up at where they’d landed. He’s in a place he’s never seen before, which doesn’t surprise him. They’re in the corner of a shop of some sort, no customers or salesperson to be found. It almost looks like it would be closed, if not for the fact that the lights were on and soft music played in the background. 

It’s quaint in its simplicity, homey even. The floors are wooden and polished neatly and there were a couple of small tables with lovingly worn chairs in each of the back corners. The counter itself was covered in various plants that couldn’t be anything but magical given their glowing hues or vibrant neon colors. One of them looked like a bush with glistening berries that glowed orange. 

It’s comfortable here, but he can’t tell if it’s truly his own thought or if there was something about the place that made him unintentionally relax. Regardless, Tommy almost makes the mistake of thinking that everything is fine until the door to the shop opens. 

It would be fine. There’s no reason why it wouldn’t be, if only the people who walked in hadn’t been the two gods that had known his name. 

////

Wilbur Soot couldn’t say that he was known for having patience. 

After seeing his dead brother reanimated, he’d been the most impatient that he’d been in decades. It had gotten far beyond the point of irritating his brother and Phil, who tried their best to pacify him with pretty promises in an attempt to ensure he wouldn’t tear L’Manberg (and thus the entirety of Essempi) to shreds. They both knew that he’d do anything to get Tommy back, even if it meant razing a country to the ground. 

… In fact, that was the least of what he was willing to do.

He could still remember when he found him again. His soul had been different, warped and missing a piece, but it had still been Tommy. Not his Tommy, perhaps, but Tommy still. A gift from their mother, as he’d thought earlier. He wasn’t sure how she’d managed to pull the strings she’d had to have pulled in order to find another Tommy entirely (one likely from a completely different reality, if he was correct in his theories), but now was the most alive he’d felt in centuries. 

He held the same sentiment he’d shared with Technoblade before when he’d said that it didn’t matter if it wasn’t technically their Tommy as long as he came home. There wasn’t a world in which a Tommy would go unloved, and he’d already hypothesized that Tommy didn’t have anyone where he’d come from. It was obvious in the way that he didn’t recognize either of them, despite the hurt Wilbur felt from the lack of recognition. 

The thought of a world where Tommy didn’t have a him or a Techno made his heart both ache and burn with barely-restrained rage. It was both a blessing and a curse, Wilbur decided, that Tommy didn’t know them.  A blessing in the sense that he wouldn’t be stealing from any other version of him, not that he would’ve particularly cared if he had been, and a curse because it meant that Tommy had been alone. 

His little brother, alone. It was a miracle he’d made it this far in the first place. Wilbur seethed at the thought. He’d noticed it before, the ratty, too big clothes and the slight greasiness in his hair. He’d been filthy. A street rat. Something that Tommy never should have had to experience being. Though the personality and freedom in his being had suited him, it had still been heartbreaking to see where it had come from. 

This Tommy was different. Wilbur had already accepted that he would have to relearn things about his brother. He wouldn’t replace Theseus, couldn’t replace him, but it was a second chance that he wouldn’t allow himself or the rest of his family to pass up. A gift. 

“I don’t see why we’re going to Niki’s,” Wilbur tells Techno, kicking at the ground as they both walk. “We’re too far from Essempi. We have things to do that are far more important than-”

“You never learned patience,” Techno sighs. To most, he’d sound monotone. Wilbur knew from the eons he’d spent with him that he was getting fed up, however. Techno had heard this tangent more times than he could bother to count within the last few days. “The opportunity to get him back will come, Trixxtin will ensure it. When it does, we’ll bring him home.”

“It’s not that simple,” Wilbur hisses, even though it is. Their mother was known for being generous, and though she ruled over Death, she had a grip on Fate as well. She and Pryme had been friends for a very, very long time. The goddess of Fate and Future didn’t mind doing favors, not for Kristin. 

“It is,” Techno replies simply. “He can’t outrun Fate, Wilbur. You of all people should know that.”

It’s a low blow. Wilbur doesn’t really like to think about it, the time centuries and centuries ago when he’d been on his own as a somewhat new deity. Phil and Techno had taken one look at him and known something that he hadn’t known at the time but knew now. Then, though, he’d been as selfish as he’d been foolish. Nations had burned before he’d joined their family. Even now, he can’t bring himself to regret any of it. 

“You’d do well not to piss me off right now,” Wilbur says hotly instead of snapping. His self-restraint has been wearing thin these days and getting in a brawl with his brother wouldn’t exactly fix that. In fact, Wilbur is fairly certain that if he tries, he’ll just end up setting off to find Theseus on his own. Something that wouldn’t end well for anyone involved. He was gentle enough with those he cared for, yes, (especially his youngest brother who was still painfully mortal), but he had never been known for being kind. 

Techno, to his credit, does look a bit apologetic… even if he doesn’t feel guilty in the slightest. He was probably having his own inner battles. He’d mentioned to Wilbur briefly that Chat wouldn’t shut the fuck up. Something that had confused them when they had first spiked in activity a few weeks ago but understood the reason for now. 

“I can’t believe he grew up without us,” Wilbur murmurs after a moment of silence between the both of them. There’s a coldness that creeps into his voice. “I don’t doubt that he was alone. He seemed far too used to living the way he is.”

“Makes it easier for us,” Techno shrugs. “No family, nothing to fall back on. Anything we give him would be beyond the bare minimum he’s received. Makes getting him reliant on us easy, even if he won’t trust nearly as fast.”

Leave it to Technoblade to see the ways they could both exploit Tommy’s loneliness in their favor. He’d always been the type to view their lives like he would a plan for war. Everything was carefully thought out when it came to his views on people, even those he cared for. Wilbur used to wonder what he’d thought of him when they’d first met. Now he doesn’t care all that much, especially since anything Techno thought up for him was for Wilbur’s own benefit. 

“You think you’ll be fine to go to Niki’s?” Techno continues as Wilbur’s gaze snaps back to him. “I’m goin’ to talk to Punz. Said he might know a thing or two about Ranboo.”

They both know that going to talk to the god was the equivalent of threatening him within an inch of his life, but Wilbur couldn’t exactly blame his brother. They’d been looking for Ranboo for months and when Wilbur wasn’t thinking about his lost brother, he was lingering on the thought that the younger god might’ve actually attempted to run from them after all. 

