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Lines Drawn in Sand & Concrete - Ch 6 of ?

Niki feels like she's in a tea kettle. Wilbur is alive out of reluctant obligation.

[CW: description of injuries, dead bodies, discussion of suicidal thoughts.]

crossposted to ao3

Ch 1

Ch 5

Ch 7

Mafia AU

~ Niki & Wilbur ~

Niki doesn’t like the way things are heading. She would have thought after Schlatt’s death there would be some peace, instead, she has new reasons to worry. It’s like she can measure the health of the city by the attendance at the Secret City. She rarely sees any of the Badlanders, Puffy only on rare occasion, and always busy and absentminded. Even more worrying to her, Tommy and Tubbo don’t come to the Secret City very much anymore, and never together. Ranboo, already quiet, has gotten quieter.

Niki’s business worries have at least declined. In Schlatt’s absence, her profits have nearly doubled, or rather, she’s kept the other half of her income she’d been making before. She doesn’t have to reorder alcohol from Puffy as often, which is another good thing considering Puffy seems to be dealing with her own troubles at present. In theory, Niki should be doing better than ever. She’s not.

The bloodiest parts of this mess are probably what should scare her the most, but she isn’t sure. Bodies are turning up in the streets, and since Tubbo has apparently taken on the mantle of controlling the streets, she’d expected the violence to die down, but it hasn’t. The Badlanders are more aggressive, territorial and secretive, and Tubbo’s lot––she doesn’t really know what to call them, they’re certainly not Schlatt’s dogs anymore––are too bold, bold in the way a cat puffs up to scare away a bigger animal. Attendance at the speakeasy has died down in part due to that. People are nervous to go out at night, because if it’s not the gangs getting into petty scuffles around the block, it’s other dead. Someone is attacking people deemed undesirable. Niki’s speakeasy caters to no one but the undesirable. She doesn’t know what worries her more, the dead bodies, often times faces she recognizes as local common criminals, and those she doesn’t recognize, she can guess also share similar records, or the ones who aren’t murdered.

It seems there is one person behind this threat, or maybe a group sharing the same mask. People will ask to spend the night at the Secret City, skittish and bruised. They’re not hardened criminals––largely because it seems this person doesn’t like to let hardened criminals live––the people that come to her for help, injured but alive, they’re the homeless, they’re fences who work on the street, people like Karl doing something harmless like selling stolen watches, and whoever is out there, lurking like a ghost, thinks that warrants bloody retribution? This is wrong. All of it, whatever is happening out there, she feels like she’s trapped in the bottom of a kettle, waiting for the pressure to build and finally boil over. She’s considered on more than one occasion moving the bakery, finding property deep in Puffy’s territory, Puffy had offered her help more than once, but she can’t bring herself to do it. This is where she’s always been, it’s where people know to go, and changing that now, it feels unfair. She won’t abandon any of them. Tubbo still keeps her bakery safe, actually safe, not in any manner like Schlatt’s so-called protection, and he does so perhaps viciously, but at least for now, there’s no reason for her to move. Not really.

Trouble does not keep itself neatly contained in the streets away from her and her family, nor is it always something so blunt as violence. Her little brother doesn’t talk to her. He doesn’t go out with Tommy and Tubbo. He just works. Niki will tell him he doesn’t have to, that she’s fine on her own and he can go see friends, but Ranboo just shrugs and says “they’re busy. I’d rather just hang out with you right now.” Niki isn’t used to Ranboo not telling her things, nor Tubbo and Tommy. She prefers when they had stumbled home after getting into trouble and immediately babbled a confession at her, like her knowing was important somehow, like she could always make things right. It doesn’t feel that long ago. Where Tubbo had learned he could tell her when something had gone wrong and there wouldn’t be harsh consequences, where Tommy trusted her enough to not act like a guarded, hunted dog, all bark and no bite, and instead had talked to her like her help wasn’t a threat. And Ranboo, who did things for himself and not for her for once in his life; he’d run around with his friends and had come home late sometimes and had finally had something to actually apologize to her for.

Niki doesn’t know why that has slipped away. Tubbo had acted oddly, cutting off Quackity and arguing in her speakeasy––Niki cannot remember Tubbo ever raising his voice like that, let alone in front of an audience––and he never looks open to conversation when he does still turn up, he just sits quietly in the corner with Jack, the two of them talking in hushed tones and Niki knows they stop talking whenever she walks too close. It hurts, and worse than hurt, it’s wrong. Her boys don’t sneak around her unless it’s for shoplifting from a sweet shop or trying to smuggle an injured squirrel into Ranboo’s bedroom.

The nights Tommy still turns up––rarely on the nights Tubbo is there, and never together, and if someone is there, whoever was there first will find some excuse to leave, which is profoundly wrong––if Tommy is there it’s usually to heckle Wilbur. Tommy seems unchanged, he’s still loud and a bit rude and always ready for a good joke, but Niki knows him better. There’s the more surface-level changes, he’s a bit scruffier than usual, and there’s this strange duality of him being more quick to refuse her offers of help and more inclined to ask for it. She’ll ask if he wants to spend the night and he jumps to say no, but that same day he’ll ask her if she has anything leftover from the bakery that she needs to toss. Always with a joking tone, like he’s just a teenager with a sweet tooth, but Niki knows it’s different now. She buries the urge to ask him, “are you not eating enough?” because she knows doing so will make Tommy not accept anything.

There are deeper changes too, ones she has to look more carefully for. Tommy comes to the Secret City alone. He will still talk with Ranboo, he’ll talk with her, and oddly enough he’d talk quite a bit with Wilbur, but in the pauses in between his usual rough banter, when he’s stopped taunting Wilbur, he looks tense. He looks tense like he did before he realized the speakeasy was for people like him. Tommy views strangers as threats or targets or often both. He moves through the world like a prey animal and a scavenger, but Niki hasn’t seen that tension cross her doorstep in a long time. He looks tired too. Maybe as tired as Tubbo does.

She can’t read Ranboo anymore. She thinks he might know more about what’s going on than she does, but she’s not sure. She’s never not sure. When she asks, Ranboo is always neutral and avoidant in reply, and it’s hard to decide if he looks more worried when she asks about them or if that’s just the persisting, quiet anxiety he’s worn for weeks now.

Niki is good at not prying, to a point. She’s been perhaps too lenient with Wilbur, who had turned up so mysteriously. She’d done the basics, told him he should look for a job, that he can’t live on their couch forever, but that doesn’t tell her much. Wilbur had once been her best friend. That was a long time ago. Still, between the two of them, Niki finds it easier to dig a little more at a man she hasn’t seen in years than at her little brother about his friends who might be her little brothers too.

“Morning, Wil,” Niki says. It’s Monday. The Bakery closes on Mondays, it gives them time to rest from the weekend rush. Hence, this is one of the few times she’s still in the apartment when Wilbur stirs.

Wilbur sits up blearily from the couch, curls askew. “Morning…” He rubs his eyes.

“How are you so tired?” Niki asks. “You don’t have a job, what is it you stay up late to do?”

Wilbur smiles halfheartedly. “Find trouble.” He adds more insistently, “and play for your speakeasy sometimes.”

“Could you work on finding a job before you find trouble?” She teases. “And play at my speakeasy. I need you there to keep me company, but maybe a proper job too.”

Wilbur wakes up a bit more in his embarrassment, sheepish. “Er, yeah. Probably should do that.”

“Yeah,” Niki says pointedly.

Wilbur gets up, pulling on the same wrinkled white button up he wore yesterday over his undershirt. “You… didn’t happen to make enough coffee I could have some, perchance?”

She rolls her eyes at him and nods to the pot.

“Ah, you’re a saint,” he mumbles.

There is a brief calm, Wilbur getting himself a cup, and Niki content to lean against the counter and drink hers, thinking. Wilbur is freshly awake. He is not a morning person. Niki knows he is weak and however much he’ll loathe it, it’s the perfect time to push.

“So, we haven’t had much time to talk, Wil. Feels like you’re always running around doing something, or I’m running around doing something.”

“Oh?” Wilbur says mildly. “Yeah, yeah guess so,” he sips coffee.

“How’s home?”

Wilbur seems to almost choke, quickly lowering his mug. “Home?”

“You know, where you came from? Where you’ve been living? For the past eight years?” Niki raises her eyebrows at him.

Wilbur almost winces. “That, uh. That didn’t really feel like home.”

