Archive of Our Own ^beta

Technoblade sighed as he finally collapsed on his couch upstairs.

It had been a long day, too long in his opinion.

When Techno had, so many years ago now, thought about retirement, he had thought about a cozy house, some dogs, maybe a garden. And, whenever he felt very daring, during those long nights where the furnace bubbled all the time with precious ores and his hands ached from shaping weapons all day long, he would perhaps even include the idea of a few horses in his retirement.

Now, almost a decade later, he found retirement was very different from what he thought.

Sure, he had his cozy house, he had some dogs —two dozen dogs wasn't much right?—, he had a couple of horses, he had a small garden too. He also had, in some moment where he had gotten a little too bored, three beehives, a polar bear, an enderman living rent free in his first floor, a few mobs with pumpkin heads that squatted in the basement, two foxes that wouldn't get out from underneath the house, a herd of cows and a pond full of turtles.

Someone ought to have told him how much work went into retirement, honestly.

Since he had decided, in some fit of mania probably, to live isolated in the middle of nowhere, he had to get his own food. Which meant a big garden that he had to constantly tend to, renewing enchantments every week if he didn't want the blasted plants to wither away in the cold. At some point, he had lost track of his dogs, and before he had known it, he had two dozens dogs and the number was constantly growing whenever Techno was distracted. And feeding so many dogs took a lot of time.

The cows were finicky too, a breed used to the cold thankfully but that led them to being a little too wild. Which meant that Techno had to wake up before the sun rose to feed the cows, if he didn't want the animals to startle and throw him out of the pen again. And he had to do it early in the morning, because otherwise the dogs would be awake, and would be howling and howling until Techno went to feed them. And that always took a few hours.

Morning was then, used exclusively to feed the animals and generally clean their pens. Midday, he gave himself a very brief respite to eat something small and maybe catch a nap, before he had to spend the rest of the afternoon taking care of everything else. The garden, the beehives, trying to get the foxes out of the horse's stable so the poor things wouldn't get trampled to death by Carl, stopping Edward —the enderman hadn't given any reason to show that he disliked the name so he was Edward until Techno thought of a more…enderman-y name— from trying to kill the polar bears, fighting with the wild rabbits that kept threathening to make a burrow on his garden, and so on.

By the time Techno was finished with everything, it was already night outside.

He would, at most, maybe spend an hour or an hour and a half doing something that he liked —be brewing potions or trying to read— before he dragged his exhausted body up the stairs and collapsed into bed, so he could do the whole thing again the next day.

Still, he let himself at least once a day a month do nothing besides the necessary —which was mostly feed the animals and make some food for himself— for moral. Or something like it. Retirement was hard, okay, so sometimes he just wanted a little break. Sleep until the sun was at least in the middle of the sky, nap all afternoon, maybe go exploring some cave to kill a few mobs so he didn't get rusty. Things like that.

Today, his plan was to sleep most of the day.

It was a glorious plan, honestly, he had left everything ready the night before, so he didn't even have to wake up too early. Left the cows and horses with food, and set that weird tiny contraption Phil had made for him last time he visited —Four, five months ago maybe? He should really call him soon— so the dogs would be feed automatically, that sort of thing.

So, when Techno was very rudely awoken from his nap on the couch on his free day, he was a tiny bit angry, to say the least.

The door was knocked, so strongly, that he even heard a few paintings downstairs fall to the floor. The sound was strong, echoing into the house, rumbling the walls like a miniature earthquake. Still, Techno stayed sitting down. Maybe, if he stayed very still and quiet, whoever was at the door would leave, right?

The knocking continued for a good five minutes more, which was the limit Techno had before the sound started to grate on his ears.

With a groan and a very foul mood, he dragged himself downstairs, grabbing the dull axe he used for wood that was resting by the door —just in case— and throwing the door open. Ready to threaten whoever it was, Techno slammed the door open, mouth ready to start complaining.

"Hey mate," Phil said very brightly in his doorstep, almost doubled over, face waxy and pale, "Sorry for visiting without notice."

"Phil? What are you—Is that blood?" Techno interrupted himself, staring with wide eyes at the ever growing puddle in his doorstep, axe already dropped and forgotten on the floor.

"So. Um, I may have gotten into a tiny little problem," Phil grinned, which looked like a grimace, seemingly trying to ignore the way his body was starting to shake, "Can I come in?"

Techno gaped a bit, eyes going back to the blood and then to Phil, the avian clutching his abdomen, where the piglin now could see the blood seeping from, sluggishly darkening the green undershirt until it looked black.

