Chapter Text
The trip to the grocery store is a blink in Wilbur’s mind.
He has no patience for it to be anything more.
It takes only a few suggestions, a few slightly stilted words for Phil to hurry up with their items, all the while Technoblade holds onto Wilbur’s hand, led along as his eyes glaze over in a way where he isn’t quite all there.
Shadows pick around back home. Around the outside hallway, around the building, around the street. They’re subtle, quiet, and unnoticed creatures, but nearly vicious in their search, and for all their effort given, they search everywhere except for the most crucial spot.
Technoblade doesn’t expect anything to be found within the apartment, to be fair. He never gets a signal for it. He never hears a thing, never suspects anything off. The shadows outside shift and bend around each corner, their eyes digging into every angle, but the ones that lingered inside melt away, blinded so softly and so quickly that it’s hard to remember they weren’t a part of the void to begin with.
By the time Technoblade lets go of Wilbur’s hand with a short huff, and Phil’s sorted all their groceries into bags, Wil’s assumed that they’ve hit another dead end.
They’ve found nothing.
He swallows the jagged frustration that’s scraping against his throat and carefully sets aside his rolling anger, choosing to instead carry cheerful small talk with Phil on their way back home. The normalcy of it is a harsh contrast against the shaking bitterness in his chest, but the sound of Phil’s voice soothes him. Calms him somewhat, for the moment being.
His smile is nothing but perfect when they head into their apartment building, and his tone is nothing but chipper as they travel down the hall. Techno’s face is a flat, set expression of boredom, but with how the shadows in the corners flare up as they move past, Wilbur thinks he’s more than a bit ticked off at having gotten nothing as well. He’s on edge.
Phil is none the wiser to their failure. He shifts a bag to one arm as he takes out the keys, and he opens their front door with a yell, calling that they’ve come home. Wilbur breathes in deep, then makes a small smile as he and Techno follow him inside, their own groceries in their arms. As he reaches behind to close the door, Phil travels out of view towards the kitchen, his voice fading out as he talks with Kristin in the other room.
Technoblade comes to a slow halt in the middle of the living room.
Wilbur turns and stares at the back of his brother’s head with a sliver of confusion, the click of the lock so deathly quiet against his fingertips, not giving away what exactly he’s doomed himself into.
The bags in Techno’s hands slip for a second, then they land gently on the ground as leans forward and places them down, his head jerking to the side as he’s stuck looking at- nothing in particular.
He’s not looking at anything. His eyes aren’t exactly focused, but there’s a certain curl in his lip that tells of a slight panic, that tells he’s noticed something. Sensed something. His hands are twitching at his sides like he’s hoping to pull his shadows back, but they’re not around. Wilbur doesn’t see them.
….They’re not around.
The dark is too still.
Wilbur drops his bags down, seething at the realization, at the fact something messed with Techno. His anger shifts into a raw worry when Technoblade turns his head to him, eyes still wide in a way that’s- scared.
“Something’s- wrong.” Technoblade bites out, as if he can’t quite focus on forming the words. Wilbur tilts his head in sheer bewilderment, both concern and annoyance melting together in his head. “Wilbur, there’s something wrong-” He goes to take a step towards Wil, then he stumbles.
Wil’s heart aches with how hard it jumps from fear at the sight.
“Hey-” Wilbur reaches out and quickly takes his brother by the arms, supporting him up and pulling him close. He digs his fingers into the fabric of his sleeves, wanting to grip even harder, digging nails into flesh, when Techno’s head falls further down. “Hey, hey! Technoblade!?”
“Wilbur, something is off. I can’t- I can’t hear them.” Technoblade whispers low, and it’s impossible to not hear every inflection in his words with how suddenly things have gone quiet. Phil and Kristin’s conversation has disappeared from the kitchen. Wilbur’s heart keeps hurting, pounding with too much pressure. “I can’t hear any of them.” Technoblade looks up, distress carved into his expression at the implication of what it means to have lost his shadows, to not have been aware of anything inside the house when they were gone.
A cold, freezing dread washes down Wil’s spine alongside a white hot flash of knee-jerk denial.
“No.” He chokes out, shaking his head. “Nonono- Tommy-” He chokes out, and he moves towards the kitchen, Technoblade following right after him, right at his heels.
Phil and Kristin are standing by the counter. Kristin is silently preparing dinner, a cutting board in front of her and a knife in her hand, a vegetable of some sort sliced to bits underneath her fingers. Phil’s sorting through the groceries, laying them out and putting them away. They don’t lift their attention to the twins when they come rushing through the doorway.
Technoblade doesn’t stop to say hello to them. He doesn’t even give a passing glance, he just moves right past Wilbur, into the hallway, practically breaking out into a run to Tommy’s room as Wilbur comes to a stop and sets his sights on their parents. He gives a thin smile, his palms pressed against the edge of the counter as he leans forward.
“Mom. Did anything happen while we were gone?” He asks, curious and normal, laced with a buzzing tone around the edges of his voice. He expects an immediate answer, honest and true, something to ease the unusual heaviness sitting in his chest.
He doesn’t get it. Kristin doesn’t even respond at all. She looks up, but only to glance at Techno, to twist her neck to peer into the hall. A slight frown rests on her lips.
“Well, isn’t he in a hurry?” She says, faintly hearing the noise of doors being slammed against the walls, footsteps going in and out of each room, rummaging through the place. She doesn’t seem too curious about what Techno’s even doing.
Phil makes a light laugh and continues to put groceries away, like all is well. “Don’t tease.” He says gently, and Kristin looks over her shoulder with her knife pointed up, the edge of it angled directly at Wilbur.
“I’m allowed to have my fun.” She smiles. Phil smiles back, giving a fond shake of his head.