Niki laughs. “Okay, you’re very dramatic, do you know that?” She’s unfazed, continuing on. She knows some, she knows quite a bit, actually. Niki can be quiet, but she listens. There’s something wrong with Phil and Wilbur, and while that’s not new, maybe she’d imagined he’d have grown out of it when he grew up into a proper adult. “How’s Phil? How’s…” She tries to remember other things she’s learned from their brief conversations over the last months and her even briefer amount of contact with Phil over the last eight years. “How’s your… step-mom? Do you get along okay?”

“Kristin?” Wilbur seems surprised, as if he hadn’t imagined she was an option for a subject of conversation. “She’s great. Like, professionally she sort of scares me, but she’s really fun and she makes my dad happy, so.” He shrugs. “Can’t hold her choice in business against her, really.”

Niki notes he had skipped over her question about Phil. “She’s great, but she sort of scares you? Professionally?”

“She’s, you know,” Wilbur sets down his mug and waves his hands mysteriously, “the Lady Death of Salt Lake City.”

“Oh.” Niki had not heard that name before, but then again, she already knows more than she wants to about the criminals that can touch her life, let alone keeping up with the ones that don’t. “So. When you said Phil is more working in the background..?”

“Working for her,” Wilbur nods. “He’s got a new––well, not really new now––reputation. Angel of Death,” Wilbur says mildly like his father has done something as simple as getting a promotion at the bank.

Niki nods, processing this. That reputation truly isn’t new to her. She can’t imagine Wilbur hadn’t heard it before, but Wilbur seems to be under the impression the title came from Kristin. Phil had chosen the Crowfather as his title, but the City comes up with their own names for their Gods. It was here that label started. Phil was a complex man. He could be, and often had been, ruthless. He had rules, though. If he kills someone who still has family to leave behind, he pays for the funeral. The payments are anonymous, but connections were made regardless. Phil would murder someone and then lay them to rest, sometimes to the horror of and other times to the relief of their families. Phil was an Angel of Death long before he found a Death to follow. Niki continues carefully, nudging the subject. “Bit of a change from the Crowfather.”

“Not really,” Wilbur says gloomily, and Niki thinks perhaps he did know that title. “Same business.” That blasé addition makes her reconsider. It seems Wilbur is just as unsettled by his father’s work as before. Niki doesn’t blame him for it. Of course, she has a bit of a soft spot for Phil. He’d been good to her and Ranboo. She’s not so picky as to scorn that even if he’s done things she cannot consider as anything but awful.

Niki continues quickly, before her own line of thinking strays any more grim. “And is Techno still around?”

“Yeah, as long as Phil is.”

“Yeah, I thought so,” she smiles. “How is he, then? Well, how do you think he is?”

Wilbur shrugs. “They’re the same, Niki. Alright? I don’t have anything to tell you, because they’re the same as they always were,” he says coldly. “You don’t need to bother asking anymore.”

“Wil, I’m asking because I care about them. You’re really going to be weird about it?” Niki says almost gently, because she knows that way will get Wilbur to actually care.

He wilts. “Sorry, I’m sorry, Niki,” he presses against his forehead, eyes closed as if warding off a headache. “You’re right, that was… that was a bit dick-ish of me.”

“Yep. It was a bit dick-ish,” she laughs. “I know I’ve said it before, but I’ve missed you, Wil.”

Wilbur, as always, looks surprised. “Yeah? What’d you do that for?” He teases.

That gets another laugh out of her and Wilbur looks so proud of himself. Niki doesn’t know what help this will bring, but knowing a shred more about what’s going on with Wilbur at least feels like progress of some sort. It doesn’t touch the bigger issues haunting her life or her business, but she wants to know her best friend again, she wants him to be her best friend again. One day.

“I do have a request for you today, Wilbur.”

Wilbur shifts, sitting up straighter. “Oh?”

“When you’re out… finding trouble, could you also find a few job applications? For me?”

Wilbur nods, slouching in his shame. “I will. I can for sure do that, Niki.”

“Okay. I’m going to hold you to that, Wil,” she says warningly, because she knows him, and even with the best of intentions, she knows he’s just as likely to turn up with zero job applications and some grand story about what happened that day instead.

“It was… it was good talking, Niki. Really,” Wilbur is eager to get out of this conversation. “Um, I’m gonna… I’m gonna get a start on my day, yeah?” He smiles awkwardly and side steps past her out of the kitchen.

She smiles. It’s a little fun to make Wilbur nervous, and quite warranted considering his slacking on his side of their friendship. “Bye, Wil.”

“Bye!” The front door shuts, and Niki is once more alone. She’d let Ranboo sleep in. She doesn’t have especially high hopes for Wilbur, but somehow he still seems like the problem she has the best understanding of and therefore the best chance of fixing. Niki sighs, regretting her own line of thought. She shouldn’t have to fix any of them.

~

Wilbur had told Niki while wandering today he’d grab a few job applications. Thus far he had not done so. Wilbur had never had an actual job in his fucking life, and he wasn’t enthused by the thought of starting now. He hadn’t planned on sticking around long enough to have to pay rent, but here he’s remained. Thus far he’s just wandered the streets as per usual. He’d deny it if asked, but right now he’s waiting for Tommy to come barreling into him. That kid always manages to find him in this city, it’s almost impressive, if not also a bit concerning. Thus far, the kid hasn’t showed. Wilbur doesn’t know why that makes him nervous. Last he saw him, Tommy had complained about the new management at the hotel giving him grief, bad enough his hands were all bloody. It doesn’t bode well.

Wilbur also wants to go back down into the subway tunnels. It’s not a logical draw, more it feels like a morbid compulsion, l’appel du vide and all that. He knows there’s nothing down there for him, except maybe rats and tetanus, but nonetheless. He’s not scared, but also he sort of doesn’t want to go without Tommy, for no reason in particular.

It’s like Wilbur summons him into being.

“Hello, you stupid swiss cheese of a man!” Tommy appears beside him, making him jump. “Thrown yourself at any more local mob patrols lately?”

Wilbur has one hand over his racing heart. “No. Haven’t found the time,” he says irritably. “The fuck d’you mean swiss cheese?”

“Oh, ‘cause you were almost full of bullet holes.” Tommy makes finger guns.

“Right, of course,” Wilbur scoffs. “Where did you even come from?”

“The shadows,” Tommy says with a dramatic whisper. “Actually, if you don’t mind I’d like it if you joined me in the shadows,” he’s staring at something over Wilbur’s shoulder.

“What? Why?”

“‘Cause that man––the one across the street obviously looking for me––I currently have his wallet,” Tommy nods at an irritable man wandering in a suit and ducks back into an alley, Wilbur finding himself quick to follow.

“So, still hard at work, I see?” Wilbur says dryly.

“More so than you, I see,” Tommy says mockingly. “Not an especially productive day, though. I’m… I’m not tired, but I’m a bit bored of the daily grind, so!” Tommy nods like that settles the matter, excusing some weariness that Wilbur hadn’t even noticed. Wilbur had noticed that Tommy clearly has some hangups about being seen as weak, so he doesn’t question it.

“Yeah, yeah fair enough. I told Niki I’d pick up some job applications,” Wilbur says gloomily.

“Ha! Have fun with that! Chaining yourself to the Machine, huh?” Tommy tuts him. “Poor thing.”

Wilbur glances at Tommy’s hands, which are currently perusing his stolen wallet. He can see cloth stained a rusted red. “How’re your… battle wounds, then?” He nods to them.

Tommy snaps the wallet shut, burying his hands in his pockets. “Fine, thank you very much. I heal like, super fast.”

“Really? Looks like you could use some actual bandages.”

“These are basically the same thing,” Tommy pouts. “But…” he glances at his hands in his pockets. “If you’re buying?”

Wilbur is not as broke as he was previously, as he’s gotten at least some tips playing at the Secret City. He gives some of it to Niki, a feeble approximation of rent, but it’s still something. It’s definitely not much. Not enough he should be blowing it on getting some gauze and anti-infectant for some random kid. Wilbur sighs.

“Come on. There’s a drugstore around the corner.”

“I know there is. This is my city.”

“It’s mine too! I’ve lived here longer than you have.”

“Yeah, but it’s changed since you were here, old man,” Tommy nods wisely. He stops outside the drugstore. “I’ll wait here. I’ve definitely nicked shit from here before and they won’t want to see me.”

“Haven’t you nicked shit from everywhere?”

“Yeah, but here I got caught.”

“Touché,” Wilbur smiles, amused before entering the shop. He grabs gauze and neomycin before heading up to the counter. “A pack of Marlboros too.”

