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peninkwrites · 8 months

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How to Bury Your Brother:

A guide by Tommyinnit

crossposted to ao3

“You know, the guy known for writing the best instruction manuals on the fucking earth, eh? The Tommyinnit! Thought, well, might as well. Something to do while I dig. Bet I’m gonna be fucking genius at this shit too. It’s not… it’s not written down, more like, an unofficial audiobook, ‘cause… cause I can’t write and dig at the same time, see? Or it’s like a… an oral story that will be passed down for generations! My wisdom will benefit siblings everywhere of all ages! Ha.” A long, heavy pause. “So, uh. How to bury your brother. Well, first thing you gotta do, is, funny enough, dig him out. He got buried in the rubble, see? That’s not a fuckin’ universal, but it’s my deal here, so, fuck off. Um.”

(It was a quiet thing. For Tommy, things were rarely quiet, but earlier that day, at the start of it at least, he didn't want to make a sound. As if afraid he was going to wake him. On the morning of the 17th, early morning, dawn light only just cresting over the server, Tommy went to get him out.)

Tommy’s words are mumbled and accompanied by the scraping of a shovel on dirt. “Ground is starting to freeze… it is November…” A pause, he clears his throat. “Anyway! Getting ahead of m’self. I’d get up early. Early in the morning as you can stand and it helps if you didn’t really sleep the night before anyway, but hike on out there when the sun is just pokin’ its little head up over the trees and… and then you get him out.”

(Tommy was so desperate. He’d reached the cliffside, realized he couldn’t see Wilbur, and started fighting the mountainside, railing against the rubble with a desperate panic he almost found shameful. It was hard. It would get harder.)

“So, you gotta dig him out. You know he’s under there, but you got no idea what state he’s in, yeah? And… and it could get ugly. Uglier even than the fucked up city behind you, but you won’t know until you get in there, so. Might have to gear yourself up for a bit, alright? Have a… have a little cry out on the cliffside––not me, obviously. I’m Tommyinnit, but you might have to––and then you get to digging. A-And you might get stupid too, alright? Again, not me, but you might get… might get stupid. You might start clawin’ your hands all bloody, ‘cause you get it in your thick skull that he’s alive down there. That he… that he might need you to save him again.”

(Tommy was almost struck by relief when he found him. Wilbur’s body had not been crushed in the collapse, rather, sheltered. By chance, an alcove made in the destruction. Tommy unearthed him, and maybe he could have left him buried right here, right where Wilbur dug his own grave, but he couldn’t do that. He promised he wouldn’t give up on him.)

Once more, the sharp clang of the shovel hitting dirt. “Sorry, doing digging. Distracted. He’s not alive down there. Trust me, he’s just not. You… you saw it. And you saw it on your comm later, so you know he’s gone, so don’t get yourself all worked up, it’ll be a fuckin’ let down when you see him like that–” Tommy gets choked up, forced to pause. “ Fuck. I’m not crying or nothing, I’m just distracted, a-and digging. And fuck you anyway, nothing wrong with crying! You gotta get your… your toxic masculinity checked or some shit!”

(Tommy knelt down beside him, and at first he couldn’t bring himself to touch him. His breathing was shaky as he stared at the blood soaking his brother’s chest. He buried it and instead fell silent while his gaze wandered up to Wilbur’s open eyes, and a vacant smile that looked so profoundly relieved.)

“Get yourself… get yourself ready, alright? ‘Cause it’s gonna be fucked up. He’s gonna be all bloody and his eyes–” Tommy gets choked up again and cuts himself off. He takes a shaky breath before making himself continue. “They’re still gonna be open. So, you close ‘em. And… and you ignore the fact that the piece of shit is smiling. You… you might just be imagining it. ‘Cause why the fuck would he be smiling?! No, seriously, what the fuck? Why is he… why was he smiling?” A trembling inhale. “It’s gonna be hard to get him uncovered, and… and you might want to ask for help. I didn’t, ‘cause I’m strong, you see? Big man Tommyinnit didn’t need no help movin’ those rocks! He just… he kept pushing even when it scared him, even when he thought he was gonna hurt ‘im but– I didn’t hurt him ‘cause he was dead. It… it didn’t hurt him.” A pause. “It didn’t hurt him.”

