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soddersays2019-08-25 12:00 am
sodder) wrote in soddersays2019-08-25 12:00 am
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SEPTEMBER 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME
SEPTEMBER 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME
Welcome to September's Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: CHAOS.
All Test Drive Memes contain at least one clue to the Deerington's upcoming in-game events for the month! Keep your eyes peeled! But...not literally.
Characters may die during TDMs, but you do not need to count it towards a game-canonical death unless you want to. Consider it a freebie. All TDMs can be considered game canon as TDMs introduce minor aspects about the world of Deerington that can be revisited by characters later on in the game. You may also use TDMs for your application writing sample as well as AC.
CW: Torture (emotional and possibly physical), claustrophobia, potential weapon violence (guns, knives, spears, flamethrowers, etc.), possible body horror, emotional manipulation, emojis
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!
DICE BLOCK
In case everyone hasn't had enough fun and games to last a life time in the good old town of Deerington, apparently this month brings you one more. Maybe you were just walking through the door to get into your own house, or maybe you were leaving from work — the moment you walk through any door, you'll find that it doesn't open up to the place you were looking for. Instead, you find yourself standing on a giant game board and you seem to be right on the start space. The doors already disappeared behind you, don't bother trying to run back. The only exit is at the end and you'll have to hope you make it there.But you aren't alone! With you are other unfortunate souls who hopefully weren't just looking for a quick bathroom break. Some of them might look a little worse for wear. What happened? Well, looks like you may have to ask later, because you'll only really have time to exchange names if you don't already know one another before a large screen you didn't notice was hanging from the ceiling will light up. There's a giant image of a typical six-sided game die that's completely stationary. For the moment. Shortly after, a voice will come on over the speakers, echoing in the otherwise fairly empty room. It's overly cheerful, grating, and giggles at the end of every sentence.
Would you like to hear the rules?
Okay!
Each player will take a turn rolling their die.
You can then move the number of spaces shown — but only those spaces!
You can move forward, backward, right, and left, but not diagonally!
Each space will have a symbol.
The spaces with a clover are lucky spaces! Congratulations! You'll gain some fortune, whether it's an extra turn, moving ahead more spaces, or gaining an important item you can take with you on your journey!
The spaces with the skull are unlucky spaces! Boooooo, that's too bad! You'll befall some grave misfortune here. Hopefully it won't set you back too badly! Make sure to avoid these at all costs!
The spaces with a chest are item spaces! Here you'll be able to win prizes, like medical supplies or weapons! Maybe even a small something from home! Wouldn't that be nice?
Your goal is to make it to the end alive! Good luck! And remember to have lots of fun!
The first player's name will pop up on the screen, before the die will begin to randomly blink between numbers. Eventually it will land on a number. Once the player moves forward and lands on their space, it will repeat for the second player. This will go on until one (or both players) reach the end!
When they said to make sure to not land on an unlucky space, they certainly weren't kidding. Each one seems to come with some sort of random punishment or horror; it can be as light as having to move back a few spaces or go back to the start, or as heavy as breaking a random bone or feeling a blade slice open your skin. Maybe you'll start to slowly turn into a monster or become filled with the desire to kill your opponent. Anything can happen, but it's always going to be bad.
Players who reach the end will be able to go through the door and end up back wherever it was they were intending to go in the first place. Players who lose? Well... It's back to the beginning for you. Time to wait for the next player. Better luck next time.
DANCE DANCE
But what's behind door number two! People are going to start to get tired of walking around in their own houses at this rate. Even if you managed to escape the board game horrors, this new room you've found yourself in doesn't seem much better. In the center is a large TV screen and on the floor in front of it are two pads with arrows pointing in four directions; up, down, left, and right. Anyone who is familiar with Dance Dance Revolution might feel right at home! But fear not, there are instructions on the screen for you to follow if you need them.Two players only, and you'll have to work together! It's a team dance and you'll want to encourage each other to stay perfectly in sync. The doors won't open until you finish, and should you mess up? Well, look up, friend!
The ceiling is covered in sharp, painful looking spikes and every time someone misses a beat or steps on the wrong arrow, the ceiling will drop down a foot. It's pretty high up there, but miss more than three arrows and you're gonna start to really feel the pressure. The spikes are looking a lot bigger and more ominous than they did when they were all the way at the top. Hopefully you've got some good rhythm.
But this is a good lesson in teamwork! Even the worst dancers might be able to get out of here okay if they've got someone who they can work together with. Maybe their perfect scores will make up for your two left feet. You can only hope you're both so lucky.
THAT'S NOT A "MEH" FACE!
Everyone loves to get a text, don't they? Of course they do! Which is why someone has been kind enough to send out a little special something to everyone's Fluid's this month! There's no name you recognize — in fact, it doesn't even look like a name is attached at all. The sender's identification only looks like this: 🥳The message you've gotten is pretty simple though! Each person has received a text message with one emoji inside. No rhyme or reason applied! That's... random, isn't it? You can try to text back, but no one will answer, and so you might as well just close your device and forget about it.