The man behind the counter nods, grabbing a pack. Wilbur glances at the register and what it rings up to. He stares doubtfully at his own wallet, hesitating over his lineup. He grabs the neomycin, intending on putting it back, but as he turns he sees movement out of the corner of his eye and glances over to see Tommy pressing against the glass and making faces at him. Wilbur buries a laugh.

“Actually, scrap the Marlboros. This is it for me,” he puts the antibiotic back on the counter, only processing his own choice after the fact. It unsettles him. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Nonetheless, he returns to the street. “Here,” he shoves the gauze and neosporin into his hands.

“Thanks, man!” Tommy sits down right there on the window ledge and begins peeling the scraps of sheets off his cut up hands.

“Wait, you’re not gonna wash them first?” Wilbur reaches out to stop him.

Tommy looks amused, glancing around the street. “You see a bath anywhere? Trust me, the river will do way more harm than good.”

“No, that’s not what I–” Wilbur sighs. “Come on,” he nods toward the store.

Tommy shakes his head. “No, it’s like I said, they won’t want me in there–”

“Who gives a shit? I’ll go with you, we’ll go to the bathroom, and I’ll help you dress them,” Wilbur says more insistently. He’s more surprised when Tommy doesn’t continue to protest, just stands to follow. Tommy looks surprised as well.

Tommy very deliberately stays behind Wilbur, whistling and scanning the shelves in the most conspicuous way possible, until Wilbur drags him into a vaguely horrifying bathroom.

“Honestly, this feels worse than the street,” Tommy crinkles his nose.

Wilbur gives him a look. “Wash your hands.”

Tommy rolls his eyes but obliges, wincing all the while. Wilbur stares disapprovingly at the crusted blood and cracked scabbing of the cut across either hand. Tommy’s hands are also filthy. Wilbur is also trying to bottle every screaming warning about infection; he knows Tommy isn’t exactly in a place to take good care of himself.

“This fuckin’ sucks,” Tommy mutters. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to pick pockets in these conditions?”

“It’s not like I did that, why’re you complaining to me?”

“Because you’re here.”

Wilbur rolls his eyes. “Fine.” He shoves a wad of paper towels at him. “Dry them.”

“I know how to dress a wound, dickhead! Just ‘cause I’m not rich enough to buy all this fancy shit doesn’t mean I don’t know how to dress a wound,” Tommy snaps. “And I don’t need your help!” He says when Wilbur reaches toward him.

“Your hands are hurt! You need hands to dress a wound! Come on, man, stop being a little bitch and just let me,” Wilbur snaps back.

“Fine! Fine, go for it! If you want to play doctor, fine!” Tommy rolls his eyes, muttering, half under his breath, “call me a little bitch… from the king of little bitches…”

Wilbur ruefully does so, pasting antibiotic cream onto the cuts, Tommy flinching and pulling away as it burns.

“Ow! Careful!” Tommy whines.

“It’s so it doesn’t get infected!” Wilbur snaps.

Tommy grumbles wordlessly before trailing off grumpily.

It’s quiet for a time, for once Tommy without anything snarky to say. Wilbur gets nervous when the silence continues by the time he starts wrapping one hand in gauze. He glances up, but Tommy is just watching him work with a solemn frown, wary and unsure, like he’s expecting Wilbur to do some harm. Wilbur deigns not to think on that too hard, instead he refocuses, finishing wrapping Tommy’s other hand.

“Oooh, look at me, I’m Wilbur I can wrap cuts like an expert, I’m so smart,” Tommy says in a high voice, staring at his wrapped hands with clear satisfaction.

“Is that supposed to be a thank you?” Wilbur says dryly. “Take this, okay? Just… Don’t let your hands get so grubby,” Wilbur shoves the rest of the roll of gauze and antibiotics into his hands.

“Right, I got a choice in that, do I?” Tommy scoffs.

“Come on. This place is fucking rank,” Wilbur heads back out the door.

“My hands still hurt.”

“Tough luck.” They return outside, Wilbur rummaging in his pockets. “Actually, I’ve got something else for you. You still got that torch on you?”

“What? Yeah, why?” Tommy asks suspiciously.

Wilbur offers Tommy two batteries. He’d been holding onto them for a few days now, having scrounged them from Niki and Ranboo’s junk drawer. “Fancy another trip into the tunnels?”

“Oh, I knew there was a catch! What, you think ‘cause you buy a guy a bandage that he has to follow you around and obey your every whim?!” Tommy scowls, genuinely reproachful.

“What? No! No, that’s not why I got you a fucking bandage, are you joking? If you don’t wanna go, I don’t care, I just thought…” Wilbur doesn’t know what he just thought. “I dunno. Might be another adventure.”

“I don’t need more adventure. I’m fuckin’ made of adventure. I’ve got oodles of adventure.”

“Okay, then don’t come,” Wilbur shrugs, still walking in the general direction of the maintenance entrance they had fled through before.

Tommy keeps pace. “Wait, wait but that doesn’t mean I want you to go alone! You’ll get eaten by rats, remember?”

Wilbur laughs. “I knew you’d want to come.”

“You knew I’d what? You knew I’d fucking want to what?”

“Shut up!” Wilbur cackles. “You’re the most annoying fucking child!”

“And you want me to follow you into some fuckin’ dark-ass tunnels? Hm? You’re fucking bonkers. I’m not about to get serialed by a man talking about come–”

“Get what? Get cerealed?”

“Yeah! Yeah, serialed! As in serial fuckin’ murdered!” Tommy snaps. He does stop in the alleyway, staring at the old maintenance door they had fled through last time.

“Wait, wait go back, you would get serial murdered? Doesn’t that imply plural? How the fuck would you get murdered multiple times?” Wilbur scoffs.

“You don’t know me. You don’t know my murder history,” Tommy says aloofly. Tommy puts the batteries in his torch, glancing up at the door on occasion like it might bite him. “No, no but really, why the fuck do you want to go down there again?”

“Aren’t you curious? That banging noise, look, it was probably just like… pipes settling or old machinery, but I bet we could… we could find other sneaky entrances over the city or something!” Wilbur says.

Tommy looks unenthused, but nonetheless, he’s put batteries in his torch and looks grimly prepared. “Fine, fine I will go with you, but after this you’re buying me food, got it?”

“That… that sounds like worse bribery than me just getting you some gauze, what the fuck?” Wilbur gives him look. “What, am I like, dangling cheese on a string down there for you?”

“Now you’ve just made it weird,” Tommy glowers at him before opening the door. “Surprised no one else has gone down here if it’s that easy.”

“Um, that lock looks like it’s not busted and normal people obey big danger signs,” Wilbur points out as he enters the stairwell.

“Ah, psh. Cowards!” Tommy scoffs, striding into the dark behind him before flicking on his torch. “Oh, this is loads better! I can actually see shit.”

“Don’t shine it in my eyes!” Wilbur hisses, batting his torch away.

“Don’t put your eyes by my torch!”

Wilbur gives him a look.

“Fine, fine, sorry,” Tommy says reluctantly. “So, mole-man, what are we doing in the tunnels today?”

“I am…” Wilbur hesitates. “I’m looking for this one platform. It’s… for nostalgia reasons.”

“You’re nostalgic for a grubby ass train platform?” Tommy raises an eyebrow, striding ahead along the tracks. They’ve been out of operation for years, but both of them keep off the actual rails.

“Yeah,” Wilbur tries to think of a reason he can give. “Just…”

He’s saved from replying by Tommy shouting into the dark. “HELLO?!”

Echoing back, “HELLO?!”

“HI, TOMMY!” Tommy shouts.

“HI, TOMMY!”

Tommy looks over at Wilbur, grinning. “This tunnel is very polite.”

“Is it? Are you and the tunnel making friends?” Wilbur says sarcastically, but he can’t resist a smile.

“SHUT UP, WILBUR!” Tommy shouts.

“SHUT UP, WILBUR!”

“See, we’re in agreement.”

“I’m not the one shouting, why do I need to shut up?”

“You were giving me sass, mister. Tunnel and I don’t like that disrespect,” Tommy tuts him haughtily.

“And stop going ahead! You don’t know where we’re going,” Wilbur quickens his pace to catch up.

“Oh, like you do? Last I checked, you didn’t wander from platform to platform this way back in the olden days,” Tommy points out.

“Yeah, but I still know the direction–” Wilbur goes quiet. There’s another noise, and it is not an echo. It’s that same sound of metal banging together they had heard the last time. It sounds about as close as it had the last time, that is, concerningly close. Wilbur looks over at Tommy, to find him already staring back with wide, nervous eyes. They listen. There is silence for a time, the echo of the banging noise fading off, but then it resumes rapidly, three sharp bangs that echo off. It stops for a moment, then three more, slow, measured. Wilbur is quickly starting to doubt is “old machinery” theory from last time.

