Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was the middle of August and Richie doesn’t want to admit that he misses the other Losers. He wants to say that the last couple weeks have been the best of his life, playing Street Fighter in the arcade, lounging around his house and acting like any normal kid.

Richie was never good at lying.

He missed his friends more than anything. Like yeah he and Bill got into a fight and Bill punched him in the face, but he still missed him. He missed Stan, and Bev, and Mike and Ben. And he really missed Eddie. The last time he saw Eddie he was crying in the passenger seat of Sonia’s car holding his arm. He tried calling Eddie, but Sonia picked up and told him point-blank that Eddie didn’t want to talk to him anymore.

Richie has never felt this lonely before. He’s never been surrounded by love really, his parents forgot to feed him most days, but with the Losers, he felt like he had a home.

His parent’s car isn’t in the driveway when he arrives at his house, he tries to tell himself that the thought of being home alone doesn’t scare the shit out of him. He locks the door behind him and goes to double-check that all the other doors and windows are closed and locked as well. He knows that it does almost nothing against It but the comfort it provides him isn’t lost.

He lays in his bed for hours, long enough to hear his parents come home and start screaming and drinking, and then long enough again for his dad to leave and for his mom to cry herself to sleep on the couch. After all of that he walks downstairs to the kitchen, he can see his mom’s arm hanging off the sofa before he turns and opens the fridge to find something to eat. Even though it's largely empty he must stare into it for a long time because when he turns back around empty-handed his mom is standing behind him.

“Hey, mom” he keeps his voice level, not wanting to say anything that would set his mom off.

She gives him a smile, which settles his nerves a little. “How was your day sweetie? Sorry about all the noise earlier.” Her voice is kinder than it has been in a while.

“It was okay, went to the arcade then biked around town for a little” She smiles at him again, this time though the smile lasts longer than seems normal.

“That’s good baby.”

Now Richie is confused, Maggie Tozier hasn’t called her son pet names in years, forget both ‘sweetie’ and ‘baby’ in one conversation.

“What’s with the frown Richie? Come and give mama a hug.” She extends her arms clearly waiting for Richie to come to her. He takes a step back from her and she frowns, “Baby, come give your mama a hug.” Her voice was getting louder.

That’s when he sees it, in the corner of his vision he can see the living room couch, his mom’s arms still hanging off of it. He feels his body go cold with fear. Before he can turn his face Its clawed hand extends and grabs him by the throat, yanking him to right in front of Its face. The damn clown is laughing, “Come on Richie! Don’t you wanna give mama a hug?” Richie tries to scream but before he can make a sound everything goes dark

Beverly really hated her dad, the fact that he was currently bleeding out in their bathroom as she walked around town was proof enough of that. She wiped tears out of her eyes as she walked to meet Bill in the Barrens to discuss what their next steps for It were. The damn clown had been dormant for the larger part of the month and this stressed her out more than when it was constantly kidnapping kids.

As she turned a corner a sheet of paper flew out of nowhere and hit her smack in the face before falling and resting by her feet. She picked it up and almost threw up at what she saw.

It was a missing kids flyer, and just like the one at Neibolt is had Richie’s face on it, but instead of his smiling yearbook image it was a photo of him screaming, face covered in blood and glasses broken, and instead of his address under his name it just said “try and you die try and you die try and you die”

She shoved the paper in her pocket and ran to find Bill. She finds him in their usual meeting spot leaning against Silver, she’s panting and on the verge of tears, “Richie.” She’s gasping as she tried to talk.

Bill crosses his arms and huffs, “W-what did he say t-today? It better have b-been an ap-pology.” She doesn’t let him finish, shoving the paper in his hands, she waits until the realization hits his face, quickly followed by horror and fear. “It has Richie.”

Bill began to shake, then determination filled his eyes as he looked up at her, and not stuttering once he says, “Let’s the others. We have a trashmouth to save.” Both of them get on Silver and make their way back to town.

Eddie is their last stop, Ben, Mike and Stan are meeting them at Neibolt. As Bill and Beverly pull up to the Kaspbrack household they immediately hear screaming. Bill turns to Bev, “W-what did you s-say on the phone?” Bev huffs, “I told him that It was back and that we needed to get together but that was all I managed to get out before Satan picked up and started yelling. I didn’t get to mention Richie.” She had quickly gone and grabbed her bike as fast as she could.

