WORSHIP ( ❥ ) DREAMNOBLADE [Reupload]

16. | BLAND EGO

"What should we do?" Phil asked.

"Tommy's just bein' a teenager, Phil."

"He's being what you were as a teenager. That's not good."

"Maybe we should stop making so many comparisons," Wilbur suggested, "Tommy's completely human—it's a lot different."

"Him being human just means he doesn't have the same biological inclination for the kind of violence Techno does, but it doesn't make him immune to being conditioned into behaving that way."

"Phil, I get where you're comin' from, I don't want Tommy to turn out the way I did either, but he won't. He's moldin' himself in my current image and what he sees me as—it's just a phase. Tommy will grow up, Phil," Dave assured his father figure.

Wilbur spoke up again, "Yeah, Techno's never really said anything to Tommy that I thought was worrying. Tommy just wants to be a popular swordsman like Techno, there's nothing wrong with that."

Tommy swallowed the lump in his throat, feeling guilty for eavesdropping on their conversation. Hearing their muffled voices through the door to the library made him feel a bit queasy. He knew he needed to apologize to Clay and that the blonde was in a little lounge room nearby waiting for the three men to finish their conversation. Tommy was nervous but, unbeknownst to him, so was Clay.

Clay went into a slight panic when Tommy came into the room, timidly sitting down on the opposite side of the couch Clay was on. Neither of them looked at each other until Tommy suddenly cleared his throat.

I'm sorry for yelling at you. It was uncalled for and I shouldn't assume things or speak for Techno," he murmured.

"Don't worry about it, I understand. You're probably tired of seeing Dave-" Clay paused abruptly, realizing he just used Dave's real name around Tommy.

Tommy sighed out a silent laugh, "Just keep going. There's no point in hiding it anymore."

"...You're probably tired of seeing Dave get hurt over and over again, so it's not unreasonable for you to see me as a threat. I promise I'll treat him right."

"No, I was overreacting. I'm sure Techno decided for himself not to join this championship. I just felt... bad

that I was looking forward to it so much and he dropped out without even telling me to my face. It's..." Tommy huffed, "Techno doesn't really tell me a whole lot of, like... personal shit, so for you to just come in and have him open up to you so easily and so quickly is—it didn't feel fair. But I've to come to terms with the fact that you know a different side of him that he obviously doesn't think I should see, and I should just respect that. But at the time, I felt like I'm supposed to be his brother and you were still practically a stranger.

"It... was starting to feel like Techno was sacrificing time with me to spend it with you instead when that was meant to be our time. I didn't like that it was being stolen from me and Techno didn't even care. There's nobody else like him who I can genuinely relate to and that I really look up to. But it makes sense now why he was putting distance between us and making excuses to shorten our sessions or not have them at all.

"They just told me that they wanted you to start helping train me—which I suspected would happen eventually, and is why I was so damn pissed off before," Tommy grumbled, "Phil thinks I'm stupid but I know that he's not that comfortable with Techno training me. I don't understand why Phil treats Techno like some monster... he's not. I've heard the rumors, but they're just rumors. You see it too, don't you? Techno isn't like the persona he has when he's on camera—he's not a threat to anybody. I wish Phil would just leave him alone."