Chapter Text
Each and every day, it would work, squeezing through the crack in order to free itself.
It was determined to succeed.
It had to reach its mother!
Suddenly, it felt itself break through.
It had made it!
It had escaped!
Except…
It burned.
It writhed in pain because this was not how it wanted to be no no no no no mother help please
Panicked, it retreated back to the safety of its cage.
It felt smaller than before.
Tighter.
Was the cage shrinking?
Or was it growing?
It would find its mother.
And it would ask.
A mother would know the answer, right?
“I feel like this stuff should cost more,” Tommy said, carefully running his fingers over whatever the material he was holding was.
Sam laughed. “It probably should, shouldn’t it?”
He pulled the mystery material out of Tommy’s grasp and spread it out onto his workbench.
Sam was a guy that Quackity had summoned from who-knows-where to make a super suit.
Which, wow. Okay, Tommy was going to be a vigilante. That would take some getting used to.
Anyways, Tubbo had led Tommy down to the subterranean levels of Las Nevadas, because of course the casino nation had to have a secret basement where all the illegal things happened.
Tommy would’ve thought that the evil basement would’ve been less sparkly than the casino, but he was dead wrong about that.
In fact, the basement looked like it was the sparkliest area yet, as if Quackity really needed to prove to his drug dealers that he was absolutely the richest person to ever exist on the planet.
Tommy’s eyes were actually starting to hurt from all of the glamorous sparkly golden shiny things he had seen in District Seven. He couldn’t wait to get back to his grandmother’s place, where sparkles were nowhere to be found.
If his suit had sparkles on it, Tommy would jump off of the Needle.
Sam chuckled from his position in measuring Tommy’s arm length. “I know what you’re thinking,”
“Really? Please, do tell!”
Sam’s eyes crinkled at the corners like he was smiling, though Tommy couldn't be completely sure since a gas mask covered almost the entirety of the man’s lower face. Of course, he seemed like the type of guy who would smile a lot, so the assumption wasn’t too hard to make. “You’re thinking that your costume is going to be gold and covered in sparkles, aren’t you?”
Tommy furrowed his eyebrows. “What is it with people and being able to guess what I’m thinking to an uncanny degree of accuracy?”
Sam, instead of answering, grabbed one of Tommy’s hands in his own calloused ones and began measuring the length of his individual fingers.
Sam pulled away and pushed some of his greenish hair away from his face before cinching the measuring tape around Tommy’s waist. “Quackity might be obsessed with showing off his immeasurable wealth, but he’s not about to force you to wear something that you’d rather burn than even look at.”
Tommy sighed in relief. He was starting to get really sick of sparkles.
Tubbo snorted from where he was leaning against the wall. “Quackity tried to make us all wear duck onesies once. Purpled about strangled him.”
“I have no idea who Purpled is, but he sounds like a great guy. Weird name, but he still sounds pog.”
Then Tommy realized. “Wait, does Quackity just really like ducks? Is that why Duck TV exists?”
There was a collective mutter of: “We don’t talk about Duck TV.”
Tommy nodded apologetically. “Right, sorry.”
Sam saved Tommy from his embarrassment. “What colors do you want your suit to be? I was thinking mostly black, since you’d be fairly camouflaged, and it goes with everything, but you can also suggest colors and I can go off of that.”
Tommy didn’t even have to think about it. “Red. Bright red.”
Sam paused. “Red? Are you sure?”
“Abso-fucking-lutely.” Tommy said.
Sam gave him a thumbs up and finished measuring Tommy’s body parts.
Tubbo spoke up as Sam started sketching suit designs. “Hey, Tommy. You have powers, right?”
Tommy turned to him. “…Yes?”
Tubbo nudged Sam, who looked up quickly. “What are they?”
“I’m not sure if I want to tell you that.”
“I’ll need to know them if I want to design your suit to work with your abilities.” Sam explained, seeing Tommy’s uneasy expression.
Seeing Tommy still wasn’t convinced, Tubbo added, “I know you have some modicum of common sense because you didn’t immediately tell us— which is smart! You never know who might take an interest in your abilities and ship you off into human trafficking— but we already work for the same person.”
Sam raised his hand. “I don’t actually work for Quackity.”
Tubbo pursed his lips. “That’s true.”
“You don’t?” The question was directed towards Sam, but Tubbo replied.
“He’s an independent contractor. Makes super suits and gadgets for literally everyone.”
“Even the villains?”
Sam winced. “I have made stuff for… several unsavory individuals. I might not exactly approve of anything they’re doing, but money is money.”
