Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Summer was long over, and the sharp October air nipped at Richie’s nose, staining it pink to match his ears. The Loser’s club, minus Mike, were riding to school and were all silently cursing the drop in the temperature, signalling that winter was on its way. Richie let out a long sigh, and his breath formed a white cloud in front of him that momentarily fogged up his glasses, causing him to swerve his bike towards Bill’s before he regained control. 

“Fuck me,” his voice cut through the silence, as always, “I’m freezing my dick off.”

Eddie scoffed, “Well, maybe if you wore more than just a hat and that thin ass jacket, you wouldn’t be so cold.”

“Nah, it’s okay, I’ll just get your mom to warm me up later, Eds,” Richie smirked, as Eddie shot him a glare from his bike.

“Beep beep, Richie”. 

There was barely any more conversation during the rest of the journey, with mainly the creaks of the bikes creating their own melody to fill the silence. The Loser’s rarely talked of the past summer, even though they all still thought of it. Bev had long left Derry with her aunt, which had taken a toll on both Bill and Ben who stayed cooped up in their houses the rest of the summer. 

Stan’s face had mostly healed from the cuts that Pennywise had left, and the only thing to show for it was thin pink lines bordering his jaw. He hated looking in the mirror most days, but would sometimes view them as hope. Hope that they would all get through the hardships and live past their fears. 

Eddie was still being overprotected by his mother, with Sonia always insisting his illnesses were getting worse. She now despised Richie and Mike, who spent most of August convincing Eddie to sneak out the house. They’d sometimes run into Vic Criss, the new leader of the Bower’s Gang since Henry had been incarcerated for killing his dad. Luckily, Vic was nowhere near as threatening as his former leader, so they usually escaped with barely any injuries. 

Richie’s parents still hardly interacted with their son, blatantly ignoring him most of the time and preferring the company of booze. He didn’t mind, though. That’s what he’d tell the others anyway. 

School wasn’t much better than the year before, the Losers’ were still outcast by their peers, and it seemed that they always had a target on their backs, aimed at by students and teachers alike. Richie remembered once early in the fall when Bill was struggling to finish a presentation with his stutter, tripping over the word ‘public’ for what felt like a solid minute. Some smart ass at the back of the class told him to spit it out, earning a few snickers from the other kids and a pretty loud laugh from Mr Relington too. Bill was so embarrassed the only thing that came out of his mouth the whole ride home that day was that tongue twister under his breath.

This particular day wasn’t as bad, though. Richie was pushed a couple of times in the hallways - almost tripped right into Vic - but nothing major. Eddie managed to lose his inhaler and almost passed out from hyperventilating at the thought of telling his mother until Stan found it in Eddie’s bag instead of his fanny pack. 

“Seriously, Eddie, can’t you just put all your stuff in your backpack? Would make your life a lot easier.” Stan noted as he showed him the blue inhaler. 

Eddie waved his hand, dismissing it and Stan just rolled his eyes in response, and thought ‘Why do I even try?’

“Hey, d-do you think B-Bev will come visit for the holidays?” Bill asked the rest of the group after school as they were walking towards their bikes. His head was hung low, and his eyes were fixed on his worn shoes; he tried to sound hopeful as he said it, but the doubt was obvious. Stan cleared his throat.

“Um, I mean, I feel like she would have told us if she was, but there’s always a chance, right?” He was trying to lend Bill some optimism. 

“Yeah, maybe she is coming, but she's keeping it as a surprise.” Ben piped up, looking over to gage Bill’s reaction. Bill hadn’t moved his gaze, but instead lightly nodded his head.

“M-maybe.”

“What the fuck?” Richie’s voice rang out. They had reached the bike racks out the front of the school building, but his bike wasn’t next to Ben’s where he had left it that morning. The bike lock wasn’t even there. He looked around frantically, half-expecting to see Vic and the remainder of the Bower’s gang snickering somewhere, but no. Nothing seemed off, except his missing bike. He furrowed his eyebrows, not even making a joke from being too perplexed. Bill saw Richie’s confusion.

“I-It must’ve b-b-been Vic, b-but don’t worry, Rich, y-you can ride on the back of mine.”

“Or mine, “ Eddie piped up, unlocking his yellow bike lock, “you know, only if you want”. 

Richie glanced between them both, before settling his eyes on Eddie’s and letting loose a typical Tozier smile.

“Thanks for the offer, Eds, but the only person I wanna share a bike with is your mother.” Eddie rolled his eyes as he removed his bike from the rack, positioning it towards the road, like the rest of the Loser’s were doing. 

“For fuck’s sake, Richie.”

“Come on, R-Rich,” Bill gestured for him to get on the back of his bike, “hurry up, it’s fucking c-cold.” Richie waved his hand.

“Nah, guys, don’t worry about little ol’ me. I’ll walk, see if I can find it on the way back.” Ben shook his head.

“Rich, you’ll freeze.” He said with concern bright in his eyes.

“No, seriously, it’s fine. I’ll be fine.” He flashed them all a smile, to show that he wasn’t bothered. He clapped his hands, “Right, now, pip pip, my fellows! Get going!” His awfully dramatic British accent made Stan screw his face up and Bill laughed, shaking his head.

“Fine, Rich, see you tomorrow.” Bill lifted his foot off the ground and began to pedal, the rest of the Loser’s following close behind, all waving goodbye to Richie and disappearing as they turned left at the end of the road. Richie sighed to himself, as a couple of browned leaves fell into his dark curls. He shook his head to get rid of them, then grabbed the straps of his backpack and started the 20 minute walk back to his house, where his parent’s were no doubt already drinking.

On the last leg of his walk home, Richie turned right onto Birchwood Street, but he noticed something small in the middle of the road ahead of him. Walking towards it, he saw that it was a deep green and the sun bounced off of its shiny surface. He quickly realised it was his bike lock and bent down to pick up the curved forest-green pipe. That was a mistake.

The bike lock rattled and he stepped backwards warily, his hands shaking. The lock lurched towards him, unravelling and sliding across the concrete with a hiss. It was a fucking snake. In a rushed attempt to run, Richie fell, scraping his hands on the rough ground. He scrambled backwards, inching further and further away, but the snake was almost at him.

He gave one last look into its beady black eyes before it lunged towards him, the sun glistening off of its emerald scales, highlighting its venomous teeth that were poised open to bite. Fuck, was the only thing running through Richie’s mind. He quickly raised his arms in front of his face in defence, almost knocking his glasses off, but the sharp pain he anticipated as the snake sunk its teeth into his arm didn’t come. He looked through the gap between his arms and saw that an axe had decapitated the snake’s head from its body, embedding itself into the road below as black blood seeped around it. Richie’s dark eyes trailed up the axe, skipping over the splintered crevices along the wooden handle, until they met with a familiar white gloved hand. Fuck.

“Hi there, Richie,” The clowns words thundered through his head, and drool dribbled down the demon’s bottom lip. It began to hiss, “ssseems like sssomeone’s ssstill ssscared.” Richie looked on in horror as a small forked tongue snaked past Pennywise’s jagged teeth. 

“Holy shit,” Richie uttered between laboured breaths.

“Poor little Richie,” It smiled, ripping the axe from out from the ground, making Richie flinch as the black blood that was caked on the metal was flicked onto his cheek in spots, “the only one that can’t escape his fear. Your weakness brings down the strength of your precious friends.”

“My what?” Richie asked, struggling to keep his words steady. The clown smiled, its right eye drooping ever so slightly down the side of its cheek.

“Your secret,” It spat through his seething smile, “the secret that terrifies you, that you would never want anyone to find out. The secret that I know.”

Richie could only stare.

“The fear that you’ll always have deep inside you is rotting away the barriers your friends have against their fears. Against me. You’re the weak link. You are the weakness of your friends. You’re killing them, Richie.” The clowns eyes glowed orange, as it reached out a clawed hand towards Richie, who failed at trying to back away from it. Pennywise latched onto the collar of Richie’s navy jacket and roughly pulled him up to stand on his feet. His eyes snapped shut and he was terrified to open them, silently praying to himself, repeating a mantra of ‘it’s not real, it’s not real’. Richie felt the weight of the hand gone from his collar, and slowly opened his eyes. It was gone. 

He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and shakily brushed his hands down his front, ridding the phantom feeling of the hand and smoothing out his crumbled jacket. He looked around the street, yet it seemed that no one was there.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath. He looked down at his feet to see if the mangled body of the snake was still sticky on the tarmac, but it was replaced with his bike lock which was holding down a sheet of paper. With trembling fingers, he grabbed it and turned it over to look at the print. It was his missing poster, beaming at him. 

In a split second, everything clicked. You’re killing them, Richie. The words rang out in his head. The Losers were weak with him there. He could have told them his secret, but what if they hated him for it? What if everyone else found out? It’s Derry, he'd have been murdered. No, he was petrified at the thought of telling anyone. It was right. He had to protect his friends. He had to leave them. He had to leave Derry.

Chapter Text

Two weeks had passed since Richie took his first step outside of Derry. It felt like longer as he kicked an empty Coke can along the sidewalk with his strides, scuffing up the sides of his sneakers. The rattling of the can echoed down the alleyway he walked past, startling a rat who screeched as it scuffled under a dented dumpster.

Leaving Derry was quick, surprisingly, but that did not make it easy. At all. As soon as Richie opened his front door following his encounter with Pennywise, he bolted upstairs and straight into his room that laid squarely across from the bathroom. He roughly threw his backpack off of his shoulders, unzipping it and tipping the contents out on his blue checkered bedsheet and throwing in random shit that he thought he might need: a water bottle, spare clothes that hadn’t been washed in days, a photo of his friends, and a number of scrunched up bills that amounted to $35 (it only ended up lasting him 5 days). He replaced the thin jacket he was wearing earlier with a much thicker one that was lined with a wool lining, thinking of when Eddie reprimanded him earlier for being too cold. Eddie. Leaving all of his friends has plagued his mind, but leaving them was better than killing them.

Before he left, he spent 10 minutes trying to scrub the drops of black blood off of his cheek, leftover from the snake bike lock. He gave up eventually, leaving only a faint grey smudge on the left side of his face. 

Maggie and Wentworth Tozier hardly batted an eye when their son thundered down the dark oak staircase and out the door with a single ‘bye’ as it slammed.

The first few days were tough as Richie was just getting his footing out on his own. No one really bothered him; he seemed like just any other homeless kid wandering the streets of their towns. Yet, a few days after he left, he had his first pitfall. Sleeping on a wet bench down the side of a gas station just on the edge of New York state, his backpack acting as a makeshift pillow. He’d been asleep for about two hours when his head smacked the wooden panels of the bench beneath him, rattling him awake. Though sleep still tugged at the corners of his eyes, he frantically squinted into the darkness as he felt for his glasses in the right side pocket of his jacket. 

“Motherfucker,” Richie shouted into nothing as he slotted the lenses over his eyes, amplifying their size to that of saucers. He could make out a lanky figure sprinting just ahead of him, a hand latched tightly onto Richie’s backpack as it swung wilding as if it were resisting. Stumbling, Richie tried to run after them but only made it a few paces before ceremoniously slipping on a soaked drain cover. For the second time in a few minutes, his head suffered another beating as it collided with the ground, small rocks scraping the sides of his face and ripping minuscule punctures in his skin that let loose small droplets of blood. Fortunately for Richie, the pain didn’t bother him as he blacked out from the force almost instantly, so he was just left on the edge of the road in a crumpled heap. The air was bitter with the smell of gas, and the neon sign of the gas station illuminated his body in a muted red as it hummed.

It’s hadn’t been all downs though, there were some ups on his journey to nowhere. He’d met a bunch of people hitchhiking and though most rides wouldn’t take him that far nor did they engage much in conversation - a challenge for Richie who itched to speak whenever there was company - there was one guy that he really connected with. It was a trucker that picked him up somewhere in Pennsylvania, said his name was Ted. His hair was greying and, aside from his poorly shaven beard, the most notable thing about this guy’s appearance was his burned ear.

Unlike everyone else he’d met, Ted actually liked his trash talk. He actually fired some back at Richie, making the trashmouth himself double over in fits of laughter, and for a few hours, he didn’t feel so alone.

What really piqued Richie’s interest during his time with Ted was when they got on to his childhood.

“Back in Oregon when I was twelve, me and my friends got into a load of shit,” his voice was always hoarse like he’d been smoking since he was born, “you know, always got our asses handed to us, always at the bottom, walked over by the whole goddamn town.” He shook his head and glanced over at Richie for a few seconds, who, surprisingly, was listening intently.

“So, anyway this one summer a kid had gone missing, and our buddy, Vern, had heard where to find the kid’s body, right? And, you know, being the good-for-nothing kids we were we wanted our share of attention,” Ted’s hands gripped the wheel until his knuckles turned white like his body was trying to stop him from releasing a secret he’d kept for years. Then, he relaxed, “We found the body.” He was just staring ahead now. Richie wiped away strands of his hair that were covering his eyes; uncharacteristically silent. Until-

“What did you do with it?” Ted cleared his throat before answering.

“Nothin’”.

Richie didn’t judge. He wouldn’t have known what to do either. Hell, when they found all those kids that Pennywise took, they didn’t go shouting to the town ‘Hey, we found all their bodies under that creepy ass crackhouse in Neibolt Street’. 

When he and Ted finally parted ways near Pittsburgh, Richie felt happy for the first time in weeks. Ted gave him a couple of bucks and told him to stay out of trouble, to which Richie replied that he could stay out of trouble but that he couldn’t promise that he’d stay out of Ted’s mom, though. The guy laughed it off as he drove away.

After living on and off of benches, stolen chips and whatever he could get his grubby hands on, Richie had ended up in Islington, Ohio, where he was kicking the Coke can and terrorising rats. Islington was fucking boring. Like every other quiet little town with not much to do, not much to see. He guessed that was why he got so many dirty looks from residents as he strolled down the sidewalk - he seemed too out of place for their cookie-cutter world. His jacket had stains all over, his face had scrapes down the side, and his hair lay unruly and dirty on his head. 

He was hungry with practically no money left (only about 27 cents), and he thought about lifting a couple of packets of chips from the convenience store on the street, but the cashier was already eyeing him from the window, and he was not about to get arrested in that shitty little town for a bit of food. Instead, he plopped down on the sidewalk, resting his back against the wall of the church and filtered through his jacket pockets. He was glad that before his backpack got stolen he’d transferred the photo of his friends to his jacket - if he lost that he wouldn’t have known how to feel. Holding the tattered photo in his hands made everything feel so wrong. There were scratches on the surface, and there was some wear over Stan and Mike’s faces, but there they all were. His friends. And, fuck, he missed them. He missed Bill’s stutter, Bev’s laugh, Ben’s facts, Stan’s complaining, Mike’s jokes, and Eddie. Eddie’s everything. 

As he was staring endlessly into the only snapshot of Eddie Kaspbrak he had, a raindrop exploded into the picture, warping the image. 

“Shit!” Richie wiped the water off, but more began to fall, and he scrambled to put it back in the front pocket of his jacket. The rain was plummeting rapidly, and Richie’s hair was sticking to his forehead as his glasses began to fog up.  He jumped up off the ground and looked around for some cover before deciding to take refuge in the church - they couldn’t turn him away, right? God’s love and all that? Even if he was a…

As he swung open the heavy wooden door, he noticed a few other people had taken shelter with him, wiping down their soaked coats as if they could magically dry them with their hands. One kid caught Richie’s eye. He was standing by the last row of pews, wiping his wet blond hair off of his forehead. He kind of reminded Richie of Connor Bowers, and knowing how well that went last time, he decided to stay away from the kid and just mind his own business. Yet, fake Connor had other ideas.

“Hey,” the blond walked over to Richie, giving a slight wave of his pale hand, “haven’t seen you before, you new or something?” His voice was light, but not high. 

“‘Or something’ is probably the one I’d go for,” Richie replied as he wiped his glasses clear. The kid laughed.

“Fair enough. Well, I’m Isaac.”

“Very nice to meet you, Isaac,” Richie countered in his god awful British accent. “The name’s Bill.” He didn’t know why he lied, maybe he just wanted to feel closer to the Losers’ Club. Maybe he was still scared.

Isaac adjusted his black member’s only jacket as he smiled. Richie noticed his front tooth had a tiny little chip in it. “Well, Bill, Islington’s fucking awful, like, beyond boring. I’d run before you get stuck here.” He let out a soft laugh.

“Hopefully not as bad as where I’m from…” Richie uttered gazing up at the stained glass window behind Isaac’s head. It was intricate, like a mosaic. There were figures dotted all around, rays of sunshine or God’s light here and there. And that’s when he saw it. Shards of white and red glasses arranged perfectly in IT’s deranged face, beaming down at Richie. 

Richie jumped backwards; he hadn’t seen Pennywise since Derry.

“What’s the matter, Richie?” A rough voice ripped through the silence of the church. He whipped his head back down towards Isaac, but it wasn’t Isaac anymore. The blond locks were darkening, and Isaac’s small frame was rising higher, so Richie had to keep raising his head to see his face. The face that had now warped into that of Patrick Hockstetter. 

Richie took a couple of steps back, taking in the decayed form of his past tormenter. There was water damage all over his body, and his clothes were dripping black puddles onto the floor. A crooked smile etched across Patrick’s face, and greywater spilled from his mouth, gravitating upwards instead of falling down. 

“What the fuck,” Richie managed between breaths, frantically looking around the church to see if anyone else was witnessing this. They were. All eyes were on him, everyone grinning. That’s when he bolted. 

He barely felt his feet hit the sidewalk, he just kept running, his lungs burning and the rain clouding his vision. But he didn’t stop. Not until after what felt like 5 minutes of sprinting down the abandoned roads to a gas station. He hunched over, leaning on his knees for support as he caught his breath. Richie wiped his glasses and looked back over his shoulder. Nothing. No one. No Pennywise.

“Fucking hell,” he shook his head, only one thought on his mind. Keep going. He looked in front of him to see a green pick-up truck parked by one of the pumps, a black tarp covering the back. He whipped his head to look through the window of the gas station, to see a guy inside paying. Without much thought, he ran towards the truck and scrambled in the back, covering himself with the tarp before the driver came back out, praying he didn’t get seen. He didn’t care where it would take him. Anywhere away from that fucking clown was where he needed to be. 

Anywhere.

Chapter Text

“What the fuck is this?!”, Richie heard alongside gruff, incoherent shouting as he was ungracefully pulled out of his sleep. His back ached from the hard metal of the back of the pick-up truck, and the stench of paint burned his nostrils. He was just about to get his thoughts in order as he was reaching full consciousness, when- 

“You little shit,” a cacophonous voice scraped his eardrums. Finally realising the driver had found him in the back of his truck taking, what Richie thought was, a well-deserved free ride. Rough hands grabbed the lapels of Richie’s jacket, and in one gracious swoop, he was thrown out the back of the truck and onto a heap on the sidewalk. The collision rattled Richie’s brain, and he stumbled when he first tried to stand. “You trying to steal from me?” He looked up at the driver, whose face was contorted into a furious mess. He reminded him of his dad.

“No, you’ve got it all wrong,” Richie said as he stared provokingly into the driver’s fiery eyes, “I mean, let’s be real, there’s not much to steal from you, is there, sir?” Richie wasn’t wrong, the only things in the back with him were planks of wood, but that didn’t stop the explosion of rage that erupted from the guy. 

The driver lurched forward, arms out to strike, which Richie took as his cue to run. It felt like that was all he was doing anymore.

He could hear the driver’s thunderous shouts right behind him as he darted in between groups of people, knocking over one woman’s shopping bag and spilling her carton of milk into the road. But he didn’t dare look back. Turning a corner, he was momentarily blinded by the white sun, but collected himself and stormed into the convenience store that was on his right.

The cheery chime of the bell as he entered was offset by his frantic demeanour, and the cashier on shift looked up in alarm. She was a tired woman, her brown hair had a slight red tinge that was emphasised by her eyes that seemed to know far too much. Her face was softly wrinkled; she was over-worked but unbothered by it. Richie glanced at the embroidered name tag on her navy uniform that formed effortlessly into ‘Joyce’.  Her eyebrows scrunched up in confusion at him, and she parted her lips to speak, but Richie ripped his eyes away from her. He was whipping his head around the store to see where to hide, but his mind was coming up blank. 

“M-Mike, wha-“, ‘Joyce’ started, but was cut off by the growing sounds of anger from the driver who was closing in. Richie looked back at the cashier, his eyes pleading and she ushered him behind the counter. He ran and launched himself over the top, knocking over a few packs of cigarettes on his way down. He landed awkwardly on his legs but didn’t have time to exclaim his discomfort as the bell chimed.

Richie ducked his head further and folded himself inward as far as possible as he heard the ragged breaths of the driver who was strutting around the store. Joyce let out a cough to clear her throat. “Can I help you, sir?” Her voice was small but forceful.

“Where’s the kid, huh?” the driver pressed angrily, “I saw him come in here, that little shit.” Richie could picture his red face as he seethed. He looked up at Joyce from the floor, and her face perfectly hid what she knew. She shook her head lightly, making wisps of her hair dance.

“I’m sorry, sir, but it’s just me in here,” she replied, before leaning in towards him and uttering quietly, “business has been slow the past few months.” Richie wanted to hug this woman; she didn’t even know him, but saw a messed up kid and helped for no reason. She reminded him of Ted but would probably be less accepting of his trash talk. He was so wrapped up in relief that he relaxed himself and slipped backwards into some cardboard boxes. Chocolate bars spilled out across the polished floor with a deafening rustle. Shit.

Joyce felt her heart stop then shame settled on her face. She looked down at Mike, still confused at whatever he was wearing and why he had the world’s largest glasses, and shook her head. She looked back at the trucker, a smug look had manifested on his face, and she let out a nervous chuckle. The guy roughly pushed her out the way, causing her to yelp and shout “hey!”. He reached over the counter as Mike failed to scramble away and pulled the kid back over, shaking Mike viciously. The kid’s glasses fell off and clattered onto the floor, as he tried to hold his hands up in surrender.

“L-Listen,” Mike started but was cut short by a third chime as Hopper slammed open the door. 

“Hey!” Hopper marched forward, grabbing the driver’s shoulder and Joyce tensed further but was still relieved; she didn’t think she could have calmed the guy down enough to release Mike. The driver let the kid go, and Mike’s knees almost buckled as his feet hit the ground. He brushed his front; eyes fixed on the guy who was glaring at him with fire. “What the hell’s going on here?” Hopper’s authoritative voice caused the driver to turn to face him.

“I found this little rat in the back of my truck,” the guy answered, arms waving wilding at Mike who was trying (and failing) to look innocent, “probably waiting to steal my shit.” 

Hopper looked past the driver to stare at Mike disapprovingly, but the kid just beamed a toothed smile at him. The sheriff tilted his head lightly in confusion at the out-of-character response. Mike was usually a pest to him, but he would still show some shame in being caught. He shook his head, still silently upset at El’s relationship with him, but fought to get his mind back into focus.

“Well, even if that’s the case, I think you’ll find assaulting the kid isn’t within your rights,” Hopper glared, “so, I think you should just leave and forget about it before you get yourself in a position you don’t want to be in.” The driver opened his mouth to object, his cold eyes darting between the kid and the sheriff in frustration before he gave up and stormed past Hopper and out the door. As soon as the door slammed shut, Hopper swiftly turned his gaze to the kid.

“Mike, what the hell are you playing at? Lurking around trying to steal people’s shit?”, a growing rage was building behind his eyes, “Do you want me to keep you from seeing El? ‘Cause trust me, kid, I will.” Joyce walked out from behind the counter, moving towards Hopper as the kid picked up his now cracked glasses from the floor, brushing the lenses clean.

Joyce rested a hand on the sheriff’s shoulder, “Hopper, I’m not sure-“

“Who the fuck’s Mike?” Both adults turned to face the kid, who placed the broken glasses on his face, magnifying his endless dark eyes. Hopper’s eyebrows scrunched up in confusion.

“Kid, don’t play around with me here,” His voice was threatening as he took a step forward.

The boy placed a hand over his chest and shook his head, before saying with exaggeration, “I would never!”. Joyce was just in utter bewilderment as the kid she believed she had known for years was behaving in a way she had never seen before. “Anyway, thanks for all your help, officer,” the kid saluted Hopper then turned to Joyce and smiled as he nodded, “ma’am”. He went towards the exit, knocking the sheriff’s side as he pushed past, who then grabbed the kid’s arm.

“Hey, what is going on with you?” Hopper interrogated. The kid sharply pulled his arm out of the officer’s grasp and rubbed it, glaring at him, then swiftly ran out the door. “Hey!”Hopper started after him, yet Joyce pulled him back.

“Jim,” she said, warily, staring out the window as the kid ran off, “I-I’m not sure that was Mike”. 

“What?” Hopper replied with a laugh. Joyce softly shook her head.

“I’m serious, I mean, it was him but it wasn’t. I’ve never seen him act that way before,” she turned to look him in the eyes, “and glasses? He’s never worn glasses in his life.”

The sheriff’s scoffed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Y-You’re telling me that that kid isn’t Mike? Are you blind?”

Joyce hit his shoulder, “This is crazy to you? Everything that’s happened in this town, that’s happened to my son, and you can’t believe this?”

“I just,” he sighed and looked down, “ok, fine. He wasn’t acting like the little brat that I know, but definitely a bit too outward for typical Mike.” He tipped his head back up. “Shit, I need some cigarettes to think about this.”

Putting his hand in his jacket pocket, he reached for his wallet, but he felt nothing. He froze for a second, before patting himself down, then stared at Joyce incredulously. “Fucking kid stole my wallet.”

Chapter Text

“Okay, so, a chocolate sundae,” Steve placed the glass bowl of ice cream on the table of the booth Mike, Dustin, Lucas and Will were sat in, “two  double scoops of strawberry, and a banana split.” He put the rest of the orders on the table and leant back, tucking the now-empty black tray under his arm, and an accomplished smile crossed his face. Dustin stared at the ice-creams scattered around the booth and looked up at his friend under the sailor’s hat.

“Right, well, none of this is what we ordered, though,” he said through a laugh, “you know that, right?” Robin looked over at the group with a grin, before turning back to her customer. Steve looked slightly defeated but lifted his head up.

“Yeah, well I said you could get free ice cream,” he nodded, “not the right ice cream. Plus you’re the ones ordering this shit in November.” Lucas shook his head with a smile and dug into the banana split that Steve had wrongfully given him.

“Hey, Harrington!” Robin called from behind the counter; a growing line of eager kids staring her in the face, “a little help here?” Steve hurried off, leaving the boys to pick at their desserts.

“Anyway, guys, I’m serious,” the boys looked over to Will who had taken one of the strawberry ice creams, “she said he looked exactly like Mike.” Mike rolled his eyes.

“But it wasn’t me,” he pressed, “I was with Lucas yesterday.” Lucas nodded.

“Yeah,” he affirmed, “maybe they just looked a little similar, you know.”

Dustin scoffed, chocolate already caked on the sides of his mouth, “Oh and what, both your mom and Hopper mistake a random kid for Mike? It’s not like he has a common face,” he looked at Mike, “no offence.” Mike glared back at him.

Will’s face dropped slightly, a nauseating feeling settling in his stomach, causing him to push his bowl away from him. Mike shifted his gaze to his friend, scrunching his eyebrows in concern. Will muttered, “I’ve had a weird feeling ever since yesterday, you know, ever since my mom saw him”. Lucas looked at him, his eye’s widening with worry.

“Like… an Upside Down feeling?” his voice was higher; fear creeping in, but Will lightly shook his head, causing his hair to ruffle.

“No, n-not like that,” he finally looked back up, “something… different. I can’t explain it. It feels worse, somehow.”

“Worse?” Mike questions.

Dustin wiped the food from the corners of his lips, “Okay, this can’t be a coincidence,” his words were muffled through the napkin, “some random new kid just turns up out of the blue wearing Mike’s weird-ass face and then Will-“. He was cut off by the distant sound of a store alarm sounding. 

Numerous customers turned their heads to the noise, the boys included. Shouting of a couple guards could be heard, and the pattering of running footsteps thundered until they grew quieter as the guards and the presumed thief they were chasing disappeared outside. Steve looked over to boys as they turned back and shrugged, “Third lifter in this weekend.”

Dustin yawned as the four of them stepped onto the escalator once they’d left Scoops Ahoy. Lucas snickered.

“Ooh, someone’s tired. Did you stay up late serenading Suzie, lover boy?” Mike let out such a sharp laugh that he had to cover his mouth. Dustin scowled, and the two started to bicker the whole way down. Will stared ahead as the two guards that ran off earlier re-entered the mall, looking overly disgruntled with sweat glistening on their wrinkled foreheads. 

“Hey guys,” he pointed over to them, and his friends stopped their arguing momentarily, “guess they didn’t catch them.”

“Who cares,” Mike shrugged, scratching his nose, “people steal shit all the time.” They stepped off the escalator and headed for the exit, already feeling the crisp fall air sting their noses and instinctively wrapped their arms around themselves. Will pushed the glass doors open, holding it for his friends as they left Starcourt Mall for the second time that weekend. 

“Ah shit,” Dustin threw his arms up, “no bus, are you kidding me?”

Mike shivered, rubbing his hands, “When’s the next one coming?” Lucas held out his arm and pulled back his sleeve to check his watch.

“20 minutes,” he replied with a shake of his head, “fuck, let’s just wait ins-“.

“Shh!” Mike had cut him off with a wave of his hand, his attention now focused on the alley down the side of the massive building. His friends glanced at each other with confused looks. “Did you hear that? The laughing” 

“Uh, no?” Dustin said as though it was obvious. But Mike was right, there was a soft string of laughter dancing through the air, carried by the wind. He took off after it with wary footsteps, as though he was worried too much noise would scare the sound away. His black hair was blown off of his forehead by a sharp breeze as he turned the corner to the alley before it settled roughly back on his face. 

Ahead of him sat what he assumed to be a homeless kid sitting cross-legged on the ground. The kid was wearing a dark tattered jacket with a wool collar that still looked way too thin to be wearing in the harsh autumn weather. Black locks, similar to his own yet a little curlier, were messy on his head. Surrounding him was an array of food scattered on the ground, along with a couple of wrappers that were threatening to be whisked away by even the slightest breeze. As Mike edged nearer, he could hear, in-between the small chuckles of the boy, stuff like “trash fit for the trashmouth”. He guessed, rightfully so, that this was the shoplifter the guards had missed. To him, it didn’t seem like they really tried and, if they did, maybe they should have considered a career change.

Dustin, Lucas and Will had by then rounded the corner and witnessed the boy for themselves. At the sight, Lucas shook his head and scrunched up his nose as the stench from the dumpsters wafted into his face, “Oh, that is disgusting”. His comment was loud enough to be carried down the alley, reaching the ears of the homeless kid who whipped his head around in shock and adjusting his thick-rimmed glasses. 

“Shit,” the kid exclaimed as he scrambled to his feet, leaving his stolen goods spread out on the floor. And that’s when Mike’s world warped. It was as though a tainted mirror has been placed in front of him; a veil shattering his reality. This kid was the spitting image of himself. A doppelgänger. Dustin was the first to speak, as Mike’s voice was stuck painfully in his throat.

“Holy shit”.

Mike opened his mouth, stuttering, “You-you’re-“.

Will’s voice was plain and steady amongst the confusion, “You were in my mom’s store yesterday. You stole Hopper’s wallet.” The kid took a step back, and rubbed his eyes furiously beneath his glasses, muttering “not again, stop messing with me”. Lucas and Dustin briefly glanced at each other, wariness strong in their eyes, before looking back at the scene that was unfolding before them.

“You look like me,” Mike finally managed. His voice sounded foreign; more scared than he ever did before. More in shock than being faced with a thousand Demo-dogs. Before he could say anything further, his reflection stepped back, waving his thin arms wilding and shaking his head, eyes screwed shut.

“Nope,” he opened his eyes and Mike’s own dark irises stared back at him, “I’m not falling for this shit, demon fucker.” Dustin’s eyebrows scrunched together and he, once again, shifted his gaze to Lucas who was still staring ahead, nodding.

“Oh, so he’s crazy.”

Will’s eyes were transfixed on the boy, a dread laying like concrete in his chest, “No, this is crazy.”

Mike still handed blinked, worried that if he did, he’d wake up from this fever dream, “Who the hell are you?” The kid scoffed.

“Don’t pretend you don’t know who I am after doing all this shit to me,” his voice was strong and confident, but an underlying sense of worry rattled his words. He was scared. He was alone. Mike took a step forward carefully, raising his hands up in surrender.

