Chapter 5
The day had been very long, and he was ready to go home at that point. Flash had gotten back from a two-week long vacation that day, and while he didn’t harass Tommy specifically, not anymore, he still had to deal with the dumbass the whole day. It was truly exhausting. That with work, and practice, he was just tired.
He was waiting at the subway station, mind blanked-out thinking of what they were having for dinner when he was suddenly jerked back into present-time by people freaking out. Not screaming, exactly, but there were several gasps of surprise. He glanced around, and people had made a wide circle, though it wasn’t him they were avoiding. He turned, and a huge ray of shooting white light filled his vision for about half a second before it suddenly just shut off. Then there were two guys, just standing in the middle of where it had been, a large circular rune cut into the floor below them. Tommy dragged his gaze away, trying to ignore them so maybe they wouldn’t notice him until the subway got there. One of them glanced around. His eyes landed on Tommy, and he straightened, pointing with his hammer. “You.” He said.
Tommy grimaced, closing his eyes and cursing his luck, wishing he hadn’t missed the first subway. He turned, sighing, and faced the god of thunder and lightning.
“Can you take us to the Stark Tower?” Foolish asked.
Tommy’s eyes ran over the second man. Dream, god of mischief. Also tried to take over New York the last time he was here. The god just stared back, his eyes narrowed. His expression darkened into a scowl as more people around them recognized who he was, and decided they would rather run out of the station than stay. Tommy groaned to himself, and said, against his better judgement, “Yeah. Follow me.”
He walked back up the stairs, two gods trailing behind him. “Thank you. It’s been a while since I’ve been in Midgard’s New York.” Foolish said.
Tommy nodded. “I assume neither of you has any intentions of taking over the city or the world this time?” He said, looking back with a raised eyebrow.
“Nope, none of that.” Foolish said happily. Dream just sneered at him, ignoring all the people who turned once they saw him and ran in the other direction. It was only about half, some were simply not paying attention while others didn’t quite care, but it was still a good number of people.
“Alright.” Tommy nodded, pulling his phone out and videocalling Charlie. His brother accepted within a few seconds.
“What’s up?” He asked questioningly, his camera displaying their living room.
“I’m going to be home a little late.” Tommy told him.
“Oh, okay. Why, what are you doing?”
“Taking a couple gods to the Stark tower.” Tommy said, holding up his phone so Foolish and Dream were in the video. Foolish waved jovially, while Dream just narrowed his eyes.
“Jeese, okay.”
“No one’s taking over any cities this time.” Tommy told him.
“That’s good. Come back soon.” Charlie told him.
“I will, this won’t take too long.” Tommy told him, and hung up.
“What’s your name, kid?” Foolish asked him.
“I’m not a kid.” Tommy wrinkled his nose. “I’m Tommy. I already know who you two are. Why are you on Earth again?”
“Special business.” Foolish told him.
“I was forced along.” Dream grumbled under his breath.
Tommy glanced at him, slowing down so he was walking just barely ahead of him. “Nice necklace.” He said, referring to the gold piece with emerald droplets attached by chain hanging from his neck.
Dream paused, narrowing his eyes. After a moment, he said finally, “Yes, it is.”
“It’s very extra.” Tommy told him.
“Thank you.” Dream said, slightly pleased. “That was the goal.”
“Did you magic it?” Tommy asked.
“No, this is my necklace. All of my jewelry is mine.” Dream said, his fingers brushing across the ring on his finger and the gold hoop around the cartilage of his ear.
“Sick.” Tommy nodded. “The embroidery on your shirt is interesting, too.”
Dream looked down at the rune-like patterns that ran along his clothes. “Those, I did ‘magic’.” He admitted. “I would have done them myself, but I’m not really allowed to have any sharp objects right now. Not even a sewing needle, apparently.”
“You tried to put one through my eye once.” Foolish told him.
“Did it kill you? No, it didn’t. It wouldn’t be worth trying again.”
“You sew?” Tommy asked, his interest sparked.
“Yeah. Sort of. I embroider. I can sew, too, but I like embroidering better.”
