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Nowadays, the center of operations of the Antarctic Empire is Port-aux-Francais, in the grand palace Techno and Phil had constructed. It was well worth the move out of the ice mountain they’d started in. It’s warmer in Port-aux-Francais, albeit only slightly, and has more space to build, and it’s easier to raise animals there.
And kids, apparently.
Techno still isn’t entirely clear on how the kids came into the picture. Just that Phil had looked up one day and gone, “Hey, you think it’d be safe for the boys to come and stay with us?” and now there’s a pair of children underfoot no matter where you go in the palace.
They’re not too bad, though. The oldest tends to mind his younger brother well enough to keep him out of the way, and he likes to listen to Techno talk about literature where Phil would have tuned him out. The littler one is a whirlwind of chaos, but at least he keeps Techno on his toes. And Phil seems happier to have them both here, so Techno \bears with their more annoying moments.
The kids don’t usually come along when Techno and Phil visit the stronghold, since they’re rarely gone for more than a day, but they intended to stay for the better part of a week this time — need to reorganize the chests and prepare for a possible expedition into the End for more resources, especially since Wilbur is getting to be about the age where he could probably use an elytra of his own — so they’d made a family trip out of it. The stronghold isn’t childproof in the slightest, and it’s a long fall down if one of them happens to slip past the railings, but that doesn’t deter Tommy or Wilbur from running at top speed along the winding paths. They’re there for about two hours before Phil finally cracks and tells them that if they’re going to run, they need to take the stairs down into the cavern below and do it down there.
Wilbur and Tommy hadn’t argued much -- the concept of snow in midsummer was a novelty to them even if the stairs were long and precarious.
Techno admits it was a smart decision. The caverns are well-lit, so they shouldn’t run into any mobs (so long as they mind themselves enough to avoid falling into holes in the ice left by Phil’s pickaxe long ago), and they’re kept closed in by the mountain, so they won’t run somewhere they can’t be found. And it keeps their noise far enough away that Techno can focus for once.
At least until he’s halfway through revamping their storage and Phil comes waltzing in with a shit-eating grin. “Hard at work, I see,” he says with a tone that means I’m about to distract you for the rest of the afternoon.
Techno sighs and sets the membranes in his hands back into the chest. “Yes?” he questions.
Phil just smiles brighter. “Wanna guess what the kids are up to?”
Techno blinks at him and gets slowly to his feet. He brushes past Phil, stepping out of the storage room and onto the walkway over the cavern. Leaning over the railway, he’s able to catch a brief glimpse of what looks to be a decently-sized snow fort before Phil snatches him by his back collar and drags him back.
Techno manages to catch himself against the wall, offering Phil a bewildered glance. “Don’t let them catch you looking,” Phil hisses in a whisper. “They think they can ambush us.”
“That’s for us?” Techno demands, barely remembering to keep his voice low at Phil’s warning glance.
Phil snorts. “Who else would it be for?” he asks, which is...fair. Not like Wilbur and Tommy have many kids their own age to play with, not with the guardians they have. Techno frowns and opens his mouth to respond, but Phil’s gaze is already focused into the distance. “What’s the game plan?” he asks Techno.
Techno pauses. “...Are we fighting them?”
“We’re the one with the element of surprise now,” Phil points out. “Someone’s gotta show them why you don’t mess with the Antarctic Empire.”
Techno considers a number of responses. They’re kids, maybe, or We need to get actual work done while we’re here, or Are you actually expecting me to have a snowball fight with your sons? And then he spots the grin on Phil’s face, and knows the answer to every objection he’d think to raise. Instead, he sighs and says, “Yeah, we can get the ammo from outside.”
He’d known that his complete and utter inability to say no to Phil was going to come back to bite him someday, but he can’t quite bring himself to mind when faced with the way Phil brightens at his acquiescence. At least it’s a small burden.
“I’ll take the front,” he tells Phil, pushing himself off the wall, “and you can get ‘em from above while I figure out something to shelter behind.”
“Got it,” Phil says, and then they’re off to gather ammunition.
Techno is used to taking point in battles like this. He can handle taking a few hits, while Phil (glass cannon that he is, and with only one life) is much better suited to attacking from behind or from the sky, far out of reach but still capable of plenty of damage. It’s an old tactic that will suit them just fine here, when Techno hands off the snowballs he’s collected to Phil and trudges out down the stairs and into the snowy cavern. “Boys,” he begins.
Wilbur yells for Tommy to fire, and Techno is suddenly being pelted with snowballs.
He waits one beat, two, for the fwoosh of Phil taking off from the stronghold railing, and then sets to pushing up a protective barrier to the tune of the kids shrieking under the full weight of an airstrike.
He has something passable (it’ll protect Phil, at least, even if it’s too small for Techno himself) by the time his partner lands, stumbling to a stop behind the snow wall with a laugh. He’s already taken a couple of good hits -- his hair and eyelashes are both dusted with snow. “Wil’s a hell of a shot,” he informs Techno.
Techno snorts and sinks slightly farther behind the barrier. Two snowballs, one after the other, splat against it before quiet settles over the field. Both parties taking a moment to regroup.
Techno sets to making more snowballs as he thinks, Phil quickly following suit. “So, if we all just hide like this, we’ll be here all day,” he points out. “Wouldn’t take much to go over there and dump a pile of snow on them, but they’d see me coming and run for it, and they’re already expecting you to fly down on them again.”