“No, really I don’t,” he extended one pale hand towards his reflection’s own, “I-I’m Mike, um, Wheeler”. The kid stared at the offered hand, yet didn’t take it. He returned eyes to Mike’s, confusion apparent in his face. He glanced behind Mike to his friends who were looking at him as though he was a circus animal; a performing monkey. He thought back to how he acted in Derry, how he acted most of the time and thought that those descriptions weren’t far off. Looking back to Mike, he searched deeply into the identical dark eyes. Desperately inspecting them for something that wasn’t there. Evil.

He adjusted his glasses and stood up straight, emitting a facade of confidence once he had decided that maybe this wasn’t the workings of any demonic entities. He grabbed Mike’s hand and shook it with exaggeration making a small smile awaken on the other’s face at the acceptance. “Richie”, he announced, as they released each other’s hands, “Tozier.”

He coughed and rubbed his hands together, “Now, can any of you fine fellas tell me what the fuck is going on?”

Chapter Text

Richie and the others got the bus back into town in relative silence, leaving room for each of them to drown in a  whirlpool of rushing thoughts. The whole journey Richie, surprisingly, kept his mouth shut and stared out the window at the passing scenery through the crack in his glasses. His silence, however, was replaced with the rapid movement of his right leg bouncing up and down, occasionally knocking against Mike’s who was sitting on his right. 

Mike couldn’t help but stare at Richie, and he could almost hear his mom berate him for being rude. But it was just so… unreal. Everything was identical. Like a carbon copy. All except for the hair, as Richie’s was slightly longer and considerably messier, and Richie’s poor eyesight. Mike’s head ached from trying to begin to comprehend how this was possible. Sure, he had El and her… above average skills, but there was nothing that messed with his reality quite like seeing Richie. 

Lucas and Dustin sat behind them, shooting glances between Richie and each other, while Will had his eyes glued to his feet. He couldn’t bring himself to say it, but being around Mike’s apparent doppelgänger made him feel awful. He felt as though someone had shoved rocks down his throat and dropped them in the pit of his stomach; he had to wrap his arms around himself to keep him from bringing up the little ice cream he had. What was up with him? What was up with Richie? 

Once they stepped off of the bus and began strolling down the sidewalk towards the Wheeler house, the silence finally shattered. 

“So, does this mean we’re twins?” Richie looked sideways at Mike, “‘cause if we are, I mean, who’s better looking?”. Mike scoffed and shook his head. “Obviously me, right?” Dustin laughed through his nose.

“We can’t be twins,” Mike uttered, his fingertips were tingling, and he felt a wave of anxiety envelope him. He was filled with excitement, but on edge about what it all meant. They couldn’t be twins, right? Richie was looking at him with curiosity. “There’s no way, it has to be something else”.

“Yeah, what? Are you a clone or something?”

“Well, maybe you’re the clone, dipshit.” Mike snapped as Richie feigned hurt.

Lucas was rubbing his hands, trying to give them some warmth in the harsh November temperature. He clasped them together, brought them to his lips, blowing hot air into them before rubbing them once more. “It’s possible.” 

“Dude, how the fuck is that possible?” Richie replied, throwing his hands in front of him. “I’m a person, I think I’d know if I was-“. 

“Anything is possible”, Will’s voice interrupted. It was so quiet yet shattering. His eyes are glued to the laces of his shoes, trying to ignore the growing panic that was coursing throughout his blood. The others pretended not to hear his words as they continued down the sidewalk, but Richie cast him a sideways glance. 

Richie recognised the expression that painted Will’s face. It was the same expression that he saw on Bill’s when IT had him in a headlock; the same expression of  Beverley when IT appeared in the projector. The same expression he held when he was attacked by the Paul Bunyan statue back in Derry only a few months before. When he was attacked by IT.  

“Hey, if you stole Hopper’s wallet yesterday why’d you steal from the mall?” Lucas piped up, shaking Richie from his fearful thoughts, “couldn’t you have just, you know, bought it?”. His voice was laced in sarcasm, failing horribly to hide his judgement of Mike’s homeless doppelgänger. Richie’s face turned slightly red in embarrassment, and he adjusted his cracked lenses.

“Oh, uh, the cop only had ten bucks in there, and I blew it all last night on a pack of Marlboros and a lighter...” He removed the pack from his jacket pocket and shook it. Dustin stopped, causing Will to bump into him. 

“You prioritised cigarettes over food?”

“Hey! In my defence, I’ve been through a stressful time, I gotta relieve myself!” Richie argued as Mike scrunched his face up at his wording, “plus it reminds me of my friend, you know?” He demeanour turned solemn as memories of Bev seemed to materialise behind his eyes. 

“So,” Dustin broke in, switching attention to Mike who was looking at Richie with quiet sadness, “what are you gonna do, Mike? You can’t just bring him back to yours out of the blue; your parents would freak! I mean, a goddamn clone of their son.” Richie was pulled from his memories and furrowed his eyebrows, glaring at Dustin behind his overgrown curls.

“I’m not a fucking clone, alright?!”

“There’s gotta be an explanation,” Lucas voiced what they were all thinking. Will cleared his throat timidly.

“Hey, uh, Richie? What did you mean when you called Mike a demon?” Will’s eyes bore into Richie’s own, pressing forward with the question as they all stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. The other boys looked from Will to Richie after remembering the strange accusation Richie had made when they met. 

Richie tensed, anxiously shifting his weight between each leg. “When did I say that?” he half-laughed. Lucas rolled his eyes.

“Dude, back in the alley. You called him a ‘demon fucker’”, he used air-quotes around the phrase. Richie nervously laughed and waved his hand dismissively.

“Oh, that. It’s nothing,” he tapped the side of his head twice, “the old imagination runs wild sometimes”. Mike furrowed his eyebrows, not buying a word of it. Neither did the rest of them, but nevertheless they continue the rest of the walk to the Wheeler residence in silence.

“Guys, I can’t do this,” Mike said, pacing the driveway and shaking his hands as if he was trying to rid himself of the nerves that were consuming him. Dustin grabbed him by the shoulders and grounded him.

“Mike, don’t you want to know? It’ll be fine. You’ll be fine.” Mike looked into his eyes before nodding.

“I know”, he rubbed his eyes and let out a shaky breath. He looked up at Richie who seemed concerned for him. “Okay, I’m gonna do this but please just stay outside, Richie? I don’t wanna freak out my little sister if there's two of us.”

Richie relaxed a bit, “Fine by me,” he smiled at Mike, then sat down on the slightly damp grass of the front yard. Mike waved for the others to follow, which Lucas and Dustin did. But not Will. He stood his ground, a stare fixed on Richie, which the other boy pretended not to notice as he removed a cigarette from the pack and struggled to light it with his almost numb fingers. Once they were about to open the door, Lucas looked behind and called over to Will.

“Aren’t you coming in?” Will shook his head, not tearing his gaze from the kid who finally managed to light his cigarette and took a long drag. 

“No, I-I think I’m gonna stay with Richie.” Richie whipped his head to look up at Will at the mention of his name. He felt wary of the kid like he could read Richie’s mind. Lucas shrugged his shoulders and turned back to the door only to find it swung wide open and Mike and Dustin already inside. He rushed in and closed the door slowly behind him.

Will stood still for a moment before stepping with trepidation towards Richie. He sat down next to him, cross-legged and held onto his knees tightly as if it was a strange method of creating a shield against an unknown evil. “I’m, uh, sorry if I’m being weird around you,” he stated, “ It’s just… I’ve had a bad feeling being around you.” He refused to look at the other boy as soon as the words escaped his mouth, instead opting to watch the water droplets trail down the slides of grass littered around him.

Richie let out a quiet laugh around his cigarette, a small cloud of smoke faded into the air. “What the hell does that mean?” Richie wasn’t looking at him anymore, just taking in the mundane suburban surroundings desperately reminding himself that this wasn’t Derry. In the front yard of one house at the opposite end of the cul-de-sac to the Wheeler’s was a small common white oak tree with a tire swing fixed to one of the larger branches. The tire was swaying softly in the wind, but the rope creaked sharply every time it moved, scraping Richie’s eardrums with its cacophonous aches. Will didn’t notice.

“I don’t know, like, ever since my mom saw you in the store yesterday I’ve just had this sinking feeling. Like dread or fear.” That caught Richie’s attention, and his dark eyes were torn from the tire swing as he inspected Will’s face. His eyes seemed to waver, and Richie could see the fear roll off of him in waves. Richie’s mind warped into images from the past summer, and his heart seemed to speed up in his chest. IT couldn’t come all the way out here, could it? It made it to Ohio, though…

Richie straightened his back and put his cigarette out on the rubber of his shoes. “Look out for your friends.”

“What?”

Richie adjusted his glasses as they began to slip down his nose, “you know, safety in numbers. Your friends are your strength”. He realised he wasn’t doing much to alleviate Will’s fears, but warning him was better than leaving the Party unaware. “It’s just… easier to get through some things with friends.”

(and, now, I’m gonna have to kill this fucking clown)

(welcome to the losers club, asshole!)

Richie rubbed his eyes to forget as Will asked, “so… what about yours, then?”

“What about my what?”

“Your friends. What about them?” Richie didn’t answer straight away, heavily contemplating his words to try and not sound like a hypocrite. He cleared his throat and opened his mouth to reply- 

The front door of the Wheeler’s house slammed open, and the two boys on the grass jumped at the sound, turning to look at what was going on. They were met with Mike storming out, his face a fiery red, failing to mask the hot tears that lined the brims of his eyes. 

“Mike-“ Will started before he saw Karen Wheeler appear in the doorway dishevelled. Red blotches stained her cheeks, and her mascara was just beginning to let loose.

“Michael, please! I’m sorry! You weren’t meant to find out like this!” She shouted in desperation as Mike ignored every word and started off down the sidewalk as Dustin and Lucas pushed past her after him. Will got to his feet and followed them. Richie abruptly stood up from the grass and stared at the woman who was now sobbing against the door, mumbling ‘Michael’ in-between tears. She glanced up as Mike disappeared down the street and her eyes connected with Richie.

He looked like a ghost to her. He was, obviously, a spitting image of her son, just significantly dirtier. His hair was a few inches longer and spiralled locks partially shielded his deep eyes and broken glasses. The glare of the setting sun bounced off of the lenses, making him appear more supernaturally. His jacket, much too thin for the harshness of the Indiana cold in fall weather, had stains along the front. She was horrified. This boy had stolen her son. She knew it wasn’t his fault, but she wanted someone to blame. In the midst of her internal conflict, she hardly felt Ted softly touch her shoulder or the sounds of Nancy trying to calm a now crying Holly. She just watched the ghost of her son turn and take off after the rest. As he vanished from the face of Maple Street, she finally lost all strength and slid to the floor weeping.

Richie’s shoes snapped twig after twig as he bounded into the woods after Mike. The image of his mom crying was branded in his mind, and he imagined that is what Mike was feeling at that moment. Complete agony. The agony of losing your family, like the agony of losing your friends… 

He came to a stop when he saw Mike sitting against a tree with his arms wrapped around his knees. His shoulders lurched forward with each sob as Will had him enveloped in a firm hug. Dustin and Lucas were sat right by his side, and Richie felt a pain in his chest. An ache. Friends.

Lucas was the first to speak, “Mike, they still love you.” Mike sniffled and wiped his nose.

“They lied to me; they’re not my parents.” His words were laced with betrayal, and Richie’s heart pounded. 

“What happened in there?” He asked, yet he already knew the answer. It didn’t feel the same as when they joked about it only an hour before. The boys all looked up at him, remembering that he was the reason they were in this position. Mike went to answer, but the words were stuck in his throat, and he burrowed his head into his arms. Dustin looked towards Lucas, before turning back towards Richie.

“Um,” he began, “so, apparently, you’re twins”-

(twins)

(brothers)

-“and the Wheeler’s adopted Mike when you guys were two from a foster home”. Mike’s breath hitched at the word ‘adopted’. Richie felt bad that he didn’t feel the same heartbreak as him. He thought back to his childhood. He didn’t personally consider his parents abusive, they just preferred to be drunk rather than sober around him. Ironically, many people would view that as an abusive household. It seemed to him that having a child was more of something they were forced to do, not wanted to do. He found it hard to believe that Wentworth and Maggie went out of their way to have him. What would his life have been like if he was adopted with Mike? With a twin? Would they have had a tire swing of their own in the front yard? He knows one thing. He wouldn’t have had his losers, and he knew which path he’d choose.

Richie stepped forward, the decaying fall leaves crunching under his sneakers. Will released Mike from his grip and let Richie crouch in front of his brother, putting a hand on his shoulder. Mike slowly looked up and was met with the amplified eyes of his twin, eyes that seemed to swim with a calm feeling: home.

Richie softly smirked at him and, in a poor imitation of a French accent, exclaimed, “c’est la vie, Michael.” Mike let out a small laugh as a tear rolled down his right cheek.

“So, where are you gonna go tonight, Mike?” Lucas asked, concerned strong on his words.

“I’m not going back there.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

Mike paused and thought for a moment, “I don’t know… Richie, where are you staying?” 

Richie looked at him in bewilderment and cast a glance down at his tattered clothes before returning his gaze to Mike. “Dude, does it look like I’m staying anywhere?” Mike’s face went slightly redder from embarrassment, and he broke eye contact. Will cleared his throat.

“What about if you guys stayed with me?” The whole group turned to him, and he continued, grappling for words, “I mean, technically, my mom has already met Richie and-and-and she loves Mike. Even if it’s only for tonight.” 

“Are you sure?” Richie asked, “I mean, I don’t wanna barge in and steal your mom from you,” He crossed his arms and boasted, ‘I’m really great with moms.” 

Dustin scoffed, “Dude, shut up.”

It was Mike’s turn to question his friend, “Are you really sure, Will?”. Will’s face softened as he saw his friend visibly calmer.

“Totally.” He stood up, and Richie copied, holding his hand out for Mike to take. Mike smiled and accepted it as Richie pulled him to his feet. It had just dawned on him how late it was; the sun was just a sliver on the horizon, and sharp golden beams weaved between the trees. “Home?” Will asked.

“Yeah,” Mike nodded.

The group slowly made their way out of the woods and parted ways for the night, not noticing as three of the sunbeams behind them grew brighter. The rays folded in on themselves until they formed three glowing white lights that spiralled around one another before melting into the dirt.

Long after Lucas and Dustin had split off from the group and went home, Mike, Richie and Will had arrived at the Byers’ residence. Will opened the door, glanced once behind him at the twins before returning his gaze forward. He was surprised to see his mom and Hopper sitting on the couch directly in front of him. At his entrance, they stopped from their conversation.

“Hey, mom. Uh, is it okay if Mike and, um, his brother stay here tonight?” He asked, far too quietly.

“Of cour-,” Joyce Byers began, before it dawned on her, “did you say Mike’s brother?” Both adults stood up and looked behind Will at Mike and Richie, who both stood sheepishly. That was until Richie caught sight of Hopper and recognised him from the day before. 

“Dude,” his voice was high, “you never said the cop was your dad.” Will snapped his head behind to look at the boy.

“He’s not my-“

Will was cut off by the protective rage boiling over from Hopper.

“Motherfucker.”

Chapter Text

“You got some nerve, kid,” Hopper’s voice was dangerously deep as he stepped towards Richie, hot anger rolling off of him in waves. Will quickly ducks out of the way as Richie slipped backwards, his eyes not leaving the cop’s. 

Jim Hopper never showed unrestrained aggression towards a child before, he’d swear it on his life, and he’d be telling the truth. Yet, anger can blind anyone, and, maybe it was down to the shoplifter wearing Mike’s face, the smart-ass boy who he thought wasn’t good enough for El. Whatever it was, when he looked at this kid, the same dark eye’s as Mike’s behind those shattered lenses; he saw red. He felt possessed like his mind became clouded by some master-puppeteer who only wanted to hurt. Every fibre of his being was compelling him to strangle this boy; revel in the power that came with seeing the light fade from his eyes. From creating the fear.

His towering figure was gaining on Richie, and he felt like he couldn’t stop himself, whatever he was going to do. Until a thin hand pushed roughly against his chest and he stopped in his tracks, feeling himself re-gain control. His head turned sharply to the hand’s owner: Mike. 

“Hey!” Mike half-shouted, shooting daggers from his eyes, “he’s sorry, okay?”.

Everyone looked at Richie, who was staring at Hopper with a fearful familiarity. After noticing all the attention on him, he came to his senses and adjusted his glasses. “I mean, yeah, obviously. I’m sorry, man.” 

It didn’t seem sincere, but Hopper was worried he’d get too riled up again if he contested the apology. He rolled his eyes as an alternative and asked, “Can I at least have my wallet back?”. He held out his hand to receive it.

Richie looked away in subtle shame as he scratched the back of his neck. “I, uh, don’t have it anymore.” Hopper sighed frustrated, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Of course, you don’t.”

The tension is cut by Joyce clearing her throat, diverting all attention to her. She gave Hopper a warning with her eyes as she turned back to the twins still on the doorstep and slightly shivering. “Come on, why don’t you guys come inside. It’s cold.” 

Mike nods and glares at Hopper as he stepped in the warmth of the Byers’ house, “Yeah, come on, Richie.” 

As Richie pushed passed Hopper in the house, the cop held his hands out in a frustrated surrender, “Hey, hold on, why am I the bad guy here? What the hell happened for the world to shove another one of you on my hands, huh?”. Will looked to the floor, tracing the lines in the wooden flooring with the tip of his shoe.

Richie threw his arms up, “I’m a different person! And clearly the more attractive one,” he ruffled Mike’s hair, to which the other boy pushed him off, “I mean, look at that haircut”. Will subtly reached for his own hair, silently wondering if his and Mike’s were really that similar.
    
 “So, uh, you’re Mike’s brother?” Joyce asked Richie, her voice light as if she was tiptoeing around a minefield. She shot a quick glance to Hopper, “I-I, we, didn’t know he had a brother”. Mike scoffed.

“Yeah, neither did I until about an hour ago.” His face wore a mask of anger to disguise from the burning betrayal he felt behind his eyes. Joyce sensed the bitterness in the Wheeler boy and thought back to when Jonathan rushed out of the house only 20 minutes before. He’d got a call from Nancy and, clearly, something had happened at her house. She can’t remember what she thought it was, but without question, her eldest son had driven off to see his girlfriend.

She turns to the new twin again, recalling what Mike had called him, “So, Richie, right? Where have you been?” The question seemed to rattle the boy, who looked momentarily to the floor, before returning her gaze.

“Oh, I came down from Maine, but I didn’t really plan on going anywhere. I mean, I definitely didn’t expect this shit to happen”.

Hopper crossed his arms around his chest, “Why’d you leave, Rich? Steal from everyone in your town, and they kicked you out?”. As soon as the words flew from his lips, he regretted them. What was going on with him?

“No,” Richie snapped, but the accusation struck something within him, “I just left, okay?". Mike tilted his head in confusion, furrowing his eyebrows in curiosity at his twin. Joyce’s face went sombre. “But that's life, right?” Richie put on an exaggerated voice to reassure them, “Nothin’ little ol’ Richie can’t get throu-“.

He was cut off by a piercing noise. The TV that had been whispering under their conversation, left on from earlier, glitched. The volume suddenly spiked to its peak, amplifying a single phrase that ripped through the atmosphere. ‘BEEP BEEP’.

Will covered his ears, feeling as though his eardrums had burst as Hopper rushed over to the TV set and scrambled with the dial, turning down the deafening sound. The noise level returned to normal, and Hopper visibly relaxed, “Shit, Joyce, you gotta get that set checked out”. He turned around and saw Richie. He was noticeably paler, his eyes glued on the characters on the screen that were now chattering away wordlessly. “You okay there, kid?”

Richie didn’t break out of his terror. Not until Mike nudged him with his elbow, asking “Dude?”. Richie blinked.

“What?” He saw they were all eyeing him with concern, “Oh, sorry, how the old mind wanders, you know?” He laughed nervously and rubbed his eyes, “Well, this has been a fun talk, guys, but I’m tired. Is it cool if I call it a night?”

“You don’t want anything to eat?” Joyce asked, her brow crossed with worry.

“Thanks, but I feel like I might vomit if I even look at, like, a fucking crumb.”

Ignoring his cursing, Joyce pressed on, “At least let me wash your jacket while you sleep”. She motioned to it, and he looked down at the stains that covered the fabric, before shaking his head.

“Oh, don’t worry-“.

“Come on, Richie, it’s fine. You’ll get it back in the morning.” Will pushed.

Richie sighed in defeat and removed the jacket, taking the cigarettes and lighter from his pocket. Almost immediately, Hopper snatched them from his hands, making the boy whip his head up. “Thanks for getting them for me”, the cop said, taking one from the pack and lighting it. 

Too tired to protest, Richie lightly shook his head and finally slipped the photo of his friends

(remember us, richie?)

from the front pocket, pressing it to his chest to protect it from prying eyes. He handed her the jacket, smiling in thanks, before pointing to the couch. "My bed?”

“Uh, sure”. She smiled back.

He nodded solemnly and dragged himself towards it while the others glanced between one another.

“Should we wake him up?” Will questioned in a whisper to Mike and Joyce. The three of them were sitting around the table digging into breakfast, while Richie was still asleep on the couch. Hopper was gone, and Jonathan was presumably still with Nancy; he hadn’t come home yet.

The bright Monday morning sun shone through the window, beaming throughout the Byers’ kitchen. Joyce was sipping from a mug of black coffee that was warming up her hands, wearing her blue uniform ready for a morning shift at the store. She looked at her son.

“Let him sleep a bit longer; he seemed pretty exhausted last night.” She stared at her cup, examining the wisps of steam that danced into the air. Clearing her throat, she turned to Mike, “So, how did you and, uh, Richie get separated?”

Mike tensed, “Um, apparently, we were at a foster home when we were two.” He moved the eggs around his plate without purpose, refusing to look Joyce in the eyes. “I got adopted by my par-, uh, by the Wheeler’s without Richie.” Joyce’s eyes went soft as she held out a hand and rested it on Mike’s shoulder.

“The Wheelers are still your parents, Mike. They love y-“, before she could finish, Mike shoved her hand off of his shoulder. Fire was burning behind his dark eyes, yet sadness was still there, hiding in the form of the tears threatening to spill.

“No! They would have told me the truth if they were,” His voice rattled as he tried to stay calm. He was wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt that Joyce gave him from a box of Jonathan’s old clothes - Will’s clothes were too small for him. In his fit of anger, he had already managed to spill some eggs on it. Joyce pretended not to notice.

She decided not to interfere too much with the situation; she didn’t feel as though it was her place to talk on the Wheeler’s parenting. But she was still concerned about what the twins were going to do. “Well, what about Richie? He might not be able to go back home, it seems like he ran off for a reason and he can’t just stay here in Hawkins forever.” She chose the wrong words.

Mike abruptly stood up, his fork clattering to the floor. Will looked up at him startled. “What? You want us to split up again and pretend we’ve never even met? I can’t do that, and you know it!”. He was shaking and breathing quickly, but his face seemed relieved after the words left his mouth. A weight had been lifted, but in turn, guilt grew from acting out. He timidly sat back down, putting his head in his hands. “Sorry for shouting.” The apology was muffled, but Joyce heard him nonetheless. 

Will had finished his breakfast and picked up his and Mike’s plate, including the fallen fork. Walking over to the sink, he said offhandedly, “His glasses are broken”. He turned on the tap.

Mike lifted his head out of his hands and looked over to him in confusion, “What?”.

Will had started washing Mike’s plate, “Richie. His glasses are broken.” 

“He broke them when he was at the store. They fell off when this truck driver got a hold of him,” she rubbed her forehead, “I doubt he has the cash to get them fixed; they're daylight robbery those things.” She paused, sad, “I wonder when he last had a shower”. Mike laughed lightly.

“Smells like never.”

“Mike, he’s homeless. It’s not funny.” The smile evaporated from his face, and he stared at the table.

As if on cue, Richie waltzed into the kitchen. Joyce smiled at him and gestured for the boy to sit down at the table. 

“Morning, guys and gal,” he greeted, oddly cheery. He sat down, grabbing the last two slices of toast in the centre of the table, spreading a large helping of butter on them and dug in. Mike was still amazed at his twin. He just stared at him even as he stuffed his face, crumbs accumulating at the corners of his mouth. Richie stared back at him, “Take a picture, Michael, it’ll last longer. Or look in the mirror, I guess?” Mike rolled his eyes, and Richie grinned at him, his cheeks puffed up from the toast. 

Joyce stood up and placed her mug in the, now empty, sink. Grabbing her keys from the counter, she spun round to face Richie, “Sorry we’ve gotta go when you’ve just woken up, but it’s Monday, so,” she pointed at herself, then at Will and Mike, “work, school. But I’ll be back at about 1:30 when my shift is over, so you can just hang out here if that’s okay with you?”. Richie nodded. “Great, also if you want to put on some new clothes there’s a box of Will’s brother’s clothes over there,” she pointed to a large cardboard box next to the trash can, “and the shower is down the hall and to the left”. She tried to be discreet about the shower suggestion, but Richie clearly got the message.

“You don’t have to worry about my stench anymore, ma’am”.

“Please just call me Joyce.”

“You don’t have to worry about my stench anymore, Joyce.”

Joyce smiled at him as she put on her coat, unlocking the door for Mike and Will too. They waved at him before leaving him alone in silence.

It took Richie a good ten minutes to figure out how the shower worked, but he managed eventually, letting the warm water cleanse him of the trials of the past month and when he stepped out, he felt like a new person.

(still a coward)

He rifled through the old box of clothes and chose a grey t-shirt with the Kodak logo across the chest and put on a plain dark blue long-sleeved shirt over it. He couldn’t find any trousers that fit him, so just decided to wear the same jeans as before, despite the mud stains all over.

Returning to the couch, he reached for the photo that he’d hidden under the sofa cushion, but he barely had time to lift it one inch before the sudden sound of static stopped him in his tracks. He whipped his head towards the TV set, shaking as he stared at the grey fuzz warping throughout the screen.

Panic struck at his fingertips, and he raced towards the set, fiddling frantically with the buttons until it switched off. His breath hitched in his throat, and the world swam in front of his eyes. What the fuck was going on? It was playing tricks on him. It was playing tricks on him.

(trick or treat)

Fuck that. Without a second thought, he grabbed his now clean jacket off of the back of the armchair, grabbed the photo from the couch and rushed to the front door. But before he opened it, he saw a small wad of cash on the wooden counter to his left. He felt like his morality was being pulled so hard it might snap. Stealing from Joyce? After she had helped him so much already? Fuck. 

Richie didn’t want to take it, but how could he have left without money? He couldn’t put more people in danger when it was the exact reason he left. 

(run rabbit run)

He swiftly grabbed the money and swung open the door, but instead of rushing out into the wild on his own again, he was met with his face. Mike’s face.

His twin looked startled as the door open, and he had his fist raised ready to knock. When he saw Richie, he started to smile, but something felt off. His hair was still damp from the shower, and soaked curls were matted to his forehead. Dark brown eyes trailed down from Richie’s pale face to his right hand; clutching several dollar bills. He knew for a fact that money wasn’t his brother’s.

“What the fuck?” he motioned to the cash, disappointment laced his words so much Richie could taste the bitterness. He felt the heat rise in his cheeks as he was drenched in shame. Ignoring Mike, he paced back to the counter and made a show of throwing the bills back on the table. 

“Look-“.

“Were you leaving?” Mike’s words shook with sadness, and as Richie looked back up at him, pain struck his heart. Why did he always hurt people? He grappled for the right thing to say.

“Mike, I-I’m sorry, but I can’t stay here.” There was an uncomfortable silence, and Richie sarcastically wished the static was back to fill the void.

“Then I’m coming with you.”

“No!” Terror clouded Richie’s eyes, but he had to stay calm. Mike’s winced at his twin’s outburst, but the veil that Richie was hiding behind seemed to be breaking down. He was scared.

“Why not? Who the hell are you running from?” Mike questioned as Richie just shook his head frantically, ‘Is it your parents?”.

Richie laughed, but it was dry. “I’m not running from anyth-,” he coughed, “I’m not running from my parents. I mean, I’d be surprised if they were even looking for me. Besides, who says I’m running? Maybe I’m just living the high life off-the-grid.” He slipped into one of his voices towards the end, but it held little effort.

“Dude, you’re obviously hiding from someone. Look, just tell me, maybe-maybe I could help.” Richie shook his head again.

“It’s fine, honestly,” Mike didn’t buy it, Richie’s eyes were still slightly too wide, struck open with fear, “I just… something made me need to leave town, okay? That’s it.”

It was Mike’s turn to laugh, “‘That’s it’?” Are you kidding me? You can’t just turn up out of the fucking blue and then leave without saying anything. We’re brothers, Richie!”.

“No offence, Mike, but we don’t know each other.”

“Because every time I ask you about yourself, you avoid the fucking question!”

“Is this a fucking interrogation?! Last time I checked, Mikey, I’m not on trial here,” He realised he was shouting, and quickly reeled it in, “Fuck, I’m sorry, man. I-I just don’t wanna talk about this, okay?” Mike didn’t answer, just studied Richie’s eyes. “Anyway, I thought you were at school?”

Mike cleared his throat, “Well, speaking of not knowing each other, I thought we should catch up on some major twin bonding time.” He relaxed his shoulders that he hadn’t even realised were tensed up. Richie let loose a smile, and their argument was subtly swept under the rug.

“Sure”.

Despite looking relatively similar, Richie grew to learn over the course of the day how different Derry and Hawkins were. Mike showed him around pretty much the entire town, and Richie had never paid attention to anything so much in his whole life. 

Richie’s favourite part of Hawkins was the Palace Arcade; just looking at it revived his love arcades that the incident in the Aladdin had tarnished for him. The Palace Arcade was probably double the size of the one in Derry, and there definitely wasn’t any of Henry Bower’s friends or cousins lurking in the shadows.

It had reached about half-past three when they were walking through Starcourt Mall on the way to Scoops Ahoy to meet the rest of Mike’s friends. Richie was fucking dreading it. He knew even before they got there that it would be awkward. He’d be there only to be gawked at, but he had to go. After snapping at Mike that morning, he felt he needed to make amends somehow.

“Dude, it’ll be fine, trust me,” Mike looked over to Richie, who was chewing his bottom lip, “and you’ll get to meet my girlfriend.” Richie’s head shot up to stare incredulously at his brother, and he raised an eyebrow in question.

“My dear, dear Michael has a lady?” he exaggerated in his British voice, before reverting back, “how the fuck did you manage that?’ Mike pushed him jokingly and laughed.

“Don’t get annoyed just ‘cause you can’t”.

Richie thought ‘Maybe I don’t want one’, but as soon as the thought manifested, he mentally kicked himself. Just the thought of saying something like that out loud terrified him, he hated even thinking about it. 

“Oh,” Mike continued, “and she’s Hopper’s daughter. Kind of.”

“Kind of?”

Mike sighed, “It’s complicated”.

They’d finally reached the entrance to Scoops Ahoy, and the sweet scent of the flavours was filling Richie’s nostrils; he smiled. He hadn’t tasted ice cream since summer when he was together with his losers. It was a sweet sadness, but even though he questioned Mike’s decision to eat there in the fall, he was happy in a nostalgic kind of way.

Walking in, Mike immediately spotted his Party seated around one of the booths closest to the counter, but they hadn’t seen him. He grabbed Richie’s wrist and pulled him over to where his friends sat to enjoy their ice cream.

“Guys,” Mike smiled, “here’s my brother Richie”. The kids looked up. Will, Lucas and Dustin seemed indifferent seeing as they had already met him, but Max and El were stunned.

“Holy shit,” Max uttered, eyes flicking between the twins, before settling her eyes on Richie, “Dude, your glasses are huge.”

“Not as huge as my wang”. He quipped, Dustin screwed his face up, and Max just burst out laughing. El, on the other hand, hadn’t moved. Her eyes were glued to Richie’s face as she sensed the danger rolling off of him in waves. She didn’t trust this new Mike at all.

Max introduced herself and El, earning a nod of acknowledgment from Richie.

“Hey, Mike, you getting some ice cr- what the fuck?” Steve had waltzed up to the group, his Scoops Ahoy hat slightly wonky on his hair, and was now taking steps back in shock. “There’s two.”

Mike pointed between him an Richie, “We’re twins, found out yesterday. This is Richie.” Steve nodded his head but was too engulfed in surprise he couldn’t form any words. Robin removed herself from behind the counter and placed a hand on the older teen’s shoulder.

“Twins, huh? Crazy times.” She smirked, “I’ll get you two some ice cream.” They smiled at her as they sat down in the booth.

“So, Richie, where are you from?”,  Max asked, taking a bite of her vanilla double scoop.

“Uh, Maine.”

“Shit, how did you end up here?”

“Just hitchhiked,” he ruffled his hair, “Hawkins is way better.” Lucas scoffed.

“This town sucks,” he added, “too much weird shit. Your town is probably a godsend in comparison”. It was Richie’s turn to laugh.

