#joyce is worried about will having two incidents

[brionysea]

you're kidding me. mike is doing TEN TIMES WORSE than the season's Designated Trauma Character. what if i blew up the sun

[henrysglock]

Do you have any thoughts or head canons about Eleven?

I have so many thoughts and headcanons about her...I don't think I'll be able to recite them all aldkfjkladsf

She uses White Rain apple blossom shampoo and conditioner. Sugary scents are too overpowering, and she doesn't like to smell like Products, so she settles on fruit. She's also been known to use rose hip shampoo/conditioners too.

When she was in Hop's cabin in 1984, she got creative and invented a breakfast wafflewich (sausage patty and cheese between two eggos). It's become a staple, especially when she's feeling down about being bullied or missing Jim.

She loves to draw, even if she's not very good at it. Mike gets her into creative writing, though, and she starts inventing the wildest "there's no way something like this could happen" stories that are clearly based around things that did actually happen to her. The author's barely-concealed trauma.

Sometimes, right before bed, she radios Hop's cabin. Just in case.

It's very easy to get her to try new things. She might pull a face, but she'll go into it with full determination. This did not work out well in California, where she tried sushi for the first time. She stuck a whole chunk of wasabi in her mouth to prove a point and had to deal with The Consequences.

She's a dog person. At first, she liked little dogs best because they're easy to evade, but once she actually met a big dog, she begged Joyce to let her have one. Joyce said no, citing some dog named Chester that they had to give away in 1983. Something to do with Will. El doesn't blame Will, but she does vow to get a big, fluffy dog once she's an adult.

If given the chance, she would ask Max to dye her hair for her. I don't mean brown or ginger, either. I mean purple, blue, multi-color. And then she'd end up deciding she likes her natural hair best, meaning she spends years growing it back out because the dyed parts were so fried.

She likes to sing, but only when no one is around (except Max). As soon as someone opens the front door to come home, she stops like a startled animal. It gets better with time, but its one of those weird things she struggles to shake off.

She doesn't try to go to any of the Byers for help in school—she doesn't let Joyce see her grades, she doesn't ask Will or Jon for advice. <- She's afraid of looking weak or stupid, and of being a burden. She thinks she should be able to handle it all on her own.

She's a certified meatloaf hater. Brenner's damage to the world is truly irreparable.

She didn't like onions at first—or she thought she didn't, because the lab never used onions in their meals. She tries onion rings with Hopper and falls in love.

She loves watching figure skating. She thinks the girls and their dresses are so pretty. But after the incident at Rink-O-Mania, she's too averse to rinks to pursue it recreationally. She's always worried she's going to end up hitting someone with a skate, intentionally or not.

She got to go trick-or-treating in Lenora Hills, even though she's 14. Joyce convinced Jon to take her around, and she had a blast. She went as Princess Leia, partially because Mike infodumped to her about Leia.

She loves vanilla scented candles, but only in very small doses.

She loves Christmas lights on snowy houses, even if she doesn't quite understand the holiday. She asked Jim if he could drive her around so she could see them all once back in 1984, and it became something of a tradition.

She's ride-or-die for hot cocoa, but only the powdered stuff that comes in a tin. She eats the marshmallows separately.

She's jealous of anyone who plays an instrument. Like...so jealous.

When she first got out of the lab/stayed with Jim, she loved just watching the weather. It was so foreign and new that she could sit, enthralled, and watch an entire rainstorm pass through. Thunderstorms are her favorite, ever since Jim taught her how to count between lightning and thunder. <- She misses them in Cali

She's tried, half-heartedly, to play video games with Will. I say half-heartedly because she isn't very good at them (lack of practice), and she feels like she's holding Will back. She's fine just watching Will play, though.

When she eventually gets a mobile phone, she absolutely decks it out in charms and whatnot.

If things had gone differently in 1985, and she'd gone to HS with a happier Max, she would have worn stupidly bright clothes and entirely too many bangles. And Max would have loved every minute.

El would have LOVED tamagotchi. She'd name it Mr. Fibbly 2.

Her favorite flavor of pie is sweet-potato. Yes, it's different from pumpkin pie, and yes, she can tell the difference immediately.

She was taken out to Olive Garden once and thought it was fine dining. No one had the heart to correct her.

She doesn't like soda very much, but she's a big fan of juices.

She can power through a brick of cheese in one day if she's distracted enough.

Whew. Okay. I'm leaving it here for now.

[gayofthefae]

@elhopperentourage Oh, it's much more than that. If they didn't want Byler, Mike and El would have never been separated in the first place.

And a great point in there is that, yeah, some of the things they do to emphasize Byler are like...just a little insulting to the others if it's not romantic. Why aren't the others there? Do they not love Will as much or something? What are you trying to say?

Mike is there for a singular reason: in 2x04 he prioritized differently than every other member of the party. His entire plotline, every scene he's in, is only him missing Will until it resolves at the end in him convincing Joyce to let him inside. They even do the classic thing where they show you the resolution but not the payoff to get you to watch the next episode so he goes inside to see Will but we don't follow him in until the next episode.

But everyone else was focused on finding Dart. Something might I add, he was previously very passionate about, specifically, even, in another parallel to El. They could have done something with that, had him come around to understanding, I don't know. Or if they wanted him to not pick up for Dustin's plotline, they could have had him so focused on El.

YES! They could have had the Max's board at school thing jumpstart a whole thing that separated him from the rest of the party instead. Will's story is mostly supernatural, it doesn't really change on the surface without Mike. Anyone could have realized the spy thing. Just Joyce and Jonathan could have told him they loved him.

If you need him in danger for El to see in Chicago, he could have ended up at the lab for reasons related to her, not knowing the others were there like the rest of the party didn't, then he's in danger with Hopper and that motivates El to come back.

But yeah, now I'm thinking about her being at school and how that could been played up more as them just missing each other. That she goes to see her mom and to Chicago and he can't find her but he's more committed to looking this time, whatever. But instead, Will got attacked right then. And what's more, once again, everyone was there. The others didn't do what he did. He heard from Will on Halloween but he didn't need to do anything with that.

Well, arguably he did, which brings to that setup for the season. Will didn't need to tell him and only him to give him a setup of info only he had to worry over him with and use to convince Joyce. Really, they could have done a lot with isolation for Will if Mike hadn't been there. Plenty of trauma and abuse themes there. But they didn't. And the argument they make, as always, is that it wouldn't have succeeded the same if they had.

But they wasted an inciting incident. They wasted an inciting incident. They wasted an inciting incident. I'm thinking so hard about it now I never thought about it like that. That was for El and El only. El saw Mike and Max so that it could make her angry and leave. Mike saw El, thought about her for two seconds, then went back to Will and didn't mention her again until prompted by Max.

He nearly SAW El. And instead of motivating, if anything, it was his breaking point to tell himself "I've been seeing her when she isn't really there for too long. I need to let it go." and going to Will.

Mike framed and made his own arc in season 2 have something to do with the classic "sacrificing the past and grief so you don't lose your present and future". Valid and good message and story every time. But to do that, which is good, then have the person he realized he needed to prioritize over not be dead...and him adjust THEM to his present and future(and us forgetting hey, that other guy did experience his prioritization which seemed to be going somewhere and kinda got left in the dust, until it's brought up to us directly)...juicy juicy juicy.

thinking about the hospital in season two again and…

why was mike even there if not to develop byler?

like think about it. everyone else there is an adult (minus will ofc) and all there other friends are dealing with individual problems. but mike is there for will the entire time. the entire season mike spends worrying about will. you could argue this is because they’re “just really good friends” but the other members of the party are also friend with will. mike chooses to follow will around basically the entire season. it doesn’t make sense for him to be written this way if him and will are just “best friends.” why not have mike worry about his “real” romantic interest? maybe his and el’s relationship isn’t as important to the show. maybe their relationship isn’t meant to last. maybe this was the writers trying to show mikes feelings earlier on…

[fyrefrostanimus]

Oh yay more OC posting!

Unlike the other two these guys actually were posted elsewhere before tumblr (it was DeviantArt before anyone asks) and they have some established backstory. But I wasn't really settled with the colors or even the full designs, so I thought I'd finish them up and post them here.

There's even more characters in the specific OC universe they come from but I'll stick with the main two for now.

So Arlen is a little guy. He's 9 years old. He's also a vampire. Not like he wanted to be, though.

Arlen's family hunts werewolves since the town they live in hates them and they get good pay for it. The other main group of werewolf hunters is some vampires who are paid in blood (quite literally). You probably see where this is going and Arlen gets jumped as someone in the vampire group seemed to miss their dinner. He gets bit multiple times in this incident and that's enough to start him becoming a vampire himself.

