Chapter Text
Tommy was falling.
He was falling, for the secondthirdhundredth time, and this time nothing would catch him. No Phil to catch him, no Wilbur to wrap him up in worries and clipped wings, no Tubbo to cheer him on, no dad to laugh and kiss his forehead where he rested in hands laughing laughing laughing.
Now he had nobody.
He was alone, and he was-
Falling.
The wind ripped in his ears, screaming his name as his eyes blurred.
It was cold.
He was falling.
Every heartbeat seemed like an eternity, feeling the wind push him about and do nothing to carry him. A single lifetime of of being one with the sky.
This was too high to live. This was far too high for a broken leg or two or even a spine. The ground would kiss him and snuff him out the instant he touched her.
The last of a broken, pointless family, taken into her embrace.
Would he see his mother again? Would he be able to finally hear his father's voice, feel two pairs of arms around him as he was made whole for the first time in one of these endless heartbeats?
He hoped so.
He hoped dying wouldn’t hurt too much.
He hoped it would be like falling asleep- you wouldn’t notice until you were already gone.
He hoped Phil, and Techno, and Wilbur, he hoped all of them would be okay.
He hoped Tubbo would be buried beside him.
His wings spread, but did nothing but buffet against the air currents and send him into a spiral, wind’s ghostly fingers whipping through his hair his feathers his clothes as colors spun in his vision, all that remained of the sky and buildings and street below. Blue-glass-black-glass-green-
Green?
It couldn’t have been grass. There was no grass here.
It was something plummeting towards him.
Zephyrus.
Zephyrus.
The green was rapidly growing larger (Zephyrus was tearing his coat off) -green-glass-black (Tommy could barely see, colors smeared in his vision) -glass-green-glass-
He reached out as a pair of massive wings unfurled.
He couldn’t see the sun.
He was cold.
Tommy.
Arms.
Tommy jerked, head whipping back before colliding with a chest. His vision, still blurry, could only tell him he was seeing a lot of green and black.
And he wasn’t falling. Rocking a little, ears throbbing with the beating of large wings.
But not falling.
Tommy sucked in a breath.
He was shaking, so hard his teeth chattered.
A hand smoothed his wings, which were still outstretched as if they could do more than drag him to oblivion.
“I’ve got you, Tommy. I’ve got you. It’s okay.”
Tommy clung to Zephyrus with fists clenched in fabric and arms tight around ribs, desperately wanting reassurance because his stomach was still dropping, body entirely convinced he was still falling falling falling with only pavement waiting for him. He was sobbing hard enough to break, the last of the fear and adrenaline still pounding in his veins.
“Don’t let me fall,” he choked out frantically, probably clutching Zephyrus tight enough to crack ribs. “Do-Don’t- don't let-”
There was a hand in Tommy’s hair, tenderly smoothing curls.
“I won’t. I’ll never let you fall.”
Tommy squeezed his eyes shut as if that would stop the tears pouring down his face. His breathing whistled in his throat and in his ears.
A second later he felt the world shift and move, and he knew that Zephyrus’s wings were carrying them back up to the roof.
When the ground appeared under Tommy’s dangling feet he crumpled, barely caught by Zephyrus. Wings curled around him, and Tommy resisted the urge to grab onto contour feathers so he’d be tucked into arms and wings and safety.
“Your wings,” Tommy whispered. Zephyrus’s talons scratched along his scalp and he melted, eyes still tightly closed as he tucked his chin into the gap between Zephyrus’s shoulder and neck. “You said you wouldn’t-”
“Tommy, I’d cut off my wings if it meant I could save you.” Zephyrus was holding him so, so tightly, as though he might disappear.
Maybe he would. He didn’t feel real, the ground foreign underneath him.
“I’m-” Tommy could barely speak, between hiccupy breaths. “I’m not dead- am- am I- am I dead-”
“Shh, shh, you’re okay.” The hand was smoothing over the back of his head, picking through strands of hair. “You’re not dead. You’re alive, you’re alive. You’re okay. I’ve got you.”
Tommy let out a slower, shuddering breath. He could feel Zephyrus’s feathers enveloping him, warm and soft. And safe.
