careful son (you got dreamer's plans)
Wilbur gasps back to life with mud between his fingers and rain in his eyes.
Wilbur was dead. Now, he is not. He can't say that he's particularly happy about it.
Unfortunately, the server is still as tumultuous as ever, even with Dream locked away, so it seems that his involvement in things isn't a matter of if, but when.
(Alternatively: the prodigal son returns, and a broken family finally begins to heal. If, that is, the egg doesn't get them all killed first.)
Chapter Word Count: 7,295
Chapter Warnings: swearing, injury, blood, aftermath of (temporary) character death, mild disassociation, slight s.uicidal ideation, references to past abuse
Chapter Summary: The emotional fallout is intense, but they don’t have time to stop and deal with it. Wilbur doesn’t particularly like where they decide to hole up, but beggars can’t be choosers.
(masterlist w/ ao3 links)
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Chapter Twelve: nowhere to run
The sun is too bright in his eyes. Too bright, and wrong, somehow, that it should be shining like this. Should still be shining, after the loss they’ve just suffered, after watching his brother crumple to dust in front of him. But the sun hardly cares for things like that, so they all stumble out of the hole in the ground that serves as the entrance to the spider spawner and beyond, and the daylight surrounds them, unforgiving.
“Where do we go, what do we do,” Tubbo is chanting, and Ranboo is muttering under his breath, a continuous litany of, “I can’t believe he’s gone, I can’t believe that happened—” His own lips feel glued shut, his throat devoid of sound. His skin buzzes.
(the two images interpose: Techno hanging from the vine, head at an unnatural angle, Techno wavering on his feet, blood pouring from his throat, and there is a flash of light and there is ash all at once, as if the first caused the second, as if instead of healing him, shoving his soul back into a body clinging to life, the totem burned him up from the inside out, and unlike the phoenix there was no rebirth)
“We can’t stay here,” Puffy says. Her eyes are wide, and her hands are shaking, but her voice has the same determined cant to it as it always does. “We need somewhere to hole up.”
“And where is that supposed to be?” Sapnap demands. His breathing is unsteady. “Where the fuck are we supposed to go after that? Where isn’t the thing gonna be able to reach? With, with Dream being, being, what even was that? Why was he—how was he—?” He breaks off, sparks crackling at his fingertips, and his face is a mask of distress, of questions
(was he always like that and did I not see or did something happen to him did something make him like that is that my friend or is there something inside of him something behind his eyes that is not him at all and if that is the case how did I not notice how did I not notice how did I not save him)
that Wilbur feels he recognizes. Or would, if he let himself. If he let himself care.
His eyes drift over to Phil. Phil, who stands silently, blood dripping from his wings, a thousand old injuries reopened by thrashing thorns. Who stands with Tommy in his arms, Tommy, who is curled up as tightly as he can reasonably manage, his face tucked into Phil’s shirt. Trembling. Quiet.
(he will die and I will kill him, the Egg says, and I have already begun, and you cannot protect him, you do not have the strength, except by what I can grant you)
“Church Prime,” Puffy says. “It’s the only place that might be safe.”
“Who’s to say it would be?” Sapnap snaps. “You saw it in there! The vines have never moved like that before, and Prime knows what else it can do now. And maybe the Egg wouldn’t be able to get in, but who’s to say that would stop—” He cuts off again, face contorting.
His leg is beginning to hurt, now. All of him is, actually, now that his adrenaline is wearing thin, now that the horror is sinking in, but it’s concentrated in his leg in particular, and he looks down to see that his left pant leg is all but shredded, blood dripping down in steady streams and splattering on the grass by his feet. The vines got him worse than he thought, then, and he bites his lip against the sting.
He’s had worse, though. He’s had so much worse. This is practically nothing, and Puffy and Sapnap are still arguing, and Tubbo and Ranboo are huddled together, eyeing the vines around them with deep suspicion, unmoving as they are just yet, and Phil is silent, and he’s going to stay silent, because Wilbur recognizes all too well the strain in his eyes, the way he’s holding onto Tommy with a death grip.
(he’s watched two of his sons die, now, and Techno will be back, will still have two lives left, but that does not heal the hurt, does not assuage the pain of seeing your brother, your son, your family die in front of your eyes before you can lift a finger to stop it, and Phil’s eyes shine with a grief almost beyond what Wilbur can understand. except he understands all too well, in the end)
He’s had worse, and someone needs to step up.
(the old mantle settles across his shoulders, and if he closes his eyes it’s like nothing’s changed at all, and the sun sets on the city he is determined to give everything for, still standing, walls still strong)
“Boxed in like a fish,” he croaks, and Puffy and Sapnap turn to him as one. “That’s what we’ll be, if we go to Church Prime. Whether it protects us in the moment of not won’t matter once we run out of supplies. We need somewhere better situated. Somewhere we can defend, that might withstand a siege, if it comes to it.”
Puffy makes a frustrated gesture. “I’m open to suggestions,” she says. “The prison, maybe, if we have to? We could probably keep people out as easily as—ah, shit, Sam.” She pulls her communicator out and taps out a quick message, and then frowns. “It’s telling me it can’t go through. Why isn’t it going through? Sam had all three lives, he should be—”
“Admins can read private messages,” Phil murmurs. “Wouldn’t surprise me if Dream could fuck with the whole system, whatever the fuck he is.”
Wilbur reads between the lines. Techno, for the moment, is unreachable. He processes the information and moves on, refusing to let it get to him, refusing to let himself be overpowered by
(Techno’s unreachable Techno’s unreachable Techno’s respawned and he’s on his own and they can’t talk to him can’t get to him quickly and what if something went wrong what if something happened)
emotions.
“Sam will make his way to us,” he says. “I’m vetoing the prison. Like hell are we staying in there. Other thoughts?”
“What gives you vetoing power?” Sapnap asks.
“Somebody needs to make a decision,” he says, and it is with strength he doesn’t feel, confidence he is only pretending at, a force of command that comes from some unknown place, since he feels as though he is miles away from himself, “and I don’t see you coming up with anything. Either help or stop complaining.”
Sapnap’s face reddens, and he opens his mouth, to argue, no doubt, but then Ranboo breaks in with, “Foolish, maybe?” and hunches his shoulders when attention turns to him. “Sorry, it’s just, I’m pretty sure Foolish isn’t, um, a big fan of the Egg or anything, so maybe he could help?”
