Chapter Text
Technoblade did not consider himself a man of many friends. Indeed, more than once his numerous titles and reputation deterred others and even the occasional brave soul who decided that a ‘friendship’ with The Blade would benefit them was barricaded out. He knew that any warmth or supposedly pointless kindness would end in unguarded attachments, then later, weakness- a lesson he had been taught through fire and blood and anguish many times.
He fancied that, for someone like him, the voices were adequate company enough: never completely dishonest, yet never completely truthful either. He didn’t remember why he was like this, why the urge to kill and the chant for blood rushed through his head like a deafening torrent, blocking out all else. Though he did remember the first time he had chosen to ignore the voices, or, more specifically, he remembered the agony of an overwhelming headache which pestered his head for many nights after he refused the voices blood, and the throbbing in his injured side. And the voices did not help him then. The voices hated being ignored.
Once upon a time, there were also allies: rebels, mercenaries, even kings and generals that paid handsomely for his loyalty, though with them he never stayed for long. Never making friends, never letting his guard down, never showing weakness. The voices encouraged it.
Of course, there was the matter of his family. His presumably dead, long-gone family- the lords of the Nether Wastes, but also the owners of possibly the largest bounty of gold throughout the lands. All he recalled of them was the weighted, crude cloak he was given when he was young- a gift for coming of age. But then the memory got fuzzy, and Technoblade hated that feeling, so he turned his mind away. It’s not like there was any point remembering them anyway- he was the youngest of six brothers: a runt, an outcast, a ruffian. Piglin prince of nothing. Plus, he had another family now, so it didn’t even matter.
And then there was Phil. His only friend. The Angel of Death , they called him, but he was just Phil.
The hollow snarling of an untamed beast forced him out of his thoughts and bid him stop. Although it sounded faraway, Technoblade instinctively placed his hand upon the worn leather handle of the enchanted netherite pickaxe, tracing the ancient runes engraved in the grip with his finger. The only weapon he had access to now. Rather ineffective against most mobs, but still better than nothing. After all, this was the arctic: the wild, inhospitable arctic, and it was beneficial to be prepared, lest one wanted to pay the frozen land with one’s life.
Brushing the animal’s howling aside, he trudged on, attempting to disregard the way the snow was melting, creeping into his winter boots and making his hooves itch. Or how the polar wind spiked into his silhouette despite his cloak, aggravating his swollen collarbone and the frozen, sloppy cuts Quackity had bestowed upon him not yet a day's past. Or how he could no longer feel the pain of his broken ankle but his limp still worsened. Or his headache. Or the mocking tone of the voices. Or how the guilt of failing to save his only friend from the government left a bottomless pit of hurt floating around in his stomach. Except he wouldn’t turn back; hell, he couldn’t turn back to help his friend, even if his better judgement insisted. He was too tired, too wounded, and he knew that he wouldn’t make the trek there, let alone fight off a whole server of people and save him.
Here he was now. The one who had single-handedly made armies flee, the almighty, the undying, trying to bite back the tears that threatened to fall down his face as he staggered desperately towards the cabin he had been forcefully escorted out of just this morning.
You surrendered to them, the voices supplied, You surrendered, coward, and you’ve got nothing to show for it.
It was true. In an all or nothing act of spinelessness, the Butcher Army held an axe to his stallion, his innocent Carl. It made the rage and call for blood flood into his brain, except he couldn’t do anything because he saw Quackity’s death grip on the reins, he saw Carl’s terrified white eyes. And he was about to move, about to fight, but he couldn’t because the axe was oh-so close to Carl’s neck and the crimson blood was trickling down his fur way too fast. And just like that- the prized weapons he had carried for decades stolen away; his armour stripped off his body; a potion of weakness forced down his throat and a gag shoved into his mouth. And his Carl…left at the mercy of Dream.
Defeated , the voices chanted, defeated.
Technoblade still felt the foul aftertaste of the potion of weakness in his mouth, but that wasn’t his biggest concern. It was far worse that his limbs were much more exhausted than he ever recalled then being and no longer cooperated properly, instead dragging heavily through the snow and turning the itch in his hooves to a sharp sting. Maybe he should have let them execute him, unhonourable death as it was; maybe that was the easier way out…?