Every person who received a text will find that their personality starts to shift. They begin to take on some aspect that's tied to the emoji they received. Did you get a simple smiley face? You're happy and relaxed for the time being! Or maybe a silly face will lead you to become more of a prankster. An eggplant could have someone feeling like sexting a Special Someone. An angry face might get you really riled up, even towards people you love. Did you get a knife? Time to start stabbing. A gun? Those people around you look like really good target practice...
The options are endless. Each emojis effects will last for twenty-four hours or until another emoji is sent from the same user.
Character Arrival
You can read how all characters arrive in Deerington here.There is not a collective "all these characters showed up at the exact same moment" occurrence in Deerington. Since characters fall asleep, die, or pass out at various times throughout all their worlds, it wouldn't make too much sense if they arrived in game all at the exact same time. There should be some discrepancy between character arrival, whether by a couple minutes, hours, or even days up to a week.
The players are entirely in control of how/when they want to play their characters arriving in Deerington. For TDMs, you can play it like your character has just arrived and that can be maintained as your game canon, or you can wait until game events for that moment. Or you don't need to acknowledge it at all. The flexibility for character allows a bit more of an organic feel to the character arrival situation, so please play it to whatever feels right for you.
If you are interested in having an "arrival" introduction for one of your TDM prompts, you are more than welcome to explore that option.
no subject
part of why he'd felt so betrayed when bill punched him outside the neibolt house, if he's entirely honest.
getting angry here and now with eddie isn't going to help anything at all though, especially not with eddie seeming so fragile. despite his size and fanny pack full of pills, eddie's never felt all that fragile to richie before, and that actually worries him even more than the arm.
he wraps his own arms back around the other boy when he goes in for another hug and doesn't make any cracks about eddie clearly being bereft without his presence, or any sort of comparisons to eddie's mom, the words sort of souring on his tongue when eddie sounds like he's trying to convince himself that richie is real. ]
Yeah. Yeah, of course I am, Eds. Where else would I be? [ his throat gets a little tight, his eyes a little hot, and he presses his face into the side of eddie's head until the feeling goes away and he can talk again. ] Sorry I'm late.
[ a beat, just long enough for the earnestness of the apology to settle in, for him to be sure he can get the words out without choking on them. ]
Your mom was real demanding and I couldn't get away.
no subject
It wasn't Richie's fault, after all. None of it was.)
Not here, I guess. (Eddie replies simply, and a little thickly, and oh, God. He did not need to cry right now. He squeezes Richie tighter than he's squeezed anyone else before, like some part of him felt maybe if he hugged Richie hard enough he really wouldn't be able to vanish again.
He turns his face in against Richie's neck, and it's one of those too-close moments where if Eddie had his wherewithal, he'd realize he might be nudging against some boundaries here.)
Good. You should be. (Sorry, that is. Eddie sounds a little relieved.) But it's okay. I'll forgive you this time. Next time though you're shit out of luck.
(The joke shocks Eddie and yet, it doesn't surprise him at all because of course. It's Richie. He wants to be annoyed. Really, he does. But it's been such a long time since he's heard one of Richie's dumb jokes that he begins to laugh in earnest. It's quiet at first but then it rises up and bursts out of him, his whole body shaking with laughter. It's clear it's half-amused, half-relieved, and at some point Eddie pulls away from Richie. He rubs his fists into his eyes, sniffing, and still laughing, but when he drops his hands, it's clear that there may have been some tears.
But now he was grinning.)
You're such a turd sometimes, Rich. (The joke was a welcome relief. Eddie's shoulders are a lot less tense, and he felt like he could breathe a little again.)
So. Looks like I get to show you around town. (Again. But Eddie doesn't say that.)
no subject
the pain, at least, manages to distract him somewhat from eddie's breath ghosting lightly across his neck.
when eddie finally does pull away, richie finds himself at a loss with what to do with his hands and resorts to stuffing them away in his pockets, eyes sliding just to the lest of eddie's face to avoid having to look at even the remnants of tears in his eyes. he whistles lowly. ]
A turd, huh? Yowza Eds, you kiss your mother with that dirty fucking mouth of yours?
[ he can do this. he can keep things smooth and normal. it doesn't matter that richie hasn't seen eddie in weeks and eddie hasn't seen him in much longer. that eddie's apparently been savaged by a whole new hell town while richie wasn't there to look after him. and two stupid letters carved into some wood don't suddenly make feelings any realer than they already were, even if it kind of feels like they do every time he lets himself look at eddie's face.
he can do this. ]
Guess I got nothing better to do with my day. Sure, give me the full Eddie Kaspbrak Experience, at least I'll know where the pharmacy is after.
no subject
(Eddie drawls this and sticks his tongue out of his mouth at Richie in an exaggerated expression of disgust. The shift was a welcome one. There was too much stacked up from Deerington that could be talked about effortlessly in one sitting. They just had to take what they could and run from there.
They could both do this. Eddie rubs his hands down the front of his shorts, and he wanted to do his best to try and keep it cool. Some part of paranoid that if he didn't then Richie might leave, might slip right between his fingers.)
