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Wilbur’s breath fluttered, trying not to cut himself on the tip of the blade nudging against his throat. His wings were pressed uncomfortably against the wall he’d fallen against, and his own knives were just out of reach.
“I win.”
Ace leaned down, smirking as his knife dug into the hero’s neck. Wilbur would have flinched, but he was exhausted. They’d been fighting for what must have been nearly an hour, including the time he’d spent chasing the villain across the city.
“Come on pretty boy, nothing to say?”
Rolling his eyes at Wilbur’s lack of response, he crouched, waving a remote in front of his face.
“Remember this? The thing you were chasing me for?”
Wilbur made a faint noise of protest, vaguely lifting his hand, before dropping it again in defeat. Everything seemed so slow and tiring, every muscle in his body was screaming for him to just stop trying.
“Hey- don’t…”
Eyes wide and innocent, Ace pressed the button on the remote. The sound of a distant explosion rung in Wilbur’s head, making his eyes screw closed in pain. Too loud. Too much.
Guilt flooded him as the vibrations died down. He could have stopped that. Ace was right there, he could have gotten the remote off him. Could have stayed back to diffuse the bomb. But he hadn’t, he’d been an idiot, and now he was paying for it. Those people’s lives were on his hands. Every one of them.
Tears welled under his eyelids, his head hitting the wall with a painful thump as he slumped entirely. Stupid. Useless hero.
He only realised he was hitting his head repeatedly, slowly and deliberately, when Ace’s knife dug deeper into his throat, pinning him.
“Aww, songbird… don’t be sad. You did great!”
It was just a game to his nemesis. He didn’t care about whoever had been in that building. He didn’t know the names of the people Wilbur had failed to save, and neither would he. The magpie tried to convince himself he’d find them, find every person he’d killed and make himself memorise the names as penance, but he couldn’t find the energy.
Ace’s blade shifted, and Wilbur rested his head on it, slightly more comfortable than the concrete wall. He felt like he might throw up. There was something horrible inside him, the crushing guilt of apathy weighing down his thoughts.
“Ok, now I’m worried.” The back of the villain’s palm pressed against his forehead, and Ace hummed, moving his knife away. “Did I hurt you, songbird?”
Mumbling something even he didn’t really understand, Wilbur shook his head, trying to muster the strength to move away, to push Ace away from him and do… whatever a hero was meant to do. But he couldn’t, and his head spun, even with his eyes closed.
“N- no…”
Ace tutted, his curiously short nails digging into Wilbur’s chin as he tilted his head up. Probably examining him for injuries, or something equally ridiculous.
“Oh, you stupid bird…”
A brief touch to the back of his head made Wilbur chirp in pain, squeezing his eyes shut hard enough to make colours pop in his vision.
“Well, it’s not really bleeding. That’s about all I can say, you walnut. For fucks sake… I’m not leaving you here.”
There was a finality in Ace’s voice as the villain seemed to move away, making the magpie whine again at another ache pounding through his head. That didn’t sound good, for a reason he couldn’t quite pin down.
“I- I need to go home- please, Ace…”
His voice slurred as he reached for a panic that seemed just a little beyond his current capabilities. Nails threaded through his hair, making any fight he might have had in him vanish.
“You’ll be the death of me, you know? Fine, you can go home. I think I saw Blade and Crow… they’re out, right?”
Wilbur nodded, the movement unsteady as it made his brain reel again. Phil was going after his nemesis. Techno was on daylight patrol. Tommy was at school. No one… was home. That might be worrying, if Ace was doing what he thought.
“Great. Sorry about your wings songbird, you might not enjoy this very much.”
That was all the warning he got before his nemesis picked him up, adjusting his hold to make sure he was holding Wilbur’s head still. Vaguely, he knew this should be not right. But more pressingly, he was disoriented to the point of feeling sick again, and his instincts were… being little shits. That was about all he could work out from the incessant trills from the back of his mind, which he couldn’t be bothered to decode.
“Oh- ok, you are… very out of it, gods, songbird.”
The villain laughed, and it was the most beautiful sound Wilbur had ever heard. Cold air stung at his skin, then even colder as Ace started flying.
Wilbur had a feeling he might have passed out, because the next thing he knew they were outside his bedroom, and he could just about open his eyes.
“Ace…” He still sounded woozy, and the throbbing in his head was throwing him off. “How do you know where my room is?”
“That is a question you probably don’t want the answer to.”
There was the sound of shattering glass, and a twinge in the back of his mind told him that was another thing he should feel guilty about. But then he didn’t care, because he was in a soft bed, and he could finally just lie down and sleep.
“Ah, don’t fall asleep, songbird.” Ace squeezed his hand, then walked away, sifting through the contents of his room. “We’re going to die together, someday.”
Oh. That was oddly touching. Just for his nemesis’s sake, Wilbur forced himself to cling onto consciousness, claws digging into his duvet as his eyes fluttered open and closed.
Something crashed. Ace swore. Wilbur grumbled some faint approximation of don’t break anything, you lunatic. The villain yelled back something about not leaving shit piled more than a foot high. Wilbur sighed, laughed, and let his eyes close. He was safe.
Of course, he wasn’t. Not at all. The realisation hit him harder than crashing into that wall, and he suddenly went still. Oh shit. His nemesis was in his bedroom, and he was injured, probably unable to fight him. Shit, this was bad.
Daring to open his eyes once again, he watched the villain wander out of the room, muttering about first aid kits.
