Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Phil’s pretty damn lucky.

At the start of the apocalypse, lots of people lost lots of family members and friends. Nowadays most are alone and struggling to survive.

But not Phil. He’s got Wilbur and Techno.

They met in a small coffee shop, about two months before shit really hit the fan. The place was completely empty except for the three of them. Behind the counter, Wilbur fiddled with his hair and took entirely too long to make Phil’s coffee.

So when Techno ordered, Phil joked, “You might not get your drink anytime soon.”

Wilbur got dramatically offended, Techno snorted, and a friendship was born.

They were in that very shop when they heard the first screams.

Phil had stood from his chair as he watched a man across the street get ripped apart by the teeth of what he would come to realize was one of the infected.

His instinct was to run out and help the guy, but Techno had grabbed his arm and shakily pointed to another part of the street seen from the shop’s front window.

A child was being eaten by her mother.

Phil couldn’t bear to watch for more than a second, but he knew even then that the image would haunt him for the rest of his life.

While he and Techno were mostly in shock, Wilbur was the one to act. He ran to a button on the door frame and pressed it. Something descended from the awning outside and blocked the windows. At Phil and Techno’s questioning looks, he said, “Roll-down metal shutters. We have them for protection against vandals, but… well, this seems like an applicable situation.” Wilbur’s voice had quivered ever so slightly, and for the first time, Phil felt a sort of protective instinct over the guy.

It wouldn’t be the last.

They managed to get the news on their phones, finding out that the world was collapsing around them. It was weird. They could hear screams and the sounds of fighting outside, but on the inside, the shop looked normal. If Phil covered his ears, he could almost pretend it was a typical day. Stopping to get a cuppa on the way home from work.

But the screams would always break through the calm, and he'd be bitterly reminded of their current situation.

They stayed in the shop for about a week. It would’ve been nice to stay longer, but coffee shop croissants and muffins could only sustain them for so long.

The day they left, they made a pact. No matter what would come their way, they’d protect each other. No man left behind and all that.

Techno wanted to make it a blood pact. Phil shot that idea down quickly. Techno had muttered something about blood pacts being cool but he got over it.

They took some knives from the shop’s kitchen and left through a back entrance. Now, their goal is to get out of the city without dying.

An unfortunately difficult task.

Whoop-de-damn-doo.

Over another week, they’re able to slowly but surely pick their way through the streets. Techno turned out to be a much more proficient fighter than Phil expected. Phil’s never seen someone shed so much blood before. Then again, he’s never been in a zombie apocalypse before either.

On top of everything else, Phil’s knee is bugging him.

Curse life’s third decade.

Thankfully, most of the street signs have been preserved, and they find their way to an avenue that leads straight to a bridge out of the city.

The only problem is it’s chock full of zombies.

Phil, Wilbur, and Techno hide out in an alleyway and decide to plan things out.

“I say we just rush in there.”

“Of course, that’s what you say, Techno.” Wilbur crosses his arms. “Do you really think we can take on a horde that size?”

“Yes.”

“Well that’s ridiculous!”

“You’re ridiculous!”

“Ok.” Phil puts as much warning as he can in those two letters. Wilbur and Techno immediately quiet down.

“Listen, you two, if you keep being that loud then we’ll have no choice but to take on that whole horde ourselves. Let’s discuss this.” Wilbur opens his mouth, but Phil points at him. “Let’s discuss this calmly.” Wilbur closes his mouth.

They stare at each other for a few moments. Then Phil tries another tactic.

“Could we sneak around? Like, if we climbed a building and then hopped from rooftop to rooftop, would that work?”

Techno considers it. “I’m not sure. How would we climb up there? ‘Cause if we went from the inside we might run into even more zombies.”

Wilbur points behind Techno. “There’s a fire escape right there.”

Techno turns around. “Oh.”

Phil snorts. Techno wheels on him, and is about to make some (probably derogatory) comment, when they hear an unusual amount of shuffling coming from the far end of the alley, away from the street.

They raise their blades.

“I got this,” Phil says. He slowly approaches the noise, his knife extended in front of him.

There’s an abandoned garbage bin, one of those large ones that collects the garbage from a whole building. Whatever made that noise, it’s behind there.

“Hello?” Phil calls. “Is someone there?”

And all at once, three little heads pop out from the side of the bin. Phil is startled, but he lowers his knife.

Kids? Well that’s certainly not what he expected.

Techno and Wilbur fall in line behind Phil. Nothing is said for a while as the two groups take each other in.

After a bit, one of the kids, a blond, whispers to the other two, and they emerge fully from behind the bin. They’re littler than Phil thought initially. None of them can be older than six.

The blond puffs up his chest and looks Phil in the eye.

“We are the Big Men. Welcome to our territory.”

The - what? The “Big Men?” Phil’s confused and at the same time wants to burst into laughter.

Wilbur leans in to whisper to Phil. “What do we do?”

Techno leans in also. “I say we leave.”

Phil and Wilbur glare at him. Techno raises his hands in surrender. “I’m just saying!”

Phil turns back to the kids. “I got this,” he whispers.

He kneels to get down to the kids’ levels. “Hey. My name’s Phil, and these are my friends, Wilbur and Techno. What are your names?”

The blond smiles. “I am The Great Tommy, and these are my associates, Ranboo and Tubbo.”

Did that kid just use the word “associates?”

Phil loves it.

“The Great Tommy” continues. “What are you doing in our territory?”

“We’re hiding out from all the zombies.”

The youngest of the kids, who’s hair is somehow half black and half white, claps his hands excitedly. “Zomb zomb apoplips!”

The brunet kids flops down on the ground. “Ugh, we know, Ranboo.”

Ranboo giggles. Phil glances back at Will and Techno, his own bemusement reflected in their faces.

These kids are adorable, he thinks.

He addresses Tommy again. “Where are your parents?”

“Oh, mine are at work. I don’t know when they’ll be back.”

Phil cringes inwardly. He doesn’t have the heart to tell this kid that his parents are probably never coming back.

Tubbo sits up. “My mom’s out on a run. And we don’t know what’s up with Ranboo. He’s too little.”

Ranboo looks up at Phil with wide eyes. “Issa apoplips.”

Phil nods. “Issa apoplips.”

These kids are gonna be the death of him.

Chapter Text

It takes a little bit to coax the kids out of their “territory.”

Ranboo takes an immediate liking to Phil, so he’s not much trouble. Phil picks him up and holds him with his non knife wielding arm. Tommy and Tubbo, on the other hand, are more reluctant.

Tommy crosses his arms and looks up at Phil with intense distrust. “But what about my parents? They told me that I’m not supposed to leave the flat when they’re at work.”

Wilbur cuts in. “Well, you’re not in the flat right now, are you?”

Tommy thinks about that. “No, I’m not…”

Wilbur puts away his knife and extends a hand. “Then come with us. We won’t hurt you.” He eyes Techno warningly. “We promise.”

Tommy and Tubbo exchange looks. There’s something there, a communication method that is entirely foreign to Phil. He just hopes the messages being sent will lead to trust.

Tommy turns back to Wilbur. “Ok. But me and my associate insist on being carried like Ranboo.”

Phil is coming dangerously close to smothering all these kids with hugs.

Wilbur shrugs, and he picks up Tommy. Tubbo holds out his arms. Everyone looks at Techno expectantly.

“What?”

“Pick up the child,” Phil says.

“He is not a child, he is a Big Man,” Tommy insists.

“Bro. Are you serious? Does it look like I’ve ever held a kid before?”

Wilbur sighs. “Suck it up. Pick up the child.”

“The Big Man,” Tommy corrects.

Techno looks angrily down at Tubbo, who challenges Techno with an angry stare of his own. A silent battle of wits occurs for all of five seconds before Techno relents. Tubbo smiles wickedly and leaps into Techno’s arms, almost causing him to fall over.

Techno straightens. “Alright, we have three kids. Now what?”

Phil ruffles Ranboo’s hair. “We climb the fire escape and flee the city.”

Techno stares blankly. “With three kids in tow?”

“Yes.”

“This is not a good idea.”

Wilbur interjects. “Your face wasn’t a good idea, either.”

Tommy giggles at that. There’s murder in Techno’s eyes, but it seems the presence of the children spare Wilbur’s life for the moment.

Ranboo pokes Phil in the side of his face.

“Ow, just tap me on the shoulder next time. What’s up?”

“We climb?”

“That’s right. We’re climbing up so we can avoid the zombies.”

“Zomb zomb apoplips!”

“Exactly.”

“I climb too?”

“No, mate, you’re too small. You’ll hold onto me while I climb, ok?”

“Ok!”

Wilbur smiles warmly. Techno looks like he’s trying very hard not to do the same.

Phil pushes hair out of his eyes. Ideally, he’d redo his ponytail right now so at least some of his hair would be under control, but he’d need both hands for that, and one arm is firmly occupied with carrying the cutest little guy he’s ever seen.

Hair care will have to wait.

“I’ll lead the charge, you guys follow behind.”

Luckily, there’s direct access to the fire escape from the ground. Phil doesn’t know what they would have done otherwise.

On the roof, though, they realize a flaw in their plan.

To get to the next roof, they have to cross over another alleyway. It’s a pretty significant distance, and while they might have been able to do it on their own, there’s no way they can jump over that gap holding kids.

Ah, shit.

“What do we do?”

“Do any of you have wings?” Tubbo asks.

Techno’s confused countenance makes Wilbur snort. “Not to my knowledge.”

“Oh. Well, if you did have wings, we could fly over. But we can’t.”

Tommy suddenly gets very excited. “What if we jumped over? We could be like Spiderman!”

“It’s too far for that,” Techno drawls.

“But it would be cool!”

An argument ensues, but Phil quickly tunes it out. Apparently he has to be the one to come up with a practical solution here.

He scans the ledge. The distance is definitely too far to jump, though he had already come to that conclusion. They can’t go down into the street because the horde would overrun them. And they can’t stay up here. There’s no food or water and, though it provides some semblance of temporary safety, it’s very exposed.

What can they do?

Ranboo taps Phil on the shoulder. Phil smiles. At least he knows Ranboo can follow directions.

“Yeah, mate?”

Ranboo points over Phil’s shoulder. “Der.”

Phil looks in the direction Ranboo points. “Der?”

“Yeah, der!”

What the hell is a der?

Phil looks around a little more when he suddenly spots it.

“Oh, you’re talking about the ladder.”

“Lad-der.” Ranboo giggles.

Phil could melt right here.

He turns to address the others, and finds Tommy and Tubbo sitting on the floor, watching what appears to be Wilbur and Techno getting ready to duke it out.

“Fight! Fight!”

Can Phil really not look away for two seconds without them tearing each other apart?

“Woah, woah, woah, calm down, dear Lord!”

Techno pauses midswing.

“And what exactly do you think you’re gonna accomplish by beating the shit out of each other?”

“I could finally teach Techno a lesson,” Wilbur offers.

“No! Save the murder for later, will you?” Phil sighs. “Anyway, do you think we could use that ladder to get across?”

They use that ladder to get across.

It’s more than a bit precarious, but it works.

When they reach the end of the street, everyone breathes a collective sigh of relief. They decide to spend the night on that last roof, eating the leftovers they were able to bring from the coffee shop. Ranboo, apparently, has never had a blueberry muffin before, and it is the highlight of Phil’s week to see this kid’s face light up at the sugary sweet taste.

For the first time in a while, Phil relaxes. He allows himself to just be. To talk, to laugh, and to tickle these little kids until they’re screaming with laughter. He doesn’t even have to worry about the noise, because none of the zombies can get up here.

Or, at least, that’s what he thought.

See, they didn’t realize that some of the infected might be in the buildings themselves. And while a zombie on the street might not be able to climb dozens of flights of stairs, it’s not unreasonable for one to climb one or two.

Ranboo has wriggled out of Phil’s grasp and is running across the roof, his high and clear laugh ringing in the evening air. Tubbo is chasing him and Tommy cheers them on with a mouth full of croissants.

Phil is about to call out something, he’s not sure what, but he never gets the chance.

The door to the roof is shoved open by a zombie, and Tubbo and Ranboo are only a yard away from it, maybe less.

Phil stands as fast as he can.

No.

No, no, no.

Chapter Text

Adrenaline is a helluva drug.

Techno knows far more about it than the average person, as he’s made it a goal to understand his body’s full potential.

Some people find him kinda intense.

But not Wilbur and Phil. When Techno first brought up his dedication to being at peak physicality, they invigorated and encouraged him.

What with the whole zombie apocalypse thing, it’s come in handy.

Your body releases adrenaline in response to stressors, and it has several effects: slowing down your perception of time, increasing blood flow to the muscles, decreasing your ability to feel pain, et cetera. It’s information that Techno committed to memory long ago.

He analyzes the situation quickly thanks to an influx of adrenaline. Techno’s joked in the past that it’s not unlike those slow mo shots in the movies.

Phil is already halfway to standing, his first instinct likely being to protect the kids. Wilbur grabs a hold of Tommy, pulling him into his chest and scooting away rapidly. It would almost be comical in another context.

As far as Tubbo and Ranboo are concerned, they’re mere feet away from one of the infected, who is stumbling toward them and rapidly narrowing that gap. Considering Ranboo’s previous excitement about society’s decline, Techno feels confident assuming that the toddler doesn’t understand just how dangerous zombies are. Any kid excitedly yelling “Zomb zomb apoplips!!” while clapping probably lacks a healthy fear of the creatures.

Tubbo is already starting to run away. Techno feels safe assuming that Phil will take care of him.

So he’s gotta get Ranboo.

Increased blood flow to the muscles is now being taken advantage of.

Techno’s boots hit the bitumen of the roof at an exponentially growing rate. His heartbeat slams at similar speeds in order to keep up with his muscles’ heightened demand for oxygenated blood.

As much as Techno disliked taking in these very small children, he’s not going to let one of them die in front of him.

Ranboo babbles incoherently and holds out his arms toward the zombie.

Techno pushes himself even faster.

The zombie roughly grabs one of Ranboo’s hands. Techno sees the kid’s face shift, his little eyebrows furrowing.

“Hurt!” he scolds.

Again, in a different context, it would be kinda funny. But right now Techno’s anxiety doubles.

Alright. He’s not gonna make it by simply running.

Techno dives into the toddler, knocking him loose from the zombie’s grip. Phil yells something, but Techno’s so singularly focused that he doesn’t even process it.

Techno takes a hold of Ranboo and starts running. He’s headed towards the edge of the building, and he knows it, but where else is he supposed to go? Back to Wilbur, Phil, and the other kids? Not if he can avoid it.

He reaches the edge faster than he thought he would, and finds himself nearly pitching over the side. He tightens his hold on Ranboo and throws his weight to the left. He trips, knocking his head against the side railing. He hopes Ranboo isn’t hurt.

Ranboo’s crying.

Techno freezes.

What… what does he do?

Techno isn’t that much of a people person, and he certainly doesn’t know how to deal with tears.

He pats Ranboo’s hair awkwardly. If anything, it stresses the child out more, and his cries grow louder.

Just Techno’s luck.

The zombie continues to shuffle in their direction. And suddenly Techno realizes he has no idea what to do.

He can’t fight the infected hand to hand, he’s got a kid to hold. His knife is on the ground back where they were eating.

And now his anxiety is starting to mess with his decision making skills. He’s got no perceived options, so he goes into fight, flight, or freeze mode.

It’s another thing he’s studied extensively. Fight or flight is actually an incomplete understanding of the human reaction to immediate threats to their lives - it also includes the freeze response (like when you’re frozen with fear).

Granted, it also includes the fawn response, but Techno thinks the phrase is long enough already.

In this moment, with a child in his arms and his back against the lip of a roof, Techno has no alternatives.

So he hugs Ranboo close and squeezes his eyes shut.

He feels the zombie collapse onto them, and Techno puts a hand on Ranboo’s head, feeling the child’s tears soak into his shirt.

“I’m right here,” Techno whispers.

And he waits for the zombie to start tearing his skin off.

And he waits.

And he… waits.

Hold up.

Techno uses his foot to shove the zombie away. Instead of continuing to stumble its way towards them, it just lies in a heap on the roof.

Techno’s anxiety fades a little, and he manages to stand.

Phil has fallen over, holding Tubbo in one hand and a knife in the other. Tommy is right behind them, peering apprehensively over Phil’s shoulder. This throws Techno a little. Wasn’t Wilbur holding Tommy before?

Techno looks to the left and sees Will. He’s standing and breathing hard, looking at the zombie.

Techno follows his gaze and is fairly surprised.

There’s a knife in the corpse’s back. Did Wilbur…?

“Are you at least going to thank me?” Will jokes.

Techno clears his throat. “Nice throw,” he manages.

Ranboo redoubles his grip on Techno’s shirt, hiccups, and keeps crying. Techno comes fully back to himself and runs over to Phil.

Phil rises. “Will - close the door to the roof.”

Wilbur does so as Techno attempts to hand Ranboo over to Phil.

But the kid absolutely refuses to let go of Techno’s shirt.

This is alarming to say the least.

Techno tries to pull him off, but it only makes Ranboo cry louder.

Phil chuckles.

“What? Why are you laughing at me?”

“He’s attached to you now, mate.”

“What do you mean, ‘attached?’ He can let go at any time!”

Wilbur passes by, picking up Tommy on the way. “You’ve gained a friend, Techno. Never thought I’d see the day.”

“Excuse me?!”

Phil laughs louder. Techno tries to give him a death stare, but Phil is too nice and Techno can’t stay mad at him for long.

“What’s the status on the door?”

Wilbur flops down on the floor with Tommy still in his arms. “I was able to lock it. We should be good for the moment.”

Ranboo sniffles and lifts his head. He blinks at Techno through tear-filled lashes. “Zomb gone?”

Techno smiles a little. “Yeah. Zomb gone.”

“Zomb bad.”

“Yeah.” Techno sighs. “Zomb bad.”

Chapter Text

Wilbur can’t sleep.

Not for lack of trying.

He’s lying on the roof with Tommy’s head resting on his shoulder. The moon is high in the sky. He’s been watching its progress since there’s literally nothing else to do.

