chapter one | chapter two | chapter three | chapter four | chapter five | chapter six
They trio - the three doomed musketeers - had only been riding for about a block when they realized that they hadn’t escaped as clean as they had thought. They were not ahead. They had started as the ones doing the hunting, now they were the ones being hunted. And that was made crystal clear when Bill heard metal on gravel, and the cry of Eddie in pain. He wished that sound wasn’t so familiar.
Eddie was pedaling as fast as the bike would let him, which was a fine speed, but seemed sub-par compared to Silver the Speeding Bullet. And he had his eyes fixed on the end of every street they turned onto, because he just wanted to get away, he wasn’t even intent on getting to a particular location - like home. He just wanted to put as much distance between he and Henry as possible. Unfortunately, it turns out he was closer than they thought. So close, actually, he appeared on the road in front of Eddie. Like he thought he was invincible. Like he thought the reason the bullet hadn’t hit him was because he had some kind of natural force field. Like he was being protected. As if Eddie hadn’t been the one who saved him.
Eddie had saved Henry. What a horrible concept.
Eddie froze for a moment, when he realized that this childhood bully would rather get run over than move, and he swerved. Because Henry wouldn’t be the only one hurt if Eddie tried to go through him. And he swerved in such a way that sent him into the great, big oak tree that stood on the side of Dryyer Street - with a branch just low enough that Bill was able to climb it when Stan got his kite stuck in it’s particularly high branches last summer. Eddie shut his eyes tight as he felt the collision. Like it might not happen if he couldn’t see it.
It did.
Bill tried his best to come to a graceful stop, because that sound he heard had to have meant disaster, and he was right. Although, the graceful stop didn’t pan out. The stop was to abrupt to give them both time to get their feet on the ground, to balance themselves. So the bike tilted, they hit pavement, caught themselves the best they could with their hands. A piece of stone dug into Ben’s palm, but he got off the bike as soon as he could manage, because it was instinct. Because he knew he was the majority of he weight, and it would be much easier for Bill to escape if he wasn’t weighing it down.
Two bike crashes in the span of two minutes.
One insane bully looking for quick revenge.
A Tozier Voice speaks in Eddie’s head “Tomorrow's headline! Four Sixteen Year Olds Kill Each Other in Death Battle. Dead boy grounded by livid mother! Grounded for the rest of eternity!”
Henry was laughing that terrible cackle of his. Bill got to his feet, ignored a pain throb through his leg. It was dull, enough to feel, enough to maybe impede, but not to debilitate, not enough to concern. Eddie had hit the tree trunk hard, there was blood on his face, but he had the breath knocked out of him so severely he couldn't find the mind space to figure from where it had come? Did he break his nose, or had the bark from the tree scraped his face that badly? He lied in the grass next to the tree, searching his pockets for an inhaler that had been abandoned in the roadside gravel during the fall. And once again, Eddie was convinced this was the end for him. His gasps, and Henry’s chuckles were all the Bill could distinctly hear. Sounds that he heard Ben’s voice interrupt.
“Bill?” Ben’s voice was strained, panicked, breathy, “where’s the gun?”
Bill’s the breathless one now. And maybe he understands how Eddie feels when his lungs suddenly betray him. Because he was sure he hadn’t put the gun in his bag - the bag that Ben was desperately searching, that still had a novel and a history textbook inside - and if they didn’t have it, who did?
They were snapped out of their panic when they heard a snap. Thankfully not the snap of a gun, or a trigger, or even a switchblade. But the snap of an inhaler under the heel of a boot.
Bill sprung to action as soon as the sound clicked into place, as soon as he saw the splinters of plastic under Henry’s shoe. He ran at him, in a football-esque tackle that was meant to injure. And Ben was almost sure of two things: one, was that Eddie would run out of air before they could get him anywhere. And two, that Bill would fail to knock him over, because no matter how grand Bill looked to his friends, Henry would always be bigger.