Instead of doing the actual right thing and seeking to at least stop the vampire who attacked him from attacking anyone else (or seeing what caused the attack), his family insisted that Arlen would work with the vampires so he doesn't attack anyone and gets the whole "being a vampire" thing handled. Which would mean working next to the vampire who attacked him. He runs off out of stress and not wanting to deal with having his hand forced into something he doesn't want, and that's where Arlen meets Blue.

~~~

Blue is half werewolf. They don't look human, but they're not quite a wolf either.

Other than their dad, Blue's entire family is full born-werewolves. They live in town, while Blue is on the outskirts of the forest raising sheep so they can eat and sell the wool (usually through their father, since they're not really welcome in town regardless of if they're friendly or not). Living alone in the woods isn't exactly convenient, but at least it isn't too loud, doesn't smell like in town, and people aren't hunting you down because you look a bit too wolfy. The werewolf part of Blue's family comes to their place on the full moons so they aren't wandering the forest that's regularly patrolled by hunting parties out to kill them (their mom Loren isn't about to make the mistake of letting them get her loved ones again).

When Arlen shows up on their doorstep, Blue's hesitant to let him in: his family is actively trying to hunt down werewolves like their own version of game hunting, after all. But the fact the little guy smells like his own blood and looks like he's seen a lot recently is a big factor, so they check to make sure no one's waiting to ambush them and bring Arlen inside. Hearing about the situation, Blue's not surprised that he wanted to get away. Having to work with someone who did something bad to you you're not ready to forgive yet is one thing, but it's another when it completely ruins your life and keeps you from getting any older than 9 (which Arlen was not aware would happen and it makes him even more mad). They give the kid as much time as they need to stay here so his family doesn't find him, even making sure that their own family knows he's here and he's not going to hurt anyone.

Blue and Arlen quickly forged a parent-and-child bond, not wanting to be separated for too long (especially not vampires, since not only is Arlen nervous around them from the incident but he's also worried about them dragging him back to town and killing Blue).

Some trivia because why not!

Blue actually knows a lot about vampires, having to watch out that they don't kill their family and all.

Blue's family is their mom Loren, dad Denholm, and half-sibling twins Peregrine and Maple. The twin's dad is Joyce, although he's not here anymore (Blue wasn't born when he was alive).

Blue actually looked a bit like a vampire when they were younger! They had the pointy ears and canines, but the ears weren't as big and they didn't have a tail or claws. When they hit puberty the other wolf traits started to show (including their hair changing into the fur color Loren's wolf form has).

Blue's a strict carnivore, can't really get anything from plants and eating too much veggies could make them sick.

Arlen's little neckband in his ref has cross patterns on it, and they actually can burn a vampire who's not expecting a nervous little 9-year-old child to slam their neck onto their bare skin. The only reason he's not affected is that it's two layers thick, with the inner layer not having the patterns.

Arlen gets the blood he needs from Blue's sheep (since he doesn't need to actually kill them to eat it still makes sure Blue has a food source).

Arlen's first time in bat form was STRESSFUL. He had no idea what just happened and why everything is so big and he was disoriented. Even after grasping that Arlen had to learn to fly and he slammed into so many walls.

Both of them grow winter coats in the colder months.

I mixed different versions of vampires into this world so I should probably explain how they work for sake of simplicity:

Born vampires, sired vampires, and turned vampires are actually all a bit different! Born vampires of course have fangs and slightly pointy ears, and while sired vampires look about the same they have mental bonds with the vampire who sired them (basically they have an extra psychic power in some ways). Turned vampires look a lot different, having a lot more bat traits such as the big ears and getting fluffy in the winter. Very rarely vampires will be herbivores (think fruit bats instead of vampire bats), and it's much harder to find turned vampires of that variety since they're less apt to bite enough times.

Siring needs a personal bond of some kind (platonic or romantic both work). Turning just needs more bites and is hard to do accidentally.

Vampires can go out in the sun, and survive on any type of blood. Human blood is the usual, but exceptions like Arlen exist.

Silver and stakes to the heart are somewhere in the middle. Prolonged contact with silver won't kill a vampire but may not feel that good, and a stake to the heart will paralyze a vampire for as long as the stake is in (if you take it out they'll get back up and it'll hea;).

Touching crosses (in general in this case: it's not meant as a religion thing but I didn't want to leave the cross weakness out), crossing running water, and garlic have negative affects on vampires here. A cross touching skin will burn, crossing running water makes them want to throw up, and garlic turns on their fear response (plus it smells strong to their sensitive noses).

That's really all I can think of saying here and it's already a long post

[undertsums]

Nuzzles for comfort

NOTE: This is mostly a pre fall into the void thing but I have two that are after and I'll let you know when that is. Also these are not skeleton kisses, nuzzles are a more platonic way to show affection and care for those you are closest to.

Roman sniffled as she cried, she asked just one simple question to Webdings. "Doc...Why don't you show me affection?" She asked because Shadow brought it up to her, he told her that affection was something everyone shows to those they care for. Roman never expected Webdings to freak out, she got yelled at for a pointless question, that she 'didn't need affection'.

Roman felt hurt...She thought maybe Webdings did care...But now she knew. "There there" said a familiar voice. Roman sniffled as she looked up to Shadow as he pulled her close "I did warn you...But it's okay, you don't need affection from her" he said. Roman tilted her head slightly "w-why not?" She asked, Shadow placed his nose on her forehead "because I'll give you all the affection you need" he answered.

Roman smiled and sniffled "m-me too" she said as she sat up slightly and nuzzled his forehead with her nose. Shadow smiled "that's right, just me and you" he whispered pulling her close in a hug.

*Scene shift to before the Gyftmas party incident in Season 1*

Roman was drawing with Joyce, Toriel came into the room and gave Joyce a forehead nuzzle with her nose. Roman stared as she felt her soul shift, when was the last time she gave a nuzzle to someone?

"Roman?" Joyce's voice pulled Roman from her thoughts, oh...Was she staring? Roman smiled and stood up giving Joyce a nuzzle who was a little shocked at first before smiling "have you nuzzled anyone else before?" She asked curious. "I think so...But I don't remember who" Roman said, Joyce frowned "do you ever worry why you can't remember your past?" She asked. Roman shook her head "not really, maybe it's for the best I don't remember, what if it was awful?" She suggested.

Joyce looked sad "I hope it wasn't...Your so sweet and nice, I don't know anyone who would treat you harshly" she replied, Roman sat down "I mean there's Error" she replied as Joyce giggled "he doesn't count, he hates everyone."

*Scene shift to Season 2*

Shadow was in the middle of a really good book, it was very late but sleep is not really something he needs. Well okay...He MIGHT need it but he just...Can't. He heard soft footsteps and looked up from his book to Neela standing in the doorway "oh...S-Sorry, I thought maybe you were mom" she said.

Shadow stared, Neela's body was shivering, she looked tired but also very much awake. Ah...Nightmares. He closed the book he was reading and laid it on the small desk "come here" he said patting the chair. Neela stared for a moment before joining Shadow on the chair, she wondered why he was up and was about to ask before Shadow placed his nose on her forehead. It was a nuzzle, it made Neela smile, Shadow felt comfortable enough and wanted to show Neela affection in a time she needed it.

"There there, nothing scary can hurt you now" Shadow said pulling away with a smile, "did you nuzzle Roman like this too?" Neela asked curiously. Shadow's memory flashed to that time...Comfort and affection, something he never got but saw many times. Anytime he had to pull away a parent from a loved one, they would quickly do a nuzzle of affection, a last goodbye.

Back then he didn't care, but now...He had those he wanted to comfort and cared for. "Yes...Many times when she needed comfort" he replied, Neela frowned "what about you?" She asked. Shadow smiled "once...I didn't need the comfort" he said, Neela stared and reached up and nuzzled his forehead before pulling back with a smile "you deserve it...Is that okay?" She asked.

Shadow smiled and pulled Neela close in a hug "more than okay...I guess I really did need that" he said, Neela giggled slightly.

After about an hour she would drift off into sleep, Shadow was careful in carrying her to the bedroom she was sharing with Joyce.

His memory would bring up times when he would forcefully drag kids to their doom, but now here he was, careful, gentle. He laid her down and tucked her in. Memories flashing of tying down innocent kids to a table, ready for experiments.

Shadow floated out and instead of going back to the chair decided to try to sleep. Maybe...Maybe the nightmares won't wake him up.

The screaming, the begging.

Maybe...Just maybe he'll have enough comfort...He could only hope.

[formosusiniquis]

There's something about the idea that every adult that spends more than ten minutes alone with Steve Harrington is instantly enamored with him 

The King Steve era house parties don't get broken up by the cops anymore. Steve is too far from his nearest neighbors for a noise complaint and the cops who would do it like Steve. They know they don't have to worry about any underage drinking and driving incidents after a Steve Harrington party because anyone who doesn't have a DD just crashes at the Harrington place, it's not like they have to worry about getting out of there before his parents get home.

His teachers can't help but let certain things slide. Excusing a middle school Steve's tardiness, the Harrington house is such a long bike ride away from the school and the bus route doesn't reach the grounds of Loch Nora. High School Steve's grades are average at best and his attention drifts, but his questions if poorly worded are insightful at heart and if you catch him away from the friends he tries too hard to keep he's polite and willing to spend time discussing his school work. By senior year they're excusing his tardiness again, they all know he has to swing by the middle school on his way over; and his forgetfulness too, two concussions in as many years it's a wonder he's not worse.

Joyce Byers, who by all accounts should hate this boy who fought her son and belittled her family, already has a snag in her armor thinking about a little boy who used to bike to Melvalds all alone for more milk and the sugar dusted cereal his mother didn't like him to have. Has her walls damaged by Jonathan coming home with a Christmas present they both know Nancy Wheeler even in her middle class glory couldn't afford. Has the adoption papers ready to be notarized when that same little boy, just a little bit bigger, offers to cart her Will around town since he knows she and Jon are busy and he has nothing better to do; really, and Will is the only one that ever says please or thank you.

Hopper, who largely left the everyday police work to the other officers, didn't interact with Steve much until the Upside Down business started. He's ready to add Harrington to the list of kids he'd die to protect the second the bloodstained boy cracks open a bleary eye from the Byers' sofa. Concussed and happy for it since it meant the youngest ones were safe.

Claudia Henderson has decided that the law has little to do with family. She's seen too many young men in the hospital grieving loved ones they can't see while parents who don't care make decisions for the dying. Steve Harrington is hers now has been since he did her Dusty's hair. The Sinclairs only let Erica roam the mall on her own on days they know Steve is working. They know no matter what Erica and Lucas promise the two of them aren't staying together. There's something rotten in Hawkins, and the kids don't whisper as quietly as they think they do. They know there's something they are missing, but they don't need to know everything to know they can trust the boy who put himself bodily in front of their child to protect him. Karen still occasionally mourns the loss of Steve as a son-in-law but the fact that he still drives Mike around even on his surliest days, she couldn't ask for more.

Wayne Munson lasted the longest. A product of night shifts and a powerful wariness around anyone whose tax bracket exceeds his by more than one jump. But he knows the kind of skittish that Steve is, remembers an eight year old boy with eyes he hadn't grown into who used to skitter away from a sharp tongue or raised hand just the same. Even then all it takes is sitting next to Steve on a rare night off, the game fuzzing in and out on the TV, listening to him softly explain the rules of it all to his boy relating it back to the ones of that dragon game Eddie likes so much and he's gone. Steve's a hard worker, a wage slave as much as Wayne these days, seems wrong to begrudge him just cause the house he's kept at is a little bigger than theirs. There are worse boys to have as future in-laws, even if he is a Cubs fan.

The only person who doesn't seem to get the memo is Richard Harrington. So rarely around his own son he isn't swept up in the charm. Richard and Stephanie Harrington make their way back to Hawkins, unannounced on a Tuesday. The sleepy morning hours are still lingering when they make their way into the house, through the foyer, and onto the kitchen; following the sounds of crooning oldies. Richard has long thought his son a disappointment, too lazy to get into college and too spoiled to leave home, catching him dancing around the kitchen like a fairy with some trailer trash punk is really the last straw. He lets the wife he wishes he didn't have make some asinine comment to this freak that's in his kitchen, and turns to the child he never wanted to say, "I want you out, I won't have a queer living under my roof."

Stephanie and that long haired bastard both rear back like they've been slapped. While Richard is forced to watch as the son he's neglected straightens up, every ounce the man every other adult on Hawkins has watched him become, look him in the eye and say, "It's not your house, it never was. Grandpa Otis left it to me. So if you've got a problem with me or my fucking boyfriend, you can get out of my house. Looks like you're already packed."

That empty house gets emptier as Richard, alone, takes the furniture he paid for and the clothes that lingered in the closet; but it's quickly filled with the hand-me-downs of everyone who has ever fallen for that Harrington charm. They're all too happy to help Steve fill what's his.

[vitaegratis]

creelsclocks​:

Ever since Joyce gifted him a carving knife for Christmas– Henry had tried to dodge the Byers on the holiday after retrieving their son from the Upside-Down, knowing their hearts were way too big for their body, but he’d been unsuccessful in the end– he’s been carving in a much more dedicated fashion. It’s a beautiful knife, too. Sleek and black-handled, its jagged little teeth glinting in the light every time he peels a layer of the wood away. It happens smoothly, as if he’s skinning a potato— much easier than having to make do with a blunt kitchen knife from the Munson trailer.

Since Creel’s Clocks’ grand opening, he’s invested in many tools, many knives, yet his Christmas gift from two years ago remains one of his favourites.

                                                                    ❝ Oh? Like what? ❞

Because in his mind, Eddie and Wayne have always been the teachers. They opened not only their home to a boy that knew nothing about the outside world, but their hearts too. The level of patience they had to have to be able to educate him as thoroughly as they did is still unfathomable to Henry.

                     ❝ Are you sure you’re not underestimating yourself again?                                        You tend to do that a lot, you know. ❞

Eddie smirks, watching Henry with the knife. It’s small, but sharp - something that on the surface looks like it could be dangerous, but it’s not a weapon in Henry’s hands. It’s a tool - he uses it to create. Seeing him like this, in the shop, in his element... Eddie never fails to get a kick out of it.

"Well not to get all sappy, but how to be brave, for one. Or... braver. It’s not something that you consciously taught me even, it’s just... look, you’re a little bit older, you’re the one with powers... but you still, uh. You depended on me. You needed me. No one ever had before... not really. I was in over my head, I had no idea what I was getting into...  and once I caught on I was scared out of my gourd. Not of you, but y’know. Monsters. Men in suits. Hell, even before... everything, in the interim? The idea that someone might take you away from us, or that you’d be dumb and leave to try and protect us, or... I know it’s stupid, that you don’t need me to do it in particular... and I know I haven’t always done the best job - but I’ve always tried to look out for you. I never really took anything seriously, before. There’s a lot that I still don’t, and...”

It’s not that Eddie underestimates himself, he’s just... self aware. Like the incident a few months earlier with the mind-flayer; they still haven’t talked about it all that much. He knows that there isn’t much that he can say or do. He also knows that it all doesn’t all fall upon him now, and that’s… it is a relief. He’s not jealous - Nancy is great, and El is family by proxy. He’s glad - hell, he’s proud that Henry has this larger support system now, this shop to escape to, this life… he’s just. Unsure of what his role in it is, at this moment in time. “...and I’m still pretty frickin’ scared, if I’m being honest. I’m not going to put words in your mouth, I know you still need me, but... and I know that I’ve never really been capable of protecting you... but I worry about you. I can’t help it, and, uh. I don’t want you to worry about me, worrying about you, so I just... put on a brave face. Pretend like everything’s fine until it all hits the fan, hang around the shop to remind myself that you’re still here, that you’re ok...”

This... confession, unloading it all on Henry...

He hadn’t planned for it. He feels awful about it. Shit.

[loveronlineee]

I’m Okay (Eddie Munson x Reader)

Masterlist

Eddie Munson x Reader (She/Her)

Warnings: Swearing

