BLOOD IN THE WATER
summary: “I think we’re all going to have do some pretty terrible things,” Eddie said quietly. His hand came to wrap in Richie’s shirt, trying to burn out the violent grip of his father’s from earlier. “None of us have a choice in anything anymore. Whatever happened at Greta’s tonight-“ Eddie’s voice broke and he felt Richie press a kiss into his hair. “There isn’t a good and a bad anymore. There’s just die or don’t.”
[or: after the gruesome murder of his younger brother, Bill Denbrough is determined to bring about the end of the string of crimes in Derry no matter the cost. As stories unwind and fall apart, there’s only more questions as everybody’s lives hang in the balance.]
chapter count: 14/21
chapter warnings: graphic depictions of violence, mentions of past rape, mentions of past character death, implications of sexual situations
Taglist: @honkhonkrichard @hufflepuffkaspbrak @emmieliabedelia @reddie-for-anything @wowdidiask @reddiesetrichie @beepbeepbitchard @lemonadeandrice @mirandosky @vanilluna @mqlvaa @fivxharmony
[Prologue] [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [Read Full Story on AO3] [Playlist]
Eddie Kaspbrak had just finished hanging the jacket up in his locker before it was slamming shut, nearly crushing his fingers and causing him to let out a small yelp. Standing behind where his open locker door had once been, was the tiny but fierce figure of Patricia Blum. She smiled happily up at him, as though she hadn’t just almost done damage to his hand.
“Come on, Kaspbrak,” Patty said cheerfully, grabbing his hand and trying to tug him down the halls. “We have places to go and answers to find. Whatever class you have can wait.”
Eddie let out a short, surprised noise as he stumbled under Patty’s surprising amount of force. “What? Where are we going? Is Richie-“
“Oh, Richie isn’t coming,” Patty said happily, walking quickly through the halls. Eddie’s heart jumped slightly, looking around the group of students. The whispers would no doubt to kicking to a start, Eddie being enough of a subject to school gossip ever since he started dating Richie. He’d wondered, for short moments, if it the reactions of the public could be anything similar to that of when Zachary Denbrough began dating Sharon. Eddie had started to feel as though he couldn’t walk, couldn’t breath, around his classmates without attracting attention. He supposed he should have expected that opening to his relationship with Richie Tozier would have been hot information, even with the amount of terrible things happening in Derry.
“Oh, I…” Eddie stalled for a moment, frowning and attempting to slow his steps behind Patty. “I should, I should probably go to class. I missed most of the last few weeks and I really shouldn’t skip out on anything else-“
Patty turned around and raise her eyebrows. “Eddie. Do you want to go to class?”
“No,” Eddie replied honestly without any hesitation. Nobody would want to go to a class where everybody- including your teachers- spent the entire time staring at you and whispering. “But-“
“Come on!” Patty grabbed at Eddie once more, yanking him through the halls fast enough that the heads of their classmates all whipped towards them. Eddie winced at the thoughts of all the rumors that would be following them out of the building.
Patty lead Eddie quickly through the cluster of student cars in the parking lot, then waited as a car pulled up to them. Stan Uris leaned out the drivers’ seat window and gave him an unimpressed look. “Alright. Get in.”
Eddie shook his head slightly, head spinning through a loop. “I… I thought you didn’t trust me.”
Stan sighed. “Beverly says you can’t be trusted… Which basically makes you the only person I find trustworthy about now.”
xxx
Richie pressed his yellow highlighter against the textbook and held it down, dragging it across a full line… then another… and another…. before sighing in frustration and tossing the highlighter back onto the desk. Leaning forward on his elbows, Richie ran fingers through his mess of curls.
“TOZIER!” Richie startled, looking up as Aurora Morgans came stomping into the otherwise empty classroom. Her brown eyes were blazing and slams a photograph down on the desk over his textbook. “You are not an easy dude to find, you know that?”
Richie sighed. “Yeah, Morgans. That was the whole point.”
Aurora flipped the photo over and Richie leaned to look at it on a reflex. A woman in a prom dress stared up at him, a woman he didn’t recognize. Richie’s eyes flicked back up to Aurora and he frowned. “This chick means nothing to me, and I’m pretty sure you know that. So, what are you fishing for?”
“Look a little bit closer and stop acting like a damn idiot,” Aurora growled. Richie shook his head slowly, reaching out for the photograph and pulling it towards him. His eyes landed on his mother and Frank Kaspbrak having a conversation in the background.
Richie made an aborted noise, and shook his head with a soft laugh. “What are you getting at, Morgans? They were friends, them talking together at a literal school function isn’t a crime. Why are you trying to make it into one?”
“This picture,” Aurora pointed at it angrily. “Was like, the only personal belonging that Robert Gray kept in his life after being arrested- and your mother is in it. This is the student he was dating while he was chopping up her classmates. Care to give your thoughts?”
