#<- tag to follow for this story

[steddiehyperfixation]

don't you forget about me (steddie fic)

saw this post and was inspired to write something angsty <3

The first thing Eddie is aware of when he wakes up, before he even opens his eyes, is the dull, aching pain throbbing through pretty much his entire body. The second thing he’s aware of is that someone is holding his hand. 

“Eddie?” The hand in his tightens its grip as Eddie begins to stir; the voice it presumably belongs to sounds immeasurably relieved, yet only vaguely familiar. 

Eddie groans. His eyelids flutter, blinking awake, and he groggily rolls his head to the side to get a look at whoever had spoken. 

The voice sighs again, “Oh thank god-” 

“Harrington?” Eddie’s eyes fly open wide now as they land on the mystery man sitting beside him on the edge of the bed - a man he most definitely is not close enough with to be holding his hand, and a bed that is most definitely not his own. He snatches his hand away. “What the hell are you doing? Where am I?”

“Ed-” Another man’s voice, this one just as relieved and infinitely more familiar. It fills Eddie with relief too as he looks to his other side to find his uncle Wayne rising from a nearby chair to come up next to him. 

“Wayne, what-?” His surroundings are becoming more clear. “What happened? Why am I in a hospital? And why the fuck is King Steve at my bedside?” Eddie tries to sit up only to gasp and wince in pain as the dull ache in his sides sharpens to near agony at the movement. 

“Take it easy, son.” Wayne’s hand lands on his shoulder, gently but firmly pushing him back down onto the pillows. “You were hurt real bad.” 

“Yeah, I got that,” Eddie grumbles out. He sucks in a deep, intentional breath and exhales slowly, the pain beginning to dull again now that he’s settled. His questions are still largely unanswered, though. Blank mind reaching desperately for any logical piece to this bizarre puzzle, he turns an accusing glare to Harrington. “Did you land me in here? Is that why you’re here, some sort of weird guilt thing?” 

Harrington’s looking at him like a kicked puppy. “What? No, I-” he falters, takes a shaky breath and swallows painfully like he’s trying not to cry. “You don’t remember?” 

“I don’t remember what? Will someone just tell me what happened?” Eddie’s confusion is rising more and more into agitation with every second he remains without an explanation. 

“What’s the last thing you remember?” Harrington asks quietly.

“I was driving home from school, just found out I wasn’t gonna graduate again.” Eddie frowns as he thinks back, still trying to put pieces together. “Did I crash my car? Is that it? I was emotional and not paying attention and got into an accident?” 

Yet again, he receives no answers. 

“Eddie, what month is it?” Wayne asks instead, his tone dangerously measured and serious. “What year?” 

“May…” Eddie says warily, “1985.”

His words hold a weight he doesn’t understand, landing heavy on the others in the room and thickening the air. It sends a chill of dread down his spine, the way his answer etches concern deep into the lines of Wayne’s face, the way Steve Harrington seems to take it like a blow to the chest. 

Harrington exhales sharply as if he’s been punched, standing abruptly and taking a few stumbling steps back. Wayne says, “It’s April of ‘86, Ed.”

Eddie’s blood runs cold. “No. No, it can’t be.” 

“I’m gonna go tell the nurse you’re awake,” Harrington mumbles, his voice strained and his eyes glassy with barely held-back tears. 

“I’ll go,” Wayne offers, pushing himself away from Eddie’s bed. He gives Harrington a meaningful look, though what that meaning is, Eddie can’t decipher. 

Harrington turns his devastated gaze to the older man. “But, Wayne, he doesn’t-” 

“I know, kid.” Wayne gives a sad smile and places a sympathetic hand on Harrington’s shoulder as he passes by. “Just talk to him.” 

Eddie is thrown off by this familiarity between them. Since when were those two close? He feels like he’s entered some sort of parallel universe where everything is just ever so slightly wrong. It leaves an itch beneath his skin, uncomfortable and out of place, like he no longer quite fits in his own body, in his own life. He’s lost 11 months, apparently, and this world is no longer his; he doesn’t know where he fits into it anymore. 

Wayne leaves the room, and Eddie wants to protest: Don’t leave me here with this guy I don’t know in this time I don’t know, please, you’re the only thing that feels safe and familiar! Anxiety is crawling through him like a thousand tiny bugs in his veins. He wants to scream, he wants to cry, he wants to run. Anything to shake this feeling loose. But he’s confined to this bed, trapped both by his pain and by all these machines he’s hooked up to, and he sure as shit isn’t going to have a breakdown in front of Steve goddamn Harrington. 

Instead, Eddie resigns himself to this situation and casts a sideways glance at Harrington who very much looks like he’s also trying not to have a breakdown. “I’m freaking out, man,” Eddie says finally, hating how shaky and pathetic his voice sounds. “I swear to god, Harrington, if you don’t tell me what the hell is going on…” 

Harrington worries his lip between his teeth as he hesitates. “It’s a lot to explain.” 

“Yeah, I bet,” Eddie scoffs out a humorless laugh. “I’m missing nearly an entire year, of course it’s a lot to fill in. Unless I’ve been here this whole time?” 

