Chapter Text
You saw a lot of weird shit at night.
Tommy would know that, when you live in the city, rats, cats, and maybe even bats were a common occurrence when the sky turned dark. He would know because by the time he got off his shift at the shitty burger joint he worked at, the sky would be blacker than his coffee in the morning.
He had thought that he had seen pretty much everything the night had to offer to broke employees walking home in the dark, but clearly he hadn't seen this coming. All he wanted was to go home, goddammit, but no, of course he had to be standing here with one of the city's most dangerous villains holding him hostage, at fucking 2 in the morning, for god's sake!
Phobos was quite well known in the city of L'Manburg, alongside the rest of his team, Deimos and Aries, all three of them making up the Syndicate- an infamous team of villains known for their ruthless approach when dealing with people they didn't particularly like.
Deimos was known for being practically invincible, no blade could harm him, and even if a hero hit him with all their might, he would just get up and keep fighting. They also said that he couldn't even feel pain if someone did manage to pierce his flesh, although it hasn't been confirmed due to the fact that nobody has been able to do so, though Tommy bets he could beat him up easily with his big man muscles and shit.
Aries, also known as the Angel Of Death, and what a fucking pretentious moniker that was, was known for his bird-like features, particularly his large ass black wings and his razor sharp talons that had been used on heroes who still have the scars to this day. Yikes, Tommy would not want to be on the receiving end of those.
In some ways, Phobos was the worst of the group, the fucker had the power of mind control within his voice. There was often footage of him barking his cruel commands, telling police officers to walk off buildings and instructing people to drown themselves in nearby pools. Sometimes help got there in time to save them from committing these unwilling actions; other times it didn't and the heroes compensated the grieving family by paying for the funeral.
All Tommy wanted at that moment was to go to his shitty apartment and collapse on his bed, scratchy blanket and all, but no, this fucker had to pick him out of every other person on the street and hold him as a hostage to get number 1 hero Dream off his back. Later, he would look back on his actions and groan at his impulsiveness but, in the moment, his exhausted brain, fresh off a shift of dealing with karens and his boss Gretchen's shitty behaviour, decided enough was enough.
He spat on Phobos' mask.
Immediately, the villain stopped in the middle of whatever speech he was making about killing him or whatever if Dream didn't surrender and turned to look at Tommy with the most annoyed expression ever.
"Did you just spit on me?!" Phobos said, wiping his face off with his sleeve and taking a very deliberate breath as if to control himself.
Dream had also stopped whatever he was doing, looking at the two of them in confusion and saying, "I think he just spat on you."
"Serves you right, bitch," Tommy spat," I mean just who do you think you are grabbing a tired civillian off the street and going 'yep perfect hostage material', you absolute wanker?!"
As soon as he said it, Tommy regretted the sentence, remembering exactly who he was talking to. However instead of cracking his head clean open, Phobos just stared at him strangely, as if he couldn't comprehend the fact that Tommy had just insulted him to his face.
"Let's get this straight, you are being held at the mercy of a villain and your first thought is to spit at their face and then say they deserved it?!"
"Pretty much," Tommy shrugged and the villain took another deep breath.
"You absolute child," Phobos said, his voice changer distorting the sentence so his tone was unreadable but Tommy could feel the exasperation rolling off of him in waves.
Tommy let out an offended gasp at that, who was this villain to say he, the biggest man ever TM, was a....a child.
"I'll have you know that I am anything but a simple child, I am like the male version of Nicki Minaj, an absolute king." He puffed up his chest to make himself look manlier but it effectively just made him look like a puffin, not that he would ever admit that.
"Fuck off, you're like what? Fifteen?"
"How dare you, I am not fifteen.....I'm sixteen."
"Same thing," Phobos shrugged as if he hadn't just insulted Tommy and ruined his day.
Tommy opened his mouth, a dozen different comebacks swirling in his mind, ready to make Phobos regret saying that when Dream interrupted.
"You know we are still fighting, right?"
Phobos stared at Tommy for another moment as if remembering that he was supposed to be using him as a hostage, which Tommy found very unprofessional, before he looked at him and opened his mouth.
Oh god.
"Be quiet and stay still" He said, his voice sliding like honey through Tommy's ears and swirling in his mind, everytime he tried to talk or even move, the same voice replayed in his head, Be quiet and stay still'. Again and again until Tommy settled for just glaring at the villain.
