#jonathan byers being vecnaed au

[tirednerd2012]

I wish Steve and Jonathan had deeper writing for growing up , like how I wish Nancy and Jonathan had deeper writing that way too.

Like give me Steve and Jonathan who would hang out in the woods together because their houses were so close. They would see each other almost every day, happily hanging out. Steve, who notices how shit Lonnie is early on, always finds a way to get Jonathan out of the house- is also happy and unbothered if will is there.

Drifting away when Jonathan has to start working and they both are in middle school- steve starts gaining popularity because he’s playing on the basketball team. The insults he used in season 1 are harsher in that perspective, because he knows how much those comments hurt. That’s why he chose them.

Then having a heart to heart in like season 3 or maybe even in the future when they’re trying to get Vecna. If this is the au where Jonathan is his victim, everyone rotates making sure he’s okay before their plan of attack. They’re sitting together and it’s kinda still tense between them. But Steve, kinda pulling a Jonathan with bringing up a memory for a conversation starter is like “..remember when we both got stuck in a tree when we were kids after betting who’d climb higher?” Jonathan just glanced over confused. Then Steve finishes the story, gets both of them laughing alittle. And starts apologizing, saying he regrets being so awful because Jonathan was his best friend for so long during a lot of rough shit. But he threw it away just to act like an asshole. He admits he would like to get close again, if that’s okay. After Vecna is defeated.

Jonathan is abit skeptical, but slowly relaxes when he sees how genuine Steve is being. And he knows Steve changed alot. He’s seen it with the kids, with Robin. Etc. so he says he’d like that too, it would nice to be close again.

Okay but why does this make season 1 hurt even more. Jonathan and Steve are close friends growing up until they drift apart due to Steve gaining popularity and Jonathan starting to feel unwanted by his friend. But before that, they were close. They would meet in the woods outside of their houses and Steve was the first one to realize Jonathan wasn't being truthful about Lonnie. He would see his friend meet with him covered in bruises and Will was always with him, because while he insisted that it was Will who wanted to be around, which wasn't untrue, Jonathan couldn't stand the thought of leaving Will alone with Lonnie. There was never as much of a scratch on Will when Jonathan was around. But Steve didn't mind because he liked being around the Byers brothers. As he and his own father start arguing more, Jonathan listens and stands by him when Steve feels like there's no one.

The two would get into all sorts of mischief when they hang out in the woods, and Will even tries taking pictures on Jonathan's basic camera of the two. But when middle school comes around, they start drifting apart. Steve loves the attention he gets from basketball and the approval of his father that comes with it, and it starts to lead to him and Jonathan no longer being friends due to Jonathan being viewed as the creep and loser, even at such a young age. And while Steve always regrets it, he doesn't know how to turn things around so he drives it even further until he starts hanging around Tommy H and Carol who actively bully Jonathan when he's around and Steve does nothing about it, driving them apart completely.

Then Will goes missing. And Steve knows that has to kill Jonathan and when Tommy H makes the comment about Jonathan killing Will, he hits his shoulder and tells him to shut up. Nancy, whose little brother is best friends with Will, tries to comfort Jonathan and while Steve is immediately jealous, he believes her when she says she is sure Will is fine. He has to be, right? It's Will. Smart, resourceful, kind Will. Nancy starts to avoid him in order to help Jonathan look for Will and Barb. He sneaks to her window and sees Jonathan and Nancy together and he's pissed. But then Will's death is announced.

Steve's so mad that he doesn't even feel that he is mourning for the loss of a kid he once knew. Tommy suggests they paint the theater sign and Steve just goes along with. Obviously the confrontation happens and Steve picks at Jonathan more so than Nancy because he feels betrayed. He points out everything about Lonnie, knowing how much it would hurt him, but Jonathan kept walking. He saw the pause when he brought Joyce into it, but then he brings Will into it. He tells Jonathan he's not surprised Will is gone, that Will was a disgrace, knowing that would get to Jonathan more than anything. He had witnessed firsthand for years how much Jonathan adored that kid and it's the day after his funeral. The fight happens and Jonathan is still arrested.

It's this and his feelings for Nancy that cause Steve to snap. He told someone who helped him through a lot of shit that his little brother basically deserved to die, the day after his funeral. He goes to Jonathan's house to apologize because he feels horrible. Then he ends up helping with the fight and he wants to attempt to make things right, but by the end of it, Nancy is back with him, distant sure, but back with him, and Jonathan is with Will. He walks into the hospital room after everyone's left and Joyce went to talk to the doctors, hoping to find Jonathan, but finds the two boys asleep, Will in the bed and Jonathan in the chair right beside him, holding Will's hand. It doesn't look like either of them slept much throughout that week and he leaves, wanting to give them space.

Then Jonathan and Nancy end up together and Steve insists it's fine, because he wants both of them to be happy and he recognizes he has a long path of redemption. He becomes close with Dustin and starts to realize the stress the kids can have but also understands why Jonathan loves them so much. Then he grows close with Robin. Jonathan and the Byers move away, which sucks because Steve never completely made it right, but he's happy that they get to go somewhere they can leave all of this behind them and start healing.

The next time he sees Jonathan, he is the next Vecna victim. Will and Nancy are an absolute mess about how to fix this and save him, Jonathan is quiet, El is angry, Mike is distant, the other party members are worried and now there is another member of the group (Argyle, Steve thinks that's his name), a nervous mess about it, too. He and Jonathan step outside of the cabin while the others are going over a plan. Will and Nancy are so invested into the plan, a way to save the person they each love most, that they don't see Jonathan needing some air and stepping out. Steve decides to follow just in case.

Then he brings up how they used to climb trees and how Steve almost broke his arm when they were trying to get down. Jonathan is confused as Steve sits beside him and he recalls how Jonathan caught his arm and helped him on another branch so he didn't. And Jonathan is skeptical but he knows how hard Steve is trying to be a better person so he listens, and says he remembers. Steve apologizes for "ruining it all by being an asshole" but Jonathan says he wasn't exactly perfect in the friendship either, that he could have fought for their friendship instead of just letting everything happen. They both made a lot of mistakes along the way and they're each just trying to be better people for it. Jonathan also notes how Steve is with the kids and Robin, and that he is a good person. And Steve says how he always wanted to make things right, just never got the chance. Jonathan says they're alright, and that they have been since Steve helped save Will.

Then there's silence and Jonathan asks Steve for a favor. Of course, Steve wants to make things right and he feels like helping will solidify their friendship again. He explains that he knows he will most likely die at the hands of Vecna, and when Steve tries to tell him that won't happen, Jonathan asks to let him finish. He knows he might die, and he's okay with it, but he also know Nancy and Will won't leave him in a fight, even if their own lives depended on it. So he asks Steve, if it comes to it, to get them out of there, to keep them safe. He's seen the lengths Steve is willing to go through for the group, and he trusts Steve with Will, which Steve knows is a big deal. "I just want them to be okay, to move on after all of this is over." So Steve agrees that he will do what he needs to in order to keep them safe, but he's also going to do everything he can to save Jonathan, too. Then he says after all of this is over, he'd like to be friends again and Jonathan responds with that they already are. But it would be nice to be close again.

Steve is the one, alongside Argyle, to bring the Byers-Hopper family food while they stay in the hospital after Jonathan is put in a coma. He's there during the fight when Vecna takes over Jonathan's body, and tries to keep everyone safe, but when "Jonathan" brings up how Steve turned his back on him, he hesitates, and is knocked out in the fight.

[lexirosewrites]

Vague role reversal for slick sunday wherein Eddie is a popular top of the food chain alpha, while steve is on the peripheral as an omega

O!Steve might have rich parents tht aren't around, but he's struggled to read at the same pace as his peers for years, numbers sometimes get mixed up, he's seen as strange for his interests, & ppl tend to overlook him in a room which is what he's convinced himself he prefers. He might read slowly but he retains nearly everything he reads, he's very good in history class, he's got an emotional intelligence unmatched. In this AU Steve is the founder of Hellfire, he doesn't DM entire campaigns only one shots or short little jaunts but he owns every book & has a lot of knowledge abt the rules. Steve has taken German every year at Hawkins high & that's how he meets & forms a bond w A!Robin. She joins Hellfire only to sit around & eat snacks & heckle the DM on the behalf of the players. While he's socially vulnerable he's often left alone from physical bullying bc his parents had him attend first a karate class then an aikido class since he was 12 in Indianapolis so he defends himself well.

A!Eddie on the other hand presents as an alpha early, he starts developing the physical strength associated w an alpha, he's a faster runner than before, he joins the track & field team, he becomes the plug for weed & pills once he's a sophomore in highschool, he laughs loud & doesnt necessarily stop the worst of the bullying but is still a gentleman to alpha & beta women & all the omegas, even Steve when he rarely notices him. He dates A!Nancy Wheeler, invites her to a small bonfire in the woods near the trailer park, B!Barb comes along, Barb goes missing (is killed) after everyone breaks off in couples to make out/have sex, season 1 happens pretty much the same for Nancy except Steve's role/redemption is Eddie

Will Byers goes missing & Steve approaches fellow bottom feeder B!Jonathan Byers w condolences & the statistic tht when a child goes missing its more likely to b a family member, when Jonathan goes to confront his dad Steve & Robin tag along. When tht leads nowhere Steve & Robin r told by Jonathan to not get further involved. Wills fake body is found. Then season 1 happens pretty much the same with Steve & Robin only having a peripheral involvement.

Season 2 happens, Billy tries a few times to corner Steve but Hellfire r protective especially Robin, & Steve uses aikido to throw Billy around by using his mass & inertia against him ending the confrontation by giving Billy a broken nose, Billy ends up giving up bc he gets more concerned w dragging 2nd year senior Eddie down & harassing the vulnerable black kid Max has been seen with, season 2 ends w Steve having to repeat senior year and Eddie has to repeat for the 3rd time despite Nancy's attempts to help.

Season 3: Steve doesn't get entirely cut off but his allowance is reduced by A LOT, steve & robin get summer jobs at Scoops Ahoy. Dustin goes to Eddie with the transmission but neither speaks Russian. When their caught talking abt it not so subtly while indulging in ice cream at Scoops Ahoy near closing Robin straight up calls all 3 of them out while stobin lean against the counter judging them. Dustin is a smart ass but when Robin reveals she's a polyglot the 3 start to include her, ignoring Steve & Steve convinces himself he isn't hurt. Then Steve hears music in the transmission & as they're all walking out he has the eureka moment of the ride. Season 3 happens & stobin still end up as the ones trapped by the Russians except Robin does her best to divert their attention to her in this AU, they get drugged & rescued by Dustin Erica & Eddie

Billy dies. Max has very mixed feelings abt it while Steve is relieved bc Billy had continued to harass him all summer

Idk how season 4 goes but I do know we get steddie & buckingham even if Vecna isn't defeated

idk why omega Steve being at the bottom of the food chain is so appealing to me, but it is and then the idea of alpha Eddie eventually pursuing him is so much more fun!

