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e-adlirez · 2 months

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Treasure Seekers 3 Review/Ramble

Welcome to the third and last entry of the Treasure Seekers trilogy :D

"Wait what?" I probably hear you ask. "What about the other four treasures they said the girls would find?"

And to that I say

yeah it do be a bit sad that they never made a book 4

But make no mistake, Legend of the Maze is a doozy of a third book, and I'd say it's almost on-par with book 1 if not surpassing it. Unfortunately there is no free digital copy of the book, so uh if you're down to spend a bit on a digital copy on the E-book site of your choosing or on a physical copy in a bookstore, I salute you for your determination.

As for the rest of you, you're just gonna have to trust me bro :] /j

Ready? Let's go :D (also this is being written by a sleep-deprived E running on hyperfixation juice so if you find any grammar issues feel free to let me know so I can fix them)

The story begins with the Thea Sisters touring the Capelletti House in Verona with their Italian friend/tour guide Sebastiano. Yes, this Verona.

So yeah Colette is fantasizing about Romeo and Juliet as a romantic ship, Vi is trying to kill her Santa by telling her that Romeo and Juliet are fictional characters (which Colette responds to with "oh hush I can dream"), and oop-- loose floorboard-- what's this package under the flo-- LE GAAASSSPPPP LANE LOOORRREEEEE

The girls fangirl about the ABL jumpscare a lil' too loudly and Sebastiano is a lil' confusion, soooooooo the squad goes out for some snacks outside the Capelletti house to explain stuff to Sebastiano

buckle up Sebastiano you're about to get two 300-page books worth of Lane Lore™

While listening to the story, it turns out that Sebastiano may or may not have heard a peep about a legend about a treasure called the Treasure of Eternal Love (adapted Scholastic name is "Treasure of True Love" which ew, snatches the original Italian name instead), which was said to have been owned by Juliet and tho a lotta people are trying to find it, they dunno where it is now. Sounds very Seven Treasures of the World to me :]

How does Sebastiano know a peep about this very obscure legend? Turns out he learned about it from a letter written by his great-grandpappy Jacopo, who was an archaeologist like Aurora :3

So Sebastiano invites the girls to dinner at his place so the girls can look for the letter. Vi don't get too comfy with the house library I know it looks very cool and antique but we got a goal and that is sifting through a lil' box of Jacopo's kept things and find some-- HOLY CRAP LANE LORE™

"Hi Jacopo, tysm for helping me with my research on the Treasure of Eternal Love, you're a real g my guy, regards from me and my sister Linda, also tysm for the tour of Verona."

-- ABL

The girls tell Sebastiano their findings over a dinner of bigoli al pomodoro, give some extra Lane Lore™ about Jan von Klawitz and Aurora's six sisters, and mention the possibility that Linda knows where the treasure is, which means that Luke is probably after it too, but also Linda might know where the treasure is, which means a lead >:3

First stop: Verona's city hall, where Sebastiano's friend Guido works and is able to help them with finding information about a Linda Lane who may or may not have lived in Verona approximately a century ago. They find a document that says yes, Linda did in fact live in Verona once, and also her address is listed there because legalities, y'know how it is.

So the girls head on over to the address, knock at the door, and are greeted by an old lady, and :0 turns out this old lady (her name is Mia) knew Linda personally.

Linda and Mia met when Linda was in her older years and Mia was a smol child. Mia would read for Linda since her eyesight deteriorated in her old age, and they hung out a lot together. When Linda left to return to England, she left the house to Mia, as well as a good chunk of the stuff she had in said house as mementos for Mia to remember her by.

Hey guys you wanna see a trick, it's called "the Lane Lore™ %", aka how fast can we get this old lady up to speed with the ABL drama-- /j

Unfortunately Mia doesn't really know anything about the treasures, but she does have this wack painting of a scenery in Japan that just won't align correctly no matter how much finagling you do to it-- oh there was an envelope inside-- LANE LORE™?

So the letter inside the envelope is a letter from Aurora to Linda basically Aurora telling Linda she found the Treasure of Eternal Love, but because Jan is on her tail, she left the treasure in the "House of the Sun" for now. Now, if you tried looking up "house of the sun", you'd get a hotel in Florida, a manga, a former Incan temple that's now a monastery-- you get the picture, it do be a weird detail and probably not it bro, besides Aurora's too much of a gremlin to be that obvious with her riddles.

At least if you're not a Shakespeare nerd like Colette is (the kind that never read past Romeo and Juliet's wedding), because if you were, you'd know that at one point Romeo equates Juliet to the sun rising in the east. Romeo is simping for Juliet, Juliet is the sun, ergo, the Capelletti house.

But uh, thing is we already went to the house and we already know that Aurora came back for the treasure and took it somewhere else. Sooooo might as well see what the last letter says--

"Hi so I'm on the run rn I can't chat for long because Jan is pissed and he wants to find me and force me to reveal the treasure, and I don't think I wanna know how not-kid-friendly this is gonna get if he does find me. Thanks for introducing me to your friend tho :D she's cool and thanks to her help, the treasure is safe and sound in the shade of the cherry trees! I'll come back for it one day, hopefully that day comes soon. Anyway, hugs and kisses, Linda." - ABL

Spoiler alert, despite having a beeg cherry tree on the painting, there was in fact nothing else hiding behind the painting.

LUKE TRANSITION

So Luke is doing Luke things, not touching grass as per usual. Cassidy comes by to give him a lil' souvenir from great-grandpappy Jan von Klawitz's house in London: Jan's old notes. Luke immediately dismisses Cassidy without even so much as a thank you -- Cassidy girlypop you're not scoring that man no matter what you do, he's the Adrien to your Marinette girlie we're only at book 3, you might as well accept your fate -- and Luke takes a lil' peek into Jan's notebook (he also calls his great-grandpappy "Jan", like just "Jan". I dunno maybe I'm just finding it weird because I'm Asian . .) for the goods.

And goods Luke does find, which he proceeds to consume like a goblin. Bit of Klawitz lore here:

"Grrr grrr stupid Aurora and her smartass tricks grrrrr who does she think she is grrrrr she beat me to the Treasure of Eternal Love in Verona grrrrrrrrrrrr well at least now I know how she works, I managed to find this friend of hers Jacopo, who definitely knows about the treasure even though he keeps playing stupid like I don't know that he knows Aurora. Something something cherry trees, I ransacked every single cherry tree in Verona and there was literally nothing, wth, Aurora why are you like this" - Jan von Klawitz

Luke responds to this seedy lore from his great-grandpappy with "hehehHEHEHAHAHAHAHAHAHH JAN YOU IDIOT, YOU COULDN'T SEE WHAT WAS RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU BECAUSE YOU UNDERESTIMATED THE LITTLE PILOT GIRL, I ALREADY KNOW WHERE TO LOOK"

Cut back to the girls, and they know where to look next, too

It's Japan, i-it's Japan, y'know Japan's relationship with their sakura/cherry blossoms

Turns out Linda has a friend named Kyoko Bianchi, a Japanese-Italian botanist who was raised in Japan. Since Aurora mentions in her letter that Linda's friend came in clutch, she was obviously referring to Kyoko and now the treasure is in Japan.

So Japan transition :D (based on my personal experience in Japan and also a bit of canon continuity consistency, I headcanon that despite being written in English, this segment of the story mostly had the girls speaking in Japanese, a language they would know how to speak a bit of at least (and apparently Vi is conversational in Japanese so c'mooonnnn).)

The girls land at Narita Airport and take a train to central Tokyo (damn Kumi from Cherry Blossom Adventure you came in clutch possibly teaching the girls how to Japanese subway offscreen because they actually didn't get lost using it on their own :D). Kyoko's hometown was Tokyo, so might as well start searching for her descendants/relatives there. First stop: Shibuya.

Colette is playfully ribbed a bit for having a big-ass bag while everyone else only brought smol backpacks around with them, the luck of the girls not getting lost using the Japanese subway must be balanced out so Paulina's GPS decides now is the right time to be a dick, Shibuya Crossing, and finally they make it to the hotel where Amrita Bianchi, their first Kyoko descendant candidate, is at.

And this is the first time the girls come across the concept of cosplaying, I genuinely don't know how they managed to sidestep it for so long especially since they've been to Japan before for a student exchange, all I can really justify it with is that university has been kicking their a-- RATSUNE MIKU??

Gahd even in 2018 Italy there was no escape from her /j

Anyway so Amrita didn't know Kyoko, so their second candidate is Shinobu Bianchi, a guy living in Shinjuku. They find him-- or more accurately run into him (literally) on his way to work, try to explain things to him but this man is running late, so he invites the girls to follow him to his workplace. They find themselves in a cafe on opening time, customers start filing in before the girls can even tell Shinobu what the whole deal is, soooooo karaoke break :D

Vi c'mon it's not like there's much else to do while waiting for Shinobu-- what're you gonna do, sit there and wait? A-actually y'know what that sounds like something Vi would happily do but c'mooonnn Vi where's your sense-a humor :D

Thirty minutes of singing later, they finally get five minutes to explain to Shinobu what they're looking for and Shinobu says "sorry I dunno Kyoko, I am half-Italian on my dad's side, but my mom has a different Japanese surname"

So the girls Peter William a bit emotionally, Pam goes to what Scholastic is telling me is a kiosk but might as well be a 7/11 based on the banger food Pam got from said kiosk, the girls take a taxi to a Capsule Hotel (judging from the illustration it looks like the Shinjuku Kuyakusho-mae Capsule Hotel), and after a bit of dinner, Peter William into their capsule rooms physically.

The next morning, Nicky goes out for a morning jog as usual (she prolly slept with her capsule open so she wouldn't get claustrophobic), and she finds a gardener tending to a Kyoko Bianchi flower :0 like no joke that's the name, it's a K. bianchi, named after a botanist who founded the Fairy Garden (Disclaimer: neither the K. bianchi nor the Fairy Garden Foundation in Japan exist, they're fictional bits for this fictional story and that's fine :3). Nicky gets the address for the Fairy Garden, runs back to the girls who are having breakfast, and they head on over to the venue.

At the Fairy Garden, the girls meet a gardener named Toshio who happily shows them around, and despite not knowing all the Lane Lore™ (yet), he knows enough to lead them to Kyoko's perfectly preserved office, where the late Bianchi has displayed some pictures from Verona, as well as her furniture and encyclopedia collection.

After a search, they find what was presumably a haiku alluding to Jomon Sugi and the writer's voice being hidden in there, and one jaunt to the record of Jomon Sugi in Kyoko's encyclopedia collection and uhp-- a hidden cassette tape inside the volume!

On one hand, victory, the girls have found a VHS tape that is implied to have a personal recording from Kyoko Bianchi herself, so they're super-close to the treasure now :D

But on the other hand, they found a VHS tape in the year of our lord 2018.

Good news, Toshio knows a buddy who's super tech-savvy, and that's including tech things. Bad news, he's in Kyoto, which is about 445 km/283 miles away from Tokyo.

So the girls quickly take a shinkansen and some bento boxes to Kyoto :D (their wallets are probably sobbing in an 86-USD ticket per person)

At Kyoto, meet Ren, are lowkey surprised that his house is a traditional Japanese house as opposed to a modern flat but hey it's a pleasant surprise, and Ren is able to play the tape for them.

In the tape, Kyoko explains the Treasure of Eternal Love, how it ended up in her hands at the ripe age of 20 through Linda and Aurora, and some Treasure of Eternal Love lore, or rather Ring of Eternal Love lore:

Yeah sure Romeo and Juliet were fictional characters, but reality, so it goes, isn't that much different. The Ring of Eternal Love was a courting gift from a suitor to a bachelorette of the Cappelletti household. The suitor and the girl's families had hate boners for each other for a while now, but instead of spiraling into a destructive mess of family feuding and death like in Shakespeare's play, they decided to call off the feud so the two lovers could be happy together. And now the ring, as Kyoko puts it, has been passed down from her to "one who shows love every day, in every way, towards everything that grows from the earth."

The girls are happy they got to see the tape and its contents, but they Peter William emotionally once more because well, they're back to square one now-- literally the only clue they have is the thing Kyoko said, and what is the thing Kyoko said? It's cryptic and weird and h a h ? Ren offers to accommodate them for the night, the girls get to sleep on futons for the first time since Secret of the Snow, and the next day they decide to have some downtime vacay-ing in Nijo Castle. A vacay that results in Vi having an epiphany about the riddle and thus who has the ring.

Meanwhile with Luke, he's planning something. Something that's got Cassidy in Japan and putting her master's degrees in Engineering, Chemistry and Computer Sciences to use by assembling a drone (I'm wondering how Cassidy has so little braincells out on the field despite having THREE MASTER'S DEGREES like holy crap--)

Cassidy tries complimenting Luke on the motherboard he sent in from Alaska and-- ew Omar why are you here I thought Luke fired you-- ooh what's that package thing-- oi don't diss on Japanese people being polite, once you see the ruder options you're gonna be pining for that shnit-- wait what how's this drone gonna find the Ring of Eternal Love--

Anyway the girls plus Toshio and Ren take the train back to Tokyo (istg if they took the shinkansen--) and back to the Fairy Garden Foundation, where they talk to the current head gardener: Mr. Murakami.

Mr. Murakami does in fact know Kyoko personally, and after a bit of persuading (it involves a bord like many good things in this world), he decides to bring them to his hometown Nara (which involves a train to Kyoto and then a train from Kyoto to Nara which on the Kodama plus the cheapest option from Kyoto to Nara is-- CHEESUS CRUST 91 USD PER PERSON AND THEY HAVE TO GO BACK TO TOKYO AFTER THIS???)

ANYWAY Mr. Murakami takes them to Nara Park, where he hid the treasure. He brings the girls to it, he checks the hiding place and

It's empty?

Wait, the hiding place is empty?

WAIT WHAT THE HIDING PLACE IS EM--

Off in Alaska, Luke is cackling in his fancy custom-made not-gamer chair.

Mr. Murakami is distraught, most of the girls stay to comfort him while Nicky and Ren scout out the area. In their search, Nicky and Ren find a big broken drone that seems to have crash-landed in the garden, and oop-- LVK logo. It was probably used to spy on Mr. Murakami to snatch the treasure. "DAAAMMMNNNN YOOOUUUU LUUUKKEEEE" Nicky probably would've shrieked at the top of her lungs if she weren't A. in Japan (it's very quiet generally), and B. within earshot of poor Mr. Murakami, who's still recovering from the horrible shock. The girls, Toshio and Ren take the drone to Kyoto while Mr. Murakami stays in Nara with the fam to recover because man, he deserves the break :(

In Ren's house in Kyoto, Paulina and Ren get to work hacking into the drone to snatch its data, and they find that the drone's memory goes as far back as to being in Alaska for some reason. Why would an LVK drone be in Alaska? Unless-- :OOOOO SECRET BASE??

With that lead, the girls depart for Anchorage, Alaska (if I plugged it into Google correctly the price for the flight totals out at a 567-USD one-way flight holy crap girlies have mercy on your wallets-- not including the mini shopping spree for winter clothes Colette was more than happy to drag the girls on). Ren gives Paulina a little flash drive with some written code that could come in clutch in whatever shenanigans they end up in in that secret base of Luke's. Yes Violet as much as I think you're the only person in the group who seems to be concerned for your wallet, ya'll are nawt surviving Alaska with those summer clothes ya'll are wearing.

Behold, a long rest/14-hour timeskip in the form of the last two letters the girls have yet to read from Aurora to Linda. (Well the girls besides Vi, God's sleepiest soldier over here is eeping in the back before the flight's even taken off--)

(These are the real letters this time around lmao, if you're confused, Aurora addresses Linda in these letters via her middle name Amaryllis.)

Dear Amaryllis,

I'm very sorry that, because of my job, you are taking on a responsibility that is perhaps too great, and that puts you at risk.

It's all because of the greed of my former professor, a mouse who is incapable of recognizing that beauty should be shared. My dear sister, I have thought about it for a long time, and I have come to the conclusion that the best solution is to take the Treasure of Eternal Love from Verona, where it is not safe... and put you at risk. I am sending you a copy of one of the photos I hold the most dear, in memory of the love that binds us. I hope it will help you make the best decision...

