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Tommy doesn't know what's wrong with him.
There are things happening, things occurring, things that he's started to do, and it seems as if it's for no reason at all, or at least, for reasons that he himself can't explain.
See, Tommy doesn't know why he's suddenly started to chirp every so often, letting out short, distressed noises as he paces throughout his home; he doesn't know why his wings have begun to tense periodically, growing finicky and far too strained; he doesn't know why it suddenly feels as if there's a looming cloud of dread hovering above him.
It's awkward and unneeded, making Tommy want to curl up into a tight ball, and it drains the Avian of his much-needed energy - reduces him to a shivering, mumbling mess coiled up within a tangled nest.
Tommy just wants the horrible, sickening feelings to go away – to dissolve into an invisible elixir that he doesn't need to deal with anymore because it is really, really irritating.
He just wants the pain to go away. It's not a stabbing pain, not the sort of pain that you'd associate with a blistering injury or a festering wound, but more so a dull ache settling within his bones - a continuous feeling of drowsiness and lethargy.
Tommy hates it.
He doesn't know why it's there.
He doesn't know why it's not stopping.
He doesn't-
The Avian scratched at his arms with a little huff, his large wings stretching behind him for a moment before they returned to their initially pinned position, pressed right up against a taut back. His thought process had been completely jolted and stunted by another wave of unsettling uneasiness.
This time, Tommy just felt downright annoyed with it.
It was like there was something wriggling under his skin, a motion of movements that had his – just slightly – clawed nails scratching furiously at wherever his clothes couldn't cover. It was an uncomfortable sense of impulse, and one that Tommy didn't want to indulge himself in too much, or at least, he wanted to stop before his skin got too red and raw.
With how downright shit he was already feeling, just adding onto that wouldn't do him any good. Not in the slightest.
A heavy sigh tumbled from the hybrid's lips, his feet tapping against the ground, and his narrowed, cobalt eyes drifted over his home.
His nest was still tucked in the corner, as messy and crumpled as it usually was with all of the blankets and articles of stolen clothing that he'd piled up there (most of them being Tubbo's old shirts, some of Wilbur's and Techno's, hell, even Phil had a few pieces in there.)
His chests were in order too, his furnaces were fine, his Enderchest was still shimmering with a familiar light, as was everything else.
So, what was it? What was making him feel so... lost. So unsure of himself, so confused, and as if he was missing the other half of his heart...
Hm.
Tubbo, perhaps? Was Tommy's dumb, mushy bird-brain side missing his best friend? Was that it? Hell, it was a pretty plausible conclusion, the two hadn't really had time to catch up after everything that had happened (a death, a resurrection – a marriage, a family), and it would make sense that Tommy missed him.
But then again...
Tommy's fingers skimmed over his communicator, gripping at the hand-held device as he sorted through his contacts. He was hovering over Tubbo's name, fingers twitching and feathers ruffling behind him.
"Hey. Come over. Now. Please, big man. Can't wait any longer."
The message was ready to send; he had it saved and completed – a desperate plea for Tubbo to head over and help him with... whatever was ailing him. Tommy should just click send. He should just do it; he should just ask his best friend to head over.
The Avian swallowed roughly, fingertips hovering for another moment or so before impulse took hold of him.
He slammed down on Ranboo's name instead, the glinting message jolting rapidly through his communicator and more than likely heading over towards the Enderman Hybrid's instead of Tubbo's, as he had originally intended for.
God. God. Oh, God.
Fuck. Fuck!
Tommy hadn't meant to do that.
He hadn't meant to do that at all.
Not in the slightest.
What he had meant to do, was to message Tubbo, right? Not Ranboo, right? Why did he do that? Why had his stupid, stupid, gooey brain decided that he needed Ranboo and not his actual, genuine other half? His partner in crime? His soulmate? His-
"Tommy?"
Fucking Ranboo and his stupid fucking teleporting abilities.
Tommy wanted to strangle something.
Maybe Ranboo, maybe himself. Maybe both of them. Maybe they should just go out together in a damn bang, all choking and gasping and not having to deal with this stupid fucking bullshit ever again because that would just-
"Tommy? Are you in there? I got- I got your message?"
Fuck.
"One second!"
Tommy's voice was rough and scratchy as he responded rather snappishly to the hesitantly shifting, incredibly confused hybrid outside of his door. He sounded like crap, sounded as if the inside of his throat had been put through a shredder almost a hundred times over and then rubbed against sandpaper for good measure.
His mouth was dry, too, acting like a damn cactus-filled desert as Tommy tried to swallow back some saliva to ease the aching in his throat. He didn't know what was going wrong; he didn't even know where to start with trying to figure out the problem.
And having Ranboo here wouldn't help in the slightest.
He'd just be a mumbling distraction, a lanky, too-tall nuisance that made Tommy's blood boil and his eyes to narrow into dangerous, raging slits. The younger's tongue would become venomous with cleverly crafted insults, mean enough to throw Ranboo off from ever talking to him again completely.
Or at least, that's how Tommy would have usually acted.
This time around? His stupidly deceptive bird-brain was just screaming at him to be nice, to be courteous and kind, to be welcoming.
