Chapter Text
Chapter One
When it comes down to it, flying and falling are impossible to tell apart.
Flying is a pleasure Tommy’s rarely known. Even with the wings on his back, he has never known how the clouds felt. He’s never felt the presence of the other flying creatures in the skies.
“They’re called birds.” Sandwiched together in the careroom with a stolen book under their paws, Tubbo had told him about birds. “But birds aren’t really like us. They don’t have fingers.”
“Of course birds have fingers, Tubbo,” Tommy had said, not believing a word he had said. “What kind of bird doesn’t have fingers?”
Tubbo had always been fond of fairytales. It was hard to get books at all in the nursery. They weren’t forbidden since most of the kids couldn’t read. Tubbo couldn’t, and neither could Tommy (even if he liked to pretend). He still stole them whenever he could.
If they were lucky, the books would have pictures. Even then, Tommy wouldn’t dare to look at pictures. Any glimpse of an outside world he doesn’t get to touch is torture to him.
Tubbo was right about some things - about the outside. Hell, he remembered more than Tommy ever did. Most of the shit he assumed was something out of a fairytale.
“Tubbo, are you seeing this right now?” he calls out into the empty woods. It’s quiet - if only for a moment.
There’s a gunshot and then scrambling up from the tree - high above the tiny humans on the forest floor - there’s Tubbo. “Birds, Tommy!” he hollers. “Aren’t they amazing?”
Tommy perches on the top of his tree and sticks his middle finger up to the sky. “Yeah, think you’re so cool, don’t you?” he exclaims, flicking them off as the soar over him. “I can fly too, asshole!”
“Tommy, birds are friendly,” Tubbo whispers, snickering. “They’re our friends, you know.”
“I don’t want to be friends with assholes,” Tommy counters, wings struggling to spread. His wings don’t spread apart like the taunting birds.
His are clipped behind his back.
“I don’t think we have much of a choice,” Tubbo says, climbing over to his branch. He perches on the branch next to Tommy and swings his legs over it. “We’re related to them, I think.”
“I’m pretty sure you read that wrong,” he says, cringing. “We don’t look like them.”
“Because we were human once,” Tubbo says plainly - as if it was as simple as that. “And then they ruined us.”
Well, Tommy doesn’t know about that. He doesn’t know about humans or birds.
What he does know, however, is that they’re not out of the danger yet.
“We don’t have to be anything now,” Tommy says, greedily inhaling the sharp air from the trees. “We’re free. That’s all that matters.”
Tubbo presses his shoulder against his own. “We’re free, Tommy,” he hisses, kicking his legs out. “Free! We’re free!”
Tommy staggers to his feet. He cups his hands around his mouth and screams as much as his lungs will allow him. He screams to the neverending sky, to the birds, to those that hurt him, and to the world. He screams. “We’re free, motherfuckers!”
It’s too good to be true. After all this time, Tommy was confident that nothing outside of that laboratory even existed. It was easier to think they were the only ones alive than to think of other kids his age being happy and growing up normal when he was poked at all day long.
But it’s real. The sky is there, and it’s so, so blue. The sun is hot and unbelievably bright - just like a lamp. The sky was like a roof, and yet it never ended. No matter how far Tommy cranes his head, he can see no end to the relentlessly blue sky.
Tommy, unable to look at the awestrucking sight any longer, falls back against Tubbo’s shoulder. Out of habit, Tubbo nestles his head against him in return. “We’re not out of the woods yet.”
Tommy groans, throwing his head back. “You had to go and ruin the moment.”
Tubbo’s biggest talent was ruining moments. It’s why he was the most loved, and Tommy wasn’t. He might accidentally interrupt a moment once or twice, but he brings you lots of distractions while the labcoats are dragging a scalpel against your skin.
Now, there are no labcoats. No scalpels, no bindings, no scientists, no - nobody! There was nobody in this entire godforsaken world.
Only Tubbo. Only Tommy.
Just how they had always wanted it to be.
It was always meant to be just the two of them from the beginning.
Tubbo and Tommy against the world. They stuck up for each other. In those days where they would be rendered speechless from that day’s torture, they would find comfort in the presence of one another. It was only because of the other they made it out alive.
And on the weeks Tommy got sent to the dark room, he would know Tubbo would be waiting. They made it through, even if apart, because they would always end up together.
“No one can separate us now,” Tommy says, grinning ear to ear. “We don’t know nobody, motherfuckers!”
“They know us, Tommy,” Tubbo counters, some of his anxiety returning to him. He fidgets on the branch, unsure of himself. “We should go before they catch up.”
Tubbo gently grabs ahold of Tommy’s shoulders and tugs on him. Tommy steps back. His foot slides off of the branch, but his wings flutter before he’s able to fall too hard. Even clipped, his wings are strong enough to keep him afloat - if only for a quick second. “We need to run,” Tubbo pleads, eyes blown wide.
“Who needs to run when we can fly?” His wings twitch at the primal urge to commit its purpose. “It’s what we’re meant to do, Tubbo!”
Tubbo shakes his head. “We’re not meant for anything, Tommy,” he says, and it’s nothing more than a beg. He finds his hands and intertwines their fingers. “Besides, living, I think.”
He frowns. “That’s lame.”
He hums, forcing a smile upon his face. “It won’t be. I’m sure of it, Tommy. We will live a new life.”