Yours, Aurora

Dear Amaryllis,

You wrote me that you are making a decision about the treasure. I agree that the mouse you're planning to entrust it to is worthy of that trust, and I will wait for more news. But you must be careful, even when you write to me, to not mention names or places. We need to watch out, because my former professor is more alert than ever.

It seems that he's building an underground shelter for his riches, designed as a kind of maze to test anyone who manages to enter it...

Professor Jan is clever, and he's always loved riddles, puzzles, and mysteries. I wouldn't wish for any mouse to find themselves in his maze!

Now I must say good-bye, my dear. Sending a big hug.

Yours, Aurora

Once the girls land in Anchorage, Alaska, they rent an SUV, pull out Google Maps, read some of the brochures Ren printed out for them just in case, fangirl over a moose (Nicky that's not something to fangirl about have you seen what they're capable of--), and accidental secret tunnel discovery?

Well, accidental secret garbage chute discovery, anyway, since the one thing that allows the girls to not break their ankles when landing is some garbage bags. Food waste garbage bags no less :D Ew :D

Some old aircraft bits are found too which is nice but it's never elaborated on whose old aircraft bits those were so we're moving on to the girls entering Luke's secret headquarters and Nicky trying not to die from claustrophobia :D

CCTVs pose an initial problem, but Ren's flash drive comes in clutch and allows Paulina to freeze the cameras so they can go in undetected (Ren how do you know how to program that is there something you wanna share to the class--). One lengthy labyrinth later, the girls manage to get out of the "we're walking in circles" loop-dee-loop they wound up in and find this little room with a little lit fire pit and an ominous riddle involving the "elements of nature". Pam has the idea of extinguishing the fire pit, and sure enough, inside the fire pit is a key that fits perfectly into the door across the room.

And right after Pam turns the lock on the door, a trapdoor opens up beneath her and she falls into the pit below. It's padded, it's kinda cozy, but it's way too deep for the girls to reach Pam from above without a rope or attempting to risk falling in and getting trapped as well. The girls are very reluctant to leave Pam, but Pam unfortunately only metaphorically slaps some sense into the girls and tells them to go on because they've gone too far to back out now so COMMIT TO THE BIT GODDAMMIT

(you guys like the rhyme-y bits? They're kinda fun to write I do like the rhyme-y bits a bit <:])

And thus the girls minus Pam go through the door to the next room, where there's this swimming pool with a key inside it, which Nicky swims down for, assuming that the trap in the room will only activate once they get the key into the door leading to the next room. Obviously she winds up being very incorrect, as the moment she takes the key from the bottom of the pool, the water starts to drain away until all you got left is a sopping wet Nicky in an empty pool and the key to the next room, which Nicky tosses over to Paulina while asking for her shoes and her dry clothes that they packed. Colette is devastated, devastated I tell you at the idea of leaving Nicky behind, on top of having to leave Pam behind, but Nicky's got faith that the girls will pull through and come back for her; so Colette, Paulina and Violet move on to the next room.

A LOT of walking down a twisting hallway later, the trio make it to the next room (which they use Nicky's key for), and we got four pots with something or other in them, lighting too dim to discern properly what's in the pots, a button sequence puzzle with no margin for error, and a wack riddle. Oh and Paulina's tablet's finally died after possibly uh, 18-ish hours of not charging it. RIP Paulina's tablet, that's gonna be set aside in the corner for the time being.

The pots turn out to have different types of sediment in them, and the wack riddle turns out to be the clue to the correct sequence to input, so the three figure that out fairly quickly and slide down the chute leading to the next room. Except for Paulina, who had to get her tablet from that corner she set it aside in, and wasn't able to make it to the trapdoor-chute in time before it closed on her face, leaving her trapped "forever", as the wack riddle states. The one time you're told to stop holding it, man, unbelievable. I'm never letting go of my tablet again /j

Now Vi and Colette find themselves in an empty room, and they only realize when they get down that Paulina wasn't able to make it out in time. Now this entire time, Colette has been going through it. Of the girls, Colette's been taking the whole leaving-my-friends-behind-for-the-greater-good thing not well at all, and it culminates in an emotional breakdown. Violet comforts her and reassures her that they'll get the ring, they'll pick up the other girls and they'll get outa here soon, but they gotta be brave now for the other girls. (Kinda hard to capture in short and sweet words what the emotion of the scene was but oh well). After a bit of calming down, Colette and Violet look around to find themselves in a... surprisingly simple room? There's a door on the other side of the room from them, and besides that there's literally nothing but thin air.

The two go to the door and move to open it. Yeah this one's surprisingly simple. Just walk on over, pull the door open, walk o-- a gust of wind slammed the door shut . .

Yeah that's right. You ever leave a window in your room open on a windy day and leave your door also open, and the wind going into the room slams the door shut? Yeah, it's that multiplied by uhhhh how much is a vent opposite the door opening up just to blow f%#ken WIMDY-level winds just to slam that metal door shut? However that much multiplies that. The two find themselves in a situation where had all five of them been there to do this puzzle, it would've been far easier; but it is doable with only two people. The plan is one of them wedges themself between the door and the frame and prop it open, while the other crawls under the first person's leg. Transitioning to the second person propping the door open for the first person is gonna be a bit dodgy, but it is doable kinda.

Now Colette has been going through the ringer emotionally, and if you've seen this trope before, you'd know that it'd be a real damn shame if they lost their emotional pillar and had to carry the entire plan on their own, riiiiggghhttt? She's been the handling this situation the worst (emotionally), and it would bring her a belly of the beast to trump all bellies of all beasts and force her to do a The Next Right Thing (hot take: Anna's arc in Frozen 2 was really good), presumably after a lot of sobbing in the corner! It's perfect for angst, and it's perfect for empowerment to see Colette pick herself up and be strong for the girls and save the day!

Which is why Colette doesn't end up being the last one standing :D

Colette was the one who propped the door open for Violet, who crawled through to the other side. The plan was to have Vi switch with Colette so Colette can get through, but one thing they didn't take into account was the fact that the vent would slowly create stronger and stronger winds the longer the door is held open for, so Colette winds up allowing herself to be trapped in the air room so Violet can do the thing. (Oh and the plan was Colette's idea too.)

Heeyyyy Viiiiiiii~ Do you have some cash left over in your wallet? Because I think it's time for you to put your money where your mouth is :DDD

So yeah Violet continues on alone.

Also if you're wondering where Luke is this entire time, he is in fact in his base, still not touching grass and none the wiser about the whole five lil' rat girls sneaking into his base because of the whole frozen cams situation. He does technically notice something's off, but he thinks that the clock in one of the cameras is broken and he ends up complaining about it to Cassidy, haha L. It is also at this point where we learn that the girls have been in Luke's base for a little over three hours at this point :D

Meanwhile, Violet goes down the narrow metal staircase in the hallway outside of the last room and finds herself reminding herself to stay calm but also inside Luke's treasure room, where treasures of all shapes and sizes reside. From whole dinosaur skeletons to ancient Egyptian statues to paintings to suits of armor and-- holy shnit Luke has the Ark of the Covenant in there too o o yeah this guy means business holy crap--

The Ring of Eternal Love is in there too, the lone treasure in the set of seven empty pedestals that Luke was prolly intending for the Seven Treasures of the World. So Vi, clearly not having watched Indiana Jones Raiders of the Lost Ark, attempts to lift the glass case protecting the ring, which sets off the alarms in the treasure rooms, and whoa holy crap there's a robot voice speaking through the alarms? WAIT WHAT DO YOU MEAN FIFTEEN MINUTES TO SELF-DESTRUCTION

Luke, having the shock of his life, comes down to the treasure room to see what's up, and of course it's one of the five brats who's been getting in the way of his endeavors. Hardly a surprise, really, those five have been a pain in the ass from minute one of Luke looking into the Seven Treasures-- from stopping him getting the Alabaster Garden (he didn't even get to see what it was smh), to duping him with the most audacious of gottems to exist only partially due to his goon's stupidity, and now sneaking into the heart of his base without him, his cameras, or his sensors noticing. Strange how there's only one of them, though.

Just like Aurora Beatrix Lane almost a hundred years prior, this young lady is naive, morally stubborn, and idealistic. She is preaching out about sharing these treasures to all, even when the worth of these treasures comes partly in the luxury of not everyone being able to enjoy them. There is value in that sense of rarity, and it's not like any of the uncaring, ignorant whelps working in the museums look at the pieces that sit before them and realize the true value that they have the privilege of looking at everyday. They wouldn't care about them-- they would do the bare minimum to these unique masterpieces and leave it at that. And this naive brat thinks that they are more loving, more caring to these pieces than Luke is?

But as naive and morally pretentious and... ignorant of time and place this woman is (did she really not hear the self-destruct alarm and is thus willing to babble to her grave?)... she is clearly very intelligent. She was able to affect the base's security system such that she could come in undetected. She was able to get past all four traps without getting trapped herself. It is strange how she is alone here, though. She is usually with four other girls-- ah, that's it. They got trapped, and she left them, so she could get to the treasures on her own. What a show of common sense, that is! She must've seen that the traps were designed such that risking oneself to rescue a trapped person is just not worth it, and that first point already makes her far more intelligent than Cassidy or her buffoons could ever be. It could even be on-par with Luke himself. What if... perhaps....

What if they worked together?

Luke, after a bit of back and forth with Violet, gives Violet an offer to ditch her friends and become his partner. If she accepts they can divide everything between each other in the vault, and together, they'll be able to uncover the treasures of the world and enjoy them all to themselves.

I mean of course Vi turns down the offer in favor of sticking with her friends but y'know what it was worth a shot, Luke, kudos to you for spotting a gemstone instead of covering it with mud and pretending it's not there.

Heavily disappointed by Vi turning him down for the sake of "the power of friendship" (I wish I was kidding)(Scholastic!Vi's (?) words not mine)(I would be incredibly disappointed too), he turns to leave her in the treasure room, and it's only then that Vi realizes she kinda effed up. Luke is the only guy here who knows the base inside-out, and thus would know a way to get the girls out so they can Not Die. And to add insult to injury, Luke made a bomb shelter out of his treasure room, so the entire base may explode and the girls might die, but the treasures are gonna be completely fine. Intact, even. Luke leaves, and the robot voice announces ten minutes before self-destruction.

As soon as she's able to, Vi calls the elevator, juggling anxiety and being able to think under pressure. She figures out that Luke oh so helpfully uses pictograms for his elevator buttons instead of numbers, and presses the button for the control room (the heliport floor is locked by a key). She arrives in the control room, eight minutes before self-destruction.

Just as Vi enters the control room, the cameras get kicked back into action, oh so conveniently showing to Violet a timer ticking down to the big kaboom in real time, and footage of Nicky waiting anxiously in the pool room (and Luke leaving), for extra stakes. One Perception check said "yeah, this is a LOT of buttons, TOO MANY BUTTONS", and the tablet sitting on the desk required a password, so oh god what do

Six minutes before self-destruction and one panic attack later, Vi manages to psyche herself up enough to roll for Investigation. She finds a button for disarming the traps, and that allows the girls to get outa the traps and meet up again in the treasure room. Happy reunions aside tho, four minutes to self-destruction

Turns out the girls (thankfully) didn't know about the self-destruct situation. No need to explain tho because Vi is deadlifting the group braincell like she's never done before. She drags them down to the base's... basement, where a train that was probably used to carry the treasures into the base sits unused and ready for the girls to figure out how to work. Three minutes before self-destruction, no pressure :D

Pam sits at the train's controls, Paulina tries to help but immediately brain crashes at the old-timey controls, thus deciding she'd rather help Nicky get the bars off the rails up ahead. Two minutes left, and Pam figures it out and is ready to-- wait they need electricity-- okay cool Nicky and Paulina are taking care of that, cool

Pam gets the train to start up, Nicky and Paulina manage to hop back into the train, and escape the base's explosion range with about ten seconds to spare :D

After stopping the train in a spot where their braincells could afford to deflate, the girls take a minute or two to breathe y'know, just take a minute to breathe, nibble on some wild raspberries growing in Denali National Park, before figuring out what the hell their next move is.

Vi suggests they tell the authorities about the whole secret-base-under-the-park situation and the treasure room and the stuff inside it (since Luke oh so foolishly gloated to Vi about the treasures being perfectly safe), on top of removing the train so it's not getting up in nature's business. They head back to the car talking about their adventure, get a bit sad that they weren't able to find the Ring of Eternal Love-- and oop just kidding, Vi pocketed it in the treasure room right after Luke dipped :D

So on top of the girls escaping with their lives, not only is Luke gonna lose the Ring of Eternal Love as quickly as he got it, he's also losing his entire treasure vault. Can I get a ripperooni

And that's Legend of the Maze :D

I would say that the hyperfixation-that-consumed-these-girls'-lives-for-a-whole-week energy is very strong in this one in the best way, and the girls' personalities are at their most showcased here. The banter is bantering, the girls' dynamics with each other is very believable here, Vi is carrying the group's braincell the entire time and she looks like she's a bit tired from carrying it but y'know wut she's still willing to carry it because it's honest work and she knows how important it is to have it :3 also her trying to kill Colette's "Romeo and Juliet are so romantic" Santa but failing miserably because Colette unashamedly likes believing in the power of love is hilarious

The main thing I wasn't sure about was.... all the infodumpy bits? The infodump goes a significant bit harder in this book than the previous ones (even more than Compass of the Stars, which is an achievement), and it's Scholastic-style infodumping, so you get the girls calling Luke an "evil mouse" or "selfish mouse" and I'm sitting here like "just call him sewer rat please ya'll had no problems calling him that before please for the love of god use that instead it sounds better--"

Don't even get me started with Amrita Bianchi explaining to the girls what cosplay is like she's the damn Merriam Webster dictionary--

Also the Japan segment with y'know Japanese culture and stuff had the terms localized for some reason??? Like haori became "dark jacket", kimono became "long, elegant Japanese dress", they didn't even mention Ren's hakama (he was wearing a very traditional Japanese look), they felt the need to explain bento boxes as "typical Japanese portable lunch boxes" even though "Japanese lunch box" probably would've gotten the point across just fine and also there was an illustration of the bento boxes, Japanese characters became "logograms" for some reason, and dango became "rice dumplings" which became infinitely more confusing for me because the illustration made it look like takoyaki--

I could go on and on but yeah, there are a lot of these and it felt very infodump-y to me. I'm hoping it's just a translation thing, because the story overall feels pretty solid. Scholastic, what happened to the asterisks? Were they just too much for one page? I feel like you would've been able to squeeze them in just fine to make the reading experience a little smoother,,, just like, so it's an optional thing for the reader to read the mini-infodump of the term if they dunno what it means,,,

Other than that tho I don't think I have much to complain ab--

COUGHS GAGS SCREAMS CRIES WRITHES ON THE FLOOR

(I have the magic-of-friendship-invocation tolerance of an angsty teen I'm sorry :'3)

Scholastic, buddy chum pal buddy chum buddy chum pal,,,,

You could've had Vi say "the only way I got here was thanks to my friends", and it would've been fine and infinitely better-sounding and probably more in-character,,, o<-<

Gahd I hate it when Vi's used as the power of friendship prophet -m-

There's a more minor one as the girls are going back to the car and Vi is telling the girls about the deal Luke offered her, and the girls ask her what she said, and she says "I told him I already had the greatest treasure in the world... true friendship!"

Meanwhile I'm sitting there like "MMMMMGGGGGGHHHHHH 'friends like you' or 'sisters like you' or 'my friendship with you' would've sounded better -m-"

(Also the girls call each other like "friends", so like "you were in fact right, friends", which is like, what happened to "sisters" or "girls" those work perfectly fine and get the girls' close relationship across significantly better than "just friends")

Most of what I'm saying here tho are just nitpicks and probably (hopefully) are just stuff with the English translation-- in all seriousness, the book is pretty good.

