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Tech Lives: An Ungodly Long Essay
(AKA: Turns out that my Tech Lives compilation post comment was actually a threat.)
There have been hundreds if not thousands of posts since Plan 99 aired wondering if Tech might have made it after his fall - it's probably been brought up more than any other hanging plot point, even after season 2 scooped up Omega and left us on a massive cliffhanger. Now that season 3 has started, though, Omega and Crosshair are home (for now) but we have received an almost aggressive lack of Tech info. So, I've gathered up some of the stronger Evidence for why Tech might be fashionably late but still on his way back from The Void!
THE LEAD UP
So to start, let's go back to what came before the whole Incident. This will focus mostly on season 2, seeing as that was definitely Tech's season to shine, but with bits about plotlines in season 1. Which brings us to our first bit, that's not really evidence so much as some gentle push-back on a common argument.
Doomed By Character Development?
We've all seen this particular situation before - a character is slated for a tragic death, so just before it happens the writers gives them a little extra relevance to the plot to make sure the audience really feels it when the time comes. The Clone Wars was especially good at this, giving characters like Fives an arc of his own that ended in his tragic death. Season 7 gave us a better look at Jesse, first in the Bad Batch's intro arc and then again through the Siege of Mandalore, all to bring us to the chip activation that led to his ultimate death.
When season 2 started off with one of the two intro episodes spotlighting Tech and our first breather episode of the season also spotlighting him, people started to get worried. So is it fair to say that his spotlight in season 2 was setting him up for a permadeath?
Looking at it, I don't think so, for multiple reasons. For one, Tech didn't just get a spotlight episode, his development dominated a good chunk of the whole damned season, often taking priority over the other characters that wouldn't be dropped into the mists. While giving a little bit of character development to a doomed character can be a good move, giving ALL your development to a doomed character ends up feeling like a good portion of your season was actively pointless.
The Bad Batch is not an open ended show. It seems to have been planned for the three seasons it got, and they would have gone into it knowing they had a set amount of time to work with. Dedicating so much time to developing Tech in preparation for a character death takes away all of their opportunity to develop, well, anything else.
But, along with the amount of time that was dedicated to Tech as a character through season 2, they also didn't develop him in the ways that most often get used for a doomed character. Namely...
That Sure Is A Lot Of Open Plot Lines
And not one of them got tied up. Currently, Tech has two open plot lines to himself, both started in season 2, as well as a key place in the overall show narrative arc. As the overall show narrative arc takes precedence, we'll start with that.
The Bad Batch sets up a few different narrative arcs very early. One is if clones can be more than soldiers - this is the central thing that we see them struggling against from the start, they've been created to be soldiers and don't know much else about how to function in the world. Theoretically this arc can be fulfilled with one or two of them still dying as soldiers, as long as a few of them make it to find a new life for themselves.
The arc that can't be fulfilled without everyone though is the ongoing thread of reuniting the batch. Much of the show is geared towards making the viewer want this specific end result, as soon as they talk about Crosshair, Omega says they'll just have to get him back and complete their family. The end of season 1 teases us with this only to pull it away at the last moment, then season 2 teases us with it again only to yet again pull it away, this time seemingly permanently.
Ending one of your key narrative threads you've been using to draw audiences in only 2/3rds of the way into the show and without ever resolving it... well it would be a choice. If Tech is gone for good then the last time we saw everyone together would be the end of season 1. Rewatches would lack impact because something that was made to seem so vital ended up going nowhere, and the series finale would never quite reach the height that hearing the full batch theme kick in over the team fighting droids together did. It absolutely destroys the central narrative to leave him gone without ever having reunited the family.
And then there's his personal plots.
Let's start with the obvious one. Tech got a whole potential love interest this season and they absolutely did not resolve a damn thing about it.
Again, this takes a trope that we all know - the young army man that's going to go home and finally marry his girl, who has his whole life ahead of him, but dies tragically in his final mission - and seemingly intentionally subverts the beats. Because what makes the trope work is that the plot line is resolved as soon as that young man decides how he's going to move forward. He can't die uncertain of if he's going to marry his girl, he has to make a decision, and the longer we spend on the relationship to his girl the stronger the decision has to be to consider the narrative line resolved and free him up for some tragedy.
Tech/Phee is a tentative little 'will they or won't they' romance. They're flirting, they're feeling each other out, they're seeing if they're compatible. To tie up this narrative line we would have to find out if they are or not, get a yes or a no on the question. Will they or won't they? We simply don't know because the writers didn't put a resolution in.
We do get the traditional pre-mission scene with them, which would normally be when we get the first kiss or perhaps the promise of a date, either of which would have had me digging Tech's grave for him to fall into from the second it happened. Or even a 'we can't do this right now, but maybe some day it will be the right time' which would have been a kind of lukewarm resolution but would have at least represented a decision.
Instead we get a scene that almost aggressively refuses to resolve anything. They have an awkward interaction, but not one that says they won't get together, no promises are made for the future, no decision point is reached, and the plot line is still dangling wide open when Tech falls to his supposed death. If we truly leave it off here, well, what was the Tech/Phee subplot for? Why did we spend precious time on it when it could have been spent on something else, if it was meant to make Tech's death hit harder why did it not go further?
A second subplot with Tech is that he certainly made the most progress on seeing options outside of the Empire - it starts early on in Ruins of War when he meets Romar and gets his eyes opened to the idea of cultures that existed unconnected to the war. Serenno existed before the war and before the separatists, and Romar introduces Tech to that idea of an ongoing culture. He gets a taste of racing in front of a cheering crowd, leans further into his teaching of Omega and gets new insights from her regarding their lives as soldiers, his relationship with Phee picks up right when he finds out that she is interested in the preservation of cultures. It's a quiet little subplot, but Tech was seeing the full scope of what the galaxy contained beyond being a soldier in a war.
But, like the Tech/Phee, it never resolves. He never decides to settle down, he never chooses to stop being a soldier or even openly discusses the idea of what life will look like after. Rescuing Crosshair isn't positioned as a final mission that they have to complete in order to give up their lives as soldiers. Without that decision point being reached, the plot stays open, we never find out what he Would Have Done so we don't get a sense of the future that he would lose by dying, which is what the purpose of these types of plots is for a planned permadeath.
The Kaminoans don't create without purpose and writers working on a three season timeline don't typically write without it either. So if we spent the time on Tech/Phee but Tech is dead before it ever went anywhere, if we spent time on Tech's relationship with being something other than a soldier but he never really pursues it, what is the payoff?
Too Much of a Survivor To Die?
There's also the matter of how they chose to build Tech's character this season. Namely they beefed that man's skills up incredibly high making it intensely unbelievable that he's dead without seeing some sort of concrete proof. Things we know about Tech as of the end of season 2 include:
Incredible pain tolerance - Tech fractures his femur in Ruins of War and seems shockingly unbothered by it. The femur is frequently listed as one of the most painful bones to break. This is not a broken toe the man is hobbling around on, he fractured the strongest bone in the body and kept going through the woods. He physically fought and killed a man with that busted femur.
Lightning fast mental processing - this is of course on display nowhere so much as Faster where he's put up against droids and wins by taking calculated risks that no one else is willing to try.
A cool head in stressful circumstances - this one is hilarious because he outright says it, but Tech does demonstrate time and time again that when it comes down to it, he's able to keep calm no matter the circumstances.
Essentially, we spend the entirety of season 2 setting up why Tech is the perfect person to drop out of the sky and have him survive. He has the ability to keep calm and come up with a plan in seconds and he has the grit to keep moving even if he's grievously injured once he hits the ground. When you set a character up like this, you can still kill them, but you have to work harder to do it convincingly. Leaving Tech not at the moment of death but with probably at least a minute to act in and then not showing us the body is the exact opposite.
We have a moment in The Crossing showing us Tech's precise aim, and it comes up again to brutal effect when he shoots out the connection on the rail car. If moments through the season were used to set up that particular instant of the finale, then we can't discount the numerous scenes demonstrating his survival skills as being irrelevant to his chances.
Plus, looking back at Ruins of War - one of the big moments in the episode is towards the end, where Romar tells Tech, "I'm a survivor. Remember?" The camera then lingers on Tech for a long moment. It's not the kind of action that demonstrates his capabilities as above, but it works to associate the words with Tech in the viewers mind. Romar is a survivor, and Tech is a survivor too. And when you intend to kill someone off, it's kind of an odd choice to spend that whole season setting them up as a survivor.
THE FALL
Which brings us to the scene itself. Plan 99, implied to be one of the last ditch plans that they have. It's absolutely a heartbreaking scene, and one that can be tough to analyze when it's so well done, because it's rough to watch repeatedly. But, it's worth doing, because the scene itself is FULL of questions, some structural others more based in the visual presentation.
What is Plan 99?
Well, that's just it, we don't actually know.
We know what it's implied to be, a self sacrifice plan where one of the batch gives their life for the others to get away. But in show it's never actually defined, leaving the full meaning of Plan 99 up to interpretation. It could be as simple as what it's implied to be, but that brings up questions like 'why not provide any lead up or foreshadowing for it?' and 'does killing yourself actually count as a plan?'
Removing the assumptions from it gives us room to speculate. Is the plan actually that they leave him behind, dead or alive? Hunter ordered them to do so without a plan number in season 1, but he is the sergeant, so plan 99 could easily be something that bypasses his authority - if a batcher calls a plan 99, you go and you don't question his decision. It's certainly closer to a plan if there's something they are supposed to be doing from their end rather than just an announcement of intent.
It's not strictly evidence one way or another, but it is something of note when Tech's entire sacrifice is based around a plan that we're not privy to the details of. TBB has hidden its twists in ambiguity before, so it would not be the first time that it let us assume something only to pull the rug out later. But ambiguity is not the only thing that makes this scene stand out in the raising questions department.
Pacing Goes Out The Window
Generally speaking, a self sacrifice is the climax of an episode. Think Kanan, Hardcase, Gregor, Hevy, etc - Even a minor character sacrificing their life tends to make up the most climactic portion of any given episode, let alone one of the characters from the title squad. It gets to be the big central moment, the big rush of music and feeling, the pinnacle of the viewers attention.
Tech's sacrifice is not. It happens around 5 minutes into the episode, is rapidly moved past with barely a moment to think, and then the actual climax is Omega's capture on Ord Mantell. They even repeat the music when Omega is captured, except much stronger this time, making it clear that this is the emotional crux of the episode, this is the scene that is supposed to stick with you.
The opportunity to make it the climax of an episode was certainly there. The storyline could have been adjusted to put Tech's fall at the end of The Summit, allowing more time in Plan 99 for processing his loss and making it feel final. The pacing choice is one that doesn't allow the viewer to process the loss, only giving us maybe a couple minutes of time with actual emotional reactions before we're barreling off to the next plot point. Why was Tech's death de-emphasized within the episode if it is indeed our last moment with this central character?
Tarkin, Eriadu, & Saw Gerrera
A lot goes into the set-up for Plan 99. We have Tarkin's base on Eriadu as the setting they're working within, going up against Tarkin for the first time since early season 1. This is the big leagues, and something that's come up in multiple interviews is that when going into the den of one of the franchise's big bads we have to have consequences, something to demonstrate that Tarkin is not to be trifled with.
Sounds reasonable enough. Except Tarkin doesn't actually do anything in either of these episodes. The thing that actually threw them off was Saw's planning mixing in with their own.
All Tarkin does upon finding out that the batch is stuck on the rail is order an air strike and ignore that this would kill many of his own men. This is certainly evil, but it's standard Imperial evil. Rampart would have given that order. Hemlock would have given that order. The guy in Tipping Point that we know for 5 minutes before he fried himself would have given that order.
So if the point of this finale was to demonstrate Tarkin's power, then bringing Saw in both complicates the plot and devalues what they're claiming they are trying to show. So is the point to get them to Tantiss? No, because they fail in that. They don't plant the tracker, they're no closer to finding Crosshair than they were before.
By all accounts the point of the whole endeavor is in fact just to drop Tech off a sky rail for reasons unknown and injure Omega to force them to go back to Ord Mantell. These two things could have happened anywhere in any way of course, so why choose Eriadu and why choose to complicate the plot by introducing Saw rather than letting Tarkin handle the job?
They're questions we don't have answers to yet, but they're very hard to get answers to if Tech is dead and completely out of the picture. Having a dead body on Eriadu is fairly useless to the plot, having a living Tech on Eriadu though? That has potential to move them huge leaps forward in a very short amount of time once we bring him back in. Especially given his conversation with Saw prior to everything going downhill - Tech was in favor of gathering intel from the facility rather than destroying it.
And what about Saw, anyway? If he was genuinely there to cause problems and fly away, again, that's a plot wrinkle that isn't needed and took time away from everything else. If he's there because they needed someone to pick Tech up though? There's potential there.
Did Tech's Sacrifice Mean Anything?
In universe, Tech's sacrifice means everything, of course. It's a decision made in the moment to risk everything to save his family. It's a noble deed and one he does without hesitation. But pulling away from that narrow scope of an in universe perspective, what did we accomplish narratively with his fall?
Well... not much actually! They got over the bump in the road that they encountered all of five seconds ago and promptly crashed headfirst into another, different bump in the road. Tech's dramatic sacrifice didn't allow them to escape unharmed, it didn't allow them to find Crosshair, it just allowed them to move a few steps forward, after which Omega is almost killed and then captured, which is a fairly weak reason to sacrifice a whole major character.
But not every character death is exclusively about narrative, sometimes it's about the character arc itself. So does this close out anything for Tech's character development? Again, not really. Tech has always been completely loyal to the squad and would have risked anything for his family. He never had a choice not to fall, it was either just him or the whole team, and he is an endlessly logical actor. The action would have played out the same had it happened in the series premier or the season 1 finale, or any other time in the show. If anything it's a backtrack on his character by putting him solidly back into the soldier box that the show is trying to let the clones grow out of.
Maybe it's not about Tech's character though, maybe it's about everyone else's! Does his death change anyone's trajectory? Again... no, not really. We'll get into season 3's lack of mentioning Tech later, but in the immediate aftermath of his fall, no one's course or actions is majorly changed because of his loss. Hunter wants to go back to Pabu where it's safe, the same thing he wanted to do before they ever left for this mission. Omega puts herself in danger to save her brothers, which has been one of her defining traits since season one. Wrecker is following Hunter's lead, same as he always did. (We get very little of what Echo hopes to do, but the opening of season 3 reveals that they went back to work with Rex, exactly like they were doing before.)
