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Something’s pulling him back.
Steve isn’t sure— what , exactly; all he knows is that all night, every night, he wakes up next to a rift to the Upside Down. The same rift, always right outside of where the trailer park used to be, right outside where Eddie’s trailer used to be. He wakes up alone. Sometimes his scars twinge (they’re already healed, and everyone finds it relieving but him), sometimes his ears ring in reminiscence of heavy metal. Most of the time, though, there’s a gentle hum and the flapping of wings as demobats circle him.
The first time it happened, he thought he was going to die in the same way Eddie did. (And that—that still pains him in such a way that it threatens to choke him dead . ) Yet, they only circled him, one occasionally landing to curl around his neck. Protectively. Possessively. As if he raised them the same way Dustin raised Dart. They'll even drift over him when he wakes from a nightmare screaming.
It’s fucking—in all sense of the word— weird .
He doesn’t tell anyone at first. Not Dustin, even though he knows it’ll break his heart; not Nancy, although he’s pretty sure she knows something’s wrong; not even Robin. He wakes up, starry-eyed and broken but never alone, and he feels tethered. Bonded. Head rolling to the side, a small smile, looking at a face next to him bathed in a morning sun, type of tethered. Except now he’s staring into a pit, heart constricting, watching as monsters pull themselves out by sharpened claws and wings.
Things are finally getting better . Well, as better as things can possibly be. He doesn't want to drag everyone back down, tell them something's wrong, and have another potential loss break them all apart even further.
Max is still in the hospital: Lucas and El by her side every hour of every day. Dustin is still grieving (and the thought of Eddie makes his heart twist in something akin to violence ). They can't fight again.
Not now.
He can, because, fuck, that's all he knows how to do right now, isn't it? Swinging a bat or fist, screaming until his throat is raw, feeling furious, angry, bitter (numb, empty, so fucking alone). He's there, he's there for Robin, for Dustin, for Lucas, for Max, he's there for all of them when they need him, putting on a brave face and holding them tight, but fuck . When they're gone? When he's back in his beaten house, parents still in fuck-all Hawaii?
Loneliness has forever been his Achilles Heel.
Steve forces his tired eyes open, inky black gracing his vision, gentle chittering all-encompassing. He isn’t surprised to see demo-dogs and bats alike huddled around him a few feet away, isn't surprised by the now-familiar ache in his jaw—somehow knocked out of place ever since the Russians. His stomach twists uncomfortably still, bites twinging, memories bleeding into one another in snaps. Flashes.
They’re no less vivid, even when he shuts his eyes, even when he grips his nailbat like a lifeline.
The pain doesn't leave him either. It sticks to him like an old lover instead.
“I thought,” he wheezes out, and getting to his feet is a harder task than he’d thought—stumbling rather than rising. They won’t approach him; haven’t—not since he’d woken up hissing and thrashing like one of them the first time around. “I thought I told you to leave —” Leave him, leave Hawkins, leave everything. Go back to their not-quite-right world and let everything else heal .
But he knows they won’t. Even though Vecna’s gone, even though they’d all made fucking sure of that—hacking at him time and time again for what he did to Eddie, wishing they could’ve burned him to ash when they’d found out about Max. They stay because the rifts stay. They stay because the Mindflayer is still twisting them each like puppets. Steve just—he doesn’t understand why it isn’t working when it comes to him.
He should be dead.
He should’ve been dead weeks ago.
He should’ve been ripped apart, flesh torn, blood oozing, just like Eddie. A selfish part of him wishes that was what happened. A horrible, mind-numbing part of him wishes he got to die instead, to switch places with the boy who deserved far more than he believed. Steve doesn’t think about it; it occupies his every waking thought. Eddie, Eddie, Eddie . On loop, without fail, and a wish that he were here, or that Steve was with him so at least, at fuckin' least , he wouldn’t feel so lonely.
“Just leave me alone,” he whispers, voice cracking at the edges. A demodog croons at him, voice chittering and high and unbearably gentle , even as he gives his bat a half-hearted swing. He didn’t even know they had it in them to be so. It doesn’t back up, doesn’t leave, pressing its head into his hip instead.
Steve should kill it. It’ll turn into something bigger, something vicious, and then—who knows what it’ll do. Who it’ll hurt. But, he can’t find it in himself to do so, instead pressing the palm of his hand to the top of slick skin. Another murmur. He lets out a heavy sigh, grip on his bat growing lax. “If you hurt any of my friends,” he tells it sternly, or well, he tries to—it comes out more tired than anything, “I won’t hesitate to kill every one of you. Got it?”
The widening of its flowering jaws almost sounds like an agreement.
It’s when he manages to wander back home does he see more shadows than there should be in his empty house. The sun barely stretches over the horizon. It barely shows the damage done.
The closer to the door he gets, the more he hears the franticness of several voices shouting over one another, each saying all too much all at once but with one thing in common: his name . His gut roils with it. Whether it be from guilt or from anxiety, he isn’t sure, but it shakes him from the ground to the skin stretched around his eyes. It burns. It’s eating him alive, right where it’s nestled against his heart.
Steve opens the door as quietly as he can, but even that seems to be too much, too there in the open to be dismissed. Nancy comes barreling in with her shotgun cocked and aimed only moments later before skidding to a stop. He doesn’t even flinch. Weariness wears too heavy on his shoulders for him to feel anything but exhaustion. “Hey, Nance.”
“Where the fuck were you,” she hisses immediately, and he almost laughs. Almost. It’s when her shoulders slouch and begin to shake, eyes squinted and tearing, does his stomach drop all the way to the floor.
“Nance—”
“We came here,” she spits out, cutting him off, and good god he’s only heard her sound like that once before. Bullshit . “We came here because we were worried, because you hadn’t been talking to anybody , Steve, and you were gone—” Her chest heaves. A sob rips itself out of her throat. Robin comes rushing in along with Jonathan, Dustin, and Lucas. Each wears different shades of distress. “You were gone , Steve. We thought—”
Yeah. He really is bullshit.
“Hey,” he says gently, instinctively pulling her close. She goes willingly, slumping into his arms. Dustin runs up next, gripping Steve’s still-sensitive sides harshly. Of course he holds him, too. Then Robin, Lucas, and even Jonathan, until they’re all forming a protective circle around him, shoulders tensed and ready. Ready to tear into anything that gets near. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I just went for a walk, alright?” At Robin’s disbelieving look, he adds: “I couldn’t sleep. Thought I could wear myself out a bit.”
Dustin hits him, although the movement itself holds no malice. “Write a note or something, then, asshole,” he mumbles into his shirt. Steve lets go of Nancy to hold him with both arms, until Dustin is completely wrapped up. “I thought—” A heavy intake of air. “I thought I might’ve lost another—” His fists curl, “brother,” and that’s whispered so lightly, so brokenly, that Steve almost misses it.
He doesn’t. Of course he doesn’t.
It’s Dustin Henderson.
“ Dustin ,” he says, a bit sharply if only to get his attention, and the boy’s head snaps up. He takes the hand gripped in his shirt and places it over his heart. It beats steadily as he inhales. Exhales. “I’m right here.”
A sob, and Steve holds him through it. Holds him, holds Lucas, who starts to shake off to the side, tears brimming at the corners of his eyes. And, well, when Robin and Nancy and fucking Jonathan Byers all go to hold him , Steve lets it happen. He lets it happen, tears slipping from the corners of his eyes with the rest of them.
“I’m sorry,” he says again, quieter, and it’s not just for not leaving a note.
I’m sorry for not telling you; I’m sorry for the fact that you might just lose me anyway; I’m sorry that I won’t be here when you wake up because I’ll be right back at that fucking rift; I’m sorry that I couldn’t save them, Max and Eddie; I’m sorry for sitting here, crying, when I’m supposed to be the strong one for all of you.
He tightens his hold, even when Dustin’s breathing steadies, even when Lucas has stopped shaking. “I’m here,” he says again with a small smile, wiping furiously at his eyes. Robin lets out a small huff of amusement. “I’m right here.”
“Stop repeating yourself. It's annoying,” Dustin says weakly, and that has everyone cracking wobbly grins. Steve ruffles the mess of curls that aren’t, for once, covered by his thinking cap.
“Yeah, well,” Steve says, heart twisting even as he allows himself a smile, “just gotta have you know that I'm not leaving your ass in the dust. Not going anywhere, Dusty-bun."
It earns him a very well-deserved hit to the arm, but the tension in the room eases. Nancy lets her gun fall to her side, Robin huffs out a breath. Everyone smiles, and Steve continues to pester each and every one of them with words of reassurance.
I'm staying right here.
I'm not leaving.
Yeah, yeah, you can chain me to the couch if that's what calms you down, or you can trust me. I've been babysitting your asses for how long now?
Sinclair. Lucas, I'm okay. Alright? No wounds, nothin'.
I'm fine, I promise.
Each lie tastes sweet as vanilla.
-
Erica's in the living room when everyone shoots up, eyes wild, at a small noise happening right outside the door. She doesn't move. Something in her tells her to stay still, freeze, and it won't see you. Another part of her simply reassures that it's just an animal.
Steve's the only one who doesn't look up from where his eyes are swimming through the television. Dark circles hang under his eyes. He looks as if he hasn't slept in days—not well, at least.
She tells him as much. His response is a bitter laugh that makes her stomach twist.
"That obvious, kid?" He asks her, voice a low murmur as Nancy and Robin stalk out to investigate. Jonathan only slumps against the kitchen cabinets, head in his hands as Will naps next to him, paying them no mind.
She shifts. Dustin and Lucas let out an equally timed snore that would've been funny under any other circumstances. None of them had been sleeping well. Erica, at least, had the excuse of memorizing comic books.
For Max , she'd told Steve one night, when her brother was still off in the hospital, that buzzed-headed girl right in tow.
Max was—well, she was . Certainly. Erica hadn't exactly been the fondest of her at first, because she does care about her brother, and seeing him broken-hearted made her want to shake the person who did it to him, yell at them to see how good of a person he was. But Lucas had told her about Max's situation, and then she had sacrificed herself for them all, and yeah. Erica would've liked to get to know her better.
It was a stupid, hopeful thought. That if she read those comics out loud, the comics Max loved so dearly, that maybe it would create a flicker. Some form of life. Something to show that she was there with them.
Steve had just wrapped her up in his arms like he always did with Dustin or Lucas or any of them, really, and held her tight. Told her it wasn't stupid, told her that he's sure Max would appreciate it, that she can hear her—all in that soothing voice that made Erica want to cry.
She did. He only held her closer.
He's her brother, is what she's getting at here. Babysitter felt too bland for how much he made her laugh and grin and scoff all at once. For all the shit they had gone through together. A brother felt right. And she's pretty sure Lucas felt the same way, as did Dustin, as did Max.
Seeing him now, curled up into himself, and lying about how he was okay, he was alright, he was there : it made her worry. Erica doesn't like worrying.
She figures things out. She pushes them forward. She gets to the bottom of what is happening and makes sure it's okay before letting it go.
This is different. This is something she doesn't know how to fix, or change, or make sure it's okay.
"Yeah," she says anyway. "You look like shit."
A half-hearted shrug. "No sleep will do that to you," he says wearily. "Which you should be doing. Why the hell are you even up so early, anyway?" He looks pointedly to wear Dustin and Lucas are curled around each other protectively. "They're asleep."
"It's 7 a.m.," she retorts. "And you scared the living hell out of them when you waltzed in like a dead man." You scared me. "Besides," Erica continues, a bit uneasy when Steve stares at her, squinted, for a bit too long. She swears she sees something underneath his cheekbones move. "I can't sleep either. Early-riser and all that."
Finally, the uneasiness of his silence cracks, face splitting into a grin. (Erica doesn't linger on the fact that the word split seems a bit too accurate: his cheeks curve, his teeth glint, and although it's a regular, normal, Steve-like smile… it just seems off.) "You've been hanging out with Robin too much," Steve jokes, and she barely contains the sigh of relief bubbling up in her chest.
Scratch it: she's only being paranoid. He's still Steve Harrington, just a little less awake and a lot more tired.
She could say the same for the rest of them, too.
"Yeah, well, you've been hanging out with the monsters in the woods," Erica mutters, and something flashes in Steve's eyes so violently that she jerks back with a flinch. "Joking. It was a bad joke. Steve…?"
He blinks. "Sorry," he murmurs after the silence stretches for too long. "Just—really bad headache for a minute, Erica America. Haven't been sleeping well."
"You said that already."
Another slow blink, and Steve's pressing his fingers to the bridge of his nose as if everything around him is—too much. "Sorry," Steve says again. "Jesus."
"How about you try and get some sleep?" Erica suggests. It's molasses slow. As if calming a spooked animal, baring its teeth and ready to bolt.
Or bite.
"Maybe," he says, and then Nancy comes in with several slices of old pizza, and Erica's too distracted by how hungry she suddenly is to see the way Steve's face shudders closed, jaw working back and forth, back and—
Forth.
-
Opening his eyes again was definitely a surprise, to say the very least.
Eddie's pretty sure, just a little bit positive, that he had indeed kicked the bucket. He'd cut the ropes, tried to give Henderson a bit more time , and he had gotten mailed to death by hundreds of little stupid bats with razor tails. And, you know, he was pretty damn sure he succeeded in that, too, when they all dropped dead around him and Dustin was alive.
Except now, he's waking up, alive , ass-flat in the Upside Down.
Which—in lack of better words, sucks.
It really fuckin' sucks.
He has to swallow down the bile that's gathering in his throat at the realization that he was left behind. Body in the dirt, everyone stepping over him to get home safe. They hadn't even tried to grab his body, or bury him, or do anything of the sort. And although, realistically, he knows that they might not have made it out if they grabbed him—that was the whole point of him sacrificing himself —the thought hurts. Sure, he'd expected to die young and alone, but he hadn't thought he'd be left alone to die.
Especially not by the people he had started to consider friends.
It's a struggle for him not to cry at that point, inhaling sticky and thick air over and over and fucking over in an attempt to catch his breath. In an attempt to try and calm himself down.
He ends up crying anyway: wailing and screaming inside the trailer that's his but not-quite-his as he tries to contain everything, everything, everything from exploding further. His limbs kick out to their own accord; his hands fly to his hair, gripping it so tight that he can feel some strands pull free; his body loses control along with his emotions.
Some quiet part of his grief-addled brain supplies that crying should hurt . He should be hurting physically along with the pain that comes with the loops of anxiety and despair. Tears glob down his cheeks, his ribs expand with each gulp of air, his throat is raw from how violently he is sobbing, and that is the only part of him that hurts, and it's not right .
Eddie was thrown around, torn to pieces by little rows of razorblade teeth, back skinned as it happened. Each inhale of his chest should feel like fire climbing up his lungs. Each movement he makes should feel like hell.
He died for fucks sake (and that almost throws him into a panic again): everything should hurt.
It doesn't.
Instinctively, Eddie releases his grip on his hair to clutch at his sides. What he expects is something mind-numbing: the salt of his sweat-dabbed hands stinging against open wounds. Instead, the pads of his fingers brush against what feel like newly-healed scars. Shivers race up his spine. The tears stop, leaving him hiccuping in confusion when his palms come up dirty and not bloody in the slightest.
He is completely, and perfectly fine, and isn't that all kinds of fucked up?
He has to take another shuddering breath before he finds the courage to sit up. And he does in fact manage to, all graceful-like, except that's a lie and it's a bit too much like a hurl, and Eddie almost finds himself face-down in rot if not for the way his arms fly out to catch him at the last second.
