Chapter Text
When Steve had told Eddie he knew someone who could help them translate the Russian interference they had picked up on, Eddie wasn’t expecting to be greeted by a greasy looking, balding man wearing slippers.
But hey, he’d seen stranger things by this point.
When they had first pulled up at the desolate building, Eddie wasn’t sure what he was expecting. It felt like they had travelled hours to arrive in the middle of nowhere, awkwardly sharing a room in a motel along the way, to find this ‘Murray’ that Steve had told him all about. According to Steve, Murray could speak Russian and would be able to get their found information into the right hands. From the bits and pieces he’d heard about Murray from the others, he sounded like a drunk conspiracy theory nut job. Eddie wasn’t entirely sure how much help he’d be.
They got out of Steve’s beemer, because “no way in hell are we traveling in your beat up van Eds”, and approached the rusting front door. Big red letters were spray painted across the front, ‘Keep Door Closed’.
“This feels like a bad omen,” Eddie whispered to Steve, side eyeing him.
Steve let out a little exhale of air at Eddie’s comment and then pressed the buzzer by the door. It let out a shrill buzzing sound that made Eddie jump slightly. There was a few seconds of silence before a voice spoke over the intercom.
“Look at the camera.”
Eddie looked around confused, he turned to Steve who looked equally as confused. Brows furrowed, Steve leaned closer to the intercom, inspecting it as if expecting the camera to magically reveal itself.
“Not the loud speaker, above you to the right.”
The voice sounded condescending, however it was correct. On the building to the right of them was a badly hidden camera. Eddie had an initial thought that his dad wouldn’t have been pleased that he didn’t immediately locate a camera on the property, but quickly pushed it back because fuck him. He isn’t his father.
Both Eddie and Steve shuffled around awkwardly, looking into the camera and then back to the door as the metal creaked on its hinges as it was opened.
There in front of them in a white t-shirt, glasses, dark jogging bottoms, slippers and some sort of dirty multicoloured robe, was who Eddie assumed to be Murray.
“Steve Harrington, Eddie Munson” spoke the man, looking at them both respectively, “you two are a long way from home.”
With a small smile, Murray stepped aside and gestured for the boys to enter. They took one last glance at one another before entering the building. Eddie allowed Steve to enter ahead of him and turned back to see Murray quickly looking around outside before closing the corroded door behind them.
They were led into a living space that was full of clutter, the desk, chairs, sofa, tables all covered with various files and boxes. The floor was a hard, cold looking concrete but there were rugs scattered around the room as if to make up some type of carpet. There were posters on the walls that Eddie didn’t recognise and an obscene amount of televisions with what looked to be radio equipment and VHS players stacked upon them.
Murray turned back to the boys, “I hope you’re not here to tell me about the bear in the little Byer boy’s backyard, I’ve heard that one already.”
Then before either of them could answer, Murray turned back around and unlocked a sliding metal door. Eddie and Steve couldn’t believe what they saw, newspaper articles, documents and photos all pinned to a cork board with red string joining them. The evidence was stacking up that Eddie’s initial judgment of conspiracy theory nut job was correct.
Murray had been tracking the whole upside down shenanigans from the beginning, there was even a photo of bald El with a scribbled comment above her, ‘Russian?’
As Murray started talking about his theories and the connections he had made, Steve wandered over to the photo of El. He reached a hand out to gently touch it and turned to Murray, cutting him off, “She’s not Russian.”
Murray looked taken aback at first by the interruption, “sorry?”
“She isn’t Russian, she’s from Hawkins Lab” Steve said as he turned back around to face Murray.
Eddie could tell he was pleased with himself, knowing something that this wacky man clearly didn’t. Murray also seemed slightly annoyed by this information, his head cocking to the side like an intrigued dog.
“Her name is Eleven,” Steve continued. Murray kept staring at the boys, not saying a word.
Eddie eventually spoke up, for the first time since meeting this man, “you might wanna sit down for this.”
At first Murray didn’t move, he kept staring at them as though they were a puzzle he was trying to solve. Eddie wondered if he was possibly trying to figure out if they were lying or not. But, then Murray turned around and headed back out of the room mumbling something under his breath that the boys didn’t quite catch.
They followed him back out into the hectic living room and Murray pushed aside some of the stacks of papers to sit down on one of the many sofas. Steve got out the tape recorder and hit play, the Russian transmission that they had caught on Dustin’s super radio began to play.