Oh fuck you. I know where a lot more than just the pharmacy is. (Though he definitely frequented the pharmacy more than he was about to admit. Oh but then he gets such a grin on his face, rocking back onto his heels.)
Hey. This means I get to show you my sweet ride. Wait here. Hold on.
(Eddie's spinning on his feet and darting away around the corner from which he'd already come from. There's a few minutes of silence, and then there's a low mechanical grumble. Slowly a red beast of a car comes around the corner, the windows blacked out in an uneasy sort way, and the car pulls right up next to the curb. It's threatening for a car, but then Eddie's opening the driver's door and standing up, looking over the hood at Richie with the world's biggest shit-eating grin on his face. Yes, Richie, you can think he's the coolest kid on the block now. He permits it.)
Meet Christine.
(Eddie's not thinking too hard. If he was he'd realize that he had a spare pair of Richie's glasses on the dash carefully locked around a weird bobble head of a Saint Bernard that looked like it had eaten a bar of soap. He's not thinking about what that might mean though- having Richie's glasses on his dash. He's too busy eager to show off the fact that yeah, he could drive, and yes, he had a bitching car.)
no subject
still, eddie seems to brighten exponentially at the mere idea of showing richie around and maybe he doesn't want to spoil any of that just yet. even if he is oh so painfully tempted to renege on that decision the moment eddie starts spouting off about a 'sweet ride'.
he doesn't know what he was expecting eddie to bring back, really, but the red fucking monsters he pulls up alongside richie in certainly isn't it, whatever it was. what the fuck. ]
Holy fucking shit, Eds, who'd you have to whack to get your hands on this fucking thing?
[ and now he's done holding himself back with self-control that's always been practically nonexistent to begin with. he swoops down low into eddie's space and wraps one hand around one of eddie's shins, wagging the entire leg slightly back and forth in his grip. ] And how the fuck are you even driving it with these tiny little things, anyway? Can you even reach the pedals?
I genuinely dont know which one is being more obnoxious here
In the meantime Eddie was too busy practically shining with pleasure at Richie’s reaction. Oh sure he had shown his car off gladly to dozens of people by now, but none of them had been Richie Tozier. Aka the one person whose opinion mattered above all other. Not that Eddie would ever admit that- though it is beyond evident in the way that his gray eyes were so bright they seemed silver.)
No one. One day she just showed up and it was love at first sight. It sounds dumb but she’s definitely got a mind of her own. She uh- helped me out back when I got hurt. Ran the person over.
(Not that Eddie wanted to bring it back up but he did want Richie to know that this beast of a car was on Eddie’s side.
People have made comments about how a shorty like him could be driving, but none have ever done it the Richie Tozier way which was to completely invade his sense. Eddie doesn’t jerk his leg away, but he does give a great shriek, his face flushing red. It was impossible to tell if he was blushing from rage, embarrassment, or some combination. He gives Richie’s shoulder a solid smack for his troubles- though curiously doesn’t try to shove him away or do anything to get him to stop shaking his leg. Figures.)
Riiiiichie! Stop that! I'm not that short. My legs are perfectly capable. People under 5’5 drive all the time. We can’t all be long ass bitches like you and Bev and Bill, okay?
(And because it just felt right and because if Richie was going to be obnoxious then so was Eddie- Eddie tugs his legs out from under the steering wheel and proceeds to slump down in his seat and shove both of his feet into Richie’s side and stomach, pushing with all his strength. A wide smirk grew on his face as he gave Richie’s side a good, but harmless kick.)
See? They work just fine, Rich.
it's definitely richie right now
(eddie might be tiny, but he's fighty, always has been).
once he's got his breath back he huffs out an exasperated sigh, narrows his eyes at eddie, and wraps his arms around both of eddie's ankles before folding over and draping himself fully over the other boy's legs to prevent him from getting any sort of wise idea to rabbit kick richie again. ]
Only you would get yourself saddled with a benevolent haunted ride, Eds.
[ a beat. ]
Well, maybe Ben, but his wouldn't try to kill people.
[ his expression turns from considering to wicked in the space of another heartbeat as he decides to take advantage of his current position to lean even further into eddie's space and bat his eyelashes rapidly at him. ]
Long am I? Eddie Spaghetti, have you been peeking?
there is no heterosexual explanation for this
What’s that supposed to mean, you dick?
(His eyes narrow but there wasn’t much heat there. Instead there was only mild wonder.
Wonder that quickly became bug-eyed shock. Which, really, at this point who was the real idiot for setting Richie up a perfect platform to spring a dick joke off of? It doesn’t stop Eddie from practically becoming a live wire under Richie, giving a high pitched shriek of indignation.)
You are so disgusting! (Eddie shoves his hands up at Richie’s face in some poor attempt to wipe that stupid look off of it. He winds up grabbing a handful of hair and wrenching Richie down closer, his eyes bright and his tone level. Clearly this was meant to be threatening:)
The only time I'm taking a peek is when I’m trying to figure out if you’re close enough for me to rip it off.