[dykelips]

steddie — friends with benefits to lovers drabble

“friends don't do what we do.”

rating — teen & up. | tags — fwb to lovers, roommates au, everybody lives/nobody dies, gay steve, gay eddie, mutual pining, friends to lovers, love confessions, angst and hurt/comfort, friends with benefits.

steve's never really had self control. he's never had any when it came to several instances—calling jonathan byers a queer, kissing tommy on a drunken night when he was 15, going straight into an alternate dimension, facing billy hargrove and getting his ass beat, or even telling robin he has feelings for her, soon to find out she's a lesbian, and that he himself is a gay man.

steve's self control surely didn't exist the day steve proposed an... idea to eddie—a no attachment, friends with benefits who bang and get it out of their system type of deal. they're already best friends, deeply bonded from the whole vecna ordeal, so what harm could this do to them?

and now that steve thinks about it, it didn't do a small amount of harm, it practically ruined steve. he fell for eddie, and he's not sure eddie feels the same way.

steve broke his own rule. he found himself attached to eddie, thinking about eddie, talking only about eddie, being in love with eddie.

after steve comes home to their apartment and sees eddie making out with someone on their couch, he starts an argument. he doesn't own eddie, they aren't dating, and eddie's a grown man who can do whatever he wants, but seeing someone else other than himself lay their lips onto eddie's and kiss him, that really starts something inside of steve.

he can practically feel all of the months worth of collected feelings and thoughts bubbling up inside of him and almost spilling out over the sides the second eddie says what he says.

"we're just friends. we're friends, steve. you're you, and i'm me, and that's it," eddie says, arms crossed over his chest, hiding himself away and trying to tuck himself together.

"friends!? fucking—fucking friends, eddie? that's what we are? friends don't do the things we do."

steve scoffs and looks directly at eddie, face going red with anger and a mix of pain inside of him.

eddie looks down, lips pulled into a thin line, eyes downturned and hair hanging down around him, shielding him like a cave hidden behind a waterfall.

"yes, harrington. friends," eddie breathes out, head snapping up. "you act like you want me to say that we're more than that, but you're not into me. you just want to fuck me and act like nothing happened. i can't deal with that. i need someone who loves me, who tells me they need me and will take care of me and isn't disgusted or annoyed by me. that's what i need, not a fuck-buddy."

steve sputters and reaches his hands out, mentally saying fuck it and telling eddie how he really feels.

"eddie, jesus christ! i'm in love with you! i've been in love with you since you woke up from that goddamn coma last year."

eddie's eyes go wide, comically large and round, looking like bambi. he really fucking loves him.

"stop messing around, man."

steve shakes his head, not letting eddie dismiss him and believe it's just some sick joke that he's playing on him.

"why would i lie about loving you, eddie? everything i've done, it's all because of you. do you really think i would tell you this and compromise our friendship if i didn't feel just like i'm telling you now?"

eddie's mouth opens and closes like a dead fish, and he finally shuts it fully. "i, i don't—"

"if you don't love me back, that's okay. i just had to tell you, eds. you don't understand how much you mean to me," steve confesses, lips pulled into an apologetic smile. he goes and turns to walk out the door of their apartment,

eddie shoots out his arm, hand grabbing onto steve's forearm, squeezing, trying to stop him from leaving. "steve! fuck, i love you, too! i do, i really, really do. and, look, i didn't know how to tell you, because you're always being so frustratingly you, clearly not understanding all the hints i've dropped, trying to signal that i've been in love with you for months, too."

eddie licks his lips and his eyes seem to plead.

"really?" steve asks, hope bubbling up inside of him.

he nods, hair shaking around. "yeah, stevie. cross my heart and hope to die. i mean it. swear on it, even."

steve smiles at that.

"swear on what, exactly?" he knows the line he's crossing, and if eddie says what steve thinks he'll say, then steve knows it's true.

"on my guitar. my sweetheart. you know the one. i swear on her," eddie tells him, eyes flipping down to steve's lips and back up to meet his eyes.

"that's a big swear, munson. might need you to kiss me to prove it," steve teases, stepping in closer to eddie's bubble, noses almost touching.

eddie grins, wider that steve has seen for as long as he can remember. "i can do that."

he certainly swears on his guitar if the kiss that they shared proves anything.

whoops i suck at endings and writing in general, but this has been stuck in my head and i felt like trying to write. here it is. love you xx

[horrorfreak88]

Welcome to Camp Hawkins -Chapter 1

Outside Hawkins, Indiana. Summer of 1986. July 6th.

Steve sat in his car with the windows rolled down, radio blasting the local pop station and his best friend Robin yelling at him from the passenger seat about directions. 

“You're going the wrong way!” She yelled. 

“I know exactly where we're going, Robin! And get that thing out of my face!” He swatted away at the map of Indiana Robin was holding up. 

“No you do not!” Robin protested right back at him.

“Yes I do! See? The sign is right there.” Steve pointed towards Robin's direction where a small road followed by a sign that read Camp Hawkins was in view. 

“Oh fuck you!” Robin interjected. 

Steve rolled his eyes and drove down the long, narrow road. 

Camp Hawkins hadn’t been open since 1957. There were rumors about mass killings on the grounds. Rumors about it being murder, all the way to demonic possessions. Steve and Robin had read all about them before taking up the job, but working in retail wasn’t working out for the two of them and they definitely needed jobs for the summer. A few little rumors weren’t going to scare them. 

Steve pulled up to the nearest cabin, already spotting what seems to be the other people they’d be working with. All of them are familiar faces. 

He spots Jonathan Byers and Nancy Wheeler. 

Great. Just great. 

“Why aren’t we getting out?” Robin’s hand was already on the door handle, just waiting for Steve’s cue to leave. 

“I can’t go out there.”

“And why’s that?” 

“That’s why.” He pointed in the direction of Nancy and Jonathan. Robin had heard about Steve’s little romance with Nancy, and how she called him out for being bullshit in front of almost the entirety of Hawkins High. She also heard about Steve and Jonathan’s previous brawl, and even she had to agree that the reason they’re not on good terms is Steve’s fault. But when they were all together defeating Vecna, they seemed fine. For now it looked like she was wrong. 

“Ugh, pussy.”

-

A little snippet of the first draft of Slasher Summer Steddie AU

Cannot wait to share more of this with you all

[sijssjsbssjsnsnnskbskwns]

Byler (Mike Wheeler X Will Byers) X Sapphire Witch!Reader (this is just an idea for you, you can use it if you want!)

Summary: Season 1 through season 4…season 5

Important information you need to know about the idea…..

• You are fully corrupted by the DarkHold

• Your the main Villain of Stranger Things…There’s no Vecna…you killed him in season 1…but decided resurrect him…to help you…your using him tho..but he doesn’t know that.

• Your main Goal is to Rule the entire universe/Multiverse and you with not stop at nothing to protect Mike and Will…even if it means Sacrificing/killing people…

• The plot is…Stranger things 1 through Stranger things 4….Stranger things 5…to be continued.

• Your Created the upside down and its creatures the Demogorgans, Demo-Bats, Demo-Dogs and the mindflayer…the upside down is Dark blue instead of red.

• You have Scarlet witch powers but Dark blue…not red.

• It’s your destiny to destroy the world and the entire universe/Multiverse…you will not stop nothing to do that.

• you use the darkhold to help you gain power and…protect your boyfriends Mike wheeler and Will Byers…no matter the cost.

• it’s you and Vecna they have to try to stop…

• your introverted, sadistic, serious, Bad-Tempered, kind, etc

• Mostly everyone is scared of you…..

• your hands get more worse as you use the darkhold…and your skin gets even paler to…side effects from the darkhold

• y/n Maximoff is gone…it’s the Sapphire witch

• You hate being called y/n maximoff…you prefer Sapphire witch.

• your very intimidating…

• You could use this idea on Wattpad if you want to! or just here on tumblr.

• paraphernalia: The DarkHold

• Characters: Steve Harrington, Dustin Henderson, Mike Wheeler, Will Byers, Max Mayfield, Lucas Sinclair, Erica Sinclair, Nancy Wheeler, Jonathan Byers, Robin Buckley, Eddie Munson, Joyce Byers, Eleven, Jim Hopper, Billy Hargrove, y/n maximoff/Sapphire Witch….and the rest of the stranger things Characters.

(A/N: Hope this inspires you I give ideas to you if you need inspiration I have it!…and I made y/n au profiles so you know what y/n might look like…Anyway I hope you love this and it inspired you..If you wanna see more go see my other posts then go ahead…it’s recommended!…YOUR WELCOME :)

[fantasticallyfruity4]

NO WAIT THIS IS THE AU

The Hargrove-Mayfields never leave California. Where in California do they live and stay?

Lenora fucking hills.

Billy’s not as much of a dick, because he doesn’t have the hostility of having had to leave California. He’s still a dick, but like, not a mega dick.

When the byers/hoppers move to Lenora, el has her struggle in making friends but sits beside mad max in history class.

Max tells Angela to buzz the hell off, and is els only friend. she tells her boys are dumb and Mike is dumber, and by the time Mike visits for spring break Mike is on such thin ice with el he ends up hanging out with will his whole trip in ‘86. But then spring break ‘86 happens.

And max is right with will and Jonathan and Mike trying to get to el, trying to find el, to help El.

and when Billy shows up and Joyce’s to pick max up one day during spring break suddenly there’s a whole ass shoot out and before he really knows what happens he’s in a pizza boy van with those two stoners from school, that quiet kid whose absolutely gay, some guy from bum fuck who is apparently els boyfriend (like he believes that, okay) and of corse his stupid step sister.

So the two of them are just along for the ride to find Nina.

And max isn’t actually fighting vecna, no. Max isn’t one of Vegas victims, but el is still trying to protect her friends in hawkins, save her friends in hawkins. Someone else had to take maxs place after all.

Max being fiercely protective of her super hero “bestie” girlfriend.

They go back to hawkins, maybe returning more victorious than they did in cannon.

And that’s when Lucas and el meet, in the midst of the chaos.

And Billy is just this shell shocked California ken doll who’s a bit taken by everything which is Eddie and the preppy douchebag who refuses to leave his side.

[munsonfamilyband]

What a Phone Call Can Do

Teasers for my Different Meeting AU (that has basically become a fic at this point, may even pop it on Ao3 who knows), title of this post is an idea for a title, let me know opinions?

I have specific things that I am planning to include, and moments that I will do as canon, adjusting canon, or throwing away canon, so here’s some of those and feel free to share ideas:

Steve is going to spend the night with Eddie at Rick’s, no way is he leaving him. There will be discussion of Steve’s trauma in more depth in this part, as well as discussion of his homelife and parental neglect. 

Steve will be present for Jason and Patrick’s arrival at the lake house and Patrick’s death, Jason will take a slightly different turn on his idea of what Eddie is doing.

Yes, I will be making Steve get cursed, why, because he is my little doll that I like to make bad things happen to (this means Eddie will know his song, I have two ideas already, one is my own and another I saw in a fic and laughed so hard I almost peed, see if you can guess).

After leaving Eddie temporarily, to drop off the kids and Robin somewhere, Steve is going to run some errands, mainly: getting food and clothes for himself, stopping by Gareth’s house to fill him in on what’s going on, getting food for Eddie, leaving his car at his house so it’s less suspicious and sneaking into the trailer park to get Eddie clothes/see Wayne

Steve has been accepted by the other people in Eddie’s life at this point. Wayne almost immediately fell in love with Steve (I’m a sucker for Wayne telling Eddie to marry Steve of he'll adopt him), and the Corroded boys all got wooed by Steve’s cooking and baking, especially Gareth (Steve also has hair care talks with Gareth because they both love their hair and have been trying to bully Eddie into taking care of his)

Nancy having weird Feelings about Steve and Eddie, thinking she’s into Steve at first, but then she realizes that she's just jealous (is it because she misses Jonathan? Is it because she's suddenly interested in a clumsy lesbian? Maybe it’s both and I create the messiest polyamorous relationship known to man)

Following canon: the fruity four will still get dragged into the Upside Down, starting with Steve being yanked in, Steve will still get attacked by the bats, Fred is still victim 2 but that will happen off screen as this is from Steve’s point of view, Patrick is still victim number 3 and dies in the lake, Max is still cursed and plays bait, Nancy and Robin Acting Adventure at an Asylum

Adjusting canon: Steve is with Eddie for more of the story, contemplating having Nancy be cursed by Vecna as they leave the Upside Down or maybe having it be Eddie so he can see Steve as one of the victims, Steve’s injuries are not ignored once they leave the Upside Down (homoerotic wound care anyone?) which is going to adjust the groups at the end as well

Tossing out canon: Steve is also cursed but (thanks head trauma) he doesn’t know until it’s too late, replacing War Zone scene with a cute steddie moment in the RV, addressing Steve’s many head injuries and giving him hearing problems (there is a government issues hearing aid at his house but he rarely wears it, he will be once they learn about the music), happy ending :) 

Take note that I didn’t include Eddie and the bats here, because I have no idea if I’m even going to include that, I have an idea for following canon fully, adjusting canon and tossing out canon but I won't really know what I’m doing until I get farther into the fic.

