Chapter Text
Techno sometimes asks himself: is he surprised that Wilbur ended up starting a drug business, creating a nation, making himself president, losing an election, and being exiled?
No.
It's pretty on-brand for him to do the most grandiose ridiculous things in the name of whatever ideal he's settled for. Wilbur loves stories, always has, it was only a matter of time before he wrote one for himself.
It does become a problem when Techno ends up hearing about the failed election from Tommy while Phil, isolated in his hardcore world, remains ignorant.
He has two options.
The first one is to tell Phil that his one and only son lied in his letters about winning the election. But that just feels like a betrayal somehow. Techno doesn’t want to be the twin who foils whatever plans Wilbur has that have led him to not telling Phil.
And sure it kind of sounds like Wilbur’s keeping it a secret because he’s embarrassed about the direction everything has gone. Techno doesn’t really agree with that notion since pretty much anyone can fall victim to the stupidity and charisma of a dictator.
The second option is to extend a hand while Phil is distracted. That’s the one he ends up doing.
Wilbur isn’t weak, Techno has never thought of him as a weak person, even at the times when Wilbur would consider himself so. He’d compare himself to Techno and Phil as if they aren’t immortals with years of experience in their fields. He’s capable and independent and he has a skill that Techno envies at times—the ability to interact with people.
So, no, weak is the last word he’d use to describe his twin. Stubborn as hell? Yes. Annoyingly talkative? Absolutely. Weak? No. He can’t kill as well as Techno but he’s resilient as shit.
That stubbornness ends up becoming a slight hitch in the plan because when he writes to Wilbur, asking if they need some support after being exiled, he gets a sharp no back. See, annoying.
He thinks for a moment that that is it, now, he could either tell Phil or ignore everything.
That’s when he gets a message from the kid Tommy, who Wilbur has only sparsely talked about, urging him to help them no matter what Wilbur said.
Wilbur is different. Looks different. Acts different.
He should’ve been able to tell from the sharp rejection or the lies but he still somehow expected to see the same Wilbur he grew up with. Soft brown hair, soft yellow jumper, soft all over always, next to Techno he always looked so neat and clean.
“Technoblade,” is the first thing he says, in a cold voice. “I thought I told you not to come.”
The kid, Tommy, shifts on his feet, looking guilty. He says nothing. Wilbur understands immediately. “Ah, I see. Well, whatever Tommy here has said to you is irrelevant. You can leave.”
Techno raises an unimpressed eyebrow and glances around their surroundings.
They’re in a small forest clearing, there’s a crafting table and two ovens running and despite being on the SMP for years, it looks like a starting situation. It’s anything but impressive.
“Yeah, I don’t think I’m gonna,” Techno says.
Wilbur narrows his eyes. “I don’t need you here. I don’t want you here.”
“You’ve made that clear,” Techno says drily, pretending he’s more unimpressed than he is hurt. “Too bad I’m pretty set on taking down this government.”
The kid eyes Wilbur and Techno with a healthy caution, but he also looks like not speaking up is taking a considerable effort. He’s witnessing a small standstill, one between his… What is Wilbur to Tommy again? Is he a mentor figure? No, there seemed to be more to their relationship. Brothers. He’s watching a standstill between his pseudo-brother and a known anarchist. That must be a little awkward.
Neither of them are going to let it go, but Techno’s in the best position, and Wilbur must know that.
He grits his teeth. “Fine. But you’re not telling Phil.”
Techno shrugs. “Fine by me.”
And maybe that’s easy to say because he wants to reestablish their usual dynamic, maybe Wilbur’s trust means a little more than Phil’s, maybe he just wants to spend some time with his twin.
He’s not really sure himself.
But he’s here now, and Wilbur’s allowing him to stay. That must count for something.
The thing is, it only takes one event, one weird situation to turn a situation around. Techno had kind of hoped that he could bring a positive change into Wilbur’s life, and then, when everything was over with a happy ending, they could tell Phil ‘yeah haha things got a little out of control but we overcame it’.
Wilbur never liked happy endings in his stories. He always found great interest in tragedies, in tales where you could hope and hope and hope for things to go right again and again and again, while still knowing that there’s nothing that can change it.
Orpheus is always going to turn around to check if Eurydice is there.
But whenever Wilbur told that story, he always clung to a small hope that they’d make it out of the underworld.
That’s the root of his fascination at least.
They both grew up in the cold. Kind of. Techno’s never been able to truly pin down their timeline. He knows that he and Phil were in the Antarctic first and that they were always on equal footing, with Techno, having honed his skills on Hypixel for years and years, and Philza being pretty much immortal.
He knows they’ve met before seeing each other in the north and starting their empire.
At first, he wasn’t sure how Wilbur fit into the equation either. He’s Phil’s son, his mother is a fridge? Phil has known Wilbur since he was a baby but Techno has known Phil for a longer time. He's neither older nor younger than Techno. He’s his twin, chosen, but never officially decided between the two of them. It’s just the truth of the universe. Wilbur and Technoblade are twins. So what does it matter what makes them that, or how it all ties together in the cosmos?
Techno never really cared about figuring out the logistics of it all.
Wilbur did care, and when things didn’t make sense to him, he asked.
So they’re in the Antarctic Empire sometimes, and despite the small little conflict of them overtaking the world, Wilbur’s there and he looks like he belongs and it makes Techno feel surprisingly warm—which is new and strange even though it feels like they’ve known each other their whole lives.
But they haven’t. Because that makes no sense.
Phil isn’t exactly helpful in unravelling their confusion.
