April 30th, 2021.

Two years ago today (or yesterday, since timezones exist), Phil was slain by a baby zombie in a world he had played in for five years. Thus, we see this as a fitting day to share the beginning of this fic with y'all.

Press F to pay respects.

~

And yes, I said 'we'. This is a collab with the one and only jello12451 and is going to be a hot chaotic mess, which I shall revel in.

*crash* HELLO BLUEBIRDS I AM BACK BUT BLUE WANTS TO ACTUALLY BE HELPFUL THIS TIME SO I'M GONNA GO NOW, PLEASE DO NOT EAT ROCKS, AND REMEMBER TO INHALE YOUR ORANGES AND LEMONS

*concerned noises*

Anyways, lets get into it!

Enjoy.

~ < o > ~

It was two years ago.

2019, April 30th. The day everything changed.

At least, it did for three very specific people.

For years, the rate of disappearances had been raising steadily, along with a spike in the amount of cases never solved. People who lived on their own, vanishing never to be seen again. People who simply disappeared from their own home, where their spouse could have sworn they had been in their room just a moment before. Children, who had been on their devices one moment then gone the other, leaving a global network of horrified parents.

Of course, flashing headlines and meaningless graphs never felt scary until they came close, into one's own life.

Techno remembers the day well. So does Wilbur.

'Minecraft Hardcore' streamer vanishes without a trace, during stream.

Phil Watson reported missing on-stream.

Online streamer 'Ph1lza' vanishes, leaving thousands of fans confused in chat.

And then with the flow of time, it began appearing less and less. Those who knew him would stare at their screens, forever hopeful, forever grieving, and the rest of the world moved on.

'Minecraft' Streamer missing for one week.

They weren't idiots. They all knew at this point the chance of their friend ever coming home was slim.

New lead found for missing man after one month.

A brief spot of sun in the darkness, muffled just hours later as it turned out to be a dead end.

Man missing after one year. No return is expected to occur.

It couldn't hurt to hope, right?

~ ~ o O o ~ ~

Techno dragged a hand down his face slowly.

Two years. It had been two years, but he wouldn't give up. He wanted his friend back. Was that too much to ask?

He and Wilbur had searched tirelessly for clues, mainly following Phil's internet trail. He swore he could recite every single tweet the man had made, yet they were no closer to finding where he had gone.

Sparse tweets, made up mainly of retweets of the most obscure videos. It was almost laughable.

But nothing indicated that he was to vanish.

The authorities assigned to his case had (begrudgingly, after an inordinate amount of begging and replaying clips of Phil calling the three of them friends) shared with Techno and Wilbur the facts they did know.

There was nothing to indicate he had left home. His cellphone was one his desk, his shoes on the shoe rack, jacket hung up by the door. His car was still parked in the driveway. He had simply vanished during a stream, when he had been killed in his Hardcore world.

At first, Techno, along with the entirety of the stream, has assumed it was a joke, or that perhaps Phil needed a moment to himself after dying to a baby zombie, of all things, in a world he had played in for five years.

But then minutes turned into hours, and the stream was dead silent except for the occasional faint noises of cars rumbling past outside or the calls of birds ringing through the windows. Rumours began to circulate that Phil was in danger, and viewership on his stream spiked as fans tried to see for themselves what was happening.

He was reported missing three hours later, by a relative.

The stream was ended by Twitch a day after, when it became evident Phil wasn't coming back.

Techno had rewatched all his streams too, copied down the entire script, looking for clues in his use of language. Perhaps a metaphor or some sort of message Phil could have written? But English had always been his own strong suit, never something Phil would indulge in (unless, Techno had reasoned to himself, he was truly desperate).

It was the same, day after day. Stream once a week for income, then obsessively combing through the past, digging up old memories that had been left untouched for far too long, gathering dust in the forgotten corners of the internet.

It was painful, seeing the numbers grown. The pale label of two years ago on everything Phil-related dug into his heart like a fresh thorn, but part of him was eternally hopeful that if he read them all one last time, he might gain another clue. A possibility of why one of his best friends had vanished without a trace.

Every so often, a dono would pop up about Phil's disappearance, and he would flinch, forever grateful he didn't use a facecam, and wait just a little too long before answering. It was always hard to swallow the lump in his throat and choke out that he didn't know, that he was trying everything he knew and that they all had to hope Phil would return one day.

Chat wasn't stupid though, and he wasn't sure if it was the question that hurt more or the barrage of 'don't ask about Phil', and 'leave that topic alone' that would flood through it afterwards.

The police had said to give up. Two years, they had pointed out. It's been two years. If this was a hostage situation, there's no way he's alive, and if he left on his own-

He wouldn't have, Techno had insisted. He wouldn't leave without telling anyone. Phil's not like that.

