Chapter Text
It was one thing to try to steal Phil’s car. It was another thing entirely to steal his coat instead when the car didn’t work out.
He’d been tracking these motherfuckers for the better part of the day. When two people—one holding a knife to his throat, the other brandishing an axe towards him—tried to take his car only to realize it was actual hell on earth to drive and give it back, Phil thought that was it. They’d wave goodbye to each other over the failed hijacking attempt and go about their lives as is.
But then the knife was at his throat again as he was ordered to take his coat off. That’s when Phil got mad.
Following someone through the wastes without being seen was no easy task. The desert stretched out as far as the eye could see—an orange sea of dirt, rocks, and the occasional cactus. It was easy to spot someone driving behind you, even if they stayed as far back as they could. So if someone wanted to follow another person out here, they had to know the tricks.
Luckily for Phil, he knew all the tricks the wastes had to offer.
Through a variety of methods like examining dust clouds picked up by tires to gauge how long ago they’d been made, driving closer when a dust cloud bloomed just long enough to make sure he was still following the right car without being spotted, and- actually, that was about it. Those were Phil’s main two strategies. The important part though was that they worked.
The sun was falling towards the hazy red horizon by the time Phil walked up to the hijackers base. He’d parked his car a mile back to make sure it wasn’t seen. Goosebumps rose along his bare arms as a chilling breeze blew over the wastes. Phil narrowed his eyes. Another reminder of what they’d taken from him.
The base itself was little more than a derelict gas station with an oversized convenience store attached to it. The pumps had long since dried out, so Phil didn’t even bother. His boots crunched along the crumbling asphalt as he made his way towards the wood panels they’d nailed to the door frames to act as doors. He could hear voices echoing inside.
“What do you think we’re gonna have for dinner tonight?”
“That’s the fifth fucking time you’ve asked me that in the last half hour.”
“Because I’m hungry!”
“Well why don’t you get up and go ask the boss yourself? She’s the one cooking.”
“Do you think I wanna get my damn finger chopped off?”
“Y’know, that’s not a bad idea for dinner.”
“What?!”
“No no, not your finger, dumbass. The prisoner! He still hasn’t said jack shit, y’know. Maybe if we chop off a finger and say we’re gonna eat it for our dinner that’ll get him to talk.”
“I don’t wanna eat a finger for dinner.”
“Obviously we’re not gonna eat someone’s fucking finger! We’re not cannibals!”
“We could be for all I know! You guys never let me in the loop on this stuff.”
“Trust me, if we were cannibals, I’d tell you.”
Huh, they had a prisoner. That could make this interesting.
Phil listened for another moment to see if they said anything else of note. Instead, the two seemed to have gone silent, and Phil figured it was now or never.
His sword hissed as it slid from the sheath at his hip. He tried to ignore the strange lack of weight on his shoulders. It was just a coat. A heavy one, yes, but a coat. There was no reason for him to feel unbalanced without it on. And yet he did.
All the more reason to get it back, he supposed.
Phil took a breath, then another. Then, he kicked the wooden panels in.
“What the-”
The two Phil had heard talking were standing in between the aisle shelves of the store. They both yelled when Phil burst in, the guy cowering as soon as he saw Phil’s sword, the other person standing their ground.
Phil only recognized one of the two.
“Oh fuck! You’re the guy with the shit car we couldn’t take!” The guy exclaimed, the blood draining from his face.
“You took something else of mine, and I want it back,” Phil snapped, taking a step into the store as he brandished his sword in front of him. “Where’d the other one go?”
“You think we’re just gonna let you walk in here and steal from us?” The other person asked, a crowbar already gripped in their hand.
“Uh, he’s got a sword. Maybe we should let him,” the guy stammered.
They sent a glare the guy’s way, and he shrunk back further behind one of the shelves. Then, they rolled their eyes and lowered into a fighting stance.
“You wanna dance, old man? Then let’s dance,” they said.
Well, if they wanted to play it that way.
Phil lunged before they had a chance to brace themself. They cried out as they barely blocked the sword from slicing through their head, the sound of the blade scraping against the crowbar making Phil’s ears ache.
“I’m thirty-five, for fuck’s sake!” Phil grunted as he pulled the sword away to lunge again.
