Chapter Text
“Tommy, are you coming with me?”
“I... I can’t, Tubbo. I have to stay here. For L’Manberg and Wil.”
Tubbo would be lying if he said he wasn’t terribly, terribly disappointed. But he respected how dedicated Tommy was to the revolution- to the grind, as he liked to say- and Tommy respected how tired Tubbo was of it.
“You’ll visit, won’t you?” Tubbo asked quietly. He gently reached out and Tommy wordlessly gave him his rough, callused hand to hold.
“Yeah, of course, big man.” Tommy hesitated for a second before pulling his friend into a tight hug. “Just message me the coords when you find a place to settle,” he said, his words muffled in Tubbo’s hair. Distantly, he noted how he still smelled like acrid gunpowder and smoke.
When they finally let each other go, Tubbo hefted his pack onto his shoulder and gave his best friend a wobbly smile.
“Well, I’ll see you later, Tommy.”
“See ya, Big T.”
And with a firm handshake and a steadfast grin, he was off.
Tubbo made his way through the forest, thousands and thousands of blocks away from Manberg and Pogtopia. He had made a secret Nether portal and traversed mainly through the Nether to get as far away as possible. An ice bridge between his two portals would be useful if he wanted Tommy to visit, but it’d have to be hidden to be safe.
Without anyone around, he felt more relaxed than he had in months. There was something invigorating about knowing no one was around to see him. He could sing and dance as loud as he liked, and there was something so freeing about acting without judgement.
Recently, the further Tubbo got from the rest of the SMP, the more comfortable he felt with taking his time traversing the woods. It became less about running away and more about travel, adventure, and taking the time to heal. Part of healing, he had found, was talking out loud to no one.
“I think,” Tubbo said loudly, with no reserve, “I think that normally, I’d be rather bored and lonely after being by myself for this long. Ah, excuse me-” He moved a tree branch out of his way and let it whip back into place behind him. “And I am, a bit. But being able to breathe and talk to myself and sort out my thoughts is really doing wonders for my health.” He laughed heartily. “Better to do it outside my head than inside. There’s way too much going on in there to be able to sort anything out.”
Eventually Tubbo just stopped and decided he would build a home here. There wasn’t anything particularly special about the area he chose. The ocean was near enough that he could go for a swim at any point, and the land was flat enough that he wouldn’t have to do too much terraforming to build a house. Other than that, it was just a random spot in the middle of the woods.
Choosing this place had more to do with the fact that Tubbo finally felt… okay. He was no therapist, despite how much “theropay” he had done with Tommy, but walking in the woods, surrounded by nature, and just talking to himself about how he felt these past few months without fearing judgement from anyone had just freed something inside him. He felt lighter than he had in ages, and the second he realized that, he decided that he could finally settle down and build a home.
So Tubbo cleared the surrounding area, chopped down trees, mined iron, and got to work building his new house. He didn’t want to build anything like he had built before, he wanted something completely new. So he decided on an interconnected treehouse system. It would be useful to be up in the trees since if anyone comes for him, he’d have the advantage of being higher.
Wait, no. No one’s coming for him. Tubbo’s safe here. He has got to remember that.
But an interlocking treehouse system seemed like fun to make. He used to watch this television series when he was younger- what was it called? Fineeus and Ferb? Whatever, spelling was never his forte. But there was an episode where they built these complex treehouses and that seemed sick . It’d give him a chance to really experiment with redstone machines, too.
He rolled up his sleeves. There was a lot of work to do.
Two weeks later, Tommy came for a visit.
After Tubbo built the first few rooms in his treehouse, he had immediately messaged Tommy the coords and directions on how to get there. Tubbo had already built a secret ice bridge in the Nether that connected the portal to the SMP to his new home. Admittedly, he had gotten much of the inspiration from Sam and his secret nether portal, but he was sure the man wouldn’t care much.
The ice bridge itself took forever to construct, so there wasn’t much work done on the treehouse system yet. But he had his bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom, a living room, and another bedroom prepared for Tommy. It was cozy, and that was good for now. And even though he constantly told himself that no one was going to come get him, that he was finally safe, he had some redstone traps set up around the house, just to soothe his worries a bit.
Tubbo was in the kitchen cooking some stew and pork chops and humming “Blame it on the Boogie” by The Jacksons when he heard a knock on his door. Immediately, he froze, but when the knock turned into a secret rhythmic pattern, his face brightened into a smile and he dashed over to the door, flinging it open and shrieking, “TOMMYYY!”
There Tommy stood, covered in dirt, smelling like absolute shit, and looking like he hadn’t slept in a week. But he was here! Tubbo reached out and dragged him into a hug. Oh, it felt so good to actually have human contact after so long, despite how bad Tommy stank.
“Tommy! Big man! It’s good to see you, man, how have you been?” Tubbo rambled with a huge grin on his face, pulling a shell shocked Tommy into his house. “Watch your step there, that’s a trap.” They sidestepped the barely visible pressure plates on the floor.
“Uh... Tubbo...” Tommy started.
“Yeah?”
What was there to say? Tommy was just… surprised. Last time he had seen his friend, he was so, so tired. Unable to do much of anything, especially after the festival. He couldn’t even remember the last time he saw Tubbo smile. But now his friend looked alive. More alive than he had in... months. God. He practically glowed with vitality.
“I…”
Tommy grinned. Jesus, was he about to cry? He better not.
“You look good, man.”