But Henry’s back hit the gravel - Ben was wrong about at least one thing - tore the back of his shirt. But there was one thing in the back of Bill’s mind, during the assault, that he couldn’t shake, even while his heart was racing and he had much better things to focus his attention on. When would this end? What could stop him, if not a gun? Would they actually end up killing him? And could they do it before Eddie runs out of oxygen.
Eddie grabbed a fistfull of grass, coughing, Richie, where are you?
He heard footsteps beside him, he thought for a moment he’d see Richie kneel down, and he thought for a moment he might just find the strength in himself to hurt him somehow. But then he saw it was Ben, and he realized that was a much more realistic face to see above him.
Henry struggled, cussing viciously, trying to get Bill off of him before he had a chance to hit him, or to at least turn the tables. Bill grabbed a fistfull of Henry’s hair - a mirror of the grass in Eddie’s hand - and smashed his head into the gravel - a mirror of what Henry had done to Stan those few days ago. And Henry winced, pried his eyes open in a glare so hateful Bill could say he had come face to face with the devil and it wouldn’t have been that far from the truth. He hiked his fist back to hit him, heart racing, in the same moment that Henry pointed the gun at him.
Found it.
Bill froze. Henry held his breath - resilient, fearless, insane. Ben was trying to help Eddie up, because they had to get him help somehow, somewhere. Eddie was just trying to breath.
Its a placebo. I can breath. Breath. Richie i need you. Breath.
Bill closed his eyes, hand frozen in the air, ready to hit. And then the three of them, all at once, heard the trigger snap. Eddie stopped gasping, Ben turned towards the source, and Bill nearly died from fear. But he didn’t. He wasn’t even bleeding. There was no bullet. He played a game of Russian Roulette and won.
Bill swung his fist down to connect with Henry’s nose, dead center of the face, gush of blood in a split second, sore fist in the next. He smashed the hand holding the gun down onto the gravel, and then again when it didn’t let go the first time. He felt like he was the star of an action movie, he was sure he had seen a reproduction of this scene somewhere else. He pushed the gun away from them, because Henry refused to quit, how could have they expected anything different? - and he didn’t want to risk not being so lucky. Eddie watched, breath slowly oozing back into his lungs as he was pulled to his feet, he saw the smashed aspirator on the gravel, Bill and Henry brawling a few inches to its left, people sleeping in their bedrooms just on the other side of the street, someone watching TV in their living room, totally ignorant to the war waging outside their white picket fence. And he took a shaky breath in, grateful to be breathing. Not thinking, contemplating or really noticing that his lungs decided to cooperate. And honestly, he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to think about it. He just wanted to get out of there, and maybe yell at Bill a little later.
“Thanks, Bill,” Eddie said. Bill’s tired, half-crazy face seemed suddenly lovely to him—lovely and well loved. He felt a dim sense of amazement. I’d die for him, I guess, if he told me to. What kind of power is that?
The Kids From Stephen King’s It (2017): Ben Hanscom
↳ Derry is not like any town I’ve been in before. They did a study once and, it turns out, people die or disappear at six times the national average. And that’s just grown ups. Kids are worse. Way, way worse. It (2017) dir. Andrés Muschietti
chapter one | chapter two | chapter three | chapter four | chapter five
The gun goes off with a bang, which was expected, but startling.
There were several things that seemed to have not been part of the plan. Later, though, Bill would justify that they were, or that they should have been.
First, was the fact that Eddie, in shock, pushed his arm out of the way. Hit his elbow so that the gun was no longer pointed at the human - although sometimes they doubted his sanity, they couldn't deny the fact he was human, he had to be. Which means that killing him would, by law - by definition - be murder. And Eddie didn’t want Bill to be a murderer. Because if the gun happened to kill him, he would have gone to jail. (Eddie’s mom told him once that she knows a friend who lives in LA, who shot a gun by accident in a parking lot. The bullet lodged in some stranger's leg, and they went to jail for 20 years - and they hadn’t even killed them!) But really, it was a reflex. If he took the time to think about it, he’s not really sure what he would have done differently, or if he would have done it differently. Maybe he would have reasoned that there was no point in averting the aim because there was no bullet anyway. (would have been a mistake.)
