#again. Steve was directly present for it too

[bugsbenefit]

i'll say it again but you could literally just copy paste this into s4 and pretend he's reacting to their next plan

because even if they actually managed to burn him to death against all odds then like, what? there's small gates cracked open all over town now, and there's still a giant cosmic shadow monster living over there that's not averse to possessing people. just burning him isn't really a solution to their constant UD problem at this point

their big plan in s4 was just doing what they did in s1, and s2, and then wanted to do in s3 again but Mike told them not to, AGAIN. and shockingly it still didn't work

to be fair s4 had an additional final step to it with Nancy actually considering that the fire might not kill him so she'll... shoot him to death. with the guns that famously don't kill anything above small demodog size at best...

which is actually just her plan from s1 with the Demogorgon again i'm just realizing??

no one has original plans. the sauna test was the last shred of plan creativity that also actually did what is was supposed to and that was a whole season ago (and that might just be because it wasn't a "let's literally just kill it with fire immediately" plan which is what 95% of the other plans people are coming up with are, when it turns out that the UD is still causing them problems after... they tried to burn it to death the last time)

they really don't need Will or El to figure the UD out right now, they need to start small and primarily need someone to look them deep into the eyes and tell them that they're being fucking stupid again

if someone says, let's just burn the entire Upside Down this time in s5 i will lose my fucking mind

[ghostfacesvalentine]

Anyone’s little toy - Billy Loomis x Fem!Reader

Pairing: Billy Loomis x Fem!Reader

Warnings: A tiny bit of degradation, nothing too bad, fem!receiving oral. That’s it really (?)

Type: Blurb

Request: N/A

Word Count: N/A

Prompt: Billy finds out readers lack of sexual experience.

Notes: This was originally for Jason Todd but maybe it fits Billy more? Idk shut up. Not proofread, I just needed to get this off my mind 😵‍💫 send ideas, specifically Jason Todd and Steve Roger’s in particular.

You don’t remember how the topic was brought up, all you knew was that you were sitting on Billy’s couch, your back pressed against the cushion as he interrogated you.

There had been an awful amount of sexual tension between you two. Neither of you admitted anything to the other. You were too intimidated to bring anything up to him. You were happy with coming by to hang out with him when he called, talking about his day, your day, ordering food, playing games or watching TV. Sometimes when boredom hit, you even made out, but that was always as far as it went and it wasn’t always.

You couldn’t help but fantasize about it going further, about how he would feel, what he would look like. The closest you got was sitting on his lip with his hands having an ungodly grip on your hips. His kissing always kept you from this world, you forgot everything when Billy Loomis’s spit was in your mouth.

“What is it? Have you ever been touched?” Billy asked in a bitter tone. You were both grown, grown enough to have your own experiences, god knows he had his share. You never confused in him your lack of experience.

“Um” your cheeks flushed red, adamantly avoiding his eyes, they were practically prying into you. The spotlight was on you this whole time, yet it felt like you were on a disgusting display before him.

“Yeah of course I have” you lied. Your eyes still staring at the wall behind him, a frown present on your face in hopes of disguising your truth.

It was nothing to be embarrassed about, but you were ashamed to have a pathetically stupid amount of experience in the sexual aspect of your life.

Billy stared you down like if he was about to devour you, his frown activated across his face, head tilting to the side as he tried to match his eyes with you. “I don’t know, you’re such a sweet baby. I don’t think you’ve ever been anyone’s little toy.. am I right? I could be underestimating you.”

He almost spat out the questions, there was a tinge of jealousy, again, even if you were grown he still had a piece of hope that he could be the only one to see you sprawled out and chanting his name like if he’d show you a small gesture of mercy.

His breath felt hot against your cheek, his tongue peaked out to press against your skin. Your breathing fastened, your legs clenched together in hopes of getting some feeling of relief.

He was eating this up, overly proud of the position he had you in. “Sweet little princess, why aren’t you looking at me? Are you hiding something?” He teased, what an ass. You tucked your bottom lip into your mouth, your eyes refusing to look at his directly as if you could pull one over on him.

Your skirt folded into itself as you kept yourself from getting too close to him, he never went this far and you never went this far, with anyone actually. The embarrassment alone was going to set you off in tears, this was humiliating in the sweetest way.

“N-no im not hiding anything.” You spoke up, barely.

Your squirming was a delicacy to the mercenary. His eyes were prying into your movements, watching you get uneasy. He wanted to tear you apart right then and there. He was only ashamed it took him this long, but there was a long thought process behind his actions.

“I don’t know Y/N. Somethin’s telling me you’re lying to me.” He sung, his head shaking sideways ever so slightly.

It was then his head dipped down to the side of your head, pressing a wet kiss on your cheek, slowly pulling away to watch your reaction. You were as pressed back as you could be in hopes of hiding without actually hiding. You had to check yourself to see if you were still breathing, what the hell was so shameful about this?

“Billy.” You breathed out, his face in front of yours, he slowly knelt down, hands reaching out to your thighs. He would never admit it now, but he could practically smell your arousal. Billy’s hands gripped onto you gently, the outline of his body completely covered you. He was intimidating as much as he was mouth watering.

“Mmm?” He whispered as his hands soothed your thighs gently, his eyes finally dropped down to your figure. Your panties peaked out to him, causing his eyes to focus on your lower part instead. Billy’s thumbs maneuvered to the ends of your skirt, flipping the seam to push back closer to your hips, exposing more of your body to him. He did it so slow, enough to where you could stop him if you needed to, but you didn’t want to.

You were nervous, shy, but you wanted to feel his tough more than anything.

“N-nothing. I just haven’t-“ you frowned again this time dropping your legs onto the couch slowly, sitting up in unison as your eyes finally turned to him. “I’ve never, you know. Really been with anyone. I trust you, I just-“ and there it came, the realization of what you just admitted.

Billy looked up at you, instead of pulling back, his eyes seemed to almost turn a shade darker, turning from your face, back down to your figure. “You’ve never been touched?” He raised an eyebrow, waiting for your response, still unclear with what you were trying to tell him.

“No, I mean I have I just. I’ve never gone all the way, I don’t know what to do.” You admitted without thinking, you absentmindedly pulled away from him and shifted yourself closer to the couch.

“Do you want to do anything with me?” His voice cracked the small silence between you both. You felt the redness approaching your face again, you only answered with a wordless nod. In return, the devious smile made its way back to his drying lips.

“Just tell me if it’s too far” he warned you as his head dipped down again into your thighs, he warmed you back up with wet kisses across your sensitive skin, nipping and sucking at he warm pieces. Your legs responded in shifts, his hands then trailed again to your soft legs, moving them over his shoulder as he pushed his head further up to your core.

There was a change in his ache for you, again, maybe he won’t admit it now but the thought of making you feel good, to be the only one to taste you and leave you scratching at his back when you can’t take it anymore, all the sinful ideas plagued his mind. The fantasy of it all awoke something primal in him, the more the idea saturated his mind, the more desperate he got.

His hands ran up to your hips, pulling you as close as he could to his face, his arms hooked around the bottom for your thighs to hold you in place, his fingers pushed your underwear aside, enough to give him some space to work, he flattened his tongue against your slick folds, causing your head to fall back at the intrusion.

You couldn’t move even if you wanted to. Billy restricted your legs as his mouth opened and sucked into your clit. A gasp escaped your lips at the obscenity of his movements, you never felt anything like it, your legs rubbed against the sides of his head as his mouth moved more desperately by the second.

“Billy-” you whimpered out as his tongue swirled around your opening, your pink cotton panties were in the way of the whole experience but he was too mesmerized by your taste to get away from your pussy for even a second. Your thighs clenched every time he hit a sweet spot, he was careful not to overstimulate you too fast, he was going to try to get you as wet as possible before he fucked you.

His tongue flattened then pierced your hole, feeling the tip of his tongue pushed out by your body, taking turns exploring your folds.

Your head fell back again, feeling nothing but the warm wet spit invade your sensitive slick. Between laps along your cunt he’d pull back to mumble sweet obscenities, the hoods of his eyes dripping down in sweet bliss as he tasted your juices. “Good girl, you’re doing so good.” He praised as he felt your legs squeeze his head again when the pressure was too strong.

You didn’t know what feeling you were chasing, all you knew was that it felt like you could stay here all day, little parts his tongue would swipe made you jolt, you could almost fall asleep in ecstasy.

It wasn’t long until Billy noticed your comfortability, causing him to start lapping at your clit, his left hand pulled apart your folds while the other pulled your underwear aside. Your body sure felt the pressure now, you twisted your lower half without thinking to get away from his tongue.

Billy’s fingers let go of your panties and his index finger made circles against your clit, causing your body to flinch and little moans to escape your salivating mouth. His finger then prodded into you slowly before then just shoving itself as far as he could. His eyes wouldn’t let you go as you squirmed and mumbled out incoherent moans.

“You look so cute when you have something in you.” He muttered, watching you flinch and curl your body forward as he added another finger. You whimpered as he kept the pace, his eyes half closed with lust as you panted at his impatience to use you up.

His fingers moved in a scissoring motion, causing you to squirm again, this time moaning a little louder. “Maybe I do believe you haven’t been played with. I haven’t even started and I know you’re going to cream all over my fingers soon” he hissed.

You pouted, your lustful eyes gleaming down to him, you would have something smart to say if Billy wasn’t rubbing his hands all over your cunt, talking to you like you were a stupid girl chasing a high. His fingers rammed in and out of you in a steady pace, his palm ever so slightly pushing against your clit with every thrusting motion. You felt your body involuntarily clench.

Billy slowly stood to his feet, his hands never stopping or halting in the process. He needed to see you cum more than anything right now, more than you needed to feel it.

“God if you could see yourself right now. You look so pretty.” He whined out as he looked down to you, you looked back at him, with a more prominent frown and an ache in your core. Your hips began to shift as he kept his pace, his left hand made its way up to swipe his thumb across your bottom lip.

“So fucking pretty. Maybe next time I’ll bust a load on your face play with your pretty little cunt and get a picture. What do you say?”

You were wordless, before you could even get the chance to answer he curled his fingers, finding your gspot took him a little longer but when he felt your pussy clench around him he kept prying. You closed your eyes in despair to keep your climax going, bucking your hips as he kept fucking you with his fingers. “Good fucking princess. You look so fucking pretty, fuck.” He moaned, desperate to toss you around, fill you to the brim, he knew better than to go crazy with you so fast, but it wasn’t like he had enough self control to take it slow.

Your body jolted involuntarily, your eyes squeezed shut as you cried out in pleasure. All those sweet noises for him to hear alone were enough to send him over the edge. This was going to be a long night.

[sidekick-hero]

(steddie | explicit | 7.1k | tags: Modern AU, Sex Worker Steve, Virgin Eddie, PWP, Sub Eddie/Soft Dom Steve | written for @subeddieweek | AO3 or complete fic under the cut)

As Steve waited in an impersonal hotel room for his new client to arrive, things began to feel a little off.

In truth, the term "client" there was somewhat unconventional. Three guys had hired him to surprise their friend Eddie on his birthday.

Just moments ago, Steve had received a text message from the guys telling him that they were about to bring Eddie to this very room under the guise of getting his present. What Eddie didn't know was that Steve was going to be that present.

One of the trio, a younger man named Garrett or Gareth, had only half-jokingly suggested that Steve should greet Eddie wearing nothing but a bow around his dick. Thankfully, the others had vetoed the idea, calling it cheesy and lame and saying it would only scare Eddie off. Steve couldn't help but feel a little offended by that because the last time his dick had frightened someone away had been in high school. He had been her first and she had been too intimidated by his size. Other than that, he had never had any complaints, thank you very much.

He hadn't talked to them directly when they had asked for his services; that was Robin's domain. She handled the initial negotiations, background checks, and vetting of potential clients before Steve even learned of their existence. Trusting Robin's judgment, he assumed these men were legitimate. Yet, there was something off about the whole situation.

Their lack of experience with this kind of thing was evident, demonstrated by their inquiry about kissing etiquette like this was Pretty Woman ("you have to tell Eddie if kissing is not okay dude") and their less-than-tactful remarks. When Steve had entered the hotel room, one of them, whom they had referred to as Freak, had made a comment about Steve certainly not being Eddie’s type, prompting Garrett/Gareth to reply "Nah, he secretly likes those pretty frat boy types, he'd just never admit it".

But it had been the quiet, earnest demeanor of Jeff, the third man, that had given Steve pause. Jeff had pulled him aside with a solemn plea to be careful with Eddie.

"Hey, man, you seem like a nice guy, and your manager Robin assured us that you'd take good care of Eddie. Just. Be gentle with him. He acts tough sometimes, but he deserves someone to be sweet to him, okay?"

Steve had just nodded dumbly, thrown by the unusual request. Most of the time his clients booked him directly, and while some had asked him to fuck them soft and slow, Jeff's request had sounded different to him. As if there was something they weren’t telling him about this Eddie.

Perhaps the guy had been hurt before, scarred by a past relationship, and now he approached any kind of intimacy with trepidation. Steve had had a few women hire him to help them get over something like that, so it wasn’t totally unheard of. No men had, but then again, he had only been offering his services to men for a few months, so maybe Eddie was just the first of his male clients with these kind of issues.

If Eddie was indeed struggling with past hurts, then Steve was determined to make him feel cherished and desired once again.

Lost in his thoughts, he almost missed the sound of voices growing louder outside.

Fuck, Steve thought startled. Even though he had been waiting for them, it still came as a surprise that they were already there. One for which he felt completely unprepared, because it was only then that he began to think about how to position himself.

"I don't know why you couldn't just give it to me later or tomorrow, guys," someone said with amusement just outside the door. That must have been Eddie, he thought, and found that he liked his voice.

The next voice was Garrett/Gareth's. "Believe us, Eds, you want it now. Come on, hurry up."

"Okay, okay, fine. Since when are you more excited about me getting presents than I am?"

Steve opted for simplicity and decided to sit on the bed, leaning back with his hands behind him. It was casual and easy, but also showed off the long line of his body.

The sound of someone inserting their key card into the slot was followed by the handle being pushed down. Then the door to the room opened, revealing the lucky guy who would have him for the next two hours.

He’s pretty, was the first thing that came to Steve’s mind. Tall and slender, with a small waist and very nice arms decorated in black ink. Most stunning, however, was his face. The pale skin was a tantalizing contrast to his pink lips, dark hair framing high cheekbones and deep brown eyes that looked at him like a deer in the headlights.

Then, the door closed with a bang.

“Guys? There’s some dude sitting on my bed, you might wanna call security. I’ll hold down the door but you gotta hurry.” Eddie’s voice trembled slightly and Steve was torn between worry and amusement.

Faintly he heard the other men laughing and Eddie's indignant squeak. "What the hell are you laughing at? There`s a crazy stalker in my room! Probably armed and dangerous!"

"Oh yeah, I bet he has a big gun," Garrett/Gareth snorted, and Steve rolled his eyes at the very obvious, very bad joke. The guy probably thought he was really funny.

Eddie seemed to agree with Steve, even if unknowingly. "Har-bloody-har. Jeff, c'mon, tell me you at least take this seriously!"

This was one of those nights when Steve wished he had been smart enough, or at least ambitious enough to go to college, so he wouldn't have had to make money on the side dealing with shit like this. At least most of his clients were easier to deal with, if not as easy on the eyes as this Eddie.

"Eddie, trust me, you can open the door. He's harmless."

"How do you know?"

"Because he's your birthday present!" Freak interrupted, clearly losing patience. "Gareth's right, we should have just made him put a bow on his dick and be done with it. At least then we wouldn't be standing here arguing."

Steve wondered if they knew he could hear every word they were saying. Like everyone else in the surrounding rooms, because they weren’t exactly quiet. He just hoped nobody called the cops.

"He's... What the fuck? You can't just give someone a person, that's human trafficking!"

Obviously tired of making a scene outside a hotel room, Jeff just opened the door and pulled Eddie inside, trusting the others to follow. They did, closing the door behind them, and then they all looked at Steve, who was still sitting on the bed, regretting all his life choices that had led him there.

He gave a little wave with his fingers. "Surprise."

Eddie blinked at him, speechless, his mouth slightly ajar. Despite the situation, he remained unfairly attractive, his wide eyes stirring something in Steve that he hesitated to explore further. Steve's knowledge of Eddie was limited to his questionable choice of friends, yet he felt an inexplicable urge to shield him from the world, to keep him safe. The urge was unexpected in itself, but even more so in the intensity with which it hit him.

"This is Steve," Gareth introduced, stumbling over his words. "And, uh, well, he... yeah. Guys?" Gareth glanced around, hoping for support from the others, but they remained silent.

With the air of someone who didn’t expect any different, Steve rose from his spot on the bed and approached Eddie. As he stood before him, Steve was enveloped in a mixture of clean body spray, shampoo, and a faint whiff of cigarette smoke. Eddie's eyes, even larger up close, held a warm hue that was quite captivating.

Steve flashed a smile, aiming for a blend of reassurance and flirtation.

"I'm Steve, and for the next two hours, I can be whatever you need," he declared, though technically, twenty minutes had already elapsed. Nevertheless, for Eddie, Steve was willing to make an exception.

Eddie, inexplicably, horrifyingly, burst out laughing before slapping a hand over his own mouth, his eyes even wider than before as they looked at Steve in abject horror.

"Oh my God, I am so sorry. I wasn't laughing at you, it's just this whole situation is so... and then that sounded like... I feel like I stumbled into a porn plot."

Eddie looked embarrassed by his reaction, but Steve had to agree. It all felt a little ridiculous all of a sudden and he thought he could use that to his advantage, to make Eddie feel more comfortable.

"I guess you're not wrong," Steve laughed playfully, rubbing a hand across his neck. "That was a line that could have come out of a bad porno. Let me try again." He took Eddie's hand in his own and gave him a smile, a real one this time. "Hi, I'm Steve, and your friends hired me to be your birthday present. What that means is that I'm here to make sure you have a good time, a great one even. Just tell me what you'd like to do, as long as it's nothing crazy, I'm in. I don't do pain play, nothing that leaves bruises or cuts, no breath play, no hard kink of any kind and no barebacking."

"Oh my God, you are here as a sex gift," Eddie exclaimed way too loudly as Steve finished listing the things he wouldn't do, turning even paler. Steve was so focused on Eddie that he hadn’t even noticed the other men leaving the room, but upon seeing Eddie's shocked reaction, he realized they were already gone.

"I can't believe they hired a sex worker to deflower me. I told them to leave it the fuck alone. God, this is so fucking embarrassing," Eddie whined, burying his face in his hands with a long and anguished groan.

It tugged at Steve's heartstrings, the way Eddie pulled away from him, clearly embarrassed. His first instinct was to pull him into his arms and tell him it was okay, that Steve got him. But Eddie's words continued to ring in his ears as the puzzle pieces began to fall into place. Deflower me. As in, he was supposed to take Eddie's virginity. That's why the others had been so weird about it, and why Eddie had been so shocked and clueless when he found him in his room.

Jeff's words came back to him, "be gentle with him" and "he deserves someone to be sweet to him". It wasn't that Eddie was necessarily recovering from past hurts, but that there were no past experiences. Or maybe there had been, and that was why he had never gone all the way. Because looking at him, Steve had a hard time understanding how anyone could not want to sleep with Eddie.

"Eddie," Steve tried gently, "are you...have you ever had sex with anyone?"

Peering at Steve through his fingers, Eddie shook his head.

"Did you, I mean, have you done things like handjobs, blowjobs, anything like that?"

Another anguished groan as Eddie shook his head again.

"Making out? Kissing?" Steve had to know what he was working with here, because the last thing he wanted was to do something Eddie wasn't ready for.

This at least made Eddie lower his hands so that Steve could see the expression on his face. He looked even more embarrassed, his flushed cheeks red, but there was some indignation in his eyes. "I've kissed before. And made out with someone. Well, above the waist. And fully clothed. But it still counts!"

Eddie's voice sounded almost pleading and it left Steve aching for him. He had no idea why someone as gorgeous as Eddie hadn't had sex yet, but he knew he shouldn't act like there was something wrong with him because of it.

"Hey, man, it's okay. Really, I'm not judging you," Steve tried to reassure him. He was tempted to reach out and offer some physical comfort as well, but he wasn't sure how welcome that would be as Eddie laughed bitterly at his words.

"Oh, please. I'm judging me! I'm turning 30 today and no one's even touched my dick. I'm pathetic."

Steve did reach out to him then, placing a comforting hand on Eddie's shoulder. "Hey, come on now. There's nothing pathetic about it. Everyone's journey is different, and there's no rush."

Eddie sighed, his shoulders slumping under Steve's touch. "Easy for you to say. You've probably had more action than you can count."

Steve chuckled softly. "Maybe, but that doesn’t mean anything. Quality over quantity, right?"

Eddie gave him a weak smile, but the tension in his expression remained. "I just feel like I missed out on something, you know? I grew up in a small and even more small-minded town in Indiana where it was impossible to find another gay kid without risking getting beaten up or worse. They had it out for me anyway because...well, it doesn't matter. By the time I finally left and moved to Chicago, I was 21 and hadn't even kissed anyone except Lisa Green in eighth grade, which only confirmed what I already suspected. I made out with a few guys in clubs and bars here, but it always felt... wrong. I didn't need to be romanced or anything, but I just... I wanted to feel some kind of connection, y'know? But anyone who wanted to date me, I was too scared to tell them that I had no experience whatsoever, too in my head about it. And before I know it, I'm 30 years old and my friends are hiring an incredibly hot guy to pity-fuck me."

Steve nodded sympathetically. "It's not a pity fuck, Eddie. But I get it. Just, believe me, sex isn't everything. And it's definitely not a measure of your worth."

Eddie let out a bitter laugh. "Tell that to my libido."

Steve couldn't help but laugh along with him. "Fair point. But seriously, Eddie, there's nothing wrong with taking your time. When the right moment comes along, you'll know.”

With an expression of utter defeat, Eddie mumbled. “Figured not even someone getting paid for it would want to sleep with me.” Then, he turned around and walked over to the door. “I’m sorry I wasted your time, Steve. Thank you for being so nice.”

“Whoa, wait a second. I never said I don’t wanna sleep with you. I just assumed, y’know, that you’d want to wait for the right guy.”

Eddie looked like a kicked puppy. “It’s fine Steve, I understand. There’s nothing sexy about a 30 year old virgin, you don’t have to lie.” Then, hanging his head, he pulled his shoulders up to his ears and put his hands in his pockets, making himself as small as humanly possible while still standing.