Sure, the policemen had agreed, looking unconvinced. But the point is, your friend isn't coming back. You might as well give up, go on and live your life. We've seen too many cases of someone letting a missing case ruin their lives. Don't do that. You have a promising future.

Techno couldn't do that. Phil would have done the same for him or Wilbur, he was certain, and it hurt too much to know he was giving up.

Wilbur didn't give up either, despite the valiant efforts of the policemen, and they had eventually left the duo alone, promising to update them if any new information was found.

Techno sighed, rubbing his eyes. Another fruitless search. Another day spent staring at the harsh blue light of his screen, putting on a fake (real?) smile for the public during the only event in his life that could distract him from his eternal search. Was guilt the awful feeling inside him when he considered forgetting, smiling a real, genuine, smile?

Surely not.

His phone buzzed, and he glanced down.

<Wilbur> hey, two year anniversary. You up for some hardcore gameplay? Gotta remember him somehow

He stared at his screen for a long moment. It couldn't hurt to have a bit of fun, could it? Maybe it could even take his mind off things for a while.

<Technoblade> Yeah, sure. Logging on in a minute

<Wilbur> nice, VC?

Techno hummed, clicking into the voice chat. Instantly, Wilbur's voice filled the silence of his room.

"Hey Techno! Found anything?"

He managed a half-grimace, half-smile. "You know I would tell you first if I did."

Wilbur laughed on the other end, and Techno admired how upbeat he sounded. It was almost enough to convince them both that he was happy.

Almost.

"I know. I haven't found anything either."

Techno sighed. "I know." His fingers flew across the keyboard, clicking into the little Minecraft icon.

<Technoblade joined the game>

Instantly, shrieking filled his room and he flinched away from it. "Tommy?" He gaped in surprise at the voice that was definitely Tommy's that had just screeched right into his ear.

"Hey big man," the teen burst out. "I'm in the same game as Technoblade, this is so poggers. You see that, chat? So poggers!"

He was like a noise machine, Techno marveled quietly. Silently though, his fingers were typing, words coming into shape. Tommy was still going on about . . . honestly he wasn't that sure what.

Messages

WilburSoot
Online

<Technoblade> You invited the small orphan child?

<Wilbur> Yeah, and his friend

<Technoblade> Why would you do this to me, I trusted you

<Wilbur> I thought he might be loud enough to distract you from being a shadow

Techno frowned, about to ask what the other meant, then paused. Was it true? Had he really been so quiet, so cautious during streams whenever he could that he had faded into nothing more than a shadow?

No, surely not. That was stupid. He was about to prove Wilbur wrong. He placed his phone face-down on his desk, unsure of how to reply to Wilbur's remark, but determined to prove it false.

"Technoblade," Tommy interrupted, jolting him out of his thoughts. He stopped for a moment, adding as an afterthought, "can I call you Techno?"

Tubbo cackled loudly in the background.

"No."

"Well Techno," Tommy started, ignoring the sound of Wilbur spitting out his water in the VC, as well as the muffled bout of furious cursing that followed. "Fine, can I call you the Blade instead?"

". . . Also no." He gave a faint smile though, secretly amused.

Tommy sighed. "Alright then, Tech."

"Why have you decided on 'Tech'," Techno protested indignantly. "That's literally the worst nickname I've ever heard."

Grinning, he walked up to Tommy's character in-game and pulled out his sword, enjoying the yelp of alarm Tommy gave at the sight of it.

"No no no Tech, please, don't kill me, that would not be very poggers, Tech-"

He put the sword away, watching Tommy's little pixelated character run past him, vanishing into the vast world.

Tubbo laughed. "You totally should have killed him."

"Thank you for sparing me," Tommy sputtered in retaliation. "It was very pogchamp. May the gods bless you with pogness." He emphasized the word in a way that was either hilarious or uncomfortable, or perhaps a mixture of both.

Techno grinned, then sighed. This was going to be a long night.

~ ~ o O o ~ ~

<TommyInnit was blown up by Technoblade>

<Tubbo_ was blown up by Technoblade>

<WilburSoot was blown up by Technoblade>

Techno gave a shriek of laughter as he set off his TNT trap, watching the explosion from a safe distance. He hasn't been sure it would work, but seeing it catch all three of them was marvelous.

He was laughing so hard that he hardly noticed none of them commented on his antics.

It was far later that he finally realized the three of them had gone dead-silent.

Just like Phil-

"Tommy? Wilbur? Tubbo?

Hello?"

~ < o > ~

Brace yourselves.

>:)