Chapter 27

131. (credit to Firehedgehog and ori)

"Are we sure she's going to fall for it?"

"Shh," Tommy hissed, eyes narrowed. Dream fell silent and sunk a little lower into the bushes they were hiding in.

In the distance, Niki Nihachu circled the chest they had left in front of her bakery, perplexed and slightly suspicious. The loopers watched with bated breath as she tested the latch, then took a step back. Eventually, her curiosity won out.

She opened the chest, and was promptly buried under a wave of multicolored keys. The two loopers observing her winced in tandem.

"Well," Dream said. "Now we know the trap works. By the way, why keys?"

"Ni-key."

Dream sat there for a moment, trying to comprehend what he'd heard. Then he sighed. "Is this what we're going to be doing for the rest of this loop?"

"Dream, big man, I have a hitlist."

~~~

"Can I ask where you got all these tubs?"

"No."

"Okay." Dream flipped a smaller tub over and slid it into the place where Tubbo's nightstand used to occupy. "You know, he's going to be pissed when he comes home and finds all his furniture replaced with tubs."

"Or he might find it funny. You never know with Tubbo."

Dream sighed. "Are you sure this is a good idea? We're painting a huge target on our backs here, and you know how Tubbo is when we piss him off."

"We'll just have to take that risk. Tubbo's name is too punny not to be taken advantage of."

"Hmm. If we get murdered, I'm blaming you."

Tommy just cackled as he wrenched Tubbo's sink out of the floor.

~~~

"Dream. My friend. My fellow traumatized time-looper. Where the fuck did you get all of those."

Dream hummed as he dumped another box's worth of burrs on Wilbur's coat. Wilbur was going to be in for a nasty surprise when he put it on the next morning. "Wouldn't you like to know," was all he said.

Tommy rolled his eyes. "Fine, you bastard. Keep your fucking secrets."

"I will!" Dream finished up with the burrs, tossed the empty box aside, and began filling the pockets with glitter. Tommy stared at him for a long moment, then scowled.

"I'll figure out where you get your glitter one day."

"I'd like to see you try."

~~~

Foolish stared at the stack of papers sitting innocuously in the center of his temple. It had been weighed down with a rock, preventing the wind from carrying it away. He approached, removed the rock, and picked up the first page.

The top of the sheet declared itself to be "Calculus Exam: Basics of Integration". His name was scribbled in the corner, right next to the big red "0/100, FAIL".

"Huh," he said, and incinerated the stack with a bolt of lightning. After all, if there was one thing he'd learned in all his years of living, it was that calculus deserved to burn in hell.

~~~

World Chat

: guys

: help

: ???

: I'm trapped in a box

: I can't get out

: Where?

: 61.72158/14.51883/4.46

: OooOoOO Jack trapped ina box???

: like a jack in a box????

: I am going to murder you

: ok

: boomer

: IM NOT EVEN THAT OLD

: ok boomer

: .

: te betrayal

: niki how could you

: :D

~~~

"Sapnap, mi amigo. What the fuck did we do last night?"

Sapnap scowled, shifting from where he was sitting on his hands. "How the fuck would I know? I just woke up with this tattoo--"

"And I woke up in a duck onesie!" Quackity gestured downwards at the aforementioned duck onesie. "Where the fuck did they even get this?!"

"At least you have control over your body!" Sapnap jerked one hand up, scowling as his fingers began snapping. He stuffed it back under his leg, forcing it to stay still. "I can't stop snapping!"

"A duck onesie," Quackity repeated, rubbing his fuzzy hands together. He paused, brows furrowing. "Wait, this is. . . kinda soft, actually. I might keep it."

"Great. Good for you. Mind giving me a hand here?"

Quackity rolled his eyes and shuffled over to squint at Sapnap's new tattoo. "Huh. Looks like an Enchantment."

"Oh really? I never could've guessed!"

Quackity snorted. "It's a henna tattoo. It'll wear off in a few days."

Sapnap stared at him. "So I'm going to keep snapping for a few days?"

"Probably."

". . . Fuck."

~~~

Tommy sighed, tapping the next names on their list. Dream looked up from where he was poring over his own copy, raising an eyebrow.

"Something wrong?"

"Sam, Punz, and Ponk." he grumbled. "They're just. . . how the fuck do you make a pun out of those names?"

