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And the universe said you are the daylight.
And the universe said you are the night.
Tommy is the sun, that is undeniable. He is bright and demanding, blinding people with his luminescence, aggressive and forceful, unforgiving. He refuses to be ignored, if someone tries, heaven forbid, he’ll up his rays tenfold, dial up the temperature and bring a wrathful humidity.
Wilbur is, admittedly, not the sun. More akin to the moon, gentle and forgettable. Quietly, skittishly, pulling the waves up to him in order to ease his loneliness, pale light emanating from his body—nothing in comparison to Tommy. He can do nothing like his brother, he cannot bring life, he cannot make the birds chirp or make people rise with smiles alight. All he can do was ask the stars, the oh-so far away stars, to twinkle and hope a cloud doesn’t cover him up, watch as he waxes and wanes into slices of himself.
Sometimes Wilbur so desperately wants to douse his brother in water, suffocate the life out of his sparkle and watch the liquid travel down his throat, watch him extinguish, drown out his brilliance and force him to stop being so fucking vibrant. Constantly, unthinkingly, heedlessly giving away his light to anyone who asked, or anyone who didn’t ask. It doesn’t matter, though, Tommy has enough light that he likely never notices his flame flicker. It's infuriating to watch, to sit by and be forced to witness his brother giving away his rays to anyone who even looks his way. It makes something deep in his ribs ache.
Wilbur does not have endless amounts of light to give away. His moonbeams are pale and soft, they are not golden and angelic. His light is not purifying. The beams he does give away are dim next to Tommy’s blinding glimmer. God, it hurts to see. He wishes he could give away pieces of himself so easily, but he has so little to give already, hardly enough to give to those he loves. Maybe it’s because he’s older, rougher and sharper around the edges. Wilbur has craters in his heart, places where misfired comets had hit too close, dips and valleys carved by a lifetime of grappling to understand where he is meant to be. What is he? A soldier? A son? A brother? Is he a good one? He doesn’t know. He isn’t sure he knows how to be good. He could never get away from Tommy, though, his gravity is much too compelling. Not that he would ever want to, even if it does hurt to look at his brother sometimes.
It’s cruelly ironic that he thinks about this while light tore he and his comrades apart. Eret’s haunting words echoing in his ears; it was never meant to be, never meant to be, never—
He can barely hear the booming of explosions past the tinny ringing in his ears, can hardly hear Fundy and Quackity’s mangled cries, unsurprisingly enough he can feel Tommy’s blind hands tearing at his uniform without a problem, can hear the “Wil, what the fu—” without having to strain his damaged ears because what is he without Tommy? What is he if not constantly reaching out to the blonde boy? He is Tommy’s until he is nothing at all.
Later, after his body pieces itself back together and he has stitched the holes in his uniform closed he will bitterly reminisce that the destructive light that had killed them all was eerily like his own pale gleam, and painfully opposite to Tommy’s aureate hue. The metallic taste of gunpowder will cling to his tongue and his hands will shake when he thinks how quaint he felt surrounded by a color so like his own. He will never admit it, not even to Tommy, never admit how at home he felt among the chaos and explosions; how good it felt to feel comfortable for once in his life.
Wilbur scares himself sometimes.
…
“Toms, no, you—here, just let me.” Wilbur struggles to not let frustration fill his tone as he takes the bow from his little brother’s hands. “You need to change the way your shoulders are, and your posture is awful.” He lifts his shoulders and pulls the string back, placing his feet evenly across from each other, turning his body to the side into the proper shooting position. It comes naturally to Wilbur; he had been shooting arrows for plenty of years with Techno before Tommy was born. “You need to keep your back straight.”
“Fuck off, bitch,” Tommy spits with no real heat, “you’re a bad teacher. How the fuck do I change how my shoulders are?”
“Lift them, don’t hunch them. You look like you’re scared of the bow. You aren’t, are you?”