“No.” Harrington shakes his head. “No, you’ve only been here about a week. I- I don’t know why you’re missing so much time, the whole Vecna thing only started like a week before that-” 

“Vecna?” Eddie interrupts to question. “What does any of this have to do with the D&D campaign I was planning? And, also, how the fuck do you know about that?” 

Harrington closes his eyes for a second and takes a breath, like having this conversation is the most painful thing he’s ever had to do. “I’m not talking about D&D, Ed. Vecna was a real-life monster from a real-life alternate dimension we called the Upside-Down. The kids only called him Vecna because we didn’t know who he was at the time and he, like, cursed people before he killed them, but he was actually Henry Creel, which is a whole other fucked up story.”

“Okay…” Eddie doesn’t know who ‘the kids’ are and he’s skeptical of the way Harrington talks so factually about monsters and dimensions and curses existing in the real world, but he does remember his uncle telling him stories about the demonic tragedy of the Creel family, which is the only thing that makes any of this even halfway believable. It still doesn’t explain how Eddie wound up in the hospital with his entire body feeling like it’d been run through a blender, though, or why the former king of Hawkin’s High was hovering over his sickbed. He gestures for Harrington to continue. 

“I never wanted you to get involved in all this Upside-Down shit,” Harrington’s voice breaks. He steps closer to Eddie’s bed again, and he looks so so sad as he stares down at him that it makes Eddie’s own heart ache, just a little bit. Harrington’s hand twitches at his side as if he means to reach out for Eddie but then thinks better of it, running the hand through his hair instead as he continues, “I tried to keep you from it for so long, I really did, but then Vecna killed Chrissy in your trailer and the whole town blamed you and you were just a part of things then, there was no getting around it. You helped us fight him - Vecna. You kept his army of bats off our ass while we weakened his body and El weakened his mind. If it weren’t for you we never would’ve defeated him and we certainly wouldn’t have all made it out alive.” Harrington’s gaze softens, as does his voice, his next words almost a whisper, “You were a hero, Eddie.” 

“That doesn’t sound like me,” Eddie says, like that’s the least plausible part of Harrington’s story. And, really, it is. He can wrap his mind around a lot of things: a murder in his trailer - sure, Forest Hills always was a shady place; the whole town accusing him of being a killer - yeah, of course, that tracks; even an evil wizard from another dimension with an army of bats - fine, okay, why the hell not. But Eddie Munson is no hero, and he’s definitely not any sort of fighter either.

“No, you never did think so, did you?” Harrington mutters with a sad sort of fondness and the barest trace of a wistful smile. “But it’s true. Dustin was in danger and you didn’t even think twice. You ran right into the fray without a second thought, sacrificed yourself so that the rest of us might survive. Those bats nearly killed you, b-” he breaks, choking on whatever word he was going to say. His eyes swim with yet more unshed tears. “I almost thought they had killed you, you know. I thought you were dead when I carried you out of the Upside-Down,” he admits shakily, choked up and barely managed, “and even when I brought you here and you were stable, I was still so scared you wouldn’t wake up…” 

Eddie doesn’t know how to react to any of that information or to such a display of emotion. His own hands twitch now with the urge to reach out and comfort him, but he too denies that instinct. He tries for humor instead, something lighter, cracking a grin and teasing, “Aw, Stevie, I didn’t know you cared.” 

Harrington makes a sound halfway between a sob and a laugh. “Oh, Ed, you have no idea.” 

“We were friends then, weren’t we?” Eddie guesses now, carefully. It’s rapidly becoming the only possible explanation for the guy’s behavior around him. “Before all the Vecna stuff?”

“Yeah,” Harrington manages, forcing a small, sad smile as his eyes finally overflow and streak his cheeks with tears. “Yeah, we were good friends.” 

~

Wayne reenters the room then with a nurse in tow, and Steve quickly turns away and rubs his hands over his face. He needs to pull himself together; he can’t break down right now, not yet, not here. 

He listens, distantly, as the nurse asks Eddie a bunch of questions and then tells the rest of them that she needs to take him in for some tests to determine the cause and prognosis of Eddie’s amnesia. He watches, numbly, as she wheels Eddie’s entire bed out of the room. 

Steve can barely hear, barely see, his emotion clouding his eyes and roaring in his ears. He stares blankly through the open doorway and struggles to swallow down the ever-rising lump in his throat. 

Wayne’s voice rumbles from somewhere beside him, but he can’t quite make out the words. “What?” 

“I’ll take that as a no, then,” Wayne says, the sound reaching Steve’s ears a little clearer now. “I asked if you were alright.” 

Steve shakes his head. His voice comes out coarse and raw, “‘Course I’m not alright.” 

“Right, ‘course you’re not,” Wayne echoes. He follows Steve’s mournful gaze to the door Eddie had disappeared through. “What did you tell him?” 

“Told him he was a hero,” Steve croaks, “...and that we were good friends.”

“Ah…” Steve’s vision is so blurred behind a thick layer of tears he can’t see the sympathetic frown on the old man’s face, but he knows it’s there. “At least he’s alive, kid,” Wayne tries to be comforting. “You can always start over.” 

“Yeah, I know, but I don’t- I don’t want to start over, I just want-” Steve chokes back a sob. He just wants Eddie.

