Chapter Text
I am drowning
There is no sign of land
You are coming down with me
Hand in unlovable handAnd I hope you die
I hope we both die-No Children, The Mountain Goats
Wilbur grins down at Schlatt, a little wild, a little free, a moment picturesque in its beauty.
Schlatt scowls, a little too exaggerated to be true, and yanks at his tie expectantly.
"Come on, can't you just start it already?", Schlatt says, and almost like an afterthought adds, "Bitch."
"Sure Schlatt.", Wilbur laughs, and the sun reflects in his eyes, stars exploding into colourful bits of nothingness, "Anything for you."
---
Wilbur falls to his knees, feels the pebbles dig into his skin and opens his mouth to scream at the sky.
Water pours from his lips, lungs heaving and fingers desperately yanking at his hair; it's the end and he knows, salt running through his veins and eyes heavy with the promise of tears.
Behind him, the ocean roars.
Somewhere, under waves crashing against the shore and land buried beneath water is Schlatt, ever so stubborn, ever so horribly, horribly stubborn, and Wilbur feels like screaming and leaving and jumping into the raging ocean to drag Schlatt out of that stupid house.
A thunderstorm tears apart the sky behind him.
---
"What are you gonna do?", Schlatt asks quietly.
Wilbur looks up at the night sky, a memory of belonging tearing at his mind, and shrugs.
"What, right now? Probably continue talking to you"
"No, are you actually stupid? I meant when this-", Schlatt gestures around them once, a look of suffocating homesickness pulling at his face, "When this is all over."
What a poetic question to ask, Wilbur thinks, and, I wish I could answer it.
"I dunno. Maybe stay on my own for a while, try to work myself out. Create something I can stand for, y'know?"
"Yeah yeah, I know", Schlatt sighs.
There's something in his eyes then, something Wilbur sees reflected in the moments just before a disaster, and the shiny surface of gold.
He doesn't ask Schlatt about his dreams.
---
Wilbur watches Schlatt's face as he falls.
He wonders, quietly, if his eyes had always been so empty, if the cruel smile on his face has always existed somewhere, or if it's just here and now that he can recognize who Schlatt truly is.
There's no tears, no remorse, no memory of friendship.
Wilbur closes his eyes.
His lungs fill with water.
He doesn't try to swim back up.
---
The war is over, Tommy thinks.
Around him, L'Manberg takes form, a nation at last, born from blood and sacrifice.
The war is over.
Finally.
And when Niki steps into L'Manberg, the start of spring clinging to her heels, an echo of the summer passing by, there's something wild and untameable in her eyes.
And Tommy knows things are going to change very soon.
---
Wilbur feels his hands shake.
At the bottom of the podium stands Tommy, looking up to him with hope so boundless in his eyes that Wilbur has to choke back tears.
He looks so young like this, his vice president, in the uniform that never really fit him, stained by blood and dirt and the memory of betrayal.
He can hear Schlatt move to stand closer to him.
"Reminds me a lot of you, that kid," he says lazily, "A whole lot of hope to be wasted."
Wilbur grits his teeth. He feels his hands shake-
-"We can make it, come on! Schlatt?"
"I'm staying here, Wilbur."
Water spills through the cracks in the wood.
"You'll die!" -
He blinks the salt water out of his eyes and straightens his back, feeling the weight of the water pull at his coat, an afterthought of the past. Yet, Wilbur knows what he must look like - once, statuesque, now, cracked, a statue about to crumble. An old thing, soon to be replaced.
Underneath him, Tommy and Tubbo move their chairs closer to each other.
The clock strikes nine.
Wilbur tears open the envelope-
-and the ocean beneath gnashes and moans, old and horribly evil, tearing away at their little house and Schlatt's in there, Schlatt's in there and he will drown and the sea doesn't show mercy for anyone and-
Wilbur turns his back. The water nips at his feet, an invitation.
A thunderstorm is coming-
"Ladies and Gentlemen.", his voice sounds flat, Wilbur thinks. But he's just so, so tired. "Welcome to the first presidential election of our great nation of L'Manberg!"
L'Manberg. The walls behind him stand tall as ever, sanctuary and home.
(And he almost, almost thinks that they're blocking out the sun.)
"Thank you for coming tonight, to experience this… this historical moment - the passing over of the presidency. I have with me the voting results of the four parties: Swag2020, Pog2020, Coconut2020 and…. Schlatt2020."
