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“This is what I want: I want to grab my brother’s hand and run back through time, losing years like coats falling from our shoulders.”
(Jandy Nelson, I’ll Give You The Sun .)
If you ask Tubbo to summarize his world in one word, he wouldn’t think twice before saying Tommy . It’s barely a sentimental statement. The world doesn’t just revolve around Tommy, it wraps itself around him, squeezing out every last drop of life. It follows him around like a lost puppy, if lost puppies were actually human-eating bloodhounds with appetites for the innocent. Though, Tubbo supposes Tommy can’t be that innocent. Not anymore, at least.
Tommy is the action to his inaction. Tommy would kill for Tubbo where Tubbo would die for Tommy. They are each other’s foils, each other’s antitheses. They fit together like puzzle pieces, covering all the bases the other lacks. Tubbo thinks him and Tommy are etched into each other’s genes. They must have been made together, wherever souls come from. They must have been clutching to each other tightly until the last second, swearing to spend the entirety of their lives restless to meet again. Tommy doesn’t think at all, he just feels; another testament to their differences.
No one knows where Tommy ends and Tubbo starts. They are TommyandTubbo, never Tommy and Tubbo. It’s an appropriate observation— neither of the boys remember life without each other. When they are together, people sneer at their childlike codependency. When separated, everyone stops to gawk at the apartness. And then, more sneering.
Tubbo supposes Tommy won’t leave his side because it simply feels wrong to him. Tubbo overcomplicates things; he fantasizes about past lives spent together, chivalrous ways he’d give his life to save Tommy’s, scientific explanations to bonds like this and the types of experiments he could do, the two of them being buried in the same casket and which types of flowers would grow from their rotting corpses.
Lately, Tubbo feels their connection wearing thin. Usually, the SMP’s conflicts practically throw them into each other’s arms, but this time around is different. Tommy’s obsession with Dream and death and other things he can’t control has distanced him from everyone else. Tubbo has a family, a home, he can’t run off with Tommy like they used to, no matter how much Tommy begs it of him.
So, when Tommy comes to Tubbo with another one of his plans, he has to intervene.
“We can’t keep doing this, Tommy.”
“What’d you mean? Tubbo, Wilbur is back . We have to stop him. He’s an old, evil bitch, and, and—” Tubbo holds his hand up, and Tommy pauses.
Tubbo asks him to leave the server behind. He says it’d be the best thing to do for everyone, Tommy included. Tommy is stricken with disbelief when he asks why he’s exiling him again , knowing how it ended last time.
“I’m not telling you to go, I’m asking you to. You can run away from all of this— Wilbur, Dream, Sam… I don’t have that freedom. Take advantage of that freedom, Tommy.”
“At least, come with me.” Tubbo shakes his head.
“You know I can’t do that. You’re not the only person in my life anymore.”
Tubbo figures that Tommy will say no, the way he always has, but Tubbo forgets that this isn’t the same Tommy he begged to run away with in Pogtopia, or the one he ordered to leave in New L’manburg.
This new Tommy is plagued with nightmares about otherwise peaceful fields of green. He hears thunder and is not reminded just of a revolution, but of fireworks being pointed at the only person that matters to him and of wither skeletons destroying everything in their paths and of TNT dropping from the sky like rain. He sees obsidian and thinks not of the Nether, but of his brains splattered against the rock.
This time, Tommy sees an invitation to leave everything behind, and takes it. To hell with the world— they can find themselves a new sun, if they’re that bothered with his absence.
-
Tommy moves to a city so far away that it takes weeks to get there from Dream SMP. He’s amazed at how organized everything is, despite the amount of people. He’s never seen so much of anything, especially so close to each other. There’s a government, but it’s void of trigger-happy lunatics and alcoholic satyrs. There aren’t any immortal pigmen walking around trying to kill the politicians. Tommy’s pretty sure you need a license to even own TNT.
Most of the people he meets have never held a sword, much less explored a cave or seen a Nether portal. He looked like a lunatic, walking through the city gates with mismatched, half-iron half-diamond armor.
He finds a job as a builder. He’s better at it then he imagined, especially because there’s very little amount of creativity involved. Tommy follows blueprints to a T, losing himself in his work. He lives in a house stacked on a couple other houses— they’re called flats, apparently. Most people use horses to get around, but he’d rather walk.
Tubbo visits him as often as possible, usually several times a year. He is the only reminder of his old life that Tommy keeps around. They don’t talk about war or sworn enemies, only about work and the weather and other easy topics.
It’s been six years since Tommy left, two since Micheal grew old enough to move to the Nether ( Either zombie pigmen mature quicker than we do, or Micheal was way older than we thought he was when we found him, Tubbo joked, heartbroken), and one since Tubbo started visiting with dark bags under his eyes. It’s a familiar look.
Today, Tubbo shows up a month before expected. Tommy doesn’t have a lot of company over, so he’s more than panicked when he hears knocking at the door. A list of names rises to the top of his head as he walks to answer it, none particularly welcoming. He feels like he’s fifteen again. He feels this more often than he’d like.
To Tommy’s relief, it’s just Tubbo. Tubbo and his shaggy hair, horns partially grown out, and the scar cutting across his face.
“You’re early, Tubbo. Scared me half to death.” Tommy smiles warmly at him, prompting Tubbo to pull him into a hug.
“Who’s she?” Tubbo asks, peeking out from Tommy’s shoulder. Tommy has a new girl over every time Tubbo visits. His latest is passed out on his couch, tattooed arms outstretched.
“Don’t worry about her.” Tommy pulls away. “Why are you here? Is something wrong?” He pulls Tubbo inside, checking the hallway for potential threats before closing the door behind them. They sit at a table Tommy built with himself.
“What’s keeping you here, Tommy?”
“Um.” (A glance at his girlfriend. He doesn’t even remember her last name.) “Nothing much. Why?”
Tubbo reaches for his hands from across the table. They’re holding each other. Tommy feels complete.
“Ranboo took your place as, quote unquote, hero of the server. He stopped coming home about a year ago. I want us to move somewhere, together. No cities, no makeshift countries, nothing. Just us.”
It’s easy to say yes, and it’s even easier to leave.
They settle in the middle of nowhere, by a riverbank in a dark oak forest. They place lanterns everywhere , so most mobs spawn too far away to bother them. They build themselves a small village.
Tubbo can’t stop thinking about how, for the first time in ages, he feels a home. Tommy wishes he’d done this years ago. He stares at Tubbo and sees someone who’s not quite his best friend, nor his brother; neither words feel permanent enough. Tubbo knows there is no word to encompass them, and he prefers it that way. What a shame it would be, to summarize the entirety of their essences to a couple measly letters.
It feels good to rest.