Archive of Our Own

Wilbur is a prince, no doubt about it.

Not that he’s complaining, he knows full well he is lucky to be one. He knows full well he could have been stuck as a regular guy, living a regular life. Or have been unlucky enough to be born into a poor family and end up on the streets—something he knows Phil, the current king, and his dad, is trying to fix.

He knows he’s lucky, okay? And he enjoys it, but it does not mean he can’t complain sometimes. Sometimes, being a prince is awful.

Like how Phil is overprotective. Wilbur loves his dad, he loves him more than anything, his dad is like, the only guy besides Wilbur left of the royal family after his mom and twin died, but that also ended in Phil being more protective. Way, way more protective. Not that he wasn’t already protective, they were royalty, you kind of had to be protective. Because some people don’t like you and try to kill you in your own home, nothing you can do about it. Phil was already stressed beforehand, from the inter-galactic war—which was thankfully over nowadays, but his wife and other son dying kind of did it for him and now Wilbur is stuck in his own home. 

It feels like a prison. Where he can do anything he wants, except leave. Phil gives him bodyguards; Wilbur shakes them off and hides in the rafters. Phil bans him from off-planet adventures, Wilbur does them anyway. Phil tells him to be careful and stay safe , Wilbur does the exact opposite. 

The worst part about it all though, is that when his twin died, that left him as the new heir to the throne. His twin, Techno, was older. So, he was getting the throne. Wilbur didn’t care because he didn’t want the throne, Techno didn’t really want it either, but he saw it as a responsibility and took it anyway. So, when Techno and mom died on an off-planet trip to one of their three moons—Ovis—when some human space pirates decided to raid their ship, killing them in the process.

Techno and Kristin did give a pretty good fight though, considering the human bodies found around the area. It was the bomb that ended up killing them, not the humans themselves. The human pirates were the ones to set the bomb off though, so it really is their fault, isn’t it?

Anyways, since then, Wilbur has been next in line for the throne. Thus, making him insanely busy, targeted by assassins, and whatever else. Most of all, he has been given responsibility. Something he, decidedly, does not want. He liked it better when he was 13 and Techno had the responsibility—too bad Techno’s dead, and so he’s stuck with it. They had a funeral and everything, burned the bodies, that guy is, 100% undoubtedly dead.

Wilbur's gone over the whole grieving process though, he’s gotten over it. Yeah, he’s sad sometimes, and yeah when the anniversary of their deaths comes around, he mopes around all day, but generally? It's fine. He’s fine. Phil... Phil hasn’t seemed to have gotten the memo that it's been 4 years and he can stop being sad about it now.

Which is why Wilbur is hanging out in the catwalks of the hangers, in a dark corner no one ever comes by and watching the pilots run around and do whatever. Some of them are going on missions to grab resources to keep the Elytrian society going, others are about to go chasing off after pirates causing troubles, some are here to take a quick fly. His ears twitch with every sound. 

Wilbur loves the hangers. Although he’ll probably never be a pilot himself—those dreams died the same day Techno and mom did—he can’t help but hang around and daydream about it. He loves watching the ships take off, loves watching them land, and loves the constant sound of activity. The drum of workers, the buzzing of constant technology. When Wilbur's here, he can’t help but feel like he himself is a pilot. That he’s waiting for his break to be over and when it is he’ll come back down from the catwalks, walk into his very own ship and put his hands on the controls. And it’ll feel so natural to him when he does, that he won’t even worry about crashing.

“Wilburrrrr?” Says a familiar voice, jolting him out of his thoughts. “Did you run away from your tutors again?”

It’s Niki, probably the nicest person he knows. She’s a fighter pilot, recently graduated from the program, her ears are real big and real droopy, and she dyes her hair pink to stand out from the normal light purple all Elytrians are born with—matching their skin. She has blue eyes, which is a nod to her Merling heritage, from her grandmother, who she’s named after. 

Niki is probably Wilbur's closest friend.

“What do you think?” He says a joking tone to his voice.

Niki laughs and sits next to him. “One of these days they’re going to chain you to your chair, so you stop running off!”

“Then I would simply die, and then they would have to face dad’s wrath.” Wilbur shoots back. “It’s not like I’m missing out on anything anyway, I’ll learn the stuff on my own time. The library exists for a reason.”

Niki looks at him with a look in her eyes, the kind where she looks like she wants to tell him how stupid he is and how he should actually attend his lessons. But she doesn’t, because Niki is nice like that.

Niki pulls out something from her bag. “Anyways, I brought you something to eat again. Stars know you won’t eat at all if I weren’t here to give you some.”

It’s one of those clear boxes, Tupperware. It’s Lanto Feathers—which were more like sticks than feathers, since everything but the calamus and rachis had been removed. What was left was dipped in a crystalized liquid similar to honey. Which brought you Lanto Feathers, the common snack that almost everyone loved, including Wilbur. Lantos themselves were flying creatures native to planet Elytria, with a deafening screech and eyes larger than walnuts. 

He thanks her, grabbing one of the sticks and chomping down on them. It snaps quickly with his sharp teeth, sharp even for an Elytrian, who were natural predators. The snack tastes amazing, as always. Sweet, crunchy, perfect. Everything you need in a food!

Something is called out within the hangers, making Niki jump up from where she sat. “Shoot! That’s me they’re calling for—bye Will! See you later!”

And then Wilbur is left alone while Niki ran down from the catwalks and down to a ship. She chats up something with some other guy, not an Elytrian, at least not fully. Fingers burnt black, shaved head, specks of orange in his skin. That’s Nikis flight partner, that he knows, she’s told him about the guy many times. Grandmother was an Elytrian, father and mother were Blazeborns. Apparently, he’s a cool guy.

Wilbur wouldn’t know though, he’s never talked to him, and Niki could be totally wrong about how cool her flight partner is.

Before he knows it, he’s eaten all the lanto feathers Niki gave him, and now he’s incredibly bored.

Thankfully Wilbur finds something to do, and that’s eavesdropping on Phil, AKA his dad. It’s just as boring as he got in the hangers, because Phil doesn’t do anything cool ever and is probably dying from a disease that makes you uninteresting, but Wilbur really just doesn’t have anything else to do.

His dad is doing... Something. Judging from the words, it’s some diplomacy shit. Otherwise known as: boring stuff Wilbur doesn’t really care about because he’s already good at it and he doesn’t need lessons on talking to people and making compromises, thank you! Even if according to Phil diplomacy is more than just talking to people, and Wilbur wants to call bullshit because every instance of diplomacy he’s ever encountered involves talking about things and then some other things.

He also knows it has something to do with diplomacy, because he’s currently hanging out in the vents above the meeting room. Which is where other planetary leaders and representatives and what-not come to talk to Phil about arrangements and alliances and trade routes and we don’t like this thing you’re doing so we are going to threaten war! Argh! 

“I am not affiliated with Earth in any way.” Says a masculine voice on the other end of the door, one that’s definitely not Phil. “I’m with planet Avis, I just happen to have a human mother.”

There's a tapping noise.

“I’ll consider it.” That’s Phil's voice. Wilbur wonders what the two are talking about.

The other guy claps. “Wonderful! If you do accept, we’ll be looking forward to doing business with you! Elytria has many useful resources after all, especially for space exploration—and Avis's culture is really big on that, I would know, I grew up there.”

“In that case, you and your crew will be off my planet by tomorrow, right?” Phil says. “We can continue relations through video.”

And with that, whatever meeting Phil was having concludes. Wilbur almost falls from the vents when he shifts to a more comfortable position. Thankfully, Phil doesn’t notice, and he leaves the room. Wilbur is then left bored once again.

The day concludes with Wilbur taking a long nap after his whole eavesdropping thing, and then waking up in the middle of the night to a grumbling stomach. It’s dark out, and his insides cramp from hunger. Niki is nice and all, but those feathers didn’t fill him up very much. 

He’s craving fruit right now. Nothing like good ol’ fruit to fill your stomach. Filling, sweet, not too disgusting, most fruits on Elytria have soft insides so they’re easy to chew. 

He’s not supposed to be out of his room at this time, though, he realizes after checking his clock. It’s midnight, and Phil doesn’t like him being up this late. For some reason, it’s not like he’ll get murdered grabbing a midnight snack! (Well, maybe he could, but it’s still very unlikely, so he’s not sure what Phils on about. Something about sleep schedules. He thinks Phils forgotten he’s part phantom and doesn’t need as much sleep as the average Elytrian. He does like sleep though! If anything, he gets too much of the stuff.)

Despite this, he decides to leave anyway. Phil can go fuck himself and find someone to help pull that stick out of his ass—as much as he loves his dad, the dude should probably get a surgery for that.

It’s not like anyone would know anyway. Temporary invisibility comes in handy!

So, silently, he opens his door. It doesn’t squeak, thank god, but one of the guards in the hallway does look his way at the beeping noise it makes when it opens. The guard couldn’t see the open door from where they stood, and they couldn’t see him either. Thankfully, the guard didn’t come check it out, or else his ass would’ve been caught—and he really didn’t want to be caught, then scolded for wanting a midnight snack god-dammit.

Once the guard has stopped looking around, Wilbur clambers up into one of the vents—what is with him and vents lately? He cringes at the noise it makes, but it thankfully blends in enough with the other noises of the castle. 

The vents themselves are pretty big, Wilbur only needs to hunch over slightly to navigate in them. Some parts of them get smaller as they go on, but none of them are anywhere he needs to go in. He’s damn near memorized the way to the kitchen via the vents by now—a man has to eat okay!? And it only takes him a few minutes give or take, considering he stops often to make sure no one hear him just... crawling around up here.

When he arrives at the kitchen, however, he meets a disturbing sight. The vent cover was already pushed out of its spot, laying discarded on the ground. Meaning someone has been here in the events with him or is in the events with him and didn’t care enough to cover up their tracks. Dumbass. That’s when it hits him that the vents smell weird. At first, when he was entering them, he thought it was just some new fancy off-planet cleaning supply, but now that he thinks about it, that’s probably not the answer.

It smells like dirt, and you can smell that smell right before the rain.