"Fuckin'—" Eddie heaves himself up again, slower, and he manages to stagger to his feet without tripping or feeling nauseous. A small victory. At least, in terms of trying to fight off the world's worst hangover: supernatural-fied. If only Wayne could see him now.
Wayne.
Well, shit, Eddie's alive isn't he? Hopefully it hasn't been years since him waking up, and Wayne doesn't think him dead. Maybe he can go find the others, too—throw his hands up in the air and say Hey! I'm actually not dead, but I appreciate the sentiment of your mourning. Can we please get pizza?
Jesus Christ, pizza sounds so fucking good right now.
He risks a glance towards the trailer only to find it eerily the same, if not just a bit more broken down. No monsters, no red lightning, no weird Vecna motherfucker invading his head. All signs point to good to go.
Eddie doesn't miss another beat, scrambling to where the broken gate opens, and only pausing once he gets to the door. He can feel the rift hum. There's a soft pulse right under his skin, only growing whenever he steps closer. Right on top of his shoulder blades. The skin stretches when he reaches for the janky handle, almost splitting if Eddie stretched a bit farther, a constant stream of just a little farther , feeling just on the edge of relief —
The doorknob twists—
And Eddie lets out a screech that bursts his own eardrums, chucking the nearest thing—a board, a stupid wooden board —at the fucking bat sitting right on top of his couch. It misses by several feet.
Look, there's a reason Eddie found love in music and DnD and not sports: he sucks at them. Not counting his asthma either, which is also a pain in his ass, but he digresses. Eddie Munson sucks at sports. Whoopee. It's never been sent back to bite him as badly as now.
Except—the bat just seems to look at him, completely unimpressed. His skin prickles in embarrassment. Embarrassment . Because of a weird monster bat. What the fuck even is his life anymore?
It chirps at him, then, not going forward to eat him dead like he'd thought. Again. It almost sounds like a greeting. He wants to throw it against the pale sidings of his walls until it stops moving.
"I hate you," he tells it. It's flower jaws open in a yawn, and he debates kicking it. Hard. "I hate you, I hate this, and I'm going to leave now—" Eddie gestures to the giant split in his roof. It's grown since his time asleep, and he really rather not think about why that is. "And hope that superpower girl they always talk about explodes you with her fucking mind."
He's losing his fucking mind, conversing with this thing instead of getting out of there right now —
It crawls forward, effectively blocking his exit, and Eddie flinches. A low noise bleeds from its throat, not at all violent, almost soothing-like, a barely-there question, and he has this weird urge to respond . To tell it it's okay. That he's okay. And it's so sudden, so sharp, that he almost keels over with the force of it, opening his mouth instinctively.
But the sound that comes out isn't anything he's ever made before.
It's inhuman. It's high-pitched, it's harsh, it rips out of his throat in a noise just like the monster in front of him. A shriek, a chitter, a howl .
What the fuck?
Eddie clamps a hand over his mouth, eyes wide. "What the fuck," he whispers through his fingers. "Oh my god, ohhh my god, what the fuck—what did you do to me? What the fuck— "
His breaths come out harsh, hands waving wildly in order to calm himself down. Another quiet noise. He's grateful that this time, at least, he doesn't respond. Even when it tries again, flowering jaws opening wide, fluttering, clawed wings clicking ever closer. Eddie squeezes his eyes closed—shaking.
Then come the images.
They're small, at first, before ever-growing. Scenes of Hawkins torn to pieces, split to four; a swarm of demobats, shrieking, wings shattering throughout the night; himself.
Himself, right now, eyes shut, fists clenched against the fabric of his ripped Hellfire T-shirt.
And, before he can open his eyes, the scene splits to Steve.
Steve Harrington, sitting right on top of his trailer—Eddie Munson's goddamn trailer, split right down the middle—legs swinging out. The rift echoes beneath him, the one that's right above Eddie right now, right fucking now , and Steve's looking down at it with a faraway look. He's glassy-eyed, whites red-rimmed as if he's been crying for a while now. And if that isn't surprising enough, there's a bat wrapped right around his wrist.
"Eddie ," Steve murmurs, and his spine straightens inevitably. He keeps fucking saying it too, over and over again, whispered like a prayer, head bowed and hands clasped: his name. It would make him insane, if not for the already lapse of lunacy he's faced.
Then it just. Snaps back. Right to the present, as if Eddie didn't just see Steve Harrington grapple his own fingers until the knuckles had turned white, saying his name like he was mourning him. Eddie Munson. Him.
Weirdest day of his goddamned life.
"Okay," he chokes out. "Okay, why—why did you show me, well, me , and then Steve? Why'd you show me Steve Harrington—why—" He swallows harshly, hands flapping wildly against his sides once more. "Better question: how . How did you—What the fuck is happening to me?"
The last part is mostly whispered to himself, but the bat clicks something again. But this time, this time, there aren't any images to go along with it, but words. Well, a word. Or more accurately: a name. One that Eddie's heard thousands of times before and has said thousands more, whether it be from his campaign with the kids, or hidden deep within his notes. His joints lock with it, bones frigid, blood frozen solid, because it's directed at him in the same way Steve had wished.
"Kas."
And it's then, that a sharpened tooth pierces Eddie's bottom lip in semblance of a kiss.
-
At first, Robin hadn't really believed Erica when the girl had come up to her, fingers wrapping around her paled sleeve like a lifeline, whispering that Steve isn't acting himself. That he's acting weird . And, you know, after spending a year or so with the guy, Robin can say wholeheartedly that Steve is always —without fail—acting weird. She has a video on her shitty little camcorder (that she had saved up for months to get) of him dancing around in his Scoops uniform, drunk off of cheap whiskey.
They were both drunk off of cheap whiskey, actually, but whatever. Robin wasn't the one who decided to get into short-shorts and scream-sing Tears for Fears, now was she?
Besides the point.
Point being : there was a moment where she'd just thought Erica was mistaking the randomness of Steve's oddities for something else. But then she'd seen the worry in her eyes, the tenseness in her shoulders, and for a minute—Erica looked just like Robin felt the first time she tried to sleep with the lights off.
Fucking terrified.
And all the pieces sorta clicked together after that, too. Everyone was still grieving Eddie and the loss of Max, but the ones taking the hardest had to be Dustin, Lucas and, well, Steve. That paired with the fact that his parents never called the station, or what was left of it, to see if he was okay, never even came home to check; the weird morning and late-night walks, and everything makes so much sense that it throws Robin for a fucking loop .
She hadn't noticed. And that hurts far more than the idea of going back to the Upside Down to finish off whatever else is down there.
Which is how she finds herself pretending to be asleep on the couch as Steve slips out of his house for around the fun hours of fuck-all. She peeks an eye open—she's the only one still in his mansion of a house right now, everyone else having gone home, no one else having parents who didn't really give a shit. So here she is.
Robin doesn't dare move until Steve's completely out the door. He's slinking in an odd sort of way, as if unaware of his surroundings. Which—yeah, okay it's odd , seeing as how he lives here. Point to Erica. She flings the covers off, and, as quietly as she can, opens to the door and creeps after him. And, somehow , she doesn't manage to break anything in the process. Or trip over anything.
Thank god.
If Steve notices her relief only several feet behind him, he doesn't notice. Just keeps swaying, feet moving in unnaturally smooth steps. Even stranger: he barely makes a noise doing it. It's as if the ground beneath him swallows all the noise he makes.
Then a low noise from the underbrush, and Steve's head fucking— snaps towards it. Tense. And Robin gets it, she understands, because she tenses too, but Steve doesn't look scared. Doesn't look ready to fight. He looks like he's about to leap towards it, his jaw working slightly, and that's when she realizes Steve Harrington looks so incredibly hungry .
She blinks, and he's gone.
A squeal from the side, high-pitched, gurgled only a second later, and Robin almost leaps three feet in the air. Almost bolts right then and there, back to the safety of Steve’s house, back to her home away from—well, home . But then she remembers that said owner of said house just fucking bolted into the middle of the woods, probably to go after whatever had rustled under the bushes, and Robin would rather die than let him face whatever monster it is all alone.
She fucking refuses, okay? He dies, she dies; he goes, she goes; he fights, she fucking fights with him.
There’s no Robin Buckley without Steve Harrington—not anymore. That’s not how it works. Not how it has worked since Scoops Ahoy.
Call her fucking codependent for it.
“Steve?” And, yeah, probably not the best idea for her to be making any sort of noise right now, but she's past the point of caring. She just wants Steve—wants her best friend, wants him by her side, wants to curl up in his arms to reassure them both that they're safe . That they're okay. She needs it like the air she breathes. Needs him.
Because what did she say? There's no Robin without Steve. There's no beginning without an end. He is hers. She is his.
It's not healthy.
Robin doesn't think she'll ever be healthy again.
Not like that, anyway. And honestly? She's okay with it.
The gurgling from before grows louder until it stops. All of the sudden, cut off, as if something ripped into the noise, swallowing it whole. Her breath stills along with it. Even as she creeps through the trees, swiping away at stray leaves and branches, she refuses to let out a single breath.
Maybe out of fear. Maybe because it just seems right at the moment. That’s what her parents would always tell her, anyway. Placing crystals against her forehead, telling her to hold her to breath, to calm down. It’s no use to worry, they'd say. It only causes problems.
Ironic, seeing as how she's here, about to tear herself out of her skin, because she doesn't know where her best friend is or if he's in danger.
Silence meets her, other than the rustling of moving leaves, as she moves forward. There's nothing else except for a quiet chittering. Not the tell-tale sounds of crickets find their way to her; not the whispers of wind; not even the gentle hum of cicadas. Only something inhuman, only something that echoes in a hiss: like disturbing, morbid , music.
It's—unnerving.
A breath; Robin pushes herself through the last barrier of wildlife standing between her and what she hopes is Steve. Alive. Not dead . If she finds her best friend dead, she—she doesn't know what she would do.
But what she finds in place is almost worse .
Steve Harrington is hunched over a deer. A doe, barely having gotten done to adulthood, lays dead, and her stomach is torn open in neat, vicious cuts. He hunches over her. He hunches over her, and his jaw is unhinging, skin and bone tearing away from one another in disgusting, fleshy sounds, and there are hundreds of little teeth sprouting from his gums—
Her foot lays on a branch—
It snaps—
His head whips around, jaws still split into four , and—
Robin runs, as fast as she can, away from her best friend.
-
Nancy's half awake, breath still trying to catch from her conversation with Jonathan ( Break up , she corrects herself silently; they had broken up—on good terms, relieving terms) when she hears the phone ring.
Mike was still asleep, and for that—she's grateful. He's been with Will nonstop, rebuilding , he'd said. Whether it be part of Hawkins, or their friendship, she isn't sure. They haven't exactly been having riveting conversations, but the fact that he's talking to her at all is enough. It's more than that.
And she does what she'll always do to keep her little brother safe: she grabs any sort of disturbance by the throat.
Or, plastic, in this case.
"It is," she says lowly, "twelve in the morning. Whatever you want better be pretty damn important —"
Surprisingly, it's Robin who cuts her off (or, unsurprisingly—she tends to do that a lot): " Rabies ."
She blinks. Rabies? "What?"
"Sorry—" A shaky inhale of air. "I think Steve might have fucking—Upside Down rabies or something. Jesus, fucking—I saw him eating a deer , Nance. A living, well, actually, scratch that because I'm pretty sure he killed it—" She breathes in sharply, sounding as if she's almost choking. "And his jaw … It split into four, Nancy. He looked like one of them."
It's that sentence alone that sort of just. Sends her into a spiral. She's dealt with these things, of course she has: she's shot at them since the beginning, since Will. Steve, too. The idea of him— becoming one ? Being mimicked by one? The idea of Steve, the one they've all relied on since Max, since Eddie, being nothing more than a monster wearing his skin? It has the air leave her lungs in almost violent pulses.
Dully, she realizes she's near hyperventilating.
Whatever it is, whatever Robin saw , it wasn't Steve Harrington.
"Robin," she snaps, probably cutting off another portion of rambling that's just Robin , "do not go near him, I'm serious. That's not—it's not Steve. Hide, run away, or something ." Under no circumstances will she let these monsters hurt another one of her friends, of the people she cares about so much it almost sickens her with the force of it. "I'll be over as fast as possible—"
But then Robin's voice grows a sudden edge. "To do what , Nancy," she hisses, "shoot him down? This is still Steve that we're talking about. He's still my best friend. We need to help him ; I called you to help him ."
Guilt claws up her throat, but Nancy forces the scoff out anyway. Confidence. She needs confidence, and she needs it for Robin. "I know Steve, Robin," and she tries for soothing, she really does, but it comes out harsher that intended, "but what you just described—"
"Oh you know Steve, do you? Do you know his favorite fucking color, and how it's yellow, it's yellow, but he always lies that it's blue because of his dad? Do you know his favorite movie is a musical with an alien plant because it's the first movie he ever saw with Dustin, but he refuses to tell anyone because The Breakfast Club is more palatable? Maybe you knew him once, Nancy, but now? I call bullshit ."
Nancy can't—
She can't breathe .
"He loved you, you know," Robin continues to hiss, and Nancy's throat is closing beyond her control, her heart is constricting, and she cannot breathe. "He loved you so fucking much, only for you to what? Go with Jonathan?" A heavy breath. "Steve was an asshole, yeah, he was, but he changed so much for you, Nancy Wheeler," and her name is spit . For the first time in years, she flinches, and she turns away. "And for some goddamned reason, he still sees you as one of his best friends.
"Steve Harrington has always sacrificed himself for you, for all of us—he's helped all of us countless times over and over , and now that he's failed, now that something's wrong , you can't find it in yourself to help him back?"
"I—"
"I respect you, Nancy," she says lowly, "but I will forever despise you if you try to pump Steve full of bullets, because what? You think he's a monster? Because Steve Harrington is no fucking monster ."
Robin says it as if the insult is directed at her, too, and all the words Nancy means to say die in her throat. Because she didn’t hesitate to call her out, and because she’s right. Steve is—the opposite of a monster. He’s a parent, he’s a babysitter, he’s someone who constantly looks out for people and hates feeling useless, and—Nancy was ready to shoot him down. Demogorgons don’t wear skins; Steve Harrington does not pretend when it comes to love and protection. It’s as simple as that.
If anything, Nancy Wheeler is the monster in her own skin.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers, clenching her jaw so tight it feels wired shut after the words leave her lips, because, hell—after Barb, Nancy refused to apologize for her actions. She didn’t when she put bullets in the skin of monsters; she didn’t when Bruce and his friends tried to tear her down from their pedestals; she didn’t apologize to anyone, instead jutting her chin out, daring anyone to question her, to argue .
But.
She also didn’t apologize for dragging Jonathan into a mess, for getting them fired, for making the one thing he’d been working for for years get flushed down the drain in mere seconds. She didn’t apologize for being rude to Robin when she’d just been trying to help. Nancy never apologized to Steve for calling bullshit .
Not when he had clearly fallen in love with her.
And maybe—
No, that needs to change.
“I’m sorry,” she repeats again, a bit louder, before Robin can respond. “I—It’s been a hellish few years. The idea of something being wrong—something getting to him—” Nancy swallows, the image of Barb disappearing out of nowhere, pierces right through the armor she spent years building to her heart. “It terrified— terrifies —me, and I just… jumped to the first conclusion that made sense to me. Which wasn’t fair. It isn’t fair.
“He’s your best friend, but he’s mine, too, I think, and he’s—” She cuts herself off sharply. He’s too good for her . But this isn’t about her, it isn’t, and maybe she’ll tell Robin all of that later, at another time.