Richie would very much like to die now thanks
it's not an especially illuminating or helpful explanation, or even all that clever, but their current arrangement has him distracted and he's honestly not all that interested in talking about the car anyway.
before eddie manages to tangle his fingers into richie's hair, they smudge the all over richie's glasses, of course, and richie gives an aggrieved sigh, followed swiftly by a short yelp when eddie yanks him forward by his hair. ]
Jesus, Eddie, easy on the merchandise would ya?
[ his mind sports through a variety of smart(trash)mouth remarks in response to eddie's threat, ranging all the way from bringing up the boy's mother again to bursting into tears from shock at the closeness of him now, after everything.
what finally winds up tumbling out of his mouth winds up sounding almost like an invitation. ]
How much closer do you need to get, Eds? I thought I was the one with bad eyes.
[ ... sometimes richie really regrets ever learning how to speak. ]
only if eddie can join
(It was just worse in a smaller space. Eddie's voice just carried and challenged the sound barrier. Except despite his loudness and the scowl on his face, Eddie somehow manages to say it in a way that suggests he was smiling behind his words.
He does feel a bit of guilt when Richie yelps, and he eases up on the pulling.)
Sorry, Rich. (A genuine apology among the wrangling around. He didn't like accidentally hurting Richie. He's working himself under Richie, legs tucking in, and he's doing his very best when Richie goes on and says that. His head snaps back so quick that it bounces off the door behind him and he's seeing stars.)
Ow. (He murmurs in a dazed sort of way, heat already rushing helpfully into his face. Once his head clears, he's shaking it back and forth and giving Richie a full body shove.)
You started it!
(Ah yes. The mature defense passed down from generation of dumbass kid to the next. Eddie manages to scramble free from Richie, and he's sitting upright and normally in his seat. His hands float to his hair automatically, patting it idly to make sure that it didn't look dumb in the wake of their messing around.)
My eyes aren't great for the record. (He says belatedly, shifting around in his seat, leaning his weight onto his hand and pointing to his own eyes.)
I should be wearing them more often, but I figured I'd leave the role of bozo in glasses rightfully yours.
(In speaking of glasses, Eddie suddenly looks perfectly exasperated.)
What'd you do to your glasses! They're all smudged. (Eddie that was literally your fault. No matter. He sticks his hand out with quiet expectancy. It may also be a silent apology.)
no subject
and riling eddie up has always been a guaranteed method to get eddie touching him back, even if it's just to hit him.
even richie sometimes thinks that he goes a touch too far though. the shove eddie gives him at his impulsive comment sends richie rocking back onto his heels in a crouch at the driver's door and he lets himself stay there for now, watching eddie flail with a soft, fond smile. ]
Probably for the best if you don't, I'm not sure your eyes could handle how handsome I am with that much clarity.
[ he says it like a joke, rolling his eyes when eddie starts chewing him out for his own glasses, but he pulls them off agreeably enough and hands them over, letting his splinter filled fingertips linger ever so slightly against the soft palm of eddie's hand before pulling away again.
there's no fear, no matter what terrible thoughts pennywise tried to plant in his head to the contrary. here, in the enclosed space of eddie's car with only eddie as his witness, he can allow himself this much without worrying. ]
no subject
He snorts at Richie's comment, taking the glasses from him, and well, if his hands linger a little too long then that's just how it is between them. He notices the prickle of splinters almost immediately- too hyper aware of that kind of thing in general but especially pertaining to Richie.
They would deal with that in a second. For now, Eddie takes Richie's glasses from him. He leans over to pop open his glove compartment where he kept a few basic glasses maintenance things. Most importantly being a microfiber cloth.)
Oh yeah, Rich. You're really as hard to look at as the sun. Just a blazing ball of fire that'll scald my eyes out.
(...It was amazing how Eddie found a way to call Richie hot while disguising it as an insult. He sinks into the seat, right next to Richie, close enough that every few seconds his leg bounced and bumped against Richie's leg. Bless 50s cars for having those big open front seats. Eventually he just leaves his knee against Richie and works on the glasses.
Eventually they're cleaner than when Richie bought them-probably-. Eddie briefly puts them on his own face to gauge such cleanliness, humming his approval, and finally slips them off and puts them back onto Richie's face with the utmost care.)
Now let me see your hands. What'd you do to them? (Eddie turns a bit in the seat, and he holds both of his hands out expectantly.)
Were you climbing a tree or something?
no subject
it's not that richie can see all that much of eddie while he's cleaning them, that's probably his biggest downer about this whole thing, he wishes a lot for two pairs of glasses so he could just wear one while eddie is cleaning the other and maybe get to see his face scrunch up in quiet focus while he works, but richie barely manages to keep one pair of glasses intact at a time so that's a distant, impossible dream but. there's enough of eddie's shape and posture in the blur of colors visible to him that he can't help but watch with quiet fondness regardless.
the slope of eddie's shoulders, the dark smear of his eyebrows. it's almost enough to distract richie from the heart-pounding realization that eddie just compared him to the sun, and did a pretty piss poor job of making it sound like an insult too. ]
Eddie, my love, I'll be your sun, moon and stars, just say the word.