(Tommy put one arm underneath Wilbur’s legs, and the other around his torso. He'd thought he wouldn't be able to lift him, and it was an awful feeling when he stood and realized how light Wilbur had gotten. Tommy knew he had lost weight in Pogtopia, but feeling it like that was worse. He could feel Wilbur’s ribs. He was stiff from rigor mortis, but Tommy was stiff too from the aches and pains of a battle. Tommy stood so slowly, afraid of dropping him, and even as Wilbur is too thin in his arms, he was still heavy. Tommy was slow and careful, even as he knew dropping Wilbur at that point wouldn’t have hurt him.)

“Right. Right, then, you got ‘im uncovered, eyes closed and all that, next bit is getting him out of there. Because you can’t bury him there. You’re not gonna fucking leave him down there. You’re not.”

(Tommy wasn't sure how he was going to get him out of there, but nonetheless, he slowly turned back the way he had come, and stepped out into the morning sun. He could have waited and gotten help, he didn't want to. It was hard. It was so impossibly hard to step over the rubble and carry him, but he never let go. He never fell, he just kept walking. He couldn’t see his feet around Wilbur’s body, not that he tried to, he’d only looked straight ahead. He’d instead felt his way over the rocks, he’d prayed not to fall and break his neck. He’d known he wouldn’t be able to carry him far, but he’d made it at least out of the dark and the earth and up on top of the hill that remains intact above the ruins. No one else was up yet. Tommy had come early for a reason.)

“So, you’re gonna be careful, yeah? He won’t weigh much, so you don’t got to worry about that. Even though it’s probably gonna worry you, ‘cause why the fuck doesn’t he weigh nothing?!” His rage is cut off by a shaky sigh. He continues more steadily. “He’s still a tall bitch, so it won’t be super easy, but you’re gonna make it. Alright? The both of you, you’re gonna drag him to the top of the hillside. Somewhere… somewhere not too far, but somewhere pretty.”

(He made it to the top of the hill before he collapsed, Wilbur hitting the ground, Tommy falling with him, and freezing, stunned and horrified, as he dropped his brother’s body. He couldn’t keep going anymore. He just couldn’t. Tommy didn't cry. He doesn’t know why he didn’t cry, but he didn’t. He had stared at Wilbur’s face. For a moment, weary calm was replaced by sharp rage. He shut Wilbur’s eyes. He couldn’t stand the sight of them.)

“Somewhere pretty.”

(Tommy set him down so carefully, as delicately as he could. He stood on aching knees and unsteady feet, and then he turned away from the body. Then, he started to talk.)

“Right, once you put him down, all nice and gentle like, even though he won’t care anymore, then you can get on to the digging bit. I know, feels funny to drag your brother out of the grave he made for one you made, but trust me, mine is loads better. It’s… it’s gonna be loads better…”

Tommy has an iron shovel. He started to dig. It’s November. The air is cold and the ground not quite frozen, but stiff and difficult to move; rigor mortis has set in for the year. This is hard too. Maybe even harder than carrying him. Tommy digs. He’s already tired. He’s been tired for a long time. Maybe he’ll rest, but not until this is finished.

He is careful and methodical. He wants it to be perfect, so it is. He is so unlike himself as he digs out a rectangle, over six feet in length, over three feet in width with such precision. Then he starts to dig down.

“You’ll mark it out, see? Make it like, a bit taller than him and a bit wider. As for me, that makes it over six feet long and three feet wide. Dunno about your brother. Measure him, or whatever the fuck.”

His knuckles ache, his palms blister, and his chest feels very tight, but he doesn’t stop. It’s a labor of love. He steps down into the grave once it gets too hard to bend down and keeps going. Once, he pauses. He’s damp with sweat, the sun has finally broken through, and soon people will come to search the crater.

“It’s gonna… it’s gonna start to hurt. Holy fuck is it hurtin’ right now, your hands are gonna hurt like a bitch and you’re gonna get all sore–– Which! To be fair, is because you fought a war yesterday! Or… Or I did. Dunno about you. I did. We… we won–” Once more, words broken by a buried sob. “Did you know that? We won the war, Wil! We… oh fuck…”

Tommy cannot stop. He keeps digging. That is why it hurts so badly. When he finally cries, it’s because of how much his hands hurt, his whole body aches, rather than his reason for doing this in the first place. It’s cool in the grave, sweat cold on his back, the sun not doing enough. It’s a labor of love.

He doesn’t know what more he can do. He has run out of ways to save his brother, because there is nothing left to be saved.

There is quiet for a time, save for the sound of digging, and the occasional breathless, whimpering sob.