Wilbur has no idea who the fuck Foolish is.
“Nah, he’s too far out,” Tubbo says. “It’ll take ages to get to his place. And we need somewhere close, but not too close, so we still have a good place to fight back from, right, Wilbur? If we leave now, the Egg’ll just take over the whole SMP with nothing to stop it.”
“My thoughts exactly, Tubbo,” he says, and again, it is just like the old days, and they are standing atop the L’Manberg walls, and Tubbo has just said something particularly clever, and warmth and pride curl in him before he remembers where they are, what they’re doing. They need to decide, and soon. They’re just hanging around near the entrance, and sooner or later, someone’s going to come after them, whether they let them go at first or not. “Is there anyone else who has a good position, location-wise and resource-wise?”
“Wait,” Puffy says. “Eret’s castle.”
“Eret’s castle doesn’t have doors,” Sapnap says.
“No, but I stopped by earlier to see if they wanted to join us,” Puffy says. “They weren’t there, but the grounds were completely free of vines. And sure, there aren’t any doors, but between all of us, I’m sure we could make some. Eret’s got plenty of supplies, last I checked.”
Eret. The name evokes a wealth of associations, most of them unpleasant. His first instinct is to reject this idea like the last, to avoid placing their lives in the hands of one who has already betrayed him, who led them all into a death trap, who almost ended their revolution in one fell swoop. But Puffy has a point. Eret’s castle ticks all the right boxes: it’s defendable, well-supplied, and if there are no vines to clear, all the better. They’ll have to build doors, but between the lot of them, that’s easily manageable.
(a wealth of associations and many unpleasant but there is Eret offering them supplies offering their fragile rebellion help and they tried so dearly to redeem themself and he could not have seen that then wrapped in his own shadows as he was but perhaps he can see it now perhaps he can better appreciate it, give a little more benefit of the doubt, and if he is given a second chance after everything after committing the worst crime of all then who is he to deny them absolution?)
(another memory, more blurry: he is scared but stalwart as they go through the motions, and he does not want to die, is terrified of that endless void, but he knows that the server needs a leader and his living self must be that leader, and Eret is here, and Eret agrees, and Eret acts out their part, and Eret is trying so hard, and he cannot see their eyes behind their glasses but he imagines that if he could, he would see a fool’s hope in them)
“Eret, then,” he says. “We go to Eret.”
And no one disagrees. It’s strange. They have no reason to listen to him, really. They have far more reasons not to listen to him, more reasons to think that following his lead will end in disaster than otherwise. But Puffy nods, and Sapnap backs down, and Tubbo and Ranboo both look to him for direction like it’s the war and he’s in charge of child soldiers once again. Phil looks to him, too, but his expression is inscrutable, and only a slight tightness around his eyes shows that he’s in any pain at all.
So they go to Eret. Staggering through the grass, tripping over vines that still don’t move, thank Prime, and then along the Prime Path, and his leg hurts worse with every step, pain jolting up into his hip, it seems, and it’s not long before he’s walking with a limp. But they’re all hurt in some way, so he hides it as best he can. He can deal with it when they’re safely behind stone walls.
And then, Tommy says, “Put me down, I can walk.”
Wilbur glances over. Tommy’s face is still buried in Phil’s shirt.
“You sure, mate?” Phil asks softly.
“Yes, I’m fucking sure,” Tommy snaps, louder now, turning his face outward, pushing against Phil’s chest. His cheeks are flushed, his breaths coming short and fast, and he’s trying to pass it off as anger, and maybe part of it is. But Wilbur knows him better than to think that that’s all. Knows him better than to think that he would have let Phil carry him in the first place if he was alright.
“Okay, then,” Phil says, and swings Tommy down. Tommy wavers for a step, but slaps away Phil’s hand when he extends it, muttering a sharp, “Fuck off.”
And then they keep going. Tommy doesn’t say anything else. Wilbur keeps glancing at him, but he’s refusing to meet anyone’s gaze, even Tubbo’s. And—that’s another thing that’s going to have to wait. He wants nothing more than to stop now and make sure that Tommy’s going to be okay, but they don’t have time, and the general in him will not call for a halt until the retreat is over, until he is sure the enemy is not biting at their heels.
(retreating from Dream once again, and it is familiar and not, the same and not, and history runs in a circle, echoes and rhymes)
Eret’s courtyard is indeed free of vines, just as Puffy promised. Wilbur half-expects them to be nowhere in sight, based on what Puffy said, but they are standing right there, next to a skeletal horse they’re frantically saddling, and they’re checking their communicator every now and again, with the jerky motions of someone who doesn’t particularly want to but can’t make themself stop.
Then, suddenly, they look up at the sky. Wilbur follows their gaze to the flock of crows wheeling overhead, a dark mass of beating wings, each bird barely distinguishable from the others. All of them completely, eerily silent.
Eret stands there a moment. Just staring. Wilbur can’t tell what the look on their face is, but their shoulders are tense. And then, they look back down, and realize that the lot of them are there, stumbling in under the gate, and they visibly startle.
“Hey, Eret,” Puffy says, before they can get a word in. “Can we crash? And build some gates?”
“What,” Eret says. “What is—Puffy, what is going on? How did Dream manage to kill Sam and Technoblade? Is he—” They run a hand through their hair, and then start striding forward, their cape flaring out behind them. They haven’t said anything about him yet, haven’t reacted to his presence. “He’s out, isn’t he? I was going to come and see, but he’s out?”
“He’s out,” Puffy agrees. “We were kind of hoping you’d help us out on this one.”
“Of course,” they say quickly. “Of course, anything you—anything you need.” They’re rattled, clearly, more than Wilbur has ever seen them, perhaps. “I just—how did this happen? I thought the prison was secure, I thought—are you all okay?”
“Aside from the obvious?” Puffy says. “Yeah, we’re great. You haven’t been around much lately, I don’t know how much you know about the Egg and all of that, but that’s an issue too, along with Dream. And some other stuff that I’ve got no idea about, that we really just kind of need to all sit down and talk about.”
