૮꒰ ˶• ༝ •˶꒱ა ♡

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The anger boiled up inside your chest as you stormed your way across the lobby. Hundreds of different Spider-Man variants were scattered across the area, some more injured than the others. It sickened you sometimes. How he had so many people under his grasp and just decided to throw some of them at the walls sometimes, not caring how hard they hit the floor because they were all just ammo to him. How despite his denials of it, that’s probably what your role was to him as well. Nothing more than a bullet in his massive machine gun. You normally tried not to think about it, how his determination towards his goal sometimes meant lack of care for others. But this time he had just gone too far. You always had a soft spot for Miles, watching closely on him whenever Miguel would let you go though scanners of all the different variants. You admired his struggle, but eventual success to taking up the previous Peter’s mantle, and always hated how Miguel talked about him. You knew there was no way Miles could’ve asked for any of this. For the pressures and struggles of being a Spider-Man, for everything causing such a strained relationship with his parents, for the death of his uncle, and for what will be the eventual death of his father. You definitely didn’t.

Ok lets do this one last time. Eh, whatever, there’s probably gonna be 50 other introductions after this one so it doesn’t really matter.

Being Earth-837’s Spider-Man has never been easy. Especially since you were bit when you were only 13 (another reason you sympathized with Miles and Gwen). Your life had followed the order of canon events to a perfect T, your older brother killed in a fight with a robber only two months after you were bit. You tried to overcome the burden of your powers by trying to live as normal of a teenage life as possible, but it was mostly in vain, having to give up multiple friendships and relationships in fear of those you love getting hurt. This was only elevated when your boyfriend Peter was murdered in the crossfire of an encounter with Doc Ock. You didn’t understand. You couldn’t. What you had done to deserve all of this. All you did was just be in the wrong place at the wrong time. You wonder sometimes what would happen if someone was in the same place you were when you got bit. If someone else went to the closed down area of that museum and ran into that spider. That stupid spider that ruined your life. Those thoughts slowly started to disappear for a bit. For a few years things were easy. Things seemed like they were finally going in your favor.

You were 25 when it happened. The last canon event. Ever since you were a little girl you hated your mother’s job. Losing nights of sleep over if she would come home or not. She always did though. She was good at her job. Too good though. Good enough to get promoted to police captain, which for who you were, was basically sealing her fate. She saved so many people that day. You were too busy fighting Venom to notice how much collateral damage you were causing in the process. Your mother’s job was to evacuate all the citizens away from the fight. She died shielding a child from incoming debris. A noble way to go. But god was it gruesome. You found her after the fight was over, two metal poles impaling her. One through her stomach and one straight through her face, pools of blood growing bigger below her as she was left there, all the paramedics busy trying to save the heavily injured. You froze when you finally recognized her, unable to at first due to how mutilated her face was from the pole. Suddenly, you were transported back to being a six year old, falling asleep outside the door to your mother’s bedroom so you would know exactly when she would come home. Purposefully falling asleep in her arms so that she couldn’t go anywhere. When you used the key she had given you to get into her apartment that night, and you slept in her room, desperate to intake anything left of her before she was fully gone. You doused yourself in her perfume so it still felt like she was standing right behind you. You had always loved her smell. The smell of vanilla, curl product, and fancy perfume. They were attached to memories you had of her. Trying on her heels when you were a kid to try and be fancy like her. Smelling her hair in the morning before school to comfort you before she left for work. Despite all of this bringing you comfort, all it really did was cause further denial in your heart. That one day you were gonna hear the keys clacking in the keyhole to your apartment one more time. That’s all you really wanted. You would give everything up in a heartbeat just to hear her police scanner go off one last time. But it wasn’t going to. And it was your fault. Deep down you knew it was. You should’ve done a better job controlling the debris. You had always been a messy fighter, but you didn’t know it was going to mean anything until it was too late. 

How you got up to the top of that building is still a blur to you to this day. But next thing you know, you were looking at the New York City skyline from the very top of the Empire State Building. And at the very edge too. You heard some sounds behind you, but you just decided it was the wind howling from how high up you were. You were just so tired. Everything and everyone you loved was cursed all because of you. And with your mother as the most recent victim, you decided you finally had enough. You took a deep breath, eyes overflowed with water, as you set your foot forward. Your plummet was interrupted by a sudden contact you felt to your forearm. Shock filled your body as you turned around to look at what had stopped your attempt. The blue hand was massive, nearly wrapping back around onto itself as it held onto you for dear life. You finally looked up at face that the hand belonged to. The mask that covered the massive figure was a strange one. Blue with strange red silhouettes for the eyes. It kind of reminded you of…your own costume? That couldn’t be though there was no way. This must be the afterlife or something. You already jumped and that's why you didn’t remember your way up to the top. This was some kind of creature trying to stop you from jumping down to hell below. His breaths were heavy and loud, almost like he was desperate to stop you. This convinced you that this was real, which caused you to try to escape from his grip. He was stronger than you, and was putting up a huge fight. You were slick though. Once you were out of his hand, you closed your eyes and quickly made your jump. Everything flashed before your eyes. Your brother, Peter, your mom. You were hoping to see them soon. This was very quickly interrupted again when you suddenly stopped falling. Something had attached itself to your stomach. You opened your eyes. A web? This web was much different than yours though. It was glowing a bright, neon orange. The man was holding onto the end of it tightly with both hands. His mask then disappeared to show his face. His was long, matching how big the rest of his body was, defined cheek bones sticking out. Brown wavy hair slicked back with a few loose strands flying out in the wind. The look of desperation on his face stook out most of all. Why did he care so much? He didn’t know you, and you definitely didn’t know him. “Let me pull you up. Please,” he said to you between shaky pants. You stared at him for a bit before nodding. He slowly pulled you up with the string of his web, each move more careful than the last. As soon as your feet were planted safely back on the roof of the building, he wrapped you up in his massive arms. You appreciated the gesture, but you didn’t return it, still very confused about why he was so concerned. He was so big around your body though, you couldn’t help but feel a little comforted, feeling his still shaky breaths against the hairs of your neck. Soon after, he clicked on some buttons on his neon orange watch and led you into a portal.

The rest is history. You’re grateful he found you that day. It allowed you to meet so many people, Peter B., Jess, Gwen, Hobie, Ben, Pavitr, Margo. They all related to you and you felt like you could share things with them that you couldn’t do with anyone else. You had grown especially close to Peter and Jess, both of them having been in the game for a long time, just like you. They both knew how you felt, having lost so much and growing so tired after so many years. Peter even named you as Mayday’s godmother when she was born, a gesture that caused you to nearly kill him with your hug. Miguel though was different. He wasn’t nearly as social as the rest of your friends, but you found yourself having much more intimate moments with him (in more ways then one). You eventually found out why Miguel was so concerned for you the day you met. He had taken interest in your abilities early into looking for variants for his little “project”, but refrained from roping you into something so dangerous while you were still in your teens. Once you were old enough though, he started paying more and more attention, hoping to catch you in a fight and recruit you then. But he was always pulled away with more important duties to attend to. That was until he witnessed your canon event. He had seen it happen so many times before through his scanners. It was going to happen. It had to in order for your universe to not collapse in on itself. But for some reason, yours hurt more than the rest to him. Especially how you coped with it. Seeing you wrap yourself up in her blankets and clothes broke his heart. He knew where this would lead to. That’s why he was there that day. To save you. He had to, or he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself. You got your own watch immediately, along with your own room in the Spider Society headquarters. He stayed close with you for the first month of you being a member of the team. When he wasn’t out on missions, he was with you. You didn’t really know what to label you two as, but whatever was going on, you liked it. And he did too.

That is until Miles came into the picture. Once Miles was bit, all hell broke loose for Miguel. He was always in some alternate dimension catching some Spider-Man villain who got out and rangled them back over here, falling back over to you more beat up and bruised than the last time. You couldn’t imagine how much stress he was under, the fate of the entire multiverse up to him. You had some ways of helping him relieve his stress, but you wish you could convince him that he wasn’t alone in this. But nothing ever got through to him. He had become distant, aloof even. You tried bringing it up to Jess every so often, but she would just brush it off. “That’s how he’s always been.” Not to you he hasn’t. This week has been hell though. With Spot making it over to Miles, Miguel had been going into rages all week. You had put up with it for now, but that was all about to stop. Watching how harsh he was being on Miles, throwing so many Spider-Men at an innocent boy, risking all of their lives in the process. Disregarding everything Gwen and Peter were feeling and then throwing Gwen back into her broken world with nothing. He had gone too far. No one else was going to stand up to him about it, so you knew it had to be you. Maybe he would listen, maybe he wouldn’t. It didn’t really matter. He just needed to hear it.

