Chapter Text
From the day he had hopped a train for the first time, Tommy knew he loved it. He was very young at the time, maybe too young, but he would never forget running to keep up with his brothers, chasing that open train car. Techno had reached out and grabbed on to his hand to help him keep up, while just up ahead, Wilbur braced himself, and hopped up into the train car.
It was chilly that morning. Tommy could see his breath, and the wind bit at his cheeks, but all the running made it hard to feel the cold. The train had only just started moving, it hadn't built up speed yet, but to Tommy it felt he was on top of the world, keeping up with a train of all things.
A head of curly brown hair popped back out and a hand extended out of the train car they were chasing. Before he knew it, Techno had picked Tommy up, running harder than before. "Ready?" he shouted through the wind, and Tommy wasn't sure if it was at him or Wilbur. As soon as he nodded, though, Tommy was tossed into the car, and into Wilbur's arms.
Techno made it in soon afterwards, and Tommy stood up and peered around at the contents of the boxcar. Wilbur and Techno took to fitting cans of soup in their jacket pockets, while Tommy found himself staring into a crate of plums. He had only had a plum one other time in his life that he could remember, and it was because of a similar one of Techno and Wil's train trips, when they had thought to bring one back for him. Tommy snatched the biggest handful of plums a six year old could hope to grab and threw them into his pockets, while taking one to snack on in the moment for himself, not taking even a moment to savor it.
They rode the train until it started to slow again near the city. As the train approached a smaller community on the outskirts, Wilbur picked up a can and handed it to Tommy, pointing out into the still dim morning. “Look,” he said, and Tommy did.
He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, until he saw them. A few run down houses, scattered in the distance. People running after the train car, just like Tommy, Wilbur, and Techno did, only they were throwing their hands into the air, waving and shouting and looking expectantly. Tommy looked up at Wilbur, and then to Techno, who was filling his arms with cans and vegetables and fruit.
Wilbur himself had a few cans of soup in his arms, and when the first of the people had caught up to the train car, he tossed a can out, right into their arms.
“Hey-!” Tommy shouted, wondering why Wilbur would just give food away if they’re the ones who found it, but Wilbur gave him a glare and he stopped. He looked to the people keeping up with the train, then to the worn out neighborhood on the horizon, then back to the crates filled with food in the boxcar.
Oh. That’s why Techno and Wil took so many trips like this. They weren't stealing from the city’s food just because they wanted to—they didn’t even need the extra food that much—no, they were helping people.
Tommy reached out, holding the can Wilbur gave him in both hands, and let it drop.
The train was moving slow enough that it fell right into the next person’s hands. A wide grin spread across their face and they shouted a thanks, and Tommy watched as they slowed their run, and the train passed them by.
Techno handed him a small bag of fruit, and he tossed it down to the next person who had caught up. Another smile of gratitude.
Tommy could see two people struggling to keep up, a man and a child. As they got closer, he saw that the man had the horns of a ram on his head and the ears to match. The ram man held onto the hand of a boy that Tommy could now see was around his age with brown hair and wide eyes.
The boy was tripping over his own feet and slowing them down, but the man with horns and hooves didn’t let go, even mouthed words of encouragement, lost somewhere in the sound of wind and the rails. The two reached the open door of the train car, and Wilbur and Techno dropped the man a soup can and a small bag of potatoes respectively.
To this day, Tommy doesn’t know what made him reach into his pocket and pull out a big ripe plum—he had made up his mind that they were his after all—but he knew at once that it was the right decision as he reached out as far as he could, leaning over the side, and dropped it into the boy’s outstretched hands.
He looked up at Tommy, and the boy with brown hair could have held the world in his eyes. His mouth had formed the words, “Thank you,” which were again lost in the din of the train.
A beaming grin had made its way to Tommy’s face and he threw up his hand to wave at the boy and the man, not realizing what he had done until he felt himself slipping off the cool metal floor of the train car. His heart lurched to his throat and his stomach did a flip, certain he was going to land face first into the dirt below. I’m going to die.
That was, until he felt his shirt dig into his neck as Techno dragged him up by his shirt collar.
When he was safe back in the car, Wilbur had some choice words to say to him like “What were you thinking?” and “Dad would’ve fucking killed us!” but Tommy was looking outside the car down at the boy whose eyes were wide with fear before they scrunched up into a smile as the boy laughed, seeing that Tommy was okay.