“Mom.” Wilbur repeats, a bit caught off guard. Her eyes stay on Phil as he keeps moving around, sorting things away. “What happened when we were gone?”
Again, Kristin doesn’t look at him. She scans over the things left on the counter, and then places her knife down, putting a hand on her hip as she turns fully to Phil. “Did you get chicken?”
Phil turns his head to her with a slow blink. “That wasn’t on the list?”
“...Mom.” Wilbur calls, partly just baffled by the fact he’s being ignored. Another part of him does not have the fucking patience for this. “Dad.” He calls, and Phil nearly glances towards him, his head turning his direction, only for his attention to be steered back to Kristin as she scolds him lightheartedly.
“I told you to put it on the list! I said, Phil, remember, we need chicken for dinner today, write it down.” She makes a writing gesture with one hand.
“When did you say that?” Phil frowns, looking terribly confused. “I don’t remember that.”
“Oh- wait, to be honest, that one might not even be on you.” Kristin gives a sympathetic look, her hand held to her chin. “That might’ve been their-”
“Mom!” Wilbur yells, sharp and loud. It cuts through the kitchen, leaves the place in a few awkward seconds of silence. Finally, Kristin turns her head to him, just as Technoblade returns back by the doorway, his expression grim. Wilbur’s nails scratch against the countertop when he sees it. It leaves marks.
“Yes, Wil?” Kristin asks, sweet and patient. Phil turns his back as he closes the fridge, done with what he had on the counter.
“Where’s Tommy?” Wilbur questions, the words burning in his mouth as he speaks. He wants to scream at her face until she gives him an actual answer, wants to cry out in such a shrill, horrible tone that it'll shatter the windows entirely and terrify everything within a mile distance. Maybe then, it would make them desperate to appease him and it would make them stop with these games. “Tell me where-” Wilbur goes to ask.
Then a drop of blood falls onto the countertop.
Technoblade goes rigid at where he stands, eyes flickering to red. Wilbur’s question dies in his throat, his breath hitching as he pulls back and holds a hand up underneath his nose, tilting his head forward with his jaw left ajar.
“Oh, dear.” Kristin says, but there’s nothing of worry nor surprise in it. She watches with an unblinking stare as blood drips over Wil’s lip, landing into his palm, and Phil leans close and kisses her on the cheek as a goodbye.
“I’ll be right back.” He says casually, and Wilbur’s eyes follow him as he walks around the counter, leaving the kitchen and moving to the living room to presumably head to the store again. Like nothing is off.
“Dad?” Wilbur murmurs.
Phil stops.
Kristin picks up the knife again, continuing with dinner, and Phil makes a small glance back over his shoulder. Wilbur can’t find anything unusual in the small smile that he gives. It’s familiar and ordinary, which makes it all the more bizarre. He doesn’t know how to react, so he doesn’t.
“I’ll be back.” Phil repeats. “You boys behave.” He nods, and Wilbur gives a tiny shake of his head, seeing Phil walk to the front door.
“Dad, don’t-” He goes to speak, and more cold blood leaks out from his nose, pouring out onto his palm as he chokes at the sensation. Some of it drops onto the tile, bright red spots against the off-white. The front door opens, then closes, and the click of the lock sounds so loud.
Wilbur stands up straighter and holds his unbloodied hand to his chest, feeling his lungs move a bit too quickly. His heart still- hurts.
“Wilbur-” Technoblade moves to Wilbur’s side, and he turns his brother to face him, trying to wipe at the blood on his face with his sleeve. Wilbur blinks with a shuddering exhale coming through his mouth, trying to think. “Wil, we’ve got to go.”
“What?” Wil blinks again, and grasping at the fabric over his heart. “No.” He immediately refuses, tilting his head up. “No, we-”
“This is all off.” Technoblade hisses quietly as he leans his head down, grabbing Wilbur by the shoulders as if to steady him. “It’s too quiet for me, and they didn’t even listen to you-”
“But Tommy.” Wilbur breathes out, moving past the disturbed weight in between his ribs so that he may grasp onto a semblance of more focused anger. He grits his words with a roughness to them, fury swelling up through his throat. “Tommy, he’s-”
“He’s not hurt.” Kristin speaks up, and both Wil and Techno snap their heads towards her, hearing the slight scrape of her knife against the cutting board. She continues cutting at what Wil first thought to be a vegetable, but now it looks more like meat, wet and bright red and chopped into messy, uneven pieces.
For some reason, his stomach feels uneasy with the sight of it. He’s not sure why.
“He’s perfectly alright. We talked for a little while. Shared a few things.” Her eyes lift up, and Technoblade tilts his head to the side with a narrowed gaze, the color having shifted into a deep, dark crimson. Wilbur only furrows his brows together, not wanting to let himself suspect anything, because then that means things are ruined.
“Where is he?” He simply asks.
Blood drips off his lip in a steady stream, soaking onto his shirt, smearing across his hand as he wipes at it. He thinks he might be actually shaking. His hands are trembling, which in itself is so unusual that he can’t help but stare down at himself with a disconcerted look.
Then Technoblade suddenly yanks him by the wrist, forcing Wil to stand behind him, pushing him backwards so that they can have a few more steps of distance from the counter.
“Technoblade-” Wilbur says, and Techno cuts him off.
“That’s not her.”
Kristin frowns the tiniest bit, clicking her tongue with something vaguely annoyed. “This again?” She mutters.
“You’re not her.” Techno squeezes his hand at where he’s holding onto Wilbur, and Wilbur freezes up, a sudden harsh grief crawling into his lungs and taking up all the space there.
