171.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT. WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!"

"I can't decide if it's cute or disturbing," Eret muttered, sidestepping to avoid Tommy's flailing arms. "It looks like it's staring into my soul."

"It is," Tubbo assured him. "You want to hold it? We've been calling it a furby, because Fundy is still in denial that he's a furry."

"I am not a furry!" Fundy shouted, hoisting his own furby like he was about to chuck it at Tubbo's head. "And it's not a furby, it's an Autonomous Emotional Support Companion--"

Tubbo nodded. "Yup. A furby."

"I'm not seeing the 'emotional support' aspect," Eret admitted. He frowned as the furby Tubbo had handed him opened its eyes with a mechanical whir. "Is it. . . sentient?"

"Maybe!" said the furby.

Eret stared at it. "Huh," he said, then turned to Tommy. "Hey, Tommy. Do you want to hold it?"

"FUCK NO!"

~~~

"So," said Dream. "Care to explain why the building is on fire?"

"He did it," George and Punz said in unison, pointing to Sapnap. The blaze hybrid squawked like an offended parrot, but when Dream turned to level him with a flat stare, he deflated.

"Look, I panicked."

"You. . . panicked?"

Sapnap nodded. "I was-- I woke up, and my bed was surrounded by these-- by these things." He shuddered, a haunted look passing over his face. "Fuck, I can still see their cold, dead, eyes. . ."

". . . What things?"

Sapnap grimaced. "I-- I dunno what they were, but, they were about this big-- furry, different colors - looked kinda like robots. I'm not sure. They were all chanting in this-- this creepy-ass language. So. So I panicked. And."

"And you set the house on fire."

". . . Yes."

Dream pushed his mask to one side just so he could pinch the bridge of his nose. "Are you sure you weren't dreaming?"

"I don't think I was?"

Dream made a mental note to check if Tommy had done something this loop. The only change they'd made was introducing Fundy and Tubbo to Sam - that shouldn't derail the timeline so early, right?

Right?

~~~

Schlatt walked into his office.

"Hello!" said the fuzzy abomination on his desk.

Schlatt stared at it, then pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming.

The fuzzy abomination clacked its beak and burped. "Hello?"

Schlatt slowly backed out of his office and shut the door. He breathed a sigh of relief when nothing tried to burrow through the wooden paneling.

"Hello!" said the fuzzy abomination sitting on the floor behind him.

Schlatt screamed.

~~~

"Look, Tubbo, not that I'm not glad to see you again and all, but--" Tommy gestured to the furby, "--why the fuck did you bring that with you?!"

"Emotional support," Tubbo said. He patted his furby on the head. "Also because Schlatt's terrified of them."

Wilbur eyed the furby with equal parts wariness and intrigue. "He's terrified of them, you say?"

"Yeah! Oh, speaking of-- Fundy and I designed a long one to screw with him."

"A. . . long one?"

"Mhm!" Tubbo pulled a. . . long furby from his inventory and held it out. "His name is Benson the Second!"

"You gave it arms," Tommy whispered, backing away. "Why the fuck did you give it arms?"

"Extra mobility! Look!" Tubbo dropped it on the floor and flipped the switch.

The furby lay still for a moment, then exclaimed "You didn't pass the vibe check!" and began crawling towards them.

Tommy shoved Wilbur towards the furby and ran like hell. His pseudo-brother's screech of terror echoed off Pogtopia's walls, soon joined by Tubbo's maniacal cackling.

Tommy wiped away a tear as he sprinted up the stairs. Wilbur's sacrifice would not be forgotten.

~~~

Dream leaned forward, ignoring the sting of rough concrete against his palms. The rooftop really wasn't the most comfortable stakeout, but it was a good vantage point for reconnaissance. Tubbo's impending execution was unfolding below, which meant that the changes they'd made hadn't been major enough to derail the timeline. Good. He and Tommy had plans for this loop.

Onstage, Technoblade was waffling nervously between shooting Tubbo or setting him free. Strangely, Tubbo didn't appear very scared. In fact, he seemed almost. . . confident.

Dream's musings were cut short when Tubbo did something very timeline-divergent. "You can't kill me," he declared, "because I have this!" He pulled a fluffy white creature (?) from his inventory and brandished it like a shield.

Dream stared as both leaders of Manberg underwent a visceral reaction. Schlatt threw himself into the waterfall, paddling all the way down in a desperate attempt to get away. Quackity went bone-white and crossed himself before falling backward in a dead faint. Technoblade looked at the creature, looked at Quackity's unconscious body, then looked at Tubbo.

"What," he said.

Tubbo shrugged. "I might have gone a little overboard with the furbies."

"What."

"I had to have fun somehow!" Tubbo beamed at Technoblade. "So are you gonna let me out now?"

