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Tubbo likes his job, ignoring the ichor and gore under his fingernails. He can deal with the way death clings to his clothes, stains his skin, leaving red rusted on his steel-toed boots. Honestly, the worst part is how animals flee from him. It doesn’t matter how hard he rubs his eyes, what he wears, how light he steps across the forest floor.
What’s dead is dead, and animals will always be able to smell the difference.
That’s fine. He doesn’t need anything from them. The bugs like him just fine, skittering around his feet as he walks, tugging at the bottom of his shoes towards whatever rot they’ve found. They lead him to decay and demise like a child would bring a friend to see a new toy. Chitters and clicks make a symphony beneath his feet, a guiding force, making sure he never lags, never falters when it comes to the festering in their forest.
He’s a cleaner for them. He takes the bodies, takes any traces of death like littered leaves, takes the withering weeds winding around the nearby trees, and takes his leave. Rot doesn’t spread on his watch. No abandoned body gets the chance to decompose. He takes pride in being quick, keeping his feet feather light.
His work space is filling with corpses faster than he can keep up, but that’s okay, he reminds himself. The rot can’t spread in the sanitized steel, and can't infect the concrete floors. It’s safer to keep them behind glass.
They haven’t been twitching with reanimation like they used to. When Tubbo started working, it was almost as if they were just waiting for him to speak to them, laying still with tight, bony fingers still grasping onto their last shreds of life. They would hang on to his every word, glow and hiss when he entered the room. Not anymore. Now they sit and wither, filling the space with smoke and ash. Tubbo used to keep his herbs in the room. Now they’re all dead, matching the bodies he can’t seem to bring back.
His newest patient is no different, in that way. But this one is special otherwise. Someone left him a note explaining his symptoms before departing, begging for Tubbo to bring him back with desperation in every scrawled letter. Usually, the bodies return to the forest by themselves, and Tubbo finds them as a returning gift to the forest for letting him stay. This body was brought to him. He found it gently propped up on the side of his work studio. The grass below him had turned black already.
Purpled Innes. Seventeen, tall with tightly coiled muscle weighing him down, a tangling web of scars twisting up his arms, all the colour leached from his skin. When Tubbo slides his eyelids open, his irises are still a shocking violet. Fitting name, he supposes. On further inspection, still outside because Tubbo can’t lift him by himself, his veins still run blue instead of black, and his teeth aren’t falling out quite yet. The wither hasn’t taken a firm hold on him.
Yet.
There’s still time for him. Tubbo snaps and clicks his tongue until beetles and ants line the floor, pointing at Purpled’s slumping body. They crawl beneath him and follow Tubbo through the opened door to his lab. He shoves all his prior work to the floor and lowers his table, leading Purpled’s head to the cushioned top. He tries to be as kind as he can, still treating each body as it is—remains of a human life, still alight with a soul. Even when the wilt has started, Tubbo still holds onto the hope they can come back.
They don’t. He doesn’t know why. The old bodies never decomposed so fast, never poisoned the earth around them and drew out bugs quite so quickly. Something has changed and he can't figure out what it is. The decay spreads around their resting places and takes days to heal, takes Tubbo hours to weed out all the withered plants. He’ll do it, over and over again, break his joints kneeling into the mud. He just wonders, furiously, what is stopping him from completing his work.
They don’t even have natural deaths. No stab wounds marring their chests, no venom on their tongues, no contorted vessels wrapped around their hearts when he opens them up. Just drying blood and smoking skin. The bodies still run hot, despite the chill of his lab, despite how their souls flicker out. It’s like there’s a fire set within their bones that stays stubbornly lit, spitting cinders at him like a taunt.
Purpled, too, is clean from any fatalities. His skin is free of lesions or abrasion, smooth except for healed gashes covered in scar tissue. He isn't bleeding anywhere, isn't bruised, is barely stiff and wooden like bodies get after a couple hours. Whoever got him here got him here fast. Tubbo glances over to the note. The ink is still wet on the paper. Maybe Tubbo was fast, too.
