Chapter Text
Eddie Munson knew Chrissy was alive. He hoped so, anyway, but hope was fragile and he hadn’t felt a heartbeat. He still remembered the brutal sounds of her bones breaking, blood pouring from her eyes like freshly shed tears. Yet somehow he knew. He had a feeling.
Eddie wasn’t sure why he was alive, and yet there he was. The rock walls seemed to close in on him every time he took a step. Sometimes, he’d hear voices.
In the night sky, when he was out there, he could tell that something above him was pretending to be a moon and stars, but it was doing a very piss poor job of it.
Eddie looked at his scarless skin and wondered what the hell might have been gaslighting him. He didn’t have his tattoos either, which was something he would have remembered removing. He wore a band shirt, but it was modest and light-colored (which he hated so much.) The band name was some obscure doo-wop act. He wore ripped jeans, but they belled toward the bottom, dragging dirt at the corners, and looked naturally threadbare towards the rips. They looked like the old pair his uncle had lent him after he had just moved in. His hair was slicked, almost like Harrington’s was when he last saw him, but he couldn’t remember ever adding pomade to it here. He could bounce his curls in his hand, scrunching them, but they weren’t greasy even though he hadn’t washed in weeks.
He was surprised that his plan had actually worked after traipsing the upside down into this new realm. He knew that Vecna wanted to follow him, make him something he wasn’t, tear away what little free will he had.
Bad news for Vecna, Eddie had been experimenting with rock climbing equipment before he ‘died.’ Climbing up something like the cave edge where Vecna dared not cross seemed treacherous at first (especially with the rotting flesh vibe it had going for it) until he saw the other side.
Blinking a bit to adjust to the light, he then looked down at himself again that many months ago. And that’s where his physical description came in. Good thing for his stupid shaving mirror in his duffle that he somehow managed to get back.
—-
Barbara Holland didn’t remember how long it had been since she last saw the light of day. When she swam to the surface, she was bleeding into the hard pack soil, smelling strongly of seawater and iron.
She had been running for a very long while. It felt right to do, but she got weaker every day. One day she decided to see if she could pierce the skin of one of those monsters. Took a couple times with the supplies she had (which weren’t much) but she managed to knock the creature out and, starting a fire, cut it into pieces to eat. She was disgusted with herself, but honestly it didn’t taste that bad, especially after seasoning (there were odd elements in the upside down, and the salt and pepper weren’t being used, she figured.)
She needed shelter. The house next to her loomed ominously. She took a step forward onto the wooden steps, pulling pieces of her homemade jerky to her mouth and chewing. Heading into the house, she heard the clock chime on the hour. Someone was waiting, and it was no one good.
The man-shaped figure stepped forward, pinning her to the wall.
“Who-are-“
Barb couldn’t get too much out.
“You’re not special,” he said “but you can be of use. As Henry Creel, I’d be remiss to not help you after you have trespassed on my house.”
Seemed odd to her. If someone trespassed on her house, fair likelihood a shotgun would be pulled at some point.
“I have some food, if you’re hungry. I’ll sustain you in the meantime if you refuse. You don’t have to eat my companions anymore.”
Those creatures were his companions?
He cradled her face carefully, making sure to not dislodge the vine down her throat.
“I won’t let you suffer. Nothing’s your fault, even with how idiotic humanity can be sometimes. I…pity you.”
Barb wanted desperately to push her glasses up her nose.
“They all think you’re dead,” he said, “might as well have been. Your heart wasn’t beating. Your limbs were ripped to shreds. You hardly even look the same. And yet…here you are. You know, you are dearly missed.”
She was? Did Nancy remember her? It must’ve been a while. She didn’t enter the upside down with something to keep track of time - she took her watch off before she got into the water.
“If I just put you right back, I could have the perfect little spy.”
He let the vine go.
“But I’m not doing that. We are going to hang here. It gets quiet here.”
The house lit up and looked bright and colorful. She blinked, adjusting her eyes.
“You can hang out here. Just don’t go exploring too much.”
And wasn’t that greater torture? Whoever this was didn’t seem friendly. But Barb knew that she might not run into someone else down here so she grinned and bore it. Perhaps she could find some sort of amusement.
