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Tommy scurries through the trees, branches snagging into his fur as he brushes past them, puffing harsh breaths as he goes. the ground is rough against his paws and the wind isn’t as calm as it should be as it ruffles through his hair roughly. The smells are overwhelming as he passes through other animal’s territories, he almost wants to gag in this situation, though that wouldn’t be ideal seeing as he’s running away from the fucking scariest thing known to fucking man.
Well that’s not true as Tommy is sure that the D-man is NOT the scariest thing know to man but he digresses.
Speaking of the D-man, Dream is chasing after him right now, he’s surprisingly fast for a human with no transformation powers or magics. He’s yelling Tommy’s name in a screeching type way that Tommy’s so sure it’ll be in his nightmares for the next five years. He has his collar in his right hand and his wand in the other. It seems like that Dream is trying to hex Tommy into stopping but it doesn’t look like it’s working. After all, Dream kind of needs his familiar to cast his spells or else they’re useless. Dream has no practical magic ability at all, he’s hopeless in almost anything magic. The only thing (or person for that matter) that gave him that magical ability was Tommy, his familiar.
See, Tommy was a particularly powerful familiar, only sought out for the sole purpose of being used as a generator-powerhouse thing. He usually has to be hunted down instead of being asked nicely (not like he would’ve went if they did but…) and he is usually overworked, witches and warlocks over estimating his power and he’s ran into the ground.
Speaking of running and the ground, his paws are starting to hurt and D-man seems to be catching up. Tommy almost stumbles right into a tree root as he continues to run onto a log like bridge over a raging river. He’s scrambling now, with high pitched squeaks and yelps tumbling out of him as Dream throws something at him and the something explodes.
The something was potion.
The splash potion seemed to be one of weakness, a potion that isn’t hard to make or find but just a pain and hassle to make because of the fermenting process of the spider eyes that took way too long for any sane witch to wait out. Especially since those same eyes had to be monitored through the entire process because if they are left fermented for too long, the eyes are rotten, too rotten to put in any potion.
Anyway, the splash potion hit him, and the effects were almost immediate. He could feel himself slowing down, his blinks slowing down into the long, slow blinks you see in cats when the trust their owners. But instead of slow blinking of trust, there was only
The sluggish, agonizing blinks of pain as the glass cuts into some of his joints. He yelps as shard of glass cuts deep into his paw, making him trip and fall hard into the dirt and grass floor below.
He hears Dreams footsteps pound behind him as he viciously yanked from the ground, his limp figure being presented in front of a scarred and angered face. He’s being shaken and jerked in front of Dream, as if making him more nauseous would help anything, D-man.
Tommy tries to shift into his human form, which is (unbelievably) more pathetic than his raccoon form but he know the added weight would startle Dream. Or so he thought. He tries to shift but finds that he is blocked.
What the fuck???
He tries to ignore the implications of what the fuck that could mean. Tommy is scratching at Dream’s arms, leaving long, bloody lines of what Tommy is sure is going to be an infection with the dirt caked up under his nails. The run had him scrambling, what could he say?
The blocking may have been from the weakness, though Tommy has never heard once that weakness stops the shift from animal to human. That is what Tommy is sure is unheard of.
“Do you think you can run from me?” Dream questions with horribly bad breath (like Prime does he even brush those yellow, nasty teeth?), “Do you think that even for a moment, you can run and hide from me? I have heard the tales of the ‘raccoon escape artist’ that has ran away from the most powerful witches and warlocks no matter what it is given. Who do you think you are, rodent, that you think you can just take and barely give?”
Tommy whimpers in pain at the Warlock’s tight and painful grip on his stomach. Dream makes it seem like it was simple. He made it seem like giving his magic, which was expendable as it was plentiful, for some food crumbs scraped off the table and only meager drops of water was enough to fill him, to be enough to keep him in a cottage that mistreated him anyway. He has no to give because there is nothing to take.
Tommy cannot stand the mistreatment that him and his fellow familiars get, it is basically a crime. They get fed and watered and given a small, bare minimum bed as it is all that is specified to be given in order to be humane, to stay in the favor of the law. But it isn’t enough.
It wasn’t enough to be fed only the table scraps. It wasn’t enough to only be given the last dregs of water that was brought in from the well.
They needed more. And Tommy always took more, no matter of what it was. If he thought he needed more of it, he got more of it.
For example, Tommy needs more freedom.
‘How does he get more of it?’ you ask?