And just like that, they too were left behind by the train.
There were others still, and Techno and Wilbur spared no thought in tossing them the contents of the train car, just as they had with the ones before; however, they made Tommy stay in the back of the train car for the rest of the trip.
When they rode the noon train home from the city, Phil would chew the twins out for taking Tommy out somewhere so dangerous, somewhere two fourteen-year-olds shouldn’t be, let alone a child. But Wilbur or Techno would notice just a hint of pride on his face, knowing that his sons had given away food to a particularly worse off neighborhood in a suburb near the city.
“Tommy, get up.”
Tommy shifted uncomfortably in his sleeping bag. “Fuck off, Wil.”
“I’m serious, Tommy, we have to go .”
The sound of a zipper and a rustling bag, coupled with a large vehicle outside, was like an alarm to Tommy, who shot up from the floor. His brother was rolling up his own sleeping bag in a rush and slinging his backpack on his back. In an instant, Tommy was up, grabbing his pack and dragging his unrolled sleeping bag to a smudged, dusty window that Wilbur had shoved open. Wilbur as silently as possible dropped his things out the back window, and slipped through before taking Tommy’s items and helping him through. Thank god they had practiced this, gathering their things and getting the hell out so fast.
It had to be just in time, too. As Tommy quietly hit the floor of the back porch, he heard the sound of his father’s voice greeting someone at the front door. Wilbur pulled the window down to shut it, and pressed his ear against the back door. The old house was small enough that it wasn’t too hard to hear what was going on in the front. But Tommy didn’t have to hear the conversation to know what was going on. The Officer would have some sort of disarming small talk with Philza and Techno, before asking to see their IDs. It was practically routine at this point, like the Officers were slowly catching on to their trail. Like they were getting backed into a corner, but no one would ever catch them. Tommy was sure of that.
From his spot at the door, Wilbur motioned vaguely down at the porch. Get down .
Tommy made a face at him. Keeping his voice down, Wilbur whispered, “You need to hide.” Tommy just glared back at him and crouched down below another window with cracked glass spidering out from a fist-sized hole in it. The window was in front of an inside wall, blocking Tommy from view, but allowing him to hear.
"-ou plays guitar?" Tommy could hear a familiar electronic distortion coming from the Officer's mask to hide his voice.
"Uh, I do, sir," he heard Techno answer hesitantly. Tommy almost snorted to himself. Techno didn't know the first thing about music, let alone Wilbur's guitar. He glanced over at Wilbur at his spot at the back door, who was chiding himself for not taking his guitar with him, but Tommy couldn't see why. If anything, an object like a guitar made the two less suspicious. If he was in the Officer's position, he wouldn't exactly want to trust people who wander house to house with no possessions to their name.
"Really?" the guard said, his intrigue showing through his voice modifier. "Care to give us a song?"
There was silence for a moment, followed by a, "Uh, yeah, sure." Wilbur and Tommy shared equally confused looks. Soon, a staggered, off key rendition of an old timey song about a girl and a lamb rang through the air. It was a short song, and the air was silent once more after it was done.
Philza filled the awkward silence. "Well… He didn't say he played well, did he?"
At this, the guard actually lets out a chuckle, a strangled sound from inside his helmet. "Hah, you keep practicing, young man." Tommy heard Wilbur breathe a sigh of relief. "Now, you said you two are brothers?"
"Half-brothers, officer," Phil answered. They only recently had to start using that story. Both Techno and Wilbur were getting too old for people to believe them to be Phil's sons. Philza had hardly aged a day since they had been born. Besides that, if all four of them were spotted together, the Officers surely would have reported them as suspiciously similar to the four wanted criminals that stole from government supply.
“I can tell that much,” was the officer’s simple response, and even though Tommy couldn’t see the guard, he knew he had to be eyeing Techno’s tusks. “Listen,” the officer went on, “We’ve had reports of a group of wanted criminals around this area, so you’ll probably understand why I’m gonna need to see your IDs.”
Tommy cursed to himself. They had stayed around for far too long. Despite this, a happy sounding bee-beep came from inside, telling Tommy that at least one of the fake IDs worked.
“Alright, Alexander, you’re clear. Next.” Alexander. The fake name on Techno's ID. Techno was safe.
The air was tense before Tommy could hear a longer, lower beeep , signaling something was wrong with the ID. Wilbur’s head whipped around to face Tommy, concern etched on his face. Once again, Wilbur made a gesture that meant “Run.” Tommy didn’t know much about communicating without words, but he did know one sign. He flipped Wilbur off and then put his ear back to the wall.
