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Sharp, acrid sulphite burnt Tommy’s lungs, stripping away layers and layers of his lungs as he breathed out the smoke coiling between his ribs, dark against the Arctic sky. It was late in the afternoon, almost evening, but in this godforsaken tundra it was always light, everything bland and white and boring and oh so fucking cold-
Tommy sighed, drawing his knees up higher under his chin, doing his best not to shiver. As much as he loved his brother (his only brother, since Will was dead, or dying or as good as dead, no longer his brother) and his dad, they’d chosen a god awful place to settle their little ‘anarchist commune’ or whatever it’s stupid title was. The Arctic was cold, so, so cold, especially after Exile.
Exile.
Tommy shuddered at the memory, taking a deeper drag on the cigarette resting between calloused fingers.
Exile.
Blistering humid sun, the too close atmosphere that clings to his skin like a layer of sweat and self pity, the long grass next to the beach that hid mosquitos and monsters with a too wide smile… that couldn’t be further from the Arctic, the place Phil and Techno had taken him to heal, or whatever bullshit they were calling this.
Healing. Ha. Funny joke. It had taken all of Tommy’s self restraint not to laugh in Phil’s face when he’d suggested that he was safe now, safe from Dream or L’Manburg or any other thing that had hurt him, and he could finally heal.
As if something like him could heal. Dream had made sure of that… In Tommy’s mind it was like- he was crack in the wall right? Sure even if it gets bigger, you can piece it back together again and again and again, filling and hiding the holes, but eventually it will bend to the pressure for one last time, and then it’s broken! Gone, that once strong wall is nothing but dust and rubble of a once strong foundation.
Or something like that. Wilbur was always the better one with words out of the pair of them.
Tommy laughed, bitter and crackling around the smoke spilling from his lips at the irony. Wilbur, the one with the silver tongue, who could convince you it was Thursday if on a Monday if he tried hard enough, had been the one to have his words fail him in the end. All his pretty words and sharp tongued promises were hollow, nothing but a facade for a cracking interior… for all Wilbur talked, he didn’t have much to say when their dad had shoved a sword between his ribs.
Funny that.
So here he was, once again alone to ‘heal’… Techno was down in the basement three storeys below where Tommy was hiding out on the roof, and Phil was out in the forest, talking to the trees or whatever weird magic the old man did. And Wilbur (not the real Wilbur, the half shambling corpse that liked to call himself Tommy’s brother)…
Was also here. Somewhere. Not that Tommy cared all that much, really.
That had been a rough night, the day Phil had brought a freshly revived Wilbur back to the commune. Tommy had taken one look at those cracked glasses, wire rimmed and lopsided against a crooked nose, and those stupid fucking tar dark eyes that hadn’t stopped smiling as soon as he’d caught sight of Tommy and-
And he’d panicked.
Holed in Techno’s basement with his brother by his side, wrapped up in a fur lined cape as he sobbed. Techno, who had never been the one to comfort him growing up, that was his oldest brother’s job, had decided to step into Will’s shoes, and had held him for the hours he’d cried. The comforting, oh so familiar scent of leather and metal and bright, cold that was intrinsically and inexplicably Techno had lingered for what seemed like weeks after that, and the two of them hadn’t talked about it after Tommy stopped crying.
And that was fine! Oh so fine, because neither Tommy or Techno wanted to talk about their feelings, nope! This was fine…
It wasn’t fine, cause Wilbur was back and living just a stone's throw away in their father’s house whilst Tommy was confined to Techno’s basement unless he wanted to see his brother’s ghost or-
He sighed, another cloud of darkened smoke slipping out into the crisp air, the ember of his cigarette glowing against the dying sunset, finally.
Tommy wasn’t sure when he’d started smoking.
Probably back in Pogtopia, looking back. Will had always smoked the damn things, never as much as he’d done in that stupid ravine. They always seemed to take the edge of his brother’s spiteful anger, biting and sharp. So why wouldn’t Tommy want to try them? He had a lot of anger back then (not so much anymore… just resigned accepting of the poor hand he’d been dealt at fate) and the cigarettes helped a little, gave him a subtle buzz even if they made him hack his lungs out.