Phil hums, tossing a snowball from hand to hand. “Sounds like the smartest thing to do would be to lure them out from their fortress,” he says, “but hell if I know how to make ‘em do it.”
“You think if I went out and made a show of storming them, they’d scramble enough that you could pick them off?” Techno asks.
Phil snorts, a sudden reminder to Techno that he’s dealing with children. “If you think you can take that much damage,” he says dryly. “They might just tackle you instead, though. Especially Tommy, and you know he’s a biter nowadays.”
“I don’t know how kids think, Phil,” Techno whines, sliding down into an exaggerated slump against the barrier. “How am I supposed to strategize for this?”
Phil laughs again, setting aside his snowball to tuck Techno’s hair behind his ears. “Oh, what a tragedy. The great war hero Technoblade, felled by a couple of kids.” Techno rolls his eyes.
“Hey, motherfuckers!” comes a cry from across the battlefield, in what is definitely Tommy’s voice. Techno gives Phil a Look about the language -- which Phil answers with a barely apologetic shrug -- and sits up to see what the fuss is about.
Tommy is propped up on the edge of the other snow barrier, grinning widely. Wilbur is next to him, dangling lazily over the barrier. “You two going to hide behind that all day like cowards?” Wilbur calls.
“They’re using our own strategies against us,” Phil whispers, sounding mortally offended.
Techno suppresses a chuckle. “You’re the one who keeps talking about how fast they learn,” he points out, and lobs a snowball at Tommy. It misses, but Tommy goes tumbling back behind the barrier anyway. Wilbur shrieks in mock outrage, and the battle begins again in earnest.
Not that it’s much of a battle. Tommy seems to have abandoned Wilbur entirely to his fate, so it’s just Wilbur throwing his own stockpile at Phil and Techno while trying to avoid being buried under their combined assault. He is a good shot, though -- Techno takes a hit right between the eyes that makes him frown until Wilbur’s proud laugh carries over the battlefield right behind it.
Hard to stay mad at that. Techno is slowly coming to understand why Phil has such a hard time telling the two of them no. He really needs to get more involved in Wilbur’s archery training, especially if they’re putting an elytra on him soon.
“Where did Tommy go?” Phil murmurs to himself, just loud enough to jar Techno out of his thoughts, and then there’s a bell-chime giggle right behind Techno and snow sliding down the inside of his shirt. Techno reacts on instinct, turning and throwing the snowball in his hand at his assailant.
It hits Tommy square in the face, and all four of them freeze in their tracks.
Tommy stands stock-still for a moment, face covered in snow. He surveys them all -- Techno, Wilbur, and Phil-- for a moment, almost contemplatively. Then his face pinches in a tell-tale motion. “Oh, that didn’t hurt you,” Phil murmurs, but he still leaps forward immediately to sweep Tommy up into his arms. Tommy’s little hands close around Phil’s clothes immediately as he buries his face in Phil’s neck, already in tears.
Techno can feel guilt settle in his chest like he’s swallowed a rock. It numbs his fingertips better than snow ever could. “Sorry, Toms,” he starts, hauling himself to his feet. Tommy just sniffles louder.
“It’s alright,” Phil says soothingly, though it’s hard to tell if he’s talking to Techno or Tommy. “It’s part of the game. We all took a few good hits.” He leans his head against Tommy’s, rubbing comforting circles into his back. Out of the corner of his eye, Techno spots Wilbur standing as well, visibly trying to figure out if the battle has ended. “How about we all go back inside, and we can have hot chocolate, okay? We can all warm up, Techno can change clothes, and you and Wilbur can explain your grand plan.”
“With extra marshmallows?” Tommy asks pitifully. Phil snorts, making eye contact with Techno. Kid’s good at getting what he wants when he sets his mind to it.
“Yeah, okay, with extra marshmallows,” Phil agrees. “C’mon, upstairs we go.” He plods off across the cavern, leaving Techno to stand awkwardly by the barrier.
Wilbur comes to stand at Techno’s side, and Techno glances down at him. He’s barely thirteen, still tripping over his own feet and calling for an audience whenever he nails a chord on his guitar, but he’s already mastered his father’s distant stare — the one that means he’s thinking about something he doesn’t want to share.
Techno reaches over and tugs on the black feather Wilbur’s been braiding into his hair since he saw the Palace. Wilbur jumps and looks at him, mortally offended. Techno just grins. “You really oughta let me pierce your ears,” he says. “I did mine when I first started winning battles.”
Wilbur scoffs, turning his gaze away. “We didn’t win that one. We stopped because Tommy started crying.” He’s trying to pretend he’s annoyed about it, but the protective set to his crossed arms tells another story.
“If you’d lost, I wouldn’t have snow in my shirt,” Techno tells him plainly. Something in Wilbur’s posture loosens.
After a moment’s hesitation, he glances up at Techno. “Would you really pierce my ears?” he asks nervously.
Techno shrugs. “Sure. You gotta ask Phil first, though, don’t want to surprise him. But we can look through my stuff for a good starter set for you tonight if he says yes.”
Wilbur’s face lights up, and he takes off across the snowdrifts, yelling Phil’s name as he hurries to catch up. Techno watches him for a long moment before chuckling and moving to follow.