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So, I’m getting to know me, really slowly
One thing about being lonely, is you get stuck with yourself. Every second for the past few months has been Tommy with only his own mind, and it’s such a shame because maybe if he’d been able to talk to another human fucking being he wouldn’t be who he is right now. (Dream doesn’t count. He never lets Tommy talk back).
He’s stuck in a curse, he thinks bitterly. A loop, with no way out and nobody other than himself to keep him company. He wishes he was still naïve, wishes he knew less, wishes he was just a little kid again. He used to be so good at lying when he was younger too, convincing himself heroes get happy endings for oh, so long despite Technoblade’s words.
Tommy’s found more about himself since he’d been exiled than he ever has before. He found out it only takes a few punches in the face for him to grow almost completely numb to the pain. Learned that he really likes the colour of his own blood, learned that an axe cuts through his skin much deeper and harsher than a sword, and works much better than those blunt razors Wilbur once gave him way back when he was alive, just bordering insanity.
Soon, who I am right now will be the old me
Somewhere far, far deep in his mind, Tommy knows time is passing; his old friends are living without him, not caught up in a weird state of permanent dissociation. It doesn’t really matter though, does it? If he’s growing up right now, all this fucking pain will slowly just become a memory – it won’t mean anything. Nothing but a mere plot point in his life: that one thing that changed him forever, purged the colour from his eyes, scratched at his soul until it started to shred on its own, as if someone had hit self-destruct. He’s making such a big deal out of this, just like he did when Schlatt had exiled him and Wilbur, but now that’s nothing more than history. Who fucking cares that he’s keeling over and heaving so violently that he tastes metal every other night? Soon this will be just another version of himself, lost and forgotten as only a distant memory, faint and blurry around the edges.
I’ll ask me from the future “how we doing?”
Tommy hopes he dies. Everyone dies, but it doesn’t feel very Dream-like to let him run free like that. The smiling man has too much power over him already but simply crippling a child’s life wouldn’t be satisfactory to him: he likes to play with Tommy, he’d said. He doesn’t seem the type to enjoy giving up his toys. He’s an object – a possession – that Dream never wants to let go of and the tightness of his grip on Tommy’s throat becomes more excruciating with each night spent shivering in his tattered excuse of a tent.
Before Tubbo exiled him, there were whispers in L’manburg of a revival book; at the time, it had felt like a feeble desire to bring his brother back. Now, Tommy thinks it would be better to meet Wilbur again in limbo instead. He’ll be happy there with him, he thinks. There’s nothing left here for him: Tubbo banished him, Ranboo has stopped writing, his father probably wants him dead given how he murdered his brother in front of his eyes. Dream is the only one that really pays any attention to him, but he’d rather just be agonisingly alone than have to see his face ever again. He wants to die. He wants to die so, so bad.
Do you wish you were me?
There’s a chance the afterlife won’t be any easier for him. Wilbur could still be the maniac he was in the moments before he left and well, Schlatt… Tommy’s heard Tubbo’s stories of how he would beat the poor boy for hours upon hours when he was President. Although his best friend abandoned him, he doesn’t want to see the man who covered his melanin (once matched with a beaming smile) with black and blue. He knows how it feels, to an extent, to have someone you look up to so much turn around with unrecognisable eyes glowing with a terrifying emptiness as they hurl a closed fist straight into your cheekbone. The shock as you sit and take it because you never thought-
Tommy loves Wilbur though, and that includes his flaws because unlike Dream, Wilbur isn’t always a monster, never really was. Dream would pretend to care, pretend to be his friend, and then finish with “put your stuff in the hole, Tommy.” There was a time he believed it, thought maybe Dream really was his only friend. Then he remembered how Wilbur actually apologised when he had his outbursts, however quiet and off-handedly. It doesn’t matter that it would take weeks for the apology to come, to the point Tommy struggled to recognise if it was for everything that happened in between or just the original few punches and shouts. He said sorry, and he clings to the belief that Wilbur had meant it every time.
Should I wish I was you?
They could have changed. It was evident every living person on the SMP had, so what’s stopping the dead from changing too? A small thrill shoots up him – he’s curious as to what they’re like up there; wants to know so badly how differently solitude affected them. Were they together? Wilbur and Schlatt were so close before, maybe they’ve brought the good out in each other. Maybe they’ll help Tommy bring out the good in himself. Ghostbur is only a shell of what his brother once was but Wilbur? The real person? That’s the only person with a chance of bringing Tommy back, if there’s a chance at all.