He decides not to dwell on it, if there was an intruder the guards would have long caught on by now. Or something. If anything, they just hadn’t thought to tell Wilbur about it, or put away the vent cover. Yeah, that’s definitely it, he tells himself as he steps into the dark kitchen he thinks may-or-may-not be haunted now.

The kitchen is dimly lit, with nothing but a light bulb in the center of the ceiling. It was night, so he would have to turn the lights on physically—not like he was going to, the number one way to get caught. Like, he's not dumb, despite what others seem to think. 

Wilbur isn’t usually scared of things, theres really nothing much to fear on Elytria if you’re a prince—but the kitchen is fucking creepy right now, and Wilbur is starting to second guess his decision for a midnight snack. Instinctively, he tiptoes on his talons so his footsteps wouldn’t make much noise. As he passes one of the counters, he sees a knocked over fruit bowl. He shivers. He doesn’t like this.

One of his ears twitches—his right one, he can hear the sound of breathing. Quick and shallow huu phew’s. Despite his best judgement, he turns right. 

It’s probably the creature that was also in the vents with him. 

He peaks around the corner of one of the many fridges. What he sees takes him aback.

“Holy shit-” he hears himself say, because right there, pressed up against one of the fridges, is a tiny... creature. No taller than Wilbur's chest, dull yellow hair—his first thinks it’s dyed, before realizing the thing in front of him is not an Elytrian—it has pale, smooth skin and bright blue eyes—maybe it had merling decent. There's light red feathers on its elbows, creeping up its cheeks. The patterns are reminiscent of an avian's, but avian's were much, much more feathered than the alien in front of him.

It stares at him, with bright blue eyes, and it drops the fruit it was holding on to. Wilbur barely has time to process being pushed to the side as the creature scampers off somewhere.

Wilbur, obviously, chases it. He’s not going to let a thief run around in the castle! 

His ears twitch at every sound, his nose along with it. He’s in full hunt mode, not uncommon for Elytrians. Instincts on full blast, locked onto the wet, rainy, and smokey scent of the creature that just ran past him. He swings his head left and right, looking for any movement within the quite frankly small kitchen—at least compared to the other kitchens in the castle.

Something moves in his peripheral vision. 

He spins towards it, running over, his claws grasping out for the thief. The hand catches on one of its limbs as it attempts to climb the cabinets—probably into one of the vents, like Wilbur had come from. He knows there's an entrance on the ceiling, he’s never used it though. 

It tries and shakes off his grip as it moves higher. 

Wilbur only tightens it.

Before there's a pain in his hand, and before he knows it, there's a clanking sound as the vent cover falls straight onto his head. God, that hurt! 

He glares at the hole in the ceiling. Motherfucker. 

After quickly checking his hand was okay—it was, there were small indents from the little creature’s teeth, but it didn’t break skin, so he was okay. The thing he’s really worried about is a concussion from the vent cover. Despite his better judgement, Wilbur pulls himself onto the counter. He was going after that thing, not only was it a thief, but it also bit him! He wasn’t just going to let the rascal roam free after that!

He stands, reaching for the edge of the hole in the ceiling, fingertips brushing the edges. He jumps up a bit, getting his arms over and into the vents, before kicking up with his legs into it completely.

The creature has a very strong smell, so it's easy to follow. The vents make it all the more easier, with the two being in such an enclosed space. 

He walks slowly in the vents, not wanting to alert anyone below, or the creature. He had no idea where he was in the castle now, nor where the thief was, but he doesn’t need to scare it off when he’s so close to catching it—its smell is becoming stronger. 

He’s still on the tips of his talons, trying his damn hardest to not make a lot of noise. He can feel his ears flaring out, ready to take in any noise within the vents. Wilbur pauses. The scent is real strong now, suffocating even. 

Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Found you.” He whispers, eyes locking onto a dark shape in the corner of the vents. 

Thank god for night vision.

The creature tries to run past him again, like it had done before, but Wilbur isn’t falling for that this time. He’s not surprised this time. His reflexes are quicker. “ Oh no you don’t,” he snarls, slamming his body into the wall of the vent, catching the creature in his arms.

It glares up at him with its bright blue eyes. 

Then it bites him again, and he instinctively lets go. He only gets to take one look at his now torn sleeve, before running after it.

He starts to lose track of how many turns he’s taken following the thing, but he hasn’t let it leave his sight. There's a scratching noise, and he can see it slow down. Something is thrown to the side, and Wilbur sees it go down. He soon follows, finding himself in one of the hangers. Not the one he hangs out in, no, not that one. 

The emergency one. Four emergency escape pods in the room, two that would probably never be used. Only the royal family could enter it, well, unless you were in the vents.

And the creature? He has no idea where it is. Again. Fan-fucking-tastic

He’s just about ready to give up, maybe tell Phil about the thief that was running around the castle, before he sees one of the pods light up blue. Meaning: someone, or something was in it. He runs towards the pod, it was the one in the front, closest to the exit. Couldn’t fit any more than two Elytrians.

He peers in through the blacked-out window, before realizing he can't see in it, proceeding to instead yank the door open. 

There it is: the creature. Pressed up against the other door behind it, snarling at him. Wilbur shoots forwards, arms grabbing wildly for the thing. He takes it in his arms, but it kicks and punches and tries to escape. At some point, the door closes. 

He’s trying to pin the darned thing down, but it just keeps escaping his grasp. 

At some point during their little cat fight, one of them knocks a lever on the control board. 

Before he realizes it, Wilbur's head is knocked against the seat, and everything goes dark.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

“Wilbur! Wake up!” A voice says. The voice is oh so familiar, deeper than his, monotone. Warm. “C’monnn, Wil-burrr-”

“I’m up! I’m up!” Wilbur exclaims, smacking a hand away from his face. His voice is higher than it usually is. He feels younger.

“Finally.” The voice says again, and when Wilbur opens his eyes, he sees Techno leaning over him. His long hair is in a bun, and he has a small smile gracing his lips. “Me an’ mom are leaving today! You’re not going to see me for like, 6 months, and so we need to spend as much time as possible together today to make up for it!”

Oh, Wilbur realizes. I’m dreaming. About my dead twin brother. Great, just great. 

He yawns, rubbing his eyes. “ Yeah, yeah, whatever, let's just get breakfast.”

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Can that stupid beeping sound stop? He really dislikes it. It’s annoying.

The rest of the day/dream/whatever are a blur. Running around the castle, making a ruckus in town, making Phil worry about them immensely, the normal stuff. Or, at least, what used to be normal. They hung out with Niki that day, she gave them some baked goods she, her brother, and her mom made. Her brother even joins them, and he seems pretty close with Techno too—Ranboo, Wilbur thinks his name was. (He’s seen the guy around the hangers a few times, chatting with Niki. He looked real different as a kid. He hasn’t talked to him for more than a few minutes since that day, though.)

And then, he and Phil are standing in front of a ship. Kristin is there, along with Techno. They all hugged each other, joking about how oh, how could I go 6 months without you? Then, Kristin and Techno enter the ship and leave.

Phil and Wilbur wave goodbye to it until it’s left their sight.

The dream blurs over the next day, Wilbur eavesdropping on Phil, who just got a call.

His breath hitches when he hears the news.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Wilbur wakes up with a weight on his hips. There's a beeping noise. His vision is blurry, his ears are ringing. He tries to lift himself up, but he can’t.

The smell of smoke fills his lungs.

Am I going to die like this? 

The next time he wakes up, the smell of smoke is gone, and Wilbur would have thought he was in the afterlife were it not for the fact the beeping noise was still there. 

His vision seems to have cleared up a bit, allowing him to see a bit of the world around him. There's a hole in the pod, giving way to the outside world. The sky is a purplish bluish colour, stars clearly visible against the sky—god there are so many stars. You can’t see the stars back in Elytria because of the light pollution. He knows Phil is trying to double down on that, put a limit on light or whatever, but it would never be as beautiful as what he’s seeing right now. 

In the sky, there are two bodies. One is what must be the star of this planet, bright and shining. The other is what must be either another planet, or a moon. It contrasts with the star. 

But he can only see so much through the hole of the pod. He tries to move to get a better look, before realizing he can’t. He looks behind him... and oh, oh that’s bad. Like, real bad. The ceiling of the ship seems to have collapsed on him. He can’t see his lower body, but he knows it’s been crushed and he’s probably not coming out of this without major damage to his body. Wilbur's always been lucky though, maybe it’ll just be a broken leg.

He twists his body, holding himself up weakly with his arms. Maybe he could escape his... predicament, if he tried hard enough.

(God, what happened? He can’t really remember, everything's all... fuzzy.)

He holds his hands up to the metal of what-used-to-be-the-ceiling, trying to push it off his legs. It’s heavy, it doesn’t move, and Wilbur doesn’t know what he expected. Despite this, he continues to try again anyway. Eventually, he’s too exhausted to continue, simply laying down again, going back to sleep.

The next time Wilbur wakes up, he hears the sound of footsteps. His first instinct is to pretend he’s dead.

He closes his eyes, tries to slow his breathing enough to not be noticeable, tries to relax his face enough so it doesn’t twitch and give him away. 

The footsteps become louder.

“ Misterr... terrifying misterr...” A voice says, and it takes Wilbur’s brain a second to translate. Universal Common, someone is speaking Universal Common. “ Wake up scary man!” Says the voice, and Wilbur can feel fingers on his shoulder, shaking him. 

Wilbur tries his hardest to keep his eyes closed.

“ I know you’re awake.” The voice says again. “Even Dream is better at pretending to be asleep than you are!” It pauses. “Also, I brought food! And everyone loves food, even scary people.”

Reluctantly, Wilbur opens his eyes. The voice sounds like a child, and there's no way a child could be harmful. 

Immediately, a thing is shoved into his face. Looks sort of like a deformed chicken, with four wings, and literal sticks for legs. Along with that, it seems freshly (and unprofessionally) killed. Some of its head is caved in, its neck at a weird angle. 

As if the kid, who Wilbur can’t seem to get a good look at, read his mind, they say: “Sorry it’s a bit weird... I couldn’t figure out any other way to kill it—and I don’t know how to set a fire or anything and I kinda put out the only one because all the smoke was getting annoying, and the fire was hazardous, so I guess you’ll have to risk being poisoned from eating uncooked meat...”