It wasn’t the most probable scenario, seeing as Ranboo had been known to have problems with their memory and had most likely gotten lost and then blanked on what was going on, but Wilbur knew that Techno would be livid if it ended up being true. It was no secret that The Blade had grown fond of the lesser god of Mind and Memory after their family had saved them from Dream.

“I’ll be fine,” Wilbur answers, but it comes out as an irritated hiss. “Go find your answers.”

Techno gives him a long look, silently warning him not to do anything stupid, and Wilbur just flashes him a too-sharp grin. He won’t try to find Tommy, not now when Phil was working on it himself, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t ask Niki to keep an eye out. Perhaps she knew something. She traded in information just as much as she did potions and bargains, something that she had learned in her time following Technoblade around for a few decades after she’d been Made. 

After Techno leaves him to his own devices, Wilbur makes the trek to Niki’s apothecary. The shop was near-constantly empty of people, but that was mostly due to the fact that the top floor was a ruse. Everyone worth their shit knew that the real shop was a floor below, where Niki was able to manufacture anything she wanted. From weapons to potions to deals that could make a man into something great or terrible, Niki had it all. It made sense, given that she was the Goddess of Revenge and Retribution. 

Opening the door, Wilbur prepared himself to give her a warm welcome only to stop in his tracks. 

He’d always known whether or not he was alone in a room. It came with the territory of being able to figure out most everything in his surroundings. The only time that he hadn’t was when Tommy had stolen from him, and that was simply because Tommy’s presence was unregisterable to him. Something that most likely had to do with the fact that he didn’t originate from this plane of existence. 

So when something in him tells him that there’s someone powerful in his near vicinity, his eyes immediately snap over to where they were. 

But all he could see there was Tommy. And he knew that there was someone else there, someone who was with his younger brother, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. Not when Tommy was right there. 

The boy seems frozen in place, unmistakably tense where he stands and stares at Wilbur with wide eyes. Wilbur can’t help but be slightly offended by the fear that creeps into the blue-eyed boy’s posture, even as he recalls the details of their last meeting. Ah, yes, that was right. Wilbur had nearly killed his… friend? Whoever the godling had been to Tommy. Though, he supposed that it didn’t matter right now. 

“Oh,” comes another voice, and Wilbur’s eyes dart to where Ranboo stands beside Tommy. “We found him anyway.”

Fucking Ranboo. Right in front of him. 

Of course. Of course they would somehow have managed to be together. His mother was sure to be laughing at him right now, given all the whining he’d done in regard to not being able to search for Tommy while Techno had slaved away in an attempt to find any new information on Ranboo. 

“What the fuck?” comes Tommy’s voice, and Wilbur watches with a stupefied expression as the boy turns to his companion, looking downright distraught. “You know this dickhead? What the hell do you mean we found him? He fucking found me! This is the same son of a bitch that nearly killed me!”

“He tried to kill you?” Ranboo echoes, visibly confused. “No, uh, Wilbur was supposed to help you. He was the one who…”

There was a growing look of horror dawning on Ranboo’s face but Tommy speaks before they have the chance to say anything. “He’s the fucker who chased me into the sewers, Boo. Why the fuck do you think we met?”

“Tommy,” Wilbur breathes, a myriad of emotions flooding through him before he finally settles on something despondent. He doesn’t know why he’s surprised that Tommy had thought they were after his blood. It makes a shocking amount of sense from the boy’s perspective, even if it pains Wilbur to admit it. 

“Shut the fuck up,” Tommy growls, and Wilbur nearly growls right back at the animosity in his tone. Then he watches as Tommy seems to descend into something like despair and loses the anger that had begun to brew beneath his skin. Tommy keeps talking, a tremor to his voice as it grows louder. “Shut the fuck up! You don’t know me. Don’t fucking say my name like you do.”

“I wouldn’t kill you,” Wilbur somewhat desperately tries to correct, his voice too-quiet as the understanding that Tommy genuinely believed that he would- that he did- sinks in, but it falls on deaf ears. 

“You chased me down an alleyway! You nearly killed… you nearly killed Tubbo!” Tommy bites back at him, choking on the words. Had something happened between them, then? Him and the godling that had stolen from Wilbur? How convenient. Tommy sounds downright livid as he pushes forwards, spitting out an infuriated array of insulting phrases. “Why wouldn’t I think that you want me dead?! You… You fucking wrong’un! You right bitch! You fucking–”

“Gods,” Wilbur muses, both amused and unimpressed by his ire. “You haven’t changed at all.”

“You must think this is really funny, huh?” Tommy continues, even more irate by Wilbur’s response, and Ranboo makes a small noise of discomfort even though the words aren’t directed at them. “Finding a kid who looks like your dead brother. I’m not him. So what if we had the same name? So what if I happen to have blonde hair and blue eyes? I’d rather die than–”

Ranboo grabs Tommy’s shoulder and the boy quiets, still trembling from head to toe. Whatever had happened in Wilbur’s absence, it hadn’t been good. It’s hard to focus on much of anything over the ringing in his ears. I’d rather die. He doesn’t know what he feels about hearing his brother say such a thing, especially given the circumstances, but it isn’t good. 

“I won’t let you,” Wilbur hisses slowly, and it’s not a reassurance as much as it is a threat. He takes a step forward, nothing more than a predator locking eyes with its prey. The motion is slow, calculated. He’s more than aware of Tommy’s dreadful habit of running and isn’t keen on letting it happen a second time. “So best believe me that if you try, I’ll make you regret it.”

Techno can go fuck himself. He’s bringing his little brother home. 

Speaking of the bastard, Wilbur hears the door open before he sees his brother enter the room. “I didn’t find anything on…”

He can hear the way that Techno pauses upon seeing who’s in the room with them. Tommy’s face grows several shades paler and Ranboo looks even more sickly upon seeing Tommy’s reaction to their mentor. The former has begun to breathe more heavily as a reaction to the stress he was surely feeling, his hand tight in its grip around Ranboo’s own. 

Wilbur doesn’t dare take his eyes off of them, but he can hear the reverent covetousness in Techno’s voice as he breathes, “Theseus.”

Tommy goes white as a sheet as he begins quietly speaking to his friend. Wilbur can’t hear much more than a quiet, “Ranboo, Ranboo please. Ranboo we’ve gotta get the fuck out of here. I can’t fucking do this. I can’t fucking do this, Ranboo.”

Wilbur lunges without a second thought. 