"Come on Phobos, you know you have to let him go now," Dream said, the fucker just standing there, using his telekinesis to push himself into the air, not even trying to help Tommy.
"No, actually, I think I might keep this one." Phobos said, all traces of the amused man from before gone as his lips curled into a cruel, mocking sneer, Well, at least until you give me the bracelet,"
And just like that, the fight was back on. Dream and Phobos battling on the rooftops, with him being dragged along for the ride. Apparently, they were fighting over a fucking bracelet. Why? Tommy had no clue.
What really confused Tommy though, was the fact that every couple minutes, the villain would glance at him with a puzzled expression on the lower half of his face not covered by his mask. It was as if he saw Tommy as a puzzle he just had to solve, which is not a cool way to see someone, in Tommy's opinion.
Their fight was more of a dance, in his opinion. Phobos was dodging Dream's attacks and trying to charm him with that stupid honey-like voice of his, but failing to be heard past the wind that was slowly picking up. Dream was constantly grabbing bits of rubble and loose brick from the top of the building they were on and throwing them with his telekinesis, forcing Phobos to dodge and start the tango all over again.
Finally, Dream got the upper hand, and Phobos was forced to retreat, not without a small glance back at Tommy, for whatever weird reason. The number one hero untied him, not even bothering to apologise for the inconvenience the night had been, and left him.
Stranded.
On a rooftop in the middle of the city.
Somehow Tommy's rating of the Number one hero of the city, went even lower—from one to zero point five. What a terrible hero, honestly.
After a lot of trouble, Tommy managed to get the door to the rooftop open and, using his very sneaky thief skills, climbed down the apartment building's stairs as quietly as possible. Tommy doesn't know what went wrong but, by the time he was outside on sweet ground again, a dozen people had been woken and were all now complaining so loudly that he could hear them from outside the building.
This, of course, woke up more people and started a chain reaction and, before he knew it, everyone was awake at fucking two in the morning. Tommy looked at the building full of angry tenants and then at himself, the cause of this, and you wanna know what he did?
He ran.
Now, you can't blame him, it was really fucking late and all he wanted was to go home and sleep. So he went home. Simple as that, really.
Now you may be wondering, in this world where people with powers run amok and there are supervillains and superheroes, what power does big man Tommyinnit have?
Well, he can talk to animals. At least that's what he thought before his houseplants started screaming at him. He can talk to all living creatures. Including the bane of his existence, Clementine the cat.
Who was suspiciously nowhere to be seen.
Usually, the feral feline would be waiting for him in one of the alleyways near his home, ready to jump him and, once he recovered, bombard him with questions about where he had been.
Now, she may sound horrible, and she is horrible, but when you live alone with only a feral cat you found on the streets one day, you grow to care for that feral cat and, as he stepped into his apartment lobby with no cat in sight, he grew a bit worried. Only a little bit worried though, can't have her thinking he loves her now, could he?
He stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for floor number 9. Thankfully, no one came into it with him, and he was saved from a very awkward situation. The elevator doors slowly drew open and he walked along the stained red carpet until he reached his apartment. He took a deep breath...
And he opened the door to see a teenager sitting on his ugly green couch, scrolling through Netflix.
Tommy Fucking Screamed.
The boy looked over at him, brown hair falling onto his face, and promptly ignored him in favour of looking through what options his TV had available to watch.
"You have any good show recommendations?" He said, looking bored.
Tommy stood there with his mouth agape. It took him a few moments to get himself together as he watched the fucking stranger in his house stare at him expectantly.
"Who the fuck are you and what are you doing in my home?!" Tommy spluttered, "How did you even get in here?"
The boy just looked at him and grinned.
"I'm Tubbo, and I needed a place to stay after I might've exploded my old apartment, so I'm staying here, and you can't convince me otherwise,"
Tommy was going to ignore the fact that the boy— Tubbo —had exploded his previous home; otherwise he might have an aneurysm and collapse onto the floor in a pained heap.
"You didn't answer my question, how did you get in here?"
Just then, a fluffy white cat walked into the room, looking terribly proud of herself. Clementine was holding a spare pair of keys to his apartment.
Tubbo grinned, "The cat let me in."
"Oh fuck me."