Work Text:
It was nice and quiet when Phil first woke up and that should have been the first warning sign. Rolling over, he groggily blinked away the last dredges of sleep and fumbled around for his alarm clock.
The blinking red letters stared right back at him, a cheery 10:47 in a blocky font. That was unusual to say the least. Normally Phil would be woken up practically by the crack of dawn by screaming or shouting or one of the boys sneaking into his bed in the middle of the night.
Maybe everyone else was still asleep, he mused, yeah that sounded like it was a likely option. Phil decided to be optimistic about this turn of events and that was his first mistake. Sighing, he gave himself a couple more minutes in bed before pushing himself to his feet and wandering over to the window where the barest glimpse of sunlight could be seen peeing through the thick curtains.
Drawing back the curtains, Phil let an exasperated smile creep across his face at the sight of the sun already steadily creeping across the sky. Was it too late for his usual morning cup of tea? He quite wanted his tea. Maybe a peppermint tea would be nice, that seemed appropriately festive.
Opening the window, Phil took a deep breath, letting the pleasant scent of pine needles waft across the breeze. December was always such a nice month, the air was filled with pine needles and nutmeg and…smoke? Why would he smell smoke?
Was something burning? Would the boys scream if the house was on fire? Holy shit, was the house on fire? Still in his sleep clothes, Phil practically threw open his bedroom door, sprinting down the stairs while desperately clinging to the wall in a rather pathetic attempt not to crack his skull open right before Christmas.
The smell of smoke was definitely getting stronger, which did not do much to quell his fears. God, the last time he smelt smoke it was because Wil set the toaster on fire and the entire house had almost burnt down. While it may look very nice, Phil’s humble cottage was made almost entirely out of wood and was most certainly very flammable.
He really hoped the toaster was unscathed this time. It would be such a pain to get a new one, and how else was Phil meant to have his morning tea and toast? Well, maybe he could have porridge or something along those lines instead. Porridge seemed quite festive for no good reason.
Actually, on second thought, it would not be very festive if the entire house burnt down. With that in mind, Phil rounded the corner and saw what he could only describe as utter chaos.
The oven was wide open with massive billows of smoke spilling out, which was probably the source of the aforementioned smell. Tommy was standing next to the oven rather enthusiastically waving a tea towel around, presumably to try and dispel the smoke with very little success.
Technoblade was nowhere in sight at first glance, but Phil looked around and quickly spotted him standing very firmly on the other side of the room with a judgmental stare focused towards whatever Tommy was currently trying to accomplish. Tommy had moved on from waving the tea towel in what could potentially seen as a helpful gesture to simply just smacking Wilbur over the head in typical Tommy fashion.
Speaking of Wilbur, Wil was holding what could only be described as an atrocity to all of humankind. In his hands was one of Phil's baking trays, and what lay on the baking tray was certainly something.
It was hard to describe the shape of such an object, because it did not seem to have one shape but what for certain was that it was rather lumpy with suspicious looking blackened bubbles forming on the right side. The entire thing looked rather crispy, and was pitch black with the left side somehow dry and crumbling, a stark contrast from the liquified right side.
Phil could only watch in horror as Tommy decided it would be a really good idea to pop one of the bubbles causing more blackened ooze to spill onto the tray. He could already feel himself mourning the loss of that tray.
Wilbur also seemed to be in shock, silently staring at whatever he’d created in solemn silence. Technoblade was still staring at it from across the room with a face of just pure disappointment. On the other hand, Tommy seemed rather excited over the object, prodding it with some random utensil he’d picked up. Yet another thing Phil would have to throw away.
Techno was the first to spot him, holding his hands up in a defensive position. “Phil, you gotta believe me, I did nothing to contribute to that.”
“Technoblade, that is so untrue,” Tommy piped up from where he was poking the crumbling side of the monstrosity, “You helped make the dough.”
Wilbur frowned, still looking at the blob in vague disappointment. “Techno, don’t you want to help take credit for this masterpiece? We could call it interpretive art and sell it to Quackity. Unless Phil wants it. Phil, do you want it-” Wil seemed to cut himself off as he took notice of Phil. “Phil, this is not what it looks like. It was Tommy’s fault.”