Tommy had always wished he was a dry angry person. He wished his words were scalding and tar-like, wished his cadence would strike like flint against steel, a dry spark against a tinder.
Instead, he had been a wet type of hatred. Frustrated tears always formed in the waterline of his eyes, crystalline and clear, his throat feeling full of cotton and barbed wire.
No one ever took him seriously.
Well, back then they didn’t anyway.
Before he’d started smoking, standing in his oldest brother’s too big shoes to dull the wet anger, leaving him nothing but a cold and empty husk- he had to be cold and sulphuric, if he wanted to survive another day.
Pogtopia was perpetually smoke filled, a fissure deep into the ground swimming with smog and smoke and smouldering anger, that if you took a match too it’d immediately burst into flames.
Again, ironic considering Wilbur’s fate.
Seemed like everything in Tommy’s life was ironic… great, good for him.
He was so deep in his thoughts that he didn’t even hear the sound of snow crunching beneath him, an ambling gait of a dying man uneven in the snow. He didn’t hear the soft grunt of someone hoisting themselves up onto the shingles roof, or of someone creeping up behind him. He didn’t hear the soft curse ring out as they took in the sight of him, Tommy Innit, curled up on the edge of the roof with a cigarette dripping from his teeth.
He didn’t see.
“What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?”
Tommy jumped, that his awful familiar drawl he’d committed to memory harsh against his red tipped ears. The cigarette was snatched from his fingers before he could even turn and flung out into the snow, snuffed into the brilliant white as if it had never even existed. Lithe fingers came to rest on his shoulder as the shell of his brother sat beside him, scowling behind those stupid wire rims.
“Well? What do you think you’re doing Tommy?” Wilbur insisted, eyes narrowed as he glared at the blonde. “Smoking? Really? I thought you’d be better than that… god, does Techno know? Of course he doesn’t he’d have murdered you if had a clue but-“
“Just stop it Wilbur.”
Tommy’s voice was harsh, dry as he coughed, the remnants of smoke still on his tongue as he glared back at Will. The man had the gall to look hurt, brows halfway up his forehead in a pretty convincing caricature of shock.
Well, Wilbur was always a good actor… managed to convince Phil in his letters that he was fine for the best part of a year.
“Stop what?”
“Stop pretending that you care about my health,” he muttered, reaching around Wilbur to pull another cigarette from the packet, refusing to meet the other’s eyes as he set the end alite.
“It’s not a pretence,” Will said, sounding earnest enough as he reached out to snatch the cigarette from his fingers. The brunette’s face fell when Tommy flinched away from him. “Tommy, seriously, give me the cigarette. They’ll kill you!”
“You think death scares me Will?” He said with a scoff, taking a long drag and letting it out again. “There are worse things than dying… trust me I’d know.”
“You can’t truly think that.”
…
“Tommy, hey come on!” Wilbur insisted into the terse silence. “Trust me, I can tell you from experience that nothing is worse than death.”
“Funny joke,” he said with a bitter laugh. “Trust me Wilbur, I stopped listening to you a long time ago. You’re not gonna convince me to trust you anymore.”
“What happened to you?” Wilbur murmured softly, the treacle dark curls of hair flat against his head in the Arctic wind, the single bone-bleached strand matching with Tommy’s own. “What happened to you, what happened to my little brother?”
“You happened, Wilbur!” Tommy snapped with a scowl.
“You happened! You- you dragged me away from home, away from our family to fuel your own fucking ego! You brought a teenager with you to start a country, what the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Tommy, sunshine please-“
“No! For once in your stupidly fragile life actually fucking listen to me!” He spat, stubbing out the cigarette and leaving a smudge against the roof tiles.