“Wha...” Wilbur manages to force out. “Who are you?” 

The kid leans down, and if Wilbur had enough strength in him to recoil in shock, he would. It’s the thief! The little bugger he chased down in the vents! That horrible, feathered freak!

The kid doesn’t give him any time to process this. “Oh, uhm... I’m Theseus! But everyone just calls me Tommy!”

Wilbur stays silent. 

“Sorry for stealing by the way...” The kid, Tommy says. “I was hungry, and my brother's ship accidently left without me...”

“You could've just told Phil about it and he would have called...” Wilbur responds. The kid could have found a guard and told them his situation. The situation would be brought up to Phil, who would fix it, like Phil always does. Even then, it's common knowledge you always do a headcount before leaving! Seriously, did these people not think about this? “’Sides, if you’re ship left you, that’s on their part—didn't even do the proper headcount, did they?”

Tommy bites his lip, worry spreading across his face. “I couldn’t do that! Or else I would've given away that I snuck onto the ship...”

Wilbur blinks and he suddenly feels like he’s about to be very tired. “So, you’re a stowaway?”

Tommy smiles and nods vigorously. “Yeah! A stowaway!”

“Huh. Cool.” Wilbur says. He’s quite annoyed that he can’t get up, due to being pinned down by the ceiling. “Hey kid, what do you say? Can you help me get out from under here?”

Tommys eyes flick between Wilbur to the ceiling, then back to Wilbur, then back to the ceiling. “I can try... But I’m not very strong, you know that mister? Brother always says I should eat more because I’m ‘awfully thin’ and whatever else he says... he’s wrong though! I’m totally strong! I’m a big man.”

“Sure you are buddy...” Wilbur nods. Well, as much as you can nod when pinned down by a ceiling and too weak to even pull yourself up from the ground.

Tommy’s eyes fill with sparkles, and Wilbur can feel himself dying inside. 

Before he knows it, Tommy is out of his sight, but Wilbur can still hear the boy poking around, humming. He can hear scratching and scrambling, knocking on metal, he’s pretty sure he’s heard a kick at some point and then a yelp of pain. Can’t be sure though, maybe it was something else.

Tommy comes back soon after.

“So there's like... Uh... Hm...” Tommy can’t seem to put what he’s saying to words. “So, like, you’re currently on a load of dirt right now, and if we dug enough then you would be free. But I don’t have a shovel and we’re not going to get anywhere with just my bare hands.”

Wilbur resists retorting that Tommy totally could use his bare hands, nothing like good old dirt under your fingernails after all, but he doesn’t. “Then make a shovel. There’s enough scrap metal around her from the crash for you to figure something out, right?”

A puzzled look comes across Tommys face, and the boy sits down. Perhaps to process what Wilbur said, you can never be too sure about the smartness of children. 

“I saw some shovel-ish shaped metal around here! Maybe I could get a rock and use it to make it more... like a shovel! Right now, the metals are just sort of flat, well it's curved too, but it's mostly flat, and it wouldn’t make for a very good shovel...” Tommy says, trailing off.

Right at that moment, Wilbur's stomach begins to growl. 

“Oh no!” Tommy exclaims. “I forgot! I got this meat-” He still has the mutilated animal from earlier, Wilbur didn’t even realize he had been holding onto it the entire time. “But I don’t know how to make fire... or cook it...” He pauses, then looks at Wilbur. “Hey! Mister, can you teach me? And what’s your name, I don’t know your name! I should know your name since you know mine, right?”

Wilbur hums. “It’s Wilbur. Prince of Elytria. And sure, I can teach you if you want. Get some rock, and metal while you're at it. Place the meat somewhere, just not on the dirt. Get something sharp, something you can use as a knife—and be careful, don’t cut yourself. We don’t know what's on this planet, the air could infect a wound for all we know.”

It probably wouldn’t, Wilbur can feel his many, many different cuts over his skin, and he’s pretty sure none of those have been infected. But Tommy’s a whole different species than him, so he should still be careful about it.

“You don’t look very princely.” Tommy says, tilting his head. “Especially when you’re trapped under all that rubble.”

“So, what are we doing first?” Wilbur asks, deciding to ignore Tommy’s comment. “Are you getting me out from under here first, or making food first? It’s your choice, you’re the one here who can walk free.”

Tommy thinks for a moment, eyebrows furrowing and his nose scrunching up. “Hmm.... food probably! We’re both hungry, and I'd probably be strongest to help you if I was on a full stomach! I know I’m always stronger when on a full stomach!”

Wilbur sighs. “Good choice... find something that’s not the ground to put the meat on—”

“Find a rock, metal, and something I can use as a knife?” Tommy continues.

“And don’t—”

“Hurt myself?” Tommy says. “Got it!”

“Get some sticks too! Preferably dry ones! Make sure they’re thicker too!” Wilbur adds on quickly. You can’t start a fire without wood. 

Then he runs off, taking the meat with him, leaving Wilbur to his own devices.

Tommy comes back with a black rock, hopefully flint of some sort, two pieces of scrap metal—one sharper than the other, and a bunch of sticks. The meat is in his other hand. The boy carefully drops all the sticks on the ground, letting the sharper piece of scrap metal on the ground. He drops the meat on the scrap metal and sits down in front of the pile of sticks.

“So... What do I do, Mister Wilbur?” Tommy says, holding one piece of metal in one hand and a rock in the other. 

Wilbur cringes. “Don’t call me Mister, I’m not old.”

Tommy rolls his eyes. “Whatever, Mister, just tell me how to do this!”

Wilbur's starting to really hate this kid more than he did already. “Just arrange the sticks in a weird... circle shape or whatever. Just arrange them in a way that will make a fire.”

Tommy simply proceeds to pile them on top of each other. Good enough.

“Now take the rock, and like... scrape it against the metal? Kind of? Just look for flying sparks. Sparks set fires.”

Tommy scraps the rock against his scrap metal, sticking his tongue out as he does so. A few seconds go by, there are no sparks. Tommy readjusts his angle, sparks fly. The sparks hit the dry wood that Tommy collected, and it quickly goes up in flames. Now to make sure it doesn’t go out of control.

“Keep an eye on that fire.” Wilbur says. “Find something that’s not flammable to surround it with, we don’t want it spreading.”

Tommy nods, running off, which in fact, was not keeping an eye on the fire. And Wilbur doesn’t count, he’s being pinned down by the ceiling. Tommy comes back a few seconds later with a bunch of rocks in his arms. He quickly places them around the fire, the flames licking at his hands and surely it must be burning his skin, right? The kid doesn’t even flinch, he doesn’t even seem affected. His skin isn’t burning.

What even was this kid? The feathers scream avian, the fire resistance points towards blazeborn, blue eyes of a merling, a face that looks awfully human. This kid was something else, a mixing pot.

“Uhm... what about the food?” Tommy asks.

Wilbur then realizes he had no idea how to cook anything that wasn’t noodles. 

“I’m going to be honest with you kid, I have no idea.” Wilbur says. “Just... cut off anything that doesn’t have like, organs or anything. Use a stick to put those bits over the fire, but don’t let the stick catch fire. Cook it till there's no pink left, hell, cook it till it’s burnt just to be safe.”

Tommy looks at him, concerned. “You’re telling me you don’t know how to cook?”

“As if you know either, you were the one asking me how!” Wilbur exclaims, narrowing his eyes at the feathered boy. 

Tommy rolls his eyes, simply doing as told.

Tommy's food was good, considering he was a child. Wilbur didn’t get sick from it (well, not yet that is) so that’s really his only measure of how good it was. If we’re talking about taste, it fucking sucked and it makes Wilbur want to get off this planet faster.

Now, they are attempting to dig Wilbur out from the ceiling. Tommy is gripping his shovel-y scrap metal, of which had been painstakingly bent into a bowl shape via pure strength (was the kid part piglin? That was some serious strength he showed! Or maybe Wilbur's just weak.)

“ Ow.” Wilbur curses as Tommys ‘shovel’ ends up hitting his side again. 

“Sorry!” Tommy calls from behind him. 

Their efforts don’t seem to be in vain though, Wilbur can feel the space around him loosen up. He’s able to wiggle his legs a bit now! When he gets out, he’s so punching Tommy in the gut. To get back at him for hitting Wilbur with his shovel a million times. Wilbur swears his hips are bruised from that.

“Can you hurry up?” Wilbur complains. He’d been sitting there for hours, or maybe days, he had no idea how long he had been trapped under the ceiling, and he didn’t really want to find out.

“Be patient!” Tommy yells from where he was. “Isn’t being a prince all about patience? Because you’re awfully bad at it!”

Wilbur rolls his eyes. “Shove it. You’re the one that’s a thief here, not me.”

“I was hungryyyyyyyyyyy-” Tommy drawls out. “Not even a little pity for a starving avian?”

“If anything, you’re more human than avian, considering your looks.” Wilbur retorts.

Tommy huffs something. “Yeah...” He says, before going quiet.

Suddenly, Wilbur feels like he’s hit a sour spot. Oh god, he didn’t make the kid sad, did he? Blegh, why does he care? They're only working together because they happen to be stranded on the same planet, they’ll never see each other again after this. (And yet, Wilbur can’t help but feel bad at the prospect of making Tommy feel bad.)

Wilbur simply sighs, laying on his arms. He quickly fell asleep, he was exhausted.

“Hey, Wilbur?” Says a familiar voice. 

The voice is oh so familiar, oh so comforting. He wants to reach out for it.

“Yeah?” Says his own voice.

The voice is quiet for a second, nothing but the sound of its breathing. “Where do you want to go when you get that pilots license?”

He hums. “Avis! For sure. I’ve heard their food is great! Maybe even Enderia? I’ve heard it’s very pretty over there! If I'm being ambitious... Exmurdon, maybe Gilun if I’m lucky. Maybe Niki could bring me to Atrana to meet her grandparents!”

The voice sighs wistfully. “Wish I could go with you...”

Silence.

“But I can’t. Prince stuff an’ all.”