“The Egg? I’ve—I’ve heard of it, I think. I’ve been elsewhere for a while.” Their lips twist into a smile that isn’t quite a smile. “Doing a bit of soul-searching, you might say. Found more questions than answers, unfortunately. Alright. I can get you all whatever you need, you can absolutely stay here if that’s what you’d like, but what was that about gates?”
Right. This is taking too long.
Wilbur still feels a bit outside of his body as he steps forward, but that’s alright. He’s limping, but the pain is distant, and he can let his brain work on autopilot, let his mouth move on its own without regarding the consequences, without thinking too much about
(this is Eret and you know them and they betrayed you and you hurt them and now you’re back and here is a test here is a true test it shouldn’t matter how they react to you you shouldn’t care for their opinion but you do you know you do though you pretend you don’t pretend they’re nothing but a traitor to you but you are a traitor to yourself and you know that between the two of you you are the worse and here you both are and you only need one more and everyone will be back together again like the old days like the old days those good old days)
what happens next.
“Right, then,” he says, straightening his spine and stepping up to be visible just behind Puffy, to the side and a few feet back. Eret’s head whips toward him. “To summarize: the Egg is bad, Dream is also bad, they’re now working together, also with Bad, Techno is gone, we’re all in rough shape, a mind-controlling potentially demonic entity is likely to try to take over the server, and also, I’m here, despite my best efforts. Does that paint enough of a picture for you, or should I elaborate further?”
Eret stares at him. He stares back, doesn’t let himself fidget. He’s putting the general on display, and it has never felt more like a disguise, like yet another mask,
(and didn’t he tell Tommy he wasn’t going to do this anymore?)
but a familiar one, one that’s almost comfortable. He can force himself into the general’s shoes and worry about tactics and battles and numbers and strategy, and tuck the rest of himself away for when there’s time for it. Can think of this as just another alliance to be made, a debriefing to be held rather than
(Eret traitor friend ally enemy the place in your heart is curdled and sour and you do not know if you are capable of starting anew)
and his losses are statistics and cold facts rather than
(Techno’s eyes golden and glittering and then they go dim and pale red pale and staring the light in your brother’s eyes gone out and it is not the first time you have watched a brother die in front of you but Technoblade never dies is never supposed to die never to go to dust never and you cannot make sense of it cannot make sense of the world turned on its head)
“Wilbur?” Eret asks, after a very long moment, and he doesn’t understand why their voice breaks in the way that it does. “You’re—it’s you? Not Ghostbur?”
He spreads his arms, lifting an eyebrow.
“Do I look like Ghostbur to you?” he asks.
“No,” Eret answers right away. “No, that you do not. Um, has this been a thing, or…?” They trail off, and Wilbur can’t figure out exactly what their feelings are, but it’s too late to back down, even if he wanted to.
“For a bit,” he says. “Not for too long. Can we move on? We’ve got bigger issues to deal with at the moment.”
He means multiple things, with that. He means, there’s bigger things to worry about than why I’m here. He means, there’s bigger things to worry about than our history, and as so long as we’re on the same side for the moment, it can’t matter right now. He doesn’t know if Eret catches all of that, but whether they do or not, they nod, seeming to steady themself.
“Of course,” they say. “I—for the record, it is good to see you, Wilbur.” There is genuine relief in their voice, a tone that says they’re actually glad he’s here, more than glad, even, and he really doesn’t have time to unpack that at the moment. They need a plan, and fast, and they need some goddamn gates. And medical attention, probably. The cut on Puffy’s head looks nasty, and Phil’s wings are still dripping blood, and it’s difficult for Wilbur to look at them for too long,
(grief rises up guilt rises up crushing choking your father is grounded and it is your fault)
but it concerns him, how little Phil appears to care for their current state. So there’s that to handle, and it’s almost too much, almost. Almost too much for someone who has spent the majority of the time since he’s been brought back to life cringing away from meeting people, all the confidence he once displayed gone, shrinking, left in the void or in Pogtopia or on the podium from which he announced his own defeat, perhaps. But even still, he remembers how to be the general. He can hide in the general, present the general on the outside, be useful even while he thinks he might be on the verge of collapse, internally. He has been a general, and so he shall be again.
What comes first, then?
He pulls out his comm, scrolling through the messages. There are quite a few in the general chat from just after Sam’s death message, people from all over the server demanding to know what’s going on. His eyes drift over Techno’s, then, and he winces, but keeps reading. There are even more messages after that, capitalization usage increasing dramatically, and his eyes trace over familiar names, a pang in his heart. Niki. Fundy. Quackity. Several from Eret as well. Some from names he doesn’t recognize, like this Foolish person, and someone named Hannah.
But then, they all cut off. There have been none in the past half hour. Since they escaped from the Egg.
Out of curiosity, he taps out a few words: dream and egg have teamed, regrouping at eret’s. Upon hitting send, the screen goes fuzzy, giving him an error message he’s never seen before. So comms truly are down, then, and it’s probably just as well; Dream likely knows where they are, but if he doesn’t, there’s no reason to give him the information.
(and do these old allies old friends deserve to learn of your return from cold words on a screen do you not have the courage to face them yourself face your son your son you have not seen your son)
(the last time he spoke to Fundy, he disowned him. he doesn’t know if he still has a son)
(if he does not, he has no one to blame for himself, and perhaps that is why he is too cowardly to check)
“Right, then,” he says, looking back up. “Gates are the first priority. They might not do much against whatever the fuck that thing is, but it’s better than nothing. Eret, I assume you’d know the best way to go about it?”
Eret’s lips quirk into a slight smile, one that is, perhaps, slightly sardonic.
“It is my castle,” they agree. “The more hands I have, the quicker it will go, but I can get it done.”
“Anyone who’s not bleeding profusely, help them with that, then,” he says. “Anyone who is bleeding profusely—I assume you’ve got pots somewhere, Eret?” Eret nods, gesturing toward the inside. “Anyone who is bleeding profusely gets a pot. Once we’ve got that all covered, we’ll reconvene, come up with a plan for where to go from here. Everyone got that?”
He gets a few nods, and no one dissents, so he’ll take that as a yes. His gaze travels to the kids then, standing clumped together, and Tommy’s eyes are still shadowed, and Tubbo is shifting his weight between his feet, and Ranboo looks lost, awkward, and he wishes he didn’t have to ask anything more of them. But that’s not how wars work, and this has certainly turned into a war.