Before Bill could respond the door slammed open and Eddie came storming out, he grabbed his bike as Sonia made it to the door screaming and crying his name. As quick as the could the three of them made it two blocks away before Bev called for them to stop.

Eddie turned to look at the two of them, “What’s going on?”. Bev gets off her bike and takes the paper out her pocket again, not saying anything as she hands it to Eddie. He takes it in his hand with the cast and looks, much like Bill he begins to shake. “It has Richie.” His voice is shaking, and all Bev can do is nod as the two of them try not to cry. He hands her back the paper and looks between his two friends, “Then let’s go get that fucking idiot back.”

Chapter Text

Richie woke up in a puddle of gray water and blood. He groaned and slowly sat up, he looks around and realizes that he’s alone in the sewers with It. He stands up and gags at the smell around him, in the water surrounding him he sees body parts mixed with blood and shit. He makes the mistake of looking up and when he does he immediately freezes, in the middle of the sewer is a tower of objects and floating around the tower in varying degrees of decomposition were the bodies of missing children new and old.

As he tries to take a step away from the tower he slips and falls on his ass, he’s panting and trying his hardest not to start crying. Then in the water in front of him the decomposing head of a young boy bobs out of the water, he screams and pushes himself away from it. The head goes back under the water and disappears. Richie looks around trying to find a way out, he sees a manhole not too far from where he is, and he stands up and runs up to it. He grabs onto the bars and desperately pulls and yanks to try to get it to open but it just won't budge.

“Come on! Fuck!” he screams in frustration. He leans his head against the manhole and tries to catch his breath. All of a sudden lights turned on behind him and the sewer was filled with the sound of circus music, Richie slowly turned around and came face to face with a huge stage. On top of the stage, it read ‘Pennywise: The Dancing Clown’.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Richie was beyond done with this fucking clown. Then from somewhere behind the stage Pennywise appeared and began dancing to the music. Richie immediately turned back to try and open the manhole. As he felt the manhole begin to move It leaped from the stage across the sewer and landed right behind Richie, he was larger than before and used his huge clawed hand to once again pick Richie up off the ground.

It was drooling all over the both of them, Richie was hitting the arm circling him and struggling to get out of Its grasp. The fucking clown began to laugh, “Come on Richie! Didn’t you like my show! I bet your friends would like it! Especially little Eddie!” Its laugh became maniacal, but for the first time Richie felt no fear towards the clown, he only felt anger. “Fuck you!” he spits right in Its face, “I’m not scared of you anymore you fuck!” It immediately stopped laughing and instead he frowned and let out an inhuman growl, he gripped Richie harder before speaking, “Oh but you will be.” Before Richie could say anything back the clowns fucking jaw unhinged and his whole face opened up; out of his face three circling orbs of light appeared and as much as Richie tried he couldn’t tear his eyes away, the last thing he remembered was his whole body going cold and It let go of him and he began to float up with the rest of the bodies.

The rest of the Losers were not standing outside Neibolt; Bill, Bev and Eddie in the front with Mike, Stan and Ben following behind them. Eddie ripped off his fanny pack and threw it into the dead shrubbery next to them, no one said anything, but the significance of the action was clear. Eddie wasn’t scared anymore. Richie was down there alone with It and Eddie wasn’t going to let his fears keep him from saving Richie.

As they reached the steps of the house Bill turned to face the rest of his friends, “I k-know we’re scared but w-w can’t let t-that stop us from g-going in t-there and saving R-Richie,” determination once again took over Bill’s face, “He would do the same thing for any of us.” The rest of the Losers nodded; the Losers picked up spikes from the broken fence as Mike tightened the ammo belt around his chest. Bill leads them into the house. They made it the well room with relatively no problems, Bill, Bev, Eddie, Ben and Stan were already waiting on the ledge when they heard the fighting from above.

“Mike!” Stan screamed, “Mike are you okay?” There was no response but they could hear Mike struggling with something, then Henry Bowers head poked over the side of the well and smiled wickedly at them, yanking the rope up with him before any of them could grab it. He disappeared again and they could hear the sounds of the two of them fighting.

“Mike!” Stan kept screaming, then they heard Bower’s scream before they see his body fall down the well and hit the ground with a crack.