Techno and the kids fell asleep almost instantaneously, their energy sapped from the drama of the day. Phil is supposed to be keeping watch but from the way he’s snoring Wilbur doubts he’s getting that done.

So he’s alone with his thoughts.

Tommy shifts a little and mutters something.

“What’s up, big man?” Wilbur whispers.

But Tommy is already asleep again.

Will’s gaze returns to the sky. He realizes that he can actually see the stars for once. Before, the light pollution in the city drowned out those twinkling pinpricks of light. Wilbur stares in wonder. How long has it been since he saw a starry sky?

Too long, he decides.

Usually on sleepless nights like this one, Wilbur would pull out his guitar and quietly play so as not to wake the neighbors. Sometimes he’d pluck at random strings, sometimes he’d play chords, and sometimes he’d go through full songs. Still other times it would be a mix of all three. It was just something to do with his idle hands, a way to wait until the tiredness set in.

But his guitar is back in his flat.

Eons away.

Wilbur misses it.

He then remembers something he’d do when things at the coffee shop were slow, when he was the only one working and there was no one else in the store.

Without disturbing Tommy, he lifts his hands and starts to plunk out the notes of “Hayloft.”

On strings of air his worries melt away. He gazes up at the stars and imagines performing in front of a crowd, not a zombie in sight, singing this song about two (probably gay) people fucking in a hayloft.

He almost chuckles, but the humor fades when Tommy’s hand moves, settling on Wilbur’s chest. Right over his heart.

The imaginary guitar falls to pieces as Wilbur moves to cradle this small child.

He’s never really liked kids. Too annoying, too loud. And while Tommy aggressively checks both of those boxes, Wilbur can’t help but feel this utter sense of protectiveness.

He would never let any zombie so much as touch this kid.

Will is suddenly reminded of the events of the evening. He tries not to think about it but the memories surface anyway.

Seeing Techno on the ground, clutching Ranboo to his chest and looking utterly helpless was not something Wilbur was prepared for. He had sent Tommy over to Phil because… well, because he didn’t know what he was going to do, but he knew he didn’t want Tommy there when he did it.

Techno and Phil had always been the ones to actually kill the zombies. Wilbur might have knocked them around a little bit, but Techno and Phil were the ones who actually dealt the final blow.

Wilbur had never even thrown his knife before. Imagine his surprise when it found its mark.

Techno didn’t move for a solid ten seconds, and Will was terrified that his blade had come too late. But then Techno kicked the zombie away and everything was alright.

He sighs.

“What’s the matter?”

The whisper makes Will jump a little, though luckily Tommy stays asleep.

“Jesus, Techno, you scared the shit out of me. I thought you were out.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve never been the greatest at sleeping. So what’s up? Why are you sighing?”

Wilbur contemplates brushing it off as nothing. Then again, what would be the use? At the very least, talking to Techno will give him something to do.

“I’ve been thinking about what happened earlier.”

“Same.”

“It’s just… I’ve never…” Wilbur clears his throat. “I’ve never killed anyone before.”

Techno sits up suddenly, Ranboo still fast asleep against his chest. “No, Will. You can’t think about it like that. They aren’t people anymore.”

“It’s just -”

“Seriously. This is a virus taking over people’s bodies.”

“We don’t know that though! We’re not scientists. We don’t know why this is happening.”

“What else could it be then? Listen, man, I’ve seen The Walking Dead -”

“So have I! But this isn’t The Walking Dead, Techno, it’s real life -”

“Well duh. But seriously! What else could it be?”

“I - I don’t know.”

“Then why argue about this? There’s no saving someone from infection. Once they’re gone, they’re gone for good.”

“But you can’t blame me for feeling bad! They were humans -”

“Not anymore, Wilbur.”

Wilbur blinks, suddenly close to tears.

“Not anymore.”

“I don’t want to kill anyone.”

“I know. You don’t have to.”

“I did have too, though. Earlier.”

“That wasn’t a person, Will.”

He hugs Tommy a little closer. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

There’s a bit of quiet and Techno lies back down. Wilbur strokes Tommy’s hair for a bit, contemplating.

“Thank you, Techno.”

“Anytime. Now shut up and go to sleep.”

“No.”

“Well, I tried.”

Wilbur does eventually fall asleep.

When he wakes, he’s greeted with the sight of a sunrise.

The sky is painted with hues of blue, orange, pink, and yellow. Wilbur wonders how such beauty can be created by nature.

It’s a welcome reward for his valor yesterday.

Nobody else is up yet, but they will be soon. Today is the day for them to get across the bridge.

Tommy stirs, looking blearily up at Wilbur. “What time is it?”

Wilbur checks his watch. “6:30. Do you wanna go back to sleep?”

“No.”

“Ok. But we have to be quiet so we don’t wake anyone else up.”

Tommy groans, but he does it quietly, so Wilbur counts that as a win. He stands, still holding Tommy.

“What do you wanna do?”

“Can I see the bridge again?”

Tommy was absolutely fascinated by the sight of the bridge yesterday. “Sure.”

Will walks over to the roof’s edge, being careful not to hold Tommy over the side. He pulls out a stale, half-crumpled croissant, splits it, and gives half to the child. He starts to chomp away greedily.

“Are we gonna go across?” he asks through a mouthful.

Wilbur smiles. “Yup. And then we’ll go somewhere safer than this city.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Maybe we’ll go to a forest and build a treehouse.”

“A treehouse!”

“And it’ll be the coolest place ever!”

Phil calls after them. “Would you two shut up?”

Tommy grins. “No! Wilby told me we’re gonna build a treehouse!”

Chapter Text

Phil really wishes Wilbur hadn’t said anything about a treehouse.

Once Tubbo and Ranboo are up, they jump on the treehouse bandwagon and join Tommy in talking far too loudly and excitedly about it.

It’s unclear if Ranboo even knows what a treehouse is. Phil thinks he’s just mimicking the animation of the other two.

Techno is over by the edge, looking out at the bridge and the landscape beyond it. Ranboo at least has gotten brave enough to stop the constant clinging, but he’s still hovering nearby, unwilling to go too far from the guy. Every so often Ranboo will look back at Techno, as if he’ll disappear if Ranboo doesn’t keep an eye on him.

It warms Phil’s heart, frankly.

Honestly, though, Phil’s worried about Techno. He seemed fine the night before, but now… Phil’s not exactly sure what it is, but he’s been standoffish all morning. Hence the staring dramatically off into the distance.

He heads over to Techno. Might as well try to have a talk before they attempt to cross the monstrosity down below.

“Hey.”

Techno grunts in response.

Off to a great start.

“What’s got you brooding?”

“Existentialism.”

“Typical.”

Techno shoots Phil a bemused glance. Phil raises an eyebrow, challenging him.

If you’re gonna give me one word responses, Phil thinks, then two can play at that game.

Techno points at him. “Annoying.”

Phil points back. “Irritating.”

“Punchable.”

“Bitchy.”

“Cunt.”

Suddenly they’re both bursting into laughter. Wilbur yells to be heard over them.

“Hey, you idiots, when you’re done enjoying life, could you help me with these little brats?”

Phil and Techno look at Wilbur and start laughing even harder.

Tubbo has somehow managed to climb onto Wilbur’s shoulders and is doing his best to use his hands to obstruct Will’s vision. Ranboo grips Will’s leg and Tommy is running circles around him. It’s quite the sight.

Phil wipes a tear from his eye. “That is the funniest thing I’ve seen in ages.”

“Well I’m glad you’re enjoying it,” Wilbur deadpans. “You gonna help or what?”

Techno grins. “No, I think we’ll just leave you like that.”

“Gee, Techno. After last night I thought you would be nicer to me.”

Phil smirks, raises his eyebrows, and looks at Techno. “What happened last -”

“Do not even. Do not.”

“I’m just glad you two are getting… closer.”

Phil laughs again when Techno shoves him, even though he stumbles a little.

Techno scoffs. “I hope you fall off the roof.”

“Jesus!”

They do eventually manage to coax the kids away from Wilbur. But it takes them a while, longer than it probably should’ve.

They’re delaying this journey.

Phil knows it, even though he’d never admit it out loud.

He thinks it has to do with the sense of safety they have up here. Yes, they were attacked by one of the infected, but for the most part, they were able to rest. Let their guards down. Phil’s laughed more times over the past two days than in the past two weeks. He didn’t realize how precious this sanctuary is until he’s faced with the prospect of losing it.

But the lack of a food/water source is gonna drive them away eventually, so they might as well go while they still have some supplies.

They make a plan of attack. They’re not gonna wing this, not like they have in the past. Maybe Phil, Techno, and Wilbur can afford to gamble with their lives, but they’re not gonna take such risks when there’s kids in the mix.

It’s amazing how quickly they’ve become attached.

They divide their plan into several steps:

Step 1: Who’s gonna carry the kids?

“We don’t need to be carried, we are the Big Men,” Tommy asserts.

Wilbur runs his hands through Tommy’s hair in a vain attempt at combing it. “Maybe so, but what happened when we let Tubbo and Ranboo run free?”

“Oh. Huh.”

“And that was only one zombie.”

“Yeah…”

“Imagine what would happen if -”

“Ok, I get it!”

Phil picks up Ranboo. “Will, do you think you could carry Tommy and Tubbo?”

“Why do I have to carry two of them?”

“Techno’s gonna be doing a lot of fighting, I assume, so I want to keep his hands free.”

“Aren’t you gonna do some fighting too?”

“Not if I can avoid it. Besides, I wanna keep this little guy -” he tickles Ranboo, who shrieks with laughter “- as close to me as possible.” At Wilbur’s obvious hesitation, he adds, “Well, you don’t have to carry both of them, but it would be a big help.”

Apparently, Phil has this look that he gives which makes other people feel really bad for not agreeing with him.

He doesn’t always mean to activate it, but…

“Ugh, fine.”

Step 2: How are they gonna climb down?

They can descend on another fire escape but all the noise they’ve made has attracted a shit ton of zombies, all of whom are clawing at the building, eager for blood. And once they’re spotted on that fire escape, the zombies will go even more nuts than they already are.

The original plan was to have Techno go first and clear some out. In practice things go awry.

Techno starts his descension without much of a hitch. Phil watches him go. He’s more concerned about the guy than he’d like to admit.

He probably should’ve paid more attention to the door to the roof.

Yes, Wilbur had locked it, but that wasn’t going to hold off more than a few of the infected. If enough were pressing against the door, they’d bust the lock.

And that’s exactly what happened.

Wilbur shouts something. Phil’s head whips around.

He’s tried not to curse in front of the kids. But his filter falls apart at the sight of a dozen zombies stumbling their way.

“Oh, shit.”

Wilbur, with Tommy in one arm and Tubbo in the other, sprints towards the fire escape. “We’ve gotta go, right now!”

“What about the ones down below?”

“We just have to go!”

They drop onto the fire escape. From a few floors down, they hear Techno’s voice.

“What’s going on?”

“Zombies busted through the door.”

Phil hugs Ranboo a little tighter. “We couldn't stay up there.”

Techno sighs. “Alright, give me a minute to lure away the ones below.”

“Sure.”

As they wait for Techno to do what he needs to, Ranboo taps Phil on the shoulder.

“Where Techno?”

“He’s going to clear away some zombies for us, that way we can cross the bridge.”

“Techno make zomb go bye?”

“Yeah.”

Ranboo looks at Tommy. “Tom? Tub?”

“What’s up, Big Man?”

“Techno make zomb go bye!”

Tommy and Tubbo exchange puzzled glances.

Ranboo looks up at Phil proudly.

“Good job, mate.”

Techno’s yelling breaks through… whatever that was. At first, Phil is afraid he’s in trouble, but it turns out he’s just using the sound to attract the zombies.

They’re supposed to keep waiting until Techno leads the infected a sufficient distance away. Of course, things don’t go to plan.

Bam!

Something big and heavy slams into Phil’s side, nearly bringing him to the floor. Ranboo’s arm gets banged on the side rail, and Phil doesn’t have time to check the damage. All he’s focused on is… well, what the fuck just hit them?

Blood spatters onto him and he gets his answer pretty quickly. It’s not a great answer.

The zombie’s face is half smashed in from its collision with the railing, its skin torn almost completely off. It stumbles, careening into the side of the building.

“Run, Will!”

He doesn’t need to be told twice, barreling down the rickety stairs with a kid’s face buried in each shoulder.

The zombie takes a second to recover. It gives Phil enough time to draw his knife and back away. The fire escape doesn’t give him much space, but he does what he can.

It reaches forward with a bloodied arm, the bone partially exposed to open air. Phil slashes, and its hand falls to the floor.

Ranboo points a tiny finger at the creature. “Bad zomb! Go home!”

God, if Phil was not in immediate danger he would spend hours making this kid feel special.

The infected cocks its head, as if considering Ranboo’s suggestion. Phil takes advantage of the hesitation and buries his blade in its neck.

Ranboo whimpers.

Phil will deal with it later.

He catapults down the fire escape, finding Wilbur on the last level above the ground.

“Where’s Techno?”

“Dunno. But we’ve gotta head for the bridge ASAP. More brain-hungry idiots are gonna throw themselves onto the fire escape eventually.”

“Just give me a second.” Phil brushes Ranboo’s hair aside so he can get a good look at his face. “Is your arm good?”

“Yeah!”

“You sure? It got banged up back there.”

Ranboo nods. “It hurt but it ok.”

“I’m so proud of you, you’re being really brave.”

Phil swears that Ranboo’s eyes light up brighter than the sun. “Thank you!! Brave is fun.”

Phil turns back to Wilbur. “Let’s head to the bridge. Hopefully Techno will meet us there.”

Wilbur adjusts his grip on Tommy and Tubbo. “Hopefully.”

Chapter Text

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

Techno had done a fairly good job removing the zombies from the general area, but he could only do so much.

Five of the infected reach for them, scraping the bottom of the fire escape with what’s remaining of their nails.

Tubbo pulls his face out of Wilbur’s shoulder to peek at Phil. “What are we gonna do?”

He has no idea how to respond. Phil doesn’t want to kill zombies in front of three kids. Plus, Wilbur is not going to fight, Phil made sure of that. Can he take on five? All by himself?

With Ranboo in one arm?

Phil fiddles with his knife in his hand.

It’s not a question of if he can do it. It’s a question of when, because Phil has to get everyone to safety. By any means necessary.

“Wilbur, follow me. And kids, close your eyes.”

Ranboo taps Phil on the shoulder. “Why close?”

“It’s gonna get really scary.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, mate. Close your eyes.”

Phil hates the expression on Ranboo’s face. No toddler deserves to go through as much as he has. He deserves a normal childhood, goddammit. Phil takes a deep breath. That’s his motivation. He’s gonna do this, take on five at once.

For Ranboo. And Tubbo and Tommy. They deserve a life lived in a place safer than cities.

“It’s gonna be ok. I promise. Close your eyes.”

“Ok.”

Phil pats Ranboo on the head, then checks to see if Wilbur’s ready. He and Phil make eye contact, and Phil sees a desperate look. Wilbur’s barely holding back some emotion.

“We’re gonna be alright.”

Wilbur blinks a little too quickly. “We better be.”

Phil gets a foot up on the railing, braces himself, and jumps.

The shock up his legs was a lot more than he expected. The bottom of the fire escape wasn’t that high up, was it?

The zombies stumble toward him. Oh, right. He doesn’t have time to consider things.

Phil’s knife embeds itself in a neck, a chest, a head, and a stomach. One by one they drop.

Except for that last one, who manages to get a hand on Phil’s shoulder. He whips around, not exactly knowing what to do.

Shit, shit, shit.

Wilbur drops from the fire escape, crushing the zombie.

Thank God.

“You’ve really got this timing down, huh?”

Wilbur tosses his head to get his bangs out of his eyes. “What can I say? You guys wouldn’t know what to do without me.”

“Yeah, right. Let’s head to the hedges.”

Speaking of, Step 3: How are they gonna get across the bridge?

There’s a group of large hedges nearby. They provide enough protection that the group can regroup and recover. Phil, Wilbur, and the kids head to the bushes and wait. Techno is going to rendezvous with them as soon as possible.

Impatience hits Phil faster than he expected.

What the hell is going on with Techno? They can’t even hear the sound of his feet running through the city streets over the zombies’ groans.

“Techno’s taking forever,” Tommy complains.

And then they see him sprinting towards them.

With a horde at his back.

“Time to go!” he yells.

Time to go indeed.

They take off running, making their way across the bridge as fast as they can.

Techno did his job well. The horde is a decent distance away, giving them plenty of time to deal with the more immediate threat of zombies on the bridge itself.

Techno is practically a killing machine.

So at first, things are going really well.

A little too well.

Because soon enough, they’re flagging.

They’re flagging and they can’t afford it.

Techno’s ok (of course he is) but Phil and Wilbur… they’re not built for this. The weight of the kids isn’t helping either.

It starts with little things, a bit of a stumble, a kid slipping from a grip just a little. Phil desperately wants to ignore it. They’re fine, he tells himself.

But no amount of false reassurances will get them very far.

Wilbur trips and careens into the asphalt.

Fuck.

Techno reacts with incredible efficiency, picking up Tubbo and using his other hand to help Wilbur stand.

It’s a valiant effort.

It’s not enough.

The zombies have caught up to them already.

How… how did they do that? The horde wasn’t that close behind them.

Were they?

They also have to contend with the zombies in front of them on the bridge, who are just as eager as the ones behind them.

No.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

They were supposed to find a safe place.

They were supposed to cross this bridge. Maybe they’d get banged up on the way, but they’d make it. They were supposed to run far from here, find a safe space to raise the kids properly. Give them a real childhood. They were supposed to get away from all this.

A zombie shuffles its way toward them, getting dangerously close to Ranboo.

They were supposed to build a treehouse.

Techno slashes one of the infected. It goes down, but there’s far too many. Techno can’t take them all.

They were supposed to build a treehouse, and it was going to be beautiful. It was gonna have three bedrooms and a combination kitchen/living room.

Phil pulls everybody close.