Aurora's trail here makes sense and is rather logical, and the interesting thing I find about it is that it feels different from the previous two books' worth of shenanigans. Aurora in this one had far less veers and nation hopping shenanigans, and I feel that it was perhaps intentional. Perhaps to give off finale vibes-- Aurora works far more closely with her sister in this one, and the main thing the girls had to work with was not Aurora's diaries, but the letter she wrote to Linda when they were discussing the Ring of Eternal Love. Something about it feels closer, more intimate, more tragic than the previous ones. I felt the need to put her last to letters in the book verbatim because they were emotional dammit -m- Damn you British Amelia Earhart you've done it again /lhj

Luke's character I think is the strongest here. He gives off in a way the most... normal? Vibes here? He's still not touching grass and muttering to himself ominously a whole lot, but his mindset is nice and easy to wrap your head around here. He literally doesn't care about his goons unless he needs something from them, he is more than happy to overanalyze the crap out of a piece of text if he feels Cassidy didn't look through it thoroughly enough, and he wants what he wants right away, and that includes the things he needs to get the thing he actually wants. He as a character literally observes everything happen from his base in Alaska and backseat gamers the crap out of his goons if he sees something they didn't, or if they fumbled the bag and it was perfectly avoidable had it not been for SM being SM--

Also his blatant disrespect for his great-grandpappy Jan is holy crap haha-- it might just be my cultural background, but when I saw Luke call his great-grandpa "Jan" and then say "you disappoint me, Jan", I was flabbergasted haha, not a criticism I just wanted to mention it because I thought it was funny

I really like the fact that Stan and Max (aka SM) didn't show up at all in this book. It would've been easy to have them show up for regularly scheduled hijinks, but in Luke's mind, none of SM's operations have ever been... up to Luke's standards. Especially with how much of a ruckus they tended to make with their presence, they were more of a liability to Luke than an asset; therefore Luke changing up his strategy to be as hands-off and clean and non-intrusive as possible feels like something he'd do, what with how laser-focused he is on min-maxing efficiency to get what he wants as soon as possible.

Omar still being there despite being "fired" might just be a Scholastic oopsie so I can forgive it, Cassidy is still simping for Luke and trying to impress this man and trying to prove she's at an equal level to him, but every time nah. Just nah. Girlie you think you're on the same level as him, which can't possibly be further than the truth. I haven't seen Miraculous Ladybug, but I'd bet Cassidy has even less of a chance of impressing Luke, than Marinette had a chance at getting Adrien to see her as more than "just a friend" before they finally got together.

Now here's something I've been wanting to ramble about for a while: Violet being left alone instead of Colette. It's actually pretty clever when you think about it: Colette is the closest the girls have to a heart (tho she plays hot potato with Paulina when it comes to that role imo), so she's been the most emotional and the most sentimental of the group this entire time. From daydreaming about Romeo, to wanting to believe in love, to happily picking up a microphone to sing karaoke with the girls, to her strong reactions to having to leave the girls behind one by one for the sake of their mission, Colette was being set up for a moment where she is the one who is left alone. You see it a lot in media: the main character is the most sentimental one and as their friend squad make their way to the Big Bad Evil Guy, the supporting characters are forced to get left behind one by one to either hold the evil minions back or because there's no way for the character to move forward with the MC; so the MC is forced to go through the five stages of grief knowing that their friends trust them to get the job they'd set out to do done. It literally happened in Geronimo's third Kingdom of Fantasy book Amazing Voyage, and in that one Geronimo was the one who desperately didn't want to be alone, but he wound up carrying on alone anyway. You see this kinda thing everywhere.

However, in this bit, it makes total sense that Violet is the one who ends up carrying the last leg of the journey alone instead of Colette. Compared to Colette (and honestly the rest of the girls), Violet is the most level-headed. She's the girls' braincell keeper (in this trilogy), the babysitter holding the leash tied to the four gremlins, the one keeping everyone on track and also making sure that the group's collective ADHD doesn't spiral down as badly as it could possibly be. Whenever the girls make a big move that could affect the whole group, Vi is the one asking if it's a good idea or if it's worth doing, and she's the one thinking ahead enough to say "if x happens instead of y, what then?" You get the idea-- Vi is the most capable of keeping herself level-headed even when she's under all this pressure, and she's good at analyzing and planning on account of her often taking the position of the quiet observer.

With this context, it sort've makes you wonder what was going through Colette's head when she offered to help Violet get out of the air room. Violet and Colette in particular get paired together fairly often, and it's probably because of how well they're able to understand each other-- so with the plan, was Colette volunteering herself to prop the door open out of "it was my idea" courtesy, or was she thinking that maybe Violet would be able to figure things out better and thus needed to get to the other side? She probably was expecting to get to the other side with Vi, but would she have thought far enough ahead to a what-if where that wasn't possible? :3c

And Scholastic and power-of-friendship funkiness aside, Violet did handle the situation well, all things considered. The one bit where she only realized Luke was hers and the girls' only ticket out of there was a bit weird, but it can be chalked up to her not being able to take that into account in the moment because of a mix of stress, sheer bafflement from Luke's deal, and the fact that when put on the spot, observers don't exactly handle taking the driver's seat that well :'D (speaking as an observer myself here)

It makes me wonder a bit if Violet and Luke were meant to be foils of each other, what with how similar they are to each other (both of them being observers and planners who delegate more often than they do the work themselves), yet different enough that the contrast between the two is striking. Said difference being

Violet touches grass. Luke does not :)

Anyway so yeah, that's Treasure Seekers 3, and while it is kinda sad that this is where Treasure Seekers ends, y'know what? It gave a solid show as the last installment in the trilogy. I liked it, I liked the canon compliant blorbo angst, I liked the characters character-ing when the dialogue was letting them breathe :]

And of course, we can't forget

God's sleepiest soldier <3

She deserves that nap after what she went through and you know it--

#geronimo stilton #thea stilton #thea sisters #violet conked out the moment she got into the suv and the girls drove off to plan stuff out. change my mind /j #there's a bit where nicky fangirls upon seeing a moose like she suddenly turned ten and like #she inched closer to the window to see it better but violet was like “hey you're squishing me”#and nicky was like “sorry vi.. i got a bit excited.... y'know how much i love nature”#and vi in this moment where she gave straight-up the most mom vibes #was like “here let's swap seats"#like UEUEUEUEUWAAAAA....#also like remember the bit where colette wound up lugging a big-ass bag around with her while the girls had smoller backpacks #well surprisingly it backfired but not in the way you'd think #the rest of the girls were basically stuck wearing the same clothes the entire time #meanwhile colette was happily not having to deal with wearing clothes that weren't accumulating sweat from having to walk around #if not y'know because of japan's heat #i wrote this while i was sleep deprived so maybe i missed more than a few things in this review that i wanted to say because forgor #maybe i'll end up editing stuff in here a bit after like #i'm more awake #but yeah <3 #if the infodumpy bits and dialogue quirks are the same in italian i will cry /hj #*psst hey angst lovers wait for my next post i got something for you*#wait for like #when i wake up and hopefully actually get to sleep tonight lmao #before i go consider #alternate scenarios where any of the other girls end up in that same situation with luke #i'll leave those ingredients on the counter. take them and use them however you wish :3 #book rambles #book rant #book review #rambles

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morninkim · 1 year

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Rise of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers - Evil Empire Aliens

After 10,000 years... It’s free.

(Story-relevant info and context under the cut)

Dr. Finster has been hearing whispers in his head for the past 50 years, roughly since he acquired this strange artifact found on the Moon. It started sparingly at first, once or twice a year at most, however in the past few months - since the appearance of Goldar and the Power Rangers - they’ve become more frequent. Louder. It says it can help Promethea defeat these invaders, help the Power Rangers, help the Earth.

It just needs energy.

An alert comes in on the base’ security systems, Goldar has appeared just outside the perimeter. The voice beckons Finster to go.

“The Power Rangers will come. I just need the energy from their transformation. Take me to them.”

Finster resists at first, but is compelled, sneaking himself and the artifact out in the panic as Goldar makes his approach to Promethea base. Of course, he’s intercepted by the Power Rangers, their teleportation scrambling Promethea’s video relays. No one in the base sees what happens next. But they feel it.

The Rangers - too occupied with their battle to notice Dr. Finster hiding nearby in the desert brush with the artifact - call their Dinosaur powers and transform, releasing a pulse of multicolored energy.

And the artifact opens.

Everything is swallowed in darkness in an instant as a shape begins to form between the two factions. Piercing red eyes. Gold markings. And sharp claws.

The shadow wastes no time in attacking the Rangers, taunting them. It calls them “incomplete”, “weak” and “lacking”. Questions where their sixth is.

Beaten down and near defeat, the Rangers make a stand. They refuse to give up, combining their attacks to deal a solid strike to the shadow.

It shudders from the damage, weakened.

And retreats.

Goldar withdraws as well. There is no honor in taking another’s kill. He must go find where the shadow went, and leaves the Rangers to lick their wounds.

Following their defeat, Alpha V alerts the Rangers to something new he’s detected. Something that may lend them the help they desperately need.

Or rather, someone...

Meanwhile, the shadow streaks across the desert to the city, finding a lone girl in a green hoodie in an alleyway. It senses... Insecurities. Loneliness. Strife. Exactly what it can take advantage of. It draws itself over the girl, taking root in her mind and controlling her body.

Later, in the body of the girl (or Tommy Oliver, as it had found in her head) and having created its own garments with its magic, the shadow finds Finster at his small apartment downtown. It thanks him for freeing it. But she requires more from him.

“What was it you called my urn? Rita Repulsa? Yes... yes, I like that name.”

#rotmmpr #mmpr #mighty morphin power rangers #power rangers #rita repulsa #tommy oliver #putting the story stuff under the read more so its not intrusive on anyone's dash lmao-#but there's neat stuff in there #only one more design until i'm fully done with rise s1 stuff and we can get into s2 #which uhh you probably guess is based on Green with Evil #season 1 is essentially an extended Day of the Dumpster #so it'd have a few more comedy-centered episodes than the other planned seasons #with story ones thrown in intermittenly #anyway rita's shadow form (Atir. which we'll get to when i post the next design. which also obvs is gonna be Zordon)#was one of the first things i thought of when i first started on the design series so lmao-#i just like big vague shadow shapes. and her taking over tommy's body ties into some Good Story Shit later on so i'm excited to share that #when i do a season 2 wrap up #anyway. next design's Zordon and then i'll do a Season 1 summary post #my art

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steelycunt · 2 years

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aus where r/s have a kid are a little strange to me sorry. because well s okay i sort of get it but r? what about that man makes you think he would a) want a child b) be a good father to one. be real

#when i say aus i also mean the child she made him father in the canon material. which never shouldve happened #teddy lupin means nothing to me. those are just words. there is no residual fondness left over from my affection for his father #sorry but even if they got married. i dont think theyre having kids. that seems like such a strange next move for them i cannot imagine the #wanting that #r endangered every child in hogwarts incuding his dead best friends son so as not to damage his reputation with the big boss. and now you #have to understand i dont see that as any sort of crime because i dont give a shit about any of those kids if it was up to me #he wouldve eaten harry when he got the chance. but the principle of it does not scream to me 'man who should have a child :-('#as much as i HATE to acknowledge the existence of hjp. he was kid enough for s i think and i grant you he was a good parental figure to him #but like. for him and his loser boyfriend to go out of their way to have a child. feels unlikely ill level with you. but this might all jus #be my disinterest in kidfic showing. i think im right though #like its one thing to take h in as the orphan son of ur dead friend in canon. but like in aus...hm.#its the same as i feel about them proposing to each other. said it b4 but i cannot imagine either of them planning some big heavily #orchestrated candles and roses down on one knee proposal. that is not them its just not. if they DO get married its because they are #brushing their teeth together and one of them goes we should get married and the other one goes what? and the first one says we should #get married again and the other one goes take your toothbrush out of your mouth i cant understand what youre saying like that. and the #first one takes their toothbrush out and repeats i SAID we should get MARRIED and the other one goes oh okay. if you'd like #anyway. this post got away from me no one is reading these tags are they jeez #r/s

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nickyroethemarinebiologist · 8 months

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DONT KNOW WHAT TO SAY HERE but the cowboys are ON THE WAY!! AGAIN!! FOR CHAPTER THREE!!!! In which Jensen has his meet-cute beside his own wanted poster, and Amos very much hates his job

* * *

Chapter Three, "Fish Out Of Water"

They arrived at the next town nearly an hour short of Jensen’s original estimate, with the wagon driver having sped them along their way best he could, perhaps out of his own kindness, though more likely out of some measurable concern, and a want to rid himself and his wagon of Jensen as soon as he was able to. Jensen made a point to thank him even so, and was eventually able to dig up enough money to pay the man for the whole journey, much to Jensen’s immense relief; he did not at all feel that yet another escape would do him much good, especially not in the circumstances, for he was awfully tired and ached all over from the journey in such a cramped cabin, and mostly wanted to find a soft bed to sleep in.

With the wagon gone, Jensen turned for the hotel; he had little desire to wander through town for much longer while his legs ached so dreadfully, and thought, or rather hoped, that he still had a few coins enough left in his bag to buy him a room for the night.

It was quite early in the morning, with the journey lasting all through the night, and most of the street was closed, with the shop windows darkened and shut up, and most of their inhabitants likely still asleep. Jensen looked into the buildings as he passed, with considerable interest; there were a number of shops he would have liked to visit later, and he supposed he might as well learn the layout of the town, if he planned to stay here for much longer.

Fortunately, it was not hard to locate a hotel nearby, what proved difficult was finding one that was open, or that he could afford with his pitifully small funds. He found one which looked on the outside to be comfortable enough, and when he looked inside he thought it would have been the perfect place to stay, and had already begun to plan for his new room. But the man at the front desk had said, with a very weary expression and little change from the monotony of his tone, that the meagre funds Jensen offered him would not even account for half of what a room would cost, for even one night. Jensen had not given up at once, and had attempted to negotiate, but the man did not at all want to cooperate, and was forced to send him on his way.

Jensen instead found a different hotel, which looked rather drab and small in comparison to the first, but he supposed it would have to suit, else he would end up sleeping under his coat in the rain — he dreaded even the thought of it. He paid for his room with the very last of his money, which managed to supply him for three nights, and he supposed that would do. He had a short discussion with the man at front, which was mostly to quiet his mounting worry at the likely prospect of another escape, and likely only served to cause the poor fellow some sizable concern at Jensen’s expense.

He dropped his bag at the foot of his bed, deciding against folding what little clothes he had brought along with him on impulse into the wooden drawers by his bedside; there were not so many that it would really matter whether he did or did not, and his arms were achingly tired already, so he thought there was no good reason to put himself through the extra trouble.

The bed proved soft enough, though the sheets were folded oddly at the end, and he gave them a pointedly disapproving look before shaking them out and laying them down quite neatly, and then finally, he sat at the very end of the bed, and issued a heavy sigh. He had thought he would fall into his bed and sleep at once, but now that he was shut up in his room, having sorted all distractions, he did not think he felt safe enough to sleep at all.

Instead, he left the hotel entirely, and turned instead for the bank, hoping at the very least that he might be able to scrounge something more from his savings, for fear that he would end up stranded with empty pockets. Fortunately, he passed through the bank without much trouble, though he found the place rather dull, and thought the man who spoke at the desk was terribly impolite; he caught him looking at him with an oddly sour expression, on more than one occasion, though Jensen was beginning to think that the entire town had a similar manner.

Still, he said nothing of it, though made the interaction as short as possible, and pointedly returned the ugly look as he left, feeling a rather childish sense of pride at himself in doing so.

With his funds renewed and his dignity kept mostly intact, Jensen found himself again at the need for a distraction, so set himself to running his errands around the town; he found there were a surprising amount of things to be done, if he meant to stay for much longer than a night, and by mid-morning, he already felt quite at home in is new town. He stopped in half the shops he passed, and told himself that it would help him learn the town’s layout, but secretly he could not keep his excitement; everything seemed to catch his eye. The town might have been drab, but it had a great many things to offer; he found a rather stylish new coat, somewhat longer than the one he wore, and he thought it looked quite smart when he tried it on.

“Sir, what do you think?” He had asked the man at the desk, who looked ready to fall asleep. The man said something that Jensen did not hear; he was too busy pulling at the sleeves and watching the way the long coat twirled when he turned to pay any attention. He could not find the self-control to stop himself from buying it on the spot, and felt some shame at it, though he could at least admit, it was a fine use of his money, and he made a point to twirl it again whenever he had the chance.

With his impulses satisfied, Jensen had meant to turn at once for the hotel again; he was now forced to carry his old coat under his arm, and he would very much have liked to drop it in his room, and then likely take a very long nap. But as he turned for the hotel, he found himself stopped at the side of the street, and his heart sank quite abruptly.