Ranboo goes down first, easily persuaded into sleep as Wilbur’s fingers brush against their forehead with an intent of rest and a promise of safety. They’d always been easy to put under. He’d found that they were well-receptive to anything that felt like peace, like safety, like home. It made things simple whenever they’d had nightmares back in their castle home and needed to be pacified by some means other than normal grounding. 

Tommy shrieks when he watches them fall not into Wilbur’s arms but to Techno’s, who’d been well aware of what had been about to transpire if the harsh glare he sent Wilbur’s way was anything to go by, but Wilbur doesn’t spare it a second thought as his tone turns soft, soothing. 

“It’s okay, Toms,” he murmurs, embracing the boy even as he attempts to push and yank himself away by force. His hand curls into Tommy’s blonde hair, brushing against it softly. He pushes whatever feelings of comfort he can muster past Tommy’s defenses and into his very soul and feels as his brother grows more lax against him despite his best efforts to stay alert. “It’ll be alright. When you wake up we’ll be home and you’ll have come back to us. Everything will be just fine, so all you need to do is go to sleep.”

He knows very well that Tommy doesn’t feel much of anything after that. 

////

Tommy wakes up screaming.

It’s an odd sort of awakening, one that jars him significantly. For a moment, he thinks that he’s by the god that had sent him into sleep. It takes longer than he’d ever like to admit to realize that he’s not awake at all. This place, wherever he is, is a dream. 

He hadn’t dreamt like this since the last time he’d seen The Woolgatherer, something that made him fall deeper into the pit of despair that had been growing deep within him for the last day. Words couldn’t describe how he felt about what had happened to him. Running away with Ranboo had been supposed to be a means to help him. Instead, he’d found himself in the clutches of the very entity that he’d been trying to avoid. 

He doesn’t want to think that Ranboo would betray him. From the look on his friend’s face and their reaction to his words when he’d revealed who the god– who Wilbur was to him, they hadn’t known that Wilbur and the other god had been who he’d run from that day in the market. It didn’t stop the horribly familiar sense of betrayal from creeping into his blood. Could he really trust Ranboo? Could he trust anyone at all anymore?

He wasn’t even going to try and unpack what had happened with Wilbur, the visceral fear that he’d felt when the god had promised him pain should he try to or even insinuate that he would die. 

I won’t let you die. So best believe me that if you try, I’ll make you regret it. 

Absolutely fucking terrifying. Somehow, the fear that he’d felt when seeing Dream again was nothing in comparison to this, especially when Madness had put him to sleep with nothing but a few sickly sweet words and a too-tight embrace. Whatever Wilbur wanted, whatever he and his companion were capable of, Tommy was terrified of the possibilities. 

He’d promised that when Tommy awoke, he would be home. Somehow, Tommy had the sneaking suspicion that the home he spoke about wasn’t the one that Tommy so badly wanted to return to. 

He takes a deep breath, or rather tries to, and focuses on what’s around him now. He’s not in a cabin, or anywhere else that feels comforting or oddly familiar. Instead his dreams have placed him in a voice of endless black. It extends in all directions, even above and below him, and Tommy has the sudden thought that he doesn’t know how to leave. Or how to wake. 

He tries to quell the panic brewing in his veins, thinking hard on some sort of solution. The Woolgatherer, however much of a bitch it may be, had mentioned something about finding him in a place that wasn’t part of whatever dreamscape existed in this world. The Inbetween, if he remembered correctly. Was that where he was now? Some place between realities, stuck with no way to get out. 

This time, he can’t stop himself from panicking. 

“Hello? Woolgatherer?!” He shouts into the darkness, voice cracking. “Is anyone there? Come out already, you fucking pussy! I know you wanted me to come back. Well, I’m fucking here, so don’t just– don’t just–”

Don’t just leave me here, he wants to say, but can’t bring himself to choke out the words. 

Who does he even have left? Tubbo isn’t someone he can rely on anymore, not after what he had found and run away from. Ranboo was complicated, someone he wanted to trust but couldn’t bring himself to when they were in cahoots with the people who’d tried and succeeded in hunting him down. He didn’t know how much he trusted The Woolgatherer, how much he wanted to, but the thought that the entity would leave him to the void when he’d made promises of helping him made him sick to his stomach. 

“Hello?!” He shouts again as his breathing picks up. He’s about to completely break down in the blackness encompassing him from every direction when–

“Tommy?” a soft, horribly sweet voice calls. 

He knows who it is before he even turns to face them. The Woolgatherer stands a ways away, a beacon of color in the darkness surrounding them. He looks sad, almost uncertain as he stares towards Tommy with all-white eyes. The blue dripping from them runs down his face at a slow pace, dripping down his cheeks and into the abyss below their nonexistent floor. 

Its cardigan is covered in rips and tears, covered in new patches that Tommy doesn’t remember being there the last time he’d seen the figure. Its wings are mottled in dirty feathers like they hadn’t been properly taken care of in the time they’d last met, and the small decorative appendages at either side of his head droop pathetically. 

Tommy can’t help but wonder what the hell happened to him to make him look this shitty. 

Tommy tries to think of something to say, then falls short as the weight of everything comes crashing back down onto him. What even is there to say? Hey, so, you were right about everything and the one person I wanted to trust was planning to betray me? How’s it going now that I’m back and you’re the only one who bothered to tell me the truth? 

He has half a mind to tell the stupid phantom prick to go fuck himself for having the audacity to be right about Tubbo. To curse himself for not bothering to listen to its warning and choosing to put all of his faith into the boy who’d wanted to sell him out to the delusional deities who now deemed him a replacement for their dead brother. 

“Oh sunshine, what’s wrong?” The Woolgatherer asks him with the same soft tone, and Tommy breaks down completely. 

He can’t stop the tears that leak from his eyes and down his face in a horrible mirror of the ghost’s own, and everything feels like it's finally reached the point where he’s shattering into something that can’t be pieced back together as an ugly sob tears itself from his throat. Everything is just too much. 

He’s stranded in another reality. His best friend (and only friend in years) never really considered him a friend in the first place. He’s just been kidnapped and is doomed to be forced into a narrative he wants no part in. He has nothing, no one to turn to in order to help him. No one but the entity in front of him who looks at him with so much sympathy that Tommy almost loathes it. He would usually loathe it, but right now he can’t help but yearn for the comfort, for the promises of safety and companionship that The Woolgatherer had tried to give him before. 