Tommy could open his eyes and see Zephyrus’s wings. He could see what color they were, if there were slots between the primaries or the tips were tapered.
“You should’ve let me fall,” he whispered. Zephyrus’s mask pressed into his hair, as if it was meant to be a kiss.
“No. I’d never. Never. Never ever.”
Tommy opened his eyes. He blinked a few times in the weirdly blue light, the sun feeling strange for half a moment.
Then he looked down. Zephyrus’s wings, even wrapped around him, were huge.
They gleamed in the sun, coated with a slick green-violet iridescence.
The feathers were black.
The black of a magpie, of a raven. Of a crow.
Of-
Tommy blinked, and slipped his hands around Zephyrus into the black feathers. He sought out the spot he remembered, and froze when he felt string under his fingertips.
He looked down.
There was a spot of color on one of the scapulae, interrupting the pure blackness. The spot was a pair of different feathers tied to one of the secondaries. One was creamy white and barred with brown. The other was red.
Tommy threw himself back. The pebbles and cement scraped at his hands, but he didn’t care. His heart was pounding in his head, wings snapped tightly against his back.
Zephyrus sat unmoving, leaned back on his heels and wings draped out on the roof behind him. They gleamed in the sun, more perfect than Tommy’s would ever be.
“Why do you have Phil’s phone?” Tommy whispered.
Zephyrus tilted his head slightly, glass eyes winking emotionlessly in the sunlight.
“Oh Tommy,” he said. “I think you already know.”
Tommy couldn’t stay.
He ran.
He scrambled past a silently looming Protesilaus and slammed through the stairwell door, heavy breathing the only thing he could hear as he stumbled down the stairs, bursting back out of the door and passing the occasional person as he sprinted for the elevator.
Repeatedly slamming the ‘down’ button with a fist, Tommy frantically looked over his shoulder every few seconds, terrified to his very core that at any moment he’d see a pair of shadows slipping down the hallway behind him.
The elevator dinged, and Tommy stumbled in - his shoes had somehow become untied - and immediately pressed the ‘close doors’ button.
Once safely enclosed in the metal box of the elevator, Tommy let out a sobbing breath and crumpled to his knees, fingers gripping the worn carpet.
Zephyrus-
Zephyrus was-
Zephyrus was Phil.
Phil, who made smoothies so thick they could be eaten with a spoon. Phil, who’d looked after him while he was delirious and puking his guts out. Phil, who sang along to ancient showtunes. Phil, who took the kids no one else wanted and loved them. Phil, who’d comforted Tommy after his nightmares. Who was the first to make sure his wings were taken care of.
Who’d kidnapped him.
Who’d locked him in a house for two weeks.
Who’d organized the explosions that got Tommy’s mom killed.
Who’d made Tommy fear for his safety, for his friends’ safety.
Who had been Zephyrus this whole fucking time.
Tommy let out a proper sob, the sound wrenching out of his throat like it was actually his heart that had been torn out.
Phil was part of the Syndicate. And Tommy had trusted him.
Had nearly called him a father.
Tommy couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. All he could feel was pain, organs sliced out with surgical precision one, by one, by one, leaving him empty and bleeding from the chasm left inside him.
The elevator dinged again, at the floor above- above the apartment.
Tommy looked up as a couple entered the elevator, quickly getting up and wiping his cheeks free of tears as he hovered in the corner of the elevator.
“You alright there bud?” The man asked. Tommy sniffed.
“Fine,” he croaked.
“Don’t believe that, but hey, whatever it is, it’ll pass.”
Tommy sniffed again, risking a glance over, but all he could see was the woman’s dirty blonde hair and the man giving him a look with startlingly blue eyes.
“Thanks, I guess.” Tommy said. He wiped his cheeks again, watching the floor numbers pass by. The lobby button was already pressed, no doubt by half of the couple.
Tommy wrapped his arms around his middle. He felt… weird. Numb, maybe.
Empty, and achingly so.
A few minutes later, the elevator reached the lobby.
“Well, this is us,” the man said. “C’mon Molls. Bye kid.”
