Borrower world building au borrower world building-
I wrote all of this on discord with the input and ideas of @wendy130 and @bio-nerds-corner
They are pretty much the reason I got this out as fast as I did-
And the word count-holy hecking heck it got very big within the span of a few days(like-three-)
So yay- i hope you all enjoy! It’s one of my more lore things and any questions with lore you can just ask me-
I encourage questions-
I will brain rot about this for ages and ages
Truth falls out and boils up till it burns
Tw: Mentions of vore(none happen), dehumanization, disturbingly cruel ideas, fear, swearing
Word count: 3844(Largest one yet I believe)
Part one of Borrowing From The Internet au
-——————
It had been just another casual stream.
Nothing bad should have happened.
Naturally things went south the moment he went onto youtube, videos about borrowers showing up.
The videos themselves didn’t seem too bad but his recommendation was filled with the videos and that was what made him worried. He hoped nobody would make any comments on it…
A donation appeared on his screen, and he tensed, his tail already anxiously curling around his leg as he read the donation. "Hey what are your opinions on borrowers? Cause like-I think they make too big of a deal of things like the 'Massive Accident' at that one restaurant..." His voice trailed off and he grit his teeth, his anxious feeling vanishing as it was replaced by raw, annoyance and anger. He took a deep breath in. 'Don't let anyone see that this stupid dono phased you-chat'll know something is fucky otherwise.' "Yeah, massive accident my ass-it was more like a genocide of entire bloodlines, families and friends-I'd really appreciate if chat didn’t bring up borrowers." Wilbur huffed, making sure to privately message a mod to ban the words and sentence 'Massive Accident' as fast as possible.
He had tough skin. He could normally handle shit like this but this time it was really getting under his skin. It was one thing if someone said it to him while he was in person but when someone in chat actively made sure to mention borrowers in the one setting, he thought he was safe from the world's mistreatment and lies about borrowers.
Wilbur was shaken back to focus from a voice call from Phil and he tried to smooth out his frazzled tail, slowly uncurling it from his leg, being as discreet as plausible in order to avoid people possibly seeing the appendage.
He clicked the answer on the call and plastered a more neutral expression, forcing a small smile.
"Hey Phil!"
"Hey Wil! How's the late night streaming?"
'Huh...was it just him or was Phil sounding a little...less cheery? It sounded forced more than anything and he would know since he was also forcing a thin layer of joy.'
He was about to continue before he felt a buzz from his phone and almost froze up.
From Dadza at 10:59
'Hey Wil you really might wanna check what's being said in your chat.'
Wilbur swallowed nervously, his tail already beginning to tightly wrap around his leg again to the point where he had to gently pry it away to make sure he didn't cut off his own circulation.
From Wilbur at 11:00
'Hey Phil, uh what are you getting at? Can you send me a few screenshots from like-a little while ago? I don't want to alert chat that anything is happening.'
He glanced up from his phone, smiling at his web camera again.
“Nothing is wrong at all chat, I'm just getting some important texts. I might have to unfortunately end the stream a little earlier than I had anticipated."
The lie came easily. He had adapted to lying to anyone and everyone he didn't talk to everyday. It was pretty easy to lie about being upset and uncomfortable at restaurants as well. The waiters and waitresses would always ask if he wanted a borrower or if he wanted an accommodating area.
They wouldn't ask in a polite way though. They sounded like it was a pain in the ass to go out of their way to ensure that a borrower, another person, was comfortable, felt safe while they went to do a basic thing. It boiled his blood and he wanted to let it boil out.
Of course, he kept his control on stream though. He didn't want to erupt while everyone was watching because naturally rumors and 'conspiracy' theories would come out and everything would surely get worse from there.
He glanced down at his phone and a shiver ran up and back down his spine at the pictures that made their way across the screen.
Nausea. That was the word he could and would use to describe how sick he felt in the current moment.
’No hate but I really don’t get why Wilbur likes borrowers.’
’Yeah I don’t either. They aren’t really even people lol’
’Just something for a person to snack on to be honest. I’ve had one. They taste pretty good-‘
Phil kept sending picture after picture with things that only further made him want to throw up everything and anything he could.
While Phil was seemingly typing and getting more he took the opportunity to message him.
From Wilbur at 11:10
’Hey Phil uh-I’ve seen enough of the screenshots. I’m gonna get off now. Could you go and make sure all these people are banned?’
He shakily breathed in and out. He mentally reminded himself that he couldn’t feel his leg and forced his tail off his leg.
“Alright chat I’m gonna head off-It’s late for me and I’m really exhausted at this point.”
Most of chat seemed to buy it but some seemed to continue spouting their horribly nauseating thoughts though he was glad to see his mods banning them immediately.
