Archive of Our Own

A flash of wings woke Wilbur up this morning. He’s tired of bad dreams. He has to remind himself that’s all they are. He has to convince himself, more like. His father does not have wings, his twin is not a pig, and his little brother is not the martyr of a war that Wilbur has sent him to die in. This is the real world. And the real world is just as terrifying.

The real world is fragile in a way that makes Wilbur Soot want to lay down in a dark room and never have to participate in society ever again. Things like capitalism, injustice, and the separation of Pangea aren’t quite as mind-numbingly terrifying, oddly enough. He knows he can’t fix those things. They’re scary, but the only thing scarier than not having control is knowing you do . At the end of the day, the things that rot away his insides and take hold inside of him are his father’s disappointment, the fact that he hasn’t seen his best friend in over a year, and his little brother’s hero worship that has begun to feel like suffocation. The things he could do to fix any of these things—participating in society like his twin rather than still mooching off of their father just months before their 27th birthday, a single phone call to Niki where he apologizes and genuinely means it because she has always been far kinder than he deserves, actually making an effort to be the good person and brother that Tommy thinks he looks up to—are far harder than they really should be, probably. But he knows he could fix them even easier. He knows he could breathe into the universe, and the universe would respond in kind. It takes a lot of self control to not. Wilbur is not the best with self control, admittedly, but he is piss-terrified of having control over the universe.

Things like capitalism and injustice, he doesn’t know if he could fix. They’re ideas more than physical things, and the very few times Wilbur has bent the universe to his whim, they’ve been physical things. He could, probably, say, “Pangea is still formed”, and like the past millions of years never happened, the world would be one. He could say, “My father does not play favorites, and even if he did, Technoblade is surely not the one”, and he would not longer see his worth dwindle in Phil’s eyes. But Wilbur doesn’t do any of those things. Wilbur tries not to think much about it; the idea that the world could be better if he said the word (the idea that the world could be worse if he said the word). He often fails.

“Can you stop angstin’ over my pancakes?” Technoblade interrupts his thoughts, nudging Wilbur away from the stove that is covered in a mess of flour and bits of egg. The batter Technoblade pours into the pan looks lumpier than usual.

“Did Tommy help you?” Wilbur asks, and the way Technoblade immediately sighs like the most harried man in all the world makes Wilbur smile. The past few months without Technoblade are becoming more familiar than the man being around, as an out-of-state college became an out-of-state job teaching history at the Colorado School of Mines. It’s rare for him to come home anymore, as apparently the shitty apartment he managed to score near-campus is more home to him than their childhood home, and Wilbur was almost sure he wouldn’t come up during spring break. According to Technoblade, “It’s different now that I’m actually teachin’, break isn’t about partyin’.” Phil had responded, “Your break has never been about partying, you can grade papers here.” and that had been that. It was odd having him back in the house, though. Wilbur was getting used to just heating up ramen and frozen waffles, and now Technoblade was back in the kitchen making them breakfast every morning. It’s odd, but it’s nice. 

“He didn’t break a measuring cup this time,” Technoblade says in a strained voice. He doesn’t continue. Apparently that’s the only good part of the experience he can name. Tommy never lost the desire to help with pointless tasks that most kids grew out of at the beginning of their teen years (things more about the time spent than the tasks done), but he also didn’t grow out of making an absolute mess of it every fucking time.

“Just lock him out of the house next time,” Wilbur suggests as he slides into a chair at the kitchen table. The shit sleep he got last night is making him feel a bit too winded to make fun of Technoblade standing up.

“You got mad at me last time I did that,” Technoblade complains. Wilbur tries to think back to when that was but he comes up with nothing. He doesn’t even remember an instance, and he personally locked Tommy out of the house about a month ago because the kid kept trying to steal his keys, insisting “I can drive, now, I’m old enough, let me drive the damn car” despite having literally no teaching at all. Apparently he was “built different” and would “just get it”. Wilbur wasn’t risking his car’s life on that kind of explanation. He let him back in once he realized Tommy was trying to hot wire his car, despite not having a Goddamn clue how to hot wire a car either.

“When was this?”

“Couple years back? You were all, Technoblade, he’s gonna run away and get hit by a car and die and-”

“That was 7 years ago, Technoblade!” Wilbur cries, finally remembering the instance from a near fucking decade ago. “He was 10 and was only here like a week at that point!” Wilbur remembers the freakout hadn’t only been on Tommy’s behalf, but he was also concerned that leaving a 10 year old outside with no supervision, food, or water for hours would probably get Phil in trouble and he would be taken to jail or something. Wilbur and Technoblade were already 19 by that point, so it wouldn’t have changed much for them, but he was already fairly fond of the annoying 10 year old, as well as of his father not being in jail.

“I don’t see your point,” Techno says with a shrug. Wilbur would dispute him further, even if it is just Technoblade giving him shit for the sake of giving him shit, but he puts a plate of pancakes in front of Wilbur and that’s all that really matters now. The second the plate hits the table, however, Tommy has grabbed it and pulled it toward his seat as he plops into it.

“Do you fucking mind?” Wilbur complains. He tries to snatch the plate back, but Tommy keeps a tight grip as he lifts it away from him.

“Oh, not at all,” Tommy says pleasantly, and spits on the stack of pancakes before handing them back to Wilbur with a grin. Wilbur just pushes it back toward him with a scowl and ignores the snicker the exchange gets from Technoblade. Tommy shoves half a pancake in his mouth and says, incredibly muffled, “Fruits of my labor, dickhead. Worked hard all morning on this batter, I get first dibs.”

“There’s flour all over the floor.”

“Flour’s a bit of a state of mind, innit?”

“What does that even mean?”

“What it says on the package.”

“No, I want you to explain it. I want you to explain the words coming out of your mouth and-”

“Good to see it’s a calm morning,” Phil sounds tired as he steps into the kitchen. He pats Technoblade on the shoulder before sitting across from Wilbur in his usual spot. “Slept like shit. Who was screaming at 2 in the morning?”

“Boy do I wonder,” Technoblade says monotonically, and Tommy hits a fist against the kitchen table because his mouth is too full of food to talk. Thank God. “Said he wanted to watch a horror movie. My bad for believin’ him.”

“That doesn’t sound like me, Technoblade,” Tommy lies with bits of pancake falling out of his mouth that has both Wilbur and Phil scrunching up their noses in distaste. “You’re making up lies and slander to look innocent and it’s incredibly rude and fucked up, actually.” The kid spent like an hour begging Techno to pick out something scary, claiming he could absolutely handle it; that he was 17 and you’re both being ridiculous not wanting to watch horror with him in the room. Ten minutes later, Wilbur was hit in the face with an elbow and deafened by the high-pitch screech Tommy let out the second something remotely spooky happened on the TV. Wilbur thinks it’s a noise that only dogs should hear. He wishes it were a noise that only dogs could hear. There is a split second of panic as he considers his thoughts and how they could affect the universe, but he rolls his eyes at the thought. He knows he has to say it. If he just had to think things for them to come true, Wilbur would have destroyed the universe 10 times over. He certainly wouldn’t be there anymore.

“You doing alright, Wil?” Phil asks. Wilbur looks up from where he was apparently staring a hole into his empty plate and tries to slap on a smile to replace his scowl. His father looks at him like a particularly confusing puzzle. It's a far more familiar sight than he cares to think about.

“Yeah, all good, sorry,” Wilbur laughs. “Just a bit tired is all. Probably stayed up too late.” It’s not fully a lie. Wilbur is tired. But not from staying up until 3am with his brothers, rather for the recurring and vivid nightmares that came afterward. Wilbur would like just one night of his life where he doesn’t watch his entire family fall apart because of him and the power he holds. It’s not too difficult, though. He just has to remind himself it’s all fake. He knows he wouldn’t hurt them, even if he sees himself in his mind's eye with a stack of explosives and a desperation he is all-too familiar with. He wouldn’t hurt them. That’s all he needs to remember. No matter how weary he gets, he just has to remember.

Technoblade sets a plate of pancakes in front of Phil and Wilbur lets out an offended sound. “I like him more,” Techno explains easily, and turns back to his pan. Alright, maybe Wilbur would fucking hurt them. Just Technoblade, though. But he sees a warrior pig with a face so set one may think he doesn’t care, but Wilbur knows just how desperately he does, and the words Wilbur spoke to make him fall. 

A shiver runs up his spine and a prickle of heat runs across his arms and he wants to excuse himself from the table, but Tommy worries when he doesn’t eat breakfast and tries to shove it down his throat, and Phil has been getting really into “talking about our feelings” even though the man himself is horrifically bad at it and usually just leaves Wilbur feeling like he’s said the wrong thing. The only one who would handle it like a normal person is Technoblade who would just leave a plate of pancakes outside of his door and possibly offer to go with him to the SPCA to get a bit of animal therapy. But Wilbur thinks he can handle it, the eyes, the thoughts, the dreams he would rather be rid of, so he smiles painfully and stays in his seat at the table. He really does feel warm, though. Probably just because of Technoblade’s cooking. 

Techno sets a plate in front of Wilbur again, and while Wilbur has to smack Tommy’s hand away before the kid tries to steal it, he finally gets to eat breakfast. It tastes of nothing. He doesn’t say anything because everyone seems to have enjoyed theirs well enough, but there’s not even a hint of taste on his tongue. He excuses himself then, after finishing two of the pancakes because he really couldn’t stomach the third, handing Tommy the remainder of his plate and heading to his room to rot for just a little while. Phil calls out about chores, but Wilbur waves him off for the time being. He’ll help out later, he just needs an hour or so to compartmentalize the nightmares and feel human again. 

As he lays back down in the bed, he tries to get himself comfortable enough to relax but not so comfortable he falls asleep. He really doesn’t want to deal with the nightmares right now. He wonders if he could speak the nightmares out of existence. He wouldn’t, though. He should never use his powers. He and his father agreed on that many, many years ago.

“He’s actin' strange,” Tommy says to the quiet room. Wilbur’s departure felt odd and he looked kind of green around the gills. The three of them just stayed quiet as he shambled away and Tommy finished off the plate he was handed. Phil just hums at Tommy’s concern, paying more attention to his plate than his son. Tommy frowns. “Like, stranger than Wilbur usually acts strange,” he tries to push.

“Like he said,” Phil says, taking a bite of his pancakes. “Just tired.”

“I call bullshit.”

“We did stay up pretty late,” Techno posits.

“Okay? You and I are doing just fine, Technoblade, Wil’s not acting tired strange, he’s acting- he’s acting-”

“Wilbur strange?” Phil suggests with humor.

“But stranger!” Tommy insists. 

“Just let him nap it off,” Phil pushes aside Tommy’s concern. “If he actually feels bad, he’ll let us know.” Tommy scoffs and meets Technoblade’s considering eyes as his brother turns off the stove. Wilbur coming to them when he feels like shit is about as likely as Wilbur leaving this house in the next decade. The man will complain until the cows come home if he’s got the sniffles, but if anything were actually wrong? They have to suss that shit out of him. Even if Techno is usually on Phil’s side with shit, even he can’t go along with something so blatantly untrue, right? But Techno looks away and says without much feeling, “Yeah, probably.” Tommy wants to ring their necks.

“Whatever,” he pushes Wilbur’s finished plate toward the middle of the table. “Wil’s supposed to drive me to Tubbo’s later. If he’s not less strange by then I’ll be forced to do something drastic.”

“I could just drive you,” Phil offers, as if that is even remotely the fucking point. 

“I’ll pipe bomb your car,” Tommy threatens, and Phil puts his hands in the air in surrender.

“I’ll talk to him, okay? I just want to give him a little while. He really might just need a nap, Tommy.”

“Bold coming from the man so close to his own nap. Eternally.”

“Bold coming from the kid whose roof I’m paying for.”

“Philza Minecraft is threatening orphans, this is so fucked up,” Tommy turns to Technoblade and tosses his arms up. “Can you believe this shit?”

“Sorry, I can’t hear you over all these dirty dishes you’re not cleanin’,” Techno turns the sink on, drowning out any other possible conversation. Tommy still shouts, “You’re a dick!” over the noise before storming out of the kitchen. If they’re gonna be freaks about it, Tommy might as well check in on Wilbur himself. Phil’s logic be damned. Logic and Tommy don’t really go hand in hand.

Sneaking a look behind his shoulder so he knows Phil isn’t about to stop him, Tommy slips into Wilbur’s room without even knocking. Not exactly anything new, though, because Tommy comes and goes wherever he damn well pleases.

He asks, “You awake?” to the lump laying in the middle of Wilbur’s bed. No response. Alright, maybe Phil was right then. Tommy hates when that happens. “Better’ve set an alarm. Not missin’ out on Tubbo ‘cause you’re a little sleepy, dickhead.” He’s got his hand on the doorknob to slip out again when Wilbur suddenly sits up, scrambling back and hitting his head against the wall as he slips on his sheets. “Fucking- Jesus, man, are you alright?”

Wilbur doesn’t seem to hear him. He looks around the room with wild eyes that never really focusing on anything. Tommy steps forward asking, “Wilbur, seriously, what’s-”

“His wings,” Wilbur says in a hoarse whisper. “I- I didn’t mean to, I never meant to, but he took the brunt of it. He protected me.” His voice cracks and Tommy barely understands what’s going on but hearing Wilbur so upset makes his nerves spike.

“Wilbur?” He calls out, sounding small even to his own ears. There’s no response. A little desperate and a lot louder he calls again, “Wilbur?” The door behind him opens and Wilbur doesn’t get a chance to reply, though Tommy is almost sure he wouldn’t, because Phil pops his head in and says, “Tommy, what the fuck did I say?”

“And what the fuck did I say?” Tommy hisses. “Fuckin’ look at him.” Phil steps further into the room, looking closer at his terrified son still barely coherent on the bed. 

“Jesus,” Phil breathes. “Tommy, get out of the room.”

“But-”

“Out, Tommy,” Phil repeats firmly, and Tommy wants to defy him and snap Wilbur out of whatever the Hell is wrong himself, but he exits the room with a slam of the door and a hope that Phil actually knows what the fuck he’s doing.

Phil has no clue what the fuck he’s doing. His son looks closer to a zombie than the living, breathing man Phil saw not 10 minutes ago. His gaze is entirely unfocused, something glossy and confused, and his body is shaking like it’s freezing in the little bedroom but it’s the same tepid 69 degrees it always is. The one emotion Phil can describe Wilbur as very obviously feeling is afraid. Like he’s dealing with a wild animal, Phil puts up his hands and slowly walks over, quietly saying, “Wil, I need you to calm down. Everything’s alright. You’re just sick.” For all Phil knows, he’s lying. For all Phil knows, Wilbur is having an aneurysm and is about to fucking die. But he thinks he can be a bit more rational than that.