It quickly became a dodge of lunging and blocking. Every time Phil would try to hit the person, they would react in just the nick of time. While there was clearly some level of skill, at the same time, it was obvious they weren’t used to sword fighting (or, sword-crowbar fighting if he was being specific). There was no technique to their blocking. No specific foot patterns they fell into. Despite their cool exterior, they were acting on pure survival instinct, Phil could tell.
Thrust and parry. Advance and retreat. A back and forth dance that went on and on until Phil decided it was time to use a different tactic.
Phil lunged again, sweeping his blade down this time instead of up. Blade met flesh, slicing across their shin and making them cry out in pain. They fell onto one leg, barely bringing the crowbar up in time to block his next slice into their shoulder.
“Don’t just stand there! Get some fucking help!” They cried out to their friend, who was still hiding behind the aisle.
The guy peeked his head above the shelf, eyes wide and full of fear as they snapped to another door in the shop that must’ve led to the back room. He glanced between his friend and Phil, then back to his friend again.
Things went very fast after that.
Phil dropped his sword. His opponent faltered as it landed beside them. Using that moment, Phil grabbed the crowbar they’d been using to block. They yelped as he wrenched it from their grasp, flipping it around. He swung it into the side of their head, watching as they collapsed to the ground, unconscious.
Their friend was already running. Still holding the crowbar, Phil sprinted after him. Despite the headstart, Phil was able to grab the back of his poncho and yanked him back. Then, using his momentum against him, Phil swung him into the row of glass doors that used to hold cold drinks, back when this place still sold things.
The glass cracked, but didn’t break. The guy sprawled onto the ground. His eyes were full of terror as Phil swung the crowbar down, knocking him unconscious as well.
Running back to the first person he fought, Phil picked up his sword and sheathed it again. He held onto the crowbar and hurried towards the back.
Silence fell over him as he crept through the dark hallway. Lightbulbs that had long since burnt out gleamed in the late afternoon sunlight that crept through the windows. Phil kept his footsteps as soft as possible, although he would be surprised if whoever was back there hadn’t heard the commotion.
He reached another door and pressed his ear to it. Nothing.
Odd.
Phil took a step back. He held the crowbar out in front of him, and used it to slowly push open the door.
The crowbar was knocked out of his hands as an axe from behind the door swung down on it.
“Fuck me!” The person on the other side exclaimed.
Taking out his sword again, Phil grinned and kicked open the door. “No thanks!”
This next room seemed to be some kind of storage room. A few sleeping bags had been set up, along with a portable gas stove set on top of a rotted cardboard box. Then, in the center of the room there was a figure tied to a chair, head hanging low. Before he could get much more of a look though, he had to jump out of the way of that axe swinging towards his head.
And there was his coat, being worn by the woman who robbed him.
“Did you follow us back?” The woman asked when she saw his face. “We didn’t even take your car!”
“Yeah, but you did take that,” Phil said, gesturing to the coat.
“You followed us all the way back here for a stupid jacket?”
“It’s a good fucking jacket!” Phil argued. “I painted it myself!”
The woman glanced down at the splashes of white paint streaked across the worn, black leather. “You’re right, that was unfair. It’s a very good jacket. I especially like the wings on the back.” Then she swung the axe towards his head again. He shouted as he barely reached up to block it in time. “Too bad you’ve pissed me off too much to give it back.”
Unlike the other two, this woman was clearly proficient in fighting. She’d gotten the upper hand on Phil before when she took him by surprise. This time though, they were starting on equal ground.
Every time Phil would swing for her, she’d catch his blade in the hook of her axe. Every time she tried to bring the axe down on his head, he’d block. At one point though, when she hooked his sword in her axe, he decided to let go again. It’d worked on her friend, so maybe it could work on her.
His sword went with her axe, and she was thrown off by the sudden shift in her own momentum. Phil lunged again, this time shoving her back and sending both her axe and his sword to the ground. He didn’t give her a chance to recover as he leapt at her again.