Tubbo closes his eyes briefly before staring out onto the setting sun, far off into the horizon. He doesn’t have to imagine the sky anymore. It’s here, in front of him. What a tragedy it is to see the sun for the first time only for it to slowly fall down in the sky. “Why would I want a new life when I have one with you?”
“You don’t think you’ll get sick of me?” Tubbo asks, squeezing his hands. “I mean, come on. We’ve been together forever.”
“Exactly,” he says, squeezing him back. They hold onto each other - a hand in each hand - and sink down against the tree’s sturdy branch. “Why break the streak now?”
Sheepishly, Tubbo turns his head. “Well, I dunno… Maybe you’d be sick of me?”
“Sick of my Tubbo?” he gasps dramatically. “Maybe. But never for too long. I can’t ever leave you.”
“You could,” he counters. “You could leave me. We’re free now. There’s nothing holding you to staying with me.” Tommy tightens his grip on him. He digs his talons against Tubbo’s clammy palm. “Ouch!”
“Don’t you ever say that to me,” Tommy threatens, digging in his claw as sharply as he could manage. “I’m nothing on my own.”
Tubbo retaliates, headbutting Tommy. Neither of them pull away - connected through sharp talons and painful shoves.
“Who am I, without you?” Tommy asks, desperately clinging onto him.
Tubbo raises his chin. The sun finally sets, and the golden warmth vanishes from Tubbo’s eyes. In its wake remains Tubbo’s own sparks of sun in his eyes. “Yourself.”
Even if it was true, Tommy could never believe that. A Tommy without Tubbo is an empty and desolate thing.
His lifeforce, his motivator, his solace, his everything, his world - his Tubbo.
“You can’t get rid of me that easily,” Tommy begins, and it’s a promise.
“We will always be together.” Six years old.
“Always.” Eight years old.
Even as the others in the class didn’t make it out, didn’t come back from trials, Tubbo and Tommy did. They had something the others didn’t: each other.
“Even if we expire,” four years old. “We expire together.”
A bloodborne promise shaken with young, feeble hands.
“Who said I want to?” Tubbo says, snickering. “The world is ours!”
He rises to his bare feet, bruised and bloody from the rough branches. “‘M tired, and--”
“We’re leaving this hellhole,” Tubbo declares. “You with me?”
Like it’s even a question.
Tommy nods. His hand finds Tubbo again, as they often do. Tommy leads the way. He drags him down the tree - hopping from branch to branch. The trees are just close enough for them to jump from one to the other.
Tubbo’s shorter than Tommy, so Tommy goes first. He jumps then waits for Tubbo to follow and catches him when he falls short.
This was a routine plan discussed over and over again. Even the two of them with their birdbrains knew this plan as well as a student knows his pledge, as a preacher his prayer.
Together, they moved through the woods. To their freedom, locked together only by each other’s hand.
“There’s a clearing here,” Tommy says, panting. Tubbo faceplants into his back with a muffled “oof!” His wings puff up behind him in an attempt to steady himself. He balances himself without Tommy ever catching hold of his blunder. “Maybe we take a breather?”
“Yeah, but what if they catch up?” Tubbo asks, whining. “We’ve talked for too long. We need walls.”
“We need rest!” Tommy counters, turning around. “We’re not gonna make it like this. We need food. We need rest.”
He throws his hands up. “Fine. We’ll do it your way, genius,” Tubbo mocks. “But when a labcoat catches up to us--”
The world trembles underneath his feet. The earth tilts on his axis on a whim, and Tommy is no longer right side up. His wings struggle to expand on innate behavior, yet they catch up on the silver clippings at the base. He reaches out for Tubbo, who in the same state, fails to flutter his wings.
They’ve lost their branch.
“Fuck!” Tommy curses, chest rising and falling rapidly as the familiar adrenaline courses through his body. His wings stretch against the bindings. They beat frantically against the familiar bonds, yet they don’t budge. “Tubbo!” he screams, lungs burning at the increasing pressure.
Falling and flying always looked too similar - far too similar for his liking.
Ever so difficult to tell apart, even for those with wings.
The air brushes past over his wings and pets him all over. His hair brushes out from his face. For the first time in his life, he feels the wind against his skin.
He doesn’t get a chance to enjoy it much before he lands against a bush. He lands on his arms and knees with his fragile wings away from the harsh ground.
“Tubbo!” he calls out again, staggering to his feet. The sudden pressure drop fills his vision with black spots, but he fights it. He steps on trembling legs and makes his way through the forest floor.
The leaves are wet and cold against his toes. It stings something unpleasant in a way he’s not accustomed to.
“Tubbo!” he calls out desperately, chest spasming with the effort. “Where’d--”
The sound happens again, and a mess of leaves appear before him.
He ducks to the ground and looks behind him.
“Stay still, you motherfucker.” The girl is trembling as she reloads her rifle. “It’ll be over soon.”
He uses his hands to push off of a tree. He doesn’t wait any longer to question her or look for Tubbo. The rifle in her hand answers enough of his questions.
His vision is still blocked by the blurring dots, but he doesn’t stop running. He picks his feet up as quickly as he can, one after the other. His chest burns with every greedy intake of air, and it burns again with the exhale.
“Tubbo, run!” he calls desperately into the no longer empty forest. A futile attempt to reach his other half.
Tubbo’s got to be handling it better than he is. If he’s the one with the hunter on his trail, Tubbo’s got to have it easy. “Lucky bitch.”
One of them should be able to make it out of this alive. They deserve that much, at the very least.