Whumptober 2023
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Eddie doesn’t remember hitting his head. Which is probably a consequence of, you know, hitting his head in the first place.
He does know that everything is way too fucking loud and bright and that opening his eyes hurts. But he forces them open anyway, considering the angel hovering over him. Which, huh, that’s not at all what he expected. Like, if he had to choose some religious place to end up, he would’ve put his bets on demons and hell and Satan. Not an actual angel looking at him with wide, hazel eyes.
Series
- Part 1 of Whumptober 2023
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“Go home, dingus,” she tells him after only ten minutes of being there. “You look like you’re gonna become best friends with the floor if you stay on your feet.”
Steve shakes his head, but he does lean on the counter for a little extra balance. “It’s only two more hours, I’m fine,” he argues back but it’s weak.
The store is dead and Robin would be fine without him. And he really does feel so horrible, something that’s getting worse with each passing minute. Maybe she’s right…
Series
- Part 2 of Whumptober 2023
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A pen scratches heavily over the page, jagged lines drawn without ink.
“Hey!” Eddie calls through the tiny barred window in the door of his cell. “The pen’s out of ink again!”
He’s lost count of how many pens he’s gone through, how many journals he’s filled with every thought that passes through his mind, every story he wishes he could tell his friends or develop into campaigns. Things he doesn’t want to forget, just in case he ever gets out of here again. The tally marks he’s scratched into the wall next to the door with his nail tell him that rescue isn’t likely, but if he gives up hope, he gives up everything.
Series
- Part 3 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 2 of right where you left me
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“Don’t move! Whatever you do, Eds, do not fucking move!” Steve hollers from his spot in the doorway.
Without a question, Eddie freezes, eying him with a questioning gaze. He’s standing somewhere between the pool and the house, trying and failing to find what has so much fear working its way into Steve’s face.
“One of the lines just snapped and fell,” Steve explains, eyes on the area around Eddie but never directly on him. “Right into the puddle.”
Series
- Part 4 of Whumptober 2023
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remember when you hit the brakes too soon by sourw0lfs
Fandoms: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
05 Oct 2023
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Summary
Steve doesn’t ever think he’ll forget the sound of metal scraping against metal, will never forget the lurch of suddenly finding himself upside down and then right side up again, will never forget the weight of his car feeling like it’s pressing in on him.
Assuming he makes it out of this alive at least.
Series
- Part 5 of Whumptober 2023
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Cutting through the woods at night had been Eddie’s first mistake. He’s spent his entire life being reminded why that’s a bad idea, but it was take a shortcut or have Wayne up and worrying about him.
He’s starting to think making Wayne worry would have been the safer option, because as he walks, Eddie swears he can feel something following him, stalking him, hunting him. It’s too dark to see very far around him, but the unmistakable feeling of being watched hasn’t left Eddie since he crossed the tree line.
Series
- Part 6 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 1 of a monster on the hill
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Summary
There's something oddly peaceful about walking through the city at night. It's quieter than the day, but there's still enough noise that Eddie doesn't feel alone as he goes.
The route home from his job is familiar and Eddie thinks he could probably do it with his eyes closed if someone dared him to. It's all muscle memory at this point, the same steps worn into the pavement over the last six years, right down to the pit stop at the corner store down the street from his apartment building for cigarettes and a snack or two.
Series
- Part 7 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 1 of bleeding me dry
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Summary
The fact that there's even a hospital still standing is probably nothing short of a miracle.
The fact that all of them get funneled to the same one is an even bigger miracle, considering the nurses running around the waiting area, going from person to person to triage injuries. There are so many people, too many really for the space with more stumbling through the door each minute that passes.
Series
- Part 8 of Whumptober 2023
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Morning comes far too soon and far too bright for Steve’s tastes. But he has little choice but to get himself up, wincing as he pulls a rock from the small of his back. The woods are loud with the sounds of twittering birds and scampering creatures. There’s dirt and blood under his fingernails. He doesn’t remember anything from the night before.
It’s always the same thing, each time the monster takes over, leaving Steve to pick up the pieces in the light of day. But it’s never anything bad. At least not so far.
Series
- Part 9 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 2 of a monster on the hill
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Summary
Robin’s finger presses down on the power button as hard as it can, but the phone does nothing beyond reflect her image back to her with a black screen. “Are you fucking kidding me?” she gripes. “So much for water resistance…”
And really, it is her fault for dropping it in the puddle in the first place, but it’s the last thing she needs right now. Pocketing the phone with a frustrated growl, Robin looks around, trying in vain to find something, anything, that she recognizes. But all of the buildings look rundown, abandoned, foreign.
She’s officially lost.