She grabbed his arms, swinging him into the wall and knocking the wind out of him. His vision went spinning as she threw him to the ground. But despite his struggles to breathe, he didn’t let go of her. She fell to the ground with him. Black spots danced in his vision as he wrapped his arm around her throat to pull her into a headlock. His chest was burning for air as he squeezed it out of her lungs. She gasped and clawed at his arms, but he held on, counting in his head just until-
The woman went limp. Immediately, Phil let go, and used the few seconds he had to take the coat off of her. Right as she sputtered back into consciousness, he grabbed a piece of scrap fabric he found on the ground and used it to tie her wrists to some pipes sticking out of the wall.
“I could’ve killed you. Instead you just gotta wait for your friends to wake up and untie you,” he told her.
She glared at him but didn’t say anything else, seemingly having accepted her defeat.
Phil stood up again, breathing a sigh of relief as he pulled his coat back over his shoulders. The weight was familiar. Reassuring.
Then, there was another voice in the room.
“Hey! Before you go, could you do me a solid an untie me before those other fuckers wake up?”
Oh, yeah, Phil forgot about the guy tied up in the room.
He turned to the man. His shoulders were broad and well-muscled. One of his arms was made of metal, and twisted behind his back so it could be tied to his other flesh and blood arm. There was something familiar about the man and his voice. But it wasn’t until Phil looked up and saw a blindfold tied around a bald head that he recognized who this was.
“Fit? What are you doing here?”
Fit’s brows furrowed above his blindfold. “Wait, I know that voice. Fucking- Phil, is that you?!”
“Sure is, mate,” Phil laughed, bending down to untie his wrists. “How the fuck did you get yourself into this one?”
“It’s a long story, man.” As soon as his wrists were free, Fit pushed the blindfold up, wincing at the light filtering into the room. After letting his vision adjust, he met Phil’s eyes and grinned. “Should’ve known it was you the second you talked about your coat. That thing is practically glued to you.”
“It’s the longest standing relationship I have,” Phil joked as he got to work untying Fit’s ankles.
Once Fit was free, Phil straightened up again before helping his friend to his feet. Fit winced when he put weight on his legs, and Phil wondered how long he’d been held captive for. At the very least, he didn’t seem any worse for wear.
“Where’s my shit?” Fit asked the woman after he’d gotten his balance.
The woman glared at him for a moment before jerking her chin towards a pile of blankets in the corner of the room. “You got lucky this time.”
Fit huffed at this, shaking his head as he tossed aside the blankets to reveal a backpack and a sledgehammer. “You’re the ones who got lucky. If I ever see you guys again, I’m smashing this thing straight through your skulls.” He tapped the end of the sledgehammer into the palm of his hand. The woman rolled her eyes and turned her head away.
Phil and Fit left the gas station in silence. The two people Phil had knocked out were just beginning to stir as they walked by, and all it took was a sharp look from Phil to keep them both on the ground.
Night had fallen while Phil was inside the gas station. A few stars twinkled through the haze above their heads, Phil’s coat flaring out behind him when another breeze blew over the wastes.
“My car’s a bit down that way. Where’s yours?”
“It better still be parked at Pleser, or else the car park there owes me,” Fit said, folding his arms over his chest. “I hope it wouldn’t be too much trouble for you to give an old friend a lift?”
Phil scoffed and started walking down the road. “Definitely not. You were fucking kidnapped but I’m just gonna leave you stranded out in the desert because I’m an asshole like that.” He shook his head. “I was going to go to Pleser anyway after this.”
“Oh yeah?” Fit asked, raising an eyebrow as he walked alongside him. “You looking for a job?”
“You know how it is in our profession, Fit. You’re always looking for a job.”
Fit tilted his head back and laughed. “Very true, my friend. Very true.”
It didn’t take long for them to make it to Phil’s car. Once they were on the road again, Fit told Phil he was going to try and take a nap while they drove to Pleser. Apparently it was difficult to sleep when you were tied to a chair.
Phil didn’t mind the silence. It was how he preferred his drives, if anything. Empty road, hazy sky, and the sound of the wind echoing outside his windows. Sure, he had questions about how the hell Fit of all people ended up getting kidnapped by three dumbasses like that, but those could be answered later.
It took a lot for Phil to consider someone a friend. Fit was one of those few. The business of being a mercenary was a ruthless one, and most didn’t make it more than a few years. If you managed to survive as long as they had, you found yourself meeting each other over and over again. They’d even taken a few jobs together, and Fit was one of the only people Phil had trusted with his life numerous times over.