——
Chrissy Cunningham’s arms still cramped as she walked. They offset her gait ever-so-slightly, making her look almost like a scarecrow. Scarecrows weren’t her ideal body type at all.
She took a shallow breath and left the Munson’s, darting faster towards the woods. She didn’t know what she was trying to find, but she knew she’d find it. The woods were long and craggy, and seemed to go on forever, but they were leading her somewhere, she was sure of it.
The spiritual breadcrumbs seemed to be leading out to what seemed to be a fort, built with large boards and nails and a large piece of painted muslin, reading ‘Castle Byers.’
It looked like she had made her way to one of the loser kid’s art projects. She wouldn’t admit it but she was relieved.
“Castle Byers, huh.”
She took a long sip of beer (she could admit that being in the flipside for so long probably affected its taste but she didn’t care too much.) and ducked under the awning.
She had a bit of a hangover the following morning, which wasn’t too bad. It masked the other pain well enough.
She got to running again after checking her safe space for disturbances.
A creature approached from behind, its flower-like maw ready to crunch her whole.
“Take this, sucker!”
A heavy dose of pepper spray didn’t do too much to the creature but it seemed bewildered for a second. Just long enough for her to sneak away.
She made her way, about an hour later, to the fairgrounds, or what she assumed this version of the fairgrounds was.
She almost ran into somebody, going the speed she was going, which was odd, since the open plain was full of a lotta nothing.
She scooted out of the way into full view of the unguarded man in the field. It looked like he knew how to hold a weapon, but he wasn’t currently carrying one, which was alarming with those things walking around. She at least had that pepper spray.
“C’mon, idiot,” she said, staring equally at him and his slushy,” you’re out in the open and you don’t think one of those… things is gonna get you?”
——
Billy Hargrove had a fever. Admitting it was one thing he would have done only if it got him more excuses to ditch, but in this case ditching was the least of his worries.
“Fuckin’ Hell. What is this place?”
Billy sighed, pulling the door exiting the pool, using his spare towel to daub at his head.
“I need a lie-down. I’m lucky that I always carry a knife and sleep with one eye open.”
Hopefully his keys still worked. He somehow knew this was all Max’s fault. If she was there, he’d kill her. Probably.
——
Bob Newby frowned. He wasn’t sure where he was.
“Gotta keep calm! It’s nothing! I’m fine!”
He had to keep a level head, to make this go smoother.
“Joyce? Joyce????,” he called as he ran, a last ditch attempt to get a response. He knew it would be unrequited.
Arriving at the library, Bob settled down to read and get his mind in order.
Waking up from this nightmare wasn’t in the cards, he found the next day. Settling behind the counter after realizing that there were no librarians in the library, he went to sit, and dozed off, setting the alarm on his watch for the time he was almost certain he was supposed to be up.
As the alarm beeped, Bob blinked his eyes open.
A man was there. Well, it wasn’t really a man. It looked like a man made of twigs. The Vecna character Joyce’s youngest (Will???) mentioned?
“Hello,” he said, and in that moment sounded more like a nerd pretending to be intimidating than a strong presence. “Are you the librarian? I would love to check out some books.”
He looked down at the date stamps and lined them up with the date on his watch. Nervously, he leaned forward at his??? desk. He loved the Dewey Decimal system. Library science wasn’t really an option for him but if it had been he would’ve taken it for sure.
“What kinda books are you looking for?”
Vecna stared right into his eyes.
“Something fantasy, I think,” he said, “or sci-fi. If you have it.”
It seemed like he was in on something Bob should be. But, if this was what Bob needed for preservation, he would gladly take it.
—-
Alexei was dead.
Alexei still had a bit of his slushy left to sip.
Down here seemed freezing enough to keep his drink perfectly cold, so he would savor it.
But where was he? It seemed to be a long, green plain with small holes where the amusement park had been removed every year.
He pulled his hand through his hair and straightened out his outfit.
Could he go home, here? It seemed eerily quiet.
“C’mon, idiot,” said someone from his left,” you’re out in the open and you don’t think one of those… things is gonna get you?”
——-