Synopsis: The older kids get trapped in the upside down and are desperate to find a way back. Luckily Y/N and the kids can help. (This is basically just the last episode of S4 part one)

Y/N notes: shorter than Eddie

Wanna be on the Eddie Munson tag list? Look here!

Wanna request something? Look here!

Nancy, Robin and Eddie rushed downstairs, hearing Steve repeatedly call out for Dustin. They were confused to find Harrington frantically looking around the Wheeler’s empty dining room.

“Maybe he really does have rabies.” Robin mumbled to herself.

“Steve, what are you doing?” Nancy called out. He shon the torch in their faces, making them all squint.

“He’s here. Henderson. That little shit, he’s here. He’s like- He’s in the walls or something. Just listen.” The rest of the group fell silent. And soon enough they started hearing him too.

———————————————————————

“And that brings us to the question you first raised. How and why is there a gate at Lover’s Lake?” Dustin paced back and forth as he talked. The Sinclair siblings listened, sitting at the dining room table. “Let’s analyse. What do Eleven and Vecna have in common?”

Y/N leaned on the counter from the kitchen. Her leg bouncing up and down as her anxiety got worse and worse. She was only half listening to the younger kids, her mind too preoccupied worrying about Eddie and the others.

“I should’ve gone with them. I should’ve gone…” She repeated to herself again and again.

———————————————————————

“Dustin!” Nancy called out as the older kids looked around. Robin and Eddie joining in.

“Dustin!”

“Dustin!!” Steve sighed.

“Alright either this kid can’t hear us or he’s being a total douchebag.”

“Wait.” Robin said, holding a hand up. “There’s another voice.” The group fell silent once again.

“…did Steve have to go too?” The other voice said, a mix of worry and annoyance in their tone.

“It’s Y/N.” Eddie said, recognising her voice instantly. He began yelling again. “Y/N! Y/N it’s Eddie! Can you hear me?!”

“Can’t help but notice you got a lot louder Munson.” Robin teases. Eddie sighed.

“Yeah whatever she’s my oldest friend and I know for sure she wouldn’t be acting like a douche in this situation, unlike Dustin who I’m not too sure about.”

“You sure you two are just friends?” Nancy asked. The older kids had had their suspicions for the last couple days.

They didn’t even know Y/N knew Eddie until the incident with Chrissy. It made sense though, Y/N had already graduated and would have been in the same grade with him. It was still a shock at the amount of panic they found her in when they were rounding up the group.

Y/N was always standing the closest to Eddie. They’d constantly ask each other if they were okay. She’d hold on to his wrist in fear of losing him again. Eddie would stare at her a lot. When she was talking, walking, listening to others. No matter what, his eyes were on her.

“Yes Wheeler, we’re just friends.” He might have been telling the truth but the slight sadness in his voice made the group know he wished it was more.

“He’s the fuckin babysitter not me.” Y/N’s voice came back in, but she definitely couldn’t hear them. The group chuckled, hearing Y/N talk to herself. It was somewhat comforting to hear such mundane words in a situation this dire.

“Come on Y/N.” Eddie mumbled to himself. “You were always the smart one, get us outta here.”

“Will found a way.” The group turned to Nancy.

“What?” Steve questioned.

“Will. He found a way to speak to Joyce through the lights.” She headed to the nearest lamp and started flicking the switch. She quickly got frustrated. “It’s not working…” Steve shone his torch up at the ceiling.

“Guys?”

———————————————————————

Dustin continued to ramble as Lucas tried to take it all in. Erica had gotten bored and started looking around. She noticed the lights had started flickering.

“Are you even listening to me?” Dustin asked, sitting down in the empty chair. Erica kept her eyes on the light. “Y/N can you help me out here?” The older kid looked up at him, then at Erica.

“Yeah I’m listening.” Erica said “It’s just-“ She stood up and began walking closer. “You said you followed Vecna through lights, right?”

“Yeah, why?” Dustin questioned. Y/N’s eyes widened, understanding.

“Because I think he’s here.” The older girl immediately stood up and rushed over to the kids, standing in front of them.

“Okay I’m no Harrington but I’m sure as hell gonna do my best as the babysitter right now-“ Y/N stopped talking and looked closer at the flickering lights. She knew that pattern. Morse code.

“S…” Dustin whispered. “…O…S.

“Eddie.” Y/N said.

———————————————————————

The metal head closed his eyes and smiled. Appreciating the comfort in hearing Y/N say his name.

“How’d you know it’s Eddie specifically?” They heard Dustin question. There was a pause before Y/N answered.

“Because I taught him that.” The group looked to Eddie who was smiling like an idiot.

“I used to meet Y/N at her house at night and we’d hang out. We’d go watch a movie or buy snacks from the 24 hour convenience store. If she used her flashlight saying S.O.S, that meant she was grounded and I’d help her climb out her bedroom window instead.”

“And you’re not dating?” Steve questioned. He shot Nancy a side glance. This was starting to sound a lot like when they were together. Eddie sighed.

‘No guys. We are not dating.” He looked at all three of them. Robin folded her arms.

“But like… why not?” Eddie wandered around in a circle, swaying his arms as he talked.

“Because… I’m Eddie the freak and she’s Y/N the… she’s the best.” Eddie chuckled to himself, thinking about her. “She’s just the fuckin best a-and she can do a lot better than me.”

That’s when they understood.

“Dude don’t think like that.” Steve said. “I’ve only seen you guys together for like two days and I know for sure she likes you. Trust me. I know all the signs.”

“Yeah?” Eddie looked at him.

“Yeah dude. Just go for it.” Steve could see a little glimmer of hope in the metal head’s eye.

———————————————————————

Dustin and Y/N gave each other a look before turning to the Sinclair siblings.

“Hey uh, remember when I said they wouldn’t be stupid enough to go through Watergate?”

“Yeah?” Lucas said, dreading he already knew what Dustin was gonna say.

“I overestimated them.” The kids looked up at Y/N for help.

Oh fuck right I’m the adult in this situation. Shit I am not a good leader in instances like this. Okay keep calm. What would the others do? Nancy would think of a plan. Steve would put the safety of the kids first. Robin would make jokes to ease the tension. And Eddie… would probably be looking after me. Fuck I wish he was here right now.

She looked back up at the ceiling, eyebrows furrowed.

“Okay lights, lights… I’ve got a plan. Where’s Holly?”

———————————————————————

“That’s my girl.” Eddie smiled.

“I thought she wasn’t your girl?” Steve said, souring Eddie’s mood.

“Shut up it’s not like- like it’s.. it’s different cause-” Eddie continued to attempt to form a sentence as the other three smiled knowingly at him.

“Guys!” Y/N’s voice called out to them. “Go… Nancy’s room! We’ll…. there!” The message was hard to hear but they got the important parts.

“Okay let’s go.” Nancy stated. The four ran back upstairs, following the familiar voices and looking around for the orange glow.

Soon enough one appeared just above the bed. They knelt around it. Dustin could be heard partially from the other side.

“… seeing this?” Nancy moved her hand around and it glowed brighter. That was a good sign “Okay we’re gonna unplug it stand by! … okay try now!” Nancy tried again, hearing excitement from the other side. “Okay that worked!!”

The group all cheered, knowing that they were one step closer to getting out. Nancy began to write.

Stuck.

“… can’t get out through Watergate?” Dustin replied.

“What the hell’s watergate?” Steve questioned. Robin figured it out.

“Cause it’s in water and it’s a gate.” The group nodded.

“That’s cute.” Eddie commented.

Guarded.

“Okay uh Watergate’s guarded. We think we have a theory that could help with that!” The group nodded.

“Genius child.” Robin said under her breath.

“We think Watergate isn’t the only gate! That there’s a gate at every murder site.” Nancy frowned.

“Does anybody understand what he’s talking about?” She asked. The group shook their heads. Nancy sent them a question mark. Dustin yelled something back.

“Jesus Christ this kid’s gotta get his ego in check.” Steve sighed. Eddie leaned forward.

“It’s his tone, right?”

“I know.” Suddenly Y/N’s voice came back in.

“…tin give them a break. They’re stuck in the fuckin… down right now. You gotta watch that tone sometimes…” Eddie chuckled at Y/N’s words. The others looked at each other again knowingly.

“So… so how far is your trailer?” Nancy asked Eddie, making a plan in her head.

“Seven miles.”

“Uh Nancy?” Robin piped up. “I know your house is here like weirdly, creepily frozen in time and shit, but haven’t you always had bikes?” Nancy’s eyes widened as she wrote again.

———————————————————————

“Trailer.” Lucas read. Y/N stood up.

“They got it. Let’s get Max and go.” The kids got up and ran downstairs. “We’ll meet you guys there!” Y/N yelled before following them.

The group managed to escape the Wheeler house and make it to Eddie’s trailer. Dustin pulled on the front door.

“Shit! It’s locked.” He looked at the others hoping they would have a suggestion. He noticed Y/N kicking rocks over further away. “Uh Y/N???” She flipped another one over with her foot and smiled.

“Bingo.” She picked up a key off the ground and headed to the boy.

“Oh and how many people know about that?” Dustin questioned, a cheesy grin on his face.

“Just me.” Y/N replied so matter of factly as she unlocked the door. The group followed her in to find a gate on the ceiling. “Well Dustin you were right.”

Y/N headed straight for a room at the back of the trailer and came out with a broom. “Okay everyone stand back.” The kids did what they were told, Dustin with a smile on his face.

“You seem to know this place pretty well Y/N. Come here often?”

“Dustin I swear to God I’ll throw you through this stupid gate if you don’t shut up.” She’d let all the comments from the last couple of days pass but now was not the time. Y/N poked the broom through the gate, making a hole. “Please be there. Please please please.” She said quietly to herself.

She threw the broom down and looked straight up. The kids walked over to join her. No one was on the other side. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Come on guys come on.”

“Y/N?” A familiar voice called out from the other side.

“E-Eddie?” The metal head emerged, the rest of the group with him. Y/N slapped a hand to her chest and breathed the biggest sigh of relief .

“Oh thank God.” She ran a hand through her hair as Dustin gigged and waved at them. It was trippy to see both groups on either side looking up. “Okay okay great now we just gotta get them on this side.”

“We can make a rope.” Dustin said.

“Great. There’s some bedsheets in Eddie’s room.” Y/N said as she headed over, the kids following her. “We can tie them together. Oh and we can use his mattress as a landing pad.”

“You seem to know a lot about Eddie’s room.” Dustin commented. “Specifically his bed.”

“Not in the mood Henderson.” Y/N snapped back as she helped Lucas pull the mattress up. They placed it below the gate and Dustin grabbed the rope they made.

“Not quite sure how these physics are gonna work but uh… here goes nothing.” Dustin threw one end into the gate. “There we go. And if my theory is correct…”

Dustin let go of the rope and it hung from both sides. The groups stood there amazed. “Alright pull on it! See if it holds!” They watched Robin yank the rope and it stayed in place. Success.

“This is the craziest shit I’ve ever seen in my life.” Erica said. “And I’ve seen some crazy shit.”

“Okay okay everyone off the mattress! Robin’s coming through.” Y/N said, pushing the kids back softly. They watched Robin climb the rope and then begin to fall down.

“Oh my God!’ She hit the landing pad and sat up. “Oh thank God. That was fun.” She said with a smile as Y/N gave her a hand up. The kids continued to watch the rope as Y/N pulled Robin to the side.

“You okay?? What happened to you guys?” Y/N asked, checking Robin over for any injuries.

“Yeah yeah I’m fine. Steve might need some medical help though.”

“Yeah I saw he was bandaged up. I think there’s a first aid kit in the-“ Before Y/N could say anything else, Eddie fell through and landed safely.

“That. Was fun. Shit.”

“Eddie…” Y/N said in an almost whisper. She walked over to him as he got up.

“Y/N! There’s my little Velma Dinkey. You and the mystery gang really solved this one.” She didn’t speak. She just wrapped her arms around him, just needing to feel him. To know that he was really back there with her. “W-Woah okay, miss me much?”

“I was really fucking scared dude.” Y/N managed to say, her words muffled in Eddie’s shirt. He could tell she was on the cusp of crying from the wobble in her voice.

“Hey hey Y/N, it’s okay I’m fine! We’re fine! We’re all fine.” Eddie reassured, putting both his hands on her shoulders and pushing her a little away, wanting to see her face. A single tear falling from one eye.

God she’s pretty. Was Steve really right? I mean she’s a lot more worried than I thought she was gonna be.

He looked up at Robin behind her. Her eyes widen and she nodded at him. “Uh hey let’s get some stuff for Steve. It’s in my room.” Eddie held on to Y/N’s hand as he led her.

He closed the door behind the pair and started looking through drawers. Y/N sat on his bed and wiped the tears away from her face. She took a deep breath in then out to compose herself.

“Fuck. S-So what exactly happened? Why did you guys go through the gate?” Y/N asked.

“Steve dove into Lover’s Lake to take a closer look and something grabbed him and pulled him in.” Eddie explained as he continued to look around. “We- well those two ladies followed him and I didn’t want to be left alone so I went too.”

“And what happened to Steve?” Eddie spun around to look at her.

“These crazy little bat creatures started attacking him. Like eating his sides.” He described it, deeply disturbed. Y/N stood up and walked over to him.

“And it was just Steve who got bit? Right?” Eddie smiled at her obvious concern for him.

“Yeah it was just Steve. I’m fine. The ladies are fine.” He saw her sigh of relief. “You did amazing on this side.”

“That’s what you think. I was stressed outta my mind! I’m never the adult in a situation like this! I always look to other people. I was so fucking scared you guys were gonna die and it was gonna be on me.”

“Well we’re back now right? So you did it.”

“I had to think about what you guys would do if you were here with me.” Eddie chuckled.

“I probably would’ve just ran. Because apparently that’s what I do now.” He looked down at the ground and fiddled with the rings on his finger.

“But you wouldn’t have.” He looked back up at her. “Not if I was there. You would’ve stuck with me.”

“Nah I would’ve ran and taken you with me.” He joked. Y/N laughed and shook her head.

“And I would’ve said no so you would be stuck with me and the rest of the group.” She replied. Eddie smiled and wrapped his arms around her, still looking down at her face.

“Well you got me there.” Y/N moved one hand to rest on the side of Eddie’s face.

“I’m really glad you’re okay.” Eddie gulped. The space between their faces was getting smaller and smaller.

“I’m glad you’re okay too.” He mumbled before closing the gap. He pulled her in closer as Y/N’s free hand moved to the other side of his face. Her hands traveled up the back of his neck and into his messy hair. Feeling themselves smiling against each other, only pulling away to breathe.

“I can’t believe it took us a near death experience to finally get to this point.” Y/N commented. Eddie chuckled, resting his head in the crook of her neck, playing small kisses all around. Y/N placed a hand on his chin to guide his lips back onto hers.

“Yo guys did you find the OH MY GOD-“ Dustin opened the door and immediately regretted it. He ran back into the living room screaming. “OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD-“

“DUSTIN I TOLD YOU TO KNOCK-“

“I THOUGHT YOU WERE JOKING!!”

[willbyersdevotee]

Will Byers cooking but make it hcs and mental images.

Steve used to babysit him, right after the UD incident, and one night he was particularly tired because of school and stuff, so he ended up falling asleep on the couch while they were watching a movie.

Will was a really quiet kid, not to mention kind, so he obviously didn't wake Steve up once he got hungry, he just went to the kitchen and got to work, careful not to make too much noise

Then Steve wakes up, panics, checks the time, panics again because oh shit that's right I forgot about dinner, finds Will in the kitchen and “???”

Will on the other hand is humming quietly to himself and serving two, extremely inviting, plates of scrambled eggs, grilled cheese and a bowl of salad

he sees Steve (who's sort of like.. staring because this kid looks like he knows what he's doing, and thats fucking weird??) and smiles at him, asks him if he slept well and stuff

so then they sit down for dinner and everything is so good Steve almost couldn't belive little Will Byers had cooked it all on his own

and then they talk and Steve asks where and why he learned to cook and Will tells him that

he sort of... had to learn to cook, with Jonathan and Joyce working a lot and him being home alone more often than not

plus he wants to help how he can, and if that's by letting them worry about one less thing then so be it

so by 11 he could make eggs, grilled cheese, various kinds of pasta etc. etc. The basics, really.

(Steve, rich kid Steve who never had to worry about things like that, ESPECIALLY not at Will's age, teared up a whole lot little.)

I'm such a sucker for Steve and Will tbh, I want more of them, I want Steve to look at this child and decide he'll protect him with his life.

TW: MENTIONS OF LONNIE BYERS//

Now, since we can't not mention him, Lonnie. He never wanted Will to cook said it was a woman's job, not a man's, used to tell him it'd just turn him into more of a queer.

END TW (yeah I didn't have much to say about this)

may I also raise you: Will cooking/backing snacks for the Party

Some more potential for s3 angst huh :)

him making a snacks for the campaign and everyone ditching him :)

BUT we also have WONDER TWINS!! WOOO!!!!

Will teaching El how to bake and cook<3

it's a little hobby they share and bond over

El asks him to teach her how to make herself useful so they start doing chores together and stuff <3

[stranger-marauders]

fractured

nineteen: reunited

chapter summary: After Eleven reunites with everyone at the Byers' house, the group comes up with a new game plan to close the gate for good.

chapter warnings: language

word count: 1.9k

series masterlist | masterlist

KATE LOWERED HER gun as she watched Mike move closer to Eleven.

As far as everyone in that room knew (besides her and her father, of course), El had died after defeating the Demogorgon last year. Neither Kate nor her father had told any of them that she hadn't died because of the threat to her safety. While it had impacted everyone involved in the first incident involving the Upside Down, it had certainly affected Mike the most (he had taken care of El in secret in his basement for a week whenever they had first become involved with the Upside Down).