“I’m not scared of anything.” Tommy grumbles, snatching the bow back from Wilbur’s hands. Wilbur quirks a brow and chuckles through his nose as he watches Tommy try to reposition himself despite his rebuttals. His back is straighter this time. Truthfully, he knows Tommy wants to impress him, it’s in his little brother’s bones. He is constantly looking for Wilbur’s validation, and maybe that was just because Wilbur is the older brother, so it makes sense. But how could he ever explain to the younger boy that he too wants his validation? All he wants in life is for his brother to be impressed by him, to continue to see the way pride flows through Tommy when he calls Wilbur his brother. Watching the way Tommy’s lips quirk up and his cheeks flush bright red, when he says it, the ice covering Wilbur melts away. He wishes he could explain any of this to the boy, even begin to put it into words.
I love you; I love being your brother, I love how fearless you are, I love how you never let anything stop you, I love how passionate you are—don’t ever stop. Don’t stop being so bright. The world would end if you went out, my world would end. You’re everything to me. Turn around and look at me, God, please, recognize me. Don’t leave me, ever, please. Give me some of your light. How are you so unyielding even in the face of war? How are you so brave? Teach me.
“Your feet are lopsided.” Is what he says instead. Tommy scowls, turning his face to the side and sticking his tongue out at Wilbur, muttering something under his breath. Probably something crude. Tommy may be bright and loving but his tongue is a serpent with fangs sharper than the sword sitting on Wilbur’s hip. Tommy could so easily give someone life and in the same breath rip it away. It’s terrifying.
Tommy lets the arrow fly and Wilbur can’t seem to tear his eyes away from his brother to see if the shot lands or not. He can tell from the way Tommy reacts, can see how his shoulders bunch up in anticipation, can see his nose twitch like a bunny’s, can see how red rushes to the tips of his ears. Even as Tommy looks back with his mouth in a wide ‘o’ he can’t seem to look at the tree they were been aiming at. His lips creeps up into a smile as he hears Tommy’s whooping and cheering filling his ears.
“Did you fucking see that, Wil? I hit it! I hit that fucking tree! I’m such a big man, I am massive!” Tommy leaped around like a little kid, excitement coming off him in waves. It hit Wil then that, oh, Tommy is still a kid. Sometimes he’ll be randomly reminded that no, Tommy is just a kid. Not that he would ever admit to it, Tommy hates a lot of things, but he hates being called a kid more than anything. He’s hardly 15 and still he’s in the front lines of a revolution. It pains him sometimes if he thinks too hard about it, thinks about if Tommy truly knows what war is. Does he understand how deadly this is? He had already lost a life, his whole crew had, and all Tommy has to show from it is a Band-Aid on his nose and a wobbly front tooth. His army is a bunch of kids glued together with him at the front helm, always ready with tape to frantically fix any loosening or breaks. It’s exhausting, always living on the edge. “I’m going to kill Dream! I am! He’ll never get my fuckin’ discs!”
Which, of course, is when Dream, Sapnap and George decide to step up in front of them, the setting sun illuminating their menacing outlines. Tommy at least has the common sense to quiet down and doesn’t immediately spit out some insult—maybe he’s growing, or maybe he’s just scared, maybe both? Wilbur doesn’t want to think about it.
“Hello,” Dream says, mask muffling his words a bit. That doesn’t stop the shiver that builds in between his shoulder blades from travelling down his spine. “Nice day, hm?”
The five men—or, well, four men and one boy—stand in tense silence, even the birds stop chirping. Wilbur desperately wishes Quackity was here, at least he wouldn’t be the only adult on the opposing side from the three aggressors. He could use the raven-haired man’s humor to diffuse the tension here, Wilbur is no good at playing these games.
“What do you want?” Wilbur asks finally, sensing the way the three men standing opposite from them shift at his response. George’s head lowers, arms crossing across his chest, shoulders widening somehow, Sapnap juts out his chin, eyebrow quirking up—he looks stupid, like a little boy in his dad’s suit, Wilbur thinks—Dream is almost unnoticeable, all in the way his hips shift.