“You won’t have to be a prince if you faked your death!” He exclaims. He can feel the smile spreading across his cheeks. “You could do whatever you want, and no one would be there to stop you!”

“Yeah...” The voice trails off. “Faking my death, huh?”

“Yeah! Faking your death!” 

“Sounds... Wonderful.” the voice says. “But I might give Phil a heart attack if I did that, don’t want to risk it!”

Wilbur wakes up, immediately jolting into a sitting position. His ears twitch at the sound of liquid hitting the ground. Rain. He looks up, and hisses as little droplets of water hit his face. He scrambles out from under the ceiling, not even realizing he was no longer trapped under the thing. 

He continues to stare up at the perpetual twilight of the sky, this place doesn’t rotate, does it? It doesn’t spin; there are no days on this planet, are there? 

They must have been lucky then, to have crash landed in the zone where night and day met. If Wilbur's guesses were right, if they didn’t, they’d either be trapped in searing heat or freezing cold.

The rain is cold, it soaks his hair, his clothes—of which were already torn and bloody, from the crash. Wilbur loves it. He hasn’t felt rain in so long. Most of his time regarding the rain was spent inside, trapped in his room, staring out the window and longing for something more.

The last time he had been out in the rain was a week before Techno died.

They had been hanging out on the roof of the palace, one of the higher ones. If you fell from that height, you probably wouldn’t survive. But they had wings to stop their fall, no height would stop them from clambering onto the roof of the highest point of the palace and daring each other to jump off. 

At that time, they had been laying down, looking at the stars, when the clouds came in. They had been naming constellations— Calamatis, Corvus, Lupus— when suddenly they couldn’t see the stars anymore. Rain started soon after, soaking them both. The air was cold, but Wilbur felt free. Techno was smiling, and he had stood up. He leaned out, one arm around the spire of the palace, wind lightly blowing his hair.

He had looked so free then. Wilbur had felt so free then.

Then, Techno finally looked his age. Then, Wilbur finally felt his age.

Then, both of them were 14. Then, they were both 14, like they should be.

Now, Wilbur is 18, and experiencing rain for the first time in 4 years. On a foreign planet, a wrecked ship, and some hybrid avian kid who can’t seem to keep his mouth shut.

Wilbur's throat blocks up and he bites his lip. Something tracks down his cheeks, and before he knows it, Wilbur is sobbing into his chest. His knees are pulled up to his chest and he’s gasping for air as he wastes it on his own tears.

God, why were things like this? Why couldn’t things be normal, why couldn’t he be 14 again?

He just wants to be 14 again. 

“Wilbur?” A small voice says.

Wilbur gasps, looking up. “Tommy?” He says, locking eyes with the quite frankly, soaked child in front of him. His red feathers are darker, from the rain. His blond hair is plastered to his head, and he’s shivering. He’s shivering so hard; Wilbur can hear his teeth clacking together.

Wilbur probably not any better, he’s stuck in the rain too, the only shelter having been the collapsed ceiling. 

“C’mere.” He whispers, he can barely hear himself, he’s not sure if Tommy’s heard him either. “You must be cold... We can share body heat.”

Tommy freezes up, looking at him warily. Wilbur opens his arms, his sleeves heavy on his arms from how wet they were. An oof escapes him as Tommy crashes into his arms. Wilbur closes them around the boy, holding on tightly. 

“ I wanna go home.” He says meekly, and Wilbur has to take a few seconds to process it. 

“Me too...” Wilbur manages to get out. Then, he says something that could only have been born from his new-found care for the kid. “I promise that I’m going to get us home, yeah?”

Tommy smiles up at him, and the rain continues to fall.

A few minutes later, he finds himself carding through Tommys wet, tangled hair as the boy snores on top of him.

“ Achoo!” Tommy sneezes into his arm as Wilbur works. The avian-human-merling-blaze-whatever boy has been sneezing since he woke up. The boys for sure caught a cold. All Wilbur can do is tell him to lay off on the work, since Wilbur is free from the ceiling now, and to warm up by the (new) fire. 

Tommy seems more than happy to not do anything.

Wilbur himself is working on repairing the pod. The more he looked at it, the more salvageable it looked. Yeah, its side was torn, and yeah, the roof was caved in—which was actually the floor, since the thing had been flipped upside down, but it wasn’t that bad. The engine was fixable, and the crystal core was undamaged. All they had to do was patch up the holes, fix the engine, and then they’re off this godforsaken planet. 

They wouldn’t have to do this if the communicator built in with the pod hadn’t broken, however. If it didn’t break, then Wilbur could have used it to call for a rescue party and have been done with it. Turns out, however, that everything in regard to communication and connecting to the Intergalactic Web was out of the picture. The pod's antennae were destroyed completely, and so had the mini satellite on top. The wires that powered the communicator had been completely fried, and Wilbur had no idea how to fix that. 

The ship itself would still be able to fly, of course. But the navigational system had been fucked, Wilbur would have to fix the thing up enough to leave the planet, and stop by a swap moon to fix everything else. Like the navigation system, and maybe find someone to fix the communications too.

“Are you done yet?” Tommy complains, kicking his legs back and forth.

So far, Tommy and Wilbur had flipped the pod right side up, and Wilbur had patched up some of the wall. After that, Wilbur was going to work on the floor. Thankfully, only part of the floor was gone. Not the entire thing. The chairs and controls were still there in the front, the cargo section, however, lacked majorly in the floor department. 

“This is going to take a while to fix, Tommy.” Wilbur says. “And who's being impatient now?”

Tommy rolls his eyes, hugging Wilbur's now dried coat around himself. “This is different, Wil-bur.”

Wilbur was simply in his thin, and airy dress shirt that he wore under everything else. It was torn on the sleeves, but it was generally fine, and he’d rather work in his torn dress shirt than his heavy coat and wet, not yet dried shawl.

“How long will it take to fix though?” Tommy asks, and it’s a valid question. After he says this, he sniffles up snot from his nose. 

Wilbur thinks for a moment. Fixing the floor will be complicated, and then there's fixing whatever wires needed to be fixed. And then double checking everything was working properly, and then there's the engine... Wilbur's forgotten how good it is to be back on a ship again, back to fixing them. When he was 14, before Techno died, he was set to be a pilot. The first part of the Royal Pilot Program was engineering, learning how to fix what you were flying on. Wilbur never got to finish that part, but he knew enough to know what was wrong with their pod, how to fix it, and what to do. 

All the pod's damage put together piles up to a week if he rushes. Reasonably, it would be better to take it slow, but that would shoot the time up to a month at least, and they need to get off this planet. Fast. Wilbur made a makeshift device that told him about the atmosphere, there was too much oxygen on the planet, and if they stayed there for too long, he would start to deteriorate from the inside out. Tommy could probably handle it better, considering his obvious human blood. Even then, there was too much oxygen here even for a human, and even then, Tommy’s clearly not fully human. 

Not that he’s told Tommy any of this, no, nope, not at all. The kids already stressed enough, being trapped here and left behind by his ship. 

“A week at most.” He says. Wilbur's sure of it. 

He could fix this. He can get them off the planet in a week. He knows he can. It’s a bit ambitious, yes, but Wilbur knows he’ll be able too.

The worst thing about being on a planet that does not spin is that it’s very hard to keep track of the days.

Mainly because there are no days.

So far, Wilbur's been keeping track via the clock he managed to fix up on the pod. It was the first thing he fixed when he was free from the ceiling (which actually turned out to be the floor). For all he knows, the days on the clock could be wrong. The hours could be off, and that’s not even taking into consideration how long he could’ve been out before he woke up. 

So far, it’s been 3 days since that night in the rain. Which means he has 4 days left to fix this ship. And so far, it’s going pretty well. The floor is almost entirely fixed, and Wilbur's managed to find a load of rock outside that he can melt down into sheets of metal. Which is great, because they’ve started to run out of scrap metal. 

During this time, Wilbur's taken a closer look at the crystal core. The crystal hadn’t been cracked, and the mechanism itself hadn’t been damaged, which is quite frankly, amazing. Wilbur doesn’t know what he would do if the crystal had been damaged, they couldn’t exactly find a new one. The only real thing he needs to fix is the engine, and the wiring for the controls. They had been ripped, but not fried. Nothing a little electrical tape couldn’t fix, and Wilbur had found some in one of the compartments in the pod.

Overall, he should be done by the end of the week, just like he told Tommy.

“Wil-burrr-” 

Speak of the devil.

“What?” Wilbur asks, spinning around from where he’s quadruple-checking the ship’s crystal core, just in case. 

Tommy stares up at him. “I’m bored.”

“Well, hi bored, I’m Wilbur.” Wilbur says, and he almost cringes at himself. What kind of idiot is he? Hi bored, I’m Wilbur!

Tommy seems to share the same sentiment, judging by his disgusted face. “Not funny. Even Dream is funnier than you, and he’s boring. Tommy, you need to eat more! Tommy, I’m busyyy, Tommy go bother Sap-nap instead.”

One new development with Tommy, he talks about this Dream dude a lot more. From what Wilbur's gathered, he’s Tommy's brother, and is a diplomat. Wilbur has a suspicion it’s that guy from Avis that had visited when he was eavesdropping on Phil before the whole crashing a pod thing. Tommy talks a lot about his life on Avis, actually. He talks a lot about his mother, his brother, his brothers' friends, even his baby sister who's only 7, and annoying. Wilbur has also learned Tommy’s age.

Tommy is 13, almost 14.

Tommy reminds Wilbur of himself when he was that age. Constantly smiling, not a worry in the world. Dreams far bigger than himself. 

Tommy is everything pure in the world.

“Whatever.” Wilbur says. “What do you say we do, Mister Bored?” 

“ We could play a game, obviously!” Tommy says, his hands moving to convey what he’s trying to get across. “Like tag, or rock-paper-scissors, or I Spy, or Bang Bang Shoot—something to pass the time!”

Wilbur does not know any of the games Tommy just listed.

“But I’m trying to fix the ship—” Wilbur tries, but Tommy simply cuts him off. 

“You can fix the ship later.” Tommy tells him firmly. “You’ve been doing nothing but working on the ship, and you’re going to burn yourself. Loosen up and play a game.”