“It’s so hot,” Wilbur rasps out, and while the words are concerning considering the way he shivers, Phil is relieved that his son has actually fucking spoken. “Why is- why is it so hot?” Phil puts a hand up to Wilbur’s head, and his son flinches back so hard he hits the wall. Wilbur curls forward, protecting his head from the wall and Phil and everything else. It’s no matter, though, because Phil only needed a second of skin-to-skin contact to feel that Wilbur is fucking burning.

“Looks like you got the flu, mate,” is Phil’s judgment. A thousand things can cause a fever and slight delirium, but the flu is the safest option. Phil knows how to fix the flu. “It’s alright. I’ll get some medicine and you’ll be alright.”

“Will you?” Wilbur’s voice is muffled from the position he sits in, but Phil hears him crystal clear. He gives Wilbur a gentle pat to the shoulder, wincing a bit at the way it makes him jump. At least he doesn’t nearly bust his fucking head in again.

“I’m fine, Wil. Just want to make sure you’re alright. So how about you lay down and I’ll-” Wilbur’s head pops straight up and the fear in his eyes goes desperate. His son is suddenly very focused and it’s a little bit terrifying.

“I can’t sleep, please don’t make me sleep,” he begs. “I hurt you, your wings- your wings are gone.” He buries his face into his hands like the shame has overwhelmed him. Phil stands there for a moment, perplexed at the idea of having wings, before putting a hand to his son’s shoulder again. This time Wilbur doesn’t flinch at least.

“Wilbur, I’m fine. You didn’t hurt me. I don’t have wings.”

“Because of me,” and he sounds so heartbroken as he says it. An admittance that makes no sense to Phil. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. It was supposed to be me.” Phil doesn’t quite know what that means, but it sends a chill down his spine. 

“It’s… It’s alright, Wil,” he tries, playing into forgiveness so he can just go grab the fucking Nyquil and let his son sleep through the worst of the fever. “It’ll be alright. I forgive you.” Wilbur stands up suddenly and throws his arms around Phil, squeezing tight in a way that reminds him of when Wilbur was a kid.

“I forgive you too,” Wilbur whispers, words choked out through what Phil thinks may be tears. He doesn’t know what he’s being forgiven for, but he pats Wilbur on the back before untangling himself from his sobbing son.

“I’ll be right back, Wil,” he promises. Wilbur doesn’t say anything, just puts his face back into his hands. Hesitantly, he leaves Wilbur to his confusing despair and sets his sight on the medicine bucket in the laundry room. He finds Techno folding towels.

“You good?” Technoblade asks. “Tommy was yellin’ about Wilbur bein’ a freak.”

“Freaky for sure,” Phil agrees, thinking back to the ravings of wings as he sifts through the bucket. “Think he’s got the flu. Fever’s burning him up. We got Nyquil?”

“Uh, I think Tommy drank the last of it at Christmas.”

“What- Tommy was sick at Christmas?”

“Nah. He just likes the taste and I wasn’t quick enough,” he pulls a bottle of orange liquid out and says, “We have Dayquil still. Apparently it tastes worse.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Phil complains, both at the idea that his youngest is drinking Nyquil like it’s a fucking drink despite the fact that the kid thinks alcohol is the grossest thing ever, and the fact that he doesn’t have anything better to give Wilbur than Dayquil. “Was hoping to knock him out.” 

Stopping his folding and sending Phil a judgmental squint, Techno says, “You’re a great dad.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Phil grabs a wash cloth and tosses it at him. “Better to be asleep during the worst of the fever than awake, trust me. Maybe I’ll go pick some up.” He wishes he could send Techno or Tommy to get it, but Tommy would crash within seconds, and Technoblade goes on a driving strike the second he gets back home because of the 10 hour car-trip he takes to get here, so the only one of his sons who could drive is currently half-dead with delirium. With a sigh he says, “Yeah, I’ll go pick some up. You mind bringing Wilbur some water? Maybe some soup?”

“I’ll think about it,” Techno says noncommittally, but Phil knows that means he will.

Technoblade doesn’t think very long before starting the stove. He chops up some carrots and leaves them to simmer while he brings a glass of water to Wilbur’s room. He’s not exactly ecstatic to take care of a sick person as someone who would rather die than catch something as cringe as the flu, but their dad looked like he was on the verge of a panic attack and he should probably make sure his brother doesn’t burn to death.

He knocks on the door and doesn’t get an answer. “Wilbur?” He calls, but there is still no answer. On one hand, Wilbur might be asleep which just fast-tracks Phil’s whole “knock him out” plan. On the other, Wilbur could be dead or dying and Technoblade is standing out here awkwardly with a glass of cold water in his hands. With a sigh, he pushes open the door. 

“Sorry if you’re asleep, Tommy would kill me if I let you die,” he jokes. There’s no response. Wilbur is half-leaning off the bed, actually looking kind of dead, and Technoblade quickly sets the glass of water on Wilbur’s bedside table and grabs the idiot before he fully falls off. Wilbur tries to shrug him off, but he’s weak and man he is warm, is Phil sure this is just the flu? 

“I have to find it,” Wilbur says to him. “I have to find it, it’ll make it all better.”

“Find-” Technoblade heaves him up with a grunt, setting Wilbur in an upright position. “Find what, Wilbur?”

“The blue.”

“Right,” Technoblade says agreeably because he isn’t stupid enough to fight with a man who barely looks like he’s in this dimension anymore. “Right, well, you can find the blue once you’re better.”

“But the blue will make me better,” Wilbur sounds desperate for Technoblade to understand him, which is incredibly unfortunate considering Technoblade decidedly does not understand why Wilbur looks ten seconds from sobbing his eyes out over the concept of a color. 

“I’ll look for it,” Techno lies. “Might be out in the kitchen.” 

“It’s out in the roads, Technoblade, but thank you,” Wilbur whispers the incomprehensible sentence with more emotion than Technoblade is comfortable with. “You’re a good brother.” Words that have literally never been spoken by Wilbur before, and make Technoblade uncomfortable enough for him to never want them to be said again.

“Thanks, I try,” Technoblade tries to joke, but Wilbur is looking at him with such a genuine expression of fondness he ends up sighing and saying, “Yeah, yeah, you’re a good brother too. Most of the time.”

“No, I’m not,” Wilbur says, sounding very sure of himself. “But that’s okay. It’ll all be over soon.”

“What, uh,” Technoblade clears his throat. “What does that mean exactly?”

“Oh, well,” Wilbur shrugs. “Universe is punishing me. I understand,” he squints at Technoblade suddenly. “Your hair isn’t brown. Your hair is pink.”

“That is just not true.”

“It is now,” Wilbur says with an odd little smile. 

“Right. Uh, I’m gonna go look for that blue. Oh,” he grabs the water, handing it over to Wilbur despite his brother’s shaking hands. “Drink this.”

“I’m not thirsty.”

“It’s blue.”

“It’s clear.”

“It’s light blue.”

“Are you lying to me?”

“I would never,” Technoblade lies. Wilbur hums and takes a small sip from the glass. Technoblade takes his leave, feeling like he has sufficiently hydrated his brother, and gets back to trying to make his soup. He read carrots are good for sick people. Or maybe that’s some crap Tommy told him to get him to make it more. He’s stirring the broth when the aforementioned probable-liar screeches behind him, making him jump so hard he sends the ladle to the floor.

“What the heck, Tommy?” He demands, trying to recover from the heart attack he definitely didn’t just have.

“You’re pink!” Tommy screeches.

“What?”

“Your fucking hair, man!” Technoblade grips at his hair, about to claim that no, he’s got brown hair, you and Wilbur need your eyes checked, but he’s shocked to see that his hair is actually a pastel pink. Well, he certainly doesn’t remember doing that.

“Okay,” is all he can seem to get out. “Okay.” He speedwalks toward the bathroom and tries to make sense of it as he stares at himself in the mirror. It looks even pinker. 

“Why’s your hair pink?”

“That is a great question, Tommy,” Technoblade says, mesmerized by his own apparently-pink hair. “Genuinely stellar. Best one you’ve ever asked.”

“What?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Yep."

“How the fuck don’t you know? It’s your hair.”

“Another incredible question. A modern Einstein.”

“Techno, seriously-”

“Tommy, I am bein’ serious,” he squints at the mirror, trying to will himself back to normal. “Hair wasn’t pink an hour ago, I can tell you that much.”

“That’s absurd.”

“It sure is,” Technoblade agrees, combing the pink hair with his fingers like that’ll do anything. To be fair, it’s not terrible. Definitely not the worst hair-do he’s ever had. “Wilbur said it was pink too. But I saw you like ten minutes ago, and I saw myself an hour ago, and I was as brunette as the day I was born.”

“Weren’t you born blonde?”

“Don’t change the subject, man.”

“I’m not changing the subject if the subject is your stupid fucking hair!” Technoblade tries to think logically about how this could possibly be. He comes up with nada. Considering he can’t figure out anything, he figures he may as well just go back to making soup. He scooches around Tommy and does just that. “Where the fuck are you going?”

“Phil said I should make soup for Wilbur,” Techno says. “So I’m makin’ soup.”

“But your hair is pink.”

“My hair is actually not involved in the soup process at all.” He picks the ladle he dropped when Tommy jumpscared him up from the ground and grabs a sponge to wash it off. 

“This is all fucking weird. First Wil’s got a fever that’s makin’ him spout shit about wings and now your hair’s all pink.”

“I just don’t think the two are correlated,” except. Except. Wilbur’s words of, it is now. The smile. Dear God, Technoblade hopes the two aren’t correlated. 

“I hope they are. I hope Wilbur’s fever breaks and your face turns purple.”

“Not the worst thing that could happen,” Technoblade says with a shrug and stir of the broth. It smells good at least. “I kind of like the hair actually. Me and Niki match now.” She had her hair in a split-dye thing with blonde and brunette a little while ago, but she said she needed a change in life and it was either dye her hair completely pink or kill a man. Technoblade would have usually been in favor of the murder option, even offered a sword for Niki to borrow, but he’s pretty sure his twin would be at the end of the blade, and he would unfortunately be a little sad if Wilbur died. 

“‘Course you would, freak.”

“You’re literally blonde, Tommy, you don’t have any right to judge other people's hair,” Technoblade says, and Tommy looks like he’s about to go on a tirade but the front door opens. Phil looks incredibly put out and he’s not holding a single shopping bag. “They out of cold medicine?” Phil looks so confused. “Phil?” He does not stop looking confused. “Dad?” he tries. Nada.

“Oi!” Tommy shouts. “Fuck’s up with you?”

“The roads are made of jello,” Phil says hysterically.

“I can’t do this today,” Technoblade decides. He doesn’t even want to know if that’s a serious statement. He doesn’t want to know anything actually. He thinks he’ll quit his job as a professor and go work at an Aldi’s or something. He might have to know the price of tomatoes, actually. A hermit, then.

“No, no, because the roads are made of blue fucking gelatin, Techno, and if I have to deal with that so does everyone in this fucking house.”

“Right,” Tommy says. “Right, ‘cause Techno’s hair is pink and the roads are jello and Wilbur’s dying. Fucking- just fucking awesome.”

“Wilbur is not dying,” Phil says sharply, then does a double-take at Techno. “Oh my God, why is your hair pink?”

“Literally could not tell you,” Technoblade says with a shrug. “I’m, uh, a little more concerned about the roads, though. Like, are they actually made of blue-” he stops mid-question because he’s starting to think that maybe Wilbur’s fever and his hair and the jello now are a little correlated. Just a bit. Because he remembers Wilbur talking about the blue, that it was out in the roads, and he didn’t say anything about jello but that seems way too much of a coincidence to be one. “Okay. I’m gonna sound insane here.”

“The road is made of jello,” Phil reminds him.

“Right. I’m going to sound close to sane here. I think that Wilbur’s fever is, uh,” he doesn’t even know how to articulate this. “Making him… do stuff.” Right. Perfect. Technoblade should be a public speaker, actually.

“Do stuff,” Tommy repeats, squinting confusedly. 

“Do stuff,” Phil repeats, but he actually sounds thoughtful. Technoblade doesn’t know how considering even he’s confused by what he really meant by that. “Fuck. Fuck. I know what’s going on.”

“So he doesn’t have the flu?”

“No, no, he probably does,” Phil says, sounding like he’s deep in thought. “But the fever, it’s making his brain all fucking mush. He doesn’t remember not to say anything.” What?

“What?” Tommy asks, echoing Techno’s thoughts. “Not to say- Phil, what the fuck-”

“It’s difficult to explain.”

“Well fucking start then, we’ll find our way somehow.”

“I don’t-” Phil looks nervous. “It’s not great.”

“Just fucking say it!”

“Wilbur is able to… speak things into the universe.” 

“What?” Tommy asks again, but Technoblade has already been hit with certain dread. Do stuff indeed. The road, his hair… It makes no sense, but it makes complete sense with the information he has. Other than this being an impossible thing, of course.

“He can make things happen just by saying it. It’s- it’s kind of complicated.”

“It’s fucked!”

“And fucked,” Phil agrees.

“And you never told us?” Tommy demands.

“Wilbur doesn’t do it. We decided a long time ago it was better he didn’t.”

“How long ago?” Technoblade asks. He doesn’t know anything about this either. Even if Wilbur didn’t tell him, he’s incredibly surprised Phil didn’t. The two of them, Techno and Phil, are pretty good at keeping other people's secrets, but they tend to tell each other. Probably not very moral or ethical of them, but just how they do things. 

“Found out when the two of you were 6,” Phil says sheepishly. 

“And you never told me? I mean I get not tellin’ Tommy-”

“Hey!”

“But me?” Technoblade will admit he’s the slightest bit hurt. Phil sighs.

“We tried to just forget about it. Wilbur didn’t really get it at first, he was too young, but he had a healthy fear of the power so it never became a big thing. He doesn’t use it. It’s like it wasn’t there.”

“But it was,” Tommy says, apparently an expert on the power he just found out ten seconds ago. “Just ‘cause you shoved it in a fucking box doesn’t mean it wasn’t still there, Phil.” Phil huffs. 

“It’s ‘cause of the fever. His self control is fucked because he barely even knows he’s awake. He’s delusional and thoughtless.”

“Describes both of you, I’d say,” Tommy says angrily. Technoblade doesn’t really get why he’s so mad. He’s a bit miffed just ‘cause Phil kept it from him, but at the end of the day it doesn’t really matter. It was just some secret between Phil and Wilbur that went a little sour. They can figure it out. “You can’t just do this, man, you can’t just make the bad shit disappear!”

“Tommy, calm down,” Phil says, exasperated. “We’ll figure it out. Wilbur’ll be back to normal before you know it.” 

“Yeah, I’m sure,” Tommy spits. Phil looks at Techno, confusion on his face, but Technoblade just shrugs helplessly. He doesn’t know what makes Tommy’s weird brain tick. “So who’s gonna talk to him?”

“I feel like I’m gonna get murdered if I go in there,” Technoblade admits. Tommy scoffs, but Techno can absolutely see Wilbur saying something like, I want Technoblade to get the black plague, because he was slightly annoying. He’s actually impressed now that Wilbur never has.