“Trust me, it’s not…”, he trailed off as he saw a little girl walk into the store with her mom. She couldn’t have been older than six, and she was holding a bright red balloon in her left hand. 

Richie felt as if his heart had stopped. The ballon spun around painfully slow until he saw the text that was printed on it:

I 
♥ 
DERRY
HAWKINS

He only managed to read it for a second before the ballon suddenly popped, making Richie yelp and leap to his feet, staring at the empty space. The girl started wailing.

“Dude, are you okay? It’s just a balloon, man”. Dustin said, trying to mask his laugh. Will looked at Richie concerned, the nauseating feeling returning. Richie slowly sat back down, his eyes darting around wildly.

Lucas laughed, “Mike, I think your twin’s scared of balloons”. The Party, minus Will and El, snickered. Richie just stared at the table, drowning in his thoughts.

Robin came over and placed two bowls of ice cream on the table then disappeared back behind the counter. Richie felt too sick to even contemplate eating, so just ignored the strawberry scoop given to him.

El finally stopped staring at him, but her wariness had by no means faded. She nudged Mike and quietly asked to talk to him alone. He furrowed his eyebrows but agreed nonetheless. They both stood up.

“We’ll be back in a second, guys”, Mike addressed the group, holding El’s hand as they walked out the front of the store.

“Don’t have too much fun,” Max called after them.

The pair stopped right outside Scoops Ahoy, and Mike studied El’s face. There was no inkling of a smile on her lips, and her eyes held his gaze, not giving anything away. “What’s up, El?”

“He’s not scared of balloons.”

“What?”

“Your… twin. He’s not scared of balloons.”

“Well, yeah. He was probably just caught off guard when it popped.”

“There was writing on it. ‘I Heart Derry’, but Derry had a line through it, and it said Hawkins instead”.

“Derry?” She nodded.

“What the hell is Derry?”

“I don’t know, but he does. It’s familiar to him; he’s scared of Derry. Not balloons. And Derry is here.”

Mike fell deep into his thoughts. ‘Derry’ had to be his old town, but how is it possible that his hometown in Maine was written on a balloon here? Had someone followed him to Hawkins? Mike knew that his brother was hiding something; running from someone. What if this person he was trying to escape from was dangerous? He knew that Richie wasn’t telling him something, mainly because they had only just met, but it hurt. Mike had put so much trust in him which Richie hadn’t returned. 

He was scared; Mike had seen that already, and he wanted to help him. But what if Richie had done something terrible? He felt a faint twinge of shame for having blindly trusted Richie, but he had to clear his mind. 

His twin might have brought danger to Hawkins, and if Richie wasn’t going to tell them anything, they’d have to figure it out for themselves.

Chapter Text

Portland wasn’t as bad as Beverly Marsh had imagined. There was a hell of a lot more to do than in Derry, but getting by without the rest of the Losers Club was something that she just couldn’t shake and knowing that Richie wasn’t with them was tearing her apart. The only person that was getting Bev through it was Gina, her aunt. 

After spending only a few months with Gina, Bev regretted not leaving her father sooner. Her aunt seemed as though she had been sent as a guardian angel, and Bev couldn’t help but seeing her mom in her. Gina’s hair was a light brown that she kept long; a sharp contrast to her niece’s short fiery waves and the blue of her eyes swam with such radiance that Bev felt comfort just looking at them. She had soft wrinkles bordering her mouth, and it warmed Bev’s heart to know it was because she smiled so much. She might not have been living with Gina for that long, but she couldn’t pretend that she didn’t love her already.

This particular November morning, Bev felt like absolute shit. Her head was pounding, and the light rays of sun that crept through the gaps in her curtains felt like lasers. She slowly sat up in bed, wincing as the movement made her head rattle. As her bare feet touched the carpet and she lifted herself up, the world seemed to spin so violently she had to grab the bed frame to keep herself from toppling over.

“Fuck,” she whispered to herself, shuffling out of her room towards the kitchen. The sweet smell of french toast was wafting through the doorway and, normally, the sizzle of the frying pan would spark a little excitement in her, but this day it only made her grimace more as the sounds pounded in her head. Gina heard Bev’s slow footsteps and spun around from the pan with a faint smile on her face until it dropped unceremoniously at the sight of her niece. She looked awful.

“Bev,” Gina started, concern evident in her tone, “are you okay? What’s wrong?”. She quickly made her way over to the teen, gently placing a hand on Bev’s forehead to check her temperature. “You’re burning up,” she said, removing her hand. 

“I feel like shit,” Bev muttered. 

“Well, there’s no chance you’re going to school today,” her aunt frowned, “Go back to bed, I’ll bring you breakfast in a bit”. Bev nodded slowly, working a soft smile onto her face in thanks before she turned back around. Yet, the warmth in her head was increasing, and she felt like she was on fire, so she made her way down the hall and to the bathroom. 

As soon as she swung open the door, she shuffled towards the sink, turning on the faucet and began to splash cold water in her face, willing her temperature to go down. After a few seconds, she sighed as tiny droplets escaped from her chin and glanced up at her reflection in the mirror. 

She wished she hadn’t looked. For a split second, her eyes were completely glazed over in a cloud of white before effortlessly returning to their natural blue. It had to just be a hallucination from her fever, right? Bev frantically brushed wet strands of her hair out of her face in an attempt to get a closer look, and although her eyes were normal, something behind her was most definitely out of place.

In a crumpled heap on the beige tiles was a figure; limbs sprawled out at all angles. A jolt of fear flurried through Bev’s chest, and she whipped herself around to look at the ground, but no one was there. Her eyebrows furrowed as she warily turned to look back at the mirror, her breath hitched tightly in her throat.

As much as she wished it wasn’t, the body was still lying there in the mirror’s reflection, motionless. Black curls laid in a mess, obscuring the person’s face, but for Bev, the familiarity was painfully strong. Her eyes flicked over to the body’s left hand were they became fixed to a long pink scar that tainted the pale skin of the boy. Richie. Staring intensely and ignoring the throbbing pain in her head, she jumped at the sight of movement. A sliver of hope in her longed for Richie to get up, to move, to talk to her. But it wasn’t him that moved. A red balloon was rising, attached to a string that was tightly bound to Richie’s wrist and causing his hand to gradually turn purple.
 
“R-Richie,” Bev stuttered, reaching an arm out towards the mirror. “Rich-“

She was cut off abruptly by the deafening pop of the balloon, making her eyes shut harshly. As she reopened them, everything was gone. The balloon. Richie. Nothing was out of the ordinary. 

Except for the growing sense of dread in the pit of her stomach.

“We could go to the library,” Dustin suggested to the rest of the Party, minus El, as they walked through the crowded hallways of Hawkins Middle School, “You know, for research on Derry.” Lucas scoffed, rubbing his nose.

“Yeah, I’m sure there’ll be loads of information there on a random ass town in Maine,” he replied, sarcasm thick on his tongue. Max pushed him lightly on the shoulder to which he exaggeratingly rubbed it.

“Yeah, well, do you have a better idea?”

Mike nodded, “We’ll go to the library after school then, but we gotta be quick, so Richie doesn’t wonder why we’re not back”. He didn’t want to hide things from Richie, but it’s not like Richie wasn’t hiding almost everything from him. Will cleared his throat.

“I can’t stop thinking about how scared he got at home. I mean, it was the TV set, and he was basically in shock.”

“He almost left yesterday,” Mike blurted, looking down at the ground as the walked.

Max turned to look at him, “What?”

“When I went back to Will’s house he was about to leave town, tried to take some money from Joyce too.”

Dustin lightly threw his hands in the air, “And why do we like this guy, again?”

Ignoring what Mike mentioned about the money, Will felt pain for the twin, muttering under his breath, “He’s terrified”.

It had been a month since Richie had been missing, leaving a gaping hole in the Losers Club that they all tried so desperately to ignore. The hundreds of missing posters that were plastered up throughout Derry were beginning to fade and crumble and, as much as they hated to admit it, so was the Losers’ hope that they’d see him again.

“Have you g-guys heard a-anything from the T-T-Tozier’s recently?” Bill asked Stan, Eddie and Ben as they walked down the steps out the front of their school. 

Stan shook his head, “Nothing.”

Eddie rubbed his eyes out of frustration, “It has to be IT”.

“But it can’t be, I mean it’s only be a few months”, Ben reasoned, but the doubt was dancing in his eyes. Eddie laughed, but there was no humour in it.

“Oh, so you think he left of his own accord? He’s such a fucking pain in the ass he would have stayed here just to piss everyone off”. His anger was intense, and it began to rattle his words. As he looked away from Ben, who had slightly shrunk in on himself at Eddie’s little outburst, he spotted Mike Hanlon waiting by the bike racks. He was staring mindlessly at the ground, directly at the spot that the Losers’ had last seen their friend.

Mike rarely waited for them outside the school; they usually rode from there straight to his house once the bell rang, so seeing him there raised a few questions in each of their minds.
 
Once they reached the bike racks, Mike was lifted from his thoughts and stared back at them, a weak smile flashed across his face quickly before it diminished. His dark eyes were apprehensive.

“M-Mike,” Bill was the first to speak, “What are y-you doing here?” Mike sharply cleared his throat, looking between all of them before his eyes finally settled back on Bill's.

“Bev called me.”

“What did she say?” Ben asked, the question slipping passed his lips way quicker than he intended them to.

“She saw Richie.”

Time seemed to stop for a second, and only the patter of shoes on the ground reached the Losers’ ears. One collective thought ran through all of their minds: He’s alive.

“The fucker’s in Portland?” Eddie almost shouted, but he couldn’t contain his relief. This relief, however, depleted just as fast as it came when he saw Mike softly shake his head.

“No, she, like, saw him. A hallucination. She said it felt like she was back in the deadlights. He was unconscious.” 

Even though he didn’t say it, his words confirmed their worst fears.

“S-So, IT’s got him”, Bill sighed.

Stan’s hand was shaking as he brought it up to his head, “Fuck.”

Eddie took a step back, throwing his hands up in the air wildly as his thoughts came tumbling out of his mouth, “This is fucking crazy, I can’t go through that shit again. It’s a miracle I didn’t contract every disease under the fucking sun last time. Why did Richie have to bring all this shit up again?! I’m gonna kill him. Do you know how long it took me to convince my mom to let me leave the house again after Neilbolt?” 

In the midst of Eddie’s pause, Stan mouthed ‘a week’, the time ingrained in his brain after Eddie ranted about it the rest of the summer.

“A week!” His face had turned a light shade of red, and he grappled for his inhaler after his second outburst in the space of a few minutes.

“But has he really been there this whole time?” Mike piped up again, subconsciously running his finger along the scar that settled in the middle of his palm. “We have to go back. For him”.

They all knew he was right, but they wished that he wasn’t. They couldn’t leave their friend, not after promising to kill IT whenever it came back. 

Only a few kids were still left out the front of the school as the buses had left a few minutes ago. Ben could vaguely hear Sally Mueller laughing with Carla Bourdeaux somewhere as he looked up at the big oak tree behind the bike racks where one of Richie’s missing posters was stapled roughly against the bark. His eyes grew wide, and he tapped Stan’s arm with his hand without removing his gaze from the paper. “Guys”, he pointed up at the poster waiting for the others to spot what he saw, silently praying that they could see it.

“Holy shit”, Eddie uttered. Richie’s face beamed down at him from the poster, taunting them as the words ‘MISSING’ now said ‘FOUND’.

Stan took a couple of steps backwards as Bill ripped the poster down, leaving only the corners of the paper stapled to the tree. The rest gathered slowly around the poster only to see that the print had changed, once again declaring their friend as missing.

Stan took the poster from Bill’s hand and threw it on the ground, “What the hell is going on?”. It didn’t sound like a question.

“IT”, Mike stated, his voice emotionless in contrast to the sadness in his dark eyes.

“S-So m-much for 27 years, Ben”, Bill muttered.

Silently, they all mounted their bikes as their thoughts rushed endlessly. They rode away from their school, ignorant to the fact that the poster that lay discarded in the dirt had pictured their friend in his newly cracked glasses.

Hawkins Public Library stood proudly in the middle of the town; a palace built of red brick. Despite all of its visual splendour, the library was cold as shit. As the Party stepped through the large wooden double doors, it almost felt as if a gust of icy wind had hit them. They might as well have just stepped back outside.

Rubbing her hands together violently in a futile attempt to manifest some warmth, Max declared to the others, “What now?”

Without responding, Dustin marches towards the front desk, letting the rest of the group follow. He cleared his throat to gain the attention of the librarian that sat behind the computer monitor, internally amazed at how the low temperature seemed not to bother her in her thin blue cardigan. “Can we-“, he began.

“Shh!” The librarian cut him off sharply, “Lower your voice.” 

Dustin rolled his eyes and started again in an exaggerated whisper, “Can we use the automated catalog?” Her eyes bore into his, silently hinting that he was missing something. “Please?” She nodded curtly and stood up from the desk.

“Fine, I was going on break anyway,” She began to walk away before turning back sharply, “But I’ll be back in ten minutes. Stay quiet”.

Lucas offered her a sickly sweet smile, “We will, ma’am.”

Mike rushed around the desk, settling down in the chair as his friends gathered around him, staring intently at the monitor.

“Okay, so search in ‘books’ and ‘newspapers’ for Derry, Maine”, Dustin said, adjusting his hat to cover his ears that were already red from the cold.

Mike sighed, “That’s what I was gonna do, Einstein.”

He typed in the subject ‘DERRY, MAINE’, hoping against all odds for some results and his silent prayers were answered. There were a couple of books on the history of Derry, but none of them were a part of the library’s inventory unsurprisingly; however, the library did have a few newspapers that covered stories on the town.

Without a seconds thought, they rushed to the section the catalog directed them to, gathering all 13 newspapers that were available containing articles on Derry and spread them out over an empty table. They were shot a few dirty looks from a couple of people browsing the shelves near them, but they hardly took any notice. They had more pressing matters on their mind than being judged by strangers.

As they filtered through each paper, it became shockingly apparent that Derry had a missing kids problem. Missing poster after missing poster was printed on the broadsheet pages, and Mike paused when he found Richie’s. It was on the 27th page of a paper published back on October 6th. As he stared at the enlarged eyes of his twin's in the grainy photograph, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of guilt that he knew where Richie was when a whole town believed he was missing. Max’s words brought him out of his overwhelming thoughts.

“So they all ran away?”

“No,” Will stated, bluntly. He was holding a newspaper so high it was covering his face. Placing it back on the table, he pointed to a story from the end of the summer. “They were killed. A kid called Henry Bowers was incarcerated for it.”

Lucas shut his eyes in confusion and pinched the bridge of his nose, “But all of this happened before Richie left?”.

Will nodded, “And if the guy is locked up, who is Richie running from?” 

“Uh, guys,” Dustin looked up from the paper he was reading as the rest of his friends turned to look back at him, “This town is weird as shit”.

“What do you mean?” Max was the first to ask.

“I mean, look at this,” he spun the paper round so the rest could read as he pointed, “Those death rates are beyond high. Like way higher than anywhere else in the country”. 

Lucas let out a long breath, “Shit”.

Max continued to stare at the statistics on the page, “No wonder Richie got out of there”.

Mike shook his head, “There’s gotta be something that we’re missing.”

“Like, what if Richie did something”, Lucas supplied, “you know, something bad.”

Mike sighed, standing up straight, “Then we’ve got to find out”.

“The photo,” Will blurted out, looking between each of them.

Dustin looked around as if he was missing something, “Uh, what photo?”

Will turned to look at Mike, “Remember the photo that Richie has with him?” Mike nodded quickly, unsure of what Will was getting at, “I saw a bit of it, and there were other kids in it. Like his friends.”

Still not getting the idea, Dustin asked, “And your point is?”

“Maybe we could ask El to try and find them”.

“I didn’t think I’d be looking at this piece of shit again this soon,” Eddie spoke, as the what remained of the Losers stared up at the dilapidated state of the Neilbolt House. As he looked at it, he didn’t feel the same as he did in the summer. He didn’t feel the creaks of the rotten floorboards punch his heart, he didn’t feel the thick, dusty air choke him as he walked up the broken stairs of the porch. He didn’t feel the same fear. Something was missing.

As they walked through the front door, Bill turned back to look at his friends, seeing the apprehension in all of their faces. “You r-ready?”

Stan let out a shaky sigh, “Never”.

They made their way through the tattered rooms of the house, on edge ready to fight anything that pounced from behind a corner. As they descended the steps of the basement, a sinking feeling settled at their feet. 

“What the fuck?” Eddie exclaimed.

The stone well stood exactly where it always had, everything the same except for a thick wooden covering placed over the top of it. The boys warily walked closer, ignoring the smell of rotting wood and saw that a small piece of ripped card was nailed to the top of the covering. In a neat, black script, the words ‘I’m on vacation - be back soon!’  were scribbled across it.

Mike quickly searched around the basement and found a crowbar tucked into one of the corners. Grabbing it, he strode over to the note and began to remove the nail that was holding the note in place.

“You better have got your tetanus shot,” Eddie muttered, but Mike ignored him, taking the now free piece of card. Flipping it over, they saw that the message was written on the back of part of a postcard. It was difficult to make out what the image in the background was, but most of the printed greeting was still intact. It read:

WISH YOU WERE HERE!

HAWKINS, 

None of them spoke, but they didn’t have to. They were all thinking the same thing: Where the fuck is Hawkins?

Chapter Text

The sharpness of winter was closing in; Joyce could feel the numbing pain crawling over her fingertips. She struggled to slot the key into the front door of her house as her hands shook from the bite of the wind. After what felt like hours, she finally made it work and let herself in, feeling the gracious warmth from one of the heaters inside wash away the chills. 

Checking her watch, she saw that it was quarter to four in the afternoon, but as she looked around, neither Will or Mike seemed to have come back from school. There was, however, Richie Tozier sprawled out on the couch in the middle of a nap. She felt bad for him being left alone most of the day, but he seemed so exhausted all the time no matter how desperately he tried to hide it through over the top voices. 

After she removed her scarf and her coat, she quickly rubbed her hands together for some extra warmth, then lit a cigarette before sitting down in an armchair across from the twin. As much as she tried not to, Joyce couldn’t help but look at the boy. It was all just too strange.

She fiddled gently with the cigarette in her fingers as she gazed over at Richie, feeling a subtle flash of hatred.

(burn him)

She contemplated with a sharp glance back to the cigarette.

(burn him)

Shaking her head softly, she shoved away those malicious thoughts, ignoring that they had ever been there at all. Work must have really worn her out if she was thinking like that, right? She wouldn’t dream of hurting a child, of hurting Richie.

He laid on his side, black curls spread out in every direction and, with his glasses discarded on the floor, she could for once fully see his face. He looked even more like Mike than she saw before that for a moment she thought that it might have actually been Mike. Richie stirred a little, letting his left arm drop over the side of the couch, but he didn’t wake up. Joyce’s eyes trailed down his arm to his hand, and that was when she saw it. A thick, pink scar across his palm. How had she not seen it before? 

She leaned forward to get a closer look, the cigarette hanging loosely from between her fingers. It looked recent, and Joyce had read enough books to know that a cut in someone’s palm is usually done in some type of ritual or oath. She racked her mind for some kind of logical explanation, but she kept coming to terrible conclusions. What shit what this kid involved in? 

She tore her eyes from the scar and let them wander over his face. Richie seemed to be in a really deep sleep; his eyes lightly darting beneath his eyelids and soft breaths escaped from his nose.

Ever since he left a month before, Richie had recurring dreams about being back with the Losers. This particular instance, they were messing about in the quarry, splashing each other in the crystal water as their laughs were carried up the cliffs. He felt happy, forgetting that he ever left. 

He could almost feel the sensation of treading water and the delicate heat as the sun grazed his face. Leaning back slightly, he let himself float on the surface, moving ever so slightly with the water.

“Hey, trashmouth”, he heard just before a tiny wave splashed over his face and leaving little pools of water over the lenses of his glasses. He positioned himself back up straight as he wiped his vision clear, looking for which one of his friends splashed him.

For a split second, he saw that it was Eddie who was staring at him with a shit-eating grin right before pushing a second wave at him that knocked his glasses clean off his face. Yet, the typical blurred reality was not what Richie saw when they left his face. The world was black. Completely and utterly black. 

“Uh, guys!” He called for his friends, but his voice only echoed right back at him. “Where the fuck are you?” He frantically felt through the water for his glasses, eventually feeling them graze his knuckles before grabbing them. As he put them back on, his vision returned, only interrupted by the little droplets on his lenses, but after seeing what was in front of him, he wished he was blind again. 

Floating silently ahead of him were his friends, the water stained red around them. His head spun.

“Guys!”, he screamed as he tried to swim towards them, only making it about a metre before something firm grabbed his ankle. Nails dugs viciously into his skin, and long fingers grew tighter. He didn’t even think to gasp before he was pulled under.

Joyce jumped as Richie awoke suddenly; sweat glistening on his brow and making thick strands of black hair stick to his forehead. He was breathing heavily, dark eyes darting from side to side until they rested on her. At the sight of Joyce, he seemed to calm down ever so slightly, and he managed to sit up, grabbing his glasses from the floor and returning them to his face.

Unsure exactly of what to do, Joyce cleared her throat. “Are you okay?” She questioned, trying to be as gentle as possible. Richie raised his head up to look at her, a forced laugh escaping his chapped lips in a poor attempt to dismiss his obviously anxious demeanour.

“Right as rain”, he smiled, but the gestured faded almost as quickly as it appeared. His eyes flickered over to the pack of cigarettes on the coffee table, and he pointed to them. “Can I have one?” 

“No, I don’t think-“

“Please, just this one time?” A sombre look crossed his face as he let out a shaky breath, “Fuck, I just need… please?” 

She thought about it for a second, looking over to the discarded pack feeling a strange sense of irony in giving a cigarette to the kid she randomly thought about burning with one. With a sigh, she gave in a took one out of the carton, holding it out to him. Slender fingers grabbed it lightly, shaking subtly. Richie placed it between his lips and motioned to the lighter, wordlessly asking for Joyce to pass it to him. Once she did, she stared at him as he lit it and took one of the deepest inhales she’s seen. 

“Richie,” Joyce started, and he looked at her through the fragile smoke, “Did you have trouble at home? Trouble that made you leave?”

He sat there silent for a second, before shrugging, “Sort of. I guess.”

“Well, do you want me to call CPS? They could help… sort things out.”

Richie shook his head adamantly, “Nah, It’s better like this. Trust me.” The doubt on her face did not agree with him, and he felt the overwhelming urge to do what he always did to convince her. “Lil’ Ol’ Richie knows what he’s doing!” It didn’t seem to work.

“But-“

Joyce was cut short by the sound of the front door unlocking, and they looked over to the noise in unison. In walked Will with Max trailing ever so slightly behind him, but the absence of Mike set off a flurry of questions in Richie’s head. 

“Where’s Mike?” 

Max and Will shot each other a quick glance. “He, uh, went to see El. She’s feeling sick.” 

“Oh,” Richie relaxed, “What did Mike give her chlamydia or something?” He took another drag of his cigarette as Joyce shot him a dirty look.

“Anyway,” Will piped up, “We’re bored and were wondering if you wanted to go to the arcade?” As soon as the question reached his ears, Richie brightened up and nodded vigorously.

“You bet your ass I do”.

Will gave a weak smile, trying to not let his feelings of guilt shine through as Richie walked passed him, grabbed his jacket and marched out the door. 

“Want me to drive you guys?” Joyce asked, standing up.

Will nodded, “Thanks, mom.”

She grabbed her car keys from the counter and followed Richie outside. Max went to leave after her, yet was stopped in her tracks when Will grabbed her wrist. She spun around to face him, “What?”

“I don’t feel good about doing this.”

“It was your idea.”

“I know,” he sighed, “Fine, let’s just go.”

Once they walked out the house, Will shut the door behind him, making sure not to lock it. He still felt the guilt settle in his stomach, but he had to let Mike and the others back in to get Richie’s photo that was nestled between the couch cushions. They needed to find his friends. To find out who Richie was running from.

Lucas knocked his knuckles against the rough wooden door of Hopper’s cabin, waiting for El to open it as Mike and Dustin stood behind him, jittering with anticipation. Once the door swung open, he stepped back as he watched the confusion on El’s face. Her eyebrows furrowed slightly but softened when she laid her eyes on Mike. Dustin was the first to speak.

“We need your help.”

Mike grappled for the photograph that he had taken from Will’s couch only minutes after he had left with Richie for the arcade. He removed it from his jacket and handed it to his girlfriend who took it from him warily. As she studied their faces, she seemed to get lost, feeling an emotion deep in her gut that she couldn’t quite describe. 

In the picture, Richie was smiling incredibly hard; she almost smiled right back at it. There were six other kids in the photo, all around Richie’s age, scattered on what looked like rocks. A vast space of bright blue water shone behind them, and all El could think of was how much she wanted to be there. 

She glanced back up at Mike. “Help with what?”

“It’s about Richie”, he pointed to the photograph, “You were right about where he’s from. We just don’t know what it is exactly.” He cleared his throat as the look on her face grew with wariness. “Can you find them? In the photo?”

Her eyes darted between them, and after a few seconds, she softly nodded her head. “Fine”. She swiftly spun around, photograph clutched in her hand so tightly that Mike prayed it wouldn’t crease. The others followed quickly behind her, Dustin closing the door once they were all inside. 

El was already fiddling with the tv set, finding the perfect point of endless static as Mike unravelled the red scarf around his neck to give to her as a blindfold. Once everything was set up, Mike could already feel the sharp tingle of anticipation dance along his fingertips. Or maybe it was anxiety; he didn’t want anything to be wrong. He didn’t want anything to be wrong with Richie.

El positioned herself with her back towards the television screen; cross-legged. Her back was perfectly straight as she fastened the scarf around her eyes, enveloping her in a muted black. Lucas and Dustin sat themselves on either side of her, staring intently. Mike, however, could not sit still. He was pacing, rapidly shooting glances at his girlfriend, but too scared for his eyes to linger a second too long. The fear that his suspicions of his twin would be confirmed, he didn’t want to be right in that Richie wasn’t a good person, but he knew he couldn’t trust a kid who was so blatantly keeping dangerous secrets. 

A heavy sigh passed through El’s lips, “I see them”.

Black water pooled around her feet. She was wearing socks, but the liquid was like a phantom swarming around her, yet not touching her and leaving her feet dry. Off in the distance, soft chatter floated around as her eyes fell on five boys sitting next to each other a little further away.

Every step El took towards them sent ripples through the puddle at her feet, delicately harmonising their trickles.  As she got closer to the others, she saw that they were sitting staggered on a set of wooden stairs. Some of the wooden panels had broken so that there were splinters sticking up in every direction, but the boys didn’t seem to care. 

It was as if they were plucked straight out of Richie’s photo, yet the broad smiles that crossed their faces were absent and were now replaced with worry.

One of the boys who was holding a small piece of card spoke, and she could finally make out the words, “W-we have to a-assume he’s there.” A boy with dark brown hair and a red fanny pack scoffed.

“And where’s there, Bill? Hawkins?” That caught El’s attention. “There’s probably hundreds of places called Hawkins”.

“Well, wherever he’s is,” a dark-skinned boy uttered, “IT’s there too”. El’s brows furrowed. What was there? What was in Hawkins?

A short bout of silence fell over the group. Some of them where staring off into space, others were sitting there with their head in their hands. Yet, the boy with the fanny pack was bouncing his leg up and down, anxiety swarming inside him so strong it was bubbling to the surface. He stood up quickly, running his hands through his hair.

“Fuck. This-this is ridiculous,” The others looked up sharply as he descended the stairs, “We can’t just sit around, we’ve gotta,” He paused, breathing quickly, “Shit, I don’t even know.”

‘Bill’ stood up after him. “E-Eddie, the only thing we can do right now is look for p-places called Hawkins.” Eddie rubbed his forehead as the rest of the boys slowly got to their feet, fading away slowly into the darkness.

El ripped the scarf off of her head, trying to comprehend the conversation she overheard, trying to decipher anything worthwhile. As her eyes adjusted to the shift in light, Mike stopped his pacing and eagerly sat down in front of her. 

“You find them?” He asked. Her eyes flickered to the photo she left on the carpet in front of her, and she nodded lightly.

“They talked about Hawkins”.”

“Wha-“.

“They don’t know where it is, but they know Richie is here.”

“How?”

“I don’t know.” She paused for a moment, “They said something was here with Richie. Didn’t say what.”

Mike rubbed his eyes, desperately trying to wash away this reality. He sighed. 

“Anything else?” Lucas piped up, leaning forward in anticipation.

El furrowed her eyebrows, staring at the photograph, “Not her.”

“Not who?” Mike pressed.

She lifted a finger to the picture, hovering it over the short red-head girl that was smiling on Richie’s left. “They were all there, but not her.” El looked up at her boyfriend, “She wasn’t there”.

Lucas grabbed the photo from the floor, inspecting it carefully. “Do you think you could find her too?” El looked over to him, thinking. She nodded.

The Palace Arcade, Richie decided, was far better than the arcade back in Derry. Not only was it not in Derry, but it was also twice the size with double the number of video games. There were a lot of kids in there when Max, Will and Richie got there as school was done for the day and the loud chatter just made Richie forget that anything was wrong. The hum of machines felt soothing in a way, like a warm blanket, and he welcomed the comfort.

As they paced down the aisles between the games, Max turned to Richie, “So, which one’s your favourite?” She gestured around, “I’m a pro at Dig Dug.”

“They got Streetfighter?”

Will pointed to one of the consoles at the back, “Over there.” 

Richie’s face lit up when he saw that no one was on it, eagerly jogging over to it, grabbing a fistful of tokens from his pockets that they had got when they entered. “Oh, fuck yeah.” He loaded one of the coins into the machine and began to get lost in the game that he hadn’t played since the summer. He hadn’t even stepped foot in an arcade since Bowers threatened him last time, a memory so painfully seared into his mind that he wondered if he’d ever forget. 

Max and Will went to the two games on Richie’s left, and the rhythmic clicking of the buttons sent a flood of endorphins through him. Maybe everything would be okay.

The group hardly noticed as the time flew by them, reaching almost five pm. 

“Shit!” Max let out in frustration as the GAME OVER screen materialised in front of her. Sighing she looked over to Richie who was mashing buttons just as intensely as when they first arrived.

“This high score is mine, bitch!” He exclaimed, leaning further forward at the screen as if he couldn’t see it clear enough already. Intrigued, Max moves to stand behind him, ready to witness the feat. He didn’t notice her behind him as the game glitched; pixelated waves of black engulfing the screen seconds before his goal. “What the fuck?!” He shouted, hitting the buttons in a futile effort to revive it, but his movements slowed as he saw a herd of blood-red pixels dance across the screen, circling wildly until they spelled out ‘YOU’LL FLOAT TOO’ in the centre of the black screen.

He took a step back as soon as the words registered in his mind, bumping into Max who carried a look of confusion, not understanding the extent of Richie’s fear. Before she could ask him if he was okay, the Streetfighter console shifted. The machine rose slowly off the ground, and Max’s breath was held in her throat. The commotion made Will tear his eyes away from his screen as he looked up at the levitating game, before looking around the arcade. Yet, no one else apart from the three of them was paying any attention to it. As if only they were there to witness it. 

“Are you doing this?!” Max half-shouted at Richie to be heard over the white noise of the rest of the arcade. 

Richie didn’t answer, his dark eyes still transfixed on the scene before him as the horror embedded itself like a dagger in his chest, restricting his lungs. 

Without warning, the console plummeted back to the ground, emitting a deafening crash that shook the floor around them. Shards of glass shot out from the screen, illuminated by golden sparks as the game finally took its last breath. The group stumbled back, vaguely hearing screams from the other kids that could now see the broken corpse of machine surrounded by its own debris.

Trying to register what had just happened, Max and Will glanced over to Richie. The boy had scrunched up his eyes behind his glasses, desperately muttering, “It’s not real”, over and over again, praying against everything that he was right.

Chapter Text

“Everybody out!” The arcade manager’s voice rattled harshly in the ears of all the kids there. His shoulders were hunched as he tried to contain the waves of rage that washed over him at the sight of the mangled Streetfighter machine. No one moved; still in shock at the collection of glass and metal that littered the dusty carpet. 

The manager looked around at everyone; a vein pulsing boldly on his forehead as his fists shook violently. “Now!” 

His voice boomed through the silence, encouraging the kids to start retreating backwards until they all filed outside. Max and Will attempted to pull Richie back, away from the mess that had unfolded right in front of their eyes only moments before. Yet, no matter the urgency with which the two pulled at him, Richie stood his ground; paralysed. His eyes bore into each of the shards that sat haphazardly at the base of his sneakers; dark irises twinkling in each piece.