Riche pushed away from his desk, and walked around in Aurora’s space. “If this is your snakey ass trying to accuse the Devils of being-“
“So quick to jump to the defense-“ Aurora began to mock before another person came stomping into the once deserted classroom and slammed the door shut. Ben Hanscom stomped towards them, glaring even more towards Aurora than he was towards Richie.
“You know, I tried. I really tried.” Ben was shaking his head, face contorted with a somehow calm rage. “I tried to get out, I tried to turn off all this curiosity bullshit. But this,” he shook a crumbled piece of paper into Aurora’s face. “But I guess I can’t! So what are we going to do?”
“What is it?” Richie crossed his arms to give a strong air of non-chalance. He seemed to remember Ben Hanscom being a stuttering, terrified mess in his drive way not too long ago, but this boy in front of him seemed to have had ever inch of fear drained from him and replaced with annoyance.
Ben tossed the paper in Richie’s direction, Richie fumbling with it and being forced to pick it up off the floor. “You can keep yourself away, but you can’t hide from what must happen. All will be revealed on the night of senior prom- Okay, what the fuck is this shit?”
Ben sighed. “I was delivered to the paper sometime yesterday. It had my name on it.”
“Somebody threatened you?” Aurora asked, voice cracking awkwardly. She reached out to take hold of Ben’s hand, but he yanked away and glared at her. Richie raised his brow and glanced back and forth between him, pursing his lips to keep from smirking.
“They threatened all of us,” Ben said coldly. “That shit about prom?”
“My sister…” Richie said with a soft voice. “There was the word prom written above her body when I found her.”
Aurora and Ben glanced at one another for moment with sharp eyes. “And you never thought that might be important at all?” Aurora asked in a sharp, serious tone.
Richie narrowed his eyes at her, frowning. “The police were all there, they fucking saw it. Sorry I didn’t report to you with the latest gossip immediately after finding my thirteen year old sister’s dead body. I’ll make note of that next time.”
“That’s not what I meant and you fucking know it, Tozier.” Aurora rolled her eyes and even Ben was shaking his head.
“Actually, I don’t think I do know that,” Richie almost growled and a twinkle of that all-familiar fear flashed on Ben’s face. “All I know about you, Aurora Morgans is that you’re a soulless information sucker who I would bet lost her virginity to the super information highway and-“
“Okay, okay, we get it-“ Ben broke through, waving his hands in front of him. “As true as all those things are-“
“Hey!” Aurora gasped.
“They aren’t going to help us now.” Ben finished without out so much as glancing at the offended look Aurora was giving him.
“Helping us?” Richie laughed bitterly. “No offense but I’m not part of whatever this puppy-love-crush-turned-hate-fuck relationship you two have going on, I have my own issues.”
“And your own hate fuck relationship?” Aurora asked with a sweet voice.
Richie’s jaw clenched and arms twitched. “Morgans, you rat-spirited cunt, I really don’t want to fucking drop you kick right now but I fucking will.”
“I could take your hyped-up daddy’s boy ass,” Aurora shot back with a laugh. “You don’t have your little gangster buddies to back you up, you’re not even wearing your jacket anymore. We both know you’re nothing on your own.”
“Stop, stop, stop,” Ben cried, pushing himself between Aurora and Richie as Richie’s eyes flashed dangerously. “Basically, this is all our problem!! If we were smart, we’d probably like, drop out of school and become hermits.”
“I’m not running away from some hyped-up psychopath,” Aurora said immediately, to Richie and Ben’s matching eye rolls. “Benny, we’re so close to blowing this case wide open. Look-“ She drove forward to grab the photo from Richie’s desk but Ben was turning his head away.
“This isn’t some case, Aurora!” Ben cried. “This is people’s lives- our lives.”
“Then why didn’t you go to the police with the letter instead of me?” Aurora challenged with a smirk.
“I didn’t come to you,” Ben shot back. “I came to Richie- you just happened to be here.”
Richie made a mockery of an honour noise and pressed his hands over his heart. “I am honoured, Haystack. Look a that, the loving is really starting to blossom here-“
“Shut up, Tozier,” Aurora and Ben said in unison, which only prompted a larger grin from Richie.
“Listen, detectives,” Richie held his hands and shook his head. “I respect your…. weird obsessions with crypic clues but this is way heavy. I don’t want any part of this!”
“You’re already part of this!” Ben actually yelled, Richie and Aurora’s both startling. “Fucking like it or not, we’re all a part of this! I think we’re all going to have to work together to fix this bullshit!”
“And end scene,” Richie said, slapping his hands together. “Wonderful performance, Mr Hanscom, just splendid. Keep your ears open for your award nomination, it should be coming in anytime now.”
“Are you always such a douchebag?” Ben hissed.