As soon as he was gone, Wilbur sat up. He needed to get out of here. Wait- he couldn’t leave Ace here. Gods knew what he’d do inside their fucking house. Oh, he was stupid. So fucking stupid.
The hero tried to stand, but the world lurched, and he fell over. Fine. Trying again, he managed to stay on his feet, just about, but only by leaning heavily on the wall.
His breathing was picking up as he realised there were no good options. He couldn’t leave. He couldn’t fight. He didn’t know what Ace was playing at, but he couldn’t play along. Maybe the TNT villain was using this as some elaborate hostage situation?
Wilbur’s vision started to cloud over as his panic intensified. No good options. No way out. He tried to stagger over it the broken window, with a vague thought of at least getting out of this room, but collapsed. In trying to get up, he managed to grip a shard to glass, slicing cleanly through his palm.
No, this couldn’t be happening. He’d fucked up. But his thoughts still weren’t cooperating, painfully slow as he struggled to see the out, the way to get the upper hand. Somehow, his arm grazed over the jagged glass again as he tried to reach out, and the slash of pain was the last straw. Everything rippled unnaturally, and he blacked out.
——————
“-pid bird, utter idiot, what the hell were you doing?”
Someone rolled him over with surprising ease, and Wilbur smiled vaguely, trying to find consciousness in the midst of the foggy field he found himself in, where everything was muffled at the edges and not quite loud enough.
“Right, I found bandages, but- fuck, what have you done to your hands? I swear, I leave you alone for five minutes and you go and just grab the nearest piece of broken glass.”
Ace seemed genuinely frustrated, and not a little rattled as he looked over Wilbur’s fresh injuries, and groaned.
“Are you even awake? Good. This’d better hurt, silly bird.”
Lifting his arm onto his knees, the villain started wrapping it in bandages, wings relaxed on the floor behind him. Wilbur murmured, and turned onto his side, burying his face in the elbow of the arm Ace was holding.
“Are you gonna kill me…?”
“Songbird, if I wanted you dead, I would have left you to bleed out and die of a concussion or something equally ridiculous.”
The brisk tone was enough for him, and he nodded into his arm. His head was pounding. That wasn’t good. Ace had mentioned a concussion. Also, his wings hurt. Everything hurt. He wasn’t having very much fun.
In an effort to actually move his wing, Wilbur accidentally extended it all the way out with a flick, making Ace chirp, and flinch backwards.
“Wilbur! What the-?”
“Sorry.” The hero mumbled into his arm, blushing hard. “Hurts.”
“Now that’s your problem.”
Smart villain. Wilbur definitely didn’t want him doing anything to his wings. Cautiously, Ace tied off the bandage around his hand, and nudged the magpie.
“Songbird, I need your other arm.”
Wilbur groaned, partially for effect, and sat up, extending his arm dramatically.
“I’m hurt.”
“No shit.”
Ace glared at him, holding his hand perhaps a little tighter than necessary as he started the bandages at his elbow, winding around his arm tightly up to his wrist, where he tucked it under. Then there was a moment where the villain… didn’t let go. And Wilbur smiled slightly, giving him a faintly questioning look. Then he did, and made another huffy noise that was half a chirp.
“Are you still tired?”
“What?”
“Look, I don’t exactly have medical experience, songbird, and you’re not doing me any favours.” Ace seemed tense, eyes flicking from his bandaged arms to his face. “So, how do you feel?”
“Fine? Like… yeah, maybe not great.” His hand rose without thinking, brushing against the back of his head and making him wince. “Oh, not great. Not at all.”
“Right.”
That was all the warning he got before the villain shuffled closer, and was rather impressively holding his head still as he wrapped several layers of bandages around his forehead and injury. He didn’t bother trying to pull away, just chuckling and letting his nemesis manhandle him into some sort of coverage of his wound. He was fairly sure this wasn’t how you were meant to treat head injuries, but he’d let Ace have his moment.
“Thanks? This- this is definitely going to come off.”
He reached up to touch it, only to have his hand slapped away playfully.
“Don’t touch it then.”
Oh. Of course. He should have fucking know that. In a flash, his whole mood shifted again, and he went still. Everything was coming and going like waves lapping a beach, one moment so far away he could barely remember what he’d been so worked up about, then washing over him, drowning him.
Tears welled in his eyes as everything caught up to him again. His wings twitched as he started to sob, hand rising to cover his mouth. This was stupid. What was wrong with him? Terrible hero, terrible at everything, couldn’t even keep his composure in front of his nemesis.
Ace’s hand brushed across the inside of his wings. Wilbur froze, wide eyes raising slowly to see the villain looking almost terrified, staring at him in apprehension.
“Sorry.”
That was all Ace said as he carried on stroking the hero’s wing, occasionally making calming trills every time Wilbur’s breath caught in his throat again. It was stupid, and he knew his nemesis was just using his instincts against him, but it worked.
Eventually, the villain withdrew his hand, still watching Wilbur carefully.
“Better?”
“Mhm.” He swallowed, nodded, and smiled, shakily. “I- I would really quite like you to leave. Before my dad gets home. I- you’re freaking me out. A bit.”
He didn’t trust himself to say anything more. There. A gamble. Relying on whatever Ace chose, pure honesty. Maybe his nemesis would take pity on him.
“I suppose you deserve a break.” The villain rolled his eyes dramatically, standing up, smoothing his trench coat down, and patting Wilbur’s head idly. “Take care of yourself, songbird.”
Chirping in indignation, Wilbur leaned backwards. Then paused, and offered a small smile of thanks.
It was hard to pretend he didn’t watch the window for a long while after Ace left.