“It’s not worth it you know.” The voice snapped you out of your thoughts, stopping you in your tracks. “You know how stubborn he gets over these things,” said Jess, trying to convince you to save your breath. “I don’t care. I have to at least try,” you responded, monotonically. “I just don’t understand how you can follow him so blindly and not see what he’s doing is wrong.” “Because he isn’t wrong. I don’t know about you, but I’m not just gonna stand by and let some kid’s stupid decisions destroy another Earth,” Jess argued. “He’s just trying to save his dad, I can’t understand how that makes him such a bad person,” you said, finally turning around to face her, shocked when she was closer to you than expected. “You know exactly why. Don’t be so naive, y/n,” she shot back. “You can’t stop me,” you said staring straight into her. She shrugged. “Then I can’t help you.” She began to walk away. You did to, until you heard her say. “You don’t know how much he cares for you.” You turned around to face her again, but her back was still to you, her head tilted ever so slightly to look at you. “If you really do care for the kid, watch what you say to Miguel right now. Cause you might just give him the final push he needs to do what needs to be done.” You didn’t give her a response, and just simply kept walking. You felt Jess’ eyes on your back as you entered the elevator to get up to Miguel’s office.

The elevator ride up felt longer than it should’ve, as you tried to gather all of your thoughts and emotions together so even if he didn’t listen, your words would still stick with him in some way. You didn’t necessarily want to hurt him (though your fists were telling you otherwise), but you did want him to be aware of what he’s done. Once the doors finally opened, all of that work flew out the window as rage took over your body again, seeing Miguel up there looking at the scanners. The fact that he looked just as normal as he always does made you furious. It’s like nothing happened. “You know, I could hear you coming in from the lobby,” he said, almost stopping you in your tracks. You hated when he did that. Claiming that he knew what your every move was going to be. Like you were under his control or something. “Yeah, well then you must’ve heard me talking to Jess, which means you know exactly what this is about,” you shot back, stopping to where you could see him perched up there. “Why don’t you just save me the conversation about morality and just come up here and kick my ass already. It’ll save both of us time,” he said, not even taking his eyes off the scanners to look down at you. This only added to your fury. “That’s not what I’m here for Miguel, so don’t you dare try to twist my words here. What you did to that kid was fucked up and you know it.” “Oh yeah, then why didn’t you try to do anything to stop me?” he questioned. “Because I’m not stupid Miguel. I’m not gonna try to take down hundreds of Spider-Men at once.” “Oh, cause you’re so much better than that?” This wasn’t like him at all. That gentle, kind, and caring Miguel you once knew was gone, taken over by some sort of personal vendetta he had against Miles. “Listen, I don’t know what’s going on with you, but this all needs to stop before it gets taken too far. You’re getting into a fight you can’t win. That kid’s strong and so are his allies. And if you go any further into this, I won’t be here to help you.” He stayed still and only turned his head to look at you. “And what makes you think that you’re so important to my plan that it’ll fall apart if you leave? Have you really become that pretentious?”

Your body froze. Have I really? No no no, that’s exactly what he wants. If you begin to doubt yourself now, you’ll stay and nothing will change. You knew you were right. He was trying to crumble you down, but you wouldn’t let that happen. “And you really think that one kid is going to ruin something that you’ve been working for for years? How insecure you’ve become.” “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, turning back away from you. You did the same, wiping off your face in anger. “I hate it when you do tha-,” you said as you turned back around, but were cut off to find Miguel standing there right in front of you. He was close. Too close to your liking, although in any other circumstance you would’ve found this attractive. He tilted his head up, but his eyes were down staring daggers into yours. You hated how much he tried to make himself seem more superior to you. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he repeated, this time slower as if you were a child. “He’s just a kid Miguel,” you said in a low, quiet voice. “An anomaly. And a dangerous one at that.” “God Miguel, all he wants to do is protect his dad, do you know how insane you sound right now?” you said letting out a slight laugh when you finished. You backed away from him a little. “He doesn’t know how much damage he’ll do with this. Saving his father will only prolong the inevitable. His world will be gone within hours if he does this. All I’m trying to do is make him understand,” he tried to explain. “By trying to kill him.” “You always have to exaggerate the situation,” he said palming his face. “But that’s essentially what you’re trying to do isn’t it? Why not snuff out the problem entirely by taking him out!” He signed and began to walk away while you were talking, bringing up your anger even more. “Yeah, use all the power you’ve accumulated over the years and just take out the small problem! Except this isn’t just a fly on the wall Miguel. This is a child! An innocent boy who didn’t ask for any of this to happen to him, just like how we didn’t. I get it, I’m sorry that this job is stressful, I really am. But that gives you zero right to act the way you are!” You were screaming at him at this point. You didn’t want to. You didn’t want your emotions to get the best of you. But he was being too stubborn. This was the only way you thought you could get to him. You might not have wanted to, but you needed to hurt him now. It was the only way.

“You can’t be so power blind that you refused to accept the fact that there could be a way around Captain Davis’ death. You said we saved Earth’s before, I’m sure we could do it again.” Your anger only kept rising when he kept walking away and didn’t respond. “This is a personal thing isn’t it?” you asked calmly. You knew it was working now when he stopped walking. “Yeah, it it. You won’t let Miles get his happy ending. Because why should he be pardoned of his burden while the rest of us have suffered so much. While you’ve suffered so much.” The answer to your question was confirmed when Miguel stayed silent. “Just because you didn’t get the life you wanted Miguel, doesn’t mean you have the right to stop other people from getting theirs.” You knew you overstepped the line when Miguel turned around and started walking towards you, fury burning in his crimson eyes. “Yeah, so what! What if that is what this is all about! You should know better than anyone how much this job takes away from you!” he screamed at you, backing you up into a wall. “Why should he get to be let off so easily, while people like you and me have to suffer so much? Don’t try to turn me into the villain here when I know you’re thinking the exact same thing, y/n.” He wasn’t entirely wrong. You had wondered it at some points. “I won’t let you turn this onto me Miguel, this is about you,” you fired back. “Oh no, you’re not getting off that easily. I know you’re thinking it. And you’re right. Why should Miles get let off so easily when you’ve lost so much.” He held your hands in his, trying to connect to you. “And you have mi vida. You’ve had so much taken from you and it’s unfair. Why should he only have lost one person when you’ve had three taken from you. Your brother, Peter, your moth-.” He was cut off by your hand striking against his face in a harsh blow. “If you’re smart, and I know you are, you’ll keep those three out of them. I won’t let you drag their names through the dirt for something as stupid as this.” You both stood there for a while, both of your eyes looking towards the ground, hoping it would open up to swallow you both as an escape from this god awful conversation. You never wanted it to come to this. In all honesty, you cared for Miguel. You might’ve even loved him, if you were even capable of doing such a thing. You hoped he felt the same way about you, but in a job like this, he always had at least one wall up around you. It just wasn’t worth it anymore. You were too tired to keep trying for something that was most likely going to fall apart in the end. 

“You’re still going after him aren’t you?” you asked, finally breaking the silence. Miguel looked back up at you. “You can’t ask me not to. You know better than anyone why this is so important to me.” He moved his hand up to cup your cheek and kissed your forehead gently. You let it sit there for a minute out of habit before pushing it off your face. “And you must know why I can’t stay anymore then.” His shoulders dropped. “Whatever this thing between us is. It’s over. I can’t stay beside someone who can’t see what he’s doing is wrong.” Miguel’s dropped hand turned into a fist of anger. “Fine,” he spat in your face. “I don’t need someone like you in my way. You’re just a liability to this anyways.” He began to walk away from you back to his scanners. “Just don’t come crying back over to me when your little plan doesn’t work out, cause I won’t help you.” He used his webs to pull himself back up to the platform to keep looking for Miles. You stood there for a second, gathering yourself. Five years. Out the door just like that. It bewildered you how easily a bond like you two had could be broken all because of one teenager. You began to make your way for the door before you said. “When this is all over…don’t try to find me.” He didn’t respond. Once the elevator doors opened, you rushed inside, desperate to get away from him. So many thoughts rushed through your head as the doors closed and you sunk down back to the lobby to leave. You didn’t have much of a plan. This could end up being a horrible idea. Your gut told you it was the right thing to do though. And that was enough for you. You walked out of the headquarters lobby with a new heart and a new mind, ready to take action for your new plan.

First though, you had to find Gwen.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

a/n: god that took longer than it should've. dw dw i'll do a part 2 if enough people ask for one. im not 100% sure how im gonna do a part 2 cause yk....idk how beyond the spiderverse is gonna go so tbh, we're just gonna make it go the way i want lmao. thanks for reading, ik this was kind of a long one lmao

Senior year spring break was supposed to be fun. A formative moment in your life where you were to make memories and maybe finally come clean to Eddie, but instead you were spending most of your time hearing his name in malls, in stores, in church, at work. A constant echo that reverberated throughout the entire town as a reminder that your friend was either missing, a murder, or both.

