Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

They were falling.

Why were they falling?

Their vision blurs, focusing on the ground as it draws closer. They can’t prevent it. They’re not going to survive.

They hit the ground.

Someone is screaming. It’s an awful blood-curdling sound. The gut-wrenching voice cracks, whoever is screaming has barely reached puberty. Oh, a terrible thing for someone so young to feel such pain.

They are the one screaming. The sound is coming from their throat. Why are they screaming?

It doesn’t hurt.

Strange.

Then the pain hits them like a truck. Their skull is cracking. Neck snapping. Arms bent the wrong way. Everything hurts. It’s buzzing. All hazy.

Their vision is filled with red. The liquid covers their eyes. Blood, blood, blood.

It hurts so much.

Hours tick by and they lie there in pain, unable to move.

Like a gunshot something tears into their backside ripping at the flesh. Another scream. A bloody axe is ripping their back open.

Once again their screams rip through the night but they can’t even hear them. Their insides feel mangled and crushed. They can’t move. Their fingers twitch. They need to move. They can’t die here.

Vaguely recalling that they need to keep pressure on open wounds, they strain their broken limbs to sit up. With a crack, their arms straighten and they briefly think to themself, “That’s probably not a good thing.”

Clutching their head with a now unbroken arm they look around for something to help.

A river!

They clumsily crawl over to the river, body aching with each step.

As they enter the water, immediately most of their wounds are soothed, the sting lessening. They watch as the water turns red, the blood washing off them. They dip their head in and scrub their face which was caked with dirt and blood.

They finish cleaning themself and notice their reflection in the river water.

Dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. Large eye bags with matching dark circles, a rather unattractive nose, and a cleft chin.

This wasn’t them.

They didn’t look like this.

The reflection’s eyes widened as theirs did.

Scrambling out of the river they wildly look around for an explanation for this madness. Short trees (no branches?), green grass (too green), and a tall dirt tower with blood staining the ground next to it.

Where are they?

“Grr,” a groan comes from their right. A sickly pale green monster with decaying flesh, pieces of skin almost completely ripped off. A torn blue shirt and head split open revealing its grey brain matter.

“Zombie,” they name the creature slowly coming for them. "Nope! Nope, nopety nope. I’m not dealing with that. Fuck this shit I’m out.” They turn on their heel and bolt.

As they run it becomes apparent there is more than one zombie.

The zombies swipe at them and they desperately dodge. A loud “Twang” sound and an arrow hit their leg.

“Fucker,” they swear.

There is a whole ass arrow in their leg.

It feels like they’ve been running forever. They’re starting to get exhausted. It’s getting hard to breathe, but they need to keep running. Their chest is pounding and their side aches like hell. It’s that awful feeling like something is digging into your ribcage whenever you run for too long or too fast. And they were doing both.

Another arrow tears their shirt, stabbing their back.

They don’t stop but nearly run into a tree.

They hear more arrows being fired, the loud “Twang” sound whizzing by their ear. Like an annoying mosquito. An annoying mosquito currently trying to kill them.

Gotta keep running. Gotta survive.

An arrow hits the tree next to them.

They come to a halt, their feet skidding a bit over the grass.

It was a cliff.

A wide cliff that cuts off abruptly and if someone jumped it would mean certain death. They turn around, half-hoping the monsters had stopped chasing them.

To their surprise, there was not a single zombie in sight.

There was only this weird four-legged green thing.

It was tall, the size of the average human, and looked like a lynx with its spots and giant paws. Its nose and mouth were merged together in some terrifying abomination of nature. It lacked any ears and had holes for eyes.

It was hissing…

…and glowing.

Now, they didn’t consider themself to be very smart but even they knew, that if a live animal is glowing, that ain’t normal.

They slowly backed away from the creature.

And it promptly exploded.

With a big, “Kaboom!” and everything. Just blew up.

The shock quickly wore off as they realized the impact had blasted them off their precarious position on the edge of the cliff. And they were sent them sailing off it.