Wilbur sighs, huffing and putting down his makeshift tools. “Fine... uh... How about we play Bang Bang Shoot? I’ve never heard of it, and it sounds interesting.”

Tommy stares at him. “You’re telling me, you’ve never heard of Bang Bang Shoot?”

“I’m going to be honest; I’ve never heard of any of the games you listed.” Wilbur says, and that makes Tommy squawk in a way that Wilbur almost thought he was a bird. Which, one could say he was, since avians tended to be similar to birds.

“Okay Wilbur! It is now my duty to teach you about all of these games!” Tommy exclaims, gripping Wilbur's wrist and dragging him out of the ship. Wilbur watches as the boy scrambles up the side of the ship, sitting on the top and dangling his legs. 

Wilbur, on the other hand, simply flaps his wings a few times and settles next to him. Tommy complains about how he’s so jealous and how I wish I could fly. To which Wilbur responds: “We are literally sitting on a ship right now.”

“It just isn’t the same!” Tommy yells, throwing his hands up. 

In the distance, some birds fly up from some grass. 

“Just teach me already.” Wilbur says.

“Okay! So, to play Bang Bang Shoot you must know how—”

Wilbur comes out of the interaction an hour later with hurting hands and newfound knowledge about human hand games. The words Bang Bang Shoot constantly play in his mind, and he finds himself looking over his shoulder, so he won’t become it. 

He’s a bit annoyed that he missed out on the time he could have spent repairing the ship, but he supposes it was worth it to see Tommy happy. Wilbur guesses he enjoyed it too. He enjoyed watching Tommy smile as he fucked up time and time again, and he enjoyed it when he finally beat Tommy at Rock Paper Scissors. So, he can’t complain too much. Having fun was a good tradeoff, Wilbur supposes. 

Wilbur is done checking the crystal core now, after about 10 times of doing so. What, a man’s allowed to be paranoid when it comes to a damaged ship that can explode if said crystal core is damaged. 

He checks the clock before he fixes the engine, realizing it’s about 10 at night, and for once the sky matches the time. He decides he probably shouldn’t work on the engine this late, because he’ll end up staying up all night and wouldn’t realize it because of the perpetual twilight on this planet. Then, he would end up tired, and the number one rule when it comes to working with ships is to not work on them when you're tired. 

He looks for Tommy before he goes to bed, the kid needs sleep too.

He ends up finding Tommy at the river that their ship had crash landed by, he’s sitting on a rock, pants rolled up to his knees, his legs in the rushing water. He seems to be lost in thought, staring at the river. Wilbur wonders what he’s thinking about.

Probably about his home. Probably about Avis. Probably about his brother, and his sister, and his mother, and all his friends on his home planet. That’s what. 

Wilbur hasn’t thought about Elytria in that way once since he got here. 

“Tommy?” Wilbur calls out. 

Tommy jumps, nearly falling into the river. “Jeez! Give a guy a warning!” 

Wilbur laughs, eyes crinkling. “It’s getting late. We should go to bed now.”

“Oh.” Tommy says, looking up at the sky. “It’s so weird that the sky never changes here. As if I wasn’t bad enough when it came to keeping track of time...”

“Either way, we should go to sleep now. Be ready for a day of work tomorrow—you're almost recovered from that cold, right?” Wilbur asks, just to be sure. 

Tommy nods. “Not even a sniffle now.”

“Then be ready to get to work tomorrow.” Wilbur says. “And you want to be well rested for that, so come on. I already have the beds set up.”

Beds being the shitty, thin mattresses that Wilbur found in the compartment under the control panel.

Tommy nods, leaving the river. The two make their way over to the ship quickly, the pod now being able to protect them from the elements. It didn’t stop it from being cold though, they hadn't powered the thing up yet, so heating was out of the question. It didn’t help that they didn’t have any blankets. And the planet got cold at night, not very cold, but enough for it to be uncomfortable. 

Wilbur settles in his own mattress, while Tommy settles on the one across from him. 

“Hey Wilbur?” The monotone voice asks, and Wilbur quickly identifies it as Techno.

“Yeah?” He says.

“Do you think I’ll ever get to visit Atrana, or Gilun, or Exmurdon?” Techno pauses. “Maybe even Avis, or Enderia, or even Netherend if I’m lucky?”

“When you’re king you will.” Wilbur says, and it’s simple. “You can go anywhere when you’re a king. When you’re king Phil won’t be able to stop you from visiting whereveeeer you want to!”

Techno laughs. “But it’s not that simple, is it? Why don’t we see Phil leaving all the time?”

Wilbur sighs. “I know... He talks about planets he wants to visit all the time! But he never does! I wish it was that simple, Tech.”

“Me too.” Techno says. “I wish I could go anywhere I want. Whenever I want. And not have to worry about anything else other than whether or not my ship is working or not...” He huffs out a noise that Wilbur can’t really describe. “I wish I were you, Wil.”

Wilbur jumps back at that. “What do you mean, I wish I were you? You’re the one who gets to take the throne, not me.”

“...Because you don’t have to worry.” Techno answers, and it’s truthful. “You can be what you want, you’re allowed to be what you want. Me? I have to inherit the throne; I have to be thrown into a life I don’t want. I’d much rather fly with you than sit in a glorified chair all day.”

“Maybe you could step down as King the second you get the throne.” Wilbur says. “Give it to someone who’ll enjoy it. Then you could join me in my ship, and we could see allll the planets we want to.”

“I like the sound of that.” Techno whispers. And despite the monotone of it all, he almost sounds wistful. 

“Me too.” Wilbur says. 

Wilbur wakes up, and the first thing he does is check the time. Tommy is still asleep in the bed next to him, he seems to have gotten up in the middle of the night and grabbed Wilbur's coat from the pilot's chair, using it as a blanket. Wilbur finds he doesn’t mind, despite it being his coat.

It’s around 8 a.m., and Wilbur knows he should get to work. He already wasted time playing games with Tommy yesterday, so he’ll have to work twice as hard today. The engine has sustained more damage than he thought, and he wouldn’t be surprised if he spent the entire day messing around in there—poking wires and whatnot. 

He sighs, grabbing his toolbox. He manages to find a few tools in the ship: wrenches, screwdrivers, screws, other stuff. He even found extra wires! He considered using them on the busted navigational system, but he decided he’d keep them just in case the engine needed rewiring. Which it did, so thank god for past Wilbur's smart choices. 

Wilbur heads to the back of the ship where the crystal core and the engine where, all he had to do was finish this, and then they were off planet. 

He unscrews the lid to the engine, setting it beside him. He takes the wires, laying them out, they’re laid out in piles of different colours. One red pile, a blue pile, and a green pile. He starts with taking the red wires out of the engine, as those were pretty much unsalvageable. He replaces those wires and replaces two of the green ones. The blue wires are pretty much fine, save for one that was completely fried, and he had to replace, the rest was fixed with electrical tape.

It was no professional job, but it was what he had to work with at the moment, and it would work for the time being.

Now, all he needs to do is double check that the ship was ready for taking off.

“Okay Tommy, what did I tell you to look for?” Wilbur asks, making sure that Tommy knew exactly what Wilbur needed him to do. He couldn’t afford Tommy missing over something, and then they end up taking off while there's still damage to the ship—that wasn’t comms or navigations. 

“No cracks in the crystal, make sure there's no holes in the plating... make sure everything's put away. Look at the stabilizers and make sure they aren’t lopsided.” Tommy lists them out one by one, hitting the mark. 

Wilbur feels warmth spread in his chest. Pride, maybe. “Good. And I'll check the control panel and see if I can do anything about the navigation and comms system before we leave. I have some extra wires and I might be able to get them working.”

It turns out, Wilbur can’t do much about the comms system, and while he can fix some of the navigational system, not enough for the thing to work. He used most of his wires on the engine, and while he was able to replace some of the wires on the navigational system, there was more damage than just bad wires. And the communication system? Wilbur doesn’t even know where to start.

Tommy comes back around an hour later, which is honestly a bit too long considering he wasn’t checking that many things, but Wilbur soon learns Tommy’s a lot like him in the regard of double, triple, and quadruple checking things. Which is probably for the best, better safe than sorry after all.

“Are you ready?” Wilbur asks as he sits in the pilot's chair, something he hasn’t done since he was 14.

Tommy grins. “I was born ready.” 

Wilbur lets out a laugh. “I’m going to be honest I haven’t flown in like, 4 years, and even then, I was still learning. You might want to put on your seat belt, pray to whichever god you believe in.”

“You’re Wilbur, Prince of Elytria, though.” Tommy says, leaning back in his chair. “If there's anyone I trust to fly this thing, it's you.”

“You’re giving me too much credit.” Wilbur tells him. And Tommy’s smile just widens.

If Wilbur's going to be honest, he would crash this pod a million times over if it meant he would get to see Tommy’s smile. If it meant he would get to sit in a pilot's chair again, if it meant he would care for someone like he cared for Techno again. He would spend who knows how long trapped under dirt, and rubble, and whatever else, if it meant he would get to experience this.

Wilbur doesn’t think he wants to ever go back to Elytria.

Then he realizes that day when Tommy was digging him out from under the rubble, that he never said sorry for what he said. You’re more human than avian, judging from your looks. The words clearly made Tommy upset.

Wilbur doesn’t want to make Tommy upset. And he knows Tommy’s probably way over it by now, but Wilbur still feels awful about it. 

“Oh uhm. I’m sorry by the way.” Wilbur says, breaking the silence.

Tommy looks at him, confused. “For what?”

“The day where you were digging me out from the rubble.” Wilbur continues. “I said: You’re more human than avian, judging from your looks. And then you went quiet. It obviously bothered you, and so I’m apologizing.”

“Oh.” Tommy ends up saying. “I... Thank you. Most people wouldn’t say sorry about that kind of thing...”

Wilbur hums. “Well, I’m not most people, am I? I care about you, and I said something that hurt you that day. So, I'm sorry.”

“Wilbur, I’ve known you for little over a week.” Tommy points out.

Wilbur makes a so-so motion with his hand. “And who's to say a week isn’t enough for you to become my new little brother, huh?”