Steve couldn't stand to see Eddie so down on himself any longer, so he decided to show him exactly how much he wanted to sleep with him by simply pulling his shirt over his head, leaving him naked from the waist up. Then he reached down, unzipped his pants and stepped out of them as well, so that he was standing in front of Eddie in nothing but his underwear. He hoped to make himself at least a quarter as vulnerable as Eddie must have felt at that moment.

"Eddie, please look at me." When Eddie did, his eyes roamed over Steve's body as if he couldn't help himself, and Steve felt their gaze like a physical touch. He was accustomed to people looking at him with hunger and desire, and while Eddie's face showed signs of both, there was something else in his expression—a hint of longing, if Steve were pressed to put a name to it.

As the seconds ticked by, Steve wondered if Eddie would ever grow tired of drinking him in, since he showed no signs of being done anytime soon. But Steve began to suspect that maybe Eddie wasn't doing anything else because he didn't know what or how, so Steve had to take the lead here.

Closing the distance between them, he took Eddie's hands again, but this time he didn't hold them; he placed them on his hips. "You can touch me, Eddie. I want you to. I want you. So if you want me too, all you have to do is tell me." When Eddie continued to look at him wide-eyed, Steve asked him in his softest, most encouraging voice, "What do you want, Eddie?"

"I don't know." Eddie's hands on his hips trembled slightly, but his grip tightened, thumbs running up and down Steve's flanks. "You. Whatever you want."

Well, that was easy. "I want to make you feel good. Can I?"

"Please."

No one had ever looked at Steve the way Eddie did at that moment. It was as if Steve was the last drop of water in the desert—not like he wanted Steve, but like he needed him.

Steve cupped his face in his hands and pulled him close, whispering in the infinitesimal space between them, "I got you, baby," before sealing their lips in a tender kiss.

True to his words, Eddie kissed him back as if he had kissed people before, even if not very often. His lips still moved a little awkwardly against Steve's, but what he lacked in experience he made up for in feeling. Not even his actual girlfriends had ever kissed him the way Eddie was kissing him right now - like he couldn't believe he was allowed to do it, wavering between greedy hunger and grateful adoration that made Steve's head spin.

As they kissed, Steve felt a rush of warmth flood through him, a sensation he hadn't experienced in a long time. It was more than just physical attraction; there were the first stirrings of an emotional connection forming between them, one that felt utterly inappropriate within the confines of their current situation.

On the other hand, Steve reasoned with himself, Eddie deserved someone who would be sweet to him, as Jeff had put it. Given how he was starting to feel about Eddie, that wasn't going to be a challenge at all.

Breaking the kiss reluctantly, Steve rested his forehead against Eddie's, their breaths mingling in the space between them. "You're amazing, Eddie," he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper.

Eddie's cheeks flushed a deeper shade of pink and he smiled shyly. "Thank you. You're not so bad yourself."

Steve chuckled softly, a warmth spreading in his chest at Eddie's response. "What do you say we take this to the bed?"

Eddie nodded eagerly, his eyes shining with a mixture of excitement and nervousness. "Yeah, I'd like that."

"Good," Steve said, taking Eddie by the hips as well and beginning to slowly walk them backwards, their eyes never leaving each other's.

As they made their way to the bed, Steve's heart pounded with anticipation. He couldn't shake the feeling that this was a pivotal moment, one that could change everything for him.

Once they reached the bed, Steve gently guided Eddie to sit down, their knees touching as they faced each other. The air between them crackled with tension, charged with the promise of what was to come.

Steve took Eddie's hands in his own, his touch gentle yet firm. "Eddie, I want you to know that we don't have to do anything you're not comfortable with," he said softly, wanting to reassure him.

Eddie met his gaze with a mixture of gratitude and desire. "I trust you, Steve," he replied, his voice filled with sincerity. Steve had no idea how Eddie could trust him so easily after just meeting him, but he vowed to do right by him and not betray the trust placed in him.

With a gentle smile, Steve leaned in to kiss Eddie again, his lips meeting Eddie's with a tender urgency. This time Steve took the opportunity to deepen the kiss, sliding his tongue into the wet heat of Eddie's mouth, gently coaxing Eddie to join him in exploring each other.

The first tentative touch of Eddie's tongue to his own sent sparks of electricity through him and he would have been embarrassed by the moan that fell from his lips had it not been for the almost violent shudder that went through Eddie at the simple touch. When their lips parted, Steve glanced at the other man and found him looking tense, his hands clenched into fists on his thighs, and suddenly his reaction made sense.

"Baby, you can touch me. Don't hold back, I want you to show me how good I make you feel."

Closing his eyes with a pained expression, Eddie sighed deeply, defeated. "I feel like I don't know how. I don't want to mess it up. I mean, you must be used to incredible sex and then there's me, probably accidentally pinching you or something."

"Eddie," Steve said, wrapping his own hands around Eddie's clenched ones, "I'm sorry to break it to you, but you'll never learn if you don't try. It's like riding a bike. You can't learn it in theory, you have to get on it and ride it." And because Steve worried that might have been a little harsh, he added: "I'm your training wheels, and after tonight you can upgrade to a bike without them." Uncurling Eddie's hands and intertwining their fingers, Steve nudged their shoulders together. "Soooo. Wanna go for a ride?"

Eddie's lips twitched into a small smile at Steve's analogy, and some of the tension seemed to ease from his shoulders. "Okay, maybe I can give it a try," he said, his voice uncertain but determined.

Steve couldn't help but admire Eddie's bravery in the face of his own insecurities. He leaned in to press a gentle kiss against Eddie's forehead, offering silent encouragement.

With a deep breath, Eddie tentatively began to explore Steve's body, his touch hesitant yet eager. Steve guided him with soft murmurs of encouragement, reassuring him every step of the way.

At some point, Steve shifted back onto the bed and lay down on the sheets, offering more of himself to Eddie's curious hands. They were especially drawn to his chest, scratching the thick hair, and when Steve made an appreciative sound, Eddie let them wander to Steve's nipples.

"Start slow, run your thumb over them." Eddie did as Steve told him, and Steve noticed how every encouragement from him seemed to hit Eddie with another wave of arousal. His eyes darkened even more after Steve told him, "Just like that, baby. You're doing so good, learning so fast. Now try adding some spit so your thumb glides easier."

Eddie had been eagerly and obediently following his instructions the whole time, so Steve wasn't surprised when he immediately went to put Steve's latest order into action. What he didn't expect, however, was that Eddie would simply put his mouth on his nipple instead of wetting his thumb with it.

"Fuck," he moaned, his hands digging into Eddie's hair without his conscious decision, desperately trying to keep his mouth on his chest. "So good for me, such a good boy, just like that."

His words only spurred Eddie on, who moaned needily at his words, and as his confidence grew, so did his boldness. Steve felt the first tentative touch of teeth against his skin, setting his nerves on fire, and he encouraged Eddie to keep going by tugging at his curls. "Harder, baby."

Being the wonderful, beautiful, good boy that he was, Eddie went harder, his teeth making sure to leave marks on his chest. It was an intoxicating feeling to be laid out here, almost naked, while Eddie was still fully clothed, and yet it was Steve who was in control.

So far he had been able to ignore his cock, hard and heavy and leaking into his trunks. But it was getting harder and harder, pun intended, to keep his need for relief in check. It wasn't often that a client made him feel like he was about to lose his mind with lust, but Eddie was shaping up to be his exception in so many ways.

"Baby, you're incredible. I'm so hard for you, I need you to touch me or I'll lose my goddamn mind."

That finally gave Eddie pause. Pulling back from his mission to cover every inch of Steve's chest in bruises and bite marks, he lifted his head and looked down at where Steve's hard cock was obscenely tenting his trunks.

Watching Eddie wet his lips with his tongue, Steve decided to take a chance. "Can you take them off for me, darling? They're getting awfully uncomfortable."

That startled Eddie out of his silent reverie, his big brown eyes, which had captivated Steve from the start, turning to him. "You mean..."

"Only if you want to. We're not doing anything you're not ready for," Steve made sure to reassure him once again that while Steve was taking the lead here, Eddie was the one calling the shots. If he told him to stop, Steve would, no questions asked. "But if you're afraid of getting it wrong, I want you to know that nothing has ever felt as right as your hands and mouth on me. You couldn't get it wrong if you tried, baby."

It seemed to be just the right thing to say because Eddie leaned down to capture Steve's lips in another kiss, his weight balanced on his forearm next to Steve's head. His hand, still resting on Steve's chest, began to move again, fingertips dancing across his ribs and down his stomach until they reached their destination just above his waistband.

Eddie had moved to lie more comfortably next to Steve when he had let his hands and mouth map Steve's body, but now he positioned himself next to Steve's knees.

He looked up at Steve as his fingers curled around the waistband of his trunks, and tougher men than Steve would have had a hard time not falling in love with him right then and there. His lips, still slick with spit from their kiss, were slightly parted while his bottomless eyes looked at Steve with something akin to worship. Steve's fingers had done a great job of making his dark curls look even messier, and he was almost as proud of that as he was of the red flush that adorned Eddie's throat and cheeks.

"Do it," he order-pleaded, and Eddie listened as he had all night, pulling down Steve’s last piece of clothing and throwing it on the floor next to the bed.

The expression on his face was almost comical, breaking the thick tension in the room for a moment. Steve knew he wasn't exactly small. Not even average, but it had been a while since anyone had stared at his dick like it was a venomous snake.

"It won't bite you, I promise," he joked as the silence between them stretched on.

That at least got a snort out of Eddie, even if his eyes were still glued to his hard and leaking cock, which didn't seem to mind being stared at with a mixture of apprehension and wonder.

"I know that. It's just..." Eddie began before trailing off.

A thought occurred to Steve. "You've seen a dick before, right?"

In retrospect it might have been a bit insulting and a lot stupid to ask, but then again this wasn't exactly his area of expertise.

"Yes, Steve. Besides my own, I've seen dicks. Just not... y'know... a monster dick like that. I mean, fuck. Are you sure this thing will even fit?"

His first reaction was to laugh, because Eddie was funny and adorable in his incredulity, but the laughter died rather quickly as the rest of his words registered with Steve.

"Fit? As in - do you want me to fuck you?"

That finally made Eddie blink up at him, tilting his head like a confused puppy. "Um, yeah? I thought that was the plan all along."

It wasn't. Steve thought he'd show Eddie the ropes, how to handle another body, so he could experience his first time with someone he genuinely cared about. Not that Steve had that when he lost his virginity, but he thought Eddie deserved it.

But if Eddie was sure, Steve was more than happy to oblige. "Just checking in. And don't worry. It'll fit. It always has, it just takes a little patience and a lot of lube." When Eddie still looked a little doubtful, he added, "Do you trust me?"

"Yes." No hesitation, and that made the dangerous feeling in his chest glow brighter.

"Good, that makes it even easier. You need to be comfortable, relaxed. The more you can let go, the easier it will be."

Eddie nodded, his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. "Okay, Steve. You're the expert. I trust you. Just. Remember, I have no idea what I'm doing, okay?"

Steve sat up and cupped Eddie's cheek in his hand. "I know, and I'll take good care of you, I promise," Steve promised, sealing it with a kiss.

After they parted, he tugged at Eddie's shirt. "You're awfully overdressed, sweetheart. Mind if I help you get out of these?"

With Eddie's consent, Steve undresses him, slowly, reverently. He removed each piece of clothing with the same care as he would handle a precious gem, his hands gentle, making sure to appreciate every inch of skin that was revealed to him. And after his hands have had their fill, his mouth follows, his lips branding his ownership in invisible writing all over Eddie's body.

He paid special attention to Eddie's tattoos, and when he found the nipple piercings, Steve's brain short-circuited. He only stopped playing with them when Eddie was writhing and whimpering from the stimulation, his arousal clear in the way sweat slicked his skin and the outline of his hard cock was visible through his skin-tight jeans.

"Steve, please," he begged, and Steve was pretty sure Eddie didn't even know for what.

"Shh, I got you, baby," Steve had cooed in reply before continuing his mission to get Eddie naked and under him.

Soon the positions were reversed and Eddie was spread out on the bed, naked and wanting, while Steve was kneeling beside him, his hand stroking Eddie's thigh soothingly as he drank him in.

"Fuck, Eddie, I wish you could see yourself right now. You're so fucking beautiful, the prettiest thing I've ever seen. I can't believe you let me have you."

Eddie squirmed, clearly turned on but still self-conscious. Steve vowed to make the latter go away and replace it with nothing but mindless pleasure, helping Eddie let go and float on all the good feelings Steve would make him feel.

He had gotten the lube and a condom out of his bag while Eddie had made himself comfortable, placing them both next to them on the bed. Now he spread some lube on his fingers and warmed it up as he moved to climb between Eddie's legs. His own cock had gone back to half hard, but showed some renewed interest when Eddie immediately spread his legs wider to make room for him.

"Such a good boy, you're just perfect, you know that?"

Then Steve rewarded his good boy with the first finger in his virgin whole. He didn't want it to matter, and it didn't, not in the way Eddie thought it would. But the thought that he was the first to see Eddie like that, to feel him clench around the foreign intrusion before slowly, gradually relaxing as Steve continued to stroke the inside of his thigh with his other hand? It all made more heat pool in his groin, his cock full and heavy again between his own legs.

"That's it," Steve encouraged him as his finger sank in to his knuckle, " taking it so well. How does it feel, baby?"

"Weird," Eddie said truthfully, before wriggling his hips. "Full. Not bad, just. Weird."

Steve took that as all the encouragement he needed to start pumping the finger in and out in imitation of what he planned to do to Eddie with his cock. It went easily and soon Eddie was matching his thrusts with his hips. "That's right, take what you need. You look so good fucking yourself on my finger, sweetheart. You'll look even better on my cock."

Judging that Eddie was ready for a second finger, he leaned forward and softly called for Eddie to look at him. When he did, lifting his head from where he had pressed it into the pillow, Steve caught his eyes and held them as he slowly closed his lips around Eddie's hard cock, taking it into his mouth inch by delicious inch.

It worked like a charm as Eddie was too busy throwing his head back with a broken moan to even notice Steve adding another finger. It was only when he started pumping both fingers in and out while still licking and sucking on Eddie's cock like his favorite ice cream that Eddie seemed to notice, tightening around him for a moment before relaxing again.

Steve rewarded him with a clever swirl of his tongue and a well-aimed crook of his fingers that made Eddie scream.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, what the fuck was that," Eddie gasped as Steve pulled off of him with an obscenely wet sound.

With a third finger prodding at Eddie's slick hole, Steve grinned up at him. "Your prostate."

"I thought that was a myth."

"Nope, not a myth. Just hard to reach by yourself."

He took Eddie back into his mouth, his finger persistently nudging at his entrance until it finally slipped in alongside his other two fingers. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Eddie balling the sheets in his clenched fists, trying not to thrash around too much. The thought of feeling that around his cock was almost too much, as Eddie was incredibly responsive and Steve had to think of something unpleasant for a second to calm himself.

Steve continued to blow and finger Eddie until he could feel Eddie's cock hardening even more in his mouth, signaling his impending orgasm. His three fingers sank into him like a warm knife into butter, no resistance whatsoever, so Steve considered Eddie ready to try and take his 'monster dick' as he had so eloquently put it earlier.

Eddie's whimper as he pulled his fingers out of his body sounded desperate, and when Steve also pulled off his dick, Eddie was right back to begging.

"Please, Steve, I was so close, so fucking close, I need you, please," he babbled, exactly in that mindless place where only his own pleasure mattered instead of his own insecurities.

In a true display of multi-tasking, Steve managed to stroke Eddie's thigh soothingly while simultaneously ripping the condom wrapper open with his teeth. It was almost a shame that Eddie was so far gone that he didn't even notice.

Next time, Steve thought, immediately chastising himself for getting ahead of himself. There was no guarantee that Eddie would want to go out with the guy his friends had paid to deflower him.

"Shh, baby, almost there, just getting ready to make you feel really good. I can't wait to be inside you, Eddie, you have no idea."

Slicking his condom-covered cock, Steve took a pillow from the bed and placed it under Eddie's hips before wrapping Eddie's right leg around his waist as he positioned himself. Eddie looked up at him with dazed eyes, like he was still floating somewhere, not quite here. And even though Steve wanted him to remain there, he needed Eddie's attention right now.

"Sweetheart, I need you to listen to me, can you do that?" He could tell it was a struggle, but shaking his head like he was clearing cowebs, Eddie came back to him. "Thanks, baby, you're still so good for me, aren't you?" Eddie nodded eagerly and Steve continued. "I need you to be a good boy and do what I tell you. When I push in, I need you to press down on it as if you were trying to push me out. Can you try that?" Another nod, this one firm, determined. "And breathe, baby, deep breaths. I got you, we'll take it as slow as you need."

And with that, Steve began to push in, trusting Eddie to work with him. And he did, beautifully, doing exactly what Steve told him to do. Still, it was clear that it was a lot to take, his cock even thicker and longer than his three fingers. It was slow going, every inch fought for, and by the time Steve was halfway in they were both covered in sweat, so Steve decided to take a short break.

Eddie was having none of it, though, and looked up at him pleadingly. "Steve? Please don't stop. I want you inside."

"But I am already inside," Steve reminded him, as if Eddie had forgotten how he was being impaled on Steve's cock right now.

"More." Reaching out for Steve with his hand, Eddie replied with only one word, but it was enough to make Steve fall forward, inadvertently sinking a little further.

He didn't try to stop again.

Then, finally, blessedly, Steve sank all the way in, Eddie's muscles relaxing enough to let him in entirely. It wasn't his first time, far from it, but it could very well have been from the way it made him feel to be enveloped in Eddie's tight heat. Steve couldn't tell who was looking more starry-eyed, Eddie or him, as they stared at each other in wonder.

"You feel," Steve began, suddenly at a loss for words. "Like nothing I've ever felt before."

"Move," Eddie pleaded in reply, his eyes traitorously bright. "Please, Steve."

Steve could never deny him, not when he begged like that, so he simply kissed Eddie's cheek, his nose, and then his lips as his hips withdrew before sinking back in. Picking up a slow and easy rhythm, Steve began to move and soon Eddie was meeting him thrust for thrust.

They moved together in a slow, sensual dance, each touch and caress igniting a fire within them. Each thrust tore another sound from their throats, muffled by each other's lips, because try as he might, he couldn't stop kissing Eddie. And as they lost themselves in the heat of the moment, Steve knew he wouldn't come back from it unchanged. He already felt a sense of connection unlike anything he had ever experienced before. It was as if they were two pieces of a puzzle finally coming together, fitting perfectly.

He just hoped that Eddie felt the same, that it wasn't just the magic of firsts that made him gasp and beg and say things that made Steve's heart soar as much as his cock twitch.

"Steve, Steve, Steve," he cried, his voice cracking, "oh God, I never thought...fuck," another moan as Steve hit his prostate once more. "How do people do anything but this?" Eddie marveled as he tightened around Steve, desperately wanting him to press against that wonderful spot inside him. "I never want to leave this bed again, just let you fuck me all day long."

Oh, how much Steve would love that too. To stop himself from saying something crazy like 'yes, please move in with me so we can fuck as often as possible', he reached for Eddie's hand on his hip and intertwined their fingers next to Eddie's head, squeezing his hand instead of spilling all his messy feelings.

The new position had him sinking further down on Eddie, Eddie's hard cock trapped between their bellies and the added friction had him gasping and panting. "Fuck, Steve, I'm so close."

"Yeah, me too, baby. Can you be a good boy and hold on a little longer for me?"

Unable to form any more words, Eddie just nodded. Steve rewarded him with another deep kiss as his hips picked up speed, his thrusting becoming more powerful as he finally allowed himself to chase his own pleasure. He wanted, needed them to come together, and judging by the copious amount of pre-cum smeared against their bellies and the way Eddie's cock kept twitching, Eddie was really close.

As he felt the telltale signs of his own orgasm spreading through him, his balls tightening and the feeling of a coil in his groin being pulled tight enough to snap at any moment, he lowered his face to Eddie's ear, took the lobe between his teeth and tugged at it to get his attention. Then, putting every ounce of heat, lust and desire he felt right now into his voice, he rasped, "Come for me, baby."

Without a hand on him, Eddie came with a sound that burned itself into Steve's memory and would surely haunt his dreams for weeks and months to come.

Overwhelmed by Eddie's sounds as he lost himself in his own pleasure, his hips bucking and grinding, Steve couldn't help but follow him over the edge. When he finally came, it was almost painful in its intensity and he could barely keep himself upright.

It took him an embarrassingly long time to catch his breath, and even longer to pull himself away from Eddie long enough to get rid of the condom and fetch a washcloth from the bathroom to clean the cum from their bellies and chests.

Then he turned off the light, crawled back into bed with Eddie and pulled the covers over them before drawing Eddie into his arms, who went willingly, still suspiciously quiet. Steve would have been more concerned had it not been for the dazed smile on his face, so he decided to let him be for the moment, basking in the afterglow as he continued to stroke Eddie's back.

What felt like hours later, as they lay tangled in each other's arms, bathed in the soft glow of moonlight filtering through the window, Steve pressed a gentle kiss to Eddie's temple, feeling a surge of affection and contentment wash over him.

"I'm glad you decided to go for that ride," he whispered, warmth coloring his voice.

Eddie snuggled closer, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. "Me too," he murmured, his voice filled with a mixture of happiness and wonder.

And as they drifted off to sleep, wrapped in each other's embrace, Steve knew he had found something truly special in Eddie. Tomorrow he would tell Robin to give the guys their money back because Eddie hadn't been a client from the start. It was way too soon to even think about it, but deep down he hoped that theirs would be the kind of love that was as beautiful and enduring as the stars in the night sky.

[lavenderstobins]

Hopper’s talking to her, telling her to breathe, but all Nancy can focus on is Robin, dead, in front of her.

She barely registers when Steve stumbles in. Hopper’s moving before she processes it, trying to gently escort him out.

Steve’s a mess. Wild-eyed, his face streaked with tears, hair unkept.

“I need to say goodbye,” Steve begs, fighting against Hopper’s steady arms. “I need—I need to tell her I love her and that I’m sorry and—and I need to find the fuckers that did this—”

Steve knows about her ‘gift’. He looks directly at her, a plea on his face.

Nancy thinks of Barb, still and silent in her arms.

