Hellfire’s Sweetheart
(gif source)
A/N: the last flufftober fic is coming guys i promise. but this has been in my head for a while and i had to write it to get it out of my head so i could focus on other things 😅 anyway this is based on both how i am often the only girl in a group and how my dice bag looks with several stranger things dice sets amongst my own dice set -mod angel
Pairing: Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader
Summary: The freshman boys are surprised by someone they meet in Hellfire.
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Joining a new club was always intimidating, but Dustin, Mike, and Lucas were no strangers to Dungeons & Dragons, so they weren’t as nervous as they could’ve been. They had already met Eddie, who had basically recruited them in the cafeteria a couple weeks before the campaign started. That was the scary part; nothing after that could really surprise them.
When they walked into the club room for Hellfire, they were met with basically an empty room besides Eddie, who was setting up. Various notebooks and dice sets were scattered around the table, indicating that people dropped their stuff off here.
When Eddie heard the door open, he grinned and held his arms open dramatically. “Welcome to Hellfire, boys.”
Lucas and Mike tried to play it cool and not make it seem like they were the only newbies at the club, but Dustin responded with a bright, excited smile. He looked over at them enthusiastically before bounding towards the table as they followed more cautiously behind him.
“Are we early?” Mike asked, noting the lack of people in the room. He scanned over the table at everyone’s dice sets, noticing one that was a soft pink color, embellished by sparkles, that Eddie had to push out of the way to set up his DM screen since they were right next to him. Mike made a face of confusion, picking up one of the dice. “Whose-“
“Nah, you’re not early,” Eddie shrugged, cutting him off. “Everyone’s made a sort of ritual of going to the bathroom before every session. Say they don’t want to ruin the momentum once they get going, which I appreciate,” he explains, putting a hand over his heart after the last part.
The other boys were also now peeking at the sparkly dice, which is something they had never seen before. They were obviously wondering which one of the guys they had already met used that one. Mike put the die down, looking at them as if in silent conversation.
Just then, the doors to the club room were shoved open, and a girl came practically bouncing through it. “I still say we should move the club room,” she spoke, presumably to Eddie but really just to the room in general. “The bathrooms near here are disgusting.”
Eddie smiled at her, waving her off. “And I say again, this is the only room we can use.”
She came prancing over to him, a slight pouty look on her face. “You never listen to my great ideas,” she said, her voice a playful whine but clearly not serious. She was met with only an eye roll from Eddie.
The freshman boys were staring at her so hard they were practically boring holes into her. They had never considered a girl being in Hellfire, having never really seen a girl playing D&D before (other than Nancy playing with them when they were younger, but that didn’t count). But there she was, her Hellfire shirt tucked into a pink pleated skirt that definitely did not match the shirt or the thick ring that she was wearing as a necklace that bounced whenever she walked.
She noticed them now, smiling brightly at them. “Oh, it’s always so exciting when new people join the campaign!” She exclaimed, clapping her hands together before skipping over to them and introducing herself. The boys introduced themselves hesitantly.
“Right!” She clapped her hands, turning towards Eddie again and making her way back to him, putting her hand on his shoulder. “I left one of my textbooks in my last class. Don’t start without me.”
“What do you take me for?” He asked in faux-offense, ruffling her hair. “I’d never start without you. Hurry up, though. You know how cranky the guys get if we start late.”
She gave his shoulder a pat before leaving the room in a rush, her hair bouncing inside her sparkly scrunchie with every stride she took. All of the freshman boys just stood there for a moment, stunned.
Dustin was the first to break the silence. “… You have a Disney Princess in this club?” He asked Eddie in a joking tone.
Eddie snorted a laugh. “Yeah, you won’t think that when you’re playing with her,” he assured them, assuming his position at the head of the table. “Don’t count her out just because she’s a girl. She’s ruthless.”
Any further prodding was cut off by the rest of the club members entering. They scanned the room, waving to the mostly-new faces before turning to Eddie. “Where’s-“
“She forgot something in her last class,” Eddie explained immediately. When he heard the groans that immediately left their mouths, Eddie shook his head. “She’ll be back any minute, and if you complain I won’t be half as nice if you have to leave the room before our session.”
“You wouldn’t be half as nice to us anyway,” one of the boys grumbled, sitting down at his spot at the table. “We’re not your favorites.”
“Hey,” Eddie pointed a finger at him. “I don’t play favorites. I’m very fair.” His comment was just met with an eye roll before the doors opened again, almost as if on cue.
