Chapter Text
Tommy, Fundy, Niki, and Wilbur all stand outside the entrance to the first building, slightly awkward because of Tommy's presence but still working together to set up their game plan.
Tommy leans on the door with his arms crossed, trying to ignore Wilbur as he says, "Alright, we have the earpieces that are connected to Dream's mic, so he can hear us and we can hear him, but nobody else can. We can probably use that somehow, right?"
"But the earpieces just connected to each other," Niki points out, leaning next to Wilbur. Apparently, the two of them know each other somehow- Tommy wonders how many of his classmates were secretly his brother's friend all along, because this is the second one and Tommy is starting to feel out of the loop. "The other team has that, too. It's not going to help that much."
"Are you sure it won't help that much?" Tubbo asks mischievously, and Tommy takes absolute delight in how Fundy and Niki's faces widen at the voice that rings in their ear.
"Wh- how- how did you-?" Fundy stutters out, making Tommy grin.
"Tubbo is a literal computer," Tommy says, fixing his glasses and double-tapping the side of them to turn on the screen. "He can hack into the earpieces and the cameras. This should be a breeze."
Crackling to life with a worse mic quality than Tubbo, Tommy hears Dream's voice come through the earpiece suddenly: "Tommy, Tubbo isn't allowed to tell you where the bomb is located until you enter the building. And don't mess up the other team's earpieces, too."
Tommy makes an offended noise. "Wh- why? He's part of my support gear, isn't he?"
"It gives your team too much of an advantage," Dream explains. "You basically already have five people, it doesn't need to be any worse than that. And before you say I told you to take this seriously, a villain base holding a bomb that could level a city would not have cameras and radios that can be hacked by a sixteen-year-old's AI."
Tommy huffs. "You could have said that without insulting my coding skills."
"Just wait until you get inside, Tommy."
"Okay, okay, before we do any of that-" Wilbur says, holding out his hands. "We need plans on attack and defence. They're obviously going to be more defensive than offensive if they're smart, but we also need to know who's going to go in for the bomb and who's going to stay back for support."
Tommy blinks. He expected Wilbur to be as immature about this as possible, what with Tommy being there, but that's a pretty sound game plan.
"Inniter, I think you should be on support."
Ah. There it is.
Tommy meets Wilbur's half-smirk with an offended glare, ignoring Niki and Fundy's expressions as Wilbur dropped his hero name, his face twisting in disgust as he practically shouts, "Why should I be on support, huh? You're the one with the Quirk that can't fight anything!"
"And you're the one with no Quirk at all," Wilbur fires back, making Tommy's scowl deeper. "And considering the fact that you're the one with eyes all around the building, it'll be for the best if you stay back with me so you can communicate, and then we can go in behind Fundy and Niki- the two people with offensive Quirks- if things turn sour in the room with the bomb."
It makes perfect sense. Tommy hates that it makes perfect sense, and God knows he'll never admit it, so he keeps his mouth clamped shut so someone has to respond that isn't him.
Thankfully, Fundy takes his bait, saying, "If it's worth anything-"
"It isn't," Tommy interrupts. He realises that might have been a little ruder than necessary and quickly says, "...but continue."
Fundy glares at him, tails swishing in annoyance behind him as he says, "If it's worth anything, I think it's a pretty good plan. Plus, Sniff knows how to deal with me pretty fast, so one of you would be able to come in for backup pretty quickly if that's the issue."
Tommy almost brightens and then narrows his eyes instead, asking, "What do you mean by that?"
Fundy then goes red, just as stark and startling against his pale skin as last time. "Well, I mean, it's not really that important-"
"Fundy- sorry, Kitsune is scared of dogs," Niki interrupts. "Sniff can turn into dogs. It's a primal fear, or whatever, but it could probably startle him very easily. Then again," She pauses, turning her hand over in a swift movement as a flame erupts in her palm. She smiles sweetly, and every time she does it, Tommy gets more and more unnerved. "I have fire, and everything is scared of fire."
"Perfect, so the four of us go in and Kitsune and Nihachu go to the room with the bomb. Tommy and I will stay behind and be your eyes for whoever comes around since they'll have obviously sent people out for offence."
