Chapter Text
For as long as he’s been alive, the monster has been standing in Tommy’s back garden.
He used to think that it was a normal thing that every child had; it never spoke, nor did it do anything to hurt him. It simply stood and stared, watching over him as he played by its feet.
The monster seemed to know what he was feeling and why, and it would prove to be very useful. If he was happy or excited about something, the monster would come and make it even better. If he was sad or lonesome, the monster would come to the window and tap out a pattern. It became their call to each other; if one needed the other, the other would come at the knock.
Sometimes, if Tommy spent enough time outside with the monster, it would crouch low to the ground and pick him up, bringing him up to its shoulder and setting him down there. It would stand to its full height, making sure he wouldn’t slide off before letting free its massive wings. It was days like those that Tommy was grateful his family lived on an estate with plenty of room to move around in. He would laugh and cheer atop the monster, pretending that he himself was flying as the wind whipped his cheeks. Other days, the monster ignored him completely, standing as far away from him as it could, just watching.
Tommy quickly found out that the monster came and went as it pleased. Some days it was there, some days it was not. It simply existed, and Tommy’s family lived alongside it.
His parents never did mention the thing in the backyard, nor did they mention how the weight of its body would shake the earth whenever it took a step, nor how the blankets in the house mysteriously disappeared until even their beds were bare, nor how there were usually giant feathers strewn around their gardens for seemingly no reason.
Nobody seemed to acknowledge the existence of the monster but him. On the first day of school, in order to make friends, he asked the other children about their backyard monsters. No one knew what he was talking about, and a few kids had run screaming from him, terrified of what the boy could have bought with him.
Since then, Tommy no longer had a name. His classmates threw insults at his back, calling him monster boy if they had to address him. No amount of the teacher’s scoldings could keep Tommy from being ostracised.
][
Even years later, at fifteen, he enters his classes full of hope and leaves miserable after being either ignored or harassed for the better part of six hours. Who knew teenagers could be so cruel?
Every night, Tommy opens his window, the want for its company slowly becoming constant over the years. Tommy tells it his problems, and the monster listens, which is more than his parents bother to do anymore. They’ve been so busy with work as of late that he couldn’t bother them with his stupid questions.
Tonight is no different. After their nightly 8 pm dinner, void of conversation, Tommy retreats to his room. He strips his bed of his duvet, bringing it and himself straight to the window. He slides it up to open it, and does their special knock on the windowsill. It jumps up from beneath the window, a look of fond teasing on its face. It tried to scare him, Tommy realises. The notion almost makes him laugh. He could never be afraid of his friend.
“Hey, big man,” he says, reaching out to touch the monster. “Something good happened today!”
The monster leans forward to meet Tommy, letting his hand rest on its forehead. Its eyes slip closed, contented, making an intrigued humming noise that prompts him to go on.
“Yeah! I made a friend,” Tommy says reverently. The monster’s eyes snap open in surprise, and its face cracks into the widest smile Tommy’s ever seen. It warbles joyfully, grinning ear to ear.
“His name is Toby, but we’re already such good friends that he says I can call him Tubbo,” he rambles, getting excited. “He's in three of my classes, and he let me sit with him at lunch! He introduced me to one of his friends, too, but I don’t remember their name too well. It was foreign, I think.”
The monster trills pleasantly, as if to say “I’m happy for you.”
“It’s so nice to have someone to talk to,” Tommy gushes, pulling the duvet around his body to keep out the night’s chill. “It’s nice to be spoken back to once in a while.”
The monster raises an eyebrow, tilting its head in mock offence. Tommy chuckles.
“I didn’t mean it like that. I love talking to you.”
The monster smiles softly, bringing its hand up to the window. Tommy climbs onto it without a second thought. He trusts it.
The monster lifts him to eye level and bows its head. Tommy knows to meet it with his own head. It's a sort of bonding thing, he thinks; the monster always sighs in relief after they do this.