“Holy shit,” Eddie says, eyes wide and breathing heavy. Bill yells up, “Mike are you okay?” Before Mike can respond he’s already got the rope down again and climbing down to join the rest of them. Stan immediately throws his arms around Mike and the two hug before Stan lets go.

“Mike are you okay?” Bev asks, Mike nods, “Yeah I’m good.” Everyone nods again before they continue into the sewers.

Sometime later, after they almost lost Stan and spent time making sure he knew they loved him and would never abandon him, Bill had runoff.

“Bill!” Beverly screamed, her voice echoing around them, but there was no response. “Ah fuck,” Ben exclaimed.

Bill was running after Georgie now, having left the others after he saw the yellow raincoat run around the corner. He keeps running until he comes into a large opening, he looks around for Georgie and notices the huge mountain of things surrounded by the floating children. He turns his head to look for Georgie but instead, he finds Richie, floating in the air, looking very much dead.

“Richie!” Bill runs towards his friend and tries to jump to reach him, but he’s not tall enough. He goes to try again when he sees Georgie standing by the mountain, he turns and runs off again and Bill runs after him.

“Bill!”

“Bill! Where the fuck are you?”

“Richie!”

The rest of the Loser’s voices were echoing through the tunnels as they ran down the sewer paths trying to find not only Richie now, but also Bill.

“Fucking idiot runs off by himself! It already has Richie and now It can take Bill too!” Eddie was screaming himself hoarse. They continued to walk and call for their friends until they all came into an opening.

“Holy fuck.”

“Are those-?”

“The missing kids, yep.”

“Richie!” It was Stan who saw him first. The rest of them turned and froze. Richie was floating, his head tilted back, unmoving.

“Is he-“

“Shut up!” Eddie yells before running and trying to grab Richie’s ankles. “Someone come help me!” the rest of them run over and are all trying to jump and grab Richie, but he’s too high up.

“Eddie get on my shoulder!” Mike yells, bending down so Eddie can climb on him. The two of them together reach Richie and Eddie can grab his ankles, as he’s dragging him down Ben grabs Richie’s knees and Stan and Beverly each grab a wrist.

Their combined weight drags Richie to the ground where he falls to knees but remains unmoving, Eddie grabs the sides of his face as best as he can with his cast and forces Richie head up. They all gasp at the sight of him, his face is blank, his eyes, devoid of all colour and life, and completely whited out.

“Richie?” Eddie’s voice is small and weak. He moves his hands to his shoulders and shakes Richie, “Richie!” he’s screaming again. Richie doesn’t respond, his head simply nods forward and his chin rests on his chest.

All of the Losers, minus Bill, are now kneeling around Richie, all scared out of their minds for him. Eddie can’t help it, the next time he calls out Richie’s name he starts to cry.

“Richie, please! Wake up! Wake up!” he brings his hands back up to Richie’s face and cups it. All of a sudden he remembers one night when Richie had snuck into Eddie’s room to hang out.

Richie was laughing as he laid on Eddie’s bedroom floor.

“Dude stop talking about my mom like that or I’m gonna hit you so hard I’ll knock you out dickhead!”

“Then you’ll have to kiss me to wake me up, Eddie. My Prince Charming!”

“Ugh, Richie!”

Eddie looks up at Richie’s eyes again, whited out and blank. It’s like he’s sleeping.

“Fuck it.”

He leans forward and presses his lips to Richie’s’. Richie’s lips are cold and wet, but Eddie doesn’t care.

“Well, that’s one way to go by it.” He hears Bev hit Stan in the ribs.

He pulls away and looks at Richie again, “Please”. They all wait, after a couple of seconds Richie suddenly gasps and falls forward right onto Eddie’s chest. He’s breathing heavily and Eddie wraps his arms around Richie, hugging him tightly.

“Oh, thank fuck. Oh, thank fuck.” He’s chanting as the rest of the Loser’s all start cheering and a group hug ensues.

They all move back and away and Eddie gets another look at Richie, now that his eyes are back to normal Eddie notices the blood in Richie’s hairline dripping down his temple and the bruises around his face, his chest hurts and all he wants to do I wrap Richie up in his bed and never let him leave. But right now, they have to find Bill and kill this fucking clown.