“I think we should let him rest,” Phil says, and Tommy goes to shout but Phil quickly interrupts, “Seriously, Tommy, it might be for the best to just let him be. Let him ride out the fever, get rid of the delerium before we key him in.”

“He turned the street to fucking jello!”

“That’s a fair point,” Technoblade agrees and Phil shoots him a betrayed look.

“Better than one of us,” Phil posits. 

“That is also a fair point.”

“Whatever. I’ll give him an hour,” Tommy says, and that’s honestly better than Techno was expecting. “If he's not asleep by then, we try it my way, alright?” There's a moment where complete and utter frustration takes over Phil's face, and Technoblade is actually kind of worried they're getting in actually-mad shouty-Phil territory. But he takes a deep breath and fixes Tommy with a glare.

“Fair enough,” Phil agrees with a sigh. He settles in his chair and looks exhausted. Technoblade hopes Wilbur sleeps through the fever.

“I’ve always wanted a cat,” Wilbur admits and says and breathes into the room around him. “Tommy doesn’t like cats. Technoblade prefers dogs. But I’d like a cat.” Like the universe is listening—the universe is always listening, Wilbur is the universe, he folds and molds and creates every piece of good and bad like a child’s pottery project that a father keeps up for years until a fencing trophy appears in its spot—a cat appears on his bed, yowling and confused. 

“Oh! Hello, there,” Wilbur tries for a gentle voice, and it helps that he feels so ragged he can barely stand to speak above a whisper. The cat sits and stares, eyes wide and pupils like a thin line, probably terrified of the predicament she’s in. Wilbur wonders if this cat was someone else’s, perhaps a stray, or maybe he fully spoke her into existence. She doesn’t have a collar, but her orange coat looks clean and well-groomed. He lifts a hand up, slow in his weakness and desire to not have this run from him too. After a few moments of hesitance, she sniffs his fingers. A test. He passes, apparently, because the little thing rubs against his hand. He smiles.

The cat complains when he takes his hand away, but he is just trying to get in a position better for petting her. As he adjusts, she meows against the injustice she is facing, and he politely responds back, “Meow.” It starts a call and response that lasts about thirty seconds before Wilbur is finally sat up. Fuzzy-brained and feeling weaker than ever, but the cat makes a beeline for his lap and he feels like he finally did something right.

“I hope Technoblade found the blue,” he sighs. “I’d like it, but if he’s got it first that’s okay. He probably deserves it more. Dad probably thinks so, anyway.” The cat swipes at his fingers and Wilbur frowns. “That’s a bit rude.” He gets a meow back. “Fair enough.” He focuses more on petting her head, and her swipes cease. “I think you’re the best thing I’ve ever done. Well, not the best best, if we take everything into account. I haven’t done a lot, mind you. I’m not supposed to make things. Phil says it’s not right, and I don’t disagree. But between you and me,” he leans down and whispers in her ear. “Sometimes I think I made Tommy.” He pulls back, away from his confession. “Made him or killed him. I’m never sure anymore. Maybe both? That’s all life is, I suppose. Creation and destruction. That’s all I have anyway.” 

The day before Phil came home with a nervous smile and a kid covered in mud who looked like he bit (and Wilbur would find out within ten minutes that yes, he certainly does), Wilbur had been arguing with Technoblade about something simple and stupid that made him say, jokingly but a little too sincerely, “I wish I had a little brother. This twin shit isn’t working for me.” And he immediately had a jolt of fear, a jolt of oh dear God I’ve wished for something how could I wish for something what have I done? But nothing happened. No random fucking kid appeared beside them. Not until the next day. And Tommy had a life before them, not much of one but enough that he definitely existed before Wilbur said he wanted a little brother. 

But who knows how his power works? Who knows if the universe simply bent Phil finding Tommy laid out in the park making a mud angel because Wilbur willed it? Who knows if the universe made a file for Tommy just because Wilbur wanted him to exist? Who fucking knows? Wilbur doesn’t. Wilbur doesn’t know where Tommy comes from and he doesn’t know where this cat comes from, he just knows he loves them. He also knows he watches Tommy die nearly every night, and every single time it is Wilbur’s fault. Whether he speaks the words that cause Tommy’s demise, or the loyalty he has taught his brother has him laying down his life for no reason other than Wilbur would be the one dead otherwise. He doesn’t want Tommy to die. He doesn’t think he gets to make that choice. Not this him, anyway. He doesn’t think Tommy does either. 

“What’s a good name for you?” Wilbur wonders aloud. The cat just meows. “You’re orange. You’re bitchy. You’re vocal.” The cat meows again. “Yes, yes. I’ll have to think of something. Not very inspired. Tommy’s good with naming things. The only thing he didn’t name was himself.” He has the thought, I did that, but he doesn’t know which him that’s true to. Did he name Tommy? If he created him, probably. A subconscious thing. A British soldier, a boy, sent to war for Wilbur, who may make it back but Lord knows he will never be the same. Wilbur wonders if any of them will ever be the same.

He’s so tired. He’s so fucking tired. He doesn’t want to sleep. He doesn’t want to watch Tommy die again, or Phil’s wings burnt again, or Technoblade looking at him with such contempt that Wilbur wants to get on his knees and apologize. But he never does. He falls farther and farther and farther into a pit of anger and despair because his life is a black hole, he’s a black hole, and nothing else in the world will be left when he’s done with it. 

“I think it’s bedtime,” he tells the unnamed cat. He shifts a little and she gets out of his lap with a disgruntled meow. He lays down slowly, every movement making his vision more blurry than he thinks it really should, and he finally finds himself laying down. He wants to blot out the world. He wants to lay his blanket over himself and never see anything else ever again. It’s a bit too hot for that, though. “I don’t want to see anything. I want it all gone. I want cold and dank and… I just want it gone.” He can barely make sense of the sentence. The universe, however, listens.

Stepping into Wilbur’s room is like being sucked into a black hole, or at least what Tommy imagines what being sucked into a black hole feels like. The room is incredibly cold and the only source of light comes from the open door. Already feeling like he’s suffocating, Tommy decides to keep it open anyway. Could be that Wilbur’s sensitive to light right now considering the sickness and all, but Tommy is personally sensitive to not being able to fucking see. His brother is faced away from the door anyway, curled up in the center of his bed and looking oddly small. For some reason, there’s also an orange tabby on the bed who actually looks rather cozy. Tommy doesn’t understand how considering how Goddamn cold it is, but he supposes the little fucker has fur.

“Wilbur?” Tommy calls out. The echo of his voice makes him jump. There’s no reason for his voice to echo in a room full of furniture and an open door. Wilbur doesn’t react to his voice or the echo. “Wil, look, Phil explained the whole- I dunno, universe bending shit? I still don’t really get it, but I also don’t give much of a fuck. Phil’s also a bitch,” his voice goes angry. It’s not- he can’t fully blame Phil for not seeing Wilbur struggling because when Wilbur struggles he’s so far under the water there’s just no seeing him. Not unless you’re Tommy who’s so close he’s constantly just barely brushing his brother's fingertips. But it’s never enough to pull him up. At this point, Tommy’s starting to feel like he’s going under too.

Tommy knows there’s weight on Wilbur’s shoulders, he just never knows what, but he thinks he knows at least one thing, now, that weighs fucking heavy. “You just- we just need you to be a bit more coherent, eh? Say some shit like, I no longer have a fever, or something like that. We can figure everything else out later. Wilbur, we- I just need you to be better right now, alright?” The bastard still doesn’t respond. The closest he gets to one is the cat whose eyes open and bore a hole into him. He bares his teeth at the thing but all it does is keep staring at him. 

“Techno’s bein’ a bit of a bitch about coming in here,” he keeps trying. “‘Cause he thinks you’re gonna, like, blow him up or something. He likes the hair, though. Think he might keep it.” Wilbur doesn’t even stir. “Are you asleep or something?” Tommy puts a hand out, going to gently shake (or not-so-gently if Wilbur keeps being a bitch about all this) his brother awake, but in an instant Wilbur is turned around and has his wrist in a vice grip. Tommy nearly falls back in his fear, but he keeps his feet steady even though Wilbur’s grip fucking hurts. “Fucking- let go, man, what the fuck are-”

“You can’t trick me,” Wilbur says, and his voice sounds so clear and calm that Tommy thinks Phil must be wrong about him being sick. “I know now. I get it now. You kept showing me this life, just so I didn’t have to know the truth. But I get it now.” His eyes are determined but so, so fucking sad.

“Get- get what, Wil, what are you-” Tommy tries to shake him off again, the grip on his wrist getting into bruising territory. It’s weird as fuck considering Tommy knows for a fact he’s stronger than Wilbur. Most days he could shake him off no problem. This is not most days apparently. “Can you fuckin’ let go, yeah? Seriously, Wilbur.”

“Tommy’s dead,” Wilbur says like it’s a simple fact of life, and the apparently dead man in question stops breathing. “You were trying to protect me, but Tommy’s dead. I see it every night. I did it, didn’t I?” Tommy would answer him, would say, no you didn’t you fucking moron I’m standing right here, but he’s currently clawing at his throat with his only free hand because he can’t breathe, he can’t fucking breathe, he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do when he can’t fucking breathe. “Maybe that’s why I can’t bring him back. I did it, so I have to face the consequences. I deserve them. Tommy didn’t, though. Whatever I did, Tommy didn’t deserve it,” and his voice breaks a bit at the end there, as he stares up at Tommy with grief-filled eyes. It’s fucking ridiculous. Tommy gives up on his own breathing and thumps Wilbur upside the head. 

Wilbur hisses in pain, his grip finally letting up as he goes to grab at his head. He no longer looks sad, instead leveling Tommy with the same annoyed gaze he usually gets when he’s being a little shit. The annoyance turns to confusion. Tommy tries to pantomime, I’m still alive do you fucking mind not trying to kill me? Wilbur just stares on, eyes barely focused anymore, as Tommy chokes to death on his own lack of breath. The light in the room gets a little brighter, and the last thing Tommy hears before passing out is an unintelligible shout from Phil and Wilbur muttering, “I don’t want Tommy to be dead. Tommy shouldn’t die.”

Phil doesn’t know what the fuck to do. He has CPR training, but he’s pretty sure that doesn’t apply to his son’s ability to bend the universe and apparently kill his fucking brother with it. Phil takes Tommy (Tommy’s body?) out of the room, adrenaline fueling him more than any coherent thoughts are, and Techno, sitting at the kitchen table looking thoughtful, stands so suddenly Phil almost drops Tommy. Instead, he sets him gingerly on the kitchen table as Techno asks, “What- what happened?”

“Wilbur. I don’t- I wasn’t there, the last thing I heard him say is that Tommy shouldn’t die, I don’t know what the fuck happened.” 

“Is he breathin’?” Techno asks, a worry to his voice that makes Phil have to really wrap his mind around the fact that this is real. He puts two fingers to Tommy’s neck and tries to feel for a heartbeat. He tries again. He keeps fucking trying. “Phil. Is he?” Phil tries one more fucking time.

“What the fuck?” He whispers. He doesn’t understand. He knows Wilbur could do this, he knows Wilbur could do practically anything (he remembers his young son crying over his dead fish and wonder why do things die, I wish my fish were alive again, and suddenly Milo was good as new), but he doesn’t understand a world where Wilbur would do this. To be fair, his son is in the state of mind where he’s turning the fucking streets to jello, so maybe he shouldn’t think too hard about the why. 

He’s trying to decide what he should do first. Mourn his youngest or try to get Wilbur coherent enough to bring him back (he remembers his young son looking at the dead fish in his hands, this time because after Phil scolded him he said, oh, I guess Milo shouldn’t be alive, and the young thing flopped until it died, and Wilbur being unable to bring it back a second time, because the things he kills stick), but suddenly Tommy is sat straight up with a gasp of breath that turns into a hacking cough. Phil is so relieved he thinks he could fucking cry. Technoblade puts a hand on Tommy’s shoulders, trying to calm him from his panic, and Phil can see the relief plain and clear on his sort-of eldest’s face. 

“Where the fuck is Wil?” Tommy chokes out. Technoblade releases his shoulders and heads toward the cupboards. “I’m gonna fuck him up.”

“What the fuck did he do?” Phil asks.

“He fucking- he started saying all this shit about me being dead, how sorry he was that I was dead, and then suddenly I was fucking dying.”

“You actually died?” Technoblade questions as he fills up a water glass.

“No? Yes? Do I look like a fucking deathologist?”

“Tommy, you weren’t breathing. You- you were…” Phil trails off, but they all know what he means. Tommy absolutely fucking died. Wilbur absolutely fucking killed him. “God. How the fuck could Wil-”

“He didn’t mean to!” Tommy shouts. “He’s all fucked up in the head right now, he thought- he thought I was dead already, he was just scared. I don’t- did he bring me back? What did he do?”

“I don’t know. He can’t bring shit back after he’s killed it, we’ve tried,” and Technoblade drops the glass of water he was making for Tommy in shock. “I- on a fish, Techno, on fucking Milo.”

“Bruh,” Techno says, half-breathless and staring at the glass and water at his feet. “You cannot do that. You just can’t do that.”

“He said I couldn’t die, right?” Tommy asks Phil. “He said it before I really died so maybe it was some retroactive shit. Maybe-” he looks excited all of a sudden. “Technoblade, stab me!”

“What-” Techno shakes his head, looking confused. “Only one fratricide per day, I think actually.”

“But I think maybe Wilbur made me, like, immortal or some shit. Gotta test it.”

“Oh my God,” Phil sits down at the table sharply. One of his kids can bend the universe to his will, and another is fucking immortal now apparently. How is the kid named fucking Technoblade the most normal motherfucker in his life?

“I just refuse to believe that,” Technoblade decides. “Like, I’m actively gaslightin’ myself to forget this conversation because I genuinely just cannot process that.”

“You’re both pussies. Wilbur would kill me, y’know.”

“We’re making jokes? We’re already making fucking jokes?” Phil bemoans. 

“It’s either that or I just start crying, Phil, you’ve got to make your choice now.” And Phil takes a deep breath and tries to reason that he may have just carried his son’s dead body into the kitchen, but Tommy was the one who was dead. And his killer, albeit a sort-of accident, was the person Tommy trusts most. So yeah, sure, Tommy can take the fucking piss even if Phil feels like he’s about to vomit. 

“So what’re we gonna do?” Technoblade asks.

“With what?” Phil asks.

“With Wilbur.” 

“Fuck’s that mean?” Tommy questions, sounding pissed already. The kid is prone to anger today. Always, actually, but today is definitely raising the bar for how angry Tommy can get. 

“I just mean, like, he could seriously hurt someone. He’s already seriously hurt someone. Jello and hair, that was just silly. But he can actually do damage. We gotta figure somethin’ out.”

“We’ve just gotta get him to unsick himself,” Tommy says. “Gotta talk him into saying some shit about not having the flu anymore.”

“Clearly that’s not gonna work.”

“Sorry, so what are you suggesting, Technoblade?”