The wanted poster did not stick out so much as the others beneath it, which were mostly faded or obscured entirely. But his own name was dreadfully clear when it caught his eye, and Jensen found himself glancing around him in sudden worry; he felt as if the whole town could see. He wondered how much longer he could wait before they came after him also, just as his own folk had.

With mounting anxiety, he turned to set off for the hotel, but found himself near scared out of his own skin at the sight of the man who had appeared beside him, apparently out of nowhere. He had blonde hair, swept to the side and kept neatly out of his eyes, and a relatively well-trimmed moustache, which Jensen found quite smart.

The man, fortunately, did not seem to notice his alarm, or if he did he said nothing of it, looking very closely at the wall of posters.

“Hullo,” He said, trying to sound relaxed, “See anyone you know?” He added, as cheerily as he could manage; he did not want to look awkward, and thought it at least polite to strike up a conversation.

The man did immediately give Jensen a response; he puzzled over the posters for another brief moment, and then glanced at Jensen, and furrowed his brow.

“What?”

“I, ah—I did not hear you come over,” Jensen tried instead, “You must be light on your feet,”

The man gave him an odd look. Jensen found himself for a moment at a loss for what else to say, and felt rather embarrassed, but did not want to back out of the conversation now, at risk of looking like a fool.

At last, he gave the man a smile, and said; “...Are you looking for anyone in particular?”

Here the man had an odd sort of reaction: his brow furrowed deeper, into something of a frown, and then abruptly he relaxed, and finally pointed, to Jensen’s horror, at his very own poster, jabbing his finger into the crude drawing of his face, which made Jensen grimace.

“Him,” Said the man, with some venom. He levelled his gaze with Jensen’s own, though Jensen noted that he did not quite look directly at him. “You seen him?”

“Ah...” Jensen paled, looking from the man to his poster and back again. “I—I would not think so, no, I would have...known, I’m sure—”

He coughed to cover his hesitation, and looked to the poster, at the crudely drawn picture of his face, looking to make some comment on its appearance in the hopes of throwing the man off his trail. He found with some disappoint that it did not look much like him at all, and was instead a rather ugly depiction, which he thought, with some measurable offence, shared no resemblance to him at all.

“Though I do think,” He said, unable to move on from his own disappointment, “This surely cannot be what—he...really looks like?”

The man did not say anything, and Jensen cleared his throat, quite nervously.

“I believe it was hand drawn.” He said at last, though did not take his eyes off of Jensen’s face; he looked as if he was puzzling something over in his head.

Jensen looked back to the poster, and frowned. “Ah.” He said, “Yes, you can tell.”

When he turned back to the man beside him, he found him staring quite intently, and Jensen had to keep himself from startling. The man furrowed his brow. "What’s your name?" He said, in a manner that suggested he would not care for the answer at all, or perhaps already knew it.

“E—ehhd...son.” Jensen said, and then felt a sudden need to hit himself across the face. The man seemed almost amused for a moment, before his eyes narrowed again.

“Ed-son?”

“Yes,” Jensen nodded, somewhat proud of his own rescue, though it was poorly executed, and he still felt as if he would be thinking about it in embarrassment for days to come.

“Any chance you’d be new in town?”

“Oh!” Jensen said, “I am, rather, I only arrived early this morning, I had a very long journey. And I have not yet had a chance to rest, so if I am at all eccentric, that will be why—”

“You talk a lot,” The man said, offhandedly, and then added, as though it were an afterthought; "Going to have to take you in.”

“Take me in?”

The man nodded. “Mm. Or I could kill you,” He said, quite casually, and Jensen realised suddenly that he might have greatly misunderstood the direction of their conversation.

“Oh!” He said, and then turned and fled.

He made immediately for the hotel, as quickly as he could manage, though his legs had already been complaining when he walked, and they were aching so much now that Jensen thought he might collapse if he was not careful. He thought he could remember the way well enough; he did not think it was far, but with the man close on his tail, and his own rising panic, it felt as though he must have been running for an hour before he caught sight of the hotel.

He did not allow himself to hesitate, and ran right to his room, not stopping even to greet the man at the front desk, who watched him pass with a look of plain confusion, and called after him from down the stairs.

Jensen shut the door behind him, and nearly dropped his key when he tried to pull it from his pocket; his hands were again shaking, and they fumbled awkwardly as he turned it in the lock. He had not thought look behind him to see if the man had followed him, and if he had he would not have dared, but he waited at the door with his breath held, paused halfway into the room with his hands hovering at the door. For a brief moment, there was nothing, and Jensen felt himself calm — foolishly, for there was a shout immediately afterwards, and then footsteps in the hall, and he felt his gut twist in fear.

He turned and went to the window, right across from the door, not before holding himself in a moment of panicked hesitation. It was held down by a latch at the bottom, he undid it as quickly as he could manage, and then forced it open, groaning at the effort. It went only halfway, and resolutely would not budge when he cursed and slammed his hand against it, but the gap was just large enough for him to fit through, with his bags under his arm.

He gathered up his bags, leaving his old coat slung over the end of the bed; he felt some odd guilt at leaving it so carelessly. But when he leaned over the windowsill, with his hands gripping the edge tight enough to turn his knuckles white, he felt his stomach drop at the height; he was only one floor up from the ground, but he could not even imagine falling from such a height, and landing without injury.

“Oh, good lord,” Jensen said aloud, though quietly, and pulled himself safely inside — he would have to make a run for it, he thought, if he made to escape alive and unscathed.

But when he turned for the door, he could only stop, and watch with open horror as the handle turned, quite aggressively, as though it were being pulled at with great frustration. He was sure he had locked it, and tried to calm himself with this thought, but there was the sound of a key sliding into the lock, and he found suddenly that the man at the desk must have had a key of his own. Jensen threw his hand up against his head; he could only groan in frustration.

The blond man came running into the room with the other fellow shortly behind him, though he at present stayed nervously hovering in the doorway, and watched the two men with great worry as much as confusion. The first man had a gun in his hand, which he swung at Jensen the moment he spotted him at the window, levelling it quite neatly at his head. Jensen squeaked fearfully, which he then thought was terribly undignified, but could not in the moment summon the energy to care.

“Edward Jensen,” The man said, in a voice remarkably close to a snarl. Jensen immediately threw his hands up in the air, and felt his heart sink in sorrow; he was well and truly cornered. “Not another fuckin’ step.”

“Might we not talk this out?” Jensen said, as diplomatically as he could, though he could not stop his voice from wobbling in his panic. “What’s your name?”

The man narrowed his eyes; he looked about ready to push him out of the window himself, for the sake of his own frustration rather than that of the law.

“Amos,” He said, though he spat it as though it were venom, and added only; “You ain’t talking yourself out of this one,”

Jensen made an odd sound, which might have been the beginnings of a feeble agreement, and shook his head. He thought, in one moment, that Amos was not a bad name, and he found it suited the man quite nicely, but he did not stop to dwell on it, in favour of the gun pointed at his head.

He backed against the window, having to stop himself from flinching when his back met the wall. His bags were at his feet, he did not think he could gather them up and escape through the window before Amos readied his gun, even if he could summon the strength to jump at all. He only kept pressing up against the wall, feeling with his hands for the windowsill, and keeping his focus wholly on Amos himself; he did not notice when his hands met empty space, and toppled backwards over the windowsill with a bewildered yell.

He dropped onto the ground ungracefully, sending up a cloud of dust. He did not move for a long moment, trying to summon the strength to move, while his mind seemed wholly convinced that he had broken something. His back hurt, and he was quite sure that he had hit his head; he felt dazed, and at one moment his eyes refused to focus — he blinked furiously in an attempt to fix it, and waved his hands about before his face, trying to bring them back into focus.

Somewhere up above him, there was a shout, which sounded more like a yell of full frustration than any word. He watched distantly as Amos leant over the windowsill, and then disappeared abruptly back inside, while the man from the front desk came up afterwards and closed the window behind him.

Jensen thought he ought to move: there was no doubt Amos would be on his way down at any moment. He was not wholly sure if his legs would still work, but the prospect of another chance at escape drove his body to action, and he managed to haul himself quite awkwardly from the floor, groaning both in pain and frustration, and furiously brushing the dust from his coat — it would be a damned shame for it to be ruined so soon after he had bought it.

At once he set off running again, he half expected the townsfolk to come after him, but the bewildered faces he passed looked only confused, rather than malicious. He did not know entirely where he was aiming to go, and only kept running, until the buildings at the side of the street became wholly unrecognisable. He had thought at one moment that he ought to hide, but when he paused in the street he could see no obvious spot, and did not think he had the guts to wait any longer and find one, if there were even any around at all.

Instead he ran for the very edge of town, where the buildings quickly became sparse in favour of dirt paths and shrubbery, and then a little further afterwards there stood a wooden stable, fenced off with fields of sparse grass. And in the field, was a group of dark-eyed horses, milling about and flicking their tails at the flies.

Jensen ran for the fence instinctually, hauling himself over with some difficulty and very nearly sending himself right into the mud. He frowned as his shoes sank into the wet ground, but did not dare hesitate, and turned for the horse nearest to him — a gentle-looking mare standing aside from the others, and picking quietly at the grass. Jensen approached her as slowly as he dared, whispering in a voice rather shaky with panic, though she did not seem to notice or care for him at all until the very moment he pulled on the saddle over her back, when she only snorted and flicked her ears in what looked to be irritation.

His arms ached with exhaustion, and hurt only more so from his fall, but he managed to pull himself into the saddle, though his hands trembled at every move, surprising himself as much as the mare, it seemed, for she tossed her head and snorted again. Jensen took this as a congratulations, though nervously marked the height at which he sat; his luck surely would not last forever, and if she threw him from here, he was sure to break something.

Distantly he saw Amos running out from the town, making straight for the fence. Another man was close behind him, though Jensen had not seen him before, and decided with great unease that he must be the man who owned the horses and their land; he looked as if he had been dragged from his house in a sudden rage, and was angrier, even, than Amos seemed himself.

Nervously, Jensen shifted himself on the horse’s back. He had realised very suddenly that he had never ridden a horse in his life, nor did he have any good idea how to, so could only try pulling haltingly on the reigns, and trying to shift the saddle into movement, as though to give the horse some clue that he wanted to move.

“Now, uh...go, please, ma’am?” He tried, with mounting anxiety. The two men were only growing closer — Amos was now nearly at the fence, with the other man not far behind, while Jensen sat rather stupidly stop his horse, entirely motionless. “Please?”

He patted the horses neck as politely as he could manage, to which she snorted again, and tossed her head, before turning right back to the half-chewed grass stems at her hooves, looking entirely indifferent.

Jensen’s pleading only grew more urgent, and more panicked, he was sure to be caught if he did not move now. Amos shouted something; Jensen did not hear, but his gut turned over in fear, and in a moment purely of panic he felt for the reigns and pulled on them, quite suddenly, yelling for the horse to move. The mare startled, Jensen felt her tense, and felt his stomach twist in anticipation. Amos reached the fence and slammed right into it; Jensen marked the look of determination as much as anger in his face, and then the horse kicked off from where she stood, and they were running right for the fence.

Jensen yelled out, thinking in a panic that they would crash into it entirely, and yanked on the reigns for support as much as to signal to stop. The horse again did not seem to hear him at all, only kept gaining speed, kicking up clumps of mud and grass behind them, until she halted at the fence and leaped, clean over the fence and the two men, and landing quite neatly on the other side.

Jensen watched Amos duck in fear, and then both men were staring after him in open shock; Jensen felt himself laugh suddenly, though out of joy or from fear he truly could not tell. His hand had begun to ache where he had gripped the reigns so tightly, and the wind brought tears out of his eyes; he blinked them away as hastily as he could. The horse did not stop running, it seemed she felt as free as he did, and they gained speed at a rate which Jensen found rather impressive; he had no idea a horse could run this fast at all, for he had only seen them at the front of wagons and carriages, which proved to be dreadfully slow in comparison.

Amos shouted something which sounded like a string of curses, and which Jensen only found to be rather rude, though he delighted in the man’s frustration, and felt the corners of his mouth twitch in amusement. He found himself overcome with the urge to shout, and he did, wholly and with joy. The boyish glee would be embarrassing if it were not so entirely freeing. And at once he was away, and settled into the rhythm quite quickly, though stayed clutching closely to the reigns, lest he be thrown from the horse entirely. He felt for once wholly gleeful, and made a point to shout his praise to the horse as they ran, though his voice was likely taken by the wind, and he did not once ever think to look back.

First / Previous

#ket writes #cowboy oc #oc tag #original writing #oc: amos #oc: jensen #had lots of fun writing this one actually #but the next one is where things really start happening i think. in terms of Jensen And Amos #they have so many silly moments I cannot WAIT to write them all #I also...am half-planning another book (for the future). but thats a story for another post #hrghh anyways hope you guys enjoy the cowboys :)#*looks at you with my big sad eyes*#/lh

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spring-lxcked · 1 year

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rewatching a playthrough of simul.acra ( :) ) and being like "maybe i should finally break bad and buy this game and play it myself" and then witnessing that first big jumpscare and instantly being like "cool. absolutely never playing this myself."

#—— ✧ ooc »#.tbd.#i remembered how bad it was /in theory/ but def not literally LMAO #also my paranoia Could Not #'are you scared your phone or laptop are watching you' yeah 24/7 next question—#big vibes for when i played the new version of DD.LC and i had always played nat.suki's route (but had seen yur.i's)#but it had been so long that my brain had convinced me that natsu.ki's was worse?#had to play yu.ri's to get the achievement and jesus christ IT'S SO MUCH WORSE #i think this entire post is 100000x funnier if you know i downloaded FN.AF again unironically & was planning on trying to play it again #i still want to but we all know i'm sticking to playing the A.R game (which i also absolutely redownloaded. hyperfixation and all that lmao #the need to play horror games VS having anxiety

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its-stupidhours · 8 months

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ok so the plan is:

OCTOBER: try and get the big smir fic to at least 40k to 1) get back into the swing of writing a lot and 2) lighten my load for November

NOVEMBER: nanowrimo hell. try and get big smir fic to 100k words, but more realistic goal is 75k. If I hit 40k by Halloween, then that's 2k words a day through November, which is a LOT, but fingers crossed. fingers fucking crossed. I believe in myself.

DECEMBER: don't look at big smir for until like 2024 bc I'm sure I'll be sick to death of it and instead work on some smaller things. try and get some stuff published bc I said I would be posting something for every chapter of the big smir fic I write and by this point I would theoretically have ~4 or 5 new chapters done. maybe do something for one year anniversary of the first smir fic. oh yeah and survive this semester of college I guess

JANUARY: edit nanowrimo hell stuff bc I'm sure a lot of it will be rough. I honestly have no idea when the big fic will be done, but I'm certain that nano will not be the end of it, as much as I wish it would be.

#my posts #no ship #that big smir fic #this post is mainly to hold myself accountable #and to encourage myself #and to make a plan #hence the first line #you get it #and also to let yall know what im going to be up to the next few months #im at 34k on the big fic rn!#which is 4k more than last week apparently so I'm pretty confident i can get the October goal done pretty easily #November we'll have to see

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candied-cae · 2 years

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And Who Are We At The End Of The World? - Reunions and Secrets

Chapter 13/? - - - Read it on AO3

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20]

Word Count: 13,809

Summary: Hop is racing back home to see his girl, the rest of the party is simply killing time until some parents show up. But, the three who boarded a plane from California might not be the only ones jumping into things... There just might be a few more faces coming back around...

More ST Fics

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Unfortunately, the walkie Steve handed the Byers boys had a dead battery. So the folks in the car couldn’t call ahead and tell El that her dad was coming back. Which just about made Hopper mad enough to swerve off the road. He felt like every second she didn’t know was a second she was sad or in pain. The boys assured him that, while she obviously missed him and was going to be crazy happy to get him back, she was happily watching a movie. But that didn't ease him. He needed to get back to Hawkins and let her know he was okay. And he needed to do it at that very moment.

At the house, everything was otherwise fine. Everyone was bundled together across the couch or sitting on pillows in front of it, wrapped under various blankets.