The world around them shifts, turning into a flower field that feels familiar but also not at the same time, and Tommy is hit with an odd sense of deja vu but isn’t able to linger on it before he feels arms wrapping around him in a warm embrace. It’s not warm in the sense that The Woolgatherer is warm, no, The Woolgatherer’s touch is cold and doesn’t feel like it's given by someone who has life to them. 

It’s warm because as The Woolgatherer hugs him like he’s something to be treasured, like he’s something precious instead of the coward of a boy that he knows he is. It’s not like how Tubbo and Ranboo had comforted him, there for him but still a safe distance away. It’s not like Wilbur, tight and possessive and completely unyielding despite his best efforts to escape his hold. It’s just… calming. Soothing in its consolement and something entirely foreign to him. 

Tommy clings onto the phantom, arms raising to dig his hands into the back of its sweater. It’s not nearly as nice as the ghost-like deity is to him, but Tommy has always been the type to dig his teeth and nails into the things that he cared for in an attempt to make sure they wouldn’t let him go. Holding onto things too tight only to be inevitably disappointed was all he knew how to do. 

“You— You were right. He was going to give me up,” Tommy sobs into The Woolgatherer’s shoulder. His voice breaks as he continues and he hates it. “He was going to fucking give me to them! Like I meant jack shit! And then when I left, I ran into those fucking asshole gods again. They fucking took me. I’m with them now, it’s why I’m here. I don’t… I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

The words turn violent towards the end, spat out with all the hatred and anger he can muster (which is admittedly not much). The Woolgatherer takes it in stride, running a talon-tipped hand through his hair comfortingly. Tommy is all-too aware that if he really wanted to, the entity could tear past flesh and sinew and crush his skull with claws like that, but he can’t bring himself to care. 

“It’s okay,” the deity tells him, drawing him closer into its embrace. “I’m here, darling. I’m not going anywhere. I won’t betray you.”

He can’t tell whether or not the words are softly spoken lies, but Tommy can’t really bring himself to care. It’s what he needs to hear, even if part of him is disgusted in himself for bathing in the reassurance that the entity gives him. If he doesn’t have anything else, at least (if only for this moment) he has this. 

“Who took you, Tommy?” the phantom croons in his ear. The words are said in a lilt, near hypnotic and poised carefully to coax him into confessing what had happened. For what reason, he did not know. 

Tommy finds the answer spilling from his lips before he can stop it, the melodic hum The Woolgatherer gives consolation urging him to speak. “Ranboo said his name is Wilbur. I think… I think he’s the God of Madness or some shit. The Blood God was there too. The first one knocked out Ranboo and then the fucker put me to sleep before I could even do anything.”

The Woolgatherer’s grip on him tightens to the point that it’s almost hard to breathe, and if Tommy had been able to see its face, he would’ve noted that it had shifted into an expression of unadulterated rage. 

But Tommy can’t see its expression from his place in its hold, so all he can do is make a small noise of pain, attempting to push away only to find that he can’t. For a moment, he’s back with Wilbur, unable to escape the God of Madness as he lulls Tommy to sleep with some supernatural ability. He pushes at The Woolgatherer’s chest, harder this time, and it finally relents its grip on Tommy, backing away like it realized what it had been doing. 

“Oh,” it murmurs, drawing back in on itself. The entity’s wings drape around itself like a cloak, almost like it feels guilty for making him panic. “I didn’t mean to alarm you. What you said had just… surprised me, is all. Madness is such a fickle entity to deal with. I can’t help but worry. Surely you can understand why.”

He furrows his brows in thought, staring at the deity before him in confusion. Part of what he says doesn’t make sense to him. But at the end of the day, Tommy can understand why The Woolgatherer would worry. He was worried too, for himself, for Ranboo, for his fate in the hands of Madness and Blood and Death. However, that’s not what puzzles him. From the way he speaks, it almost sounds like the phantom is familiar with Wilbur.

He doesn’t get the chance to question it before The Woolgatherer speaks again, hand brushing against Tommy’s cheekbone gently as it fusses over his wellbeing, “Has he hurt you?”

Tommy draws back at the touch. At the question, he’s reminded of the threat that Wilbur had dished out upon hearing Tommy’s declaration that he would rather die than go with him. He hadn’t even gotten to finish the sentence before Madness had promised something awful if he said something like that again. 

The thought of telling his newfound companion what had happened makes him want to be sick. It’s not like there’s much he can do, given that the phantom is stuck in his dreams and can’t follow him back to the waking world. There isn’t any point in telling it what Wilbur had said, not when the very reminder of it made Tommy’s gut twist with something awful and terrified. 

“No,” Tommy says in a too-quiet voice because it’s technically the truth. Wilbur had threatened him, yes, but he hadn’t hurt him. Not yet. 

The Woolgatherer just fixes Tommy with a stare that makes it abundantly clear that it doesn’t believe him. The entity’s hands hover around him, eyes searching over him like it's looking for wounds that aren’t yet there. “You can’t possibly expect me to believe that.”

“I’m fine,” Tommy snaps more harshly than he intends. He hadn’t mean to sound mean, but people around him had gotten into a habit of making him feel more cornered than he’s comfortable with as of late. When the deity frowns at him deeply in what seems to be disappointment, Tommy mutters an apology and tries again. “I’m… I’m fine, okay? Just drop it. It’s nothing I want to talk about. It’s fucking whatever.”

“Tommy,” the deity tries to console, but Tommy has already decided that he’s done with the topic at hand and promptly switches it to something more pressing to him. 

“How the hell do you know him anyway?”

It should’ve been a simple question, but the phantom stiffens near imperceptibly. His tension, however, is much more visible in the array of emotions that flit across his face. Surprise, then something akin to bitter resentment, then anger finally setting into resigned indifference. It’s the most he’s seen the entity emote in a negative manner other than the time it had claimed certain people had made it less inclined to be kind when falling into its domain. It’s enough to prove to Tommy that whatever happened between The Woolgatherer and Wilbur, it was personal. 

“It isn’t important,” it tries to tell him, blank white eyes staring into him. The ultramarine liquid dripping down its face has slowed to a near-stop, now sizzling against his skin. Tommy isn’t sure what the reaction is supposed to mean, but he presses onwards anyway. He needs to know anything he can about Wilbur, especially since he’s planning on getting the hell out of his clutches as soon as he can. 