[ he means every word of it with all his heart of course, but he's counting on eddie to take it as read for more of his fresh bullshit, even as he presses his knee back into eddie's and dutifully offering up his besplintered fingers for eddie's careful examination. ]
I was fighting one of those tree guys from the Lord of the Rings for your honor. You shoulda heard the things they were saying about you, Eds, I was absolutely appalled.
no subject
(The trouble is that Eddie doesn't really say 'shut up' so much as literally giggles it in this nervous sort of way. He wishes with all his might that he could melt right through the car seat and into the center of the earth. Not having seen Richie around for so long made him a lot weaker to this sort of thing. He wanted to tell Richie to knock it off like he always did, to not call him those pet names of his, but he had missed Richie more than he could put into words.
He was almost afraid that if he really told Richie to shove it, really told Richie to stop calling him things like 'Eds' or 'My love' then Richie would disappear just like that. And then what? It'd be another year before he heard Richie saying those things again? No thanks. Eddie wasn't taking his chances.
Thank fuck he had Richie's fingers to focus on. He holds Richie's hand very carefully, bringing it up close to his face for a better look. He really hadn't been lying about needing glasses.)
You mean an ent? (Lord of the Rings was blessedly the one pop culture thing Eddie definitely knew even in the 1950s.)
Oh, I'm sure that they just had loads to say. Were they making fun of my morning wood again? (Get it...Because...wood? Trees? Anyway this is the boy Richie signed up for and he was a trainwreck most days. He gets up onto his knees then, letting go of Richie's hand briefly so that he could bend over the front car seat and dangle himself into the back. His legs kick around for a second because hello! Short! But he drops back into the seat a second later with a red fanny pack. He pulls it open and begins to tug out a variety of simple medical supplies: tweezers, alcohol wipes, a small can of benzocaine, and a pair of bifocals. The glasses go on first, and they're not as thick as Richie's, but they're as big. He's used to wearing them for medical stuff over at F.E.A.R by now, so he doesn't think twice about the fact that Richie hadn't seen them yet.
He proceeds to sanitize the tweezers with the wipes and grabs Richie's hand again, bending down low to start his work. He's meticulous but exceedingly gentle.)
Sorry. It'll probably hurt a little. (He snags the first splinter and pulls it out with quick precision. Deposits the splinter into the alcohol wipe wrapper, and goes in for the next. It's far from the hardest medical thing he's had to do in a while, and Eddie's done with it before long. At least the ugly part. He slides his fingers very carefully over Richie's palm and over his fingers, frowning.)
I think I got them all. Does it feel like I missed any?
no subject
normally eddie would have told him to stop with the pet names by now, but he's hardly going to complain that he hasn't yet. between that and how much the other boy has been touching him since they saw each other, it very nearly feels like permission. ]
Edward Llewellyn Kaspbrak!
[ richie gasps loudly, pulling one hand out from eddie's careful grasp to press it over his mouth like a wilting southern belle taken to the vapors. he tries on a voice to match the gesture, but it really just winds up sound like a falsetto version of his british officer. ]
Such colorful language is hardly becoming of a gentleman, young sir.
[ honestly he'd been planning to make some joke about eddie being "fast" since those woody fucks were so goddamn slow, but he can hardly pull out that shit now that eddie's gone and upstaged him.
and anyway, he gets pretty distracted when eddie pulls the bifocals out, big and clunky and so old fashioned that richie immediately has flashes of eddie wearing those things still has an old man, and his heart slips a beat at the thought of still being around to see eddie get to that point.
he let's out a soft, heartfelt sigh at the image before he can stop himself, but manages to transform the sound into a hiss of pain halfway through when eddie starts to dig into his hands with the tweezers. christ, why were splinters so damn painful, anyway? the wood around the kissing bridge was so old and soft that even if he'd been in the right state of mind to be careful it would have been impossible to get away without at least a few, but this is honestly ridiculous.
at least it means that eddie is more or less holding his hands now. the faint, stinging pain of his treatment hardly even registers in the back of richie's mind in comparison.
once eddie's all done and releases his hands, richies clenches them experimentally between them, pressing his fingertips down into his palm with careful pressure to check for any splinters that might have dodged eddie's eye. ]
All good, Doctor K. You oughta make a career out of this. Put all that paranoia to good use.
no subject
(Eddie juts his tongue out at Richie, but he doesn't keep it out for long. There's work to be done and he wanted to take care with Richie's hands. Even if it was only just a few lousy wooden splinters. God could only know the kind of diseases that lurked about Deerington and the small things that could jump start them. No way was he about to take any risks.
Least of all with Richie Tozier.
He bites at the inside of his own cheek when he hears that soft hiss of pain. Wants to apologize, but knows it's one of those necessary acts of cruel kindness. It would be over soon in any case.
Eddie grins in satisfaction when Richie confirmed that he'd gotten all of them out. The tweezers get set aside, and he fixes his glasses, a prickle of heat rising up into his cheeks. It was a moment of shyness because it was another thing to tell Richie about himself.)
I kind of have. Here, I mean. I'm uh-. A part time medic over at F.E.A.R's headquarters. It's a whole thing. It's not a big deal. I just help around sometimes.