No- he was Technoblade. When had he ever gone the easy way to spare himself suffering?
It was going to be fine, he assured himself. It would be fine- he’d get home, warm up, go to sleep and fix up in the morning, he decided as he half-stumbled, half-crawled up the slope of a hill. He had enough resources there to be back and running in a few days. Back to plotting to kill everyone in L'Manberg- this time, for good. Nothing would help them this time, he would make sure of it.
He had finally reached the outskirts of the spruce forest that shielded his life of retirement from the outside world. Between his ragged breath and uncomfortable pace caused by his limp, he huffed indignantly: his forest was not to blame for the Butcher Army’s approach, even if they did have to go the long way around through the most wild part of the frozen woodland. The blame was all on him.
After all, Technoblade decided that no one with even half a brain would ever decide to go through there- it was much too dangerous. Even him, the Human GPS himself, wouldn’t risk camping there on the roundabout way to L’Manberg, especially if he was Tubbo and had a furious Blood God on his hands. He didn’t know the landscape like the back of his hand there, but he had a few landmarks placed to help locate himself, and, which was more than what that cabinet disguised as a battalion knew, Technoblade was aware of the land’s dangers.
Like the female polar bear who was always aggressive when she ran into him, but would not hesitate to kill him now that she had little cubs- their hostile behaviour had interested Technoblade.
Or like the thorn bushes with little white berries, like pearls, that were actually laced with the strongest of all natural poisons- Phil had warned him to be careful of those.
Or like the relatively stable looking layers of frozen snow on the ground that would shatter under any pressure, plunging the unfortunate into a deep cave or ravine- he thought it to be the most perfect of all traps.
After all of this, and more that Technoblade acknowledged he probably didn’t know about the wild forest, why would an outsider- why would anyone in their right mind try to journey through it?
So he didn’t place traps around that part of his property.
His mistake...his foolish mistake.
Technoblade sighed shakily again. The sun, like a fiery phoenix, was dying out, and the world would sink into darkness before long, which always tempted the undead to crawl out of wherever they existed. Today, he was not looking for a fight. Today, the voices, as unsatisfied with the outcome of his execution as they were, would not make him fall down to his knees to their beautifully violent suggestions. Not in this broken state. If only the sun was as warm on Technoblade’s irritated, trembling skin as it looked, lounging in the sky.
He trudged on, dragging his legs through the sharp ice. It felt like the wind had sculpted the frozen water into tiny needles, and was cheering them on as they scratched at his torn, soggy boots. The faster he could make it home, the better.
Hurry up! Faster! the voices spurred, Technoweak!
Technoblade knew his condition was bad when he couldn’t find the energy to make those remarks bother him.
His plan had gone so wrong, so quickly.
As soon as that potion of weakness was down his throat, he knew that it would no longer be easy for him to escape from Fundy’s tight grip on his chains. He knew that the difficulty level went way up, so physically fighting back was dismissed. And with the gag in his mouth, verbally fighting back?- out of the question, too. What was left?
He was going to try making a run for it, and it would have worked out for him, Technoblade was sure of it, even if he was surrounded, drugged, outnumbered and unarmed. Wasn’t that what the Hypixel Servers were all about?
But Quackity still had Carl, his diamond axe still lingering close to the horse’s neck, the perfectly straight gash in the stallion’s flesh still bleeding sluggishly. Hopeless idea; not worth considering. Next…
But was there a next?
While Technoblade stared daggers at anyone in the Butcher Army who dared to look in his direction, he fabricated his plan. All that was left was to wait for the ideal moment.
He stumbled and just saved himself from falling flat on his face. He was nearly on the plain before his house, snuggled in between two smaller hills, but dark spots were dancing across his vision and he felt like fainting from the pain.
If only he had waited a moment longer, his plan might have worked. If only the potion was a little weaker, if only Fundy was a little less confident, it would have worked.
Technoblade was pinned down in the mud before he made it a few feet from his closest captor, Fundy just smirking at his feeble attempt to get free. As he was silently cursing the clumsy nature of his drugged limps, Quackity grabbed a club, and beat it with all his might into Technoblade’s torso. The last thing he heard before Quackity battered him into senselessness was Tubbo, his voice wavering, screaming at him and demanding Quackity to stop. Or maybe that himself? He couldn’t be sure now.