"That's stupid, Wilbur," Tommy snaps, crossing his arms. "We need to pay attention to who they're sending out for offence. They have Techno on their team."
Wilbur holds up a finger to stop him, wings fluffing up dramatically behind him as he tries to make himself look important. "First of all, hero names, Inniter. This is a professional setting."
Tommy sticks out his tongue at him.
"Secondly, I was getting there. They're probably going to keep Blood God in on defence-"
"Definitely keeping him on defence," Fundy interrupts, fidgeting nervously at the thought of Tommy's older brother. "Why would they let him wander around and maybe not catch us when we can just run to him while he's waiting?"
"Right, that's a sure-fire answer, so...you'll have to explain the rest of the Quirks to me." Wilbur scratches the back of his hair. "I really only know you three in this class."
Niki, Fundy, and Tommy then give the fastest explanation of Sniff, Charlie, and Jack Manifold's Quirks that they physically can, Wilbur nodding sagely throughout the entire thing before going, "Okay, okay, so I think they would send...Charlie and Sniff out for offence. Sniff could-" He snickers slightly. "Sniff us out, probably, and if they find us, they could easily incapacitate us in an ambush. So I guess..." He shrugs dramatically, his feathers ruffling as he pulls a face that suggests that he doesn't really know where to go from there. "Watch out for that, I guess?"
"While the four of you are together, Niki should be in either the front or in the back so she'll have a clear shot if someone comes up. Wilbur- Siren- whatever should be on the opposite side of Niki." Tubbo pauses, and then says, "I think this team is mostly built out of support with Niki being the most attack-based, so do with the other end of the marching order what you will, really."
"Guys, guys," Tommy says, holding out his hands and drawing attention to himself like he usually does. "I think we're all forgetting one very important fact, here-"
An air horn blares, signifying the five-minute planning time is up. Tommy twists and pushes open the door to the office building, taking the lead and patting the side of his waist, right over his tranquilizer, and saying, "I have a gun."
Noises of agreement ring behind him, so he starts the marching order. Then is Fundy, then Wilbur, then Niki. As soon as they step foot through the door, Tubbo goes off in their ears like a bullet. "The bomb is on the highest story of the building, the sixth story, obviously. Jack has set up barricades in front of every stairwell entrance and certain hallways, and he and Sniff are parading around the fourth story, waiting for you. Techno and Charlie are waiting at the top with the bomb, and it also seems as if they've turned on ventilation? For whatever reason."
Well. At that, and the sight of the long hallways in front of them, Tommy starts running and everyone else follows, Wilbur asking, "Which direction has the least barricades for us? Can you send us in the right direction? Also, hero names, Tubbo."
"You're already going the right way, Siren," Tubbo snarks, sarcasm dripping from Wilbur's name. He hears Wilbur huff in slight annoyance, and Tommy has to force down a laugh. "The real issue is how you're going to get through the barricades. You're coming up on a stairwell now."
True to his words, the group skids to a stop as the door to a stairwell stands in front of them, completely unguarded and uncovered. The group looks at each other with confusion before Tubbo sighs, calls them morons, and tells them to open the door.
Tommy opens the door and immediately flinches back. The dim lights of the office building were easy on the eyes after he adjusted, but what's behind the door- a red and blue striped something that covers the entire doorframe and probably more- is bright and incredibly painful on the eyes. After the initial shock, Tommy does what anyone would try to do immediately- ram into it with his entire body. The block of whatever barely shifts, and Tommy figures that if it won't fall due to his massive amounts of strength, it'll take something superhuman to get rid of it.
"Tubbo, what am I looking at, here?" Tommy asks, tilting his head at the door. "How tall is this thing, how thick, what's going on?"
"It reaches the ceiling, that's probably why you can't knock it over," Tubbo says, and Tommy can hear slight tapping from the earpiece as he replies in almost a bored manner, "It's about a foot thick, but not very wide. It's definitely just supposed to cover the doorway."
"I thought he was supposed to have trouble making big things!" Fundy exclaims, wringing his hands in front of him. Wilbur walks up and knocks on the red and blue thing, and a deep, hollow sound reverberates around the eerily quiet hallway.