It’s a horrible thought, but Steve almost thinks that this just might be worse than if Eddie really had died… Because how is Steve supposed to handle the fact that his boyfriend of 9 months no longer knows him? How is he supposed to cope now that the love of his life looks right at him and no longer sees him?

He closes his eyes, presses the heels of his palms into his eyelids, inhaling a shaky breath and exhaling an even shakier sigh. Steve whispers, “It feels like I’m losing him all over again.” 

(part two is here!)

[egophiliac]

innocently logging in to look at the Twst schedule for May like

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

i wanna know more about svsss menopause

They synced their periods together too well. Now they are synced through their perimenopause years.

[tezzbot]

An interpretation of some moments from the Silver and Espio story in Sonic Rivals 2!!! They are silly to me<3

[criticaaaaaaaal]

had an idea

[eleonorpiteira]

A great art year, all in all! Worked a lot and didn't have as much time for personal work as I wanted (what else is new) but I did level up my traditional art adventures! A personal victory :) Professionally I had the opportunity to work on some amazing projects! I normally try to fill these Summary of Art things with as much personal art as possible, but this time I used a lot of client work because I really like how they turned out! (✿◡‿◡) I wish you all a wonderful year of 2024 - good health, happiness, money (it helps!), and peace, peace, peace ❤

[chiscribbs]

Some miscellaneous doodles for ACT I of my Grown Apart AU!

If you squint, you can get a little context for the plot. ... If you don't feel like squinting, however, here are some convenient notes I've included about what's going on in each image:

(top left -> bottom middle)

Donnie hides his spidertech underneath a specially designed tailcoat that he made himself. The back has two openings on either side, hidden by an overlapping layer of fabric, from where the mechanical legs extend. Naturally, each spider leg hides a multitude of secret functions, most of which no one else but him knows about (not even Big Mama.)

Raph thinks Draxum's new prisoner/test subject, who he's been instructed to keep an eye on (no trouble there!), is just the cutest thing ever.

Leo and Mikey experience the joys of a two-child-household. When the little sibling is bored, no one else is allowed to know peace.

When Draxum joins sides with the Foot Clan, Raph is forced to work alongside humans for the first time. Draxum's always taught him that humans are the enemy of the yokai and that they need to be destroyed, so he's a bit...conflicted about this new development.

In an attempt to prove his usefulness to Big Mama - Donnie enters the Hamato residence as a spy, under the pretense of being an escapee of Big Mama's prisons (is it really all pretense, though?) He manages to win the ever-optimistic Mikey over with little trouble, but Leo is not as easily convinced and remains suspicious of the purple-clad "yokai's" intentions.

Big Mama can't risk losing her best engineer and mechanic to the above world as she did her champion all those years ago. So, she takes every necessary precaution to ensure Dontavius (Donnie) remains under her thumb, exactly where she needs him to be. After all, Mama knows best ❤

Splinter searches for his two lost sons, ninja style - Leo and Mikey are still too young to be left at the lair by themselves, so he's had to improvise.

A little clue as to how April first meets the boys - Leo and Mikey, that is - in this AU.

[charrfie]

[canisalbus]

You say you're not a writer but the way you tell their stories in the tags is so writer-ish to me. I'd read their entire story written like your write tags and it would be great! Especially the last few tags there on the villain ask? Very writer-ish if you ask me

.

[katabay]

unofficially, a follow up to this!

after all, what's the point of doing a story that's as much about the actors and the stage as the story that they're acting out if you can't draw up alternative castings and explore messier different dynamics!!!

bsky ⭐ pixiv ⭐ pillowfort ⭐ cohost

[steddiehyperfixation]

don't you forget about me (part four)

(part one)(part two)(part three)

Eddie wakes from a thankfully dreamless sleep, his head on his pillow now, which is somehow far less comfortable than Steve’s solid chest. Speaking of… Eddie looks around; Steve isn’t there at all anymore, and Eddie is alone. He’s disappointed, though not entirely surprised, that Harrington’s left him again despite his promises. 

In fact, he’s honestly more surprised when less than two minutes into his wallowing in the empty room, the door is pushed open by none other than Steve Harrington carrying two trays of food, one balanced on each hand like a goddamn waiter. It’s kind of adorable, actually, Eddie thinks, and that thought surprises him a little too. 

“Oh, you’re awake! Good morning.” Steve sets one of the trays on Eddie’s lap. His smile is bright, though there’s a slight, uncertain wobble to it. “Shitty hospital food and shitty hospital TV, right?” 

“Right.” Eddie’s face breaks into a grin, something light unfurling in his chest. He glances at the plate of gross food on his lap then back up at Steve, and he admits, “You know, for a second there I thought you’d left again.” 

Steve shakes his head as he settles into the chair beside the bed with his own tray. “I promised you I’d hang out today. I’m a man of my word.”

“Good.” Eddie smiles and grabs a remote off the bedside table, turning on the TV. “Now for our mealtime entertainment, let’s see what’s on the shitty TV today.”

The television starts blaring some old black-and-white rerun of I Love Lucy. Eddie’s immediately about to change the channel, but then he notices the way Steve’s eyes have lit up. “Hey, that’s not shitty TV!” Steve says. “I used to watch this with my mom all the time when I was a kid.” 

