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sp0o0kylights · 9 months

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Part Two / Part Three

Ao3

It's 8:45 am.

The Red Barn, which is neither red nor a barn, has been open since 7, catering to the early morning crowd with rounds of coffee and pancakes.

It was no Benny's, but given the size of Hawkins and the lack of alternatives?

No one was complaining.

They were all too happy someone had opened up another watering hole for the working class man (or lass, as Foreman Shelly will dutifully remind you) which meant the place was packed with both day and night shift regulars, passing each other in staggered waves.

It also meant Wayne was sharing the packed breakfast counter with a warehouse worker by the name of John Cheese on one side and Police Chief Jim Hopper on the other.

He doesn't mind it.

Wayne's a man on a budget thinner than his shoelace, but he's also a man who understands that small indulgences need to be made in life or you didn't truly live it.

This is how he convinces himself to get a coffee at the Barn after work everyday, reading the morning newspaper and chatting with the other regulars before he heads home.

Bonus, it gets him out of the rapid-fire franticness that is his nephew in the mornings.

(All the love in the world wouldn't change the fact that all that Eddie came with a lot of noise.

The kind of noise that was a tried and true recipe for a headache right after a long shift.)

As a trade off, Wayne went to bed early so he could wake up in time for dinner with Eddie.

It was a nice little system that worked for them.

A routine Wayne was reminiscing fondly on, when the pager on Chief Hopper started to chirp. With a sad moan, the man fished out a few crumbled bills and threw them on the counter, abandoning his coffee to trudge out to his truck.

This was not unusual.

Particularly recently, given they were but a scant few weeks past that whole mall ordeal. A fact all too easy to remember when one caught sight of the Chief’s still healing face.

What was unusual, was when he came storming through the doors a minute later, face now a furious shade of red with his hat clenched in his hand.

The energy in the room shifted, taking on something a little watchful as Hopper swept his gaze from side to side, like a dog on the hunt.

Judging by the way he stilled when he caught sight of Wayne, the latter assumed he found what he was looking for and could only pray it was the person behind him.

(He liked John, but Wayne had enough trouble this year and he wasn't looking for any more.)

"Munson." Hopper called, striding over and dashing all his hopes. There was a choked fury emitting off him, and given the way John audibly scooted his chair away, Wayne knew everyone had clocked it.

"Chief." Wayne greeted, inclining his head towards him.

Idly he wondered what the hell his nephew had done this time.

'So help me if he stole all the town's lawn flamingos and put them in that damn teachers yard again….'

Wayne didn't even get to finish his threat, the Chief was already next to him.

"Mind if I have a word outside?"

Dammit Eddie.

"Ah hell, what's he done now?" Wayne asked with a sigh, eyeing the coffee he had left morosely.

There was still almost half of it left and the pot had tasted fresh for once.

"What?" Hopper said, and then Wayne got to watch as the man ran through an entire chain of thoughts, each one punctuated by things like; "Oh," and "No. "

"This is something else." He finished, flushed and fidgeting, anger making him antsy.

Wayne stared up at him.

"Something else?" He repeated, not sure he heard.

"Yes, something else." Hopper snapped impatiently, before leaning forward, voice dropping low. "This doesn't involve your nephew, but we both know you owe me for how many times I've let that kid off, Wayne. That's a damn big favor I've been doing you and I'm calling it in."

If it were any other cop, it'd sound like a threat.

It was Hopper though. The same Hopper who Wayne had gone to school with.

They'd never been friends exactly, but they had been friendly and remained so. Even now, after Wayne had taken Eddie in, who’d gone on to be an undeniable pain in the local PD’s ass.

Hopper really did let the kid off easy.

Wayne really did owe him.

So he put down his coffee with a sigh, passed his newspaper over to John and stood up, motioning for Hopper to lead the way. Got into the Chief’s truck when he waved him in, and didn’t make a big fuss when Hopper tore out of the parking lot like hell was about to open up under them.

"Not a lot of the kids involved in the mall fire could be identified, but a few of them were." Hopper started, which felt nonsensical given the utter lack of context.

Wayne hummed to show he’d heard.

“Some of them got banged up more than others, and a lot of people wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t make it.”

A pause, Hopper white knuckling the steering wheel as he swung the truck hard around a turn.

“For certain people, those kids dying is the preferred outcome.”

A mix of fear and warning swopped low in Wayne’s gut.

"Jim." Wayne said, dropping the use of a last name because if any situation called for it, it was this one. "What exactly are you saying here?"

The Chief chewed on his split lip.

"I know you're smart, Munson. I know you, and plenty of others are aware that something's happening, been happening in this town."