"It's hollow," He notes, turning back to the group. "Does that have anything to do with it?"
"It doesn't matter how he made them," Tommy grumbles, kicking the wall. "How are we supposed to get through them? Can't Niki just...light it on fire, or something?"
Niki shakes her head. "His and Crumb's Quirks work the same way. I would just set it on fire, maybe char it a little." She crosses her arms. "They're supposed to break after you do enough damage to them, but we don't have the time for that. Fundy, could you do the thing?"
Fundy blinks. "The thing?"
"The tails thing."
Fundy processes and then realizes what she's talking about a second into it becoming awkward, almost jumping up and saying, "Oh, oh, that tail thing! Yeah, actually, that might work!"
Fundy holds out his arms and shoos the rest of the group to the side, his tails starting to swish back and forth, slowly at first before growing to a rapid pace and making quite a decent amount of noise. Tommy squints from his position against the wall as he sees tiny, minuscule zaps of electricity fly between the orange fur, but he can't see much more of it before his tails swing to the side and send a loud clap of thunder pounding against Tommy's eardrums, combined with the notice of rock breaking and shattering as the fore collides with the stone walls.
He doesn't remember putting his hands up to his ears, but once the noise has stopped, he lets them fall. The door is obliterated, and there's no trace of the red and blue barricade that was there aside from wisps of red and blue smoke mixed with the white from the broken concrete draining into the air vents.
"Christ, dude," Tommy says amidst a laugh, already stepping through the literal hole in the wall. The door is bent and was sent flying off its hinges into the stairwell. "Feels a bit overkill."
"And loud, Sniff and Jack heard it and are moving in your direction. They won't be meeting you for a bit, though."
"Loud is a good enough sacrifice for fast," Wilbur says, shoving Tommy forward so the marching order is reestablished. "We were bound to meet them anyways, it'll be fine."
The group of four rush up the stairs and (thankfully) don't immediately come across another barricade. Tommy's ears are still ringing as he flings open the door, grumbling about the layout of the building being stupid. What kind of building has individual stairwells for each floor? He gets that it's for training, but doesn't that completely defeat the purpose of a stairwell?
Tubbo feeds the directions to go down the twisting hallways, and it quickly becomes painstaking and tedious, the barricades increasing in frequency as soon as they reach the third floor. Fundy doesn't seem to be tired by the repetitive use of his thunderclap, but he clearly becomes increasingly more and more jumpy and frazzled after every use, to the point where he's practically shaking down the hallway. The halls become clouded and fogged with the dust of shattered concrete, as the red and blue smoke of Jack's handiwork lingers for only a moment before disappearing into the vents. Tommy knows that it's weird that only the concrete dust stays, but he hasn't been able to put together exactly why.
And then it clicks.
"Shit," he mutters, skidding to a stop in front of another barricade in the middle of the hallway. "Shit, shit, we need to stop breaking the walls."
"What?" Wilbur questions, sounding confused. "What do you mean stop, how else are we meant to get through here?"
"Jack said that when he makes these really large things he gets weaker and has headaches or whatever, right?" Tommy stops for only a second, a rare moment where he runs what he's saying through his mind to make sure it makes sense before continuing, "Which means that when we destroy them, it's just sending that spent energy back to him."
Niki's eyes widen. "That means...we've just been healing him this entire time?"
Tommy nods, running a hand through his hair. "If I'm right, our best bet is to keep them up. We'll just bust in through walls, or maybe we could go straight up, if Fundy can crash through the-"
Tommy is abruptly cut off by the sound of concrete breaking- Fundy stands next to him, motionless aside from his rapidly rising and falling chest. Tommy flinches in on himself, instinctively covering the back of his head and ducking away from the noise at the sound of the crash. Almost in the same instance, he hears something puff behind him, and after that, it only takes concrete pelting Tommy's back for him to realise that Sniff and Jack had busted in through the ceiling.
He whips around to see Jack Manifold, oversized pen in hand and already dispensing smoke from the tip with Sniff shifting back from some massive four-legged animal into their human form, holding themself in a defensive position.