While he was sure Fit would’ve gotten himself out of his captivity sooner or later, Phil was glad he’d stumbled across him. It made his evening more interesting at the very least.
Pleser was less than an hour’s drive from the gas station. Phil rolled his car into the settlement, eyeing the half-burnt sign that he was fairly sure used to read, ‘Welcome to the Pleasant Shore Resort!’ Now, the only visible letters spelled out ‘Welcome to Ple S e R’. Hence, the name.
The settlement was one of the smaller ones in the waste. An old motel housed most of the permanent residents, with those passing through welcome to either see if there was a spare room available, or if not, there were quite a few burnt out shops that were used for camps. And of course, there was the car park.
Fit woke up right as Phil pulled into the lot, handing the attendant two packets of instant coffee to pay for the night. He parked, Fit yawned and climbed out, and then went off to ensure his own car was still there. Once he saw it was right where he left it, he gave Phil a nod, and the two headed off to the only place anyone in the settlement would be if they weren’t already sleeping.
Bars were some of the only places in the wastes that were virtually unchanged by The Burning Days. Sure, the place had to be run by a generator, but if there was one thing people were desperate for in the apocalypse, it was booze. So it wasn’t as though any functioning bar struggled to afford the gas to keep the lights on.
The Pleser bar was one of the nicer ones Phil frequented. It was kept fairly clean, it only stank a little bit like piss, and the citizens of Pleser were good at keeping one another in check. String lights stretched across the ceiling, casting the entire place in a warm glow. A few people were gathered around a pool table, quietly chanting one girl’s name as she lined up a difficult shot. There were four people making out in a corner—all at once, which Phil didn’t even realize was possible.
No one acknowledged his and Fit’s entrance, and that was fine by Phil. He was here for two reasons and two reasons only: one, he needed a drink after the bullshit of today. And two-
“Phil! It’s so good to see you!” The bartender waved at him from behind the bar, and Phil waved back. Then, her eyes flickered to Fit, and her smile widened. “Oh, Fit, I was wondering where you’ve been! Come here you guys, sit down.”
This week, it seemed Niki’s hair was back to its usual split of pink and black. She’d tied it up into two buns on either side of her head, although half of it was falling out as she rushed across the bar to fill up another customer’s glass. Then, she was pushing up the sleeves of the short shrug she had on over a tank top as she hurried back over to his and Fit’s side of the bar.
“Hi guys, are you both having the usual?”
The question was a bit pointless, because there were only two things on the menu of this bar. The usual, which was some kind of moonshine that tasted like gasoline, and that same moonshine with a twenty year old energy drink poured over top of it.
A few bars in the wastes still had liquor from the before days, but those were few and far between. Not to mention, those drinks were incredibly pricey. Nearly every place that served alcohol made their own kind of moonshine, and while tastes differed slightly, for the most part it was all the same—tasted like gasoline, and strong enough to make you go blind if you weren’t careful.
“Yup, the usual for both of us,” Fit said before Phil could.
Niki nodded and poured them both glasses of the stuff. Before Phil could reach for his bag, Fit was digging into his and taking out two cigarettes.
“Hey, I got-”
“You saved me the embarrassment of getting killed by three idiots. I can at least buy you a drink for it,” Fit said, placing the two cigarettes in the palm of Niki’s hand.
Niki considered the cigarettes for a moment, before shaking her head and returning one to Fit. “You both get a discount tonight.”
Fit looked surprised. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure. It seems like you’ve had a rough day,” Niki said, placing the cigarette in her mouth before taking a lighter out of her pocket. She took a few drags, tendrils of grey smoke curling around the jewelry in her nose, before she looked at them again. “So, you said Phil saved you?”
Taking a sip of his drink, Fit winced before shaking his head. “It’s embarrassing as all hell. Remember when I was here a few nights ago, giving you the update on that cave clearing job you gave me?”
Niki nodded. “Yeah, the guys dropped off the payment for you by the way. I was wondering when you were going to come collect it.”
“Well, I wanted to. But when I left the bar that night, someone was waiting outside the door and slammed me in the head with a damn crowbar!”
Phil grimaced as he thought back to the crowbar-wielding one. “That fucker.”