“We gag him and wait for him to get better.” 

“What the fuck?”

“Phil, you said he had to speak it, right?”

“I did,” Phil answers carefully. 

“So we gag him. Easy.”

“Not fucking easy, Techno,” Tommy seethes. “What’re you gonna do? Hold him down? What if he fights back, are you gonna fucking hurt him? He’s gonna be terrified.”

“I’m terrifed,” Technoblade says. “So I’m actually pretty okay with that.”

“What would we even gag him with,” Phil wonders.

“Are you fucking serious?” Tommy demands. “Are you seriously down to do this?”

“It’s either that or knock him out,” Phil says with an apologetic little smile. “It’s not ideal, but be serious Tommy. What else do we do?” Tommy stands there fuming with his hands balled up into fists, but he doesn’t say anything. Because there isn’t anything to say. "The only options we have to survive this with 100% accuracy are to inconvenience Wilbur. He might be afraid, or even a little hurt, but at the end of the day we’ll at least all survive."

“I’ll do it,” Technoblade volunteers.

“Sorry, do you fucking want to or something?” Tommy asks.

“Bruh,” Techno starts, exasperated. “It’s not a matter of what I wanna do. We gotta. I’m not happy about it, but it’s either this or Wilbur could do some serious damage. More serious damage.”

“I hope he turns your tongue into a snake and switches your ass for your face.”

“I’ll see if he makes requests.”

“Boys, please,” Phil begs. “Just- I’ll do it, alright? Should be me anyway.”

“Nah,” Techno says. “It’s alright. I’m no stranger to gettin’ Wilbur to shut up.” Tommy glares at him. “I’ll be careful. I promise.” And like Technoblade was actually asking Tommy permission, the kid sighs sharply and says, “Fine. Dickhead.” With a roll of his eyes, Technoblade leaves the room. Phil wonders how his day started with shitty sleep and pancakes, and now he’s sending one of his sons to gag the other. A small part of him, very small and quiet but contemplative enough to make him consider it, also wonders if this mess is somehow his fault.

Technoblade doesn’t really want to do this. As much as Tommy’s being over dramatic about everything (what a shocker), Techno isn’t exactly excited to literally gag his brother. Most nights he would be because Tommy learned half of his annoying traits from Wilbur, but Wilbur’s a little too pathetic right now for Techno to feel comfortable being like yeah, screw that guy. Technoblade can only hope the fever breaks quick.

He steps in the room quietly, holding a makeshift gag out of a washcloth and some leftover string that he hopes will do the trick. He’s also got something to tie Wilbur’s hands up, just to make sure he doesn’t tear the gag off. If he thinks about what he’s doing a little too long, the sliver of guilt becomes a whole pie, so he tries to shove away the thoughts and just do.

Without a word, he sneaks up behind Wilbur. Kind of perfect that Wilbur’s faced the other way. Techno can just wrap it around his face, tie it, and be done with the whole thing. But before he takes a step to actually do it, without turning around Wilbur asks, “Is this what you wanted?” Techno is so confused he freezes in place. “I’m not mad at you. I get it. At the end of the day, I asked you to do it. But I wish there were another way. There’s not, though. I have to make myself understand that.”

Technoblade doesn’t really get what Wilbur’s talking about, but if he’s down to get gagged that makes Techno’s life 10x easier.

“I took your wings. I took your life. I lied. I killed Tommy,” Wilbur sounds like he’s in a confessional, on his deathbed and confessing his sins. Technoblade is definitely not qualified to deal with that. “I create and destroy, first with Milo then with Tommy. Did I ever tell you I created Milo? Tommy, well… I don’t know. I just know the only option is to kill me before I do anything else.”

“What?” Technoblade is stunned into asking because he wasn’t planning on murdering his brother, just lightly gagging him. Wilbur finally turns, as shocked as Technoblade. Well, actually, Technoblade doesn’t think anyone could be as shocked as him right now.

“I thought you were Phil,” he murmurs.

“I thought you were incoherent.”

“Coherency is- well, let’s just say it’s up to the universe to decide.”

“Right, well, coherently I’m tellin’ you I’m not killin’ you.”

“Why not?” Wilbur asks petulantly, as if murder is somehow a reasonable request and Techno is ridiculous for being a little wary of it. A lot wary, actually. Far past wary, if he wants to get bogged down by the details.

“Well, first of all, Tommy would probably be a little upset.”

“Tommy’s dead,” Wilbur says like a reminder. No emotion betrays him. He’s just sharing a cold, hard fact, and Technoblade has to hope that Tommy’s probable immortality makes it so that request doesn’t go through to the sky gods or the universe or whatever. He doesn’t know what he’ll do if he walks out of here and finds Tommy’s dead body. Again. Possibly give into Wilbur’s request.

“He’s not dead. Loud as ever, actually.”

“But I saw it,” Wilbur says, something desperate in his tone. “I saw him die. I saw me do it.”

“He got better,” Technoblade says with a shrug because he doesn’t really understand how Tommy’s alive either. He barely understands how he died in the first place.

“So I did kill him,” Wilbur says, face going from the mask of stoicism he put on to completely and utterly distraught. Techno almost wants to lie to him. Maybe he should. 

“Just a little,” Techno says. “But he’s, y’know, all better. Now we just gotta make you better too.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be better.”

“That’s just the fever talkin’.” 

“I’ve been sick a very long time,” Wilbur says sadly.

“Eh, like two hours.”

“Bit longer than that,” he whispers, and Technoblade feels like one of them is losing the plot and he isn’t 100% sure it’s Wilbur.

“Look, we have two options,” Techno tries for rational, because Wilbur is at least semi-coherent and is occasionally (very occasionally) a reasonable man. “Either we gag you so you can’t talk, or you can magic yourself better.” Technoblade is actually really hoping for the second one.

“I won’t get better, Technoblade,” Wilbur repeats. “Just kill me.”

“That wasn’t an option.”

“I’ll always be like this. I’ll always be wrong. It’s easier this way, isn’t it? No stress.”

“I feel like murderin’ my brother will provide me, like, minimal stress at least.” Technoblade tries to make it a joke because he is kind of terrified by how much it is not a joke for Wilbur.

“Phil killed me. He hesitated too. But it’ll be okay.”

“Wilbur-”

“Kill me, Technoblade,” and Techno goes to refuse, to leave the room altogether because he can’t handle Wilbur trying to get him to perform assisted-suicide, actually, but his body betrays him and moves towards Wilbur with the gag in his hand and oh, okay, Wilbur has bent the universe to his will and is going to force Technoblade to violently choke his brother to death. Okay.

“Phil!” He shouts, trying to hold himself back but being unable. “Tommy! A little help!” And before Techno even finishes his sentence Phil is through the door, looking determined before being shocked frozen by the sight of Techno. “You gotta- he’s makin’ me.” 

“Jesus fucking Christ,” is all Phil can say before he’s body-blocking Technoblade from Wilbur. “Is there- how the fuck do we stop this?”

“You don’t,” Wilbur says with a smile. 

“Stop this,” Phil demands. “Wilbur, you’re not in your right mind, alright? You need to-”

“This is all I think about,” Wilbur says. “This is my mind. I’m just not afraid to die anymore.”

“And you’re gonna force your brother to do it?”

“Better than you.” 

“I don’t understand what that means,” Phil says like he’s begging. “Please, just call it off and we can talk about this, Wil.”

“What’s there to talk about? It’s over. It’s alright.”

“Stop sayin' it’s alright,” Techno grunts, trying to focus all of his energy into stopping and failing. The only thing holding him back is Phil, and Technoblade is unfortunately stronger than everyone in this room considering the years of fencing, sword-fighting, and mixed martial arts. “I am feelin’ decidedly not alright right now.”

“It’s for the greater good,” Wilbur tells him kindly. “It’ll be over soon.” The door slams open and Phil nearly loses his grip in pushing Technoblade back in his surprise. Tommy barges through looking pissed and holding a knife. 

“Call him off,” Tommy demands, pointing the knife at Wilbur like he actually plans to use it. “Call him off, I’ll do it my-fucking-self.” 

“Tommy, what the fuck-”

But Wilbur interrupts Phil by saying, “No, that’s fair. That’s just, I think. You don’t have to kill me, Technoblade.” And it’s like all of Technoblade’s muscles have relaxed after being incredibly tensed and it is exhausting. He collapses to his knees, hits his head on the corner of Wilbur’s bedside table, and passes out.

Wilbur has had Tommy threaten to stab him a thousand times in the past, but this is the first time it will amount to anything more than a little skin prick. The knife against his throat is already digging into the skin a little bit with Tommy’s shaking hands, but Wilbur thinks that’s fair. They don’t teach you how to kill your brother. It’s just something you have to figure out for yourself. Wilbur would score himself a B- considering Tommy came back. 

“Tommy,” Phil says carefully, desperately, because he is under the impression Tommy is doing something wrong. “Think about this,” he begs because he thinks Tommy holding a knife to Wilbur’s throat isn’t exactly what he deserves.

“Oh, I’ve fuckin’ thought about it,” Tommy’s rage is so palpable Wilbur can practically see it. The anger simmers into fumes that make the bright of Tommy’s eyes a shadow of what they once were. That’s what Wilbur does. He dulls the light and blots out the sun and Tommy always suffers. Why shouldn’t Wilbur for once? “‘Cause you were right, Phil. It’s about survival. And he’s dangerous and clearly doesn’t give a fuck about hurting any one of us.” 

It’s not exactly true, but it’s true enough that it hurts. Wilbur would make Techno kill him for the purpose of saving all of them, even if it’s something Technoblade would be forced to live with the rest of his life because at least he would have a rest of his life. With Wilbur around, there’s too many variables. It’s for the best. He’s proud that Tommy can see that, even if it’ll hurt all the more that Tommy’s making the choice to kill him. It’s poetic this way, at least. Wilbur kills him, Tommy kills him back. 

“Any last words, Wil?” Tommy asks, the knife pulled back just a bit to let him speak without any trouble. Wilbur doesn’t have much to say, but he’d like to get one thing out before it’s all over.

“I’m-” but before he can finish the sentence, before he can say I’m proud, he’s out like a light.

Tommy shakes his hand out with a curse because fuck he hasn’t punched someone for real in a while and that shit hurts. The knife clatters at his feet and Phil lets out a breath of relief like he actually thought Tommy would kill Wilbur, the dumbass. Tommy would’ve fallen on the knife himself before he fucking stabbed Wilbur with it. He just knew that while Wilbur may be fueled by universe bending power right now, he’s also sick and generally weak and one good punch ought to knock him out. And it certainly did.

“Jesus Christ, Tommy, I really thought-”

“That I’d kill Wilbur? Are you fucking stupid?” Phil fish-mouths for a moment before looking annoyed.

“It’s been a long fucking day, excuse me for being a little worried when you had a knife to him!”

“Was the only way to get him to let Techno go. You know Wil. Theater kid type shit. He wouldn’t make me kill him, but if I chose to? Fucking eye for an eye? ‘Course he’d let it happen.”

“Well, at least he’s knocked out now. Hopefully he’ll ride out the fever while he’s asleep and then things can go back to normal.”

“God, you are so fucking dense,” Tommy complains, wishing he had the knife in his hands again. “We’re not going back to normal, Phil! This shit isn’t normal!”

“We were doing fine, Tommy.”

“Wilbur wasn’t!”

“Tommy-”

“Be fucking serious, Phil. He was drowning. This isn’t just the fucking fever talking. He never sleeps, he barely eats unless we fuckin’ remind him, I don’t even remember the last time he talked to someone who wasn’t the three of us!”

“He’s been down, I get that, but hurting us? Wanting to die? That’s not Wilbur.” Except it is. Wilbur doesn’t want to hurt anyone, but he’ll be cruel for the sake of what he thinks is right if it comes down to it. And while Tommy wouldn’t necessarily have labeled his brother as suicidal (at least not before today), he’s starting to think there’s a bigger picture even he didn’t know about. Maybe Phil’s not the only motherfucker in the dark.

“He’s drowning,” Tommy repeats. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Well neither do I, Tommy!” And his voice cracks, an admittance that maybe he does know, he can see, he’s just too scared to fucking face it. “He’s angry and sad and I didn’t fucking raise him to be angry and sad and I don’t know how to make it stop.”

“You don’t!” Tommy shouts. “Everyone gets angry and sad, dipshit, he’s gonna be angry and sad! This isn’t going away. He’s scared. This is fucking scary. So when he wakes up and he’s still sad and scared and angry, what the fuck are you gonna do? ‘Cause ignoring it doesn’t seem to be the fucking answer now does it, Phil?”

“I don’t know,” Phil admits. “I just don’t know.” Silence permeates the room. Tommy takes stock of everything around him. His brothers are both passed out, Techno crumpled to the floor and Wilbur at least laid out on his bed. The cat is staring at everything from a little corner of the room, ears flat and eyes wide. Phil looks so sad Tommy almost feels bad for yelling at him, but as much as he loves his dad he also thinks he’s a fucking moron sometimes. 

Phil can handle Technoblade; a man who loves fairly freely and shares a lot of the same ideals and rarely defies him. Phil can even handle Tommy; who may get sad sometimes, but rarely lets it get so bad it overpowers his default settings of silly and rambunctious which are two of Phil’s default settings too. The only one Phil has trouble with is Wilbur, who he loves, Tommy fucking knows he loves, but can’t seem to fathom past the silly and the happy and the dramatic. He’s gonna have to fucking deal now.

Phil looks at the pile of pain and ugliness that is his son laid out on the bed. If Phil didn’t know better, he would think Wilbur was sleeping peacefully. But Wilbur doesn’t sleep peacefully. He never has. Even as a kid, he had night terrors so bad it took Phil hours to calm him down and even Technoblade became accustomed to his brother’s horrifying screams throughout the night. Phil never did, though. Which is why he was so damn grateful when they stopped. Apparently they never really did, though. The nightmares kept on, Phil just didn’t see them anymore. Phil didn’t have to see them anymore.

He doesn’t like to look at Wilbur’s ugliness and see because why the fuck would he want to see his son in pain? In misery that Phil can’t heal? But this brings a whole new fucking level to Wilbur’s ugliness, a part he hid and hid well until he couldn’t anymore, all for the sake of pleasing Phil and hating himself. Phil went with the easiest option, of keeping it secret and hiding the terrifying power, but he should have tried the hard option. The one where Phil has to teach him how to use it even when he doesn’t quite understand himself, even if it goes far past simple right and wrong, but at least Wilbur wouldn’t be so fucking scared of himself that he wants to die.

“Help me get Techno out of here,” he requests of Tommy quietly. His youngest sniffles but grabs one of Technoblade’s arms while Phil grabs the other. Phil leads the three of them over to the kitchen table, may as fucking well he guesses, and lays Technoblade down where Tommy’s dead body was laying less than an hour ago. God, it’s been a long fucking day and he’s pretty sure it’s barely past noon. 