Maybe she’ll open up a bit more than she ever has.
“He deserves to be saved,” she finishes quietly. “I’m sorry for ever suggesting otherwise, panicked or not, hidden monster or not.”
For a moment, there’s only lingering silence. Nancy can hear the way Robin swallows, the small shuffle of her feet, and for once—Robin is not the one apologizing to her. “Yeah,” Robin finally says. “Yeah, alright. Uh, well, I’m currently hiding in Steve’s kitchen, and I can’t really see anything, but— Jesus fucking Christ! —”
Static.
“Robin?” Nancy scrambles for the cord, wrapping it tight, glad to see that it hasn’t fried like Joyce’s did. Then, not so much, because Robin just screamed, and she can’t hear anything from her, and now she can’t—Nancy can’t breathe again.
There’s a small voice in the back of her head telling her to quiet , to not wake up Mike, to grab her shotgun or her revolver and bolt out of the house, but that voice sounds too much like Robin, and that in and of itself has Nancy spiraling. Unable to move, head spinning, eyes watering suspiciously, and she feels just like she did when Barb went missing.
“Robin, please talk to me,” she chokes out, because she can’t lose another friend, another what-if, she can’t lose anyone else. Not after Barb, not after Eddie, not after she'd almost lost Steve in the fray, too. “ Robin, please —”
“ Nancy —” comes the startled reply, and it’s as if the Earth’s righted itself, no longer making her sway, on the verge of passing out. She takes a shuddering breath, letting her head fall against the wall. Panic still thrums in her veins, not completely left, but relief has begun to numb it, increasing tenfold each time Robin speaks. “Nancy, oh my god, fucking—” And Nancy can hear Steve’s voice, high-pitched, scared, and confused underneath Robin’s screeching. “He wants Hawaiian pizza .”
She blinks. “Wh—”
“Ḧe wants Hawaiian pizza,” Robin repeats, half-hysterical. She can almost see the way Robin’s hands are flapping wildly in order to calm herself down. “He is covered in blood, and he wants Hawaiian fucking pizza, Nancy.”
And, despite it all, Nancy laughs.
Steve goddamn Harrington .
-
Steve’s head fucking hurts . Pounding and thrumming: little needles piercing through his skull as his head spins. It reminds him of the bats—the way their teeth had dug into his skin, ripping . It reminds him of Robin’s molotovs, sparks of fire igniting at the base of his skull, right behind his eyes, down to his jaw, all over and all-encompassing.
It only stops when he gets closer to where the Upside Down bleeds into Hawkins.
This is—one of the few times he’s lucid when he does it. Walks towards it willingly. He had slipped through the bolted doors of his house, unable to sleep, the nightmares being too much, and leaving Robin peacefully curled up on his couch. He’d made sure to scan the outside of the home before leaving. Made sure she was safe before he left.
He couldn’t lose anyone else.
They’d visited Max in the hospital hours before. Lucas by her side as always, El plastered to his, and both of their hands intertwined with one another’s and Max’s. Her heart rate remained a constant, steady tune of slow beeps from a monitor and barely-there breaths. She didn’t move. She didn’t change.
And Steve—
Steve had clutched himself so tightly he drew blood, looking at the girl who had become his baby sister almost involuntarily, the girl who’d willingly sacrificed herself for all of them, tied to a hospital bed without being able to move like she always does. He’d gently pushed past Mike, past Robin, past Nancy, and he had sat beside Dustin, wrapping his hands around the both of theirs, and he pressed a kiss to each of her almost-cold knuckles while everyone else just—stood there. Silent.
He hates the silence.
So he’d talked. He’d started talking to her about the day’s events, of how the sunset still looked as beautiful as it always did over the quarry, despite Watergate. Started whispering about how he’s been gathering records for her that his mother had abandoned, how he’d found some of Eddie’s cassettes (and he’d cried, then, shuddering so violently along Dustin that Robin had to steady him), and that he thinks that—she would like them. Like his music, and hopefully, hopefully a bit of Steve’s, too.
He had talked about how when she woke up, she’d always and forever have a place at his house. That she won’t ever be alone, because she has him, she has Dustin, and Lucas, and El, and all of them. She has them.
Steve told her he loved her. He told her that she was his sister, and he had cried even harder, because he can’t lose her. He can’t lose his baby sister, and neither can Dustin, so please, please, please hold on for us, Max, please, let us bring you back.
They’d all broken down then: Dustin and him holding each other like lifelines, Lucas and El coming up and hugging them so tight Steve felt his ribs constrict, and he had wrapped his arms around the both of them almost violently. Because they were his family. Max was his family. The idea of losing her—
The idea had been too much.
The nightmares had been too much.
So, for the first time in a long time, he’d willingly started towards Eddie’s old trailer, hands clenched tightly at his sides. He knows well enough by now that nothing will try and go near him, nothing will try to hurt him. Not anymore.
But then he’d heard a twig snap, a low noise, and the sharp smell of blood .
It used to disgust him. After being thrown headfirst into so many different situations where he’d gotten beaten within an inch of his life, where he’d been dragged, where he had to patch up anyone who needed it, the smell of blood became familiar as well as unwelcome. It brought him back . Back to the one place he never wanted to go back to, because with blood came them , came the monsters, came death.
But now—
Now the smell makes him snap forward in jerky movements, that piece of other rising to the surface in waves. Not necessarily a voice, just a feeling, an instinct . The instinct to lean forward, to stalk, to chase, to catch, to tear into whatever is bleeding with his bare hands and teeth—predator hunting prey.
He couldn’t help but to… lean into it. Like second nature, he had shot out like a bullet from Nancy’s gun, a power chord from Eddie’s guitar, grabbing whatever was wounded (a deer, his mind had supplied through the haze), and ripping . Fingernails lengthened to claws; relief blooming from the depths of his very fucking bones when there’s a click in the joint of his jaw, unhinging, skin splitting easily, teeth swinging forward, digging, eating—
It doesn’t register until after that what he’d just done wasn’t normal, or right, or even remotely in the wheelhouse of ‘okay’. Especially when Robin had shown up right behind him, staring at him like he was one of the monsters they hunt, that they shoot down, running when he couldn’t piece together his face right away in his panic.
Steve can’t even piece together the pieces of what he’d just done, even now, sitting in his kitchen with Robin and Nancy both as he eats (hesitantly) pineapple pizza. It doesn’t taste bad , just not as—great. Not as much as it did, anyway.
(The taste of blood still clings to his tongue, sweet and metallic, and for some reason—like the lemon bars Robin made him for his twentieth birthday. They’d been the only thing he’d eaten for days, a gentle voice in his head whispering safe, safe, safe when that sense of comfort washed over him with each bite.
It tasted like coming home.)
“Okay,” he says, shaking himself out of that thought, “I don’t know what’s been happening, so—I don’t have any answers for you.” Steve sends a pointed look at Nancy who looks like she just swallowed a lemon. She is , though, almost plastered to Robin’s side, who’s giving him her signature Why didn’t you tell me look.
He hates that look.
“‘Happening’,” Nancy asks, eyes narrowed in the type of way that lets Steve know she’s absolutely furious with him. He feels like a scolded child. “This has been happening? And you didn’t think to tell anyone ?”
“If you call me ‘Steven’, I am kicking you out of my house.”
“ Steve .”
He pinches the bridge of his nose, glad that his nails have shortened again lest they pierce his skin. The food from earlier sits uncomfortably in his stomach—less smoothly than— “The eating part is new,” Steve sighs, shaking his head a bit. The movement clears his head, calms him down. “Like the whole—face thing and hunting, or whatever. That’s, uh…” He makes a mental checklist in his head, going over it once, then twice. “Ye-e-a-ah, nope, that has never happened before.”
Robin raises an eyebrow, and although he won’t say it aloud, not with Nancy there at least, the relief that she’s not running from him anymore, that she’s still treating him like himself, is overwhelming. But with the way her eyes soften, Steve thinks she knows anyhow. “But?” Robin asks, her voice suddenly so gentle, so fucking gentle that he wants to cry . Just break down in her arms like they did only a year ago.
“I—” A clench of his heart. A shuddering breath. “It started with just—sleepwalking,” he mutters, looking everywhere, anywhere but the two people in front of him. “I couldn’t sleep most nights, you know? Too busy making sure the kids were safe and with one another; checking in on Max so often that the doctors had to kick me out; visiting—” He chokes, here, almost unable to just keep going , until Robin has an arm around him, and he’s being guided to the floor. Nancy leans against his other side, not staring at him, but there .
“Visiting Wayne,” he whispers, and both of them only squeeze him tighter. “And after, after all of it , I couldn’t sleep, so I’d walk, and I’d find myself almost directly near the Upside Down. It—it was only after that, that I could sleep. And then nightly walks turned into me waking up right next to it.”
He feels, more than sees, Robin’s flinch. He hurries to continue: “Short periods of time don’t really count , though, I can like… Nap for thirty minutes or something.” The memory of him slumped over in his car, face pressed against Eddie’s denim vest, eyes closed with his hands wrapped around the bracelet Max had made him, honeyed yellow.
She’d said, Thank you .
She’d told him, You taught me what a brother is supposed to be, I think.
She’d buried herself in his arms when he instinctively went to hold her close. She’d tugged the denim that he had worn, then, smiled through the tears welling in the corners of her eyes, and she had said that it suited him. That Eddie suited him. And Steve couldn’t help but to laugh, to hold her closer, to silently pray that she’d be safe .
Steve twists that bracelet now, a brand on his wrist, a promise. “But, yeah,” he finishes lamely, quietly, “it’s been happening since we got back. The, uh, monsters —” and it almost feels childish, calling them that, except that’s what they are , and now they’re a part of him— “don’t hurt me. At all. Even the bats. They’re like—I can talk to them, I guess?”
“Telepathically?” Nancy squints. Somehow, every time he looks at her, he forgets just how intense her stare is .
“I don’t know.” He shrugs, bringing a hand up to rub at his eyes. The little sparks of colors that he’s greeted with almost seem comforting. Surrounding his mind until he relaxes, leaving with little whispers and an aura of gentleness. “I kind of just. Talk to them. Out loud. They listen, I guess.”
Robin flops her head onto his shoulder, mouth twisted in a thin line. She always manages to look constipated when she’s trying to figure a puzzle out, and the thought pulls a small huff of laughter out of him, ruffling the strands of her light hair. “They listen,” she repeats slowly, finger up in the air as if she’s tracing some invisible sort of picture, “even though they don’t have ears? Or, like, eyes to read your lips—and that’s not counting the fact of if they even know English .”
Before he can respond, Nancy cuts in: “So it’s telepathic. Has to be. Like when El can find people—how she sort of just zones out in the static. What’d she call it? The dark place?”
“I have no idea,” Robin and Steve both sigh.
She looks as if she’s trying to hold back a small smile. “That’s so weird,” she mutters, and it’s then that the smile finally shines through. Small, gentle, and if Steve were still taken with her, he would’ve missed the way Robin’s eyes glitter at the force of it.
“Anyway,” Nancy continues with a small huff, jerking Steve out of his instant plan to tease Robin endlessly, “the only thing I don’t get is how . How it happened.”
He wrinkles his nose. “Does it really matter? It happened . What use is there to figure out how it happened when it’s probably incurable. And, no, we are not grabbing El. The kids don’t need to know about—” He gestures at his face, grimacing, “this.”
“What if it happens to one of them, though,” Nancy reasons softly, despite the harsh look Robin sends her way. It’s one he’s been on the receiving end of more than a few times, one that clearly says: You are not helping the situation . “The ‘how’ is so maybe it—maybe it won’t happen again, Steve.”
“I don’t know , Nance—”
“Wait,” Robin cuts in, eyes narrowed, “wait, wait, wait, shut up the both of you. Steve goes AWOL in the middle of the night, hears something, and ends up tearing into a deer like—fuckin’ what was it—” She snaps her fingers, “A demogorgon.” Judging by the way Robin’s hand tightens on his bicep, he didn’t hide his flinch well enough. “What if—what if it really was rabies?”
Steve blinks. “ What .”
Nancy jerks forward, though, a triumphant grin spreading across her face: “You called me saying the word rabies , Rob—”
“It’s my worst fear, for fuck’s sake,” she hisses, but the other waves her off easily.
“No, listen, you solved it from the beginning,” Nancy says, hands flicking off side to side as if she doesn’t really know what to do with them. “The literal beginning . When Steve got bit.” She gestures to his now-healed sides. “There was black spreading from the wounds, Robin. There was the Upside Down forced into his blood. It was the bats .”
Robin places her fist against her mouth, looking shocked but pleased at the same time. “Holy shit,” she whispers. Then, quieter, more horrified, “Holy shit .”
Steve squeezes his eyes shut, heart skyrocketing in its skeletal cage. How ironic, a part of him whispers, dark and soft, and he shuts his eyes tighter, bringing the heels of his hands up to press into his eyes, begging for some sort of relief, no matter how small. How ironic that you have become one of the things you kill.
Vaguely, he can hear Robin’s concerned voice rising higher and higher when he doesn’t—when he can’t —respond; Nancy’s nails digging into the skin of his palm as she murmurs something he can’t make out in his ear. He can’t, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t —
A low croon at the base of his skull, that same voice, and he’s plunged into ink.
He thinks that maybe, maybe this is what El calls the dark place.
A place filled with ink, something liquid covering the tops of his feet. It swarms him, covers him like a blanket, and unlike how El almost panics every time she would go here, he feels calm. At peace. All the building fear from before just slips away—even more so when images start to come and go.
Look , that voice says, that voice that is his, he knows, except it’s also different.
But, he does. He looks, he stares , and he’s already walking towards the one image, the one thing that tugs him forward as if there’s a loose thread hanging from his heart. Steve doesn’t fight it, not anymore, instead running towards it—running towards him .
Because Eddie’s laying there , his guitar strapped across his chest as clawed fingers dance across the strings. Wings—large, red, and twitching , are spread underneath him like drapes. His head turns, barely, and Steve is met with the same loving-brown eyes he had started to fall for right in the middle of the Upside Down.
“Steve?”
There’s blood staining the edge of his mouth.
Steve reaches towards him, grabs at him, fingers slipping through because it’s just a vision, just a memory shared, but he needs to hold him, needs him like he needed to eat , needs to feel him alive and breathing—
His eyes snap open, body flying forward, and already whispering the one name he would only say alone, by himself, like a prayer —
“Eddie—”
-
His name reverbs around the Upside Down, a short, clipped-off version of it, and Eddie feels as if he can breathe again.
Steve, Steve motherfucking Harrington, had seen him, had looked right at him, Eddie staring right back, and he had reached towards him . He hadn’t recoiled. He hadn’t done anything except run towards him, arms extended, eyes wide with tears brimming at the corners and mouth open, before—
Before Eddie couldn’t see him anymore.
He jerks forward, the bats around him scuttling backwards at the suddenness of the movement. Their voices—distorted and broken, something he only understands in the back of his mind—swarm him like they did when he’d died. Some irritated, some fearful, but most simply confused.
Why does he want to leave? Why does he want to leave them?
Eddie told them before, quietly, barely there, that he’d wanted to go home, and they didn’t understand. The idea was foreign to them. The idea of safety, of gentleness, of love was foreign to them. Here, in their world of stormy dark, there was only fear. So he’d said the closest thing to what they would understand: daylight.
It’d sent them into a panic.
It was odd, comforting the creatures that had ripped into him until his blood long since sank into the dirt; that had brought him back with venom, with poison. Odd that they had paused, burrowed closer, and told him in their own way that maybe—maybe they could learn to understand.