He wonders when exactly they lost Kristin, and if they lost Tommy too, then he pushes all of that away entirely, shoving it down, for thinking about it hurts far too much. He can’t bear to think about his mistakes, consider whatever he fucked up on to not be able to prevent this. He focuses more on his knee-jerk hostility, his teeth gritting together hard enough to crack a tooth as he recognizes now the ever so faint presence of something wrong across the countertop.
His hands grasp at the back of his brother’s shirt as he makes a burning glare, asking his question as calmly as he can possibly manage, to keep this tense, short-lasting peace that’s lingering in the air. He wants answers. He will get them.
“What did you do to her?” He asks slowly, and he ignores the feeling of blood sliding through his throat, dripping into his lungs, uncomfortable and iron-tasting. He pays no mind when it rolls down his chin, falling to the floor.
Kristin smiles, the gesture not quite reaching her eyes. “I would be touched that you would be this upset if something were to happen to me, but compared with everything else, I’m afraid I’m still rather angry with you two.”
“Oh, you’re angry?” Technoblade drawls, letting go of Wil’s wrist. He takes a single step forward, Wilbur dropping his hands from his shirt as he looks away and considers if picking this fight here is even worth it. This isn’t an easy kill, can’t be, with the side-effects he’s going through. He’s never… actually been affected like this by any others they’ve come across. Not to this extent.
Maybe they shouldn’t try starting this fight at all. As much as Wilbur would love to gleefully watch as Techno tears the bastard apart, their chances are too shaky here, and Tommy is still gone. Perhaps they should try stepping back a bit. If they were to just be able to see Tommy again, if they were to start back before they even left the-
Before they even-
Wilbur blinks, halfway through trying to loop everything back when the blood coming from his nose begins to pour. It starts to flow from his throat, pooling together in his mouth, and he chokes harshly on it, his balance swaying as his vision goes blurred. A broken, scared noise tears through him with the awareness of the fact he can’t see.
He feels his knees hit the floor, and hears Technoblade scream for him, turning away from Kristin in favor of kneeling down and trying to keep him upright.
“Wil-!? Wilbur!” Techno yells, and Wilbur coughs, blood splattering onto the tile and onto his lap, covering it all in red. He blinks frantically, his nails scratching against his eyelids in a frantic effort to try and clear his sight. His breathing is labored, wheezy and desperate, and while he knows he doesn’t need the oxygen, really, it’s the fact that he’s struggling at all that makes it so gripping. This shouldn’t be happening. This shouldn’t be happening.
They’ve had their close calls, they’ve had their experiences before, but that was mostly only ever with Techno, wounds dug too deep for him to heal away fast enough, attacks made too swiftly for him to keep Wilbur fully out of range.
He wasn’t even touched. Kristin isn’t even fucking looking at him. She’s turned her attention back to the damned cutting board.
“You.” Technoblade snarls out over his shoulder, recognizing Kristin as the cause, and before Wilbur can even try to grab onto his brother, Technoblade is rising to his feet, lunging forward in a blur of movement-
The kitchen sits dim and quiet on a warm afternoon.
Kristin picks up the knife from the counter, adjusting the food on the cutting board before her so that she can continue with dinner. The sound of the soft scraping of the blade is the only real noise in the room, beside the barely there chirp of birds somewhere outside the windows.
Technoblade stands still at the doorway that leads to the hall, the dark residing at his back. Wilbur is leaning forward on the counter, his palms pressed against the edge of it as he looks towards Kristin.
Technoblade curls his hands into tight fists at his side, hearing faint, very faint whispers somewhere further down the hall, something like cries of help amongst the darkest areas within the corners. He’s tempted to go chase after them, wretch them out from the void and bring them back underneath his palm, where they oughta be, but he’s not daring to let Kristin out of his sight.
He lets his hands go loose, then he takes a single step forward to approach his brother.
“Techno.” Wilbur says, and the shaking waver in his voice makes Technoblade freeze. “That wasn’t me.”
Wilbur isn’t looking at him. His head is pointed directly forward, eyes set on Kristin, who continues preparing dinner with a calm, relaxed expression, nothing in her posture giving away any sort of nerves. It’s like they’re both not even there, and her only concern is finishing the meal at hand.
“...What?” Technoblade asks, and Wilbur jerks his chin higher. Even though Technoblade can’t see his full face, he can feel the terror dragging through Wilbur, foreign and painful. It drags through him as well, slow and stinging across his skin, and when Wilbur talks again, he’s stammering.
“I-I didn’t do that. That wasn’t-” He retreats from the counter, backing away with shaking hands raised, such a clear image of scared surrender that Techno’s almost sickened by how wrong it looks.
Wilbur’s never been one to go begging for mercy. Never. He’s all threats, biting remarks and careful, heavy control over their situation; he’s always been the one to pull Techno back up, to twist their odds into their favor, to make the fight into a game to be won.
“That’s not possible.” Wil chokes out, too shaky, and Technoblade needs to end this here, to cease that expression of dread on his brother’s face, at the very least.
He moves fast, feet pushing against the floor as he lunges forward. He reaches across the counter with a hand stretched out, aiming toward her throat, and he notices within the moment that his claws aren’t…
They aren’t there.
The kitchen sits dim and quiet on a warm afternoon.
Kristin picks up the knife again from the counter, adjusting the food on the cutting board before her so that she can continue once more with dinner. The sound of the soft scraping of the blade is the only real noise in the room, beside the barely there chirp of birds somewhere outside the windows.
Technoblade stands frozen at the doorway that leads to the hall, the dark whispering at his back. Wilbur is leaning against the counter, his palms pressed against the edge of it as he stares downwards, eyes away from Kristin.
There is a strained air around them as Wilbur breathes heavily through his nose, quickly stepping back and feeling his hands start to tremble again. That shouldn’t be possible. This shouldn’t even be- none of it should be- it’s not possible.