After Jonathan had to go, Argyle and Nancy were left sat together on the left, surprisingly getting along pretty well after Nancy resigned herself to the fact that he was pretty good company. His easygoing everything still confounded her, but, somehow, it made Nancy stop in her tracks and think to at least give it a try. Now that she knew he wasn't just stupid and unaware. Instead, he just chose to lean on the happier side of things anyway, and Nancy could use a skill like that. They still weren't super close, but there they were, sitting next to each other while Mr. Banks approached the climax of his character arc.

Next to that pair sat Steve and Robin, with Erica between them on the floor. Obviously, they were together, as best friends like them liked to be. Robin had even gone so far as to have her legs crossed over Steve's while El hugged onto her arm. Robin wasn't entirely sure how she managed to secure a spot in the girl's heart since they barely met before she left for California, but it made her feel pretty good anyway.

Next to El were Mike and Lucas, with Dustin sitting below them on the floor cushions. Their band of boys on the right end of the living room had included Will until he had to leave for the airport. But they still sat close together. Like they had for sleepovers from years past. They were all comfortably awaiting the arrival of some real adults and to start eating the dinner they’d put together.

And the movie itself was beginning to wrap up with that damned ‘Let's Go Fly a Kite’ scene that had Steve doing everything in his power not to sniffle. If nobody looked at him, no one would see that the last few minutes always made him tear up. He just had to keep it together. Just for a minute longer.

And then Robin looked over.

Of course, she did. Because she noticed what this movie did to him when they watched it together last time. But she didn’t draw any attention to him. She just nuzzled in a little closer to his side and rested her head on his shoulder as they watched the credits roll past a kite-filled, cloudy sky. It was nice being known like that, he decided. Nice to have someone know what you needed and how to go about it. Even if she pushed his buttons too.

As the movie was just ending, there was frantic honking coming from the driveway. The kids had just the time to get stood up and look at the front door before it was thrown open by Jonathan and Will.

“El! Come on!” Will yelled, looking like he was bursting with good news.

El was already approaching, planning to see Joyce and welcome her back, when from behind them walked in Jim.

“Hi,” he said like it was the only thing he could think to say after missing his girl for the past eight months.

And while she was slowly stepping forward a moment ago… the second she saw his face and that warm smile he was wearing, she was running right into him. Probably could’ve knocked him over if he hadn’t braced for it. And before wasting another second, she was wrapping her arms around him and noticing how differently they fit together this time. He was so thin, and she was taller, her arms longer.

But it was still him. It was still Hop.

She buried her face into him as the tears dropped from her squeezed-shut eyes. Jim also looked like he was about to cry if it was any consolation. Then, after a moment, there was a barely-said mutter spoken into his shoulder.

“What’s that, kid?” he asked her to repeat.

El pulled her head back just enough to spill out between her cries,“ I’m sorry. My- they never came back- I’m sorry I couldn’t find you-“

“Hey. No.” he pulled her in tighter as he said it,” No sorry’s from you, kid. I don’t even want to hear ‘em. I knew if there was any way you’d known, you woulda got me back, alright? I didn’t doubt that you would have gone beyond hell and back to save me. Okay? It’s not your fault, and I never thought it was. Not for one second, El.”

She tucked herself back into him as if trying to escape the rest of the world to focus entirely on the fact that he was actually back with her,” I was waiting the whole time. I always left the door open three inches. I never stopped believing you’d come back.”

He chuckled, and it shook her in such a familiar way. Filling her with the warmth of his laugh for the first time in too many months,” Oh, I know. I know you did. It’s okay now, I’m here. I’m here. I’m sorry I was gone so long, kid. But I made it back before I missed a birthday.”

She nodded her head against him and huffed her own laugh,“ You did.”

“We’re going to have a big one this year, you hear me? No hiding and no secrets this time. You and me, we're going anywhere you want to go, and anyone you want to bring can come. Okay?”

“Yeah.” she agreed while she wiped at her eyes and finally pulled away enough to really look at him,” You look so…”

“So…? Not fat?” he joked.

She laughed, but she missed the squish. Then she looked back up,“ And your hair…”

“My hair? Look at your hair.” he ran his hand over the short buzz with a sigh,“ Yeah. I kinda stole your look, kid.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, what do you think?” he asked, leaning his head down and turning to the left and right to let her make a proper evaluation.

“Bitchin’,” she decided before reaching back around his middle,” Except for this part. Don’t like this at all.”

“You don’t? I tell ya, when I go see my doctor, he’s going to say that being presumed dead was just what I needed. You just wait and see.”

She shook her head, and that was the moment Joyce came in. She and Murray struggled with some of the bags, seeing as her boys and Hopper ran to the front door without helping. But when she made it in the door, she just looked at her girl.

El’s smile brightened a little more, and she said,” Thank you.”

Joyce pretty much just dropped everything at that and surged forward to get El into her arms. There was no denying that, over those eight months they’d been without Hopper, El had become her kid too. El sniffled against her for a minute until they all came down from the emotional high of their return. Past El's greetings from them, there were handshakes and hugs with Hop and more hugs and kisses on cheeks from Joyce as they both made their rounds through the rest of the room.

That is until Hopper put a hand to his stomach and groaned,” This is nice and all, but I was promised a big supper. Can we eat already?”

They all laughed at that and motioned to the open dining room doors for the adults to trickle into. The kids moved all the bags from the doorway into the living room and brought all the food in from the kitchen. Then dinner was finally underway. It was nice. Warm. The only dinner like it the Harrington House has ever seen. It was a good change.

They didn’t talk about what happened - or, more accurately - what was happening. They knew they couldn’t avoid it for very long, and the kids really did want a plan for what they could do to keep pushing forward. But… it was suppertime. They could talk about how awful everything was later. But for that moment, they could eat and laugh at how terribly Hopper stuffed his tortilla as it burst at the seams and spilled out all over his plate.

But once they’d all had their fill, Nancy mentioned Susan. It was time to get back to business. Steve was the one to call her trailer, it was already after 8:30, but she answered quickly and said she’d be there shortly for whatever conversation it was they were going to have.

During this, El noticed that Jim and Joyce were connected by their pinkies. Not outright holding hands at the dinner table. But still, they were just a little bit tied together. Just two pinkies, barely crossed, but they said a lot. She looked at it a beat longer before finding their fond smiles and asking,” So I get to keep staying with Miss Joyce, too?”

“Uh-” Jim startled slightly. Like he’d been caught red-handed. But after a second, he simmered down and answered,” Uh, yeah, kid. You can keep staying with Joyce, too. When we aren’t homeless, that is. We both can if that’s fine by all of you,” he said around the whole table, pointedly including Jonathan and Will in the question.

“Yeah.” they all seemed to answer. Happy that their household wouldn’t be splitting apart with the good news, and in agreement that it was about time for Jim and Joyce to get to be happy together. They've been heading in that direction for a while anyway, right? Then everyone moved to the living room, so they could try and figure out more of exactly what’s been going on everywhere.

“Alright, we need favorite songs.” Nancy started as she sat down and pulled back out her notebook and pen.

“What?” Jim asked, clearly that question was just about the last one he’d have expected upon his grand return. He was in Russia for eight months, after all. Surely that sort of thing should’ve come up first.

“You’re favorite song.” Robin repeated for Nancy,” We need to write it down and everyone’s getting their own on a cassette with a Walkman before much longer.”

“Okay?” he agreed, still confused,” it’s-”

“It's 'You Don’t Mess Around With Jim',” El answered for him, a proud smile tugging at her cheeks. God, they had to hurt by then. If she smiled any harder they'd bruise. Her grin just hasn’t faltered since her dad walked through that door. Not for one moment.

“Yeah. She’s right. Obviously.” Jim agreed. It wasn’t a difficult guess. It was the song he played when they moved into his cabin together. The same one he blasted in the car when he had a good day. It seemed like it was more his song than Jim Croce’s sometimes.

They looked expectantly to Joyce next, who just sort of furrowed her brows and asked herself,” What is my favorite song?”

“What about ’Uptown Girl’?” El considered.

Joyce scrunched her nose and shook her head.

Jonathan tried to come up with something next,“ Well, it has to be something Fleetwood Mac, right?”

“I mean, probably. They are my favorite, but I’m not good at remembering the names.”

“What about ’Dreams’?” he offered.

To that, she shrugged and gave a thoughtful,“ …Yeah. Yeah, I like that one.”

“Okay, but do you just like it, or do you love it? ‘Cause, it kinda needs to be one that you really love, like a lot.” Robin emphasized.

“Um… okay, what’s that one that’s all…” Joyce asked her kids and started humming a chorus line.

“Oh! Oh! I know it… It’s- it’s-” Will racked his brain for it. The title was on the tip of his tongue,” It’s- Oh! It’s ’The Chain’! Right?”

“Okay, then that’s it.” Joyce decided,” That’ll be my favorite.”

“And Murray?”

“What is this for?” He questioned Nancy back, like something as simple as his favorite song was a sort of sensitive information that she’d abuse.

“Saving your life?” she answered.

“And if I don’t buy that so easily?”

“Alright, you paranoid bastard,” Erica cut in, having no patience for him,” Newsflash: there’s an evil mind wizard who might try to possess the box of nuts and bolts on the end of your neck. And if he does, the only hope you’ll have is that somebody in this room will have the good sense to put some music over your ears that'll snap you out of his spell. So, unless you really want to die over a song title, I suggest you cough it up.”

“I see you’re still a pleasure, Miss Erica Sinclair…” he held a snide smile for her before answering,” It’s ‘No More’ by Billie Holiday. Duh.”

“The ‘duh’ was petty and uncalled for.” she checked him.

“About as uncalled for as a five-year-old on the doomsday team?” he threw back,” What’re you going to do, color the wizard to death with crayons?”

“This eleven-year-old,” she corrected,” has already stabbed a tire on a police car and swung on a psycho with a blunt object for the cause, and she’s prepared to do a whole lot more. What’ve you done for it? Besides lying about a vacation to Alaska?”

He held up a finger at her,“ For the record, we did go to Alaska. We just also took a little trip over to-”

And then there was a knock on the front door. Susan Mayfield must have arrived. And they didn’t even get through where Jim has been, what Henry/Vecna/One was, or what they were going to tell her about any of it. At any rate, it was happening right now. Nothing they could do about it. They’d just have to follow Jim and Joyce’s lead.

Steve stood up from the living room and went to answer the door. He was the one who invited Susan over, after all. But then, he was left only to find it wasn’t Susan Mayfield standing on his front porch, but Karen Wheeler instead.

“Hi, Steve!” She smiled at him, holding a glass container with what looked like lasagna in it,” Thought we’d take the first shift to drop off some food to keep you kids fed-”

That was when her eyes slipped from his frozen expression and over his shoulder to see Ms. Byers in the living room,” Joyce? When did you get into to-”, and then her gaze fell just to the left,” Hopper?! Okay- Okay, what is going on here? He’s supposed to be… ”

“Sorry, sorry! Hard getting these all in one trip.” Claudia called up as she joined Karen in the doorway with at least three different containers of food herself.

When neither Steve nor Karen responded, Claudia turned to the other mom to ask,” What’s going on?”

And when she looked back inside and saw the same guests that had Karen stunned, she reacted in just about the same way,” Joyce? Ho-Hopper? What’re you…?”

“Um... Surprise?” was all the boy could come up with.

“Surprise?” Karen questioned back at him.

Joyce came forward to meet her at the door,“ Hi, Karen. Claudia.”

“Joyce, what the hell is going on here? He- He died. There was a service, and there were articles, and the news- And- And you mourned, Joyce. And his kid-” Karen had to close her eyes to stop her sputtering questions - her mind was clearly running faster than she could manage- to focus on what she really needed to ask,” What is going on, and why do my children and a bunch of their friends know about it?”

“Why is my Dusty-bun…?”

“Um- It’s-” Joyce tried to figure herself out, until…

“Claudia? Karen?”

Ah, there’s Susan.

“Do they know?” Susan asked Steve.

“Do we know what?” Karen echoed the question.

Jim stood up from the couch and came to the front,“ Okay, so this is happening.”

“Chief Hopper?” Susan now questioned.

“Now that we’re all up to speed on how clueless the moms out here are, can someone please explain what the hell is going on?” Karen requested.

“Seems to me,” Jim decided,” the only option here is to go over everything. From the beginning, for everyone here, until we get to where we stand now. Sound good to everyone?”

“The NDAs?” Nancy inquired from the living room.

“I’m gonna say, executive decision, fuck the NDAs. I’m legally dead, and if the suits didn’t nab me off the plane…" he shrugged," Well, way I see it, everything I do before they realize I’m back is kinda their fault for being so bad at their jobs in the first place.”

“NDAs? Suits?” Karen asked.

“Oh, don't worry, Mrs. Wheeler. We’ll cover that,” Jim acknowledged.

“Holy shit- this is really happening,” Mike said to Nancy, trying to wrap his head around his mother, Karen Wheeler, knowing about all the stuff they’ve been up to over the last two and a half years.

“Language, Mike,” she called over.

“Okay, Mom, it’s kind of crazy to think that we’re going to be inviting you into hell, but-”

“Language, Nancy!”

Steve pulled the door open further and motioned for the moms to join the rest of them in the living room,“ Why doesn’t everybody just come on in?”

“Yeah, bring ‘em all in, Steve. Let’s just tell everyone’s mothers about the goddamn Upside Down.”

“Language, Dustin!” Claudia had to say to her own. To Karen, she huffed,” Geez, you’d think we raised our kids in a barn…”

“And what was that? The ‘Upside Down’ that you’re going to be telling us about?” Karen pointed out as they all got seated in Steve's living room.

Joyce thought,“ Well… um, where do we start?”

“With me?” El raised her hand.

“Yeah, we’ll start there.” Jim agreed.

The next hour or so was filled with the coverage of everything. Everything that started way back in November ‘83, and they moved forward as chronologically as they could. The kids told their sides, adults answered most of the questions, had to excuse how they couldn't stop the kids from being involved, explained away every coverup story, filled in context for every mystery scar… It was a wild ride. There were a lot of interruptions and even more disbelief. El had to change the tv channel five times and lift it off the entertainment center before any of them started to believe they were telling truth. But when they did… oh, when they did.

“And that’s about everything that happened up until two weeks ago.” Joyce concluded,” Clearly, more has just gone on, but we haven’t even had time to discuss that amongst ourselves yet, so I guess you’ll be here while we try to figure that out, well, now.”

“You’re trying to tell me that my children could’ve died countless times over the last three years, just because… why?” Karen was at a loss for words.

Joyce swore to her,“ We always tried to keep the kids out of it. We told them over and over again to stay home, or at the middle school, and, just, not put themselves on the front line while we tried to deal with it. I don’t know if you��ve noticed, but our kids don’t listen very well.”

“You’re telling me…” Karen muttered, shooting a glance at her own.

“And they saved my Will. Back when he went missing, so many people didn’t believe that something was going on. And El, she never chose to be a part of this. She got stuck with it. And this town is stuck with it. The Lab... the problem is here, it started here. And, at the end of the day, this is the crew trying to solve that problem.”

"We're the doomsday team," Erica added, using Murray's name for their group.

“And Max? She just… happened to have made friends with the kids involved and wanted to know everything herself? The reason she’s in a hospital bed right now is because last year we happened to move to the town with monsters, and she happened to find the only boys who knew about it?”

They were all struck a little silent by the question. It was Lucas who eventually answered her,“ Yeah. That's pretty much how it...”

Susan’s hand pressed into her chest, and it didn’t seem like she even saw anyone else in the room,“ If I hadn’t said that we needed a change of pace… to get away from California and the fighting… She’d be fine?”

“It’s not your fault, Susan.” Claudia put a hand on her shoulder to try and comfort her.

She stood up out of the other mother's reach,“ I was the one that said taking Billy to the Midwest might temper him. I thought a small town without so much to do might bring down his aggression and help us manage his behavior… If I had just let Neil take us to Vermont instead, we wouldn’t be…”

“Susan. You didn’t know. If you did, you would’ve never made that choice.” Karen assured her,” If I knew my kids were doing this, I would’ve packed them up the second...” Karen looked at Joyce when she realized what she was getting at. She would've made her kids leave after Will went missing. Leaving him behind for their family's good.

“I would’ve moved Dustin and me to my brother’s ages ago,” Claudia added.