Technoblade pointed at the creature. "Put that away first."

Tubbo pouted, but obligingly stowed the creature in his inventory. Technoblade wordlessly tore down the concrete, hoisted Tubbo up by the waist, and tridented away.

Dream was left staring down at the Festival that had gone very, very differently from loop zero.

". . . What just happened?"

~~~

Private Messaging: TommyInnit

<Dream> what was the thing tubbo used today

<Dream> the white thing

<TommyInnit> You don't want to know.

~~~

"GO FORTH, MY BRETHREN, AND VANQUISH!"

Tommy stared at the veritable army of furbies converging on a mildly terrified Technoblade. "Tubbo," he said. "What the fuck."

Tubbo shrugged. "I wanted to say the line."

"What. The fuck."

"It's working, isn't it?"

Tommy took a glance at the battlefield. Technoblade was putting up a decent fight, but even he could not stand against the horde of mechanical abominations. ". . . Where the fuck did you even find the time to make all those?"

"Sam helped! He and Fundy did some redstone stuff, automated manufacturing for the more complicated parts-- things were a lot faster after that."

On the other side of the battlefield, Dream swooped in on a horse. He pulled Technoblade up, then swung his steed around and ran for the hills. The furbies followed, chanting "Violence! Violence! Violence!"

Tubbo sighed. "Man, I thought they'd put up more of a fight. Welp!" He cracked his knuckles and turned to Tommy. "That's the traitor dealt with. Schlatt's dead, we got L'Manberg back, and now Wilbur's the president again. Speaking of. Where is Wilbur?"

"Wilbur. . .?" Tommy spoke absentmindedly, gaze fixed on the horde in the distance. Tubbo sent him a sideways glance.

"Yeah? Wilbur, y'know? Tall bastard, president of L'Manberg?"

Tommy blinked, then straightened in alarm. "Oh shit, I forgot about Wilbur!"

~~~

"There was a special place, but-- but it's not there anymore, you know, it's not--"

Philza crossed his arms, tamping down his rising anxiety as Wilbur's hands drifted closer and closer to the button. "It is there," he interrupted. "You've just won it back, Wil."

Wilbur's pupils constricted, and Philza forced himself not to take a step back as a mad grin carved itself across his son's face. Wilbur looked unhinged, his insanity laid out for all to see. He took a deep breath as though he was about to begin shouting - only to freeze when a staticky voice echoed down the corridor.

"Hello!"

The color drained from Wilbur's face. Philza spun and reached for his sword, only to curse when he realized the server-hop had emptied his inventory. He settled into a defensive stance, ready to take down whatever threat was approaching.

"Hello!" said the voice again. A tiny hand came into view and dug itself into the ground. Wilbur whimpered.

Philza stared as a long pink thing dragged itself around the corner, its arms bending in ways that should be anatomically unfeasible. It came to a stop about five feet away, blinked up at the two of them, then opened its beak.

"Did you pass the vibe check?"

Wilbur screamed.

172. (inspired by A_Non_ymousWriter)

"--and that's why Tommy's secretly immortal!"

Philza stared the four conspiracy theorists. The fringes of Sapnap's hair were smoking, not that he seemed to notice. Both Fundy and Tubbo appeared to be vibrating at near supersonic speeds thanks to the sheer amount of caffeine they'd ingested. Wilbur, who had been the one heading most of the presentation, was panting like he'd run a mile. When Philza failed to react with little more than a slow blink, he slammed his hand against the evidence board hanging on the wall behind him, dislodging a few of the red strings crossing it.

"See?!" his eyes shone with manic energy. "Immortal!"

Philza pinched the bridge of his nose. "Wilbur, mate. . . how much sleep have you gotten in the past week?"

The four exchanged glances. "More than six hours?" Tubbo offered. "I think?"

"Okay. And this theory is based off of. . . what, one thing Dream said?"

". . . Yes?"

"He could have been joking."

"But he wasn't," Sapnap hissed. His hair was now on fire. Philza eyed him for a moment, then nodded decisively.

". . . Right. All of you to sleep. Now."

All four opened their mouths to protest. Philza, being the responsible adult he was, hit them with a Potion of Weakness and watched as they promptly passed out. It wasn't quite as good as natural sleep, but Prime knew the boys needed any form of unconsciousness they could get.

With a huff, he rolled up his sleeves and set about carting them off to their homes.

~~~

Philza grinned as he ducked under Tommy's swing, driving his own fist into Tommy's stomach. The teenager parried at the last minute, redirecting the blow with a practiced tap and clamping a hand down on his shoulder. A leg hooked around Philza's knee and pulled. A moment later, Philza found himself blinking up at the sky.