“Let him stay,” she croaks.

“Wheeler—” Hopper starts. She shakes her head.

“Let him stay.”

Hopper relents. Steve scrambles over, faltering when he sees Robin.

Nancy understands. It’s not a pretty sight.

At open-casket funerals, the deceased undergoes hours of careful preparation to make them look presentable. To make sure they look as close to how they did in life as possible.

That is not the case here. Robin’s skin is a sickly white, freckles stark in contrast. Ugly purple marks cover her throat and neck. Strangulation, from the looks of it. Nancy doesn’t want to imagine it.

Steve strokes Robin’s hair, the gentlest Nancy has ever seen him. Fresh tears have started running down his cheeks.

“Steve,” she starts, equally gentle, because how can she tell him this? How can she describe the sensation of having your whole world stopped, started, and stopped again?

“I know,” he says, not taking his eyes off Robin. “I’m ready.”

She wants to say, You can never be ready.

Instead, she nods, and taps one finger to Robin’s cheek.

The effect is instant. Robin gasps, eyes flying open, one hand automatically going to her throat.

Steve lets out a sob, pressing his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I should’ve been there, I’m sorry—”

“Dingus,” Robin rasps, and she’s crying too. Nancy averts her eyes, a pang in her chest.

Hopper must decide to let them have their moment because nearly five minutes pass before he comes over. He asks Robin questions, the standard procedure, and Robin answers shakily, her hand held in Steve’s.

Robin didn’t fully see her attacker. It was a man, that much she knows. She’d managed to flee the initial attack but he’d caught up to her when she tried to lose him in the woods. She thinks he was less prepared because of it, but things are hazy. She remembers being pinned down, hands around her throat, and these cold, terrifying eyes. His face had been covered with only his eyes visible.

Hopper takes notes, frowning. Finally, the questioning comes to an end, Robin out of answers. His head slowly swivels to Nancy.

Steve’s still clutching Robin. They both look at her with a sad understanding on their faces.

“I’ll find him,” Steve says quietly, resting his forehead against the top of Robin’s head. “I’ll find whoever did this and I’ll kill him. I’ll kill him.”

Robin just smiles sadly. She murmurs something too quiet for Nancy to hear, but she doesn’t miss the devastation that flits across Steve’s face.

They look at her expectantly, both clearly trying hard not to cry. They’re still holding hands.

Nancy can’t do it.

“Wheeler,” Hopper says, low, a warning.

“I can’t,” Nancy whispers. She knows what will happen if she lets Robin live. The same thing that happened when she couldn’t let Will die again, when she couldn’t let Eddie die again.

The universe rights its wrongs in its own way. If it can’t have its death, it will take another. When she’d brought Will back and kept him alive, a well-loved local, Benny Hammond, had died. When she’d let Eddie live, Jonathan and Will’s stepfather Bob had a heart attack out of nowhere. There’d been seemingly nothing to cause either death.

If she lets Robin live, someone else will die in her place.

The worst part is that Nancy finds she doesn’t care.

She can’t let Steve lose his best friend the way she lost hers. She can’t let this be the end of Robin’s life.

Kind, funny Robin, who has always been so full of life, so loved by everyone around her. Nancy’s never gotten the chance to really get to know her, but she’s always wished she had.

“I can’t,” she repeats, her voice steadier now. “I won’t. It’s not fair.”

“Life isn’t fair.” Hopper’s voice is kind. She doesn’t deserve it.

“I won’t do it. Steve—”

Steve looks stunned, a hopeful expression dawning on his face. Hopper looks at him and sighs.

“I can’t force you. But… well, on your own head be it.” He shakes his head. “I’m going back to the station. You’re causing me a lot of paperwork.”

As he leaves, Steve turns to her. “Thank you. Thank you, thank you—”

“As far as you’re concerned, Robin survived the attack.” Nancy keeps her voice steady, avoiding eye contact with both of them. “Robin…”

Robin’s eyes are on her. Curious, focused, like they’re studying her. Nancy swallows hard.

“Robin, you should avoid going anywhere alone for a while. If your attacker thinks you could identify him he’ll try and finish the job. I won’t be able to do this twice.”

Robin gives a short nod. “I’ll lay low for a while.”

Her voice is soft, raspy. Steve, maybe afraid Nancy might suddenly change her mind, thanks her one last time before helping Robin up and ushering her out.

Nancy watches their retreating backs, a heavy weight in her chest.

In the nicest way possible, she hopes she never sees Robin again.

[lisafrnkenstein]

Sub Eddie Week, Day 1 — Affirmation (non sexual)

Eddie has Bad Days. Days Steve isn’t sure what to do with him, because it kills him inside to see him get like that and be so helpless to fix it.

There are a lot of factors, he gathers. They don’t always talk directly about it. It’s obvious when it’s the trauma of what they went through; what Eddie went through, specifically — being eaten alive, nearly dying.

Other times it seems like some other trauma Steve is unaware of. A lot of shit from his childhood that Eddie doesn’t ever want to bring up. Steve knows his dad plays a big part of it, especially thanks to Wayne’s input. The loss of his mom too. He hadn’t exactly had an easy childhood, and things didn’t really improve for him into his teenage years.

So Steve has stopped trying to root the source of Eddie’s episodes. He focuses instead on what he can do in the present, what he can try, to drag Eddie out of them.

They’re not always the same, and Steve is prepared to deal with them as they come, in whatever form.

Some days it’s Eddie being surly and snappish, lashing out over little things. Sometimes Eddie goes quiet and still, and he curls up on himself, like he’s trying to take up as little space as possible. Those are rarer, but they’re Steve’s least favorite — because they’re the most un-Eddie. Eddie should never be small, or silent.

Most of the time though, Steve doesn’t know what happens at all, because on those days, Eddie shuts him out completely. Doesn’t want Steve witnessing his vulnerabilities, or is too wrapped up inside his own head. It’s something they’re working on.

Like today, as Steve presses himself against Eddie’s bedroom door, head tilted to catch the sniffling sounds of Eddie on the other side.

“C’mon, Ed.” Steve begs. “You know you only get worse when you do this. I’m right here.”

And Steve knows they’re making progress when, after a few seconds, the lock on the door clicks open. Steve edges it open carefully, and takes in the sight of Eddie crammed into the only uncluttered corner of the room. Tear tracks shine on his cheeks, highlighted by the red lining under his eyes.

Steve has never seen him cry before. Not in this context. He knows he does, but Eddie is always careful to never let him see it. The only times Steve gets a glimpse of Eddie letting those walls down is when they’re having sex — when the dynamic they’ve found themselves in allows Eddie to trust Steve implicitly, to allow that wall to come down and not fear the intimacy of being seen.

Something about that clicks for Steve, right then. The idea of that dynamic, brought out into moments like these.

It’s worth trying.

He kneels down beside Eddie, hand extended as though asking permission to touch him.

Careful, careful, careful.

“Hey,” He whispers. “Do you trust me, Ed?”

There’s hesitation on Eddie’s face, but it’s alright. Steve knows how hard it is for him sometimes. How many times he’s been hurt by the people he was supposed to be able to trust most.

Eventually though, he nods. It warms something inside Steve that he can, that they’ve come far enough that even in the depths of a bad day like this, Eddie knows that Steve is Safe.

“Thank you,” Steve breathes out a sigh of relief, hands coming up to gently cradle Eddie’s face. “Baby boy. My good boy.”

Eddie’s eyes widen.

The words are purposeful, chosen specifically. The names Steve usually reserves for the bedroom play, the praise offered when Eddie is being submissive and sweet for him.

There’s a moment, a pause where Steve waits to see if Eddie accepts it. If he’ll sink into the request to bring that dynamic out here — for Eddie to let go and hand himself over to Steve to take care of, to comfort. To take away the bad from him and assume responsibility for it all.

Eddie’s eyes gradually slip shut, and he nods.

Steve strokes Eddie’s cheeks a few times. “What do you need right now, sweetheart?”

Eddie’s eyes open again, and his gaze connects with Steve’s in something challenging. Something tinged with sadness around the edges, like he’s anticipating rejection.

“Tell me you love me.”

And that’s…something they haven’t done yet.

The words they haven’t said aloud, too much baggage surrounding them on both sides. Steve had thought it had been understood, though. The unspoken truth that ran both ways.

Now, he realizes what a miscalculation that was. Now, he looks at the anxiety pouring out of Eddie, the uncertainty. The way he’s braced for the worst, like it’s really a question how he feels.

Steve swallows down any residual trepidation, and he sets aside his own fear, the whispering voice that tells him his love is too much to be accepted by anyone if he doesn’t hold it back. Eddie needs to hear it, whether he feels the same way or not.

“Eddie,” he says, taking hold of Eddie’s wrists, thumbs pressed to his pulse points. “I love you.”

Eddie’s breath catches, and his voice wobbles as he responds, “How long for?”

Steve feels thrown for a loop. “What?”

“How long,” Eddie repeats, something wretched in his tone. “Until you’re sick of me? Of this? How long until it’s too damn much and you realize you’re better than it all? When you wake up and realize that I’m not somebody worth sticking around for?”

Steve lashes out all at once with his hand, gripping Eddie’s chin to force him to make eye contact once again.

“Eddie Munson,” he utters with command, “You listen to me. You don’t get to talk about yourself like that — like you aren’t worth the effort. Because to me? Loving you isn’t effort. It’s the easiest thing I’ve ever done, in fact. And even if it was hard, I’d walk uphill both ways just to earn the privilege of it. So don’t you dare talk about yourself like that. Do you understand?”

Eddie’s eyes are big again, shocked and unsettled, but he nods, an instinctual response to the particular tone of Steve’s voice.

“Good. Good boy,” Steve praises, releasing his chin to stroke his hair.

“As for the other part…I’m not going be naive. The romantic in me wants to promise we’ll be in love forever, but you and I both know things happen, people change. I’m not going to lie to you about something I can’t know. But what I can tell you is that I’ll love you forever. Just like everyone else I’ve loved before, you’ve carved out your very own place here, Munson,” Steve taps his chest. “And that’s never going away. Even if by some stretch of the imagination it one day changes form, I’ll still love you. I’ll always love you. And I’m not going anywhere. I’m not going to leave you today, tomorrow, or for the foreseeable future. Because I love you, and you are worth loving. Do you understand?”

Eddie nods, but this time with tears squeezing out the sides of his eyes.

Steve draws him into his arms, offering a tight embrace of support for the next part.

“This might be hard,” Steve says, “But I’m going to need you to repeat after me now.”

“What?” Eddie asks, beginning to pull away, confusion etched on his features.

“Eddie,” Steve reprimands him. “Aren’t you going to be good for me?”

Eddie catches himself, a brief moment where his desire to flee the vulnerability of the unknown wars with his obedience — but then if fades into submission, his body sinking pliantly back into Steve’s arms.

“Yes.”

Steve rewards him with a kiss on the top of his head.

“Need you to say exactly what I tell you to,” He says.

Eddie’s hands fist into Steve’s shirt, holding on tight. “Yes.”

Steve nods.

“Tell me that you’re good, and kind, and worthy of love.”

“Steve-“ Eddie starts, but Steve doesn’t let him object.

“Say it.”

Eddie swallows back anything else, taking a steadying breath.

“I—I’m good, and kind, and worthy of love.”

Steve rubs a hand up and down his back.

“Tell me that you’re not hard to love. That the people who love you don’t want to leave you.”

Eddie whines, burying his nose against Steve’s chest, voice muffled. “I’m not hard to love. The people who love me…”

Steve nudges him, waiting for the rest. Eddie swallows audibly.

“The people who love me don’t want to leave me.”

“There we go,” Steve coos. “Not so hard after all, huh? You did so good. My good boy.”

Eddie goes limp against him, all the tension sapping at once from his muscles.

“Think we’re gonna work on that more regularly,” Steve says, petting Eddie’s hair as he wraps an arm around his waist. “And I’m going to have to remind you just as often that I love you.”

Eddie’s arms latch around him. “Hey, Stevie?” He calls, quiet. Soft.

“Yeah?”

“I love you too.”

Steve stumbles over the surprise of it, only for a second — but then he beams, light pouring out as warmth floods through him.

“I know,” He says. “I know.”

[wheneverfeasible]

Sickness of the Heart

wc: 5.5k || rating: T+ || cw: sexual themes, language, slut-shaming (but for a good cause) || summary: After ending his FWB relationship with a!Eddie, o!Steve must deal with the humiliation of a self-imposed rejection sickness while interacting with the other members of Corroded Coffin. Flight of Icarus compliant. Angst with an open ending. || ao3

Note: This fic does contain a brief summary of Paige’s involvement in Flight of Icarus, so while it does contain some spoilers, this also means that you do not need to have read the book to enjoy this story. Also, while this is technically a Steddie fic, Eddie doesn’t actually make an appearance in the story itself lol.

This fic is partially inspired by @fkinkindagauche ‘s fic The Unbearable Horniness of Steve Harrington in relation to Steve’s rejection sickness. Excellent read if you haven’t yet!

-

Steve was going to murder Dustin.

Or maybe he’ll let him live, he hasn’t decided yet. The kid didn’t really know the whole story, after all, so it wasn’t like he knew how utterly lost and devastated Steve felt right now, the rejection sickness curling through him in sharp pangs and dull aches. He didn’t know how much Steve’s heart was breaking with every step Steve took towards Gareth’s garage.

The only benefit was that Steve knew Eddie was out of town, setting things up with Paige for their chance of redemption. The pretty beta had reached out after the news of Eddie’s trial had made front page news even outside of Indiana, her boss apparently wanting to give Eddie a second chance at making it big in the music industry.

Eddie had been floored, energetic, and even the boys in Corroded Coffin couldn’t fault him if he ditched them again to make a better life for himself. They all knew he deserved it after everything. Except, Eddie had told them point blank that he was never running again, never turning his back on those he cared about. Had agreed to the offer to audition properly, but only if all of Corroded Coffin was invited too. All or nothing, he’d said.

After a bit of back-and-forth, Paige’s boss agreed.

It had been the final nail in the coffin for this thing between him and Eddie.

The facts were this:

During Eddie’s first senior year, Paige, with her fancy music scout assistant L.A. job, had been visiting her family in town and stumbled across Corroded Coffin playing at The Hideout. As anyone with even a passing interest in music could clearly see, she discovered Eddie and was instantly impressed with his talent and passion for music. They had…hit it off.

It had led to an offer to audition. But just for Eddie. And Eddie? Young and stupid and running away from a town that already hated him just for being his father’s son? Well, he had agreed. And then said father had come back and ruined everything, had burned those bridges for Eddie before disappearing once again and taking with it Eddie’s chance of a better life.

Had, in fact, been directly responsible for Eddie getting into drug dealing with led to…everything.

The relationship with Paige had ended messily, but not as devastating as it could have been. At least, that was Steve’s understanding of things. Over the course of his and Eddie’s…thing…the older alpha had talked about his past, slowly revealing all of this to Steve who had opened up about his own traumatic past, about his guilt over Barb, his and Robin’s torture at the hands of evil Russians, and how his parents had never truly loved him, made all that much more obvious when his secondary gender presented as omega.

It had been nice. For a moment, Steve had been able to pretend that it was something more than it actually was. Could pretend that when Eddie called him beautiful as he moved inside him, that the alpha had meant it as more than just what a good lay Steve was.

It had never been more than that, however. No matter how much Steve desperately but secretly wished otherwise.

Helping Eddie recover, then also serving as a character witness for Eddie’s trial, the two of them had grown into something actually resembling genuine friends and not just two people thrown together because of otherworldly forces and trauma. Eddie even spent a large part of his time at Steve’s house as they all prepared for Eddie’s trial, whether with the larger group or just on his own.

And then Eddie’s rut hit, unexpectedly and most likely brought on by stress from the trial, and…well…well Steve actually hadn’t had a decent lay in a while since he’d been dating betas and other omegas almost exclusively since Nancy. He missed being with an alpha. Missed being able to let himself go and fall into omega space, which he trusted Eddie with since he was his friend first and foremost.

The offer had been met with incredulity, but Steve had pointed out that things with the trial and his defense would get messy if Eddie lost control if he either tried to weather it alone or find another omega to share it with, and Steve was game if Eddie was. Purely transactional, just two bros helping each other out, never to be spoken about again.

Except neither had been prepared for how compatible they were with sex, even if they weren’t always compatible in their day-to-day friendship. So, after the embarrassment and awkwardness went away, they settled on a deal. When Steve’s heat came around, Eddie would help him out too. And he did not too long later, and it was just as great as the first time too.

And then they had sex when neither rut nor heat was present.

It was drunken sex, sure, celebrating not only Eddie’s freedom with the long trial finally being over but also celebrating the high school diploma Eddie had received in the mail that day, but it was sex all the same. And then it kept happening. Just two bros helping each other let off steam while enjoying some fantastic orgasms. Friends with benefits and that was it.

Except that wasn’t it for Steve.

No, his days of just enjoying being casual ended when he’d fallen in love with Nancy, when the idea of a Winnebago full of pups had begun to seem like something he could actually have, and he’d been chasing that high ever since. Even when he casually dated after Nancy, it has always been in search of someone to share that future with.

Enter Eddie Munson, a ridiculously nerdy and unhinged alpha who loved Steve’s honorary pups as much as Steve himself did. And yeah, they bickered all the time, clashed and argued and didn’t really have much else in common and sometimes jabbed each other with pointed insults from high school, but the sex was fantastic and Eddie was…surprisingly sweet. Sensitive. Caring. Considerate.

Eddie was annoying and hyperactive and made Steve want to tear his hair out sometimes, but he was also exactly the sort of alpha that Steve had always wanted. Steve wasn’t certain when it actually began, but it was when he was watching Eddie carefully roughhouse with the pups one day that he found himself looking forward to how Eddie would be with their pups.

And that horrifying realization had been the beginning of the end.

He knew Eddie didn’t think about him like that. Honestly, how could he? First of all, Eddie deserved better than the town slut, not that Steve ever felt ashamed about being said slut. He liked sex and he though he eventually wanted a happily-ever-after of his own, he wasn’t opposed to sleeping around until he found it. If he ever did.

Now though, realizing that his inner omega had apparently decided on yet another alpha that he knew he could never truly have, he began wondering if he was just doomed to never being properly mated. But then it wasn’t just his inner omega craving Eddie’s alpha. It was Steve himself craving all of Eddie.

He had fallen in love with Eddie Munson. And he didn’t even know when it had happened.

Which, of course, meant that he had to end things. Immediately.

The rejection sickness he’d gotten after Tina’s party had been…intense. He’d been angry too, or really just heartbroken. He’d only been able to push it down, reason with the sickness, when he decided that it was just the alcohol and the stress and the guilt and had decided to apologize for…whatever he needed to apologize for. And then It happened and the sickness was pushed back even further to deal with everything until…

Well, when he saw Nancy and Jonathan and smelled them, he knew it was well and truly over. Then the sickness hit him back harder than ever. He knew he couldn’t suffer through that again, not like that. And he knew with a certainty that losing Eddie would make his previous sickness feel like a walk in the park if he let himself fall even more deeply in love with Eddie than he already was, if he let his inner omega start even more of the courting process than it had already tried.

It hadn’t been pretty. It wasn’t that Eddie had any genuine feelings for him outside of friendship and lust, but Steve suddenly breaking things off had been…complicated. More than he had expected it to be. But Paige had come sniffing around again by then and Steve knew…fuck, he knew how considerate Eddie was.

If he knew that Steve felt the way he had, that Steve’s omega had already claimed him as his alpha, then Eddie would be a self-sacrificing idiot and give Steve what he wanted even if he didn’t want it. To spare Steve that pain. Especially if Steve accidentally got knocked up, which was seeming more and more of a possibility when Steve’s stupid omega brain kept forgetting to take his birth control because it wanted to be knotted and pupped up.

Eddie had his whole life in front of him, and now a chance to actually make it out of Hawkins and live his big rockstar hero dreams. And the chance to be with the only person Steve knew that Eddie ever had actual feelings for. Steve couldn’t take that from him. So he broke up with him…as much as you can break up with someone who was just your friend that you’re ostentatiously just using for good sex.

Eddie had been rightly annoyed when he’d arrived at their regularly scheduled dick appointment time only to be kicked out with blue balls and told that it was never happening again. Among a few other sharp words to get the point across.

Steve probably should have called him before Eddie made it to his house, before Eddie had paid for the dinner he was bringing that night, but Steve couldn’t bring himself to say the words over the phones that for all he knew were still tapped by the government.

Steve could tell that Eddie had been a bit offended too, and worried. Of course Eddie would worry that he wasn’t doing enough in bed, that he wasn’t good enough in bed, which had to be a kick to an alpha’s ego no matter who it was. Steve couldn’t really just say that he was ending things so that Eddie could get with Paige again and move out of Hawkins, however.

So he played up the angle that he was growing bored, that he was looking for something new now, even as his inner omega railed against such lies. He wanted more, certainly, but more with Eddie. Which Eddie couldn’t give him. Sure, Eddie might stick around like a martyr if Steve flashed him that pleading omega look he knew Eddie’s alpha was weak for, but that didn’t mean that Eddie himself could give Steve what he most desperately wanted: Eddie’s heart.

Which led to now, with Eddie meeting with Paige at her big fancy grownup job and no doubt rekindling old flames, and Steve stuck in Hawkins having to return one of those Dipshits and Dingbats books that Dustin had borrowed from Gareth.

The band was practicing, even without their frontman Eddie being present, and as Steve turned off the engine of his car and grabbed the ratty old book in question, he could make out something over the sporadic noise about behind the scenes footage and their eventual rise to fame.

Which…yeah. Steve knew that it wasn’t a question of if but of when. Metal still wasn’t really his preferred style of music, but he’d gone to some shows, had even been to a few of the band’s practices after he and Eddie started messing around, and he knew the boys were talented. Any music exec would be stupid to pass them up.

He grimaced a little behind his sunglasses when, with a discordant screech of Jeff’s guitar, the racket stopped. The boy in question was glaring at him, which…fair, he supposed, since he was the one that broke off the thing with Eddie, but it wasn’t like it was anything more than just sex. Nothing to warrant the glares he was receiving from the whole band.

But then, they’d never really been too keen on Eddie being friends with him, much less hooking up, and it wasn’t like they could hide that with how their scents had begun mingling. Another sign that it was high time to break it off, before it entered beyond accidental courtship and drifted into accidental bonding.