Eddie snorts. “Of course you did.”  

Steve gives him an indignant look. “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“Nothing.” Eddie shakes his head evasively, shoveling a forkful of rubbery scrambled eggs into his mouth so he doesn’t have to say anything else. 

Steve just rolls his eyes, almost affectionately, like they’ve had conversations like this before. He chews on a flimsy piece of bacon and makes a face, nose scrunching up. “Ugh, you really weren’t kidding about the shitty food, though.” 

“Nope,” Eddie laughs, “I really wasn’t. Thanks for catering it though.” He swallows down another mouthful of food, and then adds with a little less levity, “And, uh, thanks for last night, too - for calming me down. Don’t think I’ve said that yet.”

“Oh, yeah, of course.” Steve gives a small smile, shrug, slight shake of his head, a tiny pinch between his brows like he doesn't quite get why Eddie even feels the need to thank him for that. “That's what I’m here for. I just hope I didn't cross any boundaries or anything, holding onto you like that.” 

Now it's Eddie's turn to give him a confused little smile and a head shake. “No, of course not. That was exactly what I needed.” He attempts to add some humor back into the conversation, jokingly quips, “Although, to be fair, I never did think that King Steve would ever be caught dead in a bed with The Freak.”

Steve had hazarded another bite of his breakfast, trying the eggs this time, only to choke on it at Eddie’s comment. He coughs, hits his fist against his chest, and hurriedly takes a sip from the water bottle on his tray. 

“Jesus.” Eddie tries not to take offense, assuming Steve’s reaction to be one of disgust at the double entendre. “That bad of a thought, huh?” 

Steve shakes his head and clears his throat, face flushed. “No, no, it’s not that, man. Food just went down the wrong pipe, is all.” 

“Uh huh…” 

“Seriously.” Steve gulps down some more water, quiet for a moment before adding, “You know I’m not King Steve anymore, right? Haven’t been for a while now, since even long before your memories end.” 

“Yeah, I know. You ditched Tommy H. and Carol your junior year, and then Nancy Wheeler dumped you and Billy Hargrove stole your crown and bashed your face in your senior year, I remember,” Eddie recalls. “But for the most part you were still well-known and well-liked, still this popular, pretty, rich boy jock all the girls still drooled over, so.” He shrugs. “Always figured ‘King’ still fit.” 

“Right…” Steve raises his eyebrows as Eddie lists off these events of his life, looking at him with a smirk of barely-hidden amusement. “I forgot you were obsessed with me.”  

Eddie’s jaw drops in exaggerated offense. “I was not obsessed with you.” 

“Were too,” Steve taunts.

“Was not.” 

“Were too.” 

“Was not.” Eddie chucks a piece of bacon at him. 

Steve gasps indignantly as the bacon slaps him in the face and tumbles onto his lap. “You child!” But he’s laughing, retaliates by flinging a forkful of eggs back at Eddie. 

The conversation devolves into a full-on food fight, shrieking and cackling as they pelt each other with flying bits of eggs and bacon. It turns out shitty hospital food serves far better as ammunition than it does as anything actually edible. 

A nurse chooses the exact wrong time to decide to come in and check on Eddie, walking into the room at just the right moment to be caught in the crossfire and hit with a stray chunk of egg. Both boys freeze. 

“Uh oh…” Eddie mutters under his breath. Just his luck - it’s not the young, nice nurse, Katie, who always laughs at his jokes, but Nurse Margaret, the old, mean one who he’s never once seen crack a smile. She flicks the egg bit off her shoulder, leveling them with a stern frown as she marches over. 

Eddie casts a furtive glance at Steve who looks back at him, lips twitching like he’s trying not to laugh again, and Eddie feels mirth bubbling back up in his own chest too. He has to look away from Steve again before he loses it. 

He sucks his lips in, clamping them together between his teeth to hold in his laughter, and he stares up at Margaret with a thin-lipped, guilty, upside down smile as she chides them both for making a mess and scolds Eddie for exerting himself and risking reopening his wounds. Steve mumbles an apology and starts cleaning up the scattered bits of food strewn about the room while Margaret double checks that Eddie hasn’t, in fact, reopened his wounds or gotten worse in any way. Once the nurse is satisfied with both the state of the room and the state of Eddie, she whisks away what’s left of their food trays and stalks out of the room with one last disapproving look over her shoulder.

Then and only then does Eddie risk eye-contact with Steve again, and the two of them immediately burst back into laughter. Steve nearly doubles over with it, leaning against the trash can where he’d just been dusting off his hands. “Oh my god,” he chuckles out. “Her face when I hit her with that egg? I was so sure she was gonna kick me out.” 

“Nearly gave mean old Margaret an aneurysm, and that was just from hitting her shoulder,” Eddie snickers. “Imagine if you hit her in the eye or something.” 

Steve does his best impression of Margaret’s angry scowl and reproachful huff, and Eddie cackles. He laughs so hard his sides ache and his injuries hurt, wounds aggravated by the movement of his laughter, but he doesn’t care, the pain far too distant beneath the cushion of painkillers and positive emotion he currently feels so high on. 