“I’m sorry.”

“Are we gonna die?” Tubbo asks tearfully. Phil doesn’t have the heart to answer.

A zombie gets really, really close to Ranboo.

They were supposed to build a treehouse.

…

That zombie has been staring at Ranboo for an awfully long time.

Why hasn’t it attacked yet?

Ranboo stares back, and Phil sees a calm expression on his face, not unlike how he looks when he sleeps.

The other zombies have stopped in their tracks.

Techno looks at Phil and whispers. “What’s going on?”

“Hell if I know.”

Wilbur joins in. “I thought we were gonna, like, die and stuff.”

Phil’s too shocked to register the humor.

What. The. Fuck.

Techno whispers again. “Is Ranboo magic or something?”

Chapter Text

They’ve been standing there for a while.

Like a long while.

No one wants to move, afraid that even a breath out of place will have the zombies resuming their homicidal progress.

Ranboo keeps staring at that one zombie.

It’s far too quiet, Phil thinks. Just seconds ago there was a cacophony of groans, stumbling, and panic.

Now the only thing he hears is breathing.

It’s eerie.

Ranboo waves at the zombie. “Go home please.”

It cocks its head, and…

It turns back toward the city. It starts moving.

And slowly, one by one, the other zombies start moving too.

Again: What. The. Fuck.

They watch in awe as the zombies clear themselves off the bridge. The ones who were in front of them pass them on the way, freaking Phil and Techno out.

Ranboo stays still, stiller than Phil’s ever seen him. The kid is almost always moving, but right now he just watches with a calm sense of patience.

Once all the zombies have cleared the bridge, Ranboo slumps over, leaning heavily on Phil’s shoulder.

“What’s up, mate?”

“Tired.”

“Yeah, I bet. You can go to sleep if you want.”

“Ok.”

He’s out almost instantaneously.

Wilbur glances at Ranboo with a concerned gaze. “Is he gonna be alright?”

Phil sighs. “I hope so.” He looks around. There’s no zombies in their immediate area. It’s refreshing, almost. To not have to check over your shoulder every two seconds. Like with the roof, they’ve got a minute to breathe.

Maybe more than a minute, thanks to Ranboo.

“Let’s get off this bridge.”

Once they’re no longer over the water, they sit against a small brick building, which is almost shedlike. Wilbur and Techno half-collapse, physical and mental exhaustion evident in their faces. Tommy and Tubbo crawl away from them and sit together. The kids whisper frantically to each other, but Phil doesn’t care to listen in.

He takes a seat as well.

“So. Did any of you know about Ranboo’s… abilities?”

Tommy and Tubbo’s heads snap in Phil’s direction. Hmm.

“Well? Did you? We won’t be mad if you were.”

“Maybe you won’t be,” Techno grumbles, and Phil shoots him a look.

Tubbo shuffles a bit. “We sorta knew something was weird about him.”

“But we didn’t know it had anything to do with zombies!” Tommy jumps in, with an anxious look towards Techno.

“Yeah… we found Ranboo the day after the zombies started appearing. He was just walking alone in that alley -”

“So we decided to make him one of the Big Men!”

“He wouldn’t tell us where his parents were or where he came from. For like, the first three days, all he said was,” - Tubbo claps his hands together mockingly - “zomb zomb apoplips!”

Tommy nods gravely. “It got very annoying.”

“You would know about that, wouldn't you?” Wilbur mutters. Tommy becomes very offended.

“What do you mean, annoying? Big Men aren’t annoying, and I am a very Big Man! I am The Great Tommy -”

“You are not a ‘Big Man,’ you are a child.”

Tommy stands, fists clenched. “Am not!”

Phil holds out a hand. “Alright, alright. Relax, you two. Ranboo may have gotten rid of some nearby zombies but that doesn’t mean we can’t attract more.” Tommy flops to the ground with a huff. “Besides, we’re getting off topic. Tubbo, did Ranboo say anything else to you guys?”

“Um… kinda. We asked him where he was from for the billionth time and he started talking but me and Tommy couldn’t understand.”

“He was talking so fast!”

“The only things I could make out were ‘white,’ ‘zomb’ and ‘mean.’”

“He said those words so many times.”

“I also think he said something about ‘permint,’ but I don’t know what that meant.”

Wilbur’s brow wrinkles. “Permint?”

“That’s what he said.”

“Huh.”

They sit in silence for a while, contemplating the new information. Phil knows that Ranboo has trouble with a lot of multisyllabic words, but he can’t for the life of him figure out what “permint” is supposed to be. He was a video editor before all this, goddammit, not a linguist.

He’s reminded of one of the university interns at his office. He was doing dual honors - entertainment technology and linguistics.

Phil feels a pang as he thinks about the guy. Who the hell knows if he’s even alive at this point.

Phil looks around at this little ragtag group he’s acquired. Brought together by strange circumstances, they’ve each found a nice little niche for themselves.

But they all have people they left behind, people who they likely will never see again. Maybe they were important, maybe they weren’t, but they’re missed all the same.

Phil wonders who those people are for Ranboo.

If he were a little older, he’d probably be able to articulate things better. At the very least, he’d be able to speak in fuller sentences. As things stand now, though, Phil isn’t sure whether they’ll ever figure out where Ranboo came from, because by the time he can articulate better, his memories of whatever came before will be faded and obscure.

It fills Phil with a strange sense of rage. Everyone deserves to know where they came from.

Tommy interrupts his musings with a question. “Phil, do you know why Ranboo’s eyes are different colors?”

“They are?”

“Yeah. One’s green and the other’s red.”

How had Phil not noticed that?

“I don’t know, mate. Some people are just born with heterochromia.”

“Heter… what?”

Phil laughs. “Heterochromia is when someone has two different colored eyes.”

“There’s a word for that?!”

Techno and Wilbur join in the laughter, and Phil remembers why he hangs around these guys. They almost died, what, ten, fifteen minutes ago? And now they’re laughing like nothing’s wrong.

It’s the exact kind of energy that Phil thrives on.

“Ok. I think we need to get moving soon.” Everyone groans. “Yeah, yeah, complain all you want, but we gotta make sure we have a safe place to sleep tonight.”

Techno points a little ways down the road. “There’s a gigantic house right there. Let’s go and sleep for the next week.”

“But what if there’s zombies?”

“I’ll kill ‘em.”

Phil doesn’t feel like arguing. They break into the house and find it completely abandoned. Not a soul to be found. At Phil’s insistence, they all hole up in one gigantic bedroom.

Even though it’s only early afternoon, they all follow Ranboo’s example and pass the hell out.

Chapter Text

Wilbur is having some serious trouble sleeping.

This is becoming a trend and he is not a fan.

Instead of sitting with his thoughts and worrying, he decides to wander around this house. Who knows how long they’ll be staying here, anyway.

With as much care as he can muster, Wilbur moves Tommy away from him and towards Phil. Tommy grabs onto Phil’s leg, shifts a little more, and sleeps on, much to Wilbur's relief.

He closes the door quietly, turns one of the flashlights they found, and starts to meander. At Phil’s insistence (he insisted on a lot of things yesterday), they stayed on the third floor, so Wilbur’s got some ground to cover. With any luck the wandering will tire him out and he’ll be able to get some decent rest tonight.

Granted, Will thinks he spent a lot of his luck on the bridge.

The house is fucking huge, more of a mansion, really, and for a while Wilbur makes his way through grand room after grand room, down a staircase or two, until it all blends together. Suffice it to say, he’s probably half-sleepwalking, because when he comes back down to earth, he has no idea how he got there.

It’s a kitchen. About as superfluous as every other room in this goddamn house. The only difference is the mess.

While he wasn’t really paying attention to where he was going, Wilbur did have the presence of mind to notice that all the rooms he went through were very neat. Maybe a little dusty, but it looked like nothing had been touched since the apocalypse began.

The kitchen, on the other hand, looks like it experienced a tornado.

Wilbur watches his step as he walks through because broken dishes with very sharp edges are strewn across the floor. Every cabinet door is thrown open, several sets of hand towels spilling out of drawers. Plastic cups litter the counters, and cutlery is simply everywhere. With every sweep of his flashlight’s beam he sees more debris, more chaos.

Wilbur likes to think his surroundings are an accurate representation of the inner workings of his brain.

At first, he thinks that a fight happened here. What else would cause such a shitshow?

But then he notices the papers, and the drawer with the hidden compartment, and things begin to click together.

There was no fight. Someone (or some people) was (or were) searching for something. That something evidently being the papers in front of him.

So why are the papers still here?

Will uses an empty paper towel stand to prop up his flashlight. Once satisfied with the angle, he turns his attention to the small stack of what appear to be packets. Huh.

The title on the first page intrigues him even more.

“Exploration of the Effects of the ASWL Virus in Children.”

What the hell is the ASWL virus? It’s certainly nothing Wilbur’s ever heard of. Then again, he’s not a doctor. Or a scientist. So.

The title page has virtually no other information, so he turns to the next one. It’s no more exciting, just listing the study’s contributors. He turns the page again, and finally there’s something worth his while.

“NOTE: THIS STUDY IS TOP SECRET. ONLY THOSE WITH SECURITY CLEARANCE ALPHA MAY VIEW IT.”

Well, well, well. Wilbur’s never been one for following rules.

“Introduction:
In conjunction with the National Health Service (NHS) and the National Institute of Health (NIH), this study continues these agencies' explorations into the ASWL virus - henceforth referred to as ASWL or simply the virus. Discovered by Dr. Antonio Sparks and Dr. Wilimina Lovejoy, ASWL is a virus which targets the brain, slowly eating away its matter until only the most basic of functions are left behind. Individuals subject to the virus become completely unrecognizable and unable to respond to most stimuli, save for another individual. When exposed to another individual, the infected becomes bloodthirsty to the extreme and will stop at nothing to murder and consume the other. The virus is transferred through bodily fluids, with the most common method of transfer being a bite.”

Oh.

Oh shit.

Techno was right.

Wilbur will never say that to him, though.

He takes a step back to process what he just read. It does give him a little comfort to understand what’s causing all this, though this discovery raises more questions than it answers. Where’d this virus come from? Why did it hit so hard? And why now?

Wilbur brushes hair out of his eyes and returns to reading.

“At this time there is no known cure.”

Well that sucks. “Interestingly, it has been noted that some individuals are carriers -”

“We have to stop meeting like this.”

Will accidentally knocks over his flashlight in his fear. “God! How are you so quiet?”

Techno snorts. “It’s a talent, what can I say?” He takes a look around the kitchen. “I’m hoping you didn’t do this.”

“What? How destructive do you think I am?”

“I don’t know.”

“I found it like this. But here’s the really interesting thing…” Wilbur closes the packet and hands it to Techno. He takes it, confusion evident.

“What’s interesting about a packet?”

“Read the title.”

Techno does so. “ASWL?”

“Go to the third page.”

Techno grumbles as he flips the pages. After a second, he grins wickedly.

“I’m not gonna say I told you so -”

“Oh, shut up -”

“- but I did call it.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. A virus created all the zombies. Happy?”

“Hardly.”

“But listen to this.” Wilbur grabs the packet back and reads more stuff out. “Interestingly, it has been noted that some individuals are carriers of the virus.” Will looks up at Techno expectantly. “So?”

“... so?”

“Doesn’t that sound like Ranboo? A carrier?”

“I mean. Maybe.”

Wilbur throws his hands up in the air. “Do you have any settings beyond monotone?”

“No.”

“Lovely. Should we keep reading?”

“Nah. Let’s bring the papers back to the room and look at ‘em with Phil in the morning.”

“Sure, whatever.”

Wilbur grabs the rest of the papers and his flashlight, following Techno because he definitely doesn’t know the way back.

He yawns. Well, at least he’s tired now.

Chapter Text

Phil rereads the paragraph several times.

“And you found this in the kitchen?”

Techno shrugs. “Kitchens hold many secrets.”

After foraging in said kitchen for a decent breakfast and giving the kids some toy cars they found, Techno and Wilbur sat Phil down and had him read the beginning of the study. He wasn’t sure why it was so damn important until he read the first paragraph of the introduction. Now he’s not sure how to feel.

“At least we have an explanation for all this.”

Wilbur leans forward in his chair. “Yeah, but to what end? I don’t know about you, but I don’t know shit about viruses.”

“Well maybe this study could teach us something. It’s worth a read. Besides…” Phil looks over at Ranboo, who’s driving his car up a wall. In a lower voice, Phil continues. “I think this study might have something to do with Ranboo.”

That gets Wilbur and Techno’s attention. “You really think so?” Techno asks.

“I mean, just read the title. ‘Exploration of the Effects of the ASWL Virus in Children?’ It doesn’t take much to connect the dots.”

“We should read the whole thing before we jump to that conclusion,” Wilbur points out.

“I know, I’m just saying -”

Suddenly, Tommy and Tubbo zoom past, with Ranboo following as best as his chubby little legs can carry him. “Give back car!”

“Never!” Tubbo and Tommy chorus.

Phil’s eyes widen as he watches the kids sprint about the room while Techno just chuckles.

“Good luck with that one.”

When Tubbo runs by, Phil manages to snatch him up and hold him, effectively putting an end to the chase.

“Put me down!”

“Give Ranboo the car back.”

“But -”

“No. Give it back.”

Tubbo goes limp with defeat. “Fine.”

He holds out the car, which Ranboo snatches from his hand and holds close to his chest.

Looking right at Tubbo with anger in his eyes, he says, “You mean like permint.”

Phil really wishes he knew what “permint” meant.

Ranboo goes over to Techno and sits, leaning against his leg. Techno puts a hand on the kid’s head.

Phil tries to pierce the other kids with his gaze. “Ok. Tubbo, Tommy, I want you two to apologize.”

Tommy stamps his foot. “That’s not fair!”

“Tommy. Taking someone else’s toy is not nice.”

“But we were just messing around!”

“Yeah,” Tubbo adds. “We didn’t think he’d be so mad.”

“Sometimes you do things that have unintended consequences. And even if you didn’t want to be mean, you have to apologize.”

Tommy huffs. “Sorry for taking your car, Ranboo.”

“I’m sorry too.”

Ranboo fiddles with the car. “It ok.”

Phil releases Tubbo. “Now go play nice, alright?”

“We will!”

Tommy and Tubbo go immediately back to whatever they were doing, but Ranboo is more hesitant. Techno leans down so he and Ranboo are face to face.

“Are you gonna go play?”

“Tub take car again?”

“I don’t think so. He didn’t wanna be rude. And he already apologized, so he’s probably not gonna do it again, right?”

Ranboo thinks about that. “Right. I play now!”

“Sounds good.”

Ranboo scrambles up and joins Tubbo and Tommy’s game. Phil relaxes, the weight of worry gone. He glances at Wilbur, who’s grinning. Phil’s relief quickly turns to annoyance.

“What are you grinning at?”

“That was very fatherly of you, Phil.”

“Huh?”

“Nothing, nothing.”

Techno snorts.

“Oh, you’re not off the hook either, Mr. Monotone. Don’t think I didn’t notice that little moment with you and Ranboo.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. I just… wanted to get the kid out of my personal space.”

“Yeah. Sure.”

Phil waves the packet a bit. “Are you done with the bickering? We have a study to read.”

They gather around a desk in the bedroom, making sure to check on the kids every once and a while.

They spend the day pouring over the study’s contents. What they find isn’t pretty.

At one point Phil has to step back and take some deep breaths so he won’t start getting very fucking angry. This study… well, unethical is putting it lightly.

Page 24, under the section Methods and Results:

“In the second trial, each child was placed in a room with one of the infected. They were told to instruct the infected to “go home,” a command which, if performed correctly, would cause the infected to attempt to return to its place of origin. The removal of a treasured object (usually a toy or blanket of some kind) was used as a motivator to encourage the subjects to act as desired. For quick reference, the success of each subject is listed below:

#1 - Successful; Left Alive

#2 - Unsuccessful; Killed

#3 - Successful; Left Alive”

Phil feels sick to his stomach after reading that. He almost doesn’t wanna finish. Who knows what else is contained within those pages.

But Techno and Wilbur give him determined looks, and Phil knows that he can’t let them down.

So he keeps reading.

“Subject #1 was very quick in performing the task assigned. Thus far, she has been the most cooperative of the subjects.

Subject #2 was resistant at first, but under a few more instances of coercion, made several attempts to get the infected to listen. Unfortunately, it was too late, and the infected consumed the child.”

Techno and Wilbur look up in horror.

At this point, Phil physically cannot go on.

Fuck.

These scientists - these monsters - barely gave a second thought to a child’s death. A child’s death! To them, that poor kid was dispensable. All for some stupid experiment about controlling zombies.

Wait.

Permint. Could Ranboo be trying to say…

“Ranboo, can you come over here for a second?” Phil asks in a weak voice.

“Ok!”

The toddler bounds up to Phil with a bright smile. God, if Phil could give this kid the world, he would.

“Were you a part of an experiment?”

“Permint? Yeah!”

He knew it.

“What was it like?”

Ranboo furrows his brow. “Mean. Very mean. And white.”

“White?”

“Yeah. White rooms.”

Wilbur clears his throat. “What… what did you do in the experiment?”

“Talk to zomb.” Ranboo smiles a little. “Zomb nice.” But then he frowns again. “Peoples mean. They take Ender.”

“Who’s Ender?”

“My toy cat.”

The truth sinks in for Techno, Wilbur, and Phil. The dots are practically connecting themselves.

Phil ruffles Ranboo’s hair and tries to smile. “Thanks for talking to us, mate. Now go and play.”

“You ok?”

Goddamn kids and their ability to see right through you at the worst of times.

“Uh, yeah. I’m just tired. Been doing a lot of reading.”

“What’s reading?”

Phil does not have time to get into that. “I’ll… tell you later. Go on.”

Ranboo runs back to Tommy and Tubbo. Phil turns to Techno and Will.

“Well, fuck.”

Chapter Text

Techno’s got a bit of a secret.

It all started when they got to the section entitled “Discussion.” As promised, it “discussed” the results of the study. One line in particular stood out:

“Some carriers are noted to have hair discoloration, which may be permanent.”