"Oof," he huffed, raising his hands as Tommy moved to pin him. "I give, I give. You got me good with that one."

"Damn right I did," Tommy cheered. He reached down and helped Philza to his feet, then turned to Dream and Wilbur, who appeared to be having a very engaging conversation on the sidelines. "OI, BITCH! DID YOU SEE ME WIN?!"

"Yes, Tommy," Dream and Wilbur answered in unison. Then they glared at each other.

Philza snorted, dusting dirt off his back. Something was itching at the back of his mind, a sense of offness he couldn't shake. He frowned, trying to pinpoint the cause, and replayed the final moments of the spar in his mind. Now that he thought about it, the move Tommy had used seemed. . . familiar. Very familiar.

"Hey, Tommy." Philza was careful to keep his voice light. "Where'd you learn that move?"

Tommy shrugged. "Saw you do it once. Thought it was pretty cool, so I taught myself."

Philza forced his lips to curve into a friendly smile. "I see," he said. "That's not an easy one to teach yourself."

Tommy went off on a tangent about his great imitation ability and how "big man TommyInnit's a fast learner! There was this one time I tripped Dream with his own attack--" Philza tuned him out, instead mulling over this new information.

There were several things wrong with Tommy's statement. First, it would be physically impossible to learn such a complicated move simply by seeing it once. Even the best warriors Philza had encountered in his lengthy lifespan had needed guidance to master the nuances of the movements. Philza himself had learned it from a master in hand-to-hand, but the woman was long dead by now - Tommy couldn't have learned it from her. Second, Philza had never performed the move in front of Tommy. It was meant to disable, not to kill, which meant he'd only use it in spars or arena battles. Third, Philza rarely sparred hand-to-hand with Technoblade these days, and even then, Technoblade knew the trick well enough to avoid it - which meant the only time Tommy could have seen it would have been in the arena.

Philza's last arena battle had been almost a century ago.

Maybe Wilbur's crazy theory wasn't so crazy after all.

~~~

"So, mate, I heard Tommy's older than he looks."

Dream didn't look up from his drawing. ". . . Yeah? I mean, I thought that was common knowledge."

"It's not," Philza said. "Care to elaborate?"

"Well. . . you said it already. He's older than he looks."

"Wilbur said you said he was 'almost as old' as me."

"Yep." Dream dragged his pencil across the paper, leaving an elegant curve of graphite. Philza's eye twitched.

". . . I'm immortal, Dream."

"I know."

"Tommy isn't immortal," Philza tried.

"Well, he's almost as old as you."

By the gods, this man was either an idiot or being purposefully dense. "I saw him as a child. Immortals don't age that fast."

Dream just hummed. Philza narrowed his eyes, taking a moment to think through what he knew.

Immortals were players who aged as normal until they were blessed (or cursed, depending on who you asked) with immortality, at which point their bodies would become functionally frozen in time. No immortal Philza had met had been immortal from birth, nor had any spontaneously aged up in the middle of their life. Besides, Philza had been there for a good chunk of Tommy's 'childhood' - he'd seen Tommy grow from a toddler to a gangly, long-limbed child. There was no way the kid was almost his age; even if he had been frozen in time prior to Wilbur finding him and then grown up, what god would bless a toddler with immortality?

Unless. . . he was going about this all wrong. He expected Tommy to be immortal like him, but perhaps this was a new form of immortality. Reincarnation, maybe? It would explain why Tommy grew like a mortal, but held knowledge from well before his time.

His musings were interrupted when Dream set his pencil down with a clack. "Perfect!" the man cheered. He slid the paper across the table. "Here, this is for you."

Philza looked down at the messy sketch of an ancient, balding version of himself. "Thank. . . you?"

"You're welcome!"

Philza resisted the urge to wipe that vacant grin off of Dream's face. Yeah, this man was definitely being dense on purpose - partially to get on Philza's nerves, but also to protect Tommy. Now the question was, why?

Why did Dream evade every question about Tommy's age? And how did he know in the first place?

~~~

"We're running out of string," Sapnap noted.

Philza hummed, then jotted down REINCARNATION on a sticky note and slapped it on the board. Wilbur peered over his shoulder, eyes widening when he saw the word.

"Wait," he whispered. "That actually makes so much sense. "

"You're welcome," Philza deadpanned. He tossed the sticky notes back to Sapnap, who caught them with ease. The blaze hybrid studied the object in his hands, then looked up at Philza.

"You didn't believe us before," he said. "Why'd you change your mind?"

"Tommy knew some things he shouldn't," Philza muttered. He changed the subject before Sapnap could ask him to elaborate. "Where're Fundy and Tubbo?"

"In the workshop," Wilbur said. "They're testing out a new approach."