There will be a happy ending though, I promise. My own gay little heart needs to see Will Byers meet Eddie and have his tiny gay brain explode because “wow hot man”, I also need Eddie and El to meet because she would adore him (Bitchin and Metal, hello?). I may also try to include a scene with Murray, because I love him, meeting everyone properly, finally meeting the Steve and before any of the adults or Cali crew can be clued in on their relationship, Murray tries to set up Eddie and Steve. I will also be showing Steve allowing himself to be soft with some of the kids (my heart grows 2 sizes whenever I think about Steve getting close with El and calling her Ellie bean, which she loves because it’s a new nickname)

Potential other ships to be included:

Jonathan/Argyle/Nancy/Robin as a polycule or as two relationships or mixture

Lumax/Elumax (as long as Max and Lucas are together I'm happy)

NO BYLER sorry, hot take, but I don't like Byler, and I think that Will deserves better than M*ke Wheeler, maybe I'll have Will and Gareth get to know each other though

Jopper, duh I love them

[annachronisme]

What if AU

I don't remember how I came up with this but here is my idea.

What if Tommy and Steve had stayed friend.

Lemme explain real quick .

So after the fight with Jonathan, Steve and Tommy still fight. But that where things diverge because while Tommy is an asshole he is a loyal asshole. Where Steve goes, he goes. He has known Steve for what 5-10 years? So yeah, he thought about it and he went to Steve to apoligize and actually talk. And Steve told him that he had enough of being an asshole and following his shitty idea so when Steve went to the Byers to apologize guess who went with him to apologize too?

Bingo.

So not only is Steve there for all the Demogorgon and Upside Down bullshit but Tommy's too and that is going to change everything that cames after. Because it's fucked them up good, I mean paralel dimension and monster and all kinda shit, for real ? So when Steve lost his 'King' persona, Tommy followed.

When Steve start being the babysitter for a bunch of middle schooler with a death wish, Tommy does too. Even tho Steve would argue that he was worse than the kids sometimes. And the kids kinda love him kinda hate him.

When he has his fight with Billy, Tommy is there too. They still get heavily knocked around by Billy but at least it not worse than canon.

Steve has a concussion tho.

When Steve start working at Scoop ? You bet that he's going to follow. Poor Robin has to deal with not one but two reformed jock. And she honestly think it could be worse because they're kinda funny to be around and she could have worst coworker.

(Also when she came out to them, she totally didn't expect them go like 'Oh yeah ok' and ' Lol that funny, remember how we used to practice kissing on each other' it's wild)

Oh and Billy doesn't die. Because I have a love/hate relationship with his character and I want him face consequence and live happy. So that.

And then there's the whole vecna shit going on and with the added helped of Tommy -who is not much of a fighter but after three or so years against the Upside Down he gets arounds- Eddie doesn't die. And the whole time he never stop sending knowing look at Robin because he knows.

I have so much idea for this AU it's insane.

What kind of weapon could he have ? I was thinking a bow or something fire related. He's a pyromaniac in his soul I just know it.

And I don't see Carol fitting in it so they probably broke up at some point.

Bonus point for the Hagan Family, who are constantly there because Mrs. Hagan love to have people over so the kids swarm up his place as much as Steve's even when he's not there and she happily let in. ( even when they told her not to)

The idea was eating away the few braincell I can manage it had to go somewhere.

[lavenderstobins]

who's who in the dragon age au?????

Bear with, this might get long, so I’ll try and break it down by game.

Dragon Age: Origins

Chrissy is the Warden / the Hero of Ferelden, recruited by senior Grey Warden Ser Robert Buckley. I haven’t yet decided her class. Jason had been one of the recruits too but he either didn’t survive the Joining or was killed when trying to back out of it.

Jeff is the other Grey Warden, essentially filling Alistair’s role. Haven’t yet decided whether to incorporate more of Alistair’s plot for him yet! He’s a warrior.

Eddie and Wayne live in the Wilds. Eddie fills Morrigan’s role initially, with Wayne able to save Chrissy and Jeff at Ostagar—not as Flemeth, but as a passerby. Eddie’s a mage!

Nancy fills Leliana’s role. She’s a former chantry sister and a bard. She and Mike are fleeing from Lothering when they meet the trio. Nancy’s a rogue, Mike is a warrior.

Freak joins them at Redcliffe, where Jeff was raised. I’m thinking Freak is a warrior.

Gareth is a Crow (assassin) sent by Brenner to take out Chrissy. Nancy takes him out with ease and he offers to join them on their journey. He’s a rogue.

Barb also lived in Lothering, but she died in the darkspawn attack. She’d been a chantry sister same as Nancy.

Chrissy makes the ultimate sacrifice in order to end the Blight, leaving Jeff as the only Ferelden Grey Warden. He’s the one who goes to find the cure. The group separate after Chrissy’s death, which brings us to:

Dragon Age 2

Steve and Robin are both simultaneously Varric and Hawke. Steve finds his passion in storytelling and writes about their adventures and Robin ends up with the title Champion of Kirkwall. Steve’s the one with the family estate, Robin’s the one with the blood connection to seal away Henry Creel.

Vickie fills the role of the surviving twin, having escaped Lothering with Robin back when the Blight broke out. She contracts the Taint during the Deep Roads expedition and is saved by Jeff and recruited to be a Grey Warden.

Tommy and Carol fill Bartrand’s role, being behind the Deep Roads expedition. Tommy finds the lyrium idol and it eventually drives him mad, which prompts Carol to seek Steve and Robin out years later (after she and Tommy had abandoned them in the Deep Roads prior).

The Byers run the Darktown clinic. Will’s the apostate healer, with Jonathan and Joyce running the clinic with him and keeping him secret.

Max stole a Qunari relic and is trapped in Kirkwall, just like Isabela.

Lucas and Erica are two rogues who live in Kirkwall, friends with the Byers. Dustin’s also friends with them and has far too much of an interest in runes and magic despite not being a mage.

El’s a former circle mage, now apostate, who escaped the circle with the help of a Templar named Benny. Lucas, Erica, Dustin and El imprint on Steve and Robin like ducklings; I think they’d be getting into trouble in the city and Steve & Robin would intervene once and they’d immediately latch on.

Billy would be Meredith I think, I haven’t thought too much about it. I also don’t have anyone specifically behind the chantry incident at the end of the game yet.

Dragon Age: Inquisition

Nancy’s a nightingale now, still filling Leliana’s role.

Eddie’s the Inquisitor rather than Morrigan, having been at the wrong place at the wrong time. He has the rift anchor in his hand.

Steve, Dustin, Lucas, Erica, Max, El, Jonathan and Joyce come to Skyhold once Skyhold is established. Steve claims to have no clue of Robin’s whereabouts, intending to keep her safe.

Hopper I think would have Cullen’s role, being a templar and an advisor. The other advisors are Mr Clarke, Nancy and Murray.

Briefly mentioned prior, I’ve got Henry Creel/Vecna as Corypheus. Robin’s father (Ser Robert Buckley) sealed him away years ago and Steve & Robin accidentally unleashed him while ironically trying to prevent his release.

Argyle is the potions master. I think Jonathan would become the stable master.

Vickie reappears as the Grey Warden contact for Here Lies the Abyss.

They don’t all fit the characters 1:1, more their roles in the plot, and as you can tell there’s a lot of overall changes! It’s SO fun though I’m having a blast

[steddieficrecs]

Steddie WIPs/Unfinished Fics

⚠️read at your own risk⚠️

Smokin' in the Boys Room by SgntToastybuns

Steve Harrington is nearing the end of his senior year of high school and he has no idea where he's heading in life. His parents are absent, he recently broke up with his girlfriend, and now he's talking to crying band geeks in the boy's bathroom. Maybe getting high with Eddie 'The Freak' Munson will make him feel better.

AU without the Upside Down and Steve becomes friends with Robin and Eddie much sooner.

who are you? (the right one) by percylicious39

"Now, Wayne obviously knows about his nephew's preferences in partners, that one time a glaringly indisputable proof, but he couldn't quite frankly give a single damn about it, love is love and all that crap. Not that he'd understand anything about that crap. Anyway, he has seen Eddie shove enough boys out of his tiny bedroom window to know that they never get to spend the night, and they never get to prepare Eddie's favorite tea at four in the morning on a Wednesday without Eddie even being present in the room. So what the actual hell is this one doing here? And where is Eddie?"

Or five times Wayne meets Eddie's boyfriend and that time he finally learns his name.

Operation Get Steve a Boyfriend by MothToTheFlame

“Steve,” Dustin declares, a hand placed on his chest. “It would be my honor to be your wingman.”

 

or:

5 times Dustin tries to set Steve up with Eddie, and the 1 time it actually works.

Eddie Motherlovin' Munson by VacumCleanr (CharTheQ)

In which Karen Wheeler has a thing for long haired metalheads in tight jeans, and Steve is jealous as all hell.

Punk Princess by YouMakeMyHeartHowl

Steve Harrington spends the summer of 84' learning about Punk culture and Queer culture and comes back his senior year as a whole new man

 

Eddie is gay panicking all over the place

So is Steve

Harrington Charm(s Hellfire) by sailors_ink

Sometimes Eddie thinks the real Upside-Down is his life after they close the gates and save the world because this? This thing where his band, his club, his friends are all intruding on his own personal Steve time?

Not fun. No, not fun in the slightest.

off the beaten path by pukner

"I'm saying this," says Steve, loudly, cutting him off, "because someone I love is, uh, gay. And I love them, but like, platonically. And also me calling you a queer might've been a little hypocritical, in restrospect."

There is a long, baffled pause.

"What," says Jonathan, "Steve, are you--are you coming out to me?"

Steve frowns, "Oh, yeah, I guess I am. Cool."

Or, post season 3, Steve manages to figure out that he's bisexual, despite his best efforts to repress it, comes out to Robin and Jonathan Byers of all people, and figures himself out. Also, there's a cute guy who might be actually insane running the kids' dnd club and he's got his eye on him. And his bandana.

Too bad Eddie Munson hasn't had a similar revelation. He's still under the impression that he's a straight man obsessing over Steve Harrington for normal, extremely heterosexual reasons.

 

OR: Steve figures out he's bi before Eddie figures out that he's gay. Eddie still manages to fall first.

Tell Me "Don't", So I Can Crawl Back In by KiaraMGrey

When Steve finds himself alone and without friends, following his breakup with Nancy, he decides what he needs is a distraction. Maybe some new friends who don't remind him of the bullshit life he gave up. When he literally runs into Eddie Munson, school drug dealer and self proclaimed freak, an idea begins to form. Who better to show him what life outside popularity can be like, than someone who doesn't give a shit what anyone thinks?

And Eddie? Well, Eddie is just bracing for impact.

you can let it all go by lyrical_litany

After the portals close, life goes on. Eddie and Steve sort through it together.

or

the future of the Party through the eyes of Eddie and Steve.