Wilbur and Phil had looked up at Techno with smirks, and Techno threw his hands in the air.

“Listen, man, it’s just dyed.”

Except it isn’t just dyed.

Techno’s hair used to be a light shade of auburn. He had never really paid much attention to it, which is probably why it took so long for him to notice.

About five years ago, Techno looked in the mirror and was startled to see his roots were growing in pink.

Unfortunately, there’s not exactly much scientific literature on spontaneous, unnaturally colored hair growth, so for the longest time he was at a loss for an answer.

Now… well, now he can’t sleep.

Which is nothing new, of course, but it would be nice to get a decent night’s rest once in a while.

They’d gotten comfortable enough in the house to start sleeping in separate bedrooms, trying to create some semblance of normalcy. The kids were all supposed to be sharing a room, but Ranboo snuck into Techno’s bed and wouldn’t leave, so…

He strokes the kid’s hair absentmindedly as his thoughts begin to wander back to the study. It was so disturbing that he simply had to look away at times. The callous way the scientists wrote about the literal children they were working with was just disgusting.

The worst part is that Ranboo was one of them, and they know it for sure, even beyond what Ranboo had said to them earlier.

In the “Discussion” section, there was a part about describing the kids’ appearances before and after the study. Techno’s practically memorized the damning sentence.

“After the conclusion of the study, Subject #3 was relatively unchanged, except for his hair color, which shifted from a dark brown to half black and half white.”

If that’s not a spot on description for Ranboo, Techno doesn’t know what is.

But that doesn’t come with much comfort, because now they know for a fact what the hell happened to this kid before they met him and it’s not exactly sunshine and rainbows. Techno wonders how Ranboo can be so cheerful and vibrant, knowing what he’s gone through. Then again, what’s even more sickening is that he probably has never known much else.

Has this group of loud idiots been the first time Ranboo was actually treated with kindness?

Techno shudders internally at the thought. He pulls Ranboo a little closer.

He stares at the wall opposite the bed. It’s half covered in some weirdly patterned tapestry that Techno low-key hates but was and still is too lazy to take down. He traces the swirling lines with his eyes, hoping it’ll act as something like counting sheep.

He has no such luck, but it was worth a shot.

Ranboo suddenly shifts and blinks up at Techno through tired eyes.

“You ok?”

“I… can’t sleep.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

Ranboo reaches up a tiny hand and manually closes Techno’s eyes.

“There! Now sleep.”

Techno chuckles. “Thanks, Ranboo.”

“I smart.”

“Of course you are.”

And you know what? Techno manages to fall asleep. He gets a decent night’s rest.

He’s gonna need it.

The horizon gives some vague hints of dawn, just little snatches of color in the distance.

Dream pushes his feet faster, knowing that George and Sapnap will keep up. Clifton should be only three or four miles away at this point, and he’d like to get there before the sun fully rises. Plus, he can bet the place will be crawling with the infected, and it would be nice to survey the nearby suburbs in the morning.

The infected are always the least active between the hours of 6 AM and 9 AM.

As they pad their way along an isolated lane, Dream thinks about his house. He misses it a lot more than he could have predicted. The grandiose staircases, the large, sweeping rooms, the simple yet sophisticated decor, the castle vibe. It was once his sanctuary.

It can be his - their - sanctuary again.

It puts a damper on his musings, remembering how things were before. His life was once so affluent and interesting, and now he’s nothing but yet another survivor. He had worked so hard to climb the social and professional ladders! And it was all for naught!

With some difficulty, Dream shakes away the deprecating thoughts. All was not in vain. That’s why they were heading back to the house. Once he has his hands on his studies again, he can continue his research. And hey, it’s not like he’ll suffer from lack of infected test subjects.

The little half and half brat saw to that.

Dream sighs. There’s nothing he can do about it now. What he can do is continue his research and hope and pray to find a cure.

“Dream, do you remember where you left your studies?” Sapnap asks. “‘Cause I don’t feel like searching through your big fucking house for them.”

Dream smiles behind his mask. “Oh yeah, I remember. They should be on the kitchen counter.”

Chapter Text

Where the hell is Tommy?

Phil went into the kids’ room to round them up for breakfast and only found Tubbo. This stuck him as odd because - 1. Tommy and Tubbo never separate and 2. Ranboo does not seem like the type to wander.

He quickly found that Ranboo was safe and sound in Techno’s room, but it only temporarily eased his anxiety. Neither Techno nor Ranboo knew where Tommy was. The same went for Tubbo.

Phil stands in the hallway, trying to think rationally through the cloud of fear surrounding his mind. There’s two possibilities that come to mind.

First possibility: Tommy is still in the house.

This is the most likely, right? He and Tubbo are practically attached at the hip. He wouldn’t leave his friend behind without warning. Plus, the place is huge, so even if Tommy wandered away with the intent of leaving, it would probably take him a while.

Second possibility: Tommy is outside.

One thing that Phil’s noticed over the past couple of days is that Tommy is like an oiled pig when he wants to be evasive. If he really wanted to run, he could.

Phil isn’t a fan of that second possibility.

Wilbur exits the room he claimed for himself, looking like a cat attacked him in the middle of the night. Phil’s worries are temporarily forgotten as he tries not to laugh.

“How’d you sleep, mate?”

“Fine, for once.”

“Have you… looked in a mirror?”

Wilbur narrows his eyes. “No?”

“You might want to.”

Wilbur doubtfully pads over to the nearby bathroom. Five seconds pass, and then -

“What the fuck?!”

Phil starts laughing.

Wilbur stomps out of the bathroom. “Do not laugh at me, Phil. I look like a mess.”

Techno runs into the hallway with Ranboo and Tubbo at his heels. “What’s - oh.” He smirks. “What rat made its nest in your hair?”

Wilbur strides back into his room, slamming the door.

Phil wipes a little tear from his eye. Making fun of Wilbur is a very important passtime.

Ranboo toddles up to Phil. He reaches a little hand up, and suddenly seems frustrated.

Ranboo taps his own shoulder. Phil isn’t sure what he means at first, but then he remembers.

Ah, he can’t reach.

Phil picks Ranboo up. He smiles, and taps Phil’s shoulder.

“What’s up, mate?”

“Where Tommy?”

Phil’s good mood proves to be fleeting. He clears his throat. “We’re not sure. But, uh, y’know, we’re working on it.”

“Work fast.”

Ranboo looks at him with such determination that Phil would be damned if he didn’t do just that.

“We will, little man.”

He’s about to put Ranboo down, when an idea suddenly strikes him.

“How would you like to help us search?”

Ranboo starts to buzz excitedly. “How help?!”

Techno’s body language screams hesitance. “What do you mean by help?”

“Think about it, Tech. These guys have way more energy than we could ever hope for -”

“- I think you’re just old -”

“- and we need help from people who have been around Tommy for longer than us. So why don’t we split up? I’ll take Ranboo, you take Tubbo, and we’ll scour the place from top to bottom.”

“What about Wilbur?”

“He’ll… catch up.”

“I also like the idea of leaving him in the dust. Good thinking, Phil.”

“That’s not what I said!”

“But it was what you were thinking, and I agree.” Techno looks down at Tubbo. “Alright, kid, lead the way.”

Tubbo crosses his arms. “And why should I listen to you?”

“Because I will tickle you without mercy if you don’t.”

Tubbo’s eyes widen in fear. “Ok,” he squeaks. “This way.”

He starts walking quickly down the hallway, Techno strolling lazily behind. He flashes Phil a smirk.

“That, my friend, is how you motivate children.”

“You mean threaten. You threatened him.”

“Same difference.”

Tubbo and Techno disappear around a corner. Phil sighs.

“You know, Ranboo, when you get older, make sure your friends understand the difference between motivating and threatening someone.”

Ranboo looks terrified. “You tickle me?”

“No, no, no, mate, I’m not Techno.”

“Techno tickle me?”

“Not if I can help it.”

“Good.”

And with that, they’re off.

Ranboo suggests that Tommy might have gone to the kitchen for a snack, so they start there.

It’s… a fucking mess, if Phil’s being honest. Wilbur had said as much, but Phil didn’t think it would be this bad.

“Kitchen messy.”

Phil snorts. “I won’t argue with that one.”

“Tommy messy too.”

It was messy last night, too, Phil thinks. Of course, we also don’t know when Tommy decided to hightail it out of here.

“He could have done this.” Phil nudges a half of a broken plate aside with his foot. “But don’t you think we would’ve heard it if Tommy broke dishes?”

Ranboo blinks, clearly thinking very hard about that. “Dishes loud,” he relents, but he doesn’t look very happy about it.

“Don’t worry, you might not be totally wrong. Let’s keep looking.”

Phil pointedly avoids the stack of papers still sitting on the counter. Who knows what other science from hell is contained within those pages.

They move next into a sitting room. It’s ridiculously over-furnished and dusty as hell. Phil flops onto one of the couches and it kicks up a cloud of dust, causing Ranboo to sneeze.

It’s the cutest thing Phil’s ever heard.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t get time to wallow in the adorableness.

From the next room over, a screened-in porch, Phil and Ranboo hear a crash quickly followed by the distinct sound of Tommy screeching.

Well that answers one question.

Phil scrambles up, nearly dropping Ranboo (only nearly!). He shoves open the door and takes in the scene.

The broken remains of a lamp lie in a heap on the floor. Tommy cradles his right arm close to his chest, looking about five seconds away from some serious tears. When he notices Phil and Ranboo, he wipes away the wetness from his eyes and stands up straight.

“Phil. Ranboo. Men. Hey there. Hi. Hello.” Tommy’s voice wavers, and Phil’s heart breaks a little.

“You alright, mate?”

“Me? Oh yeah. Never been better.”

“Oh really? Then what’s that red stuff leaking from your arm?”

“Is blood!” Ranboo answers a bit too excitedly.

Tommy pulls his arm closer to himself. “It’s not blood… it’s… uh, it’s… ketchup.”

Phil raises his eyebrows. “Ketchup.”

“Mhm. I was eating a hamburger and it got a little messy.”

Phil sighs. Can this kid stop being so damn stubborn?

He puts Ranboo down and crouches to get to his level. “Go run and find the others. Tell them we found Tommy.”

“Ok!”

Ranboo runs off on tiny legs. “Don’t hurt yourself!” Phil calls.

He turns back to Tommy and pulls out a roll of bandages. He beckons Tommy closer. Tommy reluctantly offers his arm and Phil gets to wrapping it.

“Alright. While I have you here. What did you get up to and why?”

Chapter Text

It takes a while to get Tommy talking, something that Phil did not expect.

Even with the limited time they’ve spent together, Phil can tell that Tommy is one of those kids who can ramble for hours if you let him. Not that Phil minds, of course. He likes the noise.

So it’s unsettling when Tommy goes quiet once the bandage starts to wrap around his arm.

Is it a pride thing? He didn’t seem eager to admit that he was hurt.

“Toms? You alright?”

And… silence.

Ok, what the fuck is going on here?

Phil finishes bandaging Tommy’s arm, his movements slowed by the heavy weight of his question hanging in the air. When he finishes, he sits back on his heels and studies the kid in front of him. Tommy stares at his bandage. If Phil had to guess he’d say that Tommy was deliberately avoiding his gaze. After a moment’s consideration, he decides to try a different tactic.

“We were really worried about you, y’know.”

Phil catches the ghost of a smile on Tommy’s face. “You don’t need to worry. I’m a Big Man who can take care of himself.”

“I’m sure you can, but you left without telling anybody! That’s not good, mate.”

“I’m fine!”

“I literally just bandaged a cut on your arm.”

Tommy fumbles for a reply, and, finding none, flops onto a chair. Phil shakes his head and takes a seat across from the kid.

“Seriously, what’s up?”

Tommy becomes very interested in his shoelaces. “I… I messed up.”

An admission of guilt? Today is full of surprises. “What? What do you mean?”

“I was wandering around and then I saw these guys outside and I decided to talk to them because I am a Big Man who can defend you guys if I need to and then -”

Phil stands suddenly. It startles Tommy, and honestly, it startles Phil too. He didn’t know he had such anger in him.

“Woah, woah, woah, hold up. You saw some strangers outside, and instead of telling me, or Techno, or hell! even Wilbur, you chose to talk to them? Without knowing whether they were infected or not?”

“I was only trying to -”

“I don’t care what you were trying to do, Tommy! The world is different now. You can’t just approach someone, especially at your age. You have to be smarter than this.”

Tommy’s eyes shine with the uncharacteristic beginnings of tears. It makes Phil pause.

Shit.

By the time Techno, Tubbo, and Ranboo find him again, Phil is sitting in a chair with Tommy on his lap, face buried in his shoulder. Tommy’s asleep.

“Phil.”

Phil jumps a little, though luckily Tommy sleeps through it. “Jesus, Techno, you scared me.”

“Sorry or whatever.”

“Where’s Will?”

“He’ll be here in a second.”

Right on cue, Wilbur pokes his head in the doorway. “Is Tommy alright?”

“Yeah, safe and sound,” Phil says. “Well, mostly. He got a cut on his arm from a broken lamp, and… uh.” He points to a corner of the screened-in porch. “Tubbo, Ranboo. Can you two go over there and play? The adults need to have a conversation.”

Tubbo looks like he’s about to object, but Ranboo pulls him away with promises of “Fun!”

Wilbur enters the room fully and leans against a wall. “Are we in trouble?” he jokes.

Phil runs a hand through Tommy’s hair. “We might be.”

Techno’s hand goes to the knife in his belt. “What do you mean?”

“Tommy wandered into this group of three men outside - no Techno they’re not a threat yet - and they told Tommy to go and retrieve us so we could talk to them. I’ve been thinking over all our options and I’m honestly not sure what to do.”

“What are our options?” Wilbur asks.

“The way I see it, either we go and talk to them or we can try to run away without them knowing. Both alternatives have some serious drawbacks.”

Techno nods. “If we talk to them, they might use it as an easy opportunity to attack. But if we try to run, they might discover us and then we’d have to explain ourselves.” There’s a pause as they all consider things, the silence broken only by Tubbo and Ranboo’s chatter and laughter. After a moment, Techno continues.

“I think we should try to run.”

Phil adjusts his grip on Tommy. “And why do you think that?”

“Even if we get caught, we have a better chance of getting out of this alive if we get on the move as soon as possible. The kids are light enough that we can carry them while still making good time. If we talk to these guys, we’ll be placing ourselves in a situation where there’s a hundred unknown variables. It could lead to a fight. With the kids in tow, that’s something we can’t afford.”

Wilbur pushes himself off the wall. “But if they catch us running, it might lead to a fight anyway. We don’t know how hostile they are. I mean, they left Tommy alone, for the most part, so they can’t be entirely murderous.”

“Yeah, but Tommy’s all bark and no bite. Us, on the other hand…” Techno flips his knife. “We’ve got a bit more walk to back up our talk.”

“What is with you and the metaphors?”

Techno gives Wilbur a look. The ensuing silence is very awkward.

Phil clears his throat. “So Techno, you’re in favor of running, and Will, you’re in favor of talking to them. Do I have that right?” They nod. “And I’m the deciding vote.” Back to square one.

The choice is quickly made for them, though, when they spot three men trudging through the overgrown garden.

“Shit.”

Phil hands Tommy to Wilbur. “Gather the kids and take them upstairs. Lock yourselves in a room. We’ll come for you in a bit.” Wilbur nods and does exactly that.

Once Will and the kids are gone, Phil turns to Techno. “I’ll do the talking. You be intimidating.”

“Aren’t I always?”

They head outside, and a man wearing mostly green nods in their direction. “Is one of you Phil?”

Phil crosses his arms. “What’s it to you?”

The man raises his arms as if in surrender. “Just asking. Tommy talked very highly of someone named Phil.”

Techno and Phil exchange a look, and they collectively make a decision. Phil turns back to the three men. “I’m Phil. And who might you be?”

The man smiles. It’s devoid of warmth. “Dr. Dream Miller. I believe you’ve taken up residence in my house.”

The name triggers something, a vague snatch of recognition tainted with darkness. Phil’s not sure what it is.

Then some synapses connect, and in a flash, he knows. He remembers.

“This study was led by Dr. Dream Miller and his contributors, Dr. George Taylor and Dr. Sapnap Williams.”

Oh fuck no.

Chapter Text

The way Techno tenses behind him alerts Phil to the fact that he knows it too.

The authors of that study, the ones who put Ranboo and far too many other kids through absolute hell, the ones who didn’t think twice about the death of some of those kids - Phil and Techno stand not a yard away from them, yet it feels both too close and not close enough. Phil wants to throttle them, but he also wants to find the kids and run.

Phil fights to keep his face neutral. If he or Techno give away any of their true feelings, this whole situation could devolve real quick. And as much as Phil wants to make these bitches suffer for what they did, his priority has to be getting everyone out of here quickly and safely.

Revenge can come later.

Phil tightens his ponytail, steels his nerves, and speaks through the most genuine smile he can manage. “What brings you back home? From the looks of things the inside hasn’t been touched in a while.”

Dream’s eyes narrow ever so slightly. “My colleagues and I were… on a business trip when everything happened. We decided to travel back here because I had a feeling my house would be safe.”

Phil nods tersely, and silence falls upon them all.

Techno leans down to whisper to Phil. “This is awkward. Can we go back inside?”

“The fact that it’s awkward is what’s getting you?” Phil whispers back.

“Yes.”

Oh Techno, you socially anxious dumbass.

Phil clears his throat and addresses the shit scientists again. “We can clear out. We just needed a place to stay for a couple days.”

One of the guys standing next to Dream seems quite relieved. “We would really appreciate that.” Dream gives him a look, and an immense amount of tension enters the air.

Phil grabs Techno’s arm. “We’ll just grab our stuff and go.”

They hurry inside, heading right to the kitchen.

Phil finally lets go of Techno, who storms over to the island in the center of the room and leans against it.

They take a moment to let it all sink in. Then Techno picks up one of the few unbroken glasses and hurls it against the wall.