“That’s awesome. I’m more of a sewing guy myself. I’ve tried embroidering. This is the best thing I’ve done so far.” Tommy laughed, pulling his jacket up so his name that was messily written in thread on the tag was visible.
“That is atrocious.” Dream said, but his lips curled slightly in a way that made Tommy wonder if he was joking.
“I know.” Tommy smirked, letting go. The whole reason he’d tried it was to embroider the spider and webs on his suit, but he’d printed them on after that. “I haven’t gotten too deeply into it.”
“You should, if only to redo whatever that is.” Dream sniffed.
“I might.” Tommy nodded. “Okay, so, if you’re not allowed to have a sewing needle, then why are you on Earth? Isn’t that like, a hundred times sketchier?”
Dream rolled his eyes. “That dumbass over there is supposed to be ‘watching over’ me. He’s making sure I don’t stab anyone, basically. Which is really annoying, because he’s not stuck to me, I’m stuck to him. I told him that me on Midgard would be a bad idea. But he doesn’t listen to me.”
“Maybe if you didn’t try to take over every realm you were on, you wouldn’t have to worry about it.” Foolish told him.
“Yeah, whatever.” Dream rolled his eyes, then said lowly, “He doesn’t know I still have access to my dagger collection.” He flicked his wrist, a blade appearing out of his sleeve for a split second.
“That’s sick.” Tommy whispered, grinning. “I wish I had enough money to have even one dagger. Knives are awesome.”
“Agreed.” Dream nodded.
“They are not.” Foolish said.
“You’re just biased because you don’t like getting stabbed.” Dream told him.
“Yeah! Nobody likes getting stabbed!”
“You’re still alive, you’re fine.” Dream told him, then said to Tommy, “Asgardians are the most fun to stab. Specifically my brother. He doesn’t die, which means I get to do it again.”
“That’s fair.” Tommy nodded understandingly.
“I like you better when you’re not stabby.” Foolish said.
“I am always stabby. Whether or not I give in to the temptation is a different story.”
“Mood.” Tommy said.
“That’s not really a good thing.” Foolish said.
“You’re telling me you don’t always want to hit someone over the head with your hammer?” Tommy asked.
Foolish flipped said hammer in the air, considering. “Well, lately it has been more often, and that someone has been my brother. But I haven’t done it yet.”
“That’s different. The hammer is less fun.” Dream said.
“What are you talking about?” Foolish scoffed in offense. “My hammer is a lot of fun. You’re just jealous because you can’t pick it up.”
“I do not have any desire to pick up your hammer.” Dream rolled his eyes. “It’s too clunky for my taste. Just like you.”
The argument continued. Tommy listened, because it was free entertainment. It was only cut off when the front of the Avengers tower was completely in view.
“Why didn’t Heimdall just put us right here? There’s enough space. He knows where this tower is.” Dream said, gesturing to the street as they crossed it.
“I’m not sure. It’s alright, we found our way.” Foolish said. He turned to Tommy. “Thank you, by the way.”
“Yeah, no problem, man.” Tommy said. “You guys know what you’re doing now, right? Because I want to go home.”
“Yup.” Foolish said, smiling.
Tommy waved at them as he turned the other way. Dream waved back, to his own surprise.
“I never thought you’d be fond of a mortal, brother.” Foolish grinned as they walked through the Tower doors.
“I’m not fond of anyone.” Dream scoffed. Foolish didn’t say anything more, but his expression conveyed all it needed to.
“So how did two gods rope you into walking them to the Stark tower?”
“They kind of just fuckin’ popped up in the subway, man, I don’t know.”
When Tommy walked to work that day, he knew that he was going to see Wilbur again. His suit was done, and they had called him the day before to say he could come pick it up today. Mr. Whitlock had given him the task of hanging the suit and putting it in a bag to keep it clean, even. Tommy had been waiting for him since he started, and his shift was almost over by the time he finally came in.
“What genre of music?” He asked when the man walked through the doors.
“What?”
“I have been trying to guess what genre of music you write all day, but I can’t figure it out. So tell me.” Tommy said, leaning on the counter.
“Oh.” Wilbur said. “Uh, well, depends. I’ve done kind of comedy type songs before. My main ones right now are indie pop and indie rock.”