“Hey, Y/N,” Jason’s voice was as condescending as it was annoying as it pierced through the faint whispers and stares coming from the table of athletes as the ice cream place you worked at in the mall.

“Hi, what would you like today?” you regurgitated the script given at orientation to avoid where you saw the conversation heading.

“Where the fuck is your boyfriend?” he asked with his chin held high and his eyes cast down. It was a performance for every single gossiper in Hawkins High School who wanted to know. 

“I’m sorry?” Feigning ignorance seemed easier than giving Jason and his pack something to chew on.

“Are you dumb?” he was already annoyed but went onto say after getting closer to the cash register with a lower voice. “Munson’s on the run after killing my girlfriend and you thought we wouldn’t question your innocence?” This was Jason playing good cop, especially when he knew you had a cop waiting for you at home. It would have been worse otherwise.

His question wasn’t the first of a kind. A few glances here and there were all from those who knew you and Eddie frequently hung out.

In the second that it took you to blink, Jason’s face had changed to be littered with boils, with teeth sharp enough to shred your innocence. “Don’t you think killing one girl is enough for you or is one year all you needed to forget?” was what he said. No one else heard it. No ever did hear the last parts. It was quick, and it was the first.

You saw something that was never there and heard something that was never truly said. It pulled the blood out of your heart with fear, but it was so immeasurably swift that it terrified you into a frozen solid state until someone said. “Hey, Carver.” The monster’s face vanished into the overhead lights of the ice-cream shop.

Billy’s voice was calm, but his posture was intentionally domineering as he towered behind Jason. “Somethin’ like that come out of your mouth again and I’m gonna permanently imprint your face in that athlete packed bus you call a car. Now, order something.” Billy had heard everything—not the last thing—while the rest of the customers in the store were chattering amongst themselves like a gaggle.

You picked up a shift reluctantly in an effort to escape your overbearing parents in exchange for dealing with the youth of Hawkins during a break. It was grueling and unforgiving as most jobs were, but the murder of a cheerleader had transformed it into a dangerous balancing act. Fortunately, Jason closed his jaw quicker than he ever cared to admit, but that didn’t stop the growing feeling in your chest. Even as he ordered then moved on, his words stay right in line where he was previously. The one about Eddie and the one about you.

“You’re not seriously letting Jason Cunt Carver’s question bother you?” Billy caught the skin between your brows creasing before you could ask him about his order.

“Yeah,” you tried to sound confident in your rebuttal, but it fell flat into a whisper so quickly. “So what?”

“Jesus Christ,” he sighed. “Just give me the usual and meet me at the fountain in 5 minutes before I leave you here.” He was already twirling an unlit cigarette in between his fingers, as he was already antsy for a smoke.

“Aye, aye, captain," you snorted. And just like that, Billy had placed the exact amount of change on the counter and left.

~

“If I find the money anywhere in my car, I’m gonna leave you to foot soldier back home tomorrow.”

“Bil-Oh my, god. Take the dollar back! The ice cream is for the ride.”

“And the dollar is a tip for your service,” he said as he handled his car effortlessly with one hand on the wheel and the other keeping the cone near his mouth so he could finish the dessert before he could drop you home. His flush pink lips were covered in vanilla.

“I hate you,” you huffed as played with the hem of your bright sweater.

“I hate me too.”

“Don’t say that,” you chastised him in a matter of moments, ignoring the playful hypocrisy of the entire interaction.

“Take your own advice. You don’t think I noticed that look on your face? You look like you’ve hated yourself every day of this week.”

“I mean,” you paused and Billy saw the way you looked out the window of his car. Your visage was empty but carefully laced with unmitigated fear. “How can I not?” 

“Eddie killing Chrissy Cunningham has nothing to do with you.”

“He didn’t—” you still hadn’t had the courage to properly say those words since the first time you watched images of Eddie’s home make their rounds on every television in Hawkins.

“You can’t say it, can you?” Billy was the second guy after Eddie that your father held a high brow against. Like Eddie, he was waiting for Billy to do something to brand him with a vermillion letter.

“Do you really think he… he did that to her?” You wanted a definitive answer from someone so unwaveringly shameless that you were jealous. Maybe it would have aided you in deciding on how you should feel.

“Doesn’t matter what I think,” he said through sucking the pale cream off of his fingers after eating the cone. “I don’t know, just like you don’t know. And I don’t have time to play cop when, and I’m busy chewing out Max every night because she keeps coming home late when whoever killed that cheerleader is still unknown.”

His car stopped right in front of your house where you could already feel your mother watching from the windows. She was called by the indistinguishable sound of Billy’s engine. It would have been your dad if he wasn’t at work.

“Tell Max I said ‘hi’”

“Yeah, yeah,” he waved off as you climbed out of the passenger’s seat.

Just before you left to disappear into your suburban catalog home, you turned to Billy, looking at him through the rolled-down window.

“Thank you,” you said.

The light of that afternoon hit you just right, but just as his lungs kicked his heart, he nodded and drove off.

~

Not often was dinner accompanied by television, but your mother seemed to be much more lenient in that department when she saw the way you chose silence every day. So, you got to pick what was going to be televised while your mother set the table and your father finished the pasta. While the three of you were being watched over by the family photo of four people. One person was greatly and undeniably missed.

The mundane channels flew by while you were in search of a game show, a movie, or a show that you could laugh along to with your parents, but to get to the rest of the channels it escaped your mind that passing the news channel was unavoidable.

“From what we know, the victim’s body was found in brutal condition.”

You should have just kept channel surfing, but you were enamored by the flashing police lights on the screen. They came running out of the screen like blood with a wound and made your entire face red and blue. Never did the colors mix into purple like the bruises found on Chrissy.

The house was thrown into quicksand as you all heard the news anchor speak into your homes as if she were conducting a service. Your father had stopped stirring and the sound of plates being set seized altogether. “The victim was found without her eyes, which leaves authorities to believe that the killer—” 

The television channel had changed before you could consume the rest, and your mother looked to you with an expression that was so masked by her makeup from work that you never got the chance to actually see it.

“Hey, why don’t we pop in Grease instead since there’s nothing good on anyway,” she said.

You only nodded, but that was the most she got out of you for the rest of your dinner. Even as the sound of romantic musical reverberated throughout the home, the road to hell was paved with good intentions. Brick by boring break.

In an effort to distract you, your mother had unintentionally proven how little you knew of what was actually happening through a joint family effort. You needed to change that. Placing your head in the sand only caused the glass to end up in your stomach from all the heat that was coming down. Her plan to lift your spirits had failed, and you spent that evening thinking about the state of Chrissy’s body and what Eddie was actually capable of. Even as your father attempted to tell an uplifting funny story about a pigeon sleeping in the middle of the road on his way to work, you didn’t laugh, nor did you even smile. Everybody in town seemed to talk except for your parents.

Shame was what found a space in every part of your lungs as you chastised yourself for being so quick to think so ill of someone you were so fond of. Then guilt arrived right after, hot on shame’s tails, when you thought of how Chrissy would feel to know that you couldn’t set aside your bias for a moment to acknowledge the idea that maybe someone—someone you laughed with—took advantage of a defenseless teenage girl. It was a relentless cycle that was like watching a spinning top turning so fast that you lost track of what it looked like when it wasn’t twirling.

Your inner turmoil was so cannibalistic that as your mother showered and your father went to check something in the garage, you stopped by their rooms on the way to yours. You knew where his files were always tucked away. You never really looked at the manila folders growing up since not much ever used to happen in a previously sleepy town, but this time it was different. This time you had curiosity making a mangled meal of your mind, so you gave in and slipped into the room to just have a glance at the evidence. Perhaps something would stand out that would prove that Eddie couldn’t have been there or couldn’t have killed Chrissy.

Yet, there was a bullet hole in your plan when you never could have prepared yourself for opening to a photograph in the center of the file that showed an image of Chrissy’s body and all its graphic details. Every part of her was mangled into twists and sharp turns that made her look like an abused metal rod. Her body looked like it didn’t belong to her, as the head on top of it was the only reminder of its owner. Her hollowed and bloody eye sockets were present just as reported. From where you stood, you could see yourself where her eyes used to be in the shininess of the paper. Her open mouth made you wonder about the last thing she was kept to saying. You wondered if she called out to anyone before her death.

