Chapter Text
Tommy’s been on the streets long enough to pick up all sorts of bad habits. Pickpocketing is one of the nicer tricks up his sleeve, and that night when Sam comes around to lock things up after delivering dinner, the door clangs shut behind him with the key ring firmly clasped behind Tommy’s back. He's stolen bread, cell phones, magazines-- a keyring is simple after those. It happens so smoothly that Wilbur doesn’t even notice the grab.
The vampire leans his head back against the far wall of his cell, muttering to himself, restless with hunger and the discomfort of being locking in a bare cell for days on end.
Tommy hides the keys behind his back. The cold steel warms quickly under his touch. With them, he could run. Leave this cell behind. Without the vampire.
He can’t kid himself. He won’t make it five feet out the door alone. He brings the keys around and jangles them.
Wilbur’s head snaps towards the noise. His eyes widen. “Where did you get those?” Wilbur asks, standing in an uncanny flash, the movement too-fast for human.
Tommy steps closer to the cell door. “I stole them off Sam,” he says, cheeky, twirling them. “I’m betting one of them’s the key to both our cells.”
The vampire grins, leaning close to the bars. His fangs slide out, but the look isn’t menacing like it should be. There’s no threat hidden within those teeth as Wilbur grins at him. “So you could get us out of here?” he asks, excited.
Tommy jangles the keys again. “I should be able to,” he says carefully.
“Wait,” Wilbur cautions, and he closes his eyes like he’s thinking hard. “It’s not sundown yet. I can’t go anywhere until night falls.” He opens his eyes again, teasing playfully. “Not unless you’d prefer I fry myself, that is?”
It's a funny constraint to think about, how Wilbur and sunlight can't mix. “I don’t burn you, you don’t bite me,” Tommy offers, even though burning the vampire is beyond his abilities and they both know it. But it feels good to speak the rule aloud, to try and hold the vampire accountable in some way since Tommy has no real, concrete way of ensuring his safety if he lets Wilbur loose.
But Wilbur only nods solemnly. “I won’t hurt you,” he says softly. “You know that, right?”
Tommy knows he wouldn’t. Impossibly, against all reason, he trusts this vampire. “I know,” he says.
Wilbur grins wider, fangs fully bared with hunger and unhealed hurts and not a drop of trepidation fills Tommy at the sight. “My family’s waiting and ready,” Wilbur says knowingly. “As soon as the sun falls, we’ll be out of here.”
“What’s the plan?” Tommy asks curiously. “We’re not going to kill anyone, are we?”
“No,” Wilbur laughs. “Or, at least I don’t plan on any killing. But if you want to take the opportunity to kill Dream, I’ll be glad to help out with that.” The words are still lightly teasing, not serious.
“Can I start some fires?” Tommy asks, channeling his inner Tubbo, missing his friend with a pang but knowing he’d be glad to watch the Guild burn.
“If we have time for it,” Wilbur allows. “Fires are always a good distraction, or so Techno tells me.”
“How long until sundown?” Tommy asks excitedly.
“Minutes,” Wilbur tells him. “There should be a signal when it starts.”
“What sort of signal?” Tommy asks, stretching out his sore arms, testing the bruising across his ribs. He’s still fairly beat to shit but he should be able to manage some light running.
“Knowing Phil, it’ll be something loud and obvious,” Wilbur grins, head tilting to the side. “Oh, they might beat you to that fire idea, Tommy.”
Curious, Tommy pries for what information he can. “You can hear them that clearly?”
“Not quite,” Wilbur admits. “But it’s getting clearer now that they’re close by.” He shudders, arms wrapped around himself. “I know it’s only been a few days,” he says softly. “But I miss them like crazy.”
Tommy hefts up the keyring. “Let’s get you back to them,” he says, and chooses the first key his fingers find.
He approaches the cell, grabbing at the slide-bar lock. The entire thing is silver-plated but it doesn’t burn his fingers like it would Wilbur’s. The vampire hovers anxiously right on the other side of the bars, but Tommy isn’t afraid of the closeness.
The first key doesn’t fit. Neither does the second, so Tommy skips straight to a small silver one, because hunters are not actually brilliant individuals and sometimes common sense is all it takes.