Tommy waited a moment or two to prevent the awkwardness of following the couple out, then darted out of the building without bothering to check for any familiar faces in the lobby.
Outside, the city roared. Tommy stumbled through the crowd, feeling very lost and very alone as he wandered through the streets. The people seemed to crush him in, the sounds and bustle and everything make Tommy wish he was (at home safe in a nest with wings around him, soft croons in his ears) somewhere else.
Eventually, Tommy pulled himself out of the crowd to step up into a doorway, using shaking fingers to dial the number he hadn’t finished with before his trip off the roof.
It was maybe two rings before the other end was picked up.
“Tommy? Tommy, hey, what’s up?"
“Wilbur,” Tommy croaked, chirps stuttering out of his throat. “Wil, something’s happened, I need- I-I need-”
“Something’s happened?" Wilbur’s voice turned afraid, the words rattling as though he was talking into a fan. “Are you okay? Where’s Phil, are you with him?"
“No, I-I’m not at home, I-if you could come get me-”
“Well, Tommy, I-I can’t. I can’t come get you right now, I’m so sorry Toms but- but I can call Phil for you, okay?"
“No!” Tommy shouted, bones turning to ice. “You can’t call Phil!”
“Why? Tommy, I gotta know what’s happening here, tell me what’s going on.”
Tommy choked on it, on the truth, since it was thick and poisonous in his throat and he couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe.
“I can’t,” he whimpered. “I ca-can’t, Wil-”
“Hey, hey, Toms, just breathe, okay? Just listen to me, it’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay. Tell me what’s happening.”
“Come get me,” Tommy choked out, “please come get me Wil, please.”
“Okay, okay. I-I’ll tell Phil, alright? I’ll tell him I’m going to pick you up, if you can wait a little while.”
“NO!" Tommy screamed. “No, you can’t tell him where I am, you can’t! Please, please Will please for fuck’s sake, please!”
“Tommy, you’re scaring me. Just wait, alright, I’m going to call Phil-”
“You can’t trust him!” Tommy squeezed his eyes shut, trying to slow his breathing. This was going nowhere. He couldn’t stay on the line. He had to end this. “I’ve- I’ve gotta go, Wil, okay?”
“Hey, hey Tommy no, no Toms don’t hang up, please Toms, Tommy, sunshine tell me where you are-”
“I’ve gotta go,” Tommy croaked, frantic chirps rising from his throat at Wilbur’s panic. “I’m sorry, you’ve always been like a brother to me. Goodbye Wil.”
Then he hung up and kept walking.
The ache only increased as he walked, swelling behind his ribs and his sternum as if ready to burst and collapse into a black hole. The emptiness seemed to swallow his thoughts, his every desire, until all that remained was him and the void.
And Tommy-
He’d been lied to.
Betrayed, by one of the only people he called family. He’d been used, manipulated and molded into a perfect little pet for the people who’d done nothing but lie to him and hurt him. And now he had nowhere to turn. Nobody to go to.
Tommy was empty. It hurt.
Tommy sniffled, but this time did nothing to stop the tears that began to pour down his face as he walked, arms wrapped around his middle.
His pocket buzzed. Tommy didn’t stop walking, sliding his phone out and glancing down at the screen. A picture of Techno, balancing a potato on his snout.
Tommy chuckled a little, then accepted the call and raised the phone to his ear. Maybe Techno would listen.
“Yeah?”
“Tommy,” Techno said, and he sounded even more worried than Wilbur. “What’s going on? I’ve just been bombarded by texts and voicemails, no one knows where you are, and- and we’re all worried about you. Just come home, Tommy. Phil’s worried sick.”
Tommy bit his lip.
He hadn’t thought about this. About the fact that Techno might still believe that their adoptive father cared, that he might not listen to reason.
“I can’t come home,” Tommy whispered. “I-I can’t, Tech.”
“Why not?”
Tommy shook his head.
“I can’t- I can’t explain right now. I’m sorry.”
“Can you at least tell me where you are?"
“No. I can’t risk it.” Tommy sighed. “Bye.”