“It’s down that way, right?” Tommy whispers in the next pause, pointing down the tunnel. He jumps when there are once more three sharp bangs.

“M-Maybe?” Wilbur says. “The echo– I’m not sure which way.”

“I think it’s that one,” Tommy nods ahead.

Neither of them move. The banging has yet to resume. Knowing the direction doesn’t dictate what they do now. Neither of them really want to see what it is, or more probable, who it is. Tommy looks forward, shining his torch straight ahead. The tunnel goes straight longer than the light reaches, so it shows only more blackness.

“What kind of nutcase goes banging around tunnels?” Tommy mutters.

“I mean, us kinds of nutcases,” Wilbur points out, but still he doesn’t move down the tunnel. It’s Wilbur’s turn to jump when the banging returns without warning, three sharp clangs of metal, and a pause.

“I wanna check it out,” Tommy says, but he already looks like he regret the thought.

Wilbur waits for the next three slow bangs to fade out to reply. “Okay. Okay, fine, but the moment we see anything weird, we bail, alright?”

Three sharp bangs.

“Yeah, alright,” Tommy nods and seems to muster some bravery. He starts off down the tunnel first, stopping often to look back and make sure Wilbur is close behind him, even as he can see Wilbur’s torch shining ahead alongside his.

The banging continues on like clockwork. Three sharp knocks, whoever is responsible seems to take a break, and then continues slowly, before trying rapid knocks again. Always in sets of three. Wilbur feels like he’s missing something; he’s already deeply uneasy, and then his torch glances off of a shape splayed out across the tracks. Wilbur fumbles forward, reaching out to stop Tommy, his torch refocusing on it. It’s definitely a body. He has a feeling they’re not merely unconscious. Wilbur can’t see their face, they’re laid out on their stomach, head turned the other way, so all he can see is what looks like a red cloth tied around a head of short, dark hair. There’s definitely blood, covering the arm visible to them.

Tommy spots what his torch is shining on, and to Wilbur’s shock, starts running forward.

“Oh fuck, no, nononononono, hold on a fucking second, it can’t– no, oh my fucking god, no fucking way, it can’t be, it can’t be– f-fuck–” Tommy babbles frantically, voice high and hoarse, words almost overlapping. Wilbur lunges forward to stop him when he runs toward the strange corpse in the dark, but Tommy is too quick. Tommy falls to his knees by the body, and before Wilbur can warn him of the hundred reasons why it’s a bad idea, Tommy touches it, rolling it over onto its side. Tommy falls back, face buried in his hands, and it takes a moment for Wilbur to process that he’s relieved.

“Fuck… fuck, it’s not him… it’s not him…” Tommy’s knees are tucked up into his chest, rocking slightly, sounding breathless.

“Tommy?” Wilbur says cautiously. “Are you… are you okay?” He asks a rather stupid question, but he doesn’t know what else to do.

Tommy sniffs loudly, wiping his nose on his sleeve, and Wilbur pretends he can’t see Tommy’s cheeks are shiny and damp in the torchlight. Tommy stares at the corpse again, without any apparent squeamishness at the sight, he still pores over it, like he’s trying to make sure. “It’s not him,” Tommy croaks, reassuring himself more than informing Wilbur of anything. Wilbur dares to stare at the body’s face. The corpse it seems had been blindfolded by a strip of red cloth, but Wilbur can still see the lower half of his face, it’s a man with a patchy beard, a narrow, crooked nose, he seems to be just a few years older than Wilbur.

“Not who?” Wilbur asks gently.

Tommy blinks, and seems to come back to himself in some way, clambering to his feet. “Nothing,” he’s still staring at the corpse. “Thought it was… no one. Just, one of my mates. An old friend. I don’t… I don’t see him as much anymore, and he’s… he gets dragged into some shit. Doesn’t stay out of it like I do, and I always warned him, I always told him…” Tommy trails off, moving on. “And wears a fuckin’ red headband, and from behind, it…” Tommy nods to the blindfold, trailing off again, his thoughts disconnected. “A-And the blood on his arm, thought maybe it was… Just from behind and a ways back, not… not the face at all, just…” Tommy shakes his head. “It’s… it’s not him,” he repeats.

Wilbur still feels almost sick with nerves. This exchange had happened over the course of a lull in the banging, Wilbur isn’t sure if this pause has lasted longer than the last, but he’s not sure he wants to wait around for it to continue. “We should go, Tommy.”

“What-?” Tommy glances up at him. “Yeah,” Tommy takes one step back the direction they had come before pausing. “What about the… the noise?” Tommy looks both ways, as if inviting it to continue.

“Tommy, that man, he didn’t die from natural causes,” Wilbur says softly. “And if whoever did that to him is prowling around down here…” Wilbur hesitates. He doesn’t want to scare the kid. “I mean, the noise hasn’t gotten any closer. We’ve gotten closer to it. Like…” Wilbur looks back toward the stairwell he knows is somewhere in the dark behind them. “Like they’re trying to draw us deeper in.” Wilbur looks back at Tommy and sees he’s certainly failed to not scare the kid.

“We… we can’t tell anyone. We can’t tell anyone about this, about the…” Tommy doesn’t even look at the corpse now, but Wilbur understands. “Can’t go to the cops, least I can’t. We… we can’t explain how we were down here a-and–”

“I know, Tommy. We should go.” Wilbur doesn’t know why he does it, he doesn’t think, he just does, but he offers Tommy his hand. Wilbur almost doesn’t realize he’s done it until Tommy accepts.

Tommy’s expression doesn’t indicate confusion on his side of things, but he still seems sort of hazy, so Wilbur just starts walking, guiding them back to the street. They emerge just as the surviving streetlights kick on, but it’s still far preferable to the dark underground.

“Right, I think… I think we should get out of here,” Wilbur starts walking. “Don’t… don’t get all defensive if I offer, but d’you want me to walk you back to the hotel?”

“Nah, I’m… I’m good,” Tommy shrugs.

“Don’t do that, man, just… let me do it, alright? It’ll make me feel better–”

“Not everything is about you, ay?” Tommy scoffs. “I’m not going to the hotel no more.”

“Are you still having a hard time getting inside? I thought you figured out a way around the… the stuff,” Wilbur stops when he realizes Tommy isn’t following, instead scuffing his feet and leaning against the wall of the alley.

“No, not just that…” Tommy trails off gloomily. “The nutter that replaced Jack, y’know the one that put razors on the windows? Now he’s checking the empty rooms with a fucking golf club. Thought he was gonna crack my fuckin’ ‘ead open…”

Wilbur steps closer to Tommy, immediately finding himself bottling rage and horror in equal measure. “He came at you with a golf club?!”

Tommy steps back on impulse, scowling. “No, he asked if I wanted to go a round and I told him I only did crazy golf- yes he swung at me, dumbass…”

“Holy shit, Tommy, you– Don’t tell me you’re going back there! I mean, where are you gonna go?” Wilbur doesn’t know why he feels panicked.

“Obviously not! That’s what I just said. I’ll…” Tommy’s feeble excuse of saying he’ll find somewhere else to crash dies with a shiver. After the night they’ve had, he’s a little more vulnerable. “Can I… Can I walk to Niki’s with you? And… And I’ll figure something out on the way there.”

“Yeah, something like sleeping there.”

Tommy frowns, but he doesn’t say no this time.

~

Niki wants to talk to Ranboo. She doesn’t know what to do with herself on her days off anymore. Puffy doesn’t have time to go boxing with her anymore, and Eret is busy with the museum and some fancy new investments she’s made so she rarely has time to come over for their usual chats, and if Eret is busy HBomb is busy too, Karl even seems to be busy nowadays. Ranboo is in the same boat, not that Niki really understands why. Even if Tubbo has something going on, Tommy is always available. Niki also has a feeling that Ranboo knows she wants to talk to him, because he’s been finding excuses to go back to his room, before realizing there’s nothing to do in there, coming back out, realizing his sister clearly having some sort of emotion towards him, and finds an excuse again.

“Aren’t you going to help me with dinner?” Niki asks as Ranboo is halfway down the hall back to his room. He turns on his heels, looking a shred less anxious than someone walking to the gallows and nods.

“Yep!”

“Okay,” Niki can’t help but be amused. Even if she were actually mad at Ranboo, which isn’t the word she would use for whatever she’s feeling at present, Ranboo is well past the age where she could attempt to ground him, at this point what he’s dreading is her saying she’s disappointed in him. Which, to be fair, tends to be viewed as a death sentence by all three of them, Ranboo and Tommy and Tubbo.

