[open & closed] Under the graveyard, we’re all rotting bones

[satanicpanics]

Who: Eddie & you
Where: Panorama
When: Late January and into February
What: When the canon update hits and suddenly you’re dead…

Warnings: Death, gore



[ It’s late when it happens. Eddie dozes in the back of his van in a quiet part of the city, just far enough away from the noise and lights to get a few hours of shut-eye. He’s about three hours deep when he suddenly jolts awake, gasping for breath, his eyes wide and his hair streaked with sweat.

Shit, he murmurs beneath his breath as he tries to soothe himself, sucking in deep breaths and raking his fingers through his hair. It was just a nightmare, just a nightmare—but the sound of dark wings had felt all too real. Dozens of razor sharp fangs digging into his flesh had felt all too real. The cold embrace of death had felt all too real.

The blood still dripping from open wounds is all too real. ]

Ahhh, shit. Goddammit!

[ Blood on his jaw, on his throat, in his mouth, blood soaking through his t-shirt. Blinding pain as he hisses between his teeth and chances a look, carefully peeling up the hem of his shirt. Beneath, patches of flesh have literally been eaten away, leaving of open wounds across his torso, from hip to shoulder. ]

Okay, okay. That’s not good. That’s—that’s pretty fucking bad. Okay. Shit.

[ Now what? Well, now he panics. ]



Below are mainly closed thread for those who requested them, but there’s a couple open ones! If you’d like something specifically for you, grab me at muttonchops or shoot me a PM!

Comments

Jinu;

[satanicpanics]

[ Eddie isn’t thinking clearly when he stumbles from his van, leaving the door ajar. It’s clear that he’s not in any shape for driving, so…walking is the obvious secondary choice. If he had calmed himself touch more, he might have recalled the existence of his phone, but it still remains untouched and uncharged in the front seat.

He doesn’t know what he’s looking for as he drags himself down the road—help maybe? Yeah, help. He needs help, but the world around him swims and he feels terribly cold, blood seeping from beneath the fingers he has planted to his side and cooling in the winter air. He doesn't get far. Less than a block and he’s sunken down against the facade of a closed shop, eyelids threatening to drift closed.

He really doesn’t want to die alone. He really doesn’t want to die at all, but it’s looking increasingly likely. Teeth chattering, he begins to sing to himself. Can’t die alone when Black Sabbath is there for you, right? ]

What'cha gonna do? Time's caught up with you. Now you wait your turn. You know there's no return—

Karen;

[satanicpanics]

[ Eddie tries his best to handle it alone. He all but disappears from public life for a few weeks, taking his stay in the hospital with no visitors, feeling dreadfully lonely, but crushing any desire to reach out. The hospital bill makes him sick enough, but the thought of worrying another group of friends, feeling their sympathetic gazes layered over the gut-wrenching guilt he feels? That’s too much. He broke a promise, he left Dustin there alone, could have messed up the entire thing, and he doesn’t even know because he got himself killed. By the time he’s released, he’s on the verge of a breakdown, and he needs to talk to someone.

It hasn’t been that long since he last visited the diner—just a little more than a month ago, but he looks like absolute death when he walks through the door. He’s disheveled and pale, thinner than he has any right to be with dark circles under his eyes, and he carries himself stiffly. There’s a bandage on his jaw, and one on his neck, one on his wrist, and that’s just what’s visible beneath the layers of clothing. He isn’t smiling, and he doesn’t feel like an adult at all. He feels lost and lonely and like a kid who desperately wants the embrace of a mother he hasn’t known for nearly fifteen years, or to be told he did good by a father who never actually gave a shit. He wants to be told it’s going to be okay. ]

Look—

[ His eyes are enormous as he approaches Karen behind the counter, wide and haunted and uncertain and just…scared. He’s made a ghost of himself in the past few weeks, and now he’s not entirely sure if anyone else can see him or not. ]

I know you’re working, and I don’t want to put this shit on you, but—I really, really need to talk and I really, really need someone to listen.

Mike;

[satanicpanics]

[ Mike is a high strung kid, and Eddie knows better than anyone what that’s like. Any little thing can add stress when things are already stressful, and he doesn’t want to be the person that places another weight on a kid’s shoulders. So he doesn’t reach out. Not while he’s in the hospital, and not even for a time after.

To be totally fair, he needed medical attention and looked like a corpse—more so than after the kidney incident. He still does, but he’s awake and capable of driving. All in all, it’s a few weeks before his van pulls up outside of LuxFilms.

He doesn’t come inside. His energy is still at rock bottom, he shouldn't even be putting the effort in to drive, but here he is. Instead, he hopes that Wheeler has his phone on him, and fires off a couple texts: ]

van’s outside
come here real quick

[ Which, you know, would sound really creepy without context, but this is Eddie, and he also tacks on: ]

bring popcorn

[micycle]

[ It vaguely occurs to Mike, during the blustery middle of January, that something could be wrong with Eddie. The silence isn't particularly unusual, and Mike knows it's at least half his fault; he hasn't reached out for help, all of these months, too caught up in the immature paradox of wanting someone to notice before he breaks his own pride. Some part of him had thought that things might be different after the train, after they'd actually talked about some shit. But since coming back, nothing.