Which was a hell of an understatement if you asked Wayne. Plenty of the upper classes might be able to bury their heads when it came to the military parading about and the flow of “accidents” they brought in their wake, but then, they didn't see all the other signs of trouble.

The absolute oddity that was Starcourt’s construction.

How it had been built using primarily outside crews and anyone who'd taken a singular look at the site could tell you they were building it weird.

Weird as in it looked like it would have a multi-level basement, and not what a mall should have.

Then there were the constant electrical problems. The backups upon backups that failed. The late night delivery vans headed out to the Hawkins Lab.

The things in the woods that kept spooking all the deer and the weird markings they left behind that unnerved even the hardest of hunters.

This didn’t even touch the Russian military that more than one reputable person swore was hanging around.

The very same Wayne himself had seen, on more than one occasion.

(And you couldn’t deny it; those boys were military. Past or present, it didn’t matter. They moved like a threat, and Wayne treated them like one, staying well clear.)

"Yeah." Wayne admitted. "I also know better than to stick my nose in it."

"That makes you a smarter man than me.' Hop complained under his breath, but the anger was self directed.

"The point is, there are some government types crawling around, doing shit they shouldn't be doing, and more than a few of them are in the business of making people disappear.”

This was absolutely not where Wayne had thought this was going.

Hopper took a breath. Than another.

A third.

It was starting to make Wayne nervous, in a way he hadn’t felt since a social worker had brought Eddie to him for the last time and final time. It was the feeling that things were about to shift in a way that would change the course of his life.

"Steve Harrington is sitting in my office right now, beat to absolute shit.” Hopper admitted.

Wayne gave him the floor to talk, letting him go at his own pace without interruptions.

“He's there because some of those government types finally figured out his parents are never fucking home.”

Wayne sucked in a breath.

"We both know his parents, Wayne. Harassing them to come back and take care of their kid won't work, and frankly, I’m beginning to think all the phone lines are tapped anyway.” He winced here, like voicing such a thing pained him, and Wayne understood.

It sounded a little too out there, a little like he was buying into a conspiracy.

Except he wasn’t. Wayne knew he wasn’t.

Jim Hopper might have been an alcoholic, a man living in pain and unconcerned with his own life, but if there was one thing he was solid for, it was shit like this.

He didn’t jump to conclusions. Didn’t believe the first thing people told him. Even at his worst, he did the work to see what was really happening, and made his decisions from there.

(Even if that decision was to accept the occasional bribe, or drive an intoxicated 13 year old Eddie home instead of hauling his ass into the drunk tank.)

“Harrington won’t admit it, but he’s got a hell of a concussion if not a full blown brain injury and he’s not reacting as well as he should to Suites trying to run him off the road.” Hopper continued. Angrily, he added, “Damn kid didn’t even come to me until they tried to break into his house last night.”

His fingers squeezed the wheel so hard Wayne heard the leather creak in protest.

“I’d take him, but my cabin is being renovated from…” He trailed off, heaving a sigh.

“A storm, so me and my kid are bunked with the Byers right now and we’re full up.”

Hawkins hadn't had a storm like that in years, but Wayne wasn't going to call him out on the blatant lie.

“I need a place to stash him for the next few weeks, until I can work with some of the higher ups sniffing around, and get them to call off their attack dogs.”

“And you want to stuff him with me.” Wayne finished.

“I know you don’t have the room.” Hopper admitted easily, stopping his truck at a red light and locking eyes with the other man. “But I also know you’ll be the last place anyone would look for him.”

'Ain’t that the damn truth.'

“You’re really gonna go this far for a Harrington?” Wayne asked, instead of the million of other questions leaping to the forefront of his mind.

This one, he figured, was the most important.

“He’s not his dad.” Hopper said, as firm as Wayne had ever heard him. “He’s not either of his parents, and he saved my little girl.”

Wayne hadn’t even known Hopper had another little girl, but he also knew better than to ask where the guy had found one.

It wasn’t his business, just as nothing else Jim was involved in, was his business.

Except, apparently, Steve Harrington.

“I’m gonna need my own truck if I’m takin' Harrington home.” Wayne said easily, instead of bothering to ask anything else.

If Jim said the kid was different than his daddy, then he was--because when it came to things like that, Jim didn't lie.

No point in it.

“I know. Just needed to talk to you first, without anyone overhearing.” Jim said, before swinging the police truck around and heading back to the Barn.

“I’ll stay in contact with you, and I’ll make sure Harrington pays you for the pleasure of your hospitality. Just--” Here Jim cut himself off, looking like he was struggling an awful lot with the next thing he wanted to say.

