Work Text:
“Pull the lever!”
“No!”
There was a ringing clang that followed a sickening crunching noise and Phil watched as blood began to pool on the wood floor of the execution cage. Someone was screaming, the sound was horrifying and he couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. All eyes were on him and he realized it was him wailing like that. He clapped a hand over his mouth to muffle the noise as his vision blurred with tears. He couldn’t take his eyes off of the twisted body crushed beneath the anvil, long pink hair splayed across the dark wood, a totem of undying laying a few feet away from where Techno dropped it in panic. The bow in Phil’s hand slipped from his fingers and clattered against the floor of his porch. He felt his free hand digging through the pockets on his belt until he grasped a smooth, round item.
The pearl hit right in front of the cage and his knees buckled as he landed, red soaking the periwinkle pants he wore. The scent of iron was thick around him and he shakily reached out, gasping desperately for air. He shoved his hand between the bars and gently pressed his hand against Techno’s head, the damn breaking as he burst into helpless sobs. He pulled his hand back from the rapidly cooling body, curling in until his head pressed against the iron bars. There was a faint buzzing and a beeping sound from below him and Tubbo’s voice broke through the whirlwind of thoughts in his head.
“Philza! Philza, you are under house arrest-”
“You killed my son!” he screamed in return, whipping his head around to stare at who he had thought was his son. “You killed him! My only living son! The last of my family!” The noise he made at the end was choked and he clapped a hand over his mouth again, watching as Tubbo’s eyes widened. He looked confused and rapidly tried to connect the dots. Phil knew he didn’t know that Tommy had flung himself off of a cliff in the Nether, that Dream’s taunts and the exile had gotten to him. The only reason Phil knew was because Dream had been so kind to tell him, to rub it in his face that he was an awful father. (He could still hear the cruel ‘What sort of father doesn’t go to his son’s party?’ in his ear. He had been so wracked with grief he couldn’t say that he had never been invited. He had thought Tommy wouldn’t want his dad showing up uninvited, Tommy was a teenager after all.)
Fundy seemed to frown and climbed a few stairs. “Tubbo is your son-” He reminded and Phil had never stood so fast in his life. He drew his weapon, the blade pointed at his adoptive son’s chest. The group all drew their weapons despite the fact that he was trembling so hard that he could barely hold his sword upright. He knew that if they tried to attack him, he would be killed. Oddly enough, the idea of death wasn’t nearly as terrifying as it used to be. Perhaps it was because he had killed his eldest, was part of the reason his youngest killed himself, and watched his middle child’s death right in front of his eyes. Being killed didn’t seem so bad anymore.
“Tubbo is not my son. He’s the reason two of them are dead!” Fundy flinched back at the yell, taking a step back. Phil’s hands and arms shook before the sword clattered to the ground. There was a soft splashing noise as the weapon hit the pool of blood and he stared hard at the boy he raised, one of his boys. He swallowed tightly. “He was my son until he ransacked my home, went through my belongings, and locked me in a place you all destroyed. He was my son until he hunted down his older brother, who had changed and gone into retirement. He stopped being my son the moment that anvil killed the last living child I had.”
He felt his knees getting weak again and slumped to the ground. They were talking over him, yelling and screaming and justifying their actions. They were trying to place blame but the only person to blame was himself. He had raised these boys, had taken them into his home and heart. If they were dead so young, he had to have gone wrong somewhere. He was too late to save Wilbur, had been the one to slay him, but he thought he could save Tubbo and Tommy. He wasn’t, he was too late to fix what he had caused. All of their deaths were on his hands; Wilbur’s, Tommy’s, and, now, Techno’s. Tubbo’s madness, his longing for power, was the result of him letting them be alone for so long.
What a pitiful father he was. His children dead, his adoptive son a murderer, and his grandson despising him.
His palms pressed against the bloody ground and he closed his eyes. They were discussing what to do with him, Dream coming out of where he had hidden. The masked man stared at him before pulling the axe off of his back. “Kill him.” He told the small group, earning gasps from all of them. They argued back and forth and Fundy started yelling about how cruel Dream was but the admin simply shook his head. “No, this isn’t something regarding power. It’s not even because he’s sort of part of L’Manberg. Look at him.” Dream motioned to the man, watching as the army turned to look at him.
Phil was slumped against the cage, his fingers playing with the soaked tips of his son’s hair. The light in his eyes had faded, extinguished like a flame. He looked almost as dead as the corpse crushed by the anvil, the only difference being that he was breathing. “You guys really fucked him up. Tubbo, I get it, you wanted revenge on Techno for a lot of shit, but... Did you have to put where you were going to execute him in front of Phil’s house? When Phil couldn’t leave? He’s not coming back from this. Either we kill him or he drives himself into the ground.”
Dream gripped his weapon, turning on his heel. He climbed the stairs and stood in front of Phil. He looked down on the man, seeing nothing but a broken shell. It was odd. Phil was strong and everyone knew it. He was terrifying; surviving on his own for so long, beating the odds that were stacked against him. He was smart and cunning, lethally smart. He was dangerous and yet he sat here, broken into pieces at the hands of someone he called his son. Dream watched as Phil looked up at him, then looked at the drawn Netherite axe. There was a moment of consideration before he reached up and removed the hat on his head, closing his eyes.
He hesitated for a brief moment, looking up to see Ghostbur. The sheep he had been leading around was now hitched to a post outside of Ranboo’s house. The ghost looked confused, even as bright blue tears streamed down his face. His colorless white eyes stared into Dream’s soul and they watched each other. A moment passed, then another, and finally, Wilbur smiled. He slowly became more translucent before disappearing completely and Dream took that as his cue to raise the axe above his head. “May your family be reunited in the Void.” He whispers to the man beneath him and he watches as another tear slips down Phil’s face, indicating the other heard him. A tiny smile tugged at Phil’s lips and Dream used all the strength in his body to make this quick. Phil had suffered enough, he didn’t deserve a slow, painful death.