“We can’t just talk?” Dream inquires, hands staying frightening still by his sides. Wilbur blows a breath through his nose, he would never admit it but, yeah, he fears Dream, fears the power he has, fears that he might kill Tommy. Silence overtakes the group again.
“Practicing some archery?” Sapnap asks finally, stupidly crooked eyebrow somehow raising higher. A smile is playing at the man’s lips and Wilbur can’t help but notice the menacingly sharp diamond axe sitting at his hip. He swallows, a lump of fear sitting uncomfortably in his throat. “Nice shot. Gotta say, a little too far to the left.”
“Fuck you know about archery?” Tommy spits and, oh god, Wilbur wants to fucking kill him. He can’t keep his mouth shut for too long and apparently his silence timer has run out. Tommy puffs his chest out to try and seem bigger and scarier, but it was clear to them all that he was just a little boy, a stupid little kid thrust into a war he hadn’t even meant to start, a revolution he doesn’t fully understand. Tommy wants to be a hero with a legacy and all Wilbur wants is for him to live to see adulthood.
“Plenty,” Sapnap says, infuriatingly calm, “more than you, actually. You’re just a little shrimp, yeah? What are you, maybe 13?”
“You motherfucker, I’m—”
“What do you want?” Wilbur repeats, harshly shoving Tommy behind him. He can hear the angry grunt Tommy gave out, can feel the blue eyes burning angry holes into his head. Whatever. He can deal with an angry brother as long as he’s an alive angry brother.
“Well, now that Tommy mentions it…” Dream pushes his hands into his pockets. That doesn’t make him look any less intimidating. “What do we know about archery? Why don’t we see who’s better?”
“What?”
“You’re an idiot,” George says offhandedly, which makes Tommy sputter angrily behind Wilbur’s back.
“Don’t you fucking talk about Wil like that, you stupid mushroom fuck!” Tommy hollers, shoving past Wilbur and jabbing his finger at George, “what the fuck do you even want? All you ever do is stand behind this stupid green motherfucker and act like you’re so scary. You never even talk, dumbass! Why don’t you take off those glasses so we can see your ugly face for real? You’re probably too ugly, you’d blind us!”
“Tommy,” Dream says dangerously, “shut up.”
Tommy, with his little intelligence, does in fact shut up.
“Let’s duel for those discs, hm? You and me, like in the old times. Back-to-back, ten paces, fire. That seems fair, doesn’t it?”
“No,” Wilbur finally says, voice tearing out of his throat. Terror fills his being as he desperately grabs Tommy’s shoulder to pull him closer. He doesn’t need to see his brother’s face to know that it’s pale with fear, doesn’t need to check to see the heat of all that fire inside of him has dimmed under the rain of horror Dream’s decision brings. “No, no, that’s not fair. He’s—he’s a kid, Dream. It isn’t a fair fight; we should duel instead. I’m the leader here, Tommy is just a soldier.”
“Tommy was the one to start this, though.” Sapnap points out, finger tapping against his chin as he thinks about it. Shut up, shut up, shut up— “I mean, yeah, you’re the leader but still. When a kid acts up, they don’t punish the parent, they punish the kid.”
“I’m not his parent,” Wilbur growls, swallowing back bites and jabs and red-hot fury. He isn’t his parent, sure, but Tommy is his brother, comrade, right hand man, and best friend all rolled into one. He’s too young, too bright, too squeaky clean and new to potentially die for the second time at the ripe age of 15.
“Sapnap has a point,” Dream agrees, George’s head bobbing up and down behind him.
Fuck.