"A. . . new approach?"

Something exploded in the distance. A voice that sounded suspiciously like Fundy followed a moment later. "Dammit, Tubbo! Not again!"

Philza stared at the smoke rising over the horizon, then leveled a flat stare at Wilbur. The man grinned sheepishly.

"I mean, as long as they have results. . ."

~~~

"Just take it."

Philza eyed the scorched walls of the workshop. "It's not going to explode, is it?"

Fundy sighed, shoving the device forward. "No, it's safe. The explosion was just Tubbo fucking around with bombs."

"And. . . why was Tubbo making bombs?"

"Because he's Tubbo. Look, this isn't going to explode. Trust me."

With great reluctance, Philza took the device. It was a small, rectangular box, plain save for the delicate lines of redstone laid across its surface. The top half housed a glass case containing three number wheels. As Philza watched, the wheels inside the glass case began to spin.

The device hummed for a bit, flipped this way and that, and finally settled on a 234. Philza turned, opening his mouth to ask about its significance, then stopped short when realization hit him like a truck.

"This. . . is this a fuckin' age counter?"

"Best way to describe it, yeah," Tubbo said. He craned his head to peer at the numbers. "Wow, you're ancient."

Philza consciously chose to ignore that comment. "How exactly does it work?"

"Player code." Philza's eyes widened, but Fundy hurried on before he could react. "It's just a scan! It doesn't do anything, I promise-- we did a lot of testing before we tried it!"

"A lot of research," Tubbo added cheerily. "Spite is a great motivator."

Philza pinned them with his Disapproving Parent look. "Messing with player code is dangerous. Even admins can't access that information - how did you get a scan of it?"

"Medical technology in the Europe server is pretty advanced," Tubbo chirped. "I pulled some strings, committed some minor theft, and--" he gestured to the device.

"Sapnap also asked George to get XD on board. Turns out even god has no idea how old Tommy is."

Philza resisted the urge to find a nice pillow somewhere and scream into it. ". . . Do I want to know what 'minor theft' entails?"

"No," Fundy said. Tubbo just smiled.

~~~

"TOMMY!"

Tommy looked up from the seam he was stitching, blinking at the group that approached him. "Fundy! Hey man, how you doing?"

"Great, awesome-- I just need you to hold this for a second."

Tommy automatically took the object held out to him. "This isn't a bomb, is it?"

Fundy spluttered. "Wha-- no! Why does everyone keep asking that?!"

"Cool. Just double checking." Tommy squinted at it. "What the fuck am I supposed to do with this?"

"Just hold it and show us the numbers!"

Tommy raised an eyebrow but obeyed Tubbo's orders. The group watched with bated breath as the counter spun. And spun. And spun, all the way up to 999, where it stopped, shuddered, and broke into two neat halves.

"Um." Tommy looked at Fundy. "Was it. . . supposed to do that?"

"Holy shit," was Fundy's answer. "You're older than Philza Minecraft."

"I'm. . . what?"

"That counts age," Philza supplied, staring at the broken device. "You're. . . you're older than me."

Tommy visibly bluescreened. ". . . No I'm not?"

"Player code doesn't lie."

Tommy looked down at the device. "Huh. Wait, this reads player code? Can it tell me how old I am?"

Philza would've been more worried about Tommy's apparent lack of concern about machinery interfering with the building blocks of his existence, but he was too busy freaking out about Tommy being over four times his age what the fuck. "Mate, how the fuck are you still alive?!"

Tommy opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. "Uh. Good question."

Five seconds of awkward silence dragged by. "Well?" Philza prompted. "You don't grow like any immortal I know, and I can't feel any Blessing on you. So how'd you become immortal?"

". . . I ate my vegetables."

". . . Excuse me?"

Tommy looked him dead in the eye. "I ate," he enunciated, "My. Vegetables."

"But that's not--"

"How do you know it's not?" Tommy sniped back. He stood, stowing his sewing project in his inventory. "Oh shit. I just remembered that I forgot to turn off my stove."

"Tommy, you don't have a stove."

"It's a new installation. Fuck off."