Dream hummed. "Well. . . Sam's communicator tag is already a pun - 'Awesamdude', if I'm remembering it right - so we could try whipping something up with that."

"Maybe spray-painting the worst pun we can think of on his chestplate?"

"Mm. Or we could paint 'Pawesamdude' on his armor and glue cat ears to his head."

Tommy's pen flew over the page, recording the words. Several miles away, Sam felt a chill go down his spine. "Perfect. And then Punz and Ponk?"

"Punz. . . puns. We could bribe everyone to specifically write his name as 'puns', like with an S, in messages. Oh, and change the engravings on his weapons! He puts his name in those."

"Puns," Tommy snickered. He scribbled some more. "And Ponk?"

Dream winced. ". . . You know, it might not be a good idea to mess with Ponk."

"What? Why?"

"Two words. Lemon juice."

Both loopers paused, gazes drifting into thousand-yard stares as they recalled Ponk's wrath. Tommy shuddered. "Yeah, no. We'll just. . . leave him be."

"Mm. Probably for the best."

In the distance, there was an explosion. An enraged scream rose above the inferno, its origin easily identifiable as one Tubbo Underscore.

"TOMMYINNIT! WHERE THE FUCK IS MY COUCH?!"

Tommy and Dream glanced at each other.

"Run?"

"Run."

132. (credit to Xela_M)

Tommy took a deep, deep breath. "Friends, Comrades," he began in a deep, mournful voice, "We are here today. . . because someone couldn't stay alive."

Everyone in the audience nodded with grave expressions, though some had to smother 'coughs' behind handkerchiefs. Tubbo let out what could best be considered a mangled sob, because it was definitely not a laugh, no siree. This was a very serious event.

"It is with great sorrow," Tommy continued, "that we must gather to commemorate the life of our leader, our friend, our comrade, Wilbur Soot--"

"I'M NOT DEAD, YOU FUCKERS!"

"--who died as he lived, being a little bitch." Tommy wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, ignoring Dream, who appeared to be choking on his lungs in the front row. "President Soot was such a great man, an inspiring figure to all of us. May our heartfelt eulogies--"

"I am literally right here--"

"--do justice to his magnificent character--"

"Stop pretending you can't hear me!"

"--and embody his best virtues." Tommy sighed. "A good man, he was. The greatest bastard of them all."

"Oh for the love of--" Wilbur slammed a palm against the obsidian box he was trapped in. "Will you just let me out?!"

"Sometimes I think I can still hear his voice."

"Because I'm not dead!"

"With that being said, we will now commence this memorial service," Tommy announced with a flourish. "Niki Nihachu will be the first to speak."

Niki managed to wrestle her chortle into a sniff as she stepped onto the platform. Tommy stepped aside, allowing her to take over the podium. "Wilbur Soot was a great man," she began. "With a big heart and glorious dreams of the future, and though he wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer--"

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?!"

"--he only had the best intentions for our wondrous country."

"Drugs!" someone called from the crowd. It sounded suspiciously like Tubbo.

"The best intentions," Niki repeated, though her eyes shone with mirth. "It is a shame that he met his demise before he could see his dreams play out."

Wilbur groaned. "I hate all of you."

"In his stead, we, the people of L'Manberg, will carry his dream for him." Niki placed a hand over her heart and took a deep breath so she wouldn't start laughing. "As a proud citizen of this land, I vow to make L'Manberg the country Wilbur wanted it to be." She bowed her head. "Wilbur, if you're watching over us. . . I hope I can make you proud."

"Oh yes, I am definitely watching over you because-- you know what? This isn't worth it. Fuck this. Fuck all of you."

Niki stepped back from the podium, shoulders shaking with silent "sobs". Tommy swooped in before her tearful façade could break. "Thank you, Niki," he simpered. "A truly moving eulogy. I'm sure Wilbur would be greatly touched by your public speaking skills if he was here."

"I will murder you," Wilbur promised darkly. "I will go into your house while you're asleep and smother you with your own pillow."

"And the next speaker will be Fundy," Tommy declared, unperturbed by the threats. Fundy shuffled up to the front, carefully not looking in Wilbur's direction.

"Wilbur was an amazing leader," he started. "But more than that, he was an amazing father."

Wilbur's angry muttering was cut off with a sharp inhale.

"He raised me, through the good times and the bad. He helped me become the person I am today, and nobody will ever be able to replace him."

"Oh," Wilbur whispered. "Fundy. . ."