He knows now, that to them, he’s the closest thing to home that they’ve had in their idea of forever.
Yet, despite that, he crawls back into his trailer, the weird, unnatural version of where he once lived. The urge to stay is strong—this is where he belongs, the dark envelops him safely—but the Upside Down isn’t home to him. The people above—Dustin, Lucas, Mike, Max, Robin, Nancy, Steve —are his place, his home.
He will forever be drawn to them.
“Home can be a person, too,” Eddie had told them once, eyes closed, trying to sleep against the fallen lightning. “Home can be multiple people, really.”
Like you , they had murmured. It was the first time they ever spoke it aloud in their shared minds, and he had stayed silent.
A darker part of him, something he’s taken to calling the hive —the part of him filled with eight sharpened fangs, with a hunger to run until he was out of breath, to feed, to fly —had hummed, had wrapped up close to him, had agreed. He is now home to them; they will not let him go because of it.
Not permanently, anyway.
“Daylight,” Eddie murmurs gently when they cling to his pant leg, now horrendously torn. He might’ve missed it once. But now, it’s covered in dirt and grime, and the feeling of being free of it is relieving. “Home.”
The boy , they mutter, circling him, displeased. They know Steve, of course they do. Seen him, have wrapped up close, have called him warm in the same way they call Eddie home . And he knows that despite their grumbling, the idea of having them both close, within reach, is familiar and wanted.
“Him, too,” he says with a small laugh. Time passes differently, down here. Fear has been intermingled with love . There will always be a part of him that hates them, despises them for what they’ve done. There is now a part of him that loves them, too, for all that they’ve done to help him. “Him, too.”
They chitter, less upset but in no way less protective. Eddie smiles one full of teeth, one that they can mimic, laughing in the back of his head. Lets it spill from his lips when it gets too much, begins to climb when the offended shrieks reach his now-pointed ears.
Wings—something he’d had the unfortunate and painful experience of discovering, hands in the dirt, back arched, screaming as something new, something foreign sprouted from his back—slip back into the pockets they once resided in; skin stitching shut as they do. It’s instantaneous, the way he feels lighter, the way it’s easier to pull himself up.
His fingertips hit light. They don’t smolder, nor do they burn, the black of his claws slipping back to normal fingernails. Some of the grime washes away with it, too. Each part of him smothered in the Upside Down is drained away bit by bit as Eddie pushes himself from his grave, stretching between the broken halves of what used to be his trailer.
Blinking back the warmth that fills him from the sun alone, he manages a small smile. It’s so much better than the cold of the Upside Down.
“Hello again, Hawkins.”
-
For once, it’s not Will who senses something’s wrong.
Dustin’s sitting on Steve’s couch, watching out of the corner of his eye as he and Robin whisper something unintelligible to one another. Nancy stands beside each, looking paler than she did when Vecna had gotten her (paler than Max looks now, a self-destructive part of him adds). Even Jonathan glances up with furrowed brows, not hesitating to walk towards them, to wrap his arms around Steve when Steve sort of just—hunches over.
He’d almost forgotten that they were friends.
(Will never did. He’d call, constantly, saying how Jonathan and Steve would write to one another, trading songs, giving each other mixtapes. He would tell him how sometimes, sometimes Jonathan would cry after reading one of the responding letters. How he would never let Will even touch them.
They’re friends, he’d say. But he thinks that, for a long time—before they moved to California, before Jonathan met Argyle, before whatever happened fizzled out into something simply platonic—both of them were a little bit more.
Seeing them now, huddled together, Dustin thinks he might understand.)
He lets his gaze linger, lets his chin fall to his knees. Will, more often than not nowadays—Lucas staying with Max, Mike and El trying to repair whatever they’d broken—sits next to him. “I’m glad Jonathan found him,” he says eventually, following Dustin’s gaze with his own. “I’m glad they found each other.”
“Yeah,” Dustin echoes. He feels strangely hollow, looking at them. Has felt hollow after Eddie, but—he can’t put his finger on it. Not anymore, at least. “I’m glad you’re back, Will,” he says finally, because, fuck, he doesn’t think anyone’s really said that to him yet. Not even Mike. Judging by the way Will’s eyes widen, he thinks he hit the nail on the head. “It hasn’t been the same without you.”
“Miss me disappearing on you guys twenty-four-seven?” He jokes, but something flickers in his eyes, something sour.
Dustin allows himself a small smile, twisting his head to look at him. “Yeah,” he says simply. “I mean, like—the party itself hasn’t been the same without you. Mike’s grown into kind of an ass—” Will snorts, and his smile widens to a grin. It feels more real than it has in a while now. “Lucas got into basketball, which Steve is going bonkers over, let me tell you, and Max…” He pauses, hesitating, before finishing with, “Max was the same ‘ol Mad Max, you know? Distant but snarky as ever.”
“And what about you?”
He huffs. “Nothing too different about me,” he tries. Will—looks right through it, though. He’s been getting better at that, Dustin thinks. “Ah, okay, fine. I found—a brother,” he decides on. Eddie was more than just his friend, just as Steve was. “Another one. Me and Suzie tried to talk a little bit, but,” and he swallows harshly. “It’s been hard. It’s been really hard, man. Relationships kind of suck when you have the whole world on your shoulders, you know?”
“Tell me about it,” Will mutters. His eyes shift to Mike as they always did, as they always do. Bitterness laces the edges this time, instead of longing. “You know he told El that his life started when he found her? When she was fighting Vecna?”
“We found her—”
“When I went missing,” Will finishes sourly. “I don’t think he realized what he said, or at least—how he said it, you know? High emotions, stressful situation, whatever. I had to stop Jonathan from ripping into him.”
Dustin winces, bringing a hand up to his friend’s shoulder. He can’t understand: he never went through what Will did, but he’ll be damned if he can’t listen. “You should’ve let him,” he says solemnly, making sure to send a glare Mike’s way. He doesn’t notice, too deep into a conversation with El. “Jonathan’s fuckin’ scary when he’s upset, though; I think Mike would’ve gotten a new asshole from how hard he would shit himself.”
A startled laugh tears itself out of Will’s throat. “ Gross .”
“It’s true!” He exclaims. “Nancy can wield a gun, sure, and Steve can be pretty wicked with that bat, but Jonathan can and will rip into a demogorgon with his bare hands. Like what the fuck is up with that?”
Another laugh until Will’s practically doubled over wheezing and Dustin has his chest puffed out in pride. When he calms down, Dustin lays a hand over his shoulder. “Seriously, though, I’m sorry. You should talk to him, though.”
His smile flickers. “I can’t.”
“Not necessarily about that ,” Dustin clarifies quickly. “Just, like. Talk to him that you feel like you’re being ignored, or that he’s prioritizing El over your friendship. He’s your best friend, Will, and he claims you’re his. He’ll listen to you, even if he storms off for a bit, you know?” He nudges his friend’s shoulder. “Friendships shouldn’t be less important than romance. Even if said romance is just our desperate friend falling out with a superhero.”
And, just like that, Will brightens a little more.
“Thanks, Dustin,” he murmurs, his smile all crooked and toothy. “I appreciate it.”
Dustin shrugs, grinning with him, “Suzie taught me a lot—what can I say?” When Will rolls his eyes, he continues: “You’re welcome . That’s what I can say.”
Before Will can respond, though, trying to talk against his rising laughter, El pushes past Mike, practically runs past them up to Steve, Jonathan, Nancy, and Robin. Dustin tries not to wince. The group just—it looks wrong without Eddie there. Just like it did when Will wasn’t with any of them.
They follow her without a word.
“Something’s wrong,” she says, words stilted, and it’s almost immediate how everyone around her stiffens. Steve looks like he’s going to throw up. “Out of the rift. Something’s out—more powerful than Vecna.”
“It’s not the Mindflayer,” Will interjects. “I know how it… works, and it isn’t here.”
Steve’s eyes widen slowly, gently prying himself from Jonathan’s hold, and he takes a small step closer before kneeling in front of El. She looks at him cautiously, as if he’s going to end up snapping. It breaks his heart, realizing she doesn’t know Steve like the rest of them. Realizing she doesn’t know he would never hurt her.
“Is it close?” He asks quietly.
El shakes her head, lips drawn into a thin line. “No. It’s—” She winces, “Hiding. Trying to come out but hiding.”
A shuddered breath. Steve rises, and Robin’s eyes widen. Dustin doesn’t know how it happened, not really, but ever since StarCourt, ever since they’d gotten high off their asses, something just clicks between them. Every move one of them makes, the other understands without anything needing to be said.
Seeing as how neither of them understand any other social cues, it’s definitely weird—but not weirder than half of the things he’s seen in the past couple of years.
“I’m going,” Steve says sharply, as if Robin’s started to argue with him. Which, honestly, is entirely possible. She doesn’t flinch, glares at him head on, even when he has to look away. Looks like she’s picking apart his brain and piecing it back together with a spaghetti noodle instead of thread.
Mike and El sort of just—glance at him in confusion, and all he can do is shrug. They’re weird , he tries to communicate, but he’s not Robin nor Steve, so he probably just gives them a vaguely constipated look.
“Not without any of us. Not alone,” Robin snaps, drawing him out of his thoughts. “What if you’re wrong? We saw —”
“You saw what happened —”
“ And ?” Her voice comes out high-pitched in a shriek. “Have you forgotten that a) this is only a theory and b) theories are often proven wrong time and time again. Have you forgotten that there are people that care about you? That we aren’t going to let you just—fucking run off without backup?”
Nancy crosses her arms tight across her chest. “Rob’s right, Steve,” and Jesus, when did Nancy Wheeler become friends with Robin Buckley ? “Whatever you’re thinking—it can very easily turn south. And none of us can lose another friend, or anyone else that was close to us, okay?” She places a hand on his shoulder, and Jonathan wraps his arm tight across Steve’s shoulders again. Silent but grounding. He sinks into it.
Vaguely, Dustin remembers how Nancy and Jonathan were, once upon a time, Steve’s people.
“Gonna be honest here,” Dustin starts, making everyone’s heads turn towards him in weird synchrony, “I don’t know what the hell is happening. Which! Is vaguely infuriating. So spill . Especially you, Steven.”
“Do not call me that,” Steve mutters, nose wrinkling. “And I can’t.”
Dustin crosses his arms, mimicking the stance Nancy had only moments ago. “ Why ? No, not the name thing, do not answer the name thing. The “I can’t” thing. That one. Answer that.” He claps his hands together. “Chop chop!”
“I wasn’t going to—” Steve hisses through his teeth. “Fucking—whatever. Look, I can’t tell you because if I’m wrong —” His voice cracks, and horrifyingly, Dustin can see tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. He wipes them furiously. “I’d rather die than tell you and for me to be wrong in the end.”
“ Steve ,” Robin murmurs.
“ No ,” he cuts her off sharply. “No, because I’m serious. I’m really fucking serious, Robbie. I can’t.”
For a moment, Dustin just—doesn’t know what to do.
He hates not knowing .
So, he does the next best thing: shoves Jonathan away (who looks like he just poured salt in his coffee instead of sugar) and wraps his own arms around Steve. Buries his head in his chest, feels the way Steve stops fucking breathing, the way his arms gently come down to hold him close. A beat. Dustin squeezes, and apparently that was like—permission for Steve to hug him back or something, because he’s being hugged so tight he’s pretty sure the air has evaded itself from his lungs.
It’s the best hug he’s ever had.
“Look,” Dustin mutters, still sort of suffocating but refusing to move because it’s— comforting . He feels comforted. Kinda makes him want to cry. Jesus. “Tell me, don’t tell me, whatever, but Robin’s right. We’re not letting you go off to find whatever El knows is wrong by yourself. That’s, like, really insane and stupid, Steve. And you aren’t stupid. We know what's out there.”
There’s a choked noise, quiet and only for him to hear, and Dustin hugs him tighter. “And we’re here for you, dumbass.”
“Those sentences contradict each other,” Steve sniffles.
“Big word.”
“Been hanging out with you too much.” And, even though Dustin knows that this has to end, this little moment between him and the person he sees as his brother, it still pains him when Steve pulls away. Fortunately, everyone’s kind of had the knowledge and decency to look away, or at least step out of the room. Steve looks as relieved as he feels. “You’re fifteen, for fuck’s sake. Fifteen.”
He puffs out his chest. “And I can fight better than half the assholes in my school.”
Steve’s eyes squint in a barely-there, half smile. “Hell yeah you can.” He ruffles the top of his hair, for once not covered by his Thinking-Cap. “Look—there’s a lot going on right now, okay? I promise I’ll tell you everything, just—” A beat of hesitation. “I just need to figure out what’s going on.”
“Don’t we all,” Dustin tries to joke, but Steve looks as if his head is splitting into two, so he nods as well. “Fine. Just know you aren’t going off on your own. And not right now. It’s dark as hell out.”
Almost instantly, Steve’s expression dims and Jonathan enters the room with the nailed bat, once his, now Steve's. He looks grim—worse than how Jonathan usually looks, honestly, and a beat later, Nancy stalks in with her shotgun plastered to her back. She hands Robin an old machete, still stained with blackened blood.
“Trust me,” Steve mutters, looking somewhere past him, past all of them, “that won’t be an issue.”
-
Nancy manages to grab Steve by the wrist before he practically bolts out of the door. He has that wild look in his eyes—one she hasn’t seen since the fight with Vecna. Like he’s going to grab whatever is in the woods by the throat, whatever he believes to be out there, even if it ends up killing him.
“We need to talk,” she says. Jonathan glances up from where he’s murmuring to Will, gives a nod. Reassurance. “Please,” Nancy adds, because Robin was right—she’s forceful, she’s harsh, and she’s forgotten how to be gentle. An act won’t get her the closure she needs, the closure she knows Steve needs.
And he has this look , this look that she knows he’s gotten from her , one that says: Is this really the best time? But it’s smothered within seconds , smothered into something soft—love, she knows, but not the love he had for her all those years ago. Which is more than relieving, honestly. “Sure,” Steve says, because that’s where they differ: whereas Nancy grew sharp at the edges, cutting and biting when Barb died; Steve grew softer, put everyone before him first , and opened his arms wide.
In a way, it burns.
She lets go of his wrist but doesn’t let him out of her sight when she leads him upstairs. Not to his room, never back there, but a guest one. And, after a moment, she sits on the bed. Steve follows her easily.
“I’m sorry,” Nancy says for the fourth time in what feels like forever, to the second person who’s always been her first. Steve’s eyes widen, eyebrows furrow, and before he can open his mouth, ask For what? , she rests her head on his shoulder. It’s almost funny, how immediate his jaw clamps shut. “I’ve treated you horribly,” she whispers. “Since Barb.”
It’s been a long time since she’s said her name out loud.
“It’s not your fault,” Steve says, and she knows what he’s doing because she knows Steve Harrington. He’s giving her an easy way out. “She was your best friend.”
But Nancy shakes her head. “Doesn’t matter. It really, really doesn’t, because none of it was your fault, and yet I took it out on you. I traded everything you gave me for Jonathan because whenever I saw you, I saw what happened to her. And that’s not fair.” Nancy stares at her hands, how they’re clasped in front of her. “I loved her so much, and I loved you, and in the fray of it all, I lost both of you.”
Fortunately, Steve stays silent. If he talked now, if he did anything but keep quiet and listen, she’d burst into tears. She’d curl up in a ball, head in her hands, and she would cry, and Nancy can’t do that . Not right now, not when there’s so much to say.
