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“DAD,” He calls, running downstairs with his pumpkin bucket and his glare costume. Phil meets him at the foot of the stairs. He’s smiling, looking at his costume. Tommy must say that he’s proud of his costume, he worked long for it, Tubbo’s brother helping him stitch everything together.
“Yes, buddy,” He kneels in front of him, so they're face to face, “What’s going on?”
“Can we go trick or treating?” He tries to give him puppy eyes, and by the look of adoration on Phil’s face, Tommy knows that he succeeded.
“You can go with your brothers,” He says, which makes his brother look up in shock from the couch, “I have to stay here and give candy to all the other monsters in town,” Tommy looks up in excitement at his brothers, who just look annoyed at dad.
“I can’t go, I was supposed to meet up with Schlatt, remember,” He complains, putting his phone down on the table. Phil sighs from beside him. Tommy’s smile falters. Maybe he shouldn’t have asked in the first place. He doesn’t mind whether they go with him anyway. Maybe he could ask to go with Tubbo.
“Wil, you know I would go if I could, just,” He sighs again, and Tommy can’t help shrinking into himself. “Please, just for an hour or two,”
Wilbur doesn’t say anything, he stares at Phil, who stares back, both with a look in their eyes that Tommy can’t decipher. They’re having a conversation with each other without saying anything, and Tommy doesn’t know what they’re trying to tell each other.
He does know that it’s his fault, again. He shouldn’t be surprised at this point.
“I can just not go, if it’s too much of a bother,” Tommy says, making them break their staring contest, “I can, I can play some Minecraft, watch a movie or something,”
Wilbur’s look softens, walking up to him and kneeling in front of him. “Oh sunshine,” He says, pushing a loose strand of hair behind his ear, “I’m sorry, I’ll go trick or treating with you, alright. I’m sorry,”
Tommy tries to smile back, energetic, but he feels like his energy has left his body. He barely nods, but he doesn’t really feel like going anymore.
“We’ll go immediately. Techno, come with me,” Techno complains from his place on the couch. “We have to put some better clothes on,” Techno sighs deeply, but follows after Wilbur nonetheless.
Tommy looks back up at Phil, who doesn’t hesitate to cradle him in a hug. “Please stay safe, don’t do anything stupid,” Tommy scoffs in his chest. He never does stupid stuff.
“I’m not stupid, I’m very smart,” Phil chuckles, but doesn’t have time to comment on it as Wilbur and Techno arrive back downstairs, now in new, more clean clothes. Wilbur has his yellow sweater on again, which makes Tommy smile. He likes that sweater.
“C’mon gremlin child,” He says, pushing him to the door, “Let’s get you some candy,”
* * *
“Trick or treat,” The lady gives him vampire teeth, smiling down at him as she gives him a second one, holding a finger to her lips. Tommy giggles, giving her a big smile.
“And what might you be?” she asks, putting her candy away.
“I’m a glare, you see,” He points to the moss green pieces of fabric. He thinks it’s very obvious, not really knowing what else he could potentially be. The lady smiles.
“Of course, how could I have missed that,”
“Thank you,” He smiles, running up to Wilbur and Techno again who are standing a bit in front of the house, looking pretty bored. It’s a reminder that they don’t want to be there, that they are probably annoyed by Tommy.
He pushes it down, though, not wanting to ruin the evening even more.
“Wilby, look,” He calls, catching the attention of his brother who plasters up a big smile, “She gave me two pieces,” Wilbur pats his head, laughing at his antics.
“It’s probably a pity gift when she saw your costume,” Wilbur laughs, so Tommy knows that it must be a joke, so he doesn’t know why it stings so much. Maybe because he worked so long on it with Tubbo.
Or maybe because Wilbur had looked so annoyed.
He smiles, though, “My costume is amazing, Wilbur, you’re just horrible at judging because you never wear any costumes yourself,”
“It is pretty bad,” Techno comments. Wilbur laughs, grinning as he sees the anger that’s building on his youngest brother’s face. It’s one of the first things Techno said that whole evening.
Tommy isn’t mad exactly, he just feels embarrassed. He shouldn’t have asked to go trick or treating anyway. It was stupid of him, he should’ve first looked at their faces to see wether they would be busy or not.
Maybe he can do one more house, and then they’ll return home. Techno can go back to reading his book, Wil can go back to hanging out with Schlatt. No one would be angry or annoyed anymore.
Just one more house.
“WILBUR,” All three of them look up as Minx and Connor run up to them. Wilbur immediately brightens up, his smile looking twenty times more real than before. Even Techno seems to brighten up.
“Why are you here?” Wilbur asks, turning to the duo, as if he totally forgot about the reason why he was there. Tommy didn’t try to tune into their conversation, they’d probably only talk about stupid teenager stuff anyway.
He sighs. He wanted to do one more house. He’ll do the last house quickly before they notice he’s even gone.
“I’m going to the next house already,” Tommy announces to his brothers, who are deep in their boring adult conversation. He doesn’t really know whether they heard him, but he won’t go too far anyway.
