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strangersteddierthings · 1 year

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Shovel Talk(s) Part 2

Part One 🦇Part Two🦇Part Three🦇Part Four

Nobody in the history of the world has ever referred to Eddie as jubilant but that was certainly the best word for him currently. Eddie has survived the apocalypse (even if barely), been proven innocent for the murders (the Upside Down exploding into Hawkins helped), and he has a boyfriend. It makes Eddie feel like he's floating.

Steve drops him off, walks him up to the porch, and gives him the sweetest kiss goodbye. Eddie doesn't go inside right away because he wants to watch Steve as he leaves and maybe blow him an exaggerated kiss as he drives away.

"Glad that boy finally did something about how pathetic you were being," Wayne says in lieu of a greeting when Eddie finally slips in the front door and into the living room, plopping himself on the other end of the sofa, dragging one of the throw pillows that came with the couch into his lap to clutch onto. Ground him, because he's still floating.

"I was not being pathetic!" Eddie is scandalized.

Wayne lets out a wistful sigh and says, in a poor imitation of Eddie's voice, "when will Steve end my suffering and notice me."

Eddie lunges across the couch with the pillow in hand, whacking Wayne with every word he speaks, while also trying to dodge Wayne trying to grab the pillow from him, "I do not sound like that!"

Wayne tricks him into thinking the pillow is his only goal and before he realizes what's happening, Wayne has him in a headlock, dragging both of them off the couch as he stands, giving Eddie the gentlest noogie of his life. "I think I know how you sound, hearin' you bellyache for the last 13 years. I've had to hear your relentless sighing and bemoaning about Steve for at least six of 'em."

Eddie beats him with the pillow more until Wayne releases the headlock and then they wrestle until his uncle fakes hurt, so Eddie backs down quickly, and Wayne steals the pillow and beats him back onto the couch until Eddie yields.

"That was dirty fighting, old man," Eddie says when he finally stops laughing enough to catch his breath.

"What was it you used to tell me, when I said you were fightin' dirty?" Wayne asks, "Scrappy."

"Oh, is that what you think you are?" Eddie swings at Wayne's knee half-heartedly. Wayne flings himself across the room and into the recliner there like Eddie shoved him. "Oh, you big baby."

"You're awfully callus about bullying your old man," Wayne chuckles and settles into the recliner, popping the leg rest out. "Now, tell me about your boy. He was a gentleman to you?"

Eddie pouts, "Unfortunately, yes. One chaste kiss and then he was off."

"Smart boy."

Eddie narrows his eyes. "What's the supposed to mean?"

"Means I scare him."

"What."

"That a question or a statement, son?" Wayne looks awfully smug over in his chair.

"What do you mean you scare him?"

"Just gave him the good ole father shovel talk. Y'know? Hurt my boy and I'll make you disappear," Wayne says.

"You terrible old man!" Eddie throws his pillow at him but Wayne bats it out of the air. "I'm going to die a virgin and it'll be your fault!"

Wayne just shrugs. "Fine by me."

"You are the worst."

Eddie can't make his leg stop jiggling. He feels sorry for Nancy, who is sharing the bench seat with him because he's sure that it's shaking the whole bench. He's filled with energy and doesn't know what to do with it.

Robin sits across from them, finishing up the last of her milkshake as they wait for the to go order they're going to drop off for Steve, who is stuck at Family Video for another five hours. He was supposed to be here, too, but Keith called him asking him to cover and he'd said yes. Eddie wishes he hadn't. This was Lunch Date Day.

"Are you still upset Steve took an extra shift?" Nancy asks. "Even though you know he's just going to spend the extra money on you?"

Eddie's pouting, voice whiny as he says, "I'd rather he be heeeerrrrrrrre."

"It's disgusting how in love you are," Robin says, shoving the now completely empty milkshake glass away.

Eddie's leg stops shaking because he full on freezes. "Uh."

"Are you afraid of saying the L-word? You are not subtle in showing it," Nancy says, ever the traitor, "but luckily Steve's just as smitten."

"You don't know that," Eddie says, arguing for the sake of arguing. He doesn't believe he likes Steve more than Steve likes him. He's pretty sure they're on an even playing field.

"Yeah, I do. I threatened to shoot him if he hurt you and he didn't even flinch. He'd have taken the bullet for you."

"You did what!?" Robin yelps. She's looking at Nancy like she's grown a second head.