Wilbur knows there’s specific abilities out there that are capable of mimicking certain things, to an impressive degree. He knows there’s others who are capable of copying their features well, copying their skills, their styles, but not to this extent. Doing it to this extent should’ve already torn this one apart, because Wilbur’s abilities aren’t something one can just take on a whim. He’s not the strongest physically amongst every other monster that exists, he can certainly be torn apart, but he’s also not easy to approach, nor to steal from.
Using that so easily, resetting them back to a point without a hint of struggle-- it should be a laughable concept. They should be standing here in safety and smug victory, Kristin destroyed by her own ambition, rotting from the inside out from the pressure of twisting time.
Instead, they’re all standing here in a tense quiet, Wilbur stuck in loop that he didn’t fucking make.
He turns to Technoblade with his teeth dug into his own lip, too unnerved to be ashamed by the fact he’s become useless here. He shakes his head in a silent message, that it wasn’t him who did it, that he’s not doing this, and Techno’s eyes fill with a sudden wild anger.
There’s a flicker of deep shadows over the curve of his jaw, around his cheek, and for a second, Wilbur’s hopeful that whatever’s going on, it’s not fully affecting his brother. They have a chance.
His desperate hope is cracked apart when he notices that the shadows Techno has are too little, too few to truly help him as they always do. Where are all the rest? All those restless little souls, collected and remade by Wil’s careful hands for Technoblade to put to good use?
Technoblade is frighteningly alone when he lifts his chin and sets his gaze on Kristin again, but he still moves with a startling speed, the whispers in the hallway beginning to scream out, Wilbur closing his eyes-
The kitchen sits dim and quiet on a cold afternoon.
Technoblade immediately moves away from the doorway and pulls Wilbur from the counter, putting himself between Wil and Kristin like that’ll quit whatever she’s doing to them. He holds Wil in a short-lasting hug that’s nearly frantic, then his hands are grabbing at Wilbur’s face, pressing his forehead against his.
“We’ve got to do something, we’ve got to go.” Techno whispers, harsh and hushed, and while his eyes are gleaming red, there’s a deep dread growing underneath them. Wilbur has a flash of fury for such a look being put on his face, then it’s swallowed up by that same fear in his own heart. There’s a trace of guilt amongst it all, for being the one indirectly responsible for all this.
“We can’t run.” Wilbur reminds, even if it hurts to know it. This isn’t something you can escape from through running. “You know that.”
“You have to try.” Techno insists, and Wilbur goes to shake his head, then falters at what he’s implying, not having said ‘we.’
“No. No, I’m not-” Wilbur tries to look away, his lungs beginning to heave for air. The thought of becoming alone is something far worse than becoming trapped. He can’t bear to have that. But Technoblade doesn’t let him turn away, and he keeps Wil’s gaze on him. “I’m not going to get far-” Wil tries to protest. “I won’t get anywhere-!”
“You have to try.” Technoblade repeats, and there’s no argument against it. His hands curl against the sides of Wil’s ears, then he lets go. He steps back. “Run.”
“Techno-” Wilbur gasps, feeling too short for breath, even if he’s never needed it. His hands are shaking again, and he doesn’t know how to stop it. He doesn’t know why it even began. He feels like such a fool, for not knowing anything useful at all.
“Run.”
And so Wilbur runs.
Wilbur knows he has experience with making loops, he’s done it a thousand times before, but never has he had the actual problem of needing to break one midway. Try as he might to dig his nails in and yank at the very world around him, nothing gives to his attempts. Nothing budges or shifts.
Instead, it sits stubborn, unyielding and unrelenting. It’s suffocating as it presses down on him, crushing with the promise that things will repeat, to the control of someone who may not have mercy in their mind.
Instead, blood pours from his nose, his lips, his ears, and as the red soaks against the fabric of his shirt, he hears the crash of something being thrown in the kitchen behind him, the snapping tear of wood being ripped apart. Technoblade is screaming, furious and frustrated, and it’s nothing like those cries for blood he used to make when the excitement had gotten too high. It’s so much more desperate, dangerous.
It scares Wilbur, and he cannot remember the last time he felt so off-balanced enough to actually consider himself scared. That fact in itself makes it all the more worse.
His feet land against the soft carpet of the living room, but the front door is so far much farther than he remembers. He can’t even reach a hand to the doorknob before he’s drowning in his own blood, hacking and sputtering and clawing at his chest, as if he needs the heart underneath, as if he needs the blood through his veins to live.
The kitchen sits dark and quiet on a cold afternoon.
Kristin picks up her knife, her hand moving up to touch at the cutting board, and the silence and peace only lasts a second. Wilbur pushes away from the counter and lunges towards the living room, while Technoblade lunges towards her in an effort to take the knife from her hands and cut it across her throat.
She never loses hold of that knife, though, despite all of Techno’s attempts, and she never loses her composure, even with everything moving too quickly. As she steps swiftly to the side to narrowly avoid a grab for her, she turns her head over to Wilbur, eyes falling onto his back.
Without even seeing her face, Wil knows that she is smiling.
He lifts his hands up, much akin to an anguished man in prayer, reaching out and out towards the door, towards where Phil left them both. The taste of iron swirls over his tongue as he uselessly tears at the cage made around him and his brother, and the ground stretches out and comes up to meet him.
The kitchen sits dark and silent on a cold afternoon.
Wilbur stumbles on his feet when pushing off from the edge of the counter, and he lands onto the tile without meaning to, sprawling out against it with a choking cough, blood dripping from his teeth and smearing under his palm as he pushes himself up. Technoblade is a blur of enraged chaos, and while none of his swings ever truly hit, he’s making a mess of the kitchen throughout it all, his knuckles bloody as they hit against the walls.