“Please,” is all Tommy can bring himself to say. He hates that he even says it in the first place and he tells himself that it’s not breaching the threshold of begging– it’s not– and thankfully the god decides to grace him with an answer before he needs to stoop even lower, though it's not the one he wanted. 

“Another time, sunshine,” The Woolgatherer tells him, and Tommy opens his mouth to protest. The deity just presses a finger to his lips, shushing him. It floats before him in the field of wildflowers they’re still in the middle of, backing away as Tommy snaps his teeth at its finger. In his defense, it shouldn’t have gotten that close. He’s feral enough to want to bite. The phantom looks at him sadly as Tommy scrubs the blue from his face, from where it had gotten on his clothes during their earlier embrace. “For now, I think it’s about time you woke up.”

Fingers brush against his forehead before he can protest. The floral scent around him spirals into nothingness, and Tommy is sent back to the waking world without another word from his mouth. 

Only, waking up is as monumental of a task as swimming through sand. Though he knows he’s awake now, he can’t open his eyes. He can hardly even move, overtaken by a wave of calm, calm, calm that keeps him lying… well, wherever he is. 

He can tell that he’s in a car from the light jostling he can feel around him and there’s faint voices, both saying something he can’t quite make out. It’s hard to make out much of anything over the overwhelming calamity that weighs him down. He half-coherently understands that he’s lying down, head in someone’s lap as someone’s nails scratch idly at his scalp. 

It’s a soothing action, but one that is entirely unwelcome. It’s the oddest thing, knowing that he should be terrified but isn’t as he dooms himself to staying still. He tries to make a noise, to protest and draw back from the touch, but it just comes out as a quiet sigh. 

The hand twisting through his hair pauses, and he hears a faint huff of laughter from beside him. A low, deep voice that he doesn’t recognize sounds just clearly enough for him to understand.

“Welcome home, Theseus.”

This time when he inevitably falls back asleep, he doesn’t dream at all. 

Chapter Text

“Are you not going to eat?”

Tommy’s been staring at the plate in front of him for the last twenty minutes, not bothering to pick up the fork beside his plate. He hasn’t looked up at the people sitting at the table with him, not even when they tried speaking to him directly. It was abundantly clear that he didn’t want to be there, which was the exact point that he was trying to make. 

His freedom had already been robbed from him in a physical sense. The only thing he really had left from him was his spite and he would be damned if they broke him down completely. 

After waking up, any sadness or despair he’d felt had quickly turned into rage. He was angry that Tubbo had betrayed him, he was angry at the unfortunate coincidence that had led him into the arms of the gods he’d been running from, and he was angry that he couldn’t go back to his original world and forget about all of this entirely. He never thought he’d grow to miss living on the streets and scrounging around daily to survive, but he definitely was now. 

The anger was something he was familiar with. It was a spark in him that he knew even the deities around him wouldn’t be able to put out. Tommy, if not anything else, was a stubborn son of a bitch. The spiteful kind that made him keep it all to himself until it slashed out of him like a burning flame. 

So he doesn’t answer the stupid prick trying to get his attention. He was seated at the end of the table, as far as he could get from Madness and Blood. Ranboo was there too, but they’d been uncharacteristically quiet. He didn’t know why they hadn’t just gotten them both out of there, but he had a feeling it had something to do with the way they looked at him with an unidentifiable sort of sadness. 

Instead of gracing Wilbur with a response, Tommy looks up at him– the first time he’d done such a thing since sitting down– and slowly pushes his plate with a hand until it clatters off the ornate table and smashes against the floor. Shards of porcelain immediately scatter everywhere, spiderwebbing outwards against the marble floor alongside whatever food had been on his plate. 

“Choke and die, bitch,” he hisses afterwards, holding onto the anger like a vice. It helps him mask the fear that’s been choking him since waking up here. Wherever here was. 

Wilbur’s face contorts into something unpleasantly surprised before shifting over into anger, but he doesn’t say anything. He just looks at Tommy for a long moment, something unreadable in his gaze before pushing back from the table. He stands with a practiced sort of grace, but Tommy can see the way he shakes slightly in his ire at Tommy’s perceived insolence. 

“I’m going to go find Phil,” Wilbur says tightly. His eyes flick over to the pink-haired bitch who’s been just as quiet as Tommy’s been the whole time they’ve been seated. The God of Madness pauses for a moment, considering his words with careful purpose. “Techno– Just… you know what? Do whatever the fuck you want, I don’t care. I’ll be back later.”

He leaves without another word, the door to the dining hall slamming behind him. 

Clearly, the stupid bastard was mad that his found family fantasy wasn’t working out as intended. Good. Tommy’s already decided that he fucking hates the guy. 

He can feel eyes on him and he looks back over to Ranboo, who’s staring at him in concern, but as soon as their eyes meet they immediately avoid his stare. Tommy can’t help but silently hope that they feel some sort of guilt. Tommy doesn’t really care for what. It makes no difference to him as long as Ranboo is suffering alongside him for the escape route they refused to take. 

He supposed that part of the anger was also a means of provoking the gods. It was a test as much as it was a defense mechanism.  A test to see how far he could go before they decided that they’d had enough of their patience and actually hurt him. Perhaps it was selfish, but Tommy wanted them to snap eventually. Hurting him meant that they didn’t actually see him as their dead brother. It meant that their delusions were just that, delusions. 

So far, between the silence and the broken plate and the insults, Tommy hadn’t done nearly as much as he’d planned to do in order to antagonize them. He hadn’t thought up a long-term plan yet, but he supposed that fucking with them was good enough of a plan for the time being. 

As if unable to stand the tension in the room, Ranboo stands as well. “I’m… uh…. I’m going to go check on him.”

They bow their head at both pink-hair (or rather Techno) and Tommy before scuttling out the door, shutting it quietly instead of allowing it to slam shut. And then it’s just him and Techno in the room. Tommy tries to swallow his fear.

Instead of killing him or whatever else the God of War typically did to innocent bystanders in his usual pastimes, Techno just watches him in deafening silence. There’s something contemplatingly calculative in his stare and Tommy can’t help but feel deeply unsettled. It’s almost like he’s looking into Tommy’s very soul, trying to decide what to pick apart in order to best wear him down. 

“Tell me,” Techno finally says, his voice deep and undoubtedly prying. “Have you ever heard the story of Sisyphus?”