He clicked off the stream and turned his monitor off, taking a deep, stressed out breath as he curled his tail and uncurled it.
He stood up and stretched before walking towards his kitchen. He should just get some water, go to bed and relax. He needed some time to himself after tonight.
Though one thing that had made this shit night a little better was the fact that Phil had reached out. He knew that Phil was human and he hadn’t exactly told Phil his species yet but the blond had cared. He had seen Wilbur was uncomfortable and he had gone out of his way to see if he was ok.
There was a small part of Wilbur that told him, for the sake of his well-being, he shouldn’t look at Twitter.
He knew it’d be a disaster the second he turned on his phone, curling up in his bed, pulling the covers up as much as possible.
Twitter had been, oddly enough, the reasons laws had been passed that ensured borrowers weren’t just murdered so he held a small level of respect for the site…
Well he supposed he had held a level of respect for the social media giant in the beginning. The site was now more or less a place where people argued about borrowers rights and usually it was for borrowers to get less rights. It was bad enough they couldn’t vote for government positions or run in anything-no apparently to some people, borrowers should be Sold off as food and other products.
It was so bad he had once seen someone trying to ask for an exterminator to gas out their house, of which had several borrowers apparently, so they could cut the tails off and use them as makeup brushes.
Just thinking about it made him feel ill and he closed his eyes, flicking his tail close to his chest before running his hand along it, running his fingers through the fluffy fur at the tip.
He took deep, calming breaths in and out, allowing himself to focus on things that made him happy. ‘Friends…Games…Music and writing…the love and support of his friends(He longed to say families) provided him. The warmth and earnestness of their laughs…’
Once he was done with calming his nerves, his tail swung back down and light coiled around his ankle while he opened up twitter, already preparing to need another break.
He was beginning to remember why he hated Twitter, most notably, the trending page…
He was already met with the most trending in gaming and, shockingly, his name was there.
He felt that familiar anxiety begin to curl much like his tail was unknowingly doing.
He had options here. He could personally go and look at the posts there. Rip a hypothetical bandaid off…
….or he could simply ignore it, turn off his phone, possibly have another nightmare like the makeup brush incident. (He was sure he had made sure that stream was deleted right? He couldn’t remember.) Hell, he could simply let his thoughts pester him with ‘What if’s’ and endless questions till he accidentally slipped up while streaming.
It was against his better judgement he supposed. Checking Twitter had been a huge mistake in the past but third times the charm yeah?
He opened the app back up and took a deep breath before tapping the trending tab and going to his name.
He bit his lip before sucking in a deep breath as he opened it and his heart immediately sunk, a pit of dread filling his stomach. He felt like he was going to vomit or pass out and he wasn’t sure which one would be better.
His tail wrapped around his leg tighter, cutting his circulation off but he couldn’t quite tell, his mind fogging up and his breath growing shallow. He felt like he was being suffocated from within his chest.
He didn’t even notice as he began hyperventilating, frantically scrolling and clicking on any posts that had any pictures or screenshots from the stream.
His mind was only now just registering how much his body was shaking, how much his heart was racing and primes he couldn’t feel his fucking foot.
There were pictures. Seemingly innocent pictures. Most of the detailing the screenshots Phil had sent but some of them had been entirely out of left field.
Sure, they might be a joke but he was sure they weren’t jokes.
’Did anyone see a tail for a second or was it just me?’
’Oh yeah I just got a picture of it.’
’Is Wilbur a borrower lmao-?’
‘i don’t know but like-ew if he is. I’ll literally go and find a borrower right now and go squish it.’
Wilbur swiftly turned off his phone, pressing his palms to his eyes as he began to sob, frantically shaking as he tried to stop the stupid pictures and words from making there way into his head.
He grabbed at his sweater, trying to ground himself as his tail continued tightening around his already numb leg. The fog in his brain cleared a little as he took note of his numb leg and he released it, choosing to wrap his tail around a pillow instead while he sobbed.
…The day couldn’t possibly get any worse right?
Wrong as per usual. Go figures. His phone starts to vibrate and although he’d love to ignore it and call whomever or text whoever later he knows he shouldn’t.
Mostly because he’s positive it has something to do with his best pal Twitter.
With some hesitation, he sat up, taking a fee more deep breaths to ground himself in reality before beginning to rummage through his blankets.
Once he found the buzzing device a flash of relief hit him as hard as a truck. ‘Eret’. Eret was the only person that knew about his being a borrower that he trusted. Granted, Eret was just like him but still-it was nice to be able to talk to somebody about this without seeming too enthusiastic or passionate.