“I don’t think it was ever bullshit,” she breathes into the silence, breaking it, shattering it like one of Robin’s molotovs. “I just think I loved you and her differently. I think I loved Jonathan and her differently. And I think after losing her, it terrified me, and it burned me from the inside out.”
She doesn’t—
She doesn’t expect Steve to hug her, but that’s what he does. He wraps her up in his arms, but he doesn’t let her feel small , because just as she knows him, he knows her. “Nancy,” he whispers in her hair, and it’s instinctive how she curls into him, because he is her best friend, of course he is, “it’s okay.”
Nancy lets herself cry then.
Lets herself cry and be rocked back and forth as Steve continues, voice soft and gentle, never growing knife-sharp, “Seriously, it’s okay. It’s been a long time since then; I’m not mad. I could never be mad at you for long, Nance.” Then, even quieter: “Thank you for telling me. All of it, not just—not just you coming out.”
She buries her head deeper into his shoulder. “Yeah,” she chokes out, whispered, “yeah, no problem.”
He lets out a laugh, breathy and barely there, before going: “I love you, Nancy Wheeler.”
And she knows, knows for certain now, that he means it differently. Not how he did at the party forever ago, when she went home with Jonathan instead. This is—new but not different. “I love you too, Steve Harrington.”
She loves him with her whole heart, her whole self, and she knows he loves her back.
Eventually, they pull back—both wiping their own fallen tears away. “So,” Steve says, wrinkling his nose when a missed tear drips off his chin. “Who’s the lucky girl?”
It catches her off guard. Completely. Absolutely blind-sighted. Except—it isn’t bad . It fills her chest with something akin to hope, it has the edges of her mouth twinge upwards into a smile before she knows what’s happening. And when she does, she refuses to hide it. Not behind her hand, not stifled, but letting it consume her entire face.
It feels right .
“No one yet,” Nancy says between small, still-surprised, fits of giggles, “but—I think I'd like to get to know Robin more. After all of this.”
His shriek practically pierces her eardrums, but then he’s shaking her, a grin of his own spreading across his face, shouting a variety of noises and questions, and Nancy can’t help but to laugh .
-
Robin watches Steve and Nancy glide down the stairs above the lip of her coffee mug. They’re both smiling, which is—definitely a lot better than Robin expected whatever the hell was going to happen. Steve has a smug look on his face, and when she raises an eyebrow at him, he only winks at her.
I know something you don’t.
She narrows her eyes.
Like hell you do.
His grin only grows, that temporary happiness all-consuming, and she rolls her eyes into her mug. She doesn’t even notice Jonathan sliding up beside her until he rests his forearms on the island in front of them.
“She apologized,” he says quietly, because Jonathan is somehow always quiet, even in the few weeks she’s known him, in the year she’s known of him. “Nance, I mean. If that’s what you’re wondering.” His lips downturn, thoughtful. “No clue as to why both of them are giggling like freshmen, though. They’re over each other.”
Now it’s Robin’s turn to frown. “You don’t—okay, I know you’ve been in California for, like, eons, now, but you don’t know that.” She saw the way Steve looked at Nancy, and how she stared at him in return. Gentle niceties. A little bit of hope sprinkled in.
(She saw the bitterness in Eddie’s expression. The way he’d flung his vest at Steve when they’d stared at each other for a beat too long. She knew . Just as he did.)
But Jonathan only smiles at her. “Trust me,” he says, stirring a spoon into coffee probably sweet enough to kill a grown man, “I know. Steve and I talked a lot when I was in Cali; Nancy and I did too.” His eyes are drooped, no longer red-rimmed like they were when he was with Argyle, but they squint at her all the same. A look that tells her: You don’t know? “They talked about you a lot, you know. Albeit for—different reasons.”
And before she can ask whatever the hell that means, Steve’s walking in with moonstone eyes, the same eyes she’d seen when he went for that deer, when he’d said he saw Eddie . He blinks, they’re gone, and Jonathan is whispering a series of, What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck?
She only pats him on the shoulder. “Steve?”
“Yeah,” he mutters, pinching his brows, “sorry. Uh, we need to get moving. Dark, near storms,” and how the fuck does he know that, “all of that. They’ll be swarming.” There’s goosebumps rising on the ends of his arms. “And I don’t know if I can protect all of you guys. Not all at once, anyway.”
Jonathan lifts up his bat. “We have weapons,” he says, voice only a little shaky. “You don’t need to protect all of us.”
Steve shakes his head. “You don’t understand,” and Steve lifts his shirt, showing the scars that decorate his stomach up to his chest. Robin hears Jonathan’s breath catch, sees Nancy wince. “They swarm . You’ll only piss them off with that, so listen to me when I say that using those—” he throws his arms wide, gestures to all of them, “are a last fucking resort.”
“Uh,” Robin says, “didn’t they, like, I don’t know: attack on sight ?”
She’s—unable to contain her wince when he hisses at her. Full on hisses , inhuman, and distorted. Even Nancy turns away at the noise. “I have it under control,” Steve finishes, a bit more quietly, a bit more gently. “They listen to me. Just—keep your guard up, don’t threaten them, and we’re good.”
“You make them sound like guard dogs,” she mutters, mostly to make him smile again, to get rid of that scared, sullen look. It works. His smile is small, lopsided, but it’s there all the same— relieved .
“Alright, then—”
“Hold on a minute ,” Dustin snaps, waltzing in from the other room. He has a lamp gripped in his hands; Mike having a candlestick; El looking like she always does when she’s ready for a fight. Even Will has something—a sharpened piece of wood exactly his height. “Just because Lucas and Max are missing from this equation does not mean you forgo the rest of us.”
Steve squeezes his eyes shut with a heavy sigh. “Did you forget,” he says slowly, “that you are fifteen, and I am not bringing you into this mess again. Any of you.”
“Did you forget,” Dustin parrots, “that you were the one literally eaten by bats.”
Robin feels Steve’s flare of pain—the way his jaw clenches, his eyes glass over slightly. She knows, she knows that it’s guilt more than anything. That he survived and that Eddie did not; that both of them had been changed in some way by the Upside Down. So, she does what she does best, and juts in before Steve can say anything else.
“We need someone to hold down the fort,” Robin says gently, drawing their attention to her for just a moment, letting Jonathan and Nancy do damage control for once. “Steve’s house is huge , you know? There’s a lot of rooms that need to be covered, and even more movies stuffed in between.”
Wrong thing to say.
Each of them look at her like she’s mad, about to argue, and she understands why . She’s been in this for a year. They—several.
Still, she gets on her knees and whispers, so that only they can hear: “Look, I know you all joke about Steve as “the babysitter”, right? But he seriously sees you guys as his kids—you, specifically, as his brother.” She jabs a finger in Dustin’s chest. “Putting you all in danger kills him each and every time, alright? Stay here, and I’m serious when I do say that we need someone to hold this place down, and give him some peace of mind. It’s just a run. We’ll bring him back in one piece.”
It’s Will who asks, “Do you promise?”
Robin gives him a small smile, ruffles his hair—a habit she’d gotten from Steve. “Of course I promise, dingus. He’s my best friend. I’m not going to let anything happen to him; none of us are. He’s, uh, what is it—the glue that holds us all together, or some shit?”
Mike gives a wavering smile. “Yeah. Yeah.”
“Alright then,” Dustin mutters, gently laying down the lamp. “Keep that idiot safe. I can’t lose another brother.”
Something in her breaks, shatters, really, and she sweeps him up in a hug before she knows what she’s doing. She usually hates initiating physical contact; doesn't like being touched in turn without asking, but this—was instinctive. Panic swells in her chest, breaths coming out sharply, because she’s so fucking bad at social cues, Jesus Christ , but—
Dustin hugs her back.
Clutches at her, sniffles, and whispers that same sentence again to keep him safe, keep him safe, don’t let me lose him. Mike’s face crumples, Will hunches in on himself, and El winces. And, collectively, they all join in a single wave that almost knocks her off her feet. She’s just glad she didn’t carry the machete with her.
“I will,” she murmurs. “God fucking help me, I will.”
The cold is harsh, it is biting, and Robin shudders against it all—even through the jacket she’d stolen from Steve’s closet. “You better be right, Steve,” she hisses, “because this sucks so fucking much.”
“I told you a storm was coming,” he replies absently, goosebumps not even rising on his skin. If anything, he looks— adapted . At home within his own skin. “Close,” he mutters a moment after, voice clipped and slightly distorted, and Jonathan shivers beside her. He doesn’t say a word, still keeping pace with Steve as he leads the way.
They'd explained the gist to him—wincing as they did so. The explanation of Eddie, of the bats, of what happened to Steve (or at least, what they believed happened to him); all of it. He'd taken it with barely a flinch, nodding, and asked three questions. Was he a danger to them? No. Was he a danger to himself? No. And, was he okay?
That answer had also been a very hesitant and shaky no .
Jonathan had hugged Steve without hesitation.
Now they all follow his lead. It's odd how at home he looks here, in the edges of still-frosted spring. His eyes are glazed moonstone, his movements swayed and graceful, and Robin watches as her best friend, although masked for the rest, is keeping them safe. A hunter whose gun is his hands; a predator whose only goal is to search and protect rather than hunt. She watches as Steve Harrington quietly puts himself on a pedestal, as a sacrifice to the world, as he's done so many times before.
"Steve," she murmurs, jogging to catch up to him. He glances at her, eyes pale but still his, and gives her a small smile. One she returns. They don't need words for that. Something still, however, twists in her stomach, making her want to say the words anyway. Something nervous. "I love you."
Readily, gently: "I love you too, Robs."
She twists her fingers, feeling the joints pop between one another. "I'm nervous," she confesses softly. He doesn't snark about how she's always nervous, that's who she is, and for that, Robin is grateful. "About—all of this. I don't," she shoulders the jacket higher up on her shoulders, "want you to lose yourself. For this. For any of it." Silence; an echo to continue, and she takes it. "Not just the whole demogorgon thing, too."
Robin stares at him pleadingly, unable to say the next part out loud, hoping Steve just— understands . She looks at him and she pleads: Please let me help you if you need it. Please don't shut me out, not after everything we've been through and fought. Please let me take care of you as you do everyone else.
Please don't leave me alone.
His mouth opens in a small o . And, with wide eyes, Steve grasps her hand with his, intertwining their fingers, and bumps her shoulder. He murmurs a series of I will 's and I won't 's and I promise 's, all out loud, all for her to hear.
She smiles, although it's wobbly at the edges, although it betrays the fact that she'll cry if this continues for much longer. "Me too," she whispers. "Me too, okay? Don't you fucking forget it, Steve Harrington."
He huffs out a small laugh. "Trust me," he murmurs. "I could never."
The trailer park stretches in front of them in broken, bared tidal waves filled with fallen lumber, beams, and glass. The rift breathes new life next to it; black bleeding into the world around, grass turning gray, flowers wilting and glass creating small, red-tipped sculptures from where they pierce the ground.
It's—eerily silent as they wander deeper. The crickets are quiet, for once; the wind barely making a noise as it glides through the grass. Their footsteps, breaking the stiffness, sound too loud, sound too present. Steve, walking with an air of confidence that only Nancy could mimic; Robin and Jonathan clutching their respective weapons in a vice; each making their presence known in a heartbeat.
Eventually, they come to the heart of the park. The heart of the rift. And split down the middle, is Eddie's trailer.
Was , she supposes, barely even flinching when Steve hops inside without a second thought. It was his trailer. Now, it's barely standing, tilting and creaking whenever a gust of wind hits a bit too hard. The rest of them hesitate, not daring to follow, not yet, even when Steve throws a questioning glance over his shoulder before continuing.
A silent Come on; trust me .
"Steve," Jonathan murmurs next to her, grip on the bat knuckle-white. "I don't like this."
"It's too quiet," Nancy agrees quietly. "Everything about this screams trap . I don't care if you can control some of them, talk to some of them; we need to get out of here. It's not safe for any of us."
Not even a breath answers her. Worry claws itself deep into Robin's throat. "Steve?"
There's a small creak above her, and dark brown eyes meet twin red.
Nancy cocks her shotgun, eyes wide, and Jonathan scrambles to get a better hold on his bat. Robin—lets her machete drop to the ground, just as Steve hauls himself upwards, landing heavily on the broken roof. She can feel the grin and thumbs up he's ready to give them, feels the way it drops into stunned silence, into pride, into relief .
Eddie's smile is gentle when he whispers: "Hey, guys."
-
Time, it seems, slows down to a stop.
Pinpoints, really, narrowing down to simply Eddie ; the other images bleeding out from the world around him, blurring at the edges, sharpening at the boy that is slowly standing. His fingers twitch, his eyes are wide, and he radiates anxiety—shoulders flexed and braced for something to land.
Steve's almost glad, really, because if he wasn't, the force of how hard he barrels into them probably would have had them hurdling into the rift itself. He clings, dirt and grime burying itself under his fingernails as he wraps his arms around Eddie tightly. There's a part of him, something that always flares whenever the kids or Robin were in danger, that tells him that if he lets go, Eddie will disappear into a puff of smoke.
So, yeah. He clings. Clings and buries his face into Eddie's neck, feeling familiar tears well up at the corners of his eyes. And when Eddie grips him just as tight, he feels like he can finally breathe again, only burying himself closer.
He wants—so much.
Wants to rip into the man he holds, wants to bury himself neat inside his ribcage, to cradle his beating heart and keep it safe. Safer. He wants to cage himself in where Eddie's body protects the most vulnerable because then, then he can be held like this, evermore too. Steve wants, so badly, to never let go of someone he thought he lost, someone he thought he could end up loving, someone they had to drag him and Dustin away from screaming.
They are violent wants. They are strange and unyielding, but they are his, and this is how he's relearned how to love. Through violence, through the blood, with the want to protect the people he adores most.
"Hey, Stevie," Eddie whispers against his hair. An invitation, an opener.
And Steve—
Steve lets that part of him, the part that's so clearly other , so very monstrous , but also him—sing. A small chitter, barely there, at the base of his throat. Something that says We're the same now, you and I. And because of it, I am never letting you go again.
For a gut-wrenching moment, Steve thinks Eddie's going to pull away.
Instead, he chitters back, a hysterical laugh building through it, and although Steve can't really understand , not in words, anyway, it sounds like reassurance. Warmth. It sounds like daylight . It has him smile through his tears, through where his head is still buried in Eddie's shoulder.
"You're an asshole," he chokes out. "I told you not to—not to be a hero ."
A sigh, breath ruffling the top of his hair. "I know," he murmurs. "Just—wanted to give Dustin a bit more time. Didn't want any of the bats to—try and get through to here, you know? Draw them away, get the kid safe, hopefully they forget about the rift to try and get him too." His grip tightens when Steve starts to shake. Grounding. Alive. "I'm here now, though, okay? Just a bit different is all."
"You could say that for the both of us," he breathes. Then, "I'm sorry I left you."
Steve can't help that broken noise that leaves his lips when he feels a kiss pressed to the top of his head. Nor when they remain there. "Don't apologize for saving your own skin," Eddie murmurs gently. "I don't know what I'd do if I saw any of you joined with me. Probably yell. Maybe kick a bit."
He hums. Lets it wash over him. And, really, he's about to respond when Robin shoves herself up onto the roof, Nancy and Jonathan following suit. Eddie stiffens, only momentarily, before giving a small wave.
"Move over," Robin mutters, shoving Steve to the side. He realizes, belatedly, that she's also crying; only able to see for a moment at best before she's hugging Eddie too. "You don't get to hog him," she sniffs. "Fuck you."