Tommy hasn’t. It sounds Greek, though, so he figures that it's some sort of mythological figure– undoubtedly a tale that ends in blood and the hero’s tragic end. (Which, that’s not exactly what the story of Sisyphus is about, but how is Tommy to know that?) Tommy elects to pointedly refuse to answer him. Life feels just a little bit better when he’s ignoring the bitch who helped kidnap him.

After a moment of Tommy neglecting to answer Techno, the man speaks again. This time there’s something cold in his steel-edged tone. “Sisyphus was a king in myth, one that thought he was much more valuable than most mortals dared to believe. He knew a secret kept from a minor deity by the king of the gods, Zeus.”

Tommy continues to ignore him, internally debating whether or not it would be a better idea to flee from the scene entirely and lock himself back in his rooms. The story didn’t appear to have anything to do with him, but there was still a tendril of dread curling in his gut as if to tell him that it would be. He isn’t sure he likes what it insinuates. 

“But he gave up Zeus’s secret– that he had stolen the river god Asopus’ daughter– in exchange for the river god creating an eternal stream for his kingdom, Corinth,” Techno continues, still staring Tommy down. He can feel the hair on the back of his neck rise, but the pink-haired deity doesn’t pause. “Because of his blasphemy, Zeus ordered that Thanatos, the God of Death, chain Sisyphus in the deepest depths of the Underworld.”

“What the fuck are you on about?” Tommy spits at him at last, looking up from where he’d been staring down at the wood of the table. “I don’t care about your shitty stories.”

Techno doesn’t seem to care. “Sisyphus thought himself smarter than the King of the Gods and sensed Thanatos coming, binding him in his own chains. Because the God of Death was bound, no one died on the mortal plane above. There was an uproar due to the lack of death until Ares, the god who shared my domain, grew bored of his deathless battles and freed Thanatos out of spite, delivering the king back to Thanatos with the intent to have him killed.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Tommy asks again, fingers clenching into fists where he still sits. 

Listen, something seems to whisper in his ear. You need to listen. 

He can’t bring himself to tell the invading presence to fuck off.

“But before Sisyphus had gone to the Underworld, he’d told his wife to throw his dead body clothesless into the square once his life was taken from him. He told her to do it in order to prove her love to him, but when she went through with his plans, he instead appealed to the Queen of the Underworld to let him return to the land of the living for three days on the grounds that his wife had disrespected him,” Techno tells him, eyes still boring into Tommy’s soul.

“I don’t care about this,” Tommy tries again. The underlying themes of hubris in defying the gods is blatant in the story. It’s a story of cunning trickery sure to end in pain, and something about a god telling him this doesn’t sit well with him. 

Techno doesn’t listen. “The Queen listened and allowed him to return to the mortal plane, but Sisyphus didn’t go back to the Underworld as promised. Instead, he lived the rest of his life in his kingdom until he died of old age. Do you know what happened to him in retaliation for tricking the gods, Theseus?”

Ice shoots through Tommy’s veins, freezing over his heart. That isn’t his name. It hasn’t been for years. “Don’t fucking call me that. That’s not my name. You… You don’t get to call me that.”

He desperately tries to ignore the way his voice cracks. It feels wrong, almost, to hear that name from anyone that isn’t his parents. His parents, who were dead and he would never see again. He hadn’t been Theseus Innes in a long time. That kid had died somewhere between that one winter and him ditching the system. 

“It’s your name, isn’t it?” Techno asks him, goading. 

“Fuck you,” Tommy snarls back, uncaring that he’s taking the bait. 

“The gods took him after death and gave him eternal punishment. Sisyphus was to roll a boulder up a hill, only for it to roll all the way back down once he’d reached the top,” Techno finishes. He still hasn’t blinked and the way he looks at Tommy is predatory. “You cannot escape the gods, Theseus. We have more than one way of ensuring that.”

“So what I’m supposed to take away from that is that you’ll torture me if I try to leave? That you think I believe I’m smart enough to trick you all?” Tommy hisses despite the way his hands shake. He knows that’s not the point. It was obvious from the moment Techno started the story. 

It wasn’t about killing him or torturing him or him thinking he was better. It was just meant to nail in the fact that he couldn’t escape. That they were above mortal standards for getting what they wanted and he couldn’t stop them from keeping him. He can’t bring himself to acknowledge it. 

 “There’s no point in trying to fight Fate,” Techno hums after a moment of quiet. “We won’t torture you and you’ll never die, Theseus. But you will always be ours.”

“I’m not–” Tommy starts, cutting himself off before he can finish. The words fall from his lips after a choked silence. “I’m not yours. I’m not your brother. I know I look like him, or I talk like him, or whatever it is you think makes me him, but I’m not. I’m not.”

“Do you really think we’re so shallow as to pick you based on appearance alone? We can see into your soul. We know you aren’t him,” Techno begins, eyes boring into him once more. “You’ll never be him. But you’re a version of him. I don’t see why the specifics after that matter.”

Tommy’s world stops. Then starts. Then stops again. 

They know he’s not from this world. They know he’s not meant to be here and they’re trying to keep him here anyway. It’s the most selfish thing Tommy’s ever heard, and he’d know a thing or two about acts of spite. 

His mind draws back to the other thing Techno had said only moments before. You’ll never die, Theseus. He feels nauseous to the point that it’s an effort not to vomit bile all over the table. They really plan to keep him here? Forever or an eternity or however else things worked? Even he knows that he can’t hold out for that long. 

He knows about Stockholm Syndrome, even the platonic kinds. It sounds an awful lot like that’s what awaits him if he stays here. A sort of emotional dependency hellbent on seeing him as family when he wants nothing more than to be free of them. 

“I’m going back to my room,” he says, words coming out cracked in their panic. It’s suddenly hard to breathe, hard to think, hard to see what’s in front of him as he pushes back from the table. The chair he was sitting on clatters to the floor, but he doesn’t pay it any mind as he runs from the dining hall.

He can hardly tell what’s going on around him as he runs back to his room, feet slamming against the marble floor hard enough that he winces. He refuses to stop. He doesn’t slow at all until he’s back at the door to the room he’d woken up in that morning, clamoring with the door handle until it opens and he can shut himself inside. 

