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Tubbo had built the nukes with the intent to kill himself.
Rather blunt when you put it like that, but it's true.
He built the nukes in an era of time where he didn't think he was gonna last much longer.
Dream had a vendetta against Tommy, and the fiery blonde was taking the fight to him.
No way he'd survive.
And if Tommy was gone, then Tubbo would be gone, too.
One couldn't exist without the other, it's just how things worked.
But he didn't want to go out small. That's all he'd ever been in his life.
Small.
Killable, weak, pushable.
No, he wanted to go out big, with a bang, one to make a statement.
It was a naive thought. Looking back, he knew if he had gone through with it he'd be looked at as just another Wilbur. Went crazy and blew up, the selfish fool.
He doesn't have that hindsight when crafting the dead man's switch.
It's just a precaution, he tells himself, fully intending to use it.
He introduces the nukes to others as if it's a new type of weapon. A gun he's brandishing. He doesn't tell them the barrel’s pointing at his own head.
Neither of them end up dying, to Tubbo's surprise.
The nuke is stored, both in the factory and the back of his mind.
The switch stares at him.
-
By the time there's dust over the switch is when he gets another chance to use it.
Things are different now, though.
Back in that vault, if Tommy had died, Tubbo would have lost the one thing he had any attachment to.
But now, now that Tommy's actually, really gone, a conclusion that took him a solid week to come to, he has more things holding him down.
He has a husband. A son. People who would be upset if he suddenly blew up. He couldn't wrap his head around why, but it was the truth.
Admittedly, they were both around last time, too. But it was different.
Michael was in the nether, last time. And although he was still very cute and everything back then, Tubbo didn't have the connection he did now, and he doubted Michael had a very big one to him, either. To Michael he was just some dude who had picked him up one day and put him in a hole. No big loss if he never showed up again. Tubbo wouldn't be causing any pain to Michael if he flipped that switch.
And Ranboo.....
Okay, he'll admit that even back then he was attached to Ranboo. Not even close to the same level as currently, but it was there.
The kicker, though, is that back then he was convinced Ranboo didn't care about him at all. He could flip the switch and he was sure Ranboo wouldn't blink an eye. A tragedy, he'd say, then move on and promptly forget about him.
He'd like to think that he knows better now, but he still isn't sure if Ranboo would have cared back then.
He knows he would now, at least, if the pink tulips and emeralds and picnics are anything to go by.
He doesn't have the courage to ask if Ranboo's love is a new thing. If it's conditional, a phase. Spurred on suddenly by forced domesticity.
Or if he had felt that bond immediately, all the way back in New L'manburg, when they first met. The way Tubbo did.
That would be spilling his heart out, however, and when has Tubbo ever been known to do that?
The point is that he has people that would miss him if he was gone.
So he can't press the switch.
No matter how much his fingers twitch.
-
Maybe he should've decommissioned the switch a while ago.
Pulled it right out of it's panel and stomped on it till it was dust.
Because right now, staring at it straight on, he doesn't have the strength to do that.
His fingers twitch to flip it and he fidgets and stands up and paces and thinks.
Tubbo thinks.
Truly, what is his purpose?
Tommy is gone.
A while ago, he thought his purpose was to protect Tommy.
That wasn't something he'd ever tell the boy, he'd probably get yelled at for it. But it was something Wilbur had asked of him, all that time ago.
Protect Tommy, lord knows he doesn't do it himself.
Tommy is aggressive, abrasive, a lit match that refused to go out. Surely he didn't need protection.
But Tubbo couldn't count the amount of times he had saved Tommy. Whether in battle, or just stopping him from going through with a stupid idea.
That was their love. Not gifts, or hugs, or words. No, it was stopping Tommy from punching that person and telling him what an idiot he was and how that plan was stupid and would’ve never worked.
Protect the match. Protect his Tommy.
Well he failed that. Just like everything else.
Now what?
What's his purpose?
Be a husband?
He's not very good at that.
Be a father?
Ranboo has that covered. His hands are softer than Tubbo’s war torn ones and his visits mean more to the piglin.
Who is he without Tommy?
His own traitorous voice bounces in his head.
Yourself.
Well, who is that?
Tubbo Underscore Beloved.
That doesn't do much to help.
Friend, soldier, spy, president, husband.
Those are only titles.
Failure, pawn, pushover, tyrant, monster.
His fingers twitch.
-
He's lying in bed next to Ranboo and he doesn't remember how he got there.
Perhaps he fell asleep and his husband dragged him up here. Like a good husband does.
Tubbo's a lousy husband, he leeches and jokes and doesn't love enough.
Tubbo's a lousy friend, he allows others to be murdered in prison while he plays house.
He wonders when his mind got so negative. He has an answer of sharp horns and alcohol breath before the thought even finishes.
His fingers twitch but he's too tired to walk down to the factory and too tired to drag the nuke somewhere desolate and too tired to flip the switch and too tired to die and Tubbo is tired.
He's too tired to be..... something.
He's too tired to have some sort of grand purpose to fulfill. To have a title to live up to. To be given a role and act the part. He's been up on stage plenty of times before and he doesn't quite like the track record that follows.
Maybe for now, just until he rests up a bit, he can just...... be.
-
Tommy comes back.
He comes back and it feels like Tubbo has regenerated a limb or a lung or something. He's not good at metaphors, but his Tommy is back and that's what matters.
It's not a reunion from the movies, since it isn't until a day later that Tubbo convinces himself it's real.
But it is real, and Tommy's not the same, but he stopped being bothered by that after the first death.
Nothing fixes immediately, but the nuke with the switch is stolen anyway so it's someone else's problem now.
Wilbur comes back and at this point Tubbo can gloss over that because the man pretends he doesn't exist so what's the point.
He's not sure if he'd rather this cold shoulder or the shark's grin.
Tubbo marches on and he works on Snowchester and his new outpost and he tries to pretend to be okay.
His fingers stop twitching but Tubbo doesn't know if that's because they don't have access or because he doesn't want them to have access. He'll never have the answer.
He doesn't spill his heart but he lets it drip through cracks with stories of fireworks told in the sunset that he's sure will be forgotten.
He puts his foot down and he refuses to be moved. He builds walls that he refuses to tear down.
He loves and laughs and teaches Michael how to climb trees.
Tubbo isn't a protector. He's not a soldier or a monster.
Maybe one day Tommy will need protecting or a war will need a soldier or a fairytale will need its monster.
Maybe one day he'll step up to fill his next role.
He wonders who the puppeteer will be that time, the last ones are dead or in prison or flirting with Quackity.
For now, Tubbo isn't casted and he isn't handed a script.
For now, he makes cookies and stores them next to explosives.
For now, he rests.
For now, he lives.