(Eddie rushes through this explanation, having no interest in making it seem like he did anything special. Anything important. He slips the tweezers back into his fanny pack and grabs for Richie's hands again.)
This will feel better.
(And sanitize. Eddie shakes the can of dermoplast and sprays it over both of Richie's hands. The can gets dropped a second later, and Eddie leans in close to Richie's hands to blow over them to help the stuff dry a bit faster.)
There. (Eddie sits up straight, smiling in a satisfied sort of way. He's still holding the backs of Richie's hands, just kinda not thinking to take them away.)
i like that eddie just let richie invent a middle name for him
Oh I would, but I don't want to make your mom jealous.
[ his thoughts run along a variety of closely diverging paths at this revelation about his fretting being put to use in a more official scenario here in deerington. a young, stupid voice in his head feels possessive, wants to hoard eddie's mother-henning tendencies amongst the loser's club exclusively, but he quickly stifles that one because it's honestly embarrassing to acknowledge.
mostly, he's reminded of the fact that this town is dangerous enough to even warrant eddie's skills, which of course sends his mind spiralling down the rabbit hole of the cause for eddie's scars, the fact that he wasn't here to do anything about it.
the danger, that's hardly anything new, and he's not even entirely put out by the existence of an organization that thought it was clever to name itself fear, though its mere existence suggests that unlike derry the people of this town are aware enough of the dangers to actually try and do something about it which is. novel, honestly.
no, it's the fact that they're employing a kid eddie's age, no matter how competent richie knows he is, that has him raising an eyebrow. because that suggests that people in this town actually take kids seriously, and richie isn't entirely sure how to handle that idea. ]
F.E.A.R., huh? What dramatic fuck thought that was a good idea?
[ richie shivers lightly when eddie goes and blows on his hands like a menace, and he stares down quietly at their hands for a long, considering moment before turning his hands palm up and interlacing his newly mended fingers gently with eddie's own. ]
Eddie... how bad has it been? No bullshit.
listen sometimes you just gotta choose your battles & eddie knows it
But for two years and counting. He'd been eleven when he was first broken off from the Losers and put into this weird multidimensional experience.
And now he was turning fourteen in November.
That was a long time to go without your best friends, and Eddie had had to survive. Surviving meant finding the one or two people he thought he could trust, and it turns out that there were some decent people outside of Derry after all.
There were adults who worked at F.E.A.R who definitely didn't approve of a kid working there. He had gotten some looks, some chiding tones, but he ignored it by now. Eddie's solitary confinement had made him ignore it. He was in the constant mind state of oh what the fuck do you know? No one understood. No one understood at all. He didn't think people in this town took kids any more seriously than most adults, but there were some adults here who at least realized that Eddie wasn't a baby anymore. That he'd been through things too, and that he could use his techniques to help people. When the town was on fire and monsters were everywhere- there wasn't a choice. You either let the neurotic thirteen year old help stitch you up or you bled out.
Eddie's silent for a long time, just staring down at their curled hands. The questions' left him emptied out and hollow in a way that's familiar to him by now. He was tired. He was so tired of constantly losing this boy, and it makes him shake a little. In some ways he'd gotten so much better, he thinks, but in other ways he's crumbled apart at the seams. After all, Losers were strongest when they were together. Not apart.
Eddie doesn't even realize he's started to cry. They were the kind of tears that snuck up on you and only made themselves known when they dripped off your face and hit your arm. He blinks a few times, looking surprised at himself, but then just kind of deflates, not surprised at all. Of course he was crying. There was just so much to cry about all of the time that he had figured he'd run the well dry a while ago. Apparently not. Stupid, really, to think that he ever could. He was still that idiot boy who would see a pretty animal and sob over how much it made him feel. God, why was he like this anyway? He can feel the dull press of a migraine starting behind his eye, and he lifts his free hand up to rub over his temple.)
Rich. I don't...(He stops, closes his eyes, and there's just. So much. He finally looks directly at Richie with tired gray eyes, and he slips his glasses off and sets them aside on the dash next to his spare pair of Richie's glasses. He sinks back into Christine's seat and curls his body up, curling it in towards Richie like he just wanted to crawl onto him and burrow, never let go. He settled for holding Richie's hand instead, his body aching for a more solid thing, but he was just. He couldn't.)
I have no clue where to even begin.
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he knew, that despite all of eddie's squawking and bitching about things like grey water and tetnus and poison ivy, if something was really bothering him he would keep quiet. like he felt his concerns wouldn't be taken seriously even if he did speak up so he just kept it to himself and stewed in the feeling of it. even more than whatever paranoid fears eddie's mom fed into the other boy on a daily basis, richie really thought it was the bottling, more than anything, that got eddie so sick sometimes.
or no, not sick, that was just the face mrs. k liked to put on it. but eddie had the capability to pull things in on himself so tightly that he started to choke on those feelings. most of the time, richie only had to get him yelling to release some of that tension, and he has a particular talent in doing just that but.
this was different, he could tell. more serious. and so he'd tried for honesty and now eddie was crying over it. a thought, a feeling lodges in his throat as he watches eddie try to disappear into himself, and now richie is having trouble breathing but he's got more important things to worry about right now.
richie brings both hands up to cup at eddie's face, the familiar gesture coming off a bit more awkwardly than usual because he refuses to let go of eddie's hand to do it. he gets the other boy focusing on his face, makes sure he isn't about to just drift away, but looking eddie in the eyes like this only gives the feeling in his throat a clawing quality, and eventually he's forced to release both eddie's face and hand so he can wrap his arms fully around him and pull him close. so he can envelop eddie completely, one hand spread flat across his back and the other cupping the back of his neck. ]
Start wherever you want, Eddie, I've got the time. I'm not going anywhere, remember?
this is literally so much prose i am so sorry lmao
Blowjob...Want a blowjob, kid?