She’s lost and it’s all Steve’s fault.
Series
- Part 10 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 2 of i don't wanna lose you
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Standing at the top of the basement steps by herself, Robin is aware it’s her last chance to escape, to turn back and try something else if she can make it back to town alive. She doesn’t take it, instead choosing to descend the steps. They creak as she goes, barely illuminated by a bare bulb at the bottom. By the time she reaches the bottom, her whole body is shaking.
Then she sees him and a sob rips itself free from her throat before Robin even gets a chance to think about stopping it. Her poor balance threatens to topple her onto the concrete floor as she all but throws herself across the space, barreling into Steve at full speed. “Steve!”
Series
- Part 11 of Whumptober 2023
- Part 3 of i don't wanna lose you
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“This is so fucking stupid. You do realize that, right?”
Eddie stops walking to shine his flashlight directly in Gareth’s face, making him rear back to escape the beam of light. “I don’t recall asking for your opinion,” he points out. “Nor do I recall forcing you to come with me.”
Series
- Part 12 of Whumptober 2023
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In hindsight, it was all a disaster waiting to happen.
In reality, Steve just curses his bad luck. Though all the beatings over the years, the punches and the kicks and plates being smashed over his head, he’s never once gotten an infection or been down for any real amount of time.
When he wakes in a cold sweat with heat pouring from the still open and angry bites on his sides, he knows his luck has finally run out. It’s his own fault, really, for not getting them seen to in time, for thinking he’d be fine with some antibiotic ointment and gauze like they weren’t created by alternate dimensional creatures.
Series
- Part 13 of Whumptober 2023
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Everything is going fine. Until it isn’t.
Because one second Steve is hoisting himself up against the side of the little rowboat, relaying his finding to his friends, and the next second there’s something twinning itself around his ankle and tugging. He manages to keep his hold on the boat the first time, but the second tug is harder, wrenching his fingers free of their holds and taking Steve with it with barely enough time for him to inhale with the shock of it before he’s pulled back under the water.
Series
- Part 14 of Whumptober 2023
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“Eddie? Holy shit, are you okay?”
Eddie groans at the bottom of the cliff he’s only just finished rolling down, trying to push himself back up with the heavy backpack still on his back. It makes him feel a little like a turtle, and not in a good way. But he’s up on his elbows, staring back up at Steve a few dozen feet away above him.
“I’m fine,” he calls back even though his entire body is one giant ache and he’s definitely going to have a million bruises in the morning.
Series
- Part 15 of Whumptober 2023
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Steve jolts awake with the sound of a long, continuous beep ringing in his ears, and for just a moment he thinks it might be real. But it can’t be real, because he’s in his bedroom, in his bed, with a body breathing next to his.
No one is dying.
No one is dead.
Except there was a time when someone was dying. And someone is dead.
Series
- Part 16 of Whumptober 2023
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Summary
Eddie wakes up confused.
The room he’s in looks different than the last one he remembers and it takes a moment for him to remember the needle that pierced the skin of his neck, that pulled him down into unconsciousness. Jolting into a sitting position, he groans and promptly lowers himself back down. It feels like his brain is trying to break free of his skull with how much his head pounds at the movement.
“Oh, you’re awake,” a voice says to his left and Eddie rolls his head just enough to see a different girl than before sitting in an armchair several feet away. “That was fast.”
Series
- Part 2 of bleeding me dry
- Part 17 of Whumptober 2023
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Summary
The first time Eddie wakes up to total darkness he’s terrified. At least until his eyes adjust, because night vision is apparently a thing he has now on top of everything else.
The second time Eddie wakes up to total darkness, he’s not terrified at first. Instead he just sits up and waits for his eyes to adjust like they did the first time.
Except this time they don’t. This time everything stays dark.
Series
- Part 1 of right where you left me
- Part 18 of Whumptober 2023
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Summary
There are flowers on Eddie’s doormat when he gets home from work that night. They’re enough to give him pause as he searches the leaves and petals for a card indicating that they’ve been delivered to the wrong address because there’s no way they’re for him. No one ever gets him flowers.
But as he pulls the little card free, his name is printed neatly on the back alongside a note that reads “just because”.
It would be endearing if it wasn’t concerning. There isn’t a single person he can think of that would do something like this. He’s not seeing anyone, none of his relatives or friends are the type to choose flowers as their gift of choice, nothing is adding up.
Eddie takes the flowers inside anyway. He has no reason not to, even if they’re from a stranger or a stalker or something equally nefarious. The flowers themselves are innocent of all crimes. And actually very pretty.
They look incredibly out of place in the dinginess of his apartment.
Series
- Part 19 of Whumptober 2023