The tension melts from the monster's shoulders. It hums in contentment and relaxes its hand, tilting Tommy to an angle on which staying upright becomes impossible. He yelps, flailing to grab hold of one of its fingers, but the monster tilts him further, and he flies off.
He doesn't even have time to scream before his back hits something solid. The monster's other hand.
The air is audibly forced to leave his lungs, and with it comes a hard 'oof'. As frightful as it is to admit, the joking around the monster does sometimes feel paternal. Tommy doesn't know what to feel about it anymore.
A loud, chuffing laugh explodes into the night, breaking that train of thought. The force and volume of it make his whole body vibrate, like sitting in the back of a particularly bumpy bus.
"Very funny," Tommy says sourly, righting himself. "Put me back inside. I'm not talking to you anymore."
The monster's laughter subsides, and it dutifully brings its hand up to the window. Tommy climbs back inside, and the monster's hand drifts down to its side.
It looks expectantly at the blanket wrapped around his shoulders.
"Come on, man, please? I like this one," Tommy pleads, but all he gets in return are puppy eyes.
"Oh, fine," he relents, handing over the blanket with exasperated resignation. “You’re lucky I love you.”
The monster smiles warmly, holding the comparably small duvet to its chest as if to say thank you.
"Good- night ," Tommy sniffs indignantly, in response to which the monster smiles fondly and raises its hand to wave at him, a human trait he'd picked up from each night's goodbye.
Tommy waves back and turns away from the window to get changed into his pyjamas. The sun had long since set; any minute now, his parents would come upstairs, take his phone, and shut his door. He sighs, puts the device on his dressing table, and tucks himself into bed (at least, what’s left of it).
][
Tubbo is waiting for him at the gate the next morning, which is a pleasant surprise. Tommy didn't expect him to do that.
"Thank God," Tubbo says exasperatedly as Tommy approaches. "I thought you were never gonna show up."
"I'm sorry," Tommy says, "the bus ran late."
"It's fine. Come on," Tubbo grabs Tommy's hand and pulls him towards the school buildings. "Ranboo's waiting in the library."
"Ranboo," Tommy swills the name on his tongue. "I’ve never heard that name before."
"You better not make fun of them," Tubbo says warningly, grip tightening almost painfully on Tommy's wrist. "His parents are vegan nut-jobs and he's sensitive about it, so don’t say anything, okay?"
"I wasn't going to," Tommy says. "I just didn't really hear you the first time you said their name and-"
"It's fine," Tubbo shuts him up as they near the library. “Just don’t mention it to them.”
The library doors open on sensor and Tubbo drops Tommy’s wrist as they enter. They find Ranboo curled up on one of the sofas, his split-dyed hair flopping over his eyes as he pores over the book he’s reading. Tubbo abandons Tommy to greet them, and Ranboo immediately tries to hide the title. Tubbo obviously sees this, because Ranboo is not slick, and snatches it off of him.
“C’mon Boo, you had nightmares for weeks last time you read this shit,” he confronts, shaking the book in front of Ranboo’s face. It has a piece of paper laminated to the spine that marks the book as a horror-thriller.
“I know,” Ranboo whines, “but it’s so exciting.”
“They can read whatever they want,” Tommy pipes up, slinking into their conversation. “If he wants nightmares, let him.”
“How long have you been friends with him?” Tubbo asks, voice heated and eyes accusatory. Tommy doesn’t answer.
Ranboo stares at Tommy inquisitively, trying to figure him out.
“I know what’s best for them, okay? I’ve known them for years,” Tubbo snaps, tucking the book under his left arm and away from Ranboo’s hand, creeping steadily towards the book to take it back.
“I didn’t mean to start a fight,” Tommy defends, taking a step away from Tubbo and Ranboo. “I just thought-”
“Don’t think, then,” Tubbo shuts him down, spinning on his heel and taking the book back to the shelf.
A second of silence passes, and Tommy can’t help but feel a sense of Deja Vu.
“I was really invested in that,” Ranboo says wistfully, looking longingly at Tubbo’s back.