Wil runs again, again and again and he goes for the front door, spitting blood onto the ground, trying not to sob when his lungs begin to choke. Through the noise of a futile fight behind him, he thinks he can hear his brother screaming his name.
He can’t be too sure about it, though. It becomes hard to hear much of anything when his legs give out again.
The kitchen sits dark and silent on a cold afternoon.
Technoblade stands around the edge of the counter, a few steps away from Kristin, but he doesn’t make another move. His eyes are wide, and his breaths are heavy in his chest, panting as if all of this effort is catching up too quickly. Wilbur cannot help but mirror the exhaustion.
“You know, I am her.” She says, setting the knife down on the cutting board, the food at her fingers rotting away. The smell of it is bitter and foul. “A part of you must be so angry at thinking I took her place, but I’ve been here the whole time. Right underneath your noses.”
She lifts her hand, tapping at her own nose, and Technoblade moves and swipes at her, his frustration so vivid, so raw, Wilbur can feel it rippling over his back.
She moves away all too quickly, out of danger in a blink. Part of Wilbur wants to wonder if she’s even actually here, or if this in itself is some sort of illusion, color painted before their eyes to tire Techno out as he chases after. The idea of such a thing would make the repeating defeat easier to swallow, at least.
“No.” Wilbur denies, shoulders hunched together as he leans against the doorway, staring out into the living room. The front door is in sight, but never truly in reach. He feels faint at the idea of trying to get there. “No, you’re lying. I would’ve noticed.”
Would he have? The years have been dragging for so, so long, and while keeping Techno at his side certainly keeps him stable, keeps him together, Wilbur sometimes feels as if it might not be enough. Sometimes, he craves to sink his nails into the ground underneath him, to settle his soul within it and let himself truly rest. But he’s never been one to stay still, because staying for too long means an eventual, inevitable loss of home.
And he craves for home far more than he craves for the chance to rest.
“Wilbur.” Technoblade chokes out, suddenly so terrified, and Kristin’s voice is right in his ear, soft sounding and yet unwavering with each word.
“Well, I’m afraid I’m far better at hiding than you are.”
Wilbur turns, raising his fist with a sudden flare of anger. He turns with all the intention of harm, but when he sees his mother’s face, just a few inches from his own-
He hesitates.
Techno slams into him in an effort to get him away from her, and they go rolling into the living room, the world unsteady alongside his heart underneath his ribs.
The kitchen is dark and silent.
Wilbur can’t tell if it’s afternoon anymore, or if it was ever day at all. If he could ever reach a window, maybe then, he could check, but there isn’t much chance of him getting any farther than one single step out of this damned room.
He wouldn’t trust the sight of the sun, anyway. The shadows stick too heavily to the walls for it to be right. It’s midnight. In his heart, he’s so sure of it.
“We can do this as many times as you’d like.” Kristin hums, almost patient in the way that she says it, like a mother teaching her children a helpful skill that they just can’t seem to get right. There’s a tense note in the sound of it, though, and Wil knows that it’s a warning, not a comfort.
He presses his forehead against the back of Techno’s shoulder with held air in his lungs, letting his brother try and be a wall between him and the monster in the room. Technoblade pushes them both back another step and takes hold of his hand, gripping it tightly, almost too tight. If Wilbur were human, it would hurt. It would leave him with a bruise and aching fingers. Instead, he feels no pain. He just holds onto Techno’s hand with a mirroring sort of intensity, desperate for them to come out of this alright.
“We could go on for years and years. I wouldn’t mind.” Kristin goes on. “It would be a fitting punishment, considering what you did to my son.”
“We’re your sons.” Wilbur breathes out, the words escaping his lips before he means to. He doesn’t know when he began to sound so tired. Technoblade notices it, judging by the concerned glance he gives over his shoulder, a furrow in his brow, his eyes dark red.
Wilbur lifts his own chin up from where he was trying to hide against his brother’s back. He lifts his gaze up to stare at the daunting shadows all around them, no longer a sign of safety as he’s grown used to. Not with how Techno is so wary of them too.
“We-” Wilbur goes to repeat it, to tell a lie and will it to be the truth, but it doesn’t work. Blood drips down the top of his lip, and he looks straight at her with his breath still frozen.
Kristin tilts her head with a stretching smile, hair falling past her face, pitch-black shadows sticking to the curves of her neck. The cold, freezing look in her eyes makes Wilbur want to cry.
This could never be his mother. In another life, he would only ever see her as something for Technoblade to tear apart, a roadblock for their path towards another home, but here, he’s found a place in her home.
And he doesn’t fit.
He and Techno are intruders, and she is treating them as such, but Wilbur can’t swallow that truth whole. It burns and scratches down his throat to even try, and if he did accept it, if he dared to take defeat, he would truly be losing it all.
“Mom, we’re your sons.” Wilbur repeats, trying to force it to be true, wanting for it to become so as soon as he says it. The smile on Kristin’s lips falls away completely. The blood on Wilbur’s lips drips down to the floor.
“You’re not.”
There is a danger hidden there.
Wilbur’s pushed something a little too far, and both him and Technoblade notice it, feel it, in an instant. Nothing has obviously changed, everything in the kitchen is as it was the moment before, but there is a shift in the air, the mood becoming much too calm, far too still. Like the few, precious seconds before the worst crashes down on them all.
Techno forces them back a step, then another, grasping onto Wilbur’s hand so strongly, it’s like he’s expecting for him to be torn away any second now. Like he’s trying so hard to keep Wilbur safe, and he knows it might be futile either way.
“We’ll go.” He tries to bargain, even if Wilbur was always the one who was better with words. “We’ll-” His breath hitches, shoulders so tense, it’s as if he’s trying to curl in on himself. He’s shaking. “We’ll leave.”