Ranboo hums to fill the quiet, glancing at her often, and to her surprise, he speaks up first, methodically chopping vegetables so he doesn’t have to look over at her. “You doin’ okay?”

“What?” She looks over at him, thrown off. “Yeah. I think so. Are you?”

Ranboo doesn’t seem to believe her. “Yeah!”

Niki doesn’t really believe him either. Quiet for a bit, neither quite sure of how to proceed.

“How’s Tubbo? And Tommy?”

“Huh? Oh, I think…” He falters, "I think okay.”

“Have you not seen them much?” She already knows the answer. She asks anyway.

“No,” he sounds amused. “I mean, I’ve been with you. When would I have seen them? I mean, you haven’t seen your friends much.”

“Well, they’re busy with criminal things,” Niki says teasingly.

“Yeah, well, mine too.” Ranboo says, his humor sharper, bitter.

“But even before, you all made time for each other, didn’t you? Do you know why Tubbo hasn’t come to the Secret City with Tommy at all? It doesn’t seem like them.”

“I don’t know everything they do, Niki,” Ranboo snaps.

“Ranboo,” Niki can’t help the hint of hurt in her voice.

“Sorry,” he mutters.

“It’s… it’s fine,” she sighs. “You don’t talk to me anymore, Ranboo. I just… I just want to know what’s happening.”

“Maybe I just don’t have much to say,” Ranboo shrugs.

“Are you… are you guys not friends anymore?”

“No,” Ranboo says quickly. His face scrunches up, and he doesn’t even look upset really, more so worried. “Do we have to talk about this right now?”

“When else are we going to?!” Niki snaps. “Sorry. I’m sorry, Ranboo, I’m just… I don’t want you to lose them.”

“You say that like I have a choice.”

“You always have a choice!” Niki grows emphatic.

“Really?” Ranboo is defensive. “Did you have a choice when you lost Wilbur?”

Icy silence. Niki is taken aback, a lump in her throat, because it wasn’t just harsh or startling, coming from Ranboo, saying that to her, it’s almost cruel. Worse when he continues.

“He left you, Niki, and now you’re… you’re letting him live here…”

“You agreed!”

“I thought it was gonna be for a couple days! Not a couple months!”

“He left everyone, Ranboo. He didn’t just leave me.”

“I don’t care about everyone! I care about you. And he hurt you! And– And it’s like you’re not even mad at him!” Ranboo’s voice breaks slightly, choked up rage that isn’t just meant for Wilbur.

“It sounds like you are.”

“Because you should be,” he says accusingly. “A-And it’s not fair that he stopped talking to you, he just… he just moved on. He didn’t… he didn’t think about it. Like he didn’t even care.”

“Ranboo…” Niki reaches out to him, he pulls away. “You know it’s okay if you’re hurting right now, right?”

“This isn’t about me. Not right now, okay? I know I– I know–” Ranboo cuts himself off, frustrated by his own emotions. “Let’s– Let’s just pick one, and right now I… I wanna talk about Wilbur, and–”

The front door of their apartment opens. Wilbur and Tommy enter, and immediately read the tension of whatever they have just interrupted.

“Uh. Ayup?” Tommy gives the two of them a nod. “Well, I’ve got you home safe, Wilbur, I ought to be going–” he turns back to the door and Wilbur grabs his sleeve.

“Tommy needs somewhere to stay.”

“Do not–”

“The new hotel manager came at him with a golf club.”

“He what?!” Ranboo is snapped out of his own brooding.

“And I kicked his ass and left! It’s not a problem,” Tommy whines.

“Yeah, but you can’t go back, and you shouldn’t be just sleeping outside, Tommy,” Wilbur says pointedly.

“I’ve done it before!”

“No,” Niki says sharply. Tommy stares at her, startled. “Tommy that is in no way safe. Not right now, okay? You’re staying here.”

Tommy quickly realizes he no longer has a choice. “Right… fine, but just for tonight, alright?”

Niki turns to Wilbur, just as piercing. “Did you get any job applications?”

If Wilbur could sink into the floor, he would. “W-Well, I… I meant to, it’s just… some things came up…”

“What? What things?”

“Sorry, sorry, nothing, it was… it was stupid of me. Never mind,” Wilbur winces, knowing how useless his excuses are.

Ranboo gives Niki a weighted glance that Wilbur is at a loss to understand, and Niki is resolutely ignoring it.

“Tommy, I’m sorry, but if you’re staying here, you’ve got to take a shower,” Niki nods Tommy down the hall.

“Okay, rude, not my fault that I haven’t been able to use the hotel showers in a… in a little while…” he grumbles, following her.

For a dangerous, brief amount of time, Wilbur and Ranboo are alone.

“What came up?” Ranboo asks.

Wilbur notes the hint of ice in his tone and hesitates. “It was… it was a cheap excuse, I… I got distracted with Tommy. That’s all. No good reason.”

“So… so why’d you say you did?” Ranboo says quietly.

“I don’t… I don’t know. Felt bad about it, really,” Wilbur shrugs.

“Right,” Ranboo is cool and unfeeling. “Niki and I were making dinner. Do you think you could help?”

Wilbur knows it’s not a request.

“Right, right, let me… let me wash my hands,” Wilbur nods, going to the sink. “What’re you making?”

“Um, baked rutabaga and parmesan chicken?”

“Rutabaga…” Wilbur laughs fondly. “Right.”

Silence until Niki returns.

“Thanks, Wil,” Niki says, reentering the kitchen.

“Sure! Sure, it’s the… it’s the least I can do.”

“Yep,” Ranboo agrees quietly.

Niki gives him a warning look, before proceeding as if she hadn’t heard him. “Ranboo, Tommy is going to borrow some of your clothes.”

“Fine with me,” Ranboo says.

Wilbur looks between the two of them, eyes wide. He focuses on his assigned task. A terse half hour passes before Tommy returns, hair still dripping wet, dampening the collar of one of Ranboo’s shirts. Tommy’s had to roll up the pant legs of his jeans substantially.

Wilbur laughs. “You look like a wet dog.”

“Do I?” Tommy strides over to him and shakes his head so water flies everywhere, largely into Wilbur’s face.

“Tommy! Come on, man, not… not in the kitchen,” Ranboo says helplessly.

“Sorry,” Tommy rolls his eyes, before catching sight of Niki and offering with more sincerity, “sorry!”

“Ranboo, can you get your desk chair? We need one more.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Their tiny dining table is typically only used for two, a third chair is there for a guest, but it’s rare for them to have more than that company in the apartment. It’s far easier to host in the speakeasy. Niki has dragged the table out from the wall so a chair can be put on the fourth side. Wilbur helps set the table and Tommy gathers drinks and despite the lingering tension, it feels almost cozy. The four of them have settled in, Tommy eating with a disconcerting amount of enthusiasm, but no one at the table has the heart to scold him for it. Once Tommy has cleared a plate and gone back for seconds, he begins to peer around the table.

“Brrr. Bit chilly in here, eh? What’s got you all up in a huff?” Tommy is quite good and prodding the one issue everyone else is still avoiding.

Wilbur doesn’t feel like he knows what’s going on, so he doesn’t speak, Ranboo loathes the thought of being the one to speak up first, especially about confrontation, and Niki neither wants to lie to Tommy nor get into things. Tommy waits.

“Well I think whatever has gotten you lot in a mood, you should do some soul searching, reevaluate your pri-or-i-tees,” he enunciates every syllable around a mouthful of rutabaga. “Like, Ranboo, handsome lad like you, what on earth could be troubling that brain of yours? You’re a baker, you’re a looker, you’re all… like, sensitive and shit, you’re a catch! Niki, if you’ve got problems, you should just… y’know, kick their asses like you always do. In what fuckin’ world does Niki Nihachu feel troubled by something she can’t wreck shop over? You’ve got a badass speakeasy and everything! You don’t fear no pigs, the state should fear you!” Tommy nods once like that settles the matter, before refocusing on his plate. The tension doesn’t break, but it does crack a little.

“No grand input for me?” Wilbur says dryly.

“Nah, I know why you’ve got troubles, and it’s your own fault,” Tommy shrugs.

Ranboo laughs.

“Hey!” Wilbur says, indignant.

“You gonna tell me I’m wrong? Hm?” Tommy gives him a look.

“Yeah, are you, Wil?” Niki smiles. “I mean, you couldn’t pick up one job application?”