Tommy nodded, trying not to think about whether or not Sam had used the exact same measuring tape on Burnout. If the answer was yes, he might puke.
Tubbo nudged him. “We’re all morally grey here, Tommy. Hell, you just agreed to hunt down several different villains.”
That didn’t really make Tommy feel any better.
Tubbo frowned as though he was having some internal argument with himself before saying, “I’ll tell you my powers if you tell me yours.”
Sam smiled. “I will too, if you want.”
Tommy shifted uncomfortably, but eventually agreed. For some reason, telling these people he barely knew about his powers bothered him more than making a deal with a mafia boss.
Tubbo took a deep breath. “I can sense people’s emotions. That’s… sort of how I knew you might be a good candidate to work for us.”
Tommy stared at him incredulously. “You felt my grief and hatred and thought ‘yep, that guy would make a good mafia lackey right there’?”
Tubbo looked very uncomfortable. “Sort of? It’s all a win-win, right? Quackity gets what he wants, you get revenge, everything is great?”
Tommy glared at him and didn’t reply. Sam saved them from having to deal with another awkward silence by explaining his own powers.
“I can manipulate any and all man-made matter. That’s why I get hired by so many people to make weapons and armor and stuff. I’m the only person that can turn this,” He picked up the mystery material, “Into a working suit.”
It was interesting information, sure, but Tommy didn’t pay too much attention to the facts, since he was still feeling betrayed by Tubbo’s admittance that he had taken advantage of Tommy’s emotions in order to recruit him.
Tubbo winced in the corner at the spike in Tommy’s anger, and Tommy wondered if Tubbo could understand what Tommy was feeling any better than Tommy himself could.
Honestly, Tubbo probably would’ve made a good therapist. Or maybe a terrible one. It was a questionable situation.
Oh. It was Tommy’s turn now.
“I can talk to animals,” he said hesitantly, “And also speak every language on earth.”
Tubbo blinked. “Bossman, that sounds like two powers, not one.”
“I think my powers count human beings as animals, so I can by default understand people’s languages.”
“That is really overpowered.”
Tommy shrugged. “I didn’t fail Spanish class, at least.”
Suddenly, Tubbo froze. And it wasn’t a miniscule freezing either. It was as if every molecule in his body just stopped moving.
“You can talk to animals, right?”
“Uh, yeah? That’s literally what I said?”
Tubbo was suddenly waaaayyyyy too close to Tommy’s face. “Canyoutalktobees?”
“...Yeeeesss?” Tommy said, unsure about whether or not he should be thankful his powers were allowing him to understand Tubbo’s hyperspeech.
“Yougottashowme.” Tommy found himself being dragged down the hallway by Tubbo, who had somehow developed superstrength. Tommy looked back at Sam with a pleading expression, but the man just smiled and waved goodbye.
Tubbo dragged him out of Quackity’s basement and through the casino until they reached an employee entrance. Tubbo then proceeded to drag him into a massive garden.
Tommy soon found himself in a massive flowery meadow that was completely filled with bees. Like, so many bees. Tommy was getting a headache just by standing there.
Tubbo shoved Tommy forward. “Talk to them!” He hissed, grabbing onto Tommy’s jacket sleeve and pulling on it insistently.
Tommy then proceeded to spend the next hour acting as a translator between Tubbo and his bees.
Going home took longer than it should have, mostly because Tommy needed a reasonable alibi for why he’d been gone all day.
Spending like six hours sitting at the park was just a little bit suspicious.
Luckily for him, Tommy had his new friend Tubbo that he met at work ready to be his alibi. Which technically wasn’t a lie? They had met at Tubbo’s work, which Tommy was now working at as well. And they were sort of friends, if you didn’t count the whole ‘manipulating Tommy’ thing.
It was a decent enough lie.
Tubbo offered him a ride home, but explaining to his father and grandmother why he‘d come home in a limo would’ve been a challenge even for his extremely poggers lying skills, so he’d declined. (Even if riding in a limo was definitely something Tommy wanted to do one day)
Instead, Tommy left Las Nevadas (the casino, not the district), and took the subway back to District Five.
While walking back, a storefront caught his eye. It wasn’t a new store, but he’d never actually come home from this route before, so he hadn’t spotted it until now.
The outside looked a lot like the typical outside of any generic store in District Five, except it was significantly cleaner and nicer looking.
You could literally see the store’s property line.
The only other significant difference between this store and every other store was the giant display windows. There were two of them, and each window was showcasing an impressive display of mannequins wearing bucket hats.