He tries to adjust Techno’s head so he isn’t too uncomfortable, but not much can be done on a solid, wooden table. Getting Technoblade to his room would be a whole fucking thing though. And Phil kind of wants all three of them close. 

“You stay out here with him, alright?” Phil tells Tommy. “I’ll let you know when it’s safe to come in.”

“What are you gonna do?” Tommy asks suspiciously. Phil doesn’t know where he’s failed that Tommy thinks he’s gonna do anything to Wilbur, but the guilt is palpable.

“Be a fucking father,” Phil says. It’s been quite a few years since he sat by Wilbur’s bedside while he was sick. He thinks the last time was probably a truly pathetic ear infection when Wilbur was about 14, but despite the fact that it’s been over a decade since then, Phil thinks this is a fair occasion to do so. Wilbur’s an adult, but he’s still Phil’s son, and Phil thinks that in this particular department he may have failed a little to be a good father. In his defense, what the fuck do you do when your son has the power to bend the will of the universe? But his defense doesn’t matter right now. His son does.

He fills both a bowl and a glass up with water, and grabs a washcloth from the laundry room on his way back to Wilbur’s. Tommy watches him walk away with a wary glance, but keeps by Technoblade’s side just like Phil asked. Assured in the fact that the two of them are safe, Phil takes a steeling breath and enters Wilbur’s room, closing the door on the rest of the house. He hopes this will be enough.

Technoblade wakes up feeling like he just got hit by a bulldozer. He was hit by a truck once and that was pretty crappy, and this feels about 10x that so he figures a bulldozer is a pretty apt description. He tries to push himself up and immediately his body screams, do not do that, and the kid next to him yelps. 

“Wha’s happenin’?” Techno slurs, exhausted and feeling it in every corner of his body.

“Wil’s a bit weird. Phil’s fixin’ it.”

“Awesome. Why ‘m I dyin’?”

“Like I said. Wil’s a bit weird.”

“Cool. Can you turn the lights off?”

“Your eyes are closed.”

“Right. I think I have a concussion.”

“I’d say we should go to the hospital but, well. The road’s jello.”

“I hate Wilbur.”

Wilbur comes to with a rough cloth wiping at his forehead. With how warm he is, it’s a welcome oddity. He tries to lean into the coolness, but someone's breath stutters and the rag is sadly taken away. He probably didn’t deserve the cool anyway.

“Wil?” Phil’s voice is so quiet Wilbur can hardly believe it’s Phil’s. But when he opens his eyes, his father is staring down at him looking incredibly concerned. Wilbur is also incredibly concerned because his face aches and his head is fucking pounding.

“My head,” he whispers. 

“Sorry about that,” Phil says with a little wince. “Tommy knocked you out.” Oh. Right. Tommy’s alive. Tommy’s alive and was supposed to kill him. Why didn’t Tommy kill him? Oh, who is he kidding? Tommy was never going to kill him. It was wishful thinking to believe the knife was anything more than a show. Tommy doesn’t have the self-respect to kill him, and Wilbur’s too much of a coward to die by his own hand. Maybe if he told Tommy. The things he did, the people he is, the dreams he has. Phil killed him once. He can make that work. 

“Do you understand now?” Wilbur rasps out. “I have to die, there’s no other-”

“Did I do that?” Phil asks, and it confuses Wilbur into silence. Phil killed him, yes, but Phil didn’t kill him. Nor does Wilbur think he really understands what that means. “Did I make you feel like that?”

“I don’t- I don’t know what you mean,” Wilbur stammers. It’s the first time he hasn’t understood, hasn’t known since the day began. He and the universe are one, now, but he looks at his father and simply can’t fathom him. It’s very similar to how his father looks at him. But right now, his father is looking at him with infinite sadness. Like he can see inside of Wilbur and it hurts. It’s simultaneously Wilbur’s worst fear and something he’s wanted for a long, long time. 

Phil dips the rag into a bowl of water and rings it out. He brings it back to Wilbur’s head, and it’s a relief that Wilbur did not really know he needed. The heat-death of the universe is inside of him, and all that holds it back is a rag of lukewarm water held by his father. 

“I think I might’ve fucked up,” Phil admits, and Wilbur can’t really fathom that either. His father is a proud man, someone with a thousand excuses even when he knows he’s wrong, and Wilbur can’t imagine what would make Phil finally be able to admit he’s wrong. “You were supposed to be afraid of the power because it’s dangerous, Wilbur, it is, but you weren’t supposed to be afraid of yourself.”

“It’s me, Phil. It’s all me.” He wants to push the knowledge into his father’s brain, to make him truly understand.

“I think I’m starting to realize that,” he sighs, and it’s a pleasant surprise. An unpleasant one too. His father knows how awful he is now. How intrinsically bad. “I should’ve tried to understand it more, huh? Understand you more, I guess.”

“But you were right, Phil. It’s dangerous. It’s bad. I’m-”

“You were 6, Wilbur.”

“And two decades later I’m still dangerous.”

“So, what, you should be put down?”

“It’s the easiest way,” Wilbur tries to explain as kindly as he can. He doesn’t like how close to tears Phil looks. “In a moment of weakness, in this moment of weakness, look how it all crumbles? I’m not strong enough to control it. It’s alright, Phil.”

“You could’ve been, though. If you hadn’t been fucking running from it for 20 years,” Phil takes the rag away again, looking away from Wilbur. “If I hadn’t been fucking running from it for 20 years.” And maybe it would have been easier. If his father looked at the awful power he wielded and said, let me help you with that, instead of, board it up, hide it, don’t tell anyone. But Wilbur never would have wielded it in a way that didn’t give into his own selfish desires. He knows what he’s like. The world would be built for him, and everyone in the crossfire would suffer. He sees his dreams and wonders if those are the worlds where Phil did try and teach him. Or maybe they’re the worlds where Wilbur broke without a fever. Or maybe they’re just fucking dreams. Wilbur doesn’t know. Wilbur doesn’t care. He knows the right thing to do.

“Please,” Wilbur reaches out for him, trying to get a firm grasp on his arm, to make him understand, and Phil grips his hand. “Just- please.”

“I’m not killing you, Wilbur,” You’re my son! He hears.

“Phil, kill me,” Wilbur breathes into the universe because he is selfish, because he would rather face his execution than cause it, but he knows what needs to be done.

Phil’s grip on his hand gets tighter as he says, “No matter what you could do,” no matter what you’ve done. “I won’t do it.” I can’t do it. 

“You have to. Look at them,” and a sea of faces, ones familiar and unfamiliar, all infinitely sad and angry, look upon him and weep. His little brother’s face the brightest hope and dimmest despair among them all. “They all want you to.”

“Wilbur,” Phil says firmly, gripping Wilbur’s hand with both of his. “No one wants you dead except you.” And isn’t that an odd statement to make? An even odder one to know. Tommy doesn’t want him dead. Technoblade doesn’t want him dead. Niki doesn’t want him dead. Even Phil, Phil who knows the worst of what he can and can’t do, doesn’t want him dead. But they should. Wilbur wishes he could make them see. 

“Why aren’t you doing it?” Wilbur whines. “You’re supposed to. You have to. I made you.”

“You need to rest up, Wil,” Phil says instead of answering. Wilbur wonders why the universe doesn’t answer either. “I’ll be right here. If you get too warm, tell me. If you get thirsty, tell me. I’m right here.”

“This isn’t right.”

“It is,” Phil says sadly. “It really, really is. Do you remember the ear infection when you were 14? I stayed up with you all night.”

“I’m not a kid anymore.”

“But you’re sick and you’re still my son, so suck it up. You should sleep now.”

“Phil-”

“Sleep, Wil. Things’ll still be shit when you wake up. We can figure it out then.”

“Nightmares are worse than being awake,” Wilbur admits, feeling small and embarrassed to be so afraid of nightmares at his age. But every time he sees Tommy die, or Technoblade fall, or Phil hurt or hurt him, it all feels so, so fucking real. He’s tired of seeing that Goddamn button.

“How about this?” Phil offers. “You sleep, and when you wake up we can talk about them.”

“What’s the point in that?” Wilbur wonders. He hates them, hates having them, hates knowing he’s either evil or his brain is so fucked he might as well be. Talking about them would feel so much more fucking real. 

“You can’t keep all this shit in, Wil. It’s killing you.”

“Not fast enough.”

“This is what I mean,” Phil complains. “I know I’ve fucked up, but I need you to meet me halfway here. You can’t keep clinging onto not talking about shit. I don’t know how to help you if you don’t let me try.”

“I don’t want help.”

“Tough shit.” Wilbur huffs. He huffs and he puffs and he wants it all to just stop. But there is a part of him, a hopeful, desperate part of him, that wants to believe Phil. To believe he can be helped. To believe there’s a way out of this other than dying. Because there are things that he’ll miss. Technoblade talking about some civilization from 100 years ago that rose and fell within a week. Watching the caterpillars come creeping during the late summer. Niki teaching him to knead bread. Watching the sunrise from the roof. Sitting in the back of the theater of a shitty movie with Tommy and making fun of it until someone throws their popcorn at them because Tommy can’t whisper for shit. Phil and him taking a walk in the park. 

“You kill me,” Wilbur tells him desperately. “You’re the one who does it. Tommy never can. Techno is always too late. But you kill me.”

“Then tonight I won’t,” Phil vows, and Wilbur can’t tell if he despairs that he won’t die or hopes it makes some sort of difference.

Tommy is ready to bite off his fucking hands. Phil has been in Wilbur’s room too Goddamn long without any sort of word to them, and while Tommy is pretty sure Phil hasn’t killed him or done any irreparable damage, he is decidedly fucking nervous having no one for company except his mildly concussed brother. At least he has a pot of burnt carrot soup to eat from.

“You have gotta stop pacin’,” Techno begs him from his seat at the table. Tommy doesn’t know what the fuck he’s complaining about since his eyes are closed and his head is firmly against the table. “It’s givin’ me a headache.”

“You’re a fucking headache. Can’t believe you lost a fight to a table.”

“That table had hands,” Techno groans. 

“Do you think they’re alright?”

“Well, we haven’t heard any screamin’ so probably.”

“Phil could’ve just killed him while he was asleep.”

“Phil wouldn’t kill him. There would be no point to literally any of this if Phil were gonna kill him, Tommy.”

“Waiting sucks. This fucking sucks.”

“Go eat the road.”

“Maybe I fucking will.”

Possibly for the first time since this fever set, Wilbur is asleep. Tommy knocked him out, of course, but this is the first time he’s slept. Phil checks his phone and sees that despite how many lifetimes he’s lived today, it’s only 3pm. They had breakfast around 10am, and now it’s 3pm. 5 hours of Phil’s life has been spent trying to keep all three of his sons alive with incredibly varying results. At least all three of them are alive now. And he plans to keep it that way for a long fucking time. He’s still unsure of Tommy’s status of mortality, actually, so possibly even longer than he should be. 

But Wilbur is asleep. He doesn’t look peaceful. His face is scrunched up and he’s sweating enough that Phil risks waking him up to gently rub the rag of cool water across his face. but Wilbur is asleep and Phil still thinks sleeping through the worst of it is the best thing for him. The only way to fix all of this, for Phil to even attempt to, Wilbur needs to be coherent. Hell, Phil needs to be coherent, and watching his son try to kill himself has him admittedly a bit incoherent. 

He wonders how the outside world is. He knows Wilbur turned the roads to jello, but he wonders if he did anything else. Hopefully nothing too destructive. With Wilbur it’s a toss-up. Pink hair or dead brothers seem to be his range. 

Wilbur rests and Phil watches over him. He hopes, desperately, that it’s enough.

“Do you think he’s gonna reverse everything?” Tommy asks. Technoblade makes a grunting sound. His head is still pounding, and Tommy has a tendency to make his head pound even without the concussion. He feels a bit better, though. He can open his eyes for ten whole seconds at a time. “Like, obviously the jello is bad. But your hair and my immortality and shit?”

“We don’t know if you’re immortal.”

“But if I am?”

“Tommy, you can’t seriously wanna be immortal.”

“Just for a little while! I wanna scare the shit out of Tubbo. And you like the pink hair!”

“Because God forbid I have to bleach it instead.”

“Exactly!”

“Yeah, I think he’s gonna reverse everythin'.”

“Ugh," Tommy leans back in his chair and crosses his arms in a huff. "Fuckin’ boring.”

When Wilbur wakes up, he’s pretty sure he’s having the worst hangover of his life. His head (his face?) hurts like he downed a bottle of vodka without any water in between, and his body feels weak in a way it never has before. He doesn’t remember drinking, he rarely does on his own, but with the way he feels he wouldn’t be surprised if he got blackout drunk. The last thing he really remembers is leaving the breakfast table. He laid down to nap. Beside him, something furry is wriggling and he nearly falls out of the bed to get away from it but manages to catch himself. The movement hurts, but he’s too focused on his confusion to care. There’s an orange tabby lying next to him, and he’s pretty sure that Tommy would stab him if he snuck a cat into the house so where the fuck-

He sees a flash, then. Tommy with a knife. Tommy ready to kill him. Was that a nightmare? He remembers being punched rather than stabbed, and he presses a few fingers to his sore face and hisses when he makes contact. Alright. So Tommy punching him was at least real. He tries to focus, to remember, but the door to his room opens and he’s struck frozen by Phil’s shocked gaze. 

“You’re awake?”

“Apparently,” he mutters. “Did Tommy try to stab me?” Phil winces. “Was it ‘cause of the cat?” It gets a laugh from Phil, and Wilbur appreciates that sound when he’s so close to panicking under the weight of things he apparently doesn’t remember.

“No, the cat, uh, she wasn’t a bother, actually. Slept through most of it. She was scared, though.” Scared? Of Tommy or-

“Did- did I do something?” He asks, a dread overtaking him. “Phil, what the fuck did I do?” The cat was scared, Tommy was apparently scared enough to pull a knife on him, and he feels like he’s been run over by a truck.

“It wasn’t really your fault,” Phil says, and Wilbur wants to crawl into the earth and never return. “You were delirious with fever. Probably should’ve taken you to the hospital, actually, but by the time I realized it was serious the roads were, well...”

“Jello,” Wilbur disbelieving voice finishes for him. He can't fathom the reasoning for why he did it but he remembers doing it. A flash of blue. “Jesus. What did I-” Wilbur shoves his face in his hands. “God, it’s like a blur.”

“You’re still recovering. Fever broke, thank God, and now your body’s just trying to catch up on rest. You should lay back down, probably.”

“Well I’m trying to catch up on what I fucking did so my body can wait a damn second, actually.”

“You didn’t do much, if it makes you feel better.”

“Then why did Tommy punch me? He had a knife, I remember a knife, and then he just-” Wilbur remembers Tommy’s rage, he remembers how pointed it had been, more so than even the knife. He remembers welcoming it. “Make a list so I can just undo it. Undo it all. I’ll never use it again after that.” This power is bad enough for someone to have, but for someone like Wilbur to have it? The fact that he can get a little sick and go off the deep end is proof that he shouldn’t be allowed to wield something like it. 