“Now I get credit? Where was this before when you said it was your masterpiece, bitch? But yes, Phil I did make this. It is my child and I shall call it Bertha.” Tommy announced this fact with all the grandeur of a royal degree.
“Phil, I did nothing.” Techno added in rather unhelpfully.
It was way too early for this, something that was only made worse by the fact it wasn’t even that early but rather late into the day given his irregular sleep in. Phil sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “What happened and what the fuck is that thing?”
“Uh oh,” Tommy whispered, “He did the nose pinch. It was Wilbur. Everything that ever went wrong was Wilbur. I said let’s make a gingerbread because I have brillant ideas, and then Techno and Wilbur agreed and then Wilbur proceeded to continuously fuck up. It was Wilbur, I rest my case no questions asked.”
Phil looked between the twins, Wilbur looking like he wanted to strangle Tommy and Techno nodding in agreement.
“Yeah I have no idea what happened because obviously I did nothing but I think it was Wilbur.”
“Technoblade I will fucking kill you in your sleep.” Wilbur probably would’ve lunged at Techno right then and there if he hadn’t still been holding the tray in his hands. Oh, Phil’s precious baking tray. What a short and unfulfilled life it had lived.
“I will also kill you in your sleep!” Tommy cut in, still waving the tea towel around.
“Bruh, I was literally siding with you.”
Tommy seemed to consider this for a second, “Okay then, I guess we both just get Wilbur in his sleep because this entire mess is his fault.”
“My fault? Techno was the one who was supposed to set the timer.”
“Tommy said he had it covered.”
“I did not! Wilbur was doing it.”
“Why the fuck would you believe the child of all people?” Wilbur looked ready to drop the tray and strangle Tommy right then and there.
“Not a fucking child, you balding bitch. How’s the receding hairline going, huh?”
“Nah, I’ve changed my mind. I think Wibur said he was doing it.”
“There is nothing wrong with my hairline-”
“Okay, okay enough,” Phil cut in. He could already feel a headache forming. “Here’s what going to happen. I am going to have a nice cup of peppermint tea and the three of you are going to go outside together and bury whatever the fuck you’ve just created. Please never let me see it again, it looks like at least ten different health and safety violations all sandwiched together in a lumpy looking blob. And then after that, we can have a nice little gingerbread making session together and it will result in something actually edible. Any questions?”
Tommy stuck his hand up, still waving the tea towel around.
Phil sighed, “What is it Tommy?”
“Does this mean I can dig in the mud again?”
-✧-
There was always something peaceful about drinking his tea and watching the sun creep over the horizon each morning. Of course, the sun had long since risen but it was peaceful nonetheless. That was once the faint smell of smoke had finally dissipated and the burnt lump was safely escorted out of the house alongside Phil’s baking tray (may it rest in peace).
The kitchen window had a rather nice view of the backyard, sprawling fields of green just waiting to be covered in a thick layer of snow. Most days, it was remarkably quiet. Today Phil had a front row view that was the spectacle of Wilbur, Techno and Tommy trying to dig a hole in the backyard.
As predicted, Techno was standing a safe distance away from where Tommy seemed to be having a grand old time digging around in the mud. Phil watched in amusement as Tommy found what looked to be a worm and shoved it in Wilbur’s face, Wil practically tripping over Techno in his scramble to escape the deadly horrors of the worm.
On the bright side, the baking tray looked like it had stopped bubbling as much. After a couple minutes of watching Tommy dig around in the mud for worms, Techno seemed to decide that had been enough and left to go and fetch a shovel. From there, the entire process was considerably sped up.
Now all that remained of their creation was a small pile of mud with several terrified worms and a random rock Wilbur had found. Phil smiled at the sight of the three of them, Tommy trying to stick his muddy hands all over Techno’s hair.
His smile then quickly faded as he thought of the prospect of Tommy coming into the house with his muddy hands. The carpets would never recover.
Speaking of the three of them, Techno was sprinting back towards the house with Tommy trailing behind him, muddy hands still outstretched. Techno broke through the back door, beelining towards Phil.
“Phil, save me. He’s trying to put mud in my hair.”
Wilbur soon came running through the door not long after, Tommy seemingly having changed his targets to an “easier victim.”