Tubbo doesn't have time to waste. Purpled might be the only one he has the chance to bring back, snatch him from the underworld and return him to whoever is waiting for him here. He gets right to work, crushing flower petals and mixing herbs, melting gold into ambrosia, plucking little stars from the piece of sky he keeps contained in a glass jar. A praying mantis offers their head to him and he delicately removes their eyes, cooing at the bravery of allowing a monster so many times their size to take their sight right from them. The bugs are so kind to him. He takes the praying mantis, now blindly pawing at his fingers, and sets them into a cage built to be safe without vision.
He takes goat hooves and shaves off tiny spirals of keratin. Ethically sourced, from a Satyr he brought back after he died for the second time. That time, death embraced him with thin fingers and did not let him go. Tubbo watched him float away and didn't fight it. Everyone deserves to rest, eventually. He can't deny them that.
A quartz bowl full of moonshine water, a tiny pouch of honey from sunflower pollen, and tears from a saltwater mermaid all pour into a glass jar, blown by a hoglin who owed him a favour. Eyelashes from a kelpie and hairs from a very polite werewolf follow suit, sparking and bubbling as they’re swallowed by the frothing potion. He grinds glowing blue leaves into a powder and mixes it with salt, dusting it across Purpled’s closed eyes.
He looks tense, even while dead. His eyebrows are drawn tensely and his mouth is pinched. This is a soul waiting to come back if Tubbo’s ever seen one. It's relieving, after his past failures over the past weeks. Though, black is slowly lacing across his skin, painting his veins in midnight ink.
Tubbo soldiers on, drawing down his necromancy sigils and seals, letting them tangle over top and around each other until they're barely legible at all. He dips his feather in snake blood and writes until the page is completely red. Then, he rips out the page and lays it on Purpled’s stomach. He's almost done. The race between him and the wither rot is going to be close, though, because as he approaches completion of his potion the decay has begun eating at Purpled's nails.
He lifts Purpled to be sitting, propped up against the wall, and gingerly opens his mouth to see teeth still white against darkening gums. He's not gone. His chest stutters forward then falls back, almost like an exhale. Purpled wants to come back. Purpled will fight to come back as long as Tubbo can make his efforts worthwhile.
The potion sparkles like the sea as Tubbo pours it down Purpled’s throat. It leaves a sour smell in the air, curdling Tubbo’s stomach despite how many times he's brewed it before. He waits and watches for it to do anything more than make Purpled’s fingers twitch. He's left unimpressed. He’s just about to turn away, give himself a moment to grieve his failure, when something red catches his eye.
There’s a perfectly circular bite mark over his shoulder. Tubbo’s never noticed it before. He runs to where the other bodies are laying semi-peacefully, pulling their sleeves down to reveal matching crescent rings pressed into their skin. Fairy circles.
Oh. If that's what has been killing Tubbo’s customers, no wonder he hasn’t been able to revive them. Fairies are tricky. They’re possessive and unpredictable and they love getting what they want. They can’t stand being wrong. What else does Tubbo know about fairies that could save Purpled?
He has fairy dust. Holy skies above, how did he forget that? A shifty trader had come back to life with Tubbo’s help and gave it to him as thanks. He had pitched it as a psychedelic, a hallucinogenic substance that could “heal him from what he sees” while working. Tubbo had declined that offer but took the silk bag nevertheless. He doesn’t need healing to bring souls back to life. He does it for himself and for the forest, and what he lacks, the forest gives back.
But if it is a fairy holding Purpled in the nether world, another fairy’s magic will be able to bring him back. They'll cancel each other out and leave Tubbo enough time to snatch him from where he’s being kept captive.
There's nothing to lose except a pinch of fairy dust. Tubbo can survive without it. If he ever direly needs it he can call a friend. He's sure Niki would be able to get him some if he asked really, really nicely.
