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Tommy’s ecstatic to have another person his age in the house. He still couldn’t escape being the youngest (it was only a couple months, Tubbo, a couple months) but now he had the perfect partner in crime.
Tubbo was quieter, probably better mannered than his abrasiveness, so he assumed the bee monster would be hesitant to pull pranks or cause chaos. But he had been entirely wrong when Tubbo had enthusiastically joined in, coming up with ideas of his own.
Thus began their reign of terror, whip creaming sleeping people’s hands, taping saran wrap around doorways, and on one occasion, flipping Wilbur’s door frame. Watching him tiredly reach to the right for the handle, only to scramble for nothing, and look at the wood with confusion was hilarious.
(it was Tubbo’s idea! He’s as innocent as an accomplice can be.)
Phil tries grounding them, but that just leads to them sneaking off and the human would prefer to know where the two went off to instead of being left in the dark.
It’s Tubbo who wakes Tommy up at the ungodly hours of three am, shaking his shoulders.
“There’s going to be a meteor shower soon! We should watch it.” The boy buzzes enthusiastically.
“What’s so special about rocks burnin’?” He grumbles.
“Because,” he pulls Tommy out of bed, “it’s cool. And right now is the peak time for them to appear.”
As much as he complains, he dutifully pulls on a coat before following Tubbo through the house. They walk quietly, the slight buzzing from Tubbo’s bees the only noise they make. They slip the front door slowly open, and slip past it, closing it slowly.
They still walk with care and they rush onto the sand, both falling back to watch the sky.
Tubbo shouts in excitement, pointing to a passing meteor glowing in the sky, “Look!”
Tommy scoffs, but stares in amazement as well.
There was no sky in the Nether, just endless netherrack and lava. Even if he despised the cold nights of the overworld, he loves the stars and all the other astrological wonders.
His eyes track every new meteor in the sky, a slight smile on his lips.
“How do meteor showers happen every year if they’re burning up, anyways? They can’t really come back from that.” He asks.
Tubbo hums, “I think it has to do with being debris from a comet? I don’t know too much about them, to be honest. But right now this meteor shower is known as the perseids.”
“The per-see-uds? That’s a shitty name.”
“It’s connected to the, um, the Perseus constellation? Or that area in space? I think.”
He glances at Tubbo, who’s brow is furrowed as he goes deep into thought. He impulsively grabs a handful of freezing cold sand and dumps down the front of the boy’s shirt.
“Tommy!” He screeches, sitting up and pulling at his shirt.
Tommy scrambles away before Tubbo can do the same, and starts cackling at the sight. The night air is uncomfortably cold in his lungs, but he laughs again as he dodges a clump of damp sand thrown his way.
The standoff ends with sand everywhere, as is the nature of sand. He runs a hand through his hair, grains falling out down his neck.
He shivers, the adrenaline leaving him. It’s times like this where he’s envious of literally everyone else, who can enjoy summer in t-shirts and shorts while he’s bundled up like it’s already fall.
Tubbo notices, “Should we go back inside?”
“Nah, I’m a big man. I can handle a little cold.”
“Okay then.” Tubbo hums, buzzing a little.
The thing he likes best about Tubbo is that he isn’t treated like fucking glass. Techno would bodily haul him back inside, or Wilbur would coerce him back into bed with something like cookies… which works, but it still annoys him.
And maybe they’re right to worry, when the next morning he wakes up with a fever.
Tubbo rambles “I’m sorry Phil, it was my idea, I didn’t mean to-”
“Don’t worry Tubs, me getting sick is another Tuesday for me. Extremely normal.” He says.
And sure enough, the house goes through the motions they’ve gone through hundreds of times before, though Phil does scold the two for sneaking out at night.
Tommy is kept in bed all day, miserably trying to sleep out his fever with a cool rag on his forehead, buried underneath many blankets.
After a couple days he’s bored, and honestly feeling mostly better. But Tubbo, his partner in crime, refuses to sneak out together to watch the meteors again.
Even after a week, they won’t let him out of bed.
“You’re still running a temperature.” Techno grumbles.
“That’s a good thing, right? At least I’m not colder.”
The pained look on the piglin’s face is worth the quip. Even as Wilbur punches his shoulder.
“Hey! You’re injuring the sickly. That’s just rude.”
“So, you admit you’re sick.”
“I said nothing of the sort.”
Another punch to the shoulder.
After ten days, Tubbo whispers, “Is it normal for you to be sick this long?”
He shrugs, exhausted from nothing.
“I’m just built different.”
He knows Phil and Wilbur and Techno worriedly whisper in the kitchen, their voices still carrying lightly down the hall. The last time Tommy got really sick was months ago now, and that’s when they had used up their last health pot.
Techno had snagged a lot of pots, netherwart, and blaze powder before their big escapade but it had finally run out. Tommy’s certain that’s what they’re whispering about when they think he’s unconscious.
Tubbo curls up in bed with Tommy, even if he argues he doesn’t want the bee monster to get sick.
“I don’t have a shit immune system like you. Now scoot over.” Tubbo responds.
Tubbo places a cold cheek to his neck, cold hands curling around his abdomen.
“Clingy.” He complains, even as he nestles in closer.
He falls asleep to the slow sound of Tubbo’s breathing and the slight buzzing that always accompanies him.