“Help me!” Wilbur screeched, “Get the child away from me!”
Phil sighed for what felt like the millionth time. Was there ever any hope for his carpets? Probably not.
“Get back here bitch!” Tommy screamed.
Time to go stage an intervention, not for the sake of Wilbur, but rather for the sake of his nice clean carpets.
-✧-
After an extremely long time filled with much arguing and bargaining and complaining, everyone was finally mudfree and in the kitchen and somewhat ready to make the gingerbread.
The entire ordeal went somewhat peacefully until it didn’t. One second Phil was measuring the ingredients, humming quietly under his breath and the next there was a full on war happening on the other side of the kitchen.
Phil turned around to see Wilbur brandishing a wooden spoon at the bowl of dough he was meant to be mixing, flour covering every available surface. The benches, the floors, kitchen utensils, the handles on the drawers…even Tommy was covered in a fine layer of flour.
The cause of such an incident seemed to be a bag of flour sitting innocently on the bench which looked considerably emptier than it had before. Wilbur was death glaring at the flour like it had personally murdered all his friends and family.
“Oh my god, what just happened? Why is Tommy covered in flour?”
“Philza Minecraft it’s snow!” Tommy exclaimed with much excitement. “Isn’t this great?”
“That fucker,” Wilbur seethed, still pointing the spoon at the bag of flour. “It fucking attacked me!”
“Wil, I don’t think the flour bag attacked you.”
“It so did! Tommy, you saw it, it attacked me right?”
“There is no flour, only snow.” Tommy responded. “Or maybe drugs. Wilbur, did you just cover me in drugs? Am I high right now?”
“No drugs in the kitchen,” Techno said in a monotone voice. “You know the rules. Phil, kick ‘em out.”
“So what I’m hearing is that Wilbur was the cause of the flour?” Phil asked.
“What? No. I would never do anything that stupid. What happened is that the flour woke up and decided to be a prick and then it fucking jumped me.”
“You got owned by flour? Cringe.”
“Shut the fuck up Technoblade no one likes you anyways.”
“The Blade is five hundred million billion times cooler than you will ever be, Wilbur.” Tommy cut in. “Wilbur actually reminds me of a sad little shrimp, except way more loserish than a shrimp because some shrimp out there are quite pog.”
“Thank you Tommy,” Techno nodded in agreement.
“Hm, I’ve changed my mind. You are not that cool. Philza is the second coolest person in the whole entire world. It goes me, Philza Minecraft, Tubbo, everyone ever, Technoblade, Dream, Wilbur.”
“That’s certainly a list,” Phil agreed, trying to stifle a smile. “Now can we either clean this up and get back to making the gingerbread?”
“It’s decorative,” Wilbur announced. “I see no reason why we would clean up a wonderful feature of the kitchen, I think I will simply resume the making of the gingerbread.” With that announcement, Wilbur promptly turned back to his bowl and continued mixing like nothing had ever happened.
Phil pretended not to notice when Tommy dumped a handful of what he thought was flour into the bowl when Wilbur’s back was turned. Hopefully this would be somewhat edible.
When he turned back to see what Techno was doing, he saw Techno hunched over a bowl squinting very intensely at its contents like it held the secrets to the universe.
“Does this look fine? Is the texture okay? What about the consistency? What about the other gingerbread factors?”
Phil peered into the bowl and was pleasantly surprised to find a relatively nice looking dough mixture that seemed to be somewhat edible. “Looking great mate.”
“Do I need to add anything else?”
“I mean, if you followed the recipe fine it should be alright. I’m by no means an expert here.”
Both of them pretended not to hear the screeching sounds of Wilbur and Tommy from behind them.
Techno beamed. “I’m going to put it in the refrigerator now then.”
There was a rather alarming crash followed by a rather impressive string of swears. Phil didn’t even realise there were that many curse words in the English language.
“Make sure you set a timer for it,” Phil reminded him.
“Already on it,” Techno responded, “Got the timer right here. Two hours right?”
“I believe that should be correct,” Phil leaned over to look at the recipe, ignoring the high pitched death scream from behind him, “Yep, two hours it is. Do you want to have lunch now while it refrigerates?”
“Sure, is it just sandwiches again?”
