Chapter Text
The laugh that left Wilbur’s throat when he heard that Quackity of all people had a new country was almost acidic, Tommy noted.
It wasn’t like Tommy expected anything differently from his big brother; in all his recently-revived glory, a white streak in his hair matching Tommy’s, a sickly green tint to his skin, dangerous red eyes and crow wings with a fair bit of few feathers missing (they tended to fall out, but regrew fairly quickly). After all, the rivalry between him and Quackity had been there for years. Why in the world would it be different now?
Still, he let his heart clench around the emptiness he felt, and pondered how Wilbur would react when he found out Tommy’s growing fondness for Quackity. The man had basically taken Tommy in as his own, helped him, made him feel better, all the sappy shit. Especially after Quackity had found out what Dream had done to Tommy.
That night when he finally told Big Q what happened with Dream, he went to the prison almost immediately. When he came home (was the casino really Tommy’s home now, he wondered?) from the prison, he was bloody all over. Tommy said nothing.
Now, standing here with his brother who had been dead for the past thirteen months, Tommy couldn’t help but wince when Wilbur’s face soured the moment he heard of Tommy’s current living situation.
“You’re living with fucking Quackity?” The older brother spat, leaning back a tad. His nose scrunched and his eyebrows furrowed. “Enlighten me on why , please. Is he forcing you to do that, Tommy?” He frowned suddenly, looking rather concerned. “You know, I can get you out of there safely. You don’t need to be afraid of him, he can’t hurt you, I won’t let him.”
Tommy blinked as Wilbur was launched into an anxious rambling fit – ever since he had been revived and heard about everything that happened, he was… well, saying a tad overprotective would be an understatement.
“What?” Tommy almost couldn’t recognize his own voice, as choked and strangled as it was. “No, no, of course not!” He spluttered. “Big Q wouldn’t hurt me, you know that, Wil, come on, I could knock him out in like a second flat. Plus he’s Tubbs’ stepdad, and Tubbo would fucking destroy him if he tried ,” it was Tommy’s turn to ramble anxiously now, it seemed. He couldn’t bring himself to stop talking.
Wilbur raised an eyebrow, not much looking like he believed Tommy. “Are you sure, pipsqueak? I’ll kill him if he hurt you.”
Deep down, Tommy knew that Wilbur’s words weren’t just an empty threat as they once might have been. Deep down, he knew that if he wanted someone gone, if he wanted to get revenge on one of the many people that hurt him, Wilbur would be right by his side making whatever he wanted happen. Wilbur would destroy the world for Tommy if that would be what Tommy wanted.
After all, he already tried to kill Techno when hearing that he helped break Dream out of prison.
It was a horrible sight to walk into – Techno pinned on the floor, bloody and bruised and barely conscious while Wilbur held a sword above his head with a deranged look in his eyes, so ready to take a canon life from his twin brother – then the deranged eyes flicked to Tommy, and Tommy couldn’t breathe. The only word he could say was ‘stop’. And stop Wilbur did, letting Techno leave, scuttle back to his and Phil’s home – to the home of the family that had abandoned both of them a long time ago.
Tommy wasn’t sure if he should have told Wilbur to stop.
“I’m sure,” he spoke, realizing that he was lost in thought for a little while, and Wilbur was leaning close to his face now with a worried look in his eyes. “Seriously, Wil, you’re so overprotective and sappy, he’s been nothing but nice to me,” Tommy continued, swatting at his older brother.
“Okay,” the only-mildly-crazy brother conceded, his shoulders relaxing. “You’ve been dazed all day. What’s going on in that blonde head of yours?” He asked as he continued to walk. They were headed to Las Nevadas, where Tommy’s current place of residence was. The blonde boy distantly found himself thinking on whether Quackity would let Wilbur into Las Nevadas or not; rivalry and all.
He heard Tubbo say once that if a rivalry lasted more than five years, that wasn’t a rivalry and it was just romantic feelings in denial – and then he found himself digging in his mind for whether or not Big Q and Wil had hated each other for more than five years.
Probably not. Time was weird.