“You took everything from me! My home, my family, my friends… My brother! You weren’t him towards the end. The Wilbur in Pogtopia wasn’t my brother, just some dark shadowy version of him, twisted and- and fucking cruel! You made me and Tech fight each other for your entertainment Will… we were your brothers, how could you do that and expect me to still trust you?”
“And then you blew yourself up, and when that didn’t go your way to forced dad to murder you,” Tommy continued, unable to stop himself now he was going. “And you didn’t have to deal with the aftermath of that! Didn’t have to deal with watching Phil fall apart after killing you. Everyday, he traipses out to that forest and washes his hands in the stream, just to try and rid the blood, your blood from his hands. And Techno- you manipulated him Will! Our brother, you used him like a weapon and whispered to the voices in his head, egging him on… he still doesn’t forgive himself for letting you die. He shoulders that weight solely on his back.”
“And what about you?” Wilbur’s voice was hoarse, whimpering, a little pathetic in all honesty. “You talk about everything I’ve done to everyone else, and I’ve made my amends with that- well, I’m trying to make amends with that. I wasn’t well Tommy, which isn’t an excuse but… what about you?”
“I just wanted to be like you, Wilbur,” he said softly. “My older brother… is that such a crime?”
“Yes. Because I am not someone you should want to be like Toms…” Wilbur said. The sun had started to dip below the horizon, casting them all in a rosy hue. “I- Or the me I was before I guess- wasn’t a good person. I was ill, which isn’t an excuse I’m aware, and I said that already but I need you to know that I didn’t do this purposefully. I should have stopped long before I did, should have stopped the day we won the war… but I didn’t. I didn’t, and I hurt you, and I didn’t mean to! You’re my baby brother, I never wanted to hurt you.”
“But you did.”
“But I did. And I’m sorry.”
…
“That’s all I ever wanted from you, y’know?
Wilbur shifted closer, pressing closer to Tommy’s side. Curiously, he was warm, warmer than Tommy was expecting from a revived man. The layers of wool and yarn and cotton his brother was wrapped in kept the heat in, it seemed.
“If that’s all you want, then I’ll say it as many times as you need,” Wilbur said with a sad smile, leaning to tuck his chin against the nest of golden curls. “I’m sorry, Tommy. I’m sorry.”
…
“D’you think you could give me the rest of the cigarettes? Please?”
“You’re such a dick,” Tommy scowled, no actual heat in his voice. The flint hadn’t struck the tinder, or if it had the fire was under control, no longer burning dry and hot and scolding… just sort of simmering, like the warmth of a hearth, or Phil’s fireplace.
Wilbur just shrugged as Tommy passed him the cigarette box. “Just doing my job as the older brother. D’you remember when we were little and I snitched on Techno cause he thought it’d be smart to try and fight the voices by shoving candle wax into his ears? It’s like that… just trying to keep you safe.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Tommy grumbled, though he couldn’t help the grin on his face. He took the hand shoved in his face, letting Wilbur pull him to his feet and up into a tight hug.
“I’m sorry…”
…
“I know,” he whispered back. “And one day I think I can forgive you.”
“That’s all I can ask for.”
The moment was broken by the sound of a low voice calling out from the bedroom window underneath them, splitting through the slowly thawing ice like a knife to butter.
“Bruh, I swear to god if you two idiots keep leaving my windows open I’m gonna kick you both out, I don’t care what the old man says… get down off of my roof and stop being stupid. You’ll freeze,” Techno’s low drawl rang out, and Wilbur pulled back from the hug with a wet chuckle, rubbing at his eyes.
“C’mon, let’s get inside before Techno bursts a blood vessel.”
Huffing a laugh, Tommy swung himself off the roof and onto the windowsill, into the warmth of Techno’s cabin. He landed with a grunt, to find Techno waiting with a flat expression, mock disappointment on his face. A warm hand found his shoulder as Wilbur joined him, and all three of them ducked into the cabin, out of the cold and into the warmth.
Maybe, just maybe, Tommy thought as he huddled around the fireplace with his brothers by his side, he could forgive.
That would be nice.