(child soldiers once again, and how history echoes)
“Tubbo, Ranboo, I want you on the gates as well,” he says, and tries to soften his tone at least a little bit, even if that’s all he can do. “And then afterward—Tubbo, I need you to go through with all of us exactly what you know about—what did you call them? Dreamons?”
Tubbo looks slightly miserable, but he nods. “Right,” he says. “I can try to ward the gates if you want. With, um, anti-demon stuff. I don’t know if it’ll work. I guess last time we didn’t manage to do much of anything at all.”
“Anti-what,” Eret says, but Wilbur shakes his head.
“We don’t have time for that. Tubbo will explain later. We—”
“The fuck am I supposed to do, then?” Tommy breaks in, crossing his arms. “You haven’t given me a job.” He glares, but it is so very obvious that it’s all a front, all a show, and Tommy’s expression dares him to challenge him, but Wilbur thinks that if he does, he just might break something in him. Tommy has always been so much more fragile than he presents himself as, so much more fragile than he likes to believe he is.
(despite it all, despite it all, he is only sixteen, only a child, a child grown old before his time but a child nonetheless, and now a child who watched his brother die for him, an estranged brother perhaps but still a brother, and Tommy has always cared so much and so deeply, no matter how much he pretends otherwise)
He hasn’t given Tommy a job, and he doesn’t really intend to, because Tommy, of all people, needs to sit the fuck down and rest for a moment. They all deserve a break, but in this moment, Tommy is the one who needs it most, and also the one least likely to accept as much.
If the general gives the order, Tommy will follow it, he knows that much,
(because he made his brother into a soldier he made his brother into a soldier and soldiers follow orders)
even if he’ll be angry at him for it, but Tommy angry with him is a sacrifice he’s willing to make. And perhaps directing his anger at him will help. Perhaps it would be better for Tommy to be angry with someone within reach rather than someone out of it.
(because Tommy is hurting, and the cause of that hurt is not here, and so perhaps if Wilbur offers himself he’ll feel better, will feel more in control, because Tommy needs control, because his abuser is out, is wandering free, and his abuser has killed their brother and told him that it is his fault)
But then, Phil breaks his silence.
“I’d like him to stick with me,” he says, with a smile that is obviously strained. “I’m not going to be able to reach everything myself.” He makes a vague gesture toward his wings, still dripping blood, and there is so much of it already drying on his feathers, sticky, tacky, almost blending in with the darkness of the feathers
(but stark against the grey-white of exposed bone)
“Why the actual shit—” Tommy starts.
“Good idea, Phil,” he cuts him off. “Tommy, help him with the wings, would you?”
“Why do I have to—”
“You too, Wil,” Phil says, and his mood sours immediately. “You think I don’t see that leg? C’mon, Eret, show us to the pots.”
When faced with that, he has no choice but to agree, really.
(he wouldn’t have ignored it. he wouldn’t have. He knows better than to leave a wound untreated in wartime. Even if something whispers at him that he deserves the pain, even if the bite of it brings him closer to reality. But his better sense knows: pain is not the penance that is asked of him, not a recompense that will do anyone any good)
**********
They meet again half an hour later in Eret’s throne room. Half an hour later, and his leg is bandaged and tender and no longer an open wound, and Tommy is frowning and refusing to meet anyone’s eyes, and the state of Phil’s wings is still bothersome, because he didn’t let either of them touch them beyond what was necessary,
(and he recollects countless nights spent running his fingers through soft, silken feathers as his father told him how to preen them, told him that it was a sign of trust, an activity that only family, only flock is allowed, and now Phil will no longer let them near him, will no longer even take care of them himself and it makes him sick to his stomach to think of what has been lost)
but they are no longer bleeding, and that has to be what matters.
The throne room is not the best location for this, he thinks. It feels awkward. But it’s a room big enough to fit everyone, which is the point, big enough to fit Puffy, presence looming and forehead now bandaged, to fit Sapnap, fidgety as he is, like a caged, snarling animal, all restless energy. Big enough for Tubbo, for Tommy, for Ranboo, for Phil, for Eret and for himself, and big enough that there is an obvious gap at Phil’s right side where someone else should be standing.
Eret eyes her throne, glances at everyone else in the room, and then seats herself at its base. It’s a pithy gesture, meaningless, but Wilbur has more important things to do than to call her out on it, even though the existence of the throne itself grates against him.
“Let’s call this meeting to order, then,” he says, and Eret frowns. Perhaps she doesn’t like that he’s calling the shots in her own
(ill-gotten, dearly kept)
castle, but tough. He’s brought out the general for all of their sakes, so the general is what they’re all going to get.
(it’s a mask again and masks crack but he can keep it up for long enough he can he can they need a leader so he will lead he will lead them)
(you were so good at compartmentalizing, once, go good at shoving it all away in boxes in dark shadowy corners never to be opened to gather dust and cobwebs and faded recollections but the boxes cracked and the demon’s escaped and Pandora was too weak to stop them and it all ended in a bang and he cannot tell if hope remains but that isn’t the point because the box is opened and once opened it is not so easily closed and you are putting on a show a lie and lies come back around again they always do and you should know better than to pretend at strength you do not have you will lead them to ruin again ruin and gunpowder smoke and what gives you the right)
“Yeah, alright,” Puffy says. “Can we start by talking about—whatever that was? What were you talking about, dreamons? What’s a dreamon?”
“That sounds like a made up word,” Tommy mutters.
“I wish it were made up,” Tubbo says, and he winces when all eyes turn to him. But a moment later, he straightens, setting his shoulders squarely, holding his head up high. “I’ll tell you all what I know. Even if that turns out to be not as much as I thought.” He pauses, clearly struggling for words.
“Start from the beginning,” he suggests, and Tubbo nods at him gratefully.
“Okay, right, the beginning,” he says. “In the very beginning, me and Fundy were messing around, and we found some old books. We went through them for a laugh, and we learned about these things called dreamons.”
“Wait, that’s what they’re actually called?” Tommy interjects. “Like, properly?”
