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Tubbo didn't ask for this.
It was sweet of Ranboo to think of him, really, and it warmed his heart to know he cared, but he couldn't help but simply deflate when his husband had handed him the gift that he'd travelled so far for. "I spent maybe a bit too long looking for these," Ranboo had chuckled after returning from the five day trip he'd just been on, doing gods knew what until he'd returned. "I had to travel thousands of blocks to get access to woodland mansion maps that I hadn't already visited, which was was certainly difficult. And don't even get me started on the evokers - anyway!" He'd reached into his cloak pocket and pulled out a small, golden totem with emerald eyes and wings and intricate carvings around the base. "For you. I got one for Phil and one for Tommy as well, cause I figured they'd need them. And I… made this one into a sort of necklace thing for you? So that you'd never lose it. I know you're kind of clumsy, ha."
Tubbo had taken the tiny thing into his hand, feeling it burn against his skin. "Oh," he'd murmured. "Thank you, Boo, shit. You didn't have to do that for me, big man."
Ranboo just shrugged, cheeks darkening, a pleased smile visible even with his mask on. "Well, I lo- I care about you, so. It's nothing."
Tubbo hasn't stopped thinking about the totem around his neck ever since that moment.
Tubbo knows a few things about death. Things that Ranboo doesn't know. The boy's never died before, luckily, and Tubbo has more times than he can count - from his first death that he doesn't like to think about, to the final control room, to all the times he fell from too high a height, to the Manberg festival. He hasn't died since that day. The thought of going back to whatever dark, unfeeling hell awaits him after his heart gives out is so fucking terrifying that sometimes he finds himself rolling the totem in shaking hands, grateful for its presence. There is still a much larger part of Tubbo that thinks differently. It scares him, though, so badly, so he tries not to think about withers or fireworks or swords through the gut and instead focuses on his husband and son and best friend, back from the dead, and the beautiful home in the snow that he's carved out for himself, his own mark on the world.
Yesterday, Tommy came to their door in a frantic rush, demanding that Tubbo and Ranboo help him complete some "exposure therapy" that he was trying out himself. Tubbo had agreed against his best interests. He knows, deep down, that the recovery his friend wants isn't something that will come to him as naturally and quickly as he thinks. He remembers bloodstained aprons and a horse in a boat and a cage with an anvil hanging above - no, exposing yourself to situations that you know will hurt you isn't a fix, and Tubbo knows that all too well. He wishes fixing one's self was so easy.
"Get me wither skulls," Tommy had said at the end of the day, the two of them alone on his watch tower as the sun set. "And invis pots, please. I'm going to break into this fucking prison and kill Dream no matter what it costs me."
No matter if it kills me or not, is what Tubbo hears. Both of them know what Tommy is saying.
The totem under his shirt resting on his chest burns with magic and guilt.
His friend is thinking about death again. As a consequence, so is Tubbo. It isn't something he likes to think about, because when he does his mind ends up trailing back to bombs with dead man's switches and potions of harming powerful enough to kill a Player in minutes and cliff faces with no fences or barriers along the edge. Not that Tubbo lets those things bother him at all. He's died too many times to linger on the idea of a final permanent one. After how Tommy described the afterlife, he doesn't think he'd ever want to be back there, much less for as long as his best friend was.
It's tempting, sometimes. He will admit. It's tempting.
Sometimes he wakes up with a scream caught in his throat and considers terrible things that he doesn't go through with. It isn't worth the effort.
Tubbo is good at dealing with his problems. However, today has just been so much - between Tommy's request and seeing Eret's replica of the final control room for the first time and having spent the day in a daze ever since he'd woken up, he knows he's just not with it. He feels a little sick, if he's honest. He can't wait to get home. He wants comfort. He needs comfort so desperately right now that he thinks he could cry.
It's started to rain, and without having to worry about Ranboo (who'd left after an unexpected call a few hours prior), he can shoot off the ground and trident his way back to Snowchester. Tridenting is something he enjoys more than anything. That feeling of icy wind catching his clothes and of hanging suspended in the air, weightless, is something the boy wishes he could recreate in an easier way that didn't require waiting for rain. It reminds him of flying, something he'll never do again. The thought of the wings that no longer sprout from his back is painful and he chooses to ignore it most days. Most days. Today is not most days. He doesn't feel together today at all.