As was becoming a trend, Tommy realized Wilbur had asked him a question a few moments too late, and found himself blinking when his older brother’s concerned face was peering at his again. Too-cold, dead hands rested on his shoulders, steadying him when he jumped. Tommy found himself leaning into the touch.
Wilbur’s lip quirked.
“Oh, uh,” Tommy quickly said before the brunette could comment on it. “Just thinking, y’know,” he said awkwardly, and winced when Wilbur tilted his head to inquire further without a word escaping his throat. “Um. Thinking about when I should go visit Tubbo and Ranboo in Snowchester, I miss them a bunch. And they visit the casino a lot, but I wanna spend time with Michael, too, not just them,” he blurted – and it was true, for what it’s worth. He had been wanting to visit his best friends and their son for a while now.
“Michael?” Wilbur blinked, and Tommy was hit with the realization that they had been holding off on introducing Wilbur to Michael until said big brother was a tad more mentally stable – it might sound bad, but Wilbur had gone insane in Pogtopia. And Tubbo didn’t think therapy existed in limbo (which was so stupid, what is limbo for if not therapy?) so they didn’t want Michael to be affected by it in any way.
It may be cruel, but it was for the best. Really.
Tommy blanched. “Don’t worry about it?” He tried. Wilbur simply cocked his head, ‘tsk’ed and continued walking.
The blonde boy exhaled shakily in relief, quick to trail after Wilbur as he did many times before. It reminded Wilbur of L’manberg, of the early days; when Tommy had given up his dearest possessions for the country, for their country, for the nation that Wilbur had so lovingly built and tore to pieces without a shred of remorse. Distantly, Wilbur thought of whether he felt remorse about it now.
He found the answer to be ‘no’. In fact, he felt almost proud of the destruction he had dealt. For someone that loved to create new worlds, writing and scribbling notes and words just to launch them out in a confident musical spiel, he destroyed and broke things alarmingly often. Countries, promises, relationships, confidences.
Despite all that, he was still Tommy’s brother who had tried to do nothing but good for him. And even if he didn’t apologize yet for all that he had done, Tommy found himself clinging onto his arm and ranting about something or the other like the good old days.
A smile was plastered on Wilbur’s face, though it was different from the determined and excited grin of L’manburg’s Wilbur. This Wilbur’s smile was slightly tired, but just as attentive to Tommy’s words, just as interested in whatever stupid topic he was ranting about now, and just as careful to keep Tommy from tripping while he was too caught up in his own mind. A pang of nostalgia slammed into Tommy’s chest, striking his heart then embedding itself deep inside him like shrapnel.
“So, really, that’s why I think moths are superior to pigeons. What do pigeons bring to the world? Nothing. What do moths bring to the world? So many things!” Tommy waved his arms around to make his point properly, voice rising in octaves occasionally.
“Yeah? Like what? What do moths bring that pigeons don't?” Wilbur pressed, grinning down at Tommy.
“So many things,” Tommy repeated. “Moths help in seed production! They pollinate flowers while feeding on the nectar, like some funky multitasking. They’re so cool. They’re also major food sources for so many animals, and even for humans.”
“Who the hell would eat a moth?” Wilbur immediately spluttered, appalled. “Moths are wonderful! Why would you eat them?”
“They have a lot of important minerals and other important foodstuffs,” Tommy said, beaming wide. “Bats eat them a ton.”
“Should I be concerned about why you know so many things about moths?” Wilbur mused, peering down at his younger brother. “Seriously. Did you just binge-read encyclopedias or something? You’re so weird,” he accused.
“Of course I didn’t,” Tommy turned his nose up. “I just like watching documentaries with Ranboo and Tubbo. It’s fun.”
“So you’re above reading encyclopedias but documentaries are perfectly fine?” Wilbur cackled, nudging Tommy a bit. “God, you were always such a nerd. I guess some things never change,” he crooned.
“Shut up, bitch,” Tommy squabbled, swatting up at the taller man.
The entrance to Las Nevadas reigned over them, the sign tall and bright. Quackity’s country, in all its glory, standing right in front of them. Wilbur felt like the breath was knocked out of his lungs, staring at the lights, at the tall buildings, at everything that Quackity had somehow managed to build while Wilbur was out of commission. Everything that Quackity managed to build and was determined to keep alive for much longer than his own life.