The manager glanced at the three of them, noticing Max and Will’s futile attempts to direct Richie away. “Not you”, he muttered, the fury rattling his words as he stepped closer, shaking his head.

Will looked desperately at the windows and saw a lot of curious faces peering eagerly through the glass. The sun was setting, and it cast long black shadows across each kid’s face, warping their innocent appearances into a demonic alter.

“Which one of you was it?” The manager spat, causing Will to whip his head back around. Max looked frantically at Richie, silently hoping that he’d be able to manifest an acceptable answer, but the boy was still frozen; still as ice.

Seeing Max’s desperation at him, the manager’s face relaxed as he realised. Smirking devilishly at the twin as he took another step towards the group, “Ah, so it was you, huh?” Richie didn’t respond, making the man turn to the other two and wave a hand, dismissing them. “Get out of here while I call the cops.”

As soon as the words passed his lips, Max and Will jumped forward in protest. “Wait! We all did it!” Max half-shouted; Will frantically nodding his head in agreement.

The manager let out a harsh, humourless laugh, looking them in the eye. The cold blue of them sent shockwaves, through Will’s system, the familiar sense of nausea settling in his stomach, just like when he first met Richie. “No one likes dishonesty, kids. Get out.”

“No, we’re not-“ Max started, but was interrupted by Richie’s first words since the accident.

“Guys,” his voice was quiet, but steady, “just… just leave. It’s fine.” His eyes never lifted from the ground, and his thick-rimmed glasses began to slide slowly down his slender nose.

Will’s brows furrowed in confusion, but the threatening demeanour of the manager forced him and Max to slowly stumble back. Max cleared her throat as she glanced at the twin. “We’ll be waiting outside, Richie.” He didn’t react to her words.

The bitterness of the freezing air hit them both like a truck, but they pushed through the discomfort and immediately spun around to peer through the window like the rest of the kids still outside. Richie’s back is to them, still slouched over as the manager was no doubt cussing him out judging by the boiling rage that had engulfed the latter’s face. 

Max stepped away from the window, running her hands through her red hair, before turning back to look at Will. “What the hell was that?” She asked sharply in a whisper. 

Will shook his head softly in disbelief, not looking his friend in the eyes. “I have no idea.” His eyes widened as a thought materialised before his eyes. “Maybe he’s like El.” His gaze met Max’s, and her face softened at the revelation. 

“Maybe he’s running because someone’s after him for it.” She added, nodding slightly as if everything was starting to make sense. She shifted her gaze back to the window, noticing that the manager was a few paces away from Richie, wordlessly ranting through the phone. “We gotta tell the others.” 

“No,” Will’s voice was calm and steady. “Not yet. We need to talk to him first, I mean, we’ve already gone behind his back once, and I don’t wanna keep doing it.”

“But we barely even know him.”

“We can’t get to know him if he won’t trust us.”

Dark water lapped at her shoes again, taunting her has her head began to throb from the strain. The silence was broken by the soft song of a bird, causing El to whip her head around in the direction of the sound. At the sight before her, a tiny triumphant smile graced her lips. 

There the girl in the photograph was, leaning back on a birch park bench with a cigarette limp between her pale fingers. Her red hair seemed darker without the light of the sun in the picture, but the colour was still vibrant. As she took a drag of her cigarette, the smoke twirled lazily into the darkness, disappearing just as quick as the next drag. 

Freckles splattered the girl’s face like a million constellations, identical to the photo. “I’ve found her”, El announced into nothingness, yet the moment the sound resonated from her, the girl whipped her head around in alarm, dropping her cigarette, causing her to wince as it burned her pant leg. 

Her blue eyes bore into El’s own, a look of determination masking her wariness. She got up from the bench; cigarette falling to the ground from her lap.“Where the hell did you come from?”

El stepped back, unsure of what was happening. “You can see me?”

“Obviously”.

El remained silent; the shock overwhelming her. Nothing like this had ever happened before. Ignoring her silence, the girl pressed on.

“Who are you?”

“What is after Richie?” That seemed to shake the strange calmness of the girl.

“What? Do you know where Richie is?” Anger flooding her features as she took a step towards El. The second she moved closer, the void violently warped. Black water pushing her feet with small, but powerful waves making El stumble slightly. Fear of the unknown was grasping at her fingertips. 

In an effort not to anger the girl more, she nodded in confirmation. “What’s following-“

“Where is he?” The girl’s question was accompanied by another forceful step, and El looked on in horror and curiosity as the blue eyes were flashing white; almost soulless. The step sent another lurch through the blackness, powerful enough to knock El off her feet and backwards into the shallow water. 

The fall rattled her senses, and she pushed herself partially up, still kneeling in the pool. Desperately searching around her, she could see that the girl was now gone, vanished from the nothingness as El lost her focus. Yet, she wasn’t alone.

In replacement, three painfully bright lights danced around each other above the manic waves. They circled leisurely in front of her as she looked on in wonder and confusion. The whiteness of the lights was almost blinding, but she felt no compulsion to shield her eyes. A strange comfort accompanied their presence. 

Without warning, the lights darted towards her, embedding themselves deep within her chest, leaving her grappling at her body in shock. The familiar black of the void grew brighter until the entire atmosphere was engulfed in a soulless white. El’s breaths turned shallow as the water rose higher, enveloping her in a freezing embrace, filling her mouth with ice.

A muffled scream escaped her mouth as she roughly ripped the scarf from her eyes. She could vaguely feel Mike drop to her side, frantically asking if she was okay. 

Was she? She couldn’t tell.

Her quick breaths slowed, like a machine shutting down until an unnatural serenity washed over her. Looking deep into Mike’s eyes, a thought boomed through her head so loud it felt like it wasn’t her own.

(dark just like his brother’s)

Dustin cleared his throat in an attempt to shatter the awkward silence. “What did she say?”

El met his gaze slowly, with purpose. A tight-lipped smile crossed her face, “Nothing”.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Hopper interrogated, rage hardly kept in check as she stared at Richie who sat quietly in the back of his car. Luckily for the kid, he had been able to convince the arcade manager not to press charges if Richie would help pay for any damages. “I knew you’d be trouble if you were Mike’s brother, but I didn’t think you’d be the Devil’s incarnate.”

Richie remained silent, noticing that Will was looking sorrowfully at him from the corner of his eye.

The Byers’ house emerged from the distance, shades of a deep blue bleed through the dark black of the sky, casting ominous light throughout the trees that surrounded it. In front of the house sat an unfamiliar car, lightly piquing Richie’s interest as he looked over to Will, silently asking for an answer.

“Will, looks like your brother’s home,” Hopper answered for him, sending a little spark of worry in Richie’s brain at the thought of having to interact with anyone new at that moment.

Once Hopper parked the car, the engine shuddered to a halt. Both Will and Richie swung the car door’s open and climbed out. Only Will looked back at the cop and waved as he restarted the engine and drove away. 

The smell of gas felt bitter on Richie’s tongue as the pair walked slowly towards the porch of the house, right towards Jonathan Byers and Nancy Wheeler. 

Nancy’s arms were wrapped around her waist as her lips shuddered from the cold. She stared forcefully at her brother’s twin. Jonathan jogged lightly over to his brother, “Are you okay? What happened?” The younger of the pair opened his mouth the answer but stopped himself at the sight of Nancy marching over to Richie who stopped in his tracks. Her gaze made him shift his weight between his feet with unease.

“You need to tell Mike to come home.”

 Richie’s eyes widened behind his cracked lenses, “What?”

“Tell him to come home.”

Richie laughed emotionlessly, “Look, I don’t think that’s up to me-“

Nancy’s cool broke, and she waved her arms wildly, tears brimming her eyes. “My mom’s been heartbroken ever since he left! He left with you, and she feels like a monster! This had destroyed her, you know. You’ve destroyed her.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Just tell him to come home; she needs to know he’s okay.”

Richie let out a small sigh, looking deep into her eyes. “This might be better if it comes from you, not me, you know?” He didn’t wait for a response as he continued on past her and towards the warmth of the house; birds chirping softly from the trees in encouragement.

Nancy let out a groan of frustration and spun herself around, shooting a deadly stare at Richie’s back. “This is all your fault.”

Jonathan stepped forward to protest, calmly warning “Nance”. Yet, his girlfriend pressed on.

“It’s your fault everything’s been screwed up.”

Richie paused for the final time, muttering under his breath through the lips of a painful smile, “Don’t I know it.”

As he reached the front door, he heard Jonathan utter “Come on, Nance, let’s go”, while Will materialised behind him. Closing the door behind them, Will sighed before turning to the other boy.

“I think I’m gonna go lie down, Richie.”

(uh-oh, looks like your friends are dwindling)

Richie ignored the seething voice that plagued his head and nodded delicately at Will, who left down the hallway without another word. As he walked over to the couch, he passed Joyce, who was sitting comfortably in the armchair, a newspaper covering her face. 

“Did you have fun?” She asked, not lowering the paper.

“Tons.”

He plopped down on the couch, carefully slipping his hand down the sides of the cushions, searching for his photo; the one thing that could have provided him with any comfort. A pain struck his chest as his heart skipped a beat. It wasn’t there.

His breath hitched in his throat, as a sound escaped from him involuntarily in his shock. At the noise, Joyce put down her paper and looked over to the boy, concerned. “Everything okay?”

Chapter Text

None of the lights were on inside. After he’d stayed with El for a few hours following her search for Richie’s friend, Mike had finally headed back to the Byers’ house that night. Exhaustion tugged at his eyes as he slowly opened the front door, edging it inch by inch.

Walking through silently, he turned back to close the door behind him, equally as slow as he had opened it, yet it wasn’t enough to stop a deafening creak from erupting from the hinges. The cacophonous screech rattled Mike’s head, blood pounding. It took a second for him to recover, but he let out a quiet sigh of relief and spun back around to make his way over to the couch.

Removing the stolen picture from his pocket, he inched towards his sleeping twin. Richie was still wearing his jacket, the oversized clothing draped over the side of the couch, mimicking his thick black hair that drooped lazily around his head. Mike held his breath as he carefully pushed the photograph between the brown couch cushions at his brother’s feet.

Once the picture was put in place, a jolt of fear shook through Mike’s fingertips as Richie suddenly turned over in his sleep, making Mike’s breath speed up. Relief flooded through him when he realised he’d put it back without his twin noticing and he began to retreat backwards, heading for Will’s room down the hall.

Chapter Text

Rain in Derry was relentless. The rattle of harsh droplets on the window panes rang out like bullets, but the Losers Club - what was left of them - hardly noticed. Bill, Stan, Mike, Ben, and Eddie sat around the Uris’ dining room table, stress thick in the air. Square in the middle of the large oak table was Beverly Marsh on speakerphone, the poor connection making her voice come across as raspy and tired, not too far off of how she actually felt.

“There was this girl,” She started, “Like, she wasn’t physically there. I don’t know how I know that, but I do.” Mike’s brows furrowed in confusion as she continued. “It was like she was a hallucination, but I know she was real. Then she just… disappeared.”

A faint spell of silence overcame the group as they all fought to contemplate what they had just heard. Eddie was the first to speak up.

“And, she knows where Richie is?”

“She’s gotta be with him, wherever she is,” Bev answered, her voice growing more certain, more sure. Even though her interaction with this mysterious girl was short and not very fruitful, it gave her a brand new sense of determination that they’d find their trashmouth. “She asked me what was after him.”

“I-IT,” Bill managed, through shaky breaths as he wrung his hands to control his nerves.

“That means she’s in Hawkins, too.” Ben piped up. Mike nodded.

“There’s four different towns named Hawkins in the US,” he glanced around at the other boys, “We just gotta figure out which one is the right one.”

Eddie laughed dryly, shaking his head, “We’re fucked.”

El had managed to sit up, resting her back against the soft base of the couch as she caught her breath, taking in the situation around her. Since she came to, she felt as though a weight had been lifted; a curse. Her actions only moments before she could only recall in parts like something clouded her memories. It felt as if it wasn’t her in control. Why would she attack Richie? Sure, she had no reason to like him, but she had no reason to hate him either. So, why try to kill him? She didn’t have much time to contemplate this as Hopper began to step dangerously close to the boy.

Each step the cop took towards him, felt like it shifted the ground. Richie’s vision was still skewed from his missing glasses, and he could tell that the cut across his forward was still bleeding as fresh, warm blood stuck to his right cheek. Richie craned his neck to look up at Hopper’s face.

“I don’t know what kinda curse you got, kid, but you’ve really screwed a lot of shit up since you got here,” Hopper’s words were laced with poison, burning like fire in Richie’s head, but he pushed down the hurt a replace the emotions with a nervous laugh.

“I mean, I don’t want to take all the credit,” He scratched the back of his neck even though the movement sent flashes of pain down his spine, “It’s not just-“

A swift movement from the cop swiped the words from his mouth. Richie was yanked roughly to his feet as Hopper grabbed the lapels of his jacket, shaking him roughly. The sudden change made him dizzy, and he almost twisted his ankle as his feet were haphazardly pushed to the rough, glass-littered ground.

“Hey!” El protested softly in the background, still feeling a little disconnected from reality. Hopper ignored her protests.

“Enough of this shitty little attitude, kid.”

“It’s not me,” He struggled to put his hands up in surrender, still feeling little flashes of pain, “I swear.”

Hopper scoffed, “Well, what the hell is it then?”

The question made Richie’s brain go numb; desperately trying to evade even thinking of the demon that was stalking his every step. His dark eyes cast to the side, not daring to look at the cop as he muttered, “I can’t explain it.”

The grip on Richie’s jacket significantly tightened with Hopper’s growing anger, his fists shaking with emotion against the fabric. “Well, you better start, or I swear to God…”

It took a lot in him to return the cop’s gaze, but he looked at the man with a heated determination, the only sound left in the cabin being the subtle murmur of the television. Fire burned with the fury in Hopper’s eyes as he clearly didn’t care about Richie’s pain in the moment. It was painfully familiar.

“You’re an adult,” Richie taunted, “you wouldn’t get it.”

“What the hell is that supposed to-“

“Are you normally this angry? Is being a raging prick part of your job description?”

That hit the wrong nerve. Hopper suddenly let go of Richie as a minuscule moment of confusion swept across Hopper’s eyes but was almost instantly replaced by an anger that contorted his face. He leant forward again, arms striking out to grab a rough hold of Richie again, but the boy managed to duck out of the way at the last second, almost stumbling on a broken panel of wood that sat discarded on the floor.

“Not always,” El piped up from across the room, shaking getting to her feet as she regained her strength, “Not as much as now.”

Richie touched his head once more, inspecting the blood that was leaking lightly from it. “See?” He said sarcastically to Hopper.

His tone only riled up the cop further, who then lunged towards him. Richie stepped backwards, scrambling up his photo and glasses from the floor as he went. Before he even knew what to do, El grabbed his hand and began pulling him straight out of the cabin, through the hole where the door used to be.

The pair ran through the woods, El’s hand still latched tightly on Richie’s dragging him along as he desperately tried to put his glasses back on. The harsh cold of the wind hit them both like a truck, and once she was certain that Hopper wasn’t following them, she skidded to a halt and let go of his hand, turning to Richie with a bold stare.

“What’s going on?” She asked bluntly. “What happened to me? What happened to him?” She waved vaguely in the direction of the cabin.

Richie didn’t know how to start.

Mike felt foreign in his own house. The way Nancy and his parents stared at him in wonder and concern made his fingers twitch with anxiety, and he barely registered Jonathan who was sitting on one of the stairs with Holly restless on his lap.

The silence that coated the walls was sickly and thick; he half expected the wallpaper to crack from the tension. For a split second, he wanted nothing more than to turn back around and run out the door just as he did last time, but the memories of his mom’s brutal sobbing felt like a knife through his heart.

He glanced at her, tears brimmed her eyes, twinkling with relief, and he felt overwhelmed with a flash of comfort, before the awkwardness of the situation set in again. Karen nervously licked her lips before cutting through the quietness.

“So, what’s he like?” The words were forced like she could only just bring herself to talk about the other one, but Mike was too wrapped up in his own chaotic thoughts to catch on.

“Who?”

Karen smiled, but it wasn’t genuine. “Your… twin.” Nancy sniffed and turned away to look at Jonathan, hoping to get some solace as she remembered her interaction with Richie the night before. Was she too harsh?

(harsh?)

(it worked)

(mike came home)

“Oh,” Mike shifted the weight between his feet and shrugged his shoulders. “He’s ok, um, a bit too much sometimes, but… ok.”

Ignoring what her son said, Karen stepped towards him, placing both hands on his shoulders as she gazed into his eyes. “I’m glad you came home,” The tears that slowly built up made a free fall down her cheeks, plummeting of her chin like sleet. “He doesn’t deserve you as a brother.” 

The words pounded like punches through Mike’s ears, anger overtaking him as he took a step away from her, letting her arms fall slack off of his shoulders, but he could still feel the weight of them there. Yet, just as quickly as the rage appeared, it evaporated when Richie’s own words fought back.

(i’m not your family, mike)

A realisation struck him fiercely, and tears of his own began to fall as he glanced back up at his mom. “He didn’t think so either.”

Jonathan glanced back at Nancy; words unspoken, but she heard him.

Emerging from the woods felt more than euphoric for Richie, as though he could finally breath from the evergreens that were suffocating him, yet each step he took against the sidewalk felt heavier with the knowledge that he had to explain everything.

As the pair walked wordlessly down the street, they captured the attention of just about every passerby. The blood that ran down the side of Richie’s pale face had just about dried, and El had scrapes and scratches that seemed to cover almost every inch of her arms after she fell on the wooden debris back at the cabin. But neither kid took notice of the piercing stares that were shot their way.

The fluorescent sign of Wes’ Diner hummed happily ahead of them, the sight of it reminding Richie that he hadn’t eaten yet. His stomach churned from the anticipation, and he frantically felt around in his jacket for some cash to satisfy it.

By some hidden grace, he found a crumpled up five dollar bill tucked away in the depths of one of his side pockets. He nudged El’s arm and pointed silently to the diner up ahead; he could almost smell the strong scent of coffee from all the way down the street. El nodded once, wordlessly agreeing, hoping that if Richie satiated his hunger, maybe then he’d start talking. 

To her, Richie was beyond interesting. There was so much of Mike in him, but at the same time, they were nothing alike; a mind-boggling paradox that had chipped away at her brain for the past few days. Even though he was clearly terrified, he still sometimes managed to maintain a sense of calmness, it was almost as though he’d hide his own worries to keep everyone else happy. But she didn’t get it; you’re allowed to be scared, right?

Once they’d made it in front of the diner, Richie shot a quick glance at his mangled reflection in the window, furrowing his brows at what stared back at him. Though the thick, cracked glasses were the same, the same unruly black hair and tattered jacket; he felt like a stranger was staring back at him. A completely person from the one that left Derry a month ago. 

And then when his heart skipped for a moment. As serene as possible, a perfect red balloon floated along the road behind him. He blinked as hard as he could in a poor attempt to banish the omen, but it remained moving along aimlessly as it taunted him. Quick on his feet, he rushed to open the door, the chime of the bell signalling sanctuary and held it open, waiting impatiently for El to follow him inside.

The air inside was warm, and Richie felt it drape around his shoulders, signalling that he was safe. Without question, El waltzed over to a nearby booth, leaving Richie to come to his senses and follow her. 

There were only a few other customers in the diner and a couple of waitresses, but it seemed as though the entire building was bustling with white noise. El spoke up.

“Will you explain now:?” Her brown eyes bore heavily into his, harsh determination pinning Richie to his seat. He fiddled with his hands anxiously as he looked down.

“I don’t know what to say”, he mumbled in a poor effort to push away the conversation.

“Is it Derry?”

Richie’s head snapped up, his eyes widening as he adjusted his over-sized glasses. “What?”

“I know you’re running from Derry.” The most spectacular look of confusion swept across Richie’s face, his mouth opening and closing as he grappled for the right words to say. El continued for him, “I saw the balloon.” His face visibly relaxed as he recalled the incident at Scoops Ahoy. “What happened there?”

That was it. The moment that Richie had been dreading and had been silently praying that he’d never have to do. Explain. He tore his eyes away from her, picking at his fingernails as his voice finally piped up. “Have you ever been so scared that you feel paralysed, but every part of you is screaming to just do… something?”

El was overcome with flashes of memories from the past few years, but shielded them almost immediately, nodding along to Richie’s words. He cleared his throat.

“Imagine if that feeling was a person. Something that knew exactly how to make your happiness rot.” He could almost picture everything that happened over the summer, as though he was reliving it all over again. “That’s it. It- It exists.” Richie glanced up at El, but she only held a look of curiosity. “I don’t know if you’ll believe me, but, fuck, I’ve really messed up.”

“You have?”

“I was the only one of my friends that IT could still make scared, so… I had to leave. But, I guess IT’s followed me here, and now I don’t know what to do. Mike doesn’t want me to leave, but if I stay… people could get hurt, which is exactly what I didn’t want to happen.”

“Why?” El asked, almost in a whisper.

His eyebrows furrowed, “Uh, I don’t want people to get hurt because that’s a shitty thing?” She shook her head lightly.

“No. Why you? Why can it only make you scared?”

A wave of dread settled heavily in Richie’s chest, and he wished the feeling would just drag him through the ground and swallow him whole. Anything to stop him from facing it. From facing the truth.

But nothing was taking him away, so he had to hide it himself. Dropping his head in his hands, he sighed but felt no relief. “Because there’s something wrong with me.”

El remained silent, looking over at the boy across from her, watching as his heavy breaths shifted his shoulders. 

A jolly waitress had made her way over to their booth, whipping out a tiny little notepad and pen. She smiled at El, but the grin faltered slightly at the sight of the dried blood on both the kids. Pushing down any concern; she plastered the toothed smile back on her face. “Hey, guys. what can I get you?” 

Chapter Text

A symphony of chirps emanated from the bugs that littered the trees behind the Byers’ house as Richie returned that night. Despite the fact he felt beyond drained from his conversation with El at Wes’ Diner, he wasn’t tired. She trudged through the path leading up to the house next to him; Richie hated that she convinced him to talk to Mike. 

He wanted to protect him and everyone he’d met in Hawkins from the shit that he’d brought, but he’d stayed too long, and it seemed like it was far too late to try and change the course of time. If shit is gonna happen anyway; why not stick together?

El walked silently next to Richie, sometimes shooting him a sideways glance as they trudged up the walkway to the Byers’. The deep cracks in the boy’s lenses were illuminated in the soft moonlight, letting her know that maybe there was a light at the end of the tunnel. She could help him get through this. They can help him get through this.

Her skin crawled when she thought back to her actions earlier, orchestrated by a dark power. The anger she felt at someone using her against someone else made her fingertips tingle. What if she did more than give him a few cuts? She shook the thoughts from her head; they weren’t helping anyone, and instead cast her mind back to the conversation at the diner.

Chapter Text

All eyes were on Richie, but Mike’s burned the most. He felt like he was back in Derry. Back in the arcade.

(get the fuck outta here, faggot!)

The radio was gripped tightly in Mike’s hand, turning his skin paler. It felt like it weighed a ton. His dark eyes still stared intensely at his twin’s as he lifted the speaker up to his face again, uttering his next words carefully and bluntly. “About what?”

Light static crackles from the radio as Max continued on the other end. “There’s something up with him. I think he’s like El.” Richie let out a short laugh at that, rolling his eyes as he glanced over at Will. “At the arcade, the console… it just lifted straight up off the ground. Like, it floated.”

Richie waved his hands wildly in denial. “I’m not talking about this shit again.” His voice grew louder towards the end of his sentence, and he was reminded to be quiet after a faint shout from Ted upstairs.

The radio sputtered as Max let out a shaky sigh, signalling that she’d heard him too. “Richie’s there?”

Not tearing his eyes away from his twin, Mike lowered the antenna and threw the radio unceremoniously over on the couch before taking a dangerous step forward. Anger and confusion warped together across his face. “You did that?” Momentarily, his eyes flickered over to El, who stood her ground next to Richie, but he returned them to their previous glare.

Frustrated, Richie stepped forward too. “No! It wasn’t me!” Thoughts whirled violently around his head as he desperately willed either Will or El to come to his rescue to help him explain. Will stood silently, unsure if he even believed Richie after their vague conversation earlier, and El opened and closed her mouth as though she was trying to think of what to say, grappling for the words. She wasn’t fast enough.

Jonathan walked over to Will, bending down slightly as if he was trying to shield their conversation from the others, but he spoke loud enough for everyone in the basement to hear. “How can you trust him?” Will didn’t know what to say. Could he really trust Richie?

Seeing that this was going nowhere, Richie let his voice drop, encasing it with sincerity as he addressed Mike. “I swear I didn’t do it.” But the way that Mike’s eyebrows scrunched slightly showed that the disbelief in him was overwhelming.

El turned to look at Richie, finally finding her voice and cutting in, ripping the attention away from him. “It was the evil, right? It was IT. Like you told me.” Richie shifted his gaze over to her, she held an encouraging stare, giving him the will to push through the explanations. She’s on my side, he thought.

(ah, but will she always be?)

He offered her a sad but relieved look as he adjusted his thick, cracked glasses. Sighing, he turned back to Mike, who stood even more confused than before, and let out a shaky, “Fuck.”

The portable heater rattled quietly in the corner, running on its last legs as is strained to fend off the winter from inside the convenience store. A devilish red glow illuminated the short space around it, and the hum of electricity was occasionally offset by the cracks and creaks of the old metal. Slow business meant that the songs of the heater were Joyce’s only entertainment at work since the radio was broken.

She half-contemplated stepping outside for a smoke even though she already went on her break not even 20 minutes before, but she was itching for some sense of stimulation. Her fingers twitched as she craved something, anything to happen. And then her wishes were answered. 

A sharp chime rattled her from her thoughts, and she immediately stood up straighter in an attempt to seem more professional, but it was mainly from the abruptness of the noise. The door slammed open against its hinges, and in walked Jim Hopper a dangerous look embedded deep in his face. His brows were angled harshly, masking the white-hot fury that burned in his eyes as he made lengthy and determined strides over to the counter.

He was dressed for work, the Sheriff’s uniform crumpled and messy. As Joyce looked closer, his eyes were bloodshot as though he didn’t sleep and, by the stench rolling off of him, he didn’t shower either.

“Where is he?” The words came out restrained like it was taking all of Hopper’s strength not to scream them. Joyce glared back at him, confused, not happy with his overly dramatic and off-setting entrance.

“Who?”

Slamming a fist down on the counter, Hopper lost his cool. “Damn it, Joyce! The kid!” The force of the blow made the neatly placed boxes of gum rattle violently, and Joyce stepped back a little.

She held her hands up, letting her voice drop and become calm. “Hopper, calm down, alright?” A nervous laugh escaped her lips, and she internally cursed, hoping that her anxiety didn’t come off too strong. “You sound like that trucker.”

A flash of remembrance flooded his senses as he recalled his first encounter with Richie almost a week before. It felt like months. At the memory, he faltered, momentarily regaining control over his emotions, and the fury in his eyes morphed into a shadow of horror.

He shook his head slightly, “Look, I-I don’t know what he’s done to her, but he took off with El earlier.”

Joyce walked out from behind the counter, relaxing at Hopper’s change of attitude and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “When? What happened?”

Hopper let out a shaky sigh as he removed his ranger hat, and began running his hand through his unkempt hair. “I have no idea. I just… I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” He paused and looked deep into Joyce’s eyes. A wave of nausea flowed straight through her then evaporated like it was never there. He’s afraid of himself. “I wanna hurt this kid, Joyce. I don’t know what’s happening to me, but there are moments where I… I think I might kill him.”

As soon as the words fell from his mouth, she pulled her hand away from his shoulder, like it had shocked her all of a sudden. Terror swarmed her vision when she remembered her encounter with uncontrollable sadistic thoughts towards Richie. The cigarette.

(burn him)

(come on, just a little)

(burn him!)

Meeting his fearful eyes, she finally spoke, afraid of herself. Just like him. “Me too.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Nancy joined the conversation, but it felt more like a full-on verbal assault to Richie. “What ‘evil’?”

“Look, I-I don’t know what you want me to say.” Richie stammered.

Mike let out a groan of frustration. “I want you to tell me the truth! You come here out of the blue and put on these fucking voices all the time, skating around the truth instead of telling it straight. What the hell is going on, Richie?”

Minuscule tears brimmed Richie’s eyes, but thankfully no one noticed. The truth. This is it.

(oh, this should be fun)

“I’m sorry I didn’t want any of this to happen.”

“Any of what?!” Mike was losing his cool.

“Something followed me here. From my hometown.”

A wave of relief washed over Mike as he finally felt as though he was getting somewhere with his twin. “From Derry?”

It was Richie’s turn to be apprehensive. “How the fuck did you know that?”

“El told us,” Mike blanked, causing Richie to shoot a wary glance over at the girl. “We saw all the missing posters… including yours.” A painful memory resurfaced in Richie’s brain, pulling him from the room for a second. The fear he felt suffocated him in thick smoke when he thought back to finding his missing poster in the Well House on Neibolt Street. He wondered if they used the same photo. 

When he was ripped away from the caverns in his mind and back to the basement, anger lapped at his feet at the invasion of privacy from his brother. “What the hell, Mike?” His voice didn’t carry the cutting edge that he wanted to convey; he just seemed exhausted.

Mike ignored the question. “If you’re not running from Henry Bowers, then who the hell are you running from?”

Richie laughed dryly. “Why would I be running from Henry fucking Bowers?”

“I mean, he did kill a bunch of kids,” Will piped up quietly, causing Jonathan and Nancy to shoot each other a confused look, but Richie just scoffed.

“Bowers didn’t kill any kids. He killed his dad, sure, but he didn’t kill anyone else.”

Shock lodged itself in Will’s throat as Mike pressed on for answers. “What? How the hell do you know that?”

“Because I know what did, for fuck’s sake!” Richie ran his hands through his thick hair, the frustration seeped through his fingers and almost made him rip clumps out. “And if I stayed, it would have killed my friends.” IT would have killed Eddie.

“So, you brought it here?!” Nancy seethed.

Richie held his hands up in surrender, giving them all a perfect view of the thick pink scar that stretched across his pale palm. “Hey, I didn’t want to! I just wanted to get out of there. I thought that it might have come after me, but I never wanted to stay anywhere long enough for it to hurt anyone else.” His deep eyes flickered over to Mike, who felt a twinge of guilt.

“What the hell is it?” Mike asked exasperated, but by the way his twin was talking, he wasn’t entirely sure if he wanted to know.

Richie was lost for words, but El beat him to it. “Fear.” She looked over to Richie momentarily, nodded, then continued explaining, just how Richie had to her earlier that day. “IT’s pretty much fear itself. IT knows everyone’s fear and eats it.” Silence drowned the room. 

Richie rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, feed is a better word, but that works too, I guess.”

Mike cleared his throat, adding quietly, “So, how do we stop it?”

“Wait, you believe me?” Richie said in complete amazement.

“Clearly. So, how do we kill it?”

“Uh, I don’t know,” Richie confessed, making Nancy roll her eyes. “You just need to stick together, but even after we-” He paused and recollected himself. “Even after me and my friends did that it wasn’t enough.”

Nancy stepped towards him, throwing her hands up in the air in annoyance. “You tried this before?”

Richie nodded. “Obviously it didn’t work.”

“Well, you need to figure it out.” Nancy pressed. Jonathan walked over to her, placing a reassuring hand on her back. 

“Nance, come on.” He motioned to the stairs lightly with a nod of his head. “Let’s just go upstairs.” She thought to argue, but decided against it, following him up into the house. 

As soon as the door closed, Mike retreated back to the sofa, sinking deep down onto the cushion as the energy seeped out of him. He stared at the floor below. “Richie?”

Richie didn’t answer, just waited for the inevitable question. 

“Why is this…” He sighed and tried again, “Why is IT after you? What did you do?”

El looks back up to Richie, intrigued at what he was about to say after his vague answer to when she asked him the same thing in the diner.

(there’s something wrong with me)

(something wrong)

(something wrong)

Richie tensed as soon as the dreaded question fell from Mike’s lips. Staring down at his scar, Richie began to explain. “I’m… weak. Weak because I’m always scared.” The others furrowed their brows in confusion, but let him continue, worried that if they interrupted they would never get an answer. “I’m scared of myself.”

He paused, rummaging around the front pocket of his jacket until his fingers latched gently around his photograph. He removed it slowly, staring carefully at each of his friends, frozen perfectly in time. He imagined them safe and sound in Maine, safe from the danger he brought, and the pain of leaving them escaped him once more. He glanced at all of their faces, and then his eyes fell on Eddie. Eddie.

He ripped the picture in two.

The torn halves floated mildly to the ground. They made no sound as they touched the carpet, but the action was loud. He met Mike’s eyes once more.

(tell them, richie)

(are you scared?)

(pathetic)

“I-I think I’m gay.”