So narratively nothing required him to die, the character's arc isn't completed, and the other characters aren't motivated to change. If Tech dies here, it's the picture of a shock value death. It doesn't complete or inform his character, it doesn't need to narratively happen in order to put Omega on the path to being captured, and thematically it exists just to give the viewer an unnecessary gut-punch when just the failure to rescue Crosshair and the loss of Omega would have been enough.
Framing is Everything
In a death scene there's nothing more powerful than our final shot of a character. The very last we'll ever see of them, the image that will linger in our minds when we think of that character from then on. This is especially important in animation where everything has to go through several iterations before deciding on what that final look will be. You want it to be impactful, you want the audience to have one final connection to the character before they're gone for good.
So why does Tech die with his helmet on?
If there's one thing TBB is good at, it's their expression work, and a death scene is a perfect place to show off their full range, which is why most deaths meant to have a heavy impact occur with faces unobscured. Crosshair loses his helmet and takes Mayday's off so we can see both of their faces as Mayday dies, Slip, Cade, even Clone X and Wilco, all die helmetless. Looking into older series you have Kanan dying without his mask, Fives, Hardcase, Waxer all dying helmetless with one last good look at their faces and expressions.
And while Tech's helmet gives us a good look at his eyes, the rest of his face goes unseen, and Wrecker's face as he watches this happen is completely obscured. We're denied a look at a lot of their expressions as the decision is made and Plan 99 is executed, rendering it less personal than it otherwise could have been. Tech could have lost his helmet in the blast that knocked him from the rail, Wrecker could have had his helmet knocked off at some point to give us a good look at his expression. TBB isn't known for pulling its punches, so why leave our final look at Tech's face back in The Summit and not here?
Then there's the framing choices. We get some absolutely amazing shots of Tech during the fall, from taking the shot to falling backwards towards the cloudy cover - but here's where some interesting choices are made. Rather than letting our last shot of him be a face up shot that keeps eye contact with the camera as he falls, they make the choice to have him flip over, and we hold the shot as the rail car goes down after him, partially obscuring him.
Which means instead of our last glimpse of Tech being something like this.
We end up with something closer to this.
Which, while we all love those Tech crotch shots is somewhat less impactful emotionally. These frames go through multiple departments and get multiple eyes on them before going through final animation, and no one thought that leaving him face up and unobscured until he disappears into the fog would stick more firmly in the viewer's memory?
The Flip Might be Intentional
And I don't just mean out of universe, as every detail of animation is often intentional, but in universe as well. If you look closely at Tech as he falls, he seems to roll his shoulders back in order to begin flipping over. It was a specific enough detail to send me searching for a reason and I found it in instructions on how to survive a long fall - the first thing that you're supposed to do? Get into the arch position like a skydiver to slow and control your fall.
The flip was important enough to not only include but to include the small detail of Tech intentionally flipping himself over into said position. It's not a confirmation but it's an interesting detail, and one that has very few other reasons to exist.
THE AFTERMATH
Image chosen because even thinking he's alive I didn't want to pull from Omega reacting to the fall on Ord Mantell. Looking at her makes me Sad. So the fall has happened, the rail car has rushed forward and crashed, and Omega fades in and out of consciousness until finally waking up on Ord Mantell to the bad news.
"What if he's hurt?"
Omega is our POV character for the show. We may sometimes see things she doesn't, but emotionally she remains the center of the narrative, the character that the target audience will see themselves in. Her ultimate thoughts on a situation are the closest we have to a clear indicator of our intended takeaway.
So it's interesting that the first thing we hear out of her, having heard that Tech 'didn't make it,' is a firm denial. He can't be gone, he might be hurt, he needs them and they need to go back for him. And, despite Hunter continuing to talk with her about it for a bit, we never actually hear Omega explicitly take it back or verbally acknowledge Tech as dead. The closest we get is 'lost' which she also uses for Echo in The Crossing.
Now, here's where the interpretation between the adult and child audience will likely differ. From an adult perspective, this is a reasonable reaction for a child her age. It comes off as very natural that she doesn't want to accept it and that she doesn't have time to really process that it's true before the scene moves on. It makes sense from an in universe perspective.
However, the main audience is still children who actually are Omega's age and who are being presented with her as their window into this world. And their takeaway, seeing that same scene, is likely to be that Omega is correct. They don't know that Tech's dead, just because an adult says it doesn't make it true and just because Hemlock says it DEFINITELY doesn't mean it's true, they have to go back and check.
If they wanted the main audience to think that Tech is dead for sure, they could have had Omega be the one to say that he's gone, with Hunter simply confirming it for her. Alternatively, Omega accepting it when Hunter tells her would also function in the same way - ultimately, as the POV character, if Omega doesn't accept it there's a strong possibility much of the audience won't accept it either, especially without other evidence.
No Body?
And, as we all know, we simply don't have other concrete evidence. Not only are the batch given no time to look for Tech's body or any confirmation that he died, but we get a whole scene with Hemlock and the goggles where he also confirms verbally that he doesn't have a body either. There's very little reason to have him say this outside of putting a bug in the viewer's ear that he might not be gone for good.
Not only do we have that verbal confirmation, but we have multiple places where a body could have been included or implied without adding much to the runtime.
Easiest place would probably be when Omega passes out - there's a trooper's corpse right there in front of her, and it would have been very easy to make that identifiable as Tech. Have one of the boys check his pulse like Crosshair did with Mayday and then be forced to leave after confirming he's dead. Would it require a little bit of fudging the details of how he landed so close to them, sure, but it would have been narratively streamlined and easy.
Have Hemlock bring his helmet rather than his goggles (and damage it in a way clearly incompatible with survival) or confirm that he did find a body but has no use for the goggles.
Put the body in Hemlock's lab when Omega is brought there at the end of the episode. Have a sheet covering him even if you want and just one of his hands hanging out, especially the one with the distinctive light on the back of it. Give us her reaction to that.
These are just the ones that don't involve adding scenes or making major changes - instead, in a franchise known for bringing back everyone and their grandmother especially if there's no body, they chose to leave it extremely vague.
Reused Score
The soundtrack for Tech's sacrifice is fantastic, I don't think anyone can argue that. In fact it's so good that it's used occasionally used as a reason for why he's dead for real. If it's a fakeout, why go so hard on the music?
It almost sounds like a reasonable argument, except that the music isn't even unique to Tech's fall. We get the same motif later in the episode with Omega's capture, and it actually comes in even harder and more impactful there than it did with Tech falling.
Reusing bits of the music has two results. It lessens the impact of hearing it with Tech if it is in fact his Death music, because it makes it clear that he is not the central feeling of the episode but rather, Omega's capture is. As mentioned before, deaths are usually the climax of their own episodes partially to avoid them being upstaged by any other plot points, but here Omega's capture is fully prioritized over the loss of one of our central characters.
The second result is that it changes the meaning of the music. It's no longer meant specifically to underscore a tragic death, but rather a more general one of loss and separation. And if it's simply about that separation, then it no longer requires Tech to be dead to have that same impact. They're apart from each other, and that's painful enough.
SEASON 3 SO FAR
Which of course finally brings us to season 3! We're five episodes in as of the posting of this, so a full 1/3rd of the season down, which gives us a good idea of how they're handling the whole grief aspect of this scenario.
They Aren't!
That's right, we simply have not directly acknowledged or dealt with the whole 'watching your squadmate fall to a presumed horrible death' thing even once in five episodes. Tech has been mentioned by name twice, we've seen his goggles once, and Wrecker makes one sideways reference to him having not made it back.
In universe, there is a several month timeskip and it seems to be implied that the majority of the grief milestones happened in that gap. For example, we don't see Crosshair finding out from Omega, we don't see Omega grieving her brother, we don't see Phee finding out (more on her in a bit) despite her fledgling romance. Months of grieving and processing skipped over and what comes out the other side is single line mentions that go by in seconds.
This is especially apparent after episode 5, where we got something to compare it to. Crosshair has a long, painful moment of grieving with Mayday's helmet when they return to Barton IV. It's deep, personal, and intimate and we take a minute with him gathering up the helmets of Mayday and his men to set them up on the crates the same way that Mayday had honored them.
Mayday is a one episode character that was important to only a single character, Crosshair - Tech is a core member of the team present through two full seasons and shown as close to every member of the squad. Yet the single scene grieving Mayday is longer and more emotionally gripping than every short mention of Tech so far in season 3.
Narrative Grief
Seeing characters grieve their loved ones onscreen is about more than just the characters themselves. It's also part of the viewer experience - through the characters' grief, we're able to process our own grief at the loss. It makes it feel real, it makes it feel personal, and the amount of grieving needs to be proportionate to the character's importance in the story.
This is especially true in a show written for children like The Bad Batch. Kids don't typically have the same experience with death as adults, and a well written main character death within a children's show will need more time and energy spent towards making the loss feel real. We see this with deaths like Kanan's; it wasn't Jedi Night that told the viewer that Kanan was really, truly dead, it was Dume, where the characters mourned him and dealt with the aftermath.
Currently, with Tech, we do see holes in the team that make us miss Tech but they remain completely unaddressed by the characters. We see Tech's goggles, but Hunter isn't looking at them, he's looking at Lula. Omega mentions Tech having taught her all the plans, but without any real sadness on her or Crosshair's part. The closest we get to actually bringing it up are Wrecker saying 'not everyone came back' and Echo mentioning the datapad would be difficult without Tech, and both of those are only seconds long before moving on. They don't serve as any kind of catharsis for the viewer, relying more on gut punch impact and keeping the wound open rather than allowing it to heal. The difference between the treatment of Tech's death and Mayday's just makes it more stark.
How Do You Like Yearning?
Interestingly, though, it strongly resembles the writing team's handling of another situation: Crosshair's departure from the team in season 1 vs Echo's in season 2. The show even drew a lot of flack for the lack of discussion on Crosshair's betrayal, as outside of a couple conversations the matter often went unremarked on. Echo leaving, on the other hand, got a whole episode dedicated to processing the loss immediately after it happened.
So what was the difference? Crosshair's departure is part of a long term plot point. We're supposed to want him back, we're supposed to want the team to talk about him, anything that would ease the tension. The writers on the other hand want that tension to remain until it's time to actually resolve the plot. So we get those slow drips in between bigger encounters, we get opportunities for Crosshair to come home that he doesn't take, and we don't get the catharsis of the team actually talking about any of it. We're left to want and imagine it, using the yearning to keep it on people's minds more than anything.
If Crosshair had been discussed on screen long enough for the characters to actually come to terms with his absence, though, that would have made the plot feel more settled and resolved early on. It might be conversations we want to see, but it doesn't keep the viewer on edge and craving a resolution. Best case scenario we're just not as desperate for Crosshair to come home - worst case scenario we accept that he won't be returning and find the fact that he eventually does to be unrealistic.
Echo on the other hand gets their absence processed immediately, because their absence from the team is not meant to be a huge plot point. It's something the team has to deal with, yes, and the viewer wants to see them again just like Omega does, but Echo returning isn't meant to be a maybe, and it's not supposed to keep the viewer wondering and worrying. It's a when, not an if.
Similarly to Crosshair, Tech has never felt like a resolved plot point. We don't get confirmation on his death, we don't get any long term grieving, and we get drip fed acknowledgements that pry the wound back open. If we actually see the team discuss and come to terms with their grief and loss, the plot point closes, the wound closes and we begin to fully accept a team without Tech in it, which makes it harder to reinsert him into the storyline if he is in fact alive.
If he's truly gone for good, what is the point of denying closure to the audience? We know that they are capable of writing an intense mourning moment that feels completely in character for otherwise emotionally repressed men such as Crosshair, so why not give us that with the team mourning for Tech? A memorial, an intimate moment with the goggles, a short scene of Crosshair finding out about the loss, or anything at all really? Once again it's something that makes sense if he's alive and we're simply not being shown yet, but makes very little sense to not capitalize on if he's dead.
What's to Come
We have ten episodes of season 3 to go, and a lot to cover. Reviews have indicated that Tech is not explicitly brought up in the first eight, so the earliest we could possibly have a survival reveal is in episode 9. Will it actually happen? Maybe, maybe not. Though interestingly episode 9, The Harbinger, is almost exactly one year after Plan 99, just like The Return aired almost one year after The Outpost. Could mean nothing, but they do enjoy their anniversary dates.
One thing we do know for sure is coming up is Phee's inclusion - she's seen in the official trailer, as well as briefly in a recent twitter spot. This is interesting as Phee is, of course, Tech's teased love interest, and her connection to Tech has been emphasized multiple times, including on her Databank entry and the official 'what you need to know about season 3' guide. When she comes onto the scene, it's very likely that more information about Tech will too.
MARKETING, INTERVIEWS, & SOCIAL MEDIA
I wanted to keep this mostly focused on what can be seen within the show itself, but it's impossible to talk about whether or not Tech is alive without pointing to the absolutely bizarre messaging from the cast and crew, as well as the marketing choices surrounding his sacrifice. (Example: the Instagram Mourning Filter they layered over him in the official trailer, as seen above) I won't get quite as detailed here as in the above, but it does have to be mentioned.
Constant Focus
In between the end of season 2 and the posting of the season 3 trailer in late January, there were several posts on various official Star Wars media. The majority of them were about Tech and Plan 99. In fact, I don't think I ever saw anything mentioning the giant 'Omega's been captured' cliffhanger, just Tech. Over and over again.
Once a character is dead, marketing generally stops caring about them. They're forward focused after all, they want you coming back for what's to come not lingering on what won't be relevant again. So why the constant focus on Tech?
And it wasn't just the social media either - a huge portion of the trailers and reels included old footage of him too. For the most part this was from Plan 99 and bringing up his fall again to rip open those old wounds, but in one case they included action footage from The Summit. This was an interesting case, because the majority of people watching wouldn't have recognized it immediately. Fittingly, the entire comment section was full of nothing but 'Was that Tech?' style comments, which they would have known was going to be the case to start with.
So why are we so focused on a man that's supposedly dead? If he's genuinely never going to show up again why keep putting him in? Everything? While not even bringing him up all that often in the show? If he's dead, this is a truly bizarre marketing decision.
Never Say Die
In interviews or in official material. For several months the word 'dead' was never used for Tech anywhere, not in interviews, not in official material, nowhere. It took until January 23rd for all of the databank entries to be updated, and among all of the main cast he's only referred to as 'killed' once, and it's on Hunter's page not even his own. Then, the Friday before the premier, an interview came out referring to him as dead - on the part of the interviewer, not the creators themselves.
