Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“What would you know about that!? You're a ch–”

“A child!? Is that what you were going to say? I have been through a war, I am not a child!”

Arguments were common in Pogtopia. Sleep deprivation, paranoia, and stress don't mix well, especially when the one who insists on calling all the shots is one spilled ink bottle away from a public mental breakdown. 

Then, Wilbur had accidentally crumpled a paper of plans, and decided a good way to make itself feel better would be to ramble to his younger brother incoherently. Wilbur didn't even remember why they were arguing.

Heavy footsteps approached the small carved out room they were in—echoing slightly as they enter the space—that doesn't even get them to lower their volume, so a voice cut in, “You interrupted my beauty sleep, so quiet down. Some people have sleep schedules around here,” The pinkette grumbled.

Despite speaking of sleep as it approached midnight, he was completely ready for the day physically wise, but still looked a bit tired. As well as they could tell, as it's hard to decipher between their frustrated and fatigued expression. Likely a mix of both.

“Why are you always ruining things for me!?” Wilbur shrieked suddenly, then tugged on the ends of his hair and bounced on his heels like it would do when he was younger. “Why are you always trying to ruin things for me and Tommy, ruining things for us!” The slight hesitation before he added Tommy's name makes it clear that he wasn't talking about the argument itself.

“What are you talkin’ about? I stopped you screamin’ your head off at eleven at night?”

There was a stiff silence before Wilbur started rambling, so quick and slurred that it was almost completely incomprehensible.

“Tommy you're with me on this! Techno is ruining everything for us!” The boy in question looked between the twins with a slightly ajar mouth, and tries to think of something he could possibly say in response without triggering the brunette.

“Tommy! We were supposed to be together in all this! What the hell is wrong with you?” He hissed with gritted teeth—stained from cigarettes, and Tommy remembers a bright grin in their new country. He can't note the last time Wilbur smiled in the last few weeks— and stepped closer to the younger.

“Wil, can we just– can we just chill out for a sec?”

Techno watched with furrowed eyebrows. He knew Wilbur has been getting more antsy. But they wouldn't have expected him to talk to Tommy or all people like that. Usually he spoke with a gentle tone, or a teasing one, even a tired but no less fond voice. Nothing like this. 

He grabbed Wilbur’s shoulder and nudges it away before he can get any closer to the shorter. Not even a hard push, one that a younger would whine dramatically at, but Wilbur reacted like he had been stabbed through the chest.

The brunette looks at its identical twin with fury written all over its features, before it looked down. His eyes glinted with something unfamiliar, something that made Tommy's stomach churn with anxiousness. Mum always said Wilbur was smart, always willing to use anything he can to win, competitive, she would sigh fondly. Now Tommy wishes she wasn't so right.

His shaking, pale hand reached out quick enough that he nearly toppled over at the new weight of a pickaxe in his hands.

He raised it up quicker than he could see where he was aiming and let it fall down with the weight of his body.

He very quickly realized that it did not hit the intended target, and Techno had moved out of the way embarrassingly easy. Instead it was lodged into a crack in the stone wall—which, unknown to the others, was making rocks fall in other parts of the ravine.

Quackity furrowed his eyebrows, and watched a few baseball sized chunks of rocks hit the bottom of the ravine. He wasn't exactly a ravine expert, so he didn't think much of it, and turned off his communicator when another round of messages comes in from Schlatt.

Tubbo stays asleep at the hissing of lava moving but began to awaken. He looks up and rubbed his horn after a small rock hit it, glancing around. He got out of bed and began to get ready to go back to Manburg.

Niki barely even notices as she exits the ravine, only kicking a few rocks that she didn't remember seeing before as she walked aimlessly.

Wilbur gritted his teeth and tugged at the pickaxe again, seemingly it had intended to try once more.

Wilbur struggled to pull out the pickaxe in the stone, and used all the strength in his underweight, lanky body. He seemed to get more frustrated at every failed attempt, and mumbled to itself as it regained his grip on the handle. Tommy and Techno looked among each other, worried blue and tense red met.

Techno made a motion with his hand for Tommy to leave, and kept their eyes on his twin brother while he did so. He decided on taking care of the former president themself, he inhaled slowly and flipped their braid over his shoulder.

Tommy hesitated at doing what the older says, and bit his bottom lip as he looks back to Wilbur. He stalled leaving; he and Wilbur have always worked things out together. Arguments, issues, strategies, everything! It wouldn't be fair if he walked out on him this time.

There is an odd creaking and cracking sound that resonates through the ravine when the pickaxe is pulled out, Tommy opens his mouth to ask but doesn't even know what to say. What's that? Did you hear that? What could they say that would help? Wilbur heaves once he pulls it free, before his breath being caught in his throat at a boulder falling behind them into the lowest part of the ravine, along with the sound of splintering wood.

There is no warning before the ravine began to collapse, the sound of lightning and the power of a tsunami.

Wilbur vaguely noted that Techno dragged him and Tommy away from the falling rocks, against the wall where they were quickly getting trapped.