The key fits perfectly. There’s a small click as the lock slides back, and then Wilbur’s swinging the door open, standing there with no bars between them in a yellow bloodstained sweater.
Tommy doesn’t step back, refuses to retreat. Wilbur doesn’t lunge for his throat or anything ridiculous like that, so Tommy throws himself forward in a mad rush, locking his arms around the vampire. Something clicks into place at the embrace, a feeling of rightness. Of belonging. It feels safe. Good.
Wilbur hugs him back, laughing quietly at the incredulity of it all. “I’ve got you, Toms,” he says. “Now let’s get you out of here.”
Deep inside the building, an alarm starts to wail. Wilbur grins at the sound. “Party’s started,” he says knowingly. “You ready?”
Before Tommy can answer, the door to the rest of the Guild building crashes open and Sam charges through, wielding a strange three-pronged trident-like weapon in both hands that he lifts defensively when he sees the cell door hanging freely open and the vampire standing in the middle of the room.
Sam goes for his radio. Wilbur goes for Sam, and Wilbur’s faster when he’s not outnumbered and desperate. Wilbur crushes the radio in his fist like a handful of toothpicks, and his eyes are red as his lips raise in a snarl.
“If I were you,” the vampire cautions. “I’d drop that trident and surrender.”
“Never!” Sam cries, weapon lifted in threat, and Tommy swings the cell door wide.
“In here!” he yells, and Wilbur takes the cue beautifully. When the hunter lunges, Wilbur neatly sidesteps him, bowls the man over, and sends him skidding into the cell.
Tommy slams the door shut behind him, locking the hunter in before Sam can whirl around on them. He backs away as the hunter twists, eyes wide, and stabs reflexively out at Wilbur with his weapon.
Wilbur dodges it, barely. “Shit,” he swears, looking at the new tears in his sweater. “I loved this sweater.”
Sam’s looking between the two of them, eyes wide as the siren overhead continues to wail. “Tommy,” he says, stunned. “What have you done?”
Tommy shrugs. “I’m jailbreaking, duh,” he says, like it should be obvious. “Did you really expect me not to run?”
“With the VAMPIRE?!” Sam all but shrieks. “Have you lost your mind, kid?”
Tommy purses his lips thoughtfully. “Must have,” he decides. “Or maybe its because the hunter’s guild is really just that shitty, you know?”
Sam clangs his trident against the bars of the cell. “Let me out. Now.”
“Time to go,” Wilbur urges, checking out the now open door into the hallway beyond. “We can’t get trapped here. We need to find a way out, quickly.”
Tommy turns to Sam thoughtfully. “Tell Bad I’m sorry,” he says. “And tell Dream to go fuck himself.”
He goes with Wilbur, leaving the furious hunter locked in a cell behind him. Wilbur leads the way, and together they make it a good ways inside the Hunter’s guild without being discovered. When they do run into hunters, it’s a pair of young trainees barely in their uniforms, unarmed, and they simply flee at the sight of Wilbur’s bloodstained appearance.
“Well, that was easy,” Wilbur remarks, but there’s tension in his voice. He’s nervous. Tommy’s nervous too, but he hides his fear under brash bravery.
“I’ll fight off any hunters we run into,” he vows. “All of them! They won’t win against me so easily a second time,” he lies, crackling his already bruised knuckles.
Wilbur checks around the corner warily. “I’m sure you will,” he says. “But I’m not completely incompetent in an even fight, so try to let me handle things, alright? I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“How does ‘not being incompetent’ equal Karl kicking your ass?” Tommy snickers, his energy high and nerves jangling as they dart through the halls.
“I was outnumbered!” Wilbur protests with a squawk. “And they were heavily armed.”
A huge crashing sound rings out ahead of them and the floor shakes through the foundation. A scream rings out, the massive displacement of air as something collapses with a crackling rush. Dust thickens the air as they turn that last corner.
The guild lobby is choked with hunters, dust, and the crumbling remnants of the massive hanging light fixture that once hung above the grand space. Parts of the ceiling itself are down, scattering timbers and chunks of concrete across the ground.