“If I’m your little brother, then I think I’ll just stay on this planet actually.” Tommy grimaces. “Because you suck, and I’d hate to even be related to you.” And then the avian-human hybrid sticks his nose up in the air all pretentious-like, crossing his arms.

Wilbur almost doubles over from his laughter. “Whatever, let's just leave this godforsaken planet already, yeah?” 

“YEAH!” Tommy pumps his fists in the air. “Off this stupid planet we go!”

Wilbur’s cheeks are starting to hurt from his grin as the ship hums to life.

Wilbur's going to be honest: he’s never been off planet in his life. He knows how to fly the ships, theoretically, and he’s flown them in practice as well, but he’s never gone off planet. Not in a ship with someone else flying it, and definitely not in a ship he himself was flying.

To say Wilbur's a little nervous about the whole thing is an understatement. What if he presses the wrong button? What if he crashes into an asteroid belt? What if the crystal core malfunctions? What if this, what if that, so many what ifs ! It doesn’t help that they have a broken navigation system (which meant no autopilot, sadly) and communication system as well; they couldn’t ask for help if things went wrong, and if they somehow ended up in an asteroid field, they’ll just have to hope Wilbur knows what he’s doing.

What really doesn’t help, is the fact Wilbur hasn’t touched a ship since he was 14. 

Wilbur likes it though, he finds it... calming. The humming of the ship around them, Tommy’s snoring, checking the ship’s vitals and the repetitive turning of the wheels, the occasional flick of a lever. Wilbur and Tommy have no idea where they’re going, hell, they have no idea where they are. All Wilbur knows is that he needs to find a swap moon. Before they left the planet, Wilbur and Tommy had gathered up anything that may have been useful on a swap moon. Everything ranging from some of the local flora, which they kept in little pots made of metal with soil in them, to whatever pretty rock caught their eye.

At one point, they cross past a star. They’re not too close to it, they’re not burning up, but Wilbur wakes Tommy up anyway so he can see the sight. 

Wilbur loves it, being able to see a star so up-close. A big ball of gas, that was bright and beautiful. Something so dangerous, yet so... wonderful.

“Woah.” Is all Tommy says.

“Woah indeed.” Wilbur replies absentmindedly, as he switches the lever on the control panel, switching them into hyperspace. He didn’t want to stay near the star for too long, lest they get dragged into its gravitational pull by accident. 

The ship is silent, save for Tommy's snoring, and since they’re communication systems are broken, that means they don’t have a radio. Which also means: no music, no news, and, of course, not communication. The way Wilbur makes up for this is humming. 

He hums songs his mom taught him; he hums songs he would listen to on the palace roof with Techno. He hums made up tunes. He mutters made up lyrics under his breath to pass the time. He taps his foot to a beat and tries not to lose focus on the metaphorical road ahead of him. Eyes on the road, except the road is the vast emptiness of space.

Right now, they’re passing through a nebula. Colours of all kinds float around them, purple, pink, blue, green, it’s wonderful. Wilbur takes the time to go slow, he can afford to go slow. They’re allowed to go slow, it’s not like the swap moon is going to leave just because Wilbur decided to take the time to look at a spectacle. 

“Wilbur.” Tommy says groggily, waking up from his nap and stretching his limbs out. His red feathers flare out as he does so. "Wow.” The 13-year-old says, looking at the clouds of dust and gas around them. “This is...”

“Breathtaking?” Wilbur finishes for him, and Tommy nods.

“I would have never gotten to see this kind of thing if I hadn’t snuck onto that ship...” Tommy continues. “I don’t think I regret it. Yeah, the planet fucking sucked, but like... I don’t regret making you crash land on there, because it was so, so worth it.”

“And I don’t regret chasing you through the vents either.” Wilbur admits. “I’d chase you through those things a billion times over, just for this. I’d let you dig me out from rubble a zillion times just for this moment...”

“What even is this?” Tommy asks, and Wilbur almost laughs. How can one not know what a nebula is?

Nevertheless, Wilbur answers. “It’s a nebula. Clouds of gas and space dust, often made from dying stars. In return, the gas and dust all clump together, and they make new stars.”

“Amazing.” Tommy says, staring out at the nebula with wide eyes. “I wish I was a nebula.”

“Now that’s not something you hear every day.” Wilbur says, because it isn’t. Most people don’t want to be nebulae. 

“Hm.” Tommy simply hums, propping his head on his hands as he continues to look out the window. “Are you sure we need a navigation system? Or communication for that matter? I wouldn’t mind staying like this forever...”

“We need to get you home, Tommy.” Wilbur tells him. “But... maybe, after all this is said and done, you could ask your mom about it, and if she says yes, you could join me in my travels.”

“But don’t you have to go back to your princely duties?” Tommy asks. 

Wilbur stays quiet. “I’ve been thinking of stepping down. Telling Phil, I don’t want the throne, and that he can find someone else to take it. If he doesn’t like my decision, he can go fuck off. Maybe find someone to help remove the stick stuck up his ass.”

Tommy laughs. “Can’t wait.”

Wilbur finds a swap moon around two days after they leave the planet. 

It’s orbiting another planet, one that seemed to be covered in green. Wilbur wasn’t sure if it was the land, or something else. However, it doesn’t matter, because they aren’t going to the planet, they’re going to the moon. Wilbur only knows it’s a swap moon because swap moons are very easy to spot, even if you’ve never been to them before.

There are loads of ships coming in and out, and it’s also a moon. Wilbur could probably tell better if their communications systems were working, but alas, they’ll simply have to risk it. 

Currently, Wilbur is stuck between two other ships much bigger than their own. Tommy tells him those are A vis ships, and Wilbur only stares in awe at the work of machinery in front him. Far better than anything Elytria could come up with. Avians truly are the pioneers of space travel, huh?

Wilbur's damn near about to fall asleep on the wheel, considering how slow the traffic is here. Not only that, but he’s probably going to slow the entire thing down, because of their broken comms system. It’s likely the managers of this swap moon will have to board their pod personally to make sure they weren’t dangerous. Though, because they were in a pod, there was a high chance they could get through the atmosphere undetected, especially with these big Avis ships in the way, which would make it much easier to get by.

Wilbur doesn’t want to risk it though. If they’re stopped, they’re stopped. If they make it through, they make it through. Simple as that.

“Wilbur, the ship is moving.” Tommy says, causing Wilbur to jolt up and make their own ship go forward as well. He keeps going, and they aren’t stopped when they enter the atmosphere of the swap moon.

“...We need to find somewhere to land.” Wilbur states, eyes scanning over the many ships parked on the moon. “I don’t know if we’ll be able to find any.”

“How about over there?” Tommy asks, pointing to a spot just big enough to fit their pod in. 

Wilbur nods. “Yeah, there.” He pulls a level, sending their ship into a smooth dive. He pulls up near the ground, hovering in place before lowering to the spot Tommy pointed out. “Let's go.”

The two of them then leave their seats, Wilbur stretching because he just spent, what? Two days straight flying, no breaks. He needs to stretch. And maybe a nap. Scratch that, he definitely needs a nap, but the swap moon is more important right now. They need to find someone to fix their comms system and their navigation.

Wilbur grabs his bag full of whatever they could scavenge from the planet, along with some coins he manages to find in the pod. The pod had about everything in it, thin mattresses, some rations, some extra coins if you needed it. Everything for an emergency evac, or a crash landing. Both work, either way, Wilbur's thankful. 

“Now, Tommy, do you know basic swap moon safety?” Wilbur asks, Tommy probably does, but he wants to double check.

“I’ve probably been to swap moons more than you have, so of course I do.” Tommy says. “Don’t talk to shady people, don’t let people take advantage of you, always keep an eye on your money-”

“Okay. Good.”

“If anything, I’m more concerned about you being snatched up.” Tommy continues. “you’re a prince! And if your dad is anything like you’ve told him to be, he’s probably put-up missing posters allll over the universe, and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone grabbed you hoping for some easy money.”

Wilbur is almost in shock. How does Tommy know all this?

“You should grab your coat, use the hood to hide your features.” Tommy tells him. “We can rip the Elytrian crest off, that’s the only thing that makes it noticeable anyway. Thankfully, I came prepared and did that before we landed.”

“Wait what-” Wilbur says, finally coming to his senses. “You did what to my coat?”

“I tore that stupid Elytrian crest off. It looked ugly anyway.” Tommy crosses his arms, before he bends down and opens one of the compartments in the pods, which they had been using as a storage space. “Here. Take your coat.” Tommy then throws the heavy thing into Wilbur's arms, and it smells... It smells so Tommy. When Wilbur was wearing it, it smelled like coal and oil, from all the time he spent on the catwalks. But now, since Tommy constantly used it as a blanket, it smelled like rain. And dirt, and campfire. It smelled nice.

Wilbur wants it to stay like that forever. He can't even bring himself to be mad that Tommy tore the Elytrian crest off it.

Wilbur shimmies the thing on, shoving the hood over his face. “Okay. So, are we leaving now or what?”

“Yep! And we know what we’re getting, right?” Tommy asks him, and suddenly Wilbur feels like they’ve switched places. It’s usually Wilbur asking this kind of stuff!

“Food, water, someone to fix the navigation and comms system.” Wilbur says. “...and that game you want, if we can afford it.”

Tommy claps his hands together. “Then we’re set! Off we go, dearest Wilbur!”

The swap moon seems to be Tommy's natural environment. 

The boy weaves through the crowd like nothing, and Wilbur would have lost him multiple times were it not for the hybrid pulling him along by his sleeve the entire time. Tommy decides they’re looking for food first. Thankfully, they don’t have to look very far.

Food stalls are set up everywhere, advertising delicacies from every-which place. The smells are overwhelming, but pleasant, nonetheless. And the smell of Tommy on his coat makes it more bearable. Tommy seems to want everything they come across, of which Wilbur sternly reminds them they only have so much money to throw around. 

“But there's so much... how could I choose?” Tommy groans, gesturing towards the food stalls. “Like, those fish-things from Atrana! Or uhm... the cake stuff that the Exmurdon guy is selling! It all looks so good...”

