absence | bench trio (lore)

eleven

this was painful to write not only because its sad to think about but im worried its cheesy😭

Tommy screamed as he clutched the body closer to him. Tighter. He hugged him, but it felt like he was holding a dead weight. There was no soul left in what was this shell of Tubbo. Tommy lost it, it felt like his insides were tearing themselves apart as tears covered his face and his throat burned from painful screams. Ranboo sobbed and looked over at the only thing he had left.

"Tommy, I-" He choked, and Tommy reached over and wrapped his arms around him. They cried together, because they both shared that aching. They shared the same loss and they shared the same pain but they had each other. Ranboo placed a hand on the back of Tommy's head as the blonde cried into his shoulder, murmuring muffled words into the crook of his neck.

"I- I- f-ck!" Tommy exclaimed. "That kid, Ranboo- he was my best friend, we- we had so much left- I let- I let him die, he died right there- Techno was right there-" he stammered. "He shot him and I was- I was right there! I stood th-there and watched and I did- I did nothing!" He said, and he let out another sob. Ranboo held him, silently crying.

"I loved him too, Tommy, but he's..." Ranboo cried. He tried to search for a positive, but there seemed to be none. Tommy had lost a brother and Ranboo had lost a husband. Was there even a positive at all? Would he ever be happy again? If he ever did heal, it would never be entirely. He would always have those lost memories, those lost opportunities that Tubbo had so many of, and those lost people.

"You know d-mn well there's no 'but'." Tommy said, and he couldn't have been more correct. "He's gone and he had so much more to give and I stood there. I f-cking stood there and did- I did nothing!" His sob turned into a cough and it sounded like his lungs were on fire. "He had so much left to say, so much left to offer- f-ck!" He shouted, banging his fist on Ranboo's chest weakly. "F-ck..."

Suddenly, Ranboo felt a burning sensation in his gut and an overwhelming rush of protectiveness. He held Tommy a little tighter.

"He loves you too, Tommy. I got you, it's alright..." he said. "It's not your fault, it's theirs." Ranboo suddenly remembered who he was addressing and looked up from Tommy's shoulder. Wilbur stood there, frozen to the ground. His expression was unreadable. It was fear, and anger, and guilt and numb all at the same time. Tommy slowly turned around to see what he was looking at. Then he felt the younger's muscles tense up.

"You. You motherf-cker," he muttered, and his words stung. "You never even cared about him! You watched him die and you didn't even care!" Tommy said, tears of anger streaking his face. "You don't even feel the slightest bit guilty-!" His voice cracked out painfully, turning to a sad whisper- "You never even cared, did you?" But Tommy couldn't have been more wrong. 

Tubbo made Wilbur the happiest he could have ever been. He brought contagious giggles and an unmistakable light wherever he went, and he had still never said a cruel word to Wil after all he had done to those Tubbo loved. The boy was forgiving, and he was loyal, and Wilbur thought maybe this had happened to him because the cruel world couldn't handle a pure soul like his. Tubbo was a better person than Wilbur could ever pretend to be, and now Tubbo was gone. Then Technoblade walked up behind him, tilting his head. Not a sliver of remorse showed in his eyes.

Tommy felt his chest constrict. "Techno-" He opened his mouth to say more, perhaps to curse him out, or maybe to just ask him why, but nothing came out. His lungs stopped working and his heart felt like it had been stabbed vigorously- but he couldn't compare what he was feeling to death- not after what just happened.

But grief is pretty d-mn close.

"He was seventeen." He choked, and his voice cracked and trembled. Thunder boomed and lightning struck not too far away. The clouds got darker as Technoblade tutted, and for a moment Tommy saw his face flicker. He knew Techno wasn't heartless. In reality, none of them were. But it didn't matter now- they had killed Tubbo. And even worse, they hadn't even cared when Tommy had thrown the dagger at Big Q. 

It was painful to think about, but Tommy realized that very little people cared about Quackity nowadays.