“What the hell, Techno? If Wilbur and the kids hear that, what the fuck will they think?”

Techno turns to Phil, barely contained rage in his eyes. “They’re the ones who hurt Ranboo.”

Phil feels a similar anger rising within himself. “I know, ok? You think I’m not just as mad as you are?”

“I wanna kill ‘em.”

“So do I. But that cannot be the priority right now! We need to leave, like, yesterday. If they see Ranboo, who knows what they might do?”

“I don’t think I’ll be able to hold back if I have to talk to them again.”

“Then don’t. Get Will and the kids out of here. Go full stealth mode, y’know? Don’t be seen. And take some deep breaths, mate. You look like you’re about to pop a blood vessel.”

“Whatever.”

Techno stomps off. Hopefully he won’t scare the little ones.

Phil looks around the room, and his eyes land on the pile of papers on the counter. He walks over to them.

They’re probably here for these.

He picks up the paper on top.

The title reads: “A Complete Guide on ASWL.”

And then Phil starts to think about the information contained in all these papers. “A Complete Guide on ASWL” is something that could greatly benefit them in the long term. If they’re really gonna survive in an apocalypse with three kids in tow, every crumb of knowledge is worth it.

Phil opens his bag and stuffs all the papers inside. Maybe he’ll regret stealing a bunch of top secret studies at a later date, but he also thinks it will piss off Dream and his goons, and that is motivation enough.

He closes the bag and runs off to find the others.

Dream is impatient.

His foot taps a steady rhythm against the ground. His hand twitches, eager to grab a knife and stab some motherfucker.

But he can’t do that. Murdering two grown adults and a little kid is just inconvenient. Plus, Sapnap and George might have a problem with all that killing. They were always more… particular about morality than Dream was.

George gives him a sidelong glance. “Can we go in yet? It’s hot out here.”

Sapnap scoffs. “It’s not gonna be any better in the house! You think the A/C still works?”

“At least there’s shade in there!”

“Don’t get your hopes up, Georgie. It’ll be even stuffier inside, I promise.”

Dream stamps his foot. “Will you two shut up? I’m not in the mood for bickering.”

The other two grumble, but they do shut up.

There’s quiet for a while, giving Dream a chance to think this through. The plan is simple. Once these people clear out they’ll get back to work and find a cure.

Hopefully these people didn’t find the studies sitting on the kitchen counter.

The sound of shuffling from one of the back doors catches all their attention. They peer around one of the corners of the house and see Phil, his pink-haired bodyguard, a brunet they’ve never seen, and one, two, three kids. Huh. This group is certainly weird. But whatever. They’ll leave and Dream won’t have to worry about them ever again.

Sapnap inhales sharply and pulls on Dream’s sleeve. “Look at the kid Phil’s holding.”

Dream looks.

And his blood begins to boil.

Black and white hair. Half-and-half, the staff nicknamed him. Dream could never forget him. The little shit that’s responsible for all of this, for the implosion of Dream’s career, for the destruction of his life’s work; he’s right there.

Dream did say he wouldn’t murder anyone, but…

Chapter Text

As of late, everything has been happening with a suddenness that Techno does not enjoy.

The apocalypse ripped the world out from under him, and ever since then he’s kept falling. Falling and falling alongside his friends and a few children.

He’s been waiting for the fall to slow, or maybe for someone to catch him. He’s been waiting for some time to process things, a moment to truly, fully relax. Yet a chance to let off steam hasn’t really presented itself, and so ever since society shattered, he’s been holding a lot of his aggression back, especially because he doesn’t want to scare the kids.

But he knows deep down that there’s no one to catch him, nothing to slow the fall. He knows that at some point, he’ll hit the ground, the dam will break, and all his pent up feelings will flood out.

He just didn’t expect it to be this soon.

Techno sees Dream out of the corner of his eye before much happens. He places Tubbo on the ground, swift as a… a cheetah? Hmm, maybe that was a weak metaphor, but Techno’s a little too preoccupied to put energy towards being eloquent.

Ranboo’s cry of alarm at the sight of Dream pushes him to move even faster.

His knife is out in a flash, and a clang cuts through the air as his knife meets Dream’s.

Not today, bitch.

They push against one another for a bit, equally matched in terms of strength. Dream is now wearing a mask that covers the bottom half of his face, and it makes his stare even more intense than it was before.

Dream gives a shaky exhale. “Let me through.”

“Huh, let me think about that.” Techno pushes Dream back slightly to emphasize his point. “No.”

Techno senses Phil moving slightly behind him. “Techno, what do we -”

“Run.”

“What? Techno -”

“All of you! RUN!”

The intensity in his voice, so unlike his usual monotone, is probably what pushes them to move. Techno doesn’t dare take his eyes off Dream, so he only hears the sounds of Tubbo getting picked up and Phil and Wilbur high-tailing it out of there.

Dream tries to fight past Techno, but he ensures that their blades stay locked. Techno will not let him get to Ranboo. Absolutely fucking not.

Dream snarls. “Go after them!”

One of the two guys behind Dream pipes up (Is it Sapnap or George? Not that Techno cares). “After them?”

The other one adds, “What do you mean?”

“Just GO!”

The two shuffle for a moment, then do what Dream tells them to. Techno scoffs internally. Well they don’t seem to think for themselves. Weak minds.

Yet Techno also can’t help but be thankful for their exit. Now it’s just him and Dream. No more distractions.

Techno finally breaks the contact between their blades, and swipes a shortsword from its place at Dream’s hip. They leap back, reassessing things. Techno pockets his knife and examines his new blade. It’s balanced fairly well, and it cuts through the air with deadly speed.

He smirks. “Nice sword.”

Dream casts aside his own knife and pulls out another sword, twin to the one Techno now holds.

“Alright, Bubblegum, come at me.”

“Bubblegum? Now that’s one I’ve never heard before.”

They launch at each other again. Techno swings his blade with intent to cut into Dream’s shoulder. Dream blocks with ease. Alright. This guy is a damn good fighter for a scientist. What’s his deal?

They trade more blows. Neither sustains any injuries at first. Frustration begins to build in Techno. Why the hell can’t he get an opening?

“Is it dyed?” Dream snickers between clangs.

Techno feints left. “What?”

Dream anticipates the move and blocks his swing. “Your hair.”

“What if it isn’t?”

“Then I’d love to get you in my lab.”

“Eww. Bad move to flirt with your opponent.”

Dream snarls for the second time. Techno puts on a grin that he knows will piss Dream off even more.

Finally, finally, Techno gets a hit. It’s a shallow cut, maybe four inches in length and running along Dream’s left arm. Eh, not up to his usual standard. But hey, it’s something.

Dream staggers back slightly, examining the wound. Techno doesn’t give him the chance to breathe, though, advancing quickly and pushing him back into the wall of the house. Once he hits the wall Dream slides down and sits roughly on the ground. His sword falls out of his hand and he gasps, the wind knocked out of him.

Techno places his boot on Dream’s stomach. There’s a moment of reprieve while they stare at each other, breathing hard.

“I read your study. Enthralling, I must say.”

“Glad you liked it,” Dream says between gasps.

Deceptively delicately, Techno places his sword’s tip at Dream’s throat. “It was like those pages were ripped right out of a sci-fi novel. Almost too horrific to be real. Funny how that happens.”

Dream makes a noise. Techno can’t decide if it’s a scoff or a laugh. “Reality inspires fiction.”

Techno digs his sword in a little deeper. Not enough to draw blood, but enough to remind Dream of who’s in charge here. “Kids died under your watch. Don’t you feel any remorse?”

“Oh, please. Remorse wastes time. What I’m after is science, nothing more -'' He coughs. “- nothing less.”

“Science?! The torture of innocent children science to you?”

“I wouldn’t describe it as torture -”

Techno’s fist connects with Dream’s temple. He slumps over, out cold.

Oh.

Techno did not mean to do that.

Well, maybe he meant to do a little damage, but he at least wanted to keep him conscious and get some answers.

But at this point he can’t take things back.

He checks over Dream, ridding him of all his weapons, food, water, and a bottle of pills. He reads the label. Levothyroxine.

Excellent. I have no idea what this could be used for. He pockets it anyway. Maybe it’ll be helpful at some point.

Once he’s satisfied that Dream has been relieved of anything of use, he drags the man - who is frustratingly heavy - into the house, finds the tiniest closet he’s ever seen, and stuffs him in there. The closet door doesn’t lock, so Techno braces a chair against the knob from the other side. Satisfied with his work, Techno does a final, quick sweep of the whole place. Phil already took the studies, so all that’s left of value is just some food. Techno’s already carrying a lot, but he stocks up. You can never be over-prepared.

Now let’s find out where Phil, Wilbur, and the kids went.

Chapter Text

If someone had told Wilbur a year ago that one day he would be in a zombie apocalypse, sprinting away from people potentially trying to kill him while carrying two small children, one of which he was starting to become unreasonably attached to, he would have asked you where you got your weed because you must be on the good stuff.

The truth is truly stranger than fiction.

He’s thankful, at the very least, that he has the luxury of running along a lengthy boulevard. If he was running through forests, or a field, he might be tripping over his feet and that is not something he can afford.

Phil has taken the lead, yelling occasional directions over his shoulder.

“Right at the intersection!”

Unfortunately, it gives their pursuers clues as to where they’re going also, but what are they gonna do? Communicate telepathically?

That would be cool, actually.

Wilbur nearly faceplants while rounding the corner.

“Are you capable of running properly?!” Tommy shrieks.

“Only when you shut up!” Wilbur snaps back

Maybe he should stop thinking about telepathy.

The street they turn onto, North Road if he read the sign correctly, is lined with hedges. The houses behind the fences of greenery are grand, though perhaps not as grand as the one they stayed in last night. It would be picturesque if Wilbur couldn’t hear the incessant pounding of two pairs of feet right behind him.

They shout things, occasionally, like “Stop!” or… well, it’s mostly just “Stop!” Wilbur and Phil’s pursuers are uncreative, apparently.

He’s not sure how long they run for, only that his legs start burning. The road winds right and then a wide left. Then it’s a straightaway for a while. He thinks, maybe, that he and Phil might be able to get away.

Why is it that whenever he gets his hopes up, things immediately go sideways?

Wilbur isn’t able to comprehend what happens at first. One second, Phil’s ahead of him, shouting encouragement. The next, he’s crying in pain, falling to the pavement.

Ranboo screams as Phil goes down. It’s a sound that cuts Wilbur to the bone.

He hears a whoop of victory behind him.

Oh, absolutely fuck those guys.

Will slows himself down as best he can, skidding and slipping until he’s kneeling next to Phil. He lets Tubbo and Tommy go, and they huddle on the ground, trying to assess Ranboo’s condition.

He puts a hand on Phil’s shoulder. “Phil. What’s wrong? What happened?”

Phil grunts in pain. “My -” He winces. “- leg.”

Wilbur doesn’t have to look very far to see what Phil’s talking about. A knife, which must have been thrown by one of their pursuers, is embedded in Phil’s left calf.

Will stares at the injury for a solid thirty seconds.

What… what do I do?

Blood swiftly trickles out of the wound, coating Wilbur’s hands and matching the erratic pace of his heart.

This is totally out of my league.

Wilbur’s never been great with injuries or whatever. He tries to leave it to the more prepared people - the doctors, the EMTs, and what have you.

So he just stares, frozen with indecision.

“Hey! Did you hear me? Get up.”

Wilbur comes out of his reverie with a start, looking up to see a guy with a close-cropped beard pointing yet another knife in his face. Wilbur decides at this moment that he’s seen enough knives to last a lifetime.

“Are you stupid? Get up!”

Wilbur pulls himself to his feet. The guy keeps pointing the knife at him.

Will glances down at the kids. Tommy has an arm around Ranboo and seems to be trying to soothe him with quick whispers. Tubbo stands protectively in front of them, giving one of his famous staredowns to the guy wearing a blue shirt.

Wilbur would never admit it to anyone, but the way the kids instinctively shield each other gives him a renewed sense of hope. After all this desperation and fear, it’s refreshing.

The guy with the beard clears his throat. “Where’d you get that kid?”

“Which one?” Phil asks through gritted teeth.

“Half-and-half,” Bearded Asshole responds.

“My name Ranboo!” Ranboo says defiantly.

The Bitch with a Beard gives Ranboo a withering look. “You wanna test me kid? ‘Cause I’m not in the mood.”

Maybe it’s the knife, maybe it’s that look, or maybe it’s just his tone of voice, but tears well up in Ranboo’s eyes almost instantly.

The fury Wilbur feels is sudden and overpowering.

It feels as if someone lit a flame beneath his skin. His concern for Phil’s - or even his own - wellbeing is completely wiped from his mind. He can only form one coherent thought:

He’ll pay for that.

Wilbur’s never blacked out from anger before, so it’s a bit shocking when one second, he’s standing, under threat of Beard’s knife, and the next, he’s raining down blows, the knife nowhere in sight.

He vaguely registers the other guy, the one wearing blue, is trying to pull him off of Beard. Someone is shouting. But Wilbur is so focused on making this bitch pay that he doesn’t spare any of it a thought.

He’s not infallible, though, and Blue Man Group Reject manages to kick him in the stomach. All the breath rushes out of Wilbur’s body, and he rolls over onto the ground, gasping like a fish out of water.

“Wilby!” One of the kids (Ranboo? Or was it Tommy? Or Tubbo? Wilbur can’t process it well enough) cries out.

Phil’s deeper tones ring out in a gasp of pain, and suddenly Blue Man puts a foot on Wilbur’s stomach, knocking what little breath he was able to regain right back out again.

Wilbur’s vision swims. Is he crying? Or are his eyes unable to focus because so little oxygen is making its way to his brain? He strains against the weight of the man above him. Inhaling is an incredible struggle, a battle that Wilbur never knew to be so difficult. On top of the blurriness, he’s starting to see spots.

“Sapnap doesn’t deserve to take shit from anyone, least of all you,” Blue Man spits. Is that a knife he’s holding? Wilbur’s vision is so fucked he can’t even tell.

And then all at once the weight disappears. Wilbur takes in great lungfuls of air. For a while, he can do nothing but inhale, exhale, and wait for the ringing in his ears to go away and for his field of vision to clear. After what seems like ages, an unfamiliar face appears, leaning over him.

“Are you alright?”

Wilbur coughs. “Who are you?” he croaks.

“You can call me Niki.”

Chapter Text

Niki had gotten a bad vibe from SMP Tech ever since she started working there. Something about the way Dr. Dream Miller ordered people around and had public temper tantrums when things didn’t go exactly the way he wanted… it rubbed her the wrong way. She’d met a lot of men in STEM who expected the world to be handed to them on a silver platter, but Dream was on a whole other level.

So seeing the two people who enabled his bullshit the most holding some kids and two injured guys at knifepoint was, unfortunately, not a huge surprise.

After ensuring that George wouldn’t be getting up for a while, she helps the guy with askew glasses to sit up. He coughs and wheezes. Damn. George really did a number on him.

“How are you feeling? Can you breathe ok?”

He waves her off. “Help Phil first.”

Phil? Which one is that? From what Niki can tell, all of them are male. “Phil” could be any of them.

The other adult lifts himself up on his elbows. “Hey, mate. What d’you know about stab wounds?”

Niki is going to assume that is Phil.

She shrugs. “Not much, but I’ll see what I can do.”

Niki is a medical doctor, yes, but she specializes in virology. Treating wounds beyond little cuts or scrapes is kind of beyond her capabilities.

But she likes this Phil guy already - something about his small smile despite his likely very painful injury.

Niki doesn’t get too close to him, though. Some little ones get in the way.

One of whom she recognized.

“Ranboo?”

His face, once so downtrodden, lights up. “Niki!”

She kneels down and he leaps into her open arms.

She chuckles. “Hey there, little guy.”

The feeling of hugging him close… a memory blindsides her.

“Let’s see how much you’ve grown, little guy.”

Ranboo claps his hands. “I tall!”

“Well let’s see just how tall.”

He stands up straight against the wall, and Niki has to hold back a laugh.

She grabs the tape measure and a marker. She makes a mark on the wall and steps back. Ranboo turns around quickly. He points excitedly to the mark.

“See? I tall!!”

“I know! You’re two feet, eight inches now!”

They only get a few moments of joy before Dream busts in the room. Ranboo’s smile disappears.

“I need the kid.”

“Uh - with all due respect, Dr. Miller, he’s been participating in trials all week. This is his first day off, as it were -”

“Doesn’t matter. Come on, kid, no time to waste.”

Ranboo grabs a fistful of fabric from Niki’s pants. He looks up at her, very clearly upset. She decides to try one more time.

“You’re going to work him to death if you don’t lay off, Dream -”

“It’s Dr. Miller to you,” he says coldly. He walks over and rips Ranboo away from Niki. He starts to cry.

“Doctor!”

“You know, this is why you’re not in charge around here.”

He sweeps out of the room, leaving behind only the echoes of Ranboo’s cries.

She holds Ranboo a little tighter.

“How’ve you been?”

“Good! Wanna meet my friends?”

“Of course!”

Ranboo hops out of her arms and runs back to the two other kids.

“This Tom, and this Tub.”

Tom steps forward. “Hello, I am The Great Tommy, and these are my associates, Tubbo, Wilbur, and Phil. And also Ranboo. But I think you know him already.”

“Well, Tommy, I’m Niki, and I don’t have any associates at the moment. Do you mind if I check on Phil?”

Tubbo steps up. “What are you going to do?”

“Um… take a look at his wound and hopefully treat it. Y’know, clean it, bandage it.”

Tubbo and Tommy look at each other. They have a silent conversation and eventually turn back to Niki.

Tubbo narrows his eyes. “You can fix Phil, but I’m gonna oversee it.”

Niki fights back a grin. “Sounds good to me.”

Wilbur coughs again. “Hurry up, will you?”

Niki leans over Phil and takes in the injury. It’s bleeding, but it’s not the worst she’s ever seen. Although, she has to wonder…

“Why did you remove the knife? The blade probably did some more damage on its way out.”

“I didn’t remove it, that one did.” Phil points to George’s unconscious form.

