Chapter Text
"Tommy! Tommy come on don't die not now!" Dream pleaded frantically as potions were used and bones were reknit. The water might have saved his life but his body was a mess of blood and broken bones. It was an eternity of setting and healing, bandages and ramblings. It took hours before Dream managed to return the boy close to how a normal human body should look. How long had he been pouring potions and brewing more?
The silence stretched on and on, the man watching a bruised child stir and twitch back to consciousness.
Coughing, more blood. So much blood, the water was bright red.
Crying, tears falling and pained cries.
More pained screams, sobbing.
...And then silence. Tommy was quiet again, eyes open but they looked empty. The small candle of flame that burned and flared up was gone. Dream pulled him closer, trying to keep him awake, alive. Tommy's eyes slowly moved to look at his face, a confused glaze filling the empty space behind them. His voice was barely audible after the screams. "...Why?" He asked.
"Why what, did you think I was going to let you die?" Dream responded hurriedly, fear starting to rise inside him. This wasn't Tommy, not the puppet he was making. This was a soulless shell. How hadn't Dream noticed the lack of color in his eyes? A million signs all flashed through his memory. "Why did you jump?" The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them.
Tommy blinked, a thin smile forming. "It's better like that." He was tired, all he wanted was sleep. He hadn't slept in days, the night was so pretty! Clara must have been showing off, the stars were swirling in his vision. So was everything else...Tommy was too far gone into shock to think about what he was saying. "Better for me to die."
"But-But why." Dream was at a loss for anything to say, this was so far from anything he'd dealt with.
"Why not?"
Those two words hung in the air.
"They don't care, I don't care. Once I'm gone, things can be right again. You can go do things alone again. I'm better dead. People will be happy, they don't need me. Nobody needs me, so why not just die and let them move on?" Tommy mumbled, the smile getting bigger. "Maybe I can be a ghost, ghosts can't hurt people, I'll be much better as a ghost. Tubbo might like me as a ghost, I can help him with stuff again." He wanted to sleep, he felt warm. Dream had picked him up and let his head rest on Dream's leg. "I'll see him again...I miss him." In his barely conscious state Tommy couldn't stop the thoughts in his head from leaving his mouth. "Wilby loves me. Wilby loves me he said so. He says it all the time. He loved me so much, no one did but he did. He told me that he did. I love him too. I'll get to be with him again! He said so..." Tommy's eyes closed as he trailed off, repeating his words until they devolved into meaningless babbling.
Dream sat in stunned silence, holding the teenager. I did something wrong. I did something very wrong. I need to fix it, this isn't what was supposed to happen. Even then what Tommy was saying clicked in his brain, background thoughts as he lifted up the child and carried him to a house he'd built nearby. Hidden from Tommy. The words kept bouncing around in his head.
"Wilby loves me he said so." "He says it all the time."