“You’ve still got some egg in your hair,” Steve notices with another amused snort as he pushes himself away from the trash can and approaches Eddie’s bed again. He plucks the offending bit of food out of Eddie’s curls and smooths down the hair where it had been stuck. “There.” 

Steve’s fingertips brush ever so lightly against Eddie’s cheek when he fixes his hair. It sends a pleasant sort of shiver down Eddie’s spine, turning his laughter to breathless giggles just for a moment. “Thanks.”

Steve flicks the egg chunk into the trash before sinking back into the bedside chair with a soft sigh and a warm smile. “God, I missed this,” he says, “just laughing with you.” 

“Yeah.” Eddie returns the grin. For him, of course, this is the first time they’ve laughed together like this, but he has to admit he’s already rather fond of it. “Can’t remember the last time I’ve laughed that hard.”

Steve’s smile turns nostalgic, like he can remember the last time Eddie laughed like that, like he was there for it. “It’s a good look on you - laughter,” he says, so quietly Eddie almost feels like maybe it wasn’t meant for him to hear. And Eddie can’t help but think that laughter is a pretty good look on Steve too, all rosy cheeks and shining eyes.

“How did we become friends?” Eddie asks, before his previous thought can take any sort of root. 

The nostalgia in Steve’s expression only grows. “It was the beginning of June, start of summer, probably only a few weeks after your memories stop. I was working at the Scoops Ahoy in Starcourt, that new mall that had just opened, and you wandered in,” he says, looking at Eddie with a teasing glint to his eyes, “because you were obsessed with me-”

“Was not,” Eddie protests immediately.

“Were too,” Steve laughs. “Anyways, you saw me in my stupid little sailor uniform trying and very obviously failing to chat up a girl at the counter, and you came in just to laugh at me, actually.” 

“Okay, that does sound like me,” Eddie concedes with a grin. He probably walked in there just for the sailor costume alone, if he’s being honest with himself. That’s something he’d kill to see - just for a good laugh, of course. “Do you still have that uniform? It might, you know, jog my memory a little if you were to bring it in one day,” he suggests slyly. 

“You and that uniform, man,” Steve scoffs and shakes his head like this is something they’ve talked about many, many times before, enough for it to become a predictable sort of annoyance, a longsuffering inside joke. “No, I don’t still have it. Threw it out first chance I had, not to mention it got totally ruined when the- uh, when the mall burned down.” 

Eddie’s eyes go slightly wide. “The mall burned down? While you were there?” 

“Yeah- well, sort of,” Steve falters, a shadow falling over his expression, and he shakes his head again. “It’s kind of a long story, and not the one I’m telling right now.” 

“Right, yeah, shit.” Eddie waves his hand as if to erase everything he’d said before. “Forget I mentioned it.” He, more than anyone, understands not wanting to relive bad memories right now. “Continue the other story. How did we go from me making fun of you to us being besties?”

The shadow lifts as Steve returns to that memory. “Oh, yeah. I told you the show wasn’t free and that you needed to order something or leave. So you bought a milkshake, which I somehow managed to end up completely spilling all over the both of us when I tried to hand it to you. You were livid,” he chuckles, “thought I’d done it on purpose, even though I definitely hadn’t. I felt so bad I insisted on helping you clean up. You were icy about it, but you let me show you to the sink in the backroom and accepted the jacket I lent you so you wouldn’t have to walk around with ice cream stains on your shirt all day.” 

“That’s quite the meet-cute,” Eddie jokes. “Are you sure you’re describing our friendship and not some rom-com chick flick you watched last week?” 

“Nah, true story, honest. It wasn’t a rom-com,” Steve says, and though he smiles, there’s an odd sadness to it too. He shakes his head and continues, “Anyways, you clearly warmed up to me after that because you came back the next day to return the jacket and apologize for being a bit of a dick before, and then you gave me this whole ‘you’re actually a good dude’ speech and told me to give you a call if I ever wanted to split a joint or something. I took you up on it that same night; it had been a rough day at work and I figured why not, so I came over and we smoked and we talked and we got along like a house on fire - better than either of us expected, I think. And that was our thing, then, after that - smoking and talking. Sometimes weed, sometimes just cigarettes, and sometimes we just smoked and didn’t talk, and then sometimes we just talked and didn’t smoke; until eventually we started doing other things together too besides just talking and smoking, we were just hanging out. At that point we were friends, practically inseparable, and then we-” Steve stops himself, a shade of melancholy reentering his dim smile once more. “We only got closer from there.” 

“That sounds nice…” Eddie tries to remember it, really digs deep in his mind for any sort of spark of memory or recognition in Steve’s words, but it’s empty. It all just sounds like a story to him, doesn’t settle anywhere real. It’s a good story, sure, one he’d like to experience, one he aches to connect with, but a story nonetheless, only words, only fiction. “I wish I could remember that.” 

“Me too,” Steve says, and Eddie hates how sad he looks, hates even more that he’s the cause of it. 

“Well, I guess we’ll just have to make new memories, then!” Eddie declares with a theatrical amount of enthusiasm as he flashes Steve a bright grin, all in the hopes of chasing that sadness back off of his face. “Won’t we, my friend?” 