Yet another day, Tommy wishes his death would come quickly.
Now that I envy all of my past selves who had their health
Sometimes he gets flashbacks to when his body and mind weren’t so ruined, when he was happy with a caring family and when the word ‘dream’ made his eyes sparkle with a burning passion. It all seems so long ago now, a past life. All the memories are so warm while simultaneously forcing a shiver through his body – he gets so damn cold when he misses his family. Not whatever it’s become now, no – his real family. On particularly bad days, Tommy finds himself believing it wasn’t even real, positive he’d crafted a perfect life in an attempt to feel a little bit of love, even if he’d never feel it again.
It’s always overwhelming when he grasps afterwards that those memories aren’t intricate fabrications. He’d had everything he’d ever needed and he’d fucked it all up and lost everything and it would be nothing less than selfish to escape that truth. Tommy had destroyed his family because he was never satisfied enough to appreciate what he never truly deserved. He had been given love once – something that is unbearably foreign to him now – and he had thrown it out the window and stomped all over its bloodied corpse.
‘Cause now I’m constantly scared and needing repairs
In the early stages of exile, Dream would bandage the burn scars he left on the blond’s skin in a futile attempt to make the younger feel safe so he wouldn’t run away. So he could keep him. It had been such a monotonous cycle of harming followed by healing that it changed to just the former. The burn scars were quickly decorated with open wounds begging for stitches and then followed the shallower, straighter crimson dips in skin. There was nowhere Tommy could go and definitely nobody Tommy could pathetically beg for help.
Even if an old friend had a change of heart and offered to help, it’s not like Tommy could simply get better. No, he’s far past repairing and patching up, rather in need of an entire reset. He needs to start from the beginning, start out pliant and take all that is given to him with open hands and say please and thank you more often. He needs to become someone else entirely and leave whatever he’s become buried six feet under.
And no matter what I achieve I get thoughts of leaving
When he and Ranboo used to write, the kind hybrid would always call him ‘strong’. Tommy found it funny even then, because wanting to flee from living didn’t sound very ‘strong’. Thinking about staying under the water when he woke up drowning every morning didn’t feel ‘strong’ and it was so much more cowardly than ‘strong’ to not even go through with it. To crawl out of the water soaking and gasping for breath he has lost the right to take into his lungs.
Nonetheless, the other would keep complimenting him saying he’d gone through so much but he was still alive and how it’s so brave of him but each time, dying and leaving it all behind became more and more inviting. Then the letters ceased and Dream had destroyed the words on one particularly angry night, the smile on his mask becoming impossibly wider as Tommy watched the attempt of comfort turn to ash. If he lets his eyes stay closed longer than usual before dragging his sinking body onto the shore the next morning, it doesn’t even matter. He still wasn’t strong enough.
There trapped down in my youth, I wish I was you
If he could go back he would in a heartbeat. It’s an inane longing that pulls on his chest when he thinks about Techno as his brother, laughing lowly at him with not a single drop of malice. He thinks of how Phil once loved him; how his rambling could help the youngest fall asleep after a hard day (those seem like heaven compared to the rare good days he’s given now).
Wilbur’s smile used to reach his ears and the mischief in his eyes used to be playful, not murderous. That look would fill young Tommy with eagerness and not copious dread. He misses how blissful and unknowing they all were when the worst they could think of doing was nicking food off each other’s dinner plates. He craves for that youth back, he wants to fuck around without the fear of everyone he loves leaving him in an instant as punishment. He knows now that if he were to go back, it would simply play out exactly the same. It was his fault, after all.
With our age old ceremonies that we made up
He thinks back to baking with Niki before he’d managed to fuck things up with the nicest person he’s ever met. Her pink hair was lighter and much shorter than Techno’s, managed to make him feel nostalgic for that brotherly love while thriving off the new, wholesome friendship blooming between him and his pseudo-sister.
They’d eat fresh bread together every Thursday and talk about anything ranging from flowers to anxiety. He’d looked forward to it every week, and now he wonders if he ever told Niki just how much he appreciated spending those moments with her. He guesses it was only a matter of time until her mind got plagued too, just like everybody else on this damn server. Still, he wishes her halcyon mentality had been untouched; she should have been left in peace and not had her emotions slowly ripped apart day by day. She was pure, everything good in the world but like him, she wore her heart too easily on her sleeve. Tommy misses Niki, and he doubts she misses him back.