No. No it wasn't flu season at all that had laid him flat out in his bed late at night, shaking at the way the trees outside of his window had made ominous shapes across his wall. Just like when he had cried over that lousy seagull in the train yard, he wasn't just crying because of some dumb bird. He'd been crying because that bird was capable of everything he hadn't been: escaping.
Richie and Eddie were both like that. Tucking all of their hurt deep inside where they hoped no one would ever be able to find it. All of their real insecurities were kept barricaded firmly behind certain attitudes, certain performances. It was bottling- Richie was right- that made Eddie sick. That had him chewing on anxiety pills because it worked faster than swallowing.
It works because it's always worked. Eddie was fantastic with directions, but throw himself into his own head and he'd be lost for hours. Richie's always been good at wrenching him away from himself. He has to blink a few dozen times when Richie first grabs his face. Then he's being pulled in close and Eddie clings with his entire body. He hugs Richie tightly, and winds up just outright on his lap because of it and it's far from the first time, and it'll be far from the last time.
For a second he just lets himself work it loose. He presses his face into Richie's shoulder and bawls his fucking eyes out. He's shaking something fierce and crying in gasping sort of sobs, because it's been years of this, years of sliding through so much fucking hell, and years of feelings, years of missing Richie, years of thinking about awful things he's found out, years of loss. There's just been so much, and the entire time one thing has always remained the exact same: he's just wanted Richie. Everything would have been so much god damn easier if Richie was just around.
It takes some time, but eventually Eddie calms down, the shaking tappers off, his gasping turns into soft hiccups, and he remembers piece by piece where he was. The body wrapped up around him was warm, was real, and very much still there. Richie smelled like summer and familiarity, and Eddie squeezes so tightly around him for a second, his whole body curling into it, and he just wanted to be burrowed deep inside of Richie where he felt like nothing would ever hurt him again. Eventually a singular clear, distinct feeling opens up wide in his chest, and it's an easy, wonderful, effortless love, and all Eddie can think of was how much love he felt for this boy. He's too hectic, too worn around the edges to worry about it, to think too hard. It's always been so easy to love Richie. Love all of the Losers, certainly, but loving Richie was something else and always had been.
He exhales. Rubs his face against Richie's shoulder in a way that's clearly to try and rub some tears away, and then he picks his head up, his eyes a little pink, and a little puffy, but brilliantly shiny and he looks much calmer now. The tip of his nose was a little red, and there were streaks down his face, but he no longer looked like the world was about to end.)
Sorry-. I think I'm. I think I can breathe now. (He sniffs, and they're close, way too close- if he were in a different state of mind, he'd be dying, but this was-. It mattered. He needed to be close to Richie right now.)
I've missed you so fucking much, Rich. Jesus. Give me a second.
it wonderful shhhh
that he isn't going anywhere.
he holds eddie and waits for him to be ready to talk, hardly even notices that eddie's basically sprawled in his lap now, aside from how that makes it easier for him to keep him close.
eddie's red tipped nose shouldn't be as cute as it is, considering the circumstances, but it is and he gives into the desire to pinch it lightly in encouragement. the smile he's giving eddie is soft, slightly pained, and deeply genuine. ]
I'm here, Eds. I'm here. And I'm not going anywhere.
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(Eddie's voice pitches in his familiar whine of Richie's name as his nose is pinched. His eyes squint shut and normally he'd wrench away and probably flail a bit, screaming, but crying has worn him down and the whine was as good as Richie would get. He does reach up and loosely link his fingers around Richie's wrist, tugging his hand away, but not very far.
He also doesn't let go right away, instead frowning very firmly at Richie as if it would cement good behavior. An idle hope.)
You better not goddamn go anywhere. If you do I'll be a real fucking nightmare the next time you see me. You hear that? I swear it, Richie. You'll be in so much trouble.
(Eddie's fingers around Richie's wrist tighten. There were a thousand pleas in that squeeze: a thousand ways to say please never leave me.
All the ways that Eddie had always failed to say to Richie before. And would continue to fail to say.
He lowers his hand and with it- Richie's. He stares down at their hands and turns Richie's hand over, as if inspecting for more slivers. He slides his finger directly over the center of Richie's palm where he remembered Richie's scar to be from the promise. It wasn't on Richie's hand now.
