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Phil was not Tubbo’s father.
While Phil may have been the one to find him on the side of the road, he was not Tubbo’s father. Of course, it was to be pointed out that it was nothing against Phil as a person. He was nice, and he kept Tubbo and Wilbur alive. (More than what his own father might’ve. He didn’t know, he never knew him.) Sure, he was… absent at times, but when he was around, he made up for it. Besides, Tubbo didn’t know any better. But, again, it was nothing against Phil, it was just… they were too different.
Phil was an Avian with inky black wings, and Tubbo was not. Tubbo was a ram hybrid with nubs for horns, and Phil was not. If Tubbo told anyone that Phil was his father, (He was not, he was Phil.) they’d easily pick out his lie. So, he just called him Phil. It was easier. And more accurate. Phil had straw blonde hair, and Tubbo’s was a dark brown the color of a spruce tree during the spring and summer. Phil’s eyes were sky blue, and Tubbo’s were a calm, mossy green.
Phil was not Tubbo’s father.
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Wilbur was not Tubbo’s brother.
Oh, he was nice, certainly. And while he could be a bit controlling and annoying when it came to sharing, he was a sweetheart, and had often spun up simple lullabies for Tubbo during cold nights when it was just them. They even looked vaguely like brothers. Even when winter set in, and turned Tubbo’s hair a platinum blond. He was close enough to Phil during those months that his differences could be waved off as traits from a non-existent mother.
A shame, then, that the two could not be more different besides that. While Wilbur was poetic and extravagant, and couldn’t bear to keep any of his ideas to himself, no matter their usefulness, Tubbo was somehow both quiet and chaotic, and when he had ideas, he kept them silent, to work on them and improve them, until he had a finished product to show off. Anything less, and he wasn’t working hard enough. Wilbur would write a song, play its first notes, and scrap it if it came out wrong. Tubbo would try at it out of sheer stubbornness, and would only stop when it was perfect. Tubbo was harsh and cold at times, while Wilbur was soft and warm. And Tubbo could be calming and peaceful, while Wilbur could be wild and vicious, a tongue lashing on fire.
Wilbur was not Tubbo’s brother.
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Technoblade was not Tubbo’s… brother? Uncle?
Technoblade was large and, frankly, unadept at social situations. Tubbo was small, and deceptively charming. But both were terrifyingly stubborn, and could be vindictive and judge themselves right at a moment’s notice. (Of course, political genocide and being the first to play with a toy were far different things.) Techno’s blade was driven from coiled muscle, trained and hardened after years upon years of battle. Tubbo’s was small and wooden, but he packed a mean punch, able to slip between blows like running water. Techno liked fireworks, and Tubbo nearly cried the first time he heard them, thinking the world was imploding on itself. (His world would go that way, someday.)
Technoblade was not Tubbo’s brother.
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Tommy might’ve been Tubbo’s brother.
He was just as loud, and fueled by the inescapable rage of a child as well. Both of them loved colors, and Tommy liked moths while Tubbo liked bees. Tommy also didn’t have a mother or father. When Phil had asked wearily one day, Tommy had replied with a shallow smirk, saying they were buried alive. While it had seemed a shallow retort at first, a night’s searching pulled up a town covered in ash from a nearby volcano. Tommy joined the family that day.
Tommy might’ve been Tubbo’s brother.
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Sapnap wasn’t Tubbo’s brother.
He was too loud, and his fire was blistering. That was an easy enough reason to not like him.
Sapnap wasn’t Tubbo’s brother.
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He hardly knew George, so how could he be Tubbo’s brother? Everytime Sapnap and Dream tried to introduce him, he was always sleeping.
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Dream might’ve been Tubbo’s brother.
He had a wheezing laugh, and was nice. Sure, he was a bit controlling and obsessive, especially when they had a mini-feud between Tommy and Dream, but he was nice. Tubbo asked why Dream wore a mask, and Dream told him that he had a nasty scar from an old friend, and didn’t like people staring. (Tubbo would get a similar scar, from the same friend, but wouldn’t hide behind a mask.)
Dream might’ve been Tubbo’s brother.
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Wilbur was not Tubbo’s brother.
He was his president. They had decided they wanted their own country, L’manberg, long may she reign. And so Tubbo and Tommy were children, but they were also soldiers. So were Eret, Jack, and Fundy. Wilbur was too, technically, but was focused on the words of the war, less on the fighting.
Wilbur was Tubbo’s president.