He hid it months ago, just in case his lab ever got broken into. It wouldn’t. The forest would protect him. But it’s never a bad idea to be extra precautionary, Tubbo knows that fact well. The silk bag is sealed within a locked box in the back of his cabinet. It’s as light as a feather, soft and so weightless it feels like it might fly out of his palm.
Tubbo takes a pinch of it between his fingers and sprinkles it onto his eyes. It leaves a gold sparkle on his skin. For many long seconds, there is silence.
Then his finger twitches.
Purpled’s eye cracks open. His inhale is sharp, enough so it scares Tubbo a little. He hisses, limbs contracting and contorting, bones creaking as they crack back into place. It’s been so long Tubbo had forgotten how disgusting reanimating people sounds. He can hear the beating of blood refilling Purpled’s veins and it’s vile, so nasty he would wince if he wasn’t weathered to the sound.
“Welcome back.” Tubbo says, taking a seat facing him. He can’t let his patient see his disdain for the process, that would be unprofessional. Purpled blinks at him, violet eyes so bright it's startling. His blond eyelashes do nothing to shield Tubbo from their shine. He can’t be human. Tubbo wonders what gives such glowing irises. If he didn’t know any better he’d guess fairy.
Purpled claws his way to a more upright position, chest heaving and stuttering, pupils blown wide as he looks around the room. He searches wildly for a sign of danger, any sign, and comes up empty. Nothing in this room but death and Tubbo.
“Thanks,” he says slowly, as if he's trying to measure how to move his tongue in order to make sound. That's common with reanimating people. It's like learning how to be alive again, how to function with less than a whole soul while still remaining yourself, how to forget what Death’s embrace felt like.
Tubbo tilts his head at him. His veins are still black against his pale skin, though he's gained some colour back. His cheeks are painted pink and the whites of his eyes are spotted with red. Why are his nails still decayed, if Tubbo brought him back from the wither rot? Why does he still bear the marks of decay?
Purpled follows his gaze down to his hands, watching his fists tense and relax. His eyebrows are knitted together, his knuckles white. He seems to be in a state of unrest no matter where he is. Interesting.
“I died.” Purpled looks at him, scanning his face like he's trying to decipher a hidden clue in his expression. Tubbo nods. There isn't really a way to sugarcoat that. He died and he'll never be the same. He came back and now he gets a second chance. Death is death, no matter how you frame it. Purpled doesn’t open his mouth to speak again, so Tubbo starts.
“Who did you see?” This is still business, no matter what emotional crisis his patient might be going through. They need to get the logistics out of the way to see how easy it’ll be for Purpled to adjust back to living again. Plus, Tubbo is a little curious. This is his first customer to be taken by the wither rot and come back. People have been dropping dead with no explanation for weeks now. Who’s meeting them there? Why are they dying? Why are they staying dead?
“Her name was Hannah.” Very personal for a fairy to give her name so quickly, Tubbo wonders. “She had red wings and hair so long it looked around her ankles. She– she was lonely,” he muses, turning away to look out the lab's window and into the forest, “she wanted me to stay so I could keep her company.”
So he was for sure right about her being a fairy of the nether world. They always leave circles on their claims. A lonely fairy at that. Those are far more dangerous than he’s equipped to deal with by himself. Still, Tubbo mentally pats himself on the back for thinking of it. Purpled’s eyes follow him closely, Tubbo squints back at him. “But you wanted to come back.”
“I have a brother. I need to stay for him.” His voice is hard, edging towards offended. His mouth twists around the words as if it’s preposterous Tubbo would ever assume otherwise, meanwhile Tubbo didn’t know he had a brother at all. So that's who dropped him off. He’s got real shit handwriting.
“Hey, no judgement from me. I did bring you back, y’know.” Tubbo levels him with an unimpressed look, still inspecting the black veins running up his arms. His nails look better, at the very least, and his gums are a healthy pink when he scowls.
