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Tubbo, a few months ago, was president of what had been declared simply a crater.
To some, that was all it ever had been. A hole in the ground that left jagged rocks and exposed ores shining under the tiny waterfalls that ran into the abyss, the bottom of which couldn't be seen at night, a hollow emptiness that felt wrong in every which way. And Tubbo owned it. One final gift from his older brother figure, the friend he'd drifted apart from after he hadn't saved him the day he'd been blown to bits on stage at the command of the man they'd been trying to destroy.
It was the worst thing Wilbur had ever given him, and also the best, because he'd been presented with a chance to start again. To create something new. Despite that, however, it was more than difficult to deal with. There were days that Tubbo would spend in Schlatt's old office with his throbbing head on the desk, swimming through a migraine, wondering if any of it was worth it.
Wilbur Soot didn't get a grave after he died. Instead, Tubbo made his crater beautiful, and rebuilt the country that had once stood there on stilts, and watched lanterns be let go into the sky.
Tommyinnit got a grave after he died, both the first time, and the second time. Tubbo thinks if there was a third, his heart would shatter and he wouldn't be able to move from his bed to construct another, because after being knocked down twice already, the third destruction of something you love is enough to break someone.
L'manberg was not rebuilt a third time.
Tubbo spends little time at the crater that Technoblade and Philza left behind. (He can't bear to think of them as family anymore) He's too busy in Snowchester, his icy home that's far away enough from his old country that he can't smell the ever lingering stench of smoke and ash that hangs in the air there. He keeps himself occupied. His hands are always full with something. With welding metal, with uprooted vegetables, with Michael, his beautiful son who he loves more than his heart can take. Tubbo is good with distractions. He always has been a master of pretending he doesn't feel and pushing away anything that lingers too long at the front of his mind.
But while the smell of TNT fades from his memory, the remains of the country it resides in doesn't, and he eventually finds himself returning, and staring into the crater, and feeling just as hollow as the empty hole before him. It's so deep that he can't see the bedrock at the bottom. Tubbo's stomach rolls each time he looks.
He does not make a grave for Ghostbur when he disappears. It would feel wrong.
Instead, he watches flowers bloom in the moss that grows on the stone walls of the hole, and he picks a blue one to carry in his jacket pocket.
It's not until Wilbur returns that he stops visiting. And it's not until he's been back for three months that Tubbo finds the courage to return, on the anniversary of the day they won their freedom. The crater is thriving with life, now, and it makes Tubbo's chest ache. He wonders who planted the flowers in the coffin of L'manberg, and how they knew that oxeye daisies were the most common there when the country was full of people and not foxes and birds. He wonders if Wilbur was involved.
"I could have saved you," says Wilbur.
"But you didn't," Tubbo replies numbly, and he isn't sure how he got here, wearing his old President's uniform that he wishes he'd burned, carrying a ukulele that has the anthem of a dead country burned into its strings. He's shaking and he wants everyone away from him.
His husband is stood behind Wilbur hesitantly, as though awaiting a command.
And Tubbo gives him one. "Leave me alone," he demands quietly, and he isn't sure when he started crying - it should be more of a surprise to him, because Tubbo never cries, but he's too tired to care about anything in the world right now, too angry, too sad. If L'manberg blew up a fourth time then and there, he thinks he would lay down and die with it.
That is a dizzyingly terrifying thought to be having at the edge of a very steep drop that plunges all the way down to unseen bedrock at the bottom of the universe, so he instead turns away and sits, not caring to look and see if Wilbur and Ranboo have left, because he knows they have. Ranboo loves him and will respect his wishes always. Wilbur is an unreadable enigma. Tubbo wants him as far away from him as possible.
He isn't sure exactly how long it is until he isn't alone anymore, either. Just that there is a point where he is aware that he is being watched, and instinct tells him he must look presentable - he sits up straight and scrubs at his face, clearing his throat to stifle any soft sobs that creep up his throat. The silence almost immediately consumes him and he wants to scream.
"Heyyy, big man," someone says, and it's Tommy, of course it's Tommy and not Schlatt, because Schlatt is dead and Tommy, for once, is not. Tubbo doesn't turn to look at him, but can already picture blonde curls with streaks of white, dark grey eyes like thunderclouds, a crooked grin breaking his face. "I've looked everywhere for you. I figured you'd be here if nowhere else, although this was my last resort, honestly. If you weren't here I was gonna start thinking you'd died."
It's those last few words that make his chest tighten, and he leans forward, curling into himself, and he feels like the world is ending for the hundredth time over.
"Oh - oh, hey," he hears Tommy say, tone instantly a million times softer and gentler, the same voice he'd use when they were kids and Tubbo cried every day, over bees and rain and his hair and food. "Hey, Tubso, don't - can I sit beside you? Please, Tubbo?"
He wants to say no because Schlatt would not let Tubbo cry and his stomach rolls at the thought of being seen right now.
"I'm sorry," he apologizes hoarsely, and with that, the tears begin to fall again, and he breaks for the first time in months, here at the edge of the place where everything began. He feels just as small as he was then, one year ago.
Tommy sits down next to him and pulls Tubbo into a hug, gently and slowly so that he can pull away if he needs to. He doesn't. He slots his head underneath Tommy's chin and cries like he hasn't in months, and it feels good. Tommy holds him close and hums, the vibrations in his chest thrumming against Tubbo's ears. His heartbeat sounds steady. It's calming. Tubbo likes the sound of it, the rhythm.
"I'm sorry," he whispers again, and hiccups through his tears.
Tommy doesn't tell not to apologize, which Tubbo appreciates.
He just presses a fleeting kiss to Tubbo's hair and sways slightly as he holds him.
"I'll stay with you as long as you want," he tells him.
Tubbo tightens his arms around Tommy's chest and doesn't bite back the shuddering sob that escapes his lips when he tries to speak. "Don't you ever let me go again," he says fiercely, and Tommy doesn't.