Tubbo shrugs. “It’s what the books said,” he says. “We weren’t about to argue over names. Even if it did seem like a weird coincidence. But yeah, that’s what they’re called.” His voice falls into an odd cadence here, recitative, like he’s telling a story, and Wilbur crosses his arms, gripping at his elbows. “They come from the darkness of the void, lurking around the edges of a server’s code. Once they get in, their only goal is to cause chaos and destruction. They corrupt everything they touch, and they can possess people and turn them into their puppets. They have unknowable powers, because they’re a sickness, a rot, like an infection in the code of the server itself. It’s really, really difficult to get rid of them, but it can be done if you have the right tools. Or—” He blinks, stuttering a bit, his voice landing more naturally. “We thought so, anyway.”
“What does this have to do with Dream?” Sapnap asks, stopping his pacing, looking to Tubbo with an expression in his eyes that hurts to look at, a bit, wobbly and desperate and pinched, like he already knows the answer but hopes that he’s wrong, hopes as much as he is able, even though he knows it will be fruitless.
Wilbur has put the pieces together. As best he can, anyway. And Sapnap’s not a stupid man. He can see where this is leading.
“Dream got possessed.” Tubbo sighs, gaze drifting toward the floor. “It was a whole thing. Honestly, we were surprised nobody else noticed. But we—we performed an exorcism. And it was really scary, to be honest. But it worked. We could see it leave, all oozy and black and gross, and Dream was better afterward! He was! So we thought we got it out.”
“But it tricked you?” he asks.
“I don’t understand how it could have,” Tubbo replies. “It’s not—it’s not like the kind of possession that you see in a TV show, where the demon can pretend to be the person or something like that. It’s obvious. It’s too—it’s too wrong to blend in, if that makes sense. It made his voice go all funny and deep, and the way it moved—” He shudders, and then continues, miserably, “The way it moved, there’s no way you could mistake something like that for a human. That’s why we were so sure it worked. Because afterward, he seemed back to normal.”
Something about this doesn’t make sense.
“Tubbo,” he says, wheels spinning in his mind, “when was this?”
Tubbo blinks. “Manberg days,” he says. “Um, that’s why we never told you about it, I suppose.”
He barely bats an eye at the reference. It doesn’t make sense. Because he has sensed that wrongness, as Tubbo puts it, has been sensing it from the moment he set foot in that prison cell for the first time. On some level, he knew that something was deeply wrong, even if a demonic presence was the last thing he would have guessed. But if the whole thing happened during—during that time, and the signs of possession were as obvious as Tubbo says, he would have noticed, wouldn’t he? He had plenty of interactions with Dream during that time.
(unless his own shadows stretched long, stretched far enough to cover Dream’s, to cover the thing piloting him)
But no—his shadows were of his own making, not supernatural. If anything, his mindset should have made him more receptive to suspicious wrongness, not less. So what—
(Dream smiles, and you know what it’s like, to have something whispering in your head, he says, once you let something in, there’s no going back)
“Maybe the first bit was a fakeout,” Phil suggests, arms folded, head tilted. He’s perplexed, which is worrying; it’s rare to come across a being that Phil knows nothing about. “It made itself obvious to lure you in so it could slip under the radar. Faked leaving to put your guard down, maybe.”
It’s plausible. But somehow
(and Dream stands atop the Egg and he says, he says, I tried to fight at first, but it turns out it was right all along, and he says it he says it like it’s separate from him like there is not something else something other speaking from his mouth after all and he tried to fight it he tried to fight it and what does that mean)
“They’re the same,” he breathes, and doesn’t know what he means, not quite yet, “they’re the same, and the Egg controls people, and he was talking about fighting something, about giving in—”
He runs a hand through his hair. Shakes his head.
“Wil?” Phil asks.
“Oi, Wilbur,” Tommy says, almost at the same time. But he needs to—he needs to focus as the pieces click into place, faster than he can process, and he has a conclusion but not the words yet—
He holds up a hand.
“Tubbo,” he says, “you said it can corrupt things. What did you mean by that?”
“I dunno, really,” he says. “It talked about it in the books some, but it was all weird metaphorical language. Couldn’t really makes sense of it. We were more focused on the bits that told us how to get rid of them.”
(he says, you know what the void is like, and Tubbo says that they come from the void, and)
That’s alright. He’s not sure he needs a hard answer to that, because he thinks that if one were to describe the feeling of the corruption, it would be
(it is dark and it is peaceful and there is static at the edges eating away at what makes him himself eating at his soul at his sense of self and it is what he wants, to be nothing, and he does not imagine what it would feel like if it were not what he desired, if he tried to resist it, resist the void all-consuming, all-devouring, resist the void that takes all things into itself and is never satiated)
something familiar.
“Alright,” he says, and steeples his fingers together. “Let me paint a picture for you. Someone gets possessed. You exorcise the thing. But these things can corrupt, you say. So maybe you get rid of the thing itself. Maybe Dream’s pretty much back to normal. But maybe it leaves little bits of itself behind. Maybe he’s not possessed, but maybe that doesn’t matter so much anymore. Maybe it changed him regardless. Maybe it’s still changing him, even though it’s no longer there. Maybe a corruption took root, and there wasn’t any going back from it.” He tilts his head, closes his eyes. “Suppose that the Egg is the same type of thing. Something that forced its way through the cracks of the server, something that’s been smart about it, biding its time. The things that Dream was saying reminded me a lot of what the Egg was doing, you know? Manipulating people, making them into things they aren’t, or into their worst selves.”
He strings the words together as he goes. He’s not sure he’s getting his point across. He used to be so much better at this.
“Wait, so you’re saying you think he isn’t possessed?” Sapnap asks.
“I’m saying we don’t really know,” he answers. “Not unless we get it from him. But Tubbo’s the expert here, and if he says Dream’s not acting like he’s possessed, I believe him. But even if he’s not possessed outright, that doesn’t mean there’s no—influence, perhaps.” He keeps his eyes shut; the darkness on the back of his eyelids is a natural one, but he can almost pretend that it isn’t. That it is darker, deeper.
(void)
“He was right that I know what it’s like,” he says. “I’ve felt the Egg in my head. And I was in the void for—a long time. It felt like forever. I know what it feels like, and there’s some of it in him, I think. Him and the Egg both. They’re the same kind of wrong, the same kind of unbelonging. I’ve never been possessed by a demon before, but if it’s made up of void stuff, that’s the sort of thing that stays with you. Whispering.”