It all didn’t matter, though. At least not anymore, because you stumbled back at the ghastly image and sent all the documents flying and scattering in the wrong order, like vaulters to bodies. Many other images of Chrissy’s figure at different images circled you like sharks as you watched them all hit the ground.

Your rush to pick up documents was only prompted by the sound of the garage door closing. While your mother may have faintly heard footsteps in the bedroom, it didn’t seem out of the ordinary. Your father, on the other hand, hadn’t even climbed upstairs yet by the time you went sprinting to your room after putting everything away.

Once your head landed on the pillow, you never knew a moment of peace as you battled the image on Chrissy with all sorts of swords. It was haunting to be demanded to playback the photos when your eyelids closed, but reality was more terrifying. Especially when every photo with your sister in it that decorated your room came to life. Her stares followed you into your bed as she sent you a stare that made it clear that she knew what you did and how it ended with her growing her roots with the tree by her grave.

“Why didn’t you pick up the phone?” she asked.

The mind was notorious for protecting itself at all costs. So, in an effort to cope, you believed yourself to already be dreaming. How were you to know that it was far from it?

“Y/N. Y/N! Don’t ignore me like you did that night!” she howled.

You shot out of your bed like an arrow and your eyes landed right on the water that was leaking under the crack of your bathroom door. There were flashing red and blue lights that reflected off of the puddle that was forming on your floor.

“Open the door, Y/N,” they said. Every photo you had of your sister sung in unison, like the choir at her funeral. “Open the door and help me! Why won’t you help me! Help me!”

The wails for you to do something sent you running to your bathroom door and opening with a question as to what you were to do. The water of the lake came rushing out at such an impossible strength and speed that it knocked you right back to your bed, where your eyes blew open and you shot up. You woke from the dream and saw Eddie beside you.

“Hey, hey,” he said. His hands were already making their way to yours like they always did. “What happened?” He looked just like he always did. A little disheveled but always endearing with pink cheeks, a wide smile, and hair much too long for him to care for.

“Eddie,” you gasped. His name came out like a blessed hymn as you hugged him immediately after waking up from your nightmare. His body was warm and you fit in it just like you had always hoped you would.

You should have known better, though. Never once did you ever have the courage to tell him how you felt about him. You would rather spend hours explaining to Billy how oblivious Eddie was. You and Eddie were only friends. So what was he doing in your bed?

“Why are you here and not helping your sister?” he deviously whispered, still holding you in the embrace that you started. His lips ghosted your ears like a phantom before his ring-clad fingers found their way around your neck as he drew you down on the bed.

“Eddie?” You croaked as you looked on dumbfounded.

He never said a word as he pressed you into the mattress around your neck as you squirmed under his touch. Your body was sprawled on your mattress like a sacrifice as your white nightgown contrasted the blood that made a satanic circle around you.

Your cries for help never escaped your voice box, not your chapped lips. They were held prisoner by calloused hands and deep laughter coming from the person who was always comfort. You tossed and turned about in your expensive sheets with tears flooding your sight as you tried to shake off the murder like water.

“Eddie, stop,” you mouth as he watched how handsome he was in the reflection of your blood-shot eyes.

“Where’s your sister?” he asked. The same question he asked the night you found out that she drowned in her car.

He reached down to hover his lips above yours before he repeated once more. “Where’s your sister?”

You shook your head to signal that you had enough, but when you opened your eyes, Eddie was gonna and so was any evidence that he was there. You gasped as you shot out up from your pillows like you did before.

Perhaps you had finally woken up this time.

Yet, you were too frightened to witness if your sister was still weeping in your family photos. Instead, you laid like a corpse in your bed, hoping this time you had indeed woken in reality and not into another dream.

Eventually, time got the better of you and you were brought out of the silent stillness that you were holding your breath in because of the slight tapping at your window. Your breath was caught in your throat as you refused to breathe until the monsters were gone.

The silence that followed after frustrated you.

It seemed the only thing that would have let you return to the realm of peace and slumber was seeing that there was nothing outside of the window so you climbed out of bed to give yourself a reason to fall back asleep and tell Billy about the encounter the next day. It was too late to call him, but you knew if you did, he would have answered.

You expected the endless torment to be finished until a familiar figure pushed the window open and went stumbling through the opening just as you were walking toward it. You wasted no time to breathe in to scream but just as quickly a warm hand with cold accessories cover your lips. You didn’t even have to try to make out his face in the dark because he smelled all the same. And goosebumps went crawling up your back just like they used to. 

Your movements had stopped entirely as you refused to believe whose body was fresh against yours in the middle of the night. That was until the glimmering moonlight hit him from behind so exceptionally that he looked how you hoped death to be. Cold but inviting.

As Eddie gingerly removed his hand, he expected to see relief baptize you with a semblance of annoyance toward him for scaring you, but that wasn’t at all what he got.

Instead, he watched how your face fell and went cold instantly when you locked eyes with him. You didn’t even say his name. Your supple lips quivered as your head shook slowly. Eddie was standing in the center of your room and realized that you looked he was the last person you wished to see.

He had felt you pull yourself from him so quickly that it felt criminal. You hadn’t even given yourself a moment, as you were already crying for reasons that he could understand. Your mind was beyond rattled. Your mind was practically made of mush as strings of tears were trailing down your cheeks like cut ribbons. If Eddie wasn’t so concerned, he would have really taken the time to note how beautifully your glassy eyes refracted the moonlight.

While you looked before him, all you could sense was the feeling of hands around your throat. A cruel copy of the callouses hands that could be felt closing your airways with no consideration as to your state. It was hard to tell if you were still dreaming or entirely awake, but there was no option that you preferred. Your horror toward any encounter with Eddie was a byproduct of the chilling images of Chrissy that sat in your father’s drawer. You thought to run, but with your white socks, you wouldn’t have gone far.

“Y/N?” Eddie thought to calm you down first with whispers. Perhaps you were just shaken up by his sudden appearance.

He stepped forward to as an effort to reach you, but just as he did, you took another backward while gripping onto your wooden bed frame as an anchor. You didn’t know whether you should try to scream again or hear him out. The idea of your dad coming in to save you may have cost Eddie his life if it was real life. And no matter how apprehensive you were about him, you still couldn’t bear to call your father.

"Hey, it's just me," he spoke with a hesitance that was a direct reflection of the way you looked like a simple gaze would shatter your bones. “It’s Eddie.”

The feeling of his hands making a bird cage of your vocal chores was permanent. Were you next in line to suffer the same fate as Chrissy? That would have been a huge leap of logic days ago, but it's not like you hadn't watched Eddie try to suck the life out of you with such malice just to teach you about the death of your sister.

“Y/N—” he called once more.

“Please, please, d-don’t hurt me,” you begged as backed yourself so far back into a corner that the wall of your room began to feel so much like a coffin. 

You didn’t even consider looking at him anymore in hopes that he would be kind enough to make it painless and quick. You had always considered death to be something inevitable, but hoped that at the very least yours would end up as painless as possible. So even in this instance, you wished for Chrissy’s fate to be imitated rather than replicated if it ever was painful. Yet, through those wishes and clear strings of desperation, you still couldn’t ignore your choice to close your eyes to meet your face for the main purpose of never seeing how Eddie would end your life. You would have rather remembered him fondly than really soak in all that you had seen and heard.

At any other time, Eddie would have chosen to keep a distance out of respect for you and due to his admirable ability to be patient, but any second longer he had to watch you fold into yourself was seeming like an impossible feat. The last nail in the coffin was the way your body dropped like bad news as you lost all control of your breathing.

Your hands were placed before you as some sort of shield, but they were the first things Eddie reached to when he walked over and carefully held your wrists to move them aside. You still hadn’t chosen to open your eyes, but the teardrops were still littering your rug.

You were so willing to forfeit your life, but it was only natural to fight in your last moment so the first feeling of a familiar hand felt like a feathering breeze that rattled your sense and caused you to react like you had been tapped at your knee.

You struggled against Eddie’s hold on your wrist until he saw things were going nowhere and took you by both sides of your face.

“You’re not breathing, Y/N. Y/N?” His calls for you were whispers but were loud within the room.

That seemed to have done it because the sound of your parents’ room opened and footsteps were already making their way over to the door that separated you from the rest of the world. Eddie must have heard it too, because he was brought to a stillness as he let go over your face. 

The knocks on wood were instant and consistent while you still kept your eyes close but it was until you heard your father’s voice did you finally understand that perhaps it all wasn’t another nightmare.

“Honey?” he called.

So you rose carefully but still nervously as if you were being piloted by your own cowardice, and your pure white socks made creaks in the floor. You never looked at Eddie and opted to keep the door at your focus. It was Eddie’s turn to hold his breath as he sneaked into your closet to fall out of the door’s line of sight. He was hoping you wouldn’t say anything to your father.