Wilbur is flushing red. “Look, maybe I… I’m not thrilled at the thought of scrounging together some shitty nine-to-five with a dickhead boss…”

“How do you know what job shit is like? You’ve never worked a day in your fuckin’ life,” Tommy jeers.

“Have you had a job before, Tommy?” Wilbur says pointedly.

“More than you.”

“I’d say both of you don’t know anything about having a real job,” Ranboo points out.

“And I’d say you don’t know much about having shitty nine-to-five and a dickhead boss,” Niki adds. “You got lucky too, Ranboo.”

“I mean, maybe I do–”

Niki gasps, dramatically acting offended, throwing her napkin at him.

“Hey! Hey, I’m kidding,” Ranboo hunches down which does very little to make himself a smaller target.

“I dunno, Ranbus, she’s a tough egg to crack, y’know? She runs a tight ship. She hasn’t put up with any nonsense as long as I’ve known her. She’s been immovable since she was twelve, probably longer,” Wilbur teases. Niki rolls her eyes at him, poorly masking a laugh. Wilbur glances back over at Ranboo, startled to find Ranboo staring at him, eyebrows slightly raised, mouth open slightly like he’s unsure of how to say something, to describe whatever unreadable expression he’s currently stabbing into Wilbur’s chest. “What?” Wilbur shifts uncomfortably.

“You haven’t called me that since I was little.”

“Well, I– I haven’t been here a lot, have I?” Wilbur stammers.

“Yeah. Guess not.”

Tommy snorts. “Ranbus? That’s fucking adorable, aw, little Ranbus!”

“No, nuh uh, you’re not starting with that,” Ranboo breaks his gaze, turning sharply to Tommy. “Not allowed! Not for you!” He says it like he’s trying to get a dog to drop a sock. “I’d prefer when you call me Ranboob to you calling me that.”

Tommy grins, “aw, good to hear it, Ranboob! I shall only respect your proper title.”

Ranboo sighs head in his hands as realizes what he’s done. “Oh no…”

Tommy continues his teasing, and Wilbur plays along, but he’s wrapped up in deeper thoughts right now, so many old aches and pains mingling with new ones, and he doesn’t know where to put it all down.

Dinner finishes in better spirits than it had started, Tommy offering to help clean up after with the same heroics of a soldier offering to dive on a grenade, but nonetheless, he does it.

“Right, then, good night, lads– and Niki,” Tommy settles in on the floor with ease, stealing a pillow from the couch.

“Tommy, you take the couch, man. I’ve had it for ages, I should shake things up and sleep on the floor for a change,” Wilbur offers.

“What’ve you got against floors? I got nothin’ against ‘em! Me and floors are old friends!” Is Tommy’s attempt at a defense.

“Mhm, Tommy, where did you sleep last night?” Niki asks pointedly before she goes to her own room.

“On a bench over on 30th until one of the pigs woke me up, why?”

Niki and Wilbur exchange a look. “Take the couch, Tommy.”

“Tommy can stay with me in my room for the night!” Ranboo says perhaps too excitedly.

Tommy raises an eyebrow at him. “Look, Ranboob, I did admit, you’re a handsome lad, but me? I’m shy, I’m not ready for this step in our relationship–”

“Tommy,” Ranboo cuts him off exasperatedly. “Come on, it’ll be like when we’d have sleepovers and stuff! It’ll be fun,” Ranboo claps and points to his bedroom door. “Come on! Let’s go!”

“What, are we gonna braid each other’s hair and talk about girls?” Tommy rolls his eyes but clambers off the ground to follow.

“I mean, you can talk about girls. I don’t think I will.”

Niki smiles, fond and relieved. Ranboo had missed having company. None of them are acknowledging the hole, the absence once occupied for so many years by Tubbo. He should be here.

Even as Tommy is grateful to have a bed, as he’s missed Ranboo’s company just as Ranboo had missed his, he’s trying really hard not to get weak right now. He refuses to cry over something as ridiculous as the idea of his best friend––his former best friend?––not being in the place he is meant to. Tubbo has changed. Tommy knows this, Tommy knows he should be able to let go, because that’s not his best friend anymore, in more ways than one. At the same time, Tommy knows if Tubbo showed up right now, no matter the state, no matter the blood on his hands, Tommy would only be able to hug him, to bring him back into the fold and say “Where have you been, Bee Boy? You’re late. And you missed dinner.”

Instead, he just follows Ranboo, and even as neither of them say it, he can read Ranboo’s silence for the same thought. They miss him.

~

Wilbur has a difficult time falling asleep. He’s perturbed by troubling thoughts, thoughts he hadn’t been prepared for. It’s a peculiar list that’s been growing. Only looking at today, not even the past months, and it’s enough to make his head spin. He’d forgone cigarettes to get that scrappy kid some medicine he probably won’t even use. And when Tommy had run to the body, he hadn’t felt scared like that in a long time. Probably in as long a time since he called Ranboo Ranbus.

“Fuck…” Wilbur mutters into the dark. He rolls over and almost screams. Niki is currently making her way silently across the living room, he sits up sharply. “Niki?”

“Sh!” She presses a finger to his lips. She motions for him to follow. “Come on the roof with me,” she whispers. In her other hand, she has a bottle.

“The roof-? Right, fine,” Wilbur clambers to his feet.

“Take that blanket too.”

He does so, following her to door in the back of the kitchen, within it is a pantry, and on the opposite wall, a ladder. He does not ask questions.

Niki unlocks a trapdoor, wincing when it creaks loudly, but as far as they can tell the boys haven’t been woken.

The roof isn’t quiet. It’s well past midnight, but there’s the wind through the buildings and cars still making their way across the city. Niki shuts the hatch behind him, gesturing to the roof.

“Put the blanket down. Over here so we can look out,” she nods to the front of the building. At this angle to the street, Wilbur can see all the way to the river, to the distant lights of the bridge. They can’t see a single star in the sky here, but there’s something beautiful about it anyway.

Niki sits on the blanket, patting the spot beside her. She rips the cork out of the bottle with her teeth, spitting it over the edge of the roof. She spots Wilbur’s expression out of the corner of her eye and giggles.

“I run a speakeasy, Wilbur,” she says by way of explanation.

“I don’t think most bartenders are comfortable ripping a cork out with their teeth.”

Niki shrugs. “How would I know? I can’t exactly meet up with other bartenders in a prohibition state.” She takes a swig, wincing.

“Touché,” Wilbur sits beside her. “What’re we drinking tonight?”

“Um,” she takes another swig. “Gin.”

“Gin?”

She nods. “It’s popular. I thought we might as well,” she offers him the bottle.

“Might as well…” Wilbur mutters. He takes a drink, shuddering. “That’s… that’s some strong gin, shit.”

“Feels…” Niki mulls it over, “appropriate?”

“What’s the occasion?” Wilbur smiles, still puzzled, but also oddly delighted. He’s missed this.

“Um, not really an occasion, more like… a goal,” she takes back the bottle, takes a swig, and passes it back, nodding at him. He obliges and takes another drink.

“Goal?”

“To get you, Wilbur Soot, drunk enough to… to spill your guts to me.”

Wilbur had been halfway through another swig when he chokes. “Pardon?”

Niki smiles, all mischief. “To be fair, I am drinking too.”

“Feels like I’ve been brought here under false pretenses.”

“What pretenses?” She laughs.

“Fine. I dunno,” Wilbur smiles, offering her the bottle. “Okay, if we’re… if we’re spilling guts, lets do it tit-for-tat, quid pro quo.”

She nods, “wie du mir, so ich dir.”

“Wie du mir, so ich dir,” Wilbur attempts to copy her pronunciation and he can’t tell from her smile if he succeeded or failed. “So,” Wilbur asks the first thing that comes into his head. “Is Ranboo… is he mad at me? He seems… well, about as pissed off as Ranboo can be, if I’m honest.”

Niki nods, like it’s an easy truth.

“He is?”

“Yeah, it’s ‘cause he knows you leaving hurt me.”

“Oh,” Wilbur feels like a weight has just pressed down harder on his shoulders.

Niki nods amicably. “And now you’re back. And he thinks you have a lot to prove.”

“Yeah. I… I think I do,” Wilbur takes another swig.

“Do you have anything to do with the…” Niki gestures vaguely to the streets below.

“The what?” He’s puzzled out of his melancholy.

“The changes. A lot of little things. I don’t know,” she shrugs. “It all sort of started when you turned up, and, sorry, Wil, you…” she almost looks pitying. “You break things. Sometimes.”

Wilbur nods, staring out at the patchy trail of streetlights, some lit, some not. “I break things,” he agrees softly.