Wes’ Diner was surprisingly packed. Word of its delicious hot cocoa had clearly spread, and hordes of kids flocked the booths to down as many cups as they could. The light swarm of chatter masked the hum of the coffee machines, providing some calming background noise for Steve and Robin who were sitting at a booth against one of the diner’s front windows.

As Steve sipped happily on his hot cocoa, his eyes cast down at Robin’s white mug, and the corners of his mouth downturned in disgust. “How can you drink that?”

She stared back at him. “What?”

“Black coffee”, he stared at the gentle ripples swimming around the steaming brown drink in her cup.

“Uh, because it tastes good?”

He placed his mug down on the table, shaking his head in firm disagreement. “It tastes like liquid tar.” Robin looked at him blankly, wondering if there was a brain underneath all that hair.

“Tar is already a liquid.”

Brown eyes looked up to the ceiling as Steve thought for a second. “Yeah, well, then it tastes like tar.”

She laughed, raising her mug for another sip. “I hate you so much.”

A single raindrop splattered harshly against the windowpane, ripping Robin’s eyes away from Steve just as a flurry of droplets washed over the glass. Through the blurry screen, she could make out something that made her insides churn. A small boy, couldn’t have been older than eight, was talking to someone in the bushes across the street. A clown? 

She squinted her eyes to see more clearly but struggled through the thick rain that was thundering against the window in front of her. Vaguely, she could decipher a grown man dressed head to toe in the weirdest fucking clown costume she’d ever seen. Completely white, all the way down to the frilled collar, with the occasional muted red accent, including on the contorted face paint that was slathered on his skin. He was bending down, slightly shielded by the shadows of the early evening, and was offering this kid a bright red balloon. 

“Hey, look,” Robin pointed through the water-soaked glass, not drawing her eyes away as Steve turned to his left to see.

After a couple of seconds, he cleared his throat and muttered before taking another sip, “I got a bad feeling about that guy.”

Not thinking twice, Robin rummaged hastily through her coat pockets, throwing a couple of crumpled up bills haphazardly on the table before putting the jacket on and running straight out of the diner, the bell chiming cheerily as she left. Steve grappled for his coat, too, and clambered out of the booth, taking one final sip of his drink before he went. He struggled to jog up to Robin, who was steadily marching towards the scene. 

Their footsteps were masked by the heavy rain which had already drenched their hair, matting the strands thickly down onto their foreheads. “Hey!” Robin shouted through the noise once they stopped walking, ready to give the creepy pervert a piece of her mind. But her strong demeanor faltered when the clown turned around. Deep yellow eyes bore into her soul, embedded in the middle of his cracked ghostly skin. A gloved hand wrapped its slender fingers delicately around the string of the red balloon which sat motionless, untouched by even a singe drop of rain. A dagger of fear stabbed at her chest, but she managed to press on. “You know halloween was last month, right?”

“Tommy!” A woman’s voice called from the distance, making the boy run off towards his mother. The clown didn’t seem to care about him anymore.

Stepping forward, Steve looked the guy up and down. “Stay the fuck away from kids, dickhead.” 

Yellow eyes didn’t even flicker over to look at him, still focused intently on Robin as a wide grin contorted the clown’s face, sending globs of saliva dripping down his chin. “You’d like Richie.” She took a step back. “You two have so much in common, Robin.”

Her heart stopped upon hearing her name. She desperately wanted to step forward, to question the freak further, but she was paralysed. 

The balloon popped loudly as the clown gave them both a little wave, then he disappeared. Just like that. Was he even there?

(am i not real enough for you?)

Steve turned sharply to Robin who was still struck with fear. “What the fuck was that?”

Chapter Text

Richie’s impromptu coming out swirled around his brain in unwanted replays as he sat with his head in his hands on the Byers’ couch the morning after. The confused look on El’s face when he said it wasn’t in the forefront of his mind. It was Mike’s.  The way his eyes widened slightly before his eyebrows scrunched up, like he didn’t understand, and then he just said “Oh. Are you sure?”. Richie wanted to laugh so hard when he first heard that, but thinking back to the moment a pang of hurt spiked through his chest. It didn’t feel redeemed by Mike’s “It’s okay, you know?”. It didn’t feel redeemed because it didn’t feel like it was okay.

For his whole life it wasn’t okay. For his whole life it was the complete opposite of okay. It was wrong. 

(wrong)

(wrong)

(wrong)

He lifted his head out of his hands, leaning back to stare at the ceiling above the couch. Cracks littered across the paint, winding round and round like little twisted roads. He felt like he could have got lost in them.

Footsteps sounded from the hallway, growing closer and closer, louder and louder until they stopped. Richie looked over to the person standing there, staring at him like an alien. Will.

He stood there timidly, itching to say something but horribly stuck on how to start. Clearing his throat, he muttered, “Richie? Can- Can I talk to you?” Richie sighed, not sure if he was ready for any type of conversation. 

“Sure. What’s up?”

Will fiddled with his thumbs, not daring to meet Richie’s gaze. “Is it true? Are you really gay?”

Richie scoffed, putting on a strong Southern accent as he drawled sarcastically, “Don’t want a fairy on your couch, Will?” The other boy stumbled back slightly, waving his arms in front of him in surrender.

“N-no! It’s not that! I swear, uh,” He stammered helplessly over his words, the nerves overpowering him as he felt Richie’s dark eyes bore into him. Still not meeting the others gaze, he opened his mouth again to speak. “I just… I think I might be too.” 

(now that’s interesting)

“What?” Richie’s sarcastic tone dissolved, vanishing into the air. “You are?”

“I mean, I don’t know,” Will rubbed the back of his neck, his words coming out mumbled, “I’ve never liked girls, but I never wanted to believe that I could be anything but… normal, you know?” His face had turned a bright shade of red, feeling embarrassed for speaking about something that head pushed so far into the back of his mind for so long.

“Oh,” Richie let out a dry laugh in an attempt to lighten the situation, “trust me, I know.”

An awkward silence grew louder until Will asked ever so quietly, the words almost disappearing altogether, “Why did being gay make you need to leave? Why did that thing follow you for it?”

(you are the weakness of your friends)

(you’re killing them, richie)

Images flashed across his mind of his last day in Derry. The snake, the black pool of blood, and IT. The clown’s rotted hand latched onto the axe as it loomed insidiously over Richie. Suddenly, all the fear he’d ever held locked dangerously around his throat, and he felt as though it was closing up. Why can’t I just live?

He let out a shaky sigh, psyching himself up to explain. “Because-“

Rough static ripped through the air, scraping both of their eardrums as their attention was immediately focused on the TV set. A wave of grey fuzz engulfed the screen as it turned itself on. Will took careful steps back as Richie got to his feet, both sets of eyes fixed ahead of them. Through the harsh electric crackles, a vicious voice taunted the pair. “Your fear is so sweet.”

“W-What was that?” Will’s voice rattled. Richie didn’t answer. 

Out of the depths of the TV screen, a horrific sight unfolded. Elongated limb after limb clambered from the static, knocking over empty cups that littered the coffee table before it until a monstrous figure stood up. Bones cracked as the demon finally took its complete form. 

The contorted face of the clown etched itself into the very fabric of Will’s mind. Saliva ran down the demon’s chin as his lips rounded up into a menacing smile. Taking an overpowering step towards Richie, the clown opened its mouth, addressing him. “You’re scared of me, and it’s beautiful”. IT lurched forward, the smell of rot wafting over to Will’s nostrils. He looked over at Richie, seeing his horrified eyes stare back at his tormentor. “But the fear you have of yourself is more delicious. You’ve dug yourself a hole, and how noble of you to not bring your friends down there with you. Imagine the terror on their faces as I devour each of them. Imagine Eddie.”

Richie’s mouth turned dry at the words, and Will sent him a sideways glance. Neither of them had much time to react to the clown’s taunts as it lurched forward, roughly grabbing Richie by the front of his shirt. Clawing at the demon’s bony fingers, he desperately tried to pry himself out of IT’s grasp, but his movements slowed when he saw a change in the clown’s face. 

Jagged tears formed across IT’s cracked skin, opening up and exposing row after row of sharp teeth. Three bright lights danced at the opening, leaving Richie mesmerised at the sight of them. Behind his thick-rimmed glasses, his eyes glazed clean over. Still and white.

Being pulled into the deadlights felt a lot more seamless than he imagined. A clean white sight clouded his vision for a moment until it was wisped away almost instantly, leaving him standing alone in the middle of a familiar road. The concrete beneath the rubber soles of his shoes felt so solid, so real that he thought for a second he’d actually been transported somewhere. Heaven? Purgatory? Some kind of afterlife? He didn’t know.

“And, how do you know that he’s there, Bill?” A voice rang out. The tones of it graced Richie’s ears, the familiarity washing over him like a wave. He spun around to face the direction of the voice. Eddie’s voice. 

And there he was. There they all were.

Walking down the middle of Birchwood street, the very street Pennywise threatened him on, the Losers slowly made their way to school as they lazily dragged their bikes beside them. Richie wanted to smile, but he felt frozen. Paralysed with joy. Am I dead?

“We’ve g-gotta try,” Bill uttered back to Eddie. Richie never thought he’d be so happy to hear the other kid stutter.

A light scoff comes from Eddie in response as he rolled his eyes, his vision trailing down the street until it landed on the rugged figure of Richie.  He stopped walking almost instantly, nearly tripping over his bike, but never breaking eye contact out of the fear that he’d lose sight of him. “Holy shit.”

Richie stepped back for a moment, taking in the scene before him. As Eddie’s eyes widened, the rest of the Losers spun around to see him. The shock on their faces slowly started to morph into overwhelming relief. 

“Richie?” Stan’s voice rang out, but Richie couldn’t answer. He felt any words get lodged in his throat. 

Bill opened his mouth to speak but was cut off by Eddie who began marching towards Richie, anger flushed deeply on his face. “What the fuck, Richie?! What’s wrong with you? Were you just gonna make us think that we’d lost you?” His eyebrows had contorted, the fury rolling off of him in waves, becoming more apparent to Richie as he came closer. “I wanna fucking kill-“, Eddie cut himself off as he leant forward to push Richie in anger, but the words instantly died in his throat when his arms passed straight through the other boy’s body. 

Stumbling backwards, Eddie glanced at his hands in disbelief then back at Richie, who stood there equally in shock. 

“Are you really here?” Ben asked, his words steady but careful. 

Before he could answer, Eddie stepped forward once more, reaching for Richie’s hand before his own fazed through it once again. “What the fuck?” He uttered under his breath. 

Richie cleared his throat, “I-I don’t think so.” And then a flash of terror struck painfully in his chest. They were talking about him. And, by the sound of it, Bill had figured out where he was. They’re still looking for me. No. No. No. No. The horror was evident in his eyes as they widened. “Guys, I know you want to find me, but you can’t. Please.”

Stan scoffed, gripping the handlebars of his bike tightly as he spoke, “Seriously, Rich? We-“

“No! Look, I left to help you, fuckers! It would have screwed everything up if I stayed, alright?”

Eddie’s brows furrowed again, “What are you talking about?”

“Just leave me alone, okay? IT’ll kill you if you’re with me.” Sadness stood at the edges of his words, and all of the Losers noticed. Yet, Richie’s crypticness struck a nerve in Eddie. 

“We’re coming to fucking get you, and that’s that! We can get rid of IT if we’re together!”

Richie laughed dryly, “So, what? You guys are just gonna come all the way to Indiana?” They share a glance at each other as he mentioned the state, trying desperately to mask their surprise that he let it slip. “Just forget about-“

The air surrounded Richie rippled, warping in and out of reality. White clouds spotted throughout his vision, obscuring every aspect of Derry as he was ripped out of the deadlights.

When he came to, Richie was sprawled out across the floor in a crumpled heap, harsh coughs erupting from his throat as he was swarmed by the shift in reality. The sharp pain that engulfed his ankles told him that he must’ve fallen. Something had broken IT’s concentration on him.

Confusion swept his face as his eyes darted around the room, gaging the scene before him. Will stood over the clown, a lamp gripped tightly in his hands as his entire body trembled with ragged breaths. A thick gash was embedded in IT’s forehead, trails of black blood gravitating towards the ceiling, painting it in dark spots. 

“Richie,” Will breathed, eyes wide, noticing that the other boy was awake. “Are you-“

He didn’t have time to finish his sentence. 

The clown had recovered from Will’s futile attack and, in one gracious strike, sent the small boy flying across the room. His body slammed harshly against the wall, a sickening crack scraping Richie’s eardrums as he winced at the sight. Will fell unconscious as he slid down the wallpaper, unable to hear Richie screaming his name. He silently prayed that he wasn’t dead. 

Spinning around to face Richie, Pennywise let out a broad smile that contorted every inch of his face more, instilling terror so far deep inside him. Richie desperately shuffled back on the floor in an attempt to get away from the clown that was stalking menacingly towards him, but it was all for nothing. IT lurched forwards, grabbing his left arm with cracked, long fingers. The grip was painfully tight, and Richie could swear he felt his bone’s fracturing under the pressure. 

As he unsuccessfully tried to pull himself out of the clown’s grasp, his glasses tipping on his face at an angle, but he stopped in horror when the clown beamed down at him, taunting him with a single sharp fingernail. The tip of it seemed to glint maliciously, and he thought back to the house on Neibolt Street when Ben’s stomach was ripped to shit. Fuck. 

Richie’s struggles grew more panicked as IT loomed over his forearm. A piercing pain shot through his arm, causing a scream to rip through his throat. With each cut, the pain seemed to lessen, but the terror stayed all the same. He desperately tried to muffle his tears as salt-water tracks edged down his cheeks. 

And, then it all stopped. 

The pain lingered ever so slightly, but a wave of endorphins filtered in. He let out a ragged breath. Forcing himself to move his head, he slowly looked over at the markings freshly embedded into his skin. His dark eyes widened at the sight. Right there in jagged lines, blood overflowing in places, was an etching. 

R + E

 Thin trails of blood trickled down the curves of his forearm before melting into the carpet in pools of thick red. Richie’s eyes were still transfixed on his new wound as the clown spoke. “It’s always best to wear your heart on your sleeve. Ain’t that right, Richie?” 

Richie whipped his head back over to Pennywise, but only to witness IT melting back into the static of the TV screen. Once IT’s entire body had faded into the swarming pixels, the set shut off, leaving Richie alone in deafening silence with his burden carved into his arm. 

The Losers were speechless. Surprisingly, they weren’t speechless about the fact that Richie had appeared and then disappeared right before their very eyes. They were speechless about his reveal of were Hawkins was.

Eddie turned to look at Bill. “So, he’s in Indiana. So much for ‘Ohio is the most probable state’, Bill.”

Bill tried to take offence, but the happiness he felt trumped any annoyance. They glanced at each other for a split second, a silent conversation passing between them all before they all mounted their bikes and sped home.

Ben threw his bike on his front yard, running through the front door of his house, barely having time to close it behind him. He trudged up the stairs as fast as his feet would let him, heaving heavily as he got to his room. He looked over at the red piggy bank that sat on one of the lower shelves on his wall. He’d been saving up for a miniature scale building kit of The White House. Over 50,000 pieces, and way more expensive than it should have been. But, that was the last of his desires then.

He marched over to the piggy bank and smashed it on the floor. Shards of china sprawled across the floorboards, and he scooped up the clump of bills and collection of coins that were released from it. He grabbed his bag and ran out of his room, ready. Then a thought hit him. 

Turning on his heels, he pulled the phone off the wall in the hallway, dialling Bev’s number. 

It rang twice before she picked up. “Hello?” Her voice was sweet.

“Indiana. Hawkins is in Indiana.”

There was a pause before she spoke. “Let’s get our trashmouth.”

He smiled the whole way to the bus station, his grin growing larger as he saw his friends waiting for him there, money gripped tightly in their hands, ready to buy their tickets to Indiana. But their joy dissolved, the second they turned around to enter the ticket office. A pair of teenagers were walking down the sidewalk towards them. The unmistakable platinum blond hair of Vic Criss set off a wave of nausea in Ben’s stomach. 

“Shit,” Stan muttered, as Vic and Belch stepped up to them.

Yet, something was off. Vic didn’t seem so confident in himself as he usually did. He looked awkward, like he wanted to say something but the words couldn’t pass his lips. Belch spoke for him. 

“What’re you losers doing?”

“G-Getting our friend back,” Bill responded, taking a step closer in defiance.

“Trashmouth Tozier?” Vic asked. 

Eddie glared up at him, his words seething. “His name is Richie.” As soon as the malicious tone left his mouth, he took a step backwards, quickly reeling in his attitude in an attempt to avoid a beating. But the expected anger from the older boy never came.

Vic scratched the back of his neck and sighed, looking him in the eye, remorse thick in the air. “Listen, uh, I hope you manage to find him.”

Belch cleared his throat, nodding. “Yeah, good luck.” 

They were shocked. There was no sarcasm from the older boys; their concern was genuine. 

“Uh, thanks.” Mike gave a weak smile, unsure of the whole situation. 

The pair gave one final nod before continuing down the sidewalk. The Losers looked at each other, exchanging momentary looks of confusion before their silent conversation shifted back to determination. They walked into the building before them, ready to buy the tickets to see their friend. To save Richie.

Chapter Text

Autumn chills swept through Karen Wheeler’s hair, sending brunette strands swaying in wisps, as she walked down the street, her hand holding Holly’s. Her daughter tottered next to her.

Karen’s mind flickered back to her son, and a mixture of relief and pride overwhelmed her. He came back. A crack of a smile graced her lips. 

“Karen!” A shrill voice called to her ahead, and she drew herself quickly from her thoughts, her careful eyes landing on the woman that spoke. Julie Kaufman, Joshua’s mom from Hawkins Middle, was jogging towards her an over-zealous smile plastered on her face. She heard herself let out a friendly gasp.

“Julie! How are you?” 

 “Great! Great…” The other woman’s smile dropped dramatically from her face, and it morphed into a forced look of sincerity. “But how are you doing?” Her voice dropped lower, almost into a whisper. “How’s Michael?” 

Karen hated her. 

Her kind façade faltered for a second, but she quickly recovered it, flashing a soft smile at Julie. “Oh, I’m good.” She nodded, “Michael’s good.”

‘Oh, really? I thought-“

“Yes, he’s perfectly fine. He’s great, even.”

A battle of passive-aggressive small talk ensued, as the two women fired back and forth, silently believing they were better than the other. Holly grew restless at her mother’s side, slipping her clammy hand out of her mom’s grasp, to which the older woman didn’t notice as she tattled on to Mrs Kaufman in front of her. 

Holly gazed around, squinting slightly as she looked up at the sky. It was clean. An unblemished white, as though one giant cloud had painted the entire atmosphere. And, then she heard it. A hushed noise. A whisper. It rushed straight through her ear as quick as a sharp gust of wind, so fast, she barely registered it until she heard it again. 

(over here)

She twisted and turned, trying to figure out the origin of the voice. Her little feet carried her back the way she’d walked, and she turned down the corner, stopping when she saw something ahead.   A few yards away, a red balloon squeezed painstakingly through the small gap of a storm drain, the sounds squeaking horrifically as it grew until the entire balloon edged out of the concrete in one large pop. The whispers came back and were calming; caressing her hair.

(take it)

(take it)

Her feet shuffled forward, a small hand outstretched to latch around the thin white string attached to the balloon. Stubby fingers wrapped gently around it and without a second to fight, the string turned black, as though it was instantly engulfed in a demonic shadow. It wrapped maliciously around Holly’s wrist, pulling so tight, her hand began to turn a violent shade of purple.

Her screams weaved throughout the harsh winds that were picking up around her, taunting her as she was pulled down the storm drain. Any sound she made disappeared down the sewers with her. 

Karen spun around at the final sound of her daughter, ignoring Julie as concern warped all of her thoughts. She looked desperately around for Holly, her walk morphing into a run. Her eyes landed on a small pink shoe that sat discarded at the mouth of a storm drain.

She dropped to the ground, not registering any pain as little stones scraped her knees.

Mike sat uncomfortably on the plastic chair of his desk, shifting his weight every other second. Something didn’t feel right. Like the air was thinning. 

Mr Clarke’s words faded in and out of existence. Reality shattering and re-building itself every chance it got.

There was a knock at the classroom door, and one of the women from the office poked her head through. Her hair was pinned up behind her, and her eyes were a deep blue, emitting waves of sadness. In a low voice, she asked, “Can I borrow Michael Wheeler, please?”

Mike didn’t comprehend it at first. His name felt foreign, but he got to his feet nonetheless. His thoughts reeling. 

She escorted him out of class and walked with him down the hallway wordlessly, casting him a sideways glance every so often until they reached the front of the school. Ted Wheeler stood before him, looking solemn.

“Dad,” he looked at his father, his brows furrowing, “What’s going on?”

A short sigh escaped the man’s lips, but nothing could have prepared Mike for what followed it. 

“Holly’s missing.”

“It was weird, right?” Steve turned to look at Robin as they walked leisurely down the street. The light breeze blew his hair unpredictably, it’s temperature freezing the tips of his ears.

Robin returned his stare, rolling her eyes. “Oh, you mean the fucked up looking clown that knew my name, and that I’m-“ she stopped herself before she could finish her sentence, suddenly very aware that she was in public. She looked down at the sidewalk, focusing on the little cracks and holes that painted the asphalt. 

Steve’s gaze turned sympathetic, but he stayed silent, letting only the careful whistles of the wind grace their ears as they strolled past store after store. After a few minutes, hunger ripped through Steve’s stomach. He looks around before his eyes settled gratefully on a vending machine against the wall of Hawkins Bus Station. He nudged Robin’s arm gesturing over to the machine as he began to make his way over to it. The wear on the buttons was evident, and there was a myriad of scratches littering the glass. 

He filtered through the pockets of his pants for some change, inspecting the coins he found as he spoke, “What time is it?”

Robin shrugged, silently glad that they’d changed the subject, “Like 2:30. Why?”

Grabbing a couple of quarters from the collection of random coins in his hand, Steve started feeding them into the machine. “My dad wants me to fix a broken gutter by tonight.” He punched the buttons as he muttered, “He says I’m getting too lazy.”

A Milky Way candy bar landed at the bottom of the vending machine. Steve bent down, retrieving it from the compartment, but Robin quickly took it from his grasp. He silently protested as she peeled open the wrapper, sitting down on the wooden bench next against the bus station wall. “Well, he’s not wrong.” She took a bite of the chocolate as she shot him a smirk.

He scoffed, grabbing more coins from his pocket and inserting them into the machine once again. “I’m not lazy.” He grabbed a new candy bar as it fell, sitting next to Robin on the bench, as she scooted over. 

“You know what? You’re not lazy,” she looked over to him, “You’re reckless.” She took another bite.

Steve snorted, “Reckless?”

“Yep,” she grinned, chewing. “You never think before doing anything.”

He grappled for words in his defence, “Well, sometimes if you think for too long, you miss your chance.”

Robin rolled her eyes, screwing up the empty candy wrapper, “Okay, wise guy.”

Lucas was restless. After Mike left and didn’t come back to class, everyone was a bit confused. Then they got told why. He couldn’t stop thinking about Holly Wheeler and how Mike must’ve felt not knowing where she was. They didn’t always get on, but if Erica went missing, Lucas didn’t know if he could live with himself. 

The lecturing of his history teacher droned on in the background as thoughts swirled round and round is mind. Eventually, sitting around doing nothing got too much; he just needed to move. He heard himself asking to go to the bathroom, getting up as the teacher handed him the hall pass.

The hallway felt colder than the classroom, and he was grateful for it. Aside from drowning in his thoughts, the classroom was stuffy, and he felt as though he might as well have been suffocating.

One step after another, he slowly made his way down the hall, the muted echoes of his sneakers bouncing off of the concrete walls, and sliding down the posters. He stared at his shoes as he walked, inspecting the crevices and the scuffs that lined the edges as he absent-mindedly fiddled with the hall pass.

“Hey! Where are you going?” A thick voice cut through the strange oasis he found in the corridor, and he whipped his head up, gazing forward at the direction of the sound. The hall monitor stood motionless ahead of him, her long straight hair sat messily on her head, obscuring a large portion of her face, so much so that he had to contemplate whether or not she was actually looking at him or not. The eerie stillness of her demeanour was unsettling, and it took him a second to recollect his composure before he answered.

“Uh, going to the restroom,” he spoke like it was obvious. Attitude laid thick on his words.

“You got a hall pass?” The voice shot back, the hint of a grin latching devilishly on each syllable. 

He rolled his eyes, lifting up his left hand to show it to her. “Right h-“. He was interrupted by the sight of the object on his palm, realising that he was no longer holding the hall pass anymore. Flat in his hand was his radio. The receiver that he knew he had left at home by his bed that morning, the receiver that he knew he never brought to school. But, the receiver was there. Clear as day.

Confusion flashed across his face as he stared wordlessly at it. A small buzz of electricity ripped through the air as it began to crackle, light static emitting from every crevice before streams of black smoke escaped from every gap in the radio. He dropped it, stepping back as it clattered to the ground, a cloud of smoke growing steadily around it.

“What-“ He began, but the smoke shifted quickly, retracting back into the machine faster than it had left, until the little black box sat still on the floor, as good as new. Untouched. 

He wanted to run, to get his friends. But a part of him wondered if what he was seeing was real at all. Am I hallucinating? Fuck. I’m going crazy. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.

(poor little lucas)

(you’re losing your fucking mind)

Movement halted his train of thought. The radio jolted to life, sliding smoothly across the polished floor until it laid calmly at the hall monitors feet. How had I not noticed that she was barefoot before?

The girl bent down, extending a thin arm out to grab it off of the ground, her bones cracking as she went. Slender fingers lifted the radio up, and she straightened herself. Her head moved painfully slow, staring ahead straight at Lucas and a jolt of fear struck right in his heart. 

It was Max. But it wasn’t at the same time. It couldn’t have been. Her red hair was soaking wet, clumps of it missing. Odd patches of her skin looked inky and grey, bloated and rotting. Her eyes didn’t have the usual shine that he loved, instead her left eyeball was hanging from its socket, leaving globs of black blood running lazily down her decaying skin. A retched smile escaped from her mouth, showcasing a collection of broken and missing teeth. He felt sick. “Doesn’t look like a hall pass to me, Lucas.”

She dangled the radio tauntingly, before releasing it from her putrid fingers. It shattered on the ground, plastic shards sprawled across the floor.

“Max,” he started to back up, his voice trembling.

She ignored him, the grin still plastered on her face. She took a single step forward, and he felt as though the world was shaking. Another. Then another. Her pace picked up, and he spun quickly on his heels, sprinting back towards his classroom, praying that his peers would help him. The patter of his sneakers on the floor was no match for the Decayed Max’s thunderous footsteps. They resonated deeply in his ears, threatening to burst his eardrums, but he kept moving.

Once he reached the room, he slammed the door open, and it whacked against the wall, ratting dangerously on its hinges. Every face looked up at him in shock at the sudden outburst. Dustin looked at him, concerned, but he wasn’t looking back at his friend. He stared at his girlfriend. 

Max was sitting at her desk, her brows furrowed as she looked up at him with an apprehensive look. It seemed to ask, Are you okay?

(are you?)

He could no longer hear the footsteps; no one was chasing him. The only thing torturing his eardrums was his erratic heartbeat, struggling to keep up with the stream of adrenaline that pumped throughout him. Struggling to cope with the fear that paralysed him, stinging his eyes. 

His teacher cast him a cheery smile, “That was quick, Lucas.”

Robin rubbed her hands together, willing some warmth to grace her fingertips as she tried to increase the circulation. She was about to stand up from the bench with Steve when a bus pulled into the station. 

The engine of the bus spluttered slightly as it halted to a stop. The doors opened with a sharp release of air, and the vehicle swayed lightly as the passengers began to descend the steps. Robin didn’t know what she expected, but a small group of kids without any adults was not it.  

A boy with a mop of perfect curls was shaking out his hands as he stepped off, in an attempt to rid himself of the growing anxiety that was building up in his chest. The boy that exited the bus behind him was mid-rant, repeating over and over again that, “He better fucking be here.” His clammy hands rummaged roughly through the fanny pack latched around his middle, and he pulled out an inhaler, taking one generous gulp of medicated air before continuing his ramblings. 

The other kids that left the bus weren’t listening to him. They were too focused on staying awake, rubbing their eyes to drown out the tiredness that resulted from almost a complete day trip. Steve shared a quick glance at Robin before they both went back to observing the scene before them.

The boy with the curls addressed the rest, “So, where do we start?”

His question shut the ranting boy up, a look of bewilderment clouding the smaller boys features. “Uh, I guess I didn’t think that far.”

One of the other boys stepped closer, his straight brown hair matted down thickly on his head. He cleared his throat before stuttering, “I d-did.” He slid his backpack off of his shoulder, unzipping it and filtering through the contents before removing a single crumpled sheet of paper—a missing poster. 

Tiny rips skirted the edges of the paper, and cracks had slightly obscured the smiling face of their friend’s photo, but he was still recognisable. It was still Richie. 

He looked around, searching for someone, anyone, to start asking. His eyes landed on Robin and Steve who sat unmoving on the wooden bench, still intrigued at the random group of kids who seemingly had decided to take a vacation in their very own Hawkins, Indiana.

The boy lifted a finger and pointed at them. 

Each of the boys began to shuffle over to the two teens who looked at each other awkwardly. The dark-skinned boy rubbed his eyes, muttering, “Can’t we just take a break for a bit?”

The previously ranting kid scoffed. “Dude, we’ve been sitting down for like 18 hours. I’m up for a bit of walking.” His friend nodded reluctantly. 

The group made their way over to the pair, who then stood up, nervousness thick in the air. “Hey, s-sorry to bother you, but h-have you seen this kid around here?” The boy presented the missing poster, and a flash of familiarity struck in Robin’s chest. Steve felt it, too. 

Steve scratched the back of his neck, “Uh, that’s Mike’s twin, right?” A sharp pain shot through his side as Robin elbowed him. He shot her a look as she glared at him. 

“Hey!” She whispered, leaning in so the other’s couldn’t hear. “See? Reckless.”

“Twin?” An overweight kid took the poster from his friend, shaking his head lightly. “Richie doesn’t have a twin.” Steve opened his mouth the speak, but Robin beat him to it.

“I’m sorry, but we can’t help you.” After what had happened with the creepy ass clown, she wasn’t feeling too accepting of strangers. Worry lapped at her feet as dread settled like bricks in her throat. 

The boy with the fanny pack, stepped forward, anger growing dangerously on his face as the teenagers attempted to walk away from them. “I think you can.” Frustration rattled his words.

Robin rolled her eyes, crossing her arms as she stared him down, challenging him. “And, how do we know we can trust you, huh?”

“Look, he’s our friend, and he’s been missing for over a goddamn month,” His hand were shaking violently as he spoke, taking all of his mental strength to stop himself from shouting, “We just want that fucker back, okay? So, tell…” His words trailed off, and his eyes began to widen as he saw a police officer walk over to the notice board on the side of the station. The officer lifted up a crisp, white sheet of paper, pinning it to the board, and making the boy’s thoughts race as he saw the page’s contents. The missing poster of Holly Wheeler. “Oh, shit.”

Steve’s eyebrows furrowed as he spun around to look at whatever had made the boy scared. “What the…”

“That f-fucking clown.”
 
Robin felt like her ears were ringing as she turned to look at the boy who spoke. “Did- did you say ‘clown’?”

Chapter Text

The humming of the heater seemed to grow more daunting and menacing with every second as Will and Richie sat in the Byers’ living room in shock. The endless chatter of the radio warped in and out of their reality as they both replayed what they had just heard from it. Five year-old Holly Wheeler. Missing. 

The lamp still sat discarded on the floor from the attack the night before, glass crystals littered the carpet from the smashed bulb. Richie sat on the couch, frozen. 

(it’s your fault)

He wanted nothing more than for the soft brown couch to swallow him up whole so he wouldn’t have to confront what had happened. He wished IT had killed him the night before, instead of carving that into his forearm.

(oh, i see)

(weak and a coward)

He cleared his throat, eyes flickering over to look at Will, who also sat motionless, staring at the small plastic radio. “Wheeler? As… As in Mike?”

His heart plummeted to his toes when he saw Will silently nod his head. Standing up, his legs felt like lead, but Richie willed them to push forward. Shaky hands brushed through his thick black waves before he threw them back down in frustration. Will watched him as he paced back and forth, the smaller boys irises swinging like a pendulum. 

“You know it’s not your fault, right?” Will uttered, his voice painfully quiet as he recovered from the shock.

Richie snorted, “But it is.” He threw a glance over to Will, eyes looking wild. “I’m the dick that brought IT here.” Stray strands of hair fell into his eyes, and he was so on edge he almost jumped straight out of his skin. After frantically brushing them to the side, he muttered, “I should’ve kept going”.