Well he takes his teeth… and swiftly (because anything less from him would be sad) takes a chunk out of the handler who is mishandling him.
Dream yowled in pain as blood dribbles down his forearm. Tommy’s being dropped suddenly and quickly (or however quick he can be in this state) scurries off into the woods.
-*-
Tommy is still trying to run or at least quickly (he still has that Weakness clinging to him as well as the glass in his skin) stumbling through the brush of the woods before he’s suddenly stumbling into a small clearing.
Tommy sniffs the air, the smell of his former witch far behind him as he smells wild berries and flowers like daisies and poppies and other flowers of similar kind. He also smells the amazing smell of watermelon, something unusual in this oak and pine tree forest.
What Tommy doesn’t smell with his nose, he can see with his eyes. There’s a small cottage in the middle of the clearing with a tiny garden in the front and a horse stable that just seemed to be just… attached? to the back.
Tommy scurries to the cottage, fully planning to attack whatever is ripe in the garden, he might even go searching for the watermelon he smelled earlier.
Timmy’s starting to feel the full brunt force of the pain from his paw and other places as he limps his way into the garden, flinching every time he has to put pressure onto that paw.
It’s like every time he walks, the shard gets deeper and deeper, and he’s considering just plopping down into the middle of the crops and taking a snooze for his health. A health snooze.
The world seems to get fuzzy as he slinks into the garden, and suddenly, his ‘health snooze’ is something that his body is agreeing to, as if it didn’t know that Tommy was being funny. It knew! It was just being annoying because of the chasing and potion.
Tommy couldn’t sleep in some rando’s garden! He was a big man and could wait until he at least found a hollow tree to move into for the night! But it didn’t seem like his body was agreeing. The fuzzy world got fuzzier, his eyes started to drift close, and suddenly his hearing was muffled, though it couldn’t mask the distinct sound of as door opening.
He felt footsteps pound into the ground as he seemed to fade from consciousness. He hoped the footsteps didn’t notice him, he didn’t feel like waking up.
-*-
Wilbur never thought he’d find a familiar deep in his garden, a powerful one at that. The raccoon in question is snoozing away right next to his beets, blood wetting and matting his fur from cuts that Wilbur didn’t want to know from where.
He bends down, inspecting the poor thing collapsed in his garden before rushing back inside to his father, who was on a joint call with him and his brother, saying, “Hey, I’m gonna cal you guys back, this little familiar literally just dropped into my garden and is showing no signs of waking up.”
His brother, Techno, huffs back, “Wilbur, not to make this another Ranboo situation, please.”
“Shut up, Techno, I have no idea of what you are talking about.”
His father (Bless him) responds with the patience of an angel, “Of course, Wil. We’ll call you back later. Keep it warm, I hear it’s getting colder over there.”
“Yes, Father,” Wilbur responds before he hangs up.
He rushes into the kitchen with a renewed vigor, shuffling aside only bottles of cleaner and some old potions he needed to throw out to look for a first-aid kit. When he didn’t find any in the kitchen, he searched his bathroom, pushing past rolls of toilet paper and cleaner in there as well. When he finally found the kit, he held it up and made a noise of triumph before rushing back to his garden.
The raccoon familiar still wasn’t even near conscious when Wilbur was back outside, shaky breaths coming out of its nose. Wilbur then realized that he couldn’t just patch up the Raccoon outside, he’d have to do it in the house. So, Wilbur scurried back inside, placed the kit on the coffee table before going back outside to pick the familiar up.
The raccoon whined and whimpered as Wilbur picked him up as gentle as he could, and Wilbur shushed him, whispered apologies to him as he sat down. He placed the Raccoon into his lap as he reached over for the First-Aid kit, untouched since the last time he used it.
Actually this reminds him of Ranboo.
The memory of a little hedgehog scurrying around with a cast on his little legs as he inspects the wounds on the little raccoon made him puff up in protectiveness for the little things. Why Spell Castors decide to not treat the ones who give them the magic they need wrong eludes him, but Wilbur knows one thing. He will treat every familiar with the respect they deserve. It’s at least the bare minimum of what they deserve for giving them what is basically a Spell Castor’s livelihood.
He shakes his head as he gets a wince out of the raccoon under him as he pokes at wounds before finally coming in with a tweezer to get those small shards of glass out. He should’ve made a potion to feed to the familiar, but he decides that hell do that when he’s finished. Yes! He’ll do that, he’ll give the raccoon a nice meal with a healing potion to wash it down and close those wounds.