“...And you won’t ever come back?” Kristin asks. Something horrible flickers through her eyes, and Wilbur hides behind his brother, a coward on full display, his hands shaking with his blood pooling at his feet.
Techno nods.
“Liars.” Both Wilbur and Techno take another step back, Wil’s back brushing up against the wall. “You’d only come after Tommy.”
“What happened to him?” Wilbur asks, leaning heavily against Techno, head spinning so much that it’s hard to stay standing. Blood is flowing steady from his nose, but it’s become such a constant that he can’t even bother to wipe it away anymore. The taste of iron has become uncomfortably familiar in his mouth. “What did you do to him?”
Kristin narrows her eyes, nearly upset. “I don’t think that’s something you need to know.”
“Tell me what you fucking did to him.” Wilbur snaps, grabbing at Techno’s arm to push himself forward, to stand more beside him, rather than behind. Kristin blinks almost in a surprised manner. “He’s our little brother, we deserve to-” Her expression goes amused, and his anger rises even higher. “This is our family. This is my family, you can’t fucking take it from me.”
“You’re wrong. This is mine. It was from the start.” She moves away from the counter, circling around to step towards them both. Regret claws through Wilbur’s heart, terror stabbing through him as he realizes that for the first time, he is coming face to face with death, and there is nothing he can do to stop it. He can’t stop this.
Beside the blood on his face, he thinks tears are falling past his cheeks.
“You were both wrong to ever come here.” Kristin begins to come closer, and Technoblade suddenly lets go, pushing Wilbur behind him as he goes to attack again, a stubborn effort to keep her away. He takes a step forward, baring his teeth-
And then he falls.
He sinks down onto one knee, slamming into the ground, his foot going through the floor, through a puddle of shadows that have formed underneath him. He stares at the sight of it for a second, hand hovering up as if he could grab at it, but these shadows are far too silent, far too still to ever be his own. He realizes this at the same time as Wilbur, and as Wil reaches out to help him, as he quickly pushes himself against the ground to get up, to crawl away and pull himself out-- the dark grows.
It opens out further from underneath Techno, and hands lift out from the depths of it. Up, and up, and up, twisted and broken looking. They reach out towards Techno’s frozen expression, and Wilbur lunges forward, even if everything in him screams to get away.
“Techno-!” Wilbur chokes out, but he’s far too slow. In one single rush of movement, the broken hands pull his brother down, so quickly that Techno doesn’t even have a second to scream. He slips through the ground, through the shadows, and then he’s just- gone.
With not a single trace left behind.
“TECHNOBLADE!” Wilbur drops to his knees regardless, clawing at the place where he was, trying to drag the shadows back up so he can go right after him. “No, no , NO-!”
His nails scratch uselessly at the floor, palms smearing the blood that still spills from his mouth, his nose. He gasps for air, and it’s a choked thing, held tight by fear and despair, blood filling up his lungs. A part of him knows this is the end, and there’s nothing more to do, but he can’t help it, he’s a stubborn fool-- he grabs at the very fabric of the world around him and pulls, willing it to turn back, to give his brother back to him.
And like all the other times before, it stands still and refuses.
“Come on!” Wilbur screams, ignoring the blood that pools around his knees, turning darker and darker with each passing second. “Fucking- work! Work, work, please!” He does it again, and again, and again and again and again with all the stubbornness of someone who’s never known defeat like this. He chokes and wheezes and scratches at the ground until his hands are stained red, his vision blurred and his skin aching.
“Technoblade!” He cries, voice hoarse and exhausted. He pauses, his body trembling from the pain, his head lowered down with shaking pants, and only then does he notice the legs standing before him. The feeling of eyes looking down at him.
“Please.” He begs, eyes held closed, wet with tears, and he wonders faintly; how many times has he been on the other end of this?
How many times did he stand over another, no mercy in his eyes, only contempt for the fact something was in his way? How many times did he only laugh and wave a hand, watching Techno tear them limb from limb as if it were a show? He can’t dare to try and count them all.
“We’re sorry, we-” Wilbur sobs. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
He lifts his head up, even if it’s a struggle to do, the weight of his own skull feeling impossibly heavy. His hands press against the ground to keep himself upright, but he’s tempted to let himself fall down to the ground regardless when he sees the way Kristin is staring down at him.
There is nothing in her eyes.
Not anger, nor pity, not even a bit of satisfaction for revenge. Nothing.
All he sees is the dark of a void kept behind her eyes, endless and all consuming. Inevitable. It’s enough to make anyone lose their last bit of hope, but Wilbur won’t.
He doesn’t care that this might be justified punishment for all the suffering he’s made. He doesn’t care that she’s stronger, that she’s winning. He doesn’t care that this is all hers, because it was his too, and she can’t take it. She can’t take this family. And she sure as hell can’t take Techno.
“Give him back.” Wilbur spits out, the words sounding cracked in between his teeth. She doesn’t smile. She doesn’t even blink. Anger festers and burns within Wilbur’s chest, and he sits up higher, chin lifted to her. “ Give him back.”
No reaction is given. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care, he doesn’t care, he will kill her with his bare hands if he has to, with all the grief of a son wanting nothing more than a hug from his mother.
He goes to stand, a scream pushing out from his chest, raw and guttural and shaking the very air around them-
And a hand clasps over his mouth.
It silences him, cutting his words off, and he sits frozen for a moment, caught in a split second of hope when he hears the familiar whisper of voices that used to follow Techno around each and every corner. They’re the sound of safety, of home, of thousands of eyes willing to keep watch. It’s the sound of Technoblade’s heart, ever constant and never quiet.
But then another hand grabs onto his shoulder. Onto his arm. Wilbur’s breaths grow panicked, and he screams incoherently, muffled and useless. He tries to struggle, but he’s not strong enough, he never was, and he’s pulled backwards, his legs kicking and skidding across the blood on the ground, his chest heaving with each shrill cry.