“But I brought them here! If I hadn’t, they never would’ve-”

“Maybe they wouldn’t have.” Nancy gave her,” And maybe things would be a little bit better for a few of us if everyone had pulled us away from Hawkins when Will went missing…”

She shook her head and continued,“ But if you had, he would’ve never been found, and he would’ve died, scared and alone. And Joyce and Jonathan would’ve never known what happened to him. And El would’ve never stayed free of that lab. And maybe Barb wouldn’t have been at the wrong place at the wrong time because of me, and maybe she’d be fine. But someone else would’ve been in her place. And maybe all the people who were still here wouldn’t have stood a chance if we weren't here. But we were. And we noticed, and we fought back against an invading dimension of monsters with three successes and one pending results. There were losses. We know that. But we are what Hawkins has to fight for it. And I don’t regret being on the team.”

“You don’t?” her mother asked.

“No. I really don’t. I wish I’d done a better job in places. I wish I didn’t… make so many mistakes. But I don’t regret being on the team. We’re the team. And we have each other’s backs.” Nancy looked over and took Robin’s hand in hers before she realized she was even going to do it, simply remembering the vines and the fear,” We don’t leave each other behind. Even if we have to face down terrifying creatures or carry someone bleeding out of hell, we have each other. And now that you know what’s going on, you’re all on the team, too.”

Susan seemed a little far off in her head, but she sat back down while Claudia asked,“ And what does that mean? Being on the team?”

“It means, well, you help us not let the world end. Whatever skills you’ve got to bring to the table, we’ll use ‘em and find a way out of this mess. Because we don’t have any other choice.” Jonathan answered.

Karen continued,“ And what’s happening now? What’s all this… spring break business that happened?”

And thus, they went into another long hour of explaining. Now having to string together Henry Creel and Russia, which was a much more convoluted mess to sort out. It took a while, but they explained everything until everyone - all seventeen of them, as crazy as it was - knew where they stood currently on the apocalypse radar.

They also ended up eating a lot of the brownies Claudia had shown up with.

Comfort food to combat the reality of their horror stories. Or something like that.

By the end of the night, everyone was way more involved, and Lucas and Erica were left begging Karen not to tell Sue and Charles about everything. They were less keen on joining the club of kids whose parents were on the in. But she wasn’t having any of it. She wished she had known what was going on, and Erica is still only eleven, for goodness sake. They deserve to know when it concerns their eleven-year-old. The Sinclairs would be brought into the fold. And that was final.

But she wouldn’t be reaching out to the Buckleys and the Harringtons. She didn’t know them like she knew her neighbors, and both Steve and Robin were very insistent that their parents would only cause issues. Which is the same reason that Karen decided she would not be telling Ted what was going on.

She knew her husband. Knew how he saw giving to anyone else as tantamount to accepting theft. He audibly complains about feeding Mike’s friends when they were over. If he was aware of the situation… he would just up and move them. No discussion. He would just list the house and have them moved to another state without a second thought or consideration. And, as much as Karen would love to remove her kids from the risk entirely, she can’t not help. Not when other mothers’ children would still be in harm's way and they’d be leaving them worse off without the support.

So Ted wasn’t to know. Neither was Holly, obviously. Those Wheelers wouldn’t be a part of this.

The other three would handle it themselves.

And with that thought, Karen suddenly knew a little bit about how her daughter felt these last few years. Keeping such a big secret to spare her family pain and allow her to be there for her friends. She had a good eldest daughter. She’s always known so. But it was new to see it from this light. To know what was actually going on and how strong she's been this whole time.

She’s just been ‘trying to manage it all’.

Like she’d told her the other morning in the hospital hallway. Nancy’s been very alone in managing everything. But she’s had the other members of this team. And now she had her mother. So Karen was going to fight tooth and nail to take some of that burden off her shoulders. And keep her husband off her back. She'd be making sure he dropped his whole 'no keys until you can prove you'll be responsible' thing.

“And those other two should be joining up soon,” Jim remembered.

“Two more?” Steve asked, eyebrows climbing on his face to imagine their group growing even further.

“Yeah, we brought them over but couldn’t really seat them on a commercial flight, for obvious reasons. Dmitri and his son Mikhail.” Joyce explained.

“Mikhail? You don’t think that’ll be confusing?” Mike wondered.

“Would you prefer we left them to the Soviets where Dmitri would’ve been hunted down and executed for defecting because you and his son sort of have similar names, Michael?” Murray questioned.

Joyce dismissed,“ He doesn’t even go by Mike. So, as long as you didn’t decide to give 'Mikhail' a try, we should be fine.”

“So we actually have Russian friends now?” Robin asked.

“Just the two. Yuri was a bastard, so we didn’t invite him along. But Dmitri and his son were good. He was the only reason we knew Hop was alive and in Russia, and he’s sticking the thing out with us now that he’s fought the same monster and wants to retire to small-town America. And his kid was a little quiet, but we did snatch him up in a sudden helicopter ride, so I think he was just shy. Anyway, we got them to America, and I handed off my car to them in California with directions on a map on how to get here so we could help them get set up.”

“How were you planning to pass off heavily-accented, eastern Europeans as just simply 'the new guys in town'?” Erica pressed.

“You don’t know how strong their accents are.” Murray pointed out.

“You telling me no one’s gonna notice the voices of Mother Russia?” she asked back.

“Okay, they have pretty unmistakable accents, but whatever. We can make up some shit about them being double agents in witness protection or something.” Jim grumbled.

“Riiiiiiight, because people in Hawkins are so understanding and respectful of each other’s privacy.”

“Okay, from what I’ve heard, the town is clearing out anyhow. Whoever’s still kicking around can just deal with it.”

There was a little bit more chatter as they finished catching everyone up. Eventually, the moms decided it was time to return home, but they ended up agreeing to a real sleepover at Steve’s, now that they knew what their kids went through. It seemed like letting them spend time together, where they got to keep an eye on each other and know that no one was in danger, was something they just couldn’t say no to. So the three of them headed off into the night with the understanding that they’d be coming back to Steve’s with Erica and Lucas’s parents in the morning to explain it all to them too. And once everyone was together, they'd figure out a strategy for taking out Vecna. Once and for all.

They couldn't do it that night though. So everyone got ready to wind down.

The California crew changed into their newly delivered pajamas, and Claudia made the rounds to everyone's house before dropping off things for the locals. Meanwhile, Steve was getting room assignments figured out. The kids, again, banded together to camp out in the living room with plans to doze off to The Sound of Music. Steve was walking Hopper, Joyce, and Murray up the stairs to show them around the house. Seeing as Joyce’s house was in California, Hopper’s cabin was in shambles, and Murray’s place was in Illinois, they’d all be joining them in the now slightly packed Harrington house. He was in the process of offering the master to Joyce and Hopper since they were an item now and bringing up showers.

“Joyce mentioned you guys didn’t have time to stop and clean up, so I can grab you all some towels and leave you to the bathrooms.”

Jim looked over the moon to think about it,“ Oh, kid, you don’t even know how long I’ve been looking forward to a real, hot shower-” Then he suddenly stopped and grabbed Steve’s shoulders with wide eyes,” Wait- Steve.”

“Yes?” he asked.

“You’re rich people,” he said, asserting the fact without any further context.

Steve’s expression turned more confused,“ Yes?”

“Do your parents have- have one of those- those tubs with the- with the-”

“The jets?” Steve figured,” Yeah, they have a jacuzzi tub in the master bathroom.”

“Oh my god-” Hopper pulled Steve into a just short of crushing hug and smacked a surprising kiss to his forehead before nearly running down the hall, calling back," Joyce! We’re taking the dibs on the master! I LOVE RICH PEOPLE!”

Which was… Okay, was there something in the water? Because everyone kept hugging Steve, and he wasn't entirely opposed to it, but geez, it’s not the level of daily physical contact he’s used to.

Besides that display, Joyce followed in with their bags, and Steve showed Murray to one of the guest bedrooms to make himself at home. Steve went back downstairs to see the kids throwing around even more pillows and blankets and just about beating them into submission to get themselves settled and comfortable for the movie.

Steve took a vote for popcorn and ended up juggling four big plastic bowls of the stuff back into the living room. He passed them out and noticed Robin and Nancy looking over something together while Jonathan and Argyle whispered and glanced over at Argyle's bag. He thought nothing of it until, as he was trying to retake his seat by Robin for the movie, she and Nancy stood up. Said they were going to “be right back” before they broke for the dining room. Then the other two split off right after, presumably to get stoned.

All of this left Steve, once again, so very outnumbered by a bunch of children.

“Always the babysitter…” he groaned as he tugged on the blanket Erica was hogging.

“Then be a good babysitter and sit quietly. It’s starting,” she shot back, like the little spitfire she was, but she let them share the blanket anyway as the opening credits rolled over landscape shots of the Swiss Alps and the orchestra faded in.

The two California boys ended up sitting in the grass against the side of Steve’s house, just out of the view of the street or any neighbors. Argyle was sparking up a joint for them to pass, no longer worried about running out since his Mamá Isadora was nice enough to throw in his stash with his clothes. He thanked his lucky stars all the time that she was so into the flower power, peace and love stuff of the 70’s when he was younger. It was nice that she just understood that kind of stuff with him.

But right now, Jon was the one he needed to reach an understanding with. Because he’s been biting his cuticles down to the quick ever since they crossed the Indiana state line. So, once he got the joint started and took his own drag, he handed it over to his best friend and looked up at the stars. Letting a comfortable silence fall around them just long enough for Jonathan to take a deep inhale and get resolved to reach a blissful marijuana haze. Once he committed himself to getting it, he'd be cornered until they got there.

A winning strategy to make sure he couldn't escape.

“Alright, brochacho, what’re you doing right now?” Argyle asked, looking over at Jonathan as he let out a puff of smoke.

Jonathan looked back, confused, and handed over the joint,“ What do you mean?”

Argyle let him stew in the question for a second as he took his turn before giving it back and reiterating,“ With Nancy. What’re you doing with Nancy?”

“I-” he hesitated to take the blunt being handed back as he tried to deny it,” I’m not doing anything.”

“And that’s the problem,” Argyle proclaimed.

And he looked serious about what he was saying, which Argyle didn’t do often. So Jonathan tried to avoid his eyes. Rolled his own and looked away to ask,“ How could that be the problem?”

“We’ve been in your hometown for over 24 hours now. Right?”

“And?”

“And you haven’t talked to her. Not once, one-on-one.” he pointed out,” Which you kinda have to do to tell her you’re going to Lenora Community.”

Jonathan waved around his hand as he searched for a usable excuse,“ We’ve all been busy with the group, and always with the whole group, and there just hasn't been time to-”

Argyle cut through his fumbling with ease,“ You’re avoiding her, man.”

Jonathan took another draw and locked his eyes on the blade of grass tickling his ankle,“ That such a bad thing to do?”

“It’s only gonna get worse the longer it takes to talk to her. You need to tell her you didn’t apply to Emerson.”

He tried to explain,“ I- I was already floundering with how I was supposed to say it before. And that would’ve just been over the phone-”

“Over the phone wouldn'ta been right anyway,” Argyle threw in, not that Jonathan was really listening.

“-But how am I supposed to just spring this on her now? Right to her face, in the middle of this bullshit Upside Down stuff? And then - after it all blows up and I’ve hurt her - then we’re all just going to go back to California, and it’ll look like I’m running away from the train wreck I caused. Just leaving her behind because I’m not man enough to deal with the fact that…”

That he didn't feel like he was worth Nancy’s time to keep trying. Jonathan was all messed up right now, and he couldn’t seem to pull himself together, and he just couldn’t saddle Nancy with that job. He wouldn't. It wasn't fair to her. He cared about Nancy. Still loved her, in some way. But it wasn't… wasn't how it should be. And he was making it worse every day.

He took another hit, beating himself up in his head and seeming to forget his manners when it came to their puff, puff, pass now that Argyle was making him stop and think too much.

“Yeah, it’s gonna suck. But you can’t pretend like it’s not happening.” Argyle told him firmly,” She deserves to know that she’s headed to Boston alone, and you deserve to not look like you’re gonna blow chunks every time you’re in the same room because you're so guilty over it.”

Jonathan finally looked back over at him, lifting up his hand to admire the joint and ask,“ Can’t we just keep smoking Purple Palm Tree Delight? Eventually, make the problems actually blow away like the seed pods of a dandelion?”

Argyle took it from his fingers and assured him,“ It’s pretty incredible, dude, but not that powerful. It’ll make it feel like they have for a few hours, but you’re always gonna sober up, and the problem’s still gonna be there. Pushing it off will only make it suck even more.”

“I know you’re right. But-” Jonathan tried to argue.

But Argyle kept going,“ I already told you, back in Lenora, that you can’t keep lying about it. And now I know your crew of little dudes has a catchphrase about how ‘friends don’t lie’. Seems like you know what you gotta do. Even if you and Nance are hitting the rocks, you should be a good friend and be honest with her about it. Before she’s in the car driving up north thinking you’ve abandoned her outta nowhere.”

Jonathan rubbed his hands down his face and nodded into them,“ I know. I know, you’re right…”

“That it? Or you gonna try and squeeze another ‘but’ in there?” Argyle got the sentence out without breaking the moment by laughing, but just barely. He definitely smiled to himself at the phrase “squeeze another ‘butt’ in there”.

“That’s it,” he admitted,” You’re right. I need to break up with her. Sooner rather than later.”

Argyle clapped him on the shoulder and held back out the joint as his reward,“ Good boy, Jonny.”

“Can’t do it tonight though.”

He shrugged against him,“ Tonight’s practically over anyway. And you did good making the decision and saying it out loud. We can lose ourselves to the Purple Palm Tree Delight for now, but don’t let yourself get all swept up in things that you keep pushing it off again.”

“Yeah. I’ll do it.” Jonathan smiled a second before adding,” I know you’ll keep hounding me if I don’t anyway.”

“You know I will.” Argyle agreed with a self-satisfied smile and a ruffle to Jonathan’s hair.

They ended up staying outside together for a while. Enjoying the easy bliss that the bud draped over them. They were probably out there close to an hour before they decided it was too chilly and went back inside to watch the movie. The girls, however, were not doing something as simple as they were. Instead, Nancy and Robin collected themselves back in the dining room where Nancy unpacked her purse of the notebook, loose papers, and sticky notes into the table.

“So you said you were working on an article?” Robin asked.

Nancy nodded as she sorted through all the bits of her work so far,“ Yeah, the one I was starting before all of this happened. I figured, even if it’s not the same one I was planning to write, I could still put something together. Just, less about the murders as a mystery, and more about Eddie’s innocence of them. You know?”

Robin was following the idea well enough, but Nancy just poured a ton of disorganized chaos in front of her, so she wasn’t really sure where to look,“ Annnnd, this is what you have to work off of?”

“Well, it’s a rough idea right now.” she excused,” Over here, I have my interview notes from Wayne before we knew what was going on, and these pages have a couple of ideas on how to organize and frame the story, and - well, obviously we can’t talk about Upside Down stuff - so I’m still trying to decide how much of our story with the police I can use. Without making the whole thing just look like a story drummed up by a group of teenagers. Which is what it is, at the end of the day, so I keep trying to find a way to distinguish it. Other sources, or just something to make it seem more solid. More reliable.”

“And you want my help on it?” Robin clarified.

Suddenly it struck Nancy that maybe they weren’t friends enough for her to have asked Robin to do this for her,“ Is that weird? I’m sorry-”

“No, no. Not weird.” Robin assured her,” I just- I’m not on the school paper, so I don’t- I don’t know how helpful I’ll be with the whole journalism thing.”

Nancy went just a little rigid at the question. She didn’t meet Robin’s eyes for a bit. Instead, she fiddled with the papers in front of her as she explained,“ Freddie’s already gone. I saw Tonya on the missing person’s board at the high school. And Mary Pat was getting into her parent's car with half a dozen suitcases when I was leaving the hospital. I could try to track down Markus, Amelia, Lucy, Elijah, or Christina, I guess… But they don’t know the truth, so I’d be spending half the time brainstorming just trying to keep my mouth shut, all while having to convince them Eddie’s even a good guy in the first place-”

Then Nancy took a breath and looked at Robin again,“ But you already know those things. And I know you’re smart, so I’m sure you’d be a lot of help while we work on this and… I don’t know. I thought, if we put together something good enough and published it, we might be able to help Eddie get out from under everything. At least in the eyes of the people of Hawkins.”