"I didn't even bring a gun with me! Besides, Steve knows I didn't mean it," Nancy says with a wave of her hand, "it was just an obligation thing. You have to threaten your best friend's significant other. The whole conversation was like, 30 seconds tops."

"I'm your best friend!?" Eddie gasps, faking surprise. They have become good friends. She'd taken it upon herself to make sure he did get to graduate with Robin and herself, and they did form a sort of friendship from that. Also, from being the collective third wheel to Steve&Robin, which is enough to make people come together. Neither of them truly thinks of the other as their best friend, but it's fun to joke about their own Capitol with a P Platonic Friendship around Steve and Robin, as they become rather bitchy and defensive about their own friendship.

It's hilarious every time.

"Well, it's you or Argyle, and I don't think Jonathan wants to share his best friend, so...."

"Cold, Wheeler. Cold."

Nancy rolls her eyes and looks over to Robin. "Are you telling me you haven't given Eddie the shovel talk?"

Robin frowns as she thinks before her eyes widen in shock and she gasps, "I think I accidentally gave Steve a shovel talk instead."

Eddie bursts out laughing, "Robin, how the fuck did you end up accidentally giving a shovel talk to your own best friend?"

"I just told him to, like, be careful with you."

"Careful with me?" Eddie asks, a little incredulously. "What the fuck does that mean?"

Robin is going on the defensive, now. Eddie can see that in the way she squares her shoulders before saying, "it was said after your first date! Steve's had a lot of those, and you hadn't. I just- I dunno, wanted him to see the importance of that."

"So, what, you told him you'd shoot him if he hurt me, like Wheeler here?"

"No! I never said I'd hurt him for hurting you. I just said that he should be careful with you because, as your first boyfriend, if, and I did mean if, you don't work out, it's like... he's setting the precedent for how boyfriends should treat you. What you'll put with with, y'know?"

"That's sweet-" Nancy starts but Eddie's speaking over her just a quickly.

"Robin, that's stupid. I'm a fucking adult. If I'm not being treated how I want to be treated, I'll tell Steve," Eddie huffs. "You can trust that I say what I mean."

"Can I?" Robin shoots back. "Just like when you promised to get the fuck outta dodge and instead went on a suicide mission that ended very, very badly for you?"

"That was different, Buckley," Eddie hisses at her, sitting up straight to lean more across the table, trying to get in her face, "there was a lot of shit happening, and no way out that I saw. It's called trauma!"

It seems that a defensive Robin goes straight for the jugular because she hisses back, "No, actually, I think it's called survivors guilt and suicidal ideation. You know what, I should be giving you a shovel talk! 'Cause I don't fully trust you to not hurt Steve, either by lying or running once things get rough. You don't-"

"OKAY!" Nancy shouts, startling both of them into silence with one word. "We are in an, admittedly very empty, diner but still a very public diner, so let's not. Robin, you're not Steve's mom, it's not on you to look out for who is going to hurt him or-"

"You do not get to speak to me about hurting him," Robin points an accusing finger at Nancy. For all the anger she seemed to have for Eddie just now, he can see that it's almost doubled for Nancy. "I wasn't Steve's friend when you hurt him, but don't think I don't know every detail."

He knows this story, too. Had gotten it out of Steve one night, weeks ago now, when they'd been passing a joint back and forth on Eddie's bed. Before Eddie can pipe up, not that he knows what he'd say anyway, the waitress returns with the to go box and the check.

"It's my turn to pay," Nancy says, snatching the check before it touches the table, following hot on the waitress's heels to the register.

"Ugh," Robin flings herself against the back of the bench, both hands coming up to hide her face. From beneath her hiding place, she says, "I'm sorry, Eddie. What I said was unfair, and uncalled for."

"We're cool, Robin," Eddie says, "I forget how much of a buffer for our anxieties Steve is until we all hang out without him. He's able to defuse an argument before it happens."

"Oh, don't word it like that," Robin drops her hands and slides out of the booth, scooping up the to go box in the process," it makes Steve sound like the emotionally mature one."

They all climb into Nancy's car and apologies are said but Eddie feels like the next time Steve can't make it, they'll all bail on the weekly lunch. They're just a bunch of traumatized young adults and Steve is the heart of them, the person that bonds them outside the shit they went through. And maybe they should figure out a better way to deal with this than just pretending it didn't happen but- well, the world just kept moving on and they had to either move with it or get left behind.