The room itself is a prison in its own right. Not because of the lack of sanctuary it provides, but because he knows that it isn’t his. There’s decorations, of course, and he’s not stupid enough to think that they’d actually given him their Theseus’ old room, but everything in there seems perfectly tailored to their idealized version of him. The bed sheets are red, his favorite color, but the shade is wrong. There’s a little carved figurine of a cow on the desk, but it’s not a highland cow like the kind he likes. It’s as if everything is exactly how he likes it but tilted off on its axis. 

It unsettles him. How much of this had been put here based on the knowledge they kept of their dead brother? What did he deserve to become an almost replacement for that? 

Alone at last, Tommy allows himself to break down. It’s something he’s done multiple times since waking up in the solitude of his newfound captivity. He’s been sure to do it when there was no one else around to give him shit for it– or god forbid, try to comfort him. This time, however, the sobs are shoulder shaking and ugly as they rip from his throat. 

They know. They know that he’s not theirs, that he’s not their brother reanimated, that he’s from somewhere else entirely, and they’re hellbent on keeping him here anyway. And the line, the fucking line that Techno had said. 

They didn’t plan on letting him die. It was a chilling realization, the sort that made his blood freeze over in his veins. It wasn’t the presumably immortal fate now looming on the horizon that scared him. It was the fact that he couldn’t outrun or outlast them. It was as he said before, an eternity was a long time to wait. Tommy wasn’t stupid enough to think that he could hold out forever. 

That left the question of how to escape. Techno’s warning had scared him, sure, but it hadn’t entirely deterred him from wanting to run. He didn’t think he could outsmart them, but maybe he could sneak around them. He wasn’t going to try playing into things, not yet. That in particular was a dangerous game to play. 

God, this was all bullshit. It was such fucking bullshit. He has to resist the urge to scream as his despair turns into something burning and white-hot. He’s angry again, but he can’t bring himself to care. It’s been one of the three emotions he’s been cycling through in the last twenty-four hours, the other two being horror and grief. 

“Fuck!” he hisses through his teeth before digging his fingers into his hair. He’s curled into himself on the floor in the corner of the room, far from the comfort of the bed that feels wrong to lie on. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Tommy makes sure to keep his sobs and half-screamed insults as quiet as he can, tucking himself further into the corner as if he could disappear into the wall and leave the room entirely. What did he even have left? A god haunting his dreams and a sort-of friend who refused to get him out of here? It wasn’t much. It wasn’t anything. He doesn’t think he’s regretted taking that fuckass watch as much as he does now.

He’s about to get up and chuck the cow figurine he’d seen on the desk directly at the wall in an attempt to shatter it when there’s a knock at his door. Tommy freezes, pausing where he’s sitting as he stares at the door. It doesn’t open. The handle doesn’t even turn. 

“Toms?” calls a too-sweet voice. He immediately knows who it is. 

He doesn’t answer Wilbur and he doesn’t want to, so he keeps quiet and tries his best to stifle the sobs that have turned into near-silent sniffling. Wilbur doesn’t seem to care about his refusal to answer and he hears a deep sigh from the other side of the door. 

“You know,” Madness begins, “when I first got here, I was difficult, too.”

A bitter laugh. Tommy has to refrain from snapping that he doesn’t want to hear whatever sob story Wilbur is about to tell. 

“I understand that you aren’t happy with me right now– with any of us,” he continues. Tommy screws his eyes shut and withholds the urge to cover his ears. “But I promise you that we don’t intend to hold you hostage. You aren’t a prisoner.”

He sure feels like one. He isn’t sure Wilbur has the same definition of freedom as he does. 

“I told myself when I saw you in the market that there isn’t a world in which you don't deserve to be loved,” Wilbur exhales through the door and this time, Tommy actually flinches. Because there is reverence in his tone, in the way that he breathes the words so wholeheartedly. Despite everything, despite the fact that he’s bitter and angry and pissed the fuck off that this is happening to him to begin with, Tommy’s heart clenches. 

No one has ever spoken about him like that. 

And it’s obvious that Wilbur means it, even after Tommy had pissed him off at the dining table. He can’t understand why. It’s foreign to him, this level of devotion. For a moment, he wonders if being a part of their family would really be a bad thing after all. 

And then the moment ends and he resolifies the mentality that he can’t stay. That they’re still keeping him here against his will, even if they think their intentions are pure of heart. So Tommy still refuses to grace Wilbur with a response, even as his words still ring throughout Tommy’s head. There isn’t a world in which you don’t deserve to be loved. 

It’s all he’s ever wanted to hear and it comes from the mouth of the man who kidnapped him. Bullshit, he thinks again. It was such fucking bullshit. 

“I know it probably doesn’t mean much,” Wilbur continues through the door, “But you’ll be happy here eventually, I promise. There isn’t anything we wouldn’t do for you. We just can’t let you leave.”

The words are kind, too kind for what he knew of Wilbur and his behavior, but Tommy allows himself a moment to bask in them anyway. Just a moment where he can pretend that things aren’t as bad as they actually are and that he can trust that Wilbur is telling the truth. A glorified daydream, but it calms him to indulge in it nonetheless. 

He still says nothing, even when Wilbur finally sighs a goodbye and leaves him to his own devices. 

He says nothing for a long time after that, either. He doesn’t even bother to move from his corner. 

He cries again, but this time for a completely different reason. It was cruel, he decided, that the world would do this to him. That it would put him into a situation like this where his captors told him things he’d never before gotten to hear from the mouth of his family and promised him the very earth he walked on. It was cruel that the only catch was that he couldn’t leave and find freedom of his own. 

A cage of gilded gold. That’s what it was. But a cage still. 

He can’t help but miss Tubbo. Even after everything, even after the ram-horned boy betrayed him and planned to leave him to rot anyways, Tommy can’t bring himself to loathe him. He’d lied before when he said that he hoped Tubbo was found by what he was running from. It had been said out of anger, mostly. Despite the betrayal still fresh in his blood, he can’t help but wish that Tubbo was here to dull the pain. 

He’ll probably never see him again, he realizes. He isn’t sure he’s happy with the idea, even as a part of him screams that it's for the better. 

There’s a vwoop to his left, and he startles when he finds Ranboo in his room, standing near the edge of the bed. It takes a minute for them to locate him in his designated place in the corner and their face falls when they finally do. “...Tommy?”

“Why can’t you get me out?” is all he asks, and his voice sounds flat and dull even to himself. Ranboo looks visibly torn as they stare back at him, not saying anything at all for a long moment and letting the silence between them settle into something awkward and wrong. 