Niki sighs. “Of course George did that. Ok, I don’t have much to work with, and I definitely don’t have any anesthesia, so this is really gonna hurt.”

Ranboo toddles up to Phil. “I hold your hand?”

Phil smiles. “I’d appreciate that.”

Another memory hits Niki.

“I’m sorry, little guy, but we have to do this.”

“I don’t wanna!”

“I know. I don’t like getting my flu shot either.”

“Then don’t!”

“Listen, if you relax and sit still, it’ll be over really soon.”

Ranboo gasps. “Really?”

“Yup. You might feel a teeny, tiny prick, but other than that, it’ll feel like nothing. If you don’t relax and keep squirming, though, it’ll hurt.”

Ranboo instantly stills. “You hold my hand?”

“Anything for you, little guy.”

She’s supposed to use both hands when administering a vaccine, but she can’t help indulging this adorable one.

Niki flicks the needle, and just like she promised, it’s over in two seconds. She lets go of Ranboo’s hand and grabs a Wonder Woman Band-Aid, placing it over the miniscule puncture wound.

Ranboo looks up in confusion. “It over?”

“It sure is. Like I said, it’s fast if you stay still. Who did your shots last time?”

“Dr. Williams.”

Oh shit. Sapnap probably made him miserable.

Ranboo looks at his arm. “Wonder Woman?!”

Niki grins. “Didn’t you say that she’s your favorite superhero?”

“Yeah!”

Niki takes her time dressing Phil’s wound. Tubbo observes carefully, although Niki’s not sure if he even knows what she’s doing. Once she’s finished, she leans back and observes her work. It’s not a perfect job, and she’d like to disinfect it more, but she’ll take what she can get.

“How do you feel now?”

Phil pushes himself into a sitting position, never letting go of Ranboo’s hand. “A little better. I don’t know if I could walk on this leg, though.”

“You shouldn’t put weight on it. Not if you can avoid it, at least. Now, Wilbur… are you still having trouble breathing?”

“Not really.” He wheezes. “Well, sorta.”

“There’s not much I can do, to be honest. You might have a bruised or cracked rib, and you’ll just have to let that heal on its own.”

Wilbur exhales, frustration evident. “Fine.”

Tubbo stares Niki down. “Ok. We appreciate your help, but who are you, anyway?”

Tommy nods. “Yeah, where’d you come from?”

Ranboo stamps his foot. “She Niki! She nice.”

“How do you know her, mate?” Phil interjects.

“She help in permint.”

This statement sets Phil and Wilbur on edge. Niki raises her arms in surrender. How they know what went on during those studies, she isn’t sure, but now is not the time to question that.

“I didn’t have any power to change anything! I tried to make things as bearable for Ranboo and all the other kids as possible!”

“Why didn’t you just quit?” Wilbur rasps.

“And leave the kids alone? Hell no. Besides, if I quit, they would’ve just replaced me, and who knows if that person would’ve cared half as much as I do!”

Niki claps a hand over her mouth. God knows how many zombies she attracted with that little outburst.

There’s silence as this statement is absorbed. At the very least she has to hope that they’ll trust her now. They’re a charming little group.

Besides, any enemies of Dream and his idiots-in-waiting are friends of Niki’s.

All at once, there’s the distant sound of someone jogging. Niki tenses. It’s not a zombie, because zombies don’t jog, but other humans are just as (if not more) dangerous nowadays.

“Could that be Techno?” she hears Phil say from behind her.

“Either that or it’s Dream.” Wilbur responds.

Niki feels her chest tighten.

A voice calls from the same direction as the footsteps. “Phil? Wilbur? Little gremlins? Where’d you go?”

Niki whips her head, but Phil is smiling.

“That’s Techno alright.” He raises his voice. “We’re over here! And we got a new friend!”

A slight blush creeps onto Niki’s cheeks. To have them trust her so quickly… goodness, it’s more than she could’ve ever hoped for.

Techno appears around the bend. His muscular form and the fact that he’s dual wielding short swords creates an intimidating silhouette.

As he gets closer, it’s clear he’s wary of Niki. With any luck Phil’s use of the word “friend” will allow her to avoid an attack.

Techno gestures toward her. “What happened here? And who are you?”

“I’m Niki Wagner. A virologist. I saw your friends being attacked by some of my former coworkers and figured I’d intervene.”

Techno nods tersely. “Thanks.”

Tommy pokes her leg. “What’s that?”

“What’s what?”

“A virlol - uh, a virol -”

“A virologist?”

“Yeah. What’s that?”

“I study viruses.”

Techno cocks an eyebrow. “Do you happen to know anything about ASWL?”

“It’s what I specialize in. I’m assuming you’ll find that helpful.”

Techno nods again, though some of the tension has left the movement. Good, he’s warming up to me.

Phil pipes up from behind. “Hey, guys, can we talk about this later?”

“What? Why?”

Phil points. “We have company.”

Niki looks in the direction Phil’s pointing, and, sure enough, there’s a group of four zombies stumbling towards them.

Oh, dammit. I knew all that yelling was going to cause us problems.

Chapter Text

What the hell is taking Niki so long?

Puffy’s been waiting for almost three hours now, if the progression of the sun is anything to go by. Niki was supposed to be back an hour ago. It was supposed to be just a simple patrol - get the lay of the land, see if Dream’s house was clear, figure out how many of the infected were hanging around.

But Niki has been gone for far longer than expected, and Puffy’s on edge.

She bites at her nails, staring out into the trees and hoping, praying for a glimpse of bright pink hair.

She doesn’t get what she’s hoping for.

Puffy looks at her nails and thinks back to a day which, though it seems like an age away, could have only been a few months ago.

“You’re gonna bite those things to stubs!”

Puffy shrugs. “I don’t care what my nails look like.”

Niki gasps. “Well you should! How are you gonna make the ladies swoon with those jagged things?”

They laugh. It’s comfortable in the break room, something which cannot be said about the rest of SMP Tech. Honestly, Puffy’s considering quitting just about a hundred times, but whenever she spends her lunch with Niki or Bad or any of the other kind people who work here, she simply can’t bring herself to leave.

Dream may be a bitch, she thinks. But at least I have friends around here.

She swore that day to stop biting her nails, and she broke the habit for a while.

Nowadays she’s more concerned with survival than how her cuticles look.

Puffy scans the trees for the millionth time. Seriously, where the fuck is Niki? If she ever thought a patrol would take longer than usual, she’d let Puffy know before she left. And all Niki had said before she went off this time was that she hoped she wouldn’t see Dream.

The thought makes her stomach drop. What if Niki had run into Dream? He was ruthless before shit hit the fan but then he was still bound by the basic rules of society and decorum.

Something tells Puffy that without laws, Dream will be vicious.

She takes her gun out of its holster and fiddles with the trigger. What she wouldn’t give to put a bullet through Dream’s skull. The shit he did, the people - the kids - he hurt… it makes Puffy wanna scream.

She decides to give Niki a half hour. If she doesn’t show up after that, then Puffy will go looking.

She doesn’t have to wait that long, though.

About fifteen minutes later, Puffy hears distant yelling. It’s too far away to make out any distinct words, but she’d recognize that timbre anywhere.

Niki’s in trouble.

Puffy takes off through the woods, leaping over broken branches and large stones, sending fallen leaves floating in the breeze, their lazy flight oxymoronic to Puffy’s frantic pace. Squirrels and other forest critters scatter ahead of her, afraid of how she barrels through the greenery.

The trees get thicker as she gets closer to Clifton, and it’s right before she has to start climbing uphill that she sees the zombie.

Puffy was surprised that she hadn’t encountered one yet, but she wasn’t any less prepared.

The infected starts to lurch toward her on unsteady legs. She grabs her gun but doesn’t turn off the safety - no use in firing and having the sound attract even more of the undead. Puffy whips the pistol at the zombie’s head. It goes down in two seconds. She doesn’t stick around, though, snatching up her pistol and continuing her mad dash through the woods.

The steep uphill section of this journey will be undoubtedly the hardest. It’s practically vertical, but that won’t stop Puffy.

She hears over the sounds of her boots crunching another voice, still muted but more distinct since she’s gotten much closer.

“Phil? Wilbur? Little gremlins? Where’d you go?”

Puffy does not have the time to puzzle out what that means, but she can tell that this voice is most certainly not Niki. It’s too deep, too layered with vocal fry.

She keeps climbing.

“We’re over here! And we got a new friend!”

A new - what?

This third voice is again different, still too deep to be Niki. Puffy can’t help but be reminded of her, though. Like Niki’s, this voice has an undercurrent of amusement running through it, a laughter just waiting to bubble up to the surface.

For the briefest of moments, Puffy wonders whether Niki’s in any danger. If she’s nearby someone with so much mirth, could she really be hurt?

Then Puffy remembers that she hasn’t heard Niki's voice in a while, and that pushes her back to full speed.

All too soon Puffy crests the hill and bursts forth from the treeline, gun raised (with the safety off, this time). She sweeps the area with her gaze, and several images are quickly processed.

First, in front of her, there are two men on the ground. They appear to be unconscious. To her right, Niki is standing - Thank God she’s ok - and holding something which Puffy can’t make out because of the angle. Further back there’s three men, one leaning quite heavily on another. Next to the men are two kids, five or six by the looks of them, who are gazing up at Puffy in absolute fear.

And to her left there are four zombies.

Puffy doesn’t even hesitate. It only takes her four shots.

She turns her pistol back to the men near Niki.

“Who are you?”

Niki steps forward. “Puffy, Puffy, relax. It’s ok. I’m fine. Look who I found.”

Puffy opens her mouth to argue, but then she notices what Niki is holding. Or rather, who.

Her gun lowers. The safety clicks on.

A boy she never thought she’d see again smiles wide. “Puffy!!”

Puffy allows herself a little grin.

It takes some explaining, but they manage to convince them to come back to their camp. Wilbur, the guy who’s holding the hands of the two older kids, seems very suspicious of both her and Niki, but he doesn’t say anything.

When they make it back to camp, the little fire Puffy had going has completely burnt itself out. Its ashes smolder, and Puffy chastises herself for not taking the time to put it out. She could’ve started a goddamn forest fire, and that is the last thing they need right now.

They settle around a newly constructed fire.

Phil, the guy with the injured leg, looks at Puffy with a tired smile. “So. What brings you and Niki here?”

Puffy sighs. Time to explain for the next three hours.

Chapter Text

Phil leans his head against the rough bark of the hollow log they found. In front of him, the light from the fire flickers hungrily, painting long, haunting shadows across the forest floor. The vague scent of burning wood ghosts his nostrils. Behind him, he can hear the muffled crunching of Puffy walking the perimeter of their camp, keeping watch. The faint taste of a chocolate granola bar (a truly gourmet dinner) lingers on his tongue.

He’s tried to sleep, but the pain from his injury is keeping him up.

It’s not surprising, of course. He was knifed in the leg only six hours ago, and it’s not like they have any anesthesia. But sleep would probably help the healing process, wouldn’t it?

The human body defies understanding, he thinks.

The usual suspects for insomnia are, unlike Phil, dead asleep. Two feet to his left is Techno, passed out on his back with Ranboo sprawled across his chest and Tubbo and Tommy resting their heads on his legs. Wilbur is snoring lightly, lying face down only a breath away from Techno and the kids.

How they all manage to sleep like that Phil will never know.

Phil’s gaze flits over to Niki. She lies on the other side of the fire, curled in the fetal position with a furrowed brow. If Phil had to guess, he’d say she’s having a nightmare. Another unsurprising development, considering the world they live in now. At least she can wake up from that nightmare.

Phil adjusts his position for what feels like the millionth time. Puffy and Niki insisted that he had to sit like this so as to not aggravate his wound. Trading blood loss for discomfort.

Phil closes his eyes. Can he sleep? Should he even try? He misses the bed in Dream’s house. Even though he hates the man who owned the place, Phil will admit that he knew how to pick good mattresses.

His musings are interrupted by an unnatural-sounding crack of a branch somewhere nearby.

Phil’s eyes fly open. The steady beat of Puffy’s crunching footsteps comes to a stop right behind him.

“What was that?” Phil whispers.

Puffy gasps. “Dear God, Phil, don’t scare me like that. I thought you were asleep.”

“Sorry. But do you know what that was?”

“Not at all.” Phil hears the click of Puffy’s gun’s safety turning off. “I’m gonna go investigate.”

Phil tightens his ponytail. “I’m coming with you.”

“What? No. You’re incapacitated.”

“That’s what you think.”

“You are not walking unassisted on that leg.”

“Then assist me! It shouldn’t be that hard.”

“I can’t have you leaning on me and be able to shoot straight at the same time!”

“So give me the gun.”

“Ha ha. No way in hell.”

“Then I will walk unassisted on my leg.” Phil tries to stand and falls painfully on his ass.

Puffy chuckles. “Actually, you know what? Try and follow me. I’d like to see that again.”

Phil rolls his eyes, but there’s no real malice behind it. “Fine. I’ll keep watch over the camp while you’re gone.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t die.”

“I’ll try not to.”

Puffy walks towards where the sound of the cracking branch came from, her gun raised.

She is terrifying. But like, in a good way.

Phil sits up straighter, scanning the surrounding trees for any threats. Nothing so far.

Five minutes later, he hears the sounds of a scuffle, and Puffy emerges from the trees, dragging someone along. Her gun is at their temple. Oh, shit.

“Puffy -”

“I found him creeping around. Wake the others.”

Phil wants to object. The way Puffy is treating this random person… it’s way more violent than he’d like. Then again, he’s not really the best judge of how to treat strangers in the zombie apocalypse. If Phil had his way, he’d be making friends with everyone they came across.

He drags himself over to Wilbur and shakes him awake.

Wilbur forgot to take his glasses off before falling asleep, and now they lay askew across his forehead. “What -”

“Wake up Niki and Techno. Not the kids, if you can avoid it.”

“How can I wake Techno without waking the kids? They’re using him as a big, dumb pillow. Seriously, what’s going on?”

“Puffy found someone wandering around nearby.”

Wilbur’s eyes widen. “Oh.”

“Yeah. I’d rather the kids stay asleep for this.”

Wilbur nods, and performs a careful extraction of the kids, placing each one gently on the ground. Then he shakes Techno.

“You better have a damn good reason -”

“Puffy found someone wandering and she brought him back.”

Techno is on his feet in a blink, drawing one of the cool shortswords he stole from Dream. Wilbur shakes his head with slight amusement and wakes Niki.

The man Puffy holds has his face buried deep in a black hoodie, and even with the light from the fire, Phil cannot for the life of him make out any distinct features. He doesn’t look like Dream or George or Sapnap, and he’s definitely dressed differently than any of them were, but Phil can’t be sure.

Niki and Techno approach Puffy and the stranger. Wilbur hangs back, hovering near the kids. Thankfully, they’re all still fast asleep. Hopefully they will stay like that.

There’s a hushed conversation between Puffy, Niki, and Techno that Phil isn’t privy to, but judging from the Techno’s expression, it’s not going the way he wants.

Techno sighs dramatically and sheaths his sword. And then he grabs the stranger’s hoodie and pulls it off.

Phil doesn’t recognize the guy at all, but apparently Puffy and Niki do, because they stumble back. Puffy’s gun lowers and the safety clicks on. Wilbur and Phil exchange a bewildered look.

Puffy regains her ability to speak and waves her hand. “Techno, let him go.”

Techno, who is still gripping pretty hard onto the guy’s hoodie, looks just as confused as Phil feels. “What? Why are you two acting like this?”

Niki clears her throat. “We know him. He worked with us on the study.”

“He’s one of the good ones,” Puffy cuts in.

Techno reluctantly lets go after a moment of consideration. The stranger (though apparently not a stranger to Niki and Puffy) takes a gulping breath.

Wilbur stands. “Niki, Puffy - who is this guy?”

“Bad. Puffy and I have been trying to meet up with him ever since this all went down.”

Chapter Text

Bad’s hands shake slightly as he sits on the log which Phil still leans on. Phil can’t blame him. Having a loaded gun to your head is a most unpleasant experience. Not that Phil would know.

Puffy hands Bad a granola bar and walks to the other side of the fire. She plops down next to Niki and begins to bite at her nails.

Niki tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “So - Bad. How are you?”

Bad huffs. “Honestly? A little shaken.”

“Sorry,” Puffy mumbles.

“It’s alright. I mean, things are different now. No harm in being cautious. But I have to ask… who are your friends?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Phil notices Wilbur and Techno stiffen. Always anxious, aren’t they?

“I’m Phil. Those two are Wilbur and Techno.”

Bad leans forward. “What about the kids?”

“None of your business,” Wilbur cuts in. At the same time, Techno not so subtly shifts to put himself in between Bad and the pile of tiny sleeping humans.

Bad raises his hands in surrender. “Just wondering. How’d you all meet?”

“Some dumbasses decided to try and fuck with us,” Wilbur says. “Niki and Puffy helped us. Now we’re here.”

“Any other questions?” Techno hisses.

Bad tenses. “No, just… I’d rather you not swear around me.”

Wilbur snorts. “Really? It’s a fucking zombie apocalypse and you’re concerned about my language?”

Bad’s arms cross. “If you must know -”

But before he can continue, Ranboo decides to stir. Techno immediately hugs him close, eying Bad with continued suspicion. Bad blinks quickly a few times, then turns to Niki and Puffy. “Is that who I think it is?”

Niki smiles. “Yeah. Can’t believe we found Ranboo again after all this time.”

Phil starts to zone out of the conversation at this point. He can’t help it - he’s tired as all hell, and the combination of melatonin and adrenaline coursing through his veins makes him want to run around and pass the fuck out at the same time.

His muddled brain chooses to focus on the most minute details of his surroundings. The way Puffy’s eyes light up when Ranboo babbles something; how Wilbur is slowly starting to relax; Techno’s smile breaking through his cool facade in short bursts; how Niki leans slightly forward when she talks, almost like she’s on the cusp of taking flight.