It's two weeks after Eddie and Steve accidentally told the Hellfire crew they were a couple, which is why Eddie is not expecting it when Erica and Lucas corner him. He was expecting to be cornered by someone last week.

They'd been taking longer to pack up than usual, and that should have tipped Eddie off that something was up.

"Munson," Erica says in her no-nonsense voice, hands on her hips, face unamused. For sharing no biology with Steve, Eddie finds the resemblance uncanny. "I need you to understand that you might be my Dungeon Master, but Scoops Troop will always trump that, so if you fuck this up with Steve, you will have to answer to me."

Eddie gives a soft grin in response, amused, "no worries, Lady Applejack. I have no plans to fuck this up."

Erica's eyes flick to Lucas, then back to Eddie. "I mean it, Munson. I have it on good authority that sometimes you hurt people and then you don't try to right it. You just move on-"

"Erica, stop it," Lucas says, voice a little panicked.

But Erica continues, because nothing ever seems to phase her, "and Steve and Lucas are alike in that way. So just know that if you hurt Steve like you hurt Lucas-"

"Erica!"

"I will end you. I will ruin your life, Munson-"

"Erica, STOP!" Lucas finally steps forward, yanking on Erica's arm to get her to stop talking. It makes her stumble a bit before rounding on Lucas. "Stop it."

"No!" Erica glares at her brother as she removes his hand from her arm. "Go outside if you don't want to hear it."

They stare each other down and Eddie's not sure what he should be doing. Should he step in? He grew up an only child, is this normal sibling behavior? But he doesn't have to step in because Lucas huffs and storms out of the house, front door clicking softly behind him even though Eddie expected him to slam the door.

"Now, you," Erica whirls around to Eddie, "do you understand what I'm saying?"

Eddie does not. He's fairly certain he's getting a shovel talk from a twelve-year-old and while amusing, he senses there's more to it than just his relationship with Steve. "You're threatening me on Steve's behalf?"

Erica scoffs and rolls her eyes like she thinks Eddie's an idiot. He's starting to think he might be. "Yes, I am but also more. Your relationship has been the hot topic these days, and my brother brought up a good point but he's too nice to say it, so I will. When school starts, if Steve wants to take you to a basketball game, even though they fall on Hellfire night, you postpone the damn game and you go. No matter how much you hate basketball or jocks or- or... other things." She loses steam at the end, eyes flicking to the door.

"What?" Eddie is even more confused, "I don't hate basketball. And if Steve asks, I'm not going to say no, okay? I care about Steve. A lot."

Erica frowns, which contradicts the words that leave her mouth. "Good. That's good. I'd hate to ruin you, Munson."

"Is there... more to it?"

It takes Erica maybe three seconds to decide what she's going to say. Just long enough for her to look at the door, then back to Eddie. "You owe my brother an apology."

"Uh, sure, I'll apologize but for what?"

"Remember the basketball championship and the last session of the Vecna campaign that you wouldn't postpone so Lucas could play? You never apologized," Erica crosses her arms, another move reminiscent of Steve, before continuing, "You didn't apologize, and Lucas thought that it was because he's a jock, and you hate jocks. But now you're dating Steve and he's a jock. So, if you don't hate jocks, Lucas thinks you just hate him."

"What, no, I don't hate Lucas!"

"Then tell him that!" Erica glares at him, "and let this be a little lesson for you. Going forward if you hurt either of my brothers, intentionally or not, you can kiss the tires on your van goodbye."

Eddie tucks his metaphorical tail between his legs and goes outside to apologize, because Lucas deserves to hear it.

Then, once the Sinclairs are gone and Eddie's back in his room, he runs through every conversation he can remember having with Steve. Has he dismissed things Steve liked too easily, too often? Has he said anything offhandedly that could be taken the wrong way without explanation?

Eddie's was an only child and didn't have to grow up worrying about anyone but himself. He made himself an outcast and shunned the 'norm' by choice. Doing so didn't exactly let him learn the social graces of patience and understanding.

It's eye opening, to learn that a decision he made months ago without a second thought has been hurting Lucas this whole time.

Has he ever done that to Steve, and not known it?

Steve's been distant these past few days and no matter how many times Eddie asks, Steve's answer doesn't change. I'm fine he says. I'm fine. Just fine. It's fine.