Once again, Wayne waited him out.

“Don’t let Steve fool you. He’s good at fooling people, letting them think he’s okay. Too good at it, and between the two of us, I have a real good idea of the reason why.”

A memory came to Wayne unbidden, of Richard Harrington and Chet Hagan, beating some poor kid in the highschool bathroom bloody. The grins on their faces as the poor guy wailed for them to stop.

How they almost hadn’t.

“Alright.” Wayne agreed.

Hopper swung back into the Barn's parking lot, and Wayne moved right to his own beat to shit truck, ready to follow Jim back to the police station.

He wasn’t a praying man, not anymore, but Catholisim wasn’t a thing that let you go easy.

He found himself sending up a quick prayer, fingers flicking in a kind of miniature version of the sign of the cross.

Considering his own kid’s history with Harrington, and the sheer small space of the trailer?

Wayne had a feeling it was needed.

#this has like t wo more parts #pre steddie #wayne as a BAMF #wayne and Hopper both as psuedo parents to Steve #ya'll are gonna have to put up with my weird ass jumping all over the place warm ups sorry lol #Gary's fourth piece is coming no worries #and then this will either take its place or the other one I have will #you CANNOT look me in the eye and tell me all the blue color workers arent aware shits going down #like 100% local crews took one look at starcourt and went what the fuck #nevermind you know the local power plant lol #and with demo critters running around its not like they were tearing through brushes and shit #your local hunters are gonna know somethings up #anyway #beat to shit Steve Harrington #my beloved #hes gonna show up busted to shit with a major grade concussion and Eddie is gonna shit himself #steve harrington #steddie #I spelled collar color and im not changing it #outsider pov #wayne pov #I will write the first person who knows where I pulled John from a prompt of their choice #catholic wayne munson #jim hopper

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tiredofsatansbullshit · 10 months

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just saw a tweet where someone was being nasty in the ao3 status twitter accounts replies and so here's your reminder that ao3 is run by volunteers!! while i also make jokes and don't know what to do with myself when ao3 is down, we gotta be mindful about the fact that they don't get paid for running ao3. like at all.

#thank you to the people who run ao3 #because it cannot be easy #i appreciate them so much #ao3 #ao3 down #archive of our own

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lassan-de-biztosan · 1 year

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Lonelyness, afterall, is like death. You can try to run from it, you can try to hide from it, you can try to reason with it, you can try to scream at it, you can try to cry to it, it's all in vain because it's inherent to your being and thus, unavoidable.

#death #lonelyness #unavoidable #you cannot hide #you cannot run #inherent #alone #depressed #sad

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poorly-drawn-mdzs · 5 months

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Parallel Lines and Brothers.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

#poorly drawn mdzs #mdzs #wei wuxian #jiang cheng #lan wangji #lan xichen #jin zixuan #Does anyone else think about the tragedy of the parallel lines? Of characters who are parallel lines?#Of running the same course as someone. Of echoing each other in perfect synchronicity.#It's more than being a foil. It's about being on the same path and being so near to each other.#and yet parallel lines never intersect. They cannot meet each other despite their existence being tied to another.#I think the brothers tragedy is just as much of a tragedy of parallel lines as is pre-resurrection wangxian.#Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian spend so much time running side by side and yet - they cant close this gap between them.#Even if their relationship never recovers - they are forever tied together through their past. The good and bad and ugly.#All the things that are left unsaid between them. All the love and sacrifices they made for each other that are never shared. Parallel line #I firmly believe any post-canon material that would have them be indifferent towards each other is just...really doing them a disservice.#And dear god the Lan brothers. They certainly love each other! Its a far fonder fraternal relationship than jiangxian (/platonic)#They fool you by having you think they have a good read on each other. Lan Xichen certainly wingmans + advocates for lwj!#But lets not forget - Lan Xichen by the end is in the reverse situation and headspace as Lan Wangji by the end of this story.#Lan Wangji is more free and open than he has ever been. He's in love. He's married. He and wwx are intersecting lines.#& LXC who grew up with and lived the same path as LWJ - who even is said to resemble him visually - his parallel line - shuts himself away #Despite all the love LWJ has for his brother I don't think he ever manages to reach him.