Now such dear memories from when we stayed up late, watched the sun from the street
The bench had been there on that hill the day he’d met Tubbo. They’d become inseparable so fast, both being each other’s first best friend. Secretly, the younger sort of thanks the bench every now and then for bringing them together, no matter how stupid it sounds. Initially, the two had been too young to stay out late so far from home, so they only met up during afternoons, and Tommy would come home with cheeks hurting from how much he had smiled and laughed wholeheartedly.
As they grew older, took on exceedingly heavier responsibilities, it became an unspoken routine for them to sit together at nightfall in scarce peaceful quiet on that creaky, dying bench. The view of the sun setting was calming, letting them know that despite the chaos getting shoved their way, the day would end. This would all eventually stop and they’d be able to rest.
It was nice back then, the quiet groan of weight stressing the wood, but now Tommy thinks he had taken it all for granted. That was becoming a recurring theme.
As we made up all those lives that we surely would lead
Young Tommy had been so insistent on growing up a hero, he wanted to save people he cared for and anyone else who needed it. It always sounded harmless enough and Phil used to gently encourage him whenever he’d mention it late at night in front of the fireplace. Techno would grunt in slight disapproval but he would also ruffle Tommy’s hair and braid it neatly after – started calling him Theseus after the younger had asked what the coolest hero name was. He’d be a saviour and he would choose to be the one person everyone could count on and Prime was he excited for it.
But now our lives lead us
He wasn’t ready to become a hero though. Hadn’t fully understood that it entailed being the villain to others’ eyes. Tommy had learned the hard way that there was no such thing as a hero and whenever he wanted to back away from the responsibility, he was always forced further back in. His actions determined him, and no matter what he did, someone was angry and when he said he just needed some time to breathe he’d be yelled at by every single person around him. He couldn’t choose to be a hero and also take one day off. Who would people look up to? Who would the other side antagonise?
He was so foolish to think you could choose your own destiny. Maybe you can, but then you’re stuck with that one path forever, except as you keep walking the path disappears behind you, and it becomes thinner and thinner and cracks begin to show. One wrong move and you fall to your demise or a different move and a masked man in a green hoodie shoves you off as he laughs manically. Tommy was never in control and it was absurd of him to have ever thought otherwise.
So I’ll turn life into a habit
In a way, exile stole Tommy’s last life, seeing as he’d stopped living pretty much immediately. Rapidly shaping into Dream’s plaything and nothing more. Dream does what he wants and Tommy’s learnt to simply take it, because there’s not much else he can do. Fighting it would end with added sticky red blood staining his once white shirt, and he doesn’t have the energy for that. Dream would probably want a reaction too: a scream, some crying and begging to stop, but Tommy doesn’t even have enough energy to perform a little. Dream seems content enough to quite literally kick him while he’s already down, probably sadistic enough to enjoy having stolen the fight that once flowed obnoxiously through him.
But I’ll have this weight that people erase or think that I’m faking
Ghostbur doesn’t understand why Tommy’s so upset all the time. The little brother he remembers was so bubbly, full of joy and energy. He often tells the younger to ‘lighten up’: the flickering imitation of his older brother is so convinced they’re on a vacation that he completely disregards the reality. Barely even thinks of the possibility that Tommy has become so, so disconnected from his past self that he just wants to slice himself open and stop breathing all together, because there’s no possible way that’s the same boy from the ghost’s rose-tinted memories.
When Techno shows up, all he does is tease and mock the blond so much it’s clear he’s too oblivious to the fact Tommy’s never suffered so much in his life. Or maybe he’s completely aware of the ruined boy in front of him and is relishing it. Maybe this is all he’s ever wanted. Maybe Technoblade can’t fathom the idea that someone could become so god damn weak that he think’s Tommy’s exaggerating a little (or a lot, probably thinks the entire thing is some stupid façade), throwing up some theatrics to gain pity from those he’s fucked over. Tommy lets himself wonder – fantasise, really – about the pink haired hybrid showing empathy towards him. Of course it’s a far cry from reality, but when they were little kids Techno was always the first to help him when he’d hurt himself (physically, he was never one for emotions or vulnerability).
Bringing himself back into the present, he notices his brother staring intesnsely at the hectic and burning raised lines on his arm through the rather large rip in his shirt sleeve. There’s Techno’s evidence he’s doing this all for attention.