Except nothing feels fine. And Eddie doesn't understand the sharp change. They've got a date planned for tonight. Neither of them has specifically said it out loud, because it's sappy and stupid, but it marks three full months as official boyfriends. So, they've got a date planned, but Eddie's worried how it might end.

Eddie's been floating these last three months, but he suddenly feels grounded. He can't fix whatever happened if Steve won't tell him what it was! And in the absence of actual answers, Eddie's mind has invented his own.

Steve's realized that Eddie's not good enough for him. Steve's realized that he's actually straight, but thanks for the experimentation. Steve's found someone else and is working on how to break up with Eddie without blowing up their friend group in the process.

And Eddie hates himself for thinking these things. For projecting his own insecurities onto a version of Steve that doesn't exist. Eddie's gotten to know Steve.

Or he thought he had.

But now he's pulling away. And the only person he knows he can talk to about dating Steve is Nancy and he can't do that! He can't just go to Nancy's house and ask 'so when you were dating Steve and it was all going down the drain, was he distant or is that just a me thing?'

Fuck. Fuck!

He runs his hands through his hair and regrets it as his curls tangle around the rings on his hands. He should brush his hair, be getting ready, but he's procrastinating that because he can't decide if he's going all out, making himself look his best to see if it'll bring some life back into Steve's eyes when he looks at him, or if he shouldn't try at all and see if Steve even notices he's wearing the same thing he wore yesterday.

And it's bullshit that he's even thinking about testing Steve. Not two months ago he and Robin had argued in that diner about whether he's talk to Steve about these kind of things or not and now he was kind of proving her right. Except not, because he did try to talk! Steve just didn't answer when he questioned, and you can't really build a conversation from nothing.

Fuck! He should have known this would happen. That he would fall in love and Steve wouldn't love him back because that's always been his lot in life.

Oh.

Oh no.

He's been avoiding thinking it because once it's been thought, once it's solidified in his mind, it's true. And now he's thought it!

He's in love with Steve Harrington.

And isn't it just fuckin' peachy that this realization doesn't accompany happy feelings. He's in love and can't even be happy about it because he's so fucking sure his relationship is ending tonight.

#steddie #my fic #hmmm less happy about this part but its been a goddamn STRUGGLE #i didn't want people to give eddie a shovel talk but Erica does what she wants sooo....#also had to kinda force the scene with robin eddie and nancy in the diner because i wanted nancy to explain her side #considering how many of you were so mad at her and just over here like #oh no #cause the first part was just in steves pov and he cant read minds #anyway #have this and the third part will be out soon

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marlynnofmany · 2 months

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Playing Translation Telephone

“Hi,” I said as the door slid open. “Captain Sunlight wants to know how your translations are going.”

Coals sighed. “They’re going. This one’s a mess.” He shook his lizardy head, brick-red scales dull in the light by the doorway. That part of the translation suite was always dim because Trrili liked looming in the shadows there.

But today she was at the workstation in the back, surrounded by glowing screens and a cloud of irritated hisses. “I think we missed a language,” she announced, snapping her pincher arms and angling her antennae into a scowl.

“What, really?” Coals asked. He ran a hand over his head, scales clicking quietly. “How many is that now?”

“Sixssss,” Trrili hissed.

Coals grumbled something I didn’t catch, and walked back over to the workstation.

Curious, I followed and let the door shut behind me. “What kind of project is this one?”

“Old records of a multi-species colonizing effort,” Coals said from his floating chair with the tail hole. “The originals are lost, and all that’s left is this jumble that’s been translated through a succession of languages, none of which they bothered to write down. And they want us to figure out what the originals actually meant.”

“Sounds tricky,” I said. Each of the screens held writing, most in languages I didn’t recognize. Some were notes in the trade language we all spoke, and I was amused to see how much swearing was in Trrili’s notes.

“It is very tricky,” Trrili agreed, jabbing a little wrist finger at the screen in the middle. “The grammar doesn’t match the words, and the idioms are an utter tar hole. It’s anyone’s guess what culture came up with some of these details.”

“I’m pretty sure the bit about rocks is a Strongarm saying,” Coals said. “It makes more sense than a Frillian interpretation.”

“Yes, fine, probably,” Trrili said with an irritated wave of her pinchers. “I’m stuck at this part that goes off on a tangent about the family arrangements of the wildlife. It’s clearly significant, and at least one layer of translation wanted to make sure the full interpretation was spelled out, but that just makes it more confusing.”