Everything else seems to use a variety of euphemisms. His sacrifice, his absence, his loss, he 'plummeted out of sight', he 'fell from a tram car', he did absolutely anything it's possible to do except outright die apparently.
It's an odd choice when there's known controversy over if he's dead or not. The standard operating protocol of course, in a planned comeback, is to refer to them as dead anyway and allow fandom to fuel its own speculation, but with a fandom as devastated as TBB's was, it's quite possible that the odd behavior had to be introduced just to keep speculation going. The only interviews that sound remotely final came out right before the episodes started coming out - if they had done that from the beginning, the chances of people outright refusing to come back to the show likely would have been higher.
Much like the marketing, this is not necessarily proof of anything - but in combination with the multiple odd things in the show itself, it's certainly suspicious. Speaking of suspicious...
What an Odd Thing to Say
The cast and crew themselves have not been skimping on making strange comments when it comes to the Tech situation.
There is of course the well known Joel Aron (lighting director for the series) tweet that came out the day of the Celebrations panel (AKA when the Tech trauma was at an all time high) and in direct reply to a fan that was having a hard time with Tech's death. It's hard to take it as anything but a reference to Tech given the timing, and it was certainly taken as being about Tech in the quote tweets. If it's not about Tech, why tease the fandom with it? And the specification for it being a mid s3 episode as well...
Also from the day of Celebrations, and from the panel itself, we have Michelle Ang saying in front of God and everybody, that Tech "doesn't come back... in this episode, at least." At the time there was a possibility she didn't know and was just leaving it open, but with that only being ten months ago and the extremely long timeframe of animation, it's almost certain that she would have been done with all primary recording by that point. If you know he's not coming back, how do you accidentally imply that he is with no one correcting it?
Dee Bradley Baker, when asked for a farewell message from Tech at a con, came out with "the life of a soldier is fulfilled by fulfilling his mission and supporting his brothers. And this was the end of mine. And that's a good thing." Which was a perfectly serviceable goodbye right up until he said that the end of Tech's (life? soldier's life? mission?) was a good thing.
During an instagram interview we have Deana Kiner, one of the composers, in response to the interviewer talking about the final episode containing a major loss, saying, "It's kind of a loss... It's complicated." The claim on twitter was that this was about Omega, because everyone knows that when someone mentions the major loss in Plan 99 they're definitely talking about Omega.
So is Tech alive? Is Tech dead? We still don't know. But while one or two of the above might be a coincidence, having all of them at once coalesce around this single character death is a lot to chew over. The Bad Batch team has shown willingness to address grief and loss prior, as well as a willingness to show us death onscreen and front and center. So why, with such an important character, sidestep it all in order to keep it vague? Why keep it from sounding final for so long, if the intent the entire time was for him to be dead for good?
We won't know until he either shows back up or the show ends. If Tech's alive, all of the above starts to make sense. If he's dead... well a lot of things will just never quite add up. I feel that this team has shown enough willingness to follow up on their trailing plotlines that they've earned my trust. Fingers crossed for a satisfying resolution for all of us, and for our boy Tech, whatever that resolution may be.
#the bad batch#tbb#tbb tech#the bad batch spoilers#tbb spoilers#the bad batch speculation#this thing is some 7500 words i might have an obsession problem
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Why Suletta and Miorine's story is a romance: A Mobile Suite Gundam: The Witch from Mercury story structure analysis by Sodasa
So, I recently watched The Witch from Mercury, and I felt compelled to write an analysis of the show's use of the story structure of romances. I'm a hobbyist in the history of trends in genre fiction with a particular interest in romances. I thought it would be fun to use my area of expertise to talk about how the budding relationship between Miorine and Suletta is intertwined with the story of G-Witch.
Something particular about the romance genre is that, unlike other genres of fiction, it's mostly defined by its story structure. This means that just because a story is about two people getting together does not automatically make it a romance in the same way having magic in a story qualifies it as a fantasy. The flip side of this is that while you can't have a fantasy without fantastical elements, a romance can be put in any setting. As long as the story hits the required plot beats, it's still a romance. This makes Romance simultaneously one of the strictest and most versatile genres, as the plot can be anything as long as it ties into the main characters' developing relationship. Use this structure in a story about financial politics and mechs, and you get a story like The Witch from Mercury.
I think the show uses this structure very effectively. In my opinion, a great romance should, first and foremost, be an exploration of the part of the human condition where previous bad experiences make us reject intimacy. The romance story structure is designed to have the characters come face-to-face with their inner demons by giving them a reason to overcome them. Something that's a lot harder to pull off outside of romances, as not many things in life require us to overcome some of our deepest insecurities instead of just pushing them down.
G-Witch is a great show to use as an example of what makes a romance a romance as it follows the story structure almost to a tee, but it's also not the kind of story that most people usually think of when picturing a romance. I also believe that seeing the show through the lens of the romance structure leads to some juicy character psychoanalysis for Suletta and Miorine. I'll go over all the plot beats of a romance and explain how they apply to G-Witch and, if applicable, why I think you don't see those plot beats outside of romances. The names of the plot beats are taken from "Romancing the Beat: Story Structure for Romance Novels" by Gwen Hayes, which is also my primary source, along with my own extensive experience with the romance genre.
I hope someone gets something out of this. I have seen some excellent analyses and theories for this show, but they have been on things I don't know much about myself. Since the only part of story analysis I excel at is the structure of romances, I thought I'd lend my own area of expertise. I want to clarify that while I might sound matter-of-fact, this is just my opinion. I'm by no means saying that you have to think that G-Witch is a romance. I'm just arguing for why I personally consider it to be one.
#mobile suit gundam: the witch from mercury#g witch#the witch from mercury#suletta mercury#miorine rembran#sulemio#suletta x miorine#honestly I had too much fun making this#I can't write an analytical essay to safe my life#but I'll write a 7500+ words media analysis just to justify calling a mecha show a romance
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I do enjoy how polarizing the concept of scanlations can be amongst fans of the series being scanned and/or translated. Generally, most people are pretty happy/grateful about it (very cool, thank you!), but then some people get SOOOOOO MAD and it's just like *pops the collar on my leather jacket* ~Yeah, I'm bad. I spend 4-6 hours scanning art books and then post them online~ 😎 *sips my budget decaf green tea (bagged) with sinister intent*
#textpost#I'm almost done proofreading LtA ch1. Didn't really think about how it was uh... Like 7500 words
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I am, hilariously, ahead of NaNoWriMo pace for the month despite not doing NaNoWriMo this month.
#elumish writes#the thing i'm writing will not end up being 50k words long#and i have no interest and frankly no ability to keep this pace up for the month#but i find it very funny#my current thing is almost 7500 words and that's not including the chunk that i wrote and then took out because it didn't work#which is an extra 515 words
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In the spirit of "Reblog Your Own Work," here's a story I wrote almost two years ago, that I'm really proud of. I originally posted it in 5 parts, so to shake things up a bit, here it is all in 1 part. It's a retelling of the Grimm Brothers fairy tale "The Frog King," this time with aroace and disability representation, and the squicky elements of child marriage taken out.
Under the Linden Tree
Once upon a time, there lived a king who was widowed, and remarried. His first wife had been a true princess of a wealthy kingdom, and the daughters they had together, Zephyra and Aurora, were as lovely as a summer breeze and the dawn. His living wife had only became queen through marriage to him. But she was exceedingly lovely, and gracious, and kind. And because she was the only daughter in a house full of sons, the king thought surely she would deliver him a son of her own. Instead, he got a third daughter, whom they named Galantha.
As she grew, Galantha became even more beautiful and gracious, until, as she approached womanhood, she began to outshine even her mother. Her elder sisters, once happy playmates, now teased her, and reminded her, whenever they had the chance, that her lineage would never be as great as theirs, and that she was last in line to be married, and most likely to a baron, if not a common paddler.
Galantha would sigh, and say she knew this. She would also turn away and hide her smile. She had little interest in being wooed. And being the mother of a future king just seemed like an extra weight upon her head that she would rather do without.
But Fate and Nature had little care for her secret desires. Every day, she could feel the eyes of the courtiers watching her. Their murmurs of praise for her beauty and grace seemed like the constant drone of crickets in her ears. On festival days and market days, minstrels could be heard singing songs about how the sun, itself, was jealous of her beauty.
Whenever she could, Galantha escaped to her favorite place in the royal forest, where the Tree of Oaths stood: a linden tree with a trunk wider than the span of her arms, with leaves broader than her palm, and a well between the fork of its roots, formed from a thousand years of rain and dew dripping from the leaves above. According to the law, it was forbidden to tell a lie within its shade; according to legend, it was impossible. Its crown had spread wide enough to preside over murderers' trials, and lovers' weddings, since this kingdom had been the size of a village. And these were recorded with carvings in its bark, some so old that even the alphabets they were written in had been forgotten.
She would spend whole days here, tossing and juggling her golden ball (her favorite plaything), entranced by how it glinted in the dim light.
But the king started grumbling that she was neglecting her royal duties, that she was growing too old to spend her days amusing herself with a mere child's plaything.
Her mother would lay her fingertips on his arm, smile in that way she had, and, almost imperceptibly, shake her head.
Then, the king would sigh, and say that he would permit her private walks, for now. But soon, she'd have to grow up, and perform her duties for the court.
It was after one such scolding, when Galantha distracted by worries, that the ball slipped from her fingers. It sank into the well before her cry of dismay had escaped her lips.
She sat mourning her loss, and wondering if her father would ever let her go out into the forest alone again, when the biggest frog she'd ever seen popped its head out of the water.
"What would you grant me," the frog asked, in a perfectly clear human voice, "if I returned your golden ball?"
Galantha stammered a few syllables before she regained her composure. "Forgive me," she said, practicing her diplomacy as her father never imagined, "but you must understand how it would me unwise of me to negotiate with a complete stranger."
The frog blinked in the slow, deliberate, way that frogs had, and the princess took that as acknowledgment.
"Three questions, then," she said, "I think is fair."
The frog blinked again.
"First question: Are you a frog enchanted with the gift of human speech," she asked, "or are you a man trapped in the form of a frog?"
The frog responded with a long, rolling, croak. And then, as if startled by the sound of his own voice, disappeared beneath the surface of the water.
The princess sighed. Maybe it was true that the frog could not lie to her, here, but neither the legends nor the law said anything about answering her in her own language. When the surface of the water stilled, and the frog had not yet returned, she thought the interview over, and started for home.
She had not gone three steps, however, when she heard a small croak from behind her, sounding, for all the world, like an embarrassed cough.
So—a man, she thought.
She smoothed the smile off her expression and returned to the well's edge.
"Second question: is this form one of your own choosing?"
"No."
"Final question: Was this form imposed upon you as punishment for a crime, or the breaking of an oath?"
The frog (or rather, man) was silent. She was nearly ready to take that as a refusal to answer, and to walk away, without his help.
But then, the frog took a deep breath, and let out an uncertain "No." Then sighed wearily, in a way that was unmistakably human.
She smiled. "All right, then," she said, "I accept your offer. I will grant you anything you wish that's mine to give, short of my body, or my will."
"Then my wish is to pass between the walls where you have tread," he said.
She was taken aback. "That's all?"
"That is all I ask from you, Your Highness," the frog replied.
She nodded. "That price is certainly a fair one," she answered. "And I'll grant it freely, once you return with my treasure."
The frog disappeared below the water.
The surface grew still.
There was no sign that any living thing moved beneath. Her gold ball was heavy, she thought, and even very large frogs must have limited strength. So, with a sigh, she started the long walk home.
But soon, there was a "plip, plop, plip" on the path behind her. She turned around. The frog hopped after her, carrying her treasure in his mouth.
She gasped, and managed to not to laugh.
The frog dropped the ball at her feet. "You promised."
Galantha admitted that she had, and thanked him. As she lowered herself to pick him up, she was nearly overcome by a horrid feeling, as if her body, itself, were recoiling in disgust.
It took all her strength to resist hurling the frog to the ground. Still, Galantha strode home with the frog under her arm and the golden ball in her hand. She passed through the gate of her palace courtyard with her chin held high, barely acknowledging the guards.
And at that moment, the strange sensation of disgust faded so much, she hardly noticed it. She made her way to the throne room with a light and playful step.
Her sisters squealed in harmony at the sight of the frog, and hid behind their thrones. Her mother gasped, and looked a bit ill (and for that, Galantha was sorry). Her father was the angriest, rising from his throne, red in the face, and signaling for his guards. He had just opened his mouth to give his orders, when the frog addressed him in the most courteous and proper royal etiquette.
Galantha then broke her family's astonished silence by recalling, in the most flowery language she could imagine, how this wondrous frog had swum to the bottom of that unfathomed well, and retrieved her precious family heirloom, the golden ball.
"All he asked, in return," she concluded, "was to pass between the walls where I have tread. It seemed a small price to pay."
Upon hearing that, the king agreed. He insisted on leading a tour of the palace himself, with his wife and daughters behind in a small parade. He repeated the story the princess had told to each courtier they met, saying that, as a courteous and generous monarch, it was his duty to ensure that the just payment was given to even the lowliest of his subjects, even those as lowly as an ugly frog.
The frog-man under her arm, if he were able to show expression, was very good at keeping his opinion to himself. For her own part, Galantha struggled to hide her embarrassment.
The tour ended in the kitchen, and the king was making a show of his magnanimity toward the servants, sniffing all the dishes as they roasted and bubbled away.
As if struck by a sudden thought, he turned to the frog tucked under the princess's arm, and said, with a grand sweep of his arm: "It would be a great honor to me, Sir Frog, if you would stay, and be my daughter's special guest at dinner, tonight."
Her two elder sisters, bringing up the rear of their little parade, giggled behind their hands.
The frog shifted his weight under her arm and opened his mouth as if to speak. But in the end, said nothing.
Galantha was ready to object on his behalf, and her own. But her father looked her in the eye with a frown, daring her to disobey his wishes a second time that day.
She dropped her gaze to the floor. "Yes. Of course it would be my honor. Please, be my guest."
No sooner were those words out of her mouth than the strange, horrid, feeling strengthened once more, spreading from the frog like ink from a tipped bottle. She fought to keep from hurling him to the floor that very instant.
