Chapter Text
TW // Implied / Referenced Childhood Abuse and Trauma, Identity Issues / Crisis, It / Its Pronouns Used
Under the sink, everything was okay. They were too tall to get it there. The pipes dug into its back and bottles of cleaner made the cabinet smell sharply of a chemically lemon scent that made Techno feel sick.
But it was fine, if it stayed quiet and shut its mouth, they would forget it was there in time. Just stay quiet. The scent of lemon poison wouldn’t mean anything in the long run. The cabinet was cracked open just a sliver, letting in a thin trail of moonlight only just bright enough for its eyes to watch the door’s lock for any signs of attempted entry.
The only sound in the frigid bathroom was the ticking of the clock hung over the door. The time read 2:43. Each tick seemed ages apart, slowly counting the seconds. Its breath was ghostly quiet, shallow and just barely able to keep its lungs going. That was good enough.
When it heard the knock, all breathing ceased entirely.
A gentle voice came from the hall, as loud as a whisper. "Techno? Are you in there?" Philza.
Techno didn't know how it felt about him. The boy was the surrogate matriarch of the household and kept them all out of trouble, far from the eyes of the fosters that breathed lies down their necks, but didn’t even bother to stick around for the reaping.
It could not blame them though. Adults were all blind to the world.
Phil was not blind though. He only spoke of promises, all fulfilled, of joy, all deserved. His words were genuine, every single syllable. He was as happy as Tommy was here, accustomed to the loudness of life, the clatter of cars, the touches of warmth.
But he had never felt the glare of sunlight on his back, or crusted blood and soil caked upon his skin and under his nails. His skin was plush and fair, with gentle locks of sunny blonde. Phil looked at home in the Californian sun with a brunette father and sibling and blonde mother and baby brother. It did not belong amongst them, an imposter in their midst with its bubblegum pink hair and tanned, sunburnt skin.
But, Techno could only wonder if Phil ever wanted to hide under sinks and desks next to the lemon scented cleaners and holding boxes of pink dye, away from the scent of ash and rays of light. Maybe he had.
It wondered if there was a reason if when next to Mary and Liam or even Tommy, Philza’s cloudy jade eyes looked a millennium older than they had any right to. It wonders if there was a reason that whenever their fosters could cook up a breakfast of savoury eggs and ham, Phil took a half hour longer to leave his room.
“Can I come in, Tech?”
He thought maybe Phil thrived in the voided dark of the wild too.
“Yeah.”
The door opened and closed with a gentle click and Techno peered through his little sliver of light at Phil. He was dressed in stripey green and white pajamas, looking as if a lost boy from “Peter Pan” had hopped straight out of the pages into their house. He did indeed look a bit lost, but from what Techno had seen, it was not a new revelation.
He couldn’t see Phil, sat directly opposite the sink and hidden by the wooden door of the tiny cabinet that Techno still held shut. Only a peek of his striped knee could be seen, illuminated by the moon. Now, there were two people in the bathroom breathing, one still deadly quiet, another loud enough to fill the silence.
Phil talked without prompting. “Why aren’t you asleep?” He didn’t sound scolding, only curious.
“I could ask the same of you.”
His brother laughed gently, but it was still a comforting sound. Philza’s laugh sounded so different from Wilbur’s and he couldn’t be more relieved. “I couldn’t sleep, is all. I dreamt the clouds were falling and I couldn’t fly. I couldn’t fly, and they got me too…”
Techno didn’t ask. He was certainly curious but not enough to risk it. “I got into a fight with Wilbur.” he mumbled, “I thought I was back Home.”
He always thought it strange he called that town, Home. When his hair was brown, not just at the roots, and his face was pale, unblemished by the sun’s kisses. It wasn’t him he saw when he reminisced of Home.
Phil didn’t ask either. “It seems we’re both a bit maladjusted, doesn’t it?”
Philza is not blind, neither is he a liar. It appears Techno was the blind one.
“Seems so.”
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Techno spent the next month holed up in Phil’s room. It was not because he was avoiding anyone, of course not, it was just that Phil was a staple in his life now, an anchor holding him steady. And if Wilbur just so happened to side-step the bedroom to avoid a certain gremlin child, well Techno supposed he might benefit from it too.
Whether or not the room’s owners were present, Techno was nevertheless huddled in the corner of the room, back facing dresser's side, playing Minecraft: Hypixel for an admittedly unhealthy amount of time.
Where he slept… Well he didn’t sleep much to begin with, but now with his and Wilbur’s ongoing argument, he had to sleep on the living room couch, which by all means, was perfectly fine to him. The stiff leather cushions were vastly preferable to the hardened dirt he had grown used to resting on, so he had no reason to complain.
Unfortunately, Phil seemed to have a different opinion. “Techno! Mate, you can’t sleep on the couch for another week.”
“Watch me, Phil. Sleep is for the weak.” He and Will clearly were not meant to be friends, he reasoned. He would deal with the scoliosis if that meant never passing the boy again. Techno had dug his grave and damned well meant to lie in it.
Wilbur didn’t get the memo, however.
Techno was only venturing out his cave to snatch the Switch from its charging port situated right in front of the TV. That was on, playing an all too familiar compilation of videos.
Oh no.
He tried his damndest to slip past Will’s notice and just grab the device and run, but his foster brother was not an idiot.
“H-Hey, Techno? Can we talk?” A red flag already, it seemed. It was very, very late in the night. Nothing good could've come from this.
He briefly considered humouring Wilbur’s request before his brain finally caught up and stopped that plan right in its tracks, “I would really rather not, thanks for asking.”
That seemed to not be the right thing to say as Will grumbled in mild frustration before letting out a breath. “I was just… I want you to take the bedroom tonight. Save your back the pain just for today yeah?” A surprisingly genuine offer… But from Wilbur? Seemed unlikely.
“It’s just… I-I know we’re not on great terms right now, but I’d like to get to know you a bit better, yeah? I wanna try to be better with… Trying.” Well, how could he refuse now?
After a painfully awkward shuffle back and forth through the house, Will settled into the living room and he was situated in their bedroom. His side was left the exact same as he left it weeks ago, perfectly organized chaos with clothes piled into a neat nest in the corner and the scarlet sheets made just wrong as always.
Walking to the door, Techno couldn’t help but think Wilbur looked a lot like himself back Home. He wondered if Phil saw it too.
The door closed with a gentle click.