Downright demanding-esque screaming.
Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock-
Holy shit, Tommy got the point!
The teen shifted slightly, giving his tense body a little wriggle before he was stepping up towards the door. (At that point, he really felt as if he was preparing himself to talk to somebody like Technoblade or something, not the puzzled innocence that made up Ranboo.)
"Ranboo." He greeted as he pulled back the chipped oak, doing his best to keep a steady voice.
The Enderman hybrid tilted his head a little, ever confused and ever contemplative. "Tommy." He responded lightly, hands wringing and feet shuffling. "I uh, I got your message."
"I know. You said that before."
"Oh. Yeah... Yeah, I guess I did, didn't I? Heh..."
Tommy blinked, and Ranboo blinked back.
(They clearly weren't getting very far.)
"So..."
Ranboo swallowed the lump in his throat, a nervous spark spreading over his chest like a lit wildfire. He glanced around a little, completely unsure of what he was supposed to do in a situation like the one he, very coincidentally, found himself in.
"Did you like, need something, or something? Or did you send the message to the wrong person, or-"
"It was meant for Tubbo."
"...Oh."
Ah. There was that cloud of contrition. Tommy, admittedly, felt a little bad about the... dejected... look that had overcome Ranboo's mismatched features, a slight twinge of guilt squeezing around his heart before he let out a breath.
Perhaps he shouldn't have been as blunt as that.
"No. I'm lying, sorry. Well, I'm not. I had originally meant it for Tubbo, but..." The blonde shifted where he stood, wings flapping and his feathers rustling. He wasn't good at this shit, this sappy sort of feeling talk that Wilbur had used to try and coach him through. Tommy just wasn't that great at expressing emotions as a whole.
He did better with shouting, with letting out his feelings through rage-filled squawks, and trying to stab whatever dared come too close to him.
(Unfortunately for him, he doubted that Tubbo would be too happy with him if he started to try and stab Ranboo, simply because Tomy was unable to figure out his feelings like the' big man' he was.)
"...Just, come in. Please. Now."
"Huh? Oh- oh! Oh, okay, okay, uhm, coming in, I-"
The blonde huffed a little. "You're so awkward, aren't you?"
The questioning, slightly direct expression didn't leave Tommy's face as he shut the door behind Ranboo's exceptionally tall figure. (Seriously, what was it with Endermen and their damn unnecessarily large genes?) He just blinked a little, an almost accusatory tone clinging to his words.
Ranboo shrugged, hand lifting up to rub at the back of his neck. "I guess? Sorry... you kind of scare me sometimes."
What?
"I scare you?"
"Well... yeah? Not in a rude way! Not at all, just... you're, like, kind of intimidating? Standoffish? Blunt? And like, you're obviously Tubbo's best friend and everything, and I've just come around and married him, which honestly it seems like you're not too happy about – understandable, of course! I get it; it's just that you always look at me like..."
During Ranboo's jumbled rambling, Tommy had shifted himself ever closer to the hybrid.
Tommy didn't know why; he couldn't even begin to explain why he suddenly felt completely drawn to the thin figure, but there he was – hands clenching and unclenching, steps growing larger and larger as the seconds passed, and his brows were furrowed considerably.
It was like his brain had suddenly switched back to the whole "Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock. Flock," sort of chanting that had previously consumed him. Gone were any rational thoughts, instead replaced by a mushy sense of familial bonding and a need to wrap around the taller boy.
Tommy swallowed roughly, taking another step.
Ranboo was, unsurprisingly, completely distracted as he continued on with his disorganized explanation of why he was – just somewhat – deathly afraid of Tommy and how the younger acted. He was completely unaware of the approaching Avian and only had a single moment's reprieve before Tommy was pouncing.
"Oh!-"
They clumsily tussled for just a moment or two, long, stretching limbs spinning wildly around as Ranboo desperately looked for something, anything to grip onto. Unfortunately for him, Tommy was relentless in his mission, and he quite quickly (and easily) had the older boy pressed down into his disorderly nest.
It was a bit of an uncomfortable position, with Ranboo practically sprawled out over ripped blankets and old t-shirts, and Tommy curled possessively over his side, but neither questioned it.
Or at least, Tommy didn't question it. Ranboo seemed particularly hasty in wanting much-requested answers for whatever the hell was going on.
"Uh, Tommy?"
A huff.
"What?"
"I... I think that you might have fallen on top of me."
"Did I?"
"...Yes?"
"You sound unsure."
Ranboo blinked a little, hands nervously flitting around for a moment or two before they carefully settled against Tommy's bony shoulders. "Uhm, yes. I get that a lot."
A light snicker. "Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. You seem pretty confused, like, all of the time."
"Oh. Oh, well. That's probably because I am; I don't really understand what's going on around this server, honestly. There's just so much, isn't there? Don't you think? With like, the egg and then the, the Syndicate- Oh, I probably shouldn't have said that, but still, it's like-"
"You're rambling again."
"Sorry."