You opened the door carefully, but it creaked just like the floors.

“Everything alright in there?” your father asked as you watched him through the sliver of the door.

“Uh,” you paused, then nodded as you wiped the sweat from your forehead that made your hair strands latch onto your skin. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?” he pushed his glasses up and crossed his arms to beat off the deadly chill in the hallway.

“Yeah.” You couldn’t even convince yourself.

“Oh,” he shifted a bit in his stance and the tenseness in his shoulders seemed to be gone for a bit. “Well, just know you can talk to me about anything.”

“Of course,” you said

“Even when… even when you see something you’re not supposed to,” he said.

“W-what?” you asked.

“I know you saw the case file.” There was a supernatural silence that filled the space. “The pages were out of order.

“I’m sorry.”

“You know I keep those away from you so you don’t end up like this.” He was clearly referring to your nervous state. You always were one to get nightmares so easily.

“Yeah.”

“We’ll talk about it in the morning, okay? Just try to get some rest for now.”

“Okay,”

“Goodnight,” his smile was forced for all the right reasons that day. He had a job to do and giving you a false sense of comfort was one of them.

“’night.”

When you finally watched your father retreat back into his room, you let out a sigh and let silence fill up your room. You waited until the door of your parent’s room clicked.

“Eddie,” you whispered into the cold of the room. The sobering silence of the space after speaking to your father made it apparent that perhaps it wasn’t a nightmare.

He inched out of his hiding place with so much uncertainty that if you weren’t so afraid of what you would say next, you would have apologized for your reaction. He had heard everything and was starting to understand why you were so jumpy.

You gave Eddie not time to getting his barrings when you turned to him and said, “was it you?”

“What—” he collected himself. “n-no, no.” He was unintentionally getting closer, but this time you remained grounded.

“Did you do it?” you asked once more. Maybe if you heard him say it again, it could erase all the nightmares and convince you that this wasn’t another one. One where an even worse, Eddie was playing the long con.

“You know me. Right?” he asked. The crack in his voice was something you could have never replicated, not even in your wildest dream.

“Yes, yes. I—”

“You don’t trust me, do you?”

The cards were turned over and now you both were playing a balancing act that you were already ready to tumble on. It was his turn to be surprised.

“I saw the body, Eddie and it just—” you stopped speaking to stomach the photo while sinking onto your rug and leaning on your bed while he followed you down to see where it would all go. You had stayed close to him, so maybe he could still explain himself. “I just saw her body an-nd I-I, I haven’t been able to sleep well lately and I keep having nightmares about you and then you come in through my window—” you tried to stay in a whisper as your jaw shook from how hard you wanted to cry.

“Y/N?”

“Is this real? I-I mean, ‘are you real?’” you admitted. “Are you actually here?”

“Ye-yeah, yeah. I am.” His brown eyes pleaded his case much better than his words did.

“Just tell me what happened. Start to finish.”

~

The way Eddie delivered the story was a testament to the honesty in his recounting. The fear from that night was still fresh in his pupils as he remembered and retold supernatural events. And to know he was in hiding with the help of Dustin and his friends was comforting.

You had found yourself sitting right by Eddie, shoulder to shoulder. Two bodies leaning against one bed.

“I’m sorry about Chrissy,” you said. The tears on your face had dried into ash.

“I feel worse for her family,” he murmured.

“You’re allowed to feel upset, too. I’m sure she meant a lot to you,” you spoke but mostly to yourself.

“What?”

“Nothing, sorry,” you suddenly felt bad for prying.

“No, no. What do you mean by that?” he asked as he faced you. His nose would have grazed yours if you both weren’t so equally shy about making the wrong move.

“You and her like dating or talking or something, right?”

“Who told you that?”

“I mean, because you were spending a Friday night with her at your house and some of the class said they saw you guys talking prior.” The ridiculousness of your logic started sounding foolish even to you. When everybody talks, some parrot and that’s what you were doing. “I’m sorry, I’m not realizing how stupid I sound, I just…” You wanted to get the words out. “I-it’s because… Eddie, I—”

He had kissed you without a single thought and had spent all his years of pining, friendship, and late-night talks on a chance to grace your lips. His flush pink lips led you into a dance as one of his hands supported you by your neck and the other held you by your cold cheek.

He could feel you gripping onto his t-shirt to combat the dizziness that came with a first kiss. Your mind was entirely empty but overwhelmed as he pressed into you more. The need for air was just a suggestion as he practically swallowed you whole while your chest was bubbling.

He lost his balance in his eagerness and found his hand on your thigh and that sudden touch set your forest ablaze as your spine felt a rush of cold water run down your spine.

“Are you okay?” he asked as he felt loose droplets of tears flee from the corners of your shut eyes.

“I don’t know,” you said as you left the kiss and shook your head. Hoping to tell him about the loss of your sanity some other time. Right then, instead, you lay your head on his shoulder and buried your face in his neck as he ran his hand mindlessly along your thigh in reaction to the way your hot breath hit his skin continuously. Your lips would glide past his neck effortlessly every time you breathed, until he noticed that you had finally fallen asleep.

Eddie never moved. Even as he heard you let out small whimpers in your sleep, you continued to run his hands along your shoulders and especially up your thighs and under your nightgown.

He didn’t know that you were fighting Vecna in your sleep.

Your sister had drowned in her car that went crashing into a lake no less than a year prior. All the while, you ignored her calls for help with directions home after an argument with her. She didn’t see the sign for a turn and ended up under water while you slept soundlessly.

The guilt that came with that was eating you limb by limb everyday. And so was Vecna.

You were next.

“Do you want the crocodile one?” he asked.

“That might make a certain someone jealous. So you can have that one.”

He nodded at your confession. “I still feel bad that you had to spend like 5 pounds on this.”

“I get out of washing dishes tonight and maybe tomorrow night, so it’s a win-win for both of us.” You weaved past him to set the table, but not before giving him a quick kiss on his cheek.

“I guess so,” he paused as he watched you moved things about. He was spacing out like he sometimes did. You were ready to pull him back until he spoke again. “You never answered my question.” He pressed as placed the morning food onto the party plates.

“I was hoping you wouldn’t notice,” you mumbled.

“Y/N—”

You could already sense he was getting ready to plead his case and reprimand you a bit in the process. “I know, I know. I should be resting, but I already took an evening off and I feel fine.”

“Would it be so wrong if you put yourself first this time?” he asked as he sat down across from you. “Benny calls off like all the time—It’s a wonder he hasn’t been fired yet.”

“Well, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” 

“You can’t honestly be using that to describe the closing shift.” He saw the way you nodded to tease him and in any other circumstance he would have laughed, but it hadn’t been the best two weeks for you and he knew a thing or two about things piling onto one another so far up that it became turtles all the way down. “Stay home.” he took your hand and pleaded more with his eyes than his words. It was the look on his face that had you choked with a warmth all over your neck. “Please.”

You wished you could admit to him why you rather spend time anywhere that wasn’t the sheets of your bed. There was a simple explanation as to why every night after the incident, you pleaded for him to crawl into the bed with you. It was easier to pretend that the growing tightness around his torso from your hold was just you missing him. It certainly wasn’t you placing an anchor as you hoped to outrun your own dreams.

You invited him over as much as you could, since the echoing silence of your room was much too daunting to face in solitude. Steven would fill up the deadly space for you. Letting him ramble until his heart’s content was how you liked things. All while you were busied by the revelation of how you hadn’t seen Marc in two weeks. Or how you wondering if you were trying to love a man who seemed inconvenienced by the suffering of those who you believed were innocent.

“—Y/N”

“Yeah,” you went running back into your body.

“I was saying that you should eat up just in case your lunch break is late,” he repeated as he poured more of the contents of his food onto your plate.

“Steven!”

“Don’t fight me on this, please.”

“Half your food is gone.”

“I’ll be fine, but you need as much energy as you can get.” He then turned in the direction of your bed on the other side. “Right, Cleo?” he slightly raised his voice.

“Don’t bring her into this.”

“You’ve forced my hand.”

The journey to work was as mundane as it could ever be. Yet, you held his hand all the way to your bus stop. As you disappeared onto the bus, Steven’s smiled falter for a few seconds. He was attentive, and that was one of the things you loved about him. However, that’s what made him just as restless as you were. He knew those nights when he’d wake up from your hold around him; you were reliving everything. He knew you didn’t like to be alone much recently. It was evident that anywhere was better than alone, but you're running from it all would cause you to trip, eventually.

The day was spent as it always was as you tried to avoid to any thought of Marc and how his hands found no doubt in marrying cold bodies with bruises. It was all a game of running from the white rabbit until you were pulled aside for a moment during the evening.