Even Nancy sidles up and wraps her arms around them all too. "You say that as if you weren't complaining about how he was stealing your best friend," she mutters, and Steve narrowly avoids getting smacked in the shoulder by a loose, flailing arm.
"He was . Is. You are." Robin shoves a finger in Eddie's chest, which shakes with barely contained giggles. "I called dibs first. Me . Moi. Back off." Her lower lip trembles, huffing out a choked off laugh. "I missed you."
"Missed you too, Buckley," Eddie says gently. "And you too, Wheeler."
Steve snorts when Nancy grumbles something inaudible under her breath, glancing up for the first time in a while. And—other than Jonathan sort of just… standing there awkwardly—it's peaceful. The sun is setting, the calm before the storm (and he can taste the lightning on the edge of the horizon), the only things stirring being the yawns of waking demobats.
"Jonathan," Steve says after a beat, "quit standing there and come here."
It's like his voice snaps Jonathan out of—whatever the hell he was in, and he shuffles forward, eyebrow raised. "Little weird to be hugging my old drug dealer, but uh—" He tentatively brings his arms up to join. "Glad you're back, man. Heard you had a big impact on the kids while we were gone."
Eddie grins, squeezing, and Steve practically melts back into his hold, even more so when Eddie shifts to hold more of his weight. This was what was pulling him back. And this , he decides, is home. With his best friends, with someone he thinks he might adore. All that's missing is the kids.
Eventually, they all pull back, wiping their eyes and picking up their fallen weapons. Steve sticks stubbornly close to Eddie's side. Robin sniffs, wrinkles her nose, sidles up to Steve's other side while peering at the two of them with narrowed eyes. "You—" she says, wiggling her finger at Eddie, who raises a single eyebrow, "desperately need a bath. You stink , dude. Horrendously. And also I'm emotionally exhausted and it's past my bedtime."
Bedtime? Eddie mouths at Steve when she turns away to rest her head on Nancy's shoulder. Nancy, for her part, looks like she might just combust; Jonathan holding in his laughter as he watches the two of them.
He shrugs in response. "Robs has a schedule she likes to keep in check," Steve murmurs. "But she's unfortunately right."
"Yeah," he sighs. "I don't remember the last time I experienced hot water."
"Well," and Steve can't help the smile that threatens to overtake his entire self . He feels so—happy, for the first time in a long time. Eddie's eyes flutter shut, inhaling, and Steve rests the side of his head on his shoulder despite the grime. "Come on, then," he whispers, tugging a cool hand with his own, "—let's change that."
Entering his own house again felt relieving, to say the least. The kids were wrapped up around one another, asleep with a movie he doesn't recognize murmuring on in the background; the furniture still trashed (Robin and he had broken every shiny vase, every sparkling chandelier, ripping up the furniture with the intent to change it when his parents never even called to see if he was alright).
"I'm glad they're asleep," Eddie murmurs, breaking the easy silence. The dramatic tone he always seems to have, ever since Steve's really known him, has toned down to something quiet. Cautious. "I don't know if I could handle—" He swallows, "explaining it… right now."
And he can see the way Eddie's eyes are flickering all over the room, tensing every now and then. Like it's a dream, like he's going to wake up at any moment and realize that none of this is real .
Steve knows the feeling all too well.
So, he reaches out, grabs his hand. Cradles it, really, when Eddie immediately laces his fingers with his own. "Come on," Steve whispers, giving a gentle tug. Robin's smile is small, knowing, when they start to move. Except she takes Nancy's hand in turn, leaving Jonathan to find Argyle—wherever the other man was hiding. He tries, and mostly fails, to wrangle his amusement under control. "Let's get you cleaned up."
The steps upstairs are slow yet easy—testing. There's a faint hum of Eddie dragging his fingertips against the drywall, every so often catching on the edge of a photo. He doesn't mind. He's replaced all the ones of his parents, standing stiff in business outfits or shuddered in the back, with pictures of the kids. Collages of polaroids taken by Jonathan; small printed posters the kids have given him over the years.
" A New Hope ," Eddie reads when they reach the top. "Didn't know you were into Star Wars, Stevie."
"Dustin and Lucas made me watch it," Steve explains, rubbing the back of his neck. Embarrassment bubbles beneath his chest. Good, new, but undeniably present. "They claimed I'd really love Leia, but I dunno."
Eddie raises an eyebrow. "You don't know?"
"Yeah," he huffs. "Kinda thought Han was hotter."
Which, hilariously, stuns Eddie into some sort of shocked silence, and he basically trips when Steve tugs on his wrist. "Don't act so shocked," he says, rolling his eyes. "I thought it was pretty obvious."
"That you found Han Solo hot, or that you liked boys?" Eddie's voice comes out a bit choked, a tone that says I'm dreaming. I'm about to wake up because this is definitely some weird ass dream.
So, Steve winks, which causes Eddie's cheeks to immediately pinken. "Why do you think I instigated a fight with Jonathan back in '83?"
"You're joking . Steve— Steve . Are you kidding me— Steven —"
He ends up laughing so hard he doubles over, practically tripping his way into the master bathroom. Eddie's high-pitched giggles, he's giggling , follow only moments later. "I'm not , oh my god. Robin had to smack it into me. I told her about the whole thing, and she said," and he raises his voice several octaves higher, " Steve Harrington, you wanted his hands on you in the only way you know how. "
Eddie snorts, which ends up surprising him, and they both dissolve into giggles. Steve leans over, turning the shower on, and shakes his head. "Maybe one of the craziest conversations I had, but this one almost seems to top it."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah," Steve says before proceeding to almost hit his head on the edge of the sink when he sees Eddie wrangling himself out of his shirt. "Jesus Christ," he whispers. He practically feels Eddie's smirk, still covered by blackened fabric. "Give a guy some warning before you decide to strip."
Steve's proud to say that his voice only sounds a little bit strangled.
He gets a wink in return. "Stripping," he says, and Steve has to force himself to avert his gaze until he hears the shower curtain close, until he hears Eddie's soft, pleased sigh when the water hits his skin. "Yeah," comes a murmur, only audible because Steve's ears are straining from how hard he's listening, really, "I missed this."
"Hot water?"
A huff of laughter. "Hot water," he agrees. "And soap . My god. Heaven in a little bar—" He cuts himself off, cursing, and Steve hears the telltale clunk of soap hitting the ground. He presses his lips together to stifle his laughter. "Actually, fuck soap. I hate soap. God dammit , what the—why is it so fucking slippery —" He might actually die. His body is shaking so violently, laughter threatening to combust . "Just—" Eddie makes a frustrated sound, " Give it to me —fucking—finally, Jesus Christ —Are you laughing at me ?"
It combusts.
Eddie makes a strangled sound, peeking his head outside the curtain. He looks absolutely scandalized, which only makes Steve snort, then snort again because somehow laughing in and of itself is infinitely funnier than the thing that made him laugh to begin with. "I can't believe you," he grumbles. "I'm struggling, and you're in hysterics."
There are tears trailing down his cheeks. "Do—" And he can't help but wheeze when Eddie drops the soap again , crying out in outrage when he does so. "Do you—need help ."
" No ," Eddie hisses. Then, after another clatter that makes Steve want to drop to the floor with how hard he's giggling, he mutters, sounding like a petulant child, "Fine. Fine. Help me out here, man; I can't get my back without it slipping."
Steve lets out a noise that's half-wheeze, half- snirk . "Alright, alright, turn around then. And hand me the soap bar, pretty please." He pulls back the curtain gently, faced with Eddie sitting side-ways, his back to him, holding what looks like a clawed white bar. Dark brown runs off of him in waves, getting lighter the longer it stays.
"What did you do to this poor thing," he mutters, dragging the soap down Eddie's back before he can respond. There's a shudder, and Eddie brings his knees up to rest his head on his arms, eyes closing. He looks, for the first time since Steve's seen him—visions and memories aside—content.
Comfortable silence washes over them both; Steve washing until pale patches of skin reveal themselves again, and Eddie occasionally reaching for a bottle to scrub his hair. "I'll fall asleep if someone does it for me," he explains, voice still so unbelievably soft against the rush of water, "and I don't really want to fall asleep just yet."
Steve hums in understanding, letting the soap drag over Eddie's shoulder blades. Another shudder, and Steve can see something flex underneath the skin—something not completely bone. He replaces the soap with his hand, and Eddie groans low in his throat. It has something zing underneath his skin, something thrum through his blood.
Eddie peeks at him, rest of his face hidden in the crook of his arm. His hair's washed now, and Steve's honestly positive his back is clean, too, but he can't seem to stop himself. His hands come to a stop, right over those little divots, and he can feel the vibrations of the responding hum. "I'll show you," Eddie murmurs, eyes slipping closed again. His breathing slows. "One of these days, I'll show you."
"Okay," Steve whispers. "You're falling asleep, by the way."
Another slow open of an eye, irises still tinged red. "Thanks for pointing that out, genius," he mutters, but he rolls his shoulders back, and Steve jerks his hands back and looks away before he ends up dying. Or ascending.
"I'll grab some clothes," he says quickly, and practically—races out of the room. It— god . No matter how much confidence he has in the beginning, there's still anxiety coursing through him. Because, he, too, feels like this is just some fucked up dream. That he's going to wake up in his own bed or in a hospital and Eddie will still be dead. He'll still be dead, Max won't be getting any closer to waking up, everyone will still be gone—
A deep breath; a long exhale; his heart calms its rapid beating to something more steady as he flexes each part of his body, as he opens his eyes and focuses on every small detail of his room. It helps, and when Steve grabs the fabric of his favorite pair of sweats, he doesn't feel like throwing up at just touching .
He takes those and the one dark-colored thing in his closet—an old, raggedy thing with holes riddling the top of the sleeves from where he accidentally burned it on top of the stove (long story). But it's comfortable, and it fits smoothly across his skin, so he hopes Eddie likes it too. Not to mention it's his only band shirt— Queen fitting across the fabric in bright, yellow lettering—so, you know, brownie points.
"Hey," he calls gently outside the bathroom door, clothes bundled in his arms. "I'm gonna leave these outside the door, 'kay?" A noise of agreement follows, and Steve lets out a sigh he didn't know he was holding.
Robin was going to murder him.
Without much other thought, he throws himself on his bed, burying his face in his pillows. He doesn't want to think about it, really. The how of Eddie coming back; it most likely being the same thing that turned him into—one of them , but even still. Coming back from the dead—immortality was a curse in and of itself.
(Would El be able to cure them? Or would they have to sit and watch as the world burned?)
He doesn't open his eyes until he feels a gentle dip in the bed, sees a small smile flash in the corner of his mind's eye. "Hey," Eddie murmurs when he does, wriggling under the covers without a beat of hesitation. It's cute, in a way, how ever since being reminded of warmth , Eddie seems to want to be buried in it. "I can hear you thinking."
Steve makes a face that makes it clear he does not want to be thinking. "Stressing," he ends up correcting anyhow. "Panicking."
Eddie hums, places his hand over where Steve rests it between them, squeezes. Waits for him to continue. Steve squeezes back. "You're back," he whispers, shutting his eyes against the dark, "and I cannot be anymore grateful for it. I'm just—I'm terrified of what happens next. You're still wanted for murder—" and his voice cracks at the ends of that, "Max is still in the hospital, Wayne doesn't— know . Neither does Dustin. And when they do, when they find out, it—"
He exhales shakily, takes a leap. Leans over and presses his face into Eddie's chest. "I'm scared of this being over as soon as it begins," he finally says. "Because this is the happiest I've felt in a long time. But there's so much ahead of us."
There's another soft kiss being pressed to his head. Then, another, this time to his forehead as Eddie gently tilts it up; to his eyelids; against his nose; on the mole underneath his right eye. He doesn't stop, not until Steve completely relaxes against his hold. Barely-there fingernails trail up—and down his back. He can hear the rapid-fire beat of Eddie's heart, and it makes him feel better, slightly, that he isn't the only one nervous.
"It'll drive you mad thinkin' about the future," Eddie says against his hair. "The bad parts, anyway. Just—focus here. Now."
"For a DnD player," Steve mutters, "you have quite a way with words."
"It's 'cause I'm a dungeon master , darlin'," Eddie says, voice taking on a thick and awful southern accent. Steve can't help the absolute cackle that leaves him, nose scrunching up when he grins. Eddie laughs too, after a moment.
Steve huffs, burying his face back into Eddie's chest. He feels safe like this, being held tenderly, allowing to hide from the world. Eddie too, he knows, with the way his legs tangle with Steve's, with the way he hides his face in his hair. "Okay," he murmurs. "Focusing now. Tomorrow can wait."
"Yeah," Eddie whispers, breathing already slowing, "it can."
He laughs softly, closing his eyes, letting safety and comfort envelope him like a blanket. Like it already has. I love you , he thinks, sleep grasping him by the edges already.
(His mother would always chastise him for falling too quickly, for adoring too heavily. Too much like her , making her mistakes. His father would sneer; friends would tease, and here he is falling again off the edge.
Except, now, he knows there'll be people to catch him. A family. People he sees as his kids, siblings, friends, soulmates, and someone he doesn't know that much but wants to, needs to, cares about him the same way he does the others, if not a bit more. It feels like Nancy. It feels like something else, too.)
I love you , he thinks, burrowing closer.
For once, he doesn't feel bad about it.
-
Dustin wakes, curled up against Will's side, peacefully.
It's the first time it's happened in what feels like forever. He's not suffocating in the room his mother decorated for him; he isn't writhing in the sheets seeing blood, seeing death, seeing horrors that he can't even begin to explain to a shrink. Except this time, he fell asleep in a fit of white noise, dreamt of endlessness.
Nancy and Robin are murmuring to each other quietly in the kitchen, the smell of pancakes wafting into the room when Nancy takes the spatula and flips.
(Mike told him quietly, once, that Nancy learned how to cook for him early on. When their mother was too focused on the baby and work; when their father was too drunk and snappish to do anything but sit. There's not much she can cook, but if there was one thing Steve taught her, it was how to make the best breakfasts someone could wish for.
His gaze had darkened at the mention of Steve. Dustin had rolled his eyes.
Lighten up already , he'd grumbled, but still kept his arm around Mike's shoulders, Steve's saved our asses more times than we can count, and Nancy was the one who dumped him. Chill. They're just friends now, anyway.
Sure, Mike had muttered, stretching out the word. Sure .)
Dustin untangles himself from Will's arms, ruffling his friend's hair when he stirs. "'Morning," he murmurs, which—he thought it was pretty quiet, but seeing as how Nancy and Robin both jump three feet in the air, he guesses he's wrong. "Sorry," he rubs the back of his head sheepishly, and both their gazes soften.
"No problem," Robin says easily, ruffling his hair. It reminds him of Steve, a habit he'd gotten hold of through Dustin's mother. "We were gonna wake all you rascals up soon, anyway." Her smile turns apologetic. "Breakfast talk."
For a moment, his heart sinks. Steve would always make breakfast for them when they stayed over a bit too late, but sometimes, when it involved something a bit more serious (never really Upside Down serious, but serious nonetheless), he'd call them breakfast talks. He must've done the same thing to Robin.
And it's not like he dreads them. Steve's idea of severe importance is keeping them safe and making sure they don't stay up too late, or don't forget to eat regularly. But, now, with Max in the hospital (she's become something like his sister, now, and seeing her wrapped in so many bandages makes him sick—), with Eddie dead (the smell of pancakes is too much—too overwhelming—), he doesn't know if he can really handle this right now.