“I–” Ranboo starts, then stops themself with pursed lips. There’s purple magic sparking around their hands, but Tommy figures that it’s due to anxiety more so than anything embarrassed or excited. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I really am. I want to, I do, I just… I can’t.”

It makes Tommy wonder if the gods here are holding something against Ranboo as well. He certainly wouldn’t be surprised if they were. It doesn’t stop him from feeling resentful that they refuse to help him. Especially so soon after Tubbo.

“Whatever,” Tommy scowls, deflecting the subject in a bitter tone. “It’s fine. I don’t care.”

He does. He really does.

“Tell me everything you know about them,” he says instead. When Ranboo looks hesitant to answer, he doubles down with a snapped, “Don’t give me that shit, boob bitch. You can’t help me get out. You said so yourself. You can give me this much. If you can’t then you might as well fucking leave.”

It’s much harsher than Tommy intends it to be but he doesn’t take it back. Doesn’t dare when he needs to know as much as he can about the gods in order to get the hell out of here on his own. 

“Technoblade is older than Wilbur,” Ranboo begins after another moment of tentative reluctance. “He usually spends his time in the training yard or the library. Sometimes he just wanders through the halls checking locks and making sure that the castle is secure. He used to do it a lot more frequently when I first, uh, arrived. It died down after a while, but…”

Tommy can read between the lines and notes that he can expect to run into the Blade if he tries to sneak his way through the castle halls. 

“He likes gold,” Ranboo continues. “It distracts him, sometimes. I, um, can’t really think of anything else for him. Wilbur I don’t know much about. He didn’t spend as much time with me as Techno did. He can control people with his voice, though. He likes music…? And the markets outside the castle. He would go see them with me sometimes.”

Tommy vaguely remembers Wilbur trying to control him. At least, that’s what he thinks happened. It was hard to tell when whatever Wilbur was attempting didn’t work. It had been back in that alley when he was moments away from throwing himself into the sewer. Wilbur’s voice had turned weird, like there was some sort of otherworldly power to it, but it hadn’t compelled Tommy to do much of anything at all. He still wasn’t sure why.

He elects to keep the information from Ranboo, just in case. 

“And Death?” Tommy asks tightly, because he hasn’t forgotten that the Empire was ruled over by that god in specific. 

“Phil is…” Ranboo starts, and Tommy has to hold himself back from blurting something stupid. 

How fucking insane was it that the God of Death– literal death– was named fucking Phil. It sounded like the type of name an old white dad halfway through his second divorce would have, not the incarnation of rot and decay. He’d heard the name tossed around by Wilbur only once that morning but hadn’t thought much about it at the time. He’d been too busy trying to avoid everyone at the table to note the name. 

“Phil’s just a guy,” Ranboo says and Tommy nearly balks. “He cooks sometimes and he likes to tell stories about his wife. He has a reputation among the Antarctic’s citizens, yeah, but that’s just because he has to uphold it and instill fear into the hearts of his enemies, or whatever. He’s really just, I don’t know, a dad. I guess.”

Whatever Tommy had been expecting Ranboo to say, that wasn’t it. Really, it sounded like out of the three of them, Tommy would have to look out for Techno the most. Which, his name was fucking stupid too. What kind of name was Technoblade?

“Thanks,” Tommy says when he’s certain Ranboo is done. They didn’t give him much to work with, but not much was better than nothing at all. He’ll take what he can fucking get at this point, honestly. It was better than the alternative. 

“You’re welcome,” Ranboo replies before falling quiet. “And… I really am sorry, Tommy.”

Tommy looks away from them, refusing to acknowledge their words. “Just… get out. I want to be alone now.”

Ranboo frowns in visible dejection but nods, leaving without so much as another word. Tommy takes a bit to just sit in silence. He doesn’t move, not yet, but he mentally configures the base of his plan. 

The first step was exploring. He needed to figure out where he was and the ins and outs of the castle while avoiding whatever routes Techno took to patrol the halls. If he did that, he could move onto the next step, planning a way out. It would probably take a while and be a major pain in the ass to think through, but finding the best means of escape and taking it was all he really had. Tommy wasn’t sure where he would go when he made it out, whether it be back to Tubbo (probably not) or somewhere else entirely, but he’d have to run as far as he could once he did. 

He didn’t know how quickly the gods would try to find him once he escaped. If he could even escape in the first place. 

But that was it, his simple two-step plan to victory. It was sure to work, especially when it was formulated by him. No one would ever be able to keep Tommy Innit down, even if it killed him. Especially if it killed him. 

He waits a long while before daring to creep out of his room. The second he does, everything feels too loud. He forgoes his shoes in favor of socks to keep himself quieter against the marble flooring, ever so careful as he slinks out of his room and down the hall to his right. 

He doesn’t know where Technoblade is or when he can expect to run into him, but this is also the first time he’s trying to figure out the castle’s layout and he’ll have plenty of future opportunities even if this one does fall through. Despite their insistence that he can’t escape, their confidence in the matter was a weakness he could exploit. (Especially when it meant that no one was directly guarding his door. Idiots.)

By some stroke of luck, he manages to completely avoid Techno during his time exploring. Granted, he doesn’t find much other than hall after hall and a really ugly statue of someone he couldn’t recognize, but it was still a relief to know that the God of War wasn’t breathing down his neck. 

He’s about to call it a night and go back to his room when he sees it. 

It’s a tapestry. It’s weird that it catches his attention, given that he’s seen a bunch of them throughout the entirety of his excursion, but this one seems different. It depicts  the image of a forest beneath a full moon, crows with glittering red eyes perching upon the tree’s branches. There’s a stream towards the bottom of it, and the silver thread used seems to glow where it’s woven between lines of blue and grey and purple. 

He isn’t sure what it is, but there’s something about this tapestry that’s just… off. Like it was placed there in order to mask something important. He’s not sure if it’s intuition or something else entirely, but he reaches out, brushing his fingers against the woven thread to push it back slightly. 

And nearly startles when he realizes that there’s a door etched into the stone behind it. There’s a lock, because of course there is, but that doesn’t stop him from mentally cataloging the information for later. Tommy’s certain that whatever this door leads to, it’s important. It has to be. 

He’s about to turn back to try and (potentially) find the key when he’s stopped by a cheerful voice directly behind him. “Going somewhere, mate?”

He whirls around, only to be met with the Angel of Death himself, smiling at him gleaming eyes and sharp teeth.