And Nancy still looked like she was asking. Still unsure that Robin would be willing to help her out on this even though they’ve teamed up on both Dr. Hatch and putting together the original cover story. So Robin smiled and gave a joking,“ And we’re friends, so I’m obviously going to help you.”

Which pulled a grin onto Nancy’s face as she quipped right back,“ Yeah, I was kinda banking on that part too.”

“Alright,” Robin clapped her hands together and surveyed the papers before them,” So besides Wayne pointing the finger at the Creels, he’s also a character witness, like the boys are.”

“Yes, and I can use that, but I need more than just super biased quotes to pull from.”

“Well, the people who are most convinced that Eddie’s the devil are the ones fleeing the county. So we only need to put together enough of a story to assure the people who are still here and on the fence.” Robin hummed to herself,“ Um… what about teachers? Do we know any teachers that particularly liked Eddie? That’d be a little less personal and credible.”

“He was in band and drama. We can reach out to both directors and see if they’d be willing to say something good about him.”

“And what about Steve?” Robin suggested.

“Steve?” Nancy had no clue what Robin was doing bringing him into it.

“Well, the guy’s pretty famously not the kind of person who’d be tight in Eddie’s social circle, right?” she began to explain,” So a statement from him about what happened while we were all out there, it’d look better than one from the kids. Or from you being a Hellfire kid’s sister. Mr. Well-Known and Popular taking center stage to say even he’s sure Eddie didn’t do anything.”

“Yeah, something from Steve could help.” Nancy agreed.

“Is there anything else you might’ve not thought of yet?”

“Well,” Nancy considered,” Something that we didn’t have before, but have now… is Jim Hopper. If we re-introduce Hop back into the town soon and get a quote that he looked at the case and his gut says it’s not the Munson kid, he’d be a pretty official source.”

Robin seemed to brighten up seeing Nancy come up with something even though she seemed stuck a moment ago,“ See. Pretty damn well. Despite a few I-don’t-know’s.”

“We still don’t know if it’ll work.” Nancy tried to remind her.

But Robin’s belief in Nancy was pretty unshakeable,“ Well, by my count, that’s a few character statements, an inside peak from semi-heroic Steve Harrington, long lost chief Hopper’s opinion on the official report, and once the police department drops the charges… If I was reading something with all of that, I’d be pretty convinced. You’re a genius, Nancy, bask in it.”

“It happens to be a lot easier when I have you tackling the problem with me.” Nancy tried to share the praise.

“Oh, please,” Robin waved her off,” I’m just stoked I get to help Nancy Wheeler write the most important newspaper article to come out of this town.”

“Okay, a triple murder that preceded a natural disaster is probably the biggest thing to officially happen in Hawkins,” she had to admit,” But it’s still just the school paper. It’s not like I’m the editor at the Hawkins Post or anything.”

“Doesn’t matter. When Emerson sees you, Nancy Wheeler, reporting live with the first inside scoop, they are going to beg you to run your own class up there.”

She rolled her eyes at the other girl and teased,“ Oh really?”

“Absolutely. They’ll be almost as amazed as I am and throw a degree at you as soon as you step on campus.” Robin sat back while Nancy shook her head at her,“ What? You think I’m expecting too much of them?”

And Nancy couldn't stop the giggle rising in her chest, nor the automatic “You’re an idiot, Robin Buckley” that slipped out of her.

“You just said I was smart!” Robin tried to dispute.

“Maybe, but you can still be an idiot too.” Nancy continued to huff until her cheeks her red. She fanned them off when they’d settled down a bit and reached over,“ Here, take a pen and help me start drafting this thing. And if you can come up with a snappy, eye-catching title, that’d be helpful.”

Robin pulled out her extra gravely, spooky narrator voice and offered,“ Eddie Munson: More Man Than Monster!”

“Alliteration is not the only requirement.”

Next, she buzzed through,“ We Know You Think He’s A Serial Killer With Demon Powers, But He’s Just A Dorky Guy, And Jason’s The Crazy One!”

“I said snappy, Buckley! That's way too long! Come on, gimme something I can work with!”

“I’ll come up with something! Let me think on it a minute.”

They sat at the table working on it together all the way until Maria ran away from the von Trapps and the intermission started. At that point, all the kids ran off for bathroom breaks, and the girls took the hint it was about time to join them and wind down for the night. By then, Jonathan and Argyle had already returned, and Hopper had made himself comfy, looking like he was ready to doze off right there.

Steve stood up and took all the bowls of popcorn, empty except for the remaining un-popped kernels, into the kitchen to dump out and clean up. When he was focused on this task, Joyce must’ve wrapped up her shower and snuck up behind him. Somehow just suddenly coming up behind him with a kind of serious and gentle energy that said she had something to talk to him about.

“Hi, honey…” she already sounded like she had a specific thought on her mind she was getting to.

“Hi, are you both getting settled in fine?” he thought to ask while he scrubbed away popcorn butter with a soapy sponge.

“Oh, I wouldn’t be surprised if Hop just conks out on that couch, so yeah, I’d say so.” she gave a small laugh at the thought.

“That’s good.” was all he could come up with when he realized he didn’t have anything else to stall with until he finished the dishes.

“Um, Steve?”

“Yeah?”

She took a step closer to him,“ Is there any reason I had to wipe some dust off the bedside table?”

Shit.

He tried to excuse it,“ I should’ve cleaned that up before you guys got here-“

“Honey,” she interrupted him with a soft voice,” How long has it been since your parents have been home?”

Right. That… that makes sense to ask, given the evidence she found. Great. Great, great, great. How does he get out of this without just spewing a few obvious lies?

“It hasn’t been that long.” he tried anyway.

Joyce made a face like she wanted to wince,“ It’s dust… It takes a while to collect like that.”

It does, doesn’t it? Yeah. Of course, it does.

Steve tried to sound casual, like it wasn’t a big deal, and he was just tossing the numbers around to remember how long it’s been exactly,“ I guess… it’s been about three months.”

“Wait- you’ve been…” Joyce looked heartbroken for him,” Were they even home for Christmas?”

He shrugged and moved on to the last bowl, hoping he could finish it up quickly,“ It’s fine. You know, Robin came over every day that week, and we watched all of our favorites. We had a good time. Even ended Christmas Eve with It’s A Wonderful Life before I drove her home so-“

“Steve. I’m so sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I wish I’d known.” she insisted.

“Why?” he couldn’t help but ask. Because, really, why should she have? Joyce didn’t owe him a proper Christmas. He wasn’t her kid to take care of. And it wouldn't have done anyone any good anyway,” What would've been the point in making you sad in Lenora?”

She didn’t have an answer for him. At least not immediately. But after he put down the bowl on the drying rack and looked at her to try and pass back into the living room, then she spoke up,

“You know, we haven’t really talked it through as a family yet - the family’s changing, and there hasn't been a second to consider it - but I think we’re going to decide to move back over here. To Hawkins. Once everything resolves.”

“That’ll be nice. For all the kids to get to go to school together again, I mean-”

But Joyce continued,“ I bring it up because - I know it’s quite a ways away still - but I’d like to invite you to our house for Christmas this year. If your folks are gone again, and you don’t have family to spend it with.”

Oh.

She didn’t want to pressure him, so she added,“ You don’t have to if you’d be uncomfortable or anything. I just wanted you to know you’d be welcome at our dinner table and around our tree, even if it’s smaller than what you might be used to-”

“No. No, that sounds…” he struggled with how to describe exactly how warm and fuzzy the invitation made his chest feel, but he settled on,” That sounds really nice. I, uh, really appreciate the thought, Joyce. I don’t know what’ll happen in nine more months, but-”

“No, of course, it’s still really far away-”

“But I’d like to. Join your household for Christmas.” he decided anyway.

A soft smile came to her face,“ Then, I hope I’ll get to see you if your parents aren’t able to-”

“Would it be okay if I showed up anyway… even if they were in town?” he was a little shy to ask, but honestly, even if his mom and dad were there, he’d rather go somewhere where it'd actually feel like Christmas.

“Of course, sweetheart.” she assured him, reaching up to set a comforting hand on his shoulder,” Any reason at all, you’re always more than welcome to come by. When we aren’t already borrowing your home, that is.”

“Okay.” he nodded,” Thank you, Joyce. I-”

“Steve!” Dustin yelled from the living room,” Are you trying to miss the Baroness’s horrible attempt at parenting or something?!”

Joyce smiled wider, in that warm way that moms always seemed to in movies, and told him,“ We should probably head in to join them.”

“Yeah. Probably.” he agreed.

They ended up all together in the living room as the last hour and a half of the movie played through. By the end of it, the kids had fallen asleep, including El, who was cuddled up on top of her snoring dad. Joyce went back up to the master bedroom, and Murray went for the guest room he was set up in. Nancy headed for the other while Robin welcomed herself to Steve’s room since he was passed out in the pile.

Maybe an hour or so after the movie finished though, he blinked his eyes back open to realize he’d fallen asleep in the first place. Erica ended up using his lap as a pillow, so it took him a few minutes of very slow and careful movements to get out from under her head before he was able to break for the stairs and try to get some sleep in an actual bed. Instead of a car seat and sofa cushion, of course.

Lo and behold, he opens his door to see Robin all spread out like a starfish under his covers. He couldn’t help but roll his eyes as he crossed the room and had to shove over her limbs to try and squish himself into bed.

“Hey. Doofus. It’s rude to wake a sleeping lady,” she mumbled half-asleep to him, most of it went right into the pillow.

“It’s rude to steal a guy’s bed and spill all his secrets.” he fired back.

“You fell asleep on the couch, I didn’t want a sore back,” she rolled over a bit so she was speaking more clearly.

“I had a crazy morning…” he groaned.

With that, Robin seemed to wake up just a bit,” What do you mean 'crazy morning'? Explain.”

Steve felt the familiar urge to clam up, the warning to not be vulnerable, but he always knew he could ignore it when it was Robin he was with,“ My dad called. Got an earful. Kinda went off on some junk cars and shit after.”

She turned over enough to look at him,“ You okay?”

“Yeah.”

“You want to-?”

“Nah. I’m tired, Rob. Just wanna go to sleep.” he looked back at his ceiling and mumbled,” But we’ll find some time to run off and talk about it later. That and what we're doing about Vickie.”

"Dingus," she shoved him before snuggling herself in a little closer,“ Sorry I told so many of your secrets today.”

“It’s fine.” he sighed and looked back at her,” You spilled a few of your own too, so I guess it’s sorta even.”

She grinned at him,“ A few.”

“But not all of them.”

She closed her eyes and hummed for a moment before nodding along,“ Nope. Not all of them. I’m a girl who likes to keep an air of mystery about her, you know.”

“That why didn’t even bring up the other reason why you like ‘Dancing Queen’ so much?” he asked.

There was a pause after the question before Robin spoke in a voice rich with the sound of her smile,“ I haven't the faintest clue as to what you're referring to.”

“You’re telling me it’s not even a little bit because we spent your seventeenth birthday together?” he dared her to deny it.

Her voice hiked a pitch higher as she feigned confusion,“ We did?”

“Oh, yeah,” he squished in closer behind her and reminisced,” Little over two weeks after Starcourt burned down when you were still so freaked out about joining the end of the world club that you didn’t even want to celebrate? You were all ‘what’s the point of anything- nothing is safe- how do I live life as a normal person anymore- I can’t handle this-’ all the time. So I convinced you to come with me, and I snuck you into a club over an hour away the night before. You were stammering the whole ride over that you weren’t even eighteen yet - not even seventeen yet, technically - so there was no way they’d let you in. But I managed it anyway. And I even got the DJ to play your favorite song for you, right at midnight. So you got to be the Dancing Queen the second you became seventeen. What? That didn’t have anything to do with that at all?”

“That happened?” she tried again.

“You’re so stupid.” he playfully shoved her messy head of hair on his pillow,” You didn’t even let me sneak you a drink, so I know you remember it.”

“Maybe I do. Sue me for trying to keep a few of our secrets just our own.”

“Never.” he hummed as he shimmied to try and get comfortable. Ended up laying his arm over Robin’s waist when a thought occurred to him,“ You know this is gonna cause so many rumors, right?”

She gave a melodramatic gasp and cried,” Steve and Robin! Sharing a bed! What ever might they do?!”

He played along with her theatrics,“ It couldn’t be… they’ll… fall asleep!” and then he squeezed his arm around her tighter for effect.

“You’re such a dork,” she told him.

“No, I’m not. You’re all the dorks. Lucas, Max, and I are the cool ones.”

“Sure, sure. You keep telling yourself that.” she reached over her shoulder to pat his head.

“It’s the truth-”

Then she smeared her hand down his face,“ Sssshhhhhhhhh, Stephen, my sweet summer child, shut up and let me sleep.”

“I’m older, and I was born in winter-” he tried to correct her, but she was smooshing his lips around before he could finish.

“Ssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhh”

He had to shake his face to get her to back off,“ At least scoot over, Rob. You’re hogging all the bed space.”

“Don’t be afraid of some cuddles.”

“I’m not, but we’re already spooning, and my ass is hanging off the mattress. Now scoot.”

It took a few more minutes for them to get themselves situated, but once they did, Steve and Robin both felt safer than they had all week.

They fell asleep like that. Robin all wrapped up in Steve’s arms. They both ran warm though, so they’d most likely end up kicking each other away as the night went on, but that was just par for the course with them. It’s still a little crazy to him that he has someone he cares about enough to hold, and it’s not some romantic thing. All of the touch he got to have in the past has come from romance. But when it’s the two of them, it didn’t have to be about that. He can just love someone without all the other stuff.

It was nice. Simple. Easy.

Steve Harrington seems to be learning a lot about non-romantic love those days. The way he was with the kids, his platonic bond with Robin, all these Hawkins moms showing him what familial ties to their kids can look like, even extending some of it to him… He did wish he could get a handle on the romantic kind too, seeing as he felt like he was completely losing interest in it no matter who he was with. But at the end of the day, the non-romantic stuff was pretty nice too.

Those were the kind of thoughts that carried him off to sleep. Robin’s were of a similar vein. Appreciating her best friend’s snarky remarks and comfortable arms as she drifted off. But her mind circled who else she’d like to share a nap with someday. She had thoughts of Vickie, of course. Funny thing is, Vickie wasn’t the only one she considered…

But that was a secret she wouldn’t dare speak of.

The rest of the night was nice. Uneventful. No monsters or phone calls. And when they woke up in the morning, just as was expected, they were both nearly pushed off of the bed by the other in a tangle of limbs and sheets. What they hadn’t expected was the smell of cooking wafting up from the kitchen.

Because Hopper took it upon himself to make breakfast.

God, he was such a dad. A good dad. For a house of way too many kids with shitty dads, he was a good dad.

Robin and Steve shoved against each other as they woke up and muddled their way downstairs, and it didn’t take long for everyone to have gathered to eat. Jim wasn’t very thoughtful about being quiet. The sound of pans on the stovetop wasn't gentle, it was time for everyone to wake up already anyhow. Seeing everyone with bed heads and sleepy eyes around the table was pretty fun. They all ate the array of bacon, sausage, pancakes, waffles, and eggs as Jim whipped them up.

Wasn’t too much later that there was some knocking on Steve’s front door. The five parents were each equipped with a mug of coffee and welcomed into the living room to discuss… everything. Again. It went just about the same as it had with the moms the night before. But this time, Nancy was sure to get all their favorite songs, too.

Karen has apparently always loved Olivia Newton-John and had a particular attachment to ‘I Think I’ll Say Goodbye’. Claudia got stuck between something by The Pointer Sisters or Billy Joel. It was Dustin who said that, because she was borderline in love with Billy, something of his was the safer bet. So she decided on 'Just the Way You Are'. Susan could only think of Cyndi Lauper’s ‘Time After Time’ because of how much Max played it after the Snow Ball. Sue always used Diana Ross songs for her kids' lullabies, ‘Reach Out I’ll Be There’ was her favorite. And Charles always insisted that the song they played for the first dance at their wedding was the best in the world, Stevie Wonder’s ‘My Girl’.