“Really? That’s… interesting.” Tommy commented, pulling his suit from the rack behind him and laying it over the counter. “Have you made any of them into songs yet? Do you have anything released?”
Wilbur took his suit into his arms. “No, this is not what I wanted to talk to you about today.” He said, dodging the question entirely. Tommy thought that maybe he was a little embarrassed.
“You had something else?” Tommy asked, raising an eyebrow.
Wilbur nodded. “When do you get off work?” He asked.
Tommy glanced at the clock. “Like ten minutes.”
“There’s a soda shop a few streets down. I’ll buy you a drink.”
Tommy narrowed his eyes. “Why?”
“I don’t want anything from you, if that’s what you’re asking.” Wilbur told him.
“What’s the reason, then?”
Wilbur looked at him. “You’re really going to make me say it, huh?” He said, then sighed. “I want to get to know you. There.”
“Like friends do?” Tommy said questioningly. Wilbur lifted his eyes to the heavens and nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, okay, fine.”
“Really?” Wilbur asked, his eyebrows raised.
“Yeah.” Tommy nodded. “What, did you think I would say no to free drinks?”
“I don’t know. I wouldn’t think a highschooler would want to be friends with a twenty-six-year-old.” Wilbur shrugged.
“Yeah, well it’s not like I have anyone my own age.” Tommy said.
Wilbur’s face morphed into surprise, then amusion. “Am I really-”
“Yes.” Tommy cut him off, rolling his eyes. “All of the people in my grade and shit are annoying.”
“Well I’m honoured.” Wilbur smirked.
“Nope, you’re annoying too. I’m just tolerating you to get free soda.” Tommy told him.
“Uh huh. I’m going to go put this in my car, I’ll be back.” Wilbur said, lifting the suit and walking out.
And he did come back. He lingered around the desk while they waited for Tommy’s shift to be over. Once Tommy clocked out and changed, they walked to the soda shop together. It was an interesting place, and Tommy hadn’t actually been into it before. They mostly sold drink mixes, like various sodas with various flavourings. They had other stuff too, like boba tea and cookies. Wilbur got something with rootbeer, marshmallow fluff, and coconut in it, while Tommy got the one with coca cola, cherry, and chocolate cream. When they got their drinks, they sat down at one of the tables in the shop.
“So why do you work there?” Wilbur asked.
“At the tailor’s?” Tommy asked. The other nodded. “Because apartments in New York are damn expensive. I help pay for shit so there’s not so much worry about money.”
“Your guardians don’t make enough to pay for everything?” Wilbur raised an eyebrow.
Tommy shook his head. “I live with my brother. He has a job, but he’s also in college right now. Which means he doesn’t have time for anything full-time, or two jobs. It’s alright, I’m okay with helping.”
“Do you like it?”
“Ehhh. It’s useful, I get to watch the people who actually work on clothes do their thing, and I’ve learned a lot like that. I’ve been trying to make some of my own clothes, now. Other than that, though, I wouldn’t say I really enjoy it. It’s tolerable.”
Wilbur nodded. “What have you made yourself so far?”
“A few shirts.” Tommy said. His suit. “I’m trying to find a good pattern for a jacket. It’s gonna look sick as fuck when I’m done.”
“Nice.” Wilbur smiled. “It’s cool that you can sew. Do you use a machine?”
“Yeah, most of the time.” Tommy nodded. “What about you, what do you work as?”
“I’m not really supposed to talk about it,” Wilbur said, “But I can say that it’s a lot of sitting around looking pretty and waiting for stuff to happen. And a lot of talking with important people.”
“That sounds boring.” Tommy commented.
“A little bit. It’s great when something actually happens, though.”
The conversation turned to something a little less grownup-y after that, debating which part of the city would be the best place to be in if there was a zombie apocalypse. Tommy kept a close eye on the time, and cut the conversation off when he needed to get to practice.
“I got gymnastics practice, I have to go.” He told Wilbur.
“You do gymnastics? That’s awesome.” Wilbur said. “Late practice, though.”
“Yeah. I’m glad it is, though, ‘cus otherwise I would miss it.” Tommy said, standing. Wilbur followed him out the door. “Thanks for the soda.” He said, waving.