He took a sip of his own drink and barely held back a cough. It was like fire sliding down his throat.
“Yeah, you know the one. They knocked me the fuck out, and I woke up tied up in the back of their car,” Fit explained, “I was gagged and blindfolded, and they didn’t take the gag off till they had me tied up in a chair in their base. Then they started asking me stuff about some other merc I did a job with a year ago. They wanted to know if I kept in contact with him because they wanted to find him. Apparently he ripped them off in a deal or something.”
“Did you keep in contact with him?” Phil asked.
Fit scoffed. “No way. That asshole left me for dead in the middle of the job.” He shook his head. “We made camp one night and the next morning I woke up by myself with all of my supplies gone. Like a one night stand or something. I nearly got ambushed by damn Federation workers because of him.”
Phil frowned. “Federation workers ambushed you? Thought they were all still hiding behind their city walls after their last attempt at ‘establishing order’.”
The Federation heralded itself as one of the last bastions of ‘civilization’ in the wastes. Truth be told, they were a bunch of pretentious pricks who kept their greenhouses and water purification systems to themselves, leaving everyone else to fight for the most basic of necessities. At one point they tried to control the chaos of the wastes, but it was a total failure on their end. If anything, their towering walls and a frankly ridiculous amount of security were the only reasons wastelanders hadn’t run the place over yet.
“They mostly are, but I guess they still have some sensors out in the wastes that need to be cleaned,” Fit shrugged. “It was fine. I got away before they spotted me. Still pissed me off though.”
“What was the name of the mercenary who left you? If he comes in here I won’t give him any jobs,” Niki asked, resting her elbows on the bar.
“Spreen.”
“I’m pretty sure he’s dead,” Phil mused, “never met the guy, but I’d heard of him. Thought someone told me he got killed a few months back, but it’s been a while so I might be misremembering.”
“I’ll keep the name in mind either way,” Niki said, taking another drag of her cigarette.
“Thanks. Anyway, yeah, I didn’t know where the hell he was and I told these guys that. But they wouldn’t believe me. And because they’d stolen all my weapons when they knocked me out, I was stuck there till Phil showed up.”
“I was just there to get my coat back. When I saw Fit was there, I figured I might as well help him out too,” Phil joked, taking another sip of his drink.
“I’m glad you’re both okay,” Niki said with a kind of sincerity few could manage these days. That was one of the things Phil liked most about Niki. She was kind. Genuinely so in a way that few people were anymore. “I’ll tell my people to look out for anyone asking about Spreen as well.”
“Thanks Niki,” Fit said, before taking a long swig of his drink. A bead of sweat broke out on his head, and Phil tried not to laugh at Fit’s obvious struggle to not make a face. To his credit though, he kept his composure.
Niki disappeared to the other end of the bar to fill up another drink. When she came back her cigarette was just about gone, and she took a few more drags before stubbing it out.
“Well, before you two get too comfortable for the night, I have something for you.” She reached behind the counter and pulled out a folded scrap of paper, holding it out to Phil. “It’s for you.”
“A job?” Phil questioned.
“A message. Heard it through the radio last night and was told to pass it along to you the next time you came in,” Niki explained.
Phil frowned as he unfolded the paper. From his peripheral vision, he saw Niki walk away as she was flagged down by another customer. Meanwhile, Fit was still sipping his drink, being careful not to look over Phil’s shoulder.
The message—written in Niki’s small, neat letters—was short, sweet, and to the point.
I got something big, bossman. You’ll wanna be in on this. Get up to my place as soon as you receive this.
T
P.S. Is Fit dead? If he’s not and you run into him, tell him to get his ass up here too.
Phil bit back a sigh at the message. If Tubbo said he had something big going on, that meant it was definitely almost going to get him killed. The payout would be worth it though. It always was.
“Here, you get to read it too,” Phil said, passing the note to Fit.
Fit frowned and looked it over. Then, his expression smoothed out, and he grinned at the paper as he slid it back to Phil. “Well, I was planning on getting a motel room here and passing out for the next twenty hours, but I think this puts a wrench in those plans.”
Phil snorted. “Yeah, god knows it’s never a good idea to keep Toby waiting for too long. Knowing him, he might be building a bomb to blow up the world a second time.”