Caught in the Middle by Yamiswift

In the aftermath of Vecna Eddie can't seem to stop himself flirting with Steve. In the space of a single conversation he's told the guy to keep the jacket, compared himself to a fair maiden, and fucking winked apparently! Surely there's still some monsters left so he can fling himself into the upside-down and not have to face how embarassing he's being.

Steve is certain that all the feelings he's been having about Eddie are platonic with a captial P. True, he can't stop looking at the guy, and touching him, and thinking about how pretty he is and how soft his hair looks- But that's all totally normal friend stuff. Totally, completely, normal.

A fic exploring how the aftermath of vol. 2 could have gone had Vecna been defeated a few minutes earlier. Featuring Eddie's disaster flirting, The Jacket, Steve and Robin playing detective about Steve's sexuality, a Bi-awakening, Steve and Eddie co-parenting six children, and everyone else's reactions to the whole mess.

[heavencasteel420]

I was feeling a bit stuck on my main WIPs, so for fun I wrote a couple of lines/paragraphs for each of my other story ideas (the proper ones where I have a general sense of the story's shape, not the shitpost ideas like "Chrissy turns into a car?"). Here are the ones for my Cute/Normal story ideas:

Long

Nancy Wheeler Can't Win (no UD AU, Nancy-centric)

Sometimes, Nancy thought her life would be easier if she were dating Jason Carver instead. Not better, necessarily. She didn't like Jason nearly as much as Steve; he was kind of pompous and, although he technically looked way more like Tom Cruise, she couldn't imagine ever finding him as sexy as she did Steve. She couldn't help but notice, though, that Chrissy Cunningham didn't have to be one person on Saturday night and another on Monday morning.

Life During Wartime (companion to above, centers on Will and Jonathan)

"I can't believe I'll be the last one to get girlfriend," Mike lamented as he and Will biked home from school. It was a perfect September afternoon, neither too hot nor too cold, and the first leaves were turning yellow. "First Lucas and Max, then Dustin and Suzie, now you and Megan. I'm going to die a virgin."

"We could all still die virgins," Will pointed out. "I don't think Lucas and Max are doing it yet, and Megan and I definitely aren't. And we're not even sure if Suzie is real."

Horse Girl (Stoncy, summer 1985)

The thing about being an asshole, Steve thought, as he listlessly scooped butter pecan ice cream for a couple of sixty-something ladies, was that it took a long time to catch up with you. For instance: the thing he'd spray-painted on the theater marquee about Nancy almost two years ago. Sitting on the hood of his car outside the 7-11, he'd resigned himself to her shunning him forever. He'd even gone to apologize to Jonathan first so he could put off seeing the cold disgust on her face. Then, one month later, she'd taken him back, accepting his apology as a matter of course. Maybe that should've been his first clue that something was wrong.

It's All a State of Mind (AU where Hopper-Byers siblings are psychic carnies/confidence artists in the 1930s)

"Heather likes you," El pointed out a few days later, after they'd settled in. They were in the dining tent, digging into some beef stew. "You could get close to her."

"Keep eating and forget what Murray said," Jonathan told her, although he couldn't summon any harshness to back it up. This was the best meal that he or the kids had eaten in months. "Heather puts up with me. She doesn't want to get close to anyone, either."

Heather Holloway was an aerialist, a pert dark-haired girl who'd joined the circus to get away from a home in some ways worse than the one that Lonnie had provided him and Will. She was friendly to Jonathan, but that was probably because he'd shown no interest in getting inside her drawers.

"So you admit it," Will said smugly. "We wouldn't mind if you got married, you know. So long as we liked her.

From the High to the Low to the End of the Show (S1 AU where the teens are in their late twenties)

"Doesn't it piss you off?" Fred asked her. "That he can just waltz in and get a job because he's 'so talented,' when the rest of us had to work hard and do it the right way?" "Eyes on your own paper, Fred," Nancy said, in a chipper tone that she knew would annoy him. She agreed with him, to a point; she never would have been hired at the Hawkins Post if she'd gone to night school instead of IU. At the same time, she'd heard the other guys say that she'd only gotten the job out of pity. Fred wasn't one of them, but she was running on three hours of sleep an half a bagel, so she didn't feel like being nice. "Why would Holloway care about college? Byers has something he wants and he's willing to pay for it."

Medium

Tomorrow May Not Be Your Day (pre-S4 Jancy breakup, probably no Vecna, eventual Jargyle)

"I'm sure you'll work it out," Mom says. She smiles at him anxiously, and he knows what he should do. He should mumble agreement, accept this bit of comfort. Pay her back with white lies of his own: that the distance isn't really a problem, that she didn't kind of screw him over by moving them all across the country. That there's no reason to worry about him, because he's going to figure things out with Nancy and somehow make Emerson happen. "Yeah?" he asks instead. "What if I don't? What if this is it?" It doesn't come out as a plea for reassurance, either. That would be humiliating, maybe even futile, but at least everyone would understand what he was doing. Instead, it comes out as a challenge.

Let the Broken Hearts Stand (companion to above, Nancy's first year at college, eventual Nancy/Carol)

"Look, I was friends with Steve for, like, ten years before he ditched me and Tommy," Carol says, taking a drag off her cigarette, "but he was definitely the bigger asshole in your relationship." Nancy laughs, startled. Carol grins uncertainly, then offers her the cigarette. She accepts. "Like, whatever, you're a totally embarrassing drunk, and you didn't have the balls to dump him until you were sure you had Byers eating out of your pussy, but--" "Jesus Christ, Carol," Nancy said, turning bright red, but Carol waved her off. "Fine. Va-gi-na. Lady garden. Cavern of feminine wonders. Whatever Emily Post says to call it." Carol cackled as Nancy struggled to look disapproving. "My point is, he was also a fucking prick."

How Will You Make It on Your Own? (Stonathan no UD college AU, the context is Jonathan and Samantha have broken up):

Because all the theater freaks were shunning him, Jonathan sat with Barb and Nancy at lunch. "You'll get back together," Barb said glumly. It was unclear whether she was trying to reassure him but was too stressed out about Mathletes to manage a cheerful tone, or if she was predicting an outcome she disapproved of. "You'll ignore her, she'll call and sort of say sorry, and, because she apologized first, you'll fall all over yourself saying that it's all your fault, and that she's right that you should both move to New York City and live in a condemned building and wear garbage bags instead of clothes." Well. That answered his question. "I don't think that's going to happen," he said, contemplating the peanut butter cracker he'd spent the last half hour eating. "It feels different this time."

Oh, I'm Bound to Go (companion to Drive All Night)

Will wasn't sure who figured it out first, him or Mom. When the money first started coming in--so much money, enough for Mom's medicine and Will's new shoes and more food than he could ever remember having--he asked why they couldn't just live with Jonathan in the city. Surely Indianapolis had enough piecework and odd jobs for the two of them. "He's living in a boarding house, sweetheart," she said, keeping her eyes on the chicken she was cleaning instead of his face. "There's no room for us." Maybe she'd known it was a lie all along. But Will understood Jonathan better than anyone, knew how his lies looked and sounded. On paper, he couldn't hear the too-bright home or watch him disappear behind his eyes, but the wrongness came through all the same.

Short

I Know It Breaks Your Heart (Tommy-centric, mostly future fic)

Tommy didn't need anyone to think that he was smart except for Carol, who understood without explanation that he didn't have to act like a nerd or a circus freak to prove that he was clever. It just felt shitty, sometimes, that Steve clearly thought of him as a dumbass. Steve, who had no bullshit meter and maintained a B-minus average with more effort than he liked to admit. It was annoying, but, more than that, it struck Tommy as greedy. Steve was taller, more handsome, more impressive on the court and field. He put people at ease. He could've let Tommy have something.

Raised on Promises (El's life in California, gen)

No matter what Joyce says, and no matter how nice Will and Jonathan are about it, El still feels embarrassed by the toys. Jonathan doesn't play with anything, except sometimes for the hacky sack Argyle gave him; he just listens to tapes and smokes. And maybe that's because he's almost grown up, but Will is her age and he gave away all his D&D stuff to Erica before they moved. He does art now, which isn't playing. Grown-ups do art, too, sometimes even as a job. The girls at school don't play with toys, either. They have fun like she and Max did last summer: dressing up and messing around with makeup and hanging out at the mall. Only the girls here aren't as nice, and Max isn't here to show her how to act her age. So she finds herself building little towns out of blocks and shuffling around a bunch of plastic dolls.

The P is for Perfection (and You Know That We Are Freaks) (Joyce doesn't move the family to California and El becomes a cheerleader)

"I heard she was raised in a cult," Amanda whispered to Chrissy, as the freshman girls lined up. "Chief Hopper knocked up some hippie and only found out when she died a couple years ago. And then he left her with Joyce Byers when he died. Not really an improvement, if you ask me." "Shush," Chrissy said. She was already getting a headache and the yelling hadn't even started. "You don't want the other girls to hear." Amanda muttered that it was common knowledge, but Chrissy tuned her out and studied Jane Hopper. She was on the tall side, with a lean and strong-looking frame. No flyer, but she could be a backspot or a base. She had curly brown hair pulled back in a scrunchy and a pretty, guileless face. She was dressed okay, in a baggy light purple sweatshirt and white leggings, but there was an air of offness about her.

[tirednerd2012]

I like the idea of Jonathan and Steve being friends as kids till they drift away when middle school hits. Steve stops hanging around him as much when he goes into middle school, then when Jonathan goes the following year that’s when the taunting sparks. Some insults seem alittle personal since Steve knows him. It really fucks with Jonathan’s trust to a different level.

Later in the canon timeline when things between them aren’t as tense, Steve quietly apologizes for shutting him out. Jonathan shrugs abit, not really eager to forgive but there is a pain in his chest that really misses his old friend.

Maybe even their old friendship helps with Vecna, while looking through tapes to help Jonathan, Steve is rambling off songs that’ll help if Will is too distracted by trying to pull Jonathan down and begging him to hang on.

Okay so I just posted about Steve and Jonathan being friends but here's some more to add on:

Jonathan doesn't trust anyone after Steve's betrayal when they are younger. It was one of the more upsetting ones and he can't get over it until Steve apologizes, and one of the main reason he chose to forgive Steve was for Will, who resented Harrington for his treatment of his older brother. He wouldn't admit how much he missed having his friend.

But when Jonathan is Vecnaed, Will is obviously freaking out. He is holding on to Jonathan, a crying mess because he is begging his big brother not to leave him. They're looking through tons of tapes and while most of them are made by Jonathan, they consist of Will and Nancy's favorite songs. Nancy can't think straight as she tries to find something from Jonathan's room for himself when Steve starts rambling his old favorite songs, so fast almost no one can understand him, but Argyle does and grabs the radio and starts playing.

He also grabs Mike's arm when Mike tries to separate Will and Jonathan because Will is crying and begging Jonathan to open his eyes and Mike thinks he's going almost too far down, but Steve grabs his arm and says to give them some time. He starts carrying around mixtapes that have everyone's favorite songs on it after he and Jonathan agree something like this can't happen again.

[usagirln12003]

Steve Harrington: Hogwarts AU

Steve Harrington is a Pureblood (Lycanthrophy) wizard that was born on the 24th of April 1978 and started attending Hogwarts on the 1st of September 1989, being sorted into Hufflepuff House.

He has a Alder wand with a Unicorn Hair core.

His Patronus is Non-Corporeal.

His favorite subject is Flying and his least favorite subject is Herbology.

He was one of Hufflepuff's two Beaters from his fourth year onward.