“What are you doing here, Harrington?” Gareth growled, the scent of annoyed alpha only causing Steve to fumble slightly as he brought up one hand in mock surrender and the other holding the book.

“Henderson wanted to make certain you got this back before you left,” he huffed, pushing his sunglasses up over his head to squint at the trio glaring back at him. He waved the book a little, hoping one of them took it from him so he didn’t have to step further into the garage. No one did.

“Why didn’t he just bring it himself instead of sending you of all people?” Gareth scoffed with a small sneer, never having really been Steve’s biggest fan. Not that Steve could really blame him; he knew people like Steve hadn’t made Gareth’s life easy, including Gareth’s own father.

“Ask him yourself, asshole,” Steve muttered, cocking one hand on his hip impatiently. Though the other two were only betas and thus didn’t have much in the way of scents, their posturing didn’t leave any doubt that they didn’t like him.

He just…didn’t know why. Besides Gareth, the other two had seemed relatively okay with Steve hanging around. Jeff had even once been actively friendly, while…uh…fuck. Steve always forgot the other one’s name. Stan? No. Doug? No. Grant? He was fairly certain that was wrong too. Whatever. Anyways, he had only cared that Steve didn’t get in the way of practice or their non-Hellfire DnD games after Eddie graduated.

Now they all looked at him like how they had at the beginning, when they hadn’t trusted the former jock, when they had only seen King Steve and hated everything about him on principle, only seeing another Jason Carver instead of the dude who had stood up for their friend in trial. Whatever. It didn’t matter. It didn’t hurt.

At least, that’s what Steve kept telling himself.

He didn’t let himself think about how Jeff had once clapped him on the shoulder when he had embarrassedly brought some fudge he had made, trying out a new recipe to take to the Hopper-Byers’ during one of their semi-regular get-togethers that had originally cropped up during preparing for Eddie’s trial. Now it just became a thing they did for fun.

He also didn’t think about the other one (Jesus, seriously, what was his name again?) had jokingly argued with Eddie about what class Steve would be, certain that he’d be a basic fighter while Eddie had been adamant that he’d be a paladin. Steve hadn’t known what any of it meant, but the two of them had laughed at the end and it had been with Steve, not at him.

Even Gareth had, on occasion, been almost nice to him, settling Steve on the worn red couch at the back of the garage with noise cancelling headphones and some magazines of his mother’s when practice had run long and Steve was supposed to pick Eddie up to meet up with Jonathan and the others.

Now everyone just stared at him with unconcealed looks of annoyance and disdain. He hated it. Even though it wasn’t them his omega wanted, he still felt another sharp spasm of pain from the rejection of Eddie’s pack.

It must have showed on his face, or the way his body twitched and the arm holding out the book dropped, because a brief flash of concern whisked across Gareth’s expression and he stood up from his seat behind the drums, his nose crinkling.

“You smell like shit, Harrington,” he stated, moving around the drums to get slightly closer. At least the smell of annoyed alpha was dissipating.

“Gee, thanks,” Steve dryly said with a roll of his eyes. He swallowed against the burn of bile in his esophagus and held out the book once more. “Look, just take the damn book so I can go.”

A part of him was tempted just to drop the book, to let it fall and hit the concrete ground uncaring if the edges got fucked up or not. But these were Eddie’s friends and his inner omega wouldn’t let him do anything that might upset the alpha he wanted as his own. Pathetic as that was.

Gareth moved closer then, and Steve finally thought the younger boy would finally take the stupid thing from him, but instead Gareth’s hand shot out to grab hold of his wrist with a frown on his face. The touch of another alpha that wasn’t the one he wanted sent another roil of nausea through Steve’s belly, and he struggled hard to get his arm released, causing Gareth to simply tighten his hold.

“Let go of me!” Steve hissed. He saw the other two move forward towards them, but Gareth waved them back with his free hand, which they reluctantly listened to, though Jeff frowned as he glanced over his shoulder towards the back of the garage.

“You look sick, Harrington,” Gareth said instead of doing as he’d asked. “You smell sick too.”

“He’s right,” the other one, the bassist, said after a moment of consideration while Jeff’s head cocked to the side, an unreadable expression on his face. “I can’t smell you all that well, but you look terrible.”

“Don’t tell me,” Gareth scoffed, taking a long, deep sniff over Steve that caused him to blanche. “You really have the audacity to have rejection sickness when you’re the one who dumped Eddie?”

Steve pursed his lips and grabbed the book with his free hand to shove it at Gareth’s chest, forcing the younger boy to fumble and take it while moving back a step. He glared at them, wiping at his now freed wrist as though he could wipe off Gareth’s touch. Asshole.

“Don’t be such a fucking knothead,” Steve snarled, and no, maybe he didn’t get to have the intimidation of an alpha, but omegas would be fierce in their own ways. He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the others who were more or less gaping at him now.

And he knew, okay? He knew it was weird, being sick when he had been the one to call it off, and it wasn’t like they were even anything other than fuck buddies letting off steam together. There had never been anything but friendship and lust between them. But try telling Steve’s omega that. His nesting had been insane.

It was only by some miracle that Eddie hadn’t been clocked in to Steve’s growing emotions and affections. That he hasn’t seen just how delusional Steve had been for that brief moment when he actually thought, maybe, just maybe, just for once the person he liked might like him back, might see him as something other than a stupid, used up, good for nothing, filthy, dirty, worthless—

“Look, I’m not an idiot, okay?” Steve snapped out, flushing not just in anger this time but also embarrassment and shame at the way his eyes suddenly grew wet. He blinked rapidly, his fingers digging into his biceps. “I knew what it was and what it wasn’t. I know it was just sex for Eddie, okay?”

Steve huffed out at Gareth’s suddenly blank expression, pleased that he had at least gotten the jackass to shut the fuck up and stop stinking the place up with his pissed off alpha pheromones. He deeply sighed, moving his sunglasses to hook in the collar of his shirt to run a hand through his hair before glaring at Gareth who had moved a couple steps to the side. Putting more distance between them maybe?

“I know that someone like Eddie and someone like me would never actually happen,” he muttered, and putting it into words with someone else had the bone deep aches from the sickness sending another wave of pain.

“What do you mean, ‘someone like Eddie,’” the bassist scoffed, his hackles rising, though he exchanged looks across the garage with Jeff. Gareth sneered as well, but there was also a shrewdness in his eyes, his nostrils flaring as he took in more of Steve’s scent.

Steve rolled his eyes, throwing up a hand in frustration. He didn’t know why he was even still here, why he was trying to defend or justify himself, but his omega was telling him that these were his alpha’s packmates and thus deserved the truth.

“Like I said, I’m not an idiot,” he reluctantly said. “Eddie is…Eddie’s…” Steve huffed at himself next, scrubbing his hand over his eyes at the prickly feeling of fresh tears. He normally wasn’t much of a crier, but the hormones affecting him from the rejection sickness had him closer to blubbering at all hours of the day more than he would like.

Worse even than when it had cut through him after Nancy.

“Eddie is brilliant, okay?” he finally managed to get out, even if he was annoyed at needing to say this at all. He wished he could have just dropped the book off and left. “He’s so much braver than he gives himself credit for, he’s amazing with the pups, he’s creative and smart and and considerate and kind and probably one of the best people I’ve ever known. He’s a goddamn hero, whether he wants to believe it or not.”

Though these three had no idea what Eddie had gone through, not truly, they did know that there was more to the story than they had been told. Steve had always been quite vocal about talking about how amazing Eddie had been for the trial, and though he had to flub some of the details, everything he said had been true. Eddie was a hero, even if Eddie himself always denied that.

“And he’s hot,” Steve couldn’t help adding, with another small flush of embarrassment. “He has those stupid doe eyes that you want to spill all your secrets to, and that stupid grin that’s larger than his face, and the stupid way that even when he can’t seem to sit still, his entire focus is on you when you talk…”

Steve scoffed, ashamed of how wet it sounded, and rolled his eyes as he once more wrapped both arms tightly around himself. “And then there’s me. The asshole. The douchebag extraordinaire. The bully. The slut whose only redeeming quality is how easy of a lay I am and daddy’s money, which, by the way, I’m probably being cut off from soon, so really, what else do I have to offer except a used up pussy half the town has been in?” he sneered.

His self-hatred was probably a little too obvious with that, and he didn’t know why he said all of that anyways. Probably it had just been festering away inside of him with no one to unload on, at least no one who wouldn’t try to soothe him and lie to him and say that he wasn’t any of those things.

And yeah, maybe saying he’d slept with half the town was an exaggeration, but he had probably slept with at least half the chicks (and some of the guys) in high school, no matter their designation.

The problem was that Steve’s omega craved human connection. He never really had it growing up, his alpha father too focused on everything wrong with Steve and his beta mother too focused on making certain her husband didn’t stray to inbetween an omega’s legs…again. So Steve found physical comfort where he could, even if it meant opening thighs or mouth for anyone who shot him an interested look.

And then there was Eddie. Eddie, who never treated Steve like something shameful. Eddie, who had admitted he was wrong about Steve, even if Steve didn’t think he had been. Eddie, who even in rut had checked in on Steve and made certain he felt safe and unharmed. Eddie, who for a short amount of time almost made Steve feel good enough.

Which was the problem. Because Eddie didn’t mean it the way that Steve wanted him to, didn’t see Steve as anything other than a friend he could conveniently get off with, an omega who would never form attachments or come up with unrealistic ideas about them.

Except Steve thought he had probably been attached even before Eddie’s rut. Had too many ideas that were beyond unrealistic; they were straight up impossible. Eddie would never want Steve the way that Steve wanted Eddie.

Not when he had someone like Paige waiting for him, not when he had a future ahead of him outside of this stupid town. Steve couldn’t trap Eddie into a life he never wanted.

“So, what, you broke it off because Eddie doesn’t love you?” Jeff finally asked, his voice sounding odd and a bit louder than necessary. Steve wished he’d shut up. “You’re a used up slut of an omega with no redeeming qualities so obviously Eddie would never want to actually be with you outside of sex because he’s such a great guy and you’re not, is that it?”

Steve didn’t know why Jeff was repeating what Steve had said like that, but the words still caused him to flinch back slightly to hear someone else say them. He glared at Jeff, even as he had to hastily wipe away a traitorous stray tear that had slipped down his cheek.

“What does any of that matter,” the bassist asked. “Why would that send you into rejection sickness if you know nothing could ever come of this thing you two had? You were just using him for sex too, weren’t you?”

Steve’s frown cut across to the other beta, brow furrowing. Why did he sound weird, like he was leading Steve to say something he absolutely could not say? Not because it wasn’t true, but because it would break his heart to say it out loud.

“Come on, Harrington,” Gareth took up the goading next, taking a predatory step towards Steve who hastily took a step back. “You were just fucking, weren’t you? It didn’t mean anything to you. You were just treating Eddie like some glorified sex toy to get off, admit it. Just after an easy knot.”

“That’s not true,” Steve muttered, ducking his chin down even as he glared at Gareth with all he was worth. “I would never…” He shook his head in frustration. “That’s not how it was.”

“Nah, I think that’s exactly how it was,” Gareth said with a cruel smirk. “Why else would you have dragged him around, using him whenever you needed a good dicking. You got bored of him, isn’t that it? That’s what you said. You had enough of trailer trash like him, your bit of rough and rumble, and so you booted him so you could move on to the next target. What, gonna crawl back to Hagan next?”

Steve jerked back as though slapped. “That’s not true!” he repeated in a louder shout. “I would never use Eddie like that. He’s not trailer trash. He’s better than anyone else in this goddamned town, which is why he has to leave and never look back.”

Gareth smirked, his scent turning pleased, like Steve had said exactly what he wanted to hear. “So you broke up with him because you thought he deserved better?” he mocked, stepping closer again, though this time Steve didn’t budge. He glared furiously at Gareth, his chest heaving with his fury at the boy’s words. “Why the hell would you ever care about trailer trash like him?”

“Because I love him, dammit!” Steve yelled, eyes snapping with all the pent up emotions he never let himself actually feel, and—oh.

It truly did break his heart to say those words aloud. Steve’s face crumpled immediately, all the tears he’d been fighting back now overflowing his eyes spilling down both cheeks.

Even Gareth reacted, taking a step back and further to the side, obviously putting more distance between him and Steve’s distressed omega smell. The other boys shifted uncomfortably, likewise disturbed even without the superior senses to pick up just how much of Steve’s distress and rejection sickness was eating away at him. God, Steve felt so pathetic.

Hastily wiping at his face (not that it mattered as fresh tears continually replaced those wiped away), nose snotty and leaking, Steve glared as much as he could at the three of them. He was so angry, and so hurt, and so resigned to know that this changed nothing.

“Are you happy now?” he spat out, hating how his voice warbled and cracked. “Do you think I’m seriously stupid enough to think I ever had a chance? That I wasn’t anything more than an easy lay for him too? People like me don’t deserve happy endings. Not like Eddie does. He was going to end things anyway so I just did it for him. Assholes,” he muttered, finally turning away to leave because what else was there to say? How much more could he be hurt?

Steve paused. Right.

Turning back around, he bared his teeth as he pointed aggressively at the younger boys, shoulders back and tone once more falling back into the old familiar role of King Steve, even through the tears. “And don’t you lot say shit about this to anybody. Not to Eddie, not to the kids, not even to your fucking grandmas, are we understood?”

Jeff snorted, and Steve hated him more than he ever had for the amused look on his face. “Oh, we won’t say anything. Don’t worry, Stevie.”

Hurt clawed its way back up his throat, jaw quivering at the old familiar nickname, his sickness sending bile he had to rapidly swallow back down. All he wanted was to crawl into bed and wallow and tried to forget the alpha he wanted more than anything to be his and his alone.

Turning back around, Steve shoved his glasses back on his face before wrapped his arms around himself as he made his way back towards his car, fighting back the sobs that wanted to overtake him as he felt the rejection over and over and over again with every step away from his alpha’s pack.

He almost wished he had never met Eddie at all, had never met someone who, for such a short time, made him feel seen and heard and, biggest lie of all, like he was worth something after all.

As if he could ever be more than the bullshit he knew he was.

~

“You get all that?” Gareth asked finally after the three of them watched Steve’s car drive away. He glanced over his shoulder as Jeff moved around the drum set to the camcorder they’d set up to film today’s practice.

Jeff fiddled with the device that had been hiding in plain sight this whole time, the red light indicating it was recording until Jeff switched it off. He pressed another button and the side popped open, allowing him to pull out the vhs with a triumphant wiggle of his brows.

Gareth grinned at the other two with a pleased set to his shoulders, two matching grins meeting his own. “Excellent. After all, we said we wouldn’t say anything to Eddie. Not our fault if he overhears something he wasn’t supposed to when viewing our practice session,” he said with an easy shrug.

“Thank god, because I was sick of his moping. Should we send it overnight express to him now, or let them suffer a little longer?” Jeff laughed, wiggling the vhs in his hand.

“God, I’d say let them suffer because they are going to insufferable after this, but Eddie would skin us alive if we let his omega suffer like that for a moment longer than necessary,” Gareth grimaced, the others wincing in agreement.

“Ugh. And we thought they were bad before,” came the grumbling response, and Gareth could only snort as he glanced at the boy on the bass.

“How soon until they’re pupped up do you think?” Jeff slyly teased.

“After Eddie sees that tape?” Gareth asked with a roll of his eyes. “Same day, Jeffy. Same fucking day.”

Still, Gareth knew they were all three pleased for their friend, and as they ended practice early to get the tape sent out as soon as possible, he had the distinct feeling that when they left town in a few days, Steve would be with them.

-

Hostage tag: @derythcorvinus

Promised tag: @katyawriteswhump

[infinite-orangepeel]

“get too close to your muse & you, the artist, will lose all ability to decipher one shade from the next on your palette. keep your distance…”

fall quarter begins at the curly roots of eddie munson’s ineffable head, runs its’ labyrinthian course through passageways of blue veins & black ink, & ends at a set of hairy crimson painted toes.

steve finds himself squandering every waking moment of his lifeblood & attention somewhere, egregiously, in the middle.

“say you’re drawing a bed of flowers,” his professor lectured a few weeks back, “what happens if you put your nose in the middle of those flowers & try to recreate the details on your canvas? you come up with color and shape, sure, but it’s blurry—isn’t it? it’s a big blobby blur of nothing. that’s not very good life drawing, i’m afraid.”

flash forward to the present—

the bed is firm but comfortable. reminding you of its’ presence.

it doesn’t encourage daydreaming &, yet, steve is ignoring the better advice of his mentor & pressing his curious nose directly into the bud of an all too striking flower.

he knows the intimate contact could kill the rose, is aware of the thorns lining the stem, but he can’t stay away.

he’s struck by fear and temptation and self-loathing and a beauty that stings like a slap across the face.

eddie’s his roommate, his friend, his muse for the most important project of steve’s career as an art student.

& getting too close is lethal, so he creates a sort of optical illusion.

designs an environment in which he can pretend they are star-crossed lovers in a broken world that won’t let them be together. in which touch is a small death each and every time.

steve flits to eddie like a dragonfly to water—

never touching.

never spending too much time in his orbit before making up an excuse to leave & jerk off to the smell of old cigarettes in the bathroom.

everything he really wants to say sits in the back of his throat like a painful, malignant lump & gets spat out onto his sketchbook in a tragically romantic exorcism.

doing the dishes next to him is enough to drive him insane.

drawing him, butt-naked, is another story.

“is it supposed to be so….erotic?”

eddie arches an eyebrow as steve traces the outline of his cock into his sketchbook.

“it’s not that erotic,” steve says, blushing into his charcoals, “besides no one will know it’s you. it’s art.”

art is supposed to be weird & naked. now, hold still, & let me draw you.”

it’s definitely erotic.

there are roses—de-thorned, for safety—shrouding eddie’s dick & leaving a trail of pink petals across his pale thighs.

eddie’s hand is draped over his head; exuding a certain brattiness, lust, boredom—

as if he’s lying there because he wants someone, like steve, to stumble upon him & use his body the way it so clearly needs to be.

his lips are parted on the precipice of whispering some filthy secret into steve’s ear while milking him like a simple farm girl with nothing better to do.

fuck.

he can’t be this close to eddie without losing his mind.

fuck. fuck. fuck.

it’s just a body. just limbs and a huge cock and—

eddie’s quiet for a little while which is rare for him, before he pipes up again.

“what if we painted the flowers together?”

steve wipes the sweat from his brow, drops his pencil, and looks up at eddie across the mattress. working overtime to avoid staring at the erection sticking out amongst the bouquet of roses.

“the piece isn’t supposed to be very colorful. i’m going for muted tones. that’s why i picked the pale pinks and whites.”

eddie giggles a little and, it’s so cute, steve has to pinch his own thigh through his shorts just to maintain composure.

“i don’t think you’re understanding—the colors wouldn’t change much. except for some more white, if you catch my drift,” eddie pumps his hand over his cock several times and mimes cumming stop the petals, “might look cool. might get you extra points with that asshole professor of yours. you’ve said he likes ‘shock value.’”

“i—i guess you’re right. that’s a pretty….different and unique….um….idea. yeah.”

it’s like this that steve strips naked and clambers as close to eddie as he can possibly get without laying a finger on him. adhering to the rules—keeping a particular distance between artist & muse.

they lay side by side. sunlight streaming in through the blinds & bathing eddie’s spindly fingers in gold as he touches himself.

“harrington, don’t act like you haven’t been dreaming about this since day one,” eddie snarks, “i’ve seen the way you look at me, sweetheart. your eyes are gonna burn holes in my ass if you’re not careful. touch that pretty cock of yours, lemme see you.”

before steve can do anything about it or change his mind, he’s got a fist wrapped around his own cock and the other hand pinching his nipples. left and right, back and forth, dragging his nails through the hair sprouting around them.

“didn’t think you thought about me like that,” steve whines, watching as eddie edges himself methodically—

moving faster, slower, squeezing at the base, thumbing over the slit, cupping his balls, slapping the insides of his own thighs until they match the pink petals.

“i like a little pain,” he comments when he catches steve’s wide eyes, “and i’ve always was hallucinating the first time i walked into this room and saw you on the bed—thought i was going into the light and seeing an angel.”

“you’re so full of it.”

“i’d like to be full of you,” eddie breathes against steve’s neck, not allowing his lips to pass the barrier, “but i don’t know if you can handle me, big boy. you’re blushing like a nervous little schoolgirl.”

“am not—”

“are too, &, you’re about to cum just listening to my voice. it’s so crystal clear. look at you—fucking yourself so stupid.”

eddie looks so beautiful.

laying there like a forsaken god locked out of heaven.

steve’s been so good about keeping his hands to himself, about keeping his nose out of the flowers, but desire and temptation are stronger than any amount of remaining willpower he has.

he grabs eddie’s shoulder with his freehand & kisses him until they’re both seeing stars.

celestial explosions of pleasure & truth & this thing that’s been growing violently between them since the moment they first met.

“i’m cumming. i’m gonna—fuck steve, it’s gonna be on the flowers—i hope that’s okay—”

they cum in tandem over petals of pink and white and thornless stems.

steve gets an A+.

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[aurumacadicus]

I finished binging Miss Fisher again:

"So why did you fall out with Howard, anyway?" Steve asked, slouching down in his seat as the car inched up the driveway. He hadn't asked before, and as he'd watched Peggy's hands tighten on the steering wheel as they passed through the gates to the Stark mansion, it finally occurred to him to wonder why he wasn't still involved with SHIELD after being one of the founders of SSR.

Peggy worked her jaw delicately. "We had a disagreement about values," she finally said.

"I can't imagine why," Steve muttered, and relaxed a little when the corner of Peggy's mouth curled up.

"Well, he'll surely enjoy me coming to him for help," Peggy added with a sigh, pulling to a stop. She took a moment to take a deep, fortifying breath, then let it back out slowly, giving Steve a glance out of the side of her eye. "And that I'm bringing you."

"I can thank him for looking for me so long," Steve agreed, and turned to unfold himself out of the car as Peggy did the same. Even though she was in her sixties, she was still sprier than he was; cars had gotten smaller while he was in the ice, somehow.

The door opened before they could knock or ring the bell, and Peggy brightened a little, greeting, "Mr. Jarvis."

"Ms. Carter," Mr. Jarvis answered, voice clipped, and her smile faltered as quickly as it had arrived. He bowed slightly, motioning toward the sitting room on the left. "Mr. Stark will be down to see you presently."