"So I want to honor his memory." Fundy knitted his fingers in the fabric of his suit. "I want to carry on his legacy, to pass the story of his life down through the ages, both the good times and the bad--"

Wilbur went from teary-eyed to indignant in an instant. "Fundy Soot, I forbid you--"

"--but. . . his life story is too complicated and difficult to retell."

"Thank Prime."

"So instead I've compiled a list of all the embarrassing things I've seen him do! Plus some extra stories from Tommy." He pulled out a book, opened it to the first page, and cleared his throat. "Okay. First of all, when I was three, my dad tried to show me that sand was edible--"

Wilbur began banging his head against the obsidian.

133. (inspired by AlbiNora)

Sapnap was very confused. Emphasis on the very.

He'd stepped onto the beach to see Tommy and Dream bantering beside a smoking crater. Well, it was less banter and more Dream messing with Tommy while the kid squawked like an angry chicken, so Sapnap stepped in and told Dream to knock it off. Then he joked that it was pretty funny, and Tommy puffed up, a flurry of indignant insults on his tongue--

--only to go bone-white, trip over his own feet, and land heavily in the grass.

"Oh shit," he wheezed, tangling his fingers in his hair. "Oh shit."

Dream, meanwhile, took five large strides away and began stripping away his armor. "Wha-- Dream?" Sapnap asked, because nobody just-- took off their armor on this server. Dream ignored him as he shrugged his cloak off, then proceeded to produce the lime-green hoodie he hadn't worn in ages and. . . stuck his legs into the sleeves.

"Dream?" Bad called. He came to a stop beside Sapnap, eyeing with concern. "What are you doing?"

Dream, by now, had managed to pull the hoodie over his head and was in the process of stuffing his left arm in as well. He paused, reached up, and removed his mask, eliciting a startled yelp from Bad and a sharp inhale from Sapnap. Then he shoved his right arm into the hoodie sleeve and waddled over to Tommy (who, now that Sapnap was paying attention, appeared to be having a fucking panic attack), and said with no inflection whatsoever, "Look, I'm a crab."

Tommy choked, head whipping up. A wheezing laugh slipped between his rapid breaths. Dream tried to balance on one leg, fell over, and rolled.

"What the fuck," was Sapnap's eloquent comment.

"Language!" Bad scolded on autopilot, though his eyes had widened to the size of dinner plates.

"Help," Dream deadpanned, now on his back and waving his leg-arm hoodie sleeves in the air like an upended turtle. "I've fallen and I can't get up."

"Drea-- Prime, Dream--" Tommy spluttered, his hands relaxing from their death grip in his hair. "That was-- that was terrible."

"I try," Dream said. "Mind giving me a hand?"

"Gimme a minute," Tommy rasped. He took a few grounding breaths, then uncurled and crawled over to roll Dream onto his feet.

"Thank you," Dream said, before he took one step and faceplanted in the grass. Tommy began cackling.

Sapnap blinked, as though that would break him out of whatever strange dream he'd fallen into. "Are you all high?"

"No!" Bad protested, at the same time that Tommy said, "Maybe."

"We aren't," Dream muttered through a mouthful of dirt. He sat up, spat it out, and glanced sidelong at Tommy. "I mean, are we sure that this is real and the loops haven't been one big drug-induced hallucination?"

"Reality could be one big drug-induced hallucination."

"Thanks, Tommy. I really needed to hear that."

"You're welcome."

Dream tried to kick Tommy with one of his leg-arms. He missed and fell on his back again.

"I despise you," he told the sky.

"Love you too, big D."

". . . I think they're high," Sapnap whispered to Bad. "Should we. . . I dunno, grab Tommy and run? He doesn't seem to be doing too great--"

"I can hear you," Dream grumbled. He fixed them with an upside-down glare. "And for your information, Tommy is fine--"

"I'm really not."

"--Tommy is going to be fine--"

"That's a fucking lie."

Dream took a deep breath. ". . . Tommy is not fine, but there's nothing you can do about it."

"I meaaaaan. . . I'd feel a lot better if we covered this shitty beach with cobblestone towe--"

"No."

"Bitch."

"Child."

"I'm older than Philza Minecraft."

"And I'm older than you. Checkmate." Dream rolled onto his side and made a valiant attempt at standing up. "Mind helping me up?"

"Yes, actually. Lay there and starve."

Bad hesitantly offered a hand to Dream. Dream stared at it.