But that’s where the second previously unaccounted for surprise of the evening comes in: the bullet that shattered some kind of ceramic bowl or tile. Making the sound a plate might make if you dropped it from the third floor of a building. The trio starred in alarm.
The gun had been loaded.
Henry had come this close to being dead, or seriously injured.
And that wouldn’t have been a bad thing. But Bill going to jail? That would have broken them all.
For maybe the first time in all three of their lives, they saw Henry cower with their very own eyes. They saw him shrink away from something. They saw Henry Bowers flinch.
“Bill.” Ben said, with obvious, urgent panic, “We need to go.” a light turned on in the distance, somewhere in the junkyard, there must be someone still working. Someone who heard that.
Bill snapped himself out of his shock. He could question how the bullet escaped his inspection of the gun later. He could apologize to Eddie later. He could contemplate the whole idea and its origin later. But now, Ben was right. They needed to get out of them before Henry regained his composure, and whatever staff remained here made an appearance.
Surprisingly, Eddie pulled out in front in the race to the road, where Bill was on his heels, and Ben was keeping good pace. It was funny, that they thought they had won this one. Eddie would laugh bitterly in a few nights time at the fact he and Ben seemed to have bought into Bill’s theory that they would scare the fight and insanity right out of Henry Bowers.
News Flash - Coming to you FRESH from Richard Tozier airwaves:
That’s not how things work.
When a tin can hit the back of Eddie’s thigh, he knows right away that Henry hadn’t given up yet. After being shot at, he was only more angry. Bill nearly killed him (- was this the first time?) and he was not about to let them get away without a fight.
They tried to increase speed, but they felt like he hit their limit. The speedometer quivering on the brink of the highest possible mph. So Henry was gaining.
Eddie had almost forgotten about how angry he was at Richie. How despite the common sense he tried to enforce on that particular train of thought, he still blamed him for this whole ordeal. But when he trips, stumbles forward, cuts his cheek on something un-named in obscurity, but sharp, regains his balance, hand tags the ground to keep up, continues running - he remembers the fact that Richie wasn’t here to help him up, and push him to keep on going. He wasn’t there at the beginning to make The Joke that would have shut Bill up. That would have convinced him not to go through with this suicide mission he was so set on completing.
But of course Richie Trashmouth Tozier was absent.
So Eddie just kept running.
While this whole ordeal was going down, Richie was walking down aisles of the department store. Occasional accidental security camera glances, that turned into smiles, that turned into waves, which prompted the cashier to keep a tentative eye on him. Eddie, Bill, and Ben were running for their lives, and Richie was shopping, listening to dreadful elevator music soundtrack that the manager probably chose.
It would suck if Eddie died - then all the work he put into his birthday present would be for nothing.
Six feet scuffled on pavement, when they finally reached it. The street light failed to reach where they were in the bushes, gravel ground under their feet, small clouds of dirt were kicked up as they all seemed to run into each other. Frantic, they looked around in the dark for their bikes. Everything looked like tree, grass and garbage. What made the situation especially intense, was the fact they could no longer hear Henry, much less see him. And the fact they didn’t know where he was, put them all on edge. Because they knew he was there. He wouldn't have given up. And if he had - if today was the one out of one thousands chance - that he had given up, they wanted to get out of there before he changes his mind.
“Bill-” Ben gasped, his throat was raw from running, “I’m not fast enough-”
“The b-b-bike-”
“That too” It wasn’t really Ben’s fault, because they bike was old and to small for him. From when they were all still in junior high, and Bill had that new electric blue one that his parents got him for Easter. Guess it wasn’t so new anymore though.