Wilbur wondered whether his country would crumble with him, as Wilbur’s did.
“For the love of Prime, Tommy,” Wilbur breathed, the lights of Las Nevadas dancing in his eyes like flames. “This is so much more than I expected. I… he built this? He made this? All of this?” He asked incredulously. For lack of a better word, he was gaping, disbelieving, left wide open and unguarded to bask in the everything of Las Nevadas.
Tommy distantly felt his heart swell with pride for his bootleg father figure.
“I mean,” he started. “I don’t think he made the builds? I’m not very sure, but he probably hired someone to do it for him. But he did come up with all the ideas and everything, oversaw the building process, and, y’know. Created it.”
Wilbur looked like he couldn’t process Tommy’s words at first, still just staring, hands shoved deep into his pockets. His cigarette had fallen out of his mouth a little while ago from his earlier gaping, the still-lit embers generating smoke that wafted up and up into the night sky. “Quackity?” He uttered. “The Quackity? Co-president of Manberg? Duckie?”
“Quackity,” Tommy confirmed, grinning a tad at his brother’s reaction.
“... holy shit,” Wilbur laughed, running a hand through his hair. Even in the dim lighting of the Las Nevadas sign, the white streak was stark against dark brown and charred ends of his hair from burning it one too many times; with the explosion of L’manberg, then with his cigarettes. It wasn’t his fault his hair had gotten a tad long, being dead and all. They didn’t quite offer haircuts at the train station he was stuck at for Prime-knows-how-long, after all.
“Come on,” Tommy urged, grabbing his hand and yanking him along as he began walking into the country he had started calling home. “You should see Big Q. He looks very different than Pogtopia,” he insisted. “Oh, oh, and the casino is so nice, and all the other buildings. He has a wedding venue in the middle. He never officially showed me it on the tour, but I still snuck in to see it,” he gushed, walking faster.
Wilbur stumbles a tad, laughing softly and stomping on the still-ignited cigarette to make the embers dwindle and die. “Okay, okay, Toms,” he encouraged, easily moving along with his brother’s yanking and hurried steps. “You sure he’ll be okay with me being in here, anyway?”
“Ah, yes, because your notoriety for blowing up countries automatically makes you a threat,” Tommy deadpans, voice dripping with too-sweet sarcasm. “Don’t be a pussy, Wil, even if he’s not okay with it you can convince him. Probably. Plus, a tour never hurt anyone.”
“I’m not a pussy, fuck you gremlin,” Wilbur immediately bristles, being met only with Tommy’s boisterious laughter. It was infectious, causing such a big smile to spread over Wilbur’s face and making him laugh along softly. The laugh was dripping in honey and memories.
Wilbur hates that he couldn’t even laugh along with his brother without being reminded of the times of L’manberg. He always said it was his greatest achievement, greatest unfinished symphony, greatest shit-of-all-time, but was it really? All it had wreaked was chaos and destruction. Battles for a country that existed no longer. It was a country that exiled Tommy, one of the original founders of it.
Maybe L’manberg was not his greatest achievement, but Tommy instead.
Oh well. There was a time and a place for those thoughts (hint; a bar that Quackity undoubtedly had in this place, and well past midnight) and this was not either of those.
Wilbur allows himself to be yanked into the country that held one of his greatest rivals, and there was no telling how that rival would react. But there was nothing Wilbur enjoyed more than unpredictableness.
“So, so,” Tommy started again, words fumbly and stuttery in an overexcited manner. “There’s, like, a casino? And a big tower, Q called it the Space Needle or something, I think. There’s a strip club, but I’m not allowed in there. And the water in the big fountain over there,” he gestured in a flurry to the huge water fountain in front of them, “is so nice! I like to dip my feet in there when it’s particularly hot. Oh, oh, and– and, and, Quackity taught me how to preen my wings!” He exclaims happily.
Wilbur blinks. “Tommy, you grew wings?”