“Sorry, guys!” The girl came bounding over to the table, reaching for her bag and shoving her newly acquired textbook into it. “I’m good now. Hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long.”
“Not at all,” Eddie assured her, patting her on the shoulder as she took the seat closest to him. “Everyone else just got here a minute ago,” he continued, giving them a pointed look. They just shrugged back at the two of them; they couldn’t say anything because he wasn’t wrong.
When everyone took their seats, the new boys sat at the unclaimed chairs. Eddie dimmed the lights to set the mood, crouching on his chair when he came back over, starting his theatrical introduction to the campaign.
Any anxiety about being the newbies of the group faded away as the session went on. The familiarity of the game overtook everything, and they weren’t treated any different than everyone else. Eddie wasn’t kidding about the girl they were wary about before; the sweet, cheerful girl turned into something else entirely, assuming the persona of her chaotic magic-user. They couldn’t even tell her alignment, which kind of scared them.
After the session, everyone talked excitedly, the new campaign sparking a passionate discussion between everyone. Eddie smiled to himself as he was packing everything up, obviously feeling a bit proud.
After a while, everyone started to disperse, and the three freshman boys all checked the clock, saying to Eddie that they couldn’t be late for their rides. He shrugged his shoulders, everything finally packed away. “If you ever have a problem, I can drive you home.”
“My sister stays here for the newspaper anyway,” Mike explained, inching towards the door. “So she might as well drive me. But she gets pissed if I’m late, so…” he trailed off with a wave as he backed out of the door.
“I actually have a basketball thing…” Lucas said awkwardly, as if bringing up a sport in a D&D club was a sin. “I have a friend that helps me practice for tryouts. But, yeah, I’m also late,” he slung his bag over his shoulder, throwing a “see you later” towards the room as he also left.
Eddie looked at Dustin, asking him a silent question. “Oh, no,” he shook his head. “I made Steve promise to pick me up after his shift.”
The girl looked up at him, a puzzled look on her face that mimicked Eddie’s as they looked at each other before she went back to shoving books in her backpack. “Well, offer’s always on the table if you need it,” Eddie assured him.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Dustin nodded, walking out with the only two people left in the room. When they got outside, they waved goodbye. Eddie started heading towards his van, with the girl following closely behind him.
Two of the boys from the club were still talking in the front of the parking lot, and Dustin walked over to them as he waited for Steve. He still eyed the girl as she was walking away. “Isn’t it weird to have a girl here?” He asked them.
One of them snorted. “Don’t let Eddie hear you say that. He gets mad.”
“He’s very protective of her,” the other boy agreed. “Plus, she’s been here long enough that it doesn’t feel weird anymore,” he added with a shrug.
Dustin looked over at where the two were still walking together, the thought that she had just parked near him seeming less likely of a possibility. “I guess he takes her home?”
“Well, yeah…” The boys both look at each other as if hesitant to say something before adding, “They are dating.”
Dustin’s head whipped around. “Wait, really?” He asked as he was met with nods. “Why didn’t he say anything?”
“He never tells new members at first. She gets cautious looks by new people,” one of them explained, gesturing to Dustin as an example. “He lets them get to know her first so they know that she’s not just here because she’s his girlfriend. She loves to play, and he doesn’t give her any special treatment.”
Dustin nodded in thought as Steve finally pulled up to him, seeming to remind the other boys that they needed to leave too. They waved goodbye as Dustin got in Steve’s car, noticing now that Eddie and the girl were stopped by his van, smiling at each other as they put their things in the trunk.
Steve noticed Dustin looking somewhere, his head turning to follow his eyes. He saw this girl with Eddie, standing on her tiptoes to give him a kiss, laughing as he picked her up and spun her around.
“Huh,” Steve said in slight surprise. “I’ve never seen her before.”
Dustin faced forward again, speaking sarcastically to him. “There’s a girl in this school you didn’t try to ask out?”
Steve rolled his eyes. “I don’t know everybody. Just… most people,” he shrugged.
“Are you mad because someone you called ‘the freak’ has a steady girlfriend who shares his interests while you’re still hopping from girl to girl and not finding anything of substance?” Dustin asked, his voice slightly teasing in a way that almost sounded condescending.
Steve put the car into drive, looking out the windshield as he sighed. “I don’t have to drive you home. I could leave you here,” he deadpanned, even though he was already driving away.
That first session was the only one that had any kind of uneasy feelings. The boys soon fit in perfectly with the rest of the club, talking with them easily every day now. They were very lucky to find friends that were so accepting when they just started high school, and a club they could look forward to every week.