Steve took it as the dismissal it was, wondering at Peggy's reaction. There was so much about her that he didn't know. So much about the world he didn't know. His years in the ocean had done him no favors. He stared at a painting of peaches and tried not to think about how much he'd lost. Then his ears caught the sound of footsteps on the stairs, and he turned, clasping his hands behind his back as he instinctively fell into parade rest.

The man coming down the stairs was not Howard, Steve realized, even though he looked a lot like him. Anthony, he remembered the file saying. Howard's son. Steve hadn't believed Howard would ever settle down, but here was proof, walking casually down the stairs as if they had all the time in the world. To their surprise, he used the post at the bottom of the stairs to swivel directly to face the sitting room they'd been directed toward, walking over like he was meant to be there.

"Tony," Peggy said, and she was unable to keep the surprise out of her voice.

"Aunt Peggy," Tony answered, voice measured. He crossed his arms over his chest, raising an eyebrow. "Or should I be calling you that?"

Peggy sucked in a sharp breath and closed her eyes, looking vaguely annoyed, then opened them again. "Tony, I'm here to see your father."

"I'm the only Mr. Stark here," Tony told her flatly, scowling. "You'd know that if you ever called. Mom said she wanted to take a trip around the world while they still had their health, and they left three months ago. You'd know that if you read the society papers." He waved his hand dismissively. "And just so you know? I'm not really inclined to help. You didn't make it to a single one of my dissertations even though I invited you. You stopped coming to my birthday parties. You didn't even come to my coming out party," he added, and that last part was where Steve finally heard perhaps the first real emotion Tony had shown since he appeared on the stairs--hurt.

Omega, Steve remembered suddenly, at the mention of a coming out party. Tony didn't carry himself like the typical omega, he thought, tilting his head a little. But then, high society always carried themselves a little differently, he remembered. Howard had never carried himself like any of the alphas Steve had grown up with. It stood to reason that Tony would be much the same.

"Tony," Peggy began gently. "I'm sorry that my falling out with Howard affected you, too. I should have tried harder to stay in touch. But you were a child when that happened."

"And I was just as much of a pain in the ass then," Tony scoffed, rolling his eyes. "If they made a fuss about me talking to you, I would have just screamed the house down. I was good at it," he added with a huff.

Steve figured with the way Peggy winced, he was telling the truth.

"Whatever. I don't want to hash this out. What does SHIELD need from my dad? I'll pass the message on when they call next week," Tony continued before she could say anything else. "Maybe. If I feel like it."

Peggy looked like she was considering pressing him, but whatever she saw in his face, it made her back down. "It's about your mother's gala, Tony."

At that, Tony's gaze sharpened, shoulders straightening as his posture changed from dismissive to alert. "I'm in charge of the the foundation while Mom's on vacation," he said, sharp-edged and stern. "What would Dad have to do with that?"

"Hydra is trying to reestablish a foothold in New York," Steve finally answered, taking a step forward. "They intend to slither in through charities, because they believe it's easier to launder money that way. We believe several members will be trying to infiltrate the Maria Stark Foundation, and the gala will be where they make their move."

Tony swiveled to him, eyes calculating. "And who the fuck is this?"

Peggy glanced at him sharply, silencing Steve from answering. "This is the lead agent on the case, Agent Roger Stevens."

Tony pursed his lips, and the look he gave Steve wasn't entirely disgust, but it wasn't... not entirely disgust, either. Steve found himself sweating a little, and he couldn't quite figure out why.

"I suppose if I tell you that I'll take care of it, you'll poke your nose in anyway. Omega can't handle it," Tony said, lifting his chin at him aggressively.

Oh, Steve thought, wondering if this was how Bucky felt when Steve had raised his chin at him and asked, 'You wanna fight, too?' Tony thought that Steve believed he was incapable. "I'm sure you can handle it," he answered carefully when Peggy simply raised an eyebrow at him. He cleared his throat when Tony rocked back on his heels, clearly skeptical. "I just wonder. How you're going to arrest anyone. You need... authority from a governing body to do that."

Tony stared at him, unimpressed. Steve let the moment hang there, waiting. Adding anything else would be too risky, too likely to offend him. Steve had, unfortunately, not gotten any better at interacting with omegas. The only tried and true way to stay on their good sides, he'd found, was to shut the fuck up.

"So citizen's arrest doesn't count?" Tony finally asked.

"You have to hand the person you arrested over to a judge or police officer. I can detain them at SHIELD," Steve answered, and he thought he sounded pretty reasonable.

Tony scoffed. "Why? What can you do that the police can't?"

"Waterboard them, obviously," Steve deadpanned, then winced when Peggy's elbow rammed into his kidney.

"We do not waterboard our prisoners. We are not the CIA," Peggy told Tony sternly.

Tony's mouth dropped open into a surprised little 'o.' Then he threw his head back and laughed, loud, and Steve saw Peggy's shoulders relax, just a little. Maybe this would work out, Steve thought, allowing himself a small smile.

[strangersteddierthings]

No Regrets - Part Six

Part One🦇 Part Two🦇Part Three🦇Part Four🦇Part Five🦇Part Six

Eddie hasn't spoken a word since they found him in the boat house. Chief Powell told Nancy this on the phone, calling on Eddie's behalf, and another officer tells them again when they say they're here to pick him up.

Steve has a vague memory of this. He didn't go with to pick up Eddie last time, it was... Wayne? Maybe? The ache in Steve's head, the sign he's come to realize means he's changed something, is the indicator that's true. It means Wayne didn't go pick up El and the others last time, the original time?

Whatever. Steve can't be worried about that; it doesn't matter anymore how it went last time. Last timeline ended with him dead, dying?, so he's fine with forgetting it.

"Hey Eddie," Nancy greets as she stands in front of Eddie. He's just sat in a chair in the lobby area, staring straight ahead but not looking at anything. His eyes are vacant in a way that brings a sense of déjà vu to Steve. "Wayne asked us to pick you up."

Eddie doesn't even acknowledge that she's there.

"Eddie?" Nancy asks, leaning down just a little to put her face in Eddie's view. "Come on. Let's go."

"Nance," Steve says, digging the keys from his pocket, "can you get the car and park closer to the front door? I'll get Eddie."

Nancy turns to look at him, eyes flitting about his face before she nods, reaching out to take the keys.

Steve steps into the place she vacated in front of Eddie and squats. Gets eye level even if Eddie isn't looking back. "Hey, Eddie. It's Steve. Uh, Steve Harrington. Wayne couldn't come get you, he has something else he had to do, but I'm here to take you home."

It's barely there, but Eddie flinches at 'home.' It looks more like a twitch of his shoulder, and it could have been, but Steve thinks it's more than that.

"We don't have to go in. There's- across the road from you is Max Mayfield's house. You ever meet her?" Steve just talks, tries to keep his voice calm, conversational. "We can wait at Max's place for your uncle to get home. Just. We gotta go, man. Can't sit here in the police station all day." Steve reaches for Eddie's hand, to grab and try to coax him into standing. Except, as soon as Steve's fingers make contact, Eddie jerks back and Eddie finally looks at him, eyes snapping to Steve's face. He's not present, not really; he still kind of looks like he's looking beyond Steve rather than at him.

"Sorry, sorry," Steve says, just as softly. "I won't touch. But your uncle asked us to get you, so, please. We gotta go."

"Harrington?"

Oh. Oh no. It's only now that he's faced with looking directly at Eddie, faced with having Eddie looking directly at him that he thinks he might not be ready. He's not it turns out. He's not ready to face Eddie, not when he has memories of- of-

"And Buckley," Robin is suddenly here, pushing into Steve's space. Getting in Eddie's face. "And we are going to be heading to Forest Hills. So, unless you, like, want to spend the day the lovely police force of Hawkins, I suggest getting out of that chair and following us."

How can she have ever been worried about not being able to read his mind anymore?

"Right," Eddie says, more to himself than to Robin. He does go to stand, though, so Steve does, too. Puts some distance between himself and Eddie.

Steve leads the way to the car as Eddie follows behind like a ghost.

Except, it's Steve that's the ghost, isn't it? Does- does the future continue to go even without Steve there? Even as he changes how things went, or are going?

If it keeps going how long was Eddie trapped in his hold? Held by a selfish dead man who wasn't kind enough to not tell Eddie how he feels. Felt?

He looks to Eddie from the corner of his eye before he climbs into the passenger seat. Definitely how he still feels.

"I used your radio to get a hold of Dustin," Nancy says as they pull away from the curb. "He's on his way back to Max's from Cerebro. He got through to the walkie we sent with Wayne. We should all be together in an hour."

"Where'd you send my uncle? Why did he agree to go?" Eddie asks from the backseat.

"That's a loaded question, Munson," Robin answers, "but we'll explain it. Just, uh, just know that we believe you, and we know you didn't do anything to Chrissy."

"I didn't!"

"We know!" Robin placates, and Steve twists in his seat to he can see her. She's behind the driver's seat so he can see her without looking at Eddie. "We know. I swear we'll explain everything. Just when your uncle gets back, okay?"

Eddie doesn't verbally respond but Steve sees Robin nodding back to him so that's that.

There isn't any more talking the rest of the drive. Nancy parks next to her mom's car in front of Max's place and hands Steve's keys back to him before she climbs out. Eddie and Robin are next. Steve remains seated, listens as Robin says something about 'going home later' before he sees Eddie head towards Max's front door. He doesn't even pause to look in at Steve as he walks by.

Why would he? This Eddie doesn't know him. They're not bonded by five years of surviving hell together. This Eddie doesn't know anything about him, and Steve knows his whole life.

Robin startles him by pulling open his door to say, "you coming in?"

He looks from Robin to where Nancy and Eddie have disappeared into the trailer. "I don't- I can't. Robin, I can't."

"Hey, it's okay," Robin assures him, "it's okay. We can stay out here until you're ready."

Steve swallows thickly before nodding. She's squat beside the door, hand on the roof for support and the other on Steve. Also for support, but of the emotional kind. "I think I'm in love with him, and he barely tolerates me. It took a couple months for him to warm up to me, and that was with the help of an apocalypse. Will he even-" like me without it? He doesn't finish but the frown that comes to Robin's face lets him know he doesn't need to.

"Of course, he will. He did once before."

Steve turns from Robin to look out the front windshield. "Yeah. Maybe."

"I'll go in and let them know you need some time. Come in when you're ready," she squeezes his knee and then she's gone.

This time will be different. Vecna has to die today, because tomorrow he goes after Max and that's not acceptable. He won't let that happen. He's going to stop the end of the world before it begins. And then he doesn't know what will happen.

Will life just go on? Will he still remember a future that never was?

If he doesn't remember, will his feelings for Eddie go with the memories? That thought hurts, but if it's true, the pain is only temporary.

Steve doesn't know how long he just sits in the passenger seat of his car, staring off into space, just knows it was long enough that Wayne and the Cali crew arrive. It's the slamming of the van doors that brings him back to himself.

He twists to look over his shoulder and the first person he sees is Mike, who is, Steve thinks, not glaring at him for the first time in his life. Jonathan is standing next to him. He and Mike have a short conversation before Mike walks across the street, coming to a stop about 5 feet from Steve.

"Why are you just sitting in the passenger seat of your car with the door open?" Mike asks, voice full of his usual judgement. "Are you buckled in?"

Steve looks down and frowns. Yes, he is still buckled in. He unbuckles and climbs from his car. Mike eyes Steve warily the whole time.

"He not out yet?" Wayne's voice carries across the way and Steve looks to the Munson's home. Wayne is on the front step, the door behind him open.

"Over here! We're at Max's," Steve throws a thumb over his shoulder and it brings Wayne quickly. He's not running, but it's damn close. "Just let yourself in."

Wayne speed walks passed. Steve stays and watches as Will and El round the van and join Jonathan. Will looks like he wants to barf. Steve's not surprised by that; he's still got some sort of connection to the Upside Down. It's El who looks different.

Her entire demeanor is unlike Steve's ever known her. For the first time ever, she just looks like a scared little girl.

She takes the first step towards Steve and her brothers follow.

She stops in front of Steve, cocking her head at him. Steve looks down at her and mimics the motion. Her hair is the longest he's seen it and her face has turned serious. "You're different."

Steve nods. "So are you."

El lifts a hand up and touches it to Steve's temple. She looks confused for having done it, about as confused as Steve feels, but her confusion turns into a surprised gasp and a trickle of blood slides out her nose.

"El," Mike rushes in, shoving at Steve to make him take a step back and break their contact.

"I am fine," El says, though she looks like whole new person. Her shoulders square and she stands taller. Her eyes look as haunted as Steve remembers.

"Oh shit. You're my El," Steve says, which gets all the boys to give him odd looks.

"I am sorry for what I have done to you," she says, as no-nonsense and militant as he remembers her. "I could not go back myself, but I could piggyback on someone."

"Why me?"

"You were in Hawkins, and I knew you would do what needed to be done."

"What is happening?" Jonathan asks.

El turns to Jonathan and says, "we are going to stop the end of the world."

-

@skepsiss @i-less-than-three-you @nburkhardt @afewproblems @a-little-unsteddie @steviesummer @queenie-ofthe-void @lololol-1234 @synonym-for-strange @tchackdaw @blackpanzy @goodolefashionedloverboi

[strange-anni]

What happened to Nancy Wheeler on Wills 8th birthday?

Long story short I do believe that the events of S3 namely Mayor Larrys Fun Fair/The Mind Flayer/ The Battle at Starcourt Mall could all give us some clues as to what really happened when Will got 8 years old in 1979.

Read this post if you want to know more. If you don't you may not understand what I'm talking about in here.

This time I mostly want to talk about Nancy Wheeler and what I believe could have happened to her on the 22nd of March 1979.

The Hawkins High Marching Band was at Mayor Larrys Fun Fair in 1985. This likely means that wherever Wills birthday party took place in 1979, the band was there too. Probably not directly because of him but they were at the same place at the same time.

Since the Marching band was there, Robin was most likely too as well as Vickie.

But

In S1 Steve also assumes Nancy took part in band practices. She denies it though but I don't fully believe her. I think Steve is right that she was in band at one point in her life and therefore was also present when Will had his birthday party. I'll get into why later.

That doesn't bode well considering that it's likely something horrible happened at the same day. Something Will only has vague memories about. El distinctly remembers killing a bunch of kids in the lab in S4. Even though it turned out that she didn't do it and it was 001 who did it, I do think there is a bit of truth to it as these memories are most likely altered memories of Will.

So a bunch of children died back then and it's the year 1979 we are talking about. Nancy, Jonathan, Robin and Vickie would have only been about 12 years old at the time and Steve about 13 years.

Kids.

This is what Robin had to say when she and Steve were drugged and in the elevator with Erica and Dustin. Ominous to say the least.

But back to Nancy

I think she got shot in the chest.

Her sweater is white and it's pure fuel but it's not coming off. The fuel blood just won't come off.

And it's Larry who gave it his best shot at the Fun Fair. Larry who shares the same name with Lonnie. Both are short versions of Lawrence.

Nancy like many others got killed on that day but something else also happened. Will got a box with 120 crayons and drew a big space ship, a Rainbowship. Joyce told us it's the only thing Will wanted to do. He didn't care for his new Star Wars toys and only wanted to draw. If that Rainbowship is so important, it's for a reason I think. It's purpose is to bring a lot of people into space/the UD to save them and then bring them back to earth so they can live again.

Karen is right I think. Nancy did get swapped in the hospital. She died there and then seemingly came back to life but it's not really the same Nancy. She looks like her and mostly acts like her but it's not her.

It's the Nancy that got transported back from Space/the UD with the Rainbowship after she died in the hospital. She was swapped.

She's what an eight year old Will believed her to be like. His best version/interpretation of her along with some deliberate alterations. If being in band was what killed her on that day, she can no longer be in band. So that aspect of her life got erased. It's why I don't believe her when she said she wasn't in band. She can't remember ever being there and this version truly wasn't but the old one was.

The new car which looks just like the old car but isn't the old car. A metaphor for many things in this show

[19blackbutterfly97-blog]

Drabble? Fic? One-Shot?

Intro to an Omegaverse I'm thinking about writing when I finish one of my current fics. Feedback welcome!!

Word Count: 1530

>>>>><<<<

While most Omegas are loud and proud with their bubbly, vivacious personalities little Alice Belova was not. Raised in a family of Alphas and Betas, she was the middle of a pack of three brothers and one sister, Yelena. She was constantly surrounded by their naturally loud and brudish nature. Alice found solace being separated from others. She was usually found with her nose buried in a book in some corner of the world. When she presented at the later age of sixteen Alice decided it was time to look at a world beyond her boorish brothers and the long line of Alphas she somehow descended from. With much argument from her parents they reluctantly signed the agreement to allow their meek daughter to move to New York and join S.H.I.E.L.D..

The program was experimental. Of course they couldn't risk Omegas being field agents but right away S.H.I.E.L.D. saw the impact the office Omegas had. They’d usually start off in a call center of sorts. Some that could keep up and weren’t easily shaken would move on to become data processors, intelligence analysts, mission report scribes or lab assistants. They would mold themselves to their teams, allowing themselves the honor of serving their country and providing the support needed to get their people home safely. Then there was Alice.

Now closer to twenty-three, Alice has quietly risen through the ranks to one of the top Intelligence Analysts in the coveted Avenger’s Compound. While she doesn’t work directly with the team Alice has proven herself useful to the Director. Within six months on the Compound Alice was working on Avenger level cases, usually providing intel for locations and possible threats. She was the adorably silent side character that hid in her office waiting for the next case file to appear across her desk. It was a bit undeniable that Sam “The Falcon” Wilson turned to her when he agreed to aid in the search for James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes AKA The Winter Soldier. While she wasn’t a pivotal part in the search for Barnes, she did at least help with the initial search after his grand escape from Hydra.

The world had since healed from those events. Captain Rogers and the others were able to clear Barnes’ name and he eventually (and reluctantly) joined the team. Bucky made amends with Tony Stark and continually worked to heal some of the pain he caused but always somehow managed to overlook his own pain. He was resigned to believing that he was a defective Alpha who would never be able to protect or provide for an Omega the way she’d deserve. His friends however saw things in a different light.

“Look. I know you said we’re not allowed to intervene but it’s time. I can’t keep sitting here watching him mope around like this. It’s depressing!” Sam whispers to Steve. They’re sitting across the Avenger’s common room watching Bucky stare out the window. “He’s been there most of the day. Just like he was yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that.”

“And he’ll probably be there most of the day tomorrow, too. He’s been through hell. Let him mope.” Steve answers, still watching his friend with concern. Steve would never admit it out loud but he was always silently begging that Bucky would wake up one day and decide to fully join the rest of the world again. Sam grumbles a reply under his breath before standing up and disappearing to another part of the team’s living quarters.

“He does know I can hear him, right? Even when he’s whispering.” Bucky says a few moments later.

“If he does, he doesn’t care.” Steve says and pries open his sketchbook. “He’s just trying to help.”

“Well he can stop. I don’t need it.”

Steve hums in response to his best friend’s argument. “What if I can’t stop him from helping? You know Sam. Once he gets an idea in his head he’s going to be stubborn about it.” 

“What’s his plan?” Bucky asks with interest and turns around to look at him.

“No idea.” Steve answers with a barely hidden grin as he picks up his pencil and starts drawing.

Meanwhile, Sam had decided he was tired of watching his friend mope about. Deciding it was better to act now and worry about the consequences later he made his way down to the Intelligence office. Once there he was set on finding the quietly helpful Omega from a year ago. Alice, as per usual, was sitting at her desk with her full attention on the case file splayed across her computer monitor. The sweet scent of vanilla, lavender and honey wafted in the air as she worked. A pretzel stick poised neatly between her teeth as she concentrated on a few particulars of the case before sending it off. Sam smiled a little when he entered the cubicle behind her and waited.

“Just a minute please, Sam.” Alice says, never looking away from the screen.

“Take your time. I know how you are.” He answers and looks around the space. “Oh, I see your parents went to Prague. How’d they like it?”

“Fine that I know of. They invited me along but I turned them down. We had more important things going on here.”

Sam frowns slightly at that but doesn’t comment. Contrary to what others may believe about him when it comes to an Omega he does know when to keep his mouth shut, especially when one is as skittish as Alice. “We’ve been working on another Hydra case. I heard Tony and Steve talking the other day. Might be bringing an analyst on full time for this one.”

“Uh-huh.” Alice mutters as she sends off the case file on her screen before turning around a bit. “Any candidates?”

“Not yet. I was thinking about tossing your name in if you’re interested?”

Alice nods a little, a strand of hair falling over her face that she’s quick to push away. “Sure, thanks. Did you need anything else?”

“Me? Nah, just trying to avoid tense Alpha energy upstairs. It’s usually calmer here.”

“There’s not as many Alphas here. They’re usually training or something. Not that I mind.” She finishes with an eye-roll. “Aren’t you supposed to be training?”

“Technically, but hey, can’t a man come down and hang out with his favorite analyst?”

Alice raises an eyebrow at him. “I’m nobody’s favorite and we both know it. Plus, Alphas and Omegas - especially the unbonded, unmated ones- usually struggle with being just friends. Work acquaintances? Maybe.”

Sam smirks proudly. “Look at you coming out of your shell to argue with me. Did somebody go on a date?”

Alice groans. “Oh god, not you too. You sound like my mother right now. She asked me the same thing when I talked to her earlier.”

“That should tell you something about your life if more than one person is asking that question.” Sam teases and leans against the desk. “So, I’m assuming it went badly?”

Alice sighs and grabs another pretzel stick from the bag. “Yes. He was the typical egotistical Alpha that was only interested in talking about his last mission, his last rut and my heat cycle.”

“The audacity!” Sam feigns offence, dramatically clutching his chest. “Who was it? I'll knock some sense into him.”

“Remember Derek from team six?”

“The guy with the bad highlights that makes him look like a kid in a 90s boy band?” Alice nods, chuckling a little from the description. It’s accurate and the jab at Derek is enough to start lifting her spirits again. “Seriously? That Derek?! What were you thinking? You know he’s either slept with or tried to sleep with every Omega in this place.”

“I know, I know. I just… I guess I was just looking for something.”

“Hopefully not the number to a hairdresser.”

Alice laughs again and shakes her head. “No, gods no. I guess I was hoping there was more to him than what meets the eye… Ya know? Derek is no king of mystery but I was still holding out that he’d surprise me at least a little. Or at least be able to hold an intelligent conversation about something other than his knot.”