"Techno, mate," Phil said, voice strained, as he started to almost sway, "If you don't move I am probably going to collap—Oops."

Techno finally managed to make himself move as he saw his friend collapse to the floor, easily catching him. It seemed as if the world had snapped into movement, the stillness that had overcome the piglin finally breaking away. With hurried and large steps, Techno easily moved Phil and shoved him into his couch, already hurrying to the chests nearby to look for any potions.

"Aw shit, mate," Phil whined breathlessly, "I'm gonna stain the furniture. At least let me lay down in the floor."

"Phil,"Techno said, almost exasperated, voice tinged with not a tiny amount of panic, as he quickly raced back, arms full of potions, "What, what happened?!"

"A minor disagreement with a witch," Phil hissed as Techno started to move the undershirt away, exposing the still bleeding wound, "I was exploring the, shit, the swamp near New L'manberg, you know the one."

The wound bubbled blood endlessly, a slash so perfect that Techno knew immediately it came from magic and not from any weapon. The edges were a bright purple, and it almost seemed to hiss, like acid burning through wood.

"The one I specifically asked you not to explore alone?" Techno said, hands barely shaking as he carefully administrated a healing potion onto the wound, watching the healing magic try to overpower the poison inside the injury.

"Nobody wanted to go explore w'me" Phil almost slurred, eyes closed tight in pain, razor sharp claws in his hands clutched around Techno's arm as he tried to ignore the agony from the wound, "An' I heard it had, fuck that hurts, had a lot of, of treasure."

"Could have called me," Techno replied tightly, ignoring the painful grip on his arm as he continued to administer the potion, "Did you see what exactly the witch did?"

"Nah," Phil opened his eyes and smiled wanly, "Too busy, tryin' to, to get away."

Techno tsked, and went to stand up, but paused as Phil gave a panicked chittering, a subvocalization that the piglin hadn't heard from the other in years.

"I'm just going to grab a few golden apples," Techno carefully explained, carefully not wincing as the claws around his arm sunk a little more, "A healing pot ain't doing much, I'll be right here."

"…Right," Phil breathed out, unclenching his hands mechanically, as if trying to reassure himself, "Right, right, right…."

Techno wasted not a single second, quickly grabbing a handful of golden apples —and golden carrots and a suspicious stew he had kept in stasis in the chest just in case— and returning, carefully helping Phil sit up a little straighter as he passed him the golden apples.

With a grimace, Phil tiredly took a bite of the fruit, expression twisted in disgust at the flavor. Techno ignored the dramatics, watching carefully as the wound bubbled not unlike something alive, before slowly the purple drained away from the wound, the open gap starting to steadily close.

"God that shit's nasty," Phil muttered, once he finished eating the golden apple, body relaxing as whatever poison inside his body was finally neutralized, "Gods, that's awful."

In silence, Techno carefully bandaged the wound, before forcing a potion of regeneration into Phil's hands. The avian took it slowly, shuddering at the horrible taste, draining the glass bottle and pushing it away as he finally dropped against the back of the couch, drained.

"Thanks mate," Phil said after a few minutes of silence, skin slowly returning to a more healthy color, "I didn't know where else to go."

"New L'manberg?" Techno drawled sarcastically, as he started to clear everything up. He glanced at the floor with a frown, that would suck to clean, but decided to leave it for later, "I'm pretty sure they were closer than me, you could have gotten hurt seriously bad if you waited any longer."

"Eh," Phil shrugged unconcerned, "I don't trust them to not accidentally poison me or some shit."

"Phil, you've seen me brewing," Techno rolled his eyes, it was a constant teasing from the avian how Techno constantly experimented with potions with no success whatsoever.

"Yeah, but I trust you," Phil yawned widely, "Can I crash here for the day?"

"Bruh," Techno said, trying to not show how touched he was, "Comes into my house, bleeds all over my very nice couch, and then asks me to stay. Bruh."

"Like you would let me leave," Phil laughed, "I know your overprotective ass, now come help me stand up. The couch is sticky."

"With your blood," Techno pointed out, but he dutifully helped his friend up, "Come on, old man, ain't no way I'm letting you up the stairs, you would fall down and crack your hip or something."

"Oi," Phil warned, glaring jokingly at the other, "Shush."

Techno laughed, and dragged Phil to the small bed he kept downstairs for whenever he felt too tired to get upstairs to his proper bed.

Retirement was still too much work for what he envisioned, he thought to himself as he started to cook some light supper while Phil sipped mulishly at the suspicious stew he had forced on him, but he still liked it a lot.