cw for a pretty bad friendship by using blackmail

It's been a few hours since Dan had found out Wilbur was in a very toxic, for lack of a better term, friendship. Of course, the musician being how he is, never told anyone about it, because he thought he was strong enough to handle it.

It didn't excuse when Dan was accidentally added to a direct message group between Wilbur and the person, without Wilbur noticing until he finally confronted his friend.

Days upon days of stuff that was telling Wilbur how he needed to keep in contact with them or else they'd take Loneson. Dan knew how important Loneson was to Wilbur. The small shark plush helped his friend through everything. He hasn't seen the guitarist without it, ever since they met back in high school.

The worst was the musician's responses. He had practically been forced to write essays, multiple pages of things saying how he was sorry and how he assured them that everything was his fault just to keep the friendship. Just to keep Loneson safe.

Wilbur was anxiously curled up in his bed, hands wringing together when Dan pushed open the door. The musician immediately stopped upon hearing the slight creaking of his door, turning his head towards Dan.

"You good there..?" He asked quietly, watching the man with a curious glance seeing him keep sparing worried looks at his phone.

"Just fine and dandy, Dan!"

"... I saw the messages, Wilbur. With Jared?"

It was silent, for a few moments. Dan was worried he did something wrong, until-

"I.. I gotta keep checking for a new message, h...he- I mean.. If I don't message, they're.. they're gonna take Loneson! You saw what they were saying! I can't-" Wilbur whimpered out, motioning towards the shark plush that was sitting next to him on the bed. Oh. This was worse than he thought.

And looking back up at Wil's tearful eyes when he was finally told that this behavior wasn't normal, that he needed to leave, finally broke his friend.

"You- you need to leave that Jared guy, man! This isn't healthy!" Dan said with a slight raise of tone, making the grey-texted man cower back onto his bed, hugging the shark plush close to him. He immediately dropped all the yelling and put his hands to his side, sighing.

"I'm.. sorry for snapping." He slightly inched towards his friend, still giving him room to run if he needed to, seeing how frightened he looked.

"It's fine." Wilbur replied, voice muffled by the shark plush that was sitting underneath his chin. His gaze averted from Dan's own. Shit. He knew Wilbur tended to avoid the problem when he was upset.

"If you want, I can sit by you and help you leave him-" He was interrupted by a loud muffled sob and the man shuffling around even more.

"I-I can't just- he's- I can't lose Loneson. P-please, Dan." The musician wept into the plush.

"..Who said any of us would let Loneson be taken?" Dan said, immediately going to sit next to his friend. The other looked up slightly, feeling the bed dip at the weight of someone else getting on, and he scooted a bit closer to the red-texted one.

"I-I guess that's right." He shrugged. It was obvious that he wanted to move on from the conversation, but this was something that couldn't just be slid away with one conversation. The peaceful silence between the two, that had almost ended with Wilbur falling asleep on Dan's shoulder, was interrupted by a loud Discord ping.

---

wilburrrrrrrrrr

answer >:(

---

The way Wilbur flinched immediately made his heart shatter. The Brit's hand immediately flew for the phone, but the other shook his head and reached his hand out to grab the device instead. An eyebrow was curiously raised at him, but the curious glance was replaced with widened eyes when the red-texted man immediately began replying to Jared.

---

fuck off

this isn't wil btw

just felt the need to say that

what

??? wdym

not saying who i am but i've seen the shit you've sent

contact wil again and we can get a restraining order on you

taking this a bit 2 far bud idk what you've seen

you know how important the plush is to him.

---

And his hand finally went for the block button.

It was a moment of silence after Dan finally hit the block button, Wilbur's breath hitching, before-

"..He.. He's gone?"

More tears welled up in his eyes.

"Yeah."

He set the phone down and rested a hand in Wilbur's hair.

"..I can't promise things are gonna immediately get better for you, Wil, but.."

His shoulder shook from the man that was now sobbing onto it.

"You'll be safe. I- We promise."