The memory of salt water rises in his throat, threatening to suffocate the words tearing at his skin. Wilbur blinks back memories of water and lava and TNT and continues on:
"In 4th place, with about…. 20,000 votes, is Coconut2020!"
There's relief painted on Tubbo's face as he looks up at Wilbur, golden and bright like a fresh sunrise. Niki glances at him with a half-smile, a little crooked, a little broken, but just enough to be okay.
"With 16 percent of the votes, coming in 3rd place is… Schlatt2020!"
Wilbur feels his shoulders sag. There's tension bleeding out of them like a fresh wound, and he glances at the troubled sky with a despondency of someone who has seen what the future might hold.
There's only two parties left.
"In second place, by 30 percent of the popular vote is… Swag2020! Meaning that the winner of the popular vote, by 45%, is Pog2020!"
Tommy screams something beside him, genuine, youthful happiness flooding his veins and brightening his eyes. Tubbo cheers with him, ever the supportive one, and the world quiets at the sound of their applause.
Wilbur braces himself. Tides pull at the tailcoat of his uniform, an invitation to the great unknown of the sea.
"Two days ago, on the night of the election", he says quietly. No one pays attention. "After the announcement of Schlatt2020 and Coconut2020, Quackity made a deal."
The image of a black suit and a red tie, a golden coin flipped into the air, two businessmen turned friends turned … something, an echo of an old conversation.
"Quackity said that - no matter what happens - he would pool Swag2020 votes on with Schlatt2020 votes. Pog2020 got 45 percent of the popular vote, meaning that the coalition government of Schlatt2020 and Swag2020 got 46 percent. Tonight, Tuesday the 22nd of September 2020, Schlatt2020 has been inaugurated."
There's a great quiet. Even Tommy has fallen speechless, and Wilbur counts the seconds by tides lapping onto his feet.
Then, Schlatt laughs, a humourless, manic thing, the bloody red of a new-born dawn in his eyes. There's the sureness of a ruler in his gaze, the calculations of a strategizer in his steps.
He steps on the podium, all straight back and raised chin, a wild, animalistic thing - the memory of a great flood.
"Well," he says, "That was pretty easy."
Wilbur can feel Tommy shake next to him, anger and fear made indistinguishable by the darkness of the night.
-and above him, Schlatt smiles - cruel, eyes emotionless. He moves his polished black shoe closer to Wilbur's fingers, desperately hanging on the cliff-
"My first decree as president of L'Manberg is-"
-Schlatt pushes his heel onto his fingers with a smile-
"To revoke the citizenship of Wilbur Soot and TommyInnit!"
-he loses grasp of the cliff, and the water swallows him up with unprecedented greed, marble cracked and overflowing with water, once statuesque, now lost to the sea.
Tommy cries out beside him.
---
Tubbo feels the world spin into chaos around him - the vivacity of colours start to blur as voices mix into a single line of monologue, the end of the scene.
"And I want you to show them the door."
There's a hand on his shoulder, iron weight, dragging him down - the ocean is a relentless thing, Wilbur says distantly-
And he's pushed from the podium, down into the masses, single-file consciousness and the memory of fear.
Tommy watches him from the tree line. Wilbur has taken his hand, dragging him deeper into the void of land outside Dream SMP and Manberg, driven by fear and mocked by friends turned into enemies.
Their eyes meet, and the world fizzles down into blue eyes of laser-sharp awareness.
A memory of friendship tears at his throat-
-and Tommy barrels towards him, disks in hand, Dream close on his tail.
It only takes him a second to make the enderchest, a second longer to be stabbed by Dream, who manages to look slightly disappointed despite the mask.
Tommy respawns with the glow of victory emanating from his smile and the confidence of a champion.
"Is this what winning feels like?"-
-the air rushes back into his chest after a few hopeless seconds, and Tubbo resurfaces from the gentle waves.
Above him, Tommy laughs, loud and genuine and free, before Tubbo reaches for his leg to pull him down too-
-L'Manberg has secured independence and Tommy stands on the walls, vice president, yet in the fire's glow looking younger than ever, and Tubbo climbs up to join him.
Smoke rises into the sky, a final goodbye to the past.
In the distance, someone is singing-
-Eret smiles, a heavy, crooked thing as everyone staggers back to safety, a final goodbye.
"Eret- How could you- We trusted you!"