* * *
“I didn’t know you guys were in England,” Wilbur says, feeling the boredom flee away. No offence to Tommy of course, but he had plans to meet with friends and following an over energetic child for an hour is a big step down.
“Only for a week or so, didn’t we tell you?” Connor says, looking just as baffled to see them.
“No, you didn’t,” Wilbur has to keep himself from swearing, not wanting to get a scolding from Phil for making a ten-year-old swear.
“They told me,” Techno says from beside him. Wilbur gasps, looking at them in betrayal.
“You told him but you didn’t tell me,” Minx and Connor laugh. Wil takes one of the candys Tommy gave him, throwing it at Minx’s face. She splutters, taking the candy from the ground and throwing it back at him.
“What are you doing here anyway,” Wilbur asks. Minx and Connor grin, both at the same time.
“We’re scaring the kids with our scary outfits,” Wilbur looks them up and down, not knowing what’s scary about them. Minx looks like herself, only with devil horns on top of her head. Connor just has a Sonic the Hedgehog costume on. Not so scary in his book. “What about you guys,”
Wilbur scoffs. They must’ve seen Tommy, can’t they put two and two together. “We’re trick and treating with Tommy,” He explains, gesturing to where Tommy was standing before.
Minx and Connor give him a strange look. He looks to where Tommy was standing before, but there’s only empty air. No ten-year-old with golden hair and sky blue eyes, a stupid glare costume covering his hair. No Bucket filled with candy. Nothing.
He looks up at Techno, who looks just as scared as him.
“WIL,” They both look up, hoping to see Tommy come run up to them.
Tubbo arrives instead, looking disheveled, scared. He runs so fast that candy drops out of his bucket. “Niki said I had to come get you,” He says in between breaths, “It’s about Tommy,”
Wilbur had never run so fast.
* * *
He walks to the next house with a lit up pumpkin. He rings the doorbell, trying to look as scary as possible in his glare costume. They might have called his costume ugly, he still thinks he looks very scary when he wants to be.
A man opens the door, dirty blond hair, looking like he’s in his thirties. He has a full bag of candy and Tommy hopes that maybe he can get two candies for being extra scary. The last lady did, and it was not out of pity.
“Trick or treat,” He calls, pulling his bucket that’s halfway filled with candy in front of him. The man gives him a smile, putting two pieces of candy in his bucket. Tommy can’t help but beam.
“Thank you,” He wants to turn around and leave, but the man interrupts him.
“Where are your parents?" The man asks, kneeling down at him, grinning. He gave Tommy an uncomfortable feeling. Tommy shakes it off though. The man seemed kind enough, and he did ring their doorbell.
"They're at home, forced my brothers to go with me," he explains, smiling up at the man, "they weren't happy about it, something about wanting to do something with their friends, but they were probably just exhage-, axhe-, exxagge-" Tommy struggled, trying to find his word, “Exaggerating,”
“That’s a big word,” The man says in awe.
“My brother taught me that word,” He admits. The man smiles at him, and any feeling of uncomfortableness leaves, beaming up in pride.
“You must be very smart to be able to learn such difficult words,” Tommy nods.
“I am a big, very smart man,” He chuckles at that.
“I can see,” The man tilts his head, sticking out his hand. "You want me to help you find your brothers,"
Tommy has half a mind to agree, but the memory of the uncomfortable feeling he got from the man comes back to the front of his mind. The man might’ve been nice, and he might have called him smart, which not a lot of people do, but his brother's voice telling him about stranger danger tells him to find them on his own.
"No thanks, they're somewhere around here, I will find them," Tommy takes this as his leave, eager to find his brothers and talk about the candy he found. They will be proud of him for taking care of himself.
The man frowns, but Tommy ignores it, turning around.
“I can help you,”
A large hand swallows his tiny wrist, pulling him back to the man. He can't help but have to face the man, whose eyes are darker now, his grins more wicked, as he’s pulled away from the street. Tommy attempts to take his arm back, but the man is older, stronger, more determined than Tommy will be for years.
He can feel his breathing speeding up.
"I will help you," he repeats, his voice thick, not as sincere as he was just a minute ago.
Tommy can't help but let the tears fall as the grip tightens, making him wince. He gets pulled closer to the man, to the direction of the house. He cries out, still pulling against the grip as he's dragged by the man, who lets out a hollow, manic laugh.
The tears are falling at a rapid pace, but for some reason, he couldn’t find his voice to scream, to call for help, maybe in a desperate attempt to notify his brothers that he’s in trouble. But nothing comes out of his throat. He can only cry even harder.
“TOMMY,” He could barely hear it past the growing static in his ears. The voice is feminine, not his brothers, and although he wants to be saved, he can’t help but want to be saved by his brothers and by no one else.
Before he can proces who might’ve been calling for him, the big hand around his wrist lets go, making him stumble on the ground, into someone’s chest. He grips his bruised wrist like a lifeline, sobbing as arms grip him closer, whispering words that go unnoticed by the quivering boy.
He knows that he isn’t being held by his brothers, but he can’t help but bury his head in their chest as he clings to their arms. The arms are carousing his back, telling him to do something, something that he can’t comprehend.