Phil hummed in agreement, the screaming behind him becoming increasingly more difficult to ignore. “I think some toasted cheese sandwiches could be quite nice?”
“Okay, I’ll just move the bowls into the sink to be washed up later.”
There was a loud thud from behind them and then complete silence. Phil turned to see Tommy lying facedown on the floor and Wilbur with a bag of flour in hand that was almost empty. Suffice to say, there was quite a lot of flour on both the surrounding floors and all throughout Tommy’s hair.
Despite the fact that Wilbur was not actively throwing flour at Tommy, probably due to the bag being practically empty, Tommy was still writhing around on the floor like a dying bug and screaming countless insults.
He watched as Techno sidestepped over Tommy’s flailing limbs to put the dishes in the sink, and Wilbur seemed to take this as the perfect opportunity to dump the remnants of flour over Techno’s head. Technoblade turned with murder in his eyes, and Wilbur seemed to sense he had fucked up, taking a couple steps backwards with his hands raised in a placating manner.
Tommy, limbs still wildly flailing, somehow saw Wilbur’s legs from where his face was smushed into the floor and grabbed Wil’s ankle, sending him crashing to the floor. Techno was the next to go, Wilbur latching on his leg and dragging him towards the heap of flour that was Wilbur and Tommy. The three of them went down in a rather impressive scuffle, sending a cloud of flour flying through the air.
Phil sighed. There really was no hope for his carpets, was there?
-✧-
Once their toasted sandwiches had been enjoyed in the backyard and the gingerbread was refrigerated for a sufficient amount of time (many thanks to Techno’s timer), the dough was cut out into shapes that were carefully measured by Phil and Techno (Wilbur and Tommy got locked outside for this bit).
The gingerbread was then placed on Phil’s remaining baking trays (he was still mourning the loss of the baking tray from earlier) and Wilbur and Tommy were allowed back into the house while it baked. Of course, the first thing Wilbur did was dramatically declare that Tommy was a traitor to his nation and should be exiled.
The four of them then proceeded to part their separate ways for all of twenty whole minutes until all of them came to the simultaneous and horrible realisation that no one had set a timer. Gingerbread was apparently meant to only bake for ten to fifteen minutes, but it was probably fine. The extra time made it extra crispy, which was like added character. This would definitely be edible.
Now they were in the decorating phase, which would only ever go great. Somehow, Techno had managed to steal away half the gingerbread pieces and was now deep in concentration constructing something that actually looked rather nice.
However, the other half of the gingerbread pieces did not look quite so nice as Tommy had somehow wound up with the piping bag in what Phil could only call a brief lapse in judgement that would surely haunt him to the day he died.
Wilbur had become remarkably invested in the gingerbread house, and was holding the already crumbling walls together like his entire life and bloodline depended on it.
“Tommy! We need more icing! Get more icing!” he practically screamed.
“What the fuck do you think I’m doing, bitch?” Tommy snapped back, piping some nice designs onto Wilbur’s hand.
“Put the icing on the actual gingerbread you gremlin child.” Wilbur looked like he really wanted to commit murder, but was unwilling to remove his hands from the gingerbread house for fear of the entire thing collapsing.
“I am! Look how much fucking icing is on this thing!”
“Clearly this is an issue with the icing,” Wilbur decided, “It’s not good enough.”
Phil gave him a deadpan stare. “Wil…you made the icing.”
“I take everything I have ever said back, this is the best icing to ever be made, it is my child and I love it infinitely more than Tommy. My masterpiece is collapsing because of Tommy’s incompetence.”
“Mate, what masterpiece? You can’t ever see the gingerbread beneath the icing.”
Tommy had moved on from the icing it seemed, and was now ripping over a bag of gummy sweets and was haphazardly placing them on the rather large pool of icing that covered the gingerbread house.
Wilbur seemed to be having a heart attack. “Phil stop him! He’s ruining the structural integrity of the house, the foundations, the gingerbread, it’s all gonna collapse.”
“It’s gorgeous,” Tommy replied, adding the finishing touch to whatever he was trying to accomplish. “Phil, Phil, look!”
