this world we have built is burning down around us | Dream SMP Time Travel Fic

the world still turns with everyone in it

"This is just as fucking pog as the first time I saw it," was the first thing Theseus said as Sam dropped open the secret door, the key having been revised from a simple button test to the complicated mechanics of measuring the change in density of a section of dirt after being hoed. It hadn't lost any of its surreality, in Theseus's very professional opinion, though he couldn't say he knew much about the "how"s of it, even still.

Sam laughed, abrupt in nature but no less sincerely pleased despite it. "Well, I'm glad to hear it. It'd be pretty embarrassing to get shown up by another version of myself, future or not."

"Well, I can show up my past self any day," Theseus argued, smile sharp and mischievously smug just as Tommy's would be every day of the week. The sight made Sam ache. "So, really, even if you did, Big Man, that isn't on you. Ya' know, 'cause inferiority and all that—"

"Who are you calling inferior?!" Sam didn't dare cross the rushing river without looking ahead and covering his tracks; he lightened his tone, smiled as he said it, and didn't even try to withhold a fond chuckle to keep up his, admittedly poor, act of offense. "Maybe I'm just a bit more cultured later. What would you know?"

Theseus grinned, shaking his head as he glanced around, the door lifting to shut behind them. "Maybe I wouldn't. I never took you up on your offer—maybe you were a wrongen."

Sam returned the boy's joviality, brushing the dark wonderings the innocent remark brought forth aside (what good would it do to question how well he had fared in a time that no longer mattered? Wilbur, Tubbo, nearly everyone, and Tommy had been only one out of many to suffer; Sam couldn't help imagining perhaps he would have come to hurt Tommy, too). "Or maybe I am better than my future self?"

"Well, you built me a room, I see." Theseus shuffled over to it, eyes roaming on the door that contained a sign with his name carved into its wood, before capturing Sam's gaze again. "Most of this is the same, but this is certainly a good change, innit? Having me as a roommate is an honor!"

And Sam could laugh along, play into the joke, even mock the boy and lightheartedly argue otherwise, but he'd seen the shake of Theseus's hands, the dull gaze that would light up from the warm glow of lava, the bittersweet stretch of lips and scarred skin, and he could only respond with more honesty than the blond had possibly ever received.

"It feels like one," he agreed, meeting the surprised flicker of eyes, a moment of vulnerability from a child soldier who wore armor Tommy used to forego under his cloak and bore scars Tommy used to bare proudly like they were cracks that could shatter him if prodded just a little less gently than needed.

(Because what wasn't an honor about having Theseus still here after all the evidence that told a story of death that should've been inevitable, that he was still breathing even though he himself had already decided death was the best escape?)

Theseus scowled, then, surprise and toothy grin washed away by an impressive mask of distain and huffy disgust. "Agh, don't get mushy with me, Big S! Tubbo's clingy enough!"

Sam hummed, a small laugh slipping through the muted amusement. "But Eret got to—"

"We speak nothing of that!" Theseus spat, and Sam was thankful to hear no true spite or anger in the younger's sharp words. "I'll egg your base, too, bitch!"

"You live here, too."

"If I can live in a dirt mound, I can live with some egg yolk and chickens, bitch."

Sam snorted, and Theseus was on him in moments, curses and shouts ringing about the room as his face burned a bright red. "What're you laughing about, bitch!? Oi, pussy! Quit your laughing! Shut the hell up, dickhead!"