"Clay, why don't you just leave Tommy alone? You're just--rubbing it in his face."

"Yeah, exactly."

"I mean. Okay, that's-- that's pretty cool."

"Nick, yesterday you were all like oh I'll be your friend Tommy! and now you're like yeah, Clay, yeah, Clay, I love you Clay--"

"I didn't say I loved Clay I just said, I mean. I know you're in a tricky spot, but--it is a little funny."

"You're all assholes. Why am I--guyyyys, I'm so poor." (He's fiddling with a shop project, but there's only so much he can do with no mana and no tools.) "This isn't fair. Hey guys! Have you lot seen A Christmas Carol?"

"Who's Christmas Carol?"

"--That was a joke, Tommy."

"He thinks he's so funny."

"He laughed!!! He laughed at my joke!!!!!!! Tommy thinks I'm funny! He thinks I'm funny!"

"I definitely laughed at you." ...There are some mals lurking in the corner. Point. "Help me."

"Fine." Mals are dead now! He is so good at this.

"This isn't fair, man. This isn't fair! I'm like, I'm like a sad little spider!"

"...What?"

"All I'm saying is, if I had eight legs, I would fuck you all up."

....Nick is going to wait until Tommy's distracted again and then lure some mals nearby to spook him. (Not, like, actual bad ones, he or Clay'll kill them no problem. Nobody will actually be in trouble.)

And when he notices, Tommy is going to fall out of his chair and scream. "What the hell, man!!!!!"

(Clay, as predicted, kills them in a heartbeat. He and Nick are laughing.)

"You're literally fucking bullying me."

"Come on. It was funny."

"You smell like body odor."

"Well, that's just not true. Maybe Clay does."

"Yeah, and what do you smell like?"

"I smell like... your mother's perfume."

"Oh yeah? Why would you buy the same perfume as my mother, that's so weird."

(Clay's stifling his giggles with a hand over his mouth.)

"I didn't--"

"Have you ever considered Lynx Africa. You don't have to wear perfume."

"Maybe I want to!"

"There are so many different smells you could have."

"I thought your mother smelled really good, so I was like, oh, why not copy her, you know?"

"That's so obscure. She'd probably shout at you, as well."

"She would never shout at me. ...Well."

(Clay completely loses it and starts cracking up.)

"This is a terrible joke, I am having a terrible time, I am being harassed--"

"Wow, your shop project is kind of trash."

"You're so American. Trash."

“Rubbish.”

“It’s so rubbish!” …Squint. “Wait, that’s actually—that’s actually horrible! Do you, like, want help—”

“Yeah well I would’ve fucking had help from my study group, prick.”

“I feel like you’ve— please tell me you made it this bad on purpose.”

“Don’t be mean, I like him! He’s special!”

“Alright, well, he’s awful.”

“Alright, fine. How do I make it better, then, Mr. Artificer?”

“Give it here, I’ll fix it.”

“No, you’ll steal it from me, I know what you do.”

“Fine, keep it then.”

“Can I go to the rest of the library?”

“Yes. I mean, as long as you don’t go talk to—your old friends. Like, the whole point of this is, they were, they were enabling you. So as long as you don’t go talk to them, sure, you can go to the rest of the library.”

“And what happens if I go talk to them?”

“Thennnnnn I stop protecting you and you die.”

“Yeah, and what if you’re not there?”

“If I catch you, same thing, I stop protecting you, I let everyone know that you and whoever you were with likes angering enclavers.”

“I just— come on, man, I just want to see them.”

“Hey, hey, Tommy, I could go back and talk to them, are you jealous?”

“Nick, you don’t need to mock him.”

“I just want to have Christmas with my friends.”

“You can have Christmas with your friends. Just not those friends.”

Sigh. “I’m going to see if I can find a book that’s helpful for making this.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Hey, is your study group around? I could say hi to Alex.”

Tommy doesn’t say anything to that, just flips him off while scouring promising-looking shelves. It’s looking like the more useful ones are higher up and he’ll probably have to climb them, because of course it is. 

“Wow, no need to be so aggressive, jeez.”

"Stop baiting him, Nick." (His voice is teasing; he clearly finds it as hilarious as Nick does.)

"But it's fun. Hey, Tommy, I'm gonna go talk to Alex."

"Great. Both of you can fuck off."

...He doesn't know how to feel about it when they do and he's alone. He can hear them, if he strains, not the words but the voices, Clay's and Nick's mingling with Toby and Alex and Niki.

Fuck them. Fuck all of them.

He starts climbing one of the shelves. It doesn't feel super safe, especially alone, but it doesn't matter. He's never fallen before, and besides, it's not like it matters if he does. He's here for a good time, not a long time.

He does find a useful-looking book, at least, so that's a win.

...Whoa. He did not realize how far up he was until he looked down, and--wow. Oops. That's... A bit of a drop. Or maybe it just looks higher when you're not on the ground. He's a little mesmerized by it. He could just-- let go--

Nah, probably he'd just break his leg or something. If he wants it to hurt, he can always go the Wilbur route.

It'd be kind of nice if he landed on his head or something, though. As long as it didn't just make him all scrambled. It's gross to imagine, all his blood and brains over the floor, but it'd be done. Done sounds pretty good right about now. And he wouldn't have to deal with--fucking, Clay, and Nick and Toby and--and they're all over there, talking, and he's here--

...There is a mana light floating concerningly high up one of the bookshelves he left Tommy at, and when he gets closer, he can see Tommy: concerningly high up, holding a book and looking at the ground with a concerningly thoughtful expression.

Yeah, no. He flies up and grabs Tommy.

"Come on."

"It's not your time to die yet, Tommy." And they are on the floor again. No dumb stunts for Tommy.

"It's never my time to die."

"That's true."

"Can I not at least--on Christmas. Can I talk to Toby and Alex and everyone on Christmas Day."

"I'll consider it. But probably not. How about--how about Easter? If you do good until Easter, I'll let you talk to them."

Sigh. "Or how about you just let me see them now, you fucking prick." He punches Clay's shoulder, and it's sort of joking and sort of not. "I'm gonna be all sad and shit. I'm gonna get a New York accent."

"Are we, like, going to get more books, or are we done, orrrr--"

"I was just going to head back."

Punch. Punch. Wow this is really highlighting how Clay has five inches and a lot of muscle on him. This sucks.

"Stop it, Tommy."

"...Guys, how do you know when it's too much?"

"I think it'll go faster if we cut through that way?" Point.

.........

"Guys-- How do you--"

"Yeah, sure, let's go that way." The cool thing about believing that somewhere will get you where you want to go faster is that this has a decent chance of making it true.

...Oh.