Even though Kate and Hopper immediately recognized the girl in front of them, making them lower their weapons, and Mike moved closer to her, Steve was completely confused. At first, it didn't click into place for him; he had only been concerned that this random girl had somehow killed a Demo-dog with her mind, proceeding to throw it through Joyce's window and then unlock the door with her mi—oh. He didn't dare ask because he very quickly realized that this must have been Eleven, the girl with superpowers he had only heard about, except now she had short, slicked back hair instead of the buzz cut. He knew he couldn't be the only person with any hesitations, right? "Is that...?" Max started, but when everyone in the room only stared at Mike and El hugging in front of them, she seemed to get her answer.

"I never gave up on you," Mike said, pulling away from El. "I called you every night. Every night for—"

"Three hundred and fifty-three days," El said, cutting him off. "I heard."

Mike hesitated. "Why didn't you tell me you were there? That you were okay?"

"Because I wouldn't let her," Hopper replied.

Kate sighed as her father stepped closer to El. Her hair was slicked back, her eyes had black greasepaint under them and on her eyelids, and her clothing was all black, which was much different than the flannels she normally wore.

Hopper only seemed to stare at her. "The hell is this? Where you been?"

"Where have you been? And you?" El asked, looking to him and Kate.

Hopper only hugged the girl, and Kate came up behind her, joining in. "I'm so sorry, Ellie."

Before she could reply, however, Mike interrupted the Hopper family reunion. "You two've been hiding her," he said, anger starting to taint his tone. "You've been hiding her this whole time!"

"Hey!" Hopper said, grabbing Mike after the boy had hit him. "Let's talk. Alone."

The two girls watched as Hopper took Mike into another room. Before El could react, Kate engulfed her in a hug of her own. "I'm so glad you're okay. You scared the shit outta me, you know that?"

El started to pull Kate tighter into her arms, but she accidentally grazed the wound on her side, Kate quickly wincing in response. El jumped back, pulling herself away as she noticed the patch on her stomach peeking through the tear marks of her sweatshirt. Her eyes became wide, almost seeming to glaze over. It was almost like she had a moment of realization, one along of the lines of it being her fault Kate had gotten injured. "Hurt?"

"I'm okay," Kate said, shaking her head and trying to smile reassuringly. She didn't want to upset Eleven now that she had just gotten back. "I promise, okay? Don't worry about me, talk to your friends!"

El smiled in response, and with that, Dustin and Lucas brought the younger girl into a tight hug as Kate walked back over to Steve, who looped his arm around the girl to help support her. Before Kate could say anything, Steve said, "So that's why you wouldn't let me in the other night."

Kate shrugged, stifling a laugh. "Yeah, sorry. That shouldn't be a problem anymore for obvious reasons."

"I wouldn't have even known, by the way. I never got to see her. I was also told she had no hair?"

Kate gave him a confused look, but whenever he shot the same look back, she remembered that Steve had only gotten involved at the tail end of that weekend, when everything had happened the first time around. Steve had come to Jonathan's house to apologize for being an asshole, but Jonathan, Nancy, and Kate were there to fight the Demogorgon. While Steve did get to see the Demogorgon, he didn't get to see Eleven, nor watch her in the deprivation tank (or kiddie pool) that they'd built in the Hawkins Middle School gym. "Yeah, well, she did have a buzz cut. Those can grow out, Steven, in case you didn't know."

Steve chuckled, pulling the girl closer to him. "You know, I never thought the Hoppers would be ones to harbor a fugitive."

"You know, me neither. Guess there's a first time for everything."

He chuckled in response. Without another word, Kate leaned her head on his shoulder, closing her eyes. Whenever he looked down to her, he almost melted. Even after everything, she was still beautiful to him. "We should probably go check them soon."

"Like we didn't check them fifteen minutes ago."

Steve sighed. "I'm just worried about you, Kathy."

She gave an unreadable expression. "I'm okay, Steve."

Even though he knew that Kate was far from okay, wasn't even in the realm of okay, he didn't press her on it, only pulling her closer to him. Right now, the only thing that was keeping him from absolutely freaking out was the fact that she was standing right next to him, and helping even more was the fact that his arm was wrapped around her.

It was a feeling that he could get used to, him and her together. Now that he knew the Hoppers' deepest darkest secret, he hoped that Kate had been right in saying that it wouldn't be a problem anymore. He wanted things to be how they used to be, minus the screwing a random girl every other week or so. While he didn't exactly love the fact that she was so hurt, so close to death, he did love the excuse to put his arm around her, to hold her hand. It was his way of supporting her, even if he knew she would later try to fight him on it.

He didn't say anything else to her, letting her mind rest for a moment. Even if she didn't want to admit it, he was sure that working out the Morse code hadn't helped the obvious headache she had. He would've told her to lay down while they figured out the next portion of their plan, but he didn't want to start an argument with her. Steve figured that maybe her father would get her to hang back, and maybe she would finally listen and take it easy for the time being. He feared if she didn't stop pushing herself soon that she would make things even worse than they already were.

Steve watched over her carefully, shifting his gaze in between her and Eleven, the girl that had superpowers. Part of him couldn't believe that everyone else had been so okay with her killing one of these things and sending it flying through Joyce's living room window, but he figured he would just go with it. He didn't want to piss off the girl with superpowers, did he? Part of him could already tell, though, that the girl with superpowers was much more than a girl with superpowers to Kate: Kate loved her like a sister, and Steve knew that without her even having to tell him. It warmed his heart to see that Kate got to be an older sister again.

Kate watched carefully as Joyce explained everything that had happened to El. She had shown her Will, who still lay on the couch asleep, as the group finished their game plan.

"You opened this gate before, right?" Joyce asked her.

"Yes," El replied.

Joyce sighed. "Do you think if we got you back there, that you could close it?"

Eleven didn't reply, but just about everyone knew what her answer would be.

It hadn't taken long for the group to revise their original plan, especially now that they had Eleven to close the gate.

Hopper sighed. "It's not like it was before." He had been trying his best to explain the situation to the group, but most importantly Eleven, who had already agreed to close the gate. "It's grown. A lot. And, I mean, that's considering we can get in there. The place is crawling with those dogs."

"Demodogs," Dustin corrected.

Hopper looked to him with an unreadable expression. "I'm sorry, what?"

"I said, uh, Demodogs," Dustin replied. "Like Demogorgon and dogs. You put them together, it sounds pretty badass—"

"How is this important right now?"

"It's not. I'm sorry," he replied, diverting eye contact with the Chief. It was almost like Dustin was afraid of him.

"I can do it," El said, pulling the conversation back to the original topic.

"You're not hearing me," Hopper replied.

"I'm hearing you. I can do it."

"Even if El can, there's still another problem," Mike said. "If the brain dies, the body dies."

"I thought that was the whole point," Max replied.

"It is, but if we're really right about this...," Mike started. "I mean, if El closes the gate and kills the Mind Flayer's army..."

"Will's a part of that army," Lucas said, filling in the blank that Mike had been leaving out.

"Closing the gate will kill him."

Kate only watched Joyce at the end of the table—she knew she couldn't lose anyone else tonight and she was going to make sure of it, especially since Bob's loss was her fault. Even if no one had said it was, Kate couldn't help but blame herself. She didn't think she would ever stop blaming herself for it, not when he could have still been alive. She wished he would have let her die instead.

Before anyone could say anything else, Joyce moved out of the room quickly. Naturally, everyone followed her to her destination—Will's room.

"He likes it cold," Joyce said, almost to herself.

"What?"

"It's what Will kept saying to me," Joyce explained. "He likes it cold." She closed the window. "We keep giving it what it wants."

"If this is a virus, and Will's the host, then...," Nancy started.

"Then we need to make the host uninhabitable," Jonathan replied.

"So if he likes it cold..."

"We need to burn it out of him," Kate finished.

"We have to do it somewhere he doesn't know this time," Mike said.

"Yeah, somewhere far away."

That was when Kate and her father made eye contact with one another, and she nodded. "You know, I think I know a place."

next chapter

taglist:

@thatsonezesty13 @cece5298 @thepowerstoner @alovelytardis @coolchick333 @stand-tall-pineapple @littlet-holmes @guichu @cinderellacauseshebroke @blackbirddaredevil23 @mads-weasley @ilovemarauders @pearlstiare @liableperfections @khaylin27 @girlwiththerubyslippers

[camaro-and-smokes]

The Smear

Rating: Mature Warnings: No warnings Characters: Billy Hargrove & Steve Harrington Tags: secrets, domestic fluff, fluff, trans Billy Hargrove Words: 1640 Chapters: 1/1

Also on AO3 >>

Author notes: I've been thinking about this for a long while and I just had to write it out. Because I love the idea of Billy like this.

::::::::::

Steve finding out started when he met a stubborn red smear on the bathroom sink.

He thought it was blood, and hoped that Billy hadn't hurt himself badly for whatever had caused the bleeding. He took a piece of toilet paper and tried to wipe it off, but instead it just smeared the sink more. He rubbed it with his finger. It was sticky and waxy. It felt and smelled like lipstick. But they didn't have any lipstick, they were two men living together. Max or El didn't use lipstick. They had maybe some lip gloss, but never lipstick. They were too young for that. Or were they? Steve didn't know and didn't want to. Besides, none of the kids, or rather teens as they now were, had been around his and Billy's place for a good while.

A painful thought of Billy being unfaithful lingered somewhere on the outer reaches of Steve's consciousness, but he locked it away from his mind. Their relationship was doing just fine and there was no reason to suspect anything like that. Maybe Joyce had been over and Billy just hadn't remembered to say about it. She had been around quite a bit lately. There probably was a good reason for the stain and he had nothing to worry about.

A week or so later Steve was cleaning the bathroom when he found a piece of something black hiding behind the soapbox. When he took it in his fingers it broke and stained his hand, causing him to curse. He tried to wash it off, but the substance was such that water just rolled over it. It had to be something Billy had brought in from work, or once again, he'd been working on a greasy part of the Camaro in the house. He'd have to remind Billy, again, to bring that good stuff from his work that could clean all the oil and grease from his hands so that he wouldn’t leave stuff like this behind in their bathroom.

All of these incidents were passed as coincidences by Steve, but the time when there was a piece of toilet paper with a lipstick kiss in the bathroom bin, Steve decided they would have to talk.

"Hey babe, I'm home!" Billy shouted when he came home and closed the front door behind him. When he didn't hear a reply, he went looking for Steve. He found him sitting on their bed in the bedroom. Next to him on it was a piece of toilet paper. "Hey, what's going on, babe?" Billy asked. "Was it worth it?" Steve asked, heartbroken. "What are you talking about, babe?" Billy asked bewildered. "This," Steve said and pointed the piece of paper. Billy's eyes widened when he saw the paper and what was on it. "You know, you having an affair, and with a woman, isn't even the worst," Steve said, on the brink of tears. "But you brought her here, to our home. Probably even had sex on our bed. That's what hurts more than anything." Billy kneeled on the floor next to Steve and leaned his hand on the bed. "Babe..." "Don't babe me! How could you?" Steve screamed. Billy took a deep breath. "Babe, it's not what you think." "Explain to me then what it is." Billy bit his lip and looked down. "I'm sorry I haven't told you. I didn't think you'd find out and I didn't want to tell before I felt comfortable with it." "Oh, that's pretty thick from you." "I'll show you." Billy got up and went to the closet, reached behind the boxes on the top shelf, and took something small out. Then he came back and sat on the bed, next to Steve. "What's this?" Steve asked when Billy gave him a small black pouch. "Open it." Steve opened the zipper. He frowned when he saw the contents. "Is this a sick joke? To rub it in?" "No, Steve, it isn't. It's not a joke at all. They're mine." "Yours?" Steve asked, the frown deepening. Billy kept his gaze tightly on the floor when he nodded. Steve's anger melted away as he examined the contents of the pouch. He took Billy's chin in his hand and turned Billy's face towards him gently. "Firecracker, look at me." Billy kept his embarrassed gaze away from Steve. Steve brushed Billy's cheek gently. "Babe, how long have you had these?" Billy's reply was hardly audible. "I mail ordered them a while back." “You like putting it on?” Billy’s nod was barely visible. “I bet you look beautiful.” Billy looked at Steve cautiously. "You don't find it...disgusting?" “If you like putting it on, why would I find it disgusting? Maybe a bit surprising, because I had to find out like this. I didn’t expect it. But I would never find it disgusting. You’ve always been particular about your looks, and I’ve always loved it. This just...adds to it, in a good way,” Steve said, leaning on Billy gently. “I really wanted to tell you. When I realized that I really liked it. How it made me feel. But I was scared that you wouldn’t like it.” “How does it make you feel?” “Like I’m pretty.” Steve smiled. “You can put it on whenever you want. I definitely won’t mind. In fact, I’d like to see how you look with it.” “You do?” Billy asked, sudden excitement in his voice. “Would you like to see, now?” “Most definitely.” Billy took off his jacket and threw it on the floor as he strode into the bathroom with the pouch.

When he was done he walked out, feeling a bit too self-conscious for his own taste, and leaned on the wall, looking at Steve. When he saw Steve’s expression, a small smile crept on his face. Steve looked at Billy in awe. When he was able to form words, the only one that came out of his mouth was stunned: “Wow.” Billy walked to Steve and stopped in front of him. “Do you like it?” Steve pulled Billy to stand between his legs and hugged him, looking up at him. “You look absolutely gorgeous.” Billy smiled a wide smile and bit his lip between his teeth, a gesture that always made Steve feel weak. "These aren’t maybe the only things I haven't told you about," he whispered. "No?" Steve asked, wondering how many surprises like this he could take before he’d come into his pants just by visual stimulation alone. Billy nodded, but this time the excitement was more reserved. Seeing that Billy seemed uncomfortable in revealing more, Steve didn't want to push it. "You don't have to tell me or show me now. You can do it whenever you feel like it.”

Few weeks later they had invited some friends over. They'd had a fun night, and once everyone was gone, even though it was way past midnight, they were cleaning up a little before going to bed. "Do you mind if I go already?" Billy asked yawning. "No, you go ahead, I'll just fill the dishwasher for morning and come too," Steve said. When Steve got to the bedroom Billy wasn't yet in bed. He didn't think anything of it, he undressed and crawled to bed to wait for Billy. He leaned on the headboard lazily his eyes closed, when the bathroom door opened and the light switch clicked as the bathroom light was turned off. Steve opened his eyes, and almost dropped his jaw.

Billy was standing in the bathroom doorway, feeling very self-conscious. But when he saw Steve's stunned smile, he relaxed a bit. He had put on make-up exactly like Joyce had showed him, proper foundation is everything, Billy, when you want the make-up to stay on, when you, uh...don't want it to smear, accidentally, black kohl that made his eyes misty, mascara that made his lashes even thicker and longer - the way Steve liked - blush, and red lipstick - the shade Steve liked best - and his hair up on a messy bun. But he knew that while he'd done the make-up in a proper way this time, not like the quick mascara he put on normally when he was at home, it wasn't the make-up that had made Steve's pretty mouth hung wide open.

It was the black lingerie he was wearing. Delicate, see through bra with small studs, silk panties, and thin, over knee socks with garters.

"I was finally ready to show you,” Billy said quietly. "Firecracker..." Steve gasped and sat up. "You're...” Steve couldn’t even form words properly for he was in such an awe. “Stunning,” he stuttered. "You like?" Billy asked, still a bit self-conscious, but this time with a shy smile. "Turn around," Steve said. With every oh and oh babe Steve gasped as Billy turned around slowly, he felt less self-conscious and more sure of himself. When he looked back at Steve he almost broke into tears, for Steve looked at him with such affection in his eyes, reaching out his hand. "Come here, my gorgeous, gorgeous firecracker." Billy walked to the bed, got on it on all fours and crawled to Steve, straddling on his lap. "Babe, you are amazing. You are so beautiful," Steve said with uneven voice, hinting emotions taking over the better of him. He ran his fingers over Billy’s cheek, his painted lips, down his chin and neck, to the the bra straps, the thin material over Billy's chest, the sides of the panties - happy to see Billy relaxed enough to get excited too - the garters, the thin socks. "You're damn sexy. I want to see these on you every night from now on." Billy smiled and licked his lips. Steve put his hands on Billy’s buttocks and squeezed. “And I can’t wait to take them off of you.”

[metalheadcowboy]

Hopper had seen Billy upset plenty of times, but never like this. There were no slamming doors, no yelling, no swearing, no throwing, just the shrunken figure of a defeated teenage boy quickly shuffling to his room, door shutting with a hearty, yet soft click.

Oddly enough Hopper was almost certain he preferred the loudness of Billy’s hurt anger much more than the quiet of his solemn sadness. It’s like the feeling was contagious, washing over him like a wave. He could tell he wasn’t the only one feeling the effects as he looked curiously across the table at Eleven, almost as if to test if she too had felt the depressive tsunami, or if she was too caught up in her TV dinner to even bat an eye.