“What do you say to leaving a little earlier?” your manager said. “It’s a bit slow.” It had been slower than expected, but you would have never considered it was enough to shorten staffed.

“Um, I don’t mind still closing,” you said.

“Don’t worry, we have enough tonight. Besides, someone came in asking for you.” 

That’s what piqued your interest.

“Who?”

You should have pieced together that someone in your workplace had to be a follower of Ammit. It was only logical that things never went your way, especially when it came to distance yourself from your past and all the overlapping tree like memories that came along with that. Murphy’s law was sometimes what you lived by, especially more recently.

“Should have known that they’d be the type to get involved with you and all your followers,” you sat at the cafeteria table as your skin stretching more over your knuckles.

“It’s not me they follow,” a sincere smile lifted his thin lips as he spoke. As always, he found amusement in your frustration.

“You forced me to come to this,” you gave the place a brief look around, “neighborhood. Why?”

He knew you didn’t mind making things difficult for him. “Can’t your old man get to see you?”

“It’s only been a year.”

“A year and a few months, but who’s counting?”

“Dad,” you groaned, as you were already preparing to find a way home. When you saw him standing outside of your workplace, with a look on his face that you couldn’t decipher and a posture that seemed to be worsening, you thought it was an emergency.

“Okay, okay,” he held up his hands. “I’ll get to the point.” His sky colored eyes gazed at you the only way you had known for most of your life. A mix of sincerity for what had happened and a drop of asking for forgiveness for what was on its way. All of it was mixed with love. You don’t remember anything from before you were adopted, but everything after was how it was in that moment under the moonlight.

“So, I heard you’ve been seeing someone.”

You snickered. “Privacy isn’t really your thing now, is it? You know you could have just texted me this,” you would have kept going, but he didn’t seem amused or patient by your near childish rambling this time around.

“Honey, I have been giving you your space and privacy.”

“And that includes flying out of the country just to tell me this.”

“I didn’t come here to pester you, but imagine my surprise when yesterday Victor told me he saw you at the grocery store with Steven Grant.”

While before you were finding some nostalgia in the bickering between he and you, your eyes were entirely focused now

“He’s not who you think his is,” he said.

“I think you’re underestimating how much I know,” you countered as you leaned closer to him from across the table were seated with. “What does that have to do with you?”

“He has something that I need, that’s all," he said.

The way he calmly spoke made you feel more frustrated than you would have liked. “You know, for a while I really thought that you would have learned to leave well enough alone, but you can’t seem to help but drag me into this with you after I told that I didn’t want to be involved anymore,” you spoke quietly but there was no mistake in your confidence although it was laced with trepidation.

“I’m not asking you to join me in anything. Not anymore,” he swallowed. “I’m asking you to stay out of it and stay away from him. Please.”

You got up from where you stood without a word. “Okay.” You had no intention of listening.

“It was nice seeing you,” he said as he brought himself up from where he stood, and that’s when you got a good look at his cane again. It ushered memories of moments that you weren’t meant for you to see.

“Do your followers know you’ve never used that on me?” you whispered as you looked around at the others that occupied the surrounding area. Your dejection was now leaking out of your pores while puppetting you to say things you rather keep to yourself.

His lips fell into a line that resembled wary snaked. “I haven’t told them yet.”

“Omission of truth is still lying,” you warned. “You should know that more than anyone.”

“I’ll have someone take you home.”

He wasn’t ready to comfort anymore inevitable ideas that evening. “It’s fine,” you shook your head to no longer notice how much he hadn’t changed. “I already called a ride.” You knew he’d try to help. It was always the one thing you could be sure of.

You were prepared to go on in silence all the way to your flat but he stopped you once more.

“Y/N,” he called, and you turned around to face him to make up for how you hadn’t the last time you saw him. You didn’t need a reminder of how you walked away facing the moon to the cries of your father tainting your spine. “Please,” he hadn’t seemed this desperate since you left.

“Yeah,” was all you said before you left.

It seemed right that just as you were entering the cab, you realized the pin you had been gifted by Steven was no longer on your bag. After spending a few minutes waiting for transportation with your what-if’s on the bench along with you—you hadn’t actually called the cab yet—you were relegated to doing it once more after sending off the first cab to catch another one. You couldn’t return home and forget about what had happened or even block your father’s number from your phone to let off steam. Instead, you were shamefully making your way back with your eyes to the ground as you searched for the scarab pin that decorated your tote bag.

That was when you heard it, “Then don’t.” His voice was never roaring, but it’s cadence was something that you had learned to memorize.

“I can’t help you.” From around the corner where you hid, you saw how Steven retreated along the same path as those who lived there. They were all stepping backwards as the cane emitted purple.

“Yes, you can,” your father said. “I need to know, where is the scarab?” The shuffling noises of shoes stopped entirely as he continued. “Where is the scarab?”

“No.”

“Where is the scarab?”

A voice that was neither Steven’s nor Arthur’s cut through the conversation and made space where there wasn’t any. “I have it.”

It was a woman who, when she walked and parted the crowd, a few of her curly strands bounced in stark contrast to her angular features. She held the pin tight as her eyes held many warning signs. She looked entirely more calculated than anyone else in the room.

“You couldn’t possibly understand the value of what you’re holding.”

You wanted to see more and craved to discover the pieces that you hadn’t been given. There were a lot of things you weren’t being told, whether it was by your father or it was Marc. Your feet carried you to begin circling around to make your way to a higher place to see more of what was happening at a greater vantage point.

“Let me have that. I’ll keep it safe.”

“Summon the suit,” she said.

“Summon the what?”

Words of many were blending into too much to process until tensions were high and the atmosphere came at a standstill. You could hear the faint whispers of bickering, but before you could even begin to climb the steps while remaining hidden, you watched the stillness snowball into struggle immediately. 

Layla had taken Steven’s hand before he could even realize he had gone up a flight of stairs and was being cornered by Harrow’s disciples. She fought one after the other while they only went higher.

The ground was trembling as if a god was rising. A violet hue was slowly swallowing the cobblestone walls.

“Left, left!” he heard her say behind him. He kept running to find some place to hide. Any place would have done well. Eventually, he was pulled into a large room without a word from who had done it.

His hands were already waving about in a panic as he tried to get a few licks at whomever it was that separated him from Layla.

“Hey, hey, it’s me!” Your presences was only comforting for a brief wishful second before it became something that filled him with dread.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” his shrill voice bounced about the hiding cave as Layla came rushing in. Only one glance towards you and Steven she was already beginning to bolt the doors shut.

“Can I get some help over here!” she said.

You didn’t know what was coming, but by the way Steven was already falling into line to secure the door, you could only follow along to make sure everyone was well.

“Oh, my god,” he stepped back as he frantically looked about for an exit as Layla was already halfway across the entire room. "We’re going to die in some evil wizard’s cave.”

You were already running to soothe a panic you could already tell was coming in full force. But you didn’t know how to tell him that who he was running from was someone you had known for most of your life.

“No. Hey,” you held his face just as the door began to violently shake like the first warning signs of a natural disaster. “Steven, look at me. Look. Breath.” You met his gaze and could already tell he was descending by the glassiness of his eyes and the cracks in his cries.

Layla was standing across the room as she stopped looking for a way out and said. “There’s a suit and I’ve seen you use it. You bring it out.”

“I don’t know how to, Layla.”

“Then summon Marc!”

“You don’t think I’ve tried that!” His body was shaking even as you tried to steady him. What he had confessed was already burying six feet under once and was preparing to do it twice.

“Then you need to fight. I can do it! We need you to!” Layla said.

“No, I can’t!”

You did the only thing that you could do as you watched the doors rattled from the wrath of a horrible mistake. You brought yourself down to where he crouched down.

“Steven,” placed your hand on his shoulders.

“I can’t. I can’t.” His guilt tightened his jaw as he shook his head. “I’m sorry I can’t do it.”

The wood was splitting and giving to whatever it was on the other side giving it utter hell.

“It’s okay,” you whispered it his lips as you drew closer.

“Alright, we’ll find another way,” you heard Layla announce as she frantically searched for an escape.

That’s when the wood had finally yielded to what it could never understand. The light from the outside came flooding in to break the ark. He and you rose as Layla held her breath under water. Heaven’s gates were now closed and Steven’s face fell and went cold almost instantly.

“J-jackal. Jackal!” His words spilled out like blood.

“Wh—”

“Get out the way!” He enveloped you with his figure from what you couldn’t see as he tried to make a distance between the creature with a jaw that snapped and made thunder. However, his efforts were much too late.

The jackal’s muscles contracted just to relax as it lept and sent you and Steven plummeting through glass and falling from heaven. You couldn’t see anything but you could feel Steven as he made a cacoon around you. Falling from such a great height wasn’t how you ever expected it to be.