He clicked the answer button and brought the phone to his ear only to get a few panicked questions about if he was okay and he moved the device from his ear, setting it in speaker.
“Heeeey Eret-uh…you probably want to know about the twitter thing don’t you-“
There was no response for a moment, then another before Eret cleared their throat.
“Yes Wilbur Twitter is why I’m calling you-do not go and look at-wait how did you know this was about Twitter-?”
Another bout of awkward silence. “Wilbur are you still here?”
“…yeah I already saw Twitter Eret. I saw…I saw it.”
The silence lingered around much longer this time and both could tell the other was trying to figure out a way to comfort or reassure the other.
“I-Wilbur I’m sure they were joking around…sure I didn’t see everything cause I wanted to call you but-“
“Eret they got a picture of my tail and I don’t even know how cause I made sure my tail was always out of frame and-and-“
Wilbur was already working himself back up so he just decided to focus on the call screen and his breathing.
“Wilbur, they probably edited your tail in. I was watching the stream the entire time. And I know for a fact I never saw your ears either-“
If that was supposed to comfort him it only made it worse. He forgot to be more focused on his very obvious ears!!! He was able to hide his tail easily but his ears were close to his face which meant they were the center of focus!!
Wilbur heard Eret begin to say something else but he cut them off with a simple, ‘end call’.
Wilbur had pretty much ended up laying down in his bed, trying to mentally gather his thought and collectively calm the fuck down. Maybe Eret was right in saying that he was pretty much overreacting but that didn't matter because it was still a very real, terrifying possibility. He really wanted to limit the number of people that knew he was a borrower.
He had gotten insanely lucky with Eret who had also happened to be a borrower and who had happened to politely message him about it appearing in a video. That time, nobody had seemingly noticed it, probably focused on the game so all he had done was take down the vod and edit the YouTube video. (Eret had so kindly helped in skimming through the video to certain points, telling him exactly where his tail had appeared on screen.)
From that point forward it usually ended up being Eret who vented his frustrations about borrowers and the current conditions...and who told him to, for the love of all things, avoid Twitter.
Naturally, this only seemed to make Wilbur go onto it actively and use it.
While Eret had stopped using Twitter, they had simultaneously led Wilbur to its suffocating chokehold that would eventually lead to his first of many errors he was now coming to realize.
The next error had been allowing himself to be invited on a little thing called 'The Dream SMP.'
He hadn't had any qualms with the server at first. Hell, he had been the one to suggest and start making it a lore and roleplay-based server...
It hadn't really occurred to him that Dream would ask everyone if they wanted to add in some mods that allowed people to be shrank down. He gave his reasoning as it would make it more exciting and overall, more interesting.
An overwhelming number of people, including Eret, had said yes.
Wilbur had immediately typed a no.
Not a moment later there was a dm waiting for him.
From Dream at 12:45pm
'Why don't you want the mods? You wanna call about it because most if not everyone is alright with them.'
Dream had already started up a call and Wilbur hadn't even gotten to type a simple no and then an explanation before he was thrust into the call.
"Wilbur?"
Immediately, a jolt of anxiety and his tail snuck its way around his leg and constricted around tightly. "H-Hey Dream..."
"Would you care to tell me about you issue with the mods? Because a majority of people have no issues with the mod and I really don't want to flat out refuse adding the mod because one person is uncomfortable with it." The other spoke calmly and firmly. It was clear that he wanted an answer even from beyond the screen that lit up when he spoke.
Wilbur swallowed nervously, impulsively tugging at his hat to cover his ears even though his camera wasn't on. "They make me really uncomfortable. What with the situation about borrowers and their ri-"
"Why should the rights of borrower's concern you? They're just small, insignificant creatures that pose as humanoids."
Wilbur felt sick. Dream didn't...didn't care about borrowers. He felt his breathing begin to pick up a little and his chest felt like it was closing in around his lungs.
If he didn't care about borrowers, he didn't care about him or Eret or anyone else who was a borrower...He should have just kept his mouth shut because everything was going to shit. Primes he should have just let the mod get added and sucked it up.
“...Wilbur are you alright?"
Dream broke the silence, but he was only met with heavy, labored breathing while Wilbur pressed at his eyes, trying to take deep breaths in and out.
"Wilbur, can you breathe for me? Can you follow along with my breathing please?"
Wilbur followed along with the instructions, listening to the breathing on the other end as he sat with his legs pulled close to his chest as he watched the calming green lighting of Dreams icon every time he took a deep breath in and out.
"That's it...are you with me now Wilbur?"
There were a few beats of silence before Wilbur gathered up his thoughts, making sure it would be coherent sounding.