Murray stayed silent the whole time and stared off into space, his face looked serious as though he was really taking in what the Russians were saying. Once the recording stopped, Steve looked over to Eddie, unsure what to do next. Murray kept sitting silently on the couch.
“So…is it important? Is it enough to figure out what the hell is going on?” Eddie asked, turning his attention back towards the bald man on the couch.
Murray stood up, wiped his hands on his dirty robe and walked out of the room. Eddie looked back at Steve who just shrugged at him and then headed into the direction Murray had gone. They came into a kitchen area, just as cluttered and grim as the rest of the building. The kitchen sides and cupboards had paint peeling from them, the fridge dirty and covered in what looked to be grease stains and a shelving unit full of cups, plates, bowls ect. He even had a hanging array of mugs that reminded Eddie of his uncle Wayne.
Murray began skittering around the kitchen and grabbing various items that he then put on the empty little table. Looking at the items he had gathered, he was clearly making some sort of alcoholic beverage. He added the liquids into the shaker with ice and began to shake.
Steve pinched the bridge of his nose, other hand on his hip, “what are you doing?”
Eddie could tell he was getting frustrated, he understood why but was also just amazed by what on earth was going off in front of him.
Murray briefly stopped his shaking to answer, “thinking.”
“With vodka?” Eddie added, confused but also intrigued.
“It’s a central nervous system depressant, so yes with vodka” Murray replied as he poured his drink into a class and then pushed past Eddie to make his way over to a collection of vinyls that Eddie hadn’t even noticed up until now.
He saw Steve slump beside him and let out a sigh, “music, really?”
“Yes, it helps me…” Murray replies as he gently takes the vinyl out of the sleeve and places it on the record player.
Soothing jazz music begins to play and Murray wanders around the room, with an air of almost grace to his movements. He closes his eyes and begins to sway gently.
Steve stands up straighter and walks over to him, “how long is this going to take exactly?”
“Longer if you keep talking” Murray snaps back, not even glancing Steve's way.
Eddie knows Steve is getting more annoyed, especially if his ‘both hands on his hips’ mum pose is anything to go by.
“Is it useful or not? Is it incriminating or not? It’s a simple question.”
Murray laughs and finally turns towards Steve, “there’s nothing simple about it, nothing simple about any of this situation.”
He begins to walk over to the stack of televisions and gestures around, “we need Them to believe us and that isn’t easy.”
“Them?” asks Eddie.
“Them, with a capital T. The world at large,” Murray scoffs and then takes a big gulp of his drink, “they won’t believe us.”
“But we have the tape, we have evidence! Right?” Steve begins walking closer to Murray who’s looking at Steve like some naive child.
“They’ll bury it, easy. Those people aren’t like us ok? They’re wired differently, they don’t spend their lives trying to look behind the curtain.”
Murray puts one hand in his pocket and the other clutching his glass as he moves closer to the boys. He laughs before adding, “they like the curtain, it provides comfort and stability.”
At this point he has pretty much lost both Eddie and Steve, neither having any interests in his analogies or metaphors. But he keeps talking about curtains and curtains behind curtains and then moves onto authority, which Eddie can understand much better than curtains. Even with all the metaphors and analogies, Steve understands that Murray is saying that their little tape recording of the transmission doesn’t mean shit in the grand scheme of things.
“So this was all for nothing?” Steve shouts, once again interrupting Murray.
“I’m saying that I’m thinking,” Murray says as he lifts his glass in the air like a cheer, before taking another sip and grimacing at the bitterness. He makes his way back over to the kitchen and adds more soda water to his drink, before putting the bottle down with a thud.
“That’s it!” he exclaims, as though he has had his eureka moment.
“What’s it?” Eddie asks wearily, not really wanting to send Murray off on another tangent.
“It’s too strong, we just need to water it down a bit,” he takes another sip of his drink, “perfect.”
He looks up towards the pair, a big grin spreading across his face. Eddie and Steve look at each other, equally confused before turning their attention back to Murray. This whole interaction has been confusing and strange.
Murray begins to explain his plan to make the situation more tolerable for the public, not to introduce them to the true horrors of the upside down and the Russian involvement. As he explains, the boys nodding along, he pours another two drinks and hands them out. Eddie immediately downs a big gulp whilst Steve hesitantly takes a sip of his.