“No, Tommy wait-”
But Tommy had already hung up. The metaphorical cutting of ties made the chasm in his chest split wider, threatening to swallow him whole.
He turned his phone to ‘do not disturb’ and pushed it back into his pocket before continuing to walk. As he did, he began to think.
Where could he go now?
His first thought was Sam’s house, but he couldn’t walk there.
Tubbo-
No. Tubbo didn’t want to see him. Tubbo didn’t want anything to do with him.
He was alone. Really alone, for the first time in an eternity. He’d been abandoned by everyone and everything he’d known.
Tommy was so wrapped up in his murk of loathing and grief that only one thing pierced him though:
“Tommy!”
Tommy stopped short and risked a glance back. A familiar blonde avian was shoving through the crowd, black wings-
Shit.
Tommy ran. He stumbled on his still-untied shoelaces, barely kept up by the frantic beating of his wings as he slipped through the crowd, shoving people aside and searching, searching, for a way to hide, a way to escape.
I can’t I can’t I can’t ( go back ) I can’t I can’t ( flock flock flock go back GO BACK ) I can’t I CANT I CAN’T-
He picked out an opening between buildings, then darted in.
He staggered as a twisted piece of fire escape clawed at his arm, rust-orange metal tearing his skin open. Tommy choked on a whimper, clamping his hand over the wound swelling with red, red, red.
He couldn’t make a noise. Couldn’t make a sound, couldn’t get caught. Couldn’t get found.
“Tommy?”
Tommy bit down on his lip hard enough that wet rust burst into his mouth as he stumbled behind a pair of garbage cans, curled into the smallest version of himself he could possibly be. A little fucking kid, with red on his shoes and no dad.
Footsteps in the entrance of the alleyway, and Tommy held his breath.
“Tommy? C’mon sunshine, just let me know where you are.”
Tommy squeezed his eyes shut. With every tap, tap, tap, his blood ran a little colder. Oh fuck fuck fuck what if some had dripped on the brick, on the concrete?
A low croon, so fucking pleading and worried that Tommy chomped on his tongue to stifle the chitter rising in his throat. The croon continued, turning his brain to a cereal bowl of glass and mush.
Where are you nestling? Little one, please. Lost baby. Reply. Reply. Reply.
Each and every rising sob stuck in Tommy’s throat, but he did nothing for the tears and mucus and blood mixing on his face, heart pounding with adrenaline and everything else. He was frozen, one hand pressed over his mouth and the other to warm flesh, wet and red red red spilling between his fingers, making his shirt damp.
The world was silent. Pure, empty, aching silence.
Shhh - tap. Tap. Rssss-
An enormous fwoosh , and Tommy let himself open his eyes in time to see the last of a black wing vanish over the wall of the building across from him.
Tommy let out a long, low, shuddering sigh, and unfurled. He staggered across the alley, leaning heavily against the stone and gingerly lifting his hand. More blood swelled out of the nasty, twisted gash in his arm, dark and red red red. Tommy winced and spat out a mouthful of blood. Fuck, that hurt. It throbbed, pulsing to drive home every stab of pain up his shoulder.
Hurts, doesn’t it?
Tommy, who’d been coughing on the liquids mixing in his throat, blinked and quickly picked his head up, scanning the alley. There weren’t any people. Then what was this?
I know how that feels. The voice seemed implacable in both age and gender, almost dismissible as a thought. And yet he’d heard the slithery tangle of whispers as clear as if it was a person speaking next to him.
Tommy looked from one end of the alley to the other.
No, no, look down. You’re crushing me with your right shoe.
Tommy blinked again, and dropped his head.
Pinned underneath his foot was a skinny-looking plant tendril, a pale and sickly white-yellow with crumpled leaves. Tommy felt rather bad for it.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t- I didn’t see you.”
Few do. I accept your apology.
Tommy crouched, regarding the plant closer.
“How can I hear you?”
I connect with those in pain. Beyond this shriveled head of mine, I’ve helped quite a few people. Not much I can do in this state, though, I’m afraid.
“Well, i-is there something I can do? To help? Get water, or something?”