“So read it,” Tommy tells him. “You don’t have to pander to Tubbo.”
Ranboo shrugs. “He’s probably right, though. I will get nightmares”
“So?” Tommy says. “They’re your nightmares. Not his.”
Ranboo shrugs again as Tubbo comes back, but as the bell rings, he hangs back.
They walk out of the library with the book, holding it proudly at their side.
][
“I’m not sure Tubbo actually likes me,” Tommy muses, staring up at the monster. They’re in a similar position to how they were the night before, with Tommy sitting in the monster’s hand as they do the weird monster-bonding thing.
It hums inquisitively, eyes closed yet still seemingly interested.
“Well, this morning, he waited outside the school for me, which at first I thought was really nice of him, but then he started chewing me out for no fucking reason.”
The monster picks up its head, cocking an eyebrow as if to say, “Really?”
“Yes, really, ” Tommy grumbles. “All I did was defend Ranboo.”
The monster makes a confused sound at the back of its throat in response.
“That’s Tubbo’s friend’s name. Weird, I know,” Tommy rolls his eyes, “but Tubbo basically committed a hate crime.”
The monster nods solemnly, but there’s a twinge of amusement in its smile.
“See? You get me,” Tommy says, returning his forehead to the monster’s. “I don’t need Tubbo. I don’t need anyone but you.”
Something only describable as an incredibly loud cat’s purr erupts into the air. The monster seems to like that. It pulls him closer to it, bringing him down to his chest. Its heart beats deafeningly in his ear as the possessive hug tightens.
“Okay, man, you can let go now,” Tommy calls up to it, albeit a little strained due to the pressure on his lungs. The monster seems to realise its mistake as it moves Tommy back into its sights, checking him over for injury. It doesn’t say anything, but it conveys its apology through its eyes.
“It’s alright, don’t worry. I’m fine,” Tommy insists, rubbing his hand between the monster’s eyes. It relaxes a little but doesn’t pretend to drop him this time.
It blinks slowly twice, then reaches over to the window. It wants Tommy off.
“But I’m not tired!” Tommy complains. “I still have so much to say!”
The monster’s eyes narrow scoldingly, and he points at the sky. At the moon; more specifically, its position, squarely in the centre of the sky.
Midnight.
“Alright, fine,” Tommy allows. “But you’re making time for me tomorrow, okay?”
The monster shrugs. Presumably, it has nothing better to do than to speak to him. He’s cool like that.
So, against his better judgment, he goes back inside and gets into bed. His stolen blanket has been substituted with another, just as it always is. Whatever otherworldly force is in charge of replacing his bedcovers is fucking brilliant at their job. God only knows how they manage, what with the monster’s knack for theft. Be it his clothes, his sheets, or other random objects, it always manages to steal something from Tommy.
Tomorrow is something he can’t fathom facing right now, and he fully intends to put off turning in for the night as long as he can.
His phone is gone, so he can’t scroll TikTok for six hours until his mother comes in to wake him. He reaches underneath his mattress and guides his fingers to close around the old Nintendo his grandparents gave him for his twelfth birthday. He can just play some mindless game until the sun decides to rise again.
No such luck. A faint yet insistent tapping noise echoes around the room. Their knock. He can feel the monster’s eyes on his body, but he ignores it as best he can. It’s telling him to go to sleep, he knows, but he doesn’t want to.
The house’s thinned walls can’t muffle the warning noise that escapes the monster’s lips.
It's like a mixture of a dog's growl and a bird's screech. It shocks Tommy to his core, anxiety seeping into his bones. The monster has never done this before, and for good reason. The sound rumbles dreadfully through the whole house.
He drops the Nintendo in surprise, staring out of the window at the monster. Wide and horrified eyes meet even wider ones.
It looks terrified. Of itself? Maybe it didn't know it could make that noise. It had scared Tommy quite substantially, but he couldn’t help but imagine how concerned he would be if he all of a sudden began growling like a dog. Sympathy replaces fear.
It shudders out a breath, taking a step back. It looks shell-shocked, confusion and regret creasing its forehead.