Phil’s voice had gotten quiet, it was harder to pick out the words from outside. “... dropped it the other day… think the memory board… scuffed… it again?”
“Right, of course.”
The sound of scanning, and then this time, three short, fast beeps. Tommy’s heart sank.
“I’m sorry, sir, we’re going to have to take you in for questioning—”
“There must be some kinda mistake,” Techno’s voice piped up. “I mean, it was faulty at first, right? It’s gotta be wrong—”
“And if it’s wrong, then you’re free to go, but both of you need to come with me. Resisting only hurts your image, you know.”
Tommy didn’t even think.
He picked up the nearest rock he could find and launched it through the broken window.
“What was that?”
Wilbur’s face was equal parts horrified, pissed off, and astonished. He looked ready to shout at Tommy. In response, Tommy threw another rock through the window.
“Who else is in this house?” the Officer's voice boomed.
There was a pause, silence, and then a shuffle, a panicked, distorted “Wait-!”, and then the thud of something hitting the floor. A few seconds later and Phil and Techno made their way around the corner and out the back door at a run, Phil clutching a newly acquired Stunner to his chest. Wilbur and Tommy both picked up and took off after them.
“You lucky bastard, Tommy!”
“Yeah right Wil, I just saved their fuckin’ arses!”
They kept going, weaving in and out of alleyways and between houses in an effort to make their trail more difficult to follow. Crumbled bricks and cracked pavement passed them by and Tommy found himself catching up easily as he always did, his light footfalls hardly making a sound. Wilbur always joked about how he would make a good thief, as quick and silent as he was, but he quickly took back that statement when Tommy would laugh and loudly declare himself “Big Stealer.”
The morning haze felt like a blanket over them as they ran, and even if the smog was suffocating at times, or down right unbreathable at worst, it did help cover their trail. That was the only good thing about running from the authorities on a summer morning. After several blocks with no sign of pursuit, they slowed down, heaving and out of breath.
“What the fuck happened back there?” Tommy asked once his heart rate had calmed down.
Philza held up his own ID in defeat. “It’s fuckin' busted. That asshole we paid for new IDs sold me a shitty ripoff.”
“I knocked the guy out after you distracted him,” Techno said. “Don’t think he was too happy about it.”
“So now what?” Wibur asked bitterly. “Find another shack to sleep in? If it’s not husks banging on our doors, it’s Officers, or other robbers! What the hell are we supposed to—”
At first they only heard it, dragging its feet across the dirt road.
Its breathing was loud and heavy and it stumbled along as if it had forgotten how to walk. The husk staggered further out of the haze and donned an uneven, yellow-stained, toothy grimace. Its gaze was sharper than most, however, meaning the poor unlucky person hadn't gotten sick all that long ago in the grand scheme of things. There was still something there, holding on.
"Speak of the devil," Techno mumbled.
"Good job, Wilbur, you woke up the neighbors," Tommy said, prompting Wilbur to slap his shoulder with the back of his hand, though there was no real anger behind it.
In the blink of an eye, Techno's axe was buried in the husk's neck. The husk sputtered and tripped, falling to its knees, reaching with rotten arms and yellow, claw-like fingernails, crawling at Techno's feet. With another clean sweep of his axe, the creature's head was severed.
If he hadn't been so used to it, Tommy might feel himself get sick at the sight of it. The last remnant of a person clinging onto life before that said life, however horrid, was taken away from them. But, things were different now, and it had been "now" for so long that Tommy could hardly remember a time where life, or undeath, didn't end in violence. So, he kept what little food he had left down.
They all held their breath and listened as they heard the faint shuffling through the smog, and it didn't take much more than that to have them on their way again. This time it was less of a dead sprint and more of a jog. They needed to get out of this part of town, but being too loud would attract rather unwanted attention.
This is how Tommy found himself, not for the first time in his life, leaping roofs with surprising agility and speed.
The smog wasn't as thick on the roofs of the squat houses, as it tended to stay near the ground like a heavy blanket. Though the sun beat down on him, he felt invigorated in the slight breeze on the roofs, breaking through the heavy air. The way Tommy could navigate his way through the rooftops, it almost seemed like a giant, dangerous playground. Almost.
