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wilbur, the eldest, has wings designed for silent flight.
they're brown, transforming into a golden blonde at the edges. they're speckled in black and white, with soft feathers that feel unlike the slick wings the rest of his family has.
his wings are not very expressive. he keeps them tucked close, only letting them expand to threaten others. it's the subtle flicks, however, that he's been unable to hide. when he feels strongly, they're in constant motion. his feathers puff up very slightly when he's upset.
overall, it represents him well. silent. designed for hunting. exactly the manipulator he is, under everyone's noses.
the first time is early. early enough everyone was still friends.
it had been a cuddle night. every week, at least once, they had a night where they laid all their blankets on the floor and slept in a large pile. it was partially because of hybrid traits, partially because dream didn't sleep well alone, but mostly because they wanted to be as close as possible.
most are already asleep. only george, known for his insomnia, still sat awake.
his hands idly brush through dream's hair, just as they'd been doing when he was still awake.
until his hands pull out a down feather.
george picks it up. it's a dark shade of green, almost black. definitely not any bird native to the smp, and unlike any of the server's winged.
george gently pulls apart dream's fluffy blonde hair, and finds more of the same feathers, right behind his ears and around them. they're all dark green, and downy, and george has his suspicions about their origins.
the next morning, george only greets dream good morning, and doesn't pull any attention to the pouch of feathers hidden in his inventory.
techno is only a few millennia older than wilbur. but physically he's around the same age.
techno doesn't have wings. he's not related to phil, he's a long-time war ally turned friend turned something more devoted, but despite their clear non-parental dynamic, techno's often placed into the family tree.
techno's a piglin, one who was raised primarily around humans and avians. he's picked up enough to often display avian culture and language as his default, but he's not avian. he's better than them.
techno's nice. avians aren't. no surprise he isn't one.
the next time, now with sam, happens later.
way later.
dream's tired from a meeting with schlatt. the ram – might as well not be a hybrid with that personality of his – wouldn't stop arguing, drunk, not making any good points for anyone, and it had taken all of his power not to either fall asleep or walk out or just kill the guy.
so now, he sits on the dirt, taking care of server maintenance hard enough to fry his brain, so he doesn't even have the chance to think of other things. it's the way he's always dealt with stress: throw himself into work.
sam is working on some new mechanism. all dream cares about is that sam doesn't mind him there for the background noise, and sam likes rubber-ducking ideas off someone who doesn't have the social energy left to listen to him. it's worked before, it works now, it's all going great until it's not.
sam accidentally moves his redstone-covered hand too close to some torches, and the next thing they know, there's a loud explosion, red dust flying everywhere, right next to them.
sam, defended by his gear, is fine. he's only worried about dream, who startles hard enough to fall into a small panic. it's nothing serious, there's no danger of an actual attack, sam just needs to not spook him further. easy. he's dealt with this before.
but when sam squats down, about to ask something, dream-
dream churrs.
it's a high pitched, but still low, long sound, something that makes dream's throat visibly shake. it's a sound sam's never heard from him.
it's the sound of a distressed, scared, young, avian.
dream's never talked about his species, and they never asked, so it's- it's unexpected. sam does what he does best; he doesn't ask questions, only soothes, until dream's no longer shaky and the sound goes undiscussed, left to lurk in the depths of sam's brain, until he forgets and all that's left is a line in his journal.
tommy? he's a complete asshole.
worst example of aviankind. he does have wings, with red and white feathers, the coverts a bright, vibrant red. they're designed primarily for soaring, but not for long. they're also rather small, due to his age and late blooming. they won't grow as large as his family's, mainly as he is not really related to them. avian genetics are complicated, but phil's wings, even with the genes exposed by wilbur's brown, rounded wings, could never create the colours of tommy's.
he never learned to keep them controlled. he always causes messes with them, knocks into people, and he can't even fly properly. they're useful only for chaos.
they match him perfectly.
third time is a private moment with punz.
they're not preparing for anything. dream is preparing some bread, punz is repairing their armour. it's quiet, not much said between them.
suddenly, dream calls out, "can you get my nail clippers?"
punz looks up from the helmet. "why?"
dream looks back to him, then scrapes along the top of the furnace. it's a horrible screech. "they're too long."
"fine, fine," he relents, "just don't do that again."
when punz goes to look for them, he doesn't even really know where he should look. he's never been through dream's own regular things. they're not useful to punz, they're private to dream. no reason.
but now, as he looks in the small box filled with primarily sentimental items, he finds...
"are the avian clippers yours?"
dream yells back an affirmative. huh.
punz takes them, brings them to dream, who thanks him, and goes back to his work.
punz starts idle conversation. "can i ask why they're avian clippers?"
"my nails are too thick for regular clippers." punz stares as dream lifts a hand. indeed, they're not even letting light through. "guess the server wanted to screw my genetics up."
"you're spawned?" punz asks, furrowing his eyebrows. he doesn't look up from the runes he's etching.
"yeah?" dream asks. punz hears him walk to where he's sitting. "all admins are spawned."
"you're fullblood?"
phil's a decayed elytrian. his wings certainly don't look it, but there's no other source than phil himself, so a decayed elytrian he is.
his wings, long, perfect for extended flights, are pitch black. when small amounts of light hit them, however, they're iridescent, shining in the natural tones of the end sky, purples and whites speckled and refracted along the smooth, cold feathers. if those are the wings of a decayed elytrian, an actual elytrian must have the void itself trapped in their wings.
phil is said to be able to reflect any strike with his wings, and the legend holds true. a netherite sword can only barely scrape them.
of course, after the explosion, he's not flying much. his wings are hidden under a dark cloak. the wing he used to defend wilbur is charred, only bones remaining. the few scapulars that are still left are completely black, no sheen left on them.
phil says he grew up in an avian-elytrian society. it's obviously true. he uses his wings so expressively, constantly uses his bird sounds, that the loss of one entire wing has struck him like the loss of half your vocabulary. he's constantly struggling to express things. he doesn't know how to communicate in human, never really has.
he's the only avian dream feels somewhat bad for. but only somewhat.
the final time, the time when everything finally made sense, was right before dream was put into prison.
tommy shouts something, something about death, or discs, or whatever bullshit he usually spits, when dream hears a phrase that breaks him out of his daze.
dream, halfway laying on the ground, hears "take off your mask."
he stares up at tommy. he stares at the people all around him.
he lifts his hands, and he unclasps it.
suddenly, the enchantments wear off. his exhaustion, the recent canon death, it's too much, and the enchantment fully shatters.
his wings tear through his clothes. they're small for his age, very small, coated in dark green down, speckled in neon greens and blacks. they're not developed enough to fly, not developed enough for any kind of use.
they're fucking useless.
dream's an avian.
dream knows all avians are lying bastards. all of them, every single one, is a traitor.
guess what dream became. you won't need three.
when techno visits him in the prison, he finds dream shivering, curled up, wings tucked closely around him. there are feathers all around him, and his wings are almost fully flesh. he's picked them all off in stress.
"hey, nerd."
dream doesn't respond. there's barely any awareness when dream looks up at him.
and-
and techno understands. he walks over, lays his cape over dream and lays down next to him.
the next time both wake up, dream describes how his dad left him, techno describes the photos strewn across the attic, and throughout it, dream's wings don't emote, and his shivers don't cease.