While attending Hogwarts, Steve was initially the typical popular boy that; gained attention from everyone near him, though this caused him to fall out of favor with the lesser-known kids at school who labeled him as a "douchebag". Despite having a charming personality, he eventually fell into the wrong crowd of the snarkier popular kids, although his compassion lay underneath his superficiality.

When beginning to date Nancy Wheeler, Steve displayed his softer side and revealed himself to be hopelessly in love with her, though this in turn revealed his insecurities, as he instantly believed Nancy was sleeping with Jonathan Byers when seeing them together in the Ravenclaw Common Room, and soon caused him to vandalize property with graffiti featuring slurs of Nancy and Jonathan. It's not until Jonathan physically beats up Steve in rage that he realizes how awful his behavior was and immediately went to the Byers's home to apologize, only to be sucked into protecting them from a werewolf which is what led him to get bit. At Christmas, 1993, Steve and Nancy purchased Jonathan a new camera to replace the one he and Tommy broke.

Between his breakup with Nancy, getting disowned by his parents for being a werewolf, and Billy quickly taking over his status as "King Bee" and most popular boy, Steve was at a low point emotionally. While trying to make amends with Nancy, Dustin intercepted him and asked Steve to help catch D'Artagnan. The boys quickly bond, and Steve is shown to have a more parental or mentoring side as he gives Dustin relationship advice. Steve took on the role of 'babysitter' for the kids and was willing to put himself in danger to protect them. He had matured and became far more kind and responsible than he used to be.

In 1995, Steve was a shadow of what he once was. Aside from his sarcasm and recklessness, a lot of his traits that; he displayed in his Hogwarts years have disappeared. He was incredibly awkward and unsuccessful; with the girls he serves at Tendou Satori's Ice-Cream Parlour, and the only positive female relationship he seems to have is with his co-worker, Robin. His friendship; with Dustin is still strong, if not stronger and he seems to be on good terms; with the rest of the gang. Steve is also shown to be more kind-hearted and tolerant of things he used to poke fun of. Aside from engaging in nerd culture, he is also shed his homophobic views; which is shown when he still accepted Robin as a friend after she came out to him.

In 1996, Steve began working at Semi-Semi's Music Store, with him finding it difficult to find a suitable girlfriend for himself and started developing romantic feelings towards Nancy again. He also helped Robin deal with her crush, Vickie, and advised her to pursue her as he wanted Robin to be happy. He became jealous of Eddie and Dustin's growing friendship as he felt Eddie was taking over his brotherly role. However, Steve later softened when Eddie told him Dustin was always talking about him and worshipped him. When formulating a plan to kill Vecna, Steve had a heart to heart about his dreams with Nancy, having five or six kids and traveling around as a a professional quidditch player and he later told Nancy the dream included her.

[light-lanterne]

birthdaygate au where everyone's forgotten will's birthday except will himself,,, and mike, whose love for will is so strong that vecna couldn't make him forget.

when he gets to lenora, however, no one is saying anything about it. jonathan is lost in his own world instead of making jokes or reminiscing of the past, as usual,,, el said the day was about her and mike and has made no mention of the date, when she's usually very enthusiastic about birthdays,,, even will is quiet and grumpy when he'd normally be a bit cheerier and sure, mike ruined their reunion a bit (he just got nervous, okei ? >.<), but it's rare that will gets to this stage so quickly. it usually takes a lot longer for him to get fed up.

alas, that's the current stage of things and mike opts to remain quiet for the time being. maybe the byers have a big surprise "party" planned for later ! or maybe,,, maybe will just wants to spend the day with whoever the painting is for >:(

in fact, as the day goes on and will's mood continues to deteriorate, mike is more and more convinced that this is the case. will had probably asked his family earlier to take things easy (because he's not a child anymore) and had probably been excited to spend the day with some girl, growing progressively annoyed the longer she took to show up.

and mike is upset. because it made sense that will had grown up and found someone he liked, and mike doesn't blame him for it (well, maybe just a bit),,, but is he that bad? they'd spent almost all their birthdays together ! will seemed to have fun in the past ! why is he so pissy that mike is there for his birthday? are the last nine birthdays (eighteen between the two of them) they'd spent together not good enough for will? is the idea of being around mike so tortuous now?

he's upset. and confused, because apparently the girl is actually an asshole, now that she finally showed up.

ultimately, mike doesn't have much time to think about birthdays anymore because el just decked angela in the face and things are very tense between them all now.

it's until they arrive at the byers that he thinks about it again. because even when things were at their worst, and even when will didn't want it, joyce has always insisted on decorating the house a little for each birthday (including mike's own) and right now, the house is pristine. not a single balloon or banner, no cake or bowl of sweets. nothing. not even a "how was your day, sweetie?" over dinner, or a "happy birthday, will" as they all left the dinner table and said goodnight.

mike is very confused. and he wants to ask will about it, maybe give him his present or the damn letter he's been carrying around all day.

but things are awkward between them and mike is a little drained from their argument earlier and will seems like he needs some space.

he'll ask about it tomorrow, once he smooths things out with el.

it'll be okay then.

- the end -

(another silly idea. it wouldn't be me if i didn't write some angst x.x)

[pinkeoni]

I don’t really have the motivation to actually write the GoT AU but I did still think a lot about the lore so I’m going to infodump about it below:

In this AU the Creels are like the Targaryens. Their family ruled over Westeros for many centuries and it was mythologized that the first king, Vecna the Conqueror, united the seven kingdoms using his psychic powers and army of giant spiders. The last of the Creel family was King and Queen Victor and Virginia Creel, and Princess Alice and Prince Henry. King Victor was known as the “Cruel King Creel” for the way he treated his subjects

Before the story begins, Lonnie of House Byers (the Byers are like the Baratheons) leads a rebellion against the Creels and massacres the Creel family. The old Head of the Kingsgaurd, Jim Hopper, is the one who kills Victor Creel, giving him the title “Kingslayer”

Lonnie takes over the Iron Throne as the new King of Westeros. He marries Joyce of House Maldonado in Dorne and House Byers takes over the Crownlands. Lonnie is known as “The Bull King” for “ramming his horns into the capitol gates” and for the fact that the Byers house sigil is a bull. Lonnie wears a crown with bull horns adorned on it.

Part of how Lonnie gained so much support is because his followers believed he was the “Lord of Light,” a mythical being sent to save them from the “Lord of Darkness” King Victor but this isn’t true.

Henry Creel secretly survived the massacre of the Creels and escapes with the old Hand of the King Martin Brenner to the “Upside Down,” the wintery wasteland north of the wall where he can train his psychic powers and grow his army of creatures to take back Westeros. Kali was going to be a protogé who would eventually rebel against him when she learned that he wasn’t actually concerned about the wildlings. Henry is the true “Lord of Darkness” and a reincarnation of Vecna Creel

King Lonnie and Queen Joyce have three kids, Jonathan, Will and El in that order. When Will was born, King Lonnie suspected that he was actually the son of Jim Hopper, whom Joyce did harbor feelings for. Lonnie wanted to kill both Will and Hopper, but Joyce convinced them to send them both to Castle Black instead and have Hopper lead the Night’s Watch. Lonnie agrees and Will grows up in Castle Black as “The Kingslayer’s Bastard.”

In actuality, Lonnie knows full well that Will is his actual son, but heard from a mystic that Will was the real Lord of Light and wanted to get rid of him.

Will does know about his secret princedom, and communicates with his family with secret raven messages. He is able to see visions in firelight and draws as a way to express all of these visions and for fun.

He is joining the Night’s Watch at the same time as Mike of House Wheeler, which is like the Starks. Mike is a little like Jon Snow except he isn’t a bastard.

The reason Mike joins the Night’s Watch despite being noble is because he always hated the idea of marrying a princess or a lady and settling down and having a family. In the story he processes that this is because he is gay.

Other Night’s Watch members include Lucas, Dustin, Eddie, Gareth, and Kieth.

Will and Mike naturally gravitate towards each other. Mike is enamored by Will’s softness, and Will relates to Mike’s desire not to be noble despite how he was born. Mike later learns about Will’s nobility from him. I still wanna write the chapter where they talk up on the Wall (similar to Sam and Jon)

Early on in the story, King Lonnie dies while hunting (similar to Robert Baratheon) and this kind of kicks off the larger story. Prince Jonathan is to succeed him, but other houses see the power exchange as a weak point and are planning to take the throne from him. Will is conflicted emotionally about his father’s death.

Meanwhile, the Night’s Watch boys discover that Prince Henry is alive and is growing his army of creatures. The rest of the story was going to follow some of the boys as they make their way across Westeros and try to unite the Houses against Henry and his army.

Hopper has Mike swear fealty to Will without the former’s knowledge, which leads to problems down the road. You do NOT have to ask Mike to swear fealty to Will Byers twice

I didn’t get too much farther in planning out how it would go but that’s most of the backstory and setup for it ✌🏻more characters would be introduced to the world as I went along

[marypsue]

don’t let the sun go down on me continues to live in my head rent free so any DVD commentary of that you can spare would be much appreciated 🙏🏼

[from this meme]

Thank you very much!

don't let the sun go down on me

Before I start, I have to thank @trulyalpha / scoutshonour's we have the time, the inspiration, the blueprint, the OG Steve/Nancy/Jonathan vampire fic. Without it, this one wouldn't exist.

"Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me" is an Elton John song, but the place I first encountered it (and what I was thinking of when I used it for this fic) was Roger Daltrey's cover for The Lost Boys. So. There's that.

The first chapter was written and posted in a feverish haze in June of 2021. It was meant to be a one-shot; I never had any plans to continue it. And then in 2022 Season 4 came out and while I'm generally not impressed with it, I got absolutely obsessed with the idea of vampire trueforms modelled off the Vecna design and things...escalated quickly.

Chapter One

One of the best pieces of advice that I ever received about writing was that the story starts so much later than you often think it does. Especially when I'm writing oneshots, I try to cut right to the the part where the story I actually want to tell starts. In this case, there's a whole leadup of Steve hearing or seeing something in the woods and going to investigate and discovering a monster and some kids seemingly being menaced by the monster and going to the rescue and a whole fight scene that I decided I didn't want to write, because the story was about Nancy and Jonathan being vampires and Steve falling in love with both of them. And honestly, I don't feel like the story is lacking for not having that monster fight in it. A few sprinklings of exposition in the narration and dialogue takes care of it quite nicely.

I love giving vampires eyeshine.

Sometimes, it takes Steve an eternity to understand how things fit together. And then, sometimes, his brain makes lightning-fast connections between random things without his even asking it to. 

Steve Harrington ADHD. I don't care what the show says. It just makes sense.

(On an unrelated note, OG Season 3 Robin Buckley also ADHD. I am getting off the soapbox now.)

“That’s my kid sister.”

There are two aspects of Jonathan Byers' character that felt indelibly important to me to preserve even in an AU: he is a big brother, and he is deeply protective of and materially supportive of Joyce. Turning her from his mom into his little sister kept both of those things intact even with the change in timelines. I felt particularly proud of this one.

...and wow, there is something about her saying his name with blood all over her face that Steve is going to just pack away in the back of his mind for later.

It was very important to me and to making this whole thing work that Steve is just wildly, unabashedly, maybe a little bit confusedly but totally wholeheartedly horny for the whole vampire deal. He's discovering so many new things about himself over the course of this fic, and a fetish for fangs is just part of the package deal.

He doesn’t want to be a vampire. There are probably a lot of very good reasons for that, and the fact that the only one coming to his stunned mind is that vampires probably don’t get basketball scholarships means nothing.

This just made me laugh when I thought of it.

“Oh shit, is it bad?” Steve turns to look at Jonathan. He sounds like he’s less likely to try to sugar-coat it. “It sounds like it’s bad. ..."