Wilbur looks around at the stalls. An Elytrian is selling some Lanto Feather, that’s a no-go, Wilbur doesn’t want to risk being recognized. Atrana, Exmurdon, Enderia... So much food all in one place, awfully overwhelming. Something catches Wilbur's eyes, in the back of all the stalls, sits a smaller stall. Humbler than the rest, if Wilbur focuses enough, he can smell something... nice coming from it. 

“How about that one?” Wilbur says, pointing to it. Its sign is in a foreign language.

Tommy squints at it. “The ramen place?”

Wilbur nods. “Yeah—wait, how’d you read that?”

Tommy shrugs. “It’s in English, it’s a human language. Brother always wanted me to be at least somewhat connected with the culture.”

Wilbur hums. “So, does this mean you know what ramen is?

Tommy makes a kind of motion with his hands. “Heard of it, never had it before.”

“Let's go over, shall we?” Wilbur says, striding forward towards the ramen stand, Tommy following close behind. As they get closer, the smell becomes more distinct. 

When they reach the counter, someone pops up from the counter. They have black hair, and a weird hat on their head. They’re also very clearly human. They lean over the counter, staring at them for a few seconds. “Oh, so you’re actually getting something?” They ask in a chipper voice. “Most people usually just stare at the stand then leave.”

“Yep!” Tommy says. “What do you got here?”

“Noodles. Ramen. Forks to eat the stuff with—we would have chopsticks, but we can only afford forks at the moment.” The stand-person says. “We have some soda too, a few packs of hi-chews.”

“We’ll take the uh. Ramen.” Wilbur decides, since that’s like the only thing there. 

“What flavor?” The stand-person asks, and Wilbur realizes they have a name tag that says Aimsey.

“Uhhh... Whatever you recommend?” Wilbur answers, and Aimsey nods. 

“Wait here.” They say, turning their back to Tommy and Wilbur. Tommy decides to sit in a chair, and Wilbur does the same. He feels really awkward, sitting there like that. What if Aimsey recognizes him? Surely a hood over his face wouldn’t be enough. 

Subconsciously, he pulls it over his head tighter. 

“Back!” Aimsey says, and Wilbur thinks it has to have been at least a few minutes. She sets two bowls on the counter of the stand, two forks stuck into them. They smell good, Wilbur decides, which must mean they taste good. 

“How much will this be?” Wilbur asks, just to make sure.

Aimsey hums. “On the house!”

Wilbur shakes his head. “No, no. We have to repay you for this.”

Aimsey leans towards him from her side of the counter. “It’s free, you can tip if you want, but it’s free.”

Wilbur senses that it’ll be useless arguing with them, so he simply goes back to eating. He takes a glance towards Tommy, who is happily slurping up the noodles. Wilbur's not exactly sure how you eat this human delicacy, so he just does what Tommy does—and surely it can’t be too different from how you eat noodles on Elytria. He twirls his fork in the human-noodles, wrapping them around the thing. Then he blows on them before putting them in his mouth. He doesn’t slurp them the way Tommy did though, he’s way more sophisticated than that.

It’s delicious.

Tommy finishes before him, and Wilbur finishes soon after.

They bid their farewells to Aimsey, but not before Wilbur drops a few coins on her counter.

Now, they have to look for someone to fix their ship... god, that’s going to be annoying. And expensive. 

Tommy's natural habitat has to be swap moons, because without him Wilbur would have never found the place they were looking for. That, or he’d end up somewhere that would’ve scammed him out of his life savings. 

Tommy skips ahead, following after this Sam guy he found when they were looking for people to fix their ship. Sam himself, clearly being from Exmurdon; green all-over, centaur looking build. He must’ve had some Enderian in there too, because christ was he tall, and every time Wilbur met his eye the guy would look away immediately, but not before hissing.

But Sam seems to be a pretty chill guy, he didn’t overprice him. When Wilbur asked how Tommy found such a good guy, Tommy said he just had a feeling. Wilbur's starting to think Tommy has superpowers when it comes to finding good people in the universe. All he had to give Sam was a few coins—honestly, he thinks the guy was underpricing himself. At least go with a hundred, right? But when he asked, Sam said they were clearly in need of it, and they clearly didn’t have much money to spare. He also said he’d happily take some of those pretty rocks that Tommy mentioned when they first met him. 

Wilbur is in shock that Tommy somehow manages to meet such amazing people.

“It’s going to take a day or two to fix.” Sam tells them after looking at the damage. “It’s pretty thorough damage, but nothing I can’t fix. You’re not going to need a replacement, which is good.”

“I wouldn’t want you staying in your ship while I worked on it though, the noise would only keep you awake.” Sam continues, and Wilbur is once again in awe of Tommy’s ability to find amazingly nice people. Most wouldn’t care about that! “You can stay at my place for the time being, I don’t mind.”

Wilbur almost faints from his astonishment.

“Thank...you.” He says, and he’s about to start sobbing and ask if Sam knows he’s the missing Elytrian prince and this is why he’s being so nice to them. But he doesn’t. Maybe Sam is just nice, you know? “We really appreciate it.”

“No problem.” Sam tells him, smiling. 

Wilbur thinks he might explode.

Sam’s... house is pretty nice. Well, it’s not much of a house, more like a ship that’s mostly built for living in. Tommy compares it to something called a mobile home and a trailer. Wilbur doesn’t know what either of those are, but he has to assume Tommy is correct.

The ship is small, no bigger than their own pod. There’s another ship in front that it’s attached to, and Wilbur sees nothing that powers this smaller ship. Sam invites them inside and shows them around. There's a tiny recreational space in the front, with a TV and some games. From there, there's the kitchen. It has a stove, some pots and pans, utensils, and his fridge is packed. Then there's the back, which has Sam's bedroom, along with a tinier guest room. Sam tells them they’ll be staying in the guest room until their pod is fixed.

“This Sam guy...” Wilbur says, flopping onto the bed in the guest room, his hood is off for the first time since he arrived on the swap moon. “He’s...”

“Cool?” Tommy answers before Wilbur can finish. “Amazing? Awesome? Incredible?”

“I was going to say nice.” Wilbur corrects. “But that works too.”

“Hm. Well it’s getting late and I’m tired.” Tommy says, laying down. 

Wilbur takes off his coat and hangs drops it on the floor, he wasn’t about to sleep in that thing! No way! He’s already spent enough time on it today. (That, and Tommy might want to use it as a blanket again. Wilbur knows they have blankets in the guest room, but maybe, just maybe, Tommy will end up using it.)

Then, the two of them get under the blankets. Tommy falls asleep first, and Wilbur stays up for a bit, listening to the boy's snores and breathing, before falling asleep himself.

“Wilbur! C’mon, I need to show you something!” Techno’s voice tells him. He’s being shaken back and forth. “Wilbur, wake up!”

Wilbur opens his eyes slowly, coming face to face with Techno—who looks exactly like him, save for the longer hair and glasses. “Wha...”

He doesn’t have time to question, as Techno drags him out of bed. Wilbur takes a peek out the window and finds out it is in the middle of the night, and Techno must be insane if he’s waking Wilbur up at a time like this.

Wilbur follows Techno up so many stairs and around so many turns that he loses track of where they are. All he knows is that they’re going up, and Techno is excited. 

Techno lets go of his wrist, and Wilbur is still too tired to process the fact he just got dragged out of bed, his very comfortable bed. Techno pulls something, and a ladder comes down from the ceiling. He gestures a follow me motion as he climbs the ladder, and Wilbur follows him.

Then, Wilbur is hit with the cold. The cold, freezing air, and he looks up and sees the sky. Millions of stars look back at him, twinkling and dancing in the sky. “Woah.” He says. Then, a light, a bright light shoots across the sky. Then another, and another, and another. Until the whole sky is bathed in showering lights. 

“It’s a meteor shower.” Techno says out of nowhere. “I asked Phil if we could watch it together, but he never answered—said he’d think about it. So, I thought I’d just do it myself.”

Wilbur simply stares at the sky, a smile spreading across his face. 

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Techno says, and Wilbur can hear his smile. 

(They stay like that for a while, Wilbur halfway onto the roof, and Techno sitting above him. Watching the meteor shower. They stay even after it’s done, simply enjoying each other’s company. Wilbur could stay like this forever.)

During the two days Sam takes to fix their ship, Wilbur has narrowly avoided giving away his identity to the man too many times to count. Far, far too many times to count. 

Although Sam spends most of his time in the pod, hunched over the navigation system, Wilbur and Tommy do spend most of their time in the pod with him. Playing hand games, or talking to Sam, or whatever else to keep themselves entertained. This results in the two of them spending lots of time with Sam, and Sam spending lots of time with them. Which results in many, many conversations.

Many conversations where Wilbur can get careless when it comes to his identity.

Wilbur doesn’t even know why he’s trying to keep it a secret, he has the sense that if he just told someone (like Aimsey from the ramen stand, or even Sam for that matter), they would let him use their comms system to get Elytrian forces to pick him up. Wilbur finds he much prefers the risk of keeping his identity a secret, he’s heard the people of the swap moon talking, Phils put out metaphorical universal missing posters with his face plastered all over them. 

He also finds that he’s doing this to lengthen his time spent with Tommy. Tommy, who's always so happy. Tommy, who doesn’t seem to mind being separated from his brother, his sister, or his mother. Tommy, who’s amazed at the tiniest of things—like a nebula, or stars. Tommy, who Wilbur’s starting to love in the same way he loved Techno. Tommy, who Wilbur can’t find himself wanting to leave behind.

The faster he gets home to Elytria, the less time he has to spend with Tommy.

He thinks Tommy knows what he’s doing too, the kid is smart. 

He’s not sure if he can call Elytria home. Home was always with his family, home was always with Techno, and mom, and Phil. Home was always with Niki. Home is now with Tommy. 

He doesn’t want to go back to Elytria, but he’s still chasing after the place anyway.

“This is one ship you have here.” Sam says while he’s on his back, torso under the control panel. He's fixing the navigation system, which of course, is under the control panel. “It screams Elytrian technology, how’d you get a hold of it?”

“It was my dad's.” Wilbur answers.