He found her slumped over, almost like her shoulders were weighing her down, fork picking at the soggy peas she normally shoveled in her mouth like it was her finally meal, even if only to get to dessert faster. She only stared down at her own food for a moment before her focus shifted onto Billy’s own still perfectly packaged plate, then to Hopper himself, the inside of her cheek caught between her molars.

Hopper sighed, looking to Billy’s room, the room that used to be his, but gave up because in the wise words of Joyce Byers “teenagers need their privacy, Hop” and he couldn’t argue with that. Speaking of Joyce, he could realy use some of that helpful advice now.

”Is Billy okay?” El asked hesitantly, anxiety quivering in her voice. Every since Billy came to live with them El never stopped worrying about him, never. If he was out past curfew, even if he called, she would be waiting by the door pacing back and forth biting her nails, or if he seemed to take a little too long on the bathroom she would sit on the couch anxiously bouncing her knee until he came out complaining about the lack of towels left on the rack. Hopper always figured it had something to do with past trauma, but never had the balls to ask.

”Uh,” He started, looking back at the small girl in front of him, “I‘m not sure kid.” He knew his wavering words would only worry her more, but he didn’t know what else to say but the truth.

”Hm,“ Eleven hummed, chewing her own cheek trapped between her teeth, “Check?”

The thing was, Hopper wanted to give Billy his space, but in all honestly he was worried too. He hadn’t seen Billy this quiet since the first week that he moved in, since Neil was arrested after nearly beating him half to death and Susan kicked him out, ranting on about some sort of child endangerment bullshit as if he wasn’t the child being endangered in the first place. Not since the incident that they swore never to speak of again where Billy almost met his fate again in the same week. Not since Hopper almost lost this kid twice and he swore he would never let it happen again, and promised to stay true to that promise if it was the last thing he did.

The older man scrubbed a hand over his face, eyes glancing back to the old wood door with ‘Billy‘ scrabbled in runny glitter glue on it.

”Yeah,” he said finally, hand running through this hair that seemed to be thinning twice as fast as it was when he didn’t have two teenagers living under his roof.

The walk to Billy’s room felt like an eternity, like he was somehow walking in slow motion, the same way they did in those cheesy daytime TV dramas that El liked to watch. And yet, with all that time Hopper seemed to have in his walk from the kitchenette, if you could even call it that, to the door, he still hadn’t figured out the best way to approach the situation.

It was like on the other side of the doorway lied a bomb waiting to explode at any moment, he had to be careful, thoughtful. Something he still wasn’t completely used to.

After a few seconds of hesitation he knocked.

Nothing.

Really, he didn’t know what he was expecting. Maybe for Billy to open up the door. Maybe for him to just spill his guts, take a comforting pat on the back, and somehow everything would be healed. As naive as that sounded.

”Hey, kid?” Crickets.

”I just- I just wanna talk.” Once again, silence hit like a bag of bricks.

Hopper felt the telltale sweat spread over his palms, heart sinking into his stomach as a sickening settled.

“If you don’t answer I’m just going to have to come in.” He hated to be that person, he really did. Knew that if his teenage self could see him right now that he would never believe that he grew up to be such a, for lack of better word, stuck up, but this was his life now and if that’s how it had to be, then so be it.

When there was still no response he started a count down, stalling the inevitable, “1… 2…”

And like clockwork the old door squealed on its hinges as it swung open, not completely, but enough for Hopper to see the state Billy was it.

Only about half of his face was visible, the rest shadowed in darkness, only the most prominent features visible. Somehow Hopper was expecting worse, a split lip and a sliced cheek in the long run seemed like one of the best outcomes.

Still, he let out an exasperated, yet concerned, “Shit, kiddo,” followed by a, “If you look like this I’d hate to see the other guy.” And a quick laugh, an attempted to lighten the mood that quickly died in his throat when his eyes traveled a little further to spot two twin hickeys peaking out from behind blonde curls. A confusing combination.

This seemed to only make things worse. Billy’s breathing hitched, trying to keep up with the sniffles wracking his body, tears brimming his eyes, threatening to spill over onto already tear stained cheeks.

“Billy I didn’t- I’m-“ Hopper stammered, fully expecting to have the door slammed in his face or to have the younger boy send him away with harsh words.

But, suddenly, the unexpected happened. I’m one fluid motion the door was swung open and Billy was wrapping his arms around Hopper‘a larger frame, gasping into his shoulder for air as sobs wracked his body.

Hopper didn’t immediately reciprocate, completely shocked by the action, caught off guard, but as soon as he came back to his senses he placed one hand in the center of Billy’s back, gently patting and soothing as best he could.

Softly, he shushed, “It’s gonna be alright, son. Just calm down-“ but he was cut off.

”He duh-doesn’t love muh-me.” Billy choked out, and now it was all starting to make since.

Hopper had known Billy was gay since before he even moved in. Since the second he caught sight of the way him and his fresh out of the academy trainee looked at each other. Since he caught him and Tommy H. necking at lovers lane past curfew not even within a month of Billy having lived in Hawkins. And frankly he didn’t find it to be any of his business. Billy was his own person, and how did his gender of choice affect Hopper’s day to day life?

But now that Billy himself was his business and now that he had a scared, broken teenager crying on his shoulder things were a little more personal.

Things were starting to piece together in his mind. The two fresh hickeys on his neck, the way he seemed to be hanging out with Steve Harrington a lot more even though the last time he checked, he swore they hated each others guts.

”Billy…” Hopper just sighed, rocking them back and forth at this point, remembering how that always seemed to calm El.

Billy just shook his head and cried harder. He wasn’t ready to talk about it and Hopper understood. And maybe it would be days, weeks, hell, even months before he was ready to talk about it, but Hopper swore on his entire life that he would be waiting with a tub of ice cream and a box of tissues when he was because Billy wasn’t just his “responsibility“ now, Billy was his son and that’s what fathers were for.

[hopewritcs]

devil hands, angel heart. two.

pairing: no romantic pairing / subject to change

word count: 1.4k

summary: eleven was the last.  kali was number eight, who had escaped.  and you, well they were going to kill you.  you were an experiment gone wrong.  number nine.  so when kali left, you’d run with her.  and when she couldn’t use you for what she’d wanted, she left you in the middle of nowhere without anything to your name.  it’s been years, and despite all the normal you’ve felt in your life.  you can feel something is pulling you back to hawkins, back to “home”.  

notes: SEASON 4 SPOILERS ! while the original fic takes place in s3, i figured part two i would jump ahead to s4. don’t worry, there’s a bit of a backstory for the jump between s3-4 in the fic. i’m not entirely sure if this will be an ongoing fic, but i might do at least one or two more parts depending on what happens with the rest of s4, or where i end up with this chapter. i might have messed around with the timeline a bit for the flight but y��all get the idea lol. if you like this chapter and want to see a third part, let me know! 

part one | part two

stranger things tag list: tba 

You never thought you’d have an actual family. Sure, there had been the lab. Dr. Brenner had all the kids calling him Papa, but that place had never really felt like home--maybe in the moment for a while it had, but once you’d left? It just felt like everything there had been holding you back, keeping you down. 

But after everything happened, despite the fact that you were older than her children and had been living on your own, Joyce had offered that you go with them to California. She said that as El’s “sister” she wouldn’t want to separate you from each other when you had only just met. 

Since the move, you’d been working and under the insistence of Joyce taking classes in attempts to get a high school diploma. You were working with Jonathan’s friend Argyle at Surfer Boy Pizza, which was a bit of a stretch from your usual diner waitress job, but answering phones and running around the restaurant wasn’t entirely too bad. 

It surprised you that you were still in touch with everyone from back in Hawkins, considering you hadn’t known them long before the move to California. Nancy, when she wasn’t writing or calling for Jonathan, was often asking for you. Even Steve and Robin were checking up on you. 

Yes, Steve. He apologized for doubting you after the incident, and was now probably one of your closest friends. Which was why you were going back to Hawkins with Jonathan for Spring Break. 

Except, as the time came closer, Jonathan decided he didn’t want to go. So you were at the airport to greet Mike and then catch your own flight back to Hawkins and still looking over at Jonathan. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to come back home?” You asked, an eyebrow raised as you shifted the bag you were holding in your hands. 

“Someone’s gotta watch after the teens or whatever.” Jonathan shrugged his shoulders. Though you didn’t know him well before the move to California, from what you heard from your talks with Steve you could tell that Jonathan had certainly changed since you had moved. 

“If you want company I’m totally game to go to this mystery Hawkins place you and Jonathan keep rambling on about.” Argyle offered after Jonathan said no, looking up at you with a shrug of his shoulders. 

“Thanks, but I think I’ll be fine on my own.” You knew you would be, after all, you’d been on your own ever since the escape from the labs and Kali leaving you to go off with her “group” for vengeance. But, still, it would have been nice to have somebody with you. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay?” El asked, looking up at you nervously. You already knew what was going through her mind, she was nervous because the last time she’d let somebody in her family go away from her they’d wound up dying. 

Hopper. You’d never met him, but from all the stories you heard, he sounded like a great guy, someone who took in a super powered kid when they needed someone. That was a plus in your book. 

“I am going to be fine.” You promised her. 

How could you possibly know that there might be something different coming your way? That the promise you made in the California airport to your sister was going to go out the window in a few short days. 

“You’ll come back?” El asked. 

“Of course, it’s just Spring Break.” You answered, pulling her into a hug and smiling softly. “We’re sisters, El. I’m not going anywhere. Well...not for good, at least.” 

You’d never been on a plane before. When you moved with the Byers’ family and El out to California you’d driven, and even before then planes had never been something you thought about. 

Up in the air, you were worried about your powers, which had been acting up since the battle at the mall, but it was all difficult to focus on anything. You instead, just decided to put music on your walkman and drift out for the flight. 

You barely counted the time, but tapping your hand on the seat and listening to music helped you get through everything. Plus, knowing your friends would be there to pick you up from the airport. 

Meanwhile, back in Hawkins, after they left the school with the news looming over their heads Steve was driving and then stopped short, turning around. 

“Shit, Steve. I know Max said she thinks she’s dying but could you not try and kill us all.” Dustin said from the passengers seat, looking at him and then to the back where Lucas and Max sat, both as confused as he was. 

“I was supposed to pick up Y/N from the airport.” Steve said. “Fuck, what time is it?” he glanced at the dashboard of his car while he was driving and tapped his hands on the steering wheel. “Fuck.” 

“I thought Jonathan wasn’t coming home for break.” Lucas shrugged his shoulders. 

“Y/N still wanted to come. Robin’s parents are gonna let her stay with them for the week.” Steve said, tapping his hand on the wheel. How had he forgotten that he was supposed to pick you up from the airport? He’d been looking forward to it. In fact, it was one of the only reasons he was looking forward to Spring Break. 

Fuck this Vecna shit. He was so late. 

“I can’t even drop you off before...” he trailed off, sighing. He didn’t want to have to force them all along especially after everything that had just happened. But what else was he supposed to do? 

“Relax, Harrington.” Max spoke up, shaking her head. “It’s not like any of us are going anywhere,” she paused, clearing her throat and then adding, “right now at least.” 

“I don’t think a joke about your possible imminent death is funny, Max.” Steve sighed. 

“We’re gonna have to tell her when we see her.” Dustin pointed out.

Yeah, Spring Break was suddenly going from something Steve had been looking forward to to something he was dreading. 

How long had you been waiting at the airport? Long enough that a few people passing by had given you a certain look of pity. You knew it well, it was the look you’d seen on people’s faces when they didn’t know what to say. You tapped your hands on your leg and looked around for the clock. 

Maybe Steve was working and had forgotten? You figured you should call, but you didn’t know the number of the video store place, and who else was there to call? 

He promised. 

Finally, you saw headlights pull up in front of you and you stood up from where you sat on the sidewalk and looked over as you saw multiple people getting out of the car. Relief washed over you as you realized it was Steve, along with Max and Dustin and Lucas. 

“I’m so sorry, Y/N.” Steve said as he made his way over to you, pulling you into a hug. Dustin and Lucas busied themselves with your bag to fit it into the trunk and Steve spoke to you. “I forgot what time it was and we were... Well, uh,” 

You looked at him confused as he pulled away. The happiness you’d felt almost immediately rushing away as you thought about what could possibly be wrong. 

“So, I might be dying in the next day or so.” Max said, a shrug of her shoulder as she toyed with the headphones she wore around her neck. 

“What the fuck Max, you can’t just say it like that!” Lucas shouted from the car, looking back at her. 

“It’s true.” she answered back, turning to look at him. 

“What’s going on?” You asked, looking between everyone and waiting for an explanation. 

“Not in the open like this. Let’s go and take you to Robin’s and we’ll explain everything.” Steve said, gently tugging your arm as he spoke and gestured for everyone to head into the car. 

Dustin pulled up the antenna on the radio walkie talkie he’d held in his hand and used it to call out to Nancy and Robin, explaining the situation and saying they were on their way to Robin’s place with you. 

Somehow, you managed to wind up back in Hawkins when everything was happening again. 

You really should have stayed away from this town while you had the chance.  

[smaika]

"I Blame myself"

Will x Reader

Warning: mentions of blood, mental disorder,Trauma

Y/N Abilities: Telekinesis, Teleportion,Mind Control

As you were on the way to the Wil's House's cause you didn't feel save ever since the accident at the mall even though you and eleven both have powers.

Recently you've been having nightmares of the lab, of how they experimented on you and beat you for every mistake you made. But the worst nightmare was about how you created this whole mess. Yes you created the upside down and left a gate open after escaping the Lab with Eleven that's also where you met you're now Best Friend/Child Dustin he and his friends were sceptical about you and Eleven but seeing how you were both sisters they had no choice but to keep you both. Eventually you guys found will, but It took awhile to get the shadow monster out of him after that incident he kinda became a monster Detektor.

Fast Forward to recently The Shadow Monster escaped the upside down all thanks to the Russian and it possessed Billy and made do bad bad things later on it made Billy kidnap you but Eleven protected thinking that you don't have powers any more but that could anything from the truth. Billy ended up winning knocking everyone out , taking Eleven with him instead of you seeing you how you were conscious but had a broken leg because of Billly do you couldn't really do much you slowly started to overthink making everything around you levitate aswell as you. Actually didn't Notice this, with all the thoughts of what could happen to eleven because of you. Before you knew it you passed out.

When you woke up it was in your face

It was in your face.

it was smiling at you.

And Repeated The words.

they forgot about you.

They hate you.

Look at the spot where you last saw Max,Lucas and Mike.

They were gone.

Did they really forget about you... That's when you heard Someone call your name.

(Will's POV)

"Y/N WHERE ARE YOU"i shouted as i looked around for any sign of her but to no avail, that's when I hear slight whimper from a room in the hallway. "Y/N IS THAT YOU" i shout as i walk into the hallway, to see her pushing her body and visibly broken leg trying to leave the room "Will?" She says trying to stand on one leg. l quickly run to her side helping walk to the ambulance waiting outside.

(Reader's POV)

Once i was in the ambulance ready to be taken to the hospital Eleven,Max, Dustin,Mike and Lucas run up to me and apologize for forgetting me inside...

See they forgot you

They forgot me....

They forgot me.....

Those words kept ringing in your head thay kept reminding you that you were forgotten it was right they hated you...you had to become better, you had to become stronger so that you were protecting them.

After arriving in the hospital you just starred at a wall not even saying anything it's not like you could you had to broken your leg and a rib if not two but the worst if them all is that you had to go speech therapy cause them forgetting you and you almost got Eleven killed. Those things scarred you but the fact you were forgotten was the worse kind of pain. You officially gone mute , you didn't even move your lips an inch you were just stuck like that Everyone started to get worried so Joyce got a doctor and she explained everything to them your condition and they looked at her in horror. Will immediately ran into your room and finally saw your eyes slowly losing hope somewhat emotionless. Will knew it was his fault for not remembering sooner that you were in there he started apologizing asking you to just have lil bit of hope left in your eyes.

Fast Forward 2 years later you and Mike where on the way to Wills House but first you actually have to land in California since as for now you both were still on plane there and Mike wasn't making this anymore tolerate able with his ranting of how his gonna spend his Sommer with Eleven, Might be mute but he makes you wish you were deaf...