“Sometimes,” Niki reminds him pointedly.

He laughs, half under his breath, “sometimes.”

“There’s something wrong, Wil. Schlatt is dead, and I thought…” Niki frowns. “I don’t know what I thought. When I first found out, I was mostly worried about Tubbo, but then I… I thought it was gonna fix things.”

Wilbur once more thinks of his father, and it’s hard to resist the bitterness curdling in his stomach. “It was bad, then?” Quiet. He glances over at Niki, who is looking with the same thoughtfulness out at the city. Wilbur continues, “Schlatt, I mean.”

She glances at him, clearly measuring up how little he knows. “It’s like I said, Wil. You’ve been gone a long time.”

“I have,” Wilbur says like it’s an apology. It isn’t an apology.

“Drink more. You’re bigger than me, you need to catch up,” she presses the bottle into his hands. He obliges.

“I didn’t want to, you know. To leave you, to leave the city,” Wilbur knows it’s a feeble defense, but it’s all he can think to say.

She still look like she knows something, something she isn’t saying, not directly at least. “Didn’t you?”

“I…” Wilbur feels very vulnerable. He can’t imagine Niki knowing, knowing the whole of it, but it’s clear she understands him in a lot of ways. Which makes sense. Niki had once been his best friend. “I don’t know,” is what he settles on. It’s a safe answer, maybe too safe.

Niki sighs, sitting up, legs folded beneath her. Wilbur offers her the bottle once more and she pushes it back. “You first, then me.”

He takes a drink. She follows.

“You all left, you and Phil and Techno, and… and Phil leaving was hard. He… he sent money until I asked him to stop. He called until I… I got too busy to pick up,” she shrugs. “I don’t know,” she echoes his sentiment, staring down at the roof. “Techno said goodbye. A… a pretty good goodbye, I think. And I was… I was mostly okay for a while. Schlatt… Schlatt didn’t get involved until I was eighteen. That’s when I opened the Secret City, ‘cause before I was worried if I got caught while underage it would fall back on Eret’s family, so…”

Wilbur knows it’s far from important, but on impulse he asks her, almost defensive, like a childish teen rivalry has resurfaced. “Eret?”

“Yeah. Her family helped look after us. You… you can’t own a business at sixteen, Wil,” Niki says wryly. “I mean, we were on our own, really. Me and Ranboo. They didn’t really interfere, it just made sure no one was like, trying to take Ranboo away from me or anything like that.”

“Oh,” Wilbur feels almost embarrassed now. “I… I understand. Got it.” He takes another drink.

“You said you were coming back, Wil,” Niki says softly.

“I meant to,” he says hoarsely. He means it.

“Okay, but when you weren’t anymore, when you didn’t,” she looks over at him, eyes too shiny. “Why didn’t you call? Why didn’t you… why didn’t you write? Why didn’t you say anything to me?”

Wilbur feels like that look in her eyes, grief and broken trust and wounds still unhealed, like it might burn him up from the inside. He can’t bring himself to look away.

“I don’t have any good answers for you.”

“Give me a bad one, then.”

"Fuck, I'm just a mess," Wilbur wipes his eyes.

"Yeah, you are," she says teasingly. "Give me an answer."

Wilbur swallows thickly, a lump forming in his throat, finally tearing his gaze from hers to stare at the way the bottle in his hand gleams in the streetlight. “It was supposed to be a clean break.” He gives the wrong excuse, but it’s the only one he has.

Niki feels an ache in her chest grow sharp. She had expected a bad answer, but that one stings, especially when she knows what festers underneath. “Clean…” she scoffs. A pause, Wilbur with nothing to say in his own defense, and Niki thinking. “I was... I was okay on my own. Really. Schlatt wasn't a problem until I opened the Secret City and... and when he first started showing up and taking money and... and then alcohol, I didn't... I didn't know what he was gonna do to us. I'd never... Phil kept us away from that stuff, you know? I... I made sure they didn't know about Ranboo," Niki nods once, as if reassuring herself, proud and certain she did right by him. "They wouldn't fucking touch him, I made sure. I couldn't stop them from knowing he worked there, but... they didn't know he was my family. So, that was... a bit safer? I think? And... I hate this," she says vehemently. "I hate that this is the truth, but when I stopped fighting, it got easier. I gave them the money, my supplies, whatever they asked for. I only fought back when... when I thought it would actually sink us, and before I got brave enough to do that I had to ask Eret for help sometimes and I hated doing that, because I knew I shouldn't have had to. Once I gave up, his men stopped coming and threatening to break things, and instead it was just Tubbo. It felt... it felt easier that way. I gave up so much of what we earned, and that just became normal," she says that word like it's something vulgar. "But I did it. I did it. I kept everyone safe, everyone. I looked after them all. Homeless kids, and Schlatt's kid, and Schlatt's boyfriend, and Schlatt's boyfriend's boyfriend, and Schlatt's doctor, and... and Badlanders and ex-Badlanders, and ex-Empire kids, because... because they were gone. You were gone. The Empire left us, and I wasn't gonna let that hurt us. No way. Maybe I didn't have Phil's authority or Techno's reputation or... or anything like that. But I kept them all safe. All of them," she looks at Wilbur, and he is almost in awe of the fire burning behind her eyes. Wilbur feels so sure that if Niki wanted to burn this city down, she could and she'd probably have the right to. The fire drains out of her, and once more she looks so tired. "The earlier years were the hardest. The ones where I missed you the most, Wil." Niki takes a shaky breath. She looks away. "When I say Schlatt was bad, I don’t say it because I think you could’ve fixed things. Maybe if Phil had stuck around, he could’ve made it better, but that’s different. That’s not you.” A pause. Wilbur almost feels like he can’t breathe. Niki continues, “even with the bad parts of it, really I just wanted you to be there, Wil. You were– you were supposed to be there,” Niki says it with the certainty of a girl who had been eighteen, and alone, and scared, and trying to defend herself from threats so much bigger than her, and waiting for her brother to get taken away, and all the while wishing she could cry on her best friend’s shoulder.

“I am… I am so sorry, Niki. I don’t expect forgiveness, I don’t, I just need you to know how sorry I am.” A strange apology for someone utterly certain his father had dragged him out of this city kicking and screaming, but maybe he’s not talking about that kind of leaving. Maybe Niki knows that.

Niki does not forgive him. “I believe you, Wil.” That counts for something too.

Wilbur has felt something building in his chest for weeks, discontent forever rising as his plans never turn out quite right and he has been unable to do the one thing he came to this city for. A lot has changed in the past months. His discontent finally spills over.

“I came here, I came back to the city two months ago,” Wilbur stops, taking a deep breath to stop his lip from trembling. He quickly wipes his cheek. He doesn’t look at her. “I came back here to kill myself.”

Niki doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t know what she could say, but she isn't really surprised. She takes his hand.

“N-Not here, here. I wasn’t… I wasn’t gonna do it in your house,” Wilbur continues to spill over, a rambling defense for something he knows cannot be defended. “I was… I had a plan, it was… it wasn’t supposed to take this long, but I had to– It had to be– Someone else has to do it,” he says forcefully. “I wanted it to be Schlatt. Or Schlatt’s dogs, whatever. If not him, any gunfire would do. I tried prodding the Badlands, I tried going down the wrong streets and… and spraying stupid graffiti on claimed territory, and none of it worked. Closest I got was that stupid fucking car bomb, and all it did was almost kill Tommy…”

Now Niki can think of a reply, not to the matter on the whole, but to this piece of it. “Why?” Wilbur glances at her, burden evident at the thought of answering that sort of question, Niki corrects. “Why… why did it have to be someone else, I mean.”

Wilbur laughs bitterly. “It was supposed to be for Phil? I thought… I thought it might be nice for it to mean something, so, I thought if I got myself killed in the crossfire of some petty street violence, maybe…” Wilbur trails off, as if by voicing it aloud he’d realized the childishness of his plots. “Maybe it would make him want to change. To do better. Something like that,” he sighs.

“For Phil,” Niki repeats, processing.

“Yeah,” Wilbur says wearily.

“Don’t… don’t take this the wrong way, Wilbur, but… but once all that didn’t work, why didn’t you… you know, try something else?” Niki asks carefully.

Wilbur had forgotten how direct Niki could be. “Um, well, lots of… of little reasons, I guess.”

“Little reasons?”

Wilbur huffs, almost annoyed with the idea. “It was… it was that stupid fucking kid, alright? It was Tommy.”

Niki smiles, almost amused. “Tommy?”