"Hey," and suddenly Robin is kneeling in front of him like she did before, not really making eye contact with him but trying. "Listen to me: nothing bad, okay? Just—different. Very different. And this seemed like the best way to do it without scaring you guys half to death— not in a bad way —"
"You're, like, really bad at this," he whispers, but his heart rate's slowing, his breathing is evening out. Honestly, he didn't even realize that he'd begun to panic in the first place, getting too wrapped up in his own head. "Thanks."
"Yeah," she says, relief evident in her voice. He pretends not to notice, but his smile gets a little wider, a little more genuine. "Look—could you do me a big favor and wake the others? I gotta go get Steve, and Nancy's trying to make pancakes and waffles at the same time without burning anything."
"I'm succeeding ," Nancy mutters beside her. Robin snorts.
"She is succeeding," she informs him, and he nods solemnly along with her. It has her grin. Has her ruffling his hair— again . Which, with anyone else, he'd sorta be irritated about, but Robin's on the same level as Steve, so he doesn't mind it as much. "But I'd rather not get in her way and end up with, like, batter all over my face," she continues, shuddering. "Euough. Gross ."
Dustin grimaces. "The worst ," he agrees. "Okay, alright—waking the others. Gotcha." He does a little salute which, at first, makes Robin flinch, but she returns it fast enough that he doesn't feel too guilty about it. Still, though, he mouths a quick Sorry and files it away in the back of his mind.
El is blinking herself awake, curled away from Mike and towards Will instead, waving when he enters the room again. "Hi," she whispers. Sniffs. Her eyes widen, brighten, and for a moment, she looks like a little kid again. "Eggos?"
"Only the best," Dustin says, even though he's not exactly sure if Nancy's making Eggos or waffles in a waffle-maker. Steve seems like the type to have a waffle-maker. "Pancakes too, if you want to try some of those."
She shakes her head in a firm no . "Eggos."
"Eggos it is." He leans over, shakes Will's shoulders as gently as possible, and gets the deadliest glare in return. If looks could kill. "Hello, sleepy-head," he drawls, patting Will's cheek, "wakey, wakey, calm down, etcetera. Breakfast time."
"I hate you," Will mutters, obviously not a morning person, "did he do this to you?" El shakes her head. "I hate you double-time. You better do this to Mike."
He blinks. "Wake him up ?"
"It's too early to be woken up. It's like, six," Will grumbles, even though the clock right next to him reads a fat nine o'clock.
"I think you're dyslexic," Dustin says. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
"That's not dyslexia —"
"Will you two fucking— shut up ," Mike hisses, and Dustin ends up getting a pillow right to the face when he turns to object. It nearly knocks him on his ass. Will practically cackles from next to him, which. Rude .
He sputters, "Did you fucking freeze this? Put bricks in it? Why is it so hard—"
"Shut up —"
"Wow," and suddenly Steve is right behind him, arms crossed, singular eyebrow raised. He looks like Dustin's mother when she found out he ran out with seven different books from the library. Epitome of mom and disappointed . "I let you stay over, and this is how you repay me? Arguing at ass-o'clock in the morning."
He really is going to kill each and every one of them. Except El. El is a gift. "It is nine ," he hisses, jabbing a finger in his direction. "Ass-o'clock is six at best. At best . At worst it is three. At worst ."
Steve looks at him, unimpressed. Although it's a little hard to take him seriously when his hair is—everywhere. "You do not yet know the true pains of capitalism and early rising," he says, and Dustin really wants to argue that point, because he is still in fucking school , when Robin hops in, squinting at the two of them.
"Wayne's at the door," she says, startling Dustin to silence and making Steve straighten slightly.
"I'll get him," and he's about to protest it until Steve practically bolts up the stairs, leaving everyone but Robin and apparently Nancy, who hasn't looked back once at the interaction, stunned.
Surprisingly, it's El who mutters: "He's hiding the wrong."
Isn't that a fucking sentence .
Robin hisses through her teeth. " Yeah ," she says, drawing out the word. "But, like, that's for a fun conversation over hot pancakes and waffles. And a lot of coffee. Yeah? Yeah! Come on, let's go, go, go —"
They're being shoved into Steve's kitchen through protests and escape attempts, only ever stopping when they meet Wayne. El and Will are the only ones who smile awkwardly and wave, never really knowing who Wayne was, never knowing who Eddie was either. Dustin sort of just. Stands there next to Mike.
He looks just about as awkward and out of place as they feel. "Hey," he greets slowly, voice gruff. As if it hasn't been used in a long, long time. "Your—brother," Wayne tests the word on his tongue, and Dustin ignores the way Mike chokes, "invited me here this mornin'. Said it was about Ed." His eyes narrow a bit; everyone else cringing slightly at the sound of Eddie’s name. "I don't like jokes, sons. Not about this."
"It's—" and Dustin's suddenly struggling to speak, breathing heavily, the world spinning around him in waves. Because why , why in the seven hells would Steve want to talk to all of them about Eddie ?
Thank god Nancy steps in, mouth drawn into a thin line as she dumps breakfast less than gracefully, on several different plates. "Steve doesn't joke like that," she says, voice filled with forced politeness. "They were close."
" Steve Harrington and Eddie?" And it’s Mike who asks it disbelievingly.
Robin shrugs. "We helped him escape from the police," she says, dousing her respective waffle in syrup. "Bonding moment of sorts. Steve and Eddie—" she waves her fork around thoughtfully, "clicked. Was pretty sure he was stealing him away from me for a moment with the way they coparented Dustin."
Mike’s jaw—clicks shut. “Oh.”
“Yep,” Robin says, popping the p . She goes back to eating, and Nancy huddles the rest of them around the table, hissing at Mike when he calls her a mother. Dustin’s more dumbstruck than anything else to argue. How Steve and Eddie bonded, how Robin and Nancy barely even flinch when they mention Eddie’s name—like he’s still around, like he’s with them right now at the end of the table, two chairs empty, one of them for him, and the other for Steve.
Speaking of. “Where’s Steve,” Dustin asks, accidentally cutting through Nancy explaining… something to Wayne. He wasn’t really paying attention. Everyone turns to him, Robin opening her mouth to speak, when there’s a creak of the floorboards right behind him.
“Present,” Steve says like he’s still in high school, shoulders covering a figure hiding behind him. Dustin turns, squinting at him, and Steve shifts a bit so he can’t see. “So, uh, I’ve invited you all here—” The figure snorts; Steve smacks at them blindly. “Okay, fine, you’re all still here because I haven’t kicked you out; Wayne was invited; Jonathan is still passed out on the couch. Do not get him.”
Will wrinkles his nose. “Why?”
“Because he doesn’t really eat breakfast anymore,” Steve says, “and he’s already caught up on the breakfast talk.”
There’s a series of hums around the table: El asking Will something inaudible, Nancy putting her head in her hands while Robin stares intently at her food. Wayne looks like he’s about to just tell Steve to spit it out , when the figure shifts, straightens, reveals a mop of familiar, curly brown hair.
His fork clatters to the ground. Vaguely, he hears Wayne curse as his coffee mug slips from his hands, crashing onto the ground; hears Mike’s chair scrape on wood as he scrambles upwards. They all flinch.
Eddie peeks out behind Steve’s shoulder. Puts a hand up in a small wave, a quiet greeting. “So,” he says slowly, voice shaking, “turns out I’m not dead like… all of you thought.” Wayne takes a step forward, and Eddie shakes even harder, hands clinging to Steve’s shoulders, who stays stock-still—grounding. “Yay?”
Dustin’s shoving at Steve to move before he can say anything more; clawing at Eddie’s back as Wayne comes up next to him, already hiccuping, sobbing. He feels Mike edge closer, too. Feels him inhale before relaxing; feels Eddie’s arms come up hesitantly around them all. It lasts about a few milliseconds before they’re being crushed, Eddie crying along with the rest of them.
“I saw you— die , asshole,” Dustin hisses. “We left you; we thought you were dead —”
“You gave me a heart attack, boy,” Wayne murmurs. “The hell were you thinking? Runnin’ off like that?”
Eddie sort of collapses, at that. “I was so scared, Wayne,” he whispers. “I was so fucking scared. She died right—right in front of me—they weren’t going to believe me. I’m a drug dealer living in a trailer park—”
“Doesn’t matter,” Mike mutters. “We would’ve argued for you. Fuckin’ fought .”
“Weren’t you in California?” But there’s a new smile in his voice, a bit of laughter echoing in it. When Mike shrugs half-heartedly, it grows. Even Wayne manages a small rumble of amusement; Dustin huffing along.
“You have a lot of explaining to do,” he whispers into the fabric. “You know that?”
He feels the sharp point of Eddie’s nose dig into the top of his head. “I got lucky,” he whispers. “I got really fucking lucky, Dustin. I don’t know—what would’ve happened if Steve hadn’t found me.”
Somehow, he finds the strength to turn. Steve blinks, pausing in his ministrations—picking at a waffle while looking like it just spilled his deepest secret. “That’s why you wouldn’t let us come,” Dustin whispers before Steve could ask. “It’s because you thought Eddie was alive. It’s because you found him.”
“Thought I did,” Steve murmurs. “Police were talking ‘bout someone roaming the trailer park—curly hair, pale, had a tendency to dive behind trash cans and hurl broken bottles.” He grins; Edde wrinkles his nose. “It was—desperate,” he continues, quiet, more serious. “I didn’t know, and it was so close to the r—to where the earthquake happened that I didn’t know what would happen if I was wrong. If you had gotten hurt, or your hopes up, and I was wrong.”
Dustin lets himself be disentangled from Eddie’s arms, but he follows him all the same when Eddie sits down next to Steve, curls up against his side. “You weren’t though,” Eddie says gently. “You brought me home. I ran, and you brought me home.”
“Bullshit,” and it’s not just Dustin who snaps it, but Steve, Nancy, and Robin. Jonathan lets out a sharp snore from the other room, and he takes it as an agreement, too. “You saved my life— all of our lives more than once. When you and I were running, we were running towards home, towards the rest of us. And you turned back to make it absolutely positive that I would get out safely. Shut the fuck up with the self-deprecation.”
“Running comes with the job,” Nancy cuts in. “Sometimes when you’re in danger, you can’t hit back, you save your own skin or your family’s. But you’re always a part of that group.” Her glare is of a thousand daggers when she points it at Eddie. “You’re a part of our group now. You deserve to live like the rest of us.”
And it—it surprises him, really. How close the four of them had gotten since Vecna. Steve and Robin were always at the hip, of course they were, but now Steve’s nodding with Nancy—a multitude of emotions being sent through both of them. Eddie is stuck to Steve’s side; he looks at Nancy in surprise before gratefulness. And Robin… she playfully leans over to tap Eddie on the nose, shoulder pressed against Nancy’s own.
They look more like family rather than just a group of teens.
(Dustin supposes that’s what trauma does to you; creates bonds that are either unbreakable or too frayed to do anything about. Mending, welding, breaking, shattering. How metal can twist and bend, how under enough pressure, it can snap. They are the guns and knives they use to hunt, they are the molotovs that explode upon impact.
Like how Vecna had his vines, there is a little bit of the Upside Down wrapped around each of them.)
“Okay,” Eddie says, just like that. As if all he needed was Nancy Wheeler’s approval to end up agreeing. “Alright.”
“We do need to talk though,” Will interjects, voice somehow always gentle, always softening the blows. Dustin knows better than anyone, though—aside from Jonathan and Joyce—how his anger can flare to life in an instant. “Not now, necessarily, but, uh… definitely soon.”
They can all hear that ringing note, that chord that sings something unnatural.
Everyone aside from Wayne ends up grimacing.
“Boy’s right,” he says still. “Not just to me, but to those officers, too. Don’t look at me like that, I know. But you have a group of people with similar, if not the same stories as you, giving you an alibi. Several. That’s more than group suspicion.”
“Wayne—”
The older man crosses his arms tight against his chest. “ Edward —” Yikes. “Hiding wasn’t your best move, but I know you didn’t kill that girl. Know it because you’re my son .” Eddie chokes up at that. “And going to the police has never been in our best interests, but going to them before they catch you? It might just be our best shot.”
Eddie grimaces, but his shoulders slump—a sign Dustin knows a bit too well that means he’s given up fighting. “Not yet,” he murmurs. “I will, okay? I promise, I just—I need to sleep and eat and just—stay—” Steve squeezes his shoulder, “before I do anything else, okay? For all I know I’m still being hunted by some fuck-up jocks.
“I’m tired of fighting, Wayne,” he whispers, bringing his knees to his chest. “A few nights. Give me a few nights, please.”
And Wayne just. Deflates. “Eddie,” he says gently, squeezing between where Dustin stands and Steve is practically melded to Eddie’s side. He places a hand on top of Eddie’s shoulder, squeezing just the slightest amount. “You take all the time you need, son. I’m only worried about you. I’m sorry.”
Eddie huffs out a small, teary laugh, leaning against him. “It’s okay. I—Thank you, Wayne.”
A press to the top of his head. “Of course,” Wayne whispers against his hair. Dustin’s pretty sure his own curls get caught in the mess with the way Eddie is clutching at him. Clutching at them all. “Of course, Eds.”
Dustin can’t help the small smile that slips onto his face, can’t help the way he giggles when Steve flicks a piece of pancake at Robin when she sticks his tongue out. And, shit, there’s no way he could’ve stopped the absolute cackle that leaves him when Jonathan enters the room, looking like a bird had nested in his hair, asking nervously when he sees Eddie and Wayne clutched at each other: “Uh… what’s up?”
Despite the way he doesn’t know how Eddie came back, despite the way he doesn’t know what wrongness is stirring underneath all of their skins, he feels—strangely enough—happy.
But—
He supposes there are stranger things to be happy about.
-
It honestly took a lot of convincing for Wayne to leave. It’s not like Eddie really wanted him too, but he was huddling and it was suspicious enough for him to come over to Steve’s, much less stay more than a few hours. Some might think him dead, but Eddie knows for a fact that many do, in fact, not.
And, despite it making sense, despite him knowing Wayne had to leave for his own damned safety, it still hurt like a bitch when he stalked out Steve’s door.
( “Don’t do anything stupid,” he’d muttered, hugging him tight. “No runnin’ off, no sacrificin’ yourself for this fuckin’ town again. Stay here. Get better. Kick some ass whenever you feel ready enough to do so.”
Eddie winked, but had also blinked back several tears, so he’d probably just looked like one hell of a mess trying to give a silent ‘a-okay’. “No promises.”
Wayne frowned, flicks him on the head when he pulls away. Eddie stuck his tongue out at him, ignoring the way Steve snorted a ways behind him, chatting quietly with Jonathan. “Stay here,” he’d repeated sternly. “That Harrington boy is good for you—beat himself up ten times over for not being able to save you when everyone thought you were gone.” His voice broke at the end, jaw clenching slightly before continuing: “There’s no doubt he cares for you. That little one, too. All of them.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Wayne whispered, pulling him close again when Eddie couldn’t hold back the tears, couldn’t help the pounding in his chest. “And don’t you dare forget you have people who love you, son.”
They had to peel them away from each other when a cop car slipped past, when they saw one of Jason’s goons sneering outside one of the windows. “I won’t,” Eddie’d promised before the door shut. Before there was another barrier separating him from the man who was more of a dad than his own father ever was. “God dammit, Wayne, I won’t.”)
So, here they are, hours later, all curled up around each other while Little Shop of Horrors plays in the background. Nancy and Robin against a recliner; Jonathan and Argyle (who showed up really late to the party from his broken down van) with Will and Mike on the floor; Steve and himself with Dustin and El at their feet. It feels empty without Lucas, Max, and Erica. Like three parts of the family they forged by hand just—disappeared.