Tubbo holds Tommy back while the other boy thrashes. The pain tears at his insides-
-Tubbo watches, with careful delicacy, as a bee rests on Tommy's head. The other is asleep (and for the first time in forever, he looks content), while Tubbo is content to watch the sun fall from the sky. There's nothing a peaceful quiet and the sound of leaves, moved by wind-
An arrow lodges itself into Tommy's shoulder. He gives Tubbo one last, fearful look, before disappearing into the foliage.
(And later, Tubbo would ask himself, if the fear in Tommy's eyes came only because of him.)
----
Tommy feels the arrow lodge into his arm and takes off, through foliage and undergrowth until the green of the leaves blends in with the darkness of the sky and the world tilts on its axis.
Behind him, Wilbur heaves, ever the one with less stamina-
His foot catches on a rock and both of them tumble to the ground.
Tommy cries out in pain before Wilbur slaps a hand over his mouth.
There's something wild in his eyes and, Tommy thinks, he looks younger like this: Face obscured by shadow and tainted with mud, blood amplifying the youth carving his face.
"Why don't we just stay here?" Tommy whispers.
Wilbur laughs, cruel and cold.
"Look what became of us. I was the president! And now we're going to be sleeping on the ground in the forest. It's really funny, isn't it, how the tides change-"
Tommy shakes his head. There's something horribly old in Wilbur's voice, the echo of an old scar, hiding behind layers of irony.
He can't expect much of Wilbur tonight.
So Tommy takes out his shovel and starts digging.
--
Wilbur feels cold.
The cave is a dim, deep thing - more of a ravine than anything, stretching into the earth.
Tommy lay asleep next to him, childlike in his dreams, and he watches his chest rise and fall with each beat of a second.
It's horribly quiet.
They have taken off their uniforms and they now lay tangled on the floor.
Wilbur watches them with disdain.
They're nothing but a memory of the past now, a relic of a different time - a better one, it seems, although none of them would've called it that.
An old song echoes in his thoughts, music that can't be heard: I heard there was a special place….
Tommy mumbles something in his sleep.
And Wilbur, with hands shaking in the cold, sets their uniforms ablaze, smears the soot on his eyelids, and swears to live up to his name.
---
Fundy wonders distantly if this is what freedom feels like.
It's a dizzying feeling, a sensation that blurs his sight but at the same time highlights every colour in perfect 3D, silhouettes against a bleeding sky of splitting 4k.
His hands shake.
Schlatt smiles at him.
There's a cool distance in those eyes and Fundy thinks of-
-the ocean residing in Wilbur's eyes, a thrashing, fighting thing never to be calmed-
He laughs, maybe a little too loud, maybe a little too wild but Schlatt joins in and it feels good.
And suddenly there's a flint and steel in his hands and a wave blossoming anger in his chest and-
Niki puts a hand on his shoulder. Reality grinds to a halt.
"Fundy," she says, and her voice barely carries back to him over the whirlwind in his head, "You don't have to do this."
Eret stands next to her, smiling pitifully, and he's a traitor, a traitor, a traitor-
"I know," Fundy echoes numbly.
Niki moves to hug him and Fundy sees the ocean in her eyes, always thrashing, always fighting, never to be calmed, and pushes her away.
Resentment rises into his throat, threatening to spill over and with venom in his voice and fire in his eyes, Fundy says: "I really want to though."
--
L'Manberg's flag burns very easily, Fundy finds.
All royal colours and dangerous memories on the brink of his consciousness have become nothing but gasoline to the raging inferno beneath him.
The fire reflects in his eyes, a single, wild thing, the memory of a world turned to ash as much as a warning, screamed into the sky by smoke:
I'm not your son anymore .
---
It's strangely familiar, the expanse of white before him.
Wilbur remembers a time when there were different kingdoms, different wars - always the same people though, moved from place to place like pawns on a chessboard.
He remembers Newfoundland like one remembers the sting of an old wound, remembers the person he used to be with a hatred reserved only for himself.
Most importantly, he remembers Technoblade.
The Antarctic Empire is a cold thing, palace carved out of ice and snow, inching ever closer to the heart of the mountain.
Wilbur watches the delicate ornaments carved into the walls, telling stories of wars won centuries ago, treaties signed by versions of themselves that are long gone.
And when the time comes, he kneels before the ice throne.
"Techno", he says, voice hoarse from screaming into the sky, "We need your help."
Red eyes lock with his.
"Did someone say… revolution?"