At dinner, an extra golden chair was put to Galantha's right, and on it was placed a fine silk cushion. The princess set the frog on the cushion as graciously as she could, and then she took a portion of each food on her plate, put it in a fine china saucer, and set the saucer on the cushion beside her guest.
But the frog objected: "That well was very deep and cold," he said, "and that golden ball was so heavy. If it weren't for me, your treasure would be lost forever. I should sit beside you, and eat from your own plate."
The princess was about to object that this was more than she had promised him.
But before she could say anything, her father the king replied: "Quite right. Quite right. A princess must always be a generous hostess."
So Galantha lifted the frog from the chair to the table, while Zephyra and Aurora squirmed and made faces.
In between bites, the frog and the king discussed political matters, and the state of diplomacy between the various neighboring kingdoms.
Galantha's mind raced, trying to figure out who this might be. She tried to change the subject, but her father was thoroughly charmed. The queen, when she caught her daughter's eye, smiled and shook her head in the same disapproving manner that she had with the king, and Galantha found that, she, too, could not resist her mother's wishes.
As the evening's chatter melted into yawns, the king said that since it was now dark, and it was a long way to the forest, their guest should spend the night.
Galantha agreed. and picked the frog up into the crook of her arm, preparing to carry her guest to the fountain the center of the royal courtyard, where he would be comfortable in the cool and damp.
But instead, the king said: "Of course, as my daughter's honored guest, you are welcome to sleep in her chambers."
So she was obligated to carry the frog up to her rooms. With every step, the strange feeling in her body intensified. Still, she walked to her rooms with as much courtesy as she could muster, filled the basin on the washstand with fresh water for the frog, and set him down.
"Please look away," she said, "as I change for bed."
The frog dipped his head, and quietly crawled behind the mirror.
Just as she about to slip under her covers, the frog came out from behind the mirror, and called out to her. "Is this any way to treat an honored guest?" he demanded. "To give your guest a cold, hard place to sleep, and keep the feather bed for yourself? I should like to lie in your bed, and be as warm as you are."
And with that, the princess's last bit of patience finally snapped. "If you want my bed, Sir Frog," she said, "you shall have it!" She picked him up in both hands, and, giving in to every shiver of revulsion, hurled him against the wall.
What happened next was such a shock, she spun on her heel as though pulling her hand from a fire: a full-grown man in her bed, alive, perfect as an artist's ideal, and naked as a frog.
"You're a prince?"
"I was a king, once."
She hugged herself, willing her heart to slow. "And the spell is broken now?"
He did not answer 'Yes.'
"I must," he said at last, "receive recompense for service rendered to a human, pass between walls where a human has trod, share a meal off a human's dish, and--" he took a breath, "share a human's bed from midnight 'til first cock's crow."
As if to punctuate his point, the hall clock chimed the eleventh hour's last quarter.
"You were afraid I'd say no, I suppose," she said, "if you'd told me this, when first I asked."
"I asked for everything I wanted from you."
"And I must only 'share' the bed?"
"Only that."
"Even so, you understand: Because of my station, this will count as a betrothal between us?"
The bed creaked as he shifted his weight. "Yes," he said, finally.
"And if I gave you the bed outright, and slept on the floor?"
She heard a catch in his breath that sent a shiver down her spine. "Please," he said.
"All right, then. Keep your face to the wall and your hands to yourself, or we will find out what happens."
When she was certain that he was faced toward the wall, under the covers, she lay down over them. She could feel him at her back, that strange, horrid feeling still there, though fainter, now, like the heat from a single candle. At some point, she must have fallen asleep, because she had the distinct sensation of waking up before the sun.
When, at last, she was released by the sound of the cock's crow, she rose quietly, careful not to wake the man sleeping behind her, and washed her face and hands.
The cock crowed a second time.
There was a silent flash of light in the corner of her eye. Glancing up, she saw a full set of clothes laid out across the dowry chest at the foot of her bed. The coat was of red velvet, with gold buttons, and there was a broad purple sash, embroidered with heraldric designs she did not recognize.
The princess stepped into the foyer of her bedchamber to dress in private.
At least it looked like a king's outfit, she thought, even though the stranger in her bed seemed far too young. But some, she reminded herself, inherit their throne before they're old enough to pull up their own stockings.
The cock crowed a third time.
She heard him yawn, the bed creak as he rose, and the unfamiliar rhythm of his bare feet on the floor.
She brushed and braided her hair as she listened to the rustling of cloth as he dressed himself.
When she heard that his boots were on, she took a deep breath, counted slowly to five, and stepped back into the main apartment of her chambers.
She'd prepared herself, but seeing him was still a shock. She looked away almost as quickly as she had the night before, and dropped into a curtsy. "Good morning, Your Majesty," she said, feeling the blush spread across her cheeks. "Please forgive me, for--"
His chuckle cut her off, and she glanced up. A smile spread from the corner of his eye to his lips.
"Forgive thee?" The smile faded, but his expression remained soft. "I should thank thee, instead." He looked down at his hands and flexed his fingers. "Thou saved my life."
"I-- what?"
"Though it feels odd, having so much bone, again," he said, instead of answering her directly, running one hand down his side, over his ribs. "Did I hear correctly, last night," he asked, changing the subject, "that thy name is 'Galantha?'"
"Indeed, Your Majesty," she said.
His brows knitted for a split second. "'Milk Flower?' 'Snowdrop?' Princess Snowdrop?" He seemed on the verge of laughing, but managed to swallow it down.
"That would have been Sire's choice," she answered, "but my mother overruled him, Your Majesty."
He cocked his head to one side. "Please. Don't let me have the advantage of thee. I am named 'Cinnabar'."
She studied his face. There was nothing about him that suggested the fiery hues of that dangerous stone. His complexion was as pale as someone who had spent years in the shadows. His eyes were the dark brown of late summer honey. And his hair was so black, like a raven's feathers, that it glinted blue.
"Cinnabar?" she repeated.
He chuckled, and seemed to be about to say something more, when there was a light, familiar, rap on her chamber door.
"Come in, Margarete," she said, without thinking.
Her lady-in-waiting opened the door and poked her head around. "Good morning, Your Highness--" Her eyebrows rose barely a hair, and she (almost invisibly) mouthed: "frog?"
The princess bit her lip to keep from laughing at the absurdity. "Good morning, Margarete. Is breakfast ready?"
"Yes, Your Highness. His Majesty waits on you." She curtsied quickly and backed out the door.
The young king tugged at his sash, smoothing wrinkles that weren't there. "Well," he said, "they're expecting us, though probably not like this." He offered her his arm.
After a moment's hesitation, she took it.
She could sense the servants watching them, in the well-practiced way of not seeming to watch them at all. Halfway to the stairs, Lady Caroline, who had once been her nursery maid, caught Galantha's eye as she passed in the hallway, and smiled softly.
He ended up leaning more on her, on the way down the stairs, than she on him, testing his weight with each step, but managed to hide his uncertainty as they entered the banquet hall.
Her father was standing at the head of the table, red-faced, with clenched fists. He glared at the richly dressed stranger, then at her.
"So, it's true!?" he said, "I wasn't imagining the whispering of servants!"
"Your Majesty," the queen said, laying her fingers on his arm, her voice light, and clear, and cold, as a silver bell, "remember your royal duty to invited guests."
"Invited? Invite-- guests?!"
Cinnabar bowed. "Good morning, Your Majesty," he said. "I hope you had a restful sleep."
Her father sputtered. "I know that voice!"
"I am honored you remember it. And may I say what a pleasure it was to be a guest on your table, last night."
"On? 'On my table'? That thing? Thou!?"
"Yes. That was I."
The king huffed, and, with a sweep of his arm, gestured at the sash that the young king wore. "This bunting and glitter-- are they true emblems of royal office, or are they some player's costume?"
"This sash, along with my scepter, and crown," Cinnabar said, his voice quiet but tense, "is, indeed, an emblem of royal duty and privilege, bestowed upon me according to the laws of my homeland."
The king turned his gaze on Galantha. "And am I to take it, then, that there must now be a wedding?"
She bowed her head. "Yes, Sire."
It wasn't until then that he seemed to notice all his guests waiting for him. He nodded and sat, and signaled for others to join him, adding: "I suppose we'll need another chair."
The young king smiled and nodded at the servant who brought it, as if he had been welcomed to the table with the same generosity as the night before.
Zephyra leaned over and murmured in her ear: "I wish thee the best, truly," she said, with a catch in her voice. "We had some happy times, didn't we?"
Galantha nodded and smiled as best she could through the flurry of quiet congratulations.
She was just beginning to relax when a servant set a large, sweetened, bread between herself and her betrothed, with the knife placed on his side of the platter. It was gilded with a glaze of egg wash and saffron, decorated with a pattern of sliced, toasted almonds, and perfectly sculpted into the shape of a frog, bulbous eyes and all.
He coughed and looked around at the faces of those seated near him.
"Oh, dear!" Aurora said, giggling, and then quickly added: "It's nothing personal, Your Majesty. This is a custom in our country, for good luck, and a fruitful marriage. Even the common people do this, though not so richly."
Galantha wanted to bury her face in her hands. Instead, she nodded. "I didn't think there was time to make one for us."
He laughed. "Oh. All's well, then," he said. He picked up the knife and studied the frog a moment, before slicing it down the middle, from nose to rump, revealing the stuffing of dried fruit, nuts, and candied citron.
Turning the platter so that both halves were equally within her reach, he waited for Galantha to make her choice.
She tried not to think how things might have gone differently, last night, as she put her half on the plate before her.
The young king smiled. He popped the eye from his half of the frog into his mouth, and chuckled.
The elder king was silent and frowning throughout the meal, which was consumed and cleared away with all the haste of a picnic interrupted by rolls of thunder.
Galantha was only granted enough time to change into the gown that had been set aside for her marriage ceremony. And her only wedding gift was a wallet of sewing and spinning tools, along with her mother's blessing bound up in it.
The phrase "Husband and wife" was barely out of the priest's mouth when they heard the rattle and clatter of a carriage outside.
Her new husband nearly sprinted through the chapel door as the carriage slowed to a stop.
It was one of the finest Galantha had ever seen, with gilded eagles on the finials of the top, and scroll work of inlaid gems in twisting, vine-like patterns along the side. The six horses pulling the carriage had silver bells in their bridles, though they, themselves, were the sturdy, piebald, sort that Galantha had seen pulling farmers' plows, rather than the parade horses in whom elegant coat color was prized.
And it was also odd, she thought, that with a carriage so richly appointed, that there was only the coachman as servant-- that there were no footmen attending, to help keep the carriage steady on the highway, to watch out for ruts, or remove obstacles in the road ahead. And she also noted that the gold braiding on the coachman's livery was just a bit frayed, and there were spots in the sleeves of his coat that had been expertly darned, with evident care. But what sort of kingdom was she marrying into, if so much wealth was put into things, but not people?
The coachman alighted, and was in the act of dropping to one knee to honor his master when the young king interrupted him, and pulled him up into an embrace.
"Heinrich? Heinrich!" he exclaimed. "My good man-- it- it's been too long."
Heinrich pulled away-- a little too quickly, Galantha thought. But he was still smiling, and there were tears on his ruddy, weathered, cheeks, dampening the neat white beard on his chin.
He sniffled, still smiling, and squaring his shoulders, turned and bowed to her. "Your Majesty," he said. And he offered his hand to help her up into the carriage.
"Please, Sir," she said, "before we go, there's someone--some place--I need to say 'goodbye' to."
The coachman's mouth tightened into a thin line, and his brow furrowed.
Galantha feared he would refuse.
But her husband spoke up. "I know the place," he said. "It's not far. I'll go with her, and make sure she won't get lost."
The coachman hesitated for just a moment, but then, with a quick bow of his head, said: "Very well, Your Majesty. As you wish."
And with that, her new husband laced his fingers firmly with hers, and strode off toward the path leading to the linden tree. Galantha had to walk in double step to keep up.
As soon as they turned a corner, and his golden carriage was no longer in sight, however, he let go of her hand. He leaned close. "This way, he won't leave without thee," he said.
"Would he do that?" Galantha asked. For a fleeting moment, she imagined running away, but just as quickly dismissed the idea.
"Heinrich's… Something's…" He sighed. "I'm sure he's just eager to get me home."
The path narrowed. He stepped back to walk a few strides behind her, giving her some privacy, but also driving her forward, not giving her a chance to tarry.
He stopped at the edge of the linden tree's canopy, while she walked up to its trunk alone, patting it as though it were a dear friend's shoulder. Then, on an impulse, she took a penknife from her pocket, and carved a 'G' and 'C', back-to-back, into the its bark, along with the date, to join all the ancient inscriptions recorded there.
Then, she cut one of the slender, leafy, branches to take with her. She just could not bear to leave this old friend behind entirely. She dipped her kerchief into the well, and wrapped the wet cloth around the cut end of the branch. Then she hurried back to meet her new husband.
He fairly pulled he along the whole way back, only slowing down as the path widened, to allow her to come up beside him, before quickening his stride again.
No sooner were they back in the carriage than the coachman cracked his whip, and they sped off at an almost unnatural speed, the horses in full gallop before they even had taken three strides at a trot. The landscape outside the windows was nothing but a blur.
"Heinrich!" the young king called, "Must thou drive with such haste?"
"I'm sorry, Your Majesty," his servant called back. "But if we do not pass through the Capital's gate by sunset, all is lost."
Galantha looked down at the linden branch and bit her lip. How much had she risked, she wondered, for a mere sentimental token that wouldn't even last the week?
"We did not tarry long," her husband said, above the noises of the carriage. "All's well. All will be well." He put his fingers lightly on her arm to draw her attention, and managed a weak smile. "Heinrich is one of the most sensible men I've known. If he really thought our errand would waste too much time, he wouldn't have let us go."
Still, he seemed as full of worry as she.
"The spell?"
"It's broken. But not all trouble is magic."
Nothing more was said between them. After a while, Galantha realized he'd fallen asleep.
Suddenly weary, she leaned back and closed her eyes.
Memories slipped into nightmare. She was both juggling her golden ball, and trapped inside it: up and down, and back and forth, until she was falling without end, into an icy darkness.
Galantha woke with a start, and for a moment, she feared they'd missed the sunset, before realizing they were driving through a forest, trees on either side blocking out the sun.
He was awake, too, staring out the window.
"May I ask you something, Your Majesty?"
"Please, don't let rank stand between us; call me 'Cinnabar'. Interview, or conversation?" he asked.