“Ever the hopeless romantic, are we?”

“Maybe a little. But you know me. I was raised in a pack of Alphas. I’m used to them being loud and egotistical asses.” She pauses when Sam makes a noise of mock offence. “Present company excluded of course. Anyway, I guess I’m just waiting on the one Alpha that actually cares about what I think, not just what I can do.”

“You and every Omega on the planet. Doesn’t mean you’re going to find them.” Sam says, though that’s nowhere near what Sam was thinking. He’s currently decided that he’s going to make sure Alice is the analyst put on the case with the Avengers. He’s making plans to knock Bucky down a few pegs with the tiny dark-haired Omega in front of him. Sam is concocting and scheming the best meet-cute he can possibly think of.

[antiquarianfics]

Taken pt. 7

If Bucky Barnes could time travel, he would go back to that morning. He would hold you a little tighter in his arms, and he would kiss you a little deeper. He would pull your daughter in between the two of you, letting her giggle as loudly as she wants whilst her parents kiss her cheeks and tickle her belly. If Bucky Barnes could time travel, he would have told you not to go to the park—to go anywhere else. But Bucky Barnes can’t time travel, and his wife and daughter are gone.

a/n: we’re halfway through!! I’m sorry this part is shorter, but things are about to pick up!

warnings: swearing, blackmail, mention of murder, themes of conspiracy, canon typical violence.

note: I do not own the character Bucky Barnes or any other Marvel affiliated characters. Any and all characters are a work of fiction and any likeness to real persons is wholly unintentional.

You do not have permission to copy, translate, or repost my work; however, feel free to like, comment, and reblog.

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previous part | series masterlist | next part

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“What do you want me to do”

Morozov grins, pulls a paper out of a manila folder next to his laptop, and slides it across the table to you.

“This list contains the names of people who are keeping HYDRA from its full potential.

“Eliminate them.”

You cautiously pick up the paper Morozov slides to you, letting your eyes wander meticulously over the list of names presented. Your eyebrows shoot up in surprise as you read.

John Atkins, President of the United States of America

Elizabeth Fitzgerald, U.S. Secretary of Defense

Antonio Smith, U.S. Director of Homeland Security

Nick Fury, Director of SHIELD

Phil Coulson, SHIELD

Steve Rogers a.k.a. Captain America, Avenger

Your head begins to ache as you try to comprehend the names in front of you—the targets you’ve been given.

“You’re insane if you think I’m going to kill these people for you,” you say, bringing your attention back to the monster sat in front of you.

Morozov sighs dramatically.

“Again, Mrs. Barnes, I remind you HYDRA has eyes on your family. Each of our undercover operatives are trained snipers and combatants. Do you really think I’m bluffing when I say I’ll have your daughter killed? Your husband? Your friends?”

You purse your lips tightly.

“The names on that list belong to the people who consistently prevent HYDRA from realizing its mission. If I am to accomplish what our forefathers couldn’t, I need to eliminate any potential threats.”

“And what are you trying to accomplish?” You ask petulantly.

Morozov stands, letting his hands rest clasped together behind his back.

“I thought you’d never ask!” He sings out. “You see, eons ago, the ancient inhumans banished the all powerful inhuman HIVE to the planet Maveth. HYDRA has lost its way over the years, but our purpose is to bring HIVE back to Earth so that he may purify it.”

You scoff and Morozov glares at you.

“Steve Rogers, SHIELD, and the American government have foiled HYDRA’s attempts to bring HIVE back to Earth too many times. The HYDRA leaders who’ve come before me didn’t have the gall to eliminate such prominent leaders. That’s why I will be the one to bring HIVE home!”

“I reiterate, you’re insane,” you spit. You can hear the venom in your own voice.

“I reiterate,” Morozov mocks, “I will have everyone you love killed.”

Morozov presses a key on the laptop and a camera switches to whom you assume is one of the undercover HYDRA agents at the Compound. Morozov hits another button and speaks.

“Agent 0412, go to standby.”

You watch as the agent nods subtly before pulling out a gun, turning off the safety, and walking towards the Avengers living quarters. You suck in a breath. While you’ve been acutely aware that Morozov isn’t joking around, you hadn’t quite felt the weight of your own choices until this moment. You note that every choice you make will directly impact the next choice Morozov makes.

“Fine,” you concede. “Call him off and I’ll do it.”

Morozov grins before calling off the guard.

—

You’re sitting on a jet heading back towards the states. You wish you were headed home, but you choose to take some comfort in the fact that you’re at least leaving Siberia.

You check your gear, taking inventory of each gun and knife you have hidden in your suit and strapped to your body. Then, when you’re comfortable enough with your gear, you pull out a crumpled piece of paper that has the names of Morozov’s targets. You’ve chosen to move down the list so that you’ll start with President Atkins and end with Steve. You only hope you manage to break free from HYDRA before you actually have to kill anyone.

“Agent Barnes,” a gruff voice states, and you look up to meet the burly man speaking.

Ever since you formerly agreed to Morozov’s conditions of your family’s safety, you’d been treated more fairly and addressed more respectfully.

“Hmm?” You hum, having taken to speaking as little as possible.

“Hold out your arm, please,” the man says as he comes to kneel beside you where you’re sat. It’s then that you notice the metal case he holds.

Cautiously, you hold out your arm, and you watch as he pulls a large syringe out of the case. The man picks up a small device and loads it into the syringe. He then rolls up your tac suit sleeve and injects the device into your arm. You grimace. It hurts going in, and you can see a bulge in your arm.

“The fuck was that?” You ask incredulously.

“Your tracker,” the man responds dryly. “Dr. Frost asked me to remind you that you’ve nowhere to run. One move in the wrong direction and he orders the kill shot on your family.”

With that, the man leaves and you sit in silence for the rest of your flight towards DC.

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ko-fi

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Tags: @just-henny @jasminocano @browneyedgirl22-blog @barnesboo1967 @matchat3a @unkasworld @qwertyb2577 @raajali3 @yoruse @iilsenewman @alysianc @fairytalegirlofurdreams @marvelxlevram @casa-boiardi @buckybraneslover111 @hhiggs @smolracoon25 @questionableratatouille00 @heytheredemonsitsyourgirl @thearieunhinged @sebastianstansqueen @middaystarlight @talesofadragon @killerwendigo @ozwriterchick

[medusapelagia]

28 AU-gust: Royalty

Rating: Mature Relationship: Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson WT: omegaverse, Omega Steve Harrington, Alpha Eddie Munson WC: 1794

AU-gust 2023 Masterlist

“You are so lucky Steve! You will never have to go through the humiliating process of being presented to society to find your mate! You already have one!”

Steve sighs, he knows that being presented to society is a very stressful thing, but also being destined to a mate you have never seen doesn’t sound so exciting.

The only thing that he knows about his mate is that his name is Eddie that he is the nephew of King Wayne Munson and that his parents were lucky enough to get him engaged with the king's son as soon as he was born.

Something about an eclipse or a premonition or who knows what. 

In any case, he is not going to be presented to society like all his friends. He will be kept hidden until the moment the king makes his appearance.

This means no more walking around the castle, no more threats from the kitchen, and no more time in the garden.

Robin is trying on another dress while Steve thinks that all that he will be able to do in the next few days will be staying in his room and staring from the little window in his chamber.

He is an omega, and omega can’t be trusted among so many alphas. That’s what his father said.

He sighs. 

A week is not so long after all, right?

***

Three days and he is ready to climb up the wall.

Not only he can’t get out, but he can’t even see the servant and they are giving him his meals on a tray outside of his as if he was in jail!

When his father told him that no one could look at him he wasn’t joking.

He sighs.

Being an omega and being left alone for an entire week it’s almost a punishment. He needs love, and cuddles, and his friends, and at least Robin!

“Steve?” She calls from the garden.

Steve let out a little whimper from his bed, too sad and tired to get up and try to force open the closed window.

“Steve?” She calls again, worriedly, and then she starts to speak with another person “That's his room. Are you sure you can break it?” 

An alpha’s voice full of pride replies “Of course I can. Tell your friend to stay away from the window.”

“Steve! Stay away from the window!” She yells, and then he hears a loud crash and sees a big rock falling next to his bed, followed by a curly dark-haired boy.

“Good morning princess, we came to your rescue!”

Steve’s heart starts to beat faster at the smell of the alpha's scent.

“Alpha?” He calls, trying to get up.

“My beautiful sweet omega.” He gets closer, brushing his hair away from his face “What have they done to you?” His eyes shine red for a moment, and Steve lets out a little whimper.

The dark-haired alpha hugs him even tighter, letting him inhale his scent directly from his bond gland.

“You are ok, omega. I’m going to take such good care of you.” He murmurs, still petting him like a scared dog.

“Is he ok?” Robin asks, getting closer to the window and trying to jump high enough to see inside the room.

“He is ok, but he is going to feel so much better when we take him out of this place.

“Alpha.” He calls again while the alpha picks him up like a baby.

Steve keeps his nose deep In the crook of the alpha’s neck, inhaling his lovely smell.

The alpha looks back at the window.

“Robin, do you think you can hold him if I pass him to you through the window?”

“Why? Is he unconscious? Oh my  god, he is dead and you don’t want to tell me!”

“He is fine! Just, not in his finest shape but he’ll be ok. We just have to find a way to take him away from this fucking prison.”

They think for a moment and then Robin says “I will check who is supposed to bring him food and see if I manage to open the door!” She yells, running away while the young alpha keeps comforting Steve.

“Alpha, alpha.” He keeps calling like a litany, while he feels his body getting hotter and hotter.

He trembles. That’s not possible! He can get his heat right now and with an unknown alpha! His father is going to kill him.

“No one will touch you sweet thing.” The alpha murmurs in his ear, but when finally the door opens it is not Robin who is holding the key, but his father.

“I knew it! You are such a slut! Like all the omegas! You are such a disgrace to our family! An omega male it’s the worst thing that could have ever happened to our family! And now you are ruined! No one will want to mate a slut omega like you!” He screams, filling the air with angry pheromones.

Steve whines, hiding making himself even smaller in the alpha hold.

The young alpha’s eyes are red with fury “You are making him distressed. You left him alone in this room for days! What kind of alpha are you?” He yells at him, ready to fight for the omega that is clenching at him like a little clamp.

“The kind of alpha who doesn’t know how to treat an omega, clearly.”

Everyone turns and King Wayne Munson is glaring at Steve’s father from the corridor.

“My king!” He says getting on his knees “I tried my best to keep him away from any alpha, but this one was relentless.” He lowers his head “I’m sorry if he is not a good match for your nephew anymore. I will dispose of him! He will get punished and I’ll send in some retreat for broken omegas.”

“You will not do such a thing!” The young alpha growls and Steve’s father gets up suddenly.

“We are going to lose everything and you will pay the consequences as well young man!” He threatens him.

“Come here kid, and bring the omega.” The young alpha gets closer to the king and the man gently brushes some hair away from the omega’s face “How are you feeling pup?”

“It hurts.” He complains, feeling his body getting feverish.

“I’m sure it does but Eddie will take good care of you, you just have to hold on a little longer.”

Eddie, the young alpha, snarls at Steve’s father “What about him?” He asks and Steve stares at him. How could he talk like that to their king?

“I’ll take care of him. Now you have an omega to take care of. Does he have a nest?” He asks looking back at Steve’s room. 

“I didn’t see any.”

The king doesn’t seem surprised “ You have to make one for him. I’ll have the servants bringing you some of his blankets. I should have taught you how to make a comfort nest, right?”

The boy nods in agreement and moves to the king’s chambers, the omega still wrapped in his arm,

“We can’t go there.” Steve murmurs “Those are the king’s chambers.” 

“Oh sweet thing, you are too out of it, right?”

Steve doesn’t understand what he means so he keeps silent.

“Let’s make you a nice cozy nest and when you feel better we could talk.”

Steve nods, while his body starts to burn from the inside.

“Alpha…” he calls.

“I know baby… I know… just let it go… I got you.” he whispers in his ear.

Steve’s eyes fill with fear.

Feral. He is going fucking feral.

He tries to escape from Eddie’s grip, he doesn’t want to risk hurting him, but the boy holds him tight.

“Don’t worry, baby. You’ll be fine. I’ll be here with you all the time. I will not let anything happen to you.” he assured him.

“But you… if… if I’m going feral…”

“I’ll deal with it pup. Don’t worry. Just try to relax and let it go.”

Steve shakes his head, trying to clear his mind, but he is not lucid anymore.

“Come on. Let it go. I’m here with you.” and finally Steve surrenders to hormones that are making him crazy.

***

When Steve wakes up he doesn’t remember what happened, he just has a few flashes of being cuddled, loved, and fucked out of his mind. And now he is lying, naked, in a cozy little nest, and the alpha, his alpha, is singing in his ear.

“Hello there sweet thing, are you feeling any better?”

He nods, sniffing at the nest that now smells so familiar. 

“Did I…. Did I hurt you?” he asks, ashamed, and the other boy smiles.

“I have dealt with worst.”

“I… I’ll always go feral?” he is terrified at the idea.

Eddie hugs him “I don’t know baby. I think that too many emotions triggered your body response and you weren’t ready for it, but I can’t assure you that you will not become feral next time. What can I assure you is that, no matter what, I’ll be at your side.” he replies looking him in the eyes.

Steve blushes and lowers his eyes, and then he looks around him and realizes that they are in the king’s chambers,

He startles but the alpha, Eddie, holds him tight “It’s ok. We can stay here. It’s my room, you know?”

His room? But that means…

Suddenly everything clicks and Steve tilts his head in submission.

“Don’t do that, sweet thing. You are going to be my mate and I’ll treat you like an equal.”

“But…”

“No buts, baby. Now, can you drink something for me?” He whispers, getting a cup close to Steve’s mouth.

While he drinks and eats Eddie tells him about how he had been searching for him for days because he could feel how miserable he was and that his friend Robin has finally helped him to get into his room. 

“My uncle has dealt with your parents. They will never see you again if you are not the one asking to see them. And our mating ceremony will be private, not public. And who knows, maybe we will be blessed with a pup.” He concludes by kissing Steve’s flat stomach.

“Is this real? Are you really the king's nephew?”

He nods, cradling his head into his hands “I will repeat everything when you will feel more lucid honey. Why don’t you try to sleep a little more, uh?”

Steve nods, getting more comfortable in his mate’s arm.

He can’t believe that he is going to be mated to the king's nephew, but after he broke Steve’s window to save him, he would have probably mated him even if he was a housekeeper.

[themculibrary]

Tony And Rhodey (Ironhusbands) Masterlist 3

part one, part two

All I Know is Darling, I Was Made For Loving You (ao3) - orphan_account tony/rhodey, ana/edwin, roberta/terrence, past tony/tiberius, peggy/danielT, 25k

Summary: Tony Stark. Nobody needed to know anything beyond the name to make assumptions. He was a Stark, strong, independent, a man who had the power of nations at his disposal. Loved by the public yet called by the tabloids unlovable. So who expected him of all people to be born with a soulmark?

When James was born, nobody was surprised when they discovered a soulmark. But they were surprised at the location. It was directly on his chest, a detailed triangle surrounded by a circle.

Or..

What happens when fates collide? If you're Rhodey and Tony, you learn the lesson of love-it stretches beyond understanding.

Through the questions, the years, and the days lost to time, Rhodey and Tony know one thing: when you know you were made to love someone, it becomes your sole purpose.

A Soulmate Cannot Be A Mutual Acquaintance (ao3) - lovelyirony T, 12k

Summary: Tony and Rhodey are soulmates. They're in love with each other.

You'd think, at some point, that they might tell each other that.

Better Never Lasts Forever (ao3) - PlanetsCollide T, 4k

Summary: Five times Rhodey and Tony almost kissed, and one time they did.

Guide Me Home To You (ao3) - MagicaDraconia16 T, 31k

Summary: When his 15th birthday passed without him either gaining the spiked senses of a Sentinel or the empathic surge of a Guide, Tony Stark was marked as a Null. His MIT roommate and best friend James Rhodes had presented as a Guide but hadn't found his Sentinel yet.

When Tony is captured and held in Afghanistan for three months by the Ten Rings, it marks the longest he's ever been away from Rhodey since they first met all those years ago.

And after that . . . everything changes.

Incomplete Wish (ao3) - Rkssk G, 1k

Summary: Tony plays the piano for Rhodey. It's the first time and Rhodey's mind has some things to confess to himself.

i place your hands around my neck (ao3) - fanfictiongreenirises tony/rhodey, steve/bucky, happy/pepper N/R, 27k

Summary: "Rhodey could practically feel his lungs getting heavier again, weighed down by roots of plants that he’d thought would never take hold in him again."

 Or: the one where Rhodey's been pining over Tony for much longer than either of them realised and develops the Hanahaki disease

little fears (ao3) - sara_wolfe T, 1k

Summary: “I don’t want to do this, anymore.”

-or- Jim's got some insecurities about his relationship with Tony. Turns out, Tony does, too.

Love is Blind (ao3) - inukagome15 T, 17k

Summary: They say love is blind, but Rhodey thinks he and Tony have got things pretty well figured out at this point. They were plenty blind before, but now they're communicating and things are amazingly perfect. Even the team seems to think so, especially since Tony and Rogers have also worked their own problems out.

Pretend We're In Love (The Heartache Still Hurts) (ao3) - InsaneJuliann T, 51k

Summary: Rhodey's dad is dying, and what he's always wanted is for Rhodey to be happily married. Tony and Rhodey were best friends, and haven't spoken in years. But after a chance meeting at the airport, and a desperate, insane idea on Rhodey's part, they end up pretending to be engaged.

But how much of it is really pretend?

Reaching Out (ao3) - gokailyger84 G, 3k

Summary: After shutting down his company's weapons manufacturing division, Tony continues on his new path of self-accountability. Starting work on his new project, he realizes he's an amateur in this field and needs the help of someone more experienced.

Seas Between Us (ao3) - Copper_mouth M, 16k

Summary: There's a distance between them after Afghanistan, and it's widening each day. Rhodey is no longer Tony Stark's trusted right-hand man, his confidant and protector. Iron Man is.

Star Lit Dreams (ao3) - JarvisUandDUMEtoo G, 10k

Summary: Rhodey has come home for the holidays and decided to participate in a local charity event. The only problem? His assigned partner is none other than his ex boyfriend Tony Stark. Rhodey assumes its going to be difficult to be civil with Tony for long enough to finish the event, but instead he finds himself falling for Tony all over again.

still into you (ao3) - graveltotempo G, 13k

Summary: cause after all this time...

I'm still, into you

OR: James "Rhodey" Rhodes and Tony Stark's relationship, throughout the years.

A love story.

Tell Me You Love Me (I Want to Believe) (ao3) - inukagome15 T, 17k

Summary: As much as things have changed after the Accords, so much else hasn't and Tony has no idea where to even begin fixing things. Happiness seems like an elusive dream, no matter how much Rhodey encourages him to reach for it. After all, the one thing he wants to be happy will never happen. Will it?

Tender Loving Care For Lack of Better Titles (ao3) - AfroGohan T, 1k

Summary: The crash had punched the air out of him, throat clogged with spit and smoke as he climbed from one damaged section to the next.

A dreadful paralysis crept up his arm as he swept the wreckage for survivors. Equipment failure, the pilot said as they lost altitude and plummeted into the clearing. That was all she said before impact.

He hauled what and who he could before sprawling in the grass, staring up at the mid-morning sky as the smell of gasoline met his nostrils.

Rhodey lands in the hospital. Company makes it easier.

The Art of Persistence (ao3) - hollyandvice (hiasobi_writes) T, 15k

Summary: When James Rhodes first meets Tony Stark, they're at a party. He's watching a kid way too young to be here get drunk off his ass and all James can think is that whoever brought this kid here should really meet him in the parking lot because this shit is irresponsible and downright illegal.

The story of how Tony's drunken shenanigans lead him to the love of his life.

The Power Throuple of the Century (ao3) - holistic_alcoholic T, 3k

Summary: Life was good. Life was perfect. Nothing seemed amiss.

So when Steve Rogers, Captain Apple Pie and Goodness himself, cornered Tony with a worried expression and told him, in a voice both awkward and sorrowful, that his husband cheated on him with Iron Man, Tony was utterly unprepared.

Too Well Tangled In My Soul (ao3) - dixiehellcat G, 2k

Summary: A couple of decades of Tony and Rhodey, what grows between them, and what might threaten to keep them apart.

when we were eighteen (ao3) - graveltotempo, Violettavonviolet G, 12k

Summary: After the Rogues are pardoned and the world starts once more demanding too much of Tony, he and Rhodey say "fuck this" and go on a road trip together.

From New York to California, with the memories of another road trip 26 years ago before, and a love that has and will never fade.

you are gold (ao3) - makifa, thompsborn tony/rhodey, may/pepper M, 36k

Summary: His smile is tense and odd and twisted, too high on one end and turned a bit down on the other. He isn’t sitting, yet it feels as though he leaps to his feet upon their arrival anyway, bounding towards James with an almost relieved sounding, “Mr. Rhodes! It’s wonderful to meet you. I’m Tony, and this—” he gestures behind him, towards the teenager that only sinks lower in his seat, scowl deepening even further, “—is my son, Harley.”

Despite the clear disinterest in the situation, Harley still glances towards James and huffs out a reluctant, “Hello, Mr. Rhodes,” before turning his head towards the wall and acting as if none of them are there.

James smiles at him, even though he’s no longer looking. “Hello, Harley. It’s nice to meet you.” Then, turning towards Tony, he extends a hand and says, “And you, Mr. Stark. You can call me James.”

Tony’s face twists. “As long as you call me Tony."

-

this is not what james, former high school teacher on the hunt for a job, had expected when he applied to be a tutor at the start of the school year.

[buckyssoldat]

Chapter 61: Flicker of hope

Warnings: mentions of death, grief and loss, emotional distress, mature themes, strong language, anxiety, trauma, ptsd, mental health struggles

A/N: This is part of my series, Forsaken - The Fallen Soldier. If you wanna be tagged in this, just send me an ask or a message. Feedback is always appreciated, don’t be shy to share your thoughts on this :)

I know I'll see you again, whether far or soon

But I need you to know

That I care and I miss you

Almost a month had passed since Alice went to Tony’s house to have dinner with his family. She had been spending her days in her apartment, mostly reading or painting, a new hobby that she had recently picked up. Visiting Natasha was also that was part of her routine – either to have a cup of coffee and talk about what was happening around the world, or to drink endless bottles of wine and gossip about their past.