“I don’t think that’s the way to go about this, actually.”

“What?” Wilbur squints, confused by the guilt on Phil’s face. “Phil, it’s just the same as before.”

“I know. And the same as before was fucking killing you,” the words are like ice on Wilbur’s skin. 

“I was fine, Phil,” he tries to placate because talking about this is too much; everything right now is decidedly too fucking much. “Bit scary, yeah, but I was doing fine.”

“You didn’t tell me about the nightmares. You didn’t tell me how fucking terrified you were.”

“Because they’re not a big deal, Phil, really-”

“Wilbur, you tried to kill yourself like three times yesterday,” Phil says, a hysterical laughter at the end. “Do not fucking tell me it wasn’t a big deal.” Okay, well, in Wilbur’s defense he doesn’t really remember all that. He remembers bits and pieces, fear and nightmares and Tommy holding a knife, but he doesn’t remember-

“Did I make Tommy try to kill me?” He chokes out. 

“No,” Phil says, and it sends both relief and despair through Wilbur. Making Tommy try to kill him would be unforgivable, but the idea that Tommy tried to kill him of his own volition makes him feel just as fucking awful. “No, you made Techno.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Tommy just knocked you out to stop you.” Wilbur sags back against the wall, feeling winded. Well, at least Tommy didn’t actually try to kill him. “You tried to get me to as well. Said I’d done it before.” A nightmare he’s had a thousand times. Begging Phil to kill him, and Phil didn’t want to, not really, but in his fear and the unsettling sight of his desperate, terrible, sad son he had to. He had to. Wilbur made him. Wilbur made him. He had to have. 

“How did you not?”

“I don’t think you meant it anymore. I think you were just saying shit.” Wilbur doesn’t look at his father. That's not how his power works. He says it and it happens, even if he doesn't really mean it. It's why he doesn't wish for anything or talk about his wants in anything but the most abstract of ways. Maybe if he had more time to practice, to hone it- but that's ridiculous. He ignores his father and he ignores his thoughts and he stares at the cat instead. She looks comfortable. 

“Has she eaten?” He asks.

“Techno fed her earlier. He has the bag for the strays and all. He’s resting now.”

“What happened to him?”

“He was trying so hard not to follow your orders, it strained him and he just kind of… collapsed. Hit his head. Mild concussion, nothing too serious. Figure we’ll take a trip to the doctor once the streets aren’t jello.”

“Fuck, right, uh, I wish the streets were back to normal,” Wilbur speaks into the universe. He wonders if he should wish away the concussion, but he should only use it to reverse the things he fucked up. “What else do I need to fix?”

“Not much, really,” Phil says. “Techno’s hair’s pink, but he likes it? So? Figure you can just leave that.”

“I need to reverse all the changes I made,” Wilbur refutes.

“It’s really not a big deal, Wil.”

“No, but it is. Everything I did, I have to reverse it.”

“I, uh, don’t know if that’s… possible,” Phil says nervously.

“What’s that mean?”

“Bit of a Milo situation,” Phil says and Wilbur feels his heart beat ten times faster. “But the opposite?”

“What the fuck do you mean the opposite?”

“Tommy died,” Wilbur sits up, unsure if he’s about to break his own rules or just have a heart attack. “He’s back now, but-”

“Do not fucking start sentences like that, Phil, holy shit,” Wilbur lets out a rough breath, letting himself fall back again. “How-” but the grimace Phil gives him makes Wilbur think that maybe he does not want to know how Tommy died. Wilbur thinks maybe he should just remove his tongue and be done with the whole fucking thing. “He’s back now. I’m- I’m not reversing that,” he says apologetically, knowing it goes against everything they ever spoke about but knowing there’s no way in Hell he has the stomach to let nature take its course, even if he’s not a very good person for it.

“I wouldn’t ask you to,” Phil says, and Wilbur feels relief, though confusion still twists his heart. The rules are simple. Don't do it. If you do, reverse it. It's why he had to kill Milo. It's why Phil should be asking him to kill Tommy. It's why Wilbur really should've killed Tommy years ago because he knows what he did, he knows he created Tommy or at least Tommy's space in their lives and he's just using the fact that it could be a coincidence as an excuse. He couldn't, though. He couldn't know Tommy for five minutes and kill him. He couldn't even know Tommy for five minutes and send him away. “I don’t think you could anyway. We’re pretty sure he’s immortal now.”

“Oh,” Wilbur says because what the fuck else is he supposed to say to that?

“Yeah,” Phil shrugs. “We should probably see if we can reverse that? But, uh, yeah.”

“So. Undo the hair and immortality. Anything else?”

“Well, the cat’s also your fault. But Techno’s attached now, to her and the hair, so maybe just the immortality?”

“I don’t understand. Why are you being so fucking cavalier about this? I broke the rules.”

“The rules were some vague shit I told you when you were 6, Wil.”

“Basic shit you told me when I was 6,” Wilbur corrects. “Just don’t use it. If I do use it, fix it. That’s it. And I couldn’t even follow that.”

“You did, Wilbur,” Phil says like he’s trying to comfort him. “Two decades is a long fucking time to go following those rules, and you did it. The fever was a curveball you couldn’t have expected.”

“I need to fix it,” Wilbur insists.

“If you want to, I’m not gonna stop you. But you didn’t do anything wrong.” Wilbur can’t fathom that. He fucked up. He fucked up so bad apparently Tommy died (and he still doesn’t know how, not really, but he can make assumptions and he really doesn’t want to fucking think about it) and is now immortal but Phil’s acting like he just made a little oopsie. “You should talk to Techno before you do anything, though. He might be pissed about the cat.” He doesn’t even want to face Techno right now. He doesn’t want to face anyone. He wishes he had succeeded in his plan now, even if the plan was fucked up and shitty and relied on traumatizing Technoblade. But Phil seems like he’s in a mood where he wants to talk about their feelings, so Wilbur doesn’t say that. He can’t. 

“Wilbur,” Phil says, sounding serious and setting off every alarm bill in Wilbur’s brain. “I just think we need to… reevaluate the rules. And we need to talk about the way the previous rules were affecting you.”

“What?”

“You keep brushing it off but clearly it was- Wilbur, it was fucking killing you. And you never told me. Tommy had to tell me. I had to see you almost-” Phil cuts himself off with a heavy sigh, brushing his hand down his face. “You almost died and I wouldn’t have known why. You can’t do that, Wil, you can’t just keep shit like that until you’re already drowning.”

“And what would it have done?” Wilbur asks with a laugh. “Telling you- Phil, it doesn’t matter. The power’s dangerous and I have it so I’m fucking dangerous.”

“The power’s only as dangerous as you fucking make it, Wil. I should’ve drilled that in your head instead of just- just brushing it off altogether. And I’m so sorry for that,” Wilbur has heard his father apologize before, but nothing like this. Nothing as serious as this. Wilbur barely knows if he understands the apology being made, even if it’s something a part of him has been waiting for for years. “But it doesn’t have to be like that anymore. I won’t let it.”

“I’ll hurt someone. I’ll kill someone. I’ll destroy the entire fucking world.”

“The first thing you did was turn the road to jello, Wil. You think you’re a lot worse of a person than you actually are.” This isn’t right. Phil shouldn’t trust him. Phil shouldn’t trust him with this awful fucking power. He should’ve just let Wilbur die when he had the chance. “You’re so scared of the power you’ve become scared of yourself, you’ve- you’ve started hating yourself for shit out of your control and I never meant for that. I need you to know that. I don’t understand fully what’s going on in that brain of yours because you never fucking tell me, but I never wanted you to hate yourself for this. For anything.”

Wilbur wants to tell Phil it’s not just this. He wants to scream that there’s something wrong with him, something written in his DNA, something chemical, and the horrific power he wields is only the tip of the iceberg. He has it because he deserves it. A weight on his shoulders to keep him grounded. To keep him imprisoned. Instead, he says, “I think I’ll go back to bed now,” as pathetically as possible, and does not wait for a single word from Phil before he lays back down, back turned on his father. The cat opens an eye and Wilbur gives her a shaky smile. He’ll have to get rid of her eventually. No matter what his father says. In the meantime, he strokes her head and listens to this living little thing he created purr.

The front door opens and he hears Phil say, “I’m just letting them know you’re okay. I’ll be right back, alright?” There’s a pause, but Wilbur doesn’t answer. He just keeps petting the cat. With a sigh, Phil leaves the room and Wilbur to his devices.

Tommy would already be barging into Wilbur’s room to either hug him or tell him off, but Phil keeps a firm grip on his shoulder and says, “Not right now. His fever broke and he’s looking a lot better, but he’s still resting.”

“Is he alright, though?” Phil pauses and Tommy frowns. “That’s a no, then.”

“That’s a no,” Phil admits, and that’s a Hell of a lot more than Tommy expected, actually. “We’ve got a lot of shit to talk about.”

“You sure fuckin’ do.”

“Oh, don’t you start with me. I’m trying. He doesn’t seem to want me to,” Phil complains. “But I’m trying.”

“Biggest obstacle with helping Wil is Wil. He’s a bitch about it. You can cope about it, though. Considerin’.”

“How long have you been angry with me?” Phil asks, and Tommy looks away with a sharp little laugh. “Seriously. You and Wil both, fucking- he’s sad and you’re angry and no one said a damn thing.”

“‘Cause I’m a respectful guy, Phil,” Tommy leans against the kitchen table to pick at the table mat. With a frown and a furrow to his bushy eyebrows he says, “And it- I didn’t realize how fucked it all was. If I knew I would’ve kicked your ass years ago.”

“I appreciate the retroactive ass kicking,” Phil says with a roll of his eyes, but he wraps his arms around himself with a little frown in a way that Tommy hates to see. He may be pissed at Phil, but he still loves him. “We’ll figure it all out. How’s, uh, how’s Techno?”

“Asleep.”

“You’re not supposed to sleep with a concussion.”

“Tell him that.”

“Jesus Christ. Why are you the most capable motherfucker in this house today?”

“I’m always the most capable motherfucker in this house, Phil,” Tommy says with a little pat to his shoulder. “You’re only just now noticing because you’re so unbelievably stupid.”

“I can still ground you.”

“Have I ever told you how gracefully you’re balding, Phil, because really-”

Phil stands up and says, “Alright, I’m checking on Techno. Do not go into Wilbur’s room under any circumstances.”

“Yeah, yeah, scout’s honor and all that.” Phil rolls his eyes but heads upstairs to check on Technoblade. Tommy has never been a scout, boy or otherwise, in his fucking life so he books it to Wilbur’s room and doesn’t hesitate to sneak in because hesitation is what gets you caught. He once again is annoyed at proving Philza Minecraft right when he sees Wilbur sleeping, but before he can decide whether to leave or wait, Wilbur says, “I don’t think you’re supposed to be in here right now.”

“How’d you know it was me?”

“You stomp like a motherfucker,” Wilbur says, sounding amused as he sits up. He pets the cat next to him who looks calm and comfortable. Wilbur does not look quite as calm and comfortable. “Heard you’re immortal now.”

“Potentially. Tried to get Techno to stab me to figure it out, but he was bein’ all weird about it.”

“Probably considering… what I did,” Wilbur finishes lamely.

“Nah, this was before. Techno’s just got people beggin’ him to murder ‘em left and right, eh?” Wilbur huffs a little humorless laugh. “S’alright, anyway. I’ll just jump off the roof and see what happens.”

“Immortal doesn’t mean your bones won’t break.”

“Well it should,” Wilbur is silent. “Do you remember everything? Phil was kinda cagey on the details, just said you were doing bad.”

“I am aware of most of yesterday,” Wilbur answers, also cagey. Tommy doesn’t like cagey. He likes information given to him free as a bird because he’s nosey and worried. “But some of the details are lost on me,” he admits. “I remember turning the road to jello, though not why. I remember you dying, but not how.”

“No one knows about the jello. It just happened because you’re a freak, I think,” Tommy explains. Wilbur laughs again, a little realer than before, but his face twists to concern.

“And you dying?” Tommy’s a little less inclined to explain that actually. He’s all for everyone giving him every bit of information possible, but he’s a little too aware of how much this’ll upset Wilbur to want to say it. 

“You didn’t mean to,” is all he can really think to say, and Wilbur leans back into the wall with a loud thunk that makes Tommy wince. 

“I fucking knew it.”

“Wil, seriously, it wasn’t-”

“Don’t say it wasn’t my fault,” Wilbur interrupts angrily. “I killed you, Tommy, how the fuck is that not my fault?”

“You brought me back! And it was a fucked situation, man, you thought I was dead already. You couldn’t tell your fuckin’ dreams from reality. Terrifying, yeah, but not your fault.”

“You should’ve finished the job,” Wilbur says, sounding tired and angry and Tommy knows what he means, he still feels the knife in his hand, and he wants to punch Wilbur in the face again for even insinuating that.

“Fuck you,” Tommy says, just as angry. “I was never gonna kill you, dipshit, and I still wouldn’t. You don’t deserve to die even if your head’s on fuckin’ crooked. Shit got bad, but we figured it out and now-”

“Now you’re immortal. Now I have to kill a cat. Now I’ve probably lost people their jobs and their money because they couldn't get to work because I turned the road to fucking jello because of a fever. That’s not safe to have around.”

“You can’t do this. You can’t do this same bullshit, Wil.”

“I was right. Fever or not, Tommy, I was right. I’m dangerous and-”

“You’re just some fucking guy!” Tommy yells. “You’re not the pinnacle of fucking evil or whatever the Hell you’re thinking, you’re just some guy! You’ve got some stupid power that makes you a bit quirky, and you think it makes you some fucking harbringer of the apocalypse! Well it doesn’t, Wilbur, you’re not that fucking special.”

“Tommy-”

“I’m not letting you debate your fucking life. Say okay Tommy, we’ll figure this out, or keep your fucking mouth shut.” Tommy waits. And he waits. And he fucking waits as Wilbur just sits there and stares at him. Well. He supposes he gave this bastard a choice, even if Wilbur is so fucking insistent on making the wrong one. “What are you gonna do, Wilbur?” Tommy asks, anger deflating into something tired and sad. “Kill yourself? Make one of us do it?”

“I’m going to keep my fucking mouth shut,” Wilbur answers kindly, softly, and Tommy hates him all the more for it. 

“Please just try,” Tommy begs. “We’re- shit’s gonna change around here, alright? I already gave Phil a stern talking to, and now I’m givin’ you a stern talking to, and just to make it fair I’ll give Techno a stern talking to once his brain’s not mush. It’s gonna be better, Wil, but you just have to let it .” 

“Okay, Tommy,” he says with a tone that Tommy would more accurately describe as lies. “I’ll try.”

The conversation Phil has with Technoblade is very short.

“You feeling alright, Techno?”

“If I need a new brain after this, do not replace it with Wilbur’s.”

