We Could Be Heroes, Big Man

04*

  It seemed Tommy was just going to keep running into inconvenience after inconvenience upon coming to this school. As much as he was grateful to be surrounded by people like him, he also hated it. He had a feeling they knew more about him than they were supposed to.

  How had he come to this solution? Tubbo had slipped up, asking if he had really exploded one of his foster homes.

  "How did you know that?"

  Tubbo shut his mouth. "Just. . . Just a rumor."

  "That's an oddly specific rumor that just so happens to be true." Tommy scoffed. "Is it really just a rumor?"

  "Yes."

  Tommy didn't believe him, but decided to let it slide for now. "I didn't mean to do it. Like Bad said, I had one of those emotional break outs and it hit something in the attic of the house. Why it exploded is beyond me."

  "I think it's so cool."

  "Huh?" Tommy narrowed his eyes at Tubbo. Why was exploding his foster home cool? It was one of the only good foster homes he had been in and he ruined it by killing one of them. It wasn't cool. In fact, it was horrible.

  "I mean your power. It's really cool." Tubbo explained.

  Oh.

  "I guess." Tommy shrugged. "It's dangerous though. I've killed people with it."

  "We all have." Tubbo said casually, sitting up from his stomach to his knees on his bed. "They don't send all, what does Ms. Puffy call us. . . Gifted here. There's a lot of us out there, but there's no way we could all fit into one school. At least in England."

  Tommy paused, confused by this new information. Did Deo, his original foster care worker, know of his powers? Could it be that there were never any plans to send him here? Not until recently?

  "The way Phil described it, only kids who have caused serious havoc come here, or are really sensitive to serious havoc." He cleared his throat. "I came here really young, but it was my brother who was the really messed up one. You saw that yesterday."

  Tommy nodded. He didn't like Schlatt. He was sure he wasn't the only one.

  "See, we were both adopted out of the system. And Schlatt being three years older than me, was adopted first. Basically, our parents were having kids to give away to those who couldn't have kids."

  Tommy furrowed his eyebrows. Surely their parents were gifted as well, did they have any idea what they were doing?

  "I know I know." Tubbo giggled. "From what I know about our bio parents, our dad was the gifted one. Our mom was normal, but she didn't know about our dad. So when they found out about my brother. . . Freezing our adoptive parents to death, it didn't go over well in their relationship. We were both sent here and, yeah."

  "So you've been here all your life?" Tommy asked.

  "Basically. I get to leave occasionally on field trips and sometimes, Phil will set up some type of sports game against another prep school to make us look more like a normal school." Tubbo smiled.

  "I learn more about this school every day." Tommy smiled. "It's different. A good different."

—

  It was Tommy's third week at this school, and he had finally started branching out. While Tubbo was off doing his own things—Tommy assumed his experiments—Tommy ventured off to explore the school and talk to others.

  Someone he had taken quite an interest to was Technoblade. Phil had described him as the top student and one of his sons. Every time he passed the library—if sparring lessons weren't going on—Techno was in there. Sometimes he was reading, sometimes he looking for a new book, and sometimes he was in there with Wilbur and the two were talking.