"Tommy--"

"Nope. Bye."

~~~

Private Messaging: TommyInnit

<TommyInnit> hey dre

<TommyInnit> drem

<TommyInnit> dream

<Dream> ???

<TommyInnit> guess what

<Dream> what

<TommyInnit> we're older than philza minecraft

<Dream> .

<Dream> huh.

<TommyInnit> yeah

<TommyInnit> tubs & fundy made a machine to read age and shit

<TommyInnit> prob bcs of the age conspiracy

<TommyInnit> rest of the server's gonna know by the end of today so watch uot for thaf

<Dream> i see.

<Dream> brb gonna go have a midlife crisis

<TommyInnit> have fun

173.

Quackity rolled his shoulders, letting his breath hiss through his teeth. This was it. This was the moment he'd been working toward for so long. Dream had finally given up the secrets of the revival book. Now all he had to do was use them.

He double-checked the pile in front of him, counting out the bones and the single ram's horn set in the center. All good. He'd cleared his schedule for the day, his office doors were locked - nobody would disturb him.

He summoned the journal from his inventory, wrinkling his nose as he peeled apart the grime-stained pages. He should've made Dream wash his hands before he began writing, but the past was in the past. As long as he could read these words, he could complete the revival.

It was at times like these that he was eternally grateful that his past business ventures had forced him to learn the phonetic pronunciations of the galactic alphabet. He cleared his throat, took a deep breath, and began chanting.

"ᔑᓵᓵ𝙹∷↸╎リ⊣ ℸ ̣ 𝙹 ᔑꖎꖎ ꖌリ𝙹∴リ ꖎᔑ∴ᓭ 𝙹⎓ ᔑ⍊╎ᔑℸ ̣ ╎𝙹リ, ℸ ̣ ⍑ᒷ∷ᒷ ╎ᓭ リ𝙹 ∴ᔑ|| ᔑ ʖᒷᒷ ᓭ⍑𝙹⚍ꖎ↸ ʖᒷ ᔑʖꖎᒷ ℸ ̣ 𝙹 ⎓ꖎ||. Iℸ ̣ ᓭ ∴╎リ⊣ᓭ ᔑ∷ᒷ ℸ ̣ 𝙹𝙹 ᓭᒲᔑꖎꖎ ℸ ̣ 𝙹 ⊣ᒷℸ ̣ ╎ℸ ̣ ᓭ ⎓ᔑℸ ̣ ̣ꖎ╎ℸ ̣ ℸ ̣ ꖎᒷ ʖ𝙹↸|| 𝙹⎓⎓ ℸ ̣ ⍑ᒷ ⊣∷𝙹⚍リ↸. ℸ ̣ ⍑ᒷ ʖᒷᒷ, 𝙹⎓ ᓵ𝙹⚍∷ᓭᒷ, ⎓ꖎ╎ᒷᓭ ᔑリ||∴ᔑ||, ʖᒷᓵᔑ⚍ᓭᒷ ʖᒷᒷᓭ ↸𝙹リ'ℸ ̣ ̣ᓵᔑ∷ᒷ ∴⍑ᔑℸ ̣ ̣⍑⚍ᒲᔑリᓭ ℸ ̣ ⍑╎リꖌ ╎ᓭ ╎ᒲ!¡𝙹ᓭᓭ╎ʖꖎᒷ. . ."

Quackity trailed off, taking a glance down at himself. According to the cell security feeds, Dream had been glowing like a Christmas tree when he revived Tommy. Quackity, however, was noticing quite an absence of a flashy lightshow. Either he was doing it wrong. . . or Dream had lied.

Quackity shut the journal with a snap. Unhooking his communicator from his belt, he thumbed over to Foolish's icon.

Private Messaging: FoolishG

<Quackity> hey foolish

<Quackity> do we have a galactic translator

<FoolishG> yeah! I have one in my base

<FoolishG> what do you need it for?

<Quackity> a project. bring it to my office

<FoolishG> got it

Fifteen minutes later, Quackity slammed the translation manual shut and rose to his feet. " Dream, " he snarled, then spun on his heel and hurled what Dream had claimed to be a copy of the revival book into his fireplace. Clearly, the man hadn't learned his lesson. Looks like he'd have to--

His planning was interrupted when the prison alarms went off.

174. remix, pt. 12

TW: Mentions of Abuse/Gaslighting

"What do you mean he's gone?"

Both Quackity and Fundy tensed, but Tubbo remained unmoved in the face of Technoblade's anger. "I told you. Tommy was here. He took him."

Technoblade growled. "You're tellin' me that your vice president blew up my house, grabbed Dream, and waltzed away from Spawn while you just watched?"

Fundy bristled beneath Technoblade's glare, his ears pressed flat to his head. "Yes, but I'm telling you--"

"You're tellin' me that they let Tommy take him." The grass crunched beneath Technoblade's boots as he took a step forward. "Doesn't matter if they were actin' friendly or not."

"Something's wrong," Fundy insisted. "Dream didn't-- Dream didn't sound scared at all! He didn't fight when Tommy grabbed him--"

"Dream was crushed to death," Philza pointed out. "That usually means minor paralysis for a few minutes after respawn."

"--but then why were they acting so-- nice to each other? Tommy killed Dream! Dream was terrified of Tommy! They're enemies, but they-- they acted like they were friends."

Philza snorted. Fundy flinched back at the acerbic noise. "What, you think they were working together? Mate, even if they orchestrated this entire mess-- why would they?"

Fundy stared at his grandfather, unable to answer. Because really, why would Dream and Tommy pretend to be archnemeses, cook up an elaborate storyline, and drag both the Antarctic commune and the L'Manberg Cabinet into it? As it stood, Tommy would be losing his friends, his position, his nation - things he clearly treasured, because Fundy had seen him die for them. On top of that, Dream had been in terrible shape when he'd tried to fight the Butcher Army. Yes, injuries could be faked - but malnutrition couldn't. Would the two of them really go so far for a plot that accomplished nothing?