“I’ll make sure to let the doctors know your brain transplant preferences.” And then his son promptly passes the fuck back out. He thinks Technoblade should probably be fine by now to sleep, but it is a bit concerning. If he’s still looking worse for wear tomorrow, he’ll take him to the hospital. As it is, he’s a bit afraid to go out there for any potential neighbors who might mention the jello. If one person says, “Man, that whole jello thing was weird, huh?” Phil thinks he would blow the whole operation just from how hysterically he would laugh. It’s still so ridiculous. Fucking jello.

When he gets back downstairs, Tommy is no longer sitting at the kitchen table. That in itself is not suspicious, but he hears movement near Wilbur’s room and doesn’t bite back his sigh. He doesn’t know why he’s surprised. Tommy never fucking listens, especially when it comes to Wilbur. 

He steps into the room and almost immediately regrets it because Tommy looks like he’s on the verge of tears and Wilbur looks more exhausted than he did even with the fever. 

“Tommy,” Phil says with a disappointed tone. “What did I say?”

“Say less,” Tommy grits out. “Actually, say more, ‘cause I need to go stab some shit.” and Tommy storms out of the room he was so desperate to be in before. Wilbur’s sitting up at least, though he doesn’t meet Phil’s eyes.

“Guessing you two talked about the, uh, incident?”

“Me murdering him, you mean?” Wilbur says bitterly. Phil actually was referring to Tommy holding Wilbur at knife-point, but Tommy’s death was definitely also an incident.

“It wasn’t murder, Wil, it was an accident.”

“It’s involuntary manslaughter at fucking best, Phil.”

“He’s alive. He’s breathing. That’s because of you too.”

“I’m tired of going in circles,” Wilbur says, and he sounds it too. Phil thinks Wilbur sounds older than Phil feels, and Phil certainly feels old right now. “At the end of the day, this is what we were always afraid of. It happened. What now?”

“I told you. We reevaluate the rules and-”

“Phil, I don’t give a damn about the rules right now. I care about the fact that the only reason Tommy is breathing right now is because I fucking made him immortal after killing him,” Wilbur sounds angrier than Phil thinks he’s ever heard him. He knows all of it is directed at himself. “So explain to me what happens now.”

“What are you expecting, Wilbur?” Phil asks in disbelief. “Some kind of punishment? What the fuck would I even do?”

“I dunno. Lock me up?”

“Hey, officer, my son bent the universe to murder his brother while he had a fever, but both of them are better now. What do you mean you can’t incriminate that?”

“Fuck you. This isn’t a joke.”

“I’m not making a joke. I’m trying to show you how ridiculous this is, Wilbur. Shit happened, and now we move forward. Your powers still exist. Tommy’s still alive. You’re still alive. None of these are bad things.” The confusion and anger morph into something ugly, and Phil makes himself look at Wilbur head-on. 

“My powers are a bad thing.” And Phil, not for the first time today and certainly not the last, feels like he failed as a parent.

“They’re not, Wil,” he tries to say gently but comes off frustrated because he doesn’t know how to get this through his son’s fucking head. “They’re not good or bad, they just are. Do you understand?”

“I’m not good,” Wilbur says, like it’s a fact rather than a very concerning statement to make a few hours after trying to kill himself. “Do you understand?”

“I don’t understand,” Phil admits. “I could understand being afraid of the power. I could understand being afraid of yourself, to a point. But I don’t fucking get where the rest of this comes from, Wilbur. I don’t- why do you hate yourself?“ Wilbur looks away from him, like he can’t face the question head-on, and he finds the cat’s head to rub like a lifeline. Phil understands why, but he can’t do this anymore. He can’t play pretend like this anymore. “I’ll do anything. Just fucking help me help you.”

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Well, I don’t want my son to die. So we’re gonna fucking talk about this.”

“I’m not gonna die, Phil,” Wilbur says with a laugh that sounds just a bit too sad. “I- I get that it was scary with the fever but I wouldn’t kill myself. I couldn’t even do it then. I made Techno do the hard part.”

“You understand how terrifying this is, right?”

“‘Course I do. I’m the one with the Goddamn powers, Phil.”

“I’m not talking about that! I don’t give a shit about that right now, Wil, I’m more concerned by literally everything else. I’ve got Tommy shouting at me, pissed at me for shit I didn’t even know. I’ve got you refusing to let me even try to help you. The only person in this house I can understand right now is Technoblade and he’s concussed!”

“Right, of course, ‘cause Techno’s always so fucking perfect.”

“Oh my God, Wilbur, this isn’t about your Goddamn brother, I just want to understand,” he begs. Wilbur doesn’t say a word. “Please help me understand.” And Wilbur looks up, face twisted into the saddest scowl Phil has ever seen.

“I have tried to pretend that this curse meant nothing. I’ve tried to pretend that at the end of the day, I’m just a normal man with an unfortunate power I never have to use or think about, but at the end of the day the issue is me, Phil. The power isn’t the rot. It’s just- it’s a growth from me. The rot is me.” Wilbur looks at him, really looks at him, and Phil thinks for the first time since yesterday began, Wilbur actually wants to be understood. Phil doesn’t quite get it. He deals with his own shit, his own insecurities, his own sadness, but he’s never looked at the world and thought he didn’t belong in it.

“There’s no rot. You’re just- you’re just-”

“Me?” Wilbur asks, tone with a sadness like it’s the worst thing he could imagine.

“Yeah,” Phil answers quietly. “You’re just you. And that’s as neutral as the power. You decide who you are, Wilbur. There’s nothing innate about it.”

“I’ve made a lot of bad decisions,” Wilbur says quietly, staring at the cat.

“Lot of good ones too,” Phil says. “And you’ve got a lot of time to make even more.” Wilbur scratches at the cat’s neck, and Phil can hear the little thing purring from here.

“I don’t want to send the cat away,” Wilbur says with something like shame. 

“Neither do I,” Phil says. Wilbur nods, looking sad and confused, but he doesn’t send her away. He doesn’t disagree with the idea of rejecting the previous rules. It’s not a lot. But it’s a start.

When Technoblade wakes up, his head doesn’t hurt. Small miracles. It means his concussion was probably mild and he’s healed fully now. Or dead, possibly, but he thinks he’s the person who was the least close to dying today, actually. Or yesterday maybe? Time’s a funny thing when you’re knocked out.

He thought Wilbur would try to hurt him more, actually, though maybe he just thought littler of his brother than he should have. Well, he did try to force Technoblade to strangle him. That was pretty screwed up, actually. Techno hopes he doesn’t have trauma now, ‘cause he’s honestly done really well so far without being traumatized. Crippling anxiety? Sure. A bit of an avoidant nature? His twin got all the socializing in the genes, thanks. But he’s 26 years old and the long-reigning champion of never having literally anything awful happen to him ever. So this kind of sucks.

He walks downstairs to let everyone know he’s alive, if they even care with Wilbur still being off the deep end, and he’s incredibly surprised to see his twin sitting at the kitchen table looking sad over a bowl of cereal. Part of Technoblade just kind of wants to book it in the other direction. There’s a bigger, sadder part of him that just wants to see if he can help.

“You’re lookin’ worse for wear,” Technoblade says, instead of anything actually helpful, and Wilbur’s head shoots up like he’s been shocked. 

“Could say the same to you,” Wilbur returns the jab. Techno’s sure he’s not looking pretty, but the bags under Wilbur’s eyes have bags, and his skin is still pasty and gross from the fever. So Technoblade thinks he’s winning this beauty contest. “Your hair is actually pink,” he says in disbelief.

“Careful, now,” Technoblade jokingly warns. “Might make it even pinker.” Wilbur huffs a laugh but averts his eyes.

“Phil said you like it?” Wilbur asks. He sounds… confused. Possibly hopeful? Technoblade is not the best with reading people, and reading his brother is something he’s even worse at.

“I do,” Techno confirms with a shrug. “Looks nice. Me and Niki can start a club.” Wilbur shrinks in his seat a bit, and Techno is confused for a moment why he would be upset about Technoblade liking his hair, but realizes it’s probably less about him and more about mentioning Niki. 

She ranted about it to him sometimes, Wilbur pulling away, and Techno could only nod and hum because he and Wilbur’s relationship was actually pretty normal still. Occasionally Wilbur sent him a picture of a cute animal in their backyard, and occasionally Technoblade sent him a picture of a book he thought he might like. Neither were especially good at texting, and considering how often Wilbur misinterprets him in person, Techno can’t imagine what he’d try to garner from a thumbs up emoji.

“Does she hate me, still?” Wilbur asks.

“Yeah,” Technoblade answers, feeling a bit bad when Wilbur looks down. “She misses you more, though.” Wilbur raises his head again, looking thoughtful. “What’s happenin’, by the way? Last time I was up and attem, you were still a freak.”

“I don’t really know,” Wilbur says, a furrow to his brow. “Phil keeps talking about reevaluating shit, and Tommy just seems pissed at everything, and I’m very confused, honestly.”

“Well, hey, we got that in common.” Wilbur smiles. It drops after just a moment.

“They told me what I did,” he says quietly. “I remember.”

“Right,” Techno looks away from him. “I don’t, uh, I don’t blame you. I know stuff was weird.”

“Are you alright?” Wilbur asks, then looks shocked. “Been asked that so many times in the past hour, asking it to someone else feels wrong.” Technoblade laughs.

“I’m good,” he says and thinks he means it. “Probably, uh, not gonna be super quick to tie anythin’ up for a while. Gotta get velcro shoes, now,” Wilbur snorts. “But I’m good.”

“How do you do that?” Wilbur asks. 

“What?”

“Just- just be good. Make the bad things not matter,” he sounds frustrated. “It’s like nothing affects you.” Technoblade sighs, scratching at the back of his neck because their conversation was going good for once and now Wilbur looks annoyed.

“I dunno,” he answers with a shrug. “I just know I’m gonna be okay. Sucks, but it’s not the end of the world.”

“But it could’ve been.”

“But it’s not.”

“But-”

“Wilbur, you’re gonna drive yourself insane like that. We’re all good, and you’re good, and we’re all gonna be good. What coulda happened, what could happened, literally who cares?”

“I do.”

“And how’s that workin’ out for you?” Wilbur huffs. “I don’t- I’m not tryin’ to be a jerk here. Just, like, you are 90% of your own problems, man.”

“I know that,” Wilbur mutters.

“Okay? And what are you gonna do about that?” Wilbur looks angry and goes to say something, goes to speak, but he stops himself. He looks at Technoblade and just thinks for a minute.

“I don’t know,” he finally answers. 

“Okay. Work on that.” And Technoblade makes himself a bowl of cereal too. There’s a few seconds where Technoblade thinks that’ll be the end of the conversation, but he considers something very briefly before asking, “Hey, question. You told me that the blue would make you better, right?”

“I vaguely remember that.”

“Right. So if the jello was the blue, and we fed you the jello, do you think we probably could’ve avoided this whole situation?” Wilbur rolls his eyes and opens his mouth, probably to say something about how ridiculous it is, but he stops, looks thoughtfully confused, and his face drops entirely.

Shooting Technoblade the most annoyed look of all time, Wilbur says, “You are fucking kidding me.” All Technoblade can do is laugh.

It’s been a week since everything went down, and Wilbur is annoyed by how the kitchen goes silent as he wanders in. It didn’t seem particularly loud before, but he heard Phil talking about something and now he presumes that something was him considering all three eyes go to him then quickly look away. Technoblade sets a plate of hash browns, eggs, and toast in front of him, and Wilbur tries to ignore all three pairs of eyes back on him as he eats. 

“How'd you sleep?” Phil finally asks. 

With a sigh, Wilbur answers, “Just fine.” There’s another bit of silence, and Wilbur catches Tommy making a face at Phil.

“Seriously?” Phil asks, sounding doubtful. Wilbur just barely resists slamming his fork on the table and storming off, but is aware that’s probably not going to make Phil think he’s doing especially well. Even though he is.

“Seriously,” Wilbur answers. Tommy scoffs.

“Don’t be a bitch about this, man.”

“I’m not being a bitch about this!”

“How’d you actually sleep?” Wilbur takes a deep breath in and out while he imagines setting fire to his family home and leaving them all in the wreckage. He is once again grateful that his power only works when he speaks it out loud.

“I had a nightmare,” he admits, to placate them. “But it was genuinely fine. It turned into a dream where I married a giant, man-eating salmon.” 

“That… was a good dream?” Phil asks, befuddled.

“Her name was Sally,” he says with probably too-much affection. She was delightful, actually, and she may have eaten many people, but she was a very caring wife and mother. Wilbur would have fed her the world.

“Okay,” Tommy decides. ”I’m giving you permission to kill yourself now, actually,” and Technoblade chokes on his orange juice while Phil gives Tommy a very stern look.

“Tommy,” Phil says his name like a warning. That is a very common thing with Tommy. Wilbur doesn’t need child-gloves, though, and his brother suicide baiting him is much more familiar than any of the sad, confused stares the three of them have given him in the past week, so he just laughs.

“You don’t need to be all weird,” Wilbur tells Phil as he butters his toast. “I’m not- I’m not different now.” But the way Phil looks at him is decidedly different now. It’s no longer frustration, or amusement, or quiet disappointment (and was it ever, or did he make that one up?), instead just this awful sadness like Wilbur’s already dead and his ghost is haunting all of them. It’s frustrating. Tommy looks at him a little sad, but Tommy has looked at him a little sad for a while now. The only one almost completely normal about everything is Technoblade. Wilbur wonders if he even has the capacity for non-normalcy.

“I know that,” Phil says, even though he clearly fucking doesn’t. “I just…” and he doesn’t finish. Wilbur wonders if he knows how. The silence feels suffocating, like no one wants it there but no one wants to break it. He’s a bit surprised by who chooses to.

“Wilbur, you’re on chores today,” Technoblade says from his seat, and Wilbur lays his head on the table and groans. “Nah, ‘cause I had to do your chores last week-”

“Surely you can excuse me almost dying.”

“If that gets you out of chores, you’re doing my chores forever, bitch,” Tommy says and Wilbur groans even louder. 

“Dyin’ is not an excuse. I’m not even supposed to be here right now.” Technoblade was meant to only be at the house for a few days, but he ended up staying the entire spring break and then some. Apparently Niki is covering his class for a few days. Wilbur wonders if he’s even actually had the time to grade papers. Wilbur wonders if he told Niki about what happened.

“Even more reason,” Wilbur complains. “You never have to fucking do them.”

“I’ve done them every day this week.”

“That really sucks for you.”

“You are 25 years old, Wilbur, do your laundry.” Wilbur sighs, but lifts his hands in defeat. He’ll do the damn laundry. He’ll clean the porch too. He’ll even mop the fucking kitchen. He owes Technoblade anyway.

Wilbur is folding laundry when Technoblade nearly makes him shit himself by saying, “Hey,” in the dark laundry room. Instead of shitting himself, he just drops the towel in his hands.

“Sorry,” Technoblade says, picking it up and handing it back to Wilbur. With a frown, Wilbur tosses it back in the hamper. He’ll have to wash it again. “I, uh, I had a question.”

