Archive of Our Own ^beta

Almost the entire floor of Tommy’s dirt shack was covered in very architecturally inaccurate or impossible drawings. When Tubbo mentioned they already started brainstorming, Purpled tricked himself into thinking it was a good thing. He needed to stop lying to himself. This was a mess.

“So what do you think?” Tommy beamed, arms outstretched and scent flaring with pride.

“I think this is a disaster,” Purpled deadpanned. Ignoring Tommy’s outraged spluttering, Purpled bent down to collect the drawings. The best he could do with these was get an idea of their basic aesthetic. They could be used for kindling too, but he didn’t think that would go over well. So aesthetic it was.

“Sorry about the mess,” Ranboo said. “I tried to tell them we should clean up before you came over.”

“It’s fine,” he told the Omega. “This is about what I expected.”

“Rude!” Tommy shouted. Purpled just flipped him off, smirking when he heard Ranboo and Tubbo snicker.

As Tommy chased Tubbo around the couch, Purpled ducked past them and began flipping through the drawings. Only to find that there was no consistent aesthetic. Unless he counted the seemingly endless notes of “cobblestone”. And he fucking refused to acknowledge that option.

“So do you guys have any actual ideas?” he asked.

“What do you mean? You’re holding our ideas,” Tommy retorted, giving up on catching Tubbo and instead flopping onto the couch.

“No, I mean, like,” Purpled rubbed his forehead, “do you want something fortified or discrete or over the top?”

With a low hum, Tommy tilted his head before glancing at the other two. Ranboo hesitated, wringing his hands, while Tubbo crossed his arms; spoiled fruit and alcohol filtering into their scents. “Discrete probably,” Tommy finally said and for a split second Purpled watched his gaze dart towards the door, wary, cinnamon sharpening the air. “You know, so it’s just for us teens. Fortified would be good too.” 

Purpled glanced at the door, feeling himself bristle. Right. Wilbur. Dream had only recently managed to chase the man out of the server’s main area. Of course the other three teens were anxious. After being manipulated like that. Not that he could blame them either. Wilbur was a smooth talker. If Purpled didn’t know Dream through Punz, he might’ve fallen for it too and when he hadn’t, Wilbur had given him a wide berth.

Reaching into his inventory, Purpled pulled out a sheet of blueprint paper. “Okay. Let’s get started then.”

An hour later and he was regretting not charging more. Just trying to come up with a design was harder than fighting in a fucking war and three diamonds a day wasn’t worth even a single battle let alone a war.

“Watch towers are the way to go!” Tommy cheered. “Towers as big as I am.”

“Pretty sure you mean as big as your ego,” Purpled retorted, fending off the youngest before he could get his grubby paws on the blueprints.

“Oi you take that back!”

“Make me.”

“I’m the most humble person you’ll ever meet!”

“Wouldn’t towers give away our location?” Ranboo pointed out, hands raised to try to placate them. Purpled growled at Tommy when he tried to snatch the pen.

“But towers are poggers!” Tommy whined.

“We aren’t doing towers,” Purpled snapped back. “You’re the one that said you want a discrete den, dumbass.”

“You did say that, bossman,” Tubbo shrugged from the couch. When Tommy whirled to face him, gasping, Purpled took the chance to push him away from the table.

“I still want a poggers den,” Tommy muttered.

“We can make it cooler on the inside,” Purpled promised. “Look,” he continued as he pointed to the blueprint, “the visible den will be boring, but we can build underground. That way we have more room to do more personalized and unique things. And it won’t catch anyone’s attention.”

“But it should still have something poggers on the outside.”

A book flew past Tommy’s head and Purpled ducked out of the way. “You should look up the definition of discrete, bossman,” Tubbo cackled before yelping as Tommy lunged for him.

As the two fell to the floor in a heap, Purpled rolled his eyes. Prime he was going to regret agreeing to this wasn’t he? “How do you put up with this?” he asked Ranboo.

Beside him, the enderman hybrid watched the other two wrestle. A quiet purr thrummed in the air and Purpled relaxed a little. It wasn't because of Ranboo's purr. Definitely not.

“Tommy can be loud and impulsive,” Ranboo admitted. “And he can get us into all kinds of situations. But no matter what happens, I know he’s going to be there for us, you know? He looks after his friends, his pack.”

Pack. He should’ve put it together sooner. All of them were old enough to start creating their own packs now and all three of them were more instinct driven than he was. From the amount of time they spent together, it was obvious that they’d decide to form a pack. None of them were close enough with any of the older packs to consider joining them so the most logical thing was each other. Good. They needed that stability… And a den. And Prime only knew the mess they’d make of it without Purpled’s help. He could put up with the insanity until then.

A screech from Tommy snapped him out of his thoughts. Shaking himself, Purpled frowned at the blueprints. How could he make the den discrete and cool at the same time? There had to be a way. Fake tree towers? No. That was probably still too subtle for Tommy’s taste. Though he’d have to remember that for his own den.

After a few moments of silence, Purpled frowning at the blueprints, Ranboo suggested, “What do you think about a drawbridge and moat?”

Hm. That could actually work. Nothing would have to be super tall and a moat could easily be disguised if done right. If he could make the door of the den itself the drawbridge or somehow rig the moat to part, maybe that would be enough for Tommy to be happy. “Good idea Ran-”

“Fuck yes! A drawbridge is even more poggers than a tower!” Tommy cheered as he released Tubbo from where he’d been pinning him to the couch.

“A moat is awesome too. We can have a bunch of fish and even a squid and turtles. That’s perfect, Boo,” Tubbo agreed. The Beta left the tattered couch to nudge the Omega, purring and bumping their scent glands together.

Purpled ignored the easy way honey and blueberries blended with vanilla, both of them carrying an undertone of gingerbread.