"Son of a bitch, Lucas, is it bad?!"

The whole idea of vampire thralls and Steve maybe becoming one was something that was on my mind throughout the rising action in we have the time, but never came up in that fic. I wanted to dig into the concept, and also, it seemed like a good excuse to force Nancy and Jonathan to have to pull Steve into their investigation of the events of Season 1.

Nancy and Jonathan basically forgetting Steve's there so they can rehash an old argument (and also drop some exposition because I'd never expected to continue this fic but I had backstory I wanted to sneak in) is so funny to me, one of the ways I wanted to show they were an established established (read: old married) couple, and also quite possibly the moment Steve fell helplessly head over heels for both of them.

His mom’s sleeping with Prince Valium tonight

Lifted this line from Beetlejuice because I think it's criminally underrated. Also because, as I mentioned in my other post, my go-to characterisation for Steve's mom is just Delia Deetz. Also, also, it unintentionally became good foreshadowing.

Just because he keeps deciding to do what he thinks will make the prettiest girl alive happy – Oh. Shit. She’s not alive, though. Is she.

When I first started writing this, I had Steve referring to Nancy as 'the prettiest girl in the world' before he knew her name. And then I realised I could do this if I made one little change.

Jesus. Steve hadn’t even asked if they kill people. 

Yeah, I don't think he ever actually does end up asking that.

Chapter Two

As mentioned above, in about September 2022 the bug bit me hard and I resurrected this fic from the dead, with 'vampires, but make it Vecna-inspired and explicitly Upside-Down-related' on my mind and a half-formed thought about a murder mystery. I thought this fic had maybe three chapters in it, total, counting the original oneshot. I thought it would be quick and easy to wrap up. Hahahahahaha.

I did actually start writing this chapter back when I wrote the original oneshot - the scene where Steve finds the obits at the library, specifically up to the part where he's looking at Nancy and Jonathan's yearbook photos, was written in 2021. I decided to cut off the fic the night of Nancy and Jonathan's visit because I didn't have a direction to go in to continue it, and it felt like a complete thought. Also, I was only adding onto it because I wanted the mental image of Nancy and Jonathan in fifties styles.

And then, in 2022, I stumbled upon a direction to go in to continue it.

"...Why am I out in the woods at night with a bobby soxer who wears a virgin pin?”

Shoutout to @marzipanandminutiae who was talking about fashion history and popular fashion myths, and brought to my attention both the fad of circle pins for girls in the fifties and the myth that wearing them on one or the other side of your cardigan meant that you had or hadn't had sex / whether you would have sex. Fearmongering about silly teenage accessory trends having to do with secret sex signals didn't start in my youth, apparently. (Anybody remember jelly bracelets? I was a full adult before I found out those were supposed to be a kind of playground handkerchief code.)

I looooove writing ominous horror scenes where Something Bad Is Lurking and the characters are starting to realise it too but they will not know until it's too late. New favourite thing. Love tension. Love when everybody's thinking the same thing but nobody dares to come right out and say it.

You heard Chief Keller.

Yes, I have been watching Riverdale in fascinated horror. It's just...it's so audaciously bonkers. And so fully committed - at least for the episode or two each of them lasts - to its bits. I have to respect that. And it makes me feel sooooooo good about my plotting and pacing capabilities.

(Also, Chad Michael Murray giving an actually pretty thoughtful and nuanced performance as a charismatic high-control group leader, only to throw it all out the window when he got told 'oh btw your character dies next episode' and start gnawing through backdrops like the Hungry Hungry Caterpillar while doing three costume changes in two scenes and then trying to Evel Knievel his way off a building in a homemade rocket only to get unceremoniously and undramatically shot dead offscreen, not even by a main character, is something I never knew I needed in my life. This show makes so many choices and all of them make me want to take the tops off the writers' heads and dissect their brains.

But I digress.)

Usually when he’s on the receiving end of that stare, Hopper’s digging for something to tie him to anything from the giant GO TIGERS spraypainted across the courthouse to the beer cans and partygoers hastily hidden all over the house behind him to the rotten eggs splattered all over the side of a police cruiser, and the best course of action is to look wide-eyed and innocent and only say ‘No, chief, I have no idea about that’.

Just given who they are and what their respective roles in the community have been up until this point, there is a deep, rich vein of hilarity in Hopper and Steve both ending up in the Upside Down crew (I'm still pushing for 'fellowship' to refer to everyone who Knows, it's thematically and textually appropriate!) that has yet to be mined.

Happened the same year they opened up that lab south of town.

I'll be honest, I avoided saying much about how the events of canon went down in this 'verse on purpose. Partly because it's Season 1 and our POV character is Steve, who never gets told anything until it's much, much too late, but also partly because I didn't finish Season 4 and don't care enough to seek out spoilers to know what happened. And I think that what Season 4 tries to establish as Lore could have some serious bearing on what would make sense for the backstory to the canon events in this story. So. Please fill in the gaps as appropriate.

Steve drums both hands against the desk, and the librarian gives him a flat, unimpressed look that’s almost the twin of the one Hopper gave him in the reading room. Apparently he just has this effect on adults.

Steve Harrington ADHD.

Jonathan’s so busy sawing at the last of the vines still wrapped around Nancy’s ankle that he doesn’t notice the thick central stalk of the plant…thing pushing back up through the crumbling ground behind him.

I wrote a post about this and now tumblr won't let me find in search on my blog, because it won't show me basically any original posts I made between about June of last year and now in search on my blog, for some fucking reason. But. The way I conceptualised it is that this thing Nancy and Jonathan fought is the most stripped-down, basic trueform of a vampire in this 'verse. The two of them got infected while they were fighting it. Basically it planted seeds or spores or whatever it uses to reproduce into their bodies, and then grew throughout those bodies, intertwining its central stalk with their spines and its vines with their nervous systems so it could animate the bodies even after its intrusion killed them. Jonathan and Nancy both still have intact (or mostly-intact) brains, intact senses of self and memories. But they've also got new biological needs and new, compelling instincts that can overtake their higher brain functions in the right circumstances. And if you stripped away all the meat and muscle, you'd find something that looks an awful lot like this evil plant that tried to eat them growing on a trellis made out of their bones.

Vampires in this 'verse are a kind of parasitic fungus. (Which is also why ingesting their blood can affect the behaviours and brain functions of other people, and even make others like them.) I think this is the coolest shit and I will not stop talking about it. That is all.

(Also. Steve's still hot and bothered about it. That's important too.)

Nancy’s not sure how long they sit there, together, clutching each other and just trying to breathe.

Neither Nancy or Jonathan can see much of what's going on around them at this point, so I'm pretty sure this is where Brad found them. And how Brad found them.

Nicole’s not bad-looking, and she’s a fun time at parties even if she is kind of a nerd. And they’re both single right now. Steve’s not sure why he suddenly wants to pull away.

It's because you're already hopelessly in love with two other people. Hope that helps.

I can kind of understand how and why the fandom sort of collectively forgets Fred existed. I wouldn't say he was the biggest standout of Season 4's crop of cannon fodder for me, either. But you show me a weedy little nerd of a character who's using a prickly sarcastic sense of humour to deflect from a truly monstrous baggage of survivor's guilt and blame around unintentionally hurting someone he cared about in a way that can't ever be ameliorated or forgiven, and then be like 'yeah everybody in-canon and in the fandom kinda forgot about him lmao', and. Well. Now I gotta do something meaningful with him. I gotta.

Also, he made a good red herring suspect.

He thinks about Nancy’s apologetic smile as she said she thought she’d enthralled him, about how Jonathan had said or you’d lose your mind, and wonders, for the first time, how they know.

I also got to this plot point by writing Nancy and Jonathan's turning, stopping, realising they would not know any other vampires, and wondering, myself, how they heck they'd know all that stuff about blood and thralls. The answer that presented itself was: firsthand.

When she tries to raise her arms, to pull away the covers that have somehow gotten wrapped over her face, she bumps into something flat and cold and solid barely a few inches above her.

I learned after writing this that apparently the fridges in a morgue are like one big open space with all the rolling trays sliding back into it, not like a narrow slot for each tray with top, bottom, and sides. Oh well.

Nancy pulls the letterman jacket she’d been wearing from the plastic bag full of her clothes that they’d found in the trash. Her expression is mournful, almost stricken, as she takes in the ragged slashes torn through the leather of the sleeves, the frankly astonishing size of the rusty red-brown stain surrounding a single puncture in the back. It makes the tiger applique look like its snarling mouth has just taken a bite out of some fresh prey.

Have I mentioned lately that I love heavy-handed visual symbolism?

...the dingy little trailer he calls home.

Okay, so in the fifties, as I found out after I'd finished writing this, the mobile home park was still more in the 'new and exciting' category than what it would have been in the eighties. Think less Trailer Park Boys and more tiny home. However. I did not do extensive research before writing this, because I was most interested in the vampire part. And it seems to me that the kinds of people buying or renting holiday trailers to live in year-round would still have been people who thought it made more financial sense than buying a permanent building. It's also possible that Jonathan and Joyce's family were in a better position at the time they moved in than the one they're in as of this fic.

It’s been made clear to Steve on multiple occasions that one of the few rules he actually has to follow in this house is don’t bother your father when he’s in his office. 

I talked a lot about what I think of Steve and his parents and their relationship and how a lot of it boils down to 'they're rich and self-centred and they're raising him the same way'. This is part of that - Steve's internalised that there are some rules that apply to him, and some that don't, and that that's just how things work, some rules apply to some people and not to others, some rules don't matter and some rules do, and it's all a matter of whether someone more powerful than you will punish you if you get caught breaking them. It seems consistent with his Season 1 characterisation, and also, it's some foreshadowing, in that it shows how the person who taught him this thinks.

Everybody knew old Gower drank like a fish.

Yeah, this name was lifted from It's A Wonderful Life. It's not actually relevant to the story, just a fun fact.

She can feel the tension in Jonathan’s arms, before she lets go. But he doesn’t raise them again. Trusting her completely.

...

Nancy doesn’t resist. She doesn’t protest. She just lets Jonathan pull her away from civilisation and deeper into the woods. Trusting him completely.

Parallel presented without comment.

“You didn’t tell me you dated my dad.”

...

“In Dracula. The vampire’s servant is named -”

...

"And from how you both apparently think humans are just here for you both to mess around with ..."

So, in case it's not clear (because Steve hasn't realised it yet, so it's deliberately oblique), this whole fight is actually about him feeling envious over Nancy and Jonathan's relationship, and between the two of them together and finding out about Fred and about Nancy dating his dad, feeling like he's not actually important to them in the way he'd kind of let himself think he was, but only one in a string of people they've used and abandoned. Steve's feeling like he cares way more about them than they do about him, and also maybe he's a little scared by how much he already cares about them. And also he doesn't have the emotional intelligence to identify correctly how he's feeling and why, so he takes it out on them both.

This is not a recommended course of action for dealing with monsters than can tear you open as soon as look at you, by the way.

“Steve,” Nancy says, like Steve’s a dog who’s just pissed on the rug.

He is really not feeling valued in this relationship, folks.

Also, like in canon, Jonathan will take anything mean anybody says about or to him. But the instant you drag his family into it, it's game over.

She only lives – her family’s house is ...

I made the same mistake Nancy does, went to correct it, and then went, 'ohhhHHHHHHHH'.

Chapter Three

I really, honestly did think this was going to be the final chapter of this fic when I started writing it.