Ahaha, they’re gonna die.

They're falling again. How are they gonna survive this? People aren't made for falling…

...but cats are.

“C'mon, remember that one video,” they mutter to themself. The cat one. How cats always land on their feet. They spin, splaying their limbs, mimicking how a cat twists to survive tall falls. They hope the wind would catch and parachute them.

They’re not a cat. They’re not light enough for this to work.

And they’re gliding to their death now.

Wait, gliding?

“Holy shit,” they yell, half-fear half-overjoyed.

It worked! They’re gliding!

…how are they gliding.

They look over their shoulder and—

Are those wings?!

“Holy FUcking shit. WHat the fuck?” they shout, panicked.

As they look at their new limbs their previously peaceful flight is disrupted by their distractedness.

They begin to spin rapidly, no longer in control of their descent that is quickly moving them toward the ground.

They tuck into a ball instinctively to lessen the impact which also tucks their wings, the only thing keeping them in the air.

They drop to the ground bruising their shoulder, the one with an arrow still stuck in it, driving the arrow in deeper before snapping it. However, they don’t feel nearly as injured as they probably should be.

Their hands are cold and wet. The snow slid under their cheek.

Snow? Is that what broke their fall? But they could have sworn the grass was green maybe even greener than normal. How did it snow so fast?

Whatever.

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” they mutter before sliding into unconsciousness.

Chapter Text

They’re warm. So warm and nice and cozy. But they got to wake up for school soon. They need to get ready.

“Ugh,” they grumble pushing themself awake. They shift to climb down the ladder of their bunk bed.

Their foot hits the first prong, so they bring down their second foot.

Which hits the floor.

Huh?

The floor isn’t that close.

They quickly blink off their sleepiness, now wide awake and looking around.

This wasn’t their room.

Where are they?

Then the events of last night hit them. The falling, the zombies, the arrows, the exploding lynx-looking thing, the falling. They pull their hair, frustrated.

What was all that?

Why? How?

“Okay,” they slap their cheeks, “focus.”

They’re in an unfamiliar room, but everything is unfamiliar so moving on. The bed they were on is a small one fit for one person. It’s white with only a single lone pillow. Across the foot of the bed is a large green gem-like cubic table or something. Above is a large golden bell.

At the end of the rather small room is a lot of bookshelves that are most likely ingrained into the wall. The bookshelves surround another table with a book floating above it.

A floating book… at this point nothing will surprise them.

“Oh, you’re up,” a monotone voice drawls.

They jump in surprise and turn toward the voice.

“What the fUCK,” they screech.

The owner of the voice is a giant pig.

A pig-man thing.

An anthropomorphic pig.

“What the fuck,” they say again, softer.

The pig raises an eyebrow (how can it raise an eyebrow it’s a pig!)

“You know what,” they say. “I’m not dealing with this shit. No siree.” They crawl back into the bed, pulling the covers over their head and flopping on their side.

“This is all one badddddd dream,” they lie to themself.

“I’m still here,” the pig-man grunts.

“Nope! No, you’re not. You’re just a product of my vivid imagination,” they sing, still in denial.

The pig-man rips the blanket off them, stealing their last bits of hope along with it.

“Noooo,” they whine grabbing the blanket back.

“Give me the blanket, Tommy,” the pig-man says, sternly.

“Who the hell is Tommy?” they ask, still frantically, desperately holding onto the blanket.

“Haha very funny,” pig-man deadpans and finally manages to tear the blanket away.

“No, I’m serious. Who is Tommy? And who are you? Why am I here?”

The pig-man gives them an odd look. “You’re Tommy. It’s me, Technoblade. Did you hit your head or something? How do you not remember me?”

“Technoblade?”

The pig-man gives a sigh of relief, mistakenly thinking they remembered.

“As in The Technoblade?” they reconfirm. “The winner of the Potato War? You were part of the Antarctic Empire?”

“I created the Antarctic Empire. I wasn’t just a part of it,” he snorts.