Freedom is in the short-term as I have learned
Winning L’manburg back was the best few minutes of his life. Hand in Tubbo’s as the smaller boy took to the stage – ready to become the leader they needed to rebuild their home – he’d never felt so accomplished. Everything they’d worked towards had paid off, and he remembers vowing to never let anyone take L’manburg away from him. Then Wilbur pushed the button. Wanted his stupid fucking ‘moment’ or whatever it all came down to, not caring in the slightest that he’d just betrayed everyone who had ever loved him. Betrayed Tommy.
He’d been put through so much torture from his brother in Pogtopia; he’d bled so fucking much; still has bruises from the days Wilbur came back drunk and took everything out on him. All for what? A blown up country and an even more broken family. The day he’d gotten his home back after months and months of fighting and suffering, was the same day he watched his own father kill his brother in cold blood.
He started to realise it then, that he will never get a happy ending. He’ll be tormented relentlessly time and time again with the promise – a hint of hope, only for it to get slashed out of his hands, leaving a bloody mess in its path. Tommy wasn’t meant to be free. He knows that now.
There’s no real sense of completion, only seasons
Spring comes tells me of Summer, and then under its breath, says “Autumn’s a promise to prolong this”
There were many times since joining this hellscape that Tommy had thought it was all finally over. That he could settle down and breathe easy. He had a senseless and short-lived thought a few days into his exile that he could make the best of a bad situation, try to enjoy it as if it were the vacation Ghostbur believed. Possibly make Logstedshire his home as Techno had with his cabin. They were both so far from L’Manburg and from any form of life but he seemed fine, so maybe Tommy could copy his older brother one more time.
The flaws in that plan reared their ugly heads when Dream’s visits became more frequent and violent in nature. He’s truly come to terms now with the fact nothing will ever be over for him, not if Dream has anything to say about it. Tommy will never be allowed to leave his past behind because the man claiming to be his only remaining friend will never let him forget.
Days started to bleed into each other until Tommy found himself exceptionally cold one night, and realised as a dry auburn leaf crunched under his shoe that it had become Autumn. When did that happen? He’s been left behind long enough for the season to change; for the gentle breeze to harshen and for the daylight to hide from him quicker. Nobody seems to care.
Stay as whoever I will be
He hates who he’s become. Weak and helpless to the manipulative words that fall upon his ears. Cut up and ripped apart so frenziedly that he is more scar tissue than skin; he’s lost the blue in his eyes and his hair is becoming dull and frankly disgusting. Reduced to a body that is so far disconnected to any semblance of life and it is entirely his own doing. Tommy has not earned the right to live nor to love, yet he craves both so often and so viscerally that the urge to drive his fist forcefully into his chest to rip out his heart and leave the bloodied muscle, still beating, in the palms of essentially anybody’s open hands has become incredibly appealing at times.
He eyes Technoblade in his peripheral vision – once a brother – and sickeningly imagines the shock spreading across his face if he were strong enough to cave to his thoughts. Despite the glee that begins to bloom inside of him, he stays put. Doesn’t dare to move an inch. This is who he is now: a disgusting excuse of a child who does not and never has known a single thing about the world and its people. He cannot escape that truth and honestly, he's too exhausted to ever try.
That’s the real me, there trapped down in my youth
Techno is still staring at his scars, Tommy notices; there’s a certain glazed look to the hybrid’s eyes that he can’t quite decipher. His brother is no stranger to the physical memories a war leaves on one’s body, but here and now, Tommy watches as Technoblade familiarises himself with the foreign sight of straight, repetitive wounds that were inflicted not by war, not by a dramatic and exhilarating battle. The older scans his arms over and over again, bordering ritualistically, over the blatantly obvious self-inflicted cuts that trail down his little brother’s left arm.
The attention is unwelcome, but Tommy makes no attempt to cover up, nor does he demand to be left alone. He just sits still and lets himself be observed like a long lost artifact pulled from the ground, stolen from the soil it had become comfortable surrounded by to be displayed in a glass case.
He’s become well versed with torture, so he imagines how the Techno from his childhood would have responded, because harming himself has proven to be an effective distraction. The piglin hybrid was never a physically affectionate person, but he had discarded that trait without much hesitation when he’d found little Tommy wailing on the floor, clutching his broken ankle and begging for something to soothe the shocks of pain shooting up his body. The old Techno would have scooped up his little brother into his arms, held him close and ask why he ever felt the need to hurt himself. The old Tommy would have cried loud, obnoxious tears and clung to his soft red cape, and he would have told a truthful answer while his brother gently bandaged him up, with the promise to never do anything like that again.