It was like shooting through the sky at first, but the journey down was like swimming, as nothing but love felt real for a moment.

“Suit! Suit!” you heard Steven in your ear but it sounded like he was light years away.

His body hit one metal piece, and that heavy impact caused him to loosen his grip around you. It never separated two warm bodies, but you went spilling out of the cacoon once Steven’s body met the ground like an asteroid. The glass that was broken and went swimming along with the both of you came down like rain and one piece found a place in your stomach while the others made cuts all over.

You were gasping for air the moment you met the ground. Your vision was just as shattered and scattered as the shards around you as you tried to find Steven. You could hear him calling your name, but you had no inkling of where to look.

“Steven.” you croaked.

You were bleeding out all over the concrete while the jackal was busy tossing Steven about like it was sport. The blood began small and, like all lies and false promises, it was threatening to spill everywhere. The vermillion fluid hadn’t even made a puddle the size of a fist, but time was unforgiving.

“Marc! Marc! Can you hear me? She’s bleeding!” Steven cried as he ate hit after hit as he bit the metal of a nearby car. He could still see your body from where you originally were. You were laid across the floor like you were waiting for white chalk to outline your own crime scene.

You didn’t have enough blood left to spare, and that’s what had Steven screaming out the name of the person who refused to come out since the night you told him to stay away.

a reblog for a part four ^_^

navigation <- (taglist form, masterlist, rules, etc.)

tag list:

Your journey home was entirely suffocated by unrelenting silence until you went walking into the elevator of your building just to see Marc there, looking just as tired as you were. He saw you coming from where he stood, but no matter how many times his fingers pressed the button, the elevator kept them open as a punishment. He was forced to witness the way your body clung to the dress you wore and how the ends of the skirt grazed over your smooth skin to mock him.

“Hi, Marc,” you said. You could tell by the way he clenched his jaw that it wasn’t Steven.

“Hi.”

The ride up had never been so long and you weren’t sure how to bring it up until you just spoke. “Hey, um, could you let Steven know he missed our date? I’m not sure if he tells you about them—”

“Yeah, something came up for me.” He hadn’t noticed, but his shoulders were tight as he kept his attention forward until the doors opened.

You followed after him with your shoes following the path he made and finally noticed how he held his side on his way to his flat. “Are you okay? Do you want me to—”

“I’m fine.”

“You don’t seem fine,” you murmured.

Your first mistake was thinking you could put your warm hand on his chilling, broad shoulders and not cause him to nearly leap out of his own body. You had touched Steven countless times. However, it was the first time Marc had ever gotten a sense of what it felt like for himself.

Still, he didn’t wish to savor it in the slightest. “Pretending to worry is what you do with Steven. Not me.” He recoiled from the heat so harshly that he was already at his door and into his humble home before you could take your keys out.

Marc never got to see the way your face fell or how you clutched your keychain and shoved the metal key into your door. You disappeared into your home, begging your tears to give you time to close the door before they got it all over your dress. All this was while Marc was eyeing a photo of you by the fish tank that you had given to Steven while he took off his shoes.

As he pretended to look over persimmons, Marc watched you from a distance as your soft lips mouthed the lyrics of a song while your fingers glided over the peaches. You made it too easy sometimes and for that, he was thankful. He could spend his weekend researching—that was the word he liked to use— while you were unaware.

You glided through the other aisles, and he was careful to keep his head low and stay a few steps behind you while watching the way you smiled at a store employee while asking a question. Your shining teeth made him frown even deeper as he gripped his shopping cart.

His frustration kept on building throughout the day as he watched you carry through your laundry list of errands. Everywhere you went, he was a step behind with enough distance to go unannounced but close enough to slip your wallet back into your tote bag while you left it in your cart to have a look at some home décor. You really should have been more cautious of pick pocketers.

Landing a punch to a stranger wasn’t how he liked to spend his Sundays. Neither was lying on his bed while you were showering at home. The cardigan you had left with Steven on accident was under his nose as he brought the fragrance into his lungs. He had your Sunday schedule memorized to a point where he was used to the feeling of wanting to resist snaking his hands into his tight pants as he thought about how your hands were rubbing your thighs while he was playing with a Rubik’s Cube. For Marc, hell was Sunday afternoons at 3 PM.

For you, hell was the bus ride home looking at your phone and all the piling missed calls and texts from Steven? You deliberately avoided opening the voicemails and the messages in hopes that you’d have more time to think about what you wanted to do. Your plan was to speak to him on Monday when you felt better, or at least when you could fake it better.

Your walk to the elevator was less eventful than the day prior, but that didn’t keep you from reliving the day before, especially when you saw Steven sitting crisscrossed next to your door while he read a book with a sand-colored cover. You would have ignored him while playing Marc’s words on repeat if he hadn’t met you at your door.

“Hey, Steven.” You were hoping to keep it short and sweet so you could send him on his way gently with a promise that you’d talk to him when you weren’t so fatigued.

“Hey.” He was already rubbing his sweaty palms on his pants with the book abandoned on the floor as he got up. “I tried to call you but—is your phone okay?” You were always so good at answering your phone. “Sorry,” he shook his head. “Sorry. I mean, ‘are you okay?’”

“I couldn’t answer, because I was at work. I’m sorry.”

You didn’t usually work on Saturdays, but that was the least of Steven’s concerns. “B-But what about dinner? We said we’d meet each other there. And I went—And I went and you weren’t there.” He was doing that thing where he was speaking much too fast to figure it out himself and in any other circumstance you would have thought it was endearing, but the crack of his voice nearly pressed your heart so hard it would have stopped beating.

“Yeah,” you let out a sigh while you dug through your purse to find your keys. “I went yesterday and didn’t see you. I figured Marc lost track of time or something.”

“Today’s not Saturday, is it?” he asked while he licked his lips anxiously.

You were pleased that fishing for your key gave you a distraction, since you couldn’t bear to see his face fall again while he experienced a crushing realization that he had already gone through two times before.

“I’m afraid it’s not,” you looked up at him with an evident crease between your brows.. “I’m sorry you were there alone. Marc didn’t leave you a sticky note by the tank telling you?”

“No-no, no, he didn’t.” He looked back at his apartment at the end of the hall like he could see through walls. “At least, I don’t think so.”

You bitterly laughed to yourself to shrug off the hurt that was making room for itself in your pensive thoughts. “I don’t think he likes me very much.” What you said out loud was really meant for yourself.

“No, no, that can’t be—He likes you.”

“Steven, don’t lie to me,” you tried to keep your tone light hearted, but your façade was slipping.

“I’m not.” His wide eyes were becoming glassy, and his lips tightened into a line as he tried to fix the damage. “I swear.”

You nodded while unlocking the door. “I’m gonna head in, okay? I’m a little tired.”

“Wait,” he took your hand and made you notice how his clammy arms were desperately shaking. “I’m sorry.”

Steven saw the way your face relaxed, and the corner of your lift lifted lightly for a moment. He watched you come close to then give him an electric kiss on his cheek that made his ears too hot for comfort.

“Please, get some sleep tonight.” You watched him close his eyes as he felt your hands hold his visage tenderly. Your thumbs carefully moved back and forth over his cheek. “You look pale.” You examined his face as you saw his frown deepen and chose to ignore it. “And tell Marc to take it easy.”

“Why do I get the weird feeling you don’t want to do this anymore? Like be with me. It’s on your face. Are you upset with me? I get it if you want to go into your flat and avoid me for the rest of your life—”

“Hey, hey, don’t say that. Just give me some time to sort this all out mentally first.” You were referring to your thoughts as your finger slipped into his dark hair to calm him down, but it only sent a shudder pouring down his spine like cold water while his knees almost gave in.

“Is this a break? Or a breakup? Bloody hell, are we breaking up?—”

You gave him another kiss, but on his lips. Your warm skin was on his mouth while your hand fondly stroked his neck. It nearly caused him to become entirely lightheaded. His eyes were blown open the entire time from the moment he felt your kiss. You pulled away to get one last look at him.

“No, we’re not.” You placed your forehead onto his as you tried to have him matched your breathing. “I just want some time, maybe one or two days, to think. I’m telling you this because I enjoy being honest with you. Just give me some time to think over some things, okay?”

Steven nodded fervently at your words.

“Alright,” you smiled. His face got warmer. “See you later, gator.”

“Laters, gators,” he whispered as he felt your hand slip out of his.

If Steven could properly chew out Marc, he would, but instead he was stuck yelling at a mirror while a disinterested Marc was asking him to surrender his body so he could start off his soon-to-be long night.

“No, you don’t get to ask me that without answering me first!” Steven pointed.