“Then I guess we have no choice,” Fit said as he picked up his drink again. “We’ll get a room for the night and head out to Tubbo’s place tomorrow.”
“Buying my drinks and getting a motel room? You certainly know how to treat a date,” Phil teased.
Fit smirked. “That’s how I roll, Phil. Total gentleman over here.”
Rolling his eyes, Phil took another sip of his drink. The burning wasn’t any more tolerable than it usually was, but Phil enjoyed it anyway.
☢
Despite the pounding headache and sore muscles Phil woke up with after finishing his drink a little too quickly, he and Fit headed out as soon as they’d gotten their bearings.
Since they were both going in the same direction, it seemed pointless to take both their cars and waste the gas. So Phil was back to driving while Fit dozed off in the passenger seat.
It had been several months since Phil made his way up to Tubbo’s place. The last time Tubbo had a job for him, it ended in Phil nearly losing three fingers. When he told Tubbo this later, the kid only laughed and reassured him that if he did end up losing any extremities on a job for him, he’d build him replacements for a discounted price.
However, there was something about his message that set Phil on edge more than any other message from Tubbo had. A sense of urgency that wasn’t usually there. A demanding tone that Phil knew Tubbo wouldn’t take unless the job was serious.
He and Fit cruised along the pothole-ridden highway for as long as they could until Phil’s gas got low. Once he pulled over to refill his tank with the canister he kept in the trunk, they were back on the road, the sun arcing high above their heads. The sky would’ve been a painful shade of blue, if it wasn’t discolored by the permanent haze. All around them, orange and red sand stretched across the wastes. Towering rock plateaus followed the left side of the road, while the occasional shrub and cactus littered the right.
It was afternoon by the time they arrived. Phil’s car rattled as it drove over dirt and rocks, dodging the cacti as the ranch came into view.
Splintering wood walls and a sheet metal roof made up the primary house. Creosote bushes, yucca, saltbushes, and cholla all littered the property. A bit away from the main house, Phil could make out the metal fences of a horse pasture that was currently empty. Even further out, he could also see stables, alongside another smaller house that was similar to the main one. On the left side of the property, Phil could see a shed that he knew held Tubbo’s main workshop.
He pulled the car up beside four others—one he recognized as Tubbo’s, and while the other three were familiar, Phil couldn’t place their owners. As he and Fit climbed out of the car, both wincing as they stretched their legs for the first time in hours, a voice called out from the front porch.
“That was fast,” Tubbo commented, goggles perched atop messy, half-bleached hair. He waved at Phil when he caught his eye, before his gaze flickered over to Fit. “Oh shit, you got Fit too! I thought you were dead, man!”
“I was kidnapped for a few days, no big deal,” Fit huffed, flashing Tubbo a grin as he and Phil made their way towards him.
Tubbo snorted. “Fit MC, one of the best mercenaries in the wastes, was kidnapped? I find that hard to believe.”
“You can imagine my surprise when I found him tied up in a gas station, being guarded by three idiots who didn’t know how to fight,” Phil said, folding his arms over his chest.
“Good thing they didn’t kill you. Could you imagine how embarrassing that’d be?” Tubbo shook his head. “For shame, Fit. Your reputation is in shambles.”
“My reputation is fine, thank you very much.”
“You sure? Because I have a job for you both that could make you some of the most feared men in the entire fucking wasteland.” There was a challenging glint in Tubbo’s eyes that hadn’t been there before.
Phil narrowed his eyes. “What is it?”
Tubbo glanced around the empty desert for a moment, before taking a step closer to them both. “Can’t go into full detail out here, but I’ll tell you it’d be a group gig. Pac and Bagi are already in.”
Although it was subtle, Phil didn’t miss the way Fit’s eyes widened. “Pac is here?”
“And Bagi. They’re both inside already,” Tubbo explained, using his thumb to point at the house behind him.
That explained the extra cars outside. “You’re gonna have to give us a little more than that, Toby,” Phil pushed.
A beat passed as Tubbo leaned in. While Phil wasn’t that much taller than him, Fit had to bend down so they were all at the same level.
Then, Tubbo grinned, and the only word Phil could use to describe it was ‘maniacal’.
“You ever wanted to break into the Federation?”