Success; Steve seems a little startled by Eddie’s sudden gusto, but he laughs and smiles, the real kind this time that shines in his eyes again. “Yeah, I guess we will.”

Eddie does his best to keep the conversation away from their past after that, not only in an attempt to keep the light in Steve’s expression but for his own sake too. It’s a strange thing to be reminded of the fact that he shares a history with someone and has no memory of it, to be around someone who seems to know everything about him while he feels as though they’ve only just met.

For the most part, hanging out with Steve is nice and fun and easy - there’s something so natural, familiar, about the way they talk, the way they banter, the way they sit together even in the silences. But sometimes Eddie will say something that makes a sadness flicker in Steve’s eyes again, or sometimes Steve will say something that makes Eddie wonder just what secrets this guy knows about him and his skin crawls with that old discomfited itch. They’re both quick with a joke, a redirection, whenever the other’s expression falters, though, like Steve is trying to make sure Eddie doesn’t feel uncomfortable just as much as Eddie is trying to make sure Steve doesn’t feel sad. 

Other visitors come in and out of Eddie’s room that day too: Dustin stops by with a portable cassette player and some newer heavy metal albums that came out during the period Eddie no longer remembers, which brings more than one source of entertainment as it also incurs Nurse Margaret’s wrath again when they listen to it too loud. Wayne drops in with some actually edible fast food for lunch and a deck of cards, playing a few rounds of a few games. Nurse Katie checks in on him to redress his wounds and she laughs at his stories of annoying Margaret. Even Steve has to leave a couple times, says he has errands to run or needs to pick up Robin from work, but he promises to be back each time and each time he is. 

Night has fallen now, and it’s just Eddie and Steve again, Steve sitting, as always, beside Eddie’s bed as they watch whatever cheesy old movie is playing on TV while Eddie fights off sleep. He fears it still; each wave of drowsiness that washes over him is met with a shiver in his heart that breathes ice into his veins and freezes him awake. 

After about Eddie’s hundredth attempt to suppress a yawn, Steve turns off the TV and looks at him. “Are you tired?” 

“No,” Eddie says, only for his lie to be almost immediately undermined by another traitorous yawn. “Alright, yeah, I am, but- I don’t want to sleep,” he admits. “I don’t want to dream.”

“Oh.” Steve’s gaze softens, sympathetic. For the first time unprompted, not waiting for a nightmare or for Eddie to ask like he always had before, Steve moves closer and takes Eddie’s hand. “I’ve got you, you know,” he says, the statement fierce in its sincerity. “It’ll be alright. I’ll fight off your nightmares with my bare hands if I have to.” 

Steve’s hand is warm against the chill in Eddie’s blood, the heat of his skin seeping in to thaw his fear. “I don’t think a nightmare is something you can fight,” Eddie says, cracking a smile, but looking at Steve now, he can almost believe it. 

There’s a new sort of spark in Steve’s eyes, protective, devoted, and it burns the way a fire in the hearth of a home burns, like something dangerous made safe just for him. Eddie suddenly doesn’t doubt, somehow, that Steve could fight off anything, even something as intangible as a nightmare, if it was threatening Eddie. With Steve here holding his hand, he somehow doesn’t doubt that not a single thing can hurt him. Not a single thing would even dare try. 

And not a single thing does. 

No nightmares make their way into Eddie’s mind that night, no bad memories stir in his subconscious. That night, instead, he dreams of Steve.

(part five!) taglist (CLOSED): @romanticdestruction @daydreamsandcrashingwaves @paintsplatteredandimperfect @hallucinatedjosten @mugloversonly @estrellami-1 @alongcomesaspider @thatonebadideapanda @tell-me-a-secret-a-nice-one @dragonmama76 @wxrmland @nuggies4life @sirsnacksalot @myguiltyartpleasure @lolawonsstuff @marklee-blackmore @vinteraltus @sebastiansstanswhore @0happyeverafter0 @scarlet-malfoy @hotluncheddie @xxfiction-is-my-realityxx @emsgoodthinkin @alyelf @warlordess @stevesbipanic @lil-gremlin-things @rockandrolodex @badcaseofcasey @bat-outta-hel @fandomcartographer @manda-panda-monium @littlewildflowerkitten @giopandaonice @mightbeasleep @queenie-ofthe-void @krazyperson @worldofshea @marvel-ous-m @tartarusknight @a-little-unsteddie @xenon-demon @goodolefashionedloverboi @xxsky-shockxx @mc-i-r @bookbinderbitch @aspenshade88 @slowandsteddie @thedragonsaunt @daydreaming-mood @space-invading-pigeon @irregular-child @a-lovely-craziness (taglist continued in replies. please lmk if you'd like to be removed from this list)

[burntblueberrywaffles]

Watching Anakin haters use TCW as their main argument against him like:

That guy from your show sure sounds like he sucks glad my beloved blorbo Anakin Skywalker would never do that 😌

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

You're mine now, old man.

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[narcissarina]

𝔊𝔬𝔩𝔡𝔢𝔫 ℭ𝔞𝔤𝔢, 𝔅𝔩𝔲𝔢 𝔅𝔬𝔫𝔡𝔰

જ⁀➴Previous chapter

Pairings: bodyguard!Leon × college billionaire!reader

Word count: 2,105

Tw: mentions of death, experiment, death threats

Summary: you woke up in a strange cabin, recalling the events had happen before this. Now, not knowing what next move you'd pull.