A while later, and the density of houses in the neighborhood began to wane, with just a few here and there. Tommy had to drop down from his rooftop path, but either way, by bow he could see the railway ahead.
In the thick, early summer air that was just beginning to cool off for the night, Tommy ran. He, his brothers, and his father ran to catch a train just starting to pick up speed, and chasing that train, Tommy wished he could say it felt the same as when he was a kid.
Where once he would've heard his brothers get lectured on why they can't take Tommy on their trips, which they shouldn't have been going on to begin with, mind you , instead he saw Techno helping Phil into an open train car, the older man's cloak flapping in the wind.
If Tommy squinted hard enough, he could pretend that the flowing cloak was a pair of great, dark gray wings. He used to do that often as a kid. Back when magic was real and the world seemed so much kinder.
Dusk settled over the world and the train ride was quiet. Wilbur sat in a corner and slept while Techno sharpened his now clean axe and his father checked over the group's supplies, seeing what they could take from the crates.
Tommy sneaked an orange out of an open crate into his coat pocket, yet he couldn't help but notice how much less there seemed to be in the crates, and even less of the wooden boxes themselves. He could shrug it off, thinking that being so much younger before had influenced his view of the world around him and made the food seem more plentiful, but something told him that wasn't the case. It wasn't just people's hopes that were depleting.
The train car door was open, there were riders inside, and it was lit with a lantern, yet no one approached. No one ran after the car looking for help from strangers, no, not a living soul even moved outside of the train. All was still.
Tommy had never seen the route so empty and barren, but he no longer expected it to change.
If Tubbo was here, he'd crack some funny joke that would have Tommy clutching his sides, or maybe he would deliver solid advice in a way that always caught Tommy off guard. If his mother were here, it would be a completely different story. Hell, they likely wouldn't even be here at all. But his mother was god knows where, and Tubbo… it was hard to say, but almost none of the answers looked good. Tommy tried not to think about it.
He could tell the others were thinking the same thing. They always were. Each of them missed her in their own way, held out hope for her return in their own way. Remembered the message on their comms the day after the blast saying the two simple words, “I’m okay,” before never getting another response. As for Tommy, he didn’t know what to think.
Breaking himself from his thoughts, Tommy looked up at Techno, who was saying something in a hushed voice to Phil, pointing out the door at something on the horizon. Tommy couldn’t hear what they were saying over the noise of the train, but he could guess, given the concerned look on the two’s faces.
Once, years ago, it might have been a friend. Tubbo, the boy with blonde-dyed brown hair that Phil so readily accepted into the family when Tommy told him about the situation.
Techno picked up his axe, and Phil got up from his spot on the floor and reached for the door of the train, sliding it closed. Only, the door seemed to hit something on its track and reached a stop before it fully closed. “It’s fuckin’ stuck!”
From his corner of the car, Wilbur’s eyes fluttered open and he blearily said, “What’s going on?”
“It’s a hoard, isn’t it?” Tommy said, leaning into the doorway for a better view. “The husks took over this part a couple of years ago.” He knew this part of the route, just like he knew who once had lived here when the plums still grew fresh in the orchards.
Techno stayed silent and kept his eyes on the outside.
Through the gap, Tommy could see the vague outlines of figures lumbering toward the train in the near dark and houses on the horizon. For a brief moment, only brief, he wondered if he would recognize any of them, if he saw their faces. Would he see an older man with big, looping ram horns? Or would he see a blonde haired boy with brown roots he wanted to hide? It didn't matter how unlikely either of those were, it plagued Tommy's mind like the plague had taken these people.
A hollow-eyed face appeared at the bottom of the opening and Tommy stumbled backward, tripping over his own feet. The husk's grotesque face just stared at him with cloudy eyes and a mouth dripping a tar-like substance, permanently open due to its dislocated jaw bone. A rotted, bony hand stuck it's way through the gap as the husk pulled itself up.
Tommy shrieked, "Holy shit!" and reached for his pocket knife, but by the time he got it open, Techno had already butted in, slashing at the husks outreached arm with his axe.
The husk didn't seem aware of any pain, and used its other hand to grab onto the axe's handle, just below the head. It pulled itself further up, getting its waist over the edge of the platform as Techno thrashed the axe in his hands, trying to pry it free of the husk's grasp.
Tommy recovered his wits and grabbed the Stunner that Phil had left next to his bag. He fiddled with the safety to turn it off, got down low, and aimed under Techno's arms and axe at the husk's chest.