The rain trickles down the back of his shirt and hits his spine and causes him to tense up, but he doesn't care all that much. He is flying again. Tubbo dimly remembers Sam's words of advice when teaching him how to use enchanted tridents - don't go too high, had been his first word of advice. It probably is something Tubbo would do well to remember if he gave a shit about the consequences.
Tubbo doesn't ever give a shit about consequences these days, not when it comes to his health.
Going this high up is a fucking rush. Tubbo knows he should stop dicking around and make his way back to Snowchester - Foolish can't look after Michael forever, and he doesn't fucking know where Ranboo's gone. His husband had a tendency to up and leave some days. He wipes that thought from his mind when the wind whistles in his ears and he whoops, spinning so violently in the air that he'd be sick if he weren't so used to the motions of flying. In fact, he's sure that if it weren't for his status as an ex-winged, he'd have been forced to go back down by now.
This thought elates him, and a laugh tears from his throat as he finally breaks the clouds. It's quieter up here. Brighter, because there is no rain and the sun is bright. Tubbo throws a hand in front of his eyes. The sun is so bright. Blinding from his position. A sudden spike of panic seizes his body, and he briefly wonders why the light isn't blue and red and white - although colours all blend into one when they're a firework being shot into your awaiting arms.
He thinks the sun is going to kill him.
And then. Oh, and then, and then the wind is catching him again, and he doesn't have time to even catch a breath before he's plunging back down and his chest tightens with terror and a lack of oxygen. Tubbo's wings aren't moving and he doesn't know why - there is no coherent thought in his brain and it takes him some time to remember they are gone and there is nothing to steady his fall, nothing to catch him, and for a brief moment he thinks he doesn't even care if nothing does.
He sees a rush of green around him before he hits the ground.
Tubbo Underscore has died before, so many times, but only two of those times had a Canon Life taken from him, leaving him on one before it was all over. It's no wonder Ranboo fusses over him so. He's lucky the boy loves him. He's lucky, because when his body cracks and each bone shatters upon impact, when his skin breaks and his muscles tear and something sharp pierces his lungs, he doesn't die. Not fully. But he feels himself leave his shell and disappear into the black that has surrounded him, floating but not falling - suspended like a marionette on strings. There is no pain to feel, though. Not yet. All he knows is… is snow, or the general feeling of it, and a clock, and a sudden burst of white. He thinks this is hell. He thinks this is his own personal Limbo.
He hangs unmoving without control until he is dragged back.
White and gold and green. So much green. It ties him back together; it repairs each bone and connects each muscle and nerve ending and sews his skin back together with his blood returned to his vessels with the magic of Ranboo's gifted totem of undying. It takes maybe thirty seconds to revive Tubbo again. Each one of them stretches on for eternity.
When Tubbo is alive once more, and is no longer deaf or blind and has nerves and pain receptors back in his system, he finally feels the pain. Everything aches. Everything. There isn't a part of him that he can move without agony, and it's all he can do to stare unblinkingly up at the grey sky and towering green bamboo forest that he's landed in and cough, rattling breaths shaking his chest and causing tears of pain to well up in his eyes. He can't scream. Can't wipe the tears away as they mingle with the rain and slick his face wet.
Tubbo lays on the ground amongst the bamboo for maybe half an hour before he can twitch his fingers again, and then flex his hand, and then crack his limbs and push himself up onto his elbows. He fumbles for his necklace. Of course, he already knows what sight will greet him, he wouldn't be alive if the tiny totem wasn't cracked and dull and drained of all colour like he'd known it would be. A short throb of panic hurts in his chest. Ranboo will be so upset. Ranboo will be so upset. He went to all that effort to get totems for the people he loved, and - what? Tubbo wasted it because he wasn't thinking right and flew too close to the sun? Because he's not with it today and didn't think before acting? Because he reacted too slowly and panicked at the sight of a bright light?
Because he didn't care enough to use his trident and save himself as he fell?
Twenty minutes pass and he's on his feet. His clothes are badly torn and soaked in rainwater. He'll get changed before he sees Ranboo, and he'll pretend this never happened. Yeah, that's it. He'll pretend this never happened.
This way, things will be easier. Ranboo won't have to leave for days on end, and he won't have to worry about Tubbo, and he won't be upset or disappointed at him for making such a silly, obvious mistake. This way, everyone's happier. Tubbo can tuck the broken totem back under his shirt and hobble back to Snowchester with blurry vision and an aching head and pretend everything is ok. Everything will be ok.
What Ranboo doesn't know won't hurt him.