One thing has been keeping him from getting angry about it all, and it's the kidney. Eddie knows a lot more people, though - people who can check in and make sure he's not dying. He doesn't need Mike, this annoying kid who can't offer a lick of help. Still, the worry creeps in anyway, until he finally starts to consider reaching out first.

As it turns out, he doesn't need to. ]

on my way

[ He shows up about five minutes later, a hunched tangle in whatever cast-offs count as his pajamas. Sweatpants, threadbare at the knees, and a t-shirt that's wildly oversized, even on his frame. It advertises some place called the "Boot & Saddle", represented by a very muscular cowboy; a popular gay bar across town, but Mike doesn't need to know that. He walks up to the passenger side of Eddie's van, and raises up the bag of popcorn as a greeting.]

[satanicpanics]

[ Eddie is familiar enough with town to have some concept of what Boot & Saddle is (one of his regular buyers works there; nice guy, looks suspiciously like the cowboy on the shirt), but he doesn’t have the energy to even get into that right now. All he can do is snort and give a weak roll of his eyes as Mike clambers into the passenger seat. ]

Hey.

[ Even now, nearing a month later—or has it been more?—he doesn’t look so hot. Most of his stitches are still can’t be removed, but the bandages at his neck and jaw have been removed, showing off some nasty scabbing that doesn’t exactly look like it was caused by anything human. He looks as if he hasn’t properly slept in ages. It’s clearly not just the kidney that’s troubling him anymore. ]

So, uh…

[ He really should have scripted something for himself, but how does one breach the topic of dying when they’re clearing sitting right there? Instead, the clears his throat like a dad about to tell his kid their favorite dog died, digs in his jacket pocket for a carton of cigarettes, and tips one out. And you know, what the hell, he offers one to Mike. Nancy could probably kill him a second time if she ever shows up, but it’s fine. ]

Doing alright?

[micycle]

[ Something feels desperately wrong from the start. Mike barely takes a breath as he climbs up into the van, eyes darting around between the new injuries to the face, the spiraling exhaustion, the paper-pale skin. ]

Yeah.

[ He sets the popcorn down on the console, taking the cigarette in exchange, but his eyes don't leave Eddie. There's a twist in his gut, like he's watching a shoe begin to drop. It feels a little like, "Honey, when did Will leave last night?"; a little like, "I'm so sorry, but Hop-" ]

... What's wrong.

[ It isn't a question. ]

[satanicpanics]

Trying out a new look.

[ He avoids eye contact as he mumbles out some lame attempt at joke that he’s fully aware doesn’t hit. His patented gallows humor has definitely been in better form, and he hopes he gets it back soon. He politely cracks a window as he lights his cigarette, then offers the flame to Mike, not pressuring, just knowing it’s what he would want in this situation: a way to calm his nerves.

It’s a particularly odd to think about when he inhales the smoke—it’s the same as always, but the fact that he’s somehow drawing a breath at all nearly sends him spiraling into panic. His eyes close tight for a moment as he works his way through it, slowly breathing out a column of smoke though the cracked window.

He owes a better response than a joke. He didn’t call Mike out here to joke. He draws in another deep breath, trying hard not to overthink it this time. ]

Or Hawkins wasn’t done with me, I guess.

[ Then he echoes Mike’s own words from their previous meeting, hoping it says what he needs it to: ]

Anyone would do it, right? Die for their friends?

[micycle]

[ Mike follows Eddie's actions - breathing in just right so that it catches, holding his chest tight against the start of a cough. You don't reach fifteen in the 1980s without trying at least one cigarette, but it's nothing he's managed before without choking. This time there's that familiar, humiliating need to seem cool in front of Eddie Munson, but there's also something else. Something vulnerable and terrifying. A weak spot he needs to fill up with poison before something worse reaches it.

Then: Anyone would do it, right?

The world narrows down to a pinhole. It leaves just the orange light from outside, tunneling black around Eddie's face; hot rush of blood, pounding in Mike's ears until he's nearly deaf with it, until his entire head is spinning. ]

... No. [ It comes out like a gag on the back of his tongue. ] No, that's-

[ He shakes his head, slow and unsteady until it's not, until he's pushing back against the door like this is something he can escape. ]

You're wrong, you're- [ No, no, no, no- ] You fucking asshole, you can't-

[ His voice rises and breaks more with each word, until he seems to run out of them, the rest stuck tight in his throat. ]

Arthur;

[satanicpanics]

coming tomorrow...

Open;

[satanicpanics]

also tomorrow