One sunny afternoon, Alice was lounging on her couch, absently reading a new book, when a familiar name flashed across her screen: Steve. Even though they remained friends after their tumultuous relationship, they had eventually grown apart a little bit. Intrigued, she quickly answered.

“Alice, hey, can you come to the Compound? It’s urgent,” Steve said, his voice steady but tinged with an unmistakable urgency that piqued her interest.

“Is everything okay?” Alice asked, her heart racing as she leaned forward, the sunlight streaming through her window unnoticed.

“It’s… Scott Lang. He’s back. He has something important. You need to hear it.”

The mention of Scott, Ant-Man, stirred a sense of anticipation within Alice. She had thought he was lost to them, one of the many who had been snapped away by Thanos. The idea that he had returned was electrifying. Scott had always been a beacon of hope and humour, and if he had found a way back, it could mean something monumental. “I’ll be there in ten,” she replied, grabbing her jacket and rushing out the door, her heart racing with a mixture of excitement and apprehension.

Upon arriving at the Compound, Alice made her way directly to the briefing room, her heart pounding with anticipation. The air inside was charged with an energy that suggested something huge was about to unfold. As she entered, she found Steve, Natasha, and Scott already present, their expression serious and focused. Scott was eating a peanut butter sandwich as if he hadn’t eaten something in years.

“Hey, Alice,” Steve said, his voice steady, but Alice could see the tension in his posture. Natasha stood beside him, arms crossed, her eyes sharp and analysing.

Before Alice could speak, Scott put down his sandwich and started explaining to her about the Quantum Realm and the possibility of time travel. As Scott laid out his theory, Alice listened intently, the possibilities swirling in her mind. They discussed various time travel mechanics and the potential risks involved. Could this actually work?

Alice’s heart raced at the thought. Time travel had always been a far-fetched concept, a theme reserved for comic books and science fiction films. But here it was, standing before her like a beacon of hope. If the could time travel, there was a chance to bring Bucky back, to bring everyone back. She locked eyes with Steve, who mirrored her excitement, his brows furrowed in concentration.

As the meeting continued, Scott emphasized the need for precision and teamwork. “We’d need to coordinate perfectly,” he explained, sketching out a timeline on a whiteboard. “In and out, no lingering. We can’t mess with the past too much.”

Natasha raised an eyebrow. “And what’s to stop us from running into ourselves or accidentally altering major events?”

“That’s where we’ll have to be smart about it,” Scott replied. “We’ll have to ensure we’re in and out before anything drastic happens. But I can’t do this alone. I need an expert. So who do we talk about this?”

Alice looked around the room, weighing their options. “We should talk to Tony. If anyone can help us figure this out, it’s him.”

Since it was too late to go to Tony’s, the four of them decided to spend the night in the Compound and go first thing in the morning. They spread out into the common area, where Scott began explaining his theories in more detail. But as the conversation continued, Alice found herself unable to focus entirely. The excitement of the meeting was overshadowed by a mixture of anxiety and hope for what was to come.

After a while, Alice excused herself, feeling the need for some fresh air and solitude to process everything. Steve wanted to go after her, but Natasha stopped him. Alice made her way to the roof, a favourite spot of hers. The night sky was a tapestry of stars, and a gentle breeze rustled through her hair as she stepped outside.

Not long after, she heard footsteps behind her. Turning, she saw Natasha emerging onto the roof, a couple of beers in hand. She approached Alice with a knowing smile, her eyes glinting in the moonlight.

“Thought you could use one of these,” Natasha said, handing Alice a beer and popping the top of her own.

“Thanks,” Alice replied, accepting the drink. They both leaned against the ledge, taking a moment to soak in the peaceful night.

They stood in comfortable silence for a moment, gazing at the stars above. Then Natasha broke the quiet, her voice soft yet steady. “It’s a lot to take in, huh?”

“Yeah,” Alice replied, taking a sip of her beer. “I never thought I’d see Scott again.”

Natasha nodded, her expression thoughtful. “It’s strange. It feels like a part of me wants to hope, but another part is terrified of what might mean. What if it doesn’t work? What if we mess up?”

Alice turned to look at Natasha, sensing the weight behind her words. “I get that. But what if it does work? What if we can change things? I mean, we have a chance to bring everyone back. I could get Bucky back, Nat. And you can get Yelena back. I know how much she meant to you.”

Natasha took a deep breath, leaning her elbows on the ledge. “I miss her, you know? I miss all of them. It’s like there’s this void that just… never goes away. But I also know how dangerous messing with time can be. If we aren’t careful, we could end up causing more harm than good.”

“I’ve thought about that,” Alice admitted, gazing at the stars. “But I can’t shake the feeling that this might be our only shot. If we have a plan and if we’re smart about it, maybe we can do this.”

Natasha turned to her, her expression softening. “You really love him, don’t you?”

Alice hesitated, feeling her cheeks flush slightly. “Bucky… he means so much to me, I don’t even know how to describe it. If there’s a chance to get him back, I want to take it. For him, for all of us.”

Natasha nodded, a hint of a smile playing at the corners of her lips. “You know, I admire that about you. You have this fire, this determination. It’s what makes you who you are.”

“Thanks, Nat,” Alice said, feeling a warmth spread through her. “But it’s not just me. We all want this. We’re a team, and we need to support each other. I just hope Tony comes around. He’s the genius we need to make this happen.”

“Yeah, Tony can be stubborn,” Natasha replied, rolling her eyes playfully. “But he also cares about us. I think once he sees the potential in Scott’s plan, he’ll jump on board.”

“Let’s hope so,” Alice said, taking another sip of her beer.

As they stood on the rooftop, the cool breeze swirled around them, carrying with it a sense of friendship and understanding. In that moment, Alice felt a profound connection with Natasha. They were not just friends but best friends, bound by shared pain and the hope of a better tomorrow.

After a moment of comfortable silence, Natasha spoke again, her voice a little more serious. “You know, if this works, it’ll change everything. We’ll be diving into the unknown, and we can’t predict what will happen. Are you ready for that?”

“I think I am,” Alice replied honestly. “I’m scared, of course. But I’d rather take the risk than live in a world where I didn’t try. I owe it to Bucky and to everyone else we lost.”

Natasha studied her for a moment, then nodded. “Just remember, whatever happens, you’re not alone in this. We’re all in it together.”

Alice smiled, feeling a swell of gratitude. “I know. Thank you, Natasha. I really appreciate you being here.”

Natasha clinked her beer against Alice’s, a silent toast to their friendship and the journey ahead. “To hope,” she said softly.

“Yeah, to hope,” Alice echoed, raising her drink higher. As they took a sip, the weight of the world outside faded, leaving behind the flickering light of possibility.

As the night wore on, they shared stories and laughter, momentarily forgetting the heaviness of their reality. They discussed everything from their favourite movies to the ridiculous antics of past missions. Laughter echoed across the rooftop, intertwining with the stars above, a reminder of the strength that friendship could provide even in the darkest times.

Eventually, they made their way back inside, the warmth of friendship lingering as they rejoined Steve and Scott in the common area. Scott was animatedly discussing potential timelines with Steve, who listened intently, a look of determination etched on his face.

“Hey, what did we miss?” Natasha asked, her tone casual, though Alice could sense a newfound confidence in her voice.

“Just mapping out potential timelines,” Steve replied, gesturing to the whiteboard where Scott had scribbled various dates and events.

Alice exchanged a glance with Natasha, both silently reaffirming their commitment to this mission. They were in this together, ready to face whatever lay ahead.

The following morning, Alice, Natasha, Steve, and Scott piled into a car and drove to Tony’s lakeside cabin, where Alice had once found solace in the simplicity of his new life. But this time, the weight of the world was on their shoulders.

As they approached the cabin, Alice felt a sense of anticipation mixed with anxiety. Tony had been out of the game for a while now, and she wasn’t sure how he would react to the idea of time travel. But Scott’s theory was their only shot, and if anyone could figure out the complexities of it, it was Tony Stark.

As Tony strolled by the lake with his daughter, the peaceful silence between them was suddenly interrupted by the distant rumble of a car engine. Tony squinted towards the sound, spotting a black Audi pulling to a stop a few meters away. He groaned inwardly, recognizing the passengers. Steve, Natasha, Scott, and Alice stepped out, looking tense but determined.

Tony let out a heavy sigh. “Great,” he muttered. “Just what I needed – and impromptu Avengers reunion.”

Alice gave him a sympathetic smile. “Did you really think we’d let you live your quiet little life forever?”

Before Tony could respond, the rest of the group approached, and it didn’t take long for Scott to dive into the heart of the matter, his voice filled with excitement. He explained his plan in rapid bursts, his enthusiasm contagious despite the gravity of the situation.

“Now, we know what it sounds like…” Scott added.

“Tony, after everything you’ve seen, is anything really impossible?” Steve asked, his voice calm yet pressing.

Tony, trying to hold back his sarcasm, crossed his arms and shot Steve a look before launching into an explanation that left most of them blinking in confusion.

“Quantum fluctuation messes with the Planck Scale, which then triggers the Deutsch Proposition. Can we agree on that?”

The blank expressions on Alice, Steve, Nat, and Scott’s faces spoke volumes.

Steve accepted a drink from Tony. “Thank you.”

“In layman’s terms, it means you’re not coming home,” Tony added flatly.

“I did,” Scott retorted quickly.

“No, you accidentally survived. It’s a billion-to-one cosmic fluke. And now you wanna pull off a… what do you call it?”

“A time heist?” Alice chimed in, trying to sound proud.

“Yeah, a time heist. Of course, why didn’t we think of this before? Oh, because it’s laughable? Because it’s a pipedream?” Tony’s sarcasm was evident.

“The Stones are in the past. We can go back and get them,” Scott pressed on.

“We can snap our own fingers. We can bring everyone back,” Natasha added, her voice steady, but there was a hint of desperation.

Alice’s heart skipped a beat at Natasha’s words, the possibility of getting Bucky back looking more promising. But Tony’s gaze darkened at the mention of the snap.

“Or screw it up worse than he already has, right?”

“I don’t believe we would,” Steve countered.

Alice could sense the tension building. She finally spoke up, her tone softer than the others. “Tony, I get it. You have a family now. But so do we, in a way. We’ve all lost people we care about. We’ve already paid the price – shouldn’t we at least try to make it right?”

Tony glanced at her, his expression softening for just a moment before he turned back to the group, his voice firm.

“Gotta say, sometimes I miss that giddy optimism. However, high hopes won’t help if there’s no logical, tangible way for me to safely execute said time heist. I believe the most likely outcome would be our collective demise.”

“Not if we strictly follow the rules of time travel. That means no talking to our past selves, no betting on sporting event-” Scott began.

Tony held up his hand to stop him. “I’m gonna stop you right there, Scott. Are you seriously telling me that your plan to save the universe is based on ‘Back to the Future’?”

“No,” Scott mumbled, clearly embarrassed.

“Good. You had me worried there. ‘Cause that’d be horse shit. That’s not how quantum physics works.”

Alice exchanged a quick glance with Natasha, knowing Scott had just made his already shaky pitch a little worse. But Natasha wasn’t one to give up easily.

“We did stand. And yet, here we are,” Tony responded, the bitterness evident.

“Tony… we have to take a stand,” Natasha said, her voice firmer now.

“I know you got a lot on the line. You’ve got a wife, a daughter. But I lost someone very important to me. A lot of people did,” Scott’s voice raised as he tried to make his point. “And now, we have a chance to bring her back. To bring everyone back. And you’re telling me that you won’t even-”

“That’s right, Scott, I won’t even. I’ve got a kid.” Tony’s voice softened as Morgan ran out of the house, her small feet pattering across the ground.

“Mommy told me to come and save you,” she said proudly as she ran into her dad’s arms.

Tony smiled, lifting her up effortlessly. “Good job. I’m saved.” He turned to face Steve, Natasha, Alice, and Scott. “I wish you’d come here to ask me something else. Anything else. Honestly, I… I missed you guys, it was… Oh, and table’s set for six.”

As Tony set Morgan down, the little girl turned towards Alice, her face lighting up with a big smile. Without hesitation, she rushed over to Alice, wrapping her tiny arms around her legs in a hug. Alice’s heart melted instantly, and she bend down to give Morgan a proper hug, smiling warmly.

“Hey, kiddo,” Alice whispered softly, brushing Morgan’s hair back gently.

Morgan giggled and beamed at Alice before running back to Tony’s side.

There was a moment of quiet, the weight of the situation pressing down on everyone. Steve, ever the leader, broke the silence.

“Tony, I get it. And I’m happy, for you, I really am. But this is a second chance.”

Tony glanced at Morgan, holding her close. “I got my second change right here, Cap. I can’t roll the dice again. If you don’t talk shop, you can stay for lunch.”

Defeated, Steve, Natasha, and Scott walked back to the car, but Alcie stayed with Tony. He let out a long breath, his gaze shifting to Alice, who stood quietly, her expression troubled but unwavering.

Morgan had already run back into the house, leaving the two of them alone by the lakeside, the sun casting a warm golden hue over everything. For a moment, neither of them said anything. The soft lapping of the lake’s water against the shore was the only sound between them.

Tony glanced over at Alice, expecting her to say something light or teasing to ease the tension, but instead, her eyes were misty, her lips trembling as if she was holding back something deep.

“Tony,” she began, her voice barely above a whisper, “you know me. I’m not one to beg.”

Tony’s brows furrowed, sensing the shift in her tone. He stood straighter, turning to face her fully. Alice took a deep breath, steadying herself.

“Please reconsider Scott’s idea,” she said, her voice shaking slightly. “This… this might be the only chance I have. The only chance any of us have to make things right. I need this. I need… I need him back.”

Tony blinked, the sincerity and desperation in her voice hitting him harder than he expected. He knew she wasn’t talking about some abstract “greater good”. This was personal.

“Barnes,” Tony said softly, piercing it together. Alice nodded, tears brimming in her eyes now.

“I lost him, Tony,” she continued, her voice thick with emotion. “And not just to the Snap. We were finally starting to heal, finally starting to build something. I know it wasn’t perfect, but it was real. And I don’t know how to live in a world where he’s just… gone. I tried to think I could, but I can’t…”

Tony stared at her, the familiar ache of grief creeping up his spine as he remembered all those he had lost too. He sighed, glancing down at the ground, his hands on his hips.

“Alice…” he started, but she interrupted him, her voice shaking.

“I deserve this, Tony. We deserve this. Bucky and I – we’ve both fought so hard. We’ve lost so much. I’ve spent years running from the idea that maybe I could have a happy ending. And now, the universe has taken him away from me, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Nothing except this.” She stepped closer to him, her eyes searching his for understanding. “You know what it’s like to have a second chance. You have it now with Pepper and Morgan. You have your family. I just… I want that too.”

Tony looked away, swallowing hard, torn between his fear of losing what he had and the pull of Alice’s words, the rawness in her plea.

“I don’t wanna lose him forever, Tony,” Alice whispered, her tears spilling over now. “If there’s even a small chance that I can get him back… I have to take it. Please. Please help us. Help me.”

There was a long silence. Tony clenched his jaw, his hands tightening into fists by his sides. He’d been where she was – desperate, willing to risk everything for the people he loved. But now… now he had a family, a life he couldn’t bear to lose. And yet, seeing Alice like this, broken and vulnerable, made it harder to hold onto his resolve.

“I’ve lost him too many times already,” she added, her voice barely audible. “I can’t do it again.”

Tony ran a hand through his hair, his heart pounding. He had to draw the line somewhere, had to protect what he had now. But Alice’s words lingered, echoing in his head, and he knew, deep down, that he was only standing there with his family because someone had once given him a chance.

He looked back at her, seeing the hope she was clinging to. Slowly, he let out a sigh, his voice quiet, almost defeated.

“I don’t know if I can do it,” he admitted. “But I’ll think about it.”

Alice’s breath hitched, a small sob escaping her. “That’s all I’m asking for. Just… think about it.”

Tony nodded, his gaze softening. “You’ve got my word.”

Alice wiped her tears, trying to hold herself together, but the weight of his words brought her some small comfort. She nodded back, her heart still aching, but a sliver of hope blooming inside her.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Tony didn’t say anything, but the look in his eyes said enough. He wasn’t ready to make promises, but he understood what was at stake now – not just for the world, but for the people he cared about. For Alice. For her chance at a happy ending.

Alice began walking back towards the car, leaving Tony standing by the house. She opened the door and sat on the backseat.

“He’s scared,” Natasha finally broke the silence.

“He’s not wrong,” Steve added, but his brow was furrowed.

Alice nodded, her mind racing. “He’s not wrong, but… I don’t think we have the luxury of playing it safe anymore.”

“Yeah, but I mean, what are we gonna do? We need him,” Scott said, frustration building in his voice. “What, are we gonna stop?”

“No, I wanna do it right,” Steve replied. “We’re gonna need a really big brain.”

Scott pointed back at Tony’s house, incredulous. “Bigger than his?”

Alice caught Steve’s gaze, her eyes determined. “There’s one more person I can think of.”

The next day, Alice found herself seated at a table in a cozy little diner. Across from her sat Scott Lang, still wide-eyed and blinking as if he was trying to process everything that had been happening. Natasha sat beside Alice, arms crossed as she watched Bruce Banner, or rather “Professor Hulk’, who was enthusiastically digging into his breakfast. Steve stood nearby, arms cross in his usual stoic stance. Alice couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at the sight of Bruce – he was bigger, greener, and surprisingly… wearing a shirt.

Bruce pushed a plate of scrambled eggs toward the middle of the table. “Come on, I feel like I’m the only one eating here,” he said, his voice calm but still holding that deep resonance. “Try some. Eggs are good.”

Scott looked at him, bewildered. “I’m so confused.”

Bruce smiled a little too earnestly. “There are confusing times.”

“Right,” Scott agreed, then waved his hands in frustration. “No, no. That’s not what I mean!”

Bruce leaned back, his face falling into a more relaxed expression. “I know, I’m kidding. But yeah, it’s crazy, right? I’m wearing shirts now.”

Alice, sitting nearby, arched an eyebrow and leaned over to Steve. “Shirts? That’s the big revelation? I’ve been wearing them for years, and no one claps for me.”

Steve smirked but stayed focused on Bruce as Scott stammered again. “Yeah! How? Why?”

Bruce’s face darkened for a moment as the weight of his words became evident. “Five years ago, we got our asses handed to us. Except it was worse for me. Because I lost twice. First, Hulk lost, then Banner lost… and then we all lost.”

Natasha, always the level-headed one, spoke softly. “No one blamed you, Bruce.”

Bruce shook his head, his tone heavier. “I did. For years, I treated the Hulk like he was a disease, something to be cured. But then I realized… he wasn’t the problem. Maybe he was the solution. I spent eighteen months in a gamma lab, and I figured it out. Now… well, best of both worlds.”

Just then, a small group of kids approached Bruce, their eyes wide with awe. One girl, no older than ten, hesitantly tapped him on the arm. “Excuse me, Mr. Hulk?”

Bruce immediately brightened up, flashing a grin. “Yes, little person?”

“Can we get a photo with you?”

Bruce chuckled warmly. “One hundred percent, little one. Step up.” He handed his phone to Scott. “You mind?”

Scott awkwardly took the phone. “Sure, sure. I’m Ant-Man, by the way…”

Alice couldn’t resist. “Yep. The guy who shrinks. You should add that to your resume, Scott.”

Scott flashed her a look. “Thanks, Alice.”

As Bruce posed with the kids, Scott snapped the picture and handed the phone back, clearly a little bothered. “Don’t you wanna grab one with me? You know, Ant-Man?”

The boy shook his head. “Stranger danger,” he whispered, looking Scott up and down.

Alice stifled a laugh. “Ouch, buddy.”

Scott sighed. “No one knows Ant-Man…”

Bruce, trying to smooth things over, gestured to the boy. “No, come on. You wanna take a picture with him, right?”

The boy shook his head again, more forcefully this time. “No, I’m good.”

Scott shrugged. “He doesn’t want it. I get it.”

Bruce chuckled awkwardly. “Sorry, man. What about you, Onyx? You’re an Avenger, too. No kids asking for selfies?”

Alice smirked, but her tone was laced with sincerity. “Oh, I get my fair share. Let’s just say being one of the originals has its perks.” She leaned forward, her humour fading slightly. “But right now, this isn’t about fame or photos. It’s about getting everyone back.”

After the kids left, Bruce shifted in his seat as Steve spoke up. “Bruce. About what we were discussing…”

Bruce turned back, his demeanour changing again, realizing the seriousness of the situation. “Oh, right. The whole time-travel do-over thing? I gotta be honest, guys, that’s not really my area of expertise.”

Natasha glanced at Alice, giving her a knowing look. They all knew who had the most at stake here.

Alice leaned forward, her humorous tone long gone. “Look, Bruce, I know this isn’t simple. But you made the impossible happen once already.” She gestured to him. “No one thought you could balance Hulk and Banner, but here you are, in a shirt, telling us it’s possible. You can make this work, I know it.”

Bruce hesitated, glancing around the table. He could feel the weight of their expectations, especially Alice’s. “I get it. I do. And I’ll try to help. But time travel? That’s… outside my realm of miracles.”

Steve spoke up again, this time more firmly. “But we need this. We need you.”

Alice clenched her fists under the table, hiding the growing tension in her voice. “Bruce, I don’t care how hard it is. I need Bucky back. We all need them back. Whatever it takes.”

Bruce looked at her, truly seeing the desperation in her eyes. He nodded, understanding more than he let on. “Okay. I’ll do my best. Let’s get to work.”

tags: ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​@capswife

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[loveinhawkins]

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20 ao3

When the doorbell rings, it isn’t Lucas. It’s Erica.

“Lucas is coming,” she says, hopping off her bike and picking up a plastic bag that’s looped around the handlebars. “I told him to give me five minutes.”

“Sure,” Eddie says. He tips from concern into something approaching bemusement as Erica throws the bag at him; when he catches it, he feels the coldness of it, opens it up to find two tubs of ice-cream.

Erica side-steps him into the hall, calls over her shoulder, “Hurry up, Eddie, or it’s gonna melt.”

Eddie laughs. “Hi to you, too.”

When he reaches the kitchen, Erica has already opened the freezer to clear a space, Steve watching her from the counter with a look of benign amusement.