“You… you gotta dig for a long time, see? Make it real deep. Deep enough you can’t see out of it. That’s when… that’s when you’ll probably get bored enough to write– to talk out a book, yeah? Write a different instruction manual, though. I’ve got this one covered. Even if… even if no one is gonna fuckin’ hear it, it sure beats talking to your dead brother…”

Tommy can no longer see up over the grave. So he stops. He claws his way out and finds Wilbur exactly as he left him. He didn’t expect anything different, but still, the sight of him comes as a disappointment. He looks no less dead in the sun, skin a sickly white, eyes finally closed, there is no way for Tommy to ignore the blood soaking his chest. Tommy stands slowly. He stares, as if expecting Wilbur to move. To sit up, to say something terrible or something kind, but of course he doesn’t move. He’s dead.

Tommy wants to shout at his brother. He wants to scold him for abandoning them, to ask him why?

“Don’t… don’t bother talking to ‘im, alright? However much you want to, there’s no point. He’s… he can’t fucking hear you. Not like he… not like he ever listened anyway…”

Tommy puts his weary body through one last torment. He slowly picks up the body, struggling under the weight of it, and despite knowing Wilbur isn’t here, he still tries to be gentle. He turns to the beautifully dug grave, and he stops. His whole body hurts. He doesn’t know how much longer he can bear the weight of it. Tommy falls to his knees. He still holds on. He sits back and holds his dead brother close, hugging him tightly, even as he no longer settles right in Tommy’s arms.

“I don’t… I don’t want to let go… I don’t want to let him go… I don’t– oh, fuck, Wil, I don’t know how to do this! Please! Please, I don’t know how to fucking do this!”

There is no reply.

Holding him feels wrong. He’s so stiff and he smells like gunpowder and dying and cigarettes, but not even 24 hours ago this had been his big brother. This had been everything he had tried to save, just like that crater over the hillside.

Tommy needs to bury him. He doesn’t want to wait for him to rot.

“I don’t… I don’t wanna bury him, though…”

Silence. Perhaps for too long, but finally, Tommy speaks again.

“Right. Okay, you… next thing you gotta do, is you gotta get up. You don’t… you don’t fucking drop him in the grave, you put him down next to the grave. And… and you hop down in it for him, got it?”

As always, he goes through the doorway first, as always, he beckons his brother through, impatient like only a little brother can be. He pulls Wilbur into the grave with him, and places him gently on the ground. Maybe he should have brought a blanket. Or even a flag to cover him. It’s too late for that now. What’s done is done, and Tommy doesn’t think he can go back at this point. If he walks away now, he won’t be able to return to finish the job.

“You… you put him down, real careful like. A-And you put something with him. If you can. You give him a blanket or a flag or– or something important.” Another heavy pause. “If you… if you can…”

Tommy climbs out of the grave. Wilbur does not follow.

“Oh, now we’re getting to the big stuff, lads! That was just the… just the prep work. Now we get to the actual burying bit! Straight forward, really. You do what you did with your shovel before, just in reverse.” Tommy takes up his shovel again. “A-And we don’t look down, got it? We… we don’t look.”

He does not look down as he buries him. He just keeps going until the earth is gone, and when he turns to look, it’s like he’s still expecting to see him. He still thinks he should see his brother there, but there is only the earth.

“He’s buried. You did it. Well done,” he says weakly. “But… but you’re not done yet,” he sniffs and wipes his eyes. “Dunno about your brother, but my big brother doesn’t deserve an unmarked grave.” Tommy gets out a large flat stone. “Dunno what he deserves, but it’s not that…” He mumbles.

Tommy drags a large, flat stone over the freshly turned earth. He hunches over it, a mess of mud and sweat and day old blood, and he scratches out his name. That is as far as he gets. Wilbur Soot.

“Put something nice on it. Something special along with their name.”

Tommy doesn’t know what else to say. Nothing would be fair, nor good enough, nor bad enough, for everything his brother is. Was.

“That’s… that’s all it takes. You bury him. Only thing left to do is…” Tommy stares down at his grave. He cannot say it. Only thing left to do is leave.

Nonetheless, he does not stay. He stands, leaning on his shovel, so weighted with exhaustion. But he still goes back down the hill, to where Tubbo so many others have started to piece the world back together again. He leaves Wilbur behind and joins them.

#my writing #dsmp #the chronology in this is weird ok imagine it like a movie cutting to the past until you catch up to the present #it's a little different roll with it for me <3 #takes place on the morning of the 17th. after. you know.#c!tommy #tommyinnit #c!crimeboys

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