"Both, I think."
He gestured toward the linden branch and opened his hand. When she passed it to him, he nodded for her to continue.
"Who cursed you?" she asked.
He sighed. "I don't know if anyone did. Thou asked if it were a punishment for a crime, or broken oath. Until I heard 'no' in my own voice, I'd long wondered the same thing." He seemed about to say more, but just grimaced, as if the thought smelled of something noxious.
"How long?" she asked, after a moment.
"I see no change in my own face. But Heinrich's--. We were—he was my assigned playmate, as a boy."
Galantha pushed down the thought that this made him nearly as old as her father, along with wondering if that mattered. "If no one told you," she asked, instead, "how did you know what would break the spell?"
He shrugged, winced, and rolled his shoulders. "The same way I know to scratch an itch, perhaps. I never thought it could be broken, until thou came to the well. I truly thought passing between the walls where you had walked would be enough."
"But then it wasn't."
"Then it wasn't, nor was the meal."
"And if Father hadn't invited you to dinner?"
"Well, there were so many others I could have asked, once I was inside."
"Whom?"
He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Enough!" Annoyance rang through his voice. "We're puzzling over troubles that never came to pass."
"I'm sorry, Your M--"
"Eh?"
"Cinnabar. Forgive me."
"For this? Easily."
Galantha turned and watched the landscape roll past. The sun was high, now, and there were almost no shadows on the ground. The forest was already thinning, unfamiliar mountains visible through the trees. They'd left her homeland while she was sleeping.
Perhaps it was better this way, she thought.
"May I ask thee something?" he asked.
"Certainly, Y-yes." She waited for him to hand back the linden branch before the questions began. But he seemed to forget that it was even in his hand.
"Didst thou mean to kill me, last night?"
"Yes."
"Ha-ha! That was quick."
"Well," Galantha counted off on her fingers. "You wouldn't-- couldn't," she corrected herself, "even tell me if you were man or beast. Father was boasting about things Mother, my sisters, and I aren't allowed to whisper, and your demands were exceeding what I'd promised. For all I knew, you were a wizard, or an assassin in league with one."
"Hm," he acknowledged, nodding.
"And--" she stopped herself.
"'And'? What?"
"It's of no matter."
"It seems to be of a little matter, at least." He swallowed hard. "Dost thou fear me?"
She took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, Y-Cinnabar," she said. "But touching you-- being near you-- was horrid. It lent strength to my arm. Like, like…"
"A tunic woven from wool and stinging nettles? Only, so tight, that it's under thy skin?"
"Yes!" A chuckle escaped her. "Very!"
"The magic," he said. "I suppose, as the strands loosened their hold on me, they entangled thee."
He was so quiet, Galantha thought he'd fallen back asleep. Then he spoke: "Still, thou tookst pity on me."
She glanced at him before looking back out the window. The forest was behind them completely, now. The midday light made her squint. "You said 'Please.'"
He chuckled. "The magic word."
"You didn't have to. It was in your power, then, to, well--" she cut herself off.
He started to speak, then stopped himself, once, then again, before asking: "Wouldst thou have asked my forgiveness, if I'd been dressed as a common shepherd?"
"Maybe," she said. "But not so quick."
"What?! Wh-?"
"You were fluent in courtly idiom," she explained. "You were at ease dining with a king. That cannot be learned through tutoring. A shepherd's garb would have seemed a bigger deceit than a frog's skin."
He threw back his head and laughed. "If our laws did not forbid it," he said,"I'd appoint thee High Judge."
Galantha almost let herself laugh along with him, when she felt the carriage slow. She noticed hedgerows along road, and other signs that they were entering an inhabited place.
"Heinrich?" her husband called, sitting straighter, and scanning the view, "are we reaching the Capital? I don't recognize--".
"We are only half-way, Your Majesty," the coachman called back. "But our own royal horses have boarded at the inn's stables, so they will be refreshed for the homeward journey."
Soon, they were driving through the city proper. People in the streets stopped what they were doing to stare at the spectacle, as Heinrich navigated through the ever-narrowing streets to the ally at the inn-yard.
Heinrich, taking on the role of footman, alighted from his seat, and hurried into the inn.
A moment or two later, he emerged, leading someone Galantha thought must be the innkeeper.
It was only when Heinrich had come back to the carriage door that her husband looked down at the linden branch in his hand, seemingly aware of it for the first time since Galantha had handed it too him.
"It would be terrible if this were trod upon, or if someone mistook it for kindling," he said. "Would it be well with the if I gave it to Heinrich to look after?"
She managed a smile: "If you think it best, Y-Cinnabar," she said. She turned her face partly away from him, and lowered her veil, as her mother had first taught her, years ago, when she first realized how extraordinarily beautiful her daughter was becoming.
After Heinrich helped them down from the carriage, the young king handed the branch to his coachman, and murmured something in his servant's ear.
Heinrich frowned and shook his head, but he still accepted the linden branch with care. slipping it into the buttonhole on his lapel, to free up his hands, before turning his attention to the horses.
She could see the whites of the poor beasts' eyes, and their coats were twitching as though they were being swarmed by biting flies from head to foot, or as if they were draped in blankets of wool and stinging nettles. It must have been magic, after all, that allowed them to pull the carriage so swiftly, and so safely, over wilderness roads that were little more than ruts in the ground.
She turn to follow her husband and the innkeeper, who led them to a private corner, behind a curtain, where his wife served them a meal of soup and bread, with a smile and a few words of congratulations, before courtseying, and leaving to attend her other patrons.
They ate their meal in silence, not quite comfortably. With each bite, she was aware of the time passing. Should it really be taking this long to hitch up a fresh team of horses to the carriage? Or was it only anxiety that made the time seem to pass so slowly?
Galantha tried to think of pleasantries for conversation, but it was like fumbling for objects in the dark. Several times, she thought he would speak, but in the end, he said nothing, either.
And though he smiled at her whenever their eyes chanced to meet, there was a tension behind his features. Was it regret, or anger, or simple weariness? She couldn't guess, nor keep from wondering.
When Heinrich came, at last, to say that it was time to go, the linden branch was no longer in his buttonhole. And the slightest of smiles passed between master and servant.
Their silence continued in the carriage as they sped over the ground. When they had left her home, early that morning, the shadows were long and blue on the ground, stretching far out behind them. Now the shadows were long and blue again, and stretching out in front of them.
The land was hillier, now, and they rolled up and down like a ship at sea. They were driving ever closer to the mountains that she'd glimpsed through the forest trees. Towns, and farmland, and patches of wilderness sped past her window as if they were fence posts along the road.
Despite it all, it seemed to Galantha that they were standing still. The sun was so low in the sky, now, that whenever the carriage rolled down the slope of a hill, they were cast into shadow. She gripped the edge of the seat, and willed the carriage ever faster.
Her husband patted the back of her hand. "All's well," he said, barely audible above the screeching and rattling of the carriage, "all will be well." He pointed to the view ahead. "Almost home," he assured her.
And there, she noticed, growing ever clearer with each moment, were the walls of a city atop the mountain they were climbing, with flags flying from the watchtowers.
The road was growing steeper, now, and more winding, back and forth. Sometimes, the Capital City was in front of them; sometimes, out her side window, as the road they were traveling snaked its way up the side of the mountain. Miraculously, the sun seemed to slow in its descent toward the horizon, as if it knew that it had to wait for them.
And then, at last, the road leveled out, and the walls of the Capital City was directly before them-- so high that Galantha couldn't see the flags flying from the towers.
Heinrich finally slowed the horses' gallop to a canter, and then to a trot, as the great iron gate in the City's walls rose to admit them.
Trumpets blared a fanfare, welcoming them home, as the last sliver of the sun finally disappeared below the horizon.
And then, all of a sudden, came three, loud, metallic, bangs, louder than the blaring of the trumpets, louder than any of the complaints that the carriage joints and springs had made during their entire journey: a noise like giant watch springs breaking, or three swords being broken over stones, that left her ears ringing.
"Heinrich!" the young king called, "is the carriage-- are we--?"
"The carriage is fine, Your Majesty," he said. "Those were-- those were three iron bands I'd put around my heart."
"Heinrich, why?! Wert thou injured?"
"To keep it from breaking in two for grief, Your Majesty," he answered, "when you were lost to us."
Her husband slumped back in his seat, his shoulders sagging. "Oh, Heinrich." There was a catch in his voice, and Galantha noticed there were tears in his eyes.
Soon though, he sat upright, alert and tense, and, with a touch, drew her attention out the window.
The street was brighter than twilight, lit with torches mounted to balcony railings. A multitude of banners, of several different heraldric designs, were draped from nearly all the windows. Crowds had gathered, as if everyone in the city had left their suppers and come out of doors. Many were carrying weapons. Some had bows, a few of those more richly dressed had muskets on their shoulders, and a few looked to be carrying swords they didn't really know how to use, taken down from the attic, perhaps, or from the wall, where they had been hung in honor of an ancestor. But there was no chatter: no calling back and forth between friends, no traders calling out their wares, no children.
"Heinrich," he called, "is it a tournament, or--?"
"These are no games, Your Majesty," his servant answered, his voice grim.
The young king scanned the scene, his eyes flicking from person to person, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. He took her hand. A look of determination spread across his face, and he squared his shoulders.
As they wound through the streets, they continued to see people of all classes and trades, from beggars, to cobblers, carpenters to councilmen, all lined up and ready to fight each other, with whatever weapons or tools of their trade they had to hand. As the carriage passed by, the crowds shifted around them. Some slipped into alleys, or back behind the doors of their houses. But others walked up alongside the carriage, and behind, until they lead a massive parade all the way to the gate in the wall of the young king's palace garden.
Heinrich stopped the carriage, alighted from his seat, and came down to open the carriage door. "Your country rejoices in your return, Your Majesties," he said.
Her husband took her hand as he helped her down from the carriage. "Welcome home, my wife, my queen, Your Majesty," he said.
These words acted on the crowd like pebbles dropped dropped into water, and the people moved back, to give her room, though Galantha could sense their eyes on her, as they turned to see this stranger their king was bringing home. She was glad they could not see her blushing beneath her veil.
King Cinnabar bowed and smiled to those who bowed and curtsied to him, as he led her through the courtyard garden toward the palace. But he stepped over those who prostrated themselves, as if they were mere impediments in the road.
As her husband walked with her up the steps to the palace's doors, Heinrich followed a step behind his left shoulder, while others in the crowd tended to the horses and carriage.
It wasn't quite as still, inside the palace, as those in fairy tales she'd learned, where everything is frozen in time. She could hear distant footsteps, and distant voices. But compared to her own home, the air felt chill, and stagnant, as if there hadn't been enough people here, moving about, and carrying on with life.
Her husband put his hand on her shoulder. "Galantha, I have a wedding present for you."
She put out her hands, and felt the weight of it, first.
It was a flowerpot of white stoneware, with a decoration painted in a terracotta slip around the edge, of roses and grapevines. And planted there was her linden branch.
"I wanted to pick it out myself," he said, his voice sounding like it was far away-- like it was on the other side of a window, "but Heinrich thought it unwise for me to go through the market dressed like this. So he sent one of the stable boys instead."
Everything felt far away. The stone floor under her feet felt as unsteady as a stack of feather beds. She was so tired.
He guided her to a bench along one of the walls and sat down beside her. "Galantha? Your Majesty?"
She wanted to tell him she heard him. She wanted to say 'Thank you.' But the words disappeared in her throat.
"Your Highness?" he persisted, "Princess?" He brushed aside her veil and whispered in her ear. "Snowdrop?"
She meant to laugh at that, but it came out as a sob, first one, then another, and another, as unbidden, uncontrolled, and absurd, as a case of the hiccoughs. "I tho- I thought you'd- you'd thro--"
"Thrown it away?"
She gulped and nodded, holding her breath, to be sure she heard him.
"Why would I ever? I would never!" he said, as though it were one long word. "This is thy connection to home (mine, too, for a while). And it's a far stronger reminder of our promises than any ring-maker's trinket, or ink spilled on parchment. Hm? When it's our anniversary, we'll plant--"
Something invisible, as fine as spider silk, and sharp as a knife, snapped from around her own heart, then. And she wept. She couldn't stop. It felt like she would never stop.
But at last, the flood eased, and her breath came without catching in her chest. However long it had been, the light had shifted; it was truly night, now. Cinnabar was still there, his arm around her shoulder.
He was humming something in her ear. It sounded like it might be a children's rhyme, or a lullaby. It wasn't any she had heard before, though she could tell it was out of tune.
"Thou'rt a terrible singer," she told him, smiling.
He laughed, touching his forehead to her temple. "Always have been," he said, "every day of my life." He stood. "Come," he said. "Thou gavest me a tour of thy home. Shall I return the favor?"
She took his hand. "Yes," she said. "Thank thee, Cinnabar."
As they passed by a window, Galantha could see that her cheeks were stained with dust from the roads, her eyes were red from crying, and her braids were all askew. She was still a beautiful woman, perhaps, but no longer one that would make the sun jealous.
She sighed, and smiled.
#fairy tale retelling#The Frog King or Iron Heinrich#Grimm 001#long post#> 7500 words#aroace representation#disability representation#my own writing#reblog yourself
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i already sent this snippet to a certain someone but im still loving green being an awkward dumbass
#im now 7500 words into the rebound AU and we’ve finally gotten to the fun part#like 90% of the first half of this story is Vio and green having personal ~issues~#fan fic talk#what is their ship name???#four swords#green link#vio link#link shipping#that’s the easiest way i can tag this#vioxgreen#greenxvio
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the unmapped places [steve/eddie]
Eddie confesses. Steve, amazed, confesses back.
Read on AO3
“Okay, Harrington,” Eddie says suddenly, pushing himself up from his slouch against the couch cushions, “what are we doing?”
“Uh,” says Steve, glancing at Eddie, then at the TV across from them, then back to Eddie, “we—are—uhh, watching… a movie?” They are, right? The movie’s playing right there on the TV, right now, but the look on Eddie’s face is really making Steve doubt himself. “I mean, I am,” he corrects, and looks pointedly down at the book held in Eddie’s hand. “You’re reading a book like a total nerd.”
Eddie sits up further and turns fully toward Steve. His knee, bared by the rip in his jeans, presses into the side of Steve’s thigh, and his shoulder brushes against the arm Steve’s had flung across the back of the couch. Steve makes himself keep still. “Oh,” Eddie says haughtily, “excuse me, my fucking liege, for seeking a little entertainment outside of whatever—” he flaps a dismissive hand toward the TV “—this is.”
