Chapter Text
It was almost poetic as Tim reached out his hand for the figure. The pipe in his other hand clattered to the floor, forgotten, as he was yanked towards the edge. The hooded figure was dangling now, suspended only by Tim’s tight grip on its wrist.
Letting go would make sense, he wanted them dead, right? Right?
He didn’t have enough time to think before his hand began to slip. He braced against the railing, but the figure was thrashing against his support, and he knew letting go was the only option if he wanted to remain on the top floor himself.
He let go of the yellow-sleeved wrist and tried to look away as the figure fell to the concrete ground with a sickening crack. Their legs folded under the weight and momentum of their body, and Tim heard a strangled cry come from the masked silhouette, the first noise he had witnessed the figure make over the years they had been haunting him. And it sounded… too human. Too familiar.
Most of his hostility abandoned, Tim ran down the stairs with mounting dread, trying to reassure himself. He had to be wrong. His mind was playing tricks on him, there was no way…
Pacing towards the twisted body, Tim winced. He heard irregular, hitching breaths coming from the form, and glanced toward a small but growing pool of blood flowing from the person’s head. He held his own breath, biting his cheek in an effort not to gag as he reached toward the figure’s mask. Once his hand entered the line of sight of the person on the floor, they began thrashing, attempting to flinch away from him in any way their broken body could manage.
Taking a deep breath, Tim’s fingers tightened around the fabric of the mask, but he felt a warm brush of air as the figure exhaled, and he realized all at once that the person below him was crying. He almost hesitated to remove the mask, reasoning with himself to allow the figure security in their death. But he was curious and more concerned about the present situation than he was willing to admit.
He knew the eyes that would stare back at him, wide and brimming with tears, even before he pulled the mask up. But once he knew, a nauseating dread set in the pit of his stomach, and he wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Brian Thomas wasn’t good with pain, Tim knew better than anyone. But if the… thing… before him could even be considered Brian anymore was a mystery to him. Either way, the face of his best friend viewed him with frantic eyes, and Tim only had a moment to gather himself before the man started to scramble, attempting to crawl away on the floor.
“Hey, hey, wait—” Tim’s voice came out hoarse and accentuated in all the wrong places, and Brian didn’t seem to hear him. “Brian, I—“
The figure's head snapped toward him as he called out the name of his former best friend. Wild eyes were void of recognition, but Tim shifted nearer to him nonetheless.
“Hey, I can help you. I think. Maybe.” Tim reached for the man’s hand.