His head knocks against the wall and everything sounds like it's underwater. The darkness of it falling unconscious matched with the darkness of rocks blocking all light and shattering lanterns into a disorienting blur. Wilbur almost thought it was beautiful.

At some point he dipped into darkness in the arms of his brothers.

Death is cold, is what Wilbur first thought. 

Cold and stony. 

His body was uncomfortable against the flooring: smoothed out stone and random pebbles. His coat helped retain some of his warmth, but the Limbo its in seemed to suck all heat out of anything like a leech. Except an oddly warm part on its wrist.

That seemed like a fitting punishment for causing all of this. To suffer in the same experience he died in.

“His– he has a heartbeat, he's alive! Holy shit we're alive!” “Thank Prime.” Ah. Apparently not. The warmth—a hand? Someone's fingers? Tommy's fingers, his brain, which felt like it's enveloped in a heavy fog, supplied—moved away and Wilbur silently mourned its loss. 

The brunette opens his eyes. Then again. A third time. Has he gone blind? 

It fumbled to reach at his face with too-heavy hands. His glasses were there, now slightly scratched and cracked, and he pried them off to feel around his eyes. Nothing covered them, not any injury that would warrant the unfamiliar complete darkness that shrouded its sight.

“I-I’m blind.” Wilbur breathed hoarsely as he claws at his eyes, and if it could see, then he would imagine the other two had furrowed their eyebrows nearly in sync.

“What?” Tommy questioned, and fumbled to hold Wilbur's arm for comfort.

“I can't see. It's– it's all dark.”

“No, no, no. It's dark in here, Wil, you're fine.” His drawling voice stood out abruptly from the other's British accents, and Wilbur tried to estimate where both of his brothers are. Tommy is right next to him, shoulder to shoulder, and judged by the direction of Techno's voice, they were only a few feet away.

In here? In where? Oh Prime they were still in the ravine, aren't they?

His throat felt like it's closing up. He felt like he's going to vomit; he managed to only gag silently and swallow down bile. They were trapped. In that stupid little carved out room that was supposed to be a storage room. They're stuck. The ravine collapsed. What was supposed to be their safe place, their home, collapsed into the ground like it didn't even matter. So easily.

“Wil, deep breaths, alright?” Techno soothed with a hand on the younger’s back, before they quietly added, “You're gonna waste our oxygen.”

Deep breaths. That's easy. In and out. Inhale and exhale.

In— “Did– did the whole ravine come down?”

Out— “Is Tubbo alright!? He was here and I don't know if he left yet!”

In—“Are they coming to get us?”

Out—“Is anyone hurt?”

“Is anyone alive?” 

“That's enough, Tommy. It's not doing us any good to panic.” Techno’s voice reminded Wilbur to breathe, and another inhale felt like cool water to his lungs.

Wilbur fumbled around to see what they have. The pickaxe is broken and therefore useless, his hands first touch the split wooden handle—it could kill someone with this, a quiet thought says. He winced at the small spike of pain as it touched broken glass, likely a lantern that shattered over them as the rocks fell. A few pebbles. A crinkled piece of paper that served them no use in the deep swallowing darkness. Nothing much. No food. No matches. He left its communicator in his room and he knows Techno did as well, he doesn't bother to ask but guessed Tubbo has—had—Tommy's.

“It's… it's late, we should get to sleep. People will be here by the time we wake up, or at least be tryin’ to get us out.” Wilbur nodded at his brother's words, but he still couldn't get the thought of them running out of oxygen out of his head. It would've been less of a worry with one less person. One less waste of space, of oxygen, of warmth.

Tommy's head leaned against the brunette’s shoulder, he seemed to leech any heat out of his body the boy—the boy, not the man, only a boy—can. Wilbur felt childish as he cuddled close to his older twin—if asked he would just talk about how piglins have higher body temperatures—but the pinkette didn't complain. None of them say anything really. An uncomfortable silence.

He let Tommy's shaking, small breaths lull him into sleep. He dreamt of nothing at all. He took it as a mercy.

Chapter Text

Wilbur prayed he died. He prayed to its mother that he's died and all their corpses were comfortable together as brothers. He prayed that Tommy and Techno could take his coat to use as a blanket when they're cold. It prayed that when his body began to rot it wouldn't disturb them.

It knew he was alive. He felt his heartbeat, faint and steady—Tommy’s against his shoulder, unable to feel Techno's but knew it was there. He felt his breathing, the way its chest rose and fell—Tommy’s quiet exhales, Techno's turned to huffs as they passed by his tusks.

It knew it was alive, yet he couldn't help but pray he wasn't.

“Wilbur?” Tommy whispered, and gripped the brunette's coat tighter. He could almost pretend it's only dark because the power went out due to a thunderstorm, and Tommy was clinging to him because he had a nightmare. 

“Wilbur, what are we going to do?” Such a simple question, someone would say to a broken glass or when asking about dinner plans. Not to slowly dying in a crevice of a fallen ravine.

“What do you mean?” 

“We can't just sit here!”

