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

there is always an ending (and this one is mine)

When Tubbo opened his eyes, there was no feeling.

It was a harrowing experience, the sharp pang of absolutely nothing. It was so far from any sensory deprivation the young hybrid had ever felt, not even the movement of his chest or sensation of a heartbeat to follow for comfort. He was at a standstill in a void, the abyss swallowing anything and everything of light and color; Tubbo could hardly even call what he was seeing black. His body felt unreal, not there, and when he moved his limbs, tried to glance around, it was like suspension, a dream; logically, he knew he was moving, seeing, but it was as though he'd become a mist, no body to touch and no true movement and yet still there all the same.

It was the perfect, terrifying state of nonexistence, of the end, of death.

"Phil!" Tubbo called, curious but mostly desperate.

With the seemingly never-ending darkness ahead,  his voice didn't echo, not with nothing to bounce off of, and he could hardly tell if the sound was even able to travel in this limbo.

Swallowing a shaky breath, the boy reached up to scratch at his cheek and paused abruptly when he noticed his bandaged fingers. There was no pain or ache, no feeling at all just as everything else, and he hesitated to see what lie beneath under the simple impression perhaps he was stuck in the state he'd croaked in.

Inevitably, determined curiosity won over any cautious trepidation, and he carefully plucked the blood-crusted wrappings on his right hand away, noting in interest the way his wounds weren't sticking. Finally, the material dropped away from his stumps, and he dropped the bandages in his startled shock.

Though the digits were still missing, they weren't raw and bloody anymore, skin healed over the ends as though it'd been years since they'd been severed. Eyes wide, Tubbo swiftly unwrapped his left hand and pinky, flexing the leftover fingers and nubs with a childish form of awe.

"Huh," he muttered to himself before freezing and blinking furiously, or so he thought, growing frustrated at the lack of sensation. Impatient, and nothing short of reckless, he jammed his pointer finger into the socket of his right eye, shoulders relaxing when it was met with solid resistance. He couldn't feel the glass, of course, but he knew with certainty that's what it was, and he was thankful that death only seemed to heal what had not yet healed.

He shuddered at the thought of his eye being sealed shut from the inside out, even if he was incapable of seeing out of it anymore.

"Techno!" Tubbo tried again, squinting as though it would help him see further into the void. "Technoblade! Philza!"

No response came, and nobody appeared, so the goat hybrid took it upon himself to start trekking through the emptiness. His journey felt like walking in place, and, momentarily, he wondered if perhaps the void was not endless and instead looped around to the same spot over and over; that train of thought led to a rabbit hole that Tubbo did not wish to catch even a glimpse of, and so he pushed those thoughts away and focused on finding his friends.

Briefly, Tubbo remembered Wilbur's words of the offer to return upon death, noted his own distinct lack of options, and resolutely decided that, one way or another, he'd figure out how to find his way to Tommy.

There was no other choice he could possibly fathom.

__________

When people leave you to rot over and over, a weapon abandoned to rust when it is done being used, you begin to forget what it feels like when they stay, save you, help you. You forget what love entails, what it means to not leave and abandon, and eventually arguments and disagreements are no longer bumps in the road that can be worked out; eventually, they are only pathways to anger and hate, signs that those people do not care for you, and so you must cut ties, lash out first, or suffer the consequences.