Eddie turns his own hand over and opens it up. The center of his right hand looked a bit like a starburst. There was his original promise, one harsh line straight across, but then there were three other straight slashes, each at a slightly different angle, and then in the middle, the scar tissue was wider.)
You haven't made the promise yet. (It isn't a question.) What's the last thing you remember?
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the fact that eddie keeps hold of his wrist after is no small matter either, of course.
the small starbust scar in the center of eddie's palm is a surprise to him only because it seems purposeful. none of the sloppy, desolate destruction of eddie's arm, this scar has a purpose and serves it, nothing more, nothing less.
richie just doesn't know what that purpose is. ]
Promise?
[ he wants to ask, and even opens his mouth to do just that, when eddie's second question registers and he freezes up cold. there's no safe answer there for him here, not without going back nearly a month, and he's so preoccupied tracing those events back to something he'd be willing to mention here and now that the fact that he's searching through his thoughts is probably all too evident in his eyes.
eventually, he settles on one, and his expression clears slightly, though there's a distinctly different tenor to the troubled look in his eyes now. ]
We all went into the Neibolt house. You broke your arm really bad and IT almost killed all of us. Your mom came and picked you up and... I had a fight with Bill. We all split up after that.
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(The scars had been a heavy weight to hold over the past few years but they had kept his heart together when things were at their worst.)
...Okay well. We defeat IT. Both in the 80s and in the 50s. Afterwards we make a promise that if IT ever comes back that we'll come back too and fight IT.
(It's really as simple as that. He opened his mouth to explain about the other promises he had made, but realizes he can't. Not without having to explain everything that had come with them. Seeing himself dying in the sewers and the promise the Losers had made back on some spaceship that they wouldn't just abandon each other. The promise he'd made with Chloe after she had killed him that they wouldn't let this town do that to them again.
Those things were too big, and he thought one day he could tell Richie, but not today. Some part of him wasn't sure he should ever tell Richie about the future he had seen.
In any case as his own words freeze, so do Richie's, and he can see it plain as day. There's something there and it can be any number of things- God only knows how hellish that summer had been for them all. So Eddie rolls his hand over and he's holding Richie's hand again. Only this time it's for Richie's sake instead of his own.
A silent you don't need to suffer alone.
A soft breath sucks between his lips and he stares at Richie for a second too long. That...
That didn't seem quite right. Eddie couldn't put his finger on what was so off about it though. Richie from before had come after then too- one of the Richies anyway. And he had seen that memory with Richie. It had put a certain look on Richie's face back then too all right, but this look. That look in Richie's eyes was different. No...That look reminded him a lot more of his Richie from the fifties after he'd encountered IT for the first time.)
Right. I forgot that's what happened in your timeline. In mine IT doesn't break my arm. Bowers does. He corners me after...
(His tongue feels like slush in his mouth and he stares down at their hands.)
I forget. There's some weird differences between what we remember. (He wasn't going to pry Richie. Maybe Richie really was telling him the truth, but if he wasn't then clearly he just wasn't ready to talk. Eddie couldn't blame him for that. It isn't like he had ever told any of the Losers the full story of the leper. Sure he had told him that there was a leper, but he'd completely left out the part where the leper had offered him a blowjob. The things the leper had said.)
I saw that, you know. In some weird...memory bubble thing. (Eddie smiles at Richie then, and there's a bit of clearing up in his eyes as he remembers. He nudges Richie's shoulder with his free hand.)
You were so fucking cool. Like Jesus! It about to rip our faces off and you just-. (Eddie bites the inside of his cheek, looking from Richie's eyes to his shoulders to his eyes again, and he swallows.)
You've always got my back like no one else.
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instead, he squeezes back, let's the moment linger between them for as long as it possibly can.
richie... isn't sure how he feels about bowers being the one to break eddie's arm instead. whether he feels less or more guilty for the cause to have just been another fucking kid (and sure, bowers was a big kid, and fucking crazy to boot, but still just a kid in the end) instead of some immortal demon clown living in a crackhouse. whether it even really mattered, since he hadn't been there to stop it happening to eddie in either instance.
what he does know is that he doesn't like eddie complimenting him like this, like he'd done anything right back in neibolt, instead of leaving eddie alone to get hurt and letting his fear over the whole thing turn him angry and mean with bill after. he hadn't been able to think back then, had been so sure they were all going to die, and had just wanted... wanted eddie to not have that fucking clown be the last thing he was looking at if that was the case.
and maybe eddie had deserved better than his face being the last thing he saw instead, but he just hadn't known what else to do. ]
I... [ he chokes on his words, has to duck his head down and stop looking at eddie for a moment (as much as even that brief stretch of time hurts) to pull himself together enough to push through the overwhelming emotions that memory is waking up in him all over again. guilt and fear and love and sheer paralyzing hopelessness.
all things that had been working through his head and heart while he'd carved his and eddie's initials onto the kissing bridge with a frantic devotion that had left his fingers full of splinters. ]
You never should have gotten hurt in the first place. We... we knew better than to go off alone but It still managed to separate us. _-we still left you alone. [ his voice drops softer, a full whisper now that does nothing to disguise the stark terror in his voice as he continues. ] It always gets us when we're alone.
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