“But… you didn’t, and you shouldn’t have had to. You don’t have to deal with this alone.” When Richie didn’t answer, Will began to play with his thumbs, mentally grappling for the words he needed to calm the other boy down. “Uh, remember what you told me when we met? Outside the Wheeler’s house?”

Richie shot him a momentary look of confusion, then his eyebrows relaxed as the memory resurfaced. He rolled his eyes, “What? When you had the right feeling that there was something bad about me?”

“You said it’s easier to get through some things with your friends.” 

A flood of images overwhelmed him. Being back at the quarry in the summer; the adrenaline rush of the rock war against the Bowers’ gang. Christmases, Thanksgivings, Birthdays.

(eddie)

He stayed silent as Will continued. “You might not have your old friends, but you’ve definitely got some new ones.”

Richie raised an eyebrow. “Really?” He let out a little laugh, “You looked into me. At the library. You do remember that, right? Doesn’t really seem like a lot of trust to me.”

Will rubbed the back of his neck, awkwardly, “Yeah, well, you probably would have done the same thing if your best friend’s long lost twin turns up on accident.” 

Richie grinned, nodding. “Fair enough.”

A painful wave of silence washed over them both before Richie broke it once more. 

“We’ve gotta help Mike.” His voice was steady; clear. He had never felt more sure of himself. Will stood up, gesturing over to Richie, encouraging him to follow. Without another word between the two of them, they walked over to the front door. A small drop of dread swam around in Richie’s stomach, but he ignored it as best as he could. 

Then, they opened the door. 

Standing tall before them was Hopper and another police officer. Hopper’s right hand was raised in a fist as he was getting ready to knock before the door was opened anyway. He lowered it, glaring down at Richie under the brim of his beige hat. Suddenly, Richie felt very small.

“We need to talk to you in connection with the disappearance of Holly Wheeler.”

The air in the Wheeler’s basement was suffocating. Dust laid thick in the atmosphere, and Mike almost began to hyperventilate. How has everything gone so wrong?

(richie)

Jonathan was comforting Nancy as she sat on the floor, hugging her knees to her chest. Mike couldn’t take being down there any longer. He sighed shakily, pushing himself off of the floor, mumbling “I need some air”. His sister hardly registered as he dragged his feet along the floor before disappearing up the creaky wooden stairs. 

With no solid destination in his mind, he left the confines of the house and began to walk aimlessly down the street, half hoping that he’d turn a corner and stumble magically onto his little sister playing in the street. 

(ah, wishful thinking)

Every house he strolled passed felt like a copy of the one before it. Behind each door, a perfect family or a broken one. They filtered one after the other, morphing into a blur in his short-term memory. Only ten minutes had gone, when the spluttering of an engine pulled him from the depths of his thoughts. 

He didn’t look over to the approaching car until it parked wonkily on the curb to his left. The driver’s door swung open, and he saw the thick, messy mop of Steve’s hair emerge first, the wind blowing it in every which way. The teen clambered out of the car, almost falling over himself to get to him. “Mike!”

Mike only gave him a small glance, but carried on walking, shuffling his feet over the litter of cracks in the sidewalk. “I just wanna be alone right now, okay?” He didn’t mean for his tone to be so harsh, but he didn’t have the energy or the care to backtrack. 

He vaguely noticed Robin getting out from the passenger side as Steve lightly jogged after him. “Wait, wait, wait!” The older boy called to him, slowing down as they started walking level with each other. “Mike, we know what happened to your sister.”

The words rang throughout his ears, rippling over and over again in his mind. He stopped dead in his tracks, spinning quickly around to face Steve. Stepping forward, he spoke eagerly. “What? Where is she?”

Robin walks forward around the hood of the car. “Uh, well, we don’t know exactly where she is,” Mike’s happiness depleted almost immediately and he began to wander slowly down the street again before she elaborated. “But! We do know who took her.”

Mike raised his eyebrow, his gaze shifting between the two teens. “Who?” He pressed expectantly. 

He didn’t expect to hear another car door open and felt his attention being pulled away once more. Somehow five kids scrambled out of the back seats, all around his age. The first boy to get out, seemed calmer than the others. His straight light brown hair stuck down on his head, a few strands flew lazily around his forehead in the fall breeze. “N-Not ‘who’, w-what.”

Mike furrowed his eyebrows, and the rest of the boys had finally rested their eyes on him. They all seemed shocked, as though they had seen a ghost. One of the smaller kids shuffled towards him, dark brown eyes sat wide in their sockets as he inspected every crevice of Mike’s face. “Holy shit.”

“I guess Richie really does have a twin.” The curly-haired kid announced, surprise evident in his voice. 

The one that was still busy staring at every inch of his face looked right into Mike’s eyes. “Where’s Richie?”

And, suddenly, it hit him. 

IT came with Richie. IT came with Richie, and it took Holly.

“That thing that he was talking about… it’s-it’s really here.” The words fell out of his mouth, breathlessly. He didn’t know what to think or what to do. 

He heard one of the other boys say, “IT. The clown.” He couldn’t match a face to the voice because his whole world was spinning. So many eyes fell on him, waiting expectantly, but he couldn’t tell. Before his legs failed him, he lowered himself onto the curb, putting his head in his hands to stop it exploding from the revelation.

Steve sat down next to him, nudging him in the arm with an elbow. “Look, we’ll get your sister back, okay?” He looked to the others, nodding. “All of us.”

“Yeah, all of us,” The fanny pack kid stated, a cutting edge to his tone. “That includes Richie, and we can’t do this without him, so where is he?” He tried desperately not to sound so impatient, but it felt as though he had been waiting years for this. He earned a glare from Stan, but behind Stan’s eyes, Eddie could tell that he was longing to see their lost friend too. 

Mike rubbed his eyes, still sitting on the edge of the sidewalk. “Uh, at Will’s probably.” His voice felt foreign and raw when he spoke. 

“Well, that would be great if I knew where ‘Will’s’ was.” 

Mike doesn’t respond; everything was going too fast. 

Robin gestured to the teen next to him. “Steve’ll take you guys to Will’s. I’m gonna take Mike back to his house.” They all silently agreed.

Steve stood up from the curb, brushing his jeans down as he did. Shaking his car keys, he looked between the boys. “Let’s go.”

“You know that’s crazy, right?” Dustin laughed, glancing over at Lucas as they exited Hawkins Middle School. He shrugged his shoulders. “You’re probably, like, sleep-deprived or something.”

Lucas scoffed, rolling his eyes. “I slept fine, asshole. But, I’m telling you guys, it felt so real. Everything. The radio, the smoke.” He looked carefully over at his girlfriend. “Uh, weird dead Max.”

“Are you sure it was me?” Max asked as they descended the concrete steps at the front of the school. Lucas nodded.

“It was definitely you. Just with, um, rotten skin and a popped eyeball.” 

Max cringed, gently raising her hand up to touch her eyelid, subconsciously ensuring that it was still in place. “Shit”, she muttered under her breath, exasperated. “We have to talk to Mike.”

Lucas shook his head, ignoring as a couple of kids pushed passed him roughly. “We can’t”. His warm eyes turned sad, carrying mountains of empathy, as he glanced at her. “His sister.”

She shifted her gaze to her feet, silently mad at herself for forgetting something so severe and recent. Her self-criticism didn’t last long, though. 

Dustin clapped his hands, shaking both of his friends out of their draining thoughts. “Okay, new plan. We wait until we tell Mike. In the meantime, we’ve gotta find Holly.”

Max suddenly remembered something. “Hey, guys. Do you think El heard that she’s missing yet?”

Lucas stopped walking for a second as he contemplated, making the others pause momentarily too. “Oh shit, probably not.” He looked up at both of them. “We gotta go tell her.”

Richie sat restlessly in the back of the sheriff’s car, bouncing his leg up and down subconsciously, willing the anxiety to be expelled from his body, but every time a little bit escaped it was replaced with a brand new wave of worries and fears. Each hitting harder than the last. 

In the front, Hopper had his eyes glued on the road, staring intently. The deputy next to him hadn’t said a word at all. Richie recalled looking into his eyes back at the Byers’ house and seeing that they seemed blank. Mindless. Like he was dead. It unsettled him to his core, but he was too worried about himself.

He shifted his gaze to look at Hopper in the rearview mirror. “So, where are you taking me?”

The sheriff glanced back at him for a moment before casting his eyes back on the road, stopping so harshly at a red light that the car lurched forward, almost sending Richie flying forward into the divider in front of him. “Back to the station.”

Brand new anxiety danced along Richie’s fingertips. He grappled for words, stammering, “I-I thought you just wanted to talk to me!”

Hopper nodded, “Uh-huh. At the station.”

Richie’s heart was beating so fast, he thought it might shut down. “Am I under arrest?”

The man’s knuckles turned whiter as he gripped the steering wheel with more force. “Not yet”, he mumbled through gritted teeth, the hint of a smile on his tongue. 

“What the fuck do you mean?!” Richie half-shouted, slamming his fist on the seat next to him. The deputy remained motionless in the passenger’s seat in spite of his minor outburst.

The lights turned green, and Hopper continued forward. He cleared his throat. “We have reason to believe that you’re involved in Holly Wheeler’s disappearance.” 

“What goddamn reason, asshole?!” Richie was fully shouting, and his voice cracked as his anger rotted his throat. “I didn’t fucking do any-“

“Beep beep, Richie.”

His oncoming rant dissipated almost instantly. Dread sat heavily in his chest, warping his stomach and threatening to spill its contents. Hopper turned his head slowly round to look at him, a malicious grin contorting the features of his face. Yellow eyes glinted at Richie, setting off alarm bells in his head. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

The sheriff’s neat brown hair morphed into dead tufts of orange, and his skin became cracked and pale white. Pennywise.

Looking for any help, Richie desperately turned to the deputy to see if by some miracle he had come to his senses and would get him the hell out of there, but an even more horrific sight greeted his eyes. He would have rather kept looking at the clown. 

Ted, the trucker from Pennsylvania, sat morbidly still before him. His face was decayed, his bottom lip completely rotted away, showcasing a row of browned and decomposed teeth. An array of deep puncture wounds littered his chest, accompanied in places with thick claw marks as though he’d been stabbed and hacked at over and over and over. A once white shirt forever stained red. 

“T-Ted?” He was too shocked for tears. 

A high-pitched laugh ripped through the pain he felt as the clown cackled at the scent of Richie’s growing fear. The boy lunged over to the door and hopelessly tugged at the handle in a feeble attempt to escape, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Nowhere to run, Richie.” He stared back at the clown horrified, his widened eyes endlessly amplified by his coke-bottle glasses. “Nowhere to hide”. The sing-song voice only terrified him more, and Richie’s dark eyes darted around wildly to find a way out, but he noticed something else instead. 

“Shit!”

A car hurtled towards them as they drove through a red, crashing into the cop car directly on the passenger side. The impact sent a jolt through Richie’s jaw, causing him to bite his tongue. Blood pooled in his mouth, and he coughed helplessly, spitting out dribbles of red down his chin. The cop car spun on its wheels, skidding across the road and everything rattled. His glasses flew clean off of his face, but that was the last of his worries. 

His left shoulder throbbed from the pain of being thrown about in the back. Feeling around with his hands, he noticed that the clown was no longer in the car with him. A sharp cough erupted from his throat as the wind returned to his lungs, but he couldn’t stop. Being confined only made him feel more scared. The back door beside him had been slightly cracked open from the accident, and as soon as his dark eyes saw the rays of light peeking through the gap, he lurched forward and clambered out of the damaged car, ignoring the tiny shards of glass that rained down on him from the newly shattered window. 

As he got out, he saw that the car that crashed into them looked far worse, having collided head-on. The driver was hunched over the steering wheel unconscious, yet, luckily, the guy had no passengers. 

As soon as Richie’s sneakers hit the ground, he ran, but his knees buckled after a few paces, sending him crashing to the asphalt. 

“What did I tell you, Richie?” Oh, fuck. 

Richie rolled over to squint up at the blurry mess of his tormentor. He could vaguely see the clown’s bloody grin beaming down at him, and he wanted to shout, wanted to scream, but he just couldn’t. All of the confidence he’d had with Will earlier was gone, leaving a shell of himself in its wake. 

“So weak", saliva ran down IT’s chin, and a throaty giggle erupted from the clown. 

Richie put his hands up to cover his face in a final attempt to shield himself from the inevitable. “P-Please,” he stuttered, hating how helpless he sounded. 

“Taking after little Billy, are you?” He let out a horrifying laugh, and let his voice dropped low and dangerous as he taunted, “He thrusts his fists against the-the-“

“Posts,” a familiar voice interrupted the clown. Just hearing it made Richie’s whole demeanour light up with hope. He shifted slightly to see Big Bill Denbrough standing in the middle of the road, staring intently at IT as he challenged the demon. 

Richie had only just noticed a new car on the scene, surprised at how he didn’t hear it, but he didn’t care. Vaguely, he could see Mike’s friend, Steve, stood next to the open driver’s door. A small group were moving closer to him from the car. He barely had time to register who they were before choruses of “Richie!” rang out through the street and graced his ears. 

The Losers.

His Losers. 

The patter of shoes grew louder and louder as his friends ran toward him, falling ceremoniously to their knees and hugging him as he laid on the harsh ground. Tiny stones dug into his hands, but he didn’t care. He wanted to be mad at them for following him, but that had to wait for later. 

Richie squinted over Stan’s shoulder as they hugged to search for wherever Pennywise was, but for the second time during that encounter, the clown had vanished. Bill had moved to wrap his arms around him too, and Richie couldn’t help it. He sobbed. 

Yet, something was wrong. Missing. And, then it hit him. Bev and Eddie weren’t next to him. Looking around, Bev wasn’t with them, but Eddie stood just watching the reunion unfold.

He wasn’t hugging him with the rest. The other boy stood a few feet away from them, staring at Richie, his expression unreadable without Richie’s glasses. 

As he was released from his friends’ grip, Richie got to his feet uneasily, his ankles wobbling as he did so, but he pushed through. He couldn’t see much of Eddie, but even the blur was enough to make his heart flutter. Clearing his throat, he thought of something to say, anything, but his mind was blank. So, he said the first thing that popped into his head. “How’s your mother?”

He felt the punch before he saw it coming.

Chapter Text

Holding a bag of frozen chicken breasts to his cheekbone while sitting on the floor of the Byers’ living room was not what Richie Tozier was expecting to do after meeting his friends again, but there he was. Everyone sat huddled around the small room, trying to keep up a conversation, but between the exhaustion and awkwardness, no one was getting very far. 

Through the brand new cracks and scratches on his enormous glasses that he earned after the car accident earlier, he inspected each and every one of his friends as though if he took his dark eyes off of them for even one second, they’d vanish.

(or die)

(ah, wouldn’t that be a shame)

The setting sun shot blinding rays through the front windows, making the whole room glow with an orange hue. Reality seemed altered with his friends there, but the light made it feel even more like limbo. Is this actually real?

It felt like a dream seeing Will and the Losers get introduced, having what seemed like two different worlds colliding so suddenly. Witnessing all his friends be so close after being so far was insane. Well, everyone being so close except for Eddie who sat alone in the corner of the room, not keeping eye contact with anyone. 

He hadn’t said a word to Richie at all. Not even after the punch. Nothing. Richie wanted nothing more than to hear him talk, but he understood why he wasn’t speaking. Richie didn’t deserve to hear his voice. 

Drawing his attention back to the rest of the room, Richie adjusted the frozen chicken, stretching out his fingers a little to get the warmth and circulation running through them again. The movement knocked his glasses a little down his nose. Pushing the lenses back up, he cleared his throat. “Where’s Bev?”

“She should be here soon”, Ben answered from the couch, “I told her where to go when we left Derry.”

Richie nodded, looking down at the ground. He noticed the dried blood stains embedded in the carpet from Pennywise’s attack the night before. Speckles of brown littered around like freckles. He missed Bev a lot, but she wasn’t the only one he was curious about since he left. “How’s my parents?”

There was a short silence as the Losers shot each other a quick look, unsure of what to say. Mike cleared his throat, not daring to meet Richie’s eyes. “Um, they’re-they’re okay.”

Richie nodded once more, “Figured.” He didn’t look up at any of them, knowing that their eyes would burn with sympathy, but he didn’t want any. He didn’t want their pity, because his brain screamed at him that he didn’t deserve it. 

(that’s because you don’t, kid)

Steve, who was leaning against the wall off to the side, rubbed his hands to together, adding awkwardly, “So, how did you guys figure out where he was?” His eyes darted between the Losers expectantly.

Stan put down his glass of water on the coffee table, the liquid swaying from side to side against the calm stillness of the glass. “Well, he kind of told us…” 

Will raised an eyebrow at Richie as the other boy scoffed, retorting, “Uh, no, I didn’t, Stan.” He removed the frozen bag off of his cheekbone for a second, his pale fingers turning numb.

“Y-You kinda did”, Bill cut in, “w-when we saw you before. When y-you weren’t really there. You said you w-were in Indiana.” Richie’s mouth dropped open slightly, shock waving over him. 

“I thought you knew I was in Indiana!” He wanted to punch himself. If it wasn’t for his running mouth, his friends wouldn’t have got there. They’d still be safe.

(it’s always your fault, richie)

“We knew you were in Hawkins,” Mike shrugs, crossing his arms, “We just didn’t know which ‘Hawkins’. There’s a lot of them.”

“How the fuck did you know that?”

Richie was answered with Ben shuffling through his backpack, a couple of crumpled up pieces of paper spilling out. They seemed to be the starting of mini blueprints sketched out on their tainted surfaces. He delved deeper into the bag, pulling out a ripped postcard and handing it over to his friend.

Richie took it tenderly, his eyes scouring over the front. A bold font announcing:

‘WISH YOU WERE HERE!

HAWKINS,'

He spun the card around to read the neat scribble on the underside, breath hitching at the taunting message before him. ’I’m on vacation  - be back soon!’

He sighed heavily, passing the postcard back to Ben. “Shit. Well, I gotta give it to the guy, it does seem like Hawkins is the place to be this year.” Sarcasm laced thick on his tongue. In his peripheral vision, he saw Eddie roll his eyes at him.

(he hates you)

Richie shifted his attention to the smaller boy, sitting crossed-legged and scowling. His fanny pack stuck to his side like it was glued there. Richie just stared at him, taking in every aspect of the only Loser he never went a second without thinking about. His eyes trailed up to look at Eddie’s face, and he was mortified when he realised he was staring right back at him. 

He tore his gaze away as fast as he could, praying that Eddie didn’t notice. 

It seems he did. Richie slowly turned back to look at the other boy, jumping slightly when he saw that Eddie was standing right in front of him, having abandoned the comfort of his little corner. Everyone else in the room realised the change and were all staring at the scene before them intently. Brown eyes bore into his, and then he spoke for the first time since they were reunited.

“Richie, I need to talk to you. Alone.”

His voice was way too steady, it made Richie’s heart pick up with worry. He nodded a little too eagerly, placing down the bag of frozen chicken on the table before standing up. He felt dizzy for a moment when he got to his feet, the anxiety swirling around him like a twister. 

Will gestured vaguely over to his room, and Richie gave him a tight-lipped smile. Eddie was already way ahead of him when he turned back forward. Taking a deep breath, he followed, closing the door slowly behind both of them. Oh, boy.

“Have you talked to Mike?” El asked Lucas, Max, and Dustin as they sat in one of the booths in Wes’ Diner.

Dustin shook his head, taking a sip of his hot chocolate, getting a dollop of whipped cream on the tip of his nose. “Not since he left school”. He wiped the cream away subtly.

El stared at his movements before speaking, “We have to find Holly.”

Lucas threw his hands in the air out of slight frustration, annoyed at how useless he was feeling. “Where the hell do we even start?”

 El felt alarm bells going off in her head, speaking her thoughts before she even had time to process them. “The evil”, she looked over to Lucas on the other side of the booth. “Richie told me about it. I think it took her.”

“Eleven”. The voice resonated throughout her brain. As though it came from within her rather than from a person. She scoured the diner for the source, feeling her world crumble when her brown eyes landed hopelessly on the one person she never wanted to see again. Dr Brenner. Papa. Her shoulders tensed as cold eyes bore so deeply into her own. 

Witnessing their friend’s complete shift in stature, the others followed her gaze to the man who sat staring back, the beginnings of a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. Lucas turned back to El, his voice sincere, “El, we have to leave. Now.”

Yet, it was as though she couldn’t hear him. Her breath quickened as her hands curled into fists in a subconscious attempt to quell her anger. Plates and mugs at their table rattled with movement, gradually levitating, spilling their contents onto the surface: crumbs and hot chocolate splattering onto the floor. Without a second thought, the other three shot out of the booth, pulling El along with them and straight out of the diner door. 

Plates and cups clattered back onto the wooden table, spinning momentarily on their bases before slowing to a stop. Not a single customer registered the commotion.

Max dragged El across the street, Lucas and Dustin running right behind them. Dustin spun back around, squinting harshly to peer through the distant windows of the diner, but no person looked like Dr Brenner. “I-I think he’s gone.”

Lucas shook his head, stopping in his tracks like the rest of them. “No, this is exactly like what happened to me.” He turned to El, seeing the panicked confusion in her eyes. “It was like seeing your fears.” She looked back at him, uneasy, blood slowly dripping from her nostril.

A soft breeze wafted over them, carrying over the light and bitter smell of smoke. The group thought nothing of it until a voice rang out behind them. “Hey, you’re that girl!”

The four of them turned to face the source of the voice, confusion thick on their brows. Standing next to the bus stop across from the diner was a girl about their age, a half-burned cigarette held limply between her thin fingers. Like Max, fiery red hair blew calmly in the wind as though the warm wisps were alive. 

Pointing at El, who held a spark of recognition in her eyes, the girl spoke once more. “I’m guessing you can tell me where I can find Richie?”

Richie and Eddie had been sitting on the edge of Will’s bed silently for five minutes. Richie knew it had been that long because he’d been staring at Will’s digital alarm clock on his bedside table the entire time, watching the little red lines dance every sixty seconds. The other boy was picking at his cuticles, thinking of exactly what to say.

“Why?” The burning question was finally voiced.

Richie whipped his head around to face him, a couple of black locks falling and obscuring his vision, but this time he was thankful for them; he didn’t have to look Eddie in the eyes. He tilted his head in confusion. “Huh?”

Eddie rolled his eyes. “Why’d you leave, asshole?”

(weak)

(deliciously fearful)

Words seemed to escape him. What do I say? Nothing was coming out. Every inkling of the only language he knew whisked away down the drain the very moment the person he cared most about asked him why he abandoned him. He stammered helplessly in response, “I-I-“

“Do you have any idea how fucking scared we were? How scared I was?” Eddie’s face was flushed red as his rant began to escalate. Richie wondered if maybe he really did need his inhaler. “You can’t just get up and leave without saying anything! You’re all I’ve been thinking about for over a goddamn month and-and you don’t say a single word?! Hour after hour I craved to hear your dumb jokes, or see your massive fucking glasses, but nothing! We’ve known each other for years, don’t you like me enough to at least say goodbye? I missed you so much, and you didn’t even care! What is your prob-“

Eddie couldn’t let out another word. Not because he didn’t know what to say, but because Richie had so suddenly closed the short distance between them, connecting both of their lips. Time stopped, his heart skipping a beat so painfully it felt like a heart attack. Thoughts spun, everything building up to what Eddie did next.

He pushed Richie away.

Richie fell backwards, his arms saving him from falling flat on the bed as Eddie spluttered, “W-What the hell are you doing?” Richie didn’t answer; he felt paralysed. What did I just do?

(you ruined it, rich)

I ruined it.

He tried to answer; his mouth moved helplessly as he grappled for an apology, but Eddie spoke before he could manage. 

“I-I need to go.”

Richie didn’t watch him leave; he could move. He wanted to scream ‘I’m sorry! I’m sorry!’ from the top of his lungs and keep going until they burned; until they turned black and ripped apart. The door slammed shut, and that was when he broke down. 

Every ounce of energy immediately left him, draining him so completely that he almost collapsed. White-hot tears bled from the brim of his eyes, running rivers down his cheeks as his whole body racked with sobs. 

Pulling up his jacket sleeve, he glared down at the wound he got from the clown on his arm-

(r + fucking e)

-and cringed at how bad it actually looked. The deep jagged lines were surrounded by an inflamed red border before fading into his pale skin. He wanted it off his arm. Desperately, he scratched at it, willing for the carving to be washed away and the feelings with it. Harder and harder, he dug at it, but it was no use. His nails had been bitten down so far that he only ended up ripping little parts of scab, releasing mini streams that flowed down his arm to then drip onto the carpet and leaving flecks dotting the floor.

He stared at them, mind completely blank as he let out an occasional sniffle.

And then a droplet froze in mid-air.

Richie stifled his tears as he tried to wipe his glasses, imaging that it was only a fault in his vision as it tried to interpret the world through his lenses’ cracks. Yet, the blood remained perfectly still, floating in the air like a dark star. 

The more he looked at it, the bigger it seemed to grow. He didn’t realise how quickly it grew until it was about the size of his head. Ripples warped the surface as it gurgled. Remembering the summer, an overwhelming feeling of dread plunged to the bottom of his stomach, dragging it down to his feet—images of waiting outside Bev’s apartment as his friends cleaned.

(wall to wall of blood)

(every crevice)

(uh-oh, you might wanna get outta there)

Richie scrambled off of the bed, pulling the sheets off of it as he went, but he didn’t care. He swung the door open, slamming it behind him and pressing his back firmly against the hard wood as if to uselessly hold back an oncoming tide. 

At the sound of Will’s bedroom door slamming for the second time in five minutes, everyone in the living room spun around to see the commotion, only to be met with Richie’s shellshocked face. Drying tear tracks painting his cheeks as his skin visibly paled, and his eyes widened behind his glasses. Will spoke to him first.

“Are you okay? Eddie just ran out.”

He opened his mouth to answer but was interrupted by a grotesque splash sounding beyond the door. The noise caught everyone’s attention, and they all slowly rose, edging closer to Richie with unease. 

Feeling something move at his feet, he glanced down only to see a puddle of his own blood seep from under the crack of the door and pool around his sneakers. Richie gazed horrified at his reflection in red.

“Uh, Richie”, Stan called to him warily. The black-haired boy roughly pushed himself away from the door, spinning around to face it and stand guard in front of them all. He knew he couldn’t protect them, but if he was the one to put them in danger in the first place, he knew he had to try. 

“What the fuck,” he vaguely heard Steve utter, but there was no time to explain. 

Richie’s blood rose upwards, bleeding up the door like paint until the entire thing was engulfed in crimson. Like acid, the blood started to eat away at the wood, disintegrating each and every splinter, the final remains disappearing like campfire embers in the wind. 

Left in its place was nothing but black. Darkness filled the room so much so that it appeared like a portal into nothingness. A void.

Somewhere in the emptiness was a distant dripping; a taunt with every drop. The beat of the dripping was soon accompanied by a train of distorted carnival music, off-key notes scarring their eardrums as they became painfully mesmerised by the void.

Electricity buzzed somewhere within, powering up a swinging lightbulb a few feet beyond the empty door frame as it surged with a yellow glow—the fuse smoking. 

The faint light swayed in the non-existent breeze, shining a flickering ray on a tiny jack-in-the-box that sat discarded on the ground. It remained unmoving, yet utterly terrifying the longer everyone stared. Perverted circus melodies rang out from the little toy as the crank on its side spun wildly. 

Even though each person in the room knew what would happen, none of them were prepared for the crank stopping almost instantly, throwing the lid off the top of the box with one swoop. 

Richie’s breath hitched in his throat at the figure that emerged. Clambering out of the cube that was about fifty times too small was an extremely contorted Patrick Hockstetter. Limbs dislocated and bent, cracking with every movement. Smiling devilishly at Richie, baring his blackened teeth as he teased, “How’s it going, flamer?”

Staring dead at one of his past tormentors, Richie knew he should feel scared. But, suddenly, the feeling of his friends behind him made the fear dissipate and wither away. Hockstetter inched closer and closer, towering over him with every step. 

“Richie!” Calls of his name flew through the air as his friends looked on in horror, terror laced in each shout. Do it for them. Confidence filled his head, and without knowing what he was doing, Richie set a fist straight into Patrick’s mangled face. 

A deafening crack sounded beneath his hand as it collided with rough skin, dislocating Hockstetter’s already broken jaw. His mouth fell open, eternally slack until he began to stumble backwards, disappearing into the darkness as the lone lightbulb spluttered out. 

Stan was the first to speak into the silence. “Didn’t think we’d be seeing him again.”

Chapter Text

Eddie sat on the edge of the porch, drawing mindless patterns in the dry ground below with his shoe. Dirt particles caked into the crevices of his sneakers, staining the pure white of the rubber. The sun was setting steadily, the tips of the sky dimming into a soft lilac and falling down into a rich topaz where the star kissed the earth. 

I can’t believe I just walked out like that.

(he doesn’t deserve you, eddie)

He does.

Images swirled around his mind, cutting at his brain and letting the emotions bleed out. He felt so overwhelmingly out of control, like his brain would want something, but his mouth would do the opposite. Drowning in every thought; he was engaging in a mental battle, and he was already so drained. A well-needed sigh escaped his chapped lips, yet he got no relief from the action.

Just as he felt as though he was sinking entirely under the water in his mind, the sharp snapping of branches ahead of him made his head whip up in alarm. His foot stopped mid-drawing, and his eyes stung, but there were no tears. 

And, just like that, probably the one thing that could have made him feel better in that moment appeared. Well, the one person. 

There, in all her fiery glory, was Beverly Marsh. A cigarette hanging loosely from her fingers, almost completely burned down to its filter. Lagging behind her as she made her way over to the Byers’ house, were four other kids that he didn’t recognise. But, he couldn’t care less. Before he could get up, a smile stretched across Bev’s pale face, the remains of the sunlight illuminating her freckles like golden specks as her cheeks lifted up. She ran over to him, dropping the finished cigarette into the dirt, before wrapping her thin arms around his frame. 

“Jesus, you trying to kill me, Bev?” Eddie wheezed, as she hugged him so forcefully, the wind was knocked out of him. She only smiled as she released him from her grip, reaching out a hand to ruffle his hair. 

The other kids had finally caught up and paused at the porch where Eddie still sat, inspecting him warily. A girl with similar bright red hair to the Losers’ very own Miss Marsh was the first to address him.

“You’re Richie’s friend, too?”

He shifted his eyes between the others before staring back at her again. Hearing Richie’s name was not what he needed, but he refused to let it show. He nodded, muttering under his breath as he cast his gaze to the circles in the dirt,  “Something like that.”

Bev’s eyebrows furrowed as she heard his response and flashed him a confused look. Behind her, Lucas rapped his knuckles on the door, calling out to Will inside. Only a few moments passed before the wooden door inched open, letting out a string of soft, yellow light into the gradual darkness of the evening. The kids filed inside, leaving Bev to be the last one to walk in, yet she stopped herself before her foot overstepped into the boundaries of the house. She glanced back at Eddie, who still sat huddled into himself on the edge of the wooden surface, trying to disguise his shivers at the night grew colder. “You coming?”

He didn’t look at her, just kept his gaze fixed on the sunset ahead. “Yeah, just give me a minute.”

She lingered for a moment, seeing if he’d move. Yet, when he didn’t, she resigned herself inside, shutting the door carefully behind her.

“There’s the Trashmouth,” Bev announced as she smiled at Richie across the living room. The Losers spun around to face her, sporting uneasy grins. Their eyes held her gaze, and she saw the fear threatening to spill out. Confusion filtered through her vision, but she held a sweet smile at Richie, who was sitting on the floor, cross-legged and nursing his knuckles. He was hunched over as if to shut himself out of the world around him. 

At her entrance, Richie slowly looked up at her, a false burst of energy painting his features as he leapt to his feet and rushed over, wrapping his arms around her. They stayed there for a moment, and she pretended not to notice when Richie let out a couple of ragged breaths. It felt strange to be this close to someone she’d been so far from only a day before.

As they released each other, she glanced at the deep purple bruise that splattered his cheekbone. “Nice shiner.” He beamed a toothed grin at her, but something felt off. When it hit her, she narrowed her eyes at him, smugness tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Give them back.”

His eyes widened slightly in a split second of shock before his gaze dropped to the ground as he reluctantly held out his pale hand, a half-finished pack of Camels nestled between his fingers. Victoriously, she took them back, but not before removing a single cigarette. She reached out, placing it snuggly behind his ear, brushing aside a few black hairs that stood in the way. “There.” She announces, watching as he met her eyes again, apologies wafting through the stare. 

Warm reunions occurred one after the other, followed by the awkward obligatory introductions. It’s a wonder anyone remembered the flood of new names and faces they saw that night, but they managed. 