With a sharp but quivering inhale of breath, Tommy finds that despite everything, if Techno were to touch him as gently as that now, he would break apart in an instant. Somewhere concealed under layers of distrust and betrayal, that version of him from his youth is dormant, awaiting one single touch from the man across the tent to push through Tommy’s body and come barrelling out with ease.
I wish I was you
The movement of Techno’s eyes falter for a quick moment as Tommy comes to his conclusion, before instantly falling back to trying to make sense of the scars. Once more, Tommy wishes he was a little boy again, blissfully unaware of the torment he would be thrown headfirst into. He craves the brotherly love he used to think was simply a given in life, something he could never lose. He wants Techno to hug him tight and yearns to find the joy in living he once thought was bound to his very soul.
He has lost everything that was previously welded into his skin and bones, and suddenly, he needs it all back. He can’t live like this. He can’t keep drifting as day turns to night, either starving and shaking on his own or being thrashed around every which way by Dream. Prime, Tommy cannot stand Dream. He wants to leave.
Still the hardest words that anyone has said
Dream, who has forced his hands into the wirings of Tommy’s brain and rearranged them to make the most broken and entertaining version of him. Dream, who has left permanent reminders of his power trip scattered all over Tommy’s frail body.
Who had ripped Wilbur’s old coat – the only remaining connection to his brother – to shreds while still on Tommy’s back, letting the blood soak and stain the cloth. Who had laughed while burning letters Ranboo had sent in good faith to comfort a friend on the verge of suicide. Who had screamed at Tommy to hand over the compass, Tubbo’s compass, so he could smash it to the ground and let a mourning child use the shards of glass to pierce his own skin. Tommy was sure he wouldn’t wake up from the burning and beating he endured after he refused, lying through his teeth that he had lost it.
Dream who had stolen his home, stolen his discs, and stolen two of his lives in cold blood.
I sometimes wish I just wouldn’t have asked
Tommy had gotten too bold once: mumbled under his breath after watching the masked man explode his belongings in a hole that was becoming a more familiar part of life than food or water. His heart was roaring in his ears as he felt Dream glowering at him through the mask before his voice softened deceivingly, body edging ever closer to where Tommy stood shaking.
“What was that, Tommy?, voice incredulously calm.
Tommy tried to repeat himself, only managing weak stammers. The gentleness in Dream’s voice starting to gradually disappear as he asked again, irritation growing apparent the longer it took for the response to fall from his lips. Voice ever so wobbly, Tommy asked, “Why are you doing this to me?”, and well, it quickly became one of the worst things he has ever said. Only losing to screaming at Tubbo that he could ever be worth less than the discs.
The final cut in a long series of stabs
Tommy had endured wars, death, smacks and punches from someone he had spent his entire life idolising, stared helplessly as his father thrusted a sword into the heart of that same man. He has suffered cuts and wounds that have hit veins and felt blood spurt out of his body at a frightening speed.
None of it comes close to how badly those next few words would land on his body. Enough spite to burn through his skin like acid, making quick work of the bones beneath until Tommy was nothing more than dust, all fight leaving him. He had never given up on anything before this, ever so stubbornly persistent. As it turns out, all it takes are a few words for him to crumble and lose all sense of self.
“Look we’re sorry kid, but you’ll never get your old life back”
Dream sported a sadistic smile wide enough to be visible behind the edges of his mask. Tommy shuddered. “Oh, Tommy,” he began, still creeping slowly towards the boy in question, “you haven’t figured it out?” As if it made so much sense, something that has been woven into the fabric of the universe since the very start of time; a reason so glaringly obvious that every single person aside Tommy has known it their entire lives. It did nothing to clear the jumbled thoughts swimming frantically through his mind, and Tommy wants to shake his head no but his body is frozen firmly in place. He can only watch petrified as Dream’s hand grasped strongly around his shoulder, uncaring for the blazing skin stinging harshly at the contact.
“Your stupidity really knows no end, Tommy,” he spit out, his voice turning sour. “You are the most insolent, arrogant waste of space anybody has ever met. Don’t you understand? Everyone has left you to rot, because all you ever do is steal the air around you and beg so shamefully for attention. People have had enough of your unbearable little act, Tommy, and I’m in charge of fixing you.”