Tommy fired.
The flat, coin-like bullet hit its mark, and the husk's grip on the train car loosened, as it could make no effort to find a better hold. Tommy watched the form fall from the edge of the car, that short distance to the ground where it would likely never move from again. It would be just another part of the scenery now.
" Shit ," Wilbur breathed, clutching his heart.
Phil yanked the door shut with a loud screech and a slam, then turned his back to it and sank to the metal floor. Following a second of being dazed, Techno just simply held out his hand to Tommy for a high-five.
The rest of the train ride passed in cold silence. When the train picked up speed, there was no need to watch the outside, keeping guard. So, the four just sat, quiet, and absent-mindedly fidgeting. After all, there's never much to do during an apocalypse, is there?
Another thing high on Tommy's list of things he will never forget: the beauty of the city.
He'd seen pictures of natural landscapes and scenery on other planets, saw how beautiful they must have been, but the city was something Tommy could truly see and experience. It was busy, had bright lights, made noise- something about it was just so real to Tommy. Something tangible and interesting in a dull world.
Screens covered the large windows. Some of them had calming, serene still images of beaches and forests, while others had bright, colorful advertisements for trivial goods. All of them were attention grabbing, and Tommy's eyes could hop from one screen to the next, taking in all the noise and color.
Tommy could see the glow even from outside the massive encumbering wall that stood between them and possibly the safest place in all of the Overworld.
There was no human at the entrance, only a simple scanner that was humming away before they even pressed a button. In a slow, yet staccatoed robotic voice, it said, "Four travelers detected. If you request entry, please scan your IDs."
Phil swore under his breath. Then, he loudly proclaimed, "Aw man, I must've left my ID at home. Guess we've gotta go back and get it." He grabbed Techno and Wilbur by the arms and dragged them off, a few yards from the scanner.
Tommy knew the drill, and he felt a sense of pride at being the one to sneak his family in this time around. The last few times it was either Techno or Wil, when they were still the poor looking teenagers that systematically, the scanner was programmed to let in. Now Tommy was the kid who could garner the most sympathy with the least suspicion. That, and his ID was the safest bet out of all of them.
"Traveler detected. If you request entry, please scan your ID."
Tommy did as it asked, taking the ID module out of his communicator. It was a small flat card with a chip embedded into a part of the card that was inserted into the chip reader on the wall. He breathed a sigh of relief when the familiar standard Beep! rang out from the scanner.
"Welcome to the SMP, Nathaniel."
Tommy then rolled his eyes. Phil could have at least let him pick a cooler fake name. No one would want to mess with a man named Danger, or maybe even Kraken. Phil drew a hard line at Skull Crusher III, however, which Tommy could kind of understand. Too over the top.
Whether the scanner thought his name was lame or not, the large metal door slid open. Tommy went through as Phil, Wilbur, and Techno ducked just under and out of the view of the camera and into the chamber before the door could close again.
Inside the border security room was one of the most sanitary places Tommy had ever seen. Next to the door that must have led further into the city, there was a smaller UV chamber for items to go into to be sanitized and come out on the other side. Another speaker similar to the one outside was built into the wall, as well as a few pinholes in the wall that Tommy had to guess held barely inconspicuous cameras.
That same staccatoed voice crackled over the speaker, "Heat signature limit exceeded. Unexpected individuals inside chamber. Entry has been denied and authorities have been contacted.”
“Shit!”
Of course their plan wouldn't work. The city was on much higher security now that the plague was more wide-spread.
Wilbur darted for the metal door they had come through, looking for a latch or something to get the door open, while Techno tried the door into the city. Both evidently failed, and the room seemed to shrink in on them as dread crept its way in.
“What the fuck, they didn’t have that last time we were here!” Phil shouted in frustration at the city’s increased security.
Tommy launched a kick at the door to the rest of the city, then doubled over at the somehow unexpected pain he got from kicking an obviously metal door. His hand shot out to the wall to catch himself, but instead found a panel he had completely ignored upon walking in. It was the controls to the UV disinfecting chamber. If he looked through the chamber, he could see the next room they would enter if they hadn’t tried to cheat their way in.
Wilbur must have seen it as well, and was the first to voice the idea. He motioned for everyone to huddle in the center of the room, lest the very likely hidden microphones intercept their plan.
"You see the UV chamber?" Wilbur said under his breath. The others nodded. "There's an emergency button on the inside. If someone's stuck in there and pushes it, the doors on it open."