Before he even gets a moment to think, Tommy finds himself ducking under a barrage of drill-like shapes from Jack, having to roll and narrowly avoid slamming into the wall to get out of the way. The attack is immediately met by Niki, who sidesteps out of the way before violently flinging out her arm flinging out her arm and spraying gasoline everywhere, giving Jack less than a second to dispel his drills and bring them back into a protective shield that curves around him and Sniff as the ground erupts into flames. Niki, seemingly using both of her hands to maintain the fire, bringing up her hands to make it grow taller before yelling back at the group, "Should Fundy and I really leave now? They seem-"
"Yes! Go!" Wilbur cuts her off, flinging out his hand. "We'll be able to deal with them, just get past them!"
Niki's gaze only lingers for a moment before she glances at Fundy and swiftly brings down her hand, making the fire very suddenly vanish into the floor as both she and Fundy start sprinting past the opposing pair, Tommy dashing out right behind them to cover them with his immense power and prowess.
Jack, in a terrifyingly fluid movement, dissipates the shield and splits it into two- half of it turns into three spinning drills that fly pass Fundy's head, narrowly missing him as he jumps out of the way with a dexterity that Tommy finds vaguely impressive, and the other half turns into a long almost-bat that swings out and hits Tommy in the gut. The impact is fucking hard, and Tommy finds himself actively having to keep his balance, his head spinning from the impact. He shakes the dizziness out of him, pulling the electric baton out of his belt pocket, shaking it like a shitty kiddy flashlight until it starts crackling with electricity.
For a split second, Jack pauses. Tommy can practically see the judging in his stare, and he takes the hesitation as an easy window of attack- he keeps his movements sharp and jagged, stabbing towards Jack's abdomen as he awkwardly tries to dodge out of the way, Tommy managing to land one hit on him that makes his body seize before he tumbles to the side, slamming forcefully into the wall in an attempt to get away from Tommy. His hand brushes his side, reaching for the pocket that holds the hexcuffs before the wind in his lungs gets knocked out of him by a brick of Jack's Quirk bullshit hitting him in the back. He does actually lose his balance this time, his shoulder connecting with the ground as his grip tightens on his baton, making sure it doesn't clatter out of his hand and accidentally shock him or get stolen.
Tommy blinks the spots out of his eyes, refocusing his sight as he scoots back towards the wall and tries to take in the scene going on outside of him and Jack's scuffle. It isn't really a pleasant one- Niki is nowhere to be seen, but Fundy, the motherfucker, is being pushed back towards everyone else by Sniff, who is swinging punches left and right and making sure to keep Fundy directly in front of them, claws darting out from their nails every once in a while and nearly scratching Fundy's costume. Fundy does not attack in retaliation, instead evasively turning back and forth from fox to human form, ducking in between and under Sniff's arms. Wilbur is standing towards the back, glancing back and forth between Tommy and Sniff and Fundy with his wings outstretched behind him as he clears his throat. Tommy preemptively scoots himself super far away from Jack and presses his hands against his ears.
He sees Wilbur's mouth move and is shocked when Jack Manifold simply grins, tapping his ear- there's a small, red and blue something inside, and Tommy realises he must have made earplugs.
"Shit," Is all that Tubbo says for a moment. "At least we know they don't have comms with each other- Niki, they're probably blind to you coming up right now, so be slow and fucking careful."
"Aye aye," Niki says wryly, and then there's nothing distracting him from the fact that Jack Manifold is currently grabbing at the hexcuffs at his wrist, a drill solidifying in the air above Tommy. Ah, shit.
Before he makes a move, though, Wilbur is in front of him, holding out a black bar that's about the length of his forearm that extends into something akin to a staff in front of Tommy's eyes. He sharply twists it so it smacks Jack in the side of the head, distracting him enough for Tommy to propel himself backwards and tumble into a standing position, hand squeezing his baton tightly.
This time, the fight against Jack is easy...ish. With both Wilbur and Tommy doing their best to at least get him on the ground to pin him, he's forced onto the defensive and is basically creating a little barrier to surround him before Tommy simply body slams one out of the way, grabs Jack's wrist, pulls him harshly so he's thrown off-balance and clicks the hexcuff on him before the guy can even breathe. Tommy lets him go and he loses his balance, dropping to the floor and failing to catch his fall as he looks up at the two of them with a scowl. Tommy puts an 'L' to his forehead. Jack Manifold flips him off.
