#anyway nancy presses a fire poker into robin's back too

[eskawrites]

if you are up to it..one kind of like imaginary what-if is if robin was in s2 or even just after s4 getting flayed and having that whole thing with the rest of the party

i'm sorry anon idk if this is a prompt or hc or what, but just know that i love it, i'm obsessed with the idea.

also this makes me think of @hellsfireclub's flayed!robin au which lives in my mind rent free (actually her entire rebel robin: surviving the upside down tag gives me life, check it out if you haven't, it's everything)

but also also a post-s4 flaying is super interesting to me. i'm really curious about what vecna's original attack plan was once the gate was open. Nancy mentions seeing an army of monsters in her vision, plus some big creature with a gaping mouth, which describes most of the upside down monsters they've seen tbh but also very much describes the mind flayer in s3. but none of those things are hanging out in upside down hawkins as far as we can tell, and nothing comes out of the rift once it's open at the end of the season.

so, like, what if vecna's army fled during the attack and he has to rebuild before he can attack? what if the fastest way to do some damage is to possess people again? and what if, because he takes some part of his victim's consciousness, he sees a glimpse of robin through nancy's eyes when he taunts her in s4?

just imagine vecna deciding that, before he kills el, he needs to get revenge on nancy. and after being in her mind--and seeing her again in the attic, stepping between him and the others--he knows the best way to hurt her is to take away someone else she loves. but it's not enough to just kill her like with barb. no, he needs something more this time. something worse.

enter flayed Robin, and the group is so busy just trying to rebuild and grieve and survive after s4 that it takes too long for them to notice. she pulls away gradually from the group. steve chalks it up to her spending time with vickie, just trying to feel normal in the wake of all they've been through. nancy wonders if she feels guilty, if that's why she avoids max's hospital room or the wheeler's basement or steve's backyard when they're all hanging out by the pool. it's not until one day, when they run into a demodog on patrol and robin screams as nancy shoots it, that they start to realize what's going on

(and by then, vecna knows so much. how they run patrols, all the preparations they've made, all of it. but mostly, he knows how much robin means to nancy. and he knows how much it hurts her when robin looks at her, eyes dark and empty, and says, 'barb was my friend, too, and you killed her.')