I like Tommy and Carol because like. They're not evil, they're just high school evil. I like them best as people who genuinely like and care about each other (and Steve), who just have absolutely no idea how to express that in a positive way without the forces of high school social politics dictating how they interact with each other. Likewise, I think Tommy both looks up to Steve and resents the fact that he's second to Steve, and is always looking for little opportunities to both impress and one-up Steve. (Which is part of why he's second to Steve - because he's too obvious about how much he cares. High school, man.)

Except. He’d been so angry when he’d thought Jonathan was a murderer. Like Jonathan had personally betrayed him. Steve’s not sure what that means. If it means anything. He’s not sure he wants to think too much about it.

Some fics I write are about the slow development of feelings between characters. Not this one. Steve caught feelings before the story even started, and the rest is just him slowly realising that that's happened.

Trying to lay seeds of evidence for the solution to the murder plot while misdirecting readers away from where they're actually supposed to point is hard, but also so much fun. I tried to make each of my clues, independently, be something that could point in two or more directions. So, for example, Fred's notebook with his evidence that there was foul play in Nancy's death being missing after the crash points toward his accident being intentional, and the actual murderer trying to suppress the evidence, but it doesn't point to one specific suspect. Personally, I thought it suggested the lab most strongly. But when you put it all of the evidence together, you start to see that some of those alternate options cancel each other out, which leaves only the one, true murderer right in the crosshairs.

It's a technique I'm going to be carrying forward in my plotting in the future. After all, when you boil them down, most stories are, at heart, either a mystery or a romance. And romances are a kind of mystery, because you need to be leaving and developing clues about why these people like each other, and -

Anyway.

“Nance. It’s okay. It’s been thirty years. I’ve made my peace with it. I’m dead.”

I love Jonathan 'resigning myself to it so I don't have to hope for anything because hoping for something and (inevitably) not getting it would break me in half and somebody in this family(/relationship) has to be The Strong Reliable Okay One' Byers and love and consideration breaking down his shitty coping mechanisms so much. I also love undead characters being matter-of-fact about not being human when it clearly bothers them more than they want anyone to know. Two great tastes that taste great together.

And tried not to think too hard about the last time he’d had a girl who wasn’t Carol up here.

Steve: it's not weird that I'm thinking about sex while I'm inviting Jonathan and Nancy into my bedroom. Nancy's here and I'm in love with her. So it's not weird.

Steve straightened up and turned around with it in hand, only to catch both Nancy and Jonathan watching him intently. “What?”

They were both staring at his ass while he was bent over with his back to them, here.

(That's not a joke, that's actually what I was going for.)

"... You, obviously, and Brad, and Chief Keller, and anybody they might’ve told about it, I guess…”

Another thing about laying clues - it's good if they can have more than one logical interpretation, because then you can have your characters put the pieces together and move forward based on entirely the wrong logical interpretation, and then your characters don't look stupid or oblivious. (Unless, of course, that's what you want.) But, it's also good to keep bringing up the actual right answer to the mystery in conjunction with those clues. Not so much that it's obvious. Just enough so that the actual solution is kept in the reader's mind, so when the big reveal comes they're not going 'wait, who? What? Why? Where did he come from?', but 'OOOOOOHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhh.'

Did I get this in this fic? That is for you to tell me. But that's what I was going for.

He was interrupted by a choked noise from Jonathan, and a disbelieving, “Chief Hopper? Chief Jim Hopper?” from Nancy.

I just think that characters having different perspectives on each other is a rich vein to be mined for characterisation and also for hilarity. And also the idea of these two being older teenagers when Hopper was in middle school just demanded to be brought up.

And since when does Steve care so much about what Jonathan thinks of him, anyway?

He is so stupid (affectionate).

“- said they lost the bodies, Joyce! Lost them! ..."

This fic was specifically about Steve and Nancy and Jonathan, and in Steve's POV, so I didn't really get to get into the other two parallel storylines. But I did want to give a sense that they were going on, and also a glimpse at what was going on in them. It's one of my favourite things about Season 1.

“This isn’t funny, kid. What, is Bill Hagan’s boy in the bushes with a video camera? ..."

Every interaction Hopper and Steve have ever had before today makes it absolutely reasonable for Hopper to come to the conclusion that Steve is playing a cruel practical joke! He's wrong, we as readers know he's wrong, but he doesn't have the luxury of our perspective on Steve and it makes sense for him to think it! I just love it when characters have impressions and perspectives of each other that are shaped by their experiences with each other, and are necessarily incomplete, biased, influenced by their own prior experiences, and not the same as the impression or perspective the reader has! It makes characters feel whole and distinct from each other and human, to me!

"... I mean, you are vampires. I still don’t even know what you eat.”

Oh, he did ask! I'd forgotten. Would've been in character for him to just conveniently forget, though.

... Steve’s sure would have had the neighbours calling in yet another noise complaint if they weren’t in Bermuda...

I love a good foreshadowing, don't you?

“You can’t be Mike,” she’s insisting, in the face of all the evidence. “Last time I saw Mike, he was just two years old.” “So was Will, Nancy,” Jonathan says, so gently. It’s sweet how hard he’s trying not to laugh. “No. It has not been ten years since the last time we were here. That can’t possibly be right.”

This, unfortunately, is just what being an adult is like.

He doesn’t even really understand what’s going on. Something about making a sensory deprivation tank, or maybe a battery? The kids had all kind of been talking over each other when they tried to explain. But apparently, this pool full of body temperature water and road salt is supposed to help them find Will Byers. Somehow.

Is it really even the season's big group DIY project if Steve Harrington doesn't not fully understand what's going on?

“The way I lost it on Steve, the other night,” Jonathan says, flatly. “That’s not – he’s a complete stranger, he shouldn’t have been able to get to me like that. I shouldn’t have let him get to me like that. And you, nearly turning him -”

Jonathan Byers: The only possible explanation for how crazy we've both been acting over Steve is interdimensional interference. The only possible explanation.

If these three could communicate with each other for five minutes and all get on the same page, there would have been no story.

Steve is so hot for everything inhuman about Nancy and Jonathan that it's almost embarrassing and I love that for him.

Were Nancy and Jonathan not sure about how to get into the lab because I wasn't sure how to get them into the lab? I'll never tell, and I'm sure you'll never guess.

Nancy and Steve calling each other 'Nicole' and 'Brad' in their fake fight was unreasonably funny to me. Actually, the whole fake fight was so much fun to write. I considered cutting it, because I'm not sure it adds anything to the story as a whole, but...well, this is fan fiction. Also, I wanted to give Steve a chance for his strengths to shine and to save the day in front of the two people he most wants to impress. He was angling hard to get himself and Nancy taken inside so he could 'call his dad'. And it almost worked, too.

That warm, wet something trickling down Steve’s forehead chooses that moment to drip into his eyelashes, sticking them together for a moment.

We all got that Steve realised he was bleeding and that Jonathan was injured and likely to attack him over it, and then went over to try to help Jonathan anyway, yes?

Something moves under Steve’s fingers, those black veins shifting in Jonathan’s throat like living things, and Steve has to swallow down bile. 

Parasitic fungus!

There’s no emotion Steve can discern in Jonathan’s voice at all as he says, “I’ll kill you.” Steve has maybe never thought so fast before in his life. “Like Nancy with the dog,” he says, and Jonathan lets out a shuddering exhale.

Jonathan's trying his hardest to scare Steve off for his own safety, make Steve think he's threatening him, but Steve stops and thinks about it first, unlike when he jumped to the conclusion that Jonathan was a murderer, and - correctly - identifies it as a statement of fact. That Jonathan won't be able to help himself, because he's injured badly and needs blood. I figured this whole interaction was the moment Jonathan finally mentally went aw, shit, I'm in love with this stupid stubborn asshole.

“You’re not really much of a killer, man.”

Specifically, this exact moment, when Steve completely backtracks on everything he'd said the previous night about Jonathan being a murderer and places his life entirely into Jonathan's hands.

It's not really all that much like what he’d imagined, the other night, with his hand down his boxers. But fuck if it isn’t still lighting up those crossed wires in Steve’s head like the Fourth of fucking July.

The older I get, the less I'm interested in vampire bites ~not really hurting at all~ and ~inducing euphoric bliss~ and the more I'm interested in the people on the receiving end of vampire bites just being huge fucking masochists.

And he knows he’s never seen her with that dead-eyed, monstrous face on before. Steve’s dick does its level best to give an interested twitch about it.

In The Lost Boys, the only vampire/half-vampire who we don't get to see with monstrous, freaky vampface on is the female love interest. I think this rather denotes a lack of courage.

Chapter Four

I wrote pretty much all of chapters four and five as one piece, and then waffled over whether to split them into two. I even polled he studio audience here on tumblr (though not actually with a poll because I was late to get polls). I'm pretty sure the result was 'one big-ass long chapter please'. And then I went ahead and split it into two anyway.

It’s an uncomfortable feeling, having somebody else, somebody he’s made a practical career out of lying to, invent him such a plausible alibi without any input from him.

The thing is, while the perception of Steve that Hopper has from seventeenish years of shenanigans is incomplete, it's also not wrong. It is a spooky feeling to know you've been perceived, and with more recognition and understanding than you'd realised, but the person doing the perceiving still doesn't like you.

They’re both making their arguments like they’re concerned for Steve. But Steve, slumped in the backseat, resting his aching head against the cool glass of the rattling window, knows them both well enough to know that what they’re really fighting about is his dad’s fucking around. He’s heard them make the exact same arguments, in almost the exact same words, about who’s going to stay home and take care of his dad’s tropical fish.

Tell me you had a kid when you should have gotten a dog (okay, well, maybe you also shouldn't have gotten a dog) without telling me...

"...The things we do for our ungrateful kids, huh?” Hopper’s eyes narrow, a little.

If you can't tell that Jim Hopper would cheerfully strangle this man in cold blood and broad daylight just to have a chance to get stuck staying home with his concussed kid, then I haven't done my job.

“You’re lucky to be alive, asshole,” Carol agrees. Steve can’t explain why his chest suddenly feels so hollow.

...

“And thanks for saving my life or whatever, I guess.”

...

It hurts more if Steve presses his fingers against the bandage just over where the bite mark’s trying to scab closed.

I spent a lot of time wallowing in the sense of missed opportunities and squandered chances that leads Steve to take some stupid, risky chances - like, for example, confronting somebody he thinks is a murderer to his face. He's clearly missing Nancy and Jonathan, and feeling like he's missed his one chance with the both of them even though he'd never put it into words like that at this point, but also - he's trapped in the house with people who genuinely don't care enough whether he lives or dies to worry about him for his own sake, and feeling like maybe he doesn't, either. He was ready and willing to die happy in the woods that night, and now he's been denied that, and he's staring down the barrel of up to eighty more years of just the same mundane tedium and catty, shallow relationships and bullshit.

I had to raise the temperature slowly to a boil, to get this boy ready to do something drastic, and it's one of my favourite parts of this fic.

The lady at the ticket window tells him that with the Greyhound drivers’ strike, she can’t guarantee he’ll get to wherever he’s going when he wants to be there.

I found out about the Greyhound strike in the 80s when I was doing a little googling to figure out how likely it'd be for them to have a route that'd take Steve out to Pennhurst, and absolutely had to toss it in. For historical flavour, and to hammer home the sense of isolation and futility. It just dovetailed so nicely.

She looks over Steve’s shoulder, at the woman who’d reached for him, and smiles warmly, though there’s still steel in her voice as she says, “And you’d do well to remember you’re a guest in his house. Evelyn, stop trying to mooch cigarettes off the visitors, you and I both know the doctor doesn’t want you to have them.”