Sam hums. “You must’ve had one rich dad then, for him to have been able to afford this.”

Wilbur gulps as he realizes he nearly gave himself away. Sam must be oblivious, to just assume Wilbur has a rich dad. Wilbur's dad is actually just the King of Elytrians, nothing out of the ordinary here, no, nope, not at all.

The next time Wilbur nearly gives himself away to Sam, Tommy is with him.

Wilbur would like to preface this with that it’s totally Tommy’s fault.

“So, how’d you two end up with each other anyway?” Sam asks, munching on one of his snacks. He’s taking a break after spending a solid two hours under their control panel. “Kid’s a human-avian hybrid, you’re... something, I can’t really see what you are when you have that hood on all the time, but you’re not avian or human. So, it can’t be a family thing, unless either you or him are adopted. Tell me, how’d you two end up in each other's company?”

Tommy leans into the ship at that exact moment via the open door. “He chased me through a bunch of vents, we ended up in the ship, then we fought in it and then it crashed. Stuck with each other ever since!”

To which Sam replies: “ Through the vents? What are you people doing that causes you to chase each other through the vents-!”

And Wilbur saves them by saying: “Hide and seek.”

Then Sam goes: “That doesn’t explain how you know each other though.”

Tommy seems to catch on to what Wilbur's trying to do and says: “His dad adopted me, so now we’re brothers!”

And that is absolutely fake, by the way. Phil doesn’t even know who Tommy is, but Wilbur wouldn’t be opposed to forging Phils signature on an adoption form. Sam hums in understanding, mentioning his own adopted brother back on Exmurdon. Then, Sam finishes off his snack, and goes back to working on the navigation system.

A few hours before Sam tells them their ship is in the clear to fly again, and that their navigation system is fixed and there shouldn’t be anything wrong with their communications system, he pulls Wilbur aside. Tommy tries to follow him, but Sam says it’s for grown-ups only, to which Tommy complains—loudly, that he’s 13, almost 14, and that means he’s totally enough of a grown-up to know what they’re talking about. But Wilbur has no idea what Sam wants to talk to him about, so it’s not like he knows either.

Sam leads him to the very back of their pod, looking behind them and double checking that Tommy isn’t eavesdropping on them.

Then, he settles his hands—his very big, very heavy on Wilbur's shoulders—and he has half the mind to slap him away, because now the guy’s gotten oil all over his dress shirt. Then Wilbur remembers his dress shirt is already ripped in many, many places, and it’s not like some oil’s going to make it any worse than it already is.

“Look, man, I don’t know what you want from him.” Sam starts off and proceeds to confuse Wilbur immensely. "But you need to tell the kid who you are.”

It’s at that moment Wilbur realizes he fucked up.

“What... what do you mean?” Wilbur asks, trying to ignore the shaking in his voice.

Sam sighs, facepalming. “Does Tommy know who you are? Who your dad is?”

“...Yes.” Wilbur says, ultimately deciding that Sam knows, and there’s no use in hiding it. “He knows. I told him the second we first met.”

“He’s attached to you.” Sam tells him, and Wilbur knows he’s right. “And you are too. But he’s the brother of a diplomat, and you’re a prince. Tommy gets to live his life, but you’re set in line for the throne.”

Wilbur nods, a lump forming in his throat.

“You know that you won’t be able to spend time with him after this, right?” Sam says, and for the first time since Wilbur met him, the man looks him in the eyes. “I fixed your communications system. I fixed your navigation. I know a good guy when I see one, okay? And you’re a good guy, man. You guys' care for each other. But I know what you’re going to do, you’re going to call your dad, and then your dad’s going to call his family, and then everything will go back to normal. It’ll almost be as if you guys never met.”

Wilbur stays quiet.

“And you guys' care for each other, and I know that you two wouldn’t like the idea of being separated.”

Sam must have a superpower when it comes to reading people.

Wilbur swallows down the lump in his throat. “I’m going to be stepping down... from the throne. I’m giving away my status as an heir to the throne, as a prince, and Phil can’t stop me. I’d much rather fly than be stuck in a glorified chair. And he knows that, and Phil... He loves me. He sucks at showing it, but I know that he’d listen to me. I’m going to step down, then I’m going to contact Tommy’s parents, and then we’re going to see the universe together. We’re going to see Atrana, and Exmurdon, and all the planets we’ve never gotten to see before.”

“I trust you.” Sam says. “I trust that you’ll find a way. Just... Just know my place is always open for you guys to crash if you need it, I’ll give you my radio frequency, yeah?”

Wilbur nods. “Yeah...” 

The interaction went better than he thought it would.

They leave four hours later; Wilbur had written Sam's radio frequency down on a sticky note, sticking it onto the wall of their pod. Much like when they entered the swap moon, they left without much fanfare. 

Wilbur and Tommy decide to go to Avis, drop him off. Wilbur will call Phil on the way; he’ll tell him about his choice about stepping down. Then, Willbur'll contact Niki, and tell her all about his adventures in the week and few days he’s been gone.

Thankfully, since they have a working navigational system now, they can use autopilot. Meaning: Wilbur can get some well-deserved sleep instead of flying for days on end. He takes a nap before he calls Phil; he dreams.

Unlike the dreams he’s been having lately, this isn’t a memory. It’s something entirely new. 

He wakes up in a bed, staring up at a wooden ceiling. There's the smell of breakfast cooking in the next room over, Wilbur heaves himself up, taking in his surroundings. There's two beds in the room, there’s a bunk across from him, and he himself is in a normal one. The walls have pictures hung up on every corner, and his coat is hanging on the doorknob of the door.

The pictures have many people in them, ranging from only 2, to 5. Wilbur recognizes every single person. One photo has him and Techno, smiling up at the camera. They’re around 8 in the picture, gaps in their teeth and a big birthday cake behind them. Another picture features Tommy, holding up a medal, for something. Wilbur doesn’t know. 

Wilbur heads out of the room, looks around. He’s in a hallway, pictures cover the walls here too. He follows the hallway until he reaches the living room. 

There, he finds everyone he’s ever thought of as family.

Techno, Phil, Niki, Tommy, they all lounge on the couch watching something on the TV. They’re smiling. And Wilbur is watching them like an idiot.

“Wilbur!” Tommy exclaims, noticing him first. “You’re finally awake!”

Then, he shoots up from his spot on the couch, running towards Wilbur and embracing him in a hug.

(Is this what it could’ve been, in another life? Everyone he loves in one place. No dead twins, no princely duties. Just him, and his family. He wonders.)

He wakes up, he’s in the pilot's chair. The ship is still moving, humming, and Wilbur’s not sure he could ever exist in the quiet of the castle again. He looks to his right; Tommy is snoring on his chair. He’s curled up, and if Wilbur tries to imagine himself in that position, he finds himself cringing in imaginary pain.

Quietly, he gets up. He fell asleep in his coat. 

He shimmies it off of himself, tiptoeing towards Tommy. Then, he drapes it over the boy.

Tommy says something in his sleep, and takes the edges of Wilbur's coat, pulling it closer to himself.

Wilbur realizes he should call Phil now. Tell him about everything and tell him about how he’s going to travel the universe and there's nothing he can do to stop him. He should get it over with, there's no use procrastinating it, the ship's course was set for Avis, and either he does it when they arrive, or he does it now. Wilbur would much rather get it done now.

So, Wilbur settles back into the pilot's chair, pressing one of the many buttons of the control board. A screen pops up. Wilbur types in a frequency, Phil’s private one. The one he’s memorized by heart now. Wilbur presses call.

It rings once, twice, and one more third time before Phil picks up.

There is no video on the screen, only an equalizer bar. Static, until: “Hello?” Phil asks, and god he sounds like he’s lived a million years in only a few days. He sounds so tired, exhausted, like he might collapse at any moment. 

“Hi dad.” Wilbur says, and he sounds tired too. Probably because he just woke up. And maybe it’s because all that’s happened in the past few weeks and then some suddenly crashes down on him. 

He crashed a ship, met a human-avian hybrid, and flew for the first time in four years. And it ended up being the best week of his life. Wilbur has never felt so alive. 

“...Wilbur?” Phil says, and he sounds so, so relieved. Wilbur... he feels guilty.

What he’s about to say is sure to break the man. 

“Oh Wilbur! You’re alive!” Phil exclaims through the other end, and Wilbur winces, worried he might wake Tommy up. “You are in so, so much trouble young man... What happened?”

And Wilbur laughs awkwardly. “I crashed a pod. By accident. I was chasing a thief. We crash landed on a planet, and now we’re friends. Luckily I was only trapped under the rubble, and that I didn’t break my spine or something.”

Phil laughs. “Only you... only you Wilbur. You’re still in so much trouble when you come home, though. Don’t you forget that.”

“About that...” Wilbur starts, trying to ease into it. “I’m not coming home.”

“What?”

“Yeah.” Wilbur confirms. “I’m... I made a friend. His name is Theseus, but everyone calls him Tommy. He’s a human-avian hybrid, and he’s only 13 years old—but he turns 14 soon. He stole food from our kitchens because he snuck onto his brother's ship and got left behind. He didn’t know what a nebula was until I told him, and he wants nothing more than to explore the universe...”

“Wil, you can’t be serious—”

“And I’d much rather be there with him while he does it, than stuck in a glorified chair.” Wilbur finishes. “Consider this my official stepping down as Prince of Elytria.”

Wilbur can hear Phil sigh, and suck in a breath. He’s quiet, like he’s thinking.

“If that’s what makes you happy.” Phil ends up saying. “Just don’t forget to call good ol’ dad, will ya?”

“As if I could forget about you! Old man!” Wilbur teases, and Phil makes an offended noise from the other end. 

They fall into silence after that, on the call. Nothing but the static, and the breathing that the microphones occasionally picked up. It’s a comfortable silence, one Wilbur doesn’t mind staying in forever. Watching the stars go by, sitting next to Tommy—someone he’s grown to care about so, so much, his dad on a call. His dad. 

“You know,” Phil says, breaking the silence. “Kristin would be proud of you. So would Techno.”

And Wilbur knows he’s right.

“I’m proud of you, Wil.”