He can’t breathe, nothing entering his lungs, only a bit of oxygen entering in between the cobwebs that are covering the insides of his chest.
“Tommy,” Her voice is soft, careful. She sounds so much and so unlike the man. The man that had grabbed him, that had forced him in the direction of the house, the man that proved that stranger danger was real. The man-
He tries to pull away from the chest, tries to find the familiar voices of his brothers, because he isn’t safe, he needs to be safe. He can’t-
“Try to take a breath,” He ignores her, just as he ignores the sound of a fight behind him, just as he ignores the footsteps. It’s as if everything is muffled by static, and still so very clear.
He needs to leave, he needs to find his brothers, he needs them to keep him safe and he needs to admit that they were right about the stupid stanger danger and he just wants to be safe.
He attempts to call out to his brothers, so that they find him and so that he can be safe, but his voice barely gets above a whisper.
The arms around him loosen, and Tommy wants to take it as an opportunity to get away, to flee, but there are other arms taking him in their grip. He cries out, attempting to punch them and to get away from the grip, but the arms are too strong for the ten-year-old to do anything but obey.
“Toms,” He, he knows that voice, the voice is familiar, safe, everything he has been wanting. “Toms, it’s just me, Wilbur, your big brother, remember,” His voice is filled with concern and terror, and Tommy can’t help but stop struggling as his brother holds him close. “Try to breathe with me, alright,”
He uses Wilbur’s chest as a helping hand to get his breathing right, just so he could tell him how he was right and how Tommy was stupid from going on his own, just so he could look up and be able to see his brother there for him without the annoyed look.
He tries to solely focus on his brother's talking. He opens his eyes slightly, not seeing anything but the yellow sweater his brother was wearing when they departed. He knows this chest, the familiar arms and the familiar voice.
“You’ve been so brave,” Wilbur says, and Tommy smiles, “Such a big man, such a brave, big man,”
Tommy wants to keep listening, the compliments not something he’s used to, but the exhaustion lingers in his bones, forcing his eyes closed, safely tucked underneath his brother’s chin.
His brother won’t mind anyway.
* * *
He wakes up slowly. He’s still tucked under someone’s chin, arms still holding him close. A hand is in his hair, waving through his endless curls, making him feel safe, loved. He can’t help but lean into the touch, a soft rumble coming from his chest.
The hand in his hair stops. Tommy makes a noise, and whoever is giving him these touches understands and returns to waving his hand through his hair like before.
The calming motions steadies him, makes him want to cry and sleep at the same time. He doesn’t feel like a big man anymore, not when his hand hurts when he tries to move it. He makes a soft pained noise when he tries to move his hand more.
“Don’t try to move your hand, Toms,” Wilbur says, using the hand that’s not in his hair to steady his hand. Tommy frowns. He doesn’t know how long he’s been out. There’s no light coming out of the window, nor can he see his clock.
He faintly realizes that Wilbur was supposed to meet up with his friends, he was supposed to go to Schlatt and do teenager stuff. Guilt enters his chest again. He can never do anything good without messing up.
He tries to voice this, tries to tell Wilbur to go to his friends, to apologize, but he can barely let out a whimper, his voice gone, lost somewhere on those streets.
Wilbur shushes him, rocking him up and down slightly, as if he’s trying to comfort a baby. Tommy doesn’t know who he’s trying to reassure him, Tommy or Wilbur himself. He can feel Wilbur’s tears falling onto his head.
It doesn’t do anything to soothe the guilt in his chest.
“It’s alright,” He soothes, “You’re alright,” Tommy shakes his head. Nothing is alright. He shouldn’t have run off, he should’ve stayed with them. “I’m sorry, Toms. I’m sorry I left you alone, I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you,”
Tommy shakes his head quicker, because Wilbur shouldn’t feel guilty. He couldn’t have known that Tommy was going to run off. Wilbur did nothing wrong. He can feel himself start crying again, trying to make Wilbur know that it’s not his fault.
Wilbur only holds him closer, making the shushing noises again.
He can faintly hear the door open, light entering the room. He can’t find the energy to look up at who entered the room, too busy with crying in his own pity. Wilbur did look up, the weight of his head leaving.
He can feel himself being picked up by steady arms, holding him close to his chest as he winces when his hand brushes against the edge of the bed. His bruised hand where the man, where he, where.
The arms rock him back and forth, shushing him. Their chest rumbles, making Tommy feel safe. He’s safe, the man is gone, he’s safe. They don’t walk far, he’s being put on the couch, barely alone for two second before arms are around him again.
He opens his eyes, looking at the tv where Techno is putting up a film, struggling to get it working. Tommy almost giggles as he chooses the wrong options three times. The arms around him tighten.
The familiar music from the film starts, a third person sitting on the couch, a hand in his hair again. He tries to pay attention to the movie in front of him. Up is his favorite movie after all, one he knows out of his head.
The arms around him and the hands in his hair are too difficult to ignore, as they lull his mind to sleep. He doesn’t really want to fight against sleep, but he doesn’t want this moment to end.
He leans into the arms as his eyes close, the feeling of safety lulling him to sleep.
Maybe they love him after all.