“Fine! I’ll duel you, bitch. And I’ll win.” It was heartbreaking, really, to see the fake confidence Tommy musters, to watch his lips turn up into a massive grin with no real warmth in his face. His little brother is terrified and there is nothing he could do. Even if he tried to step in and fix it Dream has this weird obsession with Tommy, he would never get his laser focus off him now. He thought about killing Dream—it would be easy, he could yank the bow out of Tommy’s hand and shoot an arrow right into his chest before George or Sapnap could react, could hit the masked man right in between his ribs and strike his heart, if he even had one. Wilbur wasn’t sure if someone so calculating and mean had a heart, if he could love anything. He doubts it. But, well, what would that achieve? Take away one life from Dream and have George and Sapnap take he and Tommy’s second lives, which would then still lead to the duel that is unavoidable with Tommy on his last life.
“On the Prime Path, two sunrises from now. Don’t be late or I might just blow up your country.” Dream chuckles behind his mask, as if the thought was too funny to bear, as if ripping away Wilbur’s home was nothing. “Oh, come on now. Do they not have jokes in L’Manberg?”
Silence.
“Tough crowd,” Dream shrugs. “See you.”
“Fuck you!” Tommy yells as they recede, with no response coming back. Wilbur’s chest feels hollow. Normally he was good at diffusing tension, at buying time and being logical. But when it came to Tommy, to his Achilles heel, he isn’t much more than a dog, sitting there and waiting for his fate to come, waiting for his orders.
“I’ll win, Wil.” Tommy says, eyebrows pinched together angrily, “I’ll take his fucking life.” It’s hard to take him seriously when his braces glint like that in the sunset, hard to know this kid is trying to comfort the leader of their revolution. He is sunlight, bright and never-ending, even during thunderstorms. He hides behind the clouds, rays peeking through the darkness. He is unavoidable; unstoppable.
“You will,” he agrees, wrapping his arm around his brother’s shoulders as the birds start to chirp again. The world has stopped holding its breath and all at once lets out a gust of relief that blows the brothers’ hair back. “Let’s train tomorrow. We have to tell the group.”
Admittedly, they should have trained more and laughed less—but Wilbur finds it hard to force his brother to train like a soldier, force him to practice his forms and drawback skills through the winces and aches, watch his brother’s fingertips callous and bleed from the sharp string. Tommy never liked the bow and arrow; he’s much more comfortable with a sword or axe. Hands on, up close, angry and hostile attacking was his forte, which is probably why Dream was so persistent that Tommy was the one to duel.
It was easier to pretend they were just training for the fun of it, like he and Techno had back home, before all of this. Before the war, before the discs, before Tommy. He loves his brother dearly, but he’s volatile, uprooting tranquility and demanding chaos, demanding noise and attention, requiring change and revolution. He is a hot summer day; he is a drought.
On the day of the duel Tommy is covered in clouds, angry heat leaving him entirely. The ground beneath him cool and shaded, like the nighttime when Wilbur comes out. It’s horrifying, seeing his warm baby brother turn into something so quiet and so easily ignored. Like Wilbur. Anxiety churns in his stomach as he watches his enemy stand back-to-back with Tommy, watching their different statures shift. If Tommy is the sun, then Dream is the winter. Shortening Tommy’s hours of warmth into nothing, starving off the light he radiates and forcing the world into a snowy standstill. He is ice incarnate.
Wil felt uncomfortably far away from the duel as he counts the paces, the numbers bouncing around inside his head. Without Tommy there is no day, without Tommy there is no night, without Tommy there is moon, no Wilbur. And then suddenly all at once, he’s watching from inside his head as the arrows fly. Tommy’s is too far to the right, Sapnap’s comment must have gotten the best of him. And Dream’s—
Thud.
Icy tendrils fill his body as his golden brother looks down at the arrow sticking out of his chest. His face is unusually still as he looks up at Wilbur, blue eyes full of horror and fear. How could you let this happen? he seems to ask. I don’t know, he replies, I’m so sorry, so sorry.