After landing you saw will and El there it seemed like was holding something in he's hand but you didn't really pay attention to it since you immediately hugged him. after hugging you he immediately went Mike and asked him how he was instead of asking you, you slightly hurt but you didn't mind it. Mike and Eleven hugged and Mike handed eleven the flower he'd been dragging with him all day, As you looked at Will you could see that he was looking a little down so went over to talk to him "are you okay?" You asked after placing a kiss on he's cheeks "yeah I'm fine just that I wanted to give Mike this Painting, but he didn't even notice me?!" You looked at your now angry boyfriend and you felt a little hurt that he did bring you a gift but you still made sure to reassure him Mike didn't Forget him and cared about him.

He's fiasco went on throughout the whole trip that you decided to go home since you were invisible to everyone except Joyce and Murray but they weren't here either so you wrote a letter teleported home to find a Steve ravishing to your stuff wants he found what he needed he turned around to be met with an angry y/n the sight scares him resulting to a girlish scream sounding almost identical to Lucas's. "Steve Harrington why are you going through my draws.."you said in a very uncomfortable calm voice "saving lives" he said in a very sketchy laugh "hand over the phone NOW" he swore he's ears where bleeding "here , im sorry plss just don't shout or scream" said in fear while cleaning ears in attempt to hear clear again.

"so this Vecna dude kill people with extremely depressing backgrounds and you also suspect that he was once an experiment in the lab and he was and he was tattoo the number 001....am i forgetting anything" you say the last part full with sarcasm before looking at Steve with a "am i right?" Look that just makes Steve more annoyed than he already is with you. " No you didn't miss anything." He said sass filling he's voice "but we don't know for a 100% if it's actually him and if yes, we where kinda hoping you to know how to defeat since you where there before El" Lucas said looking at you in hope. You sigh before you talking again "Ones weaknesses lie where one is most at home" say before creating candles out of nothing and closing your eyes.

Ok this is the last update to this thing

Here is my besties acc

Its enjoyable to listen to while reading angst 😌

[angelinasway]

Regaining Hope

Chapter Eight

Pairing: Clark Kent/Buffy Summers Warnings/Triggers:Torture, Violence, Mention's of Major Character Death, Bad Language, Sexual Tension, Eventual Smut, Mentions of Sexual Assault Summary: Takes place during Man of Steel. When Buffy discovers the U.S Military trying to keep quiet about an object buried in a twenty thousand year old glacier, she immediately thinks the worst. However, when a surprise visit to the Canadian Arctic puts her in the path of a mysterious stranger her whole world is changed forever. Authors Notes: Thank you all so much for being so very supportive. You guys have been absolutely wonderful. Seriously I couldn't ask for a better group of readers. I need to warn you all that this chapter has quite the graphic and gruesome scene in it, so if that's not your thing I highly recommend skipping the part where Clark starts to watch the video. Some major questions answered here. Hope you all enjoy, and keep the reviews coming. Special thanks to my ever amazing beta Hipkarma. She always helps and inspires me. Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Previous Chapters: [Chapter One] [Chapter Two] [Chapter Three] [Chapter Four] [Chapter Five] [Chapter Six] [Chapter Seven]

[TTH] [AO3] [FFN]

Chapter Eight

 Dawn smirked as she saw the caller ID flash. So, Buffy had talked to Wes. That was good. She really didn’t want to have to break into the Watchers Council just because she was nosy and worried for her sister. Buffy hadn’t told her much when they talked yesterday, just that there was some sort of prophecy about her and this Clark guy, which just raised all sorts of red flags for her. Dawn had insisted on seeing a copy of the prophecy and her hackles raised even more when she found out how quiet Wes and Willow were trying to keep this. Looks like big sis came through however, and now it was time to give the man on the other line hell for keeping something this important from her.

 “Xand, honey, can you take Abby? Wes is on the phone and it’s time for her nap anyway.” Dawn said, reaching for the phone.

 “No!” Her one and a half your old screeched at the top of her lungs, making Dawn cringe. When they coined the phrase, ‘children are your parents secret revenge,’ they weren’t lying. Abigail was just like her too, even in looks.

 Xander came out of their shared office, a crooked and amused smile on his lips. “You should know by now not to say that word in front of her,” He said, kissing Dawn on the forehead before reaching out and swooping up their toddler. “Come on Abby,” he said as Dawn answered her call. “Daddy will read you your favorite story.”

 “Try to get Joyce down too,” She added, before saying into the phone, “Hello Wes, so good of you to finally call me.”

 She heard the groan on the other end of the line and smiled. “How much do you know?”

 “That there’s a prophecy about my sister and some uber-powerful guy she’s been spending time with, on your instruction I might add.” Dawn said in a mockingly sweet voice.

 She heard him sigh. “Yes, that is all true. Look Dawn, I’m going to send you a copy of the prophecy through your secure fax now. We’ve been able to translate some of it, but there are certain areas where…I don’t think the language is of this world. It’s nothing like we’ve ever seen in any human or demon writings before.”

 Dawn got up and walked into the office, a frown on her face. “You mean like interdimensional, there’s gotta be a reference somewhere Wes.”

 There was silence over the line and for a second and she thought Wes had hung up. She’d just opened her mouth to see if he was still there, when he finally said, “No Dawn, that’s not what I meant at all.”

 Her frown deepened as the first page spat out of the machine. She slid it off the rack and looked at the prophecy. There were several different languages written on the copy, Etruscan, Ancient Sumerian, Ancient Greek, and Latin. At the top were strange symbols unlike anything she’d ever seen before, almost flowing together like cursive. The next page that came out was Wesley and Willow’s translation of that page. She bit her lip, walking over to her desk and went to work making sure what they had translated so far was correct.

 “So,” she began casually, “what I’m getting from the first page is that this guy is much farther from home than just another dimension.” She paused, huffing in annoyance as she snootily added,” It was Sun God by the way, not Star God.” She sighed. “Who are you using anyway, Basile?”

 “Vonten,” He answered and Dawn rolled her eyes. Of course, he was using that moron’s guide.

 “Vonten is an arrogant prick Wes, that book confuses people more than it helps. Burn it, it’s better as kindling. Bachman is the best at Etruscan and Ancient Sumerian, and you already know Ancient Greek and Latin enough not to need a reference.” She said, before frowning as she came to the part about the soulbond. “Wes, what the hell is a soulbond, and why is this referencing my sister and Mr. E.T. having one?”

 As Wesley began to explain what they knew so far, Dawn's face began to pale. Oh, this was not of the good. Buffy was gonna wig to the nth degree when she found out.

 "Does she know any of this?" Dawn asked, turning around and grabbing more of the pages that were still spitting out of her printer.

 "She knows about the bond. I told her this morning." He answered.

 "And what, you’re waiting until she gets pregnant before you tell her the rest?" Dawn asked angrily. "You know this is gonna freak her out..."

 "Which is why I decided not to tell her." Wes interrupted.

 "If you'd let me finish," Dawn snapped, slamming her hand on the desk. "I was going to say this is gonna freak her out, but it would be better if you tell her now." She huffed in frustration. "This just proves how little you guys know my sister. She absolutely will freak and she'll probably fight it at first. Just the idea of her own children having to live the life she has, is not gonna be a happy, joyous moment for her. She's already worried that Joyce or Abby, or maybe even both will be called one day.” Dawn said, before emphasizing her next words, "However, my sister is not stupid, and when push comes to shove, she'll make the right decision like she always does. I get that you’re worried about the Slayer line Wes, we all are, but keeping this from her is not the right way to go about it.”

 She heard Wes’s sigh, “I realize that Dawn, but with the bond itself needing to be fulfilled, I thought that was more than enough for both of them to handle at this time.”

 Dawn looked at the pages covered in the strange flowing script, similar to the symbols on the first page. Wes was right, it was a language. "We need to find a way to translate this. Do you think this is Clark's language from his home world?"

The line was silent for a moment, before he said in annoyance, “Yes, that’s what I meant when I said I don’t think the language is of this world.”

 “Do you think Clark knows how to read it?” Dawn asked.

 A sigh came over the line, “I honestly don’t know. I believe he just discovered where he came from, so I don’t see how he could.” He paused in thought and then murmured to himself, “But even if he can’t, perhaps the ship has a historical archive or maybe there is some form of AI technology that could translate it for us.”

 Dawn frowned, “What ship?”

 As Wesley explained how Buffy and Clark met and the danger Buffy had recklessly put herself in, Dawn found her ire sparking at Buffy’s stupidity. “I’m gonna kill her!” Dawn growled. “She hasn’t done something that reckless since Joyce was born. God fucking dammit, she promised me!”

 Wesley sighed. “In her defense, it could have very well been her fate that made her act so rashly.” He paused before saying, “In any case, Clark was there and according to Buffy, he saved her and watched over her after she went into a healing sleep.”

 Dawn was quiet as she processed that information. So, she didn’t die, which meant Buffy actively tried to stop it from happening. That was good, she was still getting smacked when Dawn saw her, but at least she hadn’t completely broken her promise from three and a half years ago. It was also good to see that this godlike Champion the prophecy spoke of wasn’t just a creature with a penchant for destruction playing at being a white hat because of a curse. That was a nice change.

 “What else do you know about him?” Dawn asked. “I’m assuming you started trying to find him as soon as you started translating this.”

 “Well,” Wesley began, “We first caught wind of a possible candidate about a year ago. We’d been monitoring airwave chatter for possible beings with superhuman strength when we caught a lead. A distress call came in about an oil rig off the coast of Canada in flames and about to explode. In that communication there was talk of a man rescuing the crew members aboard the rig and preventing the tower from collapsing on the rescue helicopter with his bare hands.” He paused for a moment, before saying. “We managed to find a few other incidents of him saving people, one that happened when he was thirteen. According to the incident report, his school bus went off a bridge and into the river. Three witnesses stated that a young Clark Kent managed to push the bus out of the water and rescue his classmate.”

 Dawn whistled, “So this guy really is the real deal white knight, huh?”

 “It would appear so.” He sighed.

 “Wes we’re gonna need to access that ship.” Dawn said, looking over a small section of Sumerian that talked about a trial of choice. The rest of the page was in the alien script however, so any clue as to what that meant was beyond her.

 “I know,” Wesley agreed.

 “Which means, we’re gonna have to tell Buffy and Clark everything.” Dawn reiterated.

 She heard Wesley groan, but he conceded nonetheless. “Alright fine, Willow needs to bring them some pendants to stave off the worst of the compulsion the bond is creating. I’ll have her stop by and get you on her way, unless you want me to tell Buffy myself, that is.”

 Dawn shook her head, “No, no. I think it will be safer for everyone if I’m the one to do it.” Then she bit her lip in thought, “And don’t bother with Willow, just call me when she gets back. I think I need to do this one on my own.”

 “Very well,” Wes agreed. “Willow should be finished within the next few hours. I’ll call you as soon as I know she’s returned.”

 “Alright, in the meantime I’m gonna go over this and make sure all the parts I can read are translated correctly.” Dawn said, adding, "Talk in a few," before hanging up.

 She sighed, rubbing her fingers along her forehead. "Well fuck," she muttered to herself.

 "Everything alright?" Xander asked, coming into the office. 

 "No, not really," she answered handing him the translated first page of the prophecy.

 She watched his eye scan the words before he blew out a breath. "So, this guys an alien?"

 "Looks like." She answered.

 Xander snorted, "Man the Buffster really knows how to pick 'em, doesn't she?"

 Dawn mock glared, before she couldn't contain her amusement at the absurdity of the situation. "Well, you know Buffy. She doesn't do anything by halves."

 ****<S>**<S>****

 As Clark followed Buffy down the hallway, his thoughts were a jumbled mess. He knew she had been trying to reassure him, but her words only had the opposite effect. Were they only feeling any of what they were because of the prophecy and furthermore, given the choice, would she even choose him? She had basically confessed to falling in love with her best friend. The history they had both shared, as disturbing as it was, was an important one to her. She had cared very deeply for this man. How could he ever live up to the memory of a man who had essentially changed a piece of himself for her? Part of him wanted to erase Spike’s memory from her mind, to do whatever he could to drive this man, this demon from her past and another part of him just felt wholly lost. He didn’t want to be anyone’s second best and he certainly didn’t want her to want him only because some guy thousands of years ago decided they were destined. God, he wished his dad was still alive. This would definitely be the type of thing his dad could help him through.

 She stopped at a large set of double doors and turned, catching his expression before he had time to school it into a much more neutral one. She blinked in surprise, "Clark...what’s wrong?"

 He shook his head, “It’s nothing Buffy.”

 Her frown deepened, “Oh no, you definitely have something face. Talk to me. I promise whatever it is, I’ll try to understand.”

 Clark shifted uncomfortably, before finally admitting, “I’m just feeling a little unsure about all this.”

 Her eyes widened slightly, “Because of Spike?”

 Clark sighed, “Well I mean think about it Buffy. You basically told me that you fell in love with your best friend and were willing to marry him for eternity, but the only reason you didn’t is because you were too scared. Would you even look twice at me if he was here now? Are the feelings I’m having for you even real, or is this just destiny trying to force us together?”

 Realization flooded her expression, and she quickly shook her head. “I can’t speak for what-ifs, because I would be lying if I answered that either way…” She swallowed, “As for how you’re feeling, I’ve been under love spells before and granted you usually don’t know you’re under one when you are, but if the feeling’s part was being fabricated, we…we wouldn’t be able to fight this like we are. We would have probably already slept together.” She blushed, looking down. “Fabricated feelings they’re false obviously, but they’re very strong…strong enough to make people dangerous. If what we were feeling was a manifestation, you wouldn’t have these doubts Clark, you wouldn’t even realize there was doubts to be had.” She met his eyes then, her expression serious and stoic. “And as for the fear part, I didn’t want to get into it because…” She sighed again. “You remember how I told you that Angelus showed up right when I was starting to get my life back together?”

 Clark nodded, “I remember.”

 “Well, what I didn’t say is that I was planning on retiring.” She rolled her eyes, “I had this grand plan of going back to school and getting a degree in Art History and moving to Hawaii to open a gallery.” She shook her head, “It was stupid, I know.”

 He immediately shook his head, “That doesn’t sound stupid at all.”  

 Buffy blushed. “I just mean it was stupid that I ever thought it could happen.” She shook her head, “Anyway, I started training a girl named Rayanne when we were first getting the new Watchers Council on its feet. She was bright, witty, resourceful and she already had the makings of someone who could be an excellent leader.” She looked at her feet, her hands clenching. “Me and Giles had agreed, in three-years-time, when Ray was eighteen, she would step in and fill my shoes. Faith didn’t want the position and the only other possible candidate that actually did, I flat out refused due to her inability to get along with just about anyone but Willow. I mentored Ray for over a year and she became…well, like a little sister to me. After the whole General Voll fiasco, I was ready to promote her to Senior Slayer status. She had been on it more than any other girl at the compound, helpful and demanding when need be. She’d fought through a horde of zombies and we came out of it with zero losses. The attack was completely unexpected and if she hadn’t been there, I don’t know what I would have done.” She met his eyes, “I was so proud of her.” Buffy sighed, “A few months later is when the first girl, Alicia went missing, and by the time Ray disappeared, there were already six that seemed to have just dropped off the planet.” She swallowed, “Angelus revealed himself and killed Giles a few weeks later, and almost three weeks after is when we found Alicia. She was the first and youngest to go missing and she was the first he dropped on our doorstep.” Buffy shook her head squeezing her eyes shut, “I knew what he was doing to Rayanne then, and that she would probably get the worst of it because of her association with me. Alicia was just a taste of what Angelus was capable of.” She opened her eyes, meeting his. “I wanted to have Spike claim me so we would be strong enough to save her and the rest of them, and I was scared because I knew I’d be asking for the wrong reasons. I was afraid Spike would know it too and I would only hurt him by asking. Does that make sense?”

 It was Clark’s turn to avert his eyes. “Yes,” he said quietly.

