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Tommy met William S. Watson on November sixth and ever since, nothing had been going right other than the bruises along his body disappearing into a smattering of ochres and browns. Two months after meeting the awful man he was fired from the job he had maintained for a little over a year—though only a year was on paper seeing as it’s pretty illegal to hire a 14 year old to man a station where you can burn yourself on hot milks and teas,— three days after he was fired his best friends, Tubbo and Ranboo, had disappeared without a trace and nobody even seemed to notice. But worst of all, the greatest offense that no good balding man had done… his favorite cereal was discontinued, and he couldn’t find any in stock at any of his local shops. Now, Tommy was never one to be superstitious, but if this wasn’t a sign he was going to take Lady Luck out back with a crowbar. So, he had to talk to Wilbur. He had to clear the air, be honest, say that old classic line of “it’s not you it’s me!” which couldn’t be farther from the truth as it was entirely Will's fault. And he had made peace with that! He had had an open dialogue with himself, which was something he learned from his therapist Karoline—spelled Karoline with a K since she was just quirky like that—to help him process his emotions better. But, to digress, he had to find Wilbur.
Finding Will was actually pretty easy. He just had to follow the scent of ramen, axe body spray, the sickly sweet smell of god awful hair gel that was practically a solid bar of gel instead of actual gel, and self loathing. Truly, the most manly of scents. But in all honesty, he knew exactly how to find Wilbur. How? The man never shut up. He talked more than Tommy—which wasn’t to say Tommy talked too much, no, no, no, on the contrary, Others simply talked too little—which was frankly almost impossible. Will did talk more than Tommy however, and because he was a never ending spew of words and phrases, he knew Wilbur’s exact schedule. Wake up at 3:30 pm on the dot, brush his teeth after having a ‘morning’ coffee, go to ‘Shroud’s coffee house and bakery’ to bother the ‘child’—which Tommy happened to hate that term, he was sixteen years old and (il)legally emancipated thank you very much—go to the bookstore two blocks down and three blocks to the right to grab whatever flavor of myths his brother was craving that week, go home, eat whatever food Tommy gave him to try that day, go to sleep. Now, Tommy wasn’t a doctor. But he wasn’t exactly sure the 20 hour sleep sessions Will had were exactly… healthy? But, Tommy really couldn’t judge seeing as he once spent five days awake consuming only Red Bull, Monster, and black coffee mixed into a mug and called ‘Gods Juices.’ Honestly Wilbur was probably doing better than he was…
Which brings him to the now. Standing in front of the sepia toned tall building with rot and mold surrounding the doorway—was this place even up to code?—and a rickety old timey sign hanging down that read “Ravens Neverending books, and more,” of which Tommy respected the Edgar Allen Poe reference. But now he was about to walk into this building. This moldy, falling apart at the seems, having to be out of code—seriously this place had to be a fire hazard—building. Fun!
Pushing the door open and peaking inside, the store looked as dead at the rat he had seen stuffed into the brick of the wall outside. The flickering lights and dust twirling air really added to the eerie atmosphere. Now, if Tommy were a smart man, he’d run. But—fortunately enough—Tommy was an idiot. So after a moment of staring inside like a weirdo, he marched forward with his head held high and a glare on his face. Because of course he does.
The dust collecting on the books and walls, seeming as if they hadn’t been touched since the 1980s—which was ancient really—should’ve been his first red flag. However, Tommy’s favorite color was red, and frankly the color red didn’t deserve the negative connotation it got, so he plowed ahead. The second red flag was the odor, Mildew and rot that was trying to be covered by a sickly sweet smell, probably ‘Winter Candy Apple’ from Bath and Body Works if Tommy knew his body sprays well enough. This was also ignored, but the pep in Tommy’s step was dampened. The final, undeniably red flag was the six dead bodies hanging limp from the ceiling, pinned to the rafters with a piece of wood and innately carved daggers thats strength was honestly quite impressive. Yeah, the pep in Tommy’s step was officially murdered… kind of like the people on the ceiling. Tommy felt his body tense up, fists clenched as his eyes blew wide. His breath quickened as he tried to move himself to go back the way he came, though he was unsuccessful.
“Oh. You’re not supposed to be here.” A thick, graveled voice that sounded so… otherworldly shocked Tommy back to his body, his head whipping over to stare at the person now in the same room as him. He was met with a hulking figure, well over eight foot tall with rot coating… his? It’s?… it’s entire body. Well the parts of the body he could see anyway. The thick red cloak lined in fur looked wet and heavy, thick with some type of liquid that Tommy was very afraid was at least some human wet, and the fur seemed matted and dirty, the same fear of it being human soaked seeping in. The two stared at each other, not moving a muscle, before Tommy roughly cleared his voice and pointed towards the corpse string lights in the rafters.
“Love what you did to the place. The… dead people… really tie the room together.” Even the joke sounded shaky on his tongue. Damn, first Will took his job, then his friends, then his favorite cereal, and now he put him in a situation where he took his humor? Not cool.
“Ah. You’re the child Wilbur won’t shut up about,” the creature said as if it wasn’t weird that a. Will knew the monster and b. Wilbur talked in depth about a minor, which Tommy wasn’t sure which one was weirder honestly, “not that he ever shuts up anyways. I was wondering when he’d ignore the old crows warnings and drag you back himself.”
“Oh! Was that Tommy who came in!” A voice sounded off in the bookshelves before coming closer and revealing a relatively normally looking man if you ignored the patched together skin and wings made of human skin—well yeah human skin no duh, but like not it’s own—“I told Wilbur that he should just let the kid come to us on his own, but, heheh, you know Will.” The monster was much shorter than the other, but oddly enough it seemed much more dangerous than the other if the human patchwork of skin meant anything.
Officially being done and deciding that Wilbur was really just not worth dying over, Tommy turned on his heels and managed to get one good step before his eyes locked onto the figure locking the front door. It was taller than him, but nowhere near as tall as the first monster. Its eyes glowed a pale yellow and its teeth were needle points as it smiled at him. The gills along its neck flared over the all too familiar trench coat that made Tommy want to curl into himself and begin to either cry or beat himself up for being a dumb kid. As long as the thing didn’t sound like Will he would be okay, he would be able to just explain it away as an evil twin or something—which would still make Will a monster he supposed but at least not the one wanting to take him away to a freaky murder basement or… something.
“Oh! Sunshine! You came home!” Well scratch it not sounding like William. Scratch all of his previous thoughts. Ya’know what, just scratch him off the world as well for good measure.
“Dad… he’s reaking out. Can you?” Will said, as if he was just asking his dad for twenty bucks or something normal.
“Ughhh, fine. But don’t say I don’t do anything for you two,” the meat man grumbled lightheartedly—or at least it sounded lightheartedly it could’ve totally been murderous and Tommy would be non the wiser—and before Tom could really begin to digest anything that was happening, he felt two fingers push on the back of his head and he crumpled. Really? Kidnapping someone who life you forced your way into? Cliché.