It’s not water I need. The vine curled, one leaf resting limply on Tommy’s red hand. A far more precious liquid, however…
Tommy pulled his hand away and the vine twitched, coiling on on itself like a poked snake.
“You want my blood?"
It’s already been spilled. And I can return the favor, if you just give me your arm.
Tommy frowned a little, but lowered his arm so the vine wound limply around his wrist, curling tendrils into Tommy’s wound. Tommy gritted his teeth as a burning sensation invaded his arm, like a mosquito bite but more as the vine drank his blood, taking what Tommy kept so dear in his veins.
And then the pain vanished. All of it, gone, and Tommy let out a startled breath.
You see?
The vine uncoiled from Tommy’s arm and stretched out on the alley floor, all of a sudden swelling into fullness, two more creepers joining it and spooling dark red tendrils into the stone as paler pink leaves unfolded and stretched for the sun.
Thank you, Tommy. Perhaps my followers moved too soon when they planned to kill you.
Tommy sucked in a breath, and jerked back up to stand.
“You’re the Egg.”
What else would I be?
“I shouldn’t have helped you, you’re- you’re evil, you kill people.”
Evil is a human word, a fluid list of human behaviours. I am not human.
Tommy stepped away, one foot behind the other.
“But you almost killed me.”
I have never killed anyone. Those that see me as an equal, as something more, they help me. Those that won’t, they help me in other ways. You, you have an opportunity. I can take away your pain, Tommy. I can take away your pain, as long as you help me.
It is better than some people have given you. You were merely a thing to be used, to them.
A lump grew in Tommy’s throat.
“But I-I-I- I haven’t-”
You have been used. Used as a plaything by those who took advantage of your trust, of your hunger for love, so they could cut all your ties with others so you could be theirs. And theirs alone.
Tommy couldn’t help a sniff, and swiped an arm over his face to clear away some of the mess clotting on his cheeks and mouth. His arm and lip had started hurting again, the ache in his chest growing again and cracking his ribs.
“You can make it stop hurting?” He croaked.
I can. I can raise you, Tommy, above those who have lied and pretended to love you just so they could control you. I can give you whatever you want .
Tommy sniffled again, falling to his knees. One of the Egg vines brushed against his face, lapping at the blood streaked down his chin.
“I want to stop hurting,” he whispered. He wanted it so, so, so badly. “I want- I want to stop caring about them.”
Then I will give you peace.
“Okay.” Tommy closed his eyes. “Okay.”
A few minutes later, a van pulled up outside the alleyway. The windows were tinted, reflective so all Tommy could see was his own face before the window rolled down and a near-stranger appeared instead.
“So,” Antfrost said, propping his chin up on the knuckles as his ears twitched. He grinned a very smug, cat-like grin. “Long time no see.”
“Are you always on kidnapping duty?” Tommy stepped around the front of the car, pulling the passenger seat open to get in.
“Punz got you last time,” the cat said, eyes flicking over the wound on Tommy’s arm. “I was just in the area.”
As the van pulled out, rumbling through the city, Tommy watched his driver, trying to ignore the thumps and whimpering from the back.
“How does it work?” Tommy asked.
Antfrost spared a red-eyed glance over to the passenger side.
“Does what work?”
“Being- being with the Egg. Does it magically make you look evil?”
Antfrost’s whiskers twitched with amusement.
“You’ll have to find out yourself.” He looked straight ahead again, thin pupils flickering over cars as if they were birds. “You’re special, Tommy.”
Tommy sunk back in his seat, arms folded. He pressed his wound into his shirt to hopefully stop the bleeding.
“How?”
“You’re one of the few,” the cat said dreamily. “The chosen, the faithful. Most refuse to give themselves over to the Egg, to let their pain be squashed, but you saw the futility in that.”
“Why struggle for the sake of it when the Egg can give you what you want?” Tommy whispered.
“Exactly.”
Tommy glanced over again.
“What did the Egg promise you?”
Antfrost’s whiskers twitched, and he cagily looked away under the pretense of checking a side mirror.
“What did the Egg promise you?”
“Touché.” Tommy glanced out the windows, and saw the city center approaching. “So, what, we’re going back down to the murder basement?”