“Not… not for lovely sentimental reasons, not at first at least, but he just… he kept showing up. Every day, I’d be wandering around, debating between the river and a highrise, and there he’d fucking be! Calling me a layabout and following me and hounding me until I’d decide it was worth trying a few more schemes to see if I could get myself killed that way, and even then! Even then, he’d find a way to get in the way. Like, I tried to get out in front of a Badlands patrol, when they were first starting to get all nervous, and this kid latches onto me like a furious fucking koala, and he won’t let me out of the alleyway without him, so I gave up that time. And shit like that just kept happening,” Wilbur sighs, shaking his head, almost amazed. “He just… by accident, he just kept me out of it.”

“That sounds like Tommy.”

Wilbur laughs dryly. “Does it?” Wilbur broods, once more returning to the thoughts that had been circling his sleepless brain earlier. “And he’s… he needs help, right? He obviously needs help, and needs it worse than any of us first thought, apparently, and I…” Wilbur sighs. “And I can’t. Okay?”

“You… you don’t think you can help him? Wil, no one would expect that of you.”

“No, not that, and it’s not a matter of expectation, it’s–” Wilbur runs a hand through his hair, tugging at his curls as he feels like Niki and all her love for him is digging a confession out of his chest, but he wants this, he wants to tell her, because he loves her too. “I can’t kill myself. Not until… not until he’s better. ‘Cause I… I almost forgot about Ranbus.”

“You… what do you mean you almost forgot Ranboo?” Now Niki is properly confused.

“Not Ranboo– Ranbus. I… I said it so effortlessly, I didn’t even think about it, but before tonight, I almost forgot what I called that kid, that I… I was something to him,” Wilbur sighs.

“You still are something to him.”

Wilbur smiles weakly, grateful for her kindness even if he doesn’t think he deserves it. “Maybe. I… you’re good to him, Niki. You were still a kid yourself, and you took care of him. He’s lucky, and I think he knows how lucky he is, to have you for a big sister, and…” Wilbur trails off, words coming together slowly. “And Tommy’s not lucky. In more than one way, because he had no one, and instead of someone like you, Niki, he gets stuck with me instead,” Wilbur laughs. “So, I can’t kill myself. Because he needs… he needs someone. That’s all.”

Niki scoots closer, resting her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Wilbur. For… for a lot of things you’ve had to go through, but I’m really glad you’re here now. And I’m really glad you’re not going anywhere.”

Wilbur takes a shaky breath, no longer trying to ward off tears or the tremor in his voice. “Thanks, Niki.”

“Maybe Tommy isn’t as lucky as Ranboo, but he’s still lucky to have you.”

Wilbur nods. “Thank you. For a lot of things, but Niki,” Wilbur looks over at her, looking her in the eye for once without fear or guilt or shame. “Thank you for being my best friend.”

Niki smiles, reaching out to mess up his hair. “You’re welcome. Thank you for… for trying to bring my best friend back.”

Wilbur understands. “I’ll be him again. I promise.”

Niki gets to her feet, unsteady and offering him a hand off the ground. “I’ll hold you to that, Wilbur Soot. Don’t think I won’t.”

Niki doesn’t like the way things are heading. She would have thought after Schlatt’s death there would be some peace, instead, she has new reasons to worry. It’s like she can measure the health of the city by the attendance at the Secret City. She rarely sees any of the Badlanders, Puffy only on rare occasion, and always busy and absentminded. Even more worrying to her, Tommy and Tubbo don’t come to the Secret City very much anymore, and never together. Ranboo, already quiet, has gotten quieter.

Niki’s business worries have at least declined. In Schlatt’s absence, her profits have nearly doubled, or rather, she’s kept the other half of her income she’d been making before. She doesn’t have to reorder alcohol from Puffy as often, which is another good thing considering Puffy seems to be dealing with her own troubles at present. In theory, Niki should be doing better than ever. She’s not.

The bloodiest parts of this mess are probably what should scare her the most, but she isn’t sure. Bodies are turning up in the streets, and since Tubbo has apparently taken on the mantle of controlling the streets, she’d expected the violence to die down, but it hasn’t. The Badlanders are more aggressive, territorial and secretive, and Tubbo’s lot––she doesn’t really know what to call them, they’re certainly not Schlatt’s dogs anymore––are too bold, bold in the way a cat puffs up to scare away a bigger animal. Attendance at the speakeasy has died down in part due to that. People are nervous to go out at night, because if it’s not the gangs getting into petty scuffles around the block, it’s other dead. Someone is attacking people deemed undesirable. Niki’s speakeasy caters to no one but the undesirable. She doesn’t know what worries her more, the dead bodies, often times faces she recognizes as local common criminals, and those she doesn’t recognize, she can guess also share similar records, or the ones who aren’t murdered. It seems there is one person behind this threat, or maybe a group sharing the same mask. People will ask to spend the night at the Secret City, skittish and bruised. They’re not hardened criminals––largely because it seems this person doesn’t like to let hardened criminals live––the people that come to her for help, injured but alive, they’re the homeless, they’re fences who work on the street, people like Karl doing something harmless like selling stolen watches, and whoever is out there, lurking like a ghost, thinks that warrants bloody retribution? This is wrong. All of it, whatever is happening out there, she feels like she’s trapped in the bottom of a kettle, waiting for the pressure to build and finally boil over. She’s considered on more than one occasion moving the bakery, finding property deep in Puffy’s territory, Puffy had offered her help more than once, but she can’t bring herself to do it. This is where she’s always been, it’s where people know to go, and changing that now, it feels unfair. She won’t abandon any of them. Tubbo still keeps her bakery safe, actually safe, not in any manner like Schlatt’s so-called protection, and he does so perhaps viciously, but at least for now, there’s no reason for her to move. Not really.

Trouble does not keep itself neatly contained in the streets away from her and her family, nor is it always something so blunt as violence. Her little brother doesn’t talk to her. He doesn’t go out with Tommy and Tubbo. He just works. Niki will tell him he doesn’t have to, that she’s fine on her own and he can go see friends, but Ranboo just shrugs and says “they’re busy. I’d rather just hang out with you right now.” Niki isn’t used to Ranboo not telling her things, nor Tubbo and Tommy. She prefers when they had stumbled home after getting into trouble and immediately babbled a confession at her, like her knowing was important somehow, like she could always make things right. It doesn’t feel that long ago. Where Tubbo had learned he could tell her when something had gone wrong and there wouldn’t be harsh consequences, where Tommy trusted her enough to not act like a guarded, hunted dog, all bark and no bite, and instead had talked to her like her help wasn’t a threat. And Ranboo, who did things for himself and not for her for once in his life; he’d run around with his friends and had come home late sometimes and had finally had something to actually apologize to her for. Niki doesn’t know why that has slipped away. Tubbo had acted oddly, cutting off Quackity and arguing in her speakeasy––Niki cannot remember Tubbo ever raising his voice like that, let alone in front of an audience––and he never looks open to conversation when he does still turn up, he just sits quietly in the corner with Jack, the two of them talking in hushed tones and Niki knows they stop talking whenever she walks too close. It hurts, and worse than hurt, it’s wrong. Her boys don’t sneak around her unless it’s for shoplifting from a sweet shop or trying to smuggle an injured squirrel into Ranboo’s bedroom.

The nights Tommy still turns up––rarely on the nights Tubbo is there, and never together, and if someone is there, whoever was there first will find some excuse to leave, which is profoundly wrong––if Tommy is there it’s usually to heckle Wilbur. Tommy seems unchanged, he’s still loud and a bit rude and always ready for a good joke, but Niki knows him better. There’s the more surface-level changes, he’s a bit scruffier than usual, and there’s this strange duality of him being more quick to refuse her offers of help and more inclined to ask for it. She’ll ask if he wants to spend the night and he jumps to say no, but that same day he’ll ask her if she has anything leftover from the bakery that she needs to toss. Always with a joking tone, like he’s just a teenager with a sweet tooth, but Niki knows it’s different now. She buries the urge to ask him, “are you not eating enough?” because she knows doing so will make Tommy not accept anything. There are deeper changes too, ones she has to look more carefully for. Tommy comes to the Secret City alone. He will still talk with Ranboo, he’ll talk with her, and oddly enough he’d talk quite a bit with Wilbur, but in the pauses in between his usual rough banter, when he’s stopped taunting Wilbur, he looks tense. He looks tense like he did before he realized the speakeasy was for people like him. Tommy views strangers as threats or targets or often both. He moves through the world like a prey animal and a scavenger, but Niki hasn’t seen that tension cross her doorstep in a long time. He looks tired too. Maybe as tired as Tubbo does.