𝚅𝙸𝙸𝙸.

Your body lying against the hard ground, head spinning as you have a urge to vomit but you swallowed it in and cough out some strange liquids from your mouth. Trying to steady your focus, you sat up and look around to your surroundings—it’s unfamiliar and you’d be damned if your city had this kind of ruined room.

It looks like a cottage, ears started ringing as you winced and whined at the sudden ring and pain in your ear. You palm your ears to close and maybe the ringing would stop, it did—but it’s still painful. You had the urge to sob and call out for help, but it seems like no one is hear and no one would hear your cries.

It's almost dark, you got up and wail at the pain you have in your leg. Someone drew an X mark on your right leg, with something sharp. You wail and gripped on to your leg, it’s still bleeding a little of blood, you reckon its been a few minutes since someone cut an X in your leg.

Taking a couple of deep breaths, you focus your eyes to something that’ll wrap your injured leg—it’s not that big but it’s also not that small. Behind you was a bed, ruined and reeks urine, disgusting. It’s making you puke but you hold it on.

You limp your way to the broken cabinets, rummaging each cabinet. You could only see dead rats and spider webs in, but you’re determined to find at least one thing that could disinfect your wound and cover it some clean cloth.

Your legs gave out as you stood too long, you hiss at the pain when your injury made contact with the floor. “Fuck!” you hiss as tears burns your cheeks, you continue rummaging below the cabinet and something white shines from the corner of your eyes. It’s too far to reach, you stick your hand and cringe at whatever feeling your hand made contact with. The tip of your fingers caught it, you grab a hold of it and took it out.

“Finally! A fucking aid kit, the fuck.” You smiled at what you achieved to get, the med kit is a little dusty and dirty and, wait—is that a blood stain? Fuck it, you just rolled with it as long as it has what you need inside.

Opening the first aid kit and saw various of things that hasn’t been used yet, your wound throbs and you hiss. You took the distilled water first and dump it over the X mark on your leg, you felt something sharp inside the wound—though it wasn’t deep, you saw a light blue glow. You take the tweezer, put some alcohol with it and dry it off for a second.

Placing the tweezer to your injured leg, slowly but surely grabbing a hold of the small glowing rock. The moment it was taken out, you shudder and let out a relieved shaking sigh. You swallowed your saliva as blood splatter down your leg. Taking more distilled water and putting pressure to end the bleeding.

Once the bleeding stopped, you take the gauze bandage roll and made some folds four times and wrap it around your wound. To feel better, you made a silly but durable ribbon out of it but still left some bandage roll incase you need to change.

Your leg was shaking and you glance at the rock thing that made your wound hurt, it started to glow more and more. You wrapped it with thick clothing. Neatly folded the fabric three times and put the rock in and fold it another three more times.

There’s some bag pack that you could use and find a way to get the fuck out of here and get help, you also found a gun that’s been hidden away. You praise the man above for letting you have luck by your side.

It took a few minutes to finally get up, take the things you need and see the world outside.

It looks ruin.

You’re not in your street home.

You were taken away from your home.

Leon shot some zombies which he never thought would also be here, inspecting the room. Nothing that could help him, he did see a key from one of the zombie he just shot. That’s a first, he knelt down and quickly taken it with him and proceed to another room.

He just solved two puzzles and mystery in this mansion just keeps on stacking. It has taken him to solve it for almost thirty minutes and he would’ve just blown those puzzles with a fucking grenade for how much this place is testing his patience.

While looking for something in the area of the second library of this house, he thought to himself that this house very much value knowledge nor stories since it has a second library.

Leon swore he heard a gun shot from outside, since this place is a complete ruin and it’s been oddly too quiet that it has been eerie and uneasy about him. In the back of his mind that zombies aren’t the only thing he needs to fight in this mansion, but also mutated fucked up monsters or someone as big as the Nemesis, or something.

Grabbing a book, it’s unusual since it feels like it was attached from the back. “So, it’s like a secret room type of shit.” He curses and pulled the book as it angles to 120° angle. The ground shook for a bit as the bookshelves began to slide from each opposite sides—revealing a dark room, he took out his flashlight and flash it directly down, it has stairs. Great, he’s walking to his ultimate death.

Taking his gun to his hand while the other holds on to the light, he came down and he could hear every step he makes. It echoes the click, Leon made it to the flat surface and finds a light switch. It flashes dimly, which Leon accepted it’s enough for him to see.

There’s a desk in front of him, beside is a hospital bed and couple bodies were scattered—most of it is missing a head, one or both legs, an arm or eyeballs.

It made Leon shudder, knowing that someone or something is capable of doing such monstrous things. He wants to gag and puke, but he had seen enough—enough to twist his stomach and react to this things nonchalantly.

Leon felt a presence in the same room as him, but he didn’t bother it. Since it’s only observing him, as long as he doesn’t cause a certain movement to have the entity charge at him. He won’t be spilling crimsons in his hands again.

A few files were stacked on the desk, there’s dried blood splatter which was now normal to Leon every time he went out on a mission. He examines every file but one particular file took his attention when a piece of picture fell from it.