"I can't grab your hand," he said. "You can just. . . turn me over, or something. With your foot."

"Wha-- Dream, I'm not kicking you!"

"And I'm not pulling my hands out of these sleeves," Dream retorted. "Kick me, it's not like you can hurt me."

"Just leave 'im," Tommy suggested. He crawled to his feet and stood there for a moment, swaying. Sapnap hurried forward and grabbed his arm before he could fall into the hole. Meanwhile, Dream, with Bad's assistance, had gotten to his. . . feet? Hands? And shuffled over to join them.

"How long do you think I can do this?" he wondered.

"I bet a custom potion that your spine snaps before the loop ends."

"Deal."

134.

Philza narrowed his eyes at the oblong box. It sat innocently on his front porch, covered with a light dusting of snow. Strangely enough, there were no footprints leading towards or away from it.

He scanned the horizon. There was nobody in sight. "Techno?" he called, although it was unlikely that the box was from the piglin hybrid. As expected, there was no reply.

Philza huffed, deliberated for another minute, then dragged the box into the house. Nobody on this server had demonstrated the ability to trap an object yet, so he was pretty sure that it wasn't going to blow up if he opened it. That being said, it was better to be safe than sorry.

He sliced the ties binding the box shut with one swipe of his sword, then raised his shield and carefully levered the box open with the tip of his blade. The lid fell away with a clunk, and when nothing burst out of the container, Philza shuffled over to get a closer look.

The inside of the box was lined with foam, nestled around a mass of. . . something. Philza poked at it, and when it didn't slice his fingers off, he extricated it from its padding and laid it down on the floor. It seemed to unfold a bit, so he pulled it further, letting it unfurl to its full size.

"Oh," he whispered.

It was a prosthetic. A prosthetic wing. Philza sunk to his knees, reaching blindly back to grasp his burnt feathers.

In all the years of his life, he'd never seen a prosthetic this advanced. It had clearly been made with him in mind - he could recognize the curve and shape of the feathers, so similar to his destroyed wing that his heart ached at the sight of it. Sloe-black feathers had been painstakingly inlaid into the hollow netherite frame. The prosthetic gleamed with a purple sheen as he shifted it this way and that, and when he looked closely, he could see tiny runes carved into each rachis. The entire thing was lighter than it should have been, layered with Feather Falling, Efficiency, Mending, Unbreaking, and other enchantments that Philza had never seen before.

Philza blinked as salt bloomed across his tongue. He touched his face, surprised to feel tears. He should be overjoyed. He was overjoyed. He finally had a chance to regain what he'd lost, to reclaim the freedom he craved. And yet. . .

He'd murdered his own son, cradled him in his arms as his lifeblood pooled around his knees. His flight was the price he paid for his sin. He should have refused, should have hugged Wilbur and stopped him before-- before that, but he hadn't and he'd run his own son through with the sword he still wielded and fuck did he regret it every day. His wing was nothing compared to the pain that tore at his heart day in and day out. He didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve the chance to leap, to soar, to join his flock as they skimmed across the clouds. He deserved this pain, this suffering, because it was only a fraction of what Wilbur had gone through after he'd--

"Phil?"

Philza jerked, head snapping up. Technoblade stood in the doorway, face creased with concern.

"Phil?" he repeated. "I thought I heard you callin' me, are you alright?"

An incredulous noise rose in his throat, spiraling out as a strangled sob. Technoblade took a step into the house, his arms twitching like he wanted to hug Philza but wasn't quite sure how to do it. "Phil, what's wrong? Why're you. . ." his gaze landed on the prosthetic. "Oh."

"Oh," Philza echoed. His hands were shaking. Why were his hands shaking?

"Well, that's--" Technoblade cleared his throat. "--was not expecting to see. That. Okay. This is-- Phil, this is great. This is amazing. I'm-- assumin' that prosthetic works, you can fly again-- Phil, why are you cryin'? This is-- this is good, right--"

"But Wilbur," Philza blurted. "I-- I can't."

". . . I'm not followin' your train of thought here," Technoblade admitted. He shuffled around the box and knelt down beside the prosthetic. "You've got a prosthetic, Phil, don't you want to put it on, and, I dunno, fly? What's it got to do with Wilbur?"

"I killed him," Philza said. "I don't deserve to fly again."