“TOMMY—”
He doesn’t even remember running forward, doesn’t know how his limbs moved, can’t even comprehend how he’s still breathing as he holds his baby brother’s body in his arms. Golden life trickles out of the wound in his chest, filling up the white in his uniform. He can feel the warmth leaving little Tommy’s body, can feel the summer receding from the world as nighttime overtakes and winter rears its ugly head. He wants to take back every time he ever bitterly thought about how bright Tommy is and how dull he will forever be, tries to wipe away his complaints with his tears as he begs the world to let his brother breathe again, pleads with the universe to just not take his sunshine away.
“Tommy, Tommy, c’mon, wake up,” he pleads, pushing the sweaty hair out of his face. “C’mon, Toms, open your eyes. You can’t go.”
Tommy’s chest rattles as it rises and falls. The sun is setting, and Wilbur isn’t sure if it will ever rise again. He weeps as he holds Tommy’s head to his chest, stroking his brother’s dirty hair. He wants to rewind time, take it back to when the sun was always in the sky and the night wasn’t so cold and he could still hear their father’s laughter. He desperately wishes he could go back to when they were young, before they set out and started a war before any of them really knew what the world is like.
“Don’t let ‘im take my fuckin’ di-iscs, Wil.” Tommy gasps, grabbing ahold of Wilbur’s jacket forcefully. His eyes screwed up painfully and his chest sputters wetly. He is nothing then, an empty shell of a boy.
“No, no no no—Tommy, come back, don’t leave me.” He begs, pressing his face into his brother’s still chest, “stay by my side, please—”
Wilbur doesn’t keep the discs, nor does he keep Tommy by his side. Like the stars, it seems as though everything and everyone in Wilbur Soot’s life are meant to stay out of reach forever, taunted by the idea they might come closer. They never stay, though, Wilbur will come to learn.
…
Staring at the etching in the walls surrounding him made his chest feel funny, like there was something stuck there. He wishes he could reach down his throat and pull it out. Maybe it’s his heart. Is his heart still beating? Wilbur isn’t sure, he’s always so cold, and he can hardly feel his body anymore. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. He doesn’t much care, if today went how he hopes he and his heart—beating or not—will vanish forever. He brushes his fingers across the wooden button, feeling the grooves and notches with the pads of his fingers.
“What are you doing?” That voice.
Wil whips around; eyes wide as he stares at his father. He hasn’t seen his father in years, what is he doing here? The edges of his vision goes funny, black and fuzzy. Tunnel visioned on Phil; breath caught in his chest. He wonders what his father thinks of him now, does he still see the little boy that scribbled stick figures on the walls? Or was that picture ruined forever, replaced by a disheveled man that etches things into stone with his fingernails?
“Phil, I—” he laughs wetly, tears building in his eyes. Why was he crying? “I think I may have gone a little wrong.”
“Mate, mate, take your hand away from the button, okay?” Phil lifts his hands in front of him as if to say whoa now, eyes wide with fear. He’s scared of me; Wilbur realizes with a chill. Is a father supposed to fear his child? Is a brother supposed to fear another? “C’mon, we—you have to step away from there.”
“This is my unfinished symphony,” Wilbur wipes his eyes, smearing gunpowder across his cheeks. “I need to finish it.”
“Not now,” his father pleads, taking a step forward, “not like this.”
And then, without his control, his body moves by itself.
“It was never meant to be.”
Suddenly he’s wrapped in Phil’s arms, black wings shielding him from the onslaught of destruction. His ears ring, just like the first time explosions surrounded him, and just like before he can clearly feel someone holding onto him. Except, this time, he doesn’t reach back.
He probably should feel something while watching his nation blow to smithereens over his father’s shoulder. He doesn’t, though, oddly enough. His heart keeps thumping at a steady rhythm, unbothered by the chaos. Once, earlier, before his mind decayed and withered and wilted, his brain connected Tommy and chaos, thought the two were interchangeable. Tommy is a force of nature, determined beyond belief. Unrelenting, even in the face of presumable death, unafraid.