He opens his eyes. Everyone is staring at him, varying expressions of horror on their faces.
He goes back over his words. In retrospect, he can see how they probably came off sounding.
“Wil,” Phil says softly.
“I’m fine,” he says, not at all convincingly, he’s sure.
(once he starts thinking of the void of the peace and of the rest it’s hard to stop even though his desires are now tinged with red and he knows better than to listen but he cannot help himself)
“This is all speculation, anyway,” he continues. “Might not matter at all, in the end, what the particulars are. We just need a way to stop them. Can dreamons be killed, Tubbo?”
Tubbo takes a moment before replying. “I don’t think so,” he says. “Fundy might remember better. But I think the only thing in what we read was the exorcism.”
“Which doesn’t help us much if Dream’s not actually possessed,” Puffy says. “Unless it might work on the Egg? If the Egg’s a—a dreamon too?”
“Worth a shot if we can get to it again,” he says, “but I don’t like risking so much on a maybe.”
“The less we mess with forces beyond our understanding, the better,” Eret says suddenly. She frowns, pushing her sunglasses further up her face. “As I said earlier, I’ve been away a good bit recently, so I haven’t been tracking the Egg’s progress as much as perhaps I should have. But I did notice an increase in activity—well. It was shortly after we tried to resurrect you, Wilbur.” She inclines her head toward him. “I fear that in our efforts, we might have interfered with something we shouldn’t have interfered with. Weakened a barrier of some kind, between our existence and—something else.”
She speaks with a strange kind of gravity. But her words make an unfortunate kind of sense.
He doesn’t look at Phil.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Tommy states. “What the fuck does that even mean?”
“I’m with Tommy on this one. What are you talking about?” Sapnap adds.
“We’re getting off track,” he says, snapping his fingers. “We’re going about this wrong. We don’t have enough information, and we don’t have enough power. Those are our problems. How do we solve them?”
“The obvious would be to get the word out,” Puffy says. “Comms are down, but we can go by word of mouth if we have to. Kinda risky, with the amount of vines on this server, but the nether portal’s right across the way. No vines in the nether, I think.”
“I have lots of old books myself,” Phil chimes in, eyes skyward. “Might be something in there to help that I’ve read and forgotten about. And I’ve got another source of info I’ve barely begun to go through. Old shit I found. It might be worth a shot.” He looks back down. “We need to go get Techno anyway.” He says the last in a tone that brooks no argument, and Wilbur doesn’t try, even if it’s perhaps not the most tactically sound option.
(he wants Techno back too, wants to lay eyes on him, hold his wrist in his hand and count his heartbeats, each one a reassurance, because he knows what it is for a brother to die and come back but that has never made it easier)
“It’s better than nothing,” he says. “Alright, I’ve got a plan, then. Some of us go to the tundra, get Technoblade, and go through whatever books Phil has. Some stay here and fortify the defenses as best we can using what Tubbo can remember that he thinks might work, and a couple of us go around through the nether and tell as many people as possible what’s going on. Gather allies, resources anything else we might need.”
It’s not much of a plan. But based on just how outclassed they are, just how little they know, just how much exhaustion shows in their faces, it might be the best plan they’re going to get for now. To throw themselves back into a battle so soon would be folly.
It never sits well with him to bank so much on a hope, though, a mere possibility that things will go their way.
(but certainties were ripped out from under him the moment Dream killed the unkillable, the moment he saw his brother crumple to ash before his eyes)
“Great,” Puffy says, grimacing. “What could possibly go wrong with that?”
The silence that greets that statement serves perfectly well as a response.
He closes his eyes again. The darkness is no comfort.
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aight
lets ends this
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i love that he's still trying to cheer her up with her terrible crossover idea
phoenix is such a sweetie
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“...so we may put this dead lawyer walking out of his misery”
hear hear
just kill me already
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“she's now slain two high level clergymen...”
one of which was a confirmed rebel but HEY whatever ITS NOT LIEK YOU KILL THEM IN GENERAL ANYWAY
who gives a fuck this trial is janked
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“bahlgilpo’kon hell- the realm of eternal agony”
wow eternal agony is the bottom hell??? thats like the first hell in dante’s hells; youre soft as runny shit kooraheenism.
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“there she will suffer the endless punishment of ja’gar by the galuun of Puhlmo’ten.”
SUBTITLES PLEASE
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he was killed during the rite but they only found his body like two days later?!?!
what the fuck!?
...and wait a fucking second, he wasnt there when we were fucking investigating BULLSHIT
BUUULLLLLSSSHHHIIIIIIT!!!
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two consecutive murders constitutes a serial killer??
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every time sadmad sighs and shakes his head i lose a year of my life
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Rayfa’s voice is so fucking unfitting; she’s got the voice of a 30 year old woman and she’s supposed to be a whiny-ass 14 year old
do these people know anything about casting??
is it really that hard to get a 14 year old to say a few lines? i was voice acting (not professionally obvs) when i was 14. i sucked, but i was doing it, and there’ve been younger kids working on real shows.
anyway
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welp looks like this mcfuck is using a fake name
someone get on that
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I'm sorry you’re surrounded by such incompetence, Rayfa. and i mean that. i like you now, youre kinda funny.
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phoenix: plus, yesterday, someone told me how the divination seance used to work
phoenix fucking sucks at keeping secrets jesus christ holy fuck just SHUT UP ABOUT THE REBELS YOU MORON
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if he says let it go and move on again I'm going to fucking scream
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“haha! the police overlooked the clergy tattoo on the back of his neck!”
directly below the stab wound. the clergy tattoo. that has significance in their country.
Why do the Kooraheen Police suck so much ass? They can’t catch a running suspect, and apparently they’re all blind.
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HOW DOES THE JUDGE NOT FUCKING KNOW A RELIGIOUS SYMBOL FROM HIS OWN FUCKING RELIGION?!?!?
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[insert nahyuta eats (peach emoji)ass joke]
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“aren't they utterly different shapes?”
...a... peach... and an upside down peach?!
nahyuta
im gonna blow your mind
this is called a handstand, here, do it with me
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lazy ass parents naming their kid “real name”
fuck this joke country
this is some ‘who's on first’ bullshit
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RAYFA LUSTS FOR BLOOD
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yeah it was freezing on that mountain, of course your estimate was wrong.
i knew this was coming...