“Hey,” Tommy whispers, “Hey, it’s okay, hold on.”
He can’t get the window open fast enough. The monster is already trying to get its giant fingers under the tight gap and isn’t succeeding. Its breath comes ragged and desperate, its fear felt through even bricks and plaster.
The window finally slides upward, and the monster doesn’t hold back. Before Tommy can even lean out the window, the monster’s hands are on his body, yanking him out of the house and into its chest. It crushes him against its body, its hands constricting his breath as it coos frantically at him.
Tommy calls out in panic. The monster has never hurt him before, and he doesn't think it means to now. It acted on a terrified impulse. It's still making its noises, over and over begging for his forgiveness through its inhuman language. Tommy knows it was an accident, of course, and doesn’t mind letting it go. He just wishes he knew how to break it out of this stupor.
“Stop! Dude- Monster? Monster’s not your name… Can you let me down? Please?” Tommy yells into the skin he’s pressed against, the words unhelpfully muffled. Though his plea doesn’t go heard, the monster’s grip loosens enough for him to move freely again.
They stay like this for way too long, his game forgotten, with the monster chirping its apologies every now and then. It doesn’t take long for Tommy’s vision to blur into sleep.
It is late, after all.
][
When the world comes back into focus, the sun is shining in Tommy's face. His first instinct is to cover his face with his blankets to let his eyes adjust before opening them, but he finds his bed bare.
Huh. Weird. He probably kicked his sheets off in the night, he's done that before. That, or his monster stole them again. Tommy reaches blindly for the water bottle on his bedside table and finds that gone too. What the fu- oH MY GOD
The bed beneath him moves of its own accord. In surprise, his eyes jolt open, and he finds himself many many feet above the ground.
The monster is cradling him like a baby. This is not how he envisioned his Wednesday morning to begin. He's too disoriented for this bullshit.
“Hey, dad- oh, fuck, uh- Monster? Put me down, huh?” He forces out, still half-asleep. The monster keens at the word. Dad… he’s only ever called the monster that in his head. It’s absolutely ludicrous his body would betray him like this. To be fair, words are incredibly hard at… shit, what time is it?
The monster hums thoughtfully above him. Tommy can see the hesitance in its eyes as it contemplates doing as he asked. It sighs a great, heavy sigh and lowers him to the windowsill. He clambers inside, cringing as the floorboards creak under his feet.
The clock on the wall reads 8:53, approximately two minutes before school starts.
Shit.
][
He’s absolutely left 70 per cent of his books at home and there’s no food on his person but Tommy speedwalks through the school gates at 9:25, which is a fucking win. It’s bad, sure, but not as bad as it could be. Half an hour isn’t a death sentence and he can blame it on his parents for not waking him up. Not that they could have, what with him fast asleep in the monster’s arms.
He really does need to humanise it a little more. It’s ridiculous that he’s gone fourteen years without so much as asking the monster’s name. Surely it has one, right?
The office lady frowns at him as he walks past the dean’s office, giving him the ‘you’re late’ look. He approaches the desk, flashing her an apologetic smile.
“What’s your student ID?” The woman asks, clearly bored. She’s done this a thousand times and the kid’s late stories get stupider with every day that passes. She doesn’t even bother asking for one.
“20077,” Tommy replies. The woman gives him an annoyed sniff of disapproval before keying his information into her computer. She pushes her glasses further up her nose and squints for a few seconds before sighing.
“You’re signed in,” she says, turning back to him and giving him a tepid glare. “Go straight to class and apologise to your teacher, alright?”
Tommy thanks her, turns on his heel and goes to walk out of the office when a familiar voice shouts from the dean’s room a few yards away.
“That’s bullshit!”
A few older voices reprimand Tubbo for the expletive while Tommy stands in shock. Why is his friend in trouble? Well, obviously he just swore at a bunch of faculty members, but he had to be there for some reason before that. Though he can feel the receptionist’s eyes glaring into his back, he slides close to the wall and tries to listen through the door.