Looking at the bright white lights from the explosions makes him think of the final control room when he and the original members had been ripped apart, makes him think of the TNT Dream, Sapnap and George set off along the small walls of L’Manberg, makes him think of the white light coming from Techno’s fireworks as they tore Tubbo’s face apart. It makes him feel at home as the pale light, so alike his moonbeams, rips his home apart. If he wasn’t crazy, he could almost believe that his brother is calling his name. Just like the years before when he died the first time he can taste the gunpowder, can feel it clinging to his teeth.
“God, Wil, what did you do?” his father’s voice cuts through his reverie, shocking him back to the present. The sun was high in the sky. He can see it through the holes in Phil’s wings.
“Y’know, dad,” Wilbur starts, voice muffled by Phil’s shoulder. Distant explosions of random pieces of TNT still going off behind him, “Tommy and I started this nation. Tommy started the war with Dream, started with those—those stupid fucking discs and, well, as his older brother…” he trails off, the word brother tasting wrong in his mouth. Did Tommy still call him ‘brother’? He wonders if Tommy loves him still. “It felt right to finish it, to finish the symphony he started. He played the first few notes, and I finished the performance.”
“Wil, you—you blew up your nation. You blew up L’Manberg.” Wilbur tenses, “Are… what happened?”
Well, dad, let me tell you! I started a nation and watched my brother die twice, watched my son betray me and tear down the walls we built together, lost the election for my country and got exiled from my home. Tommy was sent with me, and we spent months hiding in a ravine until one day something in my head broke and now everyone around me is just shapes. No one matters and the sun stopped shining on me. Tommy took back his rays and I’m all alone and I’m so, so cold. I want to go home. I want you to hug me tighter. I want you to kill me. I want you to leave. I want you to stay. I want you to apologize. I want to apologize. I want to find Tommy. I never want to see him again. I lied to you. I’m lying. I can’t stop lying. Help me, help me, please help me—
“Do it, Phil! Kill me!” he rips away from his dad’s embrace, spreading his arms wide. He is a target. He is the moon and Phil is a stray comet coming to break him apart. “Kill me, Phil, kill me—”
“Wil, what? I—no, I—But you’re—you’re my son,” Phil cries, eyes turning glassy, a tortured look crossing his face. If Wilbur had still been logical, it would’ve knocked him off his feet to see his father even close to crying. In all the years of fighting, years of laughter and good times, years of falling and breaking bones he had never, never seen his father cry. Wilbur, unfortunately, is no longer logical. The sun had stopped shining and he is alone in the dark and God, he just wants it to stop. He wants his baby brother to look at him again without that horribly dark look, wants to feel the rays again, wants to feel Tommy’s gravity. He’s off his axis, and he can’t find his way back.
“If you won’t,” Wil starts, yanking his sword out angrily, pointing it at the man who raised him, “I’ll make you.”
“Wilbur,” Phil warns, hand tightening on the handle of his own weapon. His eyes harden, tears falling away. “Wilbur, stop it. Stop, let’s go home, let’s—”
And really, Phil should have seen it coming. He did train Wilbur after all, all those years ago. He should have known what Wil was doing, flying at him like that, like a shooting star streaking across the sky. Should have known he was forcing him into a corner like this, threatening his one and only life.
Really, Phil should have known Wilbur always gets his way.
Wilbur thinks he might’ve heard Tommy screaming his name, thinks he hears sobs ripping through the chasm that was once his home. That doesn't make sense though, Tommy is always so warm, and he’s somehow still so cold. He dies cold and alone, just like the moon. Suspended alone in a sky of darkness with those closest to him still somehow millions of miles away. Trapped above a sea he can never reach, a tide that will never love him back.
Wilbur hopes the sun will come back, for the polar night he faces is depressingly dark. He hopes the warmth will encase him again, he hopes the sun rises and never sets.
He hopes, he hopes, he hopes…
…
It’s strange, being in the land of the living again. Smelling fresh air, feeling the sunlight on his face. After spending so long in darkness it almost feels wrong. No one else is around, oddly enough. He knows L’Manberg is dead but, well, he kind of expected an audience, if he’s being honest. Instead, all he has for his return are the ghosts of his dead country staring back at him.