“Good, God, Steven. Calm down.” Marc looked as uninterested as ever.

“You did this!” Now Steven was pacing. “I don’t get it. You have so many photos of her like a bloody creep,” he grabbed one of the many in the bathroom drawer to wave around. “But you’re the one giving her a hard time?” Steven never figured out what was said when he was gone, but with the way you spoke about Marc and the way Marc spoke about you, it didn’t take much afterward.

“What does this have to do with me not telling you that I made you miss your date?”

“Everything!” His fingers combed through his hair as he tried to imitate what you did to him to calm him down. “For once in my life, I got the courage to ask someone to date me and you’re pissing all over it. You’re just as obsessed with her, but you don’t want to admit it.”

Why would Marc want to admit? That would mean that he’d have to also confess to how sour he was about Steven getting to you first. It didn’t make sense. He was under the impression that he’d get you and Steven would just have to follow along, as always. So while he looked at you sleeping with the white noise machine on, he gripped the spare key of your flat that was meant for Steven. He had found a way to forcibly turn his jealousy into a lack of trust that you had good intentions with Steven.

What was supposed to be no more than two days thinking about your relationship and Marc’s choice words turned into a seven. You had been so consumed by Marc’s accusation that you stewed in your thoughts for so long that you feared seeing Steven in passing on your way to work. You rose early and returned home extremely late. All the while, Steven spent his days at the gift shop anxiously checking his phone while typing and deleting messages that he hoped to have enough courage to send.

This brought him back full circle on Sunday, knocking on your door. Your brief look through the peephole wasn’t enough to prepare you to see him again. When you opened the door, you were met with a nervously still Steven wearing a suit that he seemed to be drowning in.

He must have not expected you to actually answer the door because once he saw you were still in your work clothes, he panicked.

“Bollocks.” He quickly pulled out the card that you didn’t know he was holding. “I falafel about what happened.” His eyes followed the Hallmark card’s words. “I’m sorry.”

He practically shoved a bouquet of flowers into your hands when he nearly tripped over his shoes trying to hand it to you. Your bewildered expression must have frightened him even further, since he was already reaching into his bag to pull out a box of chocolate. Another small box fell out in the process as he fumbled to give you the heart-shaped chocolate box. In utter panic, he brought himself to his knees to pick it up, but he stayed on his knees to give it to you while you were trying to balance the things he had already given you.

“Wait-Wait, Steven, honey, are you trying to propose?” you asked calmly as you tried to mask your panic.

“W-What?” he looked up at you from where he was on his knees with his once combed hair now disheveled. “No-no!”

You nodded.

“Do you want me to?” he asked.

“Jesus, no,” you giggled.

“It’s just a pin of a scarab,” he said as he opened the box. “for your tote bag,” he whispered the last part as he placed the box in your hand.

“I can’t accept all this.”

“But I haven’t even given you the peaches, yet.”

“Steven,” you tried to hold back your laughter while you placed the gifts on your kitchen counter as he waited at the door with bated breath. You returned to him and decided to cut him some slack instead of refusing his gifts. “Thank you. I—”

He looked at the palm of his hand, at the poorly scribbled checklist he had made just in case he forgot something.

“Have dinner with me, please,” he asked. “It’s at my place. New Gus will be there too. Nothing too serious—unless you want it to be.”

You took his hand and stroked them as you tried to calm him down from what he no doubt had rehearsed many times over. “Give me a few minutes to get dressed, since you’re looking so dapper.”

“I hope this all didn’t cost too much,” you spoke as you looked at the giant stuffed crocodile in the corner. Steven was more focused on how your lips moved with red lipstick painted over them that he hadn’t heard a word that came out of your mouth. “Steven?”

“Yeah?” he was still frazzled.

“Please, don’t tell me that Donna took the stuffed animal out of your paycheck.”

“I won’t,” he nodded.

“Steven!”

“This is our apology to you.”

“Our?”

“I’m hoping Marc is going to apologize, too. Eventually…” he looked off into space briefly. “Honestly, whenever. I’m still kind of lost with how this works.”

“Have you fed New Gus?” He didn’t even notice how swiftly you changed the conversation.

“Oh, no.”

“Poor thing is watching us eat while you haven’t fed him,” you began walking to the tank to retrieve the fish food but when it wasn’t in sight, you were already heading toward Steven’s bed to get it off of his nightstand. By the time you returned, there was a silence that filled the room that made you uncomfortable as you fed Gus. You could feel a firm set of eyes that let you know that Marc was staring.

“Hey, Marc.” You tried to keep your voice level.

“Hey.”

You turned to see him eyeing the takeout food that you had spent twenty minutes assuring Steven was delicious.

“He told me you wanted to say something.” Even as you returned to your seat to face him, he still hadn’t said a word, and you knew he wouldn’t if you didn’t speak up.

“Yeah,” he was struck by your scent since your perfume was scrambling his thoughts until he went completely silent for much too long.

“Look, if it’s gonna kill you, it’s fine. You don’t have to be here. I’m sure Steven can keep me entertained for the rest of the night.” You couldn’t even stand to look at him, so you were already heading back to New Gus—you really needed to pick a better name for him. Steven and Marc’s hands were the same, yet when he took you by your wrist, he felt colder.

“Entertain?” he whispered with a sickly smirk.

“That’s not what I meant—Look if you’re setting out to make me the bad guy—”

“You’re making it really easy to.”

“You’re the one being difficult. All I’ve ever been is kind to you.” He was pushing you over the precipice.

"I don’t need your pity.”

Your weeks of frustration and denying he was likely keeping Steven away from the dinners you planned were pouring over the fire and causing billowing smoke. “Why don’t you fucking trust me like Steven does?”

“I just can’t seem to get why you accepted his advances so eagerly.” He hadn’t gotten as loud as you were, but he was so, so close.

“For starters,” you tore his grip from your wrist. “He’s much nicer.”

“I can be nice,” he said as he got closer. He didn’t sound sincere, but rather like he was being challenged. “I-I can be nicer… funnier, better.”

“Marc, what are you going on about?” your eyes feverishly danced over his face in confusion. “Can we just go back to how it was before?”

“Like when we were just neighbors and Steven was following you like some lap dog,” he hissed so strongly you felt the wind on your nose.

“No, when I’d drop off first aid supplies and pretended not to see the photos you have of me on your mirror,” you spat.

You should have seen it coming when he had gotten so close with his towering stance. But when Marc kissed you, it sent you walking back to catch your balance, and you were stunned. It was enough to have you pull back to have a look at him to see if it was actually Steven. Yet he wasn’t. You could tell by the look in his eyes and by the way he went in for another kiss. His lips took over yours as you still were trying to catch your bearings and remedy your confusion. His teeth eventually moved from your mouth to your neck as he held your head about by his jaw.

Marc could hear the shake in your breaths as you gripped the sleeves of his suit and bunched the cotton fabric into your fist. His sloppy kisses littered your neck and chest like acid rain and made you wonder how you had already made it to the kitchen counter. He went from holding your face by its jaw to running his hands along your arms, as he was already trying to venture to where your skirt and thighs met.

He went back to kissing your red lips and swallowing the whimpers that came from your mouth. He was only going deeper as you gripped the edge of the kitchen counter to keep you grounded and stop the spinning.

Calloused hands started climbing up your dress and toying with your underwear before you had to catch him by his wrist and practically plead with your eyes. You didn’t want to go further and just wanted to talk to him, but he must have taken the hesitation for something else because he was already jumping to his own conclusions.

Just as quickly as it all started, his body slowly became stiff until his kisses decrescendoed into nothing but a whisper when his lips called out your name.

“Steven?” you pulled away. You felt the change in his posture and how quickly his hands tore from your body.

“S-Sorry.” He was taken aback by the position he had you in and cleared his throat as he peeled his hands from your body and tucked it into his pockets.

You climbed down from where you were and fixed your dress while he desperately tried to ask what had happened.

“Nothing you have to worry about,” you lightly dismissed as you grabbed your things. “It went fine. Thank you for the wonderful evening, but I’ve got to head in early since I’m taking Benny’s shift tomorrow.”

“Hey, don’t forget this.” He was practically sprinting to meet you at the door with the stuffed crocodile while you made sure the smile on your face was still there.

“Thank you. Goodnight.”

“Night.” he awkwardly drew closer to kiss your forehead before you left and slipped into your room down the hall.

Marc had you reeling the entire night until the sun swallowed the moon as you thought about the way your body quaked while he was devouring your neck and left wet hickeys in his wake. In another bed, Steven was toying with the Rubik’s cube as he thought about how he was going to fix things once more. Marc had made it seem like the only option was to love one when you had always wanted to try to love both.

reblog for a part two?