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hebLINDED HER WITH SCIENCE
BEEP BA BOO BA
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“this article is small in size but huge in importance!”
just like my d––
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How... did this work? They did a great job of hiding that wound...
also no blood at the “scene of the crime”
yeah not suspicious at all
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once again the prosecution blames the detective for something they couldn’t have helped :/
GUARD YOUR ASSHOLE EMA, GUARD YOUR ASSHOLE
HOLY SHIT
INSERT REFERENCE TO ABOVE PEACH JOKE
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loud ass clock inside a secret hideout? good one, rebels. super well done.
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ahhhh
now that is clever. i like that
although, considering the length of that statue’s beak, he should’ve been impaled right through his body, so.....
you were close, SOJ
glad to see more clever twists though.
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game ruins everything with blatant hints
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there are other cases where they can tell when two weapons have been used on the same wound
why cant they tell now?
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stone sharp enough to cut skin??
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your hideout is fucking death trap
good going rebels
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youre using serial killer wrong... again
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thats a lie, nobody likes swiss cheese
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LAY OFF CHEESE YOU PIECE OF SHIT
ILL RIP YOUR ASS OUT
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“what you said is total bullshit!! heres what happened; this, this this. and since I said it ,its true! without any proof!!! SO THERE”
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phoenix: VALID POINT!
sadmad: bullshit excuse
judge: sounds legit, overruled!
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“jeez just toss me an Axe if its that bad...”
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“plotting your escapee from this sacred hall?”
yeah well just run out
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“you would pin a crime upon the dead, who you know tell no tales?”
uh
did you just forget the whole
soul pool thing or
are you just stupid
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aw baby here we go
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stop saying 30% you dont know shit
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oh my god
whoa whats he doing with the magatama
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“wait... i think i saw something just now...”
what, phoenix
what did you see, hmm?
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“the power of prayer! yes... it uh... helps you... install listening devices in your secrets base uuhhhhhh...ITS NOT WEIRD
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“She has a way of putting me at ease...”
(weeps) my babies
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(sigh) its the wife, get on with it
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“long years of ascetic training have sharpened my ears”
god the training is more useful to Athena than it is Maya. this is depressing.
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make like a mollusc and clam up??? who says that???????
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boy you sure fuckin suck at this Mr. Inmee
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judging by that KAAHHH Tahrust should have a deep voice, and DD had a deeper male voice blip... why aren't they using it? they've already implemented singing blips and tutting blips, did they forget about the extra deep blips?
or are those reserved for demons?
he is a ghost...
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...how far along is behleeb anyway? either I'm blind or the sprite artist forgot to give her a baby bump.
hey yeah! she's barely pregnant! her character art shows that! so its not so much of a stretch that she could be running around killing rebels. Plus, she hasn’t been pregnant for two years...
...of course, its not her, it’s rUHEEL NAYMUH, but still. she’s not far along enough to be inconvenienced by her child.
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potato potahto tomahto egg salad!!
stop praying at me, nahyuta.
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dont you fucking dare...
dont you even fucking dare
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THEY DARED
I SWEAR TO FUCK
i swear to fuck
so. youre gonna blame maya. for the actions. of YOUR OWN GODDESS.
WHO’S GREAT AND POWERFUL AND MYSTICAL AND WISE AND PERFECT.... UNLESS SHE’S BEING CHANNELED BY A DIRTY FOREIGNER?
i just i cannot express how angry this makes me. it doesn’t make any fucking sense and it’s complete and utter hypocrisy. it’s even worse than before; before they were suggesting that the person dressed as Lady Kee’ra was killing rebels in her name, if it wasn’t outright her. Now they’re suggesting it was LITERALLY HER, and remember, these people are UBER RELIGIOUS, and they still have a problem with THEIR IMMORTAL GODDESS IN THE FLESH exacting her divine punishment against people THAT ARE HARMING THEIR COMMUNITY ANYWAY???
yes, vigilantism is dangerous. but it gets a little more fucking complicated when you suggest that it’s the legit actions of an ACTUAL GODDESS.
and even if this is the corrupt government just trying to cover up deaths (which it is) why didn’t they just step in and go “Yeah, another Lady Kee’ra murder. All hail the marvellous goddesses. er diarrhoea kooraheen.”
it would be a lot easier and a lot less messy than taking a kid to court. why do they even want Maya out of the way, anyway? She didn’t know any of the rebels, and she posed no threat to their corrupt government. Yeah, Zealot’s dead, but they literally could have just hired another crazy assassin.
Unless there’s a REAL GOOD FUCKIN REASON for all of this, I call bullshit, bullshit bULLSHIT
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i think it’s time to let your head go and move on to another room sadmad
at the same time
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...plus they legit just forgot their own lore.
maya can’t summon Kee’ra if she doesn’t know what she looks like.
that was so easy i didnt have to even press on statements; thats how easy that contradiction is. thats how easy it is to remember something stated five minutes ago, and how easy it is to remember how your own religion works. you fuckhats.
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oh hey i just realized Tahrust really does call Behleeb his “lovely wife”
aw. how nice. if only they didnt decide to scapegoat maya.
doesn't matter your intentions; you die if you scapegoat maya. you die by my blade.
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you ok pal. is an alarm clock really the source of an evil laugh.
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“indeed! we leave the alarm switched off at all times!”
why would you even have a clock with an alarm on it in a secret base anyway?? and how did phoenix manage to play it in the hideout if the alarm was switched off?
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“those distinctive taiko drums”
fuckin’ finally
ive been waiting for that stupid watch to come back for AAAGEES
of course there was a reason maya would mention traditional japanese instruments...
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y’know it’s funny that he would even make that fuckup in the first place. if he’s a plumed punisher fan, he should know how the theme song goes. his wife was at least a big fan, meaning he’d probably have heard the opening enough times to know that Taiko drums weren’t part of it. Furthermore, if he was banking on the fact that the two themes sound similar to pass off the deception, then it was a huge mistake on his part to define the sound as Taiko drums; thats just a needless detail that could get him caught out, which it did.
and if he just didn’t know, well... again, useless detail. always bad. always be vague if you wanna get away with shit.
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ah... at least in death, Raheel Namer didn’t have to suffer the Plumed Punisher theme song.