Steve was the one who broke it to him. That Max didn’t make it—Vecna managed to get her when Jason distracted Lucas, when he broke the walkman. Lucas has spent almost every night at the hospital with Erica, Steve the same. The only reason the doctor’s didn’t kick out Lucas or Erica was because Steve insisted. He made sure.
Eddie’s pretty sure he adores him for what he does for those kids.
“I can’t believe this is your favorite movie,” he whispers, keeping his voice down and gentle so as to not disturb the others. Steve shivers, and Eddie bites down a grin. It feels good to just tease again. “Really? A talking plant? That eats people?”
“Isn’t your favorite movie The Thing ?” Steve mutters. His gaze is kept stubbornly to the screen, but Eddie can hear the slight bump in heart rate, can feel the way Steve’s breath hitches. It’s weird, it’s really fucking weird, but he’s kind of past the point of caring. Especially now, surrounded by the people he cares about most, curled against someone that makes his heart hammer in his chest all the same.
So, he grins, leans in until his chin is resting on Steve’s shoulder. “It’s actually Rocky Horror , but I doubt you know that one, pretty boy.” This earns him a smack on the ankle from Dustin, and a jump in heartbeat from Steve.
He doesn’t really know what overcomes him to bury his head a bit deeper, to inhale and let the scent of cinnamon and spiced coffee overwhelm him. It’s—intoxicating. Steve stiffens, relaxes, and Eddie remembers just how hungry he really is. How he hasn’t eaten since the first, since he saw the bats, since before, before, before.
“Problem,” Eddie whispers against his neck, not able to bring himself to pull away. He’s starting to hear everyone’s hearts come and go in steady rhythms, starting to feel the pulse of blood in the air. It makes his head spin; it makes him nose the juncture between Steve’s neck and shoulder. “ Reeaaalll big problem here, Stevie.”
“If you say it’s in your pants, I swear to god —”
Eddie snorts, making Mike, Dustin, and El all shh him at once. Will only glares at him, which is far scarier than anything else he’s really experienced before. Jesus. “That’s a funnier answer,” he admits quietly. “But I have—just remembered I haven’t eaten in like. Months? Weeks here, I think. I don’t really know.”
Honestly, it’s a bit funny how Steve practically jumps up and dislodges his leg from Dustin’s grasp. Other than the fact Eddie almost fucking—tried to grapple him to keep him there; to sink his teeth in just to have him stay still. Thank god for years of practiced self restraint.
Everyone sort of—turns to stare at him when Steve stumbles about; Mike, Will, and Argyle being the only ones to sort of shrug him off. “Uh,” he says. “I’m officially exhausted and going to bed… feel free to stay if you want, though, okay? Guest rooms are for Nance, Rob, Jon, and Argyle only . Will, if any of the others try to sneak one, just wake me up.”
Will sort of gives him an aye-aye . “Got it.”
Dustin sort of gives him a look . A look that says: I don’t want to leave you alone. Eddie ruffles the boy’s hair, gives him an easy grin. “Not goin’ anywhere,” he says gently. “Stevie and I just have to have a little talk. And then, you know, sleep.”
He wrinkles his nose. Pretends to gag. Eddie has to hold himself back from shaking him. He instead goes for the second route, which is mentally shrieking at him that it is not like that . He wishes , but it’s not .
Get your mind out of the gutter, Henderson .
Henderson does not get the hint.
“Have fun,” he jabs with a roll of his eyes. There’s an easy smile on his face, though, and Eddie realizes that maybe—it’s good for them all to tease again, too. “Don’t be too loud,” which is ironic seeing as how he himself was too loud, and the sound of Steve’s swallowing is too loud in the gentle murmuring of the room. Robin gags; Nancy gives him an unimpressed look. Fortunately Jonathan just gives him… a thumbs up.
A thumbs up.
He hates it here.
“Alrighty,” he sighs, doing the dad-like thing Wayne always does when he stands: puts his hands on his knees, rising slowly like his back is protesting the entire way up. Which Eddie’s is , actually. The wings that he’s been fighting to hide, that have slipped underneath the seams, ache. They long to be free just as his teeth long to expand. “Let’s get you to bed then, old man. Sleepy time.”
“You are two years older than me,” Steve hisses, but there’s no heat behind his words, a smile twitching on his lips that he’s fighting his hardest to keep down. It warms something in him. Thaws that ice that’s been building since the Upside Down, clearing the darkness clawing inside his chest.
Dustin puts an end to a bantering that only just began: “You’re both old. Imagine being in your twenties. Yikes.”
“Imagine being a teen again,” Robin jabs back despite the fact that she is still a teenager, only nineteen. “Little gremlins, the lot of you.”
Eddie rolls his eyes, silently slipping from Dustin’s grasp as he goes to argue with Robin further, bringing up the silent point he’d made in his head, to follow Steve. Who’s already climbing the stairs, glancing at him with a raised eyebrow as if Eddie can’t hear the way his heart is thundering in his chest.
“Hi,” he murmurs, flashing a smile full of teeth. This is what you’re promising me, Steve. This is what you are giving yourself to.
“Hey,” Steve whispers back, taking his hand in his own, creating a soothing chitter in the back of his throat. You forget; we’re a part of the same monstrous world underneath, now. I know what I’m doing; I know you.
Eddie scoffs, shaking his head with a small smile. Insane , he wants to say, You’re insane, Steve Harrington.
By the look he receives—a grin that lights up Steve’s entire face, eyes squinted in a smile so wide they look shut—Eddie thinks he already knows.
He lets himself be led up the stairs, unable to really tear his eyes away from Steve, unable to take his hand away. From the way he looks almost ghost-like in the now-emptiness of the house. From the warmth that emanates from his palm. Eddie thinks it’s grounding. He thinks it’s grounding them both.
“From what I saw,” he says in the gentle quiet—not overwhelming, not when there’s someone next to him in all of the space echoing, “you didn’t have a big ‘ol set of chompers.” He points to where his fangs slide out, in, out again. “But to be fair, you didn’t, like, die, in order for the bats to vamp-ify you, so—”
A squeeze, small and barely there. “Stop that,” Steve whispers. “You’re here now.”
Oh.
“Steve, I’m not like—being self deprecating,” Eddie rushes forward, only to be surrounded by the smell of cinnamon, new books, spiced coffee so strong it makes him a little cross-eyed. Makes him stumble a little. “I did die. It’s just a fact. I’ve made peace with it.”
His voice is near silent when he says: “I haven’t.”
And, they’re right outside his room, the kids still downstairs with Robin and Nancy, Jonathan and Argyle, so Eddie tugs him to a stop, brings his wrist to his lips. It’s intoxicating. It clears his head instantly. “I’m here now,” he says, pressing a small kiss to the skin. “Right here, honestly surprised you haven’t freaked out, and in your house right next to your room. I’m not going anywhere, Stevie.” He lets his wrist drop but keeps their fingers entangled, lets himself look back up to where Steve’s staring, pupils blown. “Not unless you tell me to go.”
“No,” Steve says sharply, quickly, fucking instantaneous. “No.”
Eddie’s lips quirk into a smile. “To?”
“To letting you go.” Steve pulls him forward, just barely, but Eddie falls forward as if he’d yanked him. He instinctively buries his head in the crook of Steve’s neck, inhales, grazes his teeth over the skin and lets himself be held. Somehow, they’d both gotten through the threshold because Steve’s door clicks shut a moment later.
“As for the freaking out,” Steve continues, voice only wavering at the ends. “I was a little bit in love with Jonathan, like, years ago. My bisexual awakening has since happened.” Eddie snorts. “I’m serious!” He protests. “Robin had to hear me ramble about him for hours . The amount of times I’d gotten hit upside the head…”
“And me?” Eddie hums when he feels the rumble in Steve’s chest. When it vibrates through him, touches all the way down to his bones . He’s laughing. Laughing and holding him tighter until there’s absolutely no space between them, no room for hesitation. It feels so fucking good . Not even doing anything, only existing in the same space, only having arms wrapped around him with full, immediate trust.
“I felt a bit bad falling for someone who I thought was dead,” Steve murmurs. “But you’re here.”
He agrees, “I’m here.”
And with a little push from the man in front of him, with a whisper of, I’m here too , Eddie sinks his teeth in.
-
The first thing Steve registers when Eddie bites him is—it hurts.
It really fucking hurts.
He’d nosed the bundles of nerves against his neck, grazed his teeth over the spot over and over again until Steve had gone dizzy with it. Then he’d pressed the points of them down, barely breaking skin, and sunk in like his life depended on it. Which, he realizes now, dazed, that it probably did.
The pain from the bite and the euphoria of his lips on Steve’s neck all bleeds into pleasure. His body relaxes, he finds himself gently being lowered to the bed, arms still wrapped around Eddie’s shoulders. It feels like hours, except it had to have been only a few more seconds before Eddie was pulling off with a small, audible pop .
“That,” he says, pressing one, two, three kisses to the sting of the bite, “was fantastic. I feel so much better, oh my god.” Another kiss. “Thank you.”
“I feel boneless,” Steve tells him, arms sliding up to hang off Eddie’s neck. “You have turned my bones to jelly.
“That would be the blood loss,” and Eddie lets out a small giggle, so bright and energetic that Steve wants to swallow him whole. Metaphorically. “Now come on, princess, I showed you mine so show me yours.”
Steve wrinkles his nose, despite the way the blood he does still have rushes all the way to his cheeks at the pet name. “You’re horrible—why can’t you just say things normally? Ever? My god.”
Saying Eddie’s laughter sounds like bells would be… wrong. It’s more of a bark, really, surprised but happy, as if he still can’t believe any of this is happening. It thrums through Steve’s chest like shaking chords. His laughter is the drumbeats leading Steve into the unknown, the ringing of a guitar after a final note in a roaring concert—it’s music in its finality, but it is in no way quiet. It is in no way soft.
He’s a little bit in love with it.
Steve’s a little bit in love with Eddie.
“Alright, alright,” he huffs, works his jaw. There’s a relieving click , as if it’s been waiting to be put in place for years now, and slowly, the skin begins to split.
The shifting isn’t pleasant, it never has been in the two times he’s done it, including now, but it doesn’t hurt either. Instead, relief courses through him as his teeth slip through the gums, as his jaw splits into four even splits. Not quite flower-like, not that smooth in movement with the bones in the way, but close enough to see what he’s become.
He still hasn’t told the kids. Still hasn’t told them. But here, now, he feels safe sharing that secret with Eddie, with something darker singing inside of him that the man in front of him is loved, is adored, is someone he should bow his head to and sink his own teeth in as well. If Steve is marked, then so should Eddie, so should the one they whisper Kas .
And honestly, he wouldn’t have. He would’ve clicked his jaw shut a moment later, let his teeth sink back down, swing back into the roof—except his eyes meet Eddie’s and they’re filled with awe. That same love, that same adoration, and Steve feels—
Honestly, he isn’t sure what he feels.
Love.
Protective.
Hungry.
And like Eddie can hear his thoughts—which, well—he brings his wrist to Steve’s lips and grins. It’s entirely him, the hive echoes underneath, and this is where Steve realizes that he will never be the same. The darkness thrives in him, it holds him close, keeps him comfort in all of its wrongness.
This is where Steve bites down himself.
It’s quick, similar to a stapler, and he detaches himself as soon as his teeth break the thin layers of skin. Forces his jaw back shut, lets himself like the redness trickling out the side of his lips, lets himself kiss the bitten flesh.
The blood is sweet, tasting of cinnamon apples and campfire smoke, but it soothes him in an instant. Quells the hunger that was building in his gut and warms the deepest pits of him all the way to the outside.
Everything inside him crows. The hive. Himself. It sings and sings and sings because he has gotten Kas , he has marked him, and Kas has marked him back. When he opens his eyes again—not really sure when he’d closed them—he looks about as wrecked as Steve feels. Hair wild as if he ran his fingers through it, eyes wide and pupils blown.
Steve wants to kiss him.
“You look like shit,” he tells Eddie instead, and maybe it’s a question. Maybe it’s an offer, unspoken, a plea. Tell me this is more. Tell me you won’t leave me. Tell me to bite you again. Tell me to kiss you. Tell me you feel the same way even if it’s a lie. Please. Please. Please.
“You too, Stevie,” Eddie murmurs. Not Harrington, it’s never been Harrington afterwards with him, and it makes Steve feel wanted. That same warmth from before spreads further, has his fingertips tingling at the ends. Shaking. So, to quell it, he rests them against Eddie's cheeks, revels in the way he nuzzles into it. In the way he wraps his arms around Steve in turn, tightens his hold as if that could bring them any closer. "You're something else, you know that?"
"That makes both of us." Steve grins, brings Eddie's face to rest against his own until their foreheads are touching, noses brushing. Worry still bubbles up in his chest, but he forces it down—lives in the present. "By the way," he murmurs, "I think, just maybe , I really, really like you."
Eddie's hum is pleased, it's relieved, it's happiness in its purest form. "Well that's good," he whispers. "Because I, just maybe, really, really like you too."
The kiss tastes like cinnamon apples, like spiced coffee, like the gentle haze of after-cigarettes. It tastes like safety wrapping him in a weighted blanket; it tastes like coming home .
For the first time in a long time, Steve truly feels safe .
-
You feel—
All sorts of wrong in this place.
Fractured thoughts along with your bones, all torn from their ligaments. Darkness surrounds you like a vice. You cannot see, you cannot move, but it is dark and it is all-consuming. You feel it ripple underneath you, underneath your skin, waves pushing and pulling until you cannot do anything but breathe.
Sometimes you hear her voice. She has a name, you know she has a name, but you have long forgotten it.
More often, you hear someone else's. Two. You know them by name; they are more family to you than most. Lucas. Erica. They are the ones who hold your hand, they are the ones who read to you, sometimes sing, most always just whisper in low voices. They are the ones who keep you here in the dark a little bit longer, keep you from sinking into the ink.
There is a voice. Sometimes the girl's, most often not. Most often it is a gravely thing, gentle, soothing, and it rubs your insides the wrong way. Makes you want to twist away, to cry, to hiss, to reach out for the comfort of Lucas and Erica, of the girl who's name is a number, you think, of the girl who's trying to give you life.
That voice speaks to you in waves, every day—if there are days in this endless timespan. You only are able to tell when the voices stop, when that echoed warmth in your hand goes cold. Empty.
My general is gone.
You are but a girl.
He has broken you to pieces.
You are alive.
He is dead.
You might as well be at this point.
It must know, eventually, that you will not break with that. Your friends have not left you. Vecna, you remember his name being, has not shattered you to glass. You are alive. You are afloat in a sea of thickened ink.
And then it shows you the images.
Of two boys laughing together, wrestling. Of another sitting off to the side with a small smile on his face, relief evident. Of two girls chattering, grinning, leaning closer and closer. Of two men leaning against each other and passing a cigarette with lazy smiles on their faces.
It shows another. A man with long, flippant dark hair, being held by someone slightly taller, someone slightly more unruly. The first is different. His jaw splits into four, in a way that makes your breathing quicken, makes you panic. The second has teeth. Four on each row. The image is clear. You sink a little deeper into the ink.
I can bring you back like him.
Like both of them.
I can have you live again.
You do not hear the rest of the statement. Desperation claws at the edges of your mind, your throat, the backs of your eyes. You cannot see. You cannot move. You are not awake in the world that misses you.
You accept a deal that never finished.
-
" Max! "