“I’d better be compensated for this,” Erica is saying. She points at the space she’s made, and Eddie dutifully slots the tubs inside. “This goes against the you supplying me with free ice-cream for life deal.”

“You literally ate my ice-cream,” Steve says. “Besides, I kinda figured that contract was null and void when Scoops went kaput.”

Erica shuts the freezer door. “I didn’t have a contract with Scoops, I had one with you.”

And she stops. “Have,” she corrects quietly.

No longer able to focus on putting the ice-cream away, her hands fall to her sides. Her little smile drops, and all at once, Eddie is reminded that she’s just eleven years old.

Steve’s face softens. “Why’re you really here, Erica?”

“Lucas,” Erica starts, then pauses—but that’s an answer all of its own, Eddie thinks. She collects herself, looks Steve directly in the eye. “He might not… get it all out.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Steve says.

“He was…” Erica glances down. “I don’t wanna see him like that. Ever again.”

“Hey, look at me.” Steve’s tone is gentle. “I’m sorry.”

Erica sighs loudly; Eddie can hear the frustration and hurt in it, but mostly the love. “You don’t have to—that’s not why I’m telling you,” she says. “I don’t…” Her eyes widen a little. “I don’t know why I’m telling you.”

Steve smiles at her, lifts up one arm in offering. He makes a beckoning gesture. “Help a guy out? I don’t have travelling by bar stool down yet.”

“Was that meant to be funny? Pathetic,” Erica replies, but she’s heading over to him as she says it, lets herself be pulled into a hug.

Steve whispers something in her ear—Eddie half-hears it as a crack about her ice-cream preferences, and she giggles a bit, does a more dramatic sigh and says, “Nothing can cure your poor taste, Steve.”

She settles into the hug.

Eddie thinks of the slip up she made. Had, have. Past, present. Hates that she was forced into thinking of Steve in the past tense—for even a second is a second too long.

As Erica heads out, she turns to Dustin, who’s sitting out on the driveway, waiting for Lucas to show up.

“Look after him,” she says with an intensity that might’ve been funny if Eddie hadn’t known all that had caused it.

Dustin chuckles slightly. He jerks his head back to the house, where Eddie stands at the front doormat. “Which one?”

Erica grins, looks a little lighter. “I meant Lucas, but guess you’ve got your hands full. You’re the babysitter now.”

As she gets back on her bike, Eddie calls after her. “What, don’t I get any orders?”

She glances at him over her shoulder, one foot on the pedal. Her gaze lingers for a couple of beats, and he thinks of her staring him down at Hellfire, sharp and analytical. But now there’s a softness there, too.

“Keep doing whatever you’re doing, I suppose,” she says, and her lips twitch into a smile that’s just pretending to be sardonic, and Eddie feels his heart swell.

-

Dustin sits with him on the stairs. When Lucas arrived, he barely said a word, not even to Dustin, instead heading through the hallway like someone marching towards the gallows.

They stay put, giving a semi-illusion of privacy—voices can travel far in this damn house—but they can hardly hear anything right now, just the soft rumble of speech, the rise and fall of a question, then silence.

“Can I tell you something?” Dustin mumbles haltingly.

“Sure,” Eddie says, and means Of course you fucking can. Always.

“It was my fault,” Dustin says into his knees, “with… Max. When I was—Lucas, he came to get me when you, um. When you drove away.”

Eddie doesn’t know what his face is doing, but he feels a pang of guilt which Dustin must notice, because he nudges Eddie’s forearm.

“I was kinda… freaking out. A lot, actually. By the time we got to the house, Max, she—she’d already stopped listening to her tape. I… I gave her time to think about it, you know? If we were quicker, we might’ve…”

Stopped it. Eddie’s all too familiar with that sentiment.

“You know, like with Steve. He… he must’ve thought about—about it for ages when he…” Dustin clears his throat. “When he saw the clock.”

Eddie doesn’t have the heart to tell him that Steve had made his decision in a split-second, like it was inevitable; like he’d already committed to it long ago, stared that awful option down and came to the conclusion easily, if it meant everyone else would be safe.

-

“This is stupid,” Dustin announces after another five minutes have passed without them overhearing anything, not even the whisper of a voice.

He’s down the stairs before Eddie can even think about stopping him. Even if he had been quick enough, he’s not sure if he would’ve decided to stop him in the first place. Shit, he’s not all that sure about anything; there’s no guidebook for this.

He follows Dustin into the kitchen, sees him standing by the fridge; Lucas is sitting at the counter, holding a glass of water Steve must’ve instructed him to take.

Steve is speaking with a quiet urgency, his eyes pleading as he considers Lucas searchingly. “You don’t—don’t need to be nice to me or anything, dude. I can take it. Don’t, like… tread on eggshells on my account.”

“It was my fault,” Dustin interrupts.

Lucas frowns, shakes his head.

And Eddie and Steve speak in unison, a firm rebuttal: “Dustin.”

They jolt in surprise, glance at each other—and then Dustin snorts and says, “Holy shit, that was like a sitcom. Did you, like, practice that or are you just losers?”

And that makes Lucas laugh into his glass of water.

And then… maybe it helps, the echo of laughter in a room, even if it’s only for a moment.

Because suddenly Lucas just launches right into it: how he ran back inside, Dustin in tow and, still catching his breath, it had taken him a few seconds to realise that he couldn’t hear Max’s tape playing.

“Erica noticed first,” he stays, staring into the glass of water. “Her voice went all strange and—I’d never heard her like—like that before. Then she pointed, and I saw… Max had taken her headphones off.”

He grips the glass tightly. The back of his hand dashes away the tears at first, but then he just lets them fall—slow and sluggish tracks, like he’s not even aware that he’s crying anymore.

“Steve, she was… She was begging. For—for him to…”

Steve breathes out, passes a hand across his face. “Jesus, Sinclair, I’m—”

“I love her so much,” Lucas whispers with a certainty that’s much greater than his years, “but I c-couldn’t reach her. It was like she—the only thing that stopped her was…”

“When everything went to shit,” Dustin says when it’s clear Lucas can’t go on.

And it’s like Eddie can hear it, suddenly—that oppressive silence. Feeling like there was no air left to breathe, that there never would be again.

“Steve? Steve.”

Steve’s eyes, glassy and gone, no light behind them. The awful stillness of his chest.

The world ripping apart.

Eddie presses a finger hard to the inner corner of one eye, a vain attempt to block out the image. He thinks of the kids being thrown to their knees with the force of it, a window shattering—and as the rest of Hawkins screamed with no understanding, they would know exactly what it meant.

Lucas and Dustin look like they’re reliving it, too, their faces drawn.

Eddie thinks back to the RV, when Nancy first laid out the apocalyptic vision that had been forced upon her. Eddie, once again a silent watcher in the crowd, his eyes drifting over them all, noticing every twitch, every grim set to their mouth—a horrifying sense of resignation. Eddie thinking yet again that Jesus, they’re used to this.

He had thought that he’d reached his breaking point with Chrissy’s death, and then…

But the others, they’ve had years of this, stretched thin like elastic. Eddie remembers as they began the drive back to Hawkins, as the rest of them gradually dropped off to sleep. Remembers thinking, right before he caught Steve’s whisper, How much more can they take?

It’s Steve’s voice that brings him back. He starts a little at the sound.

“Lucas, you… you would’ve reached her, okay? You’d have brought her back, I know that you…”

There’s a look that passes between the three of them, Steve, Dustin and Lucas: some shared understanding. They’d barely talked about what happened when Vecna’s curse took hold of Max, apart from the song that saved her. The most Eddie is aware of is that it happened in the graveyard.

The rest is not for him to know, he thinks.

“Look, I’m not—I’m not in her head, but I don’t think she wanted to—to—” Steve says, and he stumbles a bit over the words, voice growing a little thick with emotion. “She was… scared. Really scared. And that’s—that’s on me, man.”

For barely a second, Steve’s eyes flicker over to Eddie’s. Then he looks away.

“I’ll talk to her,” Steve says, and it sounds like I’ll fix it, I’m sorry, I swear. His shoulders tense, and Eddie can practically feel it, another load this fucking selfless boy takes on like it’s as natural as breathing, and he kind of wants to cry.

He doesn’t.

-

Max doesn’t ring the doorbell, opens the front door so quietly that Eddie only notices when a gust of wind shuts it behind her.

After a grateful phone call from Steve, Claudia Henderson had given Lucas and Dustin a ride home; the emptiness of the house is now all too apparent as Max stares Eddie down in the hallway.

“Hey, Red,” Eddie says, aims to be soft enough to soothe, not too much for fear that it’ll get her hackles up. He can feel the tension within her, can almost hear the grinding of her teeth. He can’t fuck this up. One wrong move, and she’ll run.

He gestures through to the living room. She clips him with her shoulder as she barges past him, and that’s fine; if it makes it hurt a little less for her, he’ll take more than that.

She stands in front of the couch where Steve sits. She wraps one arm around herself, a move Eddie recognises. Unconscious self-defence. He thinks of her voice over the walkie, still managing to laugh at Steve’s movies. Marvels in a horrified sort of way at how long she’s been pushing everything down.

“I’m sorry,” Max says. She looks down at the floor.

Eddie moves slowly, stands at the end of the couch, not too close to Max. Steve turns to him very slightly, eyes flitting between the two of them.

Eddie doesn’t need to hear it to know what Steve means. Be careful.

Eddie barely moves his head in a nod. I know.

“I’m not staying long, so just.” Max raises her chin, and her eyes are burning—and people who didn’t know any better might call that defiance. Eddie doesn’t. “Just tell me.”

Steve opens his mouth, then closes it. He glances down at the coffee table, where the cracked tape still lies.

“Tell you what, Max?” he asks, so quiet, so worried—like he’s scared that with just one word, he’ll ruin everything.

“What I did wrong,” Max says. She scrubs at her eyes, blinks up at the ceiling, and Steve’s face falls.

“You didn’t—”

Max sighs harshly. “I’m not stupid. You can—” She turns to Eddie, and he watches in horror as she squeezes her eyes shut, bracing herself, like Eddie might crack first, might give her the judgement she’s desperately searching for. “You can say it.”

“Max,” Steve says.

“I fucked up the plan. It was meant to be me. There—there must’ve been a reason that he—”

“No,” Steve says, and the word is strong, his resolve clear. “Max, listen to me. No.”

But Max shakes her head. “I must’ve done something, I know I did, I made him get in your head—”

“That’s not how it works,” Steve says, kind but firm. “Max, it was—nothing is worth you—”

“You’re a fucking hypocrite,” Max whispers. “I was marked already, asshole, he was coming back to claim—”

“Oh my god, no,” Steve repeats. “Max, what? He had no claim on you, you never deserved—”

“And you did?” Max challenges. Her lips are trembling.

“No,” Steve says, gentle. “But… hey, listen, it. It would’ve been—”

“No, it wouldn’t have been!” Max explodes, and she’s shaking where she stands, like she might break apart. “It wouldn’t have been worth it or okay or whatever bullshit you were about to—”

“All right, all right—”

“You would’ve been gone.” And all at once, she goes very still. “You were gone.”

She pinches the skin on the back of her hand, hard enough to hurt, and Eddie thinks that’s enough.

He walks over, as slowly as he can. He doesn’t touch her, but he stands close enough that she could reach out if she wanted to.

God, Red. Please let me help you.

Max snarls as he lifts one hand in offering. “Fuck off,” she breathes, and she strikes out, hits him in the chest. It’s hard enough for him to have to bite back a gasp, but that’s fine; as far as he’s concerned, she can hit him all she likes.

But that doesn’t last long. At some point, her hand clenches around his shirt, and she just holds on.

Hardly daring to breathe, he slowly reaches out and steadies her, both hands around her elbows.

“Easy, I’ve got you. You wanna… walk with me? That’s it, there you—”

Eddie only lets go after he leads her to Steve. She sobs, once, twice, then the dam breaks as Steve sits up, pulls her close.

“Max, I’m so sorry,” he says. “It wasn’t fucking fair. Shh, hey, hey, there was nothing you could’ve—oh, baby.” His voice fades away for a moment, the barely held back tears audible. He kisses her temple. “Oh, Max, I’m so sorry. I’m here, okay? Shh, shh. Hey, we made it, huh? We’re gonna be all right.”

She cries it out for a while—eventually, all Eddie can hear is her stuttering breaths, slowly evening out.

“Oh,” Steve sighs shakily, and he strokes Max’s hair off her face, catches Eddie’s eye and mouths over the top of her head: She’s asleep.

Eddie gets a blanket from the arm of the couch, tucks it around her—knows that Steve won’t be moving one inch, not even when the angle he’s sitting at is bound to make his leg ache.

“I’ll call her… mom?” Eddie says, cautiously.

Steve thinks about it, then nods. “Yeah,” he murmurs, presses another kiss to Max’s temple when her chin dips down in sleep. “That should be… Lucas said that they’re both staying with his folks for a bit.”

As Steve’s speaking, a tear falls down his cheek. You’d never have known, Eddie thinks, not unless you were looking for it.

On impulse, he runs a hand through Steve’s hair before heading to the phone, and hopes that it says enough.

-

“I didn’t think it would be like this,” Steve says dully. He’s fiddling with one of his pills, rolling it back and forth on the counter.

Eddie pauses, mid-taking a can of Coke out of the fridge. It’s just the two of them again, an exhausted Max picked up by her mother, who somehow barely batted an eye when Eddie answered the door and led her to her still sleeping daughter; Dustin picking up schoolwork—of all things—from his house.

“Like what?”

Steve swallows the pill dry, which makes Eddie inwardly wince.

“I hoped it wouldn’t be like this,” he corrects, not answering the question.

Eddie leans against the counter with his hip, opens the can. Waits.

“It’s just… I spent some time thinking about it, you know? Well.” Steve laughs humourlessly. “Not like I had that much time to… weigh it all up, but…” He sighs. “I thought they’d be okay, if…”

Eddie sets down the can before his hand can shake.

“It’s just. Like. I know you weren’t there for it all, but I guess I kinda… got used to them bouncing back? Sort of. Um, we all needed to.” He swallows. “I had to think that they’d be okay,” he whispers. “That was, like, one of the only thoughts that kept me from…” Steve shakes his head, eyes far-off again, and for a moment they’re in the RV, and Steve is saying, gaze fixed determinedly ahead, Listen, I can see a clock in the middle of the goddamn road, okay?

“From losing it,” Steve finishes.

There’s a tremor to Steve’s fingers as they drum on the counter, uneasy taps.

Eddie reaches over, gently stills him—two of his fingers resting on Steve’s knuckles.

“They bounced back from monsters, Steve,” he says slowly. “Not from… not from losing people.” From losing you.

Steve covers his eyes with the hand Eddie isn’t touching. Breathes in and out. Shudders.

“I’ll be fine,” he says, choked. “Just… ignore me for a second, Eddie.”

At first, Eddie tries to, because that’s what Steve had asked, but then Steve’s hand moves on the counter, until he’s gripping onto Eddie’s hand tightly; and Eddie holds on as Steve’s tremor moves up through his arm, his chest, until it’s all of him.

Do you see the gaping hole you would have left? Eddie thinks. Bites down on his lip to keep from crying, because this isn’t about him. Do you see how much they would have missed you?

Do you get it now, how much they love you?

But as Steve weeps for his family, for himself, Eddie can’t hold back the thought, as inevitable as the tide going out.

I would have fucking mourned you forever.

-

Sometimes in between the afternoon and evening doses of medicine, Steve drifts off into a kind of waking sleep—he’s still there enough to be roused if someone asks him a question, but his head nods sleepily more often than not, half-caught in a dream.

In the quiet, Dustin returns, finds a gap in the couch so he can sit next to Steve without jostling him—then sets about doing homework, and Eddie can’t begin to imagine how he’s focusing on it. But then again, Dustin has the kind of mind that once wanted to solve a Russian code for kicks in the summer vacation.

It’s peaceful.

Peaceful until Steve’s head jerks up with a ragged gasp.

And before Eddie can even say anything, Steve grips Dustin by the shoulders.

“Oh, you’re—” Steve exhales, chest catching on it. “Oh.”

His eyes are wild, darting all over Dustin, face cracked open with a vulnerability he’d never show if he was fully awake. His hand reaches up, moves through Dustin’s hair, searching, searching.

“Steve,” Dustin says, but it’s not a question. Like he kind of knows, understands just enough without being told.

And as Steve cups the back of Dustin’s head, Eddie gets it. He’s looking for blood.

“It wasn’t real, Steve,” Dustin says, with a clarity and kindness that makes Eddie think oh, I fucking love you, Dustin Henderson. “We’re good. Okay?”

“Y-yeah,” Steve answers, hooks his chin over Dustin’s head and hugs him. -

When the phone rings, Eddie picks up quickly; Dustin and Steve are both fast asleep, heads lolling onto the back of the couch.

It’s Wayne—and he doesn’t sound all that surprised to hear Eddie answer.

“How’d you know I was still here?” Eddie asks.

“Made an educated guess,” Wayne says. He sounds fond. “That and Joyce Byers called.”

Oh, Eddie thinks. And then, of course she did.

“We’re on the list,” Wayne says, “to get re-housed. S’going quicker than expected. Reckon that they,” he stresses the word like it’s a capital They, “don’t wanna give folks too much time to complain.”

He says it with such ease, and Eddie’s suddenly thrown back to him arriving at the trailer, small and angry and afraid, and Wayne just looking at him, saying gently, “Well, kid, we’ll make it work.”

Eddie sighs into the receiver. “I’m sorry—”

“Ed, shut the hell up,” Wayne says through an obvious smile, and Eddie chokes out a laugh that’s slightly wet around the edges.

-

The phone rings again, and this time it’s Jim Hopper.

“Look alive, Munson. Got a number for you.”

“Oh, uh.” Eddie runs about for a notepad and pen. “Okay?”

Hopper fires off a number which Eddie copies down and underlines, just because it feels like that’s the kind of thing he should do.

“That’s a private number, got it? Ring if there’s any trouble.”

“Um, sure,” Eddie says. “I’ll, uh. I’ll tell Steve.”

“No, kid, that’s for you,” Hopper says before abruptly hanging up.

When Eddie sets the phone down, Steve is sitting up, Dustin stirring and grumbling a complaint. He hears Steve laugh under his breath: “That’s what you get for trying to do math right now, dude.”

Eddie sits cross-legged on the floor in front of them. Thinking.

“You okay?” Steve asks.

“Jim Hopper’s fuckin’ weird,” Eddie says distantly.

Steve snorts. “Wow. And that’s coming from you.”

Dustin giggles himself awake as Eddie flips him the bird.

-

Jonathan Byers comes round just as Dustin heads upstairs to use the shower which—okay, sure. Eddie’s getting used to the whole people coming and going thing, and in theory he knows that obviously Jonathan’s been around for this since the beginning, but it’s another thing to see it in person.

It’s like an annoyingly stubborn part of his brain is still stuck on high school, looking at Jonathan and Steve in the same room, whining: But that’s not right—your kind don’t mix.

Jonathan’s polite, Eddie will give him that, but it’s obvious from the outset that he’s just here to speak to Steve.

Eddie leaves them to it in the living room, but it’s hard not to overhear, even when he’s doing his best to concentrate on the hum of the microwave as he heats through casserole.

“She’s staying in her room a lot, and you know what her mom’s like, Steve, she won’t—”

“Yeah, Robin said she tried to call, got no answer.”

“The most I could get her to talk was when she was with Holly. It’s like she doesn’t want to leave her alone.”

“Yeah, I… God, I don’t know. Wish I knew how to…”

“Me, too. But you’ll… you’ll call right, if she…? Fuck, it scares me sometimes, she’s so quiet. Don’t know if she’ll even turn to anyone.”

“Yeah, Jonathan, ‘course I’ll… Look, it’s just. It’s just been a lot, man. For all of us. She just needs some time, I think.”

“Yeah, I—sorry. I just worry.”

“Me, too.”

Eddie punches the buttons, sets the microwave on again before it can screech at him.

Jonathan leaves soon after that, gives Eddie a slightly awkward but sincere smile, bids goodbye to Steve with a, “Look after yourself, Steve.”

There’s a weight behind those words.

“Wheeler okay?” Eddie asks, once the front door has shut.

Steve sighs. “Hope so.”

The silence is heavy, and because Eddie can’t leave well enough alone, and apparently has a compulsion to put his foot in his mouth when it comes to this pair, blurts out, “Yeah, I kinda thought you two were a sure thing, man.”

Steve gives him a sideways look that Eddie can’t quite read. “Do you always do that?”

“Do what?”

Steve shrugs. “Like… imagine other people’s futures.”

It’s not said, but Eddie can hear the instead of your own loud and clear.

The embarrassment is expected. What isn’t is how he strangely welcomes it—no-one’s seen him like that before, cut right down to the core of him.

It’s his turn to shrug. “Kind of? It’s… you know what this town’s like, man. People and, like, how it’s all gonna turn out… some folks’ lives are easier to imagine than, uh. Others.”  

It was a bit like solving a simple puzzle piece: it had been easy to imagine Nancy and Steve together, to picture them as they were back then, young and sweet in the school corridors… using the belief in them as a sure thing to try and keep himself from losing it in a world turned (literally) upside down.

Steve’s lips twitch at the corners into a little smile. “Thought your whole thing was how people can defy expectations, or whatever.”

“Yeah, well. Even I’m not immune to hypocrisy, Harrington.”

Steve huffs a laugh. Hums. “I think I was always meant to love her,” he says, slow and thoughtful, “just… not in that way.”

“…Oh.”

Steve’s smile shifts into something melancholy. “I think we were both lonely, y’know? And, like… too similar. We both got trapped in our heads whenever shit went sideways. So if we needed, like, help or just… we couldn’t… couldn’t reach each other. Does that make sense?”

Eddie nods faintly.

“Eddie, can you promise me something?”

Eddie nods again, holds Steve’s gaze. Anything.

“Nance, if she—if she comes to you, just… be there for her?”

Eddie opens his mouth, but Steve keeps talking.

“I mean, ‘cause, you’re a good listener, man. And you’re kind. You can… see people.”

And Eddie suddenly has to hold his breath. He knows what Steve is referring to, thinks of how he recounted his meeting with Chrissy in the woods, as the group hiked from Skull Rock. I don’t know, man, I just knew something was up with her. Like, something was really wrong.

But the way Steve speaks to him—there’s more underneath the words. Kind of sounds like You can see me, too.

Eddie swallows through the burning in his throat. “I will,” he promises.