The hand on his shoulder squeezed agonisingly for a short moment before he sighed, letting go completely. All Tommy could muster up is a broken sob. “Does the truth hurt, stupid boy? Is it making sense now? I am the only person who can make you worth anything at all, let alone even partially likeable. You have to be broken down to your ugly little core so I can pick the disgraceful pieces up from the floor and shape you into something people don’t want to spit on,” fingers start to poke and prod with a cruel softness at his scars and ever so often, dip into an open wound.
“I don’t even need to, but I’m too kind for my own good, Tommy,” the false comfort in his words piercing through his ears. “I am volunteering my days and my effort to help you, yet – as always – you don’t even say thank you,” a fingertip pressed forcefully into a day old cut and blood trickles out again – Dream simply wipes the red down the front of Tommy’s shirt. “What an ungrateful little brat. Is this how your father raised you? Phil hates you, just like everybody else.”
“I’m sorry,” is all that slips out of Tommy’s mouth, finally able to speak.
Dream’s head tilts curiously, “It’s a bit too late for apologies, child.”
“You will never get your old life back”
Tommy cannot breathe. His entire body flinches so hard it is impossible to disguise as simply a shiver when Techno stands up from where he was sat atop of an empty chest. He pauses. “Tommy,” he whispers airily, barely audible but the younger catches it. Through his glassy eyes he tracks as his brother walks slowly towards him – much like Dream had. Abruptly, Tommy stands up so fast he nearly topples to the ground as his mind swirls; hands reach out to steady him. He’s much closer than Tommy had thought.
“Tommy, you with me?” he questions.
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
Nothing but a far away howl of wind disrupts the silence between them for a very long time. Then, “Can you look at my eyes?”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir,” Tommy repeats as he looks up, startling at the lack of a mask, eyes skimming over the long pink braid that falls gracefully over Technoblade’s shoulder. It’s shameful, how the moment he realises the hands still holding his arms aren’t from a man digging his nails in to break skin, the tears immediately pool up behind his eyes. He has no other choice but to let them trail down his sunken cheeks and chokes out an “oh” when his brother removes one hand to brush some away.
“Oh, Theseus,” the name destroys him, tears turning loud and obnoxious just as they were when he was so much younger, “what have we done to you?” Tommy buries himself further into Techno’s body, clings to his soft red cape and hopes somewhere in the back of his mind that he will die of exhaustion in this very moment.
“You will never get your old life back”
No more words pass into the moment, because Techno knows there are none that could help, and Tommy cannot focus on a single thought long enough to remember how to speak. They stay as they are for many minutes, and the wind departs, sensing it has no place here in between two brothers. It’s all too sorely similar to something many years past, a time Tommy had determined he would never get back no matter how hard he tried and fuck does it hurt. Hurts in a way he had lost the ability to feel, because it feels pure. It hurts more than anything he has ever experienced, more than the wars and the deaths and the endless cycle of burns and punches and gashes in his skin.
Tommy nothing short of melts into it, breathes it all in and cries impossibly harder. There is something akin to love pouring from a brother he has spent months believing could feel nothing other than detest for him, and he wants to drown in it. Techno rubs his back as he howls, places a featherlight kiss atop Tommy’s unruly and dirty hair. He’s being loved, and nobody is here to rip him away from it.
But now our lives lead us
Time passes, until Techno says something so absurd that Tommy thinks he’s been tricked, “Let’s get away from here, Theseus.”
He waits for the laugh that is surely to follow, perhaps for Dream to show himself and throw his fist squarely at Tommy’s jaw for disregarding months of progress and being so stupidly weak. Nothing comes. Techno’s face looks somewhat hopeful, almost pleading when he finally moves to meet his eyes, mourning the lack of contact instantly. “He’s not done yet,” is what he says, choosing his words deliberately in case Dream is nearby, “he’s fixing me, Blade.”
Techno’s eyes glaze over in the same unreadable way as they were when bearing holes into Tommy’s arm. “He’s destroyin’ you, Tommy. You don’t need fixin’, never have,” he states, like it’s something that has been woven into the fabric of the universe since the very start of time, so glaringly obvious.
Tommy’s mind clears, finally able to think after many, many nights, “Oh.” The look in his eyes – Tommy distinguishes as he watches a tear fall down his brother’s face for the first time in his life – that look is grief. “Yeah,” he murmurs.
Techno narrows his eyes, “Yeah?” he questions.
“Yeah, let’s get away from here, Blade.”