He then hears two things- an animalistic yelp and an animalistic growl. He turns to see Fundy, who had presumably been dealing with Sniff this entire time, backing away step by step as Sniff, who is now some unspeakably large, brown and white dog, steps towards him with a low snarl. Wilbur and Tommy look at each other. Wilbur rolls his eyes and Tommy smirks, rushing past Fundy with his baton and pushing him out of the way, about ready to end this scuffle as he swings his baton at Dog-Sniff- and then they snap at him, teeth sharp and white and covered in drool and Tommy instinctively backs up.
"Woo! Fuckin' get his ass, Sniff!" Jack calls from his position on the floor, smoke wisping out of his ears as his plugs dissipate.
"Fuck off, Manifold, you're literally out," Tommy snaps, at which Jack mocks him in a high-pitched voice. He ignores him, focusing on Sniff, whose attention has been turned back to Fundy. It's painfully obvious how hard he's trying not to turn into a fox and hightail it the fuck out of there, so Tommy tries again with the baton, stabbing it in Sniff's direction and almost losing his balance when she suddenly rears up onto her hind legs, towering over Tommy before she continues falling backwards and puffs back down into human form, suddenly swinging at him with a clawed hand and engaging in combat with Tommy.
Her movements are...distractingly fluid, the way she dodges and ducks under Tommy's swings becoming more and more annoying as she seems to try less and less. At one point, her head suddenly ducks down and she swipes to the side, her antlers actually managing to scratch across the side of Tommy's face and make him stumble backward. He presses his hand to the side of his face, checking to see if it's bleeding (it is- how fucking sharp-?) as Wilbur dashes in with his staff and starts to fight in his place.
She meets his blows with her forearm despite the weapon literally being metal, and as Tommy watches in slight awe for a moment, he sees something small and orange go daring through the corner of is eye- Fundy, fully in fox form and jumping up and into Sniff's hair, tugging her downward and making her lose her balance. She yelps, hand reaching to grab at Fundy (who simply jumps off of her head) as she falls before she hits the ground, scrambling back and rolling over back into dog form. Her nails, in this form, scratch against the tile as she backs up with a snarl, snapping at the three of them (and especially Fundy) violently.
Tommy holds his baton in hand and glances at Wilbur, who looks back at him with a slightly concerned expression. He looks back at Sniff, who's in a defensive position, waiting for the first person to move or let their guard down.
And then, suddenly, Tubbo crackles up in their ears and yells, "Wilbur- Siren- fuck, whatever, her earplugs are jostled because of the fucking-" He stumbles over his words intensity making everything hard to get out before he finally says, "The shifting! Fucking mind control her!"
Tommy squints at Sniff's ears and is suddenly incredibly grateful for having Tubbo there- he never would have noticed the bits of red and blue poking out from underneath Sniff's floppy ears, loose and definitely only held there by the fact that her ears are sort of folded over. Tommy presses his hands to his ears just as Wilbur yells at her to "Sleep," and Tommy finds himself stumbling slightly at just how forcefully he gave the command.
Sniff all but collapses, hitting the floor haphazardly and puffing back into human form, her hands underneath her head.
Wilbur lets out an exhale as Tommy blinks the drowsiness away, gathering enough sense to grab Wilbur's hexcuffs off of his side and click them around Sniff's ankle. He turns around and snickers- Fundy, still in fox form, has fallen over, along with Jack Manifold in the background. Wilbur picks Fundy up by the scruff of his neck and whispers something at him- probably "wake up"- and Fundy suddenly moves again, jumping out of Wilbur's arms and landing in a puff back in human form, face red as he straightens his hat.
"Shut up," He hisses, turning on his heel and rushing towards the stairwell. Just as Tommy opens his mouth to tease Fundy, their earpieces crackle to life yet again.
"Guys, are you finished down there?" Niki breathes, her voice wispy and quiet. "I'm on the top floor- I don't think they have noticed me yet but I don't trust that Technoblade won't see me eventually."