“Hide.” Eddie suggested with urgency, eyes wide, concerned for Ben, who looked reluctant and terrified.
“I-” he protested meekly, not out of stubbornness. If he had of thought the plan would work, and he could hide without being seen, he would have gladly stayed back. But that wouldn’t end well, and he was certain.
“Ruh-Ride with me.” Bill pulled Silver out of some bushes, thorns that he could have sworn weren't there before cut up his wrists and hands, he didn’t care - too panicked, ready to run, hit the ground with those tires.
“Shit, Bill, I can’t.” Ben said, and there was an impatient doubt in his voice. As if maybe he thought Bill was teasing him, but Big Bill knew better, he knew that it was just a tad of insecurity. He didn’t want to be the reason that they crashed, or Bill couldn’t get the bike going or the reason they were slowed down. Maybe he would just hide.
“Sh-Sh-Shit, Ben, you c-can.” Bushes rustled, Eddie tugged his bike as hard as he could, it was stuck on something, he fell back, but scuffled to his feet real quick. Didn’t even clean the dirt off him, or notice as a banana peel stuck to him for a second before relenting to gravity.
So, because he didn’t have time to argue, Ben got in the basket. Scared, of coarse, that it would bend or break under his weight. And he was more than scared, hell, he was sure that Bill wouldn’t be able to get going. But he swung his leg on and Ben tried his hardest to help him keep balance, his face was red and concentrated, he felt almost guilty. Silver was slow at first, and, unlike the banana peel that Eddie had fallen on, seemed to defy gravity. Like they were in some kind of alien, zero-gravity simulation. But maybe it was just luck. They almost tipped over for a second, Bill stood up, pushed the pedals into action with all his might, a vein faded into view on his forehead - but he would get going, and once they get going they’d be fine.
“You a-okay, Bill?”
Bill nodded, and Ben understood enough.
Eddie had pulled ahead, glancing back at them every few seconds, going slow enough not to ride away from them, but fast enough to satisfy the fearful adrenaline that was thrumming through his still small body.
The chains on the bike started moving at a steadier pace. Ben leaned too far to one side, sucked in his breath, they steadied, dipped, regained composer, and then seemed to be off.
“HI HO SILVER AWAY.” a smile spread on Bill’s face, slowly at the corners, and then taking over his expression. He caught up with eddie, and surpassed him, like it was nothing at all. - It was like they were back in 1958, and there was some whole other nightmare behind them. Ben suddenly felt like he was 12 years old again.
That seemed like so long ago.
Eddie pedalled faster, he wouldn’t catch up - no one caught up to Silver with Bill as captain - but he could follow close behind. He had this screwed up, concentrated expression, bitter, frantic. He leaned forward a little. He thought that they had gotten away. They hadn’t won this one, and he was beginning to doubt that was even a logical concept. But he thought that maybe they had gotten away.
He was wrong.
The bell rang behind Richie as he walked out of the department store.
a/n: one person asked to be tagged so again: @darklovies
So everyone knows Richie Tozier is a Certified Gay Dumbass but so is Eddie? he’s also a huge dumbass? just… Richie and Eddie are the biggest dumbasses of the group? They are a gay dumbass power couple??? stop erasing Eddie’s dumbassary? It takes a dumbass to date a dumbass???????? Eddie is a dumbass.
stan is gonna die alone in a bathtub, probably torn between the nostalgic memories of his childhood and the feeling of the lady from the painting nearly ending his life. the deadlights.
eddie is gonna die in the sewers, missing his arm, and covered in blood and dirt, forced to spend the rest of eternity unclean. dirty.
richie is going to be forgotten by those he cares about, his worse fear coming true and he won’t even know it.
and mike is going to stay behind, watch his friends move on and be trapped in memories of the past. alone.
origamiaround
titsay
turnnoffyourmind
gummygunk