When everyone was settled on the situation most of the kids said they’d head home with their own parents in a bit, except for Lucas who went ahead and rode to the hospital with Steve before they all split off. The two wanted to check on the patients, of course. Susan had to work, but they promised her they’d call if anything happened or after she got off to tell her how Max looked. The boys walked fast past the cameras and got checked in to visit with Max and Eddie before they broke off into the opposite rooms with a plan to check in around lunchtime and eat together if there wasn’t any change in either’s condition.

So Lucas went into Max’s, and Steve turned into Eddie’s room and greeted him as he sat down.

“Sorry, I’m late today. Planned to show up on time, at eight, but those kids’ parents are so talkative. Honestly, you’re lucky you’re missing out on all the discussion that’s happened at my place in the last twelve hours. Turns out every parent in the midwest wants to be on the apocalypse squad. Anyway, sorry I was late. I’m here now for whatever’s on tv today.”

Steve was trying to relax and sit still. He honestly was. But it sucked. Everything sucked, and there was nothing good to watch, so he stood up practically every ten minutes to flip back through the channels on the hospital cable. He sort of wished he was the kind of guy who liked reading. Lucas seemed to enjoy reading that book to Max. They talked about it on the drive over. Lucas was apparently doing different voices for each character and everything. Making a show of it for her. It was sweet.

Steve couldn’t do something like that.

On what was probably his tenth time switching around the channels, he heard something. Something like the sound of fabric moving around a little. And it came from behind him. Where Eddie was.

He turned around, but Eddie wasn’t making any noise. Didn't look like he was stirring. But his face might’ve looked a little different. Like his expression had shifted, just a little bit.

Steve abandoned the unentertaining tv set, carefully sitting back down in the bedside chair,” Eddie?”

And there it was. A scrunch of Eddie’s nose and a sound that made the whole world seem brighter.

“Mmmm…”

That’s all it was. A low, grumbling hum. But it meant he was back. Eddie was back, and they didn’t lose him. Steve didn’t fail in getting him back soon enough.

Steve leaned forward,“ Hey, hey, you coming to?”

Eddie didn’t even open his eyes as he groaned,“ Was I dreaming, or were you kissing on me last night, Harrington?”

The comment pulled what Steve would call a stupid smile across his face, but he smiled all the same. He can’t be too messed up if he’s cracking jokes, right? He rolled his eyes at the other and said, in a purposely somewhat stuck-up tone,“ It’s called performing CPR, Munson, and it was not last night, for the record. But a nurse can tell you all about that, so I’ll go get-”

Eddie turned his head over and opened his eyes to look at Steve, quickly interrupting him with,“ Well, I can’t have been out too long. I see you’re still working on those whiskers, same as I last saw ‘em.”

He’d tried to motion towards Steve’s face, only to find he didn’t get very far with the cuffs. Not what a guy likes to wake up to. At least not in this condition.

“God forbid anyone tries anything around here.” Steve huffed, but sat up to pour some water from the plastic pitcher into the cup with the straw and wordlessly held it up for Eddie to take a sip,” It’s been a couple of days. Four days exactly. Four days since you tried to pull that stupid hero stunt.”

After a gulp to wet his whistle, Eddie let go of the straw and shook his head,“ Stupid hero stunt? Nah, that doesn’t sound like me. I thought we agreed on that.”

“Yeah, I thought we did. I said you and Dustin weren’t allowed to do hero shit, and then look at the mess I find not even an hour later.” Steve sat back and put down the cup.

“Oh, this? This wasn’t hero shit.” Eddie said.

Steve’s eyebrow quirked up,“ Really? It wasn't?”

“It absolutely was not. Because - I’ll remind you - you said, and I quote, ‘Don’t be cute or play hero.' And I agreed not to be a hero. So all this…?”

Steve let a small laugh slip out before he figured,“ This was you being cute, you mean?”

Eddie thought for a second that he’d like to pull a lock of hair in front of his face to play coy. Maybe rattle off some kind of teasing response like “You tell me” or “Did it work?” But the chains pinning his hands to the bedrail insisted he went for a different tactic.

So, instead, he settled for a wolfish grin and a more confident kind of remark,“ Hell yeah, this was me being cute, man.”

Steve shook his head in a way that vaguely reminded Eddie of when Wayne caught him trying to quietly strum his guitar past 3 am back in middle school. Wayne gently scorned him, told him it was a school night and the boy needed to get some sleep. Then he took the instrument and put it on top of the cabinets in the kitchen so he couldn’t reach it. But he hadn’t been mad. It was a kind of amused, faux-disappointment.

Anyway, it’s what Steve looked like as he said,“ It was still stupid. You tried to leave a little early there, you know.”

Eddie shrugged and shifted a little in the bed,“ Wasn’t really trying to. Just thought the light at the end of the tunnel looked pretty nice ‘n all.”

“Yeah, well maybe ignore it a little longer next time. I had kids sobbing all around me because you decided to stop breathing on the way here.”

“Sorry ‘bout that. You think they’ll forgive me for it?” he looked over at Steve with pleading eyes.

“They will when they see you talking again.” Steve started to stand up,” So, I should go get a nur-”

But then Eddie interrupted him again, and pretty sharply too,“ Where are those gremlins at anyway? Can’t believe Steve Harrington is the one bothering to come by this sick guy’s bed.”

Steve got quiet and relaxed back down in the chair.

“Max got hurt real bad, she’s in another room. Hasn’t woken up yet. The kids are with their families trying to figure stuff out. Plan the next move. Hawkins was hit with a lot, so it’s a bit of a shit show all over town. And we’re the crack team here to clean it up.”

“Jesus, what happened?”

“You don’t remember?” he asked,” When the world started shaking, and everything went red while the ground split open?”

“Okay, that rings a bell. But, to be fair, I was bleeding out, man. Shit’s still a little bit fuzzy.” Eddie explained.

Steve nodded knowingly and said,“ Which is why I keep trying to tell you that I should go get a nurse-”

“Do you have to?” Eddie cut in suddenly. And there was something behind the way he said it. Steve couldn’t exactly pin it down, but he didn’t just seem inconvenienced or disinterested.

“They kinda need to look you over. Make sure there isn’t anything else wrong with you, besides the loose screws.”

Eddie turned away a little, and got quieter,“ The second you tell them I’m up… it’s going to be a whole thing, isn’t it?”

And Steve didn’t have an answer.

“It’s going to get crazy, and everything’s going to happen so fast, and it’s… gonna be scary, man...”

That’s what it was. Eddie looked scared. Steve could see it now. It wasn’t like when Eddie was ranting and raving when he’d been freaked out before. This Eddie looked small.

“And once it starts, it’s not going to stop, so just - I don’t know - keep wasting my time and tell me what’s going on before they lock me in a cell and throw away the key,” Eddie asked him.

Steve tried to assure him,“ They aren’t going to-”

Eddie locked his eyes with Steve again,“ Please? Let me have just a little bit longer?”

And Steve just couldn’t say no. Seemed to feel that way a lot those days. Maybe he spends too much time with people whose lives suck so bad he just wants to give them whatever they want.

“A few more minutes. But then an actual, medical professional needs to make sure you won’t croak on us.”

“Deal.”

Steve leaned back in the chair and started,“ Well, the Upside Down was trying to get into this side. In Hawkins, the ground split open and both sides were connected for a bit. The gate cut this huge “X” across the city which was recorded as a huge earthquake. Like record-breaking magnitude getting reported on every news station kind of huge. I mean- City Hall’s gone, the General Hospital took damage, Library is about half rubble right now. Some of the trailers were completely destroyed, including half of yours, and a line was cut through some of the suburbs, not sure how many of those houses came apart, a few of the businesses downtown were demolished, and the others are all closed down anyway… And today’s Monday, by the way, but they’ve got the high school set up as the relief center right now, so there are no classes you’re missing or anything. Like I said, shit show. Everywhere.”

“Sounds like there are a dozen other things you could be doing if you wanted to then. Like resting up yourself. So what’re you doing here? Didn’t think my display, as incredibly cute as it was, woulda been enough to turn your head.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, it’s just a lot quieter here than at my place.” Steve found himself brushing off the fact that he, in fact, had been pretty worried about Eddie the entire time.

“What does that mean?”

Moving right along, he scratched the back of his neck and admitted,“ Uh, it’s a little packed back there right now.”

“Why would your family come to Hawkins now for a reunion?” Eddie assumed.

“Oh, no. Not my family. My folks are over in Washington right now.” And after he said it, he realized he’d just set himself up to explain a little bit more about his family life than he had originally planned to tell someone he just met officially less than two weeks before.

“Washington?” Eddie asked.

And yup, they were going to have this conversation it seemed. Hopefully, Steve can make him lose interest quickly enough,“ Work. Work for my dad, at least. Mom’s just with him to make sure he stays in line.”

And Eddie just looked at him all confused.

“Stays faithful,” Steve hinted.

“Oh. So who is in your house right now?”

“Some of the Byers. Jonathan, Will, and El. And a new guy, Argyle. They all showed up a few days ago. And then we got a shipment of homeless adults in last night too. Joyce and Hop and Murray - speaking of it, turns out Hop is way less dead than we thought. And all the kids crashed there, too. Our party loves sleepovers, it seems…” Steve was lovingly shaking his head when he noticed Eddie’s wide eyes on him,“ What? Those people help save the world all the time. I wasn’t going to just let them sleep on those stiff cots in the high school. It’s a four-bedroom house, might as well put them all to use.”

“And you’re sure the Harrington’s are fine with the fact that their son is passing out their keys like candy on Halloween?” Eddie asked doubtfully.

Steve thought to himself for a moment and admitted a truth he had been trying not to think too much about over the last few weeks,“ I don’t think they’re really planning to come back to Hawkins after all this.”

“Really? Just a couple days and you’re already so sure they’re done with this place...”

“Well, it’s been…” he hummed to himself, putting on an act like he had to actually think about it. Like his mind doesn’t tally every morning he wakes up and his mom and dad are still gone. Like he doesn’t already know he hasn’t seen them for over,” Three months? Yeah, I guess that sounds about right.”

He’d tried to make it seem like some casual thing, hoped he did a better job than he had in front of Joyce the night before, but Eddie didn’t take it as something small,” Three months?”

“Yeah, my dad’s a busy guy, and I’m not a baby anymore. Once I graduated they wasted decidedly less time in Indiana.”

“The town their kid lives in has a serial killer, faces the biggest earthquake the Midwest probably has ever seen, and they don’t come home to check in?” Eddie pushed. While his parents were out of the picture, he couldn’t even imagine Wayne letting him go even a week without seeing him, even if he’d graduated.

“You give Mr. and Mrs. Harrington too much credit.”

“Damn. So you’re fucked up just like the rest of us, huh?”

“The stars; they’re just like you and me.” he ended the line with a wink.

“Jesus. And, not to be self-centered and all about me or anything, but… how is the town with the whole…?”

“The whole… suspecting you of serial murder thing?” Steve finished for him.

“Yeah, that’s the one. How are they doing with that?”

“Well, most people probably still think you did it. But, uh, we’re working on it. Well, Nance and Robin are leading the thing mostly. It’s looking up, believe it or not. They have some strategy, and the cops seemed like they were leaning our way after we gave our statements. They’ll need to take yours, too. But I think we’ll get out of this.” he explained,” But if some guys with a camera crew try to talk to you, call a nurse and get them kicked out. They’ve been crowding the front doors and trying to get into your hospital room for the last few days, apparently.”

“Camera crew?” he wondered, interest piquing.

“A news team from Indianapolis has been trying to do a feature on the ‘Satanic killings that opened a portal to hell in the super cursed small-town’. And a few other fringe groups are looking to stake their big break on your sudden fame too.”

“So…” Eddie considered,” You’re saying this is my chance to shoot to stardom? Quick, I need you to bring my sweetheart, an amp, and a mic. Help me land my career in the big leagues, Harrington.”

Steve stood up and placed a hand on Eddie’s cuffed wrist with a tight smile,“ I absolutely will not.”

Eddie scoffed and tossed his head over at the betrayal.

He let go and started heading for the door as he continued,“ I will, however, make sure a nurse comes in to look you over. I’ll also radio the kids and let them know you’re up. You’re in for a storm of love, you know? Gonna get bruises from all the hugs, I’m telling you.”

“Yeah, yeah…” Eddie called to him as he went into the hall.

And maybe Steve did originally intend to do the responsible thing and get a nurse immediately. But then he thought about Lucas. Someone who was right there already and deserved to see Eddie as soon as possible. So he just walked into the other room instead.

“Hey Lucas, you wanna take a break?” he offered, hanging off the door frame for a second as he stepped inside.

“I don’t need a break from Max. And we said noon, it’s not even eleven o’clock yet.”

“You might not need it,” Steve agreed,” But there’s something across the hall you might want to see.”

Steve thought to himself that part of the reason he wanted Lucas to see Eddie, wasn’t even for Eddie’s sake. It was for Lucas’s. Because he needed to see someone come out of a coma before he convinced himself that Max never would. Steve needed to foster a little bit of hope wherever he could with these kids.

“What?” Lucas questioned.

And instead of dancing around the good news any longer, Steve let the smile break across his face as he told him,“ Eddie’s awake.”

And Lucas all but shot up out of his chair,“ He is?”

“Yeah, he is. I’ll radio everyone else and let ‘em know, but since you’re already here, you can stop by if you want. As long as you call a nurse over after you two have a minute to catch up.” Steve made him agree to do it.

“Yeah, yeah,” Lucas took a few steps toward him until he froze and looked back at Max,” Will you…?”

“Yeah, I’ll keep an eye on Mayfield.” Steve closed the distance between them and clapped Lucas on the shoulder,” Go ahead and try talking to someone who’ll answer for a bit.”

And so they switched places.

Steve sat down in the chair Lucas had been in and picked up the book he set on Max’s sheets. He thought about maybe picking up where the kid left off, but set it back down and decided that wasn’t his thing. His thing seemed to be waxing on emotionally to sleeping people. So he crossed his legs and set himself to try and convince Max to pull through. Even though they figured she wouldn’t until Vecna was dealt with, he still wanted to try a little pep talk.

“Come on, Maxie. You’re the last one now. Can’t believe you let Munson beat you. Would’ve bet good money you were a way faster little punk than he was. So… hurry up, alright. I’ve been told you’re supposed to go to a movie on Friday. Might be patching things up with a certain ex-boyfriend you shoulda never ended things with. I don’t know what Friday you’ll be aiming for at this point. But there’s some cool stuff out right now, if you wait too long there might only be boring stuff screening. And we can’t let you and Lucas get back together with a boring movie. I really would like to see you two happy together, you know? So you need a good one. Make this old man proud and snag him up before some other girl tries to steal him. But you gotta wake up to do that… so, I don’t know, sucker punch Vecna or something and break out of this already. I think you can take him down. Way tougher than anyone else I know. Don't keep me waiting. We need you back.”

#I'M SORRY Y'ALL #I FORGOT TO POST THE UPDATE ON TUMBLR #THIS WAS ON AO3 WEEKS AGO #THAT'S MY BAD!!!#Anyway-#WE GOT THE BOY BACK! IT ONLY TOOK 90K BUT HE'S HERE FOR REAL NOW!!!#And he's flirting right out the gate #Next chapter is going to be all about the reunions so there will be lots of F E E L I N G S #This chap was the longest one so far and a BEAST to tackle. But by the end we got a lil Jargyle Ronance and Steddie all fit in #And Erica and Murray are mortal enemies my beloveds #And Robin and El are forging the unbreakable bond of being autistic girls together #And I'm roping these parents in to everything (and there may be a few hints for down the road stuff in their songs)#AND I'M BRINGING OUR RUSSIANS OVER! I HAVEN'T FOUND THEM IN A SINGLE FIC AND I'M TIRED OF IT!#And there are even a few MORE people I'm planning to get in by the final showdown - this will be Avengers Endgame kind of massive team up #And I also have big plans to write a Modern The Sound of Music Steddie AU after this one now bc I rewatched it for the few refs I threw in #I want to get this one most of the way finished before i start it though so i don't get side tracked. But it's coming.#Steve Harrington #Eddie Munson #Steddie #Steveddie #Steve x Eddie #Nancy Wheeler #Robin Buckney #Ronance #Robin x Nancy #The Fruity Four #Stranger Things #Stranger Things 4 #Stranger Things 4 spoilers #Stranger Things 4 volume 2 spoilers

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