The air felt stiff and cold. No one knew what to say. El was the first to speak up, sitting cross-legged on the floor next to Max. Her voice was low, but determined as she uttered two words to spark a story: “The diner.”

Her friends’ heads whipped up, shooting her glances as the recent memories flashed before their eyes. “I saw him.” She continued,  looking forward at Richie as if she was explaining only to him. “My papa. But it wasn’t really him, was it? It was the demon.”

Mike took a sharp intake of breath as Bill stared ahead at nothing, wishing to be frozen in another time. Lucas cleared his throat, nodding before he spoke. “At school, I think I saw IT too. I-IT chased me down the hall.”

“IT’s taunting you,” Ben affirmed.

Dustin rolled his eyes. “Well, that’s just great.” The other’s ignored him.

“None of it’s real”, Bev looked across at them all, picking absent-mindedly at her cuticles. “Just remember that.” Lucas scoffed.

“It felt real as shit.”

His words invoked another wave of silence. The trickles of water could be heard from the pipes throughout the walls, growing louder with every second without a sound from the room. 

Desperate to change the subject, Bev cast her gaze over the rest of the kids. “So,” she clapped her hands together, “anyone know why Eddie’s moping around outside or was I supposed to figure that out by myself?”

The Losers looked awkwardly over at Richie, not daring to answer themselves. The Trashmouth let out a shaky breath, getting to his feet and manoeuvring himself towards the door, careful not to trip on anyone sitting on the ground. The wooden door felt icy to the touch; a reflection of the oncoming winter outside. Grabbing the knob, he opened it, bracing himself for the conversation that he could never expect to be good after what happened earlier.

(you mean when you messed it up)

When I messed it up.

As the door closed behind him, he noticed Eddie flinch for a second at the sudden sound. Still, the other boy didn’t turn to face him, just continued trailing the tip of his sneaker in the loose dirt beneath his feet. Richie stood behind him, completely still, yet the anxiety swelling within him willed for him to run. “A-About before I-“ He began, but was cut off.

“Don’t.” Eddie still didn’t turn around when he spoke, eyes still trained on the ground.

Richie went quiet, adjusting his thick-rimmed glasses with shaky fingers. He shuffled over to the edge of the porch, dropping down slowly to sit next to Eddie, careful to leave a bit of a distance between them. 

The other boy didn’t shift his gaze from the floor. He scoffed a little. “Wow, I didn’t think you’d actually shut up, Trashmouth. I didn’t even beep you.” 

Richie let out a short laugh but stayed silent, worried that he might worsen the situation with even a single word. The air felt sour, and it felt like his lungs couldn’t take it in. Why did I mess this up?

(because that’s what you do, richie)

Eddie cleared his throat. “Richie, look I-“ He paused for a second before restarting. “I’m not mad about-about what happened.” He finally turned to look at the other, brown eyes connecting. The sincerity shocked Richie as his eyebrows furrowed.

“You’re not?”

Eddie shook his head.

“Why did you run out?”

The smaller boy laughed awkwardly, each sound drifting lightly into the distant woods. He shifted his gaze away from Richie, embarrassment threatening to burn hot on his cheeks. “I mean, I thought it was just me that-that felt like that, but that’s not the main reason.” He contemplated telling him but instead resigned to shaking his head. “Nah, you’re gonna give me shit for it.”

Richie’s curiosity tingled around the edges of his thoughts. Does he really also feel like this? He nudged Eddie’s arm lightly with the tip of his elbow. “Come on, Eds,” he drawled, but it lacked his usual over-the-top finesse.

Eddie caved, the words spilling from his mouth before he could catch them. “I mean, have you seen yourself lately, Rich? You look dirty as shit. I pretty sure there’s actual shit stains on the cuffs of your pants. And-and then I just got, like, my mom’s voice in my head, and I just thought you might be sick, like the flu or something, I don’t know. And, even though I got my jabs I thought what if I got sick? What if I caught the flu when you-“ He faltered for a second, then continued. “Fuck, my mom’s already gonna be pissed at me for leaving and not telling her, but then she’d actually kill me if I got the flu. She’d probably never let me look outside, let alone leave the house, and—holy shit—what if she makes us move? What if I have to move, Richie? What if I never see you guys again?” Panic and worry had set deep in his eyes as he looked back at the other boy, who gestured his thin arms in an attempt to get him to calm down.

“Dude, dude, dude. I don’t have the flu. Promise.” Richie let out a broad smile, flashing his teeth. “I’m fit as a fiddle.”

Eddie rolled his eyes, but the sarcasm was hardly there. He didn’t have the energy for it. “I’m sorry. I still hate you, though. Why did you leave?”

Richie’s smile dropped almost instantly, and suddenly the wound etched into his forearm seemed to burn like acid. He fiddled with his thumbs as he spoke, uttering the words so quietly Eddie almost had to move closer to hear them. “IT said that because I’m scared of-of who I am, I make everyone else weak. I didn’t want to bring you guys down with me.”

A small silence pushed through the conversation, only filled by the serene sounds of crickets hidden away. 

“That’s the dumbest fucking thing I’ve ever heard, you know that right?” 

Richie looked at him incredulously, then frustration began to seep into his thoughts, spilling out onto his tongue. “What? It’s dumb that I didn’t want you guys to die because of me? You know that I never wanted to leave without you. I wish I could have just stayed, but the fear of you guys and everyone else finding out about me was just way too much, I-I could barely think of anything else. And-and I was scared that I’d run my fat mouth and just tell you all accidentally and-“

It was Eddie’s turn to cut Richie off. Lips connected suddenly, both slightly chapped from the cold, but neither of them cared. It was so much better than before; the air had cleared, and somehow it felt like everything would be okay.

Once they parted, Eddie smiled lightly. “Something tells me that we won’t care.”

Richie stared back at him in utter amazement, his breath still locked within his lungs out of shock. Yet, his momentary happiness was diminished almost as fast as it appeared, and his expression turned solemn. Eddie looked at him worried for a second, watching carefully as the other boy slowly pulled up his sleeve, exposing nasty gashes sliced deep into his skin. “Well, I’m pretty sure the clown does.”

(r + e)
(r + e)
(r + e)

“Holy fuck,” Eddie lurched forward, grabbing his arm, making Richie recoil with a hiss, but Eddie held on. “Dude, you need to clean this, it’ll get infected.” Trailing a finger mid-air over the ragged etch of the letter ‘E’, he looked up into the taller boy’s eyes, who broke the contact sheepishly. “It was you? The carving on the bridge.”

Richie didn’t say anything, but he got his answer anyway. 

“What makes you think the ‘R’ would go first?” Eddie asked, making the other glance at him with a look of slight confusion. “‘Eddie and Richie’ sounds way better than ‘Richie and Eddie”.”

The Trashmouth went a little red, but let out a short laugh. “Whatever, Eds.”

At the nickname, Eddie punched in playfully in the shoulder before letting another wave of silence settle of them, like a quiet breeze. “I missed you. A lot.”

Richie nodded, not meeting his eyes. “I missed you more than you could think,” Letting out an overly dramatic sigh, he lent back, uttering, “but, to be honest, the person I missed most is your mother.”

Rolling his eyes, Eddie began to get to his feet. “Okay, I definitely didn’t miss that.” He held out a hand to help Richie up. “Come on, I gotta clean that.” His gaze flickered to the masses of dried black blood caked on the boy’s forearm. 

Richie took his hand and pulled himself up before they both walked back inside.

Seven-year-old Tommy Kelly swayed on the balls of his feet, rubbing his eyes with his scrunched up sleeve to wipe away the tiredness surrounding his vision. Starcourt Mall was almost empty; the last dregs of people fluttering down the escalators and out the doors, far away from the harsh fluorescent atmosphere inside. 

He grew restless as he waited impatiently for his mother, who had taken one last pit stop in the women’s restroom as their trip to the mall that night drew to a close. Tommy desperately tried to find something to focus on in his surroundings to entertain him as he passed the time. The clip-clop of heels and pit-pat of sneakers fell out of existence as the mall steadily cleared out, letting the silence taunt Tommy’s ears. 

Toes wriggled within his shoes as he attempted feebly to dampen the anxiety he felt being away from his mother, even if she was only a door apart. Pure blue eyes flickered every which way as he inspected the top floor of the mall, eyeing many places within the food court that now sat empty and closed. 

His concentration on the dimmed sign of Burger King faltered when odd sounds caught his attention. At first, the noise sounded like a zipper being pulled open and closed, yet as it grew closer, he recognised it. Whipping his head around, his eyes darted across the polished floor of the food court to find the source of the rattling. And, then he saw it. 

Inching its way closer to his feet was his wind-up toy car. He’d lost it at school earlier that morning, and his heart skipped a beat with happiness. The tiny vehicle looked even better than it had before, the smooth, green plastic reflected the white lights from the ceiling, shimmering around its edges like fresh streams of water. 

His feet seemed to moved before his brain realised they were, and he tottered over excitedly to retrieve his favourite toy. Yet, just as he got close enough to drop down and snatch it up off of the floor, the little wheels spun effortlessly around before they restarted at zoomed away from him towards the escalators. Tommy knelt there on the ground in its wake, confusion attempting to enter his mind when a series of rhythmic clatters sounded throughout the building. 

He jumped to his feet, following the path of the car down the moving metal stairs, worry etched on his face as he watched his beloved toy smash against each step as it descended before sliding away into a dark corner on the ground floor of the mall. 

Tommy’s small legs raced down after it as fast as he could make them go without toppling him over, and made his way rapidly into the shadows. Squinting his eyes to see through the darkness, they landed on the car. A victorious smile graced his lips. 

He waltzed over to the toy, arms outstretched in anticipation, yet he faltered when someone else beat him to it. Someone familiar. A white-gloved hand gently plucked the car from the floor, as the other beckoned Tommy over to the stranger with one quick gesture. 

The boy slowly shuffled over to the clown, the only visible feature of its face being a pair of glowing yellow eyes. Before he could comprehend what happened next, a harsh grasp latched onto his arm, and he felt himself get whisked away into the blackness. 

The green toy car fell to the floor with a deafening clatter. The sound echoed, only to be heard by Mrs Kelly as she exited the restroom in the floor above. 

Nausea set in like rocks in the bottom of Joyce’s stomach, churning over and over again as she gripped the tight leather of the steering wheel. She pulled up out the front of her house, and the soft blue light from the moon settled the unease inside her ever so slightly.

As the engine sputtered out, she pushed open the driver’s side door of her car, clambering out. Her feet hit the clumps of dirt beneath her, and the final ounces of her energy seemed to drain from her faster than before. She hated long days. 

Once she unlocked the front door, a sight graced her eyes that she really didn’t expect. Six kids she didn’t recognise were scattered throughout her living room fast asleep, Richie laying among them. “Um”, she muttered, not sure what to do. 

A soft light let her know that someone was in the kitchen. Looking over, she saw Will sitting up at the table, staring at an almost empty glass of water as he swam deeply in his thoughts. He didn’t even notice his mom was home until she cleared her voice. 

“Will, why are all of these people in my house?” 

Chapter Text

The thick icy winds of November stung Vic Criss’ cheeks; tiny pin-pricks of frozen air painted them a bright red. The colour appeared bolder against the rest of his pale skin. A deep inhale filled his lungs with the crisp air, and he willed it to cleanse him, yet he found that nothing could clear away the guilt that he felt in the pit of his stomach and the depths of his heart. 

Derry felt different than it had a couple of months before. The atmosphere seemed lighter. More forgiving. It was only after this strange shift in the aura of the town that Vic had started to feel the dread pick up within him. Remorse never settled well in anyone, but Vic wished harder than anything that the dark swirls of this emotion would finally cease. 

Seeing that group of Losers set off to find the missing Trashmouth the other day only added fuel to the flame. The determination glistening in their eyes intimidated him to no end and left him wondering in the calm moments of the night why he had never felt that. Why had he never felt the itching desire to search for Patrick when he disappeared? Why hadn’t any of them?

His hollow eyes scanned the parking lot before him as he rubbed his hands together to bring some warmth back into the tips of his fingers. Catching sight of something on a nearby telephone pole made him stop. Clambering to his feet, the soles of his sneakers scraped along the tarmac beneath them, and he could feel the quick glances of Belch, Moose, and Peter hot on is back. 

He shivered before the tall wooden post, pale fingers shaking as he reached out to peel off an old missing poster for none other than Richie Tozier. The paper was grey and rotted, and despite the delicate touch he held it with, a chunk of the bottom broke away floating in spirals towards the ground, leaving only his name beneath the picture. 

The flimsy sheet felt like a brick in his hand, and he finally managed to tear his gaze away from the glaring image of the kid he used to terrorise. And, then he saw it. Beneath Richie’s poster on the pole was an even older one, even more decayed than the one in his hands. Patrick Hockstetter’s tight-lipped smile felt threatening, and it soured the emotion growing in his stomach even more. 

Swallowing his regret, he cleared his throat, calling back over to his friends who still sat on the edge of the curb outside the convenience store, cigarette smoke curling around them in thick clouds. “Do you think they’ll find him?” The words felt rough on his tongue.

“Who?” Belch shot back, not even looking over at his friend.

“Tozier.”

Belch said nothing, replying only with a swift shrug of his shoulders. 

Vic sighed, dropping Richie’s poster to the ground, before dragging himself back to the others. As he resumed his place on the curb, he hunched over, shoving his head in his hands, but no matter how hard he tried, there was no hiding from his guilt. “Do you think we should have looked for Patrick?”

There was a loud silence after his final question, the quiet spread thickly between them. No one wanted to answer. And, yet, after what seemed like a lifetime, Moose did.

“Doesn’t matter. Henry found him first.”

“You’ve got to go in, Mike” Robin’s voice was calm, but held minuscule flecks of frustration dotted throughout her tone. They’d been standing on the porch in front of the Byers’ house for over five minutes; Mike hesitant to finally enter. 

He rolled his eyes but knew that she was right. Yet the thought of talking to Richie was draining; he didn’t know if he could hold back his anger. Richie brought that thing here, he may not have meant to, but that didn’t matter. Richie brought it here, and now his sister was gone.

(or dead?)

Gone.

Holly was gone, and Richie was going to help get her back. Mike just needed to-

“Go inside,” Robin urged again, nudging him forward slightly. His shoes dragged along the splintered wood beneath him; planks creaking loudly. A deep sigh escaped his lips, swirling into the sharp, cold air before him.

“He brought it here,” Mike uttered, thoughts spilling out before he could catch them.

“He didn’t mean to.” 

“But he did.”

Her hands latched onto his shoulders, swinging him around so fast his head spun. Robin’s eyes bore into his own as she spoke. “Get it together, Mike. I know you’re scared, but so is he, can’t you see that? He hauled his ass all the way down from Maine to get away from this thing and it still found him. Come on, dude. There’s no point in getting all riled up; it won’t get you anywhere.” She didn’t say it, but it was implied in her words, lurking in the caverns between the letters: It won’t get you to Holly.

The breeze hummed in his ears as he swallowed down the edges of his anger, before nodding slowly. He didn’t respond, only turned, stepping lightly towards the door, momentarily inspecting the spirals and swirls in the wood. Raising a pale fist, he knocked a few times on the door, casting a quick glance back to Robin who responded with a tight-lipped smile. 

A muffled “It’s open” sounded from within the house, and with no more time to waste, Mike reluctantly let himself in. A single step forward into the boundaries of the Byers’ home felt off. A piercing coldness wrapped around his limbs, sprouting goosebumps across every expanse of skin as his entire vision was clouded in inky darkness.

For a split second, Mike thought he’d fainted, yet his feet were still planted on a new black ground. Confusion nipped at his brain as he spun around looking for Robin only to be met with more nothingness. Everything black. “Robin?”

Taking tentative steps around the unknown, his voice became more frantic. “Uh, guys? Richie?”

The instant his twin’s name escapes his tongue, a thump sounded beside him, and he couldn’t repress the jolt of fear that washed over him. His heartbeat thudded within his ears, gaining speed with every second that passed. Blood rushing. Every ounce of his being told him not to look, a persistent thrum of his thoughts synchronising with his ever-increasing heartbeat. 

(come on, mikey)

His head was turning before he could register the movement, eyes widening every second, stopping only when he saw the scene before him. 

A body. Collapsed in a pile amidst the blackness, dripping wet as though it was dragged straight from the ocean.

(or the quarry)

Drenched clothes simultaneously sticking and hanging off of the small frame before him; the only visible thing apart from Mike himself in the entirety of this new hellscape. Why does this shit always happen? A bitterness swam throughout his mind, and he contemplated that maybe Richie was right running when things got fucked up. 

The tips of his fingers felt numb with anxiety, wave after wave of fear swept the breath out of his lungs as he shuffled towards the body. The soft thumps from his shoes evoked no reaction out of them; the person laid perfectly still, and Mike couldn’t decide whether he wanted them to move or not. The closer he got, the deeper the anxiety tore at his insides. Thick black stands of hair were matted against a sickly pale scalp, and a pang of familiarity willed him to run. 

Crouching down as slow as possible, a thin hand outstretched, shaking slightly. Please don’t be Richie. Please don’t be Richie. With a quick touch to the body’s shoulder, he shoved them forward, scrambling backwards as limp limbs flayed outwards before stilling once more. A face stared back at him, eyes unseeing. Grey, sunken cheeks above blackened lips. It took him a moment to realise his own decaying image was staring through him. Not Richie. Him.

As the wave of realisation shocked him, he spun around, trying to run as far into the nothingness away from himself. Adrenaline sparked at his fingertips, and wide, dark eyes darted every which way, expecting anything to materialise out of the shadows that encompassed every angle. With a quick glance over his shoulder, he let out a mental sigh of relief as his drowned self laid only as a speck in the distance. This momentary happiness felt extraordinary, but the soaring feeling came crashing down as he collided with something hard, falling backwards, his head smacked unceremoniously on the ground. 

Pushing past the initial pain from the blow, clouds swarmed in and out of his vision, a persistent ringing that formed a melancholic melody in his ears. Squinting through the throbbing mess in his mind, he anchored himself off of the ground slightly, but the sight ahead left him still.

El stood before him, stiff as a board, holding herself defensively as she glared at her boyfriend. Any love was lost amongst the fury burning darkly in her eyes, and Mike desperately searched for some semblance of hope that she’d help him. Her stature seemed to prove otherwise. What did I do to make her so mad? He couldn’t think straight; thoughts ignited then collided with one another that he could barely keep hold of a complete sentence enough to speak it. 

Everything was wrong; not just his surroundings, that was obvious, but his brain. It felt off. Cloudy, but just when it all started to clear, fog would drift in, leaving him helplessly lost. His mouth grasped at the words, still swirling around his mind, but only one could be recovered: “El?”

“You.” She seethed, the word dripping off her tongue as though it was laced with venom, “You gave me to the bad men.”

Mike’s brows furrowed. He didn’t do that, did he?

Did I?

(did you, mikey?)

“I-I didn’t.” The stutter escaped from his lips before he could stop it, as he let all his focus flood to clambering to his feet through the daze that blurred his vision.

“You did.” Her words rattled throughout his brain as she continued. “You sent me away.” 

Mike’s feet finally found themselves planted on the ground, and he rose steadily while El’s accusation burned the edges of his brain. His mouth opened to speak, but no sound came out at the sight of her curls falling from her scalp. Brunette waves spiralled down, grazing past her shoulders before disintegrating at the touch of the shadows around them. Her head left roughly shaved, just as he’d found her.

He shook his head. “El, I-“

Her hand thrust out before he could finish, anger glinting dangerously in the darks of her eyes, and he felt his feet leave the ground once more. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Pain burned his back as his body crashed to the floor, and his eyes scrunched up out of reflex. He’d never felt fear towards El before, but he couldn’t think of any other way to describe the knots tying in his stomach. 

The air felt different, and it took all of Mike’s courage to pry open his eyes for just one moment to look around. Darkness fell away, cascading out of the edges of his vision as the world began to light up around him, causing him to squint suddenly at the change. El was gone. Vanished without a trace.

(just like poor little holly, isn’t that right?)

Sitting up, he ignored the shooting pain through his spine and rubbed the back of his head in a futile attempt to soothe the bruises on his scalp before they formed. The soft buzz of electricity droned in his ears, and it took him a second to realise where he was. Fluorescent lights forged the almost unbearable brightness of this newfound purgatory, filling the otherwise silent lobby of a derelict Starcourt Mall. 

Getting to his feet proved much harder than the time before, new aches flared up his limbs as Mike planted his sneakers on the linoleum floor. A short wave of dizziness threatened to send him falling to the ground again, but he managed to steady himself, taking in his new surroundings. 

“El?” His voice wavered, somehow knowing that she wouldn’t answer. That she wasn’t there anymore.

The panelled windows and glass doors stood a few feet away from him, taunting him with their associations of freedom, yet the darkness that laid thick beyond them shut down any hope he had of that. They may as well have been coated in tar, and the unforgiving nothingness reminded him all too much of where he just was. Repressing a shudder, Mike started to wander.

Only the droning hum of the lights graced his ears, whispering deeply into his soul that he was very much alone. He’d never done well in solitude before, always seeking out his friends whenever possible. The tug in his gut to socialise was what drove him, no matter what he wanted, it seemed miles away then. 

He shot an apprehensive look at the exit doors, the inky darkness glaring intensely at him, yet he was abruptly shaken out of the contemplation of running through the doors. Three booming thuds sounded from the distance to his right, each one carving out a deeper pit in Mike’s stomach. With a jump, he swung around to stare at the direction of the noise, breath escaping from his lips so raggedly that it burned his chest. 

Eyes locked onto a decayed wooden door, splinters of wood spiking out of its almost grey surface, entirely out of place in the pristine commercial feel of the mall. The lights had stopped their infuriating hum, leaving only a soft ringing in his ears accompanied by the rhythm of his growing erratic heartbeat. 

The door began to rattle, slowly at first but then the movement grew so violent the wood was threatening to snap at its rusted hinges. Frozen in place, all Mike could do was stare, everything in him screaming to just move, yet he was transfixed. 

Then, quiet.

The rattling stopped just as soon as it started, leaving only the wheezing sounds of his breath as he braced himself. He started to think that was it, that nothing else would happen with every empty second that ticked by, but his baseless hopes fell flat the second they were conjured. Thick black liquid seeped from beneath the door, inching across the immaculate, polished linoleum with increasing speed. Mike was finally pulled out of his paralysing fear as he saw the substance burn everything it touched like acid. 

He started to run towards the door, no longer caring if there was nothing out there, accepting whatever was beyond. A shrill demonic laugh danced around him, as he grabbed for the cool metal handle of the door, swung it open and melted into the darkness. 

Mike jolted upright, gasps slipping from his mouth as he tried to catch his breath. The cosiness of the Byers’ living room graced his eyes, and he couldn’t hide the relief that washed over him. He found himself, sitting up on the couch, and didn’t even notice his twin until he spoke.

“Jesus, Mike, are you okay?”

“Fuck”, Mike muttered, ignoring the concern and staring at the carpet instead of his brother, still feeling the tingling after-effects of whatever he’d just experienced. 

“What the hell happened, man?”

“I-I don’t know”, he stuttered, finally lifting his gaze to fall on Richie. The newly departed dread came rushing back as he took a good hard look at the other boy. One of Richie’s eyes was tainted; a sickly yellow instead of the usual warm brown. Mike’s growing worry spiked when he realised it was only the two of them in the room.

He attempted to shuffle backwards but hardly made it very far, his back colliding softly with the sofa cushions.

“Mikey”, Richie smiled, his voice steady, unfamiliar, and laced with malicious amusement. 

Mike’s breath hitched. I thought I was free, I should be free. His eyes sat wide in their sockets, staring with fear at this demonic impression of his twin. Yet, he could hardly register anything else different about Richie’s appearance as a slight movement tore his attention away. A thick line materialised in the crook of Richie’s pale neck, growing wider and wider by the second until it began to bleed. Thick blood seeped from the fresh gash, flowing almost serenely down the front of his brother’s shirt, but Richie didn’t seem to care or even notice. The sheet of deep red shone, and Mike tried desperately not to whimper when he saw his reflection in the endlessly draining blood. 

He tried to keep himself calm, but he couldn’t stop his breathing from increasing. Shutting his eyes, he started a mantra under his breath, pleading with anything, anyone to get him out of there. “Wake up, wake up, wake up.”

“Are you sure you want to?”

Mike opened his eyes, looking back up, ready to attempt a glare at the blood-soaked manifestation of Richie, but he couldn’t seem to catch a break. Towering over him, the gangly frame of an old-fashioned clown filled his vision. Abrupt giggles tainting the air as Mike’s eyes widened in silent terror. The proportions of the demon’s limbs seemed off, the Victorian-esque costume pushing Mike’s unease further as every aspect of the scene before him screamed that it was wrong. “Shit”, he uttered as a long-held breath escaped passed his chapped lips.

The clown grinned down at him, making the boy want to collapse into nothing. “Are you sure you want to wake up, Mikey?” It repeated, yellow eyes glinting under the low-light of the room. “The world is an awfully terrifying place. Maybe that’s why your sister want’s to keep dreaming.” At the mention of his sister, this newfound reality seemed to falter, rocking ever so slightly on its axis, heart aching desperately. Holly.

“Where is she?” He seethed, anger rising dangerously throughout his body, challenging the overwhelming fear that had consumed every cell. 

The clown’s head tipped to the side like a dog swarmed with confusion, but the action was mocking. “I showed you where she was,” IT revealed, causing Mike’s brows to furrow, fury diminishing as the clown continued. IT smiled, taunting, “But you didn’t open the door.”

“Wait-“ 

“Ah, ah, ah,” the demon cut him off, “You already made up your mind.”

Mike started to protest, wanting more than anything to get a clear answer on where his sister was, but IT lurched forward, claws materialising from his wretched fingers, and slicing the boy’s throat in one swift motion as Mike shut his eyes bracing for an explosion of pain.

His eyes opened, gasping violently again as he grabbed his neck. Yet, there was no pain, no blood that crept between the crevices of his fingers. He glanced upwards, still sat on the Byers’ couch, but the surreal atmosphere he had come to learn no longer stood before him. Only the true familiar comfort of his friend’s living room, with the eyes of every other kid in the room staring at him in concern. No clown. No clown.

Robin stood beside the couch, her previously stiff stature instantly relaxing with relief that Mike was conscious. Conscious and okay. “Well, thank fuck for that.”

“So, they all just showed up last night?” Hopper questioned Joyce, taking a sip of piping hot black coffee from his disposable cup, pretending as though he didn’t feel the stiff burn on the tip of his tongue.

Joyce nodded as she angrily stuffed the new stock of chip packets onto metal shelves. “I didn’t even know; Will doesn’t tell me anything anymore.” She paused, pinching the bridge of her nose in an attempt to calm herself. She huffed, “I’m starting to regret letting Mike’s brother stay with us.”

Hopper took another sip before responding, letting the stinging heat of the coffee prickle his tongue further. “Uh-huh. That fucking kid has turned your house into Hawkin’s very own orphanage.” The distaste was evident in his tone, and Joyce couldn’t help but agree.

(that little richie is a fucking nightmare, ain’t that right?)

Both adults let a moment of silence sweep between them, but Joyce piped up before the inevitable awkwardness waltzed in afterwards. “What happened to us, Jim? Why do I feel like we just don’t care anymore?’

Hopper remained quiet, letting his eyes wander away from the confrontation. 

A sigh settled from Joyce. “If Richie was dying right in front of you, and you had the chance to save him,” she paused, waiting until Hopper moves to look back at her, “would you?”

He rolled his eyes, a nervous laugh released from his mouth. “Of course I would, Joyce. It’s my job.” 

She took a few steps towards him, waving her arms wildly for a moment in response. “No, no, no.” Grasping the sides of his arms, she shook him slightly, not being mindful of his coffee cup at all. “No. Forget about your job, just think about it. Hard.” Hopper looked into her eyes properly. Witnessing the tiny red specks against fields of white, getting wider as she grew more dishevelled. “Would you save him?”

(why would you, jim?)

(he’s a nuisance)

(a parasite)

(and what do you need to do with parasites?)

“I-I really don’t know.” It was a lie, and he couldn’t do that. Not to Joyce, not after everything. Backtracking, he shook his head lightly. “No. No, I wouldn’t save him.” He set his cup down on a shelf beside him before rubbing his face in frustration. “God, what is wrong with me?”

Joyce sighed, internally sharing his question. She’d never felt that way before; never felt so dismissive of children’s suffering, but just couldn’t find it in herself to care. It was as though all the lights within her had dimmed and the switch was broken, shrouding all her sympathy in a thick fog of darkness.

Quiet crept in slowly and then all at once, not even the strong winds outside daring to allow their moaning whistles to enter the store. Hopper cleared his throat to break it. “I-I’ve gotta get going again; I shouldn’t even be here right now what with another missing kid.” He tried to get worry to bleed into his words, but everything came out like he just didn’t care.

Nodding in understanding, Joyce said, “Tommy Kelly, right?”

“Yeah, taken from the mall. Mom was in the restroom.”

“No leads?”

Hopper shook his head. “Nope, nothing. Kid just vanished.”

Every pair of eyes in the room remained fixed on Mike as he rambled, tripping over words as he described what had happened. Minuscule introductions now faded into an abyss in his mind while he finished. “It was like fear every goddamn second.”

The kids from Maine shared a concerned look, with Ben releasing a shuddered sigh.

Steve stood, leaning up against the cigarette-stained wallpaper, torn between paying attention and zoning out into his own little world. Eyes trailed throughout the room, searching from something to steal his focus away from talks of the new terrifying creature. The crumbling static of the radio stuttered in and out of clarity, erratic words shot out, unmatching until they sewed themselves together, finally conveying complete sentences.

He subconsciously turned the volume dial, allowing the words to cover the room. 

“-from Starcourt Mall last night. His mother, Anna Kelly, refused to comment. The Hawkins Police Department has closed the mall to continue the investigation; if you have any information, please contact the station as soon as possible. Tommy Kelly’s disappearance comes just two days after Holly Wheeler went missing from-“

Lucas had moved to switch the radio off as soon as Mike’s sister was mentioned, not willing to dig the pain deeper, but the other boy just stared at his feet. The clown’s words swirling around his mind. 

(you didn’t open the door)

Bev furrowed her brows, sitting on the edge of the coffee table, as she contemplated everything she’d just heard, slotting the pieces into their places. “So,” she shifted to address Mike, who lifted his eyes to share her gaze, “IT told you where Holly was?”

Mike took a ragged breath, nodding. “Sort of. He showed me a door.” 

“W-Where?” Bill piped up, leaning forward slightly. 

“The mall, but the door isn’t normally there. It was old, like from an abandoned house or something. It didn’t belong.”

(not scary at all)

Richie looked over at his twin, sympathy rising as he witnessed the shakiness that had a hold of him. The worry. The fear. He wanted to ease the pain, but he couldn’t conjure up any humour. The last time he’d been at the mall was when he saw the balloon; the taunting warning sent from the clown itself. The time before was when he met Mike for the first time. Total chance. Total coincidence. 

(are you sure about that, rich?)

Coincidence. Unless-

“What’s underneath the mall?”

Everyone’s attention was ripped towards him, questioning glances every which way. Robin was the one to speak up. 

“Uh, nothing. I think.” She paused. “I mean there’s a loading bay, but I’ve never gone there. Plus, it wouldn’t need to go underground, right?”

Richie shook his head, frantically. “No, no, but there has to be something underneath. I mean, obviously there’s pipelines and shit. And sewers.” Sewers. Holly went missing by a drain just like Georgie, but the other kid…

Taken from the mall. He’d met Mike at the mall, saw the balloon at the mall. And the door was at the mall. 

He looked back at everyone else, eyes flickering between all of them. “I think it’s time we went shopping.”

Chapter Text

Sweet tranquility rolled over the polished floors of Starcourt Mall. Relative silence accompanied by the delicate ripples of blue and red shining through the windows from the few cop cars in the parking lot; colours swirling like tendrils, combining to create perfect flashes of violet in which thousands of dust particles danced.

The investigation surrounding the disappearance of little Tommy Kelly just the night before was looking far from fruitful; an outcome not surprising. Nothing to go off of, no tiny footprints leading outside, no bloody droplets sprinkled beautifully across grey linoleum.

Only a single toy car.

The sheriff’s department’s sweep of the mall fell wildly short of thorough, almost as though the sudden and jarring vanishing of the Kelly kid was nothing more than a common nuisance, like coffee rings.

This latest development in Hawkins’ criminal cases only left the disappearance of Holly Wheeler as a fading priority in the eyes of the town’s authority figures and general population. If you had found yourself strolling down one of the more frequent areas in Hawkins, you may have overheard the common remarks of the townsfolk. I heard she was a bit of a ditsy girl anyway, you know? Not very bright. She was bound to get herself lost sooner or later.