He reaches out to Kristin, but she just watches as he’s pulled backwards, back, back, falling past the ground just like Techno did. He’s dragged underneath the surface, his head dipping into the dark, and in a blink, he’s blinded by the dark.
There’s nothing to hold onto, and there’s nothing holding onto him. He falls, then he sinks, so quickly that it’s like he’s a rock hurtling to the bottom of an unforgiving ocean. There’s no air to breathe, and he clutches at his neck, mouth held open with no noise coming out. He tries and tries to gasp, still caught up in the habit of it, and only when he lands, rough and harsh, does he remember that he never had a need for air at all.
He blinks and feels the ground underneath him. It’s smooth. Not quite cold, not quite warm. Even as he wipes at his face and pokes at his eyes, his vision doesn’t return to let him figure anything else out. It’s like the world has turned pitch black around him. Or maybe he’s lost his sight entirely.
Pushing himself into a sitting position, he feels around for anything more, but it’s just him. It’s just the smooth ground, the dark, and him. It’s suffocating. He manages to stumble onto his feet and walk, but there isn’t anywhere to go. He takes a step, and another, and ten more, and a hundred more, and a thousand more, but there is nothing here.
He’s alone.
“Techno?” He calls out anyway. There isn’t even an echo to his voice. It sounds flat and lonely in his own ears, and he almost covers his ears to block the sound. Instead, he wraps his arms around his middle, lifting his head high. “Technoblade!”
Suddenly, there’s a response. A faint scream of a cry, but instinctually, Wilbur knows it’s not his brother. He tries to move away from it, put on edge by how pained and angry it sounds, like a dying animal refusing to go down. He can’t tell from which way it’s coming. It’s wailing out, desperate and tired, and it’s joined in chorus with a dozen more voices, trapped and scared.
Wilbur wonders if that’s his fate, then. To scream along.The idea of it is heavy, crushing him in every direction, and he falls to the ground, crouching low, his head tucked into his knees with his hands held over his head. He buries his fingers into his hair, wanting to tear it from his skull.
“Techno!” He cries, even if it’s useless, even if his brother won’t hear it. “Technoblade!”
Techno isn’t coming. Wilbur’s alone, he’s entirely alone, just like before, just like how it was before. He sits here pathetic and incomplete, unable to even see. There is no air in his lungs, but he screams regardless, high and trembling, his nails digging through his own face, like he can tear it away for all the trouble it’s given him. He screams, rising and rising, shaking with it-
Then he stops.
With teeth gritted together, wounds scratched across his skin, he begins to just cry. He curls in tighter, trying to hide into himself, and he cries, tears soaking against his knees.
“Mom…!” He sobs, the word useless, but true in its desperation. “Mom!”
For a second, there is no monster in the dark, trapped with the others who made the mistake of crossing a being older than one can fathom.
There is a boy. His head on his knees, trying to hide from the dark, his voice crying for his mother.
And the dark goes still.
The kitchen sits bright and quiet on a warm afternoon, and Wilbur’s being pushed to the floor, arms wrapped around him before he can even fully process the light.
He slams into the tile, bones aching, and Technoblade is practically on top of him, grabbing at his shirt, digging his nails in and refusing to let go. He presses so tightly to Wilbur that it’s like he’s trying to melt them both together, and Wilbur only needs a second to try and do the same, clinging to Technoblade with a shaking sob.
“Wilbur.” Technoblade says, face tucked into his hair, his hands trembling at where they’re trying to hold him. “Wilbur, Wilbur-” He repeats, like a prayer, because he can’t say anything else. He can’t offer comfort or promises that they will be alright. They both know very well that control has been torn from their hands.
Wilbur opens his mouth and breathes, frantic and deep, and he cries, so horribly relieved that he feels as if he’s going to shatter with it. He keeps his eyes open, wide open, unable to bear the thought of going back to the dark, to be blinded with nothing but the faint sound of others who were doomed right alongside him.
“We have to go, we have to-” Technoblade tries to say, wanting for it to be over, wanting for them both to go on their way and have it all back to their idea of normal.
“No, nonono, we can’t.” Wilbur sucks in another deep breath, and he lets Techno pull them both up into a sitting position, still hugging close. “We can’t.” He repeats, and although it hurts him, he pushes back from Techno so he can look him in the eyes, see him face to face.
His eyes are blue. Like Phil’s. They’re blue, and wide open, a thousand pleading questions and worried tucked away inside. They’re so familiar, and Wilbur wants to burn the image into his mind, so at the very least, he can have that, if she is to ever part them again.
Techno’s mouth opens, then closes, then opens again. “...What do we do?” He breathes out, completely at a loss.
Wilbur wishes he had a good answer. He wishes he had all the cards stacked in their favor, he wishes he could smile and offer a winning path, but he is surrounded by walls, and he doesn’t know how to climb them. He’s never had a need to learn.
“I don’t know.” He admits, looking to the floor, looking at their joined hands, fingers twisted together.
“Boys.” Kristin calls them both, and they turn their heads to see her back facing towards them. She’s fiddling with something on the stove, the kitchen feeling warm with the smell of food. “Sit down by the counter.”
Technoblade puts a hand forward like he means to move in front of Wil, and Wilbur grabs him by the arm. They share a look, a quiet communication, and Technoblade relents. He pulls Wilbur up. They still hover awkwardly in place, and Kristin gives a glance over her shoulder. She waves a hand.
“Sit down, go ahead.”
A tiny, muted part of Wilbur wants to run instead. It craves to grab his brother by the hand and make a dash for the front door, but chances of that actually working are no doubt nonexistent.
He instead just moves with his brother to pull a stool out. They sit down. They clutch hands underneath the counter.