When Wilbur’s done with the glass, he moves onto the cuts and scrapes. He puts rubbing alcohol onto the cuts and wraps them in gauze. When he’s finished, he lays the Raccoon onto a pillow he has on the couch, covered in at least two pillows because his father was right, it was getting chillier by the minute.
-*-
When Tommy wakes up, he immediately wants to curse whoever woke him up, as he is immensely comfortable in his position under the blankets that smell of cinnamon. So comfortable, in fact, that he almost forgot to be suspicious of the cinnamon smelling sheets that dream never EVER smelled of (He usually smelled of blood and rot).
Almost.
He jerks up, still as a raccoon, with an alarmed chitter, his arms and back hurt but the feel better than before. He lifts up his paws to see them bandaged and he knows his back is the same. Scrambling off of the couch those blankets sat on top of. He falls onto the floor with an ‘umph’ in pain before he’s up again, sniffing his was to the door.
That was.. until he smelled the most heavenly smell known to man, Tomato Soup.
He let his legs guide him to the kitchen, almost floating towards the smell. He rounds the corner where he can smell the delicious scent of tomatoes and wanders into what must be a kitchen, given there’s a big pot of tomatoes just stewing away to perfection.
Inside the kitchen is a human, who’s obviously a witch looking at his tool belt, who is stirring away at a cauldron that Tommy hadn’t noticed in the fat center of the room. The pot smelled of watermelon (which is most definitely clashing with the magnificent smell of tomatoes, Tommy will tell you that much) and from the underlying scent of nether wart, he could tell you that a healing potion was being brewed in that cauldron.
Now that Tommy is focusing on his surroundings, he notices a huge, gaping window that is decorated with a large beam in the middle, kind of giving the illusion of a perch for a bird. The stove was huge, like 3 people could cook a 3 course meal on it all at once and still have space. The sink was piled with dishes that some gnats have started to pay some attention to, and thee counters were covered in different potion ingredients.
Tommy wanders closer towards the cauldron, trying to see the face of his captor (or savior, who knows). He gets to sniff his feet before his captor/savior looks down at him, grinning.
“Hello, precious! How are you feeling?” He asks, his voice honeyed.
Tommy only chitters in response, leaning onto his hind legs to get a better look at the man.
He has circular brown glasses that have the nose grips on them, his linen shirt is stain with red and pink stains, no doubt from the potion and Soup. His pants are just plain old polyester though enchanted with heat resistance as are his leather shoes. His hair was a coffee brown and his eyes a pretty hazel.
He reaches down and pulls Tommy up into his arms, Tommy lets him, only because he didn’t feel like putting up a fight.
He’s set on the man’s shoulders, chittering at the height, Dream never let him climb anywhere, he wasn’t even allowed into the kitchen.
“My name is Wilbur,” The man speaks, “I picked you up from my garden and packed you up. I wanted to feed you and give you a little pick me up before you decide to go. I hope you like tomato soup?” He asks.
Tommy chitters in excitement and tries his best to bring his hand together into a clap. He LOVES Tomato Soup! It was his favorite dish that his mom loved to make for him and he’ll never forget how warm it always made him to eat and reminisce on memories.
The man—Wilbur— laughs, “Excited? Well when you shift back and I finish this potion you can eat it, maybe even tell me what end you up in my garden in the first place?”
Tommy tries to nod (because of the bandages), while he doesn’t really trust this man enough, he will tell him how he got here, and to warn him about Dream. Because while Dream is not powerful in magic, he is strong as hell.
Tommy climbs his way down from his place on Wilbur’s shoulder, feeling his nails catch on loose threads front the shirt and dropping himself onto the tiles below.
He remembers how he felt blocked when he tried to shift earlier in Dream’s grasp. While that could’ve been just because Dream was holding him, he really hoped that he wasn’t just losing the ability, that would be just outright concerning.
He still needs to be able to talk as a human, you know?
He watches as Wilbur turned around to check on the Soup, smiling to himself as he turns off the fire and walks over to the cabinet, opening it to grab to bowls and walks over to the stove, snatching up a soup ladle as he does.
“Just in time! Right as a finish the healing pot as well.” Wilbur turns to Tommy, “Well, come on! I want to hear this daring story of how you evaded certain death.”
Tommy purrs in agreement and scampers over to where Wilbur is walking towards a table.
He cannot wait to dive down into this.