(hm, how amusing)

Almost as quickly as they entered, one by one the Hawkins’ police force exited the building, instead opting to linger in the parking lot outside, occasionally uttering offhand theories on the investigation in between the desperate puffs of their cigarettes.

A shame, really. Perhaps if they had stayed a moment longer, delved a little deeper into the layout of the mall, they may have heard the guttural wails of the very boy they were oh so painstakingly searching for.

Yet, no one heard him. And so, no one helped him.

You see, the underground is an incredible thing. A seemingly endless canvas of matter for a certain immortal entity to chisel down into the perfect base for the storage of bodies and bodies of fear-filled children. A temporary home. And, while the damp stone and dirt walls of this cavern may have appeared bleak, yet fitting for such gruesome needs, it remained untouched while the clown was away, taunting and traumatising as many kids as IT wished to.

The final moments of little Tommy were painful to say the least. The more pain, the more fear was the general rule, and fear is oh so sweet.

Mangled gashes oozed winding rivers of thick red blood, forming miniature waterfalls that pooled onto the dirt below. With every drop of red that fell, a ghostly haze clouded over the boy’s eyes as he faded into unconsciousness. It wasn’t long before everything stopped. Quiet little breaths ceased, as the small lake of red beneath his still frame began to coagulate in the harsh cold air.

Upon Tommy’s death, his body began to rise. Limbs stiff as he was lifted high into the space beneath Starcourt Mall, only remnants of fear left within his frame for safekeeping.

Higher and higher the boy rose, stopping only when he reached the other one.

Together, the lifeless bodies of Tommy Kelly and Holly Wheeler floated in the darkness.

“Ah shit, are you kidding me?” Dustin uttered in a harsh whisper. His hands grazed the rough asphalt as he crouched down behind a random truck in the street, peering around the side at Starcourt Mall.

Cops littered the parking lot, engaging in meaningless conversations without a care in the world, as though there weren’t a couple of children missing under their jurisdiction. A few haphazardly strewn lengths of police tape skirted close to the entrance of the building, the thin plastic slightly illuminated by the coloured flashes from the cop cars.

Dustin spun round to look at Robin and Steve; the pair also hiding behind the vehicle. “Right, what’s the plan?’

Steve shot him a confused glance. “Um, distract the cops so the others can get in? We talked about this on the way over, did you forget?” A patronising hint to his tone.

Robin rolled her eyes, sending a light punch to his shoulder as Dustin scoffed. “Dude, I mean, how are we gonna distract them?”

A flash of realisation swam in Steve’s eyes, before a slight tug of his lips revealed a knowing smile. Looking between the others, he nodded. “I’ve got this.”

Before Dustin and Robin could protest, he stood up, swiftly jogging towards the small crowd of cops with a false aura of urgency. Despite the harsh patter of his shoes on the tarmac leaving a loud footfall in their wake, no officer paid an ounce of attention to the approaching teenager. Well, not until said teen began waving his hands above his head. “Hey! Help, please!”

That got some attention.

“Help! I-I can’t find my sister!”

Robin and Dustin shared a wary look from back behind the truck, itching with anxiety at the scene before them. The few officers in the parking lot inched closer to Steve as he slowed his pace, letting his arms fall back down to his sides while he panted with exaggeration. The stances of the cops seemed apprehensive, yet there was something off in their features. As though they weren’t as concerned as they probably should have been.

Steve continued to babble about the tragedy of his poor missing imaginary sister, before one officer held up a hand to silence him. “Whoa, whoa, slow down, what do you mean you can’t find her?”

“Uh, she was just, um, out for a walk about an hour ago and she hasn’t come back…”

“Walking around here?” Doubt was heavy on the cop’s tone.

“Uh, yes, sir.”

“How old is she?”

“Eight, sir.”

“An eight year old girl was going out for a walk at this time? Alone?”

“Um,” He grappled in his brain to think of something remotely close to plausible as he rubbed the back of his neck in a feeble attempt to alleviate his growing anxiety, “she’s a very independent eight year old”. What the fuck did I just say? The cop narrowed his eyes, as Steve desperately tried to backtrack. “And, our parents aren’t really that involved…”

By some miracle, the officer sighed, turning back to address the others. “Alright, Daniels come with me, the rest of you guys stay here. We’ll radio in a few if there’s no sign of her.”

Steve walked off away from the mall with only two of the officers, still leaving four others, huddled in the parking lot, and suddenly it felt like they had gotten nowhere.

“Shit, now what?” Dustin uttered.

After a brief moment of contemplation, Robin began “Well, I guess we just need to distract them for a minute, right? Just a little while for the others to get in round the back.” She quickly scanned the floor around her, before reaching towards something on the road beside the sidewalk.

Her slender fingers gripped the grey, jagged surface of a rock, as she tested the weight of it in her hands. A short breath passed her lips, sending a small cloudy spiral into the air. “Get ready to run.”

Dustin’s eyebrows furrowed, observing his friend with confusion. “What do you-“ His voice was cut short when he saw her launch the rock overarm, straight towards the cops. The stone whistled lightly as it descended in the direction of the cop cars. He braced himself with every second that passed, flinching slightly when the sound of shattering glass rattled through the air as the rock smashed squarely through one of the vehicles’ driver’s side window. “Holy fuck, Robin!”

Ignoring the distant raging of the officers, Robin grabbed his arm, not waiting for him to process the action before she starts dragging him to stand. “Let’s get out of here.”

As the two started to sprint off down the street, a flurry of footsteps grew from a ways behind them. Angry boots hitting the asphalt as the cops attempted to follow the already distant perpetrators, leaving them completely oblivious to the group of kids that slipped effortlessly into the of the side-door fire exit of Starcourt Mall.

A sickening clang resonated throughout the hollow lobby of the mall as the fire exit slammed shut, echoing throughout the core of each of the kids that slid inside. It took a few endless moments for the first footsteps to be made, yet slowly but surely the group inched their way through the first floor, shoes squeaking on linoleum.

Richie cleared his throat, turning to his brother, “So, whereabouts was that door, Mikey?”

Somewhere deep within his brain itched at Mike to snap back at the childish nickname, but the fear and anticipation at what was ahead clouded the urge, leaving only sticky swirls of anxiety in his gut. “Uh, I don’t know. It was just on the wall near the entrance, but, like, it’s not normally there.”

“I-I don’t think n-normal matters anymore.” Bill sighed.

The conversation ended just as quickly as it started; the group walking in silence towards the front of the mall. Each step amplifying the fear that reverberated in their chests, until a soft splash sounded followed by squelching as water seeped into the cotton socks of its victim. Bev let out a frustrated sigh at the her now soaked left sneaker, yet her attention was drawn quickly away from her discomfort and towards the large puddle of murky water beneath her soles.

Richie cleared his throat, eyeing the water. ‘Well, looks like someone left the water running.”

The sound of soft drips rippled off of the walls in warning, before Bev felt the harsh grasp of something around her ankle. She whipped her head down, but before she could react, the grey decayed hand dug black nails further into her skin before yanking her down the floor, sending sharp splashes of murky water into the air. A strangled cry escaped her dry throat, leaving her mouth open to rogue drops of dirty water that now soaked her clothes.

Immediately the others spun around, scrambling forward to reach her, countless harsh splashes echoing throughout the building with every frantic footstep. Yet, the desperate hands reaching out to pull Beverly back to her feet, faltered at the sudden din of carnival music.

The blaring song taunted each pair of ears, filling the entire mall with cheerful harmonies to contrast the erratic fearful heartbeats that teetered on cardiac arrest.

Beverly pulled herself up from the ground, the dingy brown puddles surrounding her no longer filled with threatening hands with brittle fingernails. “Where the fuck is that coming from?”

Eyes darted and heads spun, but the music seemed no louder in one place than another. Just a constant hum of over-joyous melodies that scraped away at their eardrums until-

“Eleven,” A stern voice resonated, cutting through the music the second the name was uttered. It would have been a relief, if not for the frenzied way El spun on her heels, eyes widened and face grey at the sight of her former caregiver standing a few paces away. Exactly where he should not have been.

“Papa,” the name slipped off of her tongue before she could catch it; timid and deadly. She felt so alone. Small and powerless, exactly like a lab rat under the cool, calculated gaze of the scientist.

“Um, who the fuck is that?”

In most circumstances, Richie’s crude cut-ins left a sour taste in the mouth of everyone near, the immature quips enough to illicit a groan from most people. Yet, this time his total lack of emotional awareness was welcome, because it shook El out of her stupor, and while the fear that shot ice into her stomach was still there, she knew she wasn't on her own. On her side. She couldn’t be a small, powerless child if there were others with her. Others ready to fight her fights with her.

“El, listen, it’s not real, okay?” Lucas’ voice was shaky, but determined. “He’s not here!”

He’s not here.

(but you can see him, eleven)

He’s not here.

(listen to your papa, eleven. don’t disobey him. he’s right there!)

He’s not-

A flash of movement tore her eyes away from the stare of her tormentor, just in time to witness Mike Hanlon gripping a wooden baseball bat so hard the bones in his knuckles strained tightly against his skin, begging to burst out. A sickening crunch sounded the second the bat collided with the hallucination’s-

(papa's)

skull. Blood spurted out, staining wispy white strands of hair as it flew. It seemed like only seconds before the figure manifested into something else entirely as it rounded on Mike H. El no longer recognised whoever stood before them; terror evaporating from her stomach.

Unfortunately, it seemed like Mike knew exactly who this new horror was.

His mother.

Shrouded in a thick layer of soot, glowing embers dancing into the air from her sizzling fingertips. The whites of her eyes had grown disfigured, oozing out of their sockets and down ash-covered cheeks.

It was silent, aside from the sharp, shuddering breaths from Mike, who stood staring at his burnt mom in terror; conflict and fear swimming in his widened eyes. His grip on the bat had loosened ever so slightly, the tension in his knuckles faded back down.

And then she screamed.

Charred arms flailed wilding as they reached out to grapple at him, the wisps of orange embers darting out in mini fireworks. Everyone scrambled towards the two, adrenaline pumping their feet into action.

Eddie lunged towards Mike’s mom, unceremoniously jumping onto her back and landing in a very awkward piggy-back position. In his confusion and panic, he screamed, clawing aimlessly at her face with his eyes closed. Shouts came from all around him from his friends egging him on before they fizzled out.

“Oh fuck,” Richie deadpanned, causing Eddie to pry open one of his eyes to see what had caused the abrupt shift in his friends' demeanours.

He was no longer holding on to Mike Hanlon’s very dead and burnt mother.

He was instead receiving a piggy-back from a man very clearly suffering from leprosy and probably many other contagious diseases. Fuck. Eddie released his grip almost instantly, letting out a string of curses as he fell hard onto the damp linoleum with a thud. Scrambling backwards as fast as his arms and legs could take him, he crawled as far as he could get away from the man, only stopping when he felt Richie’s arm on his shoulder.

Eddie looked up at him, but his position on the floor made it so he had to set his neck at a really uncomfortable position. He didn’t care. Knowing that his friend... knowing that Richie was there helped to dissipate some of his terror. He stood up, taking his place next to the black-haired boy that had kissed him a while earlier. The hallucination was no longer gaining on Eddie. Instead it stood menacingly still, as though it was contemplating it’s next shape to take. The next nightmare.

El didn’t like waiting.

With a slight scream, she threw her arms outwards, letting a wave of her power wash over her arms and shoot out of her fingertips towards the wretched figure.

In a magnificent sweep, the monster was flown backwards, flickering between shapes mid-air. One moment appearing as Beverly’s father and a decayed Max the next. Yet, it’s display of shape-shifting prowess was cut short as it’s body slammed into the wall several feet away. Black blood splattering across the clinically white walls and dripping down to the floor; the only evidence the figure was there at all, as it vanished almost instantly upon the impact.

Save for the myriad of heavy breathing from everyone, the silence was overwhelming.

“What now?” Mike Wheeler piped up, refusing to let the fear creep into his words. He was answered immediately, though it may not have been in the way he wanted.

Metal clanging sounded overhead, followed by the surging of electricity as numerous theatre-style stage lights that weren’t there before powered on. The spotlights fell on the very wooden door Mike had seen in his vision, standing completely out of place with its rotten wood and brass doorknob.

Suddenly, a red carpet materialised. Unrolling itself out from the foot of the door to just feet from where the group stood. The dirty puddles had already began to seep into the plush material. If that wasn’t ominous enough, movement on the door itself tore Mike’s eyes from the carpet.

Blood swiped up and down the fractured wooden panels. writing out letter by letter until the invisible scribe had finished. Sloppy letters read Home for Missing Kids.

Mike saw the sign and didn’t need to think. Only one thing was raging in his brain.

Holly.

Holly.

Holly.

His legs moved on their own, sprinting down the red carpet towards the door and, ignoring the protests of his friends. He swung it open, scrambling down the narrow staircase that it revealed. He only made it a few feet from the base of the almost never-ending stairs before seeing something that made him freeze.

A thunder of footsteps sounded as the others followed, filing in one after the other. The door slammed shut as Beverly was the last one inside.

Lucas inched towards Mike, reached a hand out to place on his shoulder in comfort. Yet, the other boy was transfixed on something above them. Face void of emotion, except for the pain that welled up in the depths of his eyes.

The others followed his gaze.

They wished they hadn’t.

Floating in the dark abyss above them were the two tiny bodies of Tommy Kelly and Holly Wheeler.

“Holy shit,” Max uttered, the words coming out involuntarily along with a sharp intake of breath at the sight.

It seemed so odd. Horrifying, but serene at the same type. They were both so still, as though swimming on top of a clear pond. Two little Ophelias in their own morbid paintings.

Then they fell.

No one had any time to react as the children plummeted to the ground before them, each omitting their own sickening crunch as their bodies broke and bones shattered upon impact with the harsh ground.

“Holly!” Mike screamed, tearing at the walls of his throat as he ran skidding to his knees before the mangled body of his little sister. “No, no, no.” He continued on a loop, helpless but pleading to a God he no longer believed in. He pulled her broken frame onto his lap, her blood seeping into the fabric of his clothes.

The others just watched on in horror. Completely lost at what to do, watching their friend cradle his dead baby sister as another young child lay deceased in the same manner.

Richie’s heart thumped erratically, but loud enough for each beat to rattle his eardrums.

(look what you did, rich)

(this is all your fault)

(you brought me here)

(you killed your twin’s sister)

(you’ve broken him, rich)

(you’ve killed him)

Seeing Mike so broken made El’s brain swirl. She itched to comfort him but didn’t have the right words to say, and didn't know the right actions to help. And then-

“Welcome, welcome!” They all flinched at the voice, eyes darting towards the clown standing in the void. A manic smirk etched darkly into his face. “By the way, you’re all late to the show. Tut, tut, tut. That’s bad theatre etiquette, children.” A crazed laugh escaped his lips, echoing throughout the darkness.

El saw red.

She couldn’t understand what was so funny. Glancing between Mike and the monster behind all of his pain was the final straw. Power lashed around her, gearing up to rip the very life from this nightmare apart. She was getting high on the power, ready to avenge Mike and everyone else for all this fear and sorrow.

Yet, something got in the way.

White.

Just white.

She could see nothing. None of the blackness that covered the endless room she was in before. No clown. No friends. No Tommy. No Holly. No Mike. Nothing.

Just all white.

She was floating on an imaginary cloud, as though everything she knew was being erased from existence.

El was floating, incapacitated in the deadlights. Eyes void of all colour.

Mixed shouts erupted from the rest of the group, calling after both Mike and El. There were many seemingly hopeless attempts to pull them out of their stupors. Lucas, Will, and Beverly ran over to Mike trying to get him back to a semi-aware state in the midst of all the inevitable danger. While the rest frantically reached for El, grabbing at her legs trying to pull her down.

Manic laughter continued around them as the clown watched on basking in the fear and chaos of IT’s own creation. Getting ready for IT’s largest meal yet, and one it had waited oh so long for.

Sounds flittered in and out of focus.

She could vaguely make out voices. Some words landed, others just echoed into incoherence.

Then something touched her legs.

Hands.

“El!”

“Wake up!”

She knew those voices. She liked those voices.

The white wasn’t so calm anymore, and it was no longer just pure unblemished white nothingness. There were flickers of images in the peripherals of her vision. Max and Richie reaching out for her. Their faces spiralling around, like a kaleidoscope. Then more faces, more friends.

Then Mike.

Tears streamed down his face, dripping down onto the grey bloodied cheeks of Holly Wheeler.

No.

No.

No!

It all came back.

The white faded out of El’s eyes as she became overwhelmed with emotion. Mike’s pain and hollowness resonating throughout her very being, ripping through the manufactured coma that she was settled in. She had to help him.

Now.

It was like she exploded. Unrelenting waves of power flew in all directions as she fell to the floor, screams scraping her throat and making her voice hoarse. But, she continued.

The clown got thrown backwards, disappearing momentarily into the blackness. Many others around her lost their footing at the uncontrolled eruption of El’s power, including Eddie.

He felt his feet leave the solid ground and his arms rapidly grappled for anything to soften his landing. His head slammed against the bottom of the stone stairwell they entered from, immediately making him black out.

“Fuck, Eddie!” Richie lunged forward towards Eddie’s unconscious form, frantically shaking him to try to wake him up.

It wasn’t over.

A hoarse laugh echoed; the clown emerged back into view, looking a little worse for wear. One of IT’s eyes was dislodged from the socket and black blood seeped down from a crack in IT’s forehead.

El’s screams were far too weak to be heard any more; the anger had ripped her throat to shreds. Yet, her power was no different, and at the sight of the monster she threw her arms forward once more from where she sat in a heap on the ground.

Animalistic noises escaped the clown’s mouth, wailing in horror as IT’s skull ripped openly slowly, releasing three bright lights. IT’s body fell away from them, decaying and greying at such a rapid rate, IT became nothing by the time IT completely hit the floor.

El didn’t stop.

Her gaze was glued on the lights, unaffected by them. Blood dripped heavily from her nostrils as her fingers clenched in the air.

The orbs of light spiralled wildly, as though attempting to escape. Then they began to flicker, dimming with every hoarse scream from El’s throat.

The others watched El in bewilderment, unsure whether or not to say something.

She continued. Pushing and pushing until the lights grew smaller, darker.

And then, nothing.

They were nothing.

IT was nothing.

IT was gone.

Chapter Text

Tufts of black and grey smoke billowed from the windows of Starcourt Mall with momentary glimpses of orange flames from within. The group stood motionless from afar, all bearing witness to the downfall of the demon they had vanquished from beneath the building. Such a violent and destructive picture felt so overwhelmingly serene. Nothing could stop the relief rising up from the depths of their stomachs and off of their shoulders, mirroring the harsh smoke they saw before them. The ambers of the fire were soon accompanied by flashes of red and blue, blending together in a wash of colour.

It wasn’t long before this that the kids had scrambled out of the mall, dodging sparking electrical cables and falling debris from the crumbling walls and ceilings. The force of El’s gift coupled with the explosion of power that erupted from the death of IT seeped deeply into the foundations of the floor beneath the shopping court. Snapped wires ignited anything and everything flammable in the collapse. Richie and Beverly worked together hauling a weak Eddie to his feet and up the very stairs he crashed against. With every step his head lolled back and forth as he struggled to maintain consciousness. 

Others were dragging Mike from his stupor, eyes transfixed on the crumpled corpse of his little sister. Discarded. Gone. His brain was devoid of thoughts, anything coherent swirling down the drain of grief. It felt as though those two brown eyes were still staring at the her body on the ground even as his feet touched the parking lot outside. The gruesome image would be ingrained behind his eyelids for the rest of time.

Then they were all taking in the aftermath. Gazing at the mall from a distance. The Losers and the Party, side by side. Bitter, heinous victory glinting in every pair of eyes.

It was a few hours before the group made it back to the Byers’ house. Everyone from the Party except Will took Mike Wheeler home, knowing he needed their support.
 
Eddie leant on Richie’s shoulder almost the entire time, shifting the weight of his body on the Trashmouth both out of familiar comfort and in an attempt to relieve the throbbing pain from his head. He was sure that there was something a person had to do when suffering from a head injury but he couldn’t remember. Something to do? Or was it something not to do? Did he need a doctor? Was it all just his mother’s voice in his head? He didn’t know anymore. He didn’t care anymore. He was too tired.

Will creaked open the door to his house, greeted with the sight of Hopper sitting on the couch and Joyce pacing back and forth before him, teeth chewing her nails and the tips of her fingers raw. At the sound of the door, both adults whipped their heads up, eyes wide and bloodshot.

“Will?” Joyce’s voice wavered, drenched in relief and guilt. Hopper stood up in the background, eyes gazing over and every kid lurking behind Will.

She ran forward and wrapped her son in a tight hug, scared to let him go. Let him go and let him disappear again.

The others had filed into the room, Mike Hanlon sorting shutting the door to keep the cold out and the privacy in. As Joyce finally released her son, Hopper stepped forward, sheriff’s hat in his hands and remorse settled deep in his eyes. His gaze fell on Richie. The boy he loathed, viewed as nothing more than a parasite that had burrowed deep into the heart of his community and diseased its very essence. Yet something had changed then. Hopper no longer felt the hatred for Richie, nor the indifference for the other kids that had settled in his heart for the past week. 

It was as though he was seeing him for the first time since he arrived in Hawkins. Looking at Richie with clear eyes, his face littered with injuries covered only slightly by thick rimmed shattered glasses, he found it hard to reconcile that he had felt anything other than sympathy or concern for the boy. 

“Uh.. Kid, look,” He ran his hand through his hair and sighed, “I don’t know what I was-“

“Something was wrong with us,” Joyce interrupted, knowing Hopper did not have the best way with words. “We know that might not make sense, and we know it’s nowhere near an excuse for how we reacted towards you.” She inhaled a shaky breath as the words fell from her mouth.

She didn’t expect a short laugh from Richie to cut the momentary silence. “What the fuck,” he looked around as he paused for a second, “I mean, what the hell are you talking about? You didn’t do anything to me. I mean Paul Bunyan over there might’ve been a bit too, ya know, terrifying, but there’s been worse before. It’s all good.” He tilted his chin up in false confidence, slightly knocking the balance of Eddie who was still silently resting his weight on the other boy’s shoulder.

Joyce sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose and shutting her eyes before looking back at Richie. “I might not have done anything, but I- I thought things. Bad things.”

“Ew, lady, I don’t wanna know about that. I mean, I know I’m irresistible, but you’re a bit too old for-“

“No! Not that, for God’s sake. I thought-“

“Joyce,” Richie’s eyes were sincere, holding probably the most honest look that she’d seen him bearing, “whatever it was, it wasn’t you. I know it. There was something in this town, just like my last one, and it did the same thing to adults there. It’s not your fault. We don’t need to bother with sorries or whatever the fuck. It’s all okay, yeah?”

Everyone stood around, shifting uncomfortably on their feet. Hopper cleared his throat, “So, uh, where’s my daughter?”

“She- she went to the Wheeler’s house with everyone else,” Will piped up, looking to the ground. “You should probably go there. They need you.”

Hopper furrowed his brows but didn’t push further; the atmosphere was already thick with discomfort. He shuffled towards the door, looking back at Richie and nodding with an apologetic look. Right before leaving he noticed Eddie, balancing uneasy against the other boy. “You alright, kid?”

Eddie widened his eyes as much as he could against the strain of fatigue and the pounding in his head, “Me? Uh, yeah, just been a long day. ‘M tired.” Hopper looked around at the others, noting exhaustion on each of their features and nodded. 

“Well, I better see what’s happening then. Night, Joyce.”

“Goodnight, Jim.”

The door shut closed behind him.

The conversation was still awkward even after Hopper had left. The Losers and Will had reluctantly explained to Joyce the events of the last week, which she unsurprisingly believed. Jonathan had walked in when Joyce was setting up blankets and pillows on the floor by the couch for the rest of the kids. There were bag under his eyes; his time at the Wheeler’s house with Nancy and the others was draining, and eventually Nancy had asked him to leave so she could process. He didn’t want to leave her, but he knew firsthand that grief is different for everyone and family is the best company for some. He retired to his room, giving Will a quick hug and receiving one from Joyce before he left. He felt lighter that night.

Once Joyce and Will had settled in their own beds and drifted to sleep, the Losers laid on the blankets provided for them, with Eddie taking the couch as he suffered the most injury. 

“Well, that w-was eventful,” Bill spoke into the darkness.

“Really?” Richie retorted, resting his hands behind his head, “Felt like your average Saturday night to me.” Stan snorted at that.

“I really missed you guys,” Beverley whispered. A chorus of replies in agreement resonated throughout the room. Everyone expressing their affection for their true childhood friends.

Everyone except Eddie.

His silence didn’t go unnoticed. While not the loudest out of the bunch - courtesy of Richie - he was definitely not quiet.

“Eds?” Richie turned to look at the dim silhouette of his crush. A sliver of moonlight shone on his face, eyes closed and mouth slightly open as he let out a shuddered breath. Richie turned back to the others. “Spaghetti’s asleep.” 

“I’m pretty tired too,” Mike uttered through a yawn.

“Y-yeah, I’m gonna s-sleep, guys.”

One by one the Losers drifted off into dreamless slumber. Sleep no longer infiltrated by morbid visions and horror clichés. The clown was gone. That bastard was dead. They were safe, and they could live.

Hours had passed and Richie sat staring at the ceiling, not wanting to sleep, dreamless or otherwise. He wanted to bask in the comfort of having his favourite people surrounding him. Every second asleep would be a second wasted. It was hard for him to believe that not long ago he was running for his life and the safety of his friends. He had trekked across the country and found his twin. He made new friends. 

He had kissed Eddie.

Eddie. He looked over at the sleeping boy, smiling when he gazed at the other’s features. He wished that his eyes were open so he could see the warm brown of the irises. But something didn’t feel right. 

He recalled the position that Eddie was in a few hours ago when the others slept, and it was the exact same position he was in as Richie saw before him. Mouth slightly ajar, one arm hanging limply off of the couch, the blanket only covering a single shoulder. Only there was no steady rise and fall of his chest. There was no rise and fall at all.

Unease settled heavily in Richie’s stomach. Heavier than  guilt. Heavier than embarrassment. Heavier than fear. This was terror. 

“Eds,” He whispered at the dark outline, reaching an arm out to touch Eddie’s hand.

Cold.

Freezing.

It burned.

Richie shot up, hands twitching. He began to shake Eddie, saying his name over and over like a mantra, like a prayer. It must have escalated to shouts and eventually incoherent sobs as the reality of the situation settled in. The noise woke the house. Lights flickering on in every room as people came to see what the commotion was. 

Eddie.

Eddie.

Eddie.

Whatever divine being may have been out there, it gave no answer.

Richie had always hated hospitals. Their chemical stench burned his nostrils. The nurses tried to treat the wounds adorning his face and his arm, but he refused. Eddie was the one that needed treatment. 

Oh, I forgot. There’s no treatment for death.

It had been twenty minutes since they confirmed Eddie’s passing. Something about a brain haemorrhage. He'd hit his head too hard. Eddie would’ve known something was wrong with him. All his unnecessary medical knowledge would have actually mattered. Eddie could have helped himself, but he was too confused to recognise. 

I should have listened to his stupid ramblings.

I’ll never hear another one.

Was it my fault in the end?

IT may have died that night. El may have destroyed the very essence of that devil but as far as Richie was concerned: he took everything.

IT won.

Chapter Text

Mid-December snow fell silently on the streets of Hawkins. Spiralling snowflakes twirling in the air, dancing tenderly towards the ground. Yet they did not settle. Nothing settled right in Hawkins anymore, but that’s what grief does. 

Once the news of the deaths of Holly Wheeler and Tommy Kelly were known throughout the community, a sourness hung in the air. People walked around with an empty aura. Melancholy had flooded their senses, but only for a while. Soon Christmas decorations had been strung up, and the multicoloured lights in every direction painted a bitter juxtaposition when Karen Wheeler walked down the streets. Whispers melded in with the harsh winter breeze whenever she walked by, a bland expression constantly adorning her face. 

Ted Wheeler was barely seen without some form of alcohol in his hand, and Nancy buried herself in books. 

Mike Wheeler spent most of his time in the basement in the beginning. The Party would visit every day. At first, he’d mainly just stare at the floor, imagining the mangled body of his sister that he’d witnessed and knew he could never erase from his mind. As the weeks passed, it got easier to manage, but at the same time, every day that went by was one day further from the last time he hugged Holly. The Party never left his side, and for the most part, they were working on defeating the new monster that had entered their lives. Grief.

He hadn’t seen Richie since Starcourt Mall burned down.

Richie Tozier decided to stay in Hawkins after the Losers left for Derry. It was difficult for them to part, but at the time, he’d needed to stay for Eddie. Even if Eddie, too, had left.

Joyce had let him stay and he was beyond grateful. Her maternal instincts were often overwhelming, largely as a result of the lack of familial comfort he had received back in Derry. 

“You okay there, Richie?” Joyce asked, concern on her features as she saw him staring at his scrambled eggs and bacon that sat untouched on his plate. 

“Uh, yeah,” He mumbled, “Just dandy.” He attempted an outlandish accent, but the sounds were more off than they normally were. The soft clinking of her silverware and the clearing of Joyce’s throat filled the room. 

“Will and I were thinking of picking up a Christmas tree today, if you wanted to come?” she asked Richie. Her voice was hopeful, yet quiet as if she already knew his answer. Already knew his plan for the day. It was mainly always the same after all. 

Richie met her eyes, letting a strained smile curve his mouth. “I’m okay, Joyce.” The light in her eyes fell a bit, as if the last of her hope had evaporated with just those three words. He cleared his throat and put on another voice, “But you and ol’ William go and have a tremendous time, my lady.”

His attempt at humour was met with a sad smile. An expression he’d received so often it came as no surprise anymore.

Joyce and Will left the house with a short wave goodbye to the dark-haired boy on the couch. The kind of parting that meant ‘See you later’ intertwined with a glint of worry in their eyes that appeared every time they spoke to him.

The sound of the door creaking shut against the wooden frame just barely woke Richie from his thoughts. Eddie.

Always Eddie.

Dying by falling asleep. Peaceful? Maybe. Preventable? Abso-fucking-lutely. Oh, Eddie, with his endless knowledge about every injury, illness, and disease. The only one of them with the common sense to go to a doctor with a head injury, and he was too hurt to recall. Oh, Eddie.

Richie hardly realised he’d left the house until he was a block away, backpack hanging loosely from his shoulder, mostly empty save for a couple of pictures and his ever-waning essentials. The bitter air nipped at his nose. Winter was finally there, weaving its iciness in the wind to numb the feelings in his body. Yet, nothing could numb the feelings in his mind.

“Uh, Richie?” 

The voice cut through his thoughts, despite its wary nature. Richie looked up to see Mike Wheeler. It really was like looking in a mirror. Grief etched on both their faces, sunken eyes from sleepless nights spent silently begging for more time with them. With Holly. With Eddie. 

Richie cleared his throat, “Hey, Mikey.” The playful nickname didn’t alleviate the awkwardness in the air. “Where’re you going?”.

Mike rubbed the back of his neck, avoiding Richie’s gaze. “Just running some errands for my mom. She’s, uh, struggling a bit.” His voice broke slightly. Richie pretended not to notice. “What about you?”

“Just out for a walk.” Richie lied. “Gotta get my steps in, you know?” 

His twin stared back expressionless. “Sure. Uh, I’ll see you another time, yeah?” 

Richie gave him a genuine smile, nodding slightly. “Another time.”

The twins parted ways for a final time, though one of them was unaware. 

Left. Right. Left. Right. He’d been walking for hours. No doubt Joyce and Will were worried by now when they returned to an empty house. Hawkins was just behind him, and he had no intention of turning back. Another town he had cursed by staying there. Maybe I jinx everywhere I live.

His thoughts were interrupted by a snowflake brushing against his pale cheek. 

(If you don’t wrap up, you’ll catch a cold, and then get a fever, and those can be fatal, you know?)

Eddie’s voice rattles in Richie’s head. ‘Fatal’. Ironic.

He wonders if his missing posters are still hung up in Derry. The last proof of his existence. Or maybe they’ve all rotted away - degraded by nature like the dozens placed before his. 

A faded missing poster. Essentially a death certificate. Like Eddie’s. 

Richie holds back a sob, tears brimming in his eyes. Eddie will forever be missing to the world, and so he must remain missing too. If Eddie can’t return to Derry to be with their friends, then there is no way in hell Richie deserves to go back. 

It’s my fault Eddie came here.

It’s my fault Eddie died.

And so he must wander. Forever missing. Walking the country as just a shell of his former self. Catching glimpses of Eddie in the snowflakes, the clouds, the sound of a bike bell, the ripples of a lake. But they will only be glimpses. 

Just echoes.

Just echoes.