"Manipulation," Tubbo said.

Heads turned towards Tubbo, who kept his gaze firmly on the ground. "What?" Philza said.

"Manipulation," Tubbo repeated. "Gaslighting. It's-- some abus-- ab-- some people force other people to be dependent on them for a-- for a long time. A-and when that happens, the-- the victims might begin thinking they're friends."

"Dream doesn't think he's friends with Tommy," Technoblade pointed out.

"He told you he doesn't think he's friends with Tommy," Tubbo corrected. "How he actually feels might be a different story, and. . . and when he's with Tommy--"

"He met Tommy in L'Manberg. He had no trouble fighting him."

"He had a weapon in L'Manberg and both you and Phil at his back. He was paralyzed and alone when he respawned." Tubbo curled his fingers in the hem of his shirt. "He couldn't do anything to stop Tommy, so he-- so he fell back into that. . . mindset."

"Or he was just playing along," Philza muttered. "To keep Tommy from hurting him."

"This is ridiculous," Quackity interrupted, unable to contain his incredulity. "Look, I know Tommy's changed, but he wouldn't-- he isn't like that!"

"I don't want to believe it," Tubbo whispered, "but how else would you explain what Fundy saw? How else would you explain what happened on the execution platform?"

Quackity opened his mouth. Closed it. His shoulders slumped. "Fuck."

"No, no," Fundy snapped. "You don't get it-- Dream wasn't scared at all. They acted like brothers, not like-- I don't know, a manipulative relationship--"

"Tommy and Wilbur acted like brothers too."

Silence descended upon the Spawn clearing. Philza had gone bone-white. "Wh-what?" he stammered, taking a step back. "You. . . what do you mean, too?"

"Wh-when Tommy and Wilbur were exiled, Wilbur. . . he-- he kinda went bad in the head." Tubbo stared at his shoes. "He, uh, he'd hurt Tommy. Sometimes. Th-there were bruises. And, uh, Tommy told me he'd have these moments when he was convinced Tommy was traitor, and then it'd get really bad then 'cause Tommy would get locked up in this tiny room and Wil told him it was for his own good and I didn't do anything because I didn't know--"

"Woah woah woah--" Quackity stepped in, pressing his hands down on Tubbo's shoulders. "Tubbo. Tubbo, look at me. See me? Can you breathe with me?"

Tubbo staggered back, knocking Quackity's arms away. "I didn't know," he choked out. "I thought Tommy was okay but he was hurting but he didn't tell me until Wilbur was dead--"

"Wilbur didn't hurt Tommy," Technoblade interrupted. "I was there, Tubbo. I would have noticed."

But Tubbo was already shaking his head. "You weren't looking hard enough," he whispered. "He was good at faking."

Technoblade's eyes narrowed. He rifled through his memories, recalling the sound of Tommy's boisterous shouts echoing off the walls of Pogtopia, his bright smile--

--the way he'd lean into Wilbur when the man placed a possessive hand on his shoulder, the bruises on his arms and face that Technoblade thought had come from the walls of the ravine, how thin and pale he looked when he wasn't shouting or smiling--

"He wouldn't," Philza said. "Wilbur wouldn't do that."

Tubbo hunched in on himself. "I thought Tommy wouldn't either."

"I know Wilbur! I'm his father!"

"And I'm Tommy's best friend. Or I was." Tubbo giggled, humorless and just a touch hysterical. "Dunno if he feels the same anymore."

Philza turned to Technoblade, wings flaring with desperate hope, and Technoblade wished more than anything that he could confirm Phil's beliefs. But Tubbo's words had thrown his memories in a whole new light, and in retrospect, Technoblade should have caught on to what was happening.

Self blame later, he told himself, meeting Phil's gaze. Whatever his friend saw in his eyes was answer enough.

"N-no," the avian stammered, recoiling. "He-- he wouldn't--"

"I'm sorry, Phil," Technoblade said. "I failed him."

Philza seemed to go impossibly paler. His hands flexed around empty air, as though he was trying to grasp something that wasn't there. His damaged wings curled around him in a futile attempt to shield himself from the truth. Fundy, too, had folded in on himself, wide-eyed and trembling beneath the weight of the new revelations. Quackity was still doing his best to ground him and Tubbo, but even he appeared shaken.

"Wh-what then?" he asked roughly. "What the fuck do we do?"

"Gettin' Dream away from Tommy sounds like a good startin' point," Technoblade deadpanned. The fury burning hot in his chest had been tempered by the guilt of failing Tommy in Pogtopia, but it hadn't been extinguished. "Maybe takin' Tommy down while we're at it--"

"We're not killing him!"

