so the hermit!tommy au has been living rent free in my head, specifically the ones by @redorich and @petrichormeraki. i have now decided to write smth because why the fuck not.
quick warning tho, i've only seen a few episodes of hermitcraft season 7, so uh, yeah.
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The thing is, nobody in Hermitcraft knew exactly where Tommy came from, or what he's been through. The boy was loud, distrustful, and makes the ugliest towers. Some hermits were worried they were being invaded.
Except Tommy cries so quietly that nobody realizes unless they see his tears.
Except Tommy flinches at the sound of fireworks but looks at TnT with hollow eyes.
Except Tommy has the same posture in and out of spars, with or without a weapon.
Except Tomny wears a coat with a hole in the back, undoubtedly made by a fatal wound from a sword.
Things don't add up, and the hermits are worried.
.
Tommy is loud. So, so loud that the hermits can hear him from a long way away. It's not something they fault him for, and sure maybe he can get annoying sometimes, but that doesn't matter because the tall blond grew on them.
The problem came when Grian caught Tommy alone once, in the shopping district. He was looking through Beefy Tunes' glass, tears flowing. He was silent.
The problem came when False sparred with Tommy. He pulled out an axe and fought like it was his last. Every hit he gave was fatal. Tommy's fighting style is that of a man at war. After the match, False realizes, as Tommy walks away loudly, that he never put his guard down—even before and after the fight.
There were more of those moments. Xisuma almost fell down because Tommy did a full body flinch when he used the fireworks to take off in front of the blond. Cleo noticed Tommy tracing the bloodstains around the hole in his coat, a look of longing and grief in his eyes.
It doesn't take the hermits long to realize this is a man from war.
.
They help him heal.
Grian hugs Tommy the moment he looks any type of sad. He stops himself from celebrating when Tommy finally lets out a sob, no matter how quiet.
False hangs out with Tommy outside of spars. It was a slow process, but she doesn't stop smiling for days when she notices the way Tommy is noticeably relaxed when not sparring.
Xisuma tells the other hermits to limit taking off around Tommy. He feels absolute pride when Tommy takes an elytra and uses a firework to take off once.
Cleo offers to fix Tommy's coat when the arm is ripped off. She beams when he desperately hugs her after she saved the coat.
In exchange, Tommy learns to trust them. He tells them how he doesn't know how he's in Hermitcraft. He tells them of his exile. He tells them of the wars and the betrayals and the ghost for a brother and an anarchist for another.
Tommy, after almost a year in Hermitcraft, through pranks wars and updates and redstone mishaps on his part, forgot to ever mention a crucial thing.
The hermits ask for his birthday, for a party they were planning. It was a few months short of marking Tommy's entry into the server, and they realized Tommy never mentioned his birthday.
.
Let's just say that the residents of Hermitcraft almost invaded another server that day.
Who the fuck sends a 16-year-old to war?