Antfrost grinned at him. The smile had entirely too sharp of teeth.
“Of course. Let me find someone else to finish up here first, and I’ll take you down myself.”
Once the van was backed up to some kind of loading dock, Tommy followed the cat out and around into the city center proper. Closer, he could see things moving under the surface of Antfrost’s skin, tiny red threads curling in and out of his fur and the occasional leaf poking out of skin-
Tommy’s stomach churned, and he looked away.
In the city center, business was as usual. People walked to and fro, waiting for appointments or filling out paperwork or talking on phones. None of them seemed to notice as Antfrost and Tommy passed, Antfrost leading the way past a sign reading ‘KEEP OUT’ and down a flight of stairs.
Tommy frowned at the top, not following just yet.
“I thought the basement was filled in after the hall was bombed.”
“That was the intention,” Antfrost said. “Then the mayor found the Egg. Come on, we don’t have all day to wait.”
Tommy skipped the occasional stair to catch up, nearly slipping once or twice on the dust-coated marble of the steps.
The deeper he went, the colder the air got. The electric lights disappeared, replaced by dim red torches. Tommy squinted in the lack of light, but Antfrost’s pupils got bigger and he practically skipped along, as though this was an afternoon in the park.
But it wasn’t. When Tommy reached the bottom of the stairs, which had changed to rough stone at some point, he could hear whimpers and a choked, quickly cut-off scream. Tommy gulped.
“This way.” Antfrost kept walking, between the cages, and after a moment Tommy followed with his arms around his middle and his wings tight on his back.
He tried to ignore the sounds from the cages, shutting out the pleas and sobbing, but when there was a familiar voice it pierced straight through his skull, making him freeze as though it had been a crossbow bolt.
“Tommy? Tommy, is that you?”
Tommy pulled in a breath, and turned. In the nearest cage was a white-eyed person in a filthy wine-dark dress, thin and pale and afraid.
Tommy let the breath out.
“You,” he said. “I thought you escaped.”
A soft chuckle.
“No. I’m too weak to run. What are you doing here, Tommy? You should be free.”
Tommy tilted his head.
“I am free.” He stepped forward, kneeling and wrapping one hand around the cold, cold bars. “Look, man, all you need to do is accept the Egg, and you’ll be let out. Then you can see the sun again.”
The person curled a lip in disgust, then spat at Tommy. Tommy pulled away, wiping the saliva off on his shirt.
“You’re a pawn of the Egg,” the person hissed. “Why should I listen to a single thing you say?”
“Tommy, that’s enough.” Antfrost rested a hand on Tommy’s shoulder, tilting him back. “Eret.”
The person grinned, a pale glint of teeth in a dirty face.
“Antfrost.”
Tommy let himself be led away. He spared one glance back, but eventually looked at Antfrost again.
“You know that person?”
“Eret,” Antfrost said with a nod. “They’re a high-ranking politician in the city.”
Tommy frowned.
“I’m gonna guess they opposed the mayor.”
“They had ambitions of running against Bad in the next election,” Antfrost said. “Yes.”
“Why didn’t you kill them already?”
Antfrost didn’t say anything at first, but his pupils got larger, tail twitching behind him.
“We have our reasons.”
Tommy followed along as the cat walked up to the main platform, which was clustered with people.
“Bad!” Antfrost called, and the tallest of the people straightened.
“Antfrost!” The mayor turned, a shape behind him hoisted up into the air. Upon seeing Tommy, he spread and clapped his hands together. Something dark and wet flickered through the dimness as he did. “And Tommy, look at you. I’m so glad you finally came around. Come on, come on up here you little muffin. I won’t hurt you.”
Tommy slowly moved closer. He wouldn’t look at the dangling dripping thing behind the mayor’s head, violet spooling off slender black fingers and horns.
Instead, he looked behind. Far behind.
There was a curtain, back there. White, pure and unstained in this filthy, hellish place. Was the Egg behind it? Something else?
“You came back to join us,” the mayor said cheerfully, voice too bright for this dark place. “I’m so glad for you, Tommy.”
Tommy blinked, and looked to the mayor again.