“No problem, man.” Wilbur smiled, and turned and headed back to his car. Tommy sprinted in the opposite direction, and barely made it to practice on time.
The same day, he was swinging through the city as Spider-Man, having just returned a cat to their rightful owner when he got an alert. Aggressive roommate a few streets down, causing a scene on the roof. Might get messy. But when he swung over to the building in question, there was nothing. All was quiet. He checked the alert again, making sure he hadn’t read wrong or the speech-to-text hadn’t translated wrong. His senses started going off, and he turned to the sound of a metallic clunk.
The Iron Man suit stood in front of him. It opened, and out stepped Sam Stark. The suit closed again, and shifted into what he supposed was supposed to be something unthreatening.
“Hey, you’re not an aggressive roommate. Did I just get catfished?” Tommy said.
“Look, I just want to talk.” Stark said.
Tommy sighed. “You guys sure are insistent. Do you think the city would let me file restraining orders?”
“I just want to talk. Please.” The other repeated.
“Have you guys not gotten the hint yet? I don’t want to talk to you.” Tommy said.
“You had a conversation with- with Hawkeye the other day.” Stark raised an eyebrow.
“Yeah, I did. But just a conversation is not what you want, because otherwise you would leave me alone.” Tommy told him.
“You’re right.” Stark was quick to admit. “Would you be willing to let me explain what we do want, and why?”
“I already know,” Tommy said, “And it’s not happening. You want my identity because of the Accords, and you can forget about it. Leave me alone. I’m just a spider goin’ through the neighborhood, I don’t need to get harassed all the time.”
“Kid,” Stark started.
“I don’t want to hear it.” Tommy interrupted.
“You were on our side for the Accords. Why do you have a problem with it now?” Stark asked. His voice held only curiosity.
“I didn’t realize they would affect me.” Tommy told him. “And I fought with you because you asked me to, not because I thought you were right.”
Stark went silent, seeming to not have a rebuttal.
“I’m leaving now,” Tommy told him. “If I see you again, I’m sticking you to a wall, my idol or not.” He said, stepping off the roof and swinging away.
Sam sighed, watching him disappear around a building. He needed to earn the kid’s trust. He was pretty set on not even letting him talk, though. How could he even try? This was going to be difficult.
Tommy was in the middle of eating his lunch when he got a text from a random number in a random groupchat with another unknown number.
<1-***-****> tommy this is your brother
<1-***-****> tommy I need you to send me your credit card information
<1***-****> tommy I need to extend our car’s warranty
Clearly they were messing with him. Maybe it was one of his classmates? He was tempted to just block both numbers for a minute, but he decided to respond.
<Tommy> ????
<Tommy> who the hell is this
<Tommy> I know how to find out and I will put week-old school milk in your locker
<1-***-****> chill out man, we don’t even go to your school yet
<2-***-****> sorry Tommy, I tried to talk him out of it
<2-***-****> it’s ranboo and tubbo
<Tommy> oh
<Tommy> what the hell?
<Tommy> how did you get my number
<Tubbo> hehehe
<Tubbo> hak
<Tommy> did you actually
<Tubbo> aktually, yes
<Tommy> what did you mean, ‘yet’
<Ranboo> we’re trying to see if we can get enrolled there
<Tommy> sweet
<Tubbo> Tommy come to the mall with us
<Tommy> ???
<Tommy> I’m kind of in school right now
<Tubbo> when you’re out of school
<Tubbo> and off of work
<Tommy> .
<Tommy> I have gymnastics practice after that
<Ranboo> you do gymnastics?
<Tommy> yes
<Tubbo> :(
<Tommy> oh fuck off
<Tommy> there’s like thirty minutes that I have between my job and practice
<Tommy> if we can be out before I have to leave, then I’ll go
<Tubbo> :)
<Tubbo> that’s good because we were planning on kidnapping you if you said no
<Ranboo> I was not a part of that actually
<Tubbo> meet us today?