It sighed. “That’s the only thing we can do, Toms. The pickaxe is useless, we have no food, the lantern is broken, what are we supposed to do?” Wilbur forced his voice to calm down, then sighed deeply.

“Wil, you can only survive four days without water.” He murmured. The meaning is clear. They're going to die soon.

Wilbur knew he'd die a bit earlier. He hasn't drank anything in Prime-knows how long. It ate a potato last night. Tommy hopefully was well-fed, he deserves it.

A grumbled noise and the lash of his twin's tail alerts him of the other waking up. If he could see Wilbur would imagine they had bed-head and tired eyes, a familiar sight of his childhood.

He felt Techno stiffen, like he nearly forgot where they were for a precious moment in waking up. Wilbur almost felt empathetic. Almost. 

Tommy sighed next to him, and almost comically, the twins exhaled to mimic the younger. Perhaps a family trait. Wilbur doesn't remember much of the family home when he was younger, so the brunette is unsure.

“What does everyone have in their pockets, bags, everything.” Techno asked, and there were the sounds of clothing shuffling.

A box of cigarettes, though no lighter, Quackity took his the last time they smoked—a part of him is happy that who he loved to pretend was his lover would have something to remember him by. Crumpled paper. A pen. Those are the items that carry his legacy.

“I don't have anything useful.” Tommy murmured, and Techno hummed in response. 

“I have a dagger, but it wouldn't have enough strength, plus the rocks would collapse on us if I tried to break through.”

They were helpless. 

Wilbur broke out of his thoughts of just one less person by the sound of Techno's hair being let down from a low ponytail. The weight of long, wavy strands settled against his shoulder.

The brunette hesitated before it fumbled to locate Techno's hair. He can die beautiful. They flinched when Wilbur initially split his hair into thirds, but quietly leaned closer to their twin.

It's easy, subconscious almost. One chunk goes under, next goes over. Over, under, again and again. It reminded him of younger years, when before school, violin practices or rehearsals Wilbur would braid Techno's hair on one of their beds.

He reached the end of the pinkette’s hair before it realized, caught up in thought of simpler times, and he tied the band around the end. 

Wilbur pretended not to notice how Tommy's hands brushed over the bottom of his curls. Maybe he felt the knots and didn't think he could. He might've forgotten how.

“Tommy. You cross the hair over each other.” Techno mumbled quietly, like he knew what Tommy was doing.

The blonde tried again, hands shaky and unsure. Wilbur didn't say anything when his hands tugged on his hair unintentionally or pulled on a knot. It probably didn't look the best, but it's not like he could see anyways, so it wouldn't matter.

“See? Easy.” Techno hummed approvingly. 

Wilbur bit back the urge to snap how everything is easy for him. It's always been. Wilbur tried his damn hardest and Techno was praised for completing it all too easily.

There is a brief flash of the handle of the axe in his mind, but he smothered it by interlocking his hands with Tommy's.

“Just keep practicing and you'll get better.” He soothed, and squeezed his younger brother's hand.

He didn't know why he was so upset about braiding hair of all things, but it was. 

It's been a while. They had slept three times but time blurred both so quickly and so, so slowly that he didn't know how long it was. 

They had all stopped complaining about hunger or thirst, they had settled on knowing that nothing can fix it. The air felt heavy and Wilbur was jittery from being around people continuously for this long.

Tommy had gotten worse. Wilbur hears him crying sometimes at night. Sometimes the L’Manburg anthem is hummed, shaky and out of tune in some parts, but his. The older also swore it hears him talking to himself sometimes.

Techno is as horribly static as ever. He's snapped at people a bit more, but no other changes. They didn't touched the braid one bit, and neither did Wilbur.

Wilbur was around the jagged, wooden handle of the axe more. He could've kill one of the others if he didn't kill himself first.

“Just kill me.” It's so quiet the former president barely even hears it itself.

“What?” Tommy and Techno said in sync. Though it carried different tones, Tommy's is fear, Techno's is confusion.

“I need you to kill me,” His voice raised in volume, even though his dry throat ached, “You– Tommy, you said that you can only survive about four days without water. You can drink my blood, eat my body if you need. I deserve it.” He hissed, holding onto the axe handle closely, even if it didn't know if his brothers knew he had it.

Wilbur ignored the sound of Tommy gagging and continued talking, “You’ll last longer, I won't be using the oxygen. I need to die.”

“Wilbur, you… Wilbur you can't–” Tommy's voice broke, and Wilbur felt his heart sink to his stomach hearing a small sniffle from his younger brother.

Techno said nothing. Maybe he was thinking of something to say, maybe he couldn't say anything at all. 

There was no need for any hesitation before Wilbur plunged the handle into his chest.

It hurt.

It hurt so bad. 

The handle was jagged and splintered and it didn't go through smoothly the first try. 

Wilbur didn't bother to listen to what his brothers say, or care for what they did. Because it was dying and he'll die no matter what they do.

It's warm. His chest was pleasantly warm and Wilbur makes a cracked, shaky hum at the feeling.

He wanted to lay down.

He was tired and he deserved to die for a long, long time.

He laid down and didn't get back up.