“I- I don’t know if I’m joining you.”
The mayor’s eyes widened. They were white, the same flickering blankness as the curtain. When Tommy’s eyes darted over the mayor, he could see the writhing beneath papery skin, the way the mayor’s hollow smile was sagging in odd places, as though the expression was merely a mask, held together by thin red strands in the corners of his mouth.
The mayor’s eyes were exactly like that curtain. They were a cover, a veil over something rotten and overgrown living inside the demon.
“You don’t know?” He asked, head tilting slightly. Something throbbed in the side of his throat, pulsing too fast and too thick for a heartbeat. “Tommy, if you didn’t come here of your own free will, why aren’t you in a cage? Where is the Syndicate?”
A lump grew in Tommy’s throat, and he looked down at his feet.
“Where are your protectors?”
Tommy closed his eyes, shaking his head. A chirp stuttered out of his throat. Tears were slipping down his face again, warm and wet on his cheeks. The mayor gently wiped them away.
“Don’t cry, little muffinhead. You’ll be much happier with us, you’ll see.”
“How do you know?” Tommy croaked.
“The Egg will take away your pain. You won’t want a single thing ever again. Wouldn’t you like that?”
Tommy nodded weakly, not pulling away as the mayor continued to dry his tears. The voice slipping into his ears was soothing. Comforting.
“So tell me again whether or not you want to join us?”
“I do,” Tommy whispered. “Please. Please- please make it stop.”
“That’s what I thought.” The mayor wrapped bony fingers around Tommy’s wrist, leading him across the platform and up to the curtain.
The white fabric was drawn, and when Tommy raised his eyes, he saw-
He let out an almost reverent sigh.
There was a massive egg-shaped mass in the corner of the cavern. It pulsed, almost, and the blood-red vines growing from the base and spreading out across the stone pulsed too.
Hello Tommy, the Egg whispered. It’s nice to finally meet you face-to-face. Several vines curled around his ankles. In a matter of speaking.
Tommy blinked, slowly. The pulsing, the throbbing hum in his ears, it made him feel entranced. He reached out, wanting wanting wanting to press his hand against the red red red shell. It looked smooth, soft and inviting. He wanted to touch it.
The mayor caught his arm, a moment before Tommy’s hand brushed the shell.
“Ah, Tommy, there’s an easier way.”
Tommy let out a sigh. The air smelled funny, and it made his head swim. He didn’t see the flowers opened up on the vines, white petals emitting the smell.
“An easier way for what?” Tommy murmured. The mayor’s unchanging smile spread wider, sharp fangs gleaming in the dim light.
“Give me your arm.”
“You already have it.”
The mayor shook his head.
“The other arm.”
The wound had started hurting again. It definitely throbbed as Tommy raised his arm. The mayor took his arm, inspecting the wound, then tore the clotted blood and skin open so it began to ooze again.
Tommy cried out, crumpling as agony shot up his arm. The mayor ran a hand through his hair, raising a vine that curled around his hand.
“Shh, shh, it only hurts for a little bit.”
There was blood, crimson ribbons streaming down to his elbow, and he was being laid down, head pillowed on vine-laced stone. His brain spun from the smell and the hum and the blood spilling out on the stone.
Something appeared in the wound, something that squirmed and split and grew and Tommy screamed, both with horror and with pain because it burned it burned it burned his life was being sucked out there were threads in his muscles in his veins in his bones.
A hand smoothed his hair again, voices speaking but not understandable in Tommy’s fevered mind. Tendrils were crawling up his spine, down his fingertips.
The last threads reached Tommy’s brain-
He jerked for a moment, the threads constricting, then stilled.
Everything slowed.
The pain lessened, and as it did, Tommy felt his panic fade, his heartbeat stretch out. Everything was fine. He didn’t need to panic.
This was… nice, actually. Comforting. He felt good, in fact, relaxed as though his wings had just been preened. The hum in his brain was like a lullaby as he slowly fell asleep, the chorus of other minds like music. He was safe. He was finally safe, blanketed by a layer of vines.
He was with the Egg now. Everything was going to be fine.