Tommy nodded, reaching behind himself – yanking something or the other, and then hummingbird wings were emerging, beautiful and red , so very red. Wilbur stared, and swallowed down the lump in his throat because this wasn’t about him. This was about his little brother and his wings which had finally grown in while Wilbur was dead, which he had a reason to hide, to tie back and bend painfully.
“Big Q says that I’m not supposed to tie them back like that, because it hurts the joints or whatever,” Tommy rambles, “But I think it’s just easier to walk around the SMP like that, you know. What with a lot of people not liking me. I can’t let just anyone see them. I’m safe in Las Nevadas, though! So I can have them out here, and in Kinoko,” he rambled and rambled.
Wilbur felt his heart slam in his chest and then drop down. Purely because someone (hint; Dream) had hurt his Tommy badly enough that he started tying his wings back. When did he even grow them? Was he left to suffer for days or even weeks alone in exile as they grew, tying them back during the growing process just to be able to keep them and living in fear whenever Dream found a stray red feather? Whenever Dream found his bedsheets bloody and full of little wisps of feathers?
“When– when did you grow them?” He managed to choke out, voice strangled. His own crow wings, much larger than Tommy’s, came to gently wrap around the blonde brother.
“Oh, um,” Tommy averts his eyes. “I think around exile. I can’t remember very well, but it doesn’t matter much,” he insisted, brushing off the topic. “I can fly! Big Q taught me to fly with them. Isn’t that cool?”
“That’s so cool,” Wilbur agreed, sniffling a tad and yanking his little brother into such a tight hug that Tommy wheezed, wings splaying out.
“Wil, Wil, I can’t fuckin’ breathe, dickhead,” Tommy squirmed – all that his words earned him was a slight loosening of Wilbur’s grip, but the hug continued. Tommy hugged back, finding himself melting into the contact despite the suddenness of it all.
When Wilbur was done with his little pitying-himself-over-not-witnessing-so-many-parts-of-his-brother’s-life fest, he sniffled and pulled back from the hug. “I’m so proud of you,” he blurted.
The words were a tad bit of a shock to Tommy, and so he couldn’t contain the huge smile that appeared on his face almost instantly. “You’re so sappy,” he accused, giggling. The giggle reminded Wilbur of Quackity.
“I’m not,” Wilbur insisted, pecking the top of his head. “I just love you. You’re my brother, is loving you a crime?” He teased, a fond grin on his face. Red eyes flicked over Tommy’s face, filled with so much love for his little brother that it made Tommy squirm and giggle again.
“Might as well be if you’re gonna be that fuckin’ sappy, dickhead. I hate you,” he attempted a scowl but failed rather miserably, and he couldn’t bring his words to have any venom. That earned him Wilbur’s laughter, soft and high-pitched and loving.
When they continued walking, they were both a tad more smiley and had a special bounce in their steps. Wilbur looked around in awe at all of Las Nevadas’ buildings, staring and staring as if his eyes couldn’t get enough of it. It was amazing; Quackity, the walking second place medal had made all this.
To be frank, it was beautiful.
When they walked into the casino, Quackity was not there yet. The casino did not close until late, late into the night, and apparently late was when Quackity opted to come by and, y’know, make people gamble away their entire lives. So Wilbur and Tommy busied themselves by just looking around, and opted to sit down on a cozy-looking couch after a little bit; it was only nine PM, there weren’t many people here yet. They were free to lounge.
With each passing minute, Wilbur found himself staring at the clock. With every word that left Tommy’s mouth, he found himself glancing back at the door. Until finally, the door opened.
“Hey, Tommy,” Quackity greeted as he walked past them, and then did a double take, whirling around harshly and suddenly. “Wilbur?” He asked incredulously. Tommy thought that he sounded almost the exact same as when Wilbur saw Las Nevadas for the first time.
Wilbur fucking Soot grinned, and Quackity let out a laugh, sharp and cold and unforgiving. For a moment, Wilbur thought he would be hospitable, friendly even; they hadn’t seen each other in a long while, after all. However, he found himself very wrong, and Tommy’s face plummeted at Quackity's next words.
“Get out of my fucking casino, Wilbur.”