“Look, Toby, there’s a fine line between banter and bullying and you are toeing it,” a muffled adult voice says. “You heard Miss Puffy. Unless you want to fail, you’re his friend.”
“I know that,” Tubbo snaps back, and Tommy can imagine him running his hands through his hair, “but it’s so much harder than you think-”
“I understand what I’m asking, believe me, I do, but if you want decent grades, you have to work for them, Mr Underscore,” the dean says,
“But the monster he keeps talking about- it's real, Miss Puffy, I can feel it,” Tubbo says reverently. “I've never felt like this before, either. We’re like two magnets with the same side up. I swear, I’m physically repelled by him.”
“What nonsense,” Puffy scolds. “Look, you can’t use that as an excuse to get out of this. We made a deal, Mr Underscore. If you aren't willing to do schoolwork, you’ll have to do a bit of community service to get your credits. Do you want the grades or not?”
“I do,” Tubbo says, though it sounds like he’s holding himself back from laying into somebody, “and I’m sorry for yelling.”
“It’s alright,” the teacher says pointedly. “Now go back to class.”
Tommy takes this as his cue to go. He’s fairly certain this conversation was not meant for his ears and he definitely doesn’t want to be caught eavesdropping. He makes it out of the office doors just as the dean’s office opens and his friend storms out. As quickly and quietly as humanly possible, he slips behind the building and watches Tubbo walk scathingly back towards his class.
Thankfully their classes were separate that period, so Tommy had all of physics to wonder what that interaction was about.
By the time they saw each other again, Tommy had run over every possible reason for that conversation to have happened and really, it came down to him. Tubbo knew he wasn't lying about the monster, which was amazing, actually. It was a weight lifted from his shoulders to know that somebody believed him.
He, Tubbo, and Ranboo are sitting in their usual spot when Tommy finds that he just can’t hold his tongue any longer. He waits until Tubbo and Ran to finish talking and eating before he brings it up.
“So, Tubbo,” he begins, leaning forward to rest his chin on his hands. “How do you feel about monsters?”
For a moment, Tubbo’s eyes go completely blank. There is not a single trace of recognition at all in those brown voids until half a second later when the nothingness is replaced by displeasure.
“You mean your monster?” He shrugs, taking another bite of the apple in his hand. “I mean, it smells like fucking ass but otherwise, I don’t really have an opinion.”
Silently, Tommy preens at the fact that Tubbo doesn’t seem to care. This has to be what having friends feels like; this sense of unconditional acceptance is fucking magic.
“How do you know what it smells like?” Ranboo questions.
“I don’t know, I just do,” Tubbo says. “Usually it’s not this bad, but it’s all over you, Tommy.”
Ranboo leans over and sniffs Tommy’s shoulder.
“Nope,” they say, furrowing their brow. “I don’t smell anything.”
Tubbo, following Ranboo’s lead, also leans in for a whiff. He wrinkles his nose.
“Yeah, you definitely smell like monster,” he says, shifting ever so slightly away from Tommy. “You need a shower, like, now. ”
“Noted,” Tommy says blithely, the word ‘smell’ becoming annoying all of a sudden. He takes a bite of the sandwich half that Ranboo had been kind enough to give him and as he chews, has a little sniff of his own. Strangely enough, he actually does smell vaguely of his monster.
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The rest of the day was slow and dreary and Tommy was thankful to be home. Tubbo hadn’t spoken much to him today other than the sniff-fest they’d had at break so Tommy was more than happy to converse exclusively with Ranboo at lunch. Tommy didn’t properly bring up what he’d heard and Tubbo didn’t either, so they didn’t have much to talk about. The air between them held a sort of weight that Tommy hadn’t known existed, like he could reach out and touch the tension. The two classes in his schedule that Tubbo took with him were just as lame, barely a word spoken between them. Tommy is used to people ignoring his existence, but when Tubbo does it, it hurts . He's obviously done something wrong, he just can't figure out what. Was it to do with the smell thing?