But the person he studies most is Bad. Because as much as Puffy and Niki insist that he’s trustworthy, and as much as Wilbur and Techno are slowly starting to warm up to him, Phil can’t help but feel as if there’s just something about him. Something off.

Bad keeps glancing toward the trees like he’s expecting something to jump out of the woods. He fidgets often, his leg bouncing, his fingers tapping endlessly on his thigh. Like he’s waiting. Waiting for what?

Phil could chalk this all up to leftover nerves from having a literal gun held to his head. In fact, that’s probably the most logical explanation, and Phil’s never been one to question Occam’s razor. And yet -

“Phil?” Ranboo’s voice slices through his reverie.

“What?”

“You ok? Look tired.”

“I know, Boo. I'm having trouble sleeping.”

Ranboo thinks about this for a minute, his little face all scrunched up as he ponders. Without warning, he breaks from Techno’s loose grip and toddles over to Phil with determination.

Techno’s already halfway to standing. “Ranboo? What are you doing?”

Ranboo doesn’t answer. He makes it to Phil and reaches his hand up to Phil’s eyes, closing them.

“There! Now sleep.”

Phil struggles to keep his laughter under control. “Thanks, mate.”

“You welcome!”

Phil’s eyes are closed, but he can practically see the way Ranboo proudly marches back to Techno. Phil leans back against the log.

“You gonna open your eyes?” he hears Puffy say.

“Pshhh. That’s some magic that Ranboo just performed. Phil’s eyes won’t open until he wakes up. Can’t you see he’s asleep?” Techno answers. He sounds so serious, but Phil’s known him long enough, and he detects the traces of humor buried beneath layers of solemnity.

Phil falls asleep to the gentle lull of conversation. Right before he slips into oblivion, a stray thought floats through his mind.

Why was Bad nearby at the same time Dream was?

They pass the night with quiet discussion. Any time the laughter rings out too much, or the volume gets a bit too high, silence immediately descends. Furtive looks to the trees ensue, hands on weapons, breathing rates increasing. The children, who are eventually all awoken, giggle along until they’re quickly shushed. The occasional stray zombie wanders through, but it’s quickly put down.

A few miles away, Dream comes to.

Chapter Text

It’s dark in this closet. Stuffy.

Dream can barely stand up straight. With every little movement he feels the top of his head brush the ceiling. He can’t extend his arms in either direction.

To make matters worse, he can’t see. There’s no light except a sliver at the bottom of the door, but it’s so minimal that it doesn’t achieve much but remind him of how small this space is.

It took him a few minutes to orient himself. One second, he was on the ground with a sword to his neck and a foot on his stomach, and next, he’s…

This closet is really small.

Like, really, really small.

Dream’s breaths come a lot faster.

He fumbles for the handle, all other thoughts wiped out of his head. He needs to get out, get out, get out right now because if I don’t I think I’ll pass out and I’ve already done enough of that today.

The handle turns and he feels a rush of relief.

Except the door won’t open more than a few centimeters.

The panic within him renews, doubles, triples, and suddenly Dream can feel the walls pressing in. He pushes against the door frantically, bracing against the wall which seems to be growing closer by the minute.

There’s more light now, so at least he can see some things. Like the wall. He can see the wall and he swears it wasn’t that close before, right? If he doesn’t get this door open right this second he’s going to be crushed.

“HELP!”

His voice is raw and scratchy. But the fear in his tone is palpable.

He shoves at the door yet again, hearing something scrape just outside. But the door still won’t budge.

The tears come quicker than Dream anticipated. They burn on the way down his face.

He bangs on the door, breathing becoming even more erratic and heart beating quicker than that time George had that accident in the lab, the one that sliced his head open.

“Dream?! Where are you?”

George’s voice makes the tears fall even faster. He’s not at all embarrassed though, he just wants to get the fuck out.

“Here! I’m in here!”

Dream hears George’s quick, light footsteps getting closer.

“Oh my God.”

George does something, and then the door is open all the way and Dream is falling out, on his hands and knees and shielding his eyes from the bright light. His arm burns and his head throbs, but it’s ok because he’s out.

George kneels down next to Dream’s head. “Are you ok? What the hell happened?”

Dream gasps, hiccups, then keeps on crying.

“Oh shit. Fuck. Ok, lemme just… SAPNAP! Get your arse in here!”

Sapnap’s heavy footfalls approach. “What - oh shit. Fuck.”

“Yeah. That guy with the pink hair must’ve trapped him in there.”

It takes a while to coax Dream into a chair. He kinda wants to stay on the floor, but they talk him into moving. Dream hasn’t had a panic attack since ASWL started running amok, but his friends remember how to help him quite well.

They talk in quiet voices about mundane things, Dream listens without really listening. His heartbeat slows to a more normal pace; breathing returns to its usual rate. All at once, the cotton stuffing his ears evaporates, and the volume of the world comes back. He catches the end of Sapnap’s statement.

“- am not!”

George scoffs. “Yes, you are! Need I remind you of the time when Karl -”

“Oh, would you look at that, Dream’s feeling better!” Sapnap says a little too quickly, cheeks dusted with blush. “Let’s pay attention to him.”

George places a hand on Dream’s knee. “You ok?”

Dream clears his throat. “I will be.” He looks around. “So, I’m assuming you lost the brat.”

Sapnap sighs. “We chased them, and we damn near had him too. But then Niki of all people jumped out of nowhere and knocked us out!”

“Niki? What the hell is she doing around here?”

George rolls his eyes. “Who knows? By the time we woke up, they were all gone. Figured we’d come find you to regroup.” He glances worriedly at Dream’s hands, which still shake. “Glad we did.”

“Yeah.”

Quiet descends.

After a moment, Dream notices that there’s some sort of tension in the air. Between George and Sapnap a silent battle rages. Dream knows the signs all too well. They discussed something when he was out, and they’re debating as to whether to tell him. Dream lets them fight it out for a minute, but it gets boring real quick.

“What is it?”

You’d have thought a gunshot went off with the way Sapnap and George snap to attention. Sapnap stares forcefully at the floor. “It’s noth -”

“Don’t tell me it’s nothing. That’s bullshit and you know it. What did you talk about?”

George fiddles with his shirtsleeve. “Well, Sapnap and I were thinking -” Sapnap gives George a hard look. “- I mean, I was thinking about how… Dream, is it really worth it to chase after Ranboo? I -”

Dream stands suddenly. “Really, George?”

Sapnap huffs. “I knew we shouldn’t have said anything.”

“That little shit tore my career to pieces and you want me to just let him go? He was the best subject we ever had! My experiments aren’t finished. I have to make that kid pay!”

George stands. “Don’t you dare yell at me. I’ve stuck with you through thick and thin - through a goddamn zombie apocalypse! - and I won’t take this. That kid is two years old! He didn’t know what he was doing!”

Dream scoffs. “Maybe he didn’t really understand the full extent of his actions, but he knew what he was doing would cause me trouble. He had it out for me from day one!”

“Do you hear yourself? This is a toddler you’re talking about!”

“You know as well as I do that that kid is way smarter than anybody gave him credit for.”

“That’s not an excuse! He might’ve caused the outbreak but that doesn’t mean he did it on purpose!”

Dream is about to retort, but he’s cut off by Sapnap standing.

“This is your fault, man. All our faults, really. We didn’t secure the vials of the samples as well as we should have. We got cocky. The kid was just playing around. How was he supposed to know that those vials contained the deadliest virus humanity has ever known? He couldn’t have.”

There’s quiet again. Dream can’t decide if this quiet is better or worse than the last one.

George’s hands go to his pocket. He pats himself down.

“What?”

“Do you have my meds? I forgot to take them this morning.”

“The levothyroxine?” Dream unzips one of his pant pockets. “Yeah, it’s right…”

But the pocket is empty.

“Dream?”

He turns his pockets out. “I swear to God, I had the bottle earlier.”

George poorly conceals his alarm. “Sapnap, do you have it?”

Sapnap does not have it either.

They start to frantically search the house.

Nothing.

Dream knows he had that bottle earlier. There was only one time today when he couldn’t account for its location, and that time was thanks to a certain pink headed fucker.

He had no doubt in his mind; that idiot stole George’s medication. And while going without it for a little bit isn’t life-threatening, Dream knows that if George doesn’t get his meds back soon things will not be good. His blood pressure will start to go out of whack, not to mention the brain fog and muscle weakness. The symptoms of an underactive thyroid are difficult to deal with in normal times, but with the threat of the undead hanging over their heads, Dream knows they can’t afford to have George not at his best.

They regroup in the main kitchen.

“Remind me again why you trashed this room when we were last here?” Sapnap asks dryly.

Dream crosses his arms. “One of the infected was trying to eat me.”

“Yeah, but why did you trash this room and only this room?”

George exhales in frustration. “Can we not do this right now? What’s our plan?”

“Find the man in pink, get back your meds, stab some bitches,” Sapnap remarks. “So, you know, the usual.”

“But how are we gonna find them? We have no idea where they went.”

Dream tosses his knife in the air and catches it. “Well, we have a starting point: wherever you two got knocked out. I bet they left some sort of tracks.”

Sapnap eyes Dream knowingly. “And when we find them, we take the meds and go, right, Dream? No harming the kid?”

“…Right.”

Dream’s not sure if that was a lie or not.

They give themselves about two hours to rest.

When the first signs of dawn start to leave their impressions on the horizon, Dream’s walkie talkie erupts in static before a hushed, hurried voice sounds in the quiet of first light.

“Dream. I found the kid. The people he’s with trust me, and I found Niki and Puffy. Over.”

Dream glances at George and Sapnap. They’re asleep, and he’ll let them rest for a moment more. They don’t need to hear this.

He presses down the button on the side of the device. “Copy. Where are you right now? Over.”

“In the forest outside the suburbs. But don’t try to find us yet, I’m gonna get them to come to my house. You remember where that is? Over.”

“Yeah. I’ll let you know when we get closer. You let them know anything about what I’m after? Or our plan? Over.”

“How obvious do you think I am? They don’t suspect a thing.” Dream hears the sound of another voice in the background - “Bad! Where’d you go?!” - and Bad’s voice lowers. “I gotta go. Don’t know when I’ll be able to talk next. Make your way to my house, and be discreet. Over.”

“Copy. Be careful. Over.”

“Copy.”

The line goes dead. Dream clips the walkie talkie back onto his belt.

Time to wake his friends and get some revenge.

The metal of the gun feels far too dangerous in Niki’s small hands. Her hands are made for baking and painting, not wielding a deadly weapon. She wouldn’t have to hold the gun if Puffy hadn’t volunteered to help Phil walk.

This gun makes me sick.

Maybe if she wasn’t so tired, she’d be able to push her revulsion out of her mind. As it is now, though, she’s running on two hours of sleep and spite, which is not a great recipe for proper emotional regulation.

Bad suggested that they make their way to his house, and nobody argued. What other choice did they have? Everyone else had homes in the middle of Clifton, and that place was crawling with the undead. At least Bad’s place is in a small, relatively isolated neighborhood.

They leave their camp behind completely. Niki is not sad to see it go.

Of course, now the only problem is that they have to walk the length of the forest to get there.

Their progress through the trees is agonizingly slow. And the kids are not happy. Every five steps has Tommy or Tubbo asking “How much farther?” and Ranboo managed to swindle Techno into carrying him an hour and a half ago. Niki glances over at Techno every once and a while. When he thinks no one’s looking, he’s got a small smile on his face.

It takes them two days to make it to Bad’s house. Once they all make it inside, Tommy collapses dramatically to the living room floor.

“I’m so tired! Why did you make me walk that far?”

“It was like, a mile and a half over two days,” Wilbur says. He grabs Tommy’s ankle and starts dragging him around the room.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” Tommy screeches.

“You said you were tired. I’m helping you not walk.”

Tommy continues to scream obscenities as Wilbur’s laugh bounces off the walls. Phil turns to Bad with a tired expression. “Is this place clear?”

Bad glances around nervously. “I think so.”

“Techno, can you do a check?” Techno nods. “And Wilbur, stop torturing Tommy.”

“Ugh, fine.”

Wilbur drops Tommy’s ankle with a sigh. Tommy scrambles away and begins to converse quietly and quickly with Tubbo. Techno pulls out his shortswords and moves into the next room.

Niki places her gun on an end table and sits in a chair. “I think I’ll sit here for the rest of the day.”

Puffy chuckles. “You do you. I just can’t wait to sleep in a bed again.” After ensuring that Phil is somewhat comfortable on the couch, she falls into another chair.

Phil balks. “You guys haven’t slept in a bed since everything?”

“Nope. Niki and I were camping when we got word of all the shit going down. We were asleep, so you can bet that was a nice wakeup call.”

“Asleep?” Wilbur says. “Didn’t things start in the afternoon?”

“I think it hit at different times in different places.” Bad interjects. “From what we studied of the virus, it can incubate inside people for three to seven days before they start to show symptoms.”

Puffy nods. “I don’t know if it hit us the night before or after it hit you. We were kinda cut off from outside contact. And there was someone else with us… but…”

Niki grips the arms of the chair tightly. She doesn’t want to remember that day.

Something is keeping her up. Niki doesn’t really know what. There’s this sense of dread that sits in her chest, too painful to ignore.

She knows she’s probably just being overdramatic. This is only her second time camping. The first time she had an unpleasant encounter with a squirrel.

She hears Sam meander out of his sleeping bag.

Niki turns to him. “You ok?” she whispers.

“I’m not sure. I kinda feel nauseous. I’m gonna get some air.”

“Sam -”

But he was already gone. Niki shakes Puffy awake.

“What -”

“I think Sam might’ve gotten food poisoning from that gas station hot dog.”

“Ugh, really?”

“Yeah, he said he feels sick and he just went outside to throw up.”

“Oh, shit. Let’s check on him.” Puffy rummages through her bag and pulls out her handgun.

Niki sighs. “We don’t need the gun. Sam is just -”

“Well what if we see a bear?”

“There are no bears in this forest.”

“But what if we see one?”

“Puffy…”

“I’ll keep it in my pocket! See, it’s in the pocket.”

Niki relents. There’s not much point in fighting.

Puffy grabs one of their lanterns. They climb out of the tent and into the dry night air. At first, Niki can’t see Sam. But then Puffy moves the light to the left.

Sam is leaning against a tree, his back facing them. He does not look like he’s having a good time.

“Sam?”

He doesn’t respond at first, and Niki has half a mind to call his name again. But then he slowly turns around.

There’s something off about his eyes. Sam is always thinking, always coming up with ideas, and the light of discovery shines through his eyes at all hours of the day. Now, his eyes are dull, his stare not quite blank. It’s like his constant stream of thoughts has narrowed and he only has one thing on his mind.

It’s a stare Niki’s seen before. But never outside the context of the lab. He looks like…

“Niki,” Puffy whispers. “He looks like the infected test subjects.”

No. No, this can’t be happening, Niki thinks. We were so careful. We were decked in PPE from the start of each shift to the end.

“There’s no way,” Niki whispers back. “We can’t know that. Maybe he - maybe…”

But she can’t think of any other explanation. People with ASWL have such characteristic symptoms. Initial nausea, decreased cognitive function, muscle weakness and/or loss of control over motor muscles… Niki could list them all in her sleep. And Sam seems to be fitting the bill quite neatly.

“What do we do?” Puffy hisses.

“How am I supposed to know?” Niki shoots back. She glances at Sam, who’s still just staring at them. She clears her throat.

“Hey, Sam. Are you ok?” He tilts his head as if he barely understands. “Sam? We’re not messing around. Are you alright? What’s wrong?”

There’s a breath. The smallest of pauses. And in that moment, Niki thinks that maybe Sam is gonna start laughing, saying “I got you guys good! How was my infected impression?”

It doesn’t happen. The world is too cruel, Niki supposes.

Sam starts to stumble forward, and now there’s no question. He’s got ASWL.

Puffy and Niki stumble back. “What the fuck do we do?”

Niki’s question goes unanswered. Sam continues to advance. He opens his mouth and lets out a groan, hands reaching forward. Niki knows that he wants to tear their flesh from their limbs.

They’re backed into a clump of bushes and Puffy falls over with a strangled cry. Niki looks down at Puffy, then back at Sam’s ever approaching form.

Before she has time to second guess herself, she’s ripping the gun from Puffy’s pocket and firing.

There’s a hole in Sam’s chest that wasn’t there before.

He takes another staggering step forward before falling and it’s almost like it’s in slow motion. His eyes fade and he gives a final, shuddered exhale before he breathes no more.

“Sam, I’m so sorry,” Niki whispers. Then she bursts into tears.

Chapter Text

Wilbur puts a hand on Niki’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry.”

Niki hugs her knees to her chest. “I did what I had to do.”

It’s silent for a while. Everyone else was already in bed, the fading sun pulling them away from the somber aura of the living room. But as Phil limped away with an arm around Techno’s shoulders, Wilbur realized he couldn’t join them and the kids just yet. He had unfinished business. Puffy and Bad had left after Niki insisted that she was fine - which Wilbur did not believe at all - so it was up to him to get at what was wrong.

Now that she’s told him, he’s not quite sure what to say beyond “sorry.” Poetic, he knows.

He can’t even imagine how he would feel if he were forced to shoot -

No, he thinks. Let’s not even consider that.

Except - don’t think about it - he can picture it now. A fight. A bite. And then - this isn’t helpful - a choice. One that Wilbur would have already made before he considered the ramifications. He’d make the kids look away. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if - stop it, stop it - he knew Tommy saw him kill someone. It would be awful. But he would make it quick - would you stop?! - so that no one had to suffer for long. The last thing he wants is for Techno to suffer and -

“Wilby? Niki?”

Ranboo materializes at the end of the couch, scaring the shit out of both of them. Wilbur’s hand relaxes where it had tightened on Niki’s shoulder.

“My God, Ranboo, how are you so quiet?” Wilbur holds out an arm and the kid climbs onto his lap.

He grins. “Phil say I magic.”

“I have to agree.”

Niki brushes some of Ranboo’s hair out of his eyes. “Why are you up so late, bud?”

“My head loud.”

“Loud?”

“Yeah. Loud like when Tom and Tub talk but in my head.”