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Eret was not Tubbo’s ally.
A room that was soon enough covered in blood proved that. Tubbo didn’t realize you still had moments of consciousness when your head was decapitated. Sapnap was kind enough to show him that.
It was never meant to be.
Eret was not Tubbo’s ally.
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Tommy was not perfectly fine.
Tubbo was there when he and Dream drew their bows and shot. He was there when he saw Tommy hand away a piece of himself for L’manberg.
Tommy was not perfectly fine. (No matter what Wilbur said.)
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Wilbur was not Tubbo’s president.
A draw of the votes said as much. Wilbur and Tommy were exiled by a man with ram horns. (Tubbo still had his, they were growing in. Would he be that man, someday? He liked to think not.)
Wilbur and Tommy were not Tubbo’s allies.
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L’manberg was not Tubbo’s home.
Manberg was.
L’manberg was not Tubbo’s country.
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Schlatt was Tubbo’s president.
He drank a lot. He said things without a regard for anyone. Even, brave, loud, and blunt Quackity held his tongue and Tubbo had seen him hold back tears in his eyes. Tubbo hated the smell of alcohol. This was one of hundreds of things that he’d hate.
Schlatt was Tubbo’s president.
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Wilbur and Tommy were Tubbo’s friends.
L’manberg was not dead. It would never be dead until the day his family buried it in the ground. (And he had no family, so it could never die.) Technoblade was there, too. At this point, after months, and so much more, of war, he hated the smell of gunpowder. Technoblade (and Wilbur) reeked of the stuff. Dream had made a couple visits. He didn’t want L’manberg to breathe once more. (It would be the one thing he refused to revive.) But at least, he saw Tommy often now. They could ramble and talk to each other when Schlatt was drunk. Quackity probably knew, but honestly thought that Tommy was half-dead. He didn’t mind Tubbo presumably making his death more pleasant. (Something Tubbo had failed to do.)
Wilbur and Tommy were Tubbo’s friends.
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Technoblade was not Tubbo’s brother.
Because brothers didn’t cower at the eyes of only so many people and shoot the other in the face. Tubbo knew he hated gunpowder for a reason. Schlatt had been injured in the crossfire, but Tubbo had barely registered it, too busy focusing on the lack of an eyeball in its socket. He was fairly sure that had pieces of him not splattered into the wood and concrete, that the ringing in his ears would’ve killed him.
Technoblade had nearly killed Tommy in the Pit. Because Tubbo hadn’t gotten out of the Festival. Funny. It wasn’t just his banners decorating it, it was his brain, too. But Tommy shouldn’t have felt the need to scream at Techno. Techno shouldn’t have taken Wilbur’s insistence to heart and nearly turned Tommy into a pulp. Techno didn’t bat an eye. Wilbur only laughed. Tubbo noticed that burn scars looked much different then the pattern Techno had left on Tommy.
Technoblade was not Tubbo’s brother.
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Schlatt was not Tubbo’s president.
He was a corpse.
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Wilbur was not Tubbo’s brother. He wasn’t his president, either.
Even though they had won, Wilbur wasn’t satisfied. He never was. He tried handing off the presidency to Tommy. It had seemed, at the time, a stupid idea. Everyone knew that Tommy was prone to making bad decisions, and struggled to stay in one place for long. You couldn’t tie down a canary. Later, much later, the idea wasn’t stupid. It was cruel. Wilbur had given someone he had thought of as something closer to a brother a two sided candle. Tommy would’ve had to stitch L’manberg back from the inside out. (Tommy had already stitched Tubbo from the inside out.) Even though the word ‘president’ was given to Tubbo as a reassuring gift, gunpowder still filled the air. Wilbur still pressed a button. Technoblade still told Tommy that he was no hero, that he was a coward. He was Theseus, doomed to fall. (Icarus was a better word for that.)
(Tommy was a hero, so he’d die like one.)
Wilbur was not.
He still made gunpowder fill everyone’s lungs.
Wilbur was not Tubbo’s brother.
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Phil was not Tubbo’s father.
For how could he call a man father when that man had slain his own son like a wild beast? If anything, it was Technoblade who deserved that treatment.
Phil could never be Tubbo’s father.
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L’manberg was not Tubbo’s country.
It was Wilbur’s, and Wilbur was dead. But Tubbo would rot and decay before he’d let it fall. If he had to, he’d dig it up from its grave. If only because Tubbo and Tommy had given up so much for it already, their childhoods, Tommy’s discs, their first lives, Tommy’s second, and Tubbo’s second, and all of Wilbur’s three.