The occupants of the clearing flinched in surprise, turning to Fundy. The fox hybrid bristled, refusing to back down even under the combined weight of their stares.

"Look, even if Dream was-- was manipulated into this or something, it's-- killing Tommy isn't going to fix anything. He needs help."

"Assumin' he can be helped," Technoblade muttered. He raised a hand to forestall any protest. "I know, I wasn't talkin' about killing him anyway. But-- look, Phil and I are goin' in for Dream, and Dream only. We're not gonna go after Tommy, but if he gets in our way, that's his problem."

Tubbo shifted, visibly collecting himself. Technoblade felt a grudging respect as he watched the President facade fall back into place - the calm, collected leader who didn't bend under pressure.

"That's. . . reasonable. Truce?" he asked, holding out one hand. Technoblade clasped it in a grudging handshake.

"Truce," the piglin hybrid agreed. "Just until we get Dream back."

Tubbo released a shaky breath and let go. "Okay. Okay," he muttered, clasping his hands behind his back. "First things first, we have to track him down." His voice cracked on the fifth syllable, but he powered through. "Find where he took Dream, get him out, and. . . and detain Tommy."

Neither Fundy nor Quackity protested this decision. Tubbo turned to Technoblade, something resigned in the set of his shoulders. "Leave Tommy to us. Just don't-- don't hurt him."

"I make no promises," Technoblade rumbled. He stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled, a single, piercing note that split the air. The L'Manbergians startled as two wolves slunk from the shadows, their pale fur gleaming in the sunlight.

Technoblade knelt in front of the hounds, withdrawing a netherite pauldron from his inventory. He held it out to the animals, waiting patiently as they sniffed it. The first wolf barked and backed away. The second wolf trotted to the edge of the clearing, nosing the foliage. Both paced several times before slipping into the bushes. Technoblade strode after them, only to stop about a foot from the clearing's edge and glance back at the others.

"Well? The hounds say they went this way. You comin' or not?"

175. (for the previous part of this loop, see 165. in Chapter 33)

"What are you doing here?"

Tommy refused to falter in the face of hostility, forcing himself to remain relaxed as he lounged on Jack's couch. "Guess why, bitch."

Jack snorted. "So you've come back to haunt me. Figures."

"I'm not here to haunt you," Tommy said. "I just want to know why you killed me."

There was a beat of silence. Then Jack scoffed. "Right, ghost. You forgot, didn't you?"

Tommy frowned. ". . . No? I have all of my memories--"

"If you did, you wouldn't be asking." Jack turned away, clearly dismissing him. "Now get out of my house, I have shit to do."

Tommy obviously couldn't let that stand. He got to his feet and hurried after Jack, trailing him further into the house. "Now wait a minute, you--"

"Get lost," Jack interrupted. He quickened his pace, near-jogging down the hall. They reached a closed door at the end. Jack moved to open it.

"Jack, I just-- I just want to know why you did it! I thought we were friends!"

Jack stopped in his tracks, one hand on the doorknob. Slowly, he turned around. "You. . . thought we were friends?"

There was suddenly something profoundly unsettling about his posture. Tommy ignored the unease brewing in his chest, crossing his arms and assuming an expression of mulish confusion. "Well, yeah. We were the Triple Ts, remember? You, me, Tubbo? And you were part of L'Manberg, once! I thought-- I didn't think you'd, I dunno, kill me."

"Huh. Funny. I thought you wouldn't kill me either." Jack smiled, all teeth. "Then you shoved me into lava when I went to visit you in Exile. I burned to death. Wasn't a fun way to go."

He paused, clearly waiting for a response. Tommy could only stare at him, stunned into silence.

Jack cackled, saw-edged and sharp with fury. "You don't even remember, do you?"

Tommy tried to speak, but his tongue had turned to lead in his mouth. His first instinct was to deny the accusation, but the jagged rage carved into every line of Jack's posture spoke of nothing but truth. He-- he didn't remember. The first few weeks of exile had blurred into a haze of rage and betrayal. There had been nightmares - so many nightmares - almost to the point where he couldn't distinguish between dreams and reality. His memories of killing Jack had likely been lost in the fog.