They mentally scream. Are they in the Dream SMP?? In Minecraft? They are in a fucking video game?!

“So, you do remember who I am?” the pig-man half-questions.

Are they hallucinating? Are they on drugs right now? There is no way this is real.

“No,” they violently correct. “I know who you are. I don’t know you, personally. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to have a mental breakdown.” They stand up and gently push the pig- Technoblade back down the trapdoor. “So sorry, please reschedule another appointment at a later date. Goodbyeee!”

Making sure the pig-man was fully out of the room, they lean back against the wall, exhausted.

“I’m in Minecraft?” they mutter, frenzied. “The Dream SMP? And that’s Technoblade?”

Then something Technoblade said finally clicks.

“I’M TOMMY FUCKING INNIT?”

Wasn’t TommyInnit the source of most, if not all of the sever’s problems in the lore? And Tommy’s Dream’s sworn enemy. Dream is canonically a very powerful person they did not want to mess with.

But they kinda have to… because they’re in Tommy’s body, now.

How does this even happen? This is the kind of bullshit that happens in terrible Wattpad fanfictions not real-life!

And they hadn’t exactly forgotten that they had wings growing out their back.

That definitely wasn’t canon. But at this point, anything is possible. A self-insert Tommyinnit with wings? Yeah, why not. Eret never betrayed L’manburg? Plausible. Fundy is a closeted furry? Oh, definitely.

Actually, that last one is probably already canon.

Right anyways, wings. Yep, those buggers.

Their wings are a pretty rich royal purple gradienting into a fiery red-orange. They experimentally flex them, because they can do that now. They could actually move their wings with ease. It’s like wiggling your toes, you aren’t always consciously aware of them, but you can still move them with little concentration.

They flutter their wings a bit more to get a feel for them, but it feels so natural. Their wings shift and feel like they were always a part of them. Like another set of arms.

In fact, their wings were the only thing that definitely felt “right”. Their hands were too large and their fingers lacked their writer’s callus. They were so tall, too tall. They were thinner and they actually had acceptable posture. (Who knew it would take being placed in another’s body to stop their slouching?)

They swish their wings a bit more as they admire their wings because it was still taking a while for their mind to grasp that THEY HAD ACTUAL WINGS.

And out of the corner of their eye, they spot yet another potential problem.

“I have a tail…?”

They had a tail.

Just when they thought this couldn’t get any weirder.

Their tail looked like the average bird’s tail with a few exceptions. It was the same fiery red/ orange as their wings but it had two long tail feathers that looked similar to a peacock’s except in the same purple shade as their wings.

They knew that a bird’s tail acts as a rudder during flight but they didn’t see the purpose of the two ornamental feathers. It would just cause unnecessary drag. Most birds only had long tails to attract mates…

…Ah, that’s embarrassing.

A knock comes from the trapdoor. “Tommy?” Technoblade calls. “Are you- we need to talk. If you’re feeling better can you come down?”

When they don’t respond the anthropomorphic pig gives a huff and clambers back down the ladder.

“Might as well get over with it,” they decide, folding their arms around themself. “He deserves an explanation. And I…I need answers.”

They flip open the trapdoor to climb down the ladder.

Chapter Text

Technoblade watched as they climbed down the ladder, struggling a bit to fit through the trapdoor with their large wings.

They end up missing the ladder once they’re unstuck and fall onto the floor with a thump.

They meet Technoblade’s eyes and sheepishly grin, “Sorry, still getting used to having wings and all that.”

Technoblade gives them an expressionless stare before sitting down on the wooden floor and gesturing for them to join him.

“You don’t have any chairs, huh?” they awkwardly chuckle.

“The house is too small for furniture,” Technoblade answers.

An overbearing silence hangs over the room.

“So…” they begin. “Er… what do you want to know?”

“What’s with the wings,” Technoblade finally asks.

Their eyes widen. “You don’t know how I got them either?”