Time seemed to speed up, although that might have been the result of his blackout. Apparently Fundy had the brilliant idea to waterboard him once they were not far from L’Manberg, to get him to wake up, to not be dragged through the mud into the city, to walk on his own. Preserve his dignity, you know?
But what did they actually care about his pride? When Phil’s eyes met his on that cursed town square, Technoblade saw in them a horror, a shock, that the Blood God looked- frankly- homeless; that he had lost such an undemanding, inconsequential fight that would now lead to his death. Not even Dream would be caught dead looking like that.
Events blended into one after that: Tubbo’s ‘Look how great I am for bringing this criminal to justice’ speech, Punz’s interruption, the totem popping, Dream’s almost worried body language as he handed Technoblade a god apple, Quackity’s death wish as he stepped into that skirmish, lastly fleeing through the sewers like some rat- defeated, guilt ridden.
Technoblade told himself that he wouldn’t care about what the Butcher Army did next, that he couldn’t bring himself to care.
Except he did.
Because he left Phil.
It was instinct that led Technoblade across the next few chunks. There it was; his home, so close…
But through his state of half-consciousness he did not smell the ashy scent of an extinguished fire, nor see the black smoke dancing up from where his home should have been.
Nor would he see the burnt remains of his cabin as darkness engulfed his vision as soon as he reached the top of the little valley. He collapsed into unconsciousness.
Tommy felt drowsy.
He had marched through leagues of dense forest, meadows and icy plains; anything, anything, to get away from Dream. He didn’t plan to end up there, at his brother’s and worst enemy’s home. Much less did he plan to then tunnel out a basement under said brother’s and worst enemy’s home and attempt to live there. And what he definitely didn’t plan for was to be startled awake on his third day there by the violent shouts and sounds of fighting above the surface of the frozen ground. He well remembered that in his childhood his brother had been unpredictable and aggressive, to say the least, so perhaps a fight to the death on the front lawn in the morning wasn’t as unexpected as one would have thought it would be. In any case, Tommy did not opt to crawl out of his burrow like some homeless raccoon (albeit he wasn’t far from such) and instead held his breath as he heard people screaming in pain. Soon the noise quieted, though that in itself was only partially a relief. All it meant was that his brother had defeated whoever dared to challenge him and would therefore be making his way back inside his- no, Tommy’s house, increasing the chances of his inevitable discovery.
But even through his confused and hazy thoughts, Tommy was sure that he did not hear the door open at any point. Around that he had no doubts. Although, he did start doubting when he heard the soft ‘plop’ that explosive material made as it hit the iced ground. He would’ve recognised that sound anywhere.
Dream.
Dream was here. Here for him, here for his wings-
He didn’t get to the end of that thought as the stacks of TNT were lighted and the house above his meagre tunnel burst into flames, then exploded with a sickening BANG!
Breathe, Tommy heard Dream mutter, as if he were just behind him, leaning over to whisper softly into his ear. He was too far down in the dirt to be blown up, he purposefully dug so far down, but he still couldn’t stop the way his burning lungs wheezed faster and faster- where was all the oxygen?
Breathe!
Tommy yelped in fear. He squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his teeth as his lower lip trembled. The colour drained out of his face, replaced instead with pure terror; he yelled and writhed and yelled until his voice went hoarse. Only arctic silence answered him. No one came to check up on him, to toss him over to Dream for trespassing as a fugitive.
Steadily, he collected himself, wiping his tears and snot with the torn back of his filthy sleeve. He wrenched open his eyes and found himself in total darkness. As he crept toward his ladder, he found that a convenient trap door had fallen upon its beginning, blocking out the cold winter from seeping inside. He started climbing out carefully, as if he were made of glass, when it dawned on him that if- when- his brother was back, he would be a dead man living on borrowed time. He swore in anger, but still quickly forced himself back down, back into his warm corner where he had constructed a surprisingly warm nest made mainly of stolen old blankets and pillows, which stood next to an always fuelled and warm, stolen furnace.
With a final, half swallowed sob, Tommy inched towards the nest, wrapped himself with his aching wings and tried so very hard to fall asleep and finally just forget about everything.