Wilbur presses two fingers to his ear, looking stupidly official as he says, "We're on our way up, just stay put." He pauses. "And use the hero names, guys."
He jerks his head to the side and starts sprinting after Fundy, the three of them rushing up the stairwell until they eventually reach the sixth floor. It's easy to tell which room the bomb is being kept in- there are about four entrances to one, giant room, and when Tommy looks through the window in one of the doors, he sees Niki hiding behind a pillar and poking her head out to see exactly what's going on every once in a while. The bomb has a display that shows a timer counting down from six. Tommy curses under his breath- they had been fighting for fifteen minutes? That gives them almost no time.
Tommy presses his hand to his earpiece. "Niki, we're here- we need to go in now, there's only six minutes left and I don't know if that's enough to- I mean, it's Techno."
He sees Niki nod through the window, turning around to face them as Wilbur nods, too. Tommy rolls his eyes at the dramatics and promptly kicks open the door with his foot.
At that moment, all hell seems to break loose. Niki flings out both of her arms and tracks of flame shoot up from the floor, cutting off Techno and Charlie from a straight path to the bomb. Tommy barrels forward, trying to make a clean dash to the red button underneath the display before even having to engage in combat. Of course, he knows it isn't going to be that easy, but it doesn't stop him from trying until he's interrupted.
He makes it about halfway through the room before Charlie materialises in front of him- that's what it looked like, but from the rest of him flying over the walls of flame, Tommy deduces that he basically threw himself over the fire and reformed right in front of Tommy. He starts to sweat- both from the fire and from the fact that this guy basically has no weaknesses.
"Uh, Tubbo?" Tommy calls, taking a step back as Charlie approaches with his ever-lasting grin. "Is electricity even gonna hurt this guy?"
"...Tommy, are you a fucking moron? He's a slime, he is literally made out of more water than- of fucking course your baton would work!"
Tommy feels vaguely offended by his own thought process failing him so bad. He pulls out his baton once more and rushes at Charlie with it, who barely even reacts as he jabs the weapon into the boy's abdomen- literally. The baton sinks in and releases so much electricity the hairs on Tommy's arms and neck stands up- and then Charlie fucking melts.
Tommy yelps and jumps away, terrified that he, like, killed Charlie or some shit, but the puddle of now-green slime on the floor (that Tommy notices has the hexcuffs still inside of) immediately starts darting around his feet so that the next time his foot hits the ground, it's in the slime. Fucking gross.
"That was new!" Charlie says, a mouth forming on the edge of the puddle. Tubbo makes vaguely disgusted noises in Tommy's ears and Tommy almost gags. "Never had electricity from a baton do that- usually, it's lightning!"
Tommy doesn't respond, trying to run towards the bomb now that Charlie seems to be incapacitated, but he quickly finds that his feet are stuck. Shit. The hexcuffs are moving towards his ankle. Shit.
Doing the first thing that comes to mind, Tommy reaches down and grabs the cuffs in the slime, his hand quickly getting stuck too but preventing him from Charlie doing anything with them at the same time. Charlie makes a gurgling noise that somehow sounds exasperated, and Tommy uses his free hand to press at his earpiece and yell, "Guys, Charlie's got me fucking stuck over here- drop the fire, I need-"
Before he even finishes the sentence, the fire is dropped and Wilbur is darting towards Tommy, grabbing him around the waist and avoiding the slime on the ground with a dexterity Tommy didn't know he had in him. He's yanked out of the goo with the hexcuffs, and he barely has time to breathe before Charlie is reforming into a person, his expression still bright but slightly peeved at the same time. He doesn't bother to revert back to human skin tones, instead throwing out his arms and stretching them across the room, around Tommy and hitting Wilbur right behind him. The slime hits both of Wilbur's wings and tugs, the man yelping in slight pain as he's pulled forward, knocking into Tommy as he tries to duck out of the way. From behind, he can see loosely-shaped fingers digging into Wilbur's wings as he's pulled forward, his attempts to twist out of the way just getting him more tangled in slime.