“Do you think he's really friends with me?” Tommy asks his monster, staring up at it from his place cradled against its chest. He watches the monster shrug, expectant of more before remembering what got him into this plight in the first place. He’s so desperate for love, he’ll take anything that responds in more than purrs and coos.
"Right," he murmurs to himself, despondence lacing his words. "You don't talk."
The monster's attention draws itself elsewhere, staring out into the empty field behind the estate. Recently raked, so the ground is stirred up and dusty. Tommy's parents employ someone to do the planting and ploughing during spring but they've left for the week, so the field remains stark for another day.
It's dirty in there, and Tommy has strict instructions not to go into the pasture lest he stomp mud into his mother's pristine cream carpets.
The monster, however, was instructed of nothing.
It moves with purpose towards the field, faster than it ever has before. Tommy grabs the first thing in front of him, which just so happens to be the monster's robe-thing it wears. Its footsteps should shake the earth, but they do not. The monster has always been too gentle for its size.
It reaches the field and lowers its hand with an impatient trill. Tommy gets off, curious and wary of his friend.
“What are you doing?” Tommy finally finds the breath to say.
The monster ignores him completely, wading into the field with all the confidence in the world. It crouches and using its index finger, begins writing in the dirt.
Tommy watches on in awe, wondering when the monster found the time to learn how to write. Maybe it knew how to read and do maths as well, just for shits and giggles. Maybe it could do stuff like this all along but purposefully kept it from him. Who would know?
The monster's first letter is an A. Slowly, beside the A, an S materialises, and then a K.
Ask.
"Ask what?" Tommy wants to know.
The monster shakes its head in frustration, making a 'there's more' sort of gesture, the kind you use playing charades.
"Ask… Ask you questions?" Tommy says cautiously, and the monster responds with an encouraging nod.
"Okay… Do you have a name?"
The monster smiles gleefully, putting its finger back to the ground.
Philza.
"Philza," Tommy tests the name on his tongue. It's a surprisingly human-like name for something so otherworldly. The only unnatural part of its name is the 'za' tacked onto the end. The monster - Philza - smiles gleefully at the mention of itself.
Itself, Tommy now realises, may not be appropriate.
"Do you have, like, pronouns? Or do you not fuck with that kind of thing?"
Philza trills out a laugh and draws a cock and balls in the dirt.
Tommy laughs loudly too, as soon as he sees it. Why hadn't he thought of this before? He and the monster could have had so many conversations if he had just had a good idea for once.
"I'm sorry," he says, craning his neck so that his eyes can meet Philza's.
The curious tilt of Philza’s head wonders, "What for?"
"I've been calling you a monster my whole life," Tommy admits sheepishly, “and I never once thought you might have a name or gender or anything. I’ve never asked if you were okay.”
Usually, he would have looked away in shame by now, but something about that piercing stare won’t allow him to. Philza has rendered him totally immobile, mesmerised by the blue swirling around his pupils. He shakes his head as if to say, “You have done nothing wrong.”
Tommy just wishes Philza could speak , even if it isn’t English. He wishes anything, anything, could become of their friendship. He wants a conversation unhindered by his waiting for Philza to painstakingly craft each letter to make sure it's legible.
They stand there for a long time after that, talking to the best of their abilities. Tommy learns things about Philza that he would never have guessed. Apparently, he is not a monster at all, rather something called an avian. Similar to an angel, he had written. Also, turns out that Philza has two sons around Tommy’s age.
To be quite honest, hearing of that stung slightly. After all, Tommy confided in Philza on multiple occasions how lonely he was. Had he offered his monster-sons to him earlier, he could have been so much happier. There is one instance, as well, when Philza spells out how he has come to love Tommy as his own.
He finds that he loves Philza too, in the same way he once had loved his father. Tommy dares not bring this up. He's been told one too many times that nobody will ever love him to be that stupid.
And just maybe… in another life… somewhere over the rainbow, he's a bit scared. Leave him be.
He sucks in a breath and asks another question.