His heart dropped, colors from his face drained for the first time.

It was your picture.

Leon felt sick and quickly opened the document.

Experiment 106

Stable

Alive, barely.

Marked an X on her leg.

Left her in a cottage

She’s reacting, I don’t know if it’s a good sign. But we put her to sleep so we could perform the surgery and bury our most precious treasure deep part of her. We broken it to pieces and shoved it down in every muscle of her body. She was bleeding badly too, but it worked out in the end.

Manage to keep her alive, or else we are done for.

Looking forward to seeing the next result, letting the prey have it’s freedom while being unaware that the predator had started its hunt.

A distorted laugh was heard from behind him, he whips out his light and knife. A gun won’t be any use when it’s opponent is already close, the moment Leon turned, he saw the most terrifying thing he lay his eyes upon. He wanted to vomit at the ugliness and horrifying features that the monster before him has.

Adrenaline rushes through his veins, his instinct were kicking as he blocks and manage a stab of his opponent. It has a figure of a human, but it’s looks weren’t human.

The smile is has, left Leon tighten his grip to his light and weapon, the corner of it’s lips were reaching to its ear. Blood trailing down it’s lips, it was as white as ghost. Eyes were pop and wide as blood serve it’s purpose as tears.

There’s a cut from its throat, the dressing it has were bloody and torn. Leon question of this motherfucker went to a haunted house to be a scare actor. He knew it would nail it.

“sorry, dude. But I need to be on my way.” Leon said, making the entity laugh—it’s voice and laugh were distorted as if it came straight out from a movie, is B.O.W responsible for this? He asked to himself.

Almost losing it as the thing charged at him with a scream, “mother fuck!” Leon curses loud and threw himself across the room, avoiding the beast as he could. Taking his gun and shooting it a couple of few times, the bullets went through its skin and absorbs the bullet as if it’s food.

“Oh, what the fuck…” he knew he’s fucked. If he couldn’t kill a monster with a stab by a knife or a bullet from a gun. Then what could?

He needs to get to the other side of the room again, get the documents and get the fuck out of here and lock the monster in. He’d be dead if he couldn’t kill this bitch.

Leon successfully avoided most of it’s attacks, being careful not to get sliced by the sharpness of it’s hands. As if the nail and fingers in that monster were one, he took five of the files, manage to get the fuck away and lock and closed the secret door again.

It closed in time, or else Leon would be dead by now.

He breaths in and out, calming his breathing and heartbeat. Leon took a look at each file, he busy himself as the monster was screeching to be let out, chanting death threats on how it would eat Leon’s head and tear him from limb to limb. Those threats were already normal to him, he always make big enemies since he knew he has a reputation from inside the agency and outside.

Soon enough, the noise calmed down. Ears starts to ring when Leon read a particular information within your document and the other test subjects.

The used relic would be the only thing to stop the madness my brother created, the monster he created.

Name? Unknown

Very dangerous

Can’t die with a knife or a bullet from a gun.

We kept the cube inside our subjects to prevent the monster from taking it and destroying it. It made it feel weak and vulnerable, we could hear it screech from pain while my brother shouts that we should show mercy to “his” child.

I pray to God above that this madness would end and restore our humble island back to it’s glory.

This was written at the back of your file, messy and bloody handwriting it has. Making Leon feel rage and burn this island down, ditch his mission and go on to save you.

Life is shit, it targeted the only person he’s protecting. If he ever finds one of the scientists behind of all of this, he would do unspeakable and beyond humane things. Making their deaths slow and painful.

But first, Leon’s objective was to find you first.

A voice from his earpiece snapped him out of it, “I got something, Leon.”

“what is it?”

“Someone is in the island with you.”

Leon paused and nodded, “I figured.”

“How?”

“Just saw files of their twisted experiment and I know who they targeted.”

There was a long pregnant pause before the voice speaks, “who?” the voice asked.

Leon spoke your name in gritted teeth.

“Pin point her location if possible. This will be a lot trickier than I thought it would be.” The voice hum to Leon’s words.

“Good luck.”

The voice faded quickly, “Please be safe princess.” He mutters and took one or two papers with him, folded it quickly and tuck it in his pockets.

Change of plans, objective: to find and save you.

Next Chapter>>>

[speakofcompersion]

For jjong month ♡ part [2/4] ~happy birthday edition~

[so-very-small]

(tw for violence/death in this post; it’s about horror movies but g/t)

im in my Horror Movie era and like. i keep thinking how terrifying would a g/t horror movie be. a tiny protagonist in an oversized world could be so so scary. bugs, animals, unaware humans, even things just like struggling to get consistent meals or finding somewhere genuinely safe enough to rest. you could go psychological thriller about a recently shrunk person struggling to cope. you could have a slasher flick where the slasher is just an unaware giant.

i want Midsommar but it’s a borrower joining a fairy cult. i want Saw where it’s a borrower making traps for humans because they just hate giants. i want Hereditary with the added struggle of a mixed size family dynamic. i want whatever batshit original concepts A24 could do with a g/t dynamic

anyways i think there’s a huge potential for size horror and man. a movie like that would terrify me