'Spooky scary asylum inmates' is a shitty trope that sucks. Steve absolutely 100% would have no other schema for mental illness, though. I tried to thread that needle by having him react initially with horror to the weird, strange, freaky behaviour of the inmates, and then recontextualise that behaviour as like. yeah she just wants to bum a cigarette. what's your problem. Also to keep reminding Steve that hey, you were like three drops of blood away from being in that exact same position, and your future health and sanity is Not Guaranteed. Not sure how much any of that succeeded but. There was only so much lipstick I was gonna be able to put on that pig.

Why Steve can’t just leave it alone. His life is better, they chorus in the theatre of his imagination, if he just shuts up and keeps his head down and pretends not to notice or care like the coward he is.

There is a question that the show raises and that I think this fic is asking, which is, was Steve always the kind of guy who'd go running to the rescue with a bat when it came down to the wire and people's lives were on the line, no questions asked, or did he need Nancy's influence to let him become that? And the answer is yes. I do like how in canon it's Tommy's goading about how Steve always runs away that ends up getting him to go face his fuckups and his fears. How it's his old friends, being their shitty selves, who help move him toward becoming a better version of himself. I have several emotions and none of them are coherent.

“Hey, I’ve got to get going, I was really just passing by – but when Jonathan comes back, let him know I was looking for him? That I wanna talk to him? Or Nancy, if you see her.”

In my original draft, Steve came straight home from Pennhurst and went and confronted his dad. (Well, okay, he had dinner first.) And then I realised there was no reason for Nancy and Jonathan to break their 'we're going to stay away from Steve so maybe we don't accidentally murder him for real this time' streak, and they probably wouldn't be coming to the rescue. Which is why this scene's here. However. I like it a lot and I'm glad it's here. Steve very awkwardly trying to interact with anyone other than Nancy and Jonathan immediately post-Season 1 gives me life.

... or some kind of strategy to stop Logansport’s freakishly fast point guard from kicking all their asses.

I did Actual Research for this line (read: I looked on Google Maps and compared the positioning of Hawkins within Indiana on the Season 2-3 geological survey map to small-ish cities in the area who could believably be high school rivals to their sports teams, and also looked at the Wikipedia page for 'basketball'). I will have it appreciated.

Of life before it all turned upside down on him.

I will not stop making stupid jokes and that is a threat.

His mom jokes over dinner that maybe Steve should be concussed more often, it’s been so quiet and peaceful around the house. 

A+ Parenting

I talked at length about the confrontation between Steve and his dad, so I won't rehash it.

“You should know,” she says, taking a single step toward them, as slow and deliberate as her nod. “After all, you were the one who killed me.”

Nancy Absolutely Did Not know this until approximately ten minutes ago. She is doing a fantastic job of bluffing.

“I didn’t,” Jonathan says, low enough that at first Steve isn’t sure if he really heard it at all. “You believe me, right? I didn’t.” “What? Barbara? I know that, he has no idea what he’s talking about, can we just go?”

Jonathan still can't quite believe that Steve doesn't actually think he's a heartless, remorseless killer without anything human left in him. Mostly because that's sort of how Jonathan's been thinking about himself for the last thirty years. (Remorseless killers usually do not have this much angst about their lack of remorse, Jonathan. Protip.)

Chapter Five

After what he’s heard, tonight, he doesn’t want to give his dad the chance to say that Steve went after him, that the knife was self-defense. That a combination of the concussion and some local history project just deluded Steve into thinking his dad was a killer.

I got a lot of comments on chapter four about how Steve's dad wasn't thinking and how was he planning to get away with murder after he killed his own son in his own office in cold blood. I let myself go down the rabbit hole a little thinking about how, exactly, he would try to get away with it. And I think Steve knows his dad well enough by now to have a pretty good idea.

It turns out that limping into a police station covered in your own blood is a great way to get a lot of attention very quickly.

I'm just very proud of this line.

“Jesus, Harrington, they’re gonna have to start giving you frequent flyer miles.”

I promise I didn't set out writing this fic planning to nearly kill Steve three separate times. It just...happened.

... Hopper shoots an awkward, try-hard grin in Steve’s direction and drops into the chair beside his hospital bed. “Heyyyy, kid. How you feeling.”

I just think Hopper's absolutely abysmal bedside manner in Season 2 is the funniest thing. And. Well. Just made myself sad thinking about the possible reasons why he's so bad at being normal beside a hospital bed with a kid in it. Okay!

It seems to me to be a very popular trope for Steve to end up getting kind of pseudo-adopted by Hopper and Joyce. I see why it appeals, but it's never clicked for me. And yet. The logical progression of this fic led me here. Never say 'I'll never write...'.

At least Will sounds slightly less accusing than Mike Wheeler had when he says, “What’re you doing here?”

We collectively as a fandom do not honour Will Byers' sassmaster energy enough.

“Yeah, no shit I’m upset. What was that? Just drop me and run like an unwanted baby at a firehouse?”

Steve is...kind of a fascinating contradiction in terms, in some ways, to me. I see a lot of fanon where he's very much a sick cat about things that bother him, that he'll shut down and try to hide what he's feeling for the sake of other people, and I don't think that's wrong necessarily but I do think it's...incomplete. Like, maybe he would downplay the seriousness of his own hurts and how much they're affecting him if being honest about them would hurt other people...but that absolutely doesn't mean he's not going to bitch about them. Loudly.

“Witless protection program,” Jonathan says.

We also as a fandom collectively need to appreciate how funny Jonathan is more often.

This whole confrontation was a bit of a balancing act. I didn't want it to turn into an angstfest. There was a certain degree of 'avoiding you for your own good'/'denying my feelings for your sake' mutual pining going on in this story, and I really needed there to be a good reason why these characters didn't just communicate with each other (or, at least, for the characters themselves to feel like they had a good reason). I also didn't want to wallow in that misunderstanding, because quite frankly it drives me batty when characters who are mutually into each other end up in a situation where it's almost unavoidable that their true feelings must come out and they must communicate, but they squander it on doing everything in their power to deliberately interpret everything the character they're into does or says as rejection, and deliberately hiding all of their actual thoughts and feelings to try to drive off the character they're into. Like, at a certain point you step past obliviousness and into 'yeah maybe you guys shouldn't be together, actually, if this is how you're gonna be'. These guys aren't communicating well, but god dammit, they're communicating.

It’s so – direct. No hesitation. None of Jonathan’s usual holding back. Just confidence, certainty.

Jonathan Byers has never been hotter than that moment in the hallway in Season 1 where he's throwing that lighter and that's just facts. It's the purpose, clarity, and confidence.

Jonathan devours his mouth like – like he’s starving to death and Steve’s an open wound.

I was proud of this line, too.

... and turns on the smile that’s made half the female population of Hawkins High turn cherry-red and suddenly become very amused by the floor.

This is totally the face he gave Nancy when he was trying to convince her to play 'strip flashcards' in s1e1.

...Jonathan’s got an arm around her waist and his face pressed into the crook of her neck, pressing kisses to the pale skin exposed by the slip of her robe. She raises an arm to cradle his head...

And this is absolutely the Dirty Dancing pose. Minus the side-skimming hand gesture that tickled Jennifer Grey badly enough to bust out laughing.

“I don’t have any blood flow,” he says, sounding defensive. “It’s got to be within a couple hours after I’ve eaten if you want me to, uh.”

I went back and forth on whether to include this, and finally decided I was leaving it in because it made my friends laugh. And because I love speculative fantasy xenobiology in action. 'But Mary, drinking blood won't introduce it to the circulatory -' I already told you these vampires are a parasitic fungus animating dead flesh, right? The fungus uses fine tentacle-vine-root-things woven through the flesh to puppeteer it? And the fungus feeds on blood, which means it uses blood for energy to, for example, move its limbs? I can bullshit this one if I want to. (Which I do.)

He remembers thinking the snake was beautiful, even as he was nearly pissing his pants in terror that it’d bite him. And now that he’s thinking about it, that comparison feels a little on the nose.

I got halfway through writing that first sentence and realised it needed a lampshade, badly.

Carol even styles Steve’s hair how he likes it, when she’s done. And there’s no way she could’ve known how looking in the mirror and seeing the hair that earned him his nickname perched on top of the haunted, battered face of a boy Steve barely recognises would make him suddenly and unexpectedly feel like throwing up.

The metaphor here may be a little unsubtle. Carol and Tommy are actually trying to be good friends to Steve, in their own, selfish, high-school-politics-influenced way. And it's got to hurt when he rejects that. But they're trying to make him feel better by getting him back to his old self. And that's only making it worse.

... some four-eyed fairy who took Nicole out to the movies last weekend in this classic car he’d restored. For this cardinal sin, one of Tommy’s buddies tracked down the auto wrecker’s where the kid’s been keeping the car while he works on it, so tonight –

I stand by my theory that Chrissy Cunningham's name is a reference to Stephen King's Christine. And so is this.

... Steve’s dating two people at once. (He tried that, once before, with Laurie and Becky. It did not end well. With the benefit of hindsight, knowing what he knows now, maybe he should’ve just asked them both if they’d be cool with it. Although he thinks the answer probably still would’ve been no.)

It is very important to me that, even when he is Having Self-Affirming Realisations and Growing As A Person, Steve is still a teenage boy.

Nancy, it turns out, likes gritty courtroom dramas.

It took me a while to figure out what kind of movies I think Nancy would like. John Grisham adaptations and Twelve Angry Men seem up her alley, though.

Jonathan’s shoulders are starting to hunch forward, turtling in on himself. He still hasn’t even moved to touch the glass Steve put in front of him.

As far as I know it's never explicitly stated in canon that Lonnie Byers is an alcoholic, and he's not even Jonathan's dad in this fic anyway, but it just makes sense to me that Jonathan does not enjoy drinking or being drunk or being around drunk people and I'm going to carry that through in everything I write.

The guy who helps Steve find what he’s looking for really knows his stuff, even if he can’t seem to resist a cheesy pun.

I love Bob Newby and I'm going to shoehorn him in everywhere I possibly can. That is all.

The scene with the kids and the D&D game was pure self-indulgence. If I were a better writer or this were a more professional piece, I might have cut it. However, this is fanfiction, and driver picks the music.

I moved Steve out to California one part so that I could do this whole thematic bit about Nancy and Jonathan choosing him, choosing to stay with him, one part because I realised I really had burned his life in Hawkins down to the ground and the most hopeful thing would be for him to be able to start over, and one part because I just thought it would be fun.

“We’ve got nothing but time.”

This was a little bit a nod to we have the time.

There was no way this fic was ever going to be complete without Steve getting to at least meet Robin. They have a beautiful friendship ahead of them.

(I've got to be honest, I've never vibed with Argyle. He annoys me on a fundamental level. But there was something about including him in this scene and in the nascent relationship between these versions of Robin and Steve that just...worked. As with Murray and Owens, whether or not a character is unbearably irritating can be a matter of which other characters they get to bounce off of and what they bring out of each other as much as that character in a vacuum.)

And that's all she wrote! I still have a vague, half-formed idea in my mind about a sequel (Barbara Holland wasn't as dead - or perhaps quite the kind of dead - that everybody thought, and El opening the Gate got her brought back as a specimen for experimentation, and something something something the US government is trying to weaponise vampirism and something something) but it never congealed into an actual plot so it's unlikely to ever materialise.

(I will tell you, because I'm not planning to write it anymore, that I had an idea for a scene where Steve, in thrall to the military's vampiric supersoldier, is forced to lure Nancy and Jonathan into a trap, and then successfully rules-lawyers his instructions into letting him cut himself so that his blood can distract the less-experienced vamp and Nancy and Jonathan can tear the bitch apart. Which would have left Steve mentally fine but physically more durable and slower to age. Felt it was a rather clever way to thread that needle. No I didn't steal this wholesale from Stephenie Meyer's Eclipse shut up.)