Technoblade was silent for five long seconds. At last, he sighed, glancing off to the side. "I'm not good at this," he muttered, then took a deep breath. "Phil, Wilbur. . . wouldn't have wanted you to do this to yourself. He. . . asked to be killed. He made his choice."

"I could have helped him."

"You could've," Technoblade agreed, and Philza flinched like he'd been struck. "That being said, torturin' yourself isn't gonna bring Wilbur back. What's done is done. You have an opportunity to fly again. Take it. Let yourself be happy."

Philza chewed on the inside of his cheek. "But. . . it's not fair."

"What?"

"I get to heal, to have a second chance, but-- Wilbur. . ."

"What's done is done," Technoblade repeated firmly. "Phil, I know that it's tearin' you apart inside, but. . . you deserve a chance to heal, too. You came to this server expectin' a reunion and had to kill him instead. You didn't ask for that, and it wasn't fair for him to put that on you."

"But I still did it. I still--"

"Phil. Look at me."

Philza looked up. Technoblade glowered at him, more exasperated than angry.

"Philza Minecraft. Did you drive Wilbur to insanity?"

". . . No."

"And what did?"

"L-- L'Manberg."

"Right. Then why are you--"

"Because L'Manberg drove him insane, but I still fucking killed him, Techno! What the fuck is so hard to understand about that?!"

Technoblade stood firm in the face of his misplaced fury. "And I saw him spiralin', Phil. I was with him for months and I didn't do anything."

"He wasn't your responsibility--"

"And he wasn't yours either."

"I'm his father--"

"He wasn't a kid. He understood the consequences and he made his choice."

"I failed him--"

"And so did I, and a lot of other people. Phil." Technoblade reached over the prosthetic and put his hands on Philza's shoulders. "You can't keep doing this to yourself."

Philza looked away.

". . . And besides, I don't think your Chat would be very happy if you just threw away their gift."

Philza startled. "Chat? What've they got to do with this?"

Technoblade held up a card, likely taken from the box. Philza took it from him, flipping it open. The message appeared to have been written by two different people, with varying styles of chicken scratch that became legible only if he tilted the card about 23 degrees clockwise and squinted a bit.

Hello old man Philza,

Your flock of menaces creepy sentient flesh-eating birds commissioned us to make this for you. We hope you like it. :)

- The Mechanics : respwaned ok

: did you get out

: are u ol

: *ok?

Private Messaging: Tubbo

: tommy, where are you?

: can we talk?

Without thinking, Tommy threw his communicator across the room. It hit the far wall and clattered to the floor.

"Fuck fuck fuck," he hissed, scrambling over and scooping it up. A quick scan revealed no damage. He stood there for a moment, just breathing, then looked down at the screen again.

Tubbo's messages were swept aside. He could deal with those later. Right now, he needed to think.

This loop was spinning out of control. The lines between acting and genuine emotion were blurring. It would be dangerous to let things continue, and if Tommy said something right here, right now, Dream would drop it. Then they could fake their deaths and try their hand at another cottagecore arc.

The thing was, Dream hadn't said anything yet. If Tommy had crossed a line, he would have spoken up. Instead, Dream had gone with Tommy's plan, even when both of them strayed into dangerous territory. He'd thrown away a life for the act.

And. . . Tommy wasn't breaking any of the rules. He hadn't killed any of the non-loopers, and even if he was causing them 'extreme emotional distress' or whatever fancy bullshit it was called, anything that happened this loop would disappear in the next. There were no consequences save for the mental effects it would have on the loopers - and Dream was fine, so Tommy had to be fine too. Besides, this wasn't the final decision. If shit really hit the fan, they could easily back out.

Tommy took a deep breath and made up his mind.

Private Messaging: Dream

: all good, pearled awy before they could attack

: whatr ur plans for the rest otfhis loop?

: bc I got a couple ideas

Loop Notes

131. There are very few people that both loopers hold a healthy amount of fear for. Tubbo and Ponk are two of them.

133. He stayed a hoodie monster for the rest of the loop. . . including the lore bits. Thankfully for his spine, it was a short loop. Technoblade was very disturbed, though, when Dream showed up Like That to interrogate him about the whereabouts of Tommy.

134. Chat (with some creative potion-work) provided the feathers. Tommy built the frame with measurements taken from previous iterations of Philza and blueprints from Ponk. Dream added the enchantments. It took several loops' worth of trial and error, but the end result was definitely worth it.