“Y-Yeah I'm with you now Dream..." He was met with a sigh of relief from the other end, and it almost made him smile till he reminded himself that Dream had purposefully and had outright stated how little he thought of his kind and the ghost of a smile fell.
"...Wilbur, why did you start freaking out at the mention of borrowers? I was just joking about them not being people but it's obvious that it upset you......"
A pause and then words that Wilbur had been dreading to ever hear.
"Wait. You're a borrower...aren't you?"
His mouth went dry and the call was silent. His hand hovered over the ‘leave call’ button but before he could hit it Dream spoke up.
“Wilbur, turn on your camera please. Remove your hat.”
Wilbur tried to pick out any indications of Dreams voice but he couldn’t find anything and reluctantly turned off his camera.
“Hat off Wilbur.” Dream’s voice was calm and cold.
He listened, taking off his hat and revealing his ears which appeared to droop down a little.
And before he could even realize he was spurting out random words while his tail swung around.
“D-Dream please don’t tell anyone-my life will be a hellfire and-and I’ll lose all of my friends-and Dream please don’t take my life-my everything-from me! I can’t imagine doing anything aside this for my life! It’s what keeps me sane!”
Wilbur was pleading. Begging for this one thing. For primes sake-Dream could blackmail him now! Do whatever he wished to him and his reputation!
Dream didn’t speak. He hadn’t spoken the whole time he was rambling in his wild, fearful panic.
The silence was growing uncomfortable.
There was a deep breath heard from his speaker.
And then Dream was laughing. It started out normal sounding before growing manic and cruel. The sound sent chills down his spine.
He opened his mouth to speak before Dream began to speak again. “Oh Wilbur….Wilbur…” The humans clicked his tongue.
“You really should be more careful with whom you share this information with…”
Wilbur’s blood went cold. “Wilbur you know that I now have this conversation on a video recording and several pictures of you now yes?”
He couldn’t even find words so he nodded his head, hearing Dream let out a dark chuckle.
“Good…I can already guess you know that I’ll be using these pictures and videos when I deem I must?”
Wilbur tearfully nodded, choking back a building sob.
“Good. You’re good with the mod then right? And you’ll utilize it right?”
He nodded before he heard Dream again.
“No, I want you to verbally tell me.”
He shakily breathed in and out, clenching his hands into fists. “Yes I will use the mod and I’m good with it-“ He snapped.
“Watch your tone Borrower. Remember who has more power out of the two of us.” Dream spat.
That made Wilbur pissed more than frightened and it sent him over the edge.
“Uh you certainly don’t possess a lot of power in this case. You’re pathetic enough to blackmail me like a spineless welp. I have half the mind to report you to Ph-“
“Ah yes-go crawling back your owner borrower. Go whine to him about what the ‘Horrible’ human threatened.”
“Don’t make me laugh. Do you really think Phil would care? He’s just like me.”
“O-Of course Phil’d care! He cares about everyone and everything!” Wilbur shouted, glaring at the screen to mask his horrible thoughts that lingered too long.
Phil was a good person. He was kind and he made sure the people he cared about were ok! It wouldn’t matter to him surely if Wilbur was a borrower right?
“Oh come now Wilbur….he’s a human…you know all the things a human could do to you right?”
Wilbur went to argue when Dream decided to continue his spiel.
“As a matter of fact Wilbur-most of the humans wouldn’t lift a finger if I were to grab you and try anything. They’d just let me do what I would like.”
“I’m dying to know if anyone wants to eat you. Oh how cruel and funny it would be if Tommy did the deed.”
Wilbur appeared to lose all confidence in his prior statements at the last sentence.
Tommy also happened to be human. Most if not all his…his ‘friends’ were humans actually…
Which meant Dream was probably right. No human would ever care…
Wilbur quickly turned off his monitor, not wanting to hear anymore of Dream's words.
There was a moment of quiet save for his shallow breathing and pounding heart.
The situation finally hit him full force and he gasped, grabbing at his tail and wringing it in his hands as he swiftly stood up.
Dream was going to blackmail him. He already was blackmailing him. The human he had wanted to tell was Phil but after the talk with Dream his brain couldn’t help but think that Phil would do the same as Dream. It was probably better it had been him.
If it had been Phil he knew he wouldn’t be able to fully recover. If anything he would probably…
Holy primes Phil would have probably tried to find where he lived or-or he’d find a way to take Wilbur and then who knew what he’d do-
He was lucky Dream had found out. (The other half of him said he wasn’t lucky. It told him that if Phil had found out he would be nothing but kind.)
He forced the other thoughts away. He was certain, as much as it sucked, Dream was right.
No human would care about him. No one would look out for him. He would get hurt if he trusted any human.
No matter who they pretended to be.