“What? It’s National Lampoon! It’s hilarious, come on!”
Eddie scrunches a sarcastic smile at him. “Uh-huh,” he says, not buying it at all. “You could stand to intake a little more literature, my friend.”
“Excuse me, my fucking liege,” Steve mimics, making Eddie snort, “did I not read The goddamn Hobbit for you?” It had taken him a goddamn age—seriously, how did Eddie sit down and just turn pages for hours on end, for fun—but he’d done it. And, to his own surprise and Eddie’s extreme delight, he’d enjoyed it. Enough to push into the bigger books? Yeah, no—though, admittedly, Eddie’s earnest excitement about the whole thing had made Steve waver for a brief second. So maybe he would, someday. Maybe. But come on: credit where credit was due.
Eddie leans back a little, his expression losing its mocking edge. “Yeah, alright,” he concedes. He smiles. “Fine. I’ll give you that.”
“Well, thanks for the charity,” Steve replies dryly, but smiles back, poking Eddie’s shoulder. He lets his fingers hang loose, close, skimming lightly against the soft fabric of Eddie’s shirt.
Eddie just looks at him like that for a second, all quiet. Then that familiar glint catches in his eye, and Steve braces himself. “But—”
And here it comes. “No.”
“Come on, you said it was good, so why not—”
“No!”
“—just keep the story going! It’s an epic, sprawling world of adventure and magic, The Hobbit was but a mere taste, a tease of—” He presses forward into Steve’s space as he keeps talking, gesturing wildly. Steve catches his wrists to avoid getting smacked in the face with Eddie’s book, or his rings, or just his big hands. Those things can do some real damage, Steve knows. Nerd that he is, Eddie has a lot of power in his hands. A lot of strength. Ridiculous reach, too, his knobby fingers long and tough, calloused from his guitar’s strings. But they’re better suited for—just about anything other than fighting demon alien creatures. Playing guitar and rolling die, rolling joints, holding books, holding Ste—
Steve quickly tunes back in, lifting his focus back to Eddie’s face. “—journey of multigenerational fucking implications, man! It would expand your worldview like crazy." Eddie’s hands flex and dance in Steve’s grip, clearly wanting to make broad, dramatic sweeps. "And also you’d get, like, way more of my references.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s what it’s really about; multi-whatever be damned, you just want me to catch all your dorkass trivia when you drop it into conversations.”
Eddie scoffs. “Uh, oh-kay, I mean it’d be a definite bonus!”
“It’s not happening, Munson!” Steve says, laughing as he pushes Eddie back and releases his wrists. “Call me when the movie comes out.
Eddie slants a coy look at Steve, tapping his book against his mouth. Then he points the book at Steve. “I’ll hold you to that,” he says.
Steve shrugs and says, “Fine. It’s a date.”
Like a light switching off, all of the humor drains from Eddie’s face. He stares at Steve for a long moment, his dark eyes unwavering. It’s like he’s looking for something, but Steve couldn’t possibly guess what. Even after all this time they’ve been spending together, he could still be so, like—fathomless, or whatever. Insanely hard to read.
Then Eddie sighs, deep and loud, thunking his head back against the top of the couch. He drops his book open on top of his face and holds it there.
“What is it?” Steve asks, instantly on alert. “What’s wrong?”
"What are we doing, Harrington?” Eddie says again, his voice muffled by the book.
“Wh—huh? Eddie, are you okay? Seriously, man, look at me. Come on.” Steve reaches over and gently pulls at the book until Eddie lets it go. Steve puts it on the coffee table. When he turns back, Eddie is just staring up at the ceiling. “Hey. Eddie, come on, talk to me.”
Eddie finally sits up again. Something about his expression makes Steve straighten, giving Eddie his full attention. And for the third time, Eddie says, now in a voice that sounds almost desperate: “What are we doing, Steve?” His eyes are huge, imploring.
“I— I don’t—” Shit, his heart is hammering hard all of a sudden. He shakes his head, trying to clear it. “I’m, I don’t understand what you mean, can you…?”
Eddie groans roughly, irritated. “Y’know, usually I find your whole ‘lost puppy’ thing very…” He trails off, eyes floating all around the room for a moment. “But right now, it’s really—” He laughs a little, but it doesn’t sound amused. He cuts his gaze back to Steve. “Look, man.” He sighs. Steve frowns, wondering how to get back Eddie’s easy, bright smile from moments ago. “I am frankly losing what’s left of my goddamn mind here,” Eddie says, “so I’m just gonna shoot you straight,” and then after a slight pause, a loud laugh startles out of him, making Steve jump. “Sorry, uh, wow, terrible choice of words.”
Steve wants to say something, probably ask if he’s okay again, but he just sits there silently and waits and watches. Watches Eddie take in this huge breath and shut his eyes, like he’s about to belt out the opening notes of a ballad. Watches him release that breath slow. Watches him opening his eyes again, landing his gaze square on Steve.
And he opens his mouth and says in a rush: “I like you.”
And Steve keeps sitting there, waiting. Because there has to be more. –but we should probably stop hanging out, maybe, or at least, –but isn’t hanging out almost every day, like, kind of overkill? which it probably is, but Eddie hasn’t said anything about it and Steve keeps hoping he won’t say anything about it because he really doesn’t want to stop. But Eddie’s just looking at him now—also waiting. And Steve thinks, hold on, is that really it? Because that can’t be it. Because if it is— But it can’t be.
“What?” is all he manages to choke out, voice strangled thin.
Another long, tense silence. Steve is hyperaware of how close they are: Eddie’s bare knee digging into the side of his leg, their hands resting scant inches apart. What is happening here, he thinks, couldn’t possibly be what appears to be happening—because, in Steve’s experience these past few chaotic years, it never is.
But, jesus christ, the longer Eddie sits there, just looking at him, letting his warm proximity wash over Steve, his words settling so solidly in the air between them—the longer this moment unfurls into the space, the more this incredible lightness grows in Steve’s chest. It’s a lightness that Steve only just recently realized Eddie always puts there. And one that, even more recently, Steve has been making a concerted effort to shove down into a secret box inside himself. It doesn’t really work. But he’s been trying, for both their sakes, for the sake of the easy friendship they have that Steve has come to rely on.
But now, it feels like, maybe—
Eddie abruptly jumps to his feet. He loudly smacks both palms over his face and grumbles, “Ho-ly shit, man. I really— This is— Why did I— Haha! Oh, god.” He starts walking loops beside the couch, then expands his track to include the coffee table, muttering to himself. Steve gets the impression that he’d be climbing on top of the table if he felt like he was allowed to. Steve almost wishes that he would, if only because it would mean Eddie felt comfortable enough in Steve’s house to be his usual audacious self, and then Steve could scold him for it, and maybe that would calm them both down a little.
Eddie pauses his nonsensical mumbling, pivoting to cast an accusatory finger at Steve. “And you know that Robin— Robin said—” He cuts off, raggedly shaking his head as he starts to pace again.
“Wh— Robin?” Steve asks, bewildered, heart racing. “What did Robin say?” But Eddie either ignores him or doesn’t hear him, already lost in some other internal tangent. He’d been talking to Robin—about Steve?
With a sudden jolt of alarm, Steve realizes that Eddie’s widening orbit has gradually brought him close to the threshold leading out to the hall, and if the frazzled look in his eye is anything to go by, he’s just about ready to bolt. Steve is standing up and crossing the room before he even processes the thought fully, reaching out to grab at Eddie—before pulling back at the last second, not wanting to spook him with an unwanted touch.
Eddie freezes, knowing he’s been caught. He presses himself back against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest, eyes stuck to the floor.
Steve stands before him, hands spread wide, watching. When it seems like Eddie has no intention to make a break for it, Steve takes a slow step forward. “Hey,” he says, taking another step. “It's okay. You're okay." Another step. He gently lays a hand on Eddie's arm, just above his elbow. "It’s just me, right?”
Eddie's laugh is brittle and shaky. He leans his head back against the wall, turning his face away. “It’s because it’s you,” he says dully.
It eats at Steve to see him like this, shrinking into himself. Especially since it's because of Steve. Eddie has proven himself to be wildly courageous and inconceivably brave time and again—brave enough to fight Vecna, sure, but what impresses Steve the most is his bravery in everyday ways. The courage it took to finally graduate high school, and to be himself loudly and without apology, and to say all of this, now, to Steve. He's ashamed to have, literally, pushed Eddie into a corner
Now Steve can see why Eddie had to take in that huge breath. The words are rattling around inside his stomach, but they're going to need to be pushed out. On his exhale, Steve says, “Me too."
And Eddie replies, “Huh?”
“I—" Another jittery breath in. Another exhilarating breath out. "Eddie. I like you, too.”
Eddie stares at him, expressionless. Then he narrows his eyes. “Bullshit.”
An icy shock pools in Steve's stomach at that word. Bullshit. This, again—but no, no, it's not. This isn't like then at all. Eddie isn't Nancy, and Steve isn't the Steve from back then. He isn't hopelessly trying to convince someone to love him; he just needs to convince someone who, apparently, already likes him that the feeling is very, very mutual.
"I'm being serious," he insists.
But Eddie just shakes his head. “I don't think you're understanding me, Steve. I like you,” he repeats, harried. “As in, like-like. As in, long strolls under the moonlight holding hands-like. Doodling your name in my notebook-like. I am into you, okay? For fuck’s sake?”
Steve knows Eddie is really fucking stressed out right now, but the ligthness in Steve's chest grows warmer and brighter and fuller with every word Eddie says. "Yeah— Eddie. Me too." He moves closer, shifting his hand up to Eddie’s shoulder. "I like you exactly like that." He puts his palm to Eddie's cheek.
Steve watches Eddie's dark eyes slowly come to life with realization. “Steve,” he says. His tone is the same fragile and vulnerable thing Steve had once heard, so long ago now, sitting on the sticky tile of a mall bathroom floor.
“Yeah,” he replies, keeping his voice just as soft. He will try to be worthy of the trust being placed in him now, the same as it was back then. He gently pushes his fingers into Eddie’s hair, curls catching at his nails as he tucks the strands behind Eddie’s ear, exposing the two little silver hoops he has in. Steve remembers the first time he caught sight of Eddie’s ear piercings, normally hidden by his hair. They’d been talking about movies; Steve recalls that specifically because at some point Eddie had said, I’m a goddamn film connoisseur, and swept one side of his hair back over his shoulder, like some lofty high-society madame. And Steve, for the briefest moment, had seen the glint of his earrings. He’d felt consumed by the desire to see them again, this part of Eddie that was usually out of sight. For days afterward he would find himself staring at the side of Eddie’s face, hoping. He’d only stopped when Eddie called him out on his “frankly kinda creepy stare”—but no, he hadn’t actually stopped. He’d just managed to be a little more discreet about it, which was how he found out that it wasn’t just the one ear that was pierced but both
Now, Steve touches his thumb to the hoops, that questing beast of desire finally satisfied after all this time. He savors the feeling of the delicate skin of Eddie’s neck under his fingertips. These secret and soft parts of him. Steve wants, so badly, to take care of him.
Eddie’s eyelids slip closed. “Don’t…”
Steve immediately freezes. “Don’t?”
Eddie breathes out a slow breath. When he opens his eyes, he whispers, “Don’t do something that you’ll regret."
Again, for a moment, they watch each other. Eddie’s dark eyes are depthless. Steve could fall into them, probably, which is a stupid and absurd thing to think. It’s an even stupider thing to hear. You’ve got eyes a girl could sink into, Steve Harrington, a girl he’d been seeing once told him. He remembers wondering what the fuck that meant, and why someone would even want to do that. But now, suddenly—Steve understands that old cliché phrase, “to get lost in someone’s eyes.” Maybe not lost, though. Maybe, in Eddie’s wide, brown eyes, it’s just the opposite.
So Steve says, “Okay,” and leans in and kisses him.
When he pulls away, Eddie looks so shocked that Steve can’t help but laugh. He feels impossibly light. “You kissed me,” Eddie says blankly.
He sure had. Finally. And, damn, does he want to do it again. “Yeah, well, uh. You—you said not to do something I’d regret,” Steve tells him. “And I would’ve really, really regretted not kissing you.”
Eddie just gapes at him. It’s so rare that he’s at a loss for words; Steve is absolutely, unashamedly making notes. “King Steve,” he says eventually, his voice awed. A slow grin grows over his face, his cheeks so beautifully pink. “Smooth as fuckin’ glass.”
Steve is glad he’s making that impression because he's just bumbling his way through this whole thing. Steve Harrington, the king of cool, known for his casual come-ons and easy charm, thrown completely off-kilter by Eddie 'the Freak' Munson's big brown eyes and teasing grins.
Well, in for a penny, in for a dollar, or however the hell that phrase goes. He pulls Eddie back in. Eddie sighs softly against Steve's mouth, his kiss gentle, almost hesitant, but still so warm and wanting.
When they part, Eddie presses his face into the slope of Steve's neck. "Is this for real?" he whispers. Steve can hear the question under the question, the genuine, gut-deep fear beneath the regular doubt. It pains Steve that they — that all of them — have had simple trust burned out of them. Like anything too good might be a trick or a trap or some kind of illusion.
Steve puts both arms around Eddie and holds him close. "Yeah, Eddie. It's real; I'm here, and you're here, and this is real." Eddie says nothing, only twists his hands into the back of Steve's shirt. Steve rubs a slow hand along Eddie's shoulder blades, soothing and grounding them both. This is real, this is real.
Eddie lifts his head, his hands sliding up along Steve's back to his shoulders, then coming to cup his face. There are no other colors in Eddie's eyes, Steve notices. Just the same deep brown throughout, framed by his long dark lashes. He has faint freckles and old acne scars, crinkles by his mouth and eyes. He's magnetic without even trying. Eddie leans in and closes his pretty eyes and kisses Steve, and Steve melts against him. He can tell he's already getting hooked on kissing Eddie, hooked on the rub of his stubble, the tickle of his long hair, how he tastes like the beer they'd been drinking, smells like the joint they'd smoked together earlier, the undeniable strength in his shoulders and his hands, how wide he is, how solid, how warm, how real.
The parting of this third kiss is slower. They linger close, foreheads pressed together. "You okay?" Steve asks quietly.