Purpled doesn’t dignify that with a response. Stubborn guy, Tubbo thinks. He’s already flexing each of his joints, popping his knuckles, trying to see how his reanimated body functions. The nether world is made of smoke, Tubbo remembers. He’s probably trying to get used to being solid. Having weight.
“Did you see them–” Tubbo motions vaguely to the other bodies “--in there? Did she not have them for company?”
“No. She said you're keeping them too close to life for her to claim them.” So there's still a chance for him to revive them. His efforts aren’t futile. If his potions are powerful enough to ward off a fairy from her prey—or potential friends, he guesses—then there’s no reason he wouldn’t be able to snatch them completely out of her grasp.
“Well, sorry, Hannah, but I promised I’d return them.” It’s his duty to his customers, and to the forest. Hannah’s withering cannot infect the woods. She can kill some other people and keep them instead.
Purpled is silent. He stares at the window as if it’ll solve all his problems for him if he looks at it long enough. Tubbo’s been there. It’s a real toss-up if it helps or not. Sometimes it helps Tubbo solve whatever mental equation that’s plaguing him, sometimes it makes him wish he could just lay in the dirt for hours until the earth reclaims him. It really depends.
“I could bring her friends,” he ponders aloud, tracing the scar tissue on his arms. Tubbo raises an eyebrow. He didn’t make a promise to a fairy, did he? He seems like a smart guy and that would be really, really stupid.
“You’re going to kill people?” Tubbo asks, disbelief etched into his every feature as he leans back into his chair. Purpled’s fist tightens a little but his expression doesn’t change.
“It’s kinda what I do.” Ah. Well that explains the scars, Tubbo supposes. And why he didn’t seem the slightest frightened at the smell of death that hangs low like smoke in the room. Tubbo and mercenaries are two sides of the same coin, both stealing souls from the realm they’re in and transferring them over. He can’t judge them for killing when he kills too, in a twisted way.
If Purpled wants to deal with the fairy, that’s not his business, as long as the rot stays far away from his forest. He has enough fairy dust to bring back all of his awaiting patients but none more. Niki could bring him more but she’s a busy woman. He wouldn’t dare bother her unless absolutely necessary.
“That’s sweet. Killing people for the fairy that kidnapped you.” Tubbo hums, picking the page of scribbled red sigils from Purpled’s lap and flicking a fire spell onto it, letting it burn to ashes on his palm.
A red flush warms Purpled’s face, his ears matching the hue. “She was nice,” he almost whispers, again refusing to meet Tubbo’s eyes. He looks… shy, for an apparent mercenary not taken aback from the fact he died. How curious. He must be more intimately familiar with death than with kindness.
Tubbo smiles a little. He remembers when he was the same, flinching from comfort, always taut like a pulled-back bow waiting for the violence he was so accustomed to. Purpled isn’t like him, scared and sniffling under a canopy of leaves, too weak to save himself. Purpled is a twitching trigger finger, so ready to let bullets fly. He’s harsh and cold like the bite of iron. Tubbo respects it. It takes a lot to be that severe and still care about family.
Purpled doesn’t return the smile. Tubbo didn’t dream he would. “I need to go back to Tommy. How long was I dead?”
“Hours at most.” Tubbo shrugs, glancing at the window to see the sun not even close to setting. “He’s probably in the city nearby. There’s a path that leads straight to it outside. Don’t leave the path.” He warns, standing up to face him on level ground.
Purpled throws a cotton pouch at him that he barely catches, heavy against his palms. When he peeks inside, it’s full of worn gold coins, stained and rusted from years in circulation but still shining. Purpled’s face is void of expression.
“Thanks,” Tubbo says, pocketing the bag. Purpled mimics his shrug, stepping around him towards the door. His footsteps are light, almost silent. He holds his shoulders up to his ears and even though his back is to Tubbo, he has no doubt Purpled would have him pinned before he could even breathe danger towards him.
Purpled doesn’t look back as he says “Thanks for bringing me back.”
Tubbo watches his retreating back with a smile. What an interesting guy. For his sake, Tubbo hopes he never has to see him again.