"Shit, Wil, you're a genius," Phil whispered, trying to keep his voice down despite his excitement.
Tommy glanced back at the box in the wall. It was a good plan. One of them gets in the UV box, presses the safety button, then crawls out the other side to get the door open for the others. Except looking at that box, Tommy could tell just who in the group would be small enough to fit through, and he wasn't happy about it.
His chest heaved at the thought and he groaned, "Yeah and I'm gonna be the one going through, huh?"
Wilbur tensed up, ever so slightly, either in sudden remembrance or frustration, both of which Tommy would be equally annoyed at. He turned to Tommy, his features soft with sympathy. "You don't have to go through if you don't want to, Tommy. I can go through."
After taking a moment to slow his breathing, Tommy announced, "I'll do it. Just don't microwave me while I'm in there or anything." He punctuated this with a jab to both Wil and Techno's sides as he strode over to the sanitizer.
"That's not how-" Wilbur started, before he just sighed. "Thank you, Tommy."
"Yeah, yeah," Tommy waved him off and pulled the solid door to the compartment open.
The compartment was big enough that Tommy could crawl inside with his back just barely against the ceiling of it. Yet it was still small enough that it was beginning to feel like it was closing in on Tommy as he reached for the button.
The metal of the floor was cool on his hand, and he was sure that the sides were getting closer, pressing in, when he hit the button with his fist.
Nothing happened.
He heard a distant sounding swear, and then Phil said with a groan, "We probably have to close the door for it to work. Tommy, you'll be alright, just press the button as soon as it's closed."
Fantastic.
As if it wasn't bad enough to be in a small space, Tommy was now going to be in a small enclosed space with the looming threat of being caught by the government . His day sure is going well.
He tucks his legs in and catches his breath as Phil closes the door. As soon as Tommy hears the click of the lock, he punches the safeguard button, both doors spring open, and he practically leaps out the other side and falls onto the floor in a heap.
Tommy's head spins for a moment until he rushes to stand up, having to catch himself so that he doesn't end up back on the floor.
The room he finds himself in is similar to the last one, only this one is larger. It has reinforced tables and chairs, and most importantly, a large brick archway at the other end of it as an official entrance to the SMP.
Tommy remembers the whole "authorities have been contacted" thing and immediately turns back to the door keeping his brothers and father outside of the city. A keypad sits on the wall to the right of the door. Fuck.
He sticks his face back into the UV chamber door. "It's got a keypad lock," he whisper-shouts.
The others, clearly expecting to have been let through the door by now, appear at the other side of the tunnel. Phil answers, "What?"
"It's got a keypad lock! How do I get you guys out?"
Techno's face appeared across the tunnel as he said, "Does it have any worn down buttons?"
Tommy leaned over to the keypad and examined the buttons.
"One, two, four, and uhhhh… Zero I guess?"
There was a huddle of whispering on the other side before Phil's face appeared again and said, "Try 2410." Right, that made sense. The year the first settlement on the Overworld was founded after citizens had arrived from Earth.
Tommy put in the numbers one at a time. Once he pressed the "enter" button, a loud buzz emitted from the keypad. He raced back to the open UV chamber. "That's not it!"
Phil swore under his breath and turned back to the others. Tommy saw him rub his temples as though trying to remember something. He suddenly shot back around, "Tommy, try 4102."
Four… One… Zero… Two… Enter.
The lock in the door clicked and Tommy shoved it open. The others rushed through with a cheer
"How did you know it was 4102? Lucky guess?" Tommy asked.
Wilbur breathed a dramatic sigh. "It was the year Dream took control of the Overworld," he answered. "Self obsessed prick," he grumbled under his breath.
They walked through the brick arch into the entrance building, a giant dome with a glass atrium in the center, lush ferns and trees making up the center garden of the otherwise light gray room that resembled a shopping mall. The green atrium was a stark contrast to both the white tile of the floor, and the desert that Tommy had gotten used to seeing his entire life.
Yeah, he missed this place.
The long-expected sirens finally grew louder as they got nearer. Phil grabbed Tommy's and Wilbur's shoulders, a sense of urgency filling the group.
They all moved to a corridor on the side and rushed to the end of it, finding the less grand entrance that led out of the hub and into the city.
As he threw open the door to the towering city beyond, Phil turned to the others.
"We need to find Big Q."