"Yeah." Eddie breathes out. "Yeah, I'm good." He leans away so they can see each other fully again. "You?"
Better than good. He's never felt so lit up. "Yeah." He drops his hands down to hook his fingers in Eddie's beltloops. "But, um. Do you want to, like. I don't know. Go home, or…?
Eddie's face collapses. "What? Why— Do you… Do you want me to go?"
"No! I don't. Sorry, I meant, like, if you maybe needed some space or something. Like, to—I don't know—process, or whatever. I don't know." Christ, why is it so hard for him sometimes? "I just don't want you to feel, y'know. Overwhelmed or trapped or anything.
"Oh," Eddie says, the distress gradually melting away. "That's really thoughtful, but with all due respect, uh, fuck no. You're gonna need a crowbar to get rid of me now, Harrington."
Steve scoffs a laugh, trying to hide his relief. "Good to know," he says. "Then, do you—" He rocks back on his heels, pulling at Eddie's beltloops. "Should we…
Eddie smiles, bemused. "Steve, if you're oh-so-smoothly asking if I'd like to sit back down with you, then please." He takes one of Steve's hands in his. "Lead the way."
He shakes his head, but leads the way. Steve Harrington has been on, like, a million goddamn dates, all involving varying degrees of handsy-ness, but somehow loosely holding Eddie Munson's hand as they make the short walk back to the couch together is the most nerve-wracking thing he's experienced.
They sit. Eddie brings one leg up onto the couch, once again pressing his bare knee into Steve's thigh. It feels suggestive in a way it didn't before. The air between them is heavy with expectation. What should they do now? Steve is, admittedly, still reeling from the fact that his feelings are now not only out there but are actually reciprocated.
He suddenly bursts into loud laughter.
"Whoa! What is it?"
“‘As in, like-like,’” Steve intones seriously, then laughs some more. "Holy shit."
“Wh— Dude! Shut the fuck up!” Eddie starts jostling him. Steve just keeps laughing, letting himself get pushed around.
He's about to ask if Eddie really has been doodling Steve's name in notebook margins when another part of the conversation comes back to him with a jolt. He grabs Eddie’s arms, stilling him. “Wait, were you gonna— were you gonna say you find my ‘lost puppy thing’ cute?”
Eddie cuts him an unamused look. “Alright, don’t get a big head.”
Steve laughs, stupidly pleased. "How could I not? Eddie Munson thinks I'm cute. Stop the presses."
"Oh, fuck you, Harrington, it's not news if it's just, like, a commonly known fact of life."
"So you do think so."
Eddie squints at him. "I can see where Dustin learned his egomania from."
Steve laughs again as he brings his hand back up to Eddie's face, lightly running a thumb under his eye. "Yeah, okay, well. How 'bout this? I think you're cute, too." With his doe eyes and his laugh lines, his curly bangs, his barely-there freckles—how could he not be? But, man, no. It's more than that: "Actually, I think you're beautiful. And I've kinda been dying to tell you that," Steve adds, breathless from how long that thought had been living inside of him, how he finally gets to say it out loud. "Like really, incredibly beautiful."
Eddie seems to be literally stunned into silence. His cheeks are all pinked up. Eventually, he says, "Oh, jesus, I forgot about this."
"What?"
"King Steve's infamous alter ego, Boyfriend Steve," Eddie announces, like he's presenting a new villain to his D&D campaign, "whose powers include: truly offensive amounts of PDA; constantly talking about his partner, to the absolute detriment of those around him; donning matching costumes at Halloween parties—yes, I did hear about that—; and, most noteworthy, being ridiculously over-complimentary." Eddie sighs dramatically. "Bodes extremely ill for someone who is pathetically weak to compliments."
Okay. Breathtakingly gorgeous he may be, but Eddie Munson sure does know how to take the mood in a whole new direction. There are a metric fuck-ton of things needing to be discussed there, like. Seriously. But Steve's mind snags on one word in particular: "Boyfriend?"
Eddie's eyes fly wide, his affable smile dropping away. "Uh— N-not that— I mean, uh—"
"Is that what you want?" Steve asks evenly, doing his best to affect calm, despite how his heart is, once again, galloping in his chest. "For me to be your… your boyfriend?"
"We— You—" Eddie stammers. "You don't, I mean, it's like, we just—"
"Because I—" Steve cuts in. "I think— I want that." There's no way Eddie isn't hearing how loud Steve's heart is beating right now. He takes a steadying breath. Then he takes Eddie's hand in his, which steadies him further. "I want that," he says firmly. "I want to be your boyfriend."
"Oh," says Eddie. He starts blinking rapidly, and Steve is momentarily afraid that he's about to cry. Tenderness wells up inside of him, making Steve afraid that he's about to cry himself. "Yes. Fuck. I want that, too. Like, so badly, Steve. Fuck."
Steve has barely started leaning in when Eddie's eyes fall closed, his face tipping up. A warm affection rushes through Steve at how Eddie has already come to expect being kissed, and he smiles against Eddie's mouth. He doesn't seem that offended by Boyfriend Steve's supposedly infamous PDA.
Eddie's expression is serious when he draws back. He chews on his lip, hesitating before speaking. “Why didn’t you—say anything? And, like, how… how long…”
“I…" Steve sighs. Two very good questions. He looks down at their hands, tangled together, Eddie's blocky rings fitted against Steve's knuckles. "Honestly, man, at first I didn’t, like—know. Like, I’d never had a close guy friend like you before – christ, that sounds so lame, but it’s true – so I didn’t really, like, it didn’t click for me that something was… That my feelings maybe weren’t entirely…" He glances back up at Eddie. "Capital-P platonic.”
Eddie’s biting his bottom lip, obviously fighting to keep down a smile. He loses the battle pretty quickly, a goofy grin lighting up his face. Steve watches the way his lip changes color as the blood rushes back in; they’re close enough that he can make out the faint indentations made from Eddie’s teeth. “Oh, you never had dude friends who you cuddled with on the couch before me?” Eddie teases. “Honored.”
“Stop, god, I know, okay. In hindsight it’s so obvious.” He rubs his free hand over his forehead, feeling pretty stupid. “But then, when I realized that I, y’know… really, really like you, in a super not platonic way—” Eddie’s teasing smile turns down into something softer, more tender, and Steve has to touch a hand to his cheek “—I almost said something, but… I didn’t want… I didn’t wanna risk losing the, uh, one good thing that happened to me because of Vecna. Or, like. One of the best things. That’s happened…” One of the best things that’s happened, if he’s being totally honest with himself, since the demogorgan. There have been a lot of best things that came of that—the kids, especially Dustin; getting to be close to Nancy in a more profound way; the unexpected best friend he found in Robin. But Eddie is a different sort of best thing completely.
“Did you, um.” Eddie’s voice is so quiet. Not whispered, or mumbled, but quiet like the words are barely able to make it out of his mouth at all. He swallows. “Did you just say that I, um. Am one of the best things that’s… happened to… you?”
Steve smooths his hand over Eddie’s unruly, incredible hair. “Yeah,” he says, his throat thick. “‘Cause you are.”
Eddie pulls the ends of his hair in front of his mouth, ducking his head. “Oh, shit,” he mutters.
“What?”
He looks at Steve from under his lashes. He drops his hair, revealing a huge smile. “I’m, like, stupid fucking happy right now.”
Steve cups Eddie's face in both his palms. “I’m really sorry it took me so long.” He thinks about the kickstart of this conversation, Eddie asking what are we doing?, and feels sick with having made Eddie confused because of his own inaction. Steve is always seen as the one to jump in feet first, regardless of the risk, but in this… when the stakes were losing Eddie, he couldn't. He wishes he had, though that's pointless now. Eddie, as usual, impresses Steve with his courage. "And I'm, like, really fucking grateful that you said something."
"I mean, I am not exaggerating when I say that I, like, physically could not keep it in anymore," Eddie says, "but I'll take the praise regardless."
Steve is moved by the thought that Eddie's feelings were too intense to hold inside. Oh, shit—this guy is his boyfriend now. Holy shit. He swallows past the emotion tightening his throat.
Eddie asks, “So what did make you realize?”
“Oh—ugh. God, it’s so embarrassing.”
“Dude, I just fuckin’ straight up, like, full-on eighth grade schoolgirl confessed my feelings for you. Basically handed you a note that says ‘Do you like me? Mark YES or NO.’ So, come on, spill it.”
YES, Steve thinks, stomach doing flips. YES YES YES.
He says, "Fine, okay. It was… I don't even remember, like, a couple months ago maybe? We had all been hanging out here—you, me, Robin, the shrimps. I had to go drive Robin home, and when I got back, you were, like, coaching the kids on how to headbang. You guys looked so fucking dumb.” He laughs, thinking of them sitting on the ground, all of them whipping their heads up and down to the music. “But they looked so happy. And you—you just had this huge grin, y’know, like so proud. And I could tell that making them happy was making you happy, too. So. Yeah, that’s when it sort of clicked, I guess.”
That’s not exactly true. His real moment of clarity came when Eddie had noticed Steve, standing in the doorway watching them. He'd stuck out his tongue and thrown up a hand symbol that one of his favorite musicians likes to do—index finger and pinky up, thumb crossed over the middle two fingers. Then he put his hand down. And he'd smiled. And, out of nowhere, one of Dustin’s five-dollar words had popped into Steve's head: resplendent—shining brilliantly, gleaming. Bright and beautiful as the morning sun.
It was that smile, in that moment, in that room, surrounded by people they both love having fun, that made everything fall into place inside of Steve. The surprise blitzed through him like a flashfire, quickly replaced by something like relief. Oh, he'd thought, so that's what it is. It was as if he'd been steadily, but randomly, putting a puzzle together, and it was only when the final piece was in place that he was able to see the whole thing for what it was.
"Watching me headbang was your a-ha moment? Jesus, you're right," Eddie says, "that is pretty embarrassing." And then there it is, that smile. Resplendent.
"God," Steve mutters, then leans in to kiss Eddie again.
"Man," Eddie says dreamily as he opens his eyes, "I could really get used to this."
"You better."
"Wait— So are we, like, on a date? Like, right this second?"
No—sitting at home watching a movie is not a real date. Yes—doing anything anywhere is a date as long as it's with Eddie. "Do you want to be?"
Eddie pulls his hair in front of his face again. "Yes," he mumbles shyly.
Steve's going to pull a muscle if he keeps smiling like this. "Okay, but we will go on, like, an actual first date. Y'know, if— if you want."
"I want," he says with an immediacy that Steve is frankly flattered by. "I'm ready to be wooed. Give me the Boyfriend Steve special. Even if it's totally lame, I promise to pretend that I'm extremely impressed, because that's how much I like you."
Steve is absolutely fucking floating right now. "Gee, you're a real catch, Eddie Munson."
"Don't I know it, Steve Harrington! How lucky you are to be dating little ol' me."
I really am, he thinks, and then thinks, oh, wait, and says out loud, "I really am."
Maybe Eddie was right in saying that being over-complimentary is an unfair power, but if it surprises him like this every single time, Steve is going to be stupid not to use it.
Then Eddie gets that old familiar mischief in his eye. And Steve, as always, braces.
He starts: “My first decree as your boyfriend—”
“Wh— Decree?”
“—with whom you are so lovingly on a date right now, so you have to be nice to me—”
“Do I, though.”
“—is that we put on an actual good movie. Honestly, I’m trying to forget that we had our big gushy feelings moment to the soundtrack of goddamn National Lampoon.” Eddie starts pushing at Steve’s shoulder, who just looks at him flatly. “Chop chop!”
“What am I, a goddamn serf?”
Eddie has the audacity to bat his eyelashes at Steve. What’s worse: it actually works.
Steve shakes his head. “Yes, Your fucking Highness,” he sighs, getting up to go root around in the cabinet under the TV. As he's sifting through the movies he has, he becomes certain that his collection is about to receive a real overhaul in favor of someone's more eclectic taste. But he's not so much resigned to that fact as he is, like, maybe actually looking forward to it, all the little ways Eddie will keep making a place for himself in Steve's life.
Eventually, he finds one that he thinks will pass judgment. He holds it up, looking over at Eddie for his verdict.
After a tense moment of scrutiny, Eddie waves a dismissive hand. “I will allow it,” His goddamn Majesty declares.
Steve rolls his eyes and goes to eject National Lampoon and put the new movie in. “Christ, if this is what it’s like dating Eddie Munson," he laments as he sits back on the couch, "I don’t know how I’ll last.”
Eddie curls up against him and pats his chest, looking smug. “Be strong, soldier.”
Steve slings an arm around Eddie's shoulder, then sneaks a hand up to tweak his ear. Eddie makes an extremely unflattering noise and glares at him. Steve snickers and pulls him in closer. Fuck, he's on a date with his boyfriend right now. Of all the things to happen to him in this goddamn town, this is easily the most incredible.
There's a beach fight happening on screen when Eddie says, "Okay, Johnny Lawrence: yea or nay?"
"Yea or nay as in, like, what?"
"As in, do you think he's hot."
"Uhh." He considers the character in question as he moves around the screen, taunting the protagonist: blond, strong, flashy. A truly impressive nose. "Yea, I guess? Like, objectively, isn't the whole point that he's hot? So, sure, yea."
"What a perfectly diplomatic answer."
Steve wonders if Eddie meant something more, like maybe he's trying to suss out if Steve has taste in guys beyond him. "But he's kind of a huge douche, so not, like, I wouldn't date him."
"Yeah, okay, but by the end, there's, like, a glimmer of something under the douchebaggery. The way he's practically crying—god, it's so pathetic, it's beautiful." He hums, like he's mulling over a thought, then says, "Maybe I have a type: reformed douche."
"Oh, gee, thanks." He pinches Eddie's cheek. "Wait, you've seen this before?"
"What? Come on, of course I've seen The Karate Kid. Snatch my anti-conformity card away, but not even I am immune to some pipsqueak beating the shit out of a bunch of bullies." Eddie grins toothily up at Steve. "Living vicariously and all that."
"Okay, yeah, I can see that." He doesn't point out that Eddie really doesn't have to live vicariously through fictional characters to get that kind of wish fulfillment anymore. He's strong and tough and smart enough to fight for himself, in real life. A wave of pride washes over Steve, gratified by how far Eddie's come.
"You're way hotter than Johnny Lawrence, by the way," Eddie tells him. "Just to be perfectly clear."
"Oh, great, good, thank you. I'm so relieved that I'm not gonna have to, like, fight this guy for your hand or whatever."