Wilbur grins widely at the chaos of it and throws himself gleefully at a moving shadow. “Nikki!”
The dust-streaked figure embraces the vampire back, grinning just as wide. Through the coating of dust, Tommy can see she’s got a pink stripe dyed in her hair. Around her neck sits a black cord with a fat emerald on the end, glittering a merry green.
The pieces click together. Syndicate. Another vampire.
Nikki studies him curiously as Wilbur bounces around in excitement, chattering away. “This is him?”
Wilbur puts his arm over Tommy’s shoulders proudly. “This is him,” he says grandly.
Nikki’s answering grin is a gentle thing as he shoves Wilbur off him, embarrassed. A crossbow twangs in the gloom.
“Duck!” Nikki yells and tackles Wilbur to the ground. The bolt flies harmlessly past.
Tommy whirls around, heart pounding, and there they are. The fucking Dream team, armed to the teeth and looking pissed.
George reloads his crossbow as both Dream and Karl draw their sliver blades. Sapnap has an axe he holds like he knows how to use it, and while the Dream team might not kill Tommy outright, the two vampires are fair game.
Wilbur steps in front of him protectively as Tommy swallows hard against his sudden fear. Nikki draws two small knives that she wields in each hand as smoke begins to fill the air between them. He can feel his heart beating in all of his hurts, bruises and aches that Dream caused, that the rest of his team allowed to happen. Dream let Wilbur live the first time. Tommy has a feeling he won't be so merciful again.
Dream clashes both his swords together before him, the silver ringing. “Come on then!” he challenges. “No bloodsucker is getting past me alive.” Around him, the rest of his team stands at the ready, the Guild’s elite, the cut above. Four extremely competent hunters out for bloodshed.
Wilbur wisely balks at the sight of them, digging in his heels. For all that he’s a vampire, he’s not exceedingly old, strong, or skilled in combat. Wilbur is basically just a guy. And Nikki, while she certainly looks fierce to Tommy, is outnumbered 4-1.
Tommy tries to shove past Wilbur, challenge Dream himself if only to buy them time to escape, when a shadow congeals out of the dust and smoke around them. The dark shape solidifies more, revealing the harsh points of a crown atop their brow, shoulders adorned with a scarlet cape. But that’s not the most noticeable thing about them.
A tusked mask sits over the person’s face, made of bone with the teeth exposed. From the dark eye sockets shine eyes a vicious, searing red.
Tommy’s blood freezes, heart stopping as the figure stands there, sword in hand, radiating a menace Tommy didn’t think was possible. He may be a street kid, but he knows this silhouette. He’s had nightmares of it before, every street kid’s worst fear in the flesh— the Syndicate’s right fucking hand.
“I’ll handle this,” the Blade says easily, and Wilbur throws himself forward.
“Wait!” the vampire says quickly, tugging at the larger guy’s sword arm. “I kinda promised no killing!”
The boar-masked figure pauses, voice flat. “You what?”
“It was for Tommy,” Wilbur explains, ducking a piece of ceiling tile.
The Dream Team charges a heartbeat later, bristling with weapons. George opens fire, sending a crossbow bolt streaking at the Blade’s head.
The Blade catches the quarrel with ease, snapping the bolt with two fingers. Karl meets him first, bravely, and goes down just as brave an instant later, both his swords useless against the vampire before him.
George is next, but he’s never been great at close combat and the Blade barely pays the hunter any mind on his charge to reach Dream. George goes flying.
The Blade is simply unstoppable. He’s like a force of nature. Nothing escapes him, nothing evades him. Nothing stands a chance against him.
Sapnap swings his axe and the Blade catches that too, then lifts Sapnap up by the axe handle, boar mask tilted as those red eyes consider the dangling hunter.
“Sapnap!” Dream yells, and he throws something too, something small and round, but not at the Blade— up at the already crumbling ceiling.
The second explosion rocks the floor with a bang. The rest of the ceiling crashes down in an enormous clash of rubble.
Tommy ducks, shielding his head as Wilbur lunges for him.
“Tommy!” the vampire shrieks in panic.
The ceiling collapses right on top of him. A chunk of tile strikes his head, there’s a flash of bright, blinding pain.
Then he knows no more.