Phil leaned in closer and saw the word ‘fuck,’ or what he assumed was the word fuck, spelt out extremly lopsidedly. “It’s very nice mate, very festive,” he replied, trying (and failing) to stifle a smile as Wilbur continued his monologue about the impacted foundations of his precious gingerbread.
“It’s my festive fuck,” Tommy announced proudly. “It’s like that on-e-mati-pea thing, where the words have the same sounds or whatever.” The word onomatopoeia was horribly butchered beyond repair.
“Alliteration,” Techno corrected from where he was still very carefully piping icing onto his gingerbread. “Not onomatopoeia.”
“Shut the fuck up, no one likes English majors,” Tommy shot back. “And it’s pronounced on-e-mati-pea.” Each syllable was very carefully and very incorrectly sounded out with the utmost care and concentration.
“Bruh, I’m not even an English major, I'm not a nerd.”
Wilbur cut in from where he was desperately trying to keep the walls from collapsing, “Technoblade you are such a nerd, it’s okay to be grieving your nerdiness."
“The first stage of grief is denial," Tommy nodded in a very unconvincing manner. “You need to move forward with your life and reach acceptance.”
“I will stab both of you.”
“Hah, you would never,” Tommy scoffed, “I’m too much of a big man to be stabbed anyways. I would simply evade, I’m just too cool—HOLY FUCK IS THAT A KNIFE?”
-✧-
After a very chaotic hour filled with much screaming and bargaining between Wilbur and Tommy, the two of them somehow managed to put together their collective brain cell and build something that vaguely resembled a structure.
And by vaguely resembled a structure Phil meant it was a lopsided jigsaw puzzle of gingerbread pieces that were drowning in icing and held together by hopes and dreams. If someone even so much as breathed in the wrong direction, it was all over.
That was a proven fact after Techno peered over to see the gingerbread structure, and coincidentally it collapsed despite him being nowhere near it. Wilbur had to be physically restrained after that one.
“No one move,” Wilbur whispered, hands poised over the gingerbread. “It’s going to be alright.”
“I’m literally on the other side of the kitchen, I think I can move,” Techno replied, beginning to go back to his own gingerbread creation that Phil still wasn’t allowed to look at.
“NO!” Wilbur screeched. “You’ll wreck it! Do not move.”
“I’m bored,” Tommy complained. “Can we do stuff? I wanna eat the icing.”
Wilbur side eyed Tommy, “No moving, we cannot leave this kitchen. Everyone stop talking. Actually, maybe we should all just hold our breath.”
“Wil, we’re not going to sit here and hold our breath for the rest of the day. I'm pretty sure that's just us dying,” Phil interjected. “How about I go get my camera and we take a photo?”
“If we die here it will be an honourable cause," Wilbur stated. "If you move I will never forgive you.”
Phil grinned, already heading towards the lounge, “Okay, be right back in a second.”
He pointedly ignored Wilbur’s death glare on the way out.
It wasn’t too hard to find his camera, thankfully no one had touched it and it was in the same place as before. Squinting at the tiny buttons, Phil turned the camera on and wandered back into the kitchen, mentally preparing to take a quick photo before Wilbur started screaming again.
When he rounded the corner, it was like the world was moving in slow motion. The house tipped. One moment it was there, the next it was gone. The roof caved in first, rectangular slabs coming crashing down onto the sides of the house and pushing them outwards, gingerbread sliding through the puddles of icing and disrupting Tommy’s festive fuck.
Phil took this opportunity to take a rather cinematic shot of the house collapsing with Wilbur’s shocked face hovering in the background.
Piece after piece fell, the house reduced to a mere pile of rubble. To make matters worse, it just kept going. One of the wall pieces, or maybe it was a roof—it was hard to tell with the sheer volume of icing on it—slid down the counter, falling onto the floor with a deafening thud.
Phil stared at his poor floor, covered in icing and flour and crumbs. There was complete silence, broken only by the sound of another gingerbread piece crashing to the floor.
Wilbur seemed to be in complete shock, staring in dismay at his so-called masterpiece. Tommy on the other hand was having the time of his life, picking up one of the discarded pieces from the floor and taking a bite from the side.
There was a delayed pause, followed by a rather loud crunching sound as Tommy chomped down on the gingerbread. Yeah, that was definitely overcooked.