Techno gave him a look of what Tommy thought was empathy, before doing some sort of signal with his hand and they all drank invisibility pots. Tommy heard their footsteps hitting the muddy grass and he didn't stop them.

The cowards ran, and Tommy didn't stop them.

-

One week later

Tommy stood outside the mansion Ranboo and Tubbo had built in Snowchester. He was staying there; temporarily, of course. Now, everything was temporary. Nothing lasted forever and nothing was labeled as 'permanent'. It was always 'for now' or 'things will most likely change later'. Ever since Tubbo's death, nobody even tried to hope that things would last forever.

Nothing ever did, and nothing ever would.

Tubbo was supposed to be around forever, and look what happened to him? They were supposed to grow old together, they joked about walkers and how Tommy would eventually be shorter than Tubbo. But that reality, the reality that would eventually happen, perhaps, in another life- wasn't Tommy's current reality and he would never get to see it happen. 

Sometimes, Tommy blamed others. He blamed Ranboo once, but then the Enderman had simply hugged him and he had broken down like a little baby. He had blamed Jack Manifold, and Manifold, for some reason, was always very comforting to Tommy. He treated him like a real human, not a fragile boy that will shatter if you talk to him normally. Tommy always believed that Jack knew he liked the way they bickered, deep down- or at least, he sure hoped he did. He blamed himself the most, though. No matter how much Ranboo begged him not to, Tommy didn't know if he ever wouldn't.

Tommy knelt down in front of the headstone. Our Tubbo- Friend Forever. Seventeen. Tommy felt a panging ache, remembering the morning they had made this. They had run out of tears and they just stood there. He and Ranboo cycled through the stages of grief together, so it wasn't the worst that it could've been, but it was never exactly easy.

"Hey, Tubbo." Tommy said, and cleared his throat. His voice didn't quite sound like his own. "This is stupid, I know, but Niki sent me a letter telling me it might help." He looked down at his hands, at his nails- he had been biting them for weeks. "She said I should uh- that I should talk to you." He felt a painful lump in his throat and when he swallowed it didn't go. "So I guess I should've thought of something to say before I came here..." He stopped himself. "What am I saying? I'm sh-tting you, Tubs, I have so much to say." He said with sudden determination. He felt a few tears slip down his cheeks and he wiped them away aggressively with his palm. 

"It's not fair. You shouldn't have died, if anything it should have been me. I've died before, I'm sure I would've been able to put up with that sh-t again. But you?" He choked and took a deep breath, one that was wavering and sounded painful, more like a wheeze than an inhale- "I know you probably could, but I can't even bare thinking about it. I'm being clingy, I know, but we just- we just didn't have enough time. It's selfish, but- but I want you back." A sob escaped his throat, and it felt like his ribs were closing in on him. He was sore from crying- that wasn't healthy and he knew it. "I need you back, and I want to go back and I let you fight alone and I didn't stop you and I stood still for at least a minute just watching-" He paused, speaking rapidly and tried to breathe, covering his face with his arms. "I never told you, you had so much more left to hear and I had so much more left to say-"

What's stopping you?  A voice in the back of his head said. It wasn't his own, but it wasn't quite unfamiliar, either.

Tell him. If he could hear you, right now, what would you say? The voice asked, and Tommy still couldn't recognize it.

"I love you." He replied almost immediately, confidence lasting in him for barely a minute before he felt his other knee collapse and he was sitting on the ground, crying in front of his best friend's grave.

He loves you too, Tommy. He always will, you know that? Tommy heard it, and didn't reply aloud, but he knew the answer. He's sorry. He's so, so sorry. 

Tommy sat there for longer than he had originally planned, rambling on to a gravestone, which was pointless- it was nothing but a slab of concrete, with a meaningless name carved into the front. It was pointless and he knew it, but Tommy still felt like someone was listening.

at this time, tubbo had spent about 336 days in limbo.