#but theres like a SLEW of trigger warnings

[sp0o0kylights]

Mimic Steve!!! at number Seven I see,,, was that, perchance, on purpose? :D

AYYYY you caught that! I'm so glad someone did lol.

I had to go hunt down what I already posted about the Mimic Steve AU lmao

It's honestly easier to read the first part here , but basically, it's an AU that centers around how the Steve we know isn't actually Steve Harrington; he's a replacement that his parents bought and paid Brenner/The Lab for.

What he actually is, is a being similar to humans with mimic-like abilities from another dimension. They kidnapped him at a young age and then later tortured him into being Steve when the real one passed away from cancer as a child.

There's a vast number of problems happening when the story starts but the biggest is that Robin and Nancy have accidentally discovered that the real Steve Harrington is dead and the house Steve lives in doesn't actually belong to the Harrington's.

In a panic-ridden attempt to prevent them from discovering he's a monster from an alternate dimension whose stuck, Steve taps Eddie for help on grounds that he has romantic feelings for Eddie and already thinks he doesn't deserve to be loved in return. I he loses Eddie as a friend over this then well-- chances were that was gonna happen anyways because he sucks at hiding that he's in love--but he can't lose Robin.

In his head, that means Robin can't learn that he's not human

Snippet:

“Sweetheart, you are Steve.”

He frantically shook his head. “No, I’m not. I’m a copy of Steve, one they forced so hard that it--it overwrote the real me. I don’t know who I actually am, Eddie.” 

Besides a fucking monster, from somewhere else. 

(At his lowest, in the dark of the house in the middle of the night, Steve turned himself back into his base form. 

The thing he was--or at least thought he was--before he’d been kidnapped. 

Stared at himself in the mirror and felt only terror, because he didn’t recognize himself. )

Eddie stepped up, gently took one of Steve’s hands. 

Threaded their fingers together. 

“Okay.” He said, eyes searching Steve’s own. “What can I do to help you find yourself?” 

Steve stared back. 

“I haven’t--I never…” He trailed off faintly, all thoughts of who he had been and who he was impersonating vanishing in the face of his reality. 

That Steve’s life had been so preoccupied with keeping himself safe by living within a lie, he never actually spent any time trying to figure out who he was. 

Eddie seemed to realize this, and nodded once as if Steve’s expression was an answer in and of itself. “It’s okay. I mean it. It’s a big thing, and it’ll take you some time, but I’ll be there with you if you want me to be.” 

Steve sniffed.

“Even if I turn into a car again?” 

Eddie laughed softly. ‘Yeah Sunlight. Even if you scare the shit out of me by turning into a car again.” 

“They’re emergency purposes only.” Steve said--and he meant it. 

(The fear of getting stuck as something non-human had terrified him so badly the car incident had left him puking up his guts for two days after, nerves shot.) 

“Now about changing into that courthouse clerk…”