George POV.
As far as I had heard, every hero and every hero and every villain had themselves a tragic ‘sob story’. Some tale of ultimate woe, which inspired them to become motivated to fight crime. I knew that what I had been told wasn’t always true, but it seemed that it was.
Peter Parker witnessed his Uncle Ben’s death because of him. Bruce Wayne saw his parents get killed when he was a kid. Clark Kent’s entire home planet was destroyed, and he was one of several survivors. Tony Stark was kidnapped and forced to create weapons.
The list goes on and on, and it seems that a lot of my friends followed this same pattern.
I had become a hero after hurting my parents and running away from home. Bad became a hero after he was thrown out by his family who thought he was evil. Karl was a lone survivor of a terrible accident, his teleporting having saved him from a car crash. Techno became a hero because… well I think Philza actually told him to become a hero so he didn’t get into trouble.
As Quackity continued to ramble on about things I couldn’t focus on I looked around the room, trying to figure out the sob stories for all of these villains. The breaking point that made this of all things their career choice. Some of the more common ones were ‘terrible childhood’ or ‘treated like the bad guy so became a bad guy’.
The only two people in the room that I had no idea on was the unnamed man, and Dream himself. It made me curious. Maybe Dream had the usual criminal story of the troubled childhood making him become who he was, but that didn’t suit him. The person who knew most about Dream was his nemesis, the one and only Technoblade, but I couldn’t ask him right now.
Eventually the group was dismissed, another bit of evidence that Quackity was practically just a normal teacher on cocaine, and everyone stood up. Some of the group all started leaving the room, already seeming disgruntled that they had to spend longer than they expected here while waiting for Sapnap, while others all started talking to each other.
Dream was part of the second group, he slipped between the people standing around talking and walked over to Quackity before I got the chance to follow. I decided what to do, and I had come up with three options.
The first was that I could follow Dream, walk over to him and Quackity and try to overhear what they were saying to each other. The next was for me to interact with the other people in the room, and I could try and find out about them, but this seemed riskier than the first option. The final option was to just sit here and see what happens, which is what I went with.
I just stayed sitting down, looking at everyone around the table and listening to whatever bits of conversation they said in a voice loud enough for me to hear. Some were basic things, plans for dinner, or talking about their current wives and mistresses. There was also some chatter about some more interesting stuff, planned robberies, murders, kidnappings, etc.
Without seeming too conspicuous I managed to take mental note of several things which I could tell Philza about later. Just as one of the people started telling someone else about something particularly interesting someone put their hand on my shoulder.
My first thought was that it was Dream, but he was still on the other side of the room talking to Quackity, however the blond’s eyes were on me and whoever was standing behind me, touching my shoulder. I couldn’t help but shiver under the cold gaze that the sociopath was sending in my direction, although I know it wasn’t directed at me.
Being slow and cautious, I looked over my shoulder to see the unnamed man who was smuggled into the city yesterday. He was staring down at me with a curious expression on his face, looking at me as though I was some foreign animal. “Can I help you?” I asked quietly, wondering what he might want.
The man let out a low hum, walking around me to where Dream’s seat is now empty, and sat down. He took a moment to examine me from eye level. “Strange,” the man murmured with a notable British accent, continuing to look over my expression.
I allowed a confused smile to appear on my face as I leaned a little closer. “What’s strange?”
“You.” Was the one word response. “You’re strange. Dream barely trusts his hook-ups with coming here, yet here you are. Plus, it is not often that someone with the courage you seem to possess ends up dating a criminal.”
“Uhh… thank you?” I responded, unsure whether that was meant to be a complement.
The brunette seemed satisfied with my reply, and a grin appeared on his face. I couldn’t help but take the opportunity to study his appearance. He had fluffy brown hair and brown eyes along with a pair of round rimmed glasses. He was wearing a white shirt and a grey and white striped flannelette shirt overtop.
“So how do you know Dream and the other people here?” I asked him after a few minutes of silence, and at my question his smile faltered slightly on his face, but returned quickly.
“I owe my life to Dream… but there is not that much of a story behind it…” He explained. “I was friends with Dream and his family when I was younger, before he became a cold blooded killer.”
“Really?” I asked. “How is that not much of a story? What was he like?”
“A lot nicer than he is now.” The brunette smiled. “The two of us and one of my brothers all hung out together all of the time. We were best friends… but one day when he was about thirteen years old… something happened.”
“What happened?” I questioned, feeling myself getting curious at this small snippet of the blond’s backstory which I was managing to witness.
“Dream and my brother disappeared. It was about a month before they were found, neither were the same after that though… it was…” He couldn’t seem to find a word for it and remained quiet.
“Well where did they disappear to? What happened to the pair of them?”
“They were taken to be human lab rats, an attempt to make super soldiers, like in those Marvel movies. Faster, stronger, smarter, better stamina, etc.” The man explained. “The company was found out though, and my brother and Dream were both rescued.
I expected that to be it, but he continued. “According to found files they were the only successful experiments, and whatever they witnessed made them a lot more distant. It made them practically emotionless. My father however came up with an idea. He suggested that they get taught to fight bad guys, use their powers to protect others.”
“So… your father suggested Dream became a superhero? Why didn’t he? Did something happen?” I felt like I already knew this story… I had heard it somewhere before but there was something that didn’t make sense.
“Dream felt that my father was overworking my brother and him. All of their free time, from the morning through to the night, was used to train them. He never got the chance to act his age, and so he decided to leave, cut off all contact with myself and my brother and father.”
“Then how did you end up owing him your-” I was cut off as he continued.
“I figured out what he did a little later on. All I wanted was to be included with my brother and father, I wanted to help them both. However my father was too focused on my brother to give me, and my other little brother who was eight, much attention. So I decided to find a way to get my brother’s, and my father’s attention.”
“By committing crimes?” I guessed, and the man just nodded.
“I started with small crimes, stealing an apple off of a fruit cart, running red lights, but none of them got his attention, and so I had to work my way up to bigger crimes. One day when I was getting a lot braver, the pair found me.”
“They were both disappointed, as you would be, but apparently I needed to be arrested. When I ran from them I was caught in an alleyway, but not by my brother and father, it was Dream who caught me.”
“So that’s how you owe him your life? He kept you out of prison?” I asked.
“There is more than that.” The man confirmed. “He knew I was more of a priority than the other criminals and had made a lot of connections in the underworld, so he introduced me to a lot of these guys. Quackity helped me get out of the city, and I’ve been living in the small neighbouring town of Pogtopia ever since. It was boring, but it is good to be back.”
“That’s enough.” I gasped as I noticed Dream was now standing over the pair of us, and the strangers smile widened at the blond sociopath.
“Hello Dream,” he smiled. “Can I not say hello to my best friend's boyfriend?”
“You said more than enough.” Was Dream’s response.
“Okay then.” The brunette smiled as he stood up and held out his hand for me to shake. “It was nice to meet you, Mr…”
“George.” I responded as I shook his hand back. “Thank you for telling me about that. I hope to see you around.”
“I hope the exact same… oh and in case you were wondering, you can call me Wilbur. Wilbur Soot.” Before I got a chance to respond he walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him.
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1669 words.
😏Nice