The group then set about making copies of the tape, Murray making written translations to go with them, and begin to put them into envelopes to post to various newspapers and media companies. They spend a good chunk of the evening labeling and securing everything. Before they know it, it has begun to get dark outside and they’re all sitting back in the living area with drinks ready to celebrate a job well done.
Murray pours himself more vodka, “the commie bastards sure know how to make a good spirit don’t they?”
Murray raises his glass in the air and both Steve and Eddie follow suit, “to taking down the man!”
“To taking down the fucking man!” Eddie joins in, taking a big sip of his drink before grimacing at the strong taste.
Steve takes another sip of his drink before they both put them back down onto the table, Steve checks his watch for the time.
“We should probably start to head off, it’s getting late.”
“Shit yeah, Wayne is gonna be worried about me.”
Murray leans back in his chair, “I’m sure whoever Wayne is, he would be proud of what you’ve been up to. Tell them you’re staying at Jonathan or whoever’s house and crash here in my guest room.”
Eddie leans into Steve and asks quietly, “do you wanna stay?”
“I mean, it is getting kinda late.”
Eddie suddenly becomes very aware of how close he leaned in towards Steve and abruptly pulls back, clearing his throat and hoping the sudden redness of his cheeks is blamed on the vodka.
He turns back to Murray, who’s looking at him with a raised eyebrow, “would I be able to crash on the sofa?”
“Ok, I’m confused”, Murray’s brows furrow and he shakes his head a little, “lovers quarrel?”
Eddie and Steve both immediately begin to heat up and jump to the defensive.
“No, no, we’re just friends”, Eddie hurries out.
“Yeah, friends…just friends” Steve tries to explain, but he can feel the blush covering his face and he begins to feel twitchy. All of a sudden very aware of Eddie’s presence next to him, especially where their knees are touching.
Murray leans back further into his chair, head lolling back as he laughs.
“You’ve told me a lot of shockers today, but that is the first lie.”
Steve finds himself shaking his head, “it’s not a lie!”
“Really? You’re young, attractive, you’ve got chemistry, history and then the real shit, shared trauma”, Murray begins explaining as he gestures with his hands, glass still gripped tight in one of them.
“But…I like girls!” Steve exclaims, his last hope in trying to get Murray to stop talking.
Eddie looks towards Steve, trying not to let the hurt show on his face. Of course, he already knew all of this. Knows he doesn’t stand a chance with The Steve Harrington, but hearing Steve be so clearly disgusted in the idea does make his heart ache.
Murray on the other hand just looks bewildered, because can this kid really be this oblivious?
“Oh great, I can’t believe I have to also get you through a sexuality crisis too”, Murray leans forwards and rubs a hand over his face.
He hears Steve try to disagree once again but just holds his hand out to him and the boy immediately stops. He then points towards Eddie, “and you, I’m gonna say trust issues, am I right? Something to do with your dad.”
Even though Eddie feels like Murray is being rhetorical he still feels the need to defend himself, he’s just met this man, he doesn’t know Eddie or his family.
“Wha-I mean my dads an asshole yeah but..”
Murray cuts him off with a short hum, “it is a curse to see so clearly.”
Once again Murray leans back into his chair, the stress leaving his body as he relaxes and takes another sip of his drink. He points towards Steve this time, “you are just like everyone else, scared to be yourself, retreating back into the safety of….”, Murray clicks his fingers, “name.”
He says it like a command and Eddie immediately finds himself scoffing and muttering, “Nancy.”
He feels Steve side eye him before looking back towards Murray.
“Nancy”, he snaps his fingers again, “Oh, we like Nancy….but we don’t love Nancy.”
Eddie dares to look towards Steve and sees the younger boy's face drop slightly, mouth open as if he’s trying to think of a response.
“I mean…Nancy is…well we aren’t together…not since..”, Steve stammers his response, he can’t quite seem to get the words out. He does like Nancy, but Murray is right, he doesn’t love her. Not anymore, at least not like he used to. He wants her to be happy and safe, he loves her platonically.
Steve slumps back, as though he has given in to defeat.
“My goodness, you two are adorable aren’t you?” Murray asks as he leans forward to pour himself yet another drink.
The boys quickly glance at one another before looking away.
Murray stands up, the chair creaking as he does so, “Listen, there is a pull out sofa in my study if you want it.”
He begins to walk towards a set of stairs, once he’s stepped up the first few he gives the boys one last glance, “but if I were you, I’d just cut the bullshit and share the damn bed.”
With that final statement, Murray carries on up the stairs, leaving both boys alone on the sofa.