Tommy knows that it's training and that Charlie is playing the part of a villain really well or whatever, but that doesn't stop him from getting really fucking mad. He spares a glance over at the other fight ongoing- Techno is 1v2ing Niki and Fundy without breaking a sweat, Fundy in fox form and darting around Techno while Niki continues to just barely miss him with palms full of fire- before rushing at Charlie and Wilbur, pivoting as soon as he's close enough and swinging his baton as hard as he can into Charlie's side, the arcing electricity making him collapse into a puddle again.
Tommy's grin is wild as he pulls Wilbur away, Charlie saying from the ground, "Suddenly, that's really annoying."
Wilbur barely gets out a "thanks" before Charlie is erupting from the ground again, strands of slime tugging on both Tommy and Wilbur's legs and pulling them closer- and then they retract suddenly as Niki breaks herself from the fight with Techno, rushing over and practically skidding to the floor with an arm rippling with fire held directly over Charlie's puddle form. He shrinks back as Niki threatens him, pulling her hexcuffs from her side and practically growling out the word, "Arm."
Charlie sticks an arm out from the puddle. Tommy might just throw up if he keeps messing with his body like that, honest to God. Niki clicks the hexcuffs around the wrist of the arm and Charlie slowly stretches back to human form, laying facedown on the ground with a groan.
Tommy gets no time to gloat or celebrate- he hears a yowl from the other side of the room, a click, and then he's turning around to see a blur of pink and red rushing at them, stopping suddenly in front of Niki before practically kicking her across the room, foot connecting with her back and pushing her so far forwards she slides across the concrete.
Wilbur scrambles to try and get to the bomb as Tommy is frozen in place- he turns and sees Fundy poof back into human form, arms crossed and hat basically falling off of his head, only staying on from his flattened ears pinning it down. There's a hexcuff around one of his wrists. Niki is weakly trying to get off the ground, coughing from getting all of the wind knocked out of her at once, and Technoblade is turning towards him and Wilbur.
Tommy immediately raises his hands and starts backing up with a smile. "Ah-ha, heyyy, Techno."
Despite putting on that show of power less than two seconds ago and literally reaching for his sword as he speaks, Techno cracks a half-smile. "Hi, Tommy."
"You wouldn't consider leaving us alone if I did all of your chores for a month, right?"
Techno does actually seem to pause and consider it. He shrugs, says, "Nah," and then he's practically a blur again as he grabs onto Tommy's shoulder as he passes, swinging Tommy into Wilbur like he's a fucking bowling ball and knocking the lanky man off his feet, sending them sprawling across the ground as Techno rushes after them.
Tommy, in a very desperate fashion, cartoonishly scrambles off of the floor and runs as far away from Techno as possible, crossing the room and catching the display- two minutes and thirty seconds left. Techno is going to keep knocking them away from the bomb with brute force and there's no way that they're going to be able to fight against that. He, in a vaguely cowardly fashion, backs up and behind a pillar, trying to tune out the sounds of fighting as he says to Tubbo, "Do you think it's time?"
Tubbo snorts. "It's been 'time' since you walked in the building, Tommy. You're just a pussy."
If Tommy wasn't (situationally) scared for his life, he would yell at the boy over comms. Instead, he rolls his eyes and digs his hand into a back pocket of his belt, pulling out his tranquilizer gun. He digs into another pocket to get the short acting darts, loading the gun with shaking fingers. He holds it between two hands and breathes, trying to get himself steady enough to be able to shoot- which is difficult, because as he tries to calm down, he thinks more about the time ticking away and becomes more nervous. Eventually, after hearing a click cut through the sounds of battle, he lets out a sharp breath and swings himself around the pillar, arms outstretched with the gun.
Techno is basically leaning into his face. "Hi, Tommy."
Tommy screams, flicks his hand, and fires the gun. Techno blinks and looks down at the dart embedded in his arm. He looks back up at Tommy.
"Oh, come on, man."
Tommy shakily laughs, shrugs, and locks an arm underneath Techno's so he doesn't collapse onto the floor when he inevitably passes out. At the same time, Niki runs over and slams her hand onto the red button underneath the display, and with a minute and a half to spare, the hero team wins.
Tommy slides the the floor next to Techno. Holy fucking shit.