A slight smile tugged at Tommy's lips, his fingers shifting to gently grip onto Ranboo's dark suit. His nails were ripping at the material somewhat, but neither seemed to mind too much. (Tommy especially didn't mind, not with how content he suddenly felt.)
"It's okay."
An almost awkward silence broke out between the two after that, shifting and whirling around both of the teens in looping waves. Ranboo was, unsurprisingly, the first to break it.
"You haven't, uhm, you haven't gotten up yet, Tommy."
"I... don't plan on it."
"...Can I ask why?"
Tommy swallowed for a moment.
It was hard, hard to explain to somebody that wasn't an Avian - or at least, somebody who didn't understand Tommy's bird-like traits as well as he did. Of course, there were people like Tubbo who knew quite a lot (perks of growing up around Phil and Tommy), and the blonde's adopted brothers had known all about it, but somebody like Ranboo would definitely... not.
It might not make sense to the Enderman hybrid; it might sound dumb and silly, and, while yes, Tommy definitely thought it was too, it was also something that he desperately needed. Something he couldn't get rid of or switch off no matter how hard he tried.
That feeling from before? The one that had left his skin on fire and his mind uneasy? The one that had left him pacing around and completely tensed up?
Tommy had figured it out; whether that was a good thing or a bad thing, he couldn't tell.
(Perhaps a bad thing, seeing as his stupidly soft bird-brain had attached itself to Ranboo of all people. The same Ranboo who was a best friend stealer and an ultimately better version of Tommy. But then again, also the same Ranboo who had looked after Tommy during his worst times and made horrendously good hot chocolate whenever the blonde asked.)
Tommy saw only a few people as part of his' flock,' that small group including Tubbo, Technoblade, and Phil, and not really anyone else.
Well, it had only been those three until Ranboo had decided to completely invade Tommy's mind and turn his world upside down, pushing in past the teen's built-up walls and inserting himself into his life.
The teen obviously hadn't realised at first, but his Avian side had completely welcomed Ranboo with open arms (and wings), almost immediately having deemed the older hybrid as part of his little family and practically imprinting on him, even despite Tommy's 'surface-hatred' for the Enderman.
It was as if Tommy's stupid bird-brain had said, "Hm, no, this guy is ours now, and there's nothing that you can do about it."
There was really nothing Tommy could do except give in to his natural traits and wishes and completely wrap himself around Ranboo until he felt well enough to let the hybrid leave his side. (Which would most likely not be for a while yet. Tommy got pretty attached.)
"...Tommy?"
"Flock." The teen finally responded, just a little irritable as he tucked his face into Ranboo's shoulder. "Family."
That was the best answer he could offer in his blissed-out state. Perhaps he would have tried to flesh his answer out a little more if he was further coherent, but Tommy truthfully just wanted to continue quietly chirping and pretending as if everything was right in the world.
So, that's what he'd do. Ranboo could figure himself out.
And so, that's what the Enderman Hybrid attempted to do. Sort of.
There were a few beats of contemplative silence, Ranboo's breath coming out in even pants as he seemed to survey the situation that he'd found himself within. It was a little odd and even more than just somewhat confusing, but he'd go along with it.
(Surely, Tommy could explain it at a later date. Maybe. Possibly. Hopefully?...)
"Okay," The older boy finally nodded, letting his fingers drift up to rub at the bases of Tommy's stretched wings gently. His voice quieted somewhat, "I'll stay... if that's what you want. I won't leave."
Was that the right thing to say?
Ranboo truthfully didn't know and also didn't think that he could get up either way, but it looked as if Tommy needed some reassurance, so he was more than happy to give it.
(Whether that reassurance was given to try to make sure that Tommy didn't try to bite him or something (which he had done to Tubbo and Techno on countless occasions), or out of the goodness of Ranboo's heart... it was up for debate.)
"I'll be your, uhm, flock?"
Again, Ranboo was more than unsure about what being a part of somebody's flock meant. He knew that it had something to do with family and that it was typically used for bird hybrids, like both Tommy and Phil; he'd just never expected to have himself included in a flock.
It was a new development, something he was both wary of and excited by at the same time. (He was also just a little wary of Tommy as a whole, but they could work on that.)
"Good," Tommy mumbled quietly, large, puffed wings eventually relaxing enough that they slowly drooped against and over Ranboo's sides in a protective manner.
Admittedly, Tommy felt a lot calmer than before – a lot better and softer than he had earlier when he'd been stressing and pacing and 'accidentally' sending messages to people he hadn't intended them for.
This was nice; even Tommy could admit that.
It was like being swaddled in a blanket of warmth and reassurance; being swaddled in an encompassing embrace by one of your closest loved ones; being swaddled in the knowledge that you'd always have somebody there to back you up and look after you.
Tommy never wanted that feeling to go away.
And if that meant spending a few more cuddle sessions with Ranboo? Then so be it.
Tommy was willing. (Though just a little begrudgingly, and it was something he'd never admit.)
(Tubbo, similarly like his best friend, would also never admit that finding both Ranboo and Tommy passed out and curled up together underneath a large, heavy set of familiar wings was probably one of his favourite memories ever - he truly would have framed it if he could have.)