 She pulled out her phone and began to scroll through it, “Well just in case you have any doubts…” She swallowed, “I don’t even know why I kept this. Angelus loved tormenting me and we didn’t know it at the time but there were several Watchers from the old regime who were very unhappy with the way we were running things. Some of them made deals with Angelus, gave out my email and phone number and my location.” She looked at him, her lips pursed in anger. “One of them would even take video or pictures, documenting my pain for him when he couldn’t be there hiding in the shadows to see it.” She handed him her phone, “I’ve never watched this one, it’s the morning I found Rayanne, he saved her for last. I don’t need to see it, I lived it.” She nodded at her phone, “When he sent it, I didn’t even open it. I just dropped it in an archive and it’s been there ever since.” She shook her head, “I highly recommend only opening the third video file, the one that says, ‘Are you broken yet?’ She met his eyes then, “The first two will be what he did to her. So, unless you feel like throwing up, I would skip those.” She gestured with her chin at the double doors. “I’ll be in there beating on a bag, meet me when you’re done.”

 She turned without another word and went through the double doors not looking back. Clark looked down at the phone swallowing heavily, before opening the file. The video began with the image of the front of a house, not unlike the one they were in now, except there was a large tree in front and something very obviously dangling from it. It looked to be sometime in the middle of the night or perhaps early morning, but he couldn't tell either way due to the lights on the house illuminating everything.

 The person carrying the camera ran towards the house and a refined British voice in distress yelled, "Ms. Summers, come quickly. I think it may be Miss Stevenson."

 The front door flew open and there she was, except she looked nothing like she did now, her eyes were wild, feral even, and she was so pale and sucked up. She looked hollow, worn-down, nothing like the girl he’d spent the last couple of days getting to know. The scream that tore from her lips and the look on her face when she saw what was hanging from the tree, tore through him like a tidal wave of emotion. Clark felt himself growing angry at the Watcher, who was obviously playing both sides. Another man with bleached hair and nothing on but a pair of black jeans came flying through the door next, his eyes wild and worried. 

 The camera panned and followed Buffy as she ran out to the tree, falling to her knees and screaming again. Clark saw what was in the tree then and his stomach almost rebelled right then and there. It was a young girl, no older than sixteen and the only skin left on her body was on her beautiful face and near her pelvic region. The girl’s expression was frozen in a horrified scream that no one who cared ever had the chance to hear. A large white sheet wrapped itself tightly around the girl’s wrists and tied over the lowest branch, the excess linen draping behind the dead girl as some sort of sick backdrop silhouette for the body hanging lifelessly from the tree. There was hardly any blood to speak of, just a pinkish residue from where the body had touched the clean white linen, which told Clark she had been dead for more than a few hours. It wouldn’t be visible to a human through the recording, but because of his enhanced vision Clark could even see puncture wounds in places and deep gashes from where the girl had been restrained.

 The blond man came into the picture then and the Watcher came towards them, circling around so he could see Buffy’s expression, or at least that’s what he assumed the person with the camera was doing. Buffy's mouth was open in silent gulping sobs, giant tears dripping down her cheeks.

 “Love,” The blond man whispered in an apparent British accent not nearly as refined as the Watchers Clark had heard so far. The man fell to his knees behind her looking up at the tree. He shuddered as tears sprang to his electric blue eyes. “Don’t look Buffy…please kitten, please go back in the house.”

 The man placed his hand on her shoulder, and Buffy turned at the gesture and Clark could no longer see her face as she flung herself into the man’s arms and began to sob harder. “It’s Ray,” she howled. “Oh god, it’s Ray.”

 “Shh,” The blond man hushed, rubbing hands along her back in a comforting gesture. “I know,” He choked. “I know, love.”

 “We…we can’t leave her like that.” She sobbed. “I-I have to get her down.”

 Clark watched the blond man close his eyes and shake his head, “I’ll do it. Go back in the house, please Slayer.”

 “No,” Buffy shook her head as Clark caught the silhouette of another man flying from the house and over to them. The sound of retching could be heard, and it took Clark a second to realize the sound came from whomever had just come from the house and seen the body. “It has to be me. Don’t you see, don’t you get it? I knew,” she sobbed. “I knew what he was doing to her and I didn’t do anything.”

 “Oh, sweet girl, you’ve been trying to find her. We all have. This isn’t your fault.” The man choked.

 “It’s not good enough,” She screamed, shoving away from him and falling on her rear, “And it is my fault, all of it! They were called because of me, because I was too chicken shit to just except the power that was offered to me!”

 A sob broke from her lips, and she turned looking directly at the cameraman a sudden realization dawning in her hollow eyes. “You!” She snarled, her eyes flashing. “It’s you, isn’t it?” She started marching towards the cameraman.

 “Ms.…Ms. Summers,” Whomever was holding the camera stuttered and then she was there, a well-aimed kick flying towards the camera before Clark saw sky for a few seconds.

 “I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch!” She screamed suddenly hovering over the man, the wild fury in her eyes telling Clark that she had every intention of killing this man, and part of Clark couldn’t agree more. “No one else but an Angelus minion would have called me out here for Rayanne! Everyone else would know better!”

 Clark watched as she threw a punch, the sickening sound of cartilage breaking ringing through the speaker as the guy howled in pain. The way her arms were angled next and the gurgling sound through the phone told him she was choking the man before three sets of arms suddenly grabbed her, pulling her off. Clark could hear the man wheeze as he tried to catch his breath while Buffy screamed and fought the three people who had pulled her away. Faith was one of them, and then the blond man, which Clark was pretty sure by now was Spike, and another man, tall, brunet, with an eyepatch. He saw Willow in the distance coming towards them and when she reached them, she touched Buffy’s shoulder before she could react and muttered a few words that sounded like Latin. Buffy suddenly collapsed and Clark realized Willow had put her to sleep. All eyes then turned towards the cameraman.

 “Get her in the house, Xander.” Spike growled.

 “Uh, Spike–” Xander started to say when Spike turned on him.

 “Get her in the bloody fucking house, now!” He snarled, a sound like grinding bone emanating from the man as his voice altered to something more sinister. “I’m not going to kill him.” He said turning back towards the camera as two glowing amber eyes stared at Clark.

 “Speak for yourself,” Faith said marching towards the man. “I’ve been getting those fucking emails too.”

 “So have I,” Willow said, her eyes black as she stared the camera down.

 “We won’t have to kill him,” Spike clarified as he fell in step with Faith. “Angelus will do that for us.”

 “How you figure?” Faith asked, her eyes just as enraged as Buffy’s had been.

 Spike suddenly sprung forward, his arm reaching out and a ripping sound emanated as the man screamed. His hand came back with what looked like a wad of hair. “This enough Red?”

 “Plenty,” Willow said, sudden realization dawning in her black eyes.

 “Now,” Spike said, a sinister grin stretching his fanged mouth, to the whimpering man. “The way I figure it, you got three options. The first being, you can go back to Angelus and give him this tape, at which point he finds out we now have a way to track you, and oh trust me Marcus, he will most definitely kill you for that.” Clark heard the man begin to sob, and part of him wanted to turn off the video at that point but couldn’t look away at the furious amber eyes that stared back at the camera. “Option number two, you can destroy the tape and run, which if we’re being honest would be the preferable of the three, but I’m sure you are well aware of the kind of wrath he would bring down on you if he didn’t get to see his almost masterpiece complete, so I’m sure you won’t.” Spike’s hand suddenly flew forward and the man screamed in pain, “Or option three,” He growled, “Where you run like a coward and keep the tape for leverage, hoping that your usefulness hasn’t run its course.”

 He suddenly had the camera in his hands, staring directly into the screen his eyes burning into the lens. “Looks like your mole got ousted. This is your last one, Angelus. We’re coming for you and when we’re done there won’t be anything left.” The screen suddenly went black as the video cut off.

 Clark let out a trembling breath looking around him and realizing he had slid to the floor at some point, his heart pounding in his chest. God, he didn’t know, he didn’t understand until that moment. That poor girl, no wonder Buffy was desperate. How many girls did she find like that before this one was left for her? How many videos did she force herself to endure before this one was sent, even Faith and Willow had said this wasn’t the first one? Clark squeezed his eyes shut, she had told him, so had Gunn but to see it. She was driven half-crazy by what that vampire had done and he could not blame her for that. What would he do if it was his mother in that position? God, he could only imagine.

 He shakily got to his feet, listening as he heard the sound of a fist hitting leather, he walked to the doors and threw them open, not stopping when she paused to look at him. He had to reassure himself that she was okay, that she wasn’t that angry creature that he saw in the video. He went straight to her, his arms coming around her in a crushing embrace before his lips met hers. God, she was so strong, he didn’t realize how much until that moment. Buffy immediately melted into him, her lips parting for him as he slid his tongue into her mouth. She was such a small woman, everything about her was deceptively tiny, except her strength and fortitude both physically and emotionally. To go through what she had and still be able to function on a normal level was just short of a miracle.

 He pulled away and looked down into her green eyes, haunted by her past but not dead and hateful like in the video. He bent down and laid his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. “I…” He started, “I didn’t…I’m so sorry Buffy.” He whispered, and he could still feel himself trembling. “I didn’t… You hear words like torture, rape, and murder but–”

 “They’re not real until you see it for yourself.” She finished in understanding.

 Clark sighed, hugging her closely, her head resting against his chest. “I get it now, not…but I understand how desperate you must have been to try and save the girls from that.”

 He heard her sniffle, “I didn’t know what else to do. I watched all the others you know, even…even what he did to them. It was my fault, you see; those girls lost their lives because they had a connection to me.” She shook her head, “If they hadn’t been called, they would still be alive today.”

 Clark pulled away and used his hand to raise her chin so he could see her eyes, “You blame yourself for every one of them that dies no matter how it happens, don’t you?”

 She closed her eyes a shuddering breath hissing through her lips, before she opened them, meeting his gaze head on. “How can I not?”

 He sighed, hugging her close again and shook his head. He had no response to that; he didn’t think she should. He didn’t think it was healthy, but he didn’t want to get in an argument about it with her right now either.

 They stayed like that for a little while before she whispered, “You’re shaking.”

 Clark nodded. “I know, the video…I’m still upset.”

 She pulled away, meeting his eyes again. “Do you want me to show you how to throw a punch properly? The heavy bags have been warded well, we can start there.” She looked down, “It will…it will help relieve some of what you’re feeling at least.”

 “Yeah,” He nodded in agreement. “Yeah, okay.”

 ****<S>**<S>****

 To say Clark was a fast learner when it came to training would have been the understatement of the year. He was an absolute natural. He moved with precision and grace, sometimes striking so fast she almost didn't see him move. 

 As of now she was simply holding the bag for him as he got comfortable with the rhythm of landing punches and even with the wards on the bag, she could feel the impact of his strikes. At this rate she would need her suit within a few days to let him get the feel of fighting a moving target. At some point she might even bring him back to Cleveland to put him up against multiple fighters and see how he did.

 "Remember to move your feet,” She reminded. "A moving target is harder to hit."

 He nodded, bounced on the balls of his feet and struck, the impact of the punch making her bones rattle. "Whoa, nice one Clark." She laughed, "Felt that one in my toes."

 He grinned, striking the bag again harder. "You were right," he said casually in between punches. "This does help."

 She grinned, "Nothing like getting your aggression out with a bit of violence." And then she blushed, smirking, "Well almost nothing." 

 He chuckled as he threw a few more punches in quick succession, his own smirk forming on his lips. He had a mischievous look in his eyes and had just opened his mouth to comment when Buffy’s phone rang.

 Buffy sighed, releasing the bag. "That will either be Wes or Willow."

 It was now around three in the afternoon; Clark had told her he had to pick his mom up at six and it was an hour drive to Smallville from where they were. So, she was grateful that they were going to be able to get this taken care of before meeting his mom.

 Buffy walked over to her phone and answered. "Hey Wes," she said in greeting. "What's the haps?"

 He was silent for a moment and she could almost hear him roll his eyes at her butchering of the English language. "Willow," He began, "should be there shortly. Dawn would also like to see you. I told her I would call her once Willow was done securing the pendants."

 Buffy frowned, “What? Why?”

 “Dawn and I have come to the conclusion that one of the languages in the prophecy that I have been unable to identify, is most likely written in the script of Clark’s home world.” He paused, “We are going to need access to the ship, unless of course Clark can read it.”

 Buffy looked at Clark and raised an eyebrow, but he quickly shook his head. “Only a few words,” He confirmed. “I think the computer on the ship might be able to translate it though.”

 “That’s a negative, Wes,” Buffy answered, beginning to pace. “But he agrees that the computer on the ship should be able to do the job.”

 “Very well, I’ll inform Dawn to dress accordingly. The ship is still in the same location I presume?” He asked.

 “Whoa,” Buffy said halting her steps, realizing what he was suggesting. “You want us to go tonight? Clark has to pick up his mom from work, Wes.”

 “I think it would be for the best. The sooner we get this prophecy translated, the better.” He paused. “Lorne told me I needed to send out more Slayers to India, Kansas, and Metropolis within the next two weeks and I would very much like to know if I should be sending two or a few hundred. If this prophecy gives any indication of what’s to come, I would very much like to know what it is.”

 Buffy and Clark exchanged worried looks. “He only told me something was coming for Clark, and we’re gonna need all hands-on deck when it does.”

 Buffy watched Clark swallow nervously. “He told me my time for hiding was almost up, but he said it was in the coming month.” His eyes widened in realization. “We need to translate that prophecy.”

 Buffy nodded in agreement, “And I need to train you harder than just beating on a bag, which means it’s gonna be eight-hour days from here on out.” Clark opened his mouth to argue and she held up her hand, “We’ll get as much as we need to do in the mornings done, but if for whatever reason we can’t, I would loan you the money before I would let you lose your home.”

 Clark frowned, “Buffy–”

 “Take it from someone who knows what those kinda money troubles feel like,” She interrupted again. “I think in the scheme of things saving the world is a little more important than pride, don’t you?”

 His frown deepened. “You think it’s going to be that big?”

 “Lorne said all hands-on deck and it’s you. Someone coming after you has got to be as powerful, if not more.” She watched his face fall and reached out her hand out running it down his arm, “You’ll be ready, and now that we have a general idea of where this stuff might take place, we’ll all be even more prepared.”

 “Wes,” she said, addressing the Watcher once more. “Were gonna need Willow to keep close, and I would call Illyria back from Cairo.”

 “I agree,” Wesley said, just as a portal opened up and Willow walked through. Her smile melting away at the look on both Buffy and Clark’s faces.

 “Uh-oh,” Willow said nervously. “I know that face.”

 “Is that Willow?” Wesley asked over the line.

 “Yeah,” Buffy said.

 “Let me speak with her, please.”

 Buffy held out the phone to Willow, who frowned but took it anyway. “Hey Wes,” Willow said in greeting as Buffy walked over to where Clark was standing looking more than a little worried.

 “Hey,” she said quietly.

 He attempted to smile but he couldn’t pull it off. “Hey, yourself.”

 She bit her lip watching him, seeing the turmoil play across his face of having an unknown enemy out there that could be responsible for hurting others when they decided to rear their ugly heads. She didn’t blame him, if she needed to pull out her big guns as Lorne hinted then it could definitely get bad. She was optimistic however, because of what she’d had to face in her past. Clark didn’t have that same luxury.

 “I-I know you’re not exactly used to going up against big bads, or having to fight gods,” she started. “But I promise you Clark, no matter what it is we’ll deal with it together. Tonight, I’ll have my sister meet us at your place and we’ll go to the ship and find out what this prophecy says. Whatever’s coming, we’ll deal. I promise you; we won’t lose.”

 “How do you know?” He asked, a bit of hope showing in his eyes.

 She stared at him seriously, “Because I don’t lose when it’s the world.”

 His lips quirked slightly, and he opened his mouth to say something when Willow walked up to them. “Wes wants me to fit you for a suit,” She said to Clark, handing Buffy her phone before saying, “And, he wants to talk to you.”

 As Buffy reached for the phone Clark said, “I already have a suit and it’s Kryptonian.”

 Both Buffy and Willow blinked in surprise at his words, their voices ringing out in unison. “You do?”

 He nodded, “Yeah, it’s on the ship still, but I have one.”

 Willow smiled, “Well then, that’s gonna make this quicker. Can you bring it to me? I can enhance it with magic, add some safety features and protect you against the mystical.”

 “Will that still work, even if the material isn’t of Earth?” He asked.

 “Yeah Wes,” Buffy finally said into her phone, pulling herself away from the conversation. So, Clark already had a suit, she wondered what it looked like.

 “So, for the time being I’m going to send fifty Slayers to each location, but keep the others on standby incase things go pear-shaped.” He said, already planning ahead. “I’ll also be moving quite a few closer to all three locations, that way all the girls have backup nearby. I think Willow should stay there at the safehouse that way she’s not far from either of you.”