Kristin gives a short huff, turning back towards them, and her smile has turned kind. She looks so warm, in mood and in color, and both Techno and Wil can’t help but ease a bit at the sight of her, as if she is their mother in truth, and she’s a signal of safety.
She steps towards them and leans against the counter, her hands placed together.
“My initial plan, when Tommy was born, was for him to live carefree.” She starts. “Just until he grew a little more. I told myself- give it a few years. Let him be a normal little kid. Let him understand the perspective of humans, while he still could. Phil can only teach so much.”
Wilbur goes dead still in his seat, Techno’s hand squeezing around his fingers.
“And-” Kristin laughs a little, standing up straight with a shrug of one shoulder. “Phil was a bit worried about it. He went back and forth with me about possible problems, about him getting hurt, catching attention, but I told him it was fine! I was sure-” She stops. Wilbur holds his breath, and the room stays blessedly bright. “I was…so sure that I would be able to prevent that.”
Her eyes fall onto them both, and they feel incriminating. A flash of guilt runs over Wil’s back.
“Why couldn’t I?” She asks.
Technoblade ignores the question completely, his mind working around the fact that their little brother has been their true problem the entire time. “Tommy, he’s-?”
“Mine.” Kristin cuts him off. “He’s mine.”
“He’s yours.” Techno repeats, and there is a heavy realization in that, for both of them. Tommy is Kristin’s son. He is her son. Hers and Phil’s, in blood and soul.
“That shouldn’t be possible.” Wilbur breathes out.
Kristin raises her eyebrows, as if asking why he would question it when clearly, the impossible is within her realm. Wilbur feels too small, in this seat, underneath her gaze.
“For so long, nothing was out of place.” Kristin says, tapping her fingers against the top of the counter. “I made sure nothing would see him, nothing could touch him, nothing would find him- and yet you two still found a way past.”
Wilbur tries desperately to think on the first day, tries to recall any sort of wall pushing him back, any warning that he should’ve noticed. He can’t remember. Nothing there was important, he was just looking to find another place for him and his brother to settle.
“How?” Kristin questions, stern with it.
“I don’t know.” Wilbur instantly says. He’s truly honest in it.
Kristin seems to know it. She doesn’t press, and he’s grateful for that. “I have my own suspicions. You’re both…different? I don’t think I’ve ever seen two actually choose to stay together.”
“We’re brothers.” Technoblade reminds, like a plea and a promise.
“Of course.” Kristin whispers, and she smiles, fond and happy. “Twins. My little twins.”
Wilbur’s heart aches, his head tipping downwards. Technoblade holds his hand tighter.
Kristin turns her back to them again, finishing up with dinner. “I want you two to know that the only reason you’re being left alive right now is Tommy begged for you. He begged for two older brothers, for you two specifically, because he said you two would keep him safe, no matter what.” She turns to glance over her shoulder. “Is that true?”
“Yes.” Wilbur whispers.
“You both love him.”
“Yes.” Techno answers.
Kristin hums. She moves a pan to the side, the metal clicking against the stove. “I suppose it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to keep you both here. Like a bit of extra protection? Tommy does need to begin branching out, and you’ve made me realize I have to be more vigilant.” She turns back to them, leaning against the counter behind her. “You've met others.” She says, and it’s a fact. Tommy told her everything.
Both Wilbur and Techno nod.
“Are you on terrible terms with every single one you’ve met?”
Wilbur thinks hard for a second. “No?” He guesses. There’s a few he thinks might just ignore them if they were to cross paths again. Their first scuffles upon meeting was enough for both sides.
“Then you might know one who would work.” Kristin nods to herself. She steps closer. “If you are to stay here and be left alive, then I want one of the ones you came across. One that would be suitable for Tommy. Can you think of any?”
Both Techno and Wilbur exchange a glance, Wilbur not thinking any of them suitable for Tommy. He wants Tommy far, far away from every single threat they’ve ever seen.
Technoblade seems considerate of one, though.
“There’s-” He goes to say, and he hesitates. Kristin gives an encouraging look. “They’re young.” He says, and that's a fair reason to be hesitant. The younger ones don’t tend to be easy to approach.
“You're both young.” Kristin shoots back, and Wilbur opens his mouth to protest. “Yes, you have years on you, but you are still so very young.” Wil’s mouth closes. Again, he feels too small in this chair, and he’s left in a silent dread at what exactly his mother even is. “Tell me about them.”
“We made a truce of sorts with them, last we met.” Technoblade says, and instantly, Wilbur knows the face he’s talking about. He remembers their spitting insults, never making an attack, but never stepping back, either.
‘Leave me alone.’ Wilbur remembers the voice well, uneven with the anger, not quite stable enough to scream. ‘There’s nothing for you here.’
“He’s- harmless, really. He’s not a fighter.” Technoblade goes on, shaking his head a bit.
“Neither am I.” Kristin gestures a hand to herself. “Or Wilbur.” She waves to him. “We could do with just one fighter in our family, yeah?” She smiles at Techno, and Technoblade crushes Wilbur’s hand so tightly that there’s an audible noise of bones clicking wrongly. Wilbur only frowns a little. “Is he capable?” She asks.
“Last we saw, he was playing with an entire town out in the middle of nowhere. Controlling every little aspect, every single person.” Wilbur explains. “That's his home. It’s- it’s all him.
Kristin admires that. She thinks of the potential there, and finds interest in how it could grow.
“There's ways of moving others from where they've rooted. I think they’ll do. We’ll have to see, but I’m going to be hopeful.” She stands up straight, grinning brightly with her hands clasped together. “What's the town's name? Or, no- what did he name it?”
Wilbur wracks his mind for the memory. The name lifts up within seconds, unfamiliar on his tongue.
“Lostfield.”