And then, suddenly there he is. Tommy. His brother.
His sunshine.
Tommy’s warmth is different, after everything he’s been through it was duller, quieter. Less abrasive and demanding, more so like a sunset. Always halfway departing, golden and soft. It doesn’t hurt his eyes to look at Tommy’s brightness anymore but his heart aches dully at the way he’s fizzled out.
The way he hugs is still the same, Wilbur thinks fondly as Tommy collides against him. He’s a solid warmth against his chest and Wilbur finds himself sinking to the floor as he desperately clings to his younger sibling. His larger, taller, thicker body covers Tommy’s thinner body. A total eclipse, he totally obscures Tommy’s light, and he forces it to shine around him, illuminating his form. Tommy’s golden rays hum around him and finally, finally, he feels warm again. The frost covering him slowly melts away, pale light shooting through the cracks as he brightens again for the first time in over a decade. The light of a thousand stars couldn’t compare. Tommy cries, of course he cries, for he has too much inside of him. He always has—too much anger, too much love, too much light, and sometimes, rarely, it spills out. Fiery, deadly solar winds flash across the sky as everything spills from Tommy’s small body. Fat tears full of magma slide down his cheeks as the mass of his internal sun deflates into a smaller, whiter, more contained star. Wilbur’s hands slide up and down his brother’s back, reveling in the way he can feel Tommy’s breathing, can feel his warm breath against his neck, can feel the heat of life emanating from the younger boy.
“Wilby,” he cries pathetically, voice wrecked from emotion, “I missed you.”
And suddenly Wilbur has tears running down his cheeks too, a supernova erupting inside of his ribs as his heart stutters and kicks into motion. Oh, he thinks, he does still love me.
“I missed you too, Toms.” He whispers, resting his chin atop of his brother’s head.
And it isn’t perfect, of course it isn’t, but they slowly learn how to live in each other’s orbits again. Tommy’s gravity is no longer suffocating, and Wilbur no longer yearns to cover his brother’s light. Wilbur finds comfort in the darkened skies, slowly starts speaking to the stars around him, discovers they aren’t as far away as he thought. Tommy revels in healing the earth, loves giving life to the little flowers and weeds, loves singing to them and feeding them with his warmth. Their little solar system expands to include others too, it never feels claustrophobic. They all spin around Tommy who stays in the middle, his gravity the largest, he holds them together and keeps them alive. Tommy brightens Wilbur’s dark side until he is no longer dark at all and is instead pure pale light.
“I think that one’s Gemini,” Wilbur whispers, to make sure to not disturb the stars above their heads. “They’re brothers, came from the same mother. Caster and Pollux. Pollux was immortal.”
“Those are stupid names,” Tommy says, face scrunching up.
“Ah, but they were heroes,” Wilbur says, smiling over at his brother. “And when Caster died, Pollux begged to die with him because he couldn’t live without him. So Zeus worked some magic and Pollux gave up his immortality so he could be in Hades with his brother.”
“Why the fuck are you talking like Techno?” Tommy asks, turning to face Wilbur with a weird look on his face. He grumbles something under his breath that Wilbur can’t catch, which makes him elbow the blonde.
“What?”
“I said I would never die, that’s a bitch move.” Tommy snaps back, there isn’t any aggression in his tone though, empty words. Wilbur laughs, opening his mouth to talk. “I would give up my immortality, though,” he says, suddenly sheepish, rubbing the ends of his shoes together, “so we could hang out all the time. Or whatever.”
“Aw, Tommy,” Wilbur gushes, “you’re getting soft!”
“Fuck off, I am not! You stupid dumbass, it’s just that immortality seems boring anyway. It’s not like I want to spend time with you. I want to spend time with women. How would I get girls if I’m up on some stupid mountain?”
A light glows between the two brothers, gold meeting pale white, and they both laugh.
And the universe said the darkness you fight is within you.
And the universe said the light you seek is within you.