 “And Dawn, Xander, and the kids? They live in Metropolis after all.” Buffy asked.

 “Perhaps you should explain the situation to her when she gets there. Staying there at the safe house with Willow might also be a wise move for them.” Wes said, adding, “As well as a few Slayers. I know Faith’s been itching to get out of Cleveland for a mission, maybe she and a few of the other girls should accompany her.”

 “Just as long as it’s not Tanya, that girl’s a liability and she doesn’t listen to anyone.” Buffy said.

 “I concur,” Wesley agreed. “Only the girls who are focused and dedicated will be allowed to participate in this mission. I would like as little casualties as possible.”

 “I agree,” Buffy nodded, “What about the mystics, how many of those can we tap?”

 “I have sixty-eight on file, I’ll start making phone calls now.”  He sighed. “I’m just glad we have this much to go on.”

 “Me too,” Buffy agreed. “I’ll call Dawn when Willow gets done here and tell her where to meet us and to put on her suit and a warm hat.”

 “Very well,” he said. “Call me when you know more and I’ll begin the preparations.”

 Buffy hung up, walking back over to Willow and Clark as they spoke to each other a bit awkwardly. “So, let’s get this over with Wills.”

 Willow quickly nodded opening a small bag she brought with her. “So,” she said quickly. “These were a bit difficult to make since from what we’ve read the compulsion itself seems to be based purely on hormones as well as a need to unite your souls.” She looked at them both, “It took me a little while to find what I needed and even longer to put the spell together.” She sighed, “The pendants themselves will be made out of several crystals used to block compulsion, amethyst, ametrine, chrysocolla, and ruby.”

 Willow pulled out two small corked vials filled with multicolored stones and handed them to both Buffy and Clark. “Now, hold out your hands and link your free ones together.”

 Buffy and Clark did as she asked, holding their hands out palm up. Willow placed a vial in each of their hands and then covered them with her own hands, closing her eyes and beginning to chant. Buffy immediately began to feel her hand heat up and for a second it almost became unbearable and Buffy even watched Clark wince from the heat. It was gone just as quickly however and in its place were two hard looking marble like multicolored stones with a dark metallic chain that would hang from each of their necks. Buffy heard Willow mutter one more spell that she recognized to be a ward against breaking.

 “Well go on.” Willow said smiling happily at her work. “Try them on, see if it worked.”

 Buffy quickly slipped the necklace over her head and a sigh of relief left her lips. The sexual tension that had never fully abated her all day finally easing enough to where she wasn’t thinking about sex every few seconds.

 Clark had a similar reaction, his face seeming to ease slightly, but Buffy was surprised when he turned to Willow and asked, “You said the compulsion is only based on hormones, does that mean any feeling we have that aren’t sexual are real?”

 Willow nodded, “Of course, real love is something that can only be based off of free will. Its why love spells don’t ever work. You can’t force someone to love you.”

 Buffy watched amused as Clark seemed to sigh in relief, and then quickly blushed when he noticed her watching him. “Come on stud,” she said hooking her arm through his and dragging him towards the door of the training room. “Let me go grab my stuff before we go get your mom,” a grin creeping over her face as she turned and wished Willow a good night and a promise to catch up tomorrow. “And for the record”, she added quietly as they walked out of the training room. “I still want to jump you, that hasn’t changed even with the necklace on.”

 He quickly reached out to grab her arm, but she easily dodged him and took off down the hallway, a blush and a giggle leaving her lips.

 Clark was suddenly there in front of her, a crooked and devilish smile on his lips. “Is that so?” And then his lips were on hers, his tongue sliding into her mouth as she squealed in surprise.

[musecharm-writes]

Bad Influence, Pt 2 (Steve Harrington X Reader)

Summary: Jonathan, Robin, Steve, and Nancy find out more about what happened at Melvald’s; you have your first shift at the general store.

Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV

When Nancy, Jonathan, Steve, and Robin head to the Byers’ later that night, Joyce is there, making herself a sandwich and smoking a cigarette in the kitchen.

“Jonathan, sweetie? That you?”

“Yeah, Mom,” Jonathan replies. “Nancy, Steve, and Robin are here, too.”

Joyce appears around the corner, a look of surprise on her face. “Oh! Hey, guys! Sorry, if I had known you were coming I would’ve cooked dinner, or--or gotten take-out, or something. Will is over at Dustin’s tonight so I was expecting it to just be me and Jonathan--” She cuts herself off to take a pull from her cigarette.

“That’s okay, Ms Byers, me and Robin were gonna get pizza later,” Steve says politely. He’s always been good with parents, moms especially, and for whatever reason Joyce seems to like him. 

He assumes that Jonathan has never breathed a word to her about all the shit Steve used to put her son through, otherwise he’d probably be eating all his meals through a straw to this very day.

“Hey, Mom,” Jonathan begins, in a characteristically unsubtle fashion, “we were wondering if we could ask you about something.”

Joyce smiles, somewhat unsurely. “Okay,” she says, with a nervous little laugh, “ask away.”

Jonathan and Nancy share a look before Nancy says, “We were wondering if you knew anything about what happened at Melvald’s earlier today?”

Joyce’s eyebrows draw together, a furrow appearing like magic on a face that Steve privately thought looked too young for all the stress Joyce Byers carries with her. “How do you all know about that?”

“Steve and Robin saw it,” Jonathan says.

“Uh, technically only I saw it,” Steve corrected. “I’m still not quite sure what it was all about, though, we were too far away.”

Joyce nods slowly, her lips pursed thoughtfully. “Well… I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to tell you. Technically, I’m supposed to keep it kind of a secret.”

“We won’t tell anyone,” Nancy says, and Steve can tell she’s trying her absolute best to look innocent and wide-eyed. “We’re very curious, is all. And, honestly, a little worried that something bad is happening again.”

Clever play, Nance. They weren’t worried there was another impending apocalypse -- not really. She’s just trying to appeal to Joyce’s instinct to comfort.

Sure enough, it works; that furrow in Joyce’s brow deepens as her conflicted expression melts into a look of concern. “Oh, honey, no. It’s nothing like that.” She bites her lip, mulling it over for a moment, before she says, “Okay, if I tell you, you all have to promise you’ll keep it quiet, okay?”

They all give various answers in the affirmative.

“Someone -- a teenager, around your age -- tried to steal a carton of cigarettes from Melvald’s. I spotted them right as they slipped it into their pocket and started to walk away. Powell and Callahan happened to be there, stopping by on their way to the station, so they took the kid in.”

“Seriously? They tried to steal cigarettes?” Nancy asks, her nose wrinkling with her distaste. “God, that’s so stupid. I’m glad you caught them.”

Joyce sighs. “I feel a little bad for getting them in trouble. It seems like it’s just a case of a good kid making bad choices. I mean, I remember myself at that age…” She shakes her head, taking another drag from her cigarette. She walks over to the coffee table and flicks ash into the ashtray.

“I mean, you did the right thing though, right? Just because they’re some mixed up kid doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have to learn from their mistakes just like anyone else,” Steve says.

Everyone, save for Joyce, turns to look at him.

“...Why are you all staring at me like that?”

Robin puts a hand on his shoulder. “Probably because that’s the most intelligent thing that’s ever come out of your mouth,” she says, giving his shoulder a little pat.

“Hey!” Steve exclaims, but everyone else is laughing, and he can’t help but smile.

Even though he knows it can’t possibly be true, because he says intelligent stuff all the time.

--

The morning of your first shift at Melvald’s begins with your alarm clock, which you set the night before to go off at five. Unfortunately, it never actually went off; unbeknownst to you, one of the breakers had tripped in the middle of the night, which reset your alarm clock.

You wake up from a blissful sleep and roll over to see the blinking red 12:00 . For a second, you don’t comprehend what you’re looking at, and then when it sinks in, you scramble out of bed so frantically that you go tumbling to the ground, tangled in the sheets, yelling, “SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT!”

You get ready faster than you ever have in your life, skipping breakfast and brushing your teeth in the kitchen sink while tugging on your clothes. As soon as you’re ready, you’re flying out the door, grabbing your bike, and peeling down the road that will bring you to Downtown Hawkins. You count your lucky stars that the only drivers out this early are the people driving to work.

When you get to Melvald’s, you chain your bike up at the bike rack and blow through the door like a hurricane, your cheeks bright red with exertion and your blood rushing in your ears. The tinkling of the bell over the door is almost mocking in its gentleness.

The store is almost completely empty except for a single woman in a uniform vest who appears to be pricing items. She looks over at you; you recognise her as Joyce Byers, the woman who caught you stealing the cigarettes.

“Oh! Hey,” she says, sounding surprised to see you.

“I’m so-- so sorry,” you pant, walking forward a bit to lean on the counter. “My… My alarm... didn’t go off, and I--”

She waves a hand. “Don’t worry about it. You’re actually early.”

You pause, your chest heaving, looking at her in disbelief. “Really?”

“Yep. By about…” She looks at a clock behind the counter. “Fifteen minutes, give or take.”

You let your head loll against your back. “So I skipped breakfast for nothing.”

Joyce smiled sympathetically. “‘Fraid so. Sorry. If it makes you feel better, Hop’ll definitely be happy about it.”

And, embarrassingly enough, it does make you feel a little better.

You’d like to say your first day on the job goes pretty well.

You’d like to say that, but if you did, it would be a lie.

It starts with the pricing gun, which miraculously stops working moments after Joyce leaves you to your task. She assures you that it’s just because the damn thing is so old and Gary refuses to replace it because of how expensive they are, which makes you feel a little better, but part of you still feels as though you broke it despite her reassurance.

Then, when Joyce offers you a break to go and grab lunch for the two of you from the diner, you almost lose the money she gives you thanks to a hole in your pocket that you hadn’t even realised was there. Thankfully, you’re able to make it with the cash still in hand, but the incident makes you so nervous that on the way back to the store you almost drop everything multiple times.

When you finally make it back, the store is unusually busy, so you’re forced to stow the paper take-out bags under the counter as Joyce attempts to teach you how to use the register. You frantically memorise as much as you can, and are somehow able to make it through the rush without missing a beat, but by the time it’s over and the two of you are able to take a load off, your lunch is stone cold.

“I’m sorry,” you say to Joyce, staring dejectedly at your cold fries. “I don’t know why I’m having such a shitty day today. I’m trying so hard but it feels like everything is going wrong.”

Joyce shakes her head. “Hey, no. It’s okay. Sometimes, you just have bad luck, no matter how hard you try. It’s not your fault.” She places a hand on your shoulder and squeezes.

You wonder why she’s being so nice to you, but you can’t work up the nerve to ask. Instead, you ask if there’s a microwave you can use to heat up the food.

Toward the end of your shift at around 12:30, Joyce calls you over from where you’ve been organising a window display and says, “Hey, would you mind going into the back and grabbing the boxes that have ‘ballpoint’ and ‘pencil - yellow’ written on them? I need to restock.”

“I’ll do it for you!” You blurt out. You can feel your cheeks flushing.

“Oh,” Joyce says, raising her eyebrows at you. “Okay. Uh, I’ll show you where they go and then that’ll be the last thing you have to do before I let you go for the day. Okay?”

You nod, too flustered to speak. You need Joyce to like you for reasons you aren’t totally sure of, and you hope with every part of you that you aren’t being too obvious.

Joyce walks you through restocking the shelves and then sends you on your way to retrieve the boxes from storage. They’re bigger than you thought they would be considering they’re just boxes of pens and pencils, but you guess it makes sense, since it’s not like the boxes are full of individual pencils and pens. There are three of them, standard sized cardboard boxes; you lift each one and find that you could probably carry two at a time, if you were careful. You stack the two boxes of pencils on top of each other on the ground, squat, and lift them up with a grunt of effort.

Now that you’re holding them, you realise it’s a little hard to see around the boxes. You have to angle your head awkwardly to peer around one side, which leaves you with a pretty big blind spot. You guess you’ll just have to trust that any customers nearby will be smart enough to stay out of the way.

You’ve made it almost all the way to the correct shelf before tragedy strikes again.

You glance down at the ground to make sure that there’s nothing you could trip over or slip on, and as you’re adjusting your grip on the bottom box, you hear a voice coming near you.

“--And stop nagging me! You’re not my mother, Buckley!”

Shortly following this is a shout of, “Steve! Watch where you’re--!”

You look up right in time to slam into someone.

The boxes fly right out of your hands. Boxes of yellow Ticonderoga pencils go flying, scattering across the floor. Some of the boxes even come open and pencils go rolling every which way. You end up flat on your ass in the middle of it all.

For a moment, you stare at the boxes of pencils all over the floor, gobsmacked. Once you’re able to tear your eyes away from the mess, you look up to find Steve Harrington looking down at you with his eyes as wide as dinner plates, but not one strand of hair out of place.

The two of you just stare at each other for a moment. Then, Harrington opens his mouth.

“Oh my god, I am so sorry,” he babbles, dropping to his knees and starting to pick up the stray boxes and escaped pencils. “That was an accident, uh-- shit, I swear I’m not usually this much of a klutz. I’m sorry, please, lemme help--”

“It’s okay,” you sigh, somewhat dejected. You’re probably going to have to stay after your shift ends to finish picking all this up and do what you promised Joyce. You glance at the clock and find your theory is confirmed, to your dismay. “I can handle it. It’s my job.”

“No, really, I…” He pauses after a moment, squinting at you. “Wait. Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?”

He has. The two of you went to school together for, like, your entire lives. That’s not what he means, though; he recognises you from yesterday, when he watched you get patted down and shoved in a cop car after making the dumbest mistake you’ve ever made in your life.

“We went to the same school for twelve years,” you say stiffly. Like hell are you gonna remind him if he actually forgot.

“...Oh,” he replies awkwardly. “Uh. Sorry. But, no, I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere else. Did you used to hang out at the mall? I used to work there. Oh!” He snaps his fingers. “Wait! I got it! You’re the one who got arrested yesterday, right?”

Before you can answer, a girl you vaguely recognise as being a high schooler a couple of years your junior appears at Harrington’s side, grabbing him by the arm and yanking him with surprising strength and an almost enraged expression.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” She hisses at him, before turning to you with a sunny smile. “I’m so sorry about him, he’s chronically stupid. We’re going to go before he says another dumb thing, right , Steve?” She has him by the ear, now, and you have to admit it’s kind of funny; she’s a couple of inches shorter than him, so he has to bend down to keep her from tearing his ear off.

“OW! Yes , Robin, jesus! Let go of me, I’m leaving!”

As you watch them go, you can’t help but feel disappointed. You’d kind of wanted someone to help you pick up the pencils.

--

When Robin and Steve are outside of Melvald’s, Robin finally lets go of Steve’s ear, saying, “Steve, what have we talked about? About thinking before we speak?”

Steve scrubs a hand over his face. “I’m sorry, okay? I’m trying. It’s not as easy as it sounds.”

Robin rolls her eyes. “I know, dummy. I had to learn it, too.” She sticks her hands in her pockets and glances back into the general store through the front window. “So, what was your angle with that whole spiel back there?”

Steve blanches. “What?”

“I mean , you’re not just nice to people for no reason all the time, even if you did something to them. So why were you being such a hardcore nice guy?”

Steve opens his mouth to say something and realises he doesn’t have any clue how to respond. He crosses his arms and shrugs, flustered. “I dunno. Maybe I just felt like it. What’s it to you?”

He starts to walk away, tired of the conversation, and Robin comes trotting after him, still yapping right in his ear. (He pretends to be annoyed, but honestly, his heart feels full to the brim with love for Robin. Before her, nobody has ever chased after him before.)

“Uh, you’re my best friend, dumb-dumb! That’s what it is to me! My nose belongs stuck right in your business!” She catches up to him and runs around to plant herself in his path, grinning broadly. “So, tell me what it is that has you so riled up.”

Steve gapes at her for a moment before shrugging again. “...I don’t know.”

Robin arcs a brow at him. “Seriously? You’re still not gonna tell me?”

“Robin, c’mon, I’m telling you I have no idea ,” Steve insists. He sighs, and lowers his voice. “Look, I just felt this weird… Urge to stay and talk? And picking up the mess that I caused anyway seemed like a good excuse at the time. Until I stuck my foot in my mouth, that is,” he sighs.

Robin gasps. “Steven Janine Harrington--”

“Not my name.”

“--Do you have a CRUSH?”

Steve feels his entire body burst into flames. He looks around frantically, saying, “Will you keep your voice down?”

Robin’s face takes on an expression of pure glee. “So you do! Oh my god, I didn’t think you were capable. So, are you going to pursue anything? Or are you more the brood-from-afar type?”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Oh my god, will you shut up? You’re such an embarrassment. This is why I never take you anywhere,” Steve says, walking off in a huff.

Robin chases after him, laughing her ass off. He’s glad at least one of them thinks the situation is funny.