Jack sneered at his silence. "Yeah. Thought so. Then at the Green Festival, you had the fucking audacity to complain about how nobody visited you in exile." Something otherworldly burned beneath Jack's skin, contorting the air around him with a miasma of loathing. "Oh boo-hoo, poor little Tommy all alone in exile-- if only he hadn't killed the people who visited him!"

Tommy swallowed, tasting ash on his tongue. ". . . I. . . I didn't," he tried to protest, but it was a lie and they both knew it. Exile might have been a blur, but he remembered the events of the Green Festival in excruciating detail.

"I was in hell, you know," Jack snarled. Sparks snapped between his teeth. "I remember being in hell. It was the worst fucking experience of my life, but you know what? I dragged myself out. I hated you so fucking much that my determination to kill you gave me the strength to come back. If you think we're friends, you're fucking deluded. Now get out of my house."

Tommy didn't move. Jack's words cycled through his mind, tearing away at the bubble of denial he'd built. Here was undeniable proof that Jack despised him - and for good reason. If he'd really taken one of Jack's lives when the man had been trying to help him--

"Jack, I'm-- I'm sorry."

Jack's ragged breathing hitched. He turned white, then red, then white again. When he spoke, his voice was trembling with barely-restrained fury.

"If this is some kind of sick joke--"

"It's not a joke, Jack! I'm sorry, I really am--"

"You're just apologizing now!" Jack snarled. "Just because I threw all that shit in your face--"

" I DIDN'T KNOW! " Tommy screamed, his echoing voice crackling with static. "Jack, I swear I didn't--"

"HOW COULD YOU NOT KNOW THAT YOU KILLED SOMEONE?!"

"Exile, it was--" Tommy fumbled for words, unable to explain the fog he'd been in. "--I couldn't-- I was lost in my head, man, I didn't--"

Jack scoffed. "Right, so that makes it okay."

"It doesn't! Fuck-- I know it doesn't, so stop putting words in my mouth! Jack, man, I fucked you over-- I admit that. I'm sorry. You didn't-- you didn't deserve any of that, and--" Tommy took an unnecessary breath, trying to ground himself. ". . . Fuck. I guess-- I'm just tryin' to say I'm sorry. I know it's not enough, but-- I am. You don't have to accept my apology or shit, I'm just-- fuck, Jack, I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I killed you. I'm sorry I forgot. I'm sorry for betraying you, breaking your trust-- you didn't deserve that."

Jack was silent. Tommy hesitantly lifted his gaze to his face, and was startled to see tears trickling down his cheeks.

"Fuck," Jack hissed, pushing up his glasses to swipe at his eyes. "Fuck. I just-- I just wanted someone to acknowledge me, or at least-- at least apologize for what they did."

"I'm sorry," Tommy repeated. He knew it wasn't enough, but he had to start somewhere. "I'm so sorry, Jack. I-- what I did was wrong."

Jack snorted, low and watery. "No shit."

They stood in that hallway, man and ghost, one trying furiously to scrub his tears away and the other hovering awkwardly at his shoulder. At long last, Jack sighed and looked up.

"Fuck," he half-laughed, his shoulders slumping. "That's all I ever wanted to hear from him. And now I get it from his fucking ghost instead. Because I killed him. Fuck."

Tommy's heart dropped into his stomach. "I-- Jack, I am Tommy."

"You're not. You're some piss-poor replacement trapped here by 'unfinished business' or whatever." Jack laughed. The sound rang hollow and flat. "Guess Tommy didn't hate anyone enough to drag himself back to life."

Hate, echoed Tommy's mind. Hate, hate, hate--

"I'm sorry," he tried one last time.

Jack shook. "I don't need your apologies. He hurt me. I killed him. We're even now, as far as it goes, and you can't apologize when you're not him."

"Jack--"

Jack stepped into his room and shut the door in his face. Tommy stared at it in dazed silence for several long moments, then turned and drifted away.

Loop Notes
171. Unbeknownst to Dream and Tommy, the invention of furbies was Dream's fault. He'd been trying to make Sam a Stable Adult Figure for Fundy and Tubbo, so he'd set up an engineering apprenticeship for them. He failed to predict the catastrophe that would result from Sam introducing the two to Artificial Intelligence.
172. When pressed for answers about how he became immortal for the rest of the loop, Tommy began using increasingly ridiculous answers - ranging from "I tripped" to "I uno reversed death. Of course it works! Haven't you tried it?"
*(second answer courtesy of Birbo)
173. Yes, Dream memorized the entire Bee Movie script. Unfortunately, he couldn't demonstrate his extensive knowledge of All Known Laws of Aviation without making Quackity suspicious about how many pages he was using for a three-minute chant.