L’manberg had to be Tubbo’s country.
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Tommy could not be Tubbo’s brother.
Because Tommy had burned down George’s home, and now everyone was paying the price. Tommy was no longer part of L’manberg. He’d miss him, but he’d get him back soon enough. Tommy always came back.
Tommy couldn’t be Tubbo’s brother for now.
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Ranboo could not be Tubbo’s brother.
Ranboo had been one of the two to burn down George’s home. It had been an accident, but Dream took no prisoners. (That’d be ironic, soon enough.)
Ranboo could not be Tubbo’s brother.
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Technoblade was not Tubbo’s brother, he was his enemy.
When Tubbo had thought that Techno was the one that deserved being slaughtered like a beast, he had never thought he’d be the one to carry out the sentence. Funny, how Techno was ‘oh-so-distraught’ when he saw the bracelet on Phil’s leg. As if that was the worst thing he could’ve done. On bad nights, Tubbo had considered trying to get a pitiful form of revenge on Phil by plucking some of his feathers. Even then, his wings were too damaged by years of use to be helpful for flight. It’d be humiliating at worst. So, yeah, it was funny that Techno thought that a bracelet on an old man who couldn’t even go anywhere was horrid, while blowing up a country and telling someone who saw him as a brother to die was perfectly acceptable, soon enough after shooting Tubbo in the face.
They had prepared to execute Techno, to at least take one life away from him, when Punz and Dream had interrupted. So Techno got saved while he, Tommy, and Wilbur drowned? Of course. Techno was ‘important’. Even though the anvil came plummeting down, crushing Techno’s skull like paper, there was a pulling sensation, and he lived.
Technoblade was nothing like Tubbo, for Tubbo had to die, and Technoblade cared not for life.
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Tommy was not Tubbo’s brother.
A tall, seemingly endless pillar of dirt said as much. (Even though a ghost had given them something very special.)
Tommy was not Tubbo’s brother.
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Technoblade and Tommy were brothers.
At very least in arms. They demanded Techno’s items as ransom, in exchange for Connor, of all people. Sometimes, Tubbo had forgotten he’d existed. But Tubbo was president, and had to get him back. He had bruises, they’d discovered, later. And he complained about Tommy, for taking back his home, and all sorts of other things. Tubbo had closed his eyes and continued working.
Technoblade and Tommy were brothers.
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Tommy didn’t want to be brothers. Tommy thought Tubbo was worth less than the discs.
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L’manberg wasn’t Tubbo’s country.
He may have been its president, but Wilbur’s family had decided it was their right to put it to rest. It wasn’t ready yet. And, like Techno said, history repeated itself. Tommy and Tubbo suffered, and Phil and Techno got off scott-free. Dream disappeared into the night.
L’manberg was no one’s country.
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Snowchester could be Tubbo’s country.
He liked the snow. It was cold and sharp. Like the ram horns he had growing in. They had been for a while. He wondered if everything that happened had stunted their growth. He certainly hadn’t gotten any taller.
Snowchester was Tubbo’s country.
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Tommy and Tubbo might’ve been brothers.
They fought Dream and won. Tubbo had long since accepted his fate as a statistic. He would give anything for Tommy. (Someday, he knew, Tommy would give everything to him. He’d done it for Wilbur, for Dream, for Technoblade… It would be Tubbo’s turn soon. He just had to not screw it up.) And now Dream was in prison. Tubbo and Tommy felt like years worth of responsibility had lifted from their shoulders (and it had).
Tommy and Tubbo were brothers.
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Tommy was in the prison. With Dream.
Sam had been so nice beforehand. He’d get Tommy out. And if not, Tubbo had a nuke that he’d gladly use.
Tommy wouldn’t be in the prison for much longer.
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Ranboo might not have been Tubbo’s brother, but he was his husband. That was close enough, frankly.
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Tommy made it out of the prison.
A limp body was the only trace of the boy who had been his brother. Tubbo had long since used his tears up. Ranboo hadn’t.
Tommy made it out of the prison.
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Tommy was no longer Tubbo’s brother.
They buried him off in Snowchester. It was cold, though. Tommy had never liked the cold. So Tubbo would set out a lantern, and a plate of whatever they were eating for dinner that night.
Tommy could never be Tubbo’s brother again.