Work Text:
one more time, can the story be told.
tommy has told this story too many times; to those passing through the lands of the dream smp, to the newcomers who think they might put down roots. he's typed it out into his communicator thousands of times, sat around a fire with his friends family and retold the story of their victory. its been engrained in his mind, etched on his fingers, but one more time, once more he can tell it.
(its for a good cause after all)
---
l'manburg was born on a day when the sky was clear, in a clearing by the lake where wilbur had made his ball. that day, wilbur asked tommy if he was satisfied with what he had, with his little home in the side of a hill and his record player that held his music disks. and tommy thought about what he had and what was possible, and really, one out weighed the other, didn't it.
(if he could go back, would he change it? the story has ended now, but if he could have rewritten the chapter, changed the words, he might've.)
it began with less than perfect ideals, the cmarvan and wilbur and tommy, some less than legal bottles and a plan that not everyone would call moral. but it was home, and it was real, with the loud laughs they would let out as they dumped their goods for the day in hidden chests. the cmarvan was warm, and soon enough the warmth was shared, and the door opened wider and wider.
(he can't change the story, but maybe he can live in the memories of what once was, sitting on the wooden floor of the van with his friends and a bubbling brewing stand hidden in the cabinets.)
the walls were built high, and tommy remembers hours of wading in the lake, his pant legs rolled up and dripping at the ends, hoping for a squid to spawn, wilbur's demands for more ink crackling through the communicator. he remembers whistling a little song as he worked, poking around under bits of kelp and crying in delight every time he found one.
(when he looks back now, he wonders if he had thought a little more about the way wilbur's voice sounded frantic if he would have questioned why the walls were so high, why they had to move so quickly.)
war came fast to the newly dubbed l'manburg, and it came hard. tommy doesn't like remembering the days when he and wilbur would plot over maps for hours, wilbur shooting down plans his face creased with anxiety, pacing the floor of the cmarvan, wearing paths into the place tommy once sat and laughed at his jokes. now he sat there to wrap the scrapes and slices that come with fighting, his heart growing heavier with every loss wilbur jots down in his notebook. he remembers though, the times when they would all sit once again in the van - though it was more cramped than tommy had remembered - and wilbur would sing the anthem and they'd recollect the days past before the fighting.
(he used to think these would be the darkest chapters in the story, the bit right before everything gets better where your gut fills with fear for your protagonists until the final victory. he wishes he could go back and shake himself, now.)
they didn't exactly win the war, but they don't say that outright. because really, they kept everything they wanted, and that's what matters.
(he doesn't speak about the traitor, or the way it took weeks for the grass to look the same, or how loud noises make them all flinch. he looks at the button and he shivers, and he looks at the way dream holds the flint and steal and he feels the anxiety rising up his back again. he doesn't talk about how even now whenever eret looks over his nose he flashes back to the feeling of a sword piercing through his stomach and he wipes away all memory of the scars on his side. he doesn't write the words or tell the story of how his hands shook -shake- on crossbows, how wilbur's slow and solemn counting haunted his dreams for months.)
what matters, is what comes after. wilbur made tommy vice president, and they led. tommy, wilbur's right hand man and tubbo his, they led l'manburg. their numbers grew and they were fair rulers. they put aside their past of fighting with the dream smp, only friendly rivalries left, and things went back to how they were.
(except, when tommy speaks of these times, he skips over them, they are an afterthought in this story, a short period, no true joy. the moments he speaks of are overshadowed by the periods surrounding them, and filled with dreams of things he wishes to forget and the foreboding weight of choices that impact a nation)
the election of l'manburg was a sudden change, a seemingly harmless hope for a change from the mundanity of the l'manburgians life. tommy recalls the shock that had come when quackity had entered himself in the race, the slight feelings of betrayal when fundy and niki ran against him and wilbur. the debates inserted a kind of adrenaline into his veins that he had not felt since his duel, and it pushed him to be better, do better, be stronger for l'manburg.
(it reeks of optimism, he knows that, and his voice is thick with bitterness as he narrates the events, for he knows what comes next, what the end of this arc is, and he regrets ever beginning it.)
jschlatt won. and from there things quickly tumbled into an ever growing pit of chaos - but it is still the story of l'manburg, even if it rejects its name now. tommy ignores the way schlatts rule has made the weight on his shoulders immovable, and tries to recall the good things that come from this minor upset in the plan, tries to remember, tries to remember for l'manburg.
(he does not remember, because this era of the story is filled with wilbur snapping at him, and too many days without food. this era comes with training until his muscles are sore, and then training more, because there is no time. there is no time, that is something that wilbur has taught him, the days when they would spend hours dashing around the hills of the wilderness long gone, even the days when wilbur and he would sit side by side over the map, strategizing over and over, those days are long gone. instead, wilbur sits in a little room that he's hidden, shouting orders at tommy through the communicator, yelling insults when it isn't fast enough.)
and that brings them to now, the fetival, and god, tommy has tried everything. he has begged and bartered and obstructed in every way he can to no avail so this is all he has left. he has the story of l'manburg, the story of everything they've done together.
---
(the story fails.)
(it is time for the last resort.)