"But you would though."
This is such a stupid conversation. Steve is loving it. "Duh."
Eddie beams at him, so openly delighted. Then he says, “It was actually before all—that." He doesn’t need to clarify what he means by all that. “Me being interested in you, I mean.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah, like, witnessing you being a big damn hero was a clincher moment, certainly. And demobat was when I kinda realized, like, oh, okay—Steve Harrington is super fucking hot. I get it now, it’s true, awooga, etcetera etcetera—”
“—uh, yeah, please never say ‘awooga’ again—”
“—but it was actually way back – oh, Stevie, come on, we just established this, you’re very awooga—”
“Stop!”
“—it was actually when you were working at fuckin’—” Eddie cuts himself off with a snorting laugh. “Fuckin’ Scoops.”
“Holy shit.” Oh, no. “What?” Steve’s face is burning. “No. No no no.”
“Oh yes yes yes,” Eddie says, gleeful. “Dude, there I was, minding my own business, going to the pathetic little record store they had in the mall, when I look over—”
“Oh, god.”
Eddie is full-on giggling now, which would be cute if Steve weren’t too busy being mortified. “I look over! I look over, and who do I see in one of those dashing little blue sailor outfits—"
“Christ.”
“—but King Steve ‘the Hair’ Harrington himself. Oh, you could not imagine the—" Eddie grips one hand into a fist "—absolute vindication I felt in that moment. How the mighty have fallen! I thought. The big man on campus, reduced to slinging sweet treats at the goddamn mall?" He laughs again, clearly reliving the euphoria he felt back then.
"O-kay, man, jeez—" Steve literally just moments ago made this guy his boyfriend. Unbelievable.
Eddie, shameless, presses on. "Needless to say, I was intrigued. In retrospect, one may even say entranced—nay! enamored. Ye of the perfectly popped polo collar—"
"Wow."
"—brought to such aesthetical lows. Steve, put simply, the sight was so goddamn ridiculous that it awakened an absolute burning curiosity inside me.
"Well," Steve says, honestly at a complete loss with how to respond. "Whatever works, I guess."
Eddie's face is glowing with humor, and Steve finds that he doesn't mind at all that it's at his expense. Okay, maybe he minds, like, just a little. But the glitter in Eddie's eye is worth it. “Did they let you keep the outfit though? Because, man, I will admit it,” Eddie says with a saucy grin, “those shorts were really doing it for me.”
Nevermind, not worth it. “You need to stop. Please. I am begging you.”
Eddie tips his head back to laugh loudly. Steve takes in the long arch of his neck, the chaotic fall of his dark hair, the glimpse of the black cord from his guitar pick necklace. All these little details that make Eddie so addicting to look at, so interesting. “Make me,” Eddie tells him.
So Steve does what he gets to do now: he kisses him. This is quickly becoming a default move, which clearly neither of them mind.
Eddie pulls away just a little, murmuring against Steve's mouth, "You really like my piercings, huh?"
Steve hadn't even realized he'd been rubbing his thumb over Eddie's hoops again while they kissed. "Yeah," he says softly, pushing Eddie's hair fully out of the way to show off the cut of his jaw, his pale throat. He leans forward and touches his lips to Eddie's earlobe, feeling the hard metal of his earrings. He opens his mouth a little, just enough to catch the hoops between his teeth for a second, before letting up and pressing a kiss behind the ear. Eddie makes a sweet little noise that has Steve kissing down his throat, wanting to pull it out of him again.
Eddie’s breath hitches when he makes it down to his collarbone. "Jesus, Steve…" he sighs, carding his hands into Steve's hair. Steve hooks a finger into the collar of Eddie's ratty band tee and pulls it down so that he can put his mouth to the peek of the tattoo there. He's never seen the whole thing and he really fucking wants to. He wants to see what other tattoos Eddie has hidden away; he wants to be allowed to know every secret part of him.
Steve slowly makes his way back up to Eddie's mouth. The easy, eager way Eddie opens up to him floods Steve's entire body with heat. Eddie's rings snag at Steve's hair, pulling lightly at his scalp, sending little electric shocks zipping down his spine. He slips a hand up the back of Eddie's shirt and spreads his palm wide, soaking in the warmth of his skin.
When Steve presses closer, Eddie lets out a low, throaty moan, and they both freeze, startled out of the moment. Steve pulls up a little, realizing that, at some point, he had pushed Eddie down against the couch and laid himself over him. One of Eddie's feet is planted on the floor, his other leg bent at the knee and bracketing Steve's hip, pulling them flush together.
"Um," says Eddie, blinking his glassy eyes back into focus.
Steve immediately backs off. "Sorry, uh." It takes a lot of willpower for him to take his hands off Eddie—sliding one out from under Eddie's shirt, untangling the other from his hair—but he manages it, scooting back across the couch. His whole body is thrumming, one big heartbeat. "Shit, sorry, I got a little carried away, uh—"
Eddie clears his throat, pulling himself back upright. His face is a deep, soft red, his hair all fluffed up. And his mouth—Steve tears his gaze away, heart thumping. "What? No, Steve, it's— it's cool, I wanted—"
Steve flushes when Eddie straightens out his shirt. Jesus, when was the last time he'd blushed? His palm is hot with the memory of Eddie's bare skin. "God, I'm sorry—"
"Dude, stop, I want it, like, seriously, I really, really do—"
"No, I get it, yeah—"
"—maybe, just, you know—"
"Absolutely, yes—"
"I guess we should, like… Let's…"
"Yeah," Steve agrees, "no, yeah, let's… Let's. Yeah."
"Yeah," says Eddie, "okay. Cool."
There's a beat of quiet before they both laugh sort of bashfully. It's been a long, long time since Steve has experienced this… shyness, this almost giddiness, with a partner. Maybe not since the very first time he kissed someone. It could be because this is his first time doing all of this with a guy, but he honestly thinks it's mostly just because it's Eddie. Everything feels bright and new and curious with Eddie. It's really nice. He'd almost forgotten what nice even felt like.
Steve runs a hand over Eddie's hair to smooth out the mess he made of it the best he can. He tidies Eddie's bangs and, because he just can't resist, tucks some of his hair behind his ear so the little silver hoops are showing. Those things are going to get Steve into a lot of trouble, he knows, and drops his hand away before he starts getting into more trouble right now.
Eddie reaches up like he's about to pay Steve the same courtesy, but instead starts aggressively ruffling Steve's hair. "Dude!" Steve knocks his hand away, pushes against Eddie's chest, who just laughs and laughs. "You are so annoying."
"Yeah, but you like it."
God, he does, and it's proving to be very bad for his health. Or his hair hygiene, anyway. "Just shut up and watch the movie."
"Aye aye, Sailor Steve."
"Holy shit, Munson, I am warning you, do not start with that."
"Too late, Popeye! It's started, and it's not ending."
"I swear to god—" Steve starts dancing his fingers along Eddie's sides, remembering a few weeks ago when Dustin had accidentally discovered Eddie is hilariously, disastrously ticklish. It only takes a couple seconds for tears of laughter to start streaming down his face. Steve's heart swells, so incredibly charmed. He can't believe he was ever able to box any of this away.
He lets up when Eddie chokes out uncle! uncle! in between breathless laughs. "You seriously just tickled me into submission. I'm in awe, Harrington."
"And I will goddamn do it again. Eyes forward."
Amazingly, Eddie actually listens, settling down against Steve again. (Tickling and compliments are powerful tools against his boyfriend. Important to note. His boyfriend, Eddie Munson. Also important to note.) And despite having seen it already, Eddie seems fully engaged with what's going on in the movie. Certainly more than he was with National Lampoon. Steve still can't believe the guy was really sitting there reading—and how can someone even read with stuff going on in the world around them? Though Eddie's always telling him that a good book can pull you in, distract you just as much as music or movies. And I don't mean your Sound and the fuckin' Fury here, Steve, he'd said once, as if that meant anything to Steve at all, but he'd known better than to interject as Eddie started listing out examples of 'good books', each with a premise more nonsensical than the last.
Steve pokes Eddie's shoulder to get his attention. “What were you reading, anyway?”
Eddie tips forward to grab his book off of the table. "The Light Fantastic!" he says, presenting the cover.
"Jesus christ," says Steve, physically recoiling when he sees it, because jesus christ, what a cover it is. There's a wizard and some—gnomes? dwarves?—riding on top of a treasure chest in mid-air, and what the fuck, the chest has feet. A lot of feet. A green woman in a skimpy outfit is hanging onto the wizard's robe, and a grey man in an even skimpier outfit is hanging onto the treasure chest. There're birds. There's a troll. "Uh. Wow."
"Your face," Eddie says, "is absolutely fucking priceless."
"I'm scared to even ask what it's about."
"But you know I'm gonna tell you anyway, right?"
"Obviously," Steve says, settling in to be regaled. This time, he doesn't interfere with Eddie's exaggerated gestures. He just keeps his arm slung around Eddie's shoulder and lets himself be pulled along the thread Eddie spins.
He's amazed at how this night began and how it's now ending. It's true that, ever since that night with the kids, Steve had been aware of his wanting. Looking back, though, Steve knows now that it actually started the day that they defeated Vecna. Eddie had found him on the battlefield and launched himself at him, and though the hug had been a brief, bright, streaking comet of a moment, the weight of him had burned an imprint against Steve’s body.
It's clear now that Steve had been searching for a way back into Eddie’s arms all along. He'll try not to fault himself too much for not getting here sooner. Because, in the end, finally, here he is. Exactly where he wants to be.
#steve harrington#eddie munson#stranger things#steddie#steveddie#HAPPY STRANGER THINGS SEASON 4 PART 2 EVE!!!!! LETS HEAR IT FOR ST S4P2 EVE!!!!#feeling sick to my stomach LOL <3#big thank u to kim for reprising her role as my beta i owe u my life#i cant even append my usual disclaimer that this is 'just a little thing' bc this shit is 7500 words. instead of my usual 1-3k. please#anyway..........#my writing
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Hey!! turns out that this Home Sweet Home prologue has the potential of being the longest fic i’ve posted here!! so uh!! get ready!!!
#Ramblings :)#Gah. I'm not even at like. the main thing and. it's at. nearly 7500 words- /lh#But. i'm loving how this is turning out. so. I think you guys will like it too. :)#Hoping it's not infodumping: the fanfic SO-#guess we'll just. have to wait and see-
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I’d be finished with this fic by now if i didn’t keep coming up with situations
#my writing#along the northern heights#i hope i’m not being a tease for the people on here who read my fic#screaming into the ethernet#chap 2 is at 7500 words and counting#take my keyboard away#i can’t stop writing in dialect
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its not wednesday but have a little glance at a one of the wips anyway
#bg3#astarion#wip: that's the kind of love ive been dreaming of#this is the one with the smut that i keep talking about that should have been 2000 words but is now (checks notes) 7500#we'll get there. i fucking hope.
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I keep beating myself up for not writing enough today or yesterday but uh
I wrote 1400 words today and I think a little more than that yesterday. That's not nothing by any means. Even NaNoWriMo, which is a breakneck pace, is 1667 words a day so I should be happy with what I have.
Have I done more? Absolutely. But this is perfectly adequate for now.
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Last Line Tag
I was tagged by @fearofahumanplanet, thank you!
“We met two and a half days ago!” He smacked the wall with his hand and immediately regretted it, cussing as it throbbed and Dom looked at him like he was trying to figure out when Vince had broken and how he hadn't realized. “Look, I don’t need you to tell me I’m shit at this. I know, alright?” He pushed off the wall and past his friend, going around to the basement stairs instead of finishing that conversation.
Dom was right. It was like all his words had dried up. Every time he looked at Brian it was like looking at memories he’d shoved away. This would be hard if his brother were all sunshine and roses and shit. Instead he was this skinny, angry, bruised up kid that was nothing like Vince and everything like Vince and what the fuck was he supposed to do with a kid?
I am going to tag @kyofsonder @talesofsorrowandofruin @late-to-the-fandom @writingpotato07 and anyone else who wants to join in!
#last line tag#writing tag game#fanfiction#fast & furious#writebrl#nanowrimo#my nano doc is only at 7500 words but I've been writing in it everyday#so you know what#success#this is a pre-series AU where I made Brian & Vince half brothers#for context#my writing#wip excerpt
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newfound appreciation for horror movies with stories that take place on planes purely for the way the characters are written
#i think it’s genuinely difficult to write 10+ characters and flesh them out in a single room#and in flight 7500 is amazing in terms of cinematography and direction as well ..#one of the couples is talking having a heart to heart and there’s a compilation of the other characters that can relate to their words#playing while they talk#it’s so good#the plot doesn’t have to b great if the characters are for me at least#aweks.txt
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"Lionel? It's Drake Donovan," I said. "How much do you like me?"
There was silence over the line for several seconds. Then Lionel Harker said, "Why?"
"I fought off an aspiring murderer and was promptly arrested for it," I said. "He sexually assaulted the victim first, so I sincerely doubt the cops here will be inclined to do me any favors. I'm in New Hampshire, maybe fifty miles north of Concord."
"In that case, it doesn't matter how much I like you," said Lionel. "I'm not licensed to practice in New Hampshire."
"No, but you know people who know people," I replied. "I would like to think that some of those people are from New Hampshire."
(more)
#original fiction#a good man is hard to find (no not that one)#writeblogging#wip snippet#for $8000 a month i will stop#i was writing a character study and then i was like ''haha imagine how much worse this could have gone if i changed one important detail''#and 7500 words later i'm on the second of two chapters#you know#as one does
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okay i figured out what my nanowrimo project is going to be and i’m going to hope that maaaybe i’ll actually finish something this year.
#the only time i ever finished nanowrimo was when i wrote a story that was 7500 words. the bar was very low in high school#but this is fanfiction and i think i can bullshit my way thru 50k if it's fanfiction and i don't have to create new characters and dynamics
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*Suspicious poking of Theater AU*
Why are you over 1200 words and not giving almost finished vibes? Also how much do I trust this ‘the words are good and will need minimal editing’ feeling?
#quoth the raven#i think there's going to be 4 sections to this fic#ive finished the first one and maybe halfway through the second?#so probably a 5k-7500 word oneshot?#Haru & Reborn are still vibing so as long as i actually sit down and write this goes pretty smoothly#it just also feels a little too easy#so... suspicious#also fuck this'll be my longest fic so far if my word count prediction's correct#fucking wild
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