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i love that phoenix refers to the show by it’s full title. that’s adorable.
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now what’s really confusing me is that that Photo of the fam is stated to have been taken during the Feast of whatever. Which is the same time-frame as Reely Real Name’s death. He’s alive in the photo, Behleeb is in the photo, and the Judge and his family are nowhere to be found. But all those things were huge parts of the case, and they couldn’t have eaten before or after because of the whole ‘you can only eat Ghingil for three hours on that one special day’.
am I missing something or going nuts??
that said I'm so glad i can finally present this photo. it’s been gnawing at me as much as the watch thing.
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“trademark topknot”
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OH PLEASE JUST LET IT END
ffjglk dlg ljlgkd hey Tahrust do me a solid and just tell them how you died ok
please i have a family
i have stomach ulcers
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oh
off-brand logic
i totally forgot that was in this game too
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wow.
“hmm, there’s really nothing to suggest a murder other than the red water in the spring, which only Maya would see and probably not question (considering this isn’t her religion and she doesn’t fuckin know how that shit works) and said spring probably empties somewhere, since it would be swampy otherwise. let’s see... i can KILL MYSELF TO GIVE THE RED WATER A REASON FOR EXISTING or do literally anything else... WELP, BETTER FUCKIN KILL MYSELF. ALL HAIL THE REBELS!”
...well at least he saved maya from contracted a blood disease.
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tahrust must be pissed that his death came to naught when his own rebel pals gave the secret key to a guy who sold them out in five seconds.
never gets to meet his child... never gets to see the revolution come to fruition... never gets to live happily with his family... all because he couldn’t think of any other solution to protecting that shitty hovel behind a rock.
kinda tragic.
wish i was less angry
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“there was no weapon at the inner sanctum...”
did everyone just forget the giant bloody murder statue???
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pohl’fuckya sadmad
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babe... oh no... don’t give yourself up like this
thats sad
dont
i feel the sad now
shit
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“abbot inmee!! summon a physician at once!!’
HES DEAD
WAY TO RUIN THE MOMENT WITH UNINTENTIONAL COMEDY DUMBASS
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“but murder sanctioned by the crown is still murder”
what’s murder sanctioned by a goddess? apparently you guys are ok with that one. oh unless it’s a goddess being channeled by a foreigner.
soerry im bitter about that one moving on now
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he lunged at you from behind the stone slab?? nice trajectory moron
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hang on a second he put reereenaymee’s body in the plaza before prayer time... with the dagger still in him??
HOW DID NOBODY NOTICE THE FUCKING DAGGER
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“you need not frame the accused for your crime”
for once Sadmad says something smart
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honestly... suicide really wasn’t the answer. even if it was to protect your wife there were,,,,, so many other options
for example, realname’s last moments, as we saw, made it look like he was killed in the Plaza of devotion. You could have so easily made it look like he was murdered there, by some rando, during the rite. The kooraheen police fucking suck at their job, so it wouldn’t matter. but no; you had to die, and blame Maya.... because she was foreign. A foreigner who came to you for guidance and shelter.
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STOP AGREEING WITH ME SADMAD, I DONT LIKE YOU
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“You must use your law powers to make sure no more innocent people suffer under this shitty law!!
...like Maya did!! .......because of me!!
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i love that the excuse is like “there’s no way she could prove it was self defence in this government...” to make it all tear-jerking and point out how horrible and corrupt their legal system is...
...and yet, if we remember Reunion and Turnabout, which also included channeling and self defence... It was EQUALLY impossible for Maya to be cleared of the crime on self-defence charges!!
pot calling the kettle black, japanifornia!
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“lol sorry for almost getting you killed cause i couldn't think of a better plan than kill myself”
yea thanks tahrust, coo-al
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“I ask that you look after my wife”
er she’s... going to jail... she’s... been outed as a rebel... you do get that right
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fuck you Tahrust, you made her cry
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“now you can watch over me from the world beyond”
he cant actually, since they retconned spirits being conscious in the afterlife. good going, capcom.
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oh man that cutscene was goofy. except for the crying
fuck you Tahrust
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Maya: :D hOW y'all doin?!
also according to maya Tahrust didnt leave any regrets behind which means that he totally gives no fucks that his dumbass plan endangered Maya’s life and made his wife cry. Dick.
He doesn't even regret missing the birth of his fuckin child. Ass.
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Sadmad: I owe a debt to you, one that I will return––
Me: Eat a rotten egg.
Sadmad: Wha-–
Me: Go on, master of putrescence. Eat a whole rotten egg. Consume it shell and all. You heard me. Insert the egg into your mouth and chomp down. Times ticking, I’m waiting.
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i forgot about the stupid butterflies
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“So I was thinking, Nick, the legal system here is really stacked agains the defence! It’s really unfair!”
YA DONT SAY
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listen to this happy music playing as everyone is forced to come to terms with all this sad ass shit. also it appears we just forgot about that tiny matter of the government literally putting hits out. Rayfas dad. is doing this. Nobody gonna address that?? No? Ok
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Maya: QUIT BEINA LIL BITCH
wait what
what is this new sprite
eurhg i dont like it put it away
thats not maya thats a husk of evil
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wow. rayfa didnt even know why maya was here training. the bullshit continues to flow...
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Maya: deciding what is true and what is false for your people...
the actual truth and lies, right? RIGHT? MAYA???
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ergh this is so... corny? schlocky? it feels forced
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“Sorry for almost getting you killed anyway VIVE LA REVOLUTION”
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Yay! It’s vore man!! i kinda missed his stretchy face.
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oh well that
thats just a really anticlimactic reveal of Dhurke
like tada! there he is! and he's gone! whatever; he's just been talked about in hushed whispers for the last case or w/e!
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awww the bailiff thinks he can catch a running rebel!! so cute~
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“The Steel Samurai vs Dhurke the Rebel!”
MAYA. THE LAST FIVE MINUTES WERE DEVOTED TO EXPLAINING THAT THE REBELS ARE THE GOOD GUYS. WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM???
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i love that they keep hammering in that “maya has stayed maya”
see guys??? dont you just feel the magic of the trilogy??? ITS THERE GUYS WE SWEAR
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Welp, thats it for that case. Now back to America, to visit Athena and BK, and hopefully to read a more enjoyable storyline...
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