“One you had to jumpscare me at 4 in the morning for?” 

“No, that’s just a plus.”

“Kick rocks, Technoblade,” Wilbur says, and starts to make his way out of the laundry room when Techno makes an annoyed noise funny enough for Wilbur to turn back around and actually let him ask his damn question. “What do you need, king?”

“Okay, I need you to not laugh at me.”

“Alright,” Wilbur says, lips curling into a smile because he already kind of wants to laugh at Technoblade’s nerves.

“I need you to understand that I am bein’ 100% genuine and serious with this question.”

“Alright, Techno.”

“So when I ask the question, I need you to answer it seriously and not be all Wilbur about it, alright?”

“Just ask the damn question.”

“Do you wanna come back to Colorado with me?”

“...Are you joking?”

“You are askin’ questions my “this is not a joke” warnin’ already answered, Wilbur.”

“No, but like, seriously?”

“Wilbur.”

“It just feels very out of the blue,” Wilbur says, confusion clouding his brain. He loves Technoblade, he really does, but the two of them are not what one would call close. They share a face, but their personalities have a tendency to clash the same way that Wilbur and Phil’s personalities do. Technoblade and Phil being so damn similar and Wilbur always envying that fact certainly don’t help anything. At the end of the day, Wilbur loves Techno, but he also couldn’t tell you his favorite song. 

“You’re not gonna get better here,” Techno says, sounding so matter-of-fact it makes Wilbur feel like he’s been slapped. “Phil is gonna try until he’s smotherin’ you, and then you’re gonna have the exact opposite problem, and Tommy wants to help but he’d also just let you sit in your misery as long as you were, y’know, still here to sit in it.”

“That’s a big change, Technoblade, aren’t you not supposed to go through a big change while trying to fix your life?”

“You need a change, Wilbur. I don’t think sleepin’ in the same room you tried to kill yourself in is doin’ you any favors,” Wilbur’s jaw drops, just a little, and Techno shrugs. “Just bein’ honest.”

“You don’t know anything about this,” Wilbur says; insists, even. “You don’t know what I need, and you don’t know me.” He's scared all of the time already, and he's even more scared of the fact that Technoblade might be right, and that means he has to be as mean as possible and book it the Hell out of here once Technoblade storms off.

“Well, hey, potential brotherly bondin’ or whatever too,” Technoblade responds with a joke to Wilbur’s cruelty and it just pisses him off more. “If you don’t wanna, it’s alright. I get it. We’re not friends, not like you and Tommy,” and isn’t that sad? That Wilbur is closer to a kid who came into their lives 19 years late than the twin he was brought up with. “But I know you well enough that I think this’ll be good for you.” It feels presumptuous, to think that Wilbur wants to fuck off ten hours in the opposite direction from (nearly) everything he loves. Phil is here, Tommy is here, and Wilbur thinks you’re supposed to have a support system or whatever through trying not to succumb to your own misery. He thinks of the past week, of wanting to bite at every hand that reaches out to him, of nearly breaking the rules just to wish for a gun, of all the issues this simple fucking fever has brought up and rung out of him like a dishrag, spilling over everything and everyone he loves. 

“Can I think about it?” He asks instead of answering with what he’s sure will be a definitive no. He doesn’t want to live with his estranged brother in a state where he's never been around people he doesn’t know, and in the case of Niki, people who fucking hate him. But Technoblade said she misses him more than she hates him. And Technoblade apparently knows shit now.

“‘Course,” Techno answers with a shrug. “I leave in like three days. Take your time.”

“Thank you, Technoblade,” Wilbur says because even if he thinks the offer is weird and potentially going to end in murder, it is the kindest thing he’s been shown by his brother in nearly a decade (other than refusing to murder him, probably). Techno nods and gives Wilbur an awkward pat on the shoulder before heading back upstairs to his room. Fucking odd.

When Wilbur wakes up the next day, he thinks he wants to burn his bed sheets. He doesn’t want them anymore. They’re tainted, ruined, and sleeping in the same bed he beat his fever makes him want to scream. He doesn’t. Very quietly, he takes his bed sheets and pillow to the fire pit outside and starts the process. It doesn’t smell very good as it burns, but Wilbur supposes hair and dead skin-cells make up most of it now. He feels very calm about his decision until he’s interrupted.

“What the fuck?” Tommy questions, looking at the burning cloth. “You burnin’ shit without me? That’s fucked, Wil.”

“I don’t trust you around fire,” Wilbur says, and he fucking means it. He didn’t have eyebrows for nearly a month because of Tommy’s 16th birthday. Teaching him how to use a lighter was a mistake.

“You’ve wronged me.”

“For the safety of our friends and loved ones, yes.”

“Little arson never hurt anyone,” Tommy complains. 

“And that philosophy is why I didn’t invite you,” Wilbur jokes. The reason he didn’t invite Tommy, though, is because it felt like an incredibly odd thing to be doing, and he figured Tommy would ask questions, and he kind of just did it on impulse and didn’t think to invite anyone actually. He’s now wondering if he has enough money to go pick up some new sheets.

“So what’s with the burning, anyway?” Tommy finally questions. Wilbur wishes he wouldn’t. “Like, what even- wait, are those your fucking sheets?” And now he sounds concerned, which is fair enough because now that Wilbur hasn’t just woken up he’s a bit annoyed with his impulse-decision. “Wil, seriously, what the-”

“I’m moving to Colorado,” Wilbur blurts out. He didn’t mean to. He hadn’t even thought about it all morning. But apparently he’s made a decision. Tommy looks like he’s been slapped.

“What?” 

“I- I’m going with Technoblade to Colorado,” Wilbur says, less sure but apparently sticking with it. “He offered me a place to stay.”

“You have a place to stay,” Tommy says, dumbfounded. “Your fuckin’ house. Right here.”

“I don’t think I can be here right now,” Wilbur admits. “With Phil, with you-”

“With me?” Tommy’s voice goes high and upset, and Wilbur wishes he hadn’t said anything. “What the fuck did I do to you?”

“Tommy, you haven’t done anything, it’s-”

“No, ‘cause clearly I fuckin’ did something if you’re moving all the way to whatever made-up place you’re fucking off to!”

“It’s Colorado,” Wilbur says patiently. “The same place Technoblade has lived for the past four years.”

“But-”

“You haven’t done anything wrong,” Wilbur repeats. “Phil hasn’t either. Well, it’s not the reason I’m leaving, anyway. I just- I can’t be here, man. I can’t wake up in the same room and see the same people and live the same life I was before. I need to change, and I think this is a step in doing that.” Tommy doesn’t look at him. Looking younger than he has in years, Tommy stares at the fire with a scowl that looks like it’s trying to hide the way his lip wobbles.

“I don’t want you to go,” he says petulantly, kicking at the dirt. “Can’t we just kill Phil, sell the house, and move to Vegas? Just seems a whole lot easier than living in Colorado, is all.” 

“They’ve got all these laws about murder, nowadays,” Wilbur says with a smile. “And I actually quite like Phil.”

“I do too, but do I like him more than the money and the lights of Vegas, Wilbur? I don’t think so.”

“Tommy-”

“Do you really have to go?” Tommy asks, finally looking at him. “Like, really have to go?” And the way he asks isn’t quite as petulant as before. It’s still desperate and sad, but more of a genuine question of, is this the thing that’ll help you?

“I think so,” Wilbur says with a shrug. “Can’t know until I get there.” There’s a silence, and Tommy looks like he has something to ask, something he wants to ask desperately, and Wilbur hopes against all hope it’s not, can I come too? Because Wilbur will miss Tommy something fierce, possibly more than anything else he’s leaving behind, but Technoblade wasn’t wrong when he said that Tommy’s unconditional love enables him to be as awful as he always has been. He needs something stable, and a kid who forgives him for murder before Wilbur even has a chance to apologize is decidedly not the most stable relationship in his life. Wilbur doesn’t think he has one of those to be fair. 

“You better come back for the holidays,” Tommy finally settles on, and Wilbur breathes a sigh of relief. He also feels hurt in a way he can’t even begin to process. “And you better fucking answer my texts for once, dickhead.”

“I think I can do that,” Wilbur says with a smile. As they watch the rest of his sheets go up in flames, they’re joined by their brother. Before Technoblade can even start a sentence, Tommy kicks him in the shins.

“Ow, what the heck, kid?” Techno demands, rubbing at the spot on his leg that Tommy held back zero mercy for. 

“You suck,” Tommy hisses at him and Wilbur laughs at the bewilderment on Techno’s face. 

“Sorry, did I get universe bendin’ powers and kill you this time or somethin’?”

“At least Wilbur had the decency to look me in the eyes while he killed me, Technoblade,” Tommy complains, and Wilbur thinks they’re both a bit too lenient with joking about this deeply traumatic experience, but alright. “You backstabbed me.”

“Right, and how did I do that again?”

“You’re takin’ him to fucking Colorado!” Technoblade looks at Wilbur in surprise, and Wilbur shrugs at his brother. 

“Yep,” Technoblade says. “And I did it specifically to screw you over.”

“It’s such a pity the world revolves around me,” Tommy bemoans and Wilbur laughs.

“Truly you face hardship like no other,” Wilbur says.

“And don’t you fuckin’ forget it.”

The three brothers watch the burning fire, and Wilbur feels good about his decision. He doesn’t know how Phil will react. He barely knows if it was the right thing to do. But he’s taking a leap of faith, here, in both himself and his twin, and he hopes that a much kinder world is at the bottom.

“And you’re sure?” Phil asks for the 100th time. Wilbur leans against Technoblade’s car with the kindest smile he can muster. He thinks he understands what Techno meant about smothering now.

With one hand lifted in the air and the other on his heart he says, “I promise that we’ll both be back for the summer in two whole pieces, alright?”

“I trust you, it’s just so soon after, Wil.”

“I know. But I need to. Do you understand?” Asking if Phil understands something Wilbur does is like asking a fish if it understands the Declaration of Independence. But Phil just sighs and nods, and Wilbur hopes against all hope that he actually does. He appreciates the man trying. 

They’re interrupted by Technoblade saying, “Tommy, get out of the back seat.” Wilbur hadn’t even noticed him between the suitcases and the cat carrier. 

“Mind your fucking business, Technoblade.”

“This is my car!”

“Tommy,” Wilbur thumps the top of the car twice in quick succession. “Get out.”

“Fuck both of you,” but he follows Wilbur’s direction. Princess Motherfucker—because Wilbur had (another) moment of insanity where he forgot Tommy hates cats more than anything, and let Tommy name her, and Wilbur actually had to amend the cat not be named Motherfucker as a whole for the sole purpose of letting Techno actually say her name—meows at the shaking of the car and Wilbur sends her a sympathetic meow back. Tommy looks at him like there’s something wrong with him. There certainly is, but being kind to the cat is not the very certain wrong, Wilbur thinks.

“We’ll be back in three months, Tommy.”

“I still think it’s stupid.”

“I know,” Wilbur says kindly. Tommy huffs but pulls Wilbur into a hug and he thinks that’s the closest to understanding he’s gonna get. 

“You call me, alright? If your brain gets all fuckin’ weird.” Tommy demands. Wilbur definitely won’t, but he says, “I will,” anyway. Tommy pulls away and makes a face like he knows Wilbur’s lying, but just says, “You better.” 

He’s pulled into a hug by Phil next, who hugs him tight and says, “You’re gonna do great, Wil.” 

“I’m not doing anything,” Wilbur complains. “I’m sleeping on Technoblade’s couch.”

“And you’re gonna do great.” Wilbur laughs and pulls away. 

“Alright. I’ll see you soon.”

“Soon,” Phil repeats with a smile. Wilbur crawls into Technoblade’s tiny, shitty car and sends one last wave to his father and little brother. He gets a wave and the middle finger back. It takes just a minute for them to be completely out of sight, and Wilbur hates it a lot. He’s excited a little bit, though. He’s never even been out of the state before.

“10 hours in a car,” Wilbur says, dreading that part just a little less than leaving most of his family behind.

“Can’t you literally teleport if you wanted to?”

“Technically,” Wilbur admits warily. He still doesn’t like to use his power. His father keeps telling him it’s alright as long as he doesn’t do anything that actually changes the universe. Anything that affects other people. But Wilbur still has a hard time processing that speaking a candy bar into existence because Tommy’s badgering him, or making it so the shower head is spraying just a little harder, or any little thing in his life isn’t the same kind of evil as, say, murdering his little brother. Alright, Wilbur can process it’s not that bad, but it still feels fucking weird. The only thing he’s done since his fever is undoing the jello road. Attempting to undo Tommy’s immortality as well, but they really won’t know until he dies. If he dies. Wilbur can’t think about it for more than five seconds without feeling like he’s dying, so he tries not to.

“I mean,” Techno gives him a sly little smile and a shrug. “It’s not that big of a deal, right? And we’re tryin’ to get you used to doin’ it, right?”

“Is that what we’re trying to do?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“Need I remind you-”

“You needn’t,” Technoblade interrupts, and it shocks a laugh out of Wilbur. “C’mon, Wilbur. Just one little 10 hour trip! Cut to just ten minutes! Live a little.”

“You’re serious.”

“I am.”

“Does this shit not scare you? Even a little bit?”

“Eh, slightly. I know how bad it can get,” and Wilbur wants to curl in on himself at the reminder. “But I also, like, logically know that how bad it can get has nothin’ to do with this. So?”

“So…” Techno shoots him another little smile. Wilbur returns it, and with nothing else to lose says, “We’ll be at The Colorado School of Mines in 10 minutes.” His heart is in his ass, but he can’t really feel all that bad when Technoblade is looking at him like he hasn’t supremely fucked up everything. 

“Oh, this is amazin’. This is the whole reason I asked you to come, actually. Gonna get you to drain my shower next.”

“Oh, go to Hell, Technoblade,” but Wilbur is smiling. This is a start. Just a small something, but he thinks it’s a damn good small something.

It’s only a ten minute ride (now) but Wilbur thinks he’s had enough of talking, emotional or non-emotional, and just wants to process what’s coming in the next few days. Seeing Niki again (he sent her a text, something small, and he saw she read it; nothing back, but he still has hope), living with his twin again (something they haven’t really done since they were 18 and Wilbur was ten seconds from snapping and killing him out of probably unwarranted jealousy), and being without the only two constants in his life (and poor Phil just became more of a constant, a father who wants to try even if he doesn’t fully understand how. And Tommy, well. This is better for both of them, probably, even if Tommy doesn't see it yet. Even if Wilbur can't really either). He just wants to listen to music and compartmentalize for ten seconds. 

He turns the radio on, a song he doesn’t recognize coming on and he nearly changes it, but Technoblade says, “Oh, this is my favorite song.” Wilbur’s hand stutters over the dial, and then he retreats. He knows his brother a little better now. That’s something too.

One day down the road you'll find
Everything you hid inside

On that night, long ago
Walking down the road that we used to know
You said, "Let's take it slow"
Let's take the long way home
Let's take the long way home