Wilbur and Niki exchange a confused glance. Wilbur’s not sure what to make of that. Is Ranboo hearing voices that aren’t really there? Or… wait a minute.

“Are you thinking a lot of thoughts, Boo?”

“Yeah! Lots of think. Scary think.”

Unfortunately, I can relate.

Wilbur mouths ‘I got this’ to Niki. “I think I know what you mean. Are you afraid?”

“Yeah… Phil hurt.”

“I know, little man. People get hurt sometimes. But Niki made it better, didn’t she?”

Niki smiles a little. “I did my best.”

“When people get hurt it takes some time for them to get better. It’s ok for you to be scared, though. I get scared a lot too.” More than you would ever know.

“You do?”

You just saved me from a spiral, little man.“All the time! My brain has a little glitch and I get scared a lot more than I should. It’s called anxiety.”

“Anz-eye-tee.”

Wilbur fights back a grin. “Close enough. It’s totally normal. And I find the best way to make myself feel less anxious is to hug somebody.” He hugs Ranboo tight, and the kid giggles up a storm. “Lucky for you, you’ve got two people right here who wanna hug you till the end of time!”

Niki smiles more, and her tense shoulders start to become not so tense. Wilbur silently thanks the universe for helping him find a way to make her (and himself) feel better.

Perhaps Phil isn’t the only one who needs time to heal.

When Techno walks into the living room the next morning, he finds Ranboo splayed across Wilbur’s stomach. Niki is using Wilbur’s legs as pillows. And Wilbur is snoring louder than thunder. He is also drooling. Profusely. It’s kinda gross, actually.

“L,” Techno whispers. He snaps a picture.

The crackling of a walkie talkie wakes Bad. For a moment he teeters on the edge of sleeping and waking.

Then the walkie talkie crackles again, almost annoyed at his hesitation.

Bad hauls himself out of bed and puts the walkie talkie up to his ear. “Copy.”

“Is everything in place? Over.”

“They’re all here, and they’re getting comfortable. Over.”

“Good. We’ll show up after sunset today. Over.”

“Copy. What should I… or, I guess - how can I make this go smoothly? Over.”

“Just make sure the kid sleeps separately from everyone else. Oh, and keep the back door unlocked. Once we get him, we’ll be heading back to my house so do your best to keep everyone off our trail. Over.”

“Copy. What are you gonna do with him? Over.”

“Don’t worry about that. Make sure you’re ready on time. Over.”

“Copy.”

The call ends. Bad sighs heavily, setting the walkie talkie down on his dresser.

He tells himself not to look at the photo.

He misses his best friend so much. The weight of it burns him from the inside out. The worst part is he doesn’t even know if he’s alive. Against his better judgment, Bad picks up the photo.

“Hey, Skeppy. Long time no see.”

What is he doing? He’s crazy, talking to a picture. But who else can he talk to?

“You probably wouldn’t like this whole situation.” That’s code for I know you think I’m being very stupid at the moment. “It’s not that I’m… particularly proud of what I have to do, per se, I just don't fall back on my promises. And I promised Dream that I’d do everything in my power to find a cure for ASWL. You remember that, right?” How naive he was then, thinking he could cure a disease if he believed in himself enough. But Skeppy supported him anyway, because he’s a good friend. “Listen, the way I see it, Ranboo is the only way forward. I just have to put my reservations aside. What’s one kid in the face of curing the deadliest disease humanity has ever seen?”

Skeppy doesn’t respond. His face remains alight, that silly, boyish grin frozen in time.

“I miss you.”

Outside the door, Techno is very confused - but mostly suspicious. Suspicious and confused.

Phil wakes at the sound of a haggard-looking Techno barging into the room he’s claimed uninvited. He closes the door quickly and stands a little awkwardly in the middle of the room.

“Phil. You up?”

“Are you trying to initiate a late-night hookup?”

“Not the time.”

That gets Phil’s attention. He sits up and then winces in pain. Techno is immediately at his side, hands hovering and unsure. “I guess I should ask how you’re feeling.”

“I’m great. It’s like I never got a knife to the leg.”

“Again. Not the time.”

“You know I can’t help it. Sarcasm is built into my bones. I wouldn’t be British without it.”

“Phil!”

“You were the one who woke me up!”

“With good reason!” Techno glances at the door and then lowers his voice. “Listen, I’m starting to get suspicious about this Bad person. I was walking through the hall to come check on you and I overheard him talking to someone. I think at first he was using a walkie talkie or something like that, but then he basically spilled his guts.” He exhales and runs a hand through his hair. “He’s colluding with somebody and… I think they want to do something to Ranboo.”

Phil feels his pulse spike. “What do you mean?”

“He said something about Ranboo being the ‘only way forward’ and ‘putting his reservations aside.’ I don’t know what he’s planning but I don’t like the sound of it.”

Phil puts a hand over his mouth, thinking. He feels the stubble beneath his fingers and almost starts laughing. Good God, it’s been too long since he’s seen a razor. “We can’t make any decisions now. We have to talk to Wilbur at the very least.”

“I’ll keep Ranboo close.”

“You better.” Phil runs his hand along his stubble again. “I don’t want to talk about this in front of the kids, but someone needs to keep an eye on all of them at all times. I’m not sure how we could do that.”

Techno sits on the ground. “What if we had the kids watch each other? Tell them not to let any of the others out of their sights. You know how protective they are.”

“You think that could work?”

“What other options do we have?”

“Well, we can’t trust Niki, Puffy, or Bad now.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“It’s - just find Wilbur. I guess you’re right. The kids can protect themselves for a little bit. But when you tell the kids about this, make sure you tell them to come straight here if they think something is off.”

“Got it.”

Techno is up and out the door in a flash. Phil takes a shaky breath.

Ok. This is fine. This is fine. We’ll be fine. We just have to make a plan.

Phil hates this, though. When have they gotten a real rest? No place they’ve stayed has been safe enough. There’s always more than meets the eye, stuff that threatens to tear their group apart, danger just around the corner. When do they get to take a breath?

Phil never considered what it would be like to have kids. He knew it involved worrying, but he never imagined it would be this much.

After a few minutes, Wilbur storms in looking murderous, his hair a mess and wiping drool from his face.

“I’ll kill Bad.”

“Let’s not be too hasty.”

“Why not? I want to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze the life out of him.”

“Kinky.”

“It is still not the time, Phil.” Techno walks in and closes the door.

There’s quiet for a moment as everyone absorbs the situation. Then they make a plan in quick whispers.

This ends tonight.

Tommy is a very big, strong Man. And as the biggest and strongest of the Big Men, it is his duty to protect his associates as best he can. So when Techno tells him of the mission to protect each other, Tommy’s ready. You could say he’s been preparing for this for his entire life.

“I’m in charge, Tubbo.”

Tubbo crosses his arms. “No, you’re not. I’m older.”

Ranboo sticks his hands in the air. “I charge!”

Tommy and Tubbo look at Ranboo. “No.”

“Anyway. I’m in charge.”

“No, me!”

“No, me!”

“I charge!”

“NO.”

Before the very compelling argument can continue, Ranboo speaks up again. “Shhh! Techno say quiet. No loud.”

Tommy has to admit that the kid is right about that. He wouldn’t normally do this, but he resorts to being polite. It takes all his strength to keep his voice calm and ask: “Tubbo, can I be in charge?”

Tubbo smiles evilly. “Why, of course, Big Man. You should’ve asked nicely from the start.”

“I hate you.”

“You love me.”

“As the person in charge, I declare that I hate you.”

“You do that.”

Tommy glares at Tubbo. “Anyway. As the person in charge I also declare that we should go outside and play.”

“I concur, Big Man.”

“Play?!” Ranboo asks excitedly, with a toy car in hand.

Tommy smiles. He’s doing a great job as person in charge. “Race you to the garden!”

Tubbo yelps indignantly as Tommy sprints ahead. Ranboo struggles to keep up, but he’s got his toy car, so he’s happy.

They play outside for who knows how long, but by the time Wilby’s calling them in for lunch, Tommy wants to sleep on the floor. But he’s also hungry, so he drags himself and the other Big Men into Bad’s kitchen.

Once they get inside, Wilby picks Tommy up. Immediately he feels like something is… weird. Very weird. Phil’s usually got this big dumb smile on his face, but now he looks constipated. Or maybe he’s angry. Tommy can’t quite tell. Wilby also looks way more stupid than usual.

He’s so dumb, Tommy thinks. He looks at Techno, whose hands are clenched into fists. Niki and Bad and Puffy are nowhere to be found. Something is definitely weird. Tommy ignores the twinge in his belly. What did Ranboo call it? A-tease? An-zeye-tee? Something like that… Oh no! Wilby’s infecting me with his an-zeye-tee! This, as any Big Man would say, is not poggers.

Even with that aside, it would take someone very, very stupid (like Wilby) to miss the weird feeling in the air.

“What’s wrong with your face?” Tommy asks Wilby.

“There is nothing wrong with my face.”

“You look all mad and shit.”

“Tommy!” Phil says. “We don’t use that kind of language.”

“Who’s we?”

Techno holds out a hand. “Can we please get to the point? I don’t want to sit here and banter all day.”

Phil sighs. “Right. Listen, you remember those bad guys who chased us away from that big house?”

“Duh! They sucked.”

“Tommy!”

Techno pinches the bridge of his nose. “Phil. To the point.”

“Yeah, yeah. Well, they figured out where we are. They’re coming to…”

Tommy does hear the rest of what Phil says. He really hoped that all the jokes he’d made would have made everything alright, but instead the tension in the air has only gotten bigger. When it’s just him and the other Big Men, there’s almost never this kind of tension. Sure, he and Tubbo argue sometimes, but not to the point where his belly starts to hurt like it does right now. He didn’t actually think that an-zeye-tee was contagious, but now…

That’s not to mention the fear Tommy feels when he hears that those mean guys are coming back. He remembers the way Ranboo cried when they appeared, and how mad that made him. The worst part was that he could barely do anything to protect Ranboo. His job is to be the Big Men’s defense, but those mean guys were so much bigger than he was (and being bigger than The Great Tommy is hard to do). How was he supposed to protect Ranboo and Tubbo? What could he have done? Bit them? Maybe, but Tommy doubts it would have done much good. He has to protect all of his associates. But how? He can only be so strong.

And what happens if someone does get hurt? It’s not like that’s unheard of. Phil already got a knife to his leg and Tommy could do nothing to stop it. One second he was watching Phil run ahead, and then he was on the ground. That could easily happen again! All it would take is a blink and anyone could be hurt. Phil’s lucky that he can still get around. He might not be so lucky next time.

What if I get hurt?

The realization hits hard. Tommy’s been so preoccupied with trying to protect everybody that he didn’t even think about his own wellbeing.

What if -

“Tommy? Tommy, are you alright? What’s wrong?”

Tommy abruptly snaps back to reality. Wilby places a gentle hand on Tommy’s face and wipes away - a tear?

Tommy glances around and realizes two things:

1. His vision is swimming. But that’s not because he’s crying, of course, it’s just some strange thing that will go away soon. Probably Wilby’s fault. He’s not crying. Definitely.

2. They are not in the kitchen anymore. He’s sitting on the bed where he slept last night and Wilby is kneeling in front of him.

“Tommy, I know things are very scary right now but I can promise you that we’re working to make things safe. Please tell me what’s wrong so I can help.”

“N-nothing’s wrong.” Why is my voice so shaky? It’s not like I’m crying or anything. “’m a Big Man. ’m fine.”

Wilby sighs. “It’s ok to be upset.”

“Not upset!”

“Tommy, there are tears coming out of your eyes.”

“No!”

Wilby sighs more dramatically. “Tommy, come on.” He glances at the door. It’s closed. He turns back to Tommy, lowering his voice. “Phil might not like it when you swear but I don’t mind as much.”

Good. We’re not talking about crying anymore.“Well you shouldn’t. I - I can say whatever I want.”

“Of course. So can we not bullshit each other?”

“What does that mean?”

“Be honest with me. Don’t try to make something up to protect anybody. Can we do that?”

Tommy is about to come back with another snappy remark (and believe him, it would’ve been the funniest thing you’ve ever heard) but all of the sudden he can’t find the strength to fight anymore. He’s tired. And he can barely admit it to himself, but…

He’s afraid. Maybe, just maybe, Wilby might be able to help. And hey, as long as he makes Wilby swear to never tell anyone, his reputation as the biggest and strongest of the Big Men should be preserved.

Ok. Here he goes.

“I’m scared.”

Tommy’s never seen Wilby look so relieved. “Yeah? I am too.”

“You are?”

“Obviously! You think this whole thing is easy? But that doesn’t mean I don’t close myself off.” He grabs a tissue box - something Tommy hasn’t seen in weeks - and hands it to Tommy. “I know you wanna be strong. Sometimes, you have to reach out to the people around you.”

Tommy blows his nose in a way he hopes is very annoying. When Wilby exclaims “Ew, man! I’m trying to be serious.” he knows he accomplished his goal. He looks up at Wilby, whose face is scrunched up a bit in disgust.

“Lemme help you with that.” Wilby grabs a tissue and starts wiping Tommy’s face. Tommy resists valiantly but in the end he’s forced to surrender.

“Are you ready to hear our plan?”

“Of course, Big Man.”

Wilby gasps. “Am I one of the Big Men now?”

Tommy nods solemnly. “I, The Great Tommy, leader of the Big Men, do declare that you, Wilby, are now the fourth member of the Big Men.”

Wilby holds his hand over his heart. “I’m so honored.”

“You should be. Now tell me the plan.”

Chapter Text

cw: discussions of Techno's death

This is not easy to write, but in light of recent events I've decided to discontinue this fic. It's important that people keep writing things with Techno's character, as it will keep his memory alive. Besides, to my knowledge, he loved how people engaged with his character and all the fanworks inspired by him. But after everything I don't think I can finish this fic. At least not the way I had originally planned. For those of you who are interested, what follows is my basic outline for the end of the story. After it I've written a message that I would like for you to read.

Wilbur takes the kids are runs back into the woods while Phil and Techno stay behind to get to the bottom of Bad's relationship to Dream. They start by basically interrogating Niki and Pufy, during which the boys realize that they had nothing to do with any of this madness. They team up to put a stop to Dream.

While that's happening, Bad realizes that Ranboo is gone and start freaking out because Dream's not gonna be happy. He starts frantically looking around when he runs into the newly formed alliance between Phil, Techno, Niki, and Puffy. He breaks down and admits everything. Techno wants to literally murder him, but Niki convinces him to limit himself to punching Bad in the face (listen I wasn't looking forward to writing that but Bad was kind of... well, bad. He had to get some comeuppance). So now there's a united front against Dream's plan to kidnap Ranboo. They run after Wilbur and the kids.

Unfortunately, they're a little late. Dream has sent George and Sapnap in another direction, and he comes upon Wilbur and the kids. And while Wilbur is willing to protect these little kids with his life, he's no match for Dream. Cue this epic fight scene that would have been so incredibly epic.

Dream scoops up Ranboo (but not before Ranboo bites the shit out of his leg). Wilbur's all like "nooo!" and Tommy + Tubbo try to hit Dream but get kicked. Then Phil and Co. show up along with George and Sapnap. There's a whole argument where Sapnap is like "Dream you've lost yourself!" and Dream's like "bitch you don't understand me!!" Dream is about to high-tail it out of there with Ranboo when Techno steps up.

He makes an offer: let Ranboo go, and he will take Ranboo's place. You can imagine how a self-sacrifice like that hurts to even think about now.

Dream, after much hesitation, accepts. So Techno leaves with Dream.

Techno returns to the main group a few days later and Phil is like "awww mate! You're back. Where've you been? What happened to Dream?" and Techno is like "wouldn't you like to know." The group moves forward with life in the apocalypse together. The end.

I found Technoblade's content at a time in my life when I was at a really serious low. The pandemic was in full swing, my anxiety disorder was at its worst, and I couldn't see any of my irl friends. Then I came upon the dsmp and its fandom. Technoblade especially was a man who brought me joy during a time when there wasn't a lot of joy in my life. Whenever he was live I would rush to find a place where I could just sit and watch in private so the big, dumb smile on my face would be for me and me alone. I couldn't sit still when I watched any of his content. I just had to get up and move - it's how I express my joy.

I never met Techno, but the happy memories he gave me are ones that I will treasure forever. My kids will know about Technoblade. I will ensure that his legacy will never die.

I'm on medication for my anxiety disorder now. I've been able to reconnect with my friends. Since I became a fan of Technoblade, I've grown a lot as a person. I'm so much happier now. I wish I could have told him about how I've grown, what he's done for me. I wish I could have given him a hug. But I also think he knows all that now. And I think he'd call me a sappy nerd (and he'd be spot on).

Forgive me a brief literary reference. Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote "'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all." I think that sums up my feelings about all this.

Do not be afraid to grieve. I know you might feel strange for grieving over someone who you never had close contact with, but I would argue that we should grieve over those who brought us joy. Techno certainly brought millions of people a special sort of joy. The list of men who have made me cry is rather short - my dad, my grandfather, my acting teacher. That list has gotten a little longer. So screw you Technoblade /j. The sadness may never fully go away, but one day we will be able to remember the good things Techno brought us without all this pain. Just be patient. Injuries, whether they be physical or emotional, always hurt the worst right after they're inflicted. And keep your head held high, king/queen/monarch. Your crown is slipping, and would Techno want you to sacrifice your fashion sense for anything? Absolutely not.

If I were to live a hundred more lives, I'd get invested in Techno in every single one of them. I'd cry over him in every single one of them.

I'd love him in every single one of them.

Ciao amici.

- Flower

Chapter Text

Heyyyy

How are you all? Long time no see....

So I have started a rewrite of this fic! It's called Zomb Zomb Apoplips Redux, and I published the first chapter a few days ago. If anyone who used to read this fic is interested in coming back to this world again, you're welcome to read it! Thanks for all the support that you guys gave to this fic. I've always appreciated it, especially when I see people come back to the fic after all these years. I hope you enjoy the rewrite. :)