A loud bang drew Phil’s attention away from Tommy, and he turned to see Wilbur now cradling his wrist from where he’d apparently slammed it on the counter.
“Fuck.”
“This gingerbread is crunchy,” Tommy mused between mouthfuls.
“Tommy, don’t talk with your mouth full,” Phil reminded him.
“Fuck!” Wilbur screamed.
Tommy leaned down and grabbed the other gingerbread off the floor. “Wilba want some floor gingerbread? It’s very crunchy.”
“FUCK!” Wilbur screeched again, slamming his fist on the counter again and causing even more gingerbread to slide off. “Why did it have to fucking collaspe like that?”
“Cause you’re a bitch and don’t want my floor gingerbread?” Tommy questioned.
“Tommy, I swear to god I will-”
“Hey guys, I’m done with my gingerbread house,” Techno announced, causing all three of them to pause what they were doing and spin around to see whatever Techno had made.
Phil felt his mouth drop open.
Wilbur seemed to be in a similar state of shock, “Technoblade what the actual fuck is that?”
“My gingerbread empire, obviously."
Somehow, by some miracle Technoblade had a build a fucking castle out of gingerbread. The piping was immaculate, the walls were all at perfect ninety degree angles and it even had mini turrets. It didn’t even look like it should be a proper gingerbread creation that should exist in real life, it looked like something straight out of a fairytale.
All of the least burnt pieces had somehow made it over to Techno’s castle, with all the walls being a nice even golden brown hue. Another piece of gingerbread made up the door, and tiny windows were piped onto the sides with much care and effort. For fucks sake, Techno had somehow even gotten planter boxes under the windows.
To top the entire castle off, Techno had gone through the painstaking effort of lining up an entire packet of gummy bears on the castle's front lawn, because why would the gingerbread castle not also have a front lawn?
“No fair, you got gummy bears. Can I have one?”
“Tommy you can’t be eating my army like that. These guys are a formidable force to beat you up.” Techno peered around Phil to see the remnants of Tommy and Wilbur’s gingerbread house. “Actually, it looks like you guys have already been owned.”
“I am going to live in the room under your castle,” Tommy announced. “Actually, pretend I didn’t say that. You’re not meant to know.”
“Bruh, Tommy you can’t just come in here and mooch off all my hard work.”
Tommy picked up a red gummy bear. “This is me, I’m going to sit on the roof.”
By some miracle, when Tommy placed the gummy bear on the roof, the castle did not collapse. How structurally sound was that thing?
“And then this one is you,” Tommy continued, placing a pink gummy bear next to his one on the roof. “This one is Phil,” Tommy placed a green gummy bear next to Techno’s pink one. “And then this one is Wilbur,” he concluded, placing a yellow gummy bear lying face down at the bottom of the castle.
There was a muffled thud and the three of them turned to see Wilbur lying in the middle of the kitchen with his face smushed against the tiles.
“It’s all over. My great unfinished symphony, forever unfinished.”
“Do not worry, I will finish it,” Tommy announced before stepping over Wilbur and attempting to reconstruct something out of the remnants.
-✧-
When Tommy finished rebuilding the gingerbread house, Wilbur was still lying face down on the floor. Tommy proudly declared it was perfect, and Phil nodded with a smile on his face, not so subtly snapping a couple pictures for his photobook.
Techno complained that it was literally just gingerbread pieces lying flat on top of each other, and Wilbur raised his head from the floor to look at it, declare it a piece of shit and then return to his spot on the floor.
At this point, Tommy, taking great offense to that, dumped even more flour over Wilbur’s head. Phil was almost certain he did not have enough flour to justify the amount of flour that was all over the kitchen cabinets, the bench, the floor, Wilbur and Tommy.
After much scuffling and arguing, it was decided to watch a Christmas movie, the three boys agreeing on something for maybe the first time ever in their lives. Of course, what movie was then another lengthy disagreement before everyone voted on Home Alone because “it was funny when that guy gets smacked in the face.”
As they all settled in the living room with significantly less flour and a nice warm blanket, Phil took a sip from his hot cocoa and let a grin creep across his face. Snow was gently falling outside, the first of the season. This was going to be a good Christmas.