“Yes,” Richie and Aurora said in unison. Richie clapped his hands together a few more times then began to gather up his belongings. “Well, this was fun, y’all. I’ve got to go… somewhere that isn’t here with you.”
“Need to go find your little boy toy?” Aurora asked. “Don’t bother, I heard Uris and Blum tossed them into the backseat of the Rabbi’s car and drove off at the start of first period.”
For a spilt second, there was an emotion of Richie Tozier’s face that gave even Aurora a pause. He stepped forward and took Aurora’s chin in his fingers and tilted it up towards him. “Rory, sweetheart… jacket or not, I could still make you the next Derry bitch to disappear.”
xxx
Eddie stepped out of the backseat of Stanley Uris’ car, looking up into the sunny sky. The Neibolt House was a dark stain on the whole street, falling apart sidings and over grown grass that held a height similar to the rickety front porch. The yellow crime scene tape draped around the front door really completed the picture. Stomach tense, Eddie turned back to the couple behind him. “What are we doing at Neibolt?”
Patty hiked her backpack higher on her shoulders and grinned excitedly. “We’re going to find out the truth. From people who really know what happened. The people who died.”
“What… are you talking about ghosts?” Eddie asked with a crinkle of his nose. “Like… actual ghosts? Do Jewish people even believe in ghosts?”
Stan came around the front of the car and sighed. “I- personally as a Jewish person- am skeptic of ghosts as best. But the actual religion definitely has spirit aspects.”
“The Torah forbids trying to communicate with the dead,” Patty added in too-happy a voice. “But so does the Bible and literally every other book of Worship, and white people do that shit all the time.”
“This is how white die,” Eddie said quietly, glancing back over his shoulder at the old house. “My ma always told me to never go in this house, you know? It’s cursed.”
“She’s probably right.” Patty cheered, taking Stan’s hand in one and Eddie’s in the other. She pulled them quickly up to the house and ripped down the strings of CSI tape. Eddie made a small noise of disapproval but followed the pair of them down into the house.
“We’re going right into the heart of everything,” Patty called over her shoulder as she stomped down a set of stairs that looked as though only the barest of weight would send them tumbling apart. Eddie and Stan glanced at one another anxiously, both hesitating at the top of the steps before Patty’s voice carried back up to them. “Come on, chicken shits! I did it just fine!”
“I’ve got a foot of height and almost 100 pounds on you!” Stan shouted down but quickly sighed and took off down after her. Eddie inhaled sharply, wishing for once that he still carried around his inhaler from youth, and moved down the stairs as quickly as he could. He collided with Stan at the bottom, who gave him a look of distaste before they both stepped further into the dingy basement.
“Oh my god…” Eddie whispered, taking in the make shift bed on the ground and the chains that were still attached to the walls. His stomach twisted and churned at the thought of Janie Tozier- the little pigtail girl- being held down here for months with no hopes of ever getting free. Eddie wrapped his arms around himself, noting the stark paleness of Stanley’s face as they both move closer to the papers and cup that Patty was setting up right in front of the makeshift bed.
“Wow, wait, right here?” Stan asked, voice cracking slightly under his nerves. He and Eddie both creeped closer, looking at one another in mild distress. “Isn’t that a little disrespectful?”
It was that moment that Eddie really realized that Stanley had watched Janie Tozier grow up similar to how he’d watched Georgie Denbrough. Probably even closer, given the bond that the Devils all shared with one another, and kind of found family connection that Eddie would likely never have with anybody. Eddie swallowed harshly and found himself to recognize that this wasn’t his place to break down.
“It’s morbid, I know,” Patty said sadly. “But I feel like being as close to Janie’s spirit as possible will help us. She hasn’t been dead long and it’ll be hard to-“
“Yeah, yeah,” Stan started shaking his head and took several steps back towards the stairs. “She hasn’t been dead long. This is messed up, Pats, I’m not… I’m not doing this. I want to know if Bev did this probably worse than you do, but I… There’s got to be another way.”
“We’ve already broken in!” Patty argued. “The serious felons are already done with! The police aren’t even going to come back here, you know what they’re like!”
“It’s not the legality I’m having with this, it’s the moral issues,” Stan said angrily, rubbing at the side of his face. “I’m not going to sit here and try to… talk to Richie’s dead little sister to find out if Beverly killed her! I… I don’t want to know that bad. It’s…. disturbing.”
Patty gave Stan a sad look and as she opened her mouth to reply, the door to the basement slammed shut and Eddie felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Goosebumps shot down his arms and he felt moments away from throwing up, watching how Patty tugging her Devils jacket closer around herself. The pieces of paper she’d placed on the ground started blowing until only four remained on the floor.
P… R … O… M
Eddie gasped, flashes of dripping red letters on a wall burning the backs of his eyes. He grabbed at Stan and started pulling him. “We need to go, we need to go now.”