“You’re going to live many different lives,” he tells them with a soft, knowledgeable voice. He sounds so old sometimes. He’s caressing Wil’s hair while he rests in his lap, looking small like this, oddly so.
The same fondness is directed at Techno when he looks up again and speaks. “There are going to be many versions of you and you’ll live many different adventures. Some together and some alone.”
Wilbur frowns. “That doesn’t make sense.”
Phil lets out a soft chuckle. “It might not make sense to you now, but one day, when you’re older, you’ll understand what I’m talking about.” He looks back at Techno. “It doesn’t really matter if these things are confusing at times, you’ll have each other, and you’ll have me, and somewhere along the line, you may meet new people and it will feel like you’ve known them all your lives too.”
“You sound so old,” Wilbur teases. “Where are all your people?”
Phil’s eyes crinkle when he smiles. “You two are my people.”
“But you’re like a thousand years old!” Wilbur exclaims, waving his arms. “Who else?”
“I’ll tell you more when you’re older,” Phil chides, his smile only widens when Wilbur swats at him in complaint.
He never did end up telling them in detail who else he supposedly met. Techno never made any assumptions, he made some theories here and there—none as out there as Wilbur’s—but he has always been patient with these things.
There are some hints of his past, the wings, the worship of some lady of death, and the way he doesn’t seem to ever die.
He doesn’t linger on them.
He moves on.
He moves forward.
“Technoblade,” the kid’s voice is sharp and frantic. He runs into the potato arm which Techno is dutifully taking care of. He has a reputation to uphold in relation to potatoes after all.
“Heh?” Techno says.
“Something’s wrong with Wilbur!”
Techno gives the kid a quick once over and decides that he’s absolutely being serious and that whether it’s true or not, he truly believes something’s wrong with Wilbur. Which is… it’s only the third day Techno’s been here in what they’ve dubbed ‘Pogtopia’. It’s not like he knows Tommy at all, so he’ll just have to entertain the kid.
“What’s wrong with Wilbur?” he asks. He almost makes a joke like ‘except the things we already know are wrong with him’, but decides against it.
“He looks so fucking weird,” the kid says. “He’s asleep but he’s all curled up and there’s a guitar on his back and he hasn’t touched a fucking guitar in ages.”
Techno raises a brow. “Why didn’t you wake him up?”
“Are you stupid? This is the first time he’s slept in forever! I’m not going to wake him up—”
“Then why did you come in here?” Techno asks bemusedly. “I don’t think there’s much I can do about… a guitar.” He makes sure that Tommy knows that he sounds silly.
Tommy shoots him a glare. “It’s weird. You’re like, supposed to be his big man twin, so you should be able to tell that sleeping with a guitar is weird and you should take responsibility for it too.”
“Ah,” Techno says, unequipping his hoe. “You want me to wake him up so he’ll be mad at me if nothing’s wrong.”
“That’s not it!” Tommy denies furiously.
Techno stares at him.
“Okay, that’s it, but he’s been so on edge lately. All he needs is his twin brother, yeah?”
In the end, Techno doesn’t give in to the kid’s stupid negotiation tactics. He’s clearly just worked himself into a frenzy over nothing and Techno would rather see Wilbur wake up without the dark lines under his eyes that he’s had for who knows how long.
In the end, what makes him check on Wilbur is the sound of footsteps tapping about in the ravine, soft and subtle, almost impossible to hear.
But they do hear it, both of them at the same time. Tommy’s eyes widen and he whips his head towards the entrance. They don’t need to say it out loud, they both know that those footsteps can’t be Wilbur's.
Which means someone else has infiltrated Pogtopia.
And it’s only their third day. Ugh.
Techno takes out his sword and walks into the ravine. Sure he doesn’t have much gear yet, but he’s Technoblade, what is someone supposed to do against him? Fight? No. He’ll do some investigation.
Tommy is right behind him as they look around.
Everything looks as it has the past few days. Dark and dim. No decorations, a few torches, a few chests, a few furnaces, a single bed with Wilbur in it.
“So, this is awkward, but whoever’s hiding around here, you should probably just reveal yourself,” Techno drawls.
Nothing.
“You thought that would work?” Tommy asks, unimpressed.
Techno just shrugs and starts walking around until finally…
At a certain angle, you can see something unusual. He’s been trained to spot even the most hidden people on Hypixel. It’s fair to say that he has a knack for tracking people down.
This one’s a bit harder to pin down due to the fact that all he can see is a sleek, black tail. Scales reminiscent of those from an ender dragon reflect in the torchlight, peeking out from behind the bed where Wilbur’s guitar is shielding most of the view.
“Heh?” he stresses, walking over, sword at hand.
Wilbur rustles in his sleep, and he catches sight of the creature, the person, the girl, the child, who’s at the other end of the tail. Big, horrified eyes meet his, and she silently ducks under the bed.
“Was that a fucking child?” Tommy exclaims in utter disbelief. He crouches by the bed and looks under it. “Hello? We’re totally friendly, strange dragon kid.” While Techno grabs a bucket of water and pours it on Wilbur.
It’s effective.
Wilbur sputters and sits up. “What the hell,” he says, rubbing his eyes with his palms. “Tallulah, why—” he cuts himself off when his eyes open properly and he takes in the environment.
Their eyes meet.
Techno and Wilbur. Wilbur and Techno. Twins in anything but blood facing one another, both realising the same thing at the same time.
Techno should have listened to Tommy—something he never expected he’d say—because the kid had been right.
Something is deeply wrong.