<Tommy> eyah okay
<Tommy> I have to tell my brother but he’ll be ok with it
<Tubbo> good! great
<Tubbo> I’m going to buy us all Pretzel
<Tommy> alright big man sounds good
The rest of the day, he was spammed with texts from the two. He’d never had to check his phone so often. The two were stuck at home, their guardian working, and were thus bored. Tommy became their entertainment, which was… not terrible. He didn’t mind it. It continued through his work shift, and the whole travel to the mall. When he met with the two, the conversation about whether you could eat enough salt to kill a plant with your piss carried from text right into talk. They wandered around the shops, mostly, causing chaos. Tubbo bought them all pretzels.
“Look at this shirt.” Tubbo said, lifting it up. A messy emblem of Tommy’s spider was printed on a red background. Tommy winced, nodding, and attempted to take the attention away from it.
“Look at this one.” Tommy smirked, holding it. It had a masculine 3D figure printed on it, standing entirely still. On the chest was the periodic symbol for iron, badly edited in. Underneath was printed in caps, IRON MAN.
Tubbo laughed at it. “That’s great!” He said, reaching for it.
Ranboo smiled in amusement. “That’s terrible.”
“How much?” Tubbo wondered out loud, searching for the price tag. “We need this. One for each of us, we can be matching. It’s more money than we have right now, though. Next time we come, we’ll get them.”
“Our guardian is not gonna like it.” Ranboo raised an eyebrow.
“Good! He can deal with it.” Tubbo snickered, folding the shirt and putting it back with the others of its kind.
“Is he an Iron Man fanatic, or what?” Tommy asked. He hadn’t missed the ‘next time’ comment.
“Something like that.” Tubbo grinned.
When Tommy had to leave, Tubbo promised to keep him up all night. Ranboo just waved.
His muscles were tired from practice, but he went out for patrol anyways. Charlie was going to be later at his job today, so he had more time to stay out. He had just caught a person trying to steal from an ATM machine when he got an alert on his crime app. Aggressive roommate on the roof. Might get messy. Different building, though. Tommy sighed, and swung over to the building. He had to check it out anyway, in case he wasn’t being messed with this time.
He was sorely disappointed. Sam Stark stood on the roof, alone, without the suit this time. Tommy dropped in front of him, but kept a good distance. “You’re still not an aggressive roommate. Man, I gotta be more careful about who I decide to meet.”
Stark raised an eyebrow. “I’m surprised that worked.” He commented.
“Yeah, you made it pretty damn obvious it was you.” Tommy scoffed. “What will it take to get you to leave me alone?”
“How about a compromise?” Stark offered. That made him pause.
“Like what?” Tommy said, eyes narrowed.
“If you take back and use the suit I gave you, we’ll leave you alone.” Stark said simply.
Tommy was silent for a few moments, considering. He loved the suit, it was way better than anything he could ever make. “You have a bunch of protocols and shit in it, I know you do. I don’t want that.” He said.
Stark nodded. “I can take those off.”
“If?” Tommy prompted suspiciously.
“…If you agree to come to us if you need help.”
Tommy stared at him. “Really? That’s it?”
The man nodded. “That’s it.”
He narrowed his eyes. There had to be some sort of drawback to this. But if they wanted to arrest him, they would have at least tried it already. And once he had the suit, he could do a sweep-through the code to see if it actually had anything on it. “What counts as ‘needing help’?”
Stark shrugged. “Whatever you feel like you can’t do on your own. If you find something bigger that isn’t just in the ‘neighborhood’, you come to us. If you get really hurt, and you don’t want to find a hospital, you come to us. Need advice on something, upgrades, techniques. Whatever.”
That would be pretty easy. As long as he was careful, they couldn’t find out who he was. “Okay. Fine. Deal.”
A smile flashed across Stark’s face, but he quickly straightened it again. “Cool. Great. I’ll have Hawkeye bring it for you tomorrow.”
Tommy nodded. “Okay. Sweet.”
The alert sound for his app sounded from his phone. “You can go take care of that.” Stark raised an eyebrow. “I promise my feelings won’t be hurt.”
“Yeah, okay.” Tommy snorted, turning and hopping on top of the roof ledge. He paused, saying quietly, “Thank you.”
“No problem, kid.” Stark smiled at him. He smiled back under the mask, and swung away.