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mimikyuno · 8 months

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love and hope and kindness being the running motifs in madoka magica and the forces that can single-handedly save and curse someone.

madoka’s love and kindness being what saves homura from her suicidal tendencies, but also what ultimately dooms madoka to die at the hands of the walpurgisnacht. homura’s love for madoka and undying hope to save her what curses her to repeat time and traumatise herself over and over again, while also increasing madoka’s karma and by default, cursing her too. madoka’s refusal for homura’s hope to be in vain being the driving force that grants hope to all, but also ends madoka’s existence. sayaka’s love for kyousuke and her altruistic, heroic ideals being what gives her confidence and hope at first, but when confronted with misogyny and unrequited love (even when you told yourself you would not expect him to love you back just because you sacrificed yourself for him) being what curses her. kyouko’s love for her family being the catalyst that leads it to break apart, because in all her childlike devotion to her parents, she couldn’t see her father for who he was. mami’s kindness forcing her to put up a brave face and resulting in her demise.

but it all does not end in despair! sayaka’s newfound love for kyouko being the reason kyouko is no longer lost and angry and alone. mami’s kindness finding a recipient in nagisa, to whom she can finally be a parental figure. in one universe nagisa was the one to end mami’s existence, but now they can both heal and not be alone anymore. madoka’s love for homura encompassing time and space and saving her, every time, over and over again. even when homura does not want it. even when she refuses her hand. madoka will always reach for her and find her and save her and show her kindness, even when homura thinks she does not deserves any, even when she’s willing to die in her own personal hell. homura’s love being yes, what commits the unforgivable sin and tears god apart, but also it is only through her “selfishness” and “terrible” act that the others get a shot at a normal childhood/adolescence. kyouko and sayaka can be together at last, mami and nagisa find each other, madoka can live with her family again.

this is what i hope will be explored in the next movie. this intrinsic relationship between hope and despair, love as a lifeline and a curse. kindness and selfishness coexisting and influencing each other. i hope the girls manage to finally tip the scale between hope and despair towards the light. i hope madoka’s love will keep on reaching homura even when she thinks she’s evil incarnate, a devil. even when she thinks her existence as antithetical to madoka’s true nature. even when she thinks herself beyond salvation. i hope they get a shot at happiness, together this time.

#im going crazy if you cannot tell #im still running a fever so im sorry if this is like. nonsense #madoka magica #pmmm #puella magi madoka magica #walpurgis no kaiten #madohomu #kyosaya #madoka kaname #homura akemi #sayaka miki #kyouko sakura #mami tomoe #nagisa momoe #holy quintet #mine

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toasteaa · 22 days

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Suddenly struck with the thought of my faves twirling my hair around their fingers and I'm so deeply unwell about it!!!

Diluc getting distracted by a single free curl and trying to tuck it away, only to find himself even more distracted when the ends curl around the tip of his finger. How ardently he resists the urge to untuck it and give it a little tug, just to see it bounce back into a spiral when he lets it go again.

Kaeya giving a curl that somehow escaped its siblings wrapped up in a bun, a teasing pull and snickering when you swat at his hand lightly. Only to come back when you're focused on your work to continuously wind and unwind the hair around his fingers fondly.

Zhongli marveling at the way the sun catches each looping curl; lining them in what he believes is the finest gold that he's ever seen. Tenacious as stone when holding their shape, yet softer than down spun from clouds in his hands; he relishes in the way each curl he toys with loses it shape for only a moment before bouncing back the same as ever.

Xiao's familiar and signature wary gaze turning into one of shock and curiosity when he gives a ringlet a cautious tug, and it give a soft spring back into its original shape. He's too unsure of himself to do much more, but often finds himself passively toying with a curl or two whenever you're near.

Cyno running oiled fingers throughout your curls, helping you apply a protectant that will keep most of the heat and humidity of the forests at bay. Separating each curl so carefully, like you've taught him before; giving a satisfactory huff when his, "you should really call these 'cutie-cles'" joke makes you sigh, but the quivering of your shoulders and the light sway of your curls tells him that you're holding back your laugh.

Kaveh struck with a sudden stroke of genius and dashing to his drafts after spending the past thirty minutes mindlessly curling your ringlets on his fingers. A month later, you find pillars in his latest work with that same, familiar pattern as the ringlets he always toys with.

Neuvillette enamored with the image of you allowing a curl to coil about your fingers while you think. His hands itch to reach out and curl it himself, but he shows restraint in this public space. Perhaps in the privacy of his own quarters, you'll let him feel those ringlets curling around his fingers again.

Wriothesley, so familiar with the rigidity and gruffness of Meropide, finding a moment of solace when he gets the chance to bury his face in your curls. Always holding you as close as possible when you lay against his chest, just so he can see each coil spring back into place after he's stretched it out. Like a little calming ritual just for him.

Just! Just!!!!!! Play with my hair pleaseeee 🥺💕🙏🏾

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