“No, last time I saw you I’m fairly sure you didn’t have chicken wings.”

“Chicken wings?!” they squawk. “How dare you insult these lovely ladies,” they say, pointing at their wings. “They’re clearly the wings of some sort of tropical bird. You know with the bright colour and-” they trail off not quite sure where they were going with that.

“Anyways,” they blurt out, “You ask a question, I ask a question. Sound fair?”

Technoblade shrugs.

“Alright, my turn then.”

They let out a deep breath making a bit of a whoosh sound.

They inhaled.

C’mon just ask him, coward. He’s right there!

“Can I touch your face!” they yell, their question accidentally coming out more demanding than they wanted.

“Heh?!”

Technoblade looked, understandably, confused.

“I’m sorry. It’s just you look really fluffy and you got the floppy ears. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. My bad. I just…you look sorta like my dog and…”

Technoblade bluescreened.

They weren’t sure how the pig-man managed to perfectly convey the emotion of the sudden Windows system failure, but he did.

“Uh, you good there Techno? Can I call you that? Technoblade~” they call trying to bring the pig-man out of his daze.

They were really close to him now. It would take only a small movement of their arm to pat his head.

Do it!
Do it!
Do it!

Damm, intrusive thoughts.

They let their hand fall onto Technoblade’s head.

SO SOFT
Technosoft
Fluffy
Floof

Technoblade jerked his head up and the realization of their actions sunk in.

They are patting the Blade’s head. They’re gonna die.

It’s okay!
We can gaslight gatekeep girl boss our way out anything

They slowly lift their hand off the Blade’s head and quickly retreat to the opposite side of the room, near the ladder and door. Convenient escape routes secured they look back to judge how painful their death would be.

But Technoblade didn’t look mad?

In fact, he just sorta was staring at them.

Eerie.

He blinked. Then blinked again. Then he brushed it off?

What

“A question for a question? Alright, so why didn’t you recognize me?”

are we just ignoring the elephant in the room?
Fine by me
I see no problem with this

“Uh… because I’ve never met you before?” they say, hesitantly.

“Not sure what that’s supposed to mean as I clearly remember helping you and Wilbur in Pogtopia.”

“Yeah about that,” they tensed. “That wasn’t exactly me.”

“Sure looked a lot like you,” Technoblade said sarcastically.

“I’m not-” they start. “I didn’t…”

They take a deep breath and rub their face before looking back up at Technoblade.

"I don't remember being Tommy," they finally settle on.

Technoblade tilts his head, “What?”

“Yeah, just sorta woke up in the middle of nowhere. Bleeding out. And there was a lot of falling. It was very painful let me tell you. And there was this river that I crawled over to. You know, to wash off all the blood. Anyways as I was saying I was in this river and I see my face. But it's not my face.”

They gesture to themself. “This is Tommy’s face. I’m not Tommy.”

The pig-man closes his eyes, contemplative. “Tommy,” he begins. “I think you might’ve hit your head a little too hard.”

Oh no he didn’t!
FALSE
How dare he

They vehemently agreed with the voices. “Oi! I’ll have you know I’m the picture-perfect definition of sane. If anything you’re the weirdo,” they accuse, deflecting. "Oh, look at me. I'm Technoblade, an anarchist, despite literally being the leader of an entire empire.

"I think I'm sooooo smart because I helped a rebellion to destroy a government even though I knew the rebellion I was supporting was pro-government!" they mocked.

PREACH!

"You know the reason I'm an anarchist is because of what happened to the Antarctic Empire," Technoblade growls.

"No,” they sharply rebuke, “I don't. Because like I keep telling you, I ain't Tommyinnit!"

Technoblade sighs, tiredly. “If you’re not Tommy then how would you know about all that?”

“Er…” they couldn’t explain how he was a funny man in a block game. Even if they could they’d only end up sounding more delusional.

“Because I know everything, obviously,” they respond.

After all, if you can't reasonably explain your actions, cover it up with narcissism!