Half a Heart~ (Dream SMP)

[6] Devices?

Song Choice: Come a Little Closer- Cage the Elephant
Content Warning: Language, mention of gun.

Val stepped outside the back staff door, only to be immediately greeted with a gun in her face.
"Don't come any closer!" A British voice cried out, their hand shaking.
"Wilbur?" Val said quietly.
"Val?" He replied, quickly lowering the gun. "Aw, fuck, my bad."
"Ah, no worries."
"Wilbur!" Tommy ran our, giving the taller man a quick hug.
"Oh- hi Tommy." He replied, not expecting the affection.
"Niki!" Tubbo said, also giving her a hug.
"We're so glad you both are safe." Val explained.
"Us too!" Niki replied.

"Wait, where's Dream and George and Sapnap?" Niki asked, realizing. "Please tell me they're safe!"
"They are, they are." Val quickly assured.
"They stayed home to figure out if we could get our technology working again."
"Ah, okay." Wilbur replied.

The 5 of them walked home, with Technoblade trailing awkwardly behind them, silent.

From what they could see, Techno was merely walking. But inside his head, he was having a battle with his inner thoughts.
"Is this really a good idea?"
"Should I trust them?"
"Are they going to betray me?"
"Will I betray them?"
And so on. Techno was not accustomed to working in a team, and he was afraid they would do something bad to betray or hurt him.
Or worse, that he couldn't stop himself from doing that to them.

"AYUP DREAM WE'RE HOME!!" Tommy shouted as soon as he got in the door.
"OKAY!" He responded from the living room.

They walked into the living room, Technoblade behind them.
"Hey-" Dream greeted, pausing when he saw the masked man. "Woah, who's this?"
"I- uh I'm-" Technos started to respond, but was cut off by Tommy.
"This is our new friend, Technoblade!"
"Friend?! No way. He needs to go home now." Dream responded, looking the man up and down.
"But he has nowhere to go!"
"Go back to the grocery store then!"
"But he saved us!"
"What do you mean?" George interrupted.
"There were some scary men there," Valorie explained. "They tried to hurt us. Techno came in right on time and helped, uh, stop them."
"HE KILLED TWO MEN?!" Dream shouted.
"They were going to hurt us!" Val responded, exasperated. "He saved us!"
"He chose your life over those men! How do you know he won't do the same to you later on?"
"That's the thing, I don't know! It's called trust, and I'm trusting him!"
"That's so stupid!"
"If he wanted to kill us, he could've done it a long time ago."
"What if it's a trick? I don't trust him." Dream finished, crossing his arms.
"Well I trust him. And you can trust me. He's staying."
"Fine. But the moment he's sus, he's out."
"Deal."

They turned back to the group, and to Technoblade who looked like a fish out of water.
"I assume you heard that." Dream coughed out.
"Errrr, yeah."
"Well then you know the deal! Moving on!"

Dream led them all to the table on which the three of them had previously been working on the electronics.
"So what's the status on these?" Val asked.
"Nothing works."
"Nothing?!" Val asked. "Like you couldn't figure it out, or?"
"No, not that." George answered. "No electronics are working. They're fried."
"What do you mean? How could an earthquake possibly fry all of the electronics?"
"That's the problem." Sapnap said. "It couldn't have been an earthquake that did this."

The room went silent, a look of realization on Val's face.
"Okayyy," she started. "What could have done this then?"
"The only thing that I know of, that would have destroyed all the devices like this, is an EMP."
"A what?" Tommy asked.
"An electromagnetic pulse." Dream explained. "You can't see it, but it releases this attack that ruins all electronics."
"It would make sense with the power outage." George added. "The power went out before the earthquake, so therefore that was the EMP."

"So what can we do now?" Val asked.
"That's exactly what we need to figure out."

——————————
That's it for this chapter! Please give it an upvote if you liked it :)