The sign above the door labeled the store as ‘Phil’s Bucket Hat Emporium’.
…
Should Tommy really go into a store for bucket hats even when he had no interest in buying one?
No.
Did he feel like stalling because he didn’t want to go back home yet?
Yes.
Tommy went into the bucket hat emporium.
The inside of the store had green-and-white striped walls and was completely filled to the brim with bucket hats.
There was literally no other item on sale there. Only bucket hats.
Whoever this Phil was, he was probably monopolizing the entire city’s bucket hat supply.
As he looked around, someone called out to him. “Hello! Welcome to Phil’s Bucket Hat Emporium! I’m Philza, but you can call me Phil. Can I help you find anything?”
The voice came from a shorter man with shoulder length blond hair and bright blue eyes. He was wearing a green-and-white striped bucket hat that matched the walls of his store, and Tommy wondered if the hat was a uniform or if Phil just really liked the pattern.
“Uh… I’m just looking around.”
“That’s fine, mate! Give me a shout if you need anything!” Phil waved at him and went back to organizing his wares.
Tommy looked around. There were a lot of different types of bucket hats. There was a colored hat section, a goth hat section, an animal hat section…
Oh. Would you look at that?
There was a bee bucket hat. Tubbo would love that thing.
Of course, Tommy wasn’t sure if he actually wanted to get Tubbo anything. He was annoyed at him. But.
The bee hat was really, really, cute.
Tubbo probably had enough money to buy like a million bee hats though.
But he’d also probably never find this store.
Or the hat.
Unless Tommy told him about the store and the hat.
…
Before he could change his mind, Tommy snatched the hat off of the shelf and made his way over to the checkout counter.
Phil looked up from his work. “Oh, that’s a cute one! I make all my hats with special care, and the animals are my favorites!”
Huh. So these were all handmade.
Tommy looked around the store. That was a lot of hats to handmake. This guy must have a lot of free time.
Tommy paid for the hat and Phil waved goodbye to him.
“Bye, mate! Have a nice day!’
“You too!”
Tommy clutched the hat to his chest, slightly smushing the bee’s antennae.
How he was going to get this thing to Tubbo was anyone’s guess, but he supposed they’d probably see each other soon enough.
Vengeance waits for no one, or something like that.
Tommy quickened his pace and went home.
The next time Tommy saw Tubbo was a week after Tommy had made the deal. He’d gotten a text in the middle of History and had had to excuse himself to go to the bathroom so he could respond.
Beeboi: guess what ur souit is ready
Bigman: Do i come pick it up or???
Beeboi: can u make it to Ln 2morrow
Tommy thought about it. Tomorrow was a Thursday, and he had a Math test, but he could probably make it.
Bigman: can I come in the middle of the night
Beeboi: yessss
Sneaking out wasn’t that hard. His room was on the first floor, so he just had to unlatch the window and crawl through without making any excess noise.
He made it to Las Nevadas without incident, and Tommy was disappointed to see that the casino didn’t look any less sparkly in the night time. In fact, the entire building was lit up by giant spotlights.
He met Tubbo in the same place as last time. Tubbo waved at him and Tommy followed him back down into the basement.
“This entire establishment is literally light pollution personified.”
“Is it?”
Tommy stared at him incredulously. “Can you not see the giant fucking spotlights?”
Tubbo shrugged. “You get used to it eventually.”
They continued in silence until they reached Sam's workshop, where the man-the-myth-the-legend himself was waiting for them.
Sam smiled at the duo. “Hey, Tommy! Have you come to try on the suit?”
Tubbo scowled playfully. “Okay, just ignore me then.”
“Hello, Tubbo.” Sam said.
Tubbo nodded, satisfied.
Tommy also nodded, but that was to respond to Sam’s question.
Sam turned around and started to rummage around in the many boxes scattered around his workspace. He eventually found what he was looking for, because he pulled it out and offered it to Tommy.
Tommy took the bundle and unfolded it to reveal… his suit.
“Wow.”
Sam chuckled. “I take it this means you like it?”
Tommy didn’t respond, too busy taking in his new outfit.
The suit’s underarmor was black and red, just like they’d discussed, and felt stretchy and comfortable and altogether very nice.
The main body, forearms, and upper legs were black, but the arms, neck, and lower legs were the most perfect shade of red to ever exist.
Sam pointed to a door in the wall. “You can try it on, if you want.”
Tommy darted over to the room, and soon enough, he emerged wearing his new outfit.
Sam studied him. “It looks like it fits. How does it feel?”
Tommy did a little twirl. “Awesome.”