“How so?” I asked. I’d gotten the job on this ship because of my animal-care knowledge, so maybe I could offer some insights. I peered at the screen.

“This part,” Trrili said, “Is a recounting of a colonist’s experience in retrieving goods from a shuttle that crashed in a lake. The water creatures seem to have complex social arrangements, and somehow that relates to their behavior toward this particular colonist.” She folded her pinchers and leaned back, glaring at the ancient diary. “Of course this had to be written by someone disinclined to speaking clearly.”

“What kind of behavior is it?” I asked. “Are we talking mating advances, or aggressively protecting the young, or—?”

“Aggressive,” Trrili said immediately. “This word means mouth, possibly teeth specifically, and in the grammatical arrangement that it’s currently configured into, it has to be saying that the thing bit the colonist.”

Coals flipped through documents on another screen. “Do we know what the official name for the creature is?”

Trrili hissed. “Not even close. That’s what this whole tangent is: an attempt at describing it. I’d love to know if it was the original colonist or someone later who decided it would be helpful to tell us that this creature’s ancestors rejected social bonds.”

“Rejected how?” I asked.

Coals brought up another document. “I’ve got something on the legal system of the original colony. Sounds like there were multiple types of family arrangements at play. Possibly this colonist was just musing on a similarity to their own life.”

Trrili hissed. “How does that help us? I don’t see any accounts of this person’s family life, or even their species. We have no way to know if their own parents performed the socially-accepted rituals or not.”

“Wait,” I said. “Is this about the animal’s parents not doing a certain ritual? Like marriage? Is the colonist calling the fish a bastard?”

Both of my alien coworkers looked at me. Coals asked slowly, “That’s an insult in human circles, isn’t it?”

“Yes!”

Trrili threw her pinchers skyward and stalked away from the workstation. “Of course it is. You people are sentimental about everything, including reproduction. This would have been so much simpler if we’d known from the start that there was a human layer to this.”

“So what does it say?” I asked. “The colonist went into the lake to help with the crash, and got bitten by a bastard fish?”

Trrili was walking in circles hissing, so Coals scooted in front of the center screen. “Going by what we’ve figured out so far,” he said, “The colonist was trying to move salvage from the shuttle. Walking through shallow water. The water creatures were of many bright colors — it goes into detail about that, comparing them to refractive prisms and seaspray — but they kept their distance as long as the colonist kept moving. Pretty sure this part says one came in for a bite as soon as the colonist stood still. And that’s where we go off on an elaborate description of the creature’s family arrangements.”

I grinned. “‘Dear diary, today I waded through a lake and got bit by a rainbow bastard fish. Terrible experience; wouldn’t recommend.’”

Coals looked closer. “It does actually say something like that afterward,” he admitted. “There’s a suggestion that the next person to enter the water wear protective clothing.”

Over Trrili’s aggravated hissing, I said, “That colonist might have been a human.”

“Might indeed,” Coals said. He scrolled up through a page of notes. “That could actually shed some light on a couple other spots, now that you mention it.”

Trrili appeared beside us. “Bring up the part about the colony leader mating with someone’s mother.”

I laughed. “I can tell you right now that that’s an insult. The colonist is likely complaining about the boss, not describing something that actually happened.”

Coals looked at Trrili. “Told you we need an insult chart.”

Trrili tilted her head dramatically. “That’s so much work!”

“So’s this,” Coals pointed out. “How about you take another look at what we’ve got so far here, and I’ll start a list of common human insults.”

Trrili took a position in front of the screens, hissing quietly.

“I’ll be happy to help,” I said to Coals. “My people are very creative on that front.”

“So I gather,” Coals said. He scooted over to me, digital notepad at the ready. “And not one of those insults revolves around eggs. Mindblowing.”

“Well,” I said with a tip of my head. “There is the thing about teaching your grandmother to suck eggs. That’s kind of an insult.”

“What?” Coals said. “Never mind. I can tell this is going to be a long list.”

~~~

The ongoing backstory adventures of the main character from this book. More to come! And I am currently drafting a sequel!

#my writing #The Token Human #humans are weird #haso #hfy #eiad #humans are space orcs #translations #in spaaace #thanks to the random person who commented on a previous story #with a mention of their encounter #with what they named the #Caribbean Bastardfish #'oh hey' says I #'what a very human thing to name it. hmmm...'

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