Chapter Text
It’s with purpose that Ranboo cracks the egg into the bowl before him.
Truthfully, he should not be wasting eggs so frivolously, not when they had just gone grocery shopping so all the rest of the money they brought in will be turned towards rent. But Tommy’s birthday was the next day, and he wanted it to be special. So, he’d put in some overtime at his job and managed to get some extra money in order to buy a cake mix. They needed everything else the cake mix did anyway, so it wasn’t anything too extra. Besides, Tommy had been working hard at a part-time job trying to aid in bringing in money when both his friends insisted that he couldn’t get a full-time one. And he tried so hard to make sure that everyone was happy and laughing when he was in their shitty little one bedroom apartment.
Tommy deserved a cake for his birthday, especially when they couldn’t afford anything as presents.
“Hey, bossman,” Tubbo mumbled as he shuffled into the kitchen/main room. He butted his head against Ranboo’s lower back as the enderman hybrid whisked the cake mix.
“Evening, Tubbo,” Ranboo greeted, pouring the batter into a pan. “You’re up early.”
“It’s eleven thirty at night.”
“Mhm.”
“Weirdo,” Tubbo mumbled, slumping against his back a little more as his words slurred together.
“That’s me. The weirdest one in this apartment.”
Tubbo hummed sleepily.
Tubbo’s father, Schlatt, wasn’t exactly a well-liked man.
In fact, he was kind of a supervillain.
But despite not being the only ram hybrid in existence, apparently it was still very recognizable that Tubbo was his son. People were afraid that he’d follow in his father’s footsteps, so they tended to steer clear of him. They wouldn’t even let him into businesses.
In a way, they were right, but in a way, it was also their fault that they were right.
Because Tubbo could hardly step outside without being harassed, Tubbo could only really leave the apartment at night. And what was the best way to keep people from heckling you?
Strike fear into their hearts, apparently.
Tubbo wasn’t exactly a villain… most nights…
He was more of an anti-hero. Kinda. Maybe? Ranboo and Tommy weren’t quite sure what to call Tubbo, not that Tubbo was any help on that front.
But people definitely left him alone when they found out that he could hold a concerning amount of varied bombs and other explosives on him at any given time.
Yeah, Tubbo was the not-quite-anti-hero/villain that everyone in the city knew as Warhead.
He always had fun having the heroes chase him about the city, leading them away from Tommy, who would be doing actual vigilante work. Stopping crime and helping out old people with cats or something. It wasn’t exactly a well paying job-- or a paid job at all-- but Tommy liked doing it. It made him feel good .
And if it made Tommy feel good, then he could have at it, so long as he was careful.
The heroes didn’t patrol their area all that often. They hardly did anything outside of the first ten districts, actually. So, at first, Tommy could do vigilante work in peace.
Then someone from the Nineteenth District Police Department blabbed to someone from a different police department and the heroes got wind of a vigilante becoming very popular with the people.
Wanting to avoid another Schlatt situation, they’d swept the district. But no vigilante came out that night, having been forewarned by one of the interns at the NDPD.
When the heroes started on their way the next night, they were called instead to the thirteenth district, where Warhead made his debut, blowing up a warehouse housing illegally transported drugs. None of which were smoked, so he didn’t get the whole district high-- something that had greatly disappointed Tubbo, he was looking forward to that.
So now, whenever a hero is starting on their way to check Nineteenth, something goes off in One of the other districts.
Once, Tubbo got quite daring, and set off one of his bombs in Ninth. The hero stationed in that district-- A-Bomb, another explosive super-- had chased Tubbo all the way to Seventeenth, where Ranboo-- completely concealed to A-Bomb-- had teleported Tubbo back home.
It had been a rush, but Tubbo hadn’t done it again.
There was a thud from the bedroom, and Tubbo rushed over to help Tommy out. Ranboo left the cake to cool, before he walked into their bedroom and started patching Tommy up.
It’s times like these that Ranboo thinks back to one of the few memories he has of the End.
To the non-End native or hybrid eye, the End is surrounded by a pitch black void. But to those with End blood, they can see the millions upon billions of speckles of light that dot the skies. Not quite stars, but rather similar, and that’s what the word for them translates to.
In the End, it is said that the stars have laid out a destiny for you. That the stars will guide you through your trying times.
Ranboo can't help but wonder why the stars of the Overworld hate Tommy so.
Tommy didn’t deserve to be hiding from his idols. He didn’t deserve to be bleeding out nearly every night.
He didn’t deserve to be shaking on the floor of an abandoned garage, shaking from hypothermia and lack of food because he wanted his friends to be warm and fed.
Why did the stars hate Tommy so?