Sam smiled. “Great! You want to try on the full ensemble?”
Tommy stopped spinning. “There’s more?!”
“Of course,” Sam said, “The masks, your belt, your gloves and boots…” He handed the items over to Tommy, who put them on.
Once Tommy was done, he found himself clad in not only his suit, but a pair of black gloves (they weren’t fingerless, Sam explained that he could be identified and tracked using his fingerprints), a pair of black combat boots (with adjustments to make it easier to run, jump, and climb in), a utility belt with so many pockets it seemed like Tommy could probably fit anything and everything in there, a black and red gas mask equipped with a voice changer, and, of course, his regular mask.
It was a domino mask, split black and red down the middle, with a white mesh woven over the eyes as both protection and to help conceal his identity better.
Best of all, spread proudly across the chest of his suit was a blocky silhouette resembling a bird with its wings spread in flight colored in the same bright red as the rest of his armor.
All in all, Tommy looked fucking sick.
Sam had him twirl once more before asking his opinion on the bird symbol. “I figured since you can talk to animals, it would be a good fit. I can always change it if you don’t like the design or something, but I think I did pretty good—”
“Sam,” Tommy interrupted, “I love it.”
Tubbo clapped his hands. “Well, that looks pretty good! Now, what about his weapons?”
Sam pulled out several black-and-red objects (Tommy suddenly had a flash of realization that he was directly contrasting Phil’s aesthetic, that was kind of funny, actually) and spread them out on one of his tables.
“First up,” He pointed to some spheres, “Those are smoke bombs. You press this button here and then throw them. They should release the smoke upon impact.”
Tommy made an appreciative sound and dropped some in his utility belt.
“These,” Sam said, gesturing to what looked like knives but probably weren’t because who gives teenagers knives? “Are throwing knives. Pretty self explanatory.”
Nevermind then. Apparently Sam gave teenagers knives.
“These,” Sam said, picking up what looked like more knives, “Are daggers.” He turned to Tommy. “Don’t throw these ones, they’re designed for close combat. It won’t work out super well.” He helped Tommy clip the sheathed daggers to his belt and slide the knives into their own sheaths.
“This,” Sam picked up a short rod and pressed a button that extended it, then pressed another button to split it into two smaller rods, and then pressed another button that made the ends of the two rods hum with electricity. “Is your new taser rod. This button here extends it, this one splits it, this one electrifies it, and the same buttons will function as the reverse to the actions I just showed you.”
Tommy took it and clipped it to his belt as Sam pulled out a handful of little circles (still black-and-red, the man was apparently really committed to Tommy’s theme) and poured them into Tommy’s cupped hands.
“These are self-camouflaging trackers,” He said, putting away the black circles, “And these are listening devices.” He shut the tracker pouch and began putting red circles into another compartment.
Tommy had no idea how he was supposed to remember all this, but he did his best to memorize what Sam was saying.
“You’ll probably need to practice with your weapons, but I think you’ll eventually get the hang of them.” He paused. “Was there anything else… oh, yeah!” He tapped Tommy’s chest, right where the bird insignia’s eye would’ve been had it had any eyes. “There’s a hidden camera there. We’ll get footage from all of your vigilante outings.”
Tommy gasped. “What, Quackity don’t trust me?”
“Nope.” Tubbo said cheerfully. “I’m not sure he trusts anyone. Well, he probably trusts his fiancés…”
Tommy waved him off before he could start rambling about Quackity’s love life, which he was quite frankly not interested in at all.
“How am I supposed to learn about how to use knives, exactly? I can’t just do target practice at my house.” Tommy winced internally at the words ‘my house’ and Tubbo gently bumped his shoulder. Perks of having an emotion reading friend, I guess.
Tubbo smiled at him. “That’s where I come in, actually.”
Tommy stared at him. “You’re going to teach me how to fight?” He didn’t doubt that the brunet could fight, he just couldn’t imagine Tubbo being very good at teaching anyone anything.
Tubbo glared at him. “I felt that, you know.”
Tommy blinked innocently at him. “Felt what?”
Tubbo scowled. “Whatever. As I was saying before you so rudely interrupted me, I can help you. Not by teaching you, but by introducing you to a very good friend of mine.”
“Did you pay this friend of yours in order to get them to teach me?”
Tubbo scowled even more. “…Maybe. I might owe him a favor now. But! But. He agreed to it.”
“Okay, but who’s this he we’re talking about here?”
Tubbo grinned, sharklike. “Have you ever wanted to meet Paradox, Tommy?”