revivalproject | Heaven's on Fire

Entry tags:

Heaven's on Fire - KISS

WHO: Billy Hargrove and those that join him
WHERE: Mostly Temba's city-center area, maybe the Upside-Down
WHAT: Hey there's an event thingy
WHEN: During the event timeline
WARNINGS:STRANGER THINGS SPOILERS, profanity, event warnings, violence, panic/PTSD attacks, will update as they make themselves known

October 10th

Run To You - Bryan Adams
He’s in the civic center when the storm hits. Billy had seen it coming, but didn’t think anything of it. It’s a storm. It wouldn’t be anything to worry about. Earthquakes (well, volcanoes), those were something to worry about. Storms were not. So he had done his workout as usual as it hit and when he left…

…Well, Billy would wish later he hadn’t. Because upon leaving the civic center with the intention of hitting the diner and then heading home, he heard something. No, not something.

Someone.

He whirls around in place, his hair whipping about wildly as he struggles to see if it’s her. And Billy sees her in the distance. Tired muscles be damned, he breaks into a run, heading right towards the woman. She doesn’t seem to get closer no matter how far he runs.

“MOM!!” he all but screams out, determined to get to her, damn it. It’s hard to see with all of the lights out and the storm blocking out the sun. “Mom!” he shouts again. She disappears into the clouds, reappearing in different positions in the distance, never in the same spot. Billy looks confused, turning to try and track her.
 What was going on?!

The ghost of his mother disappeared and he turned, looking for her. “I DONT’ UNDERSTAND!!” he yells, feeling the echo of those words from when he was at the Steelworks building.

October 11th - 12th 

It’s The End of the World As We Know It - R.E.M.
It’s not the gate opening that starts it. It’s not the sight of the stupid looking bats or that weird flower dog.

It’s the gigantic thing that he knows from the mall. Seeing that mind flayer on the other side of the gate while trying to get from the cabin to the hotel to make sure there are others okay (hint: that didn’t happen). He freezes, the blood draining from his face to leave his skin white. Billy’s clammy and cold all in the span of a few seconds, but more importantly?

He’s terrified.

Billy knows that that monster can do. He’s felt it. It’s going to kill him when he’s sent home by the aliens here.

It’s here to kill him.

He ducks behind the fountain before darting to be against one of the side walls of the diner. Billy’s curling up, screaming and holding his head and looking like he’s agony. The guy is physically fine, but his mind is not. Guess seeing the very creature you helped create in your world while being possessed by the enemy would do that to you.

October 13th - End

If You Want Blood (You Got It) - AC/DC
No. He can’t be a pussy about this shit. It’ll kill him back home, but Billy has the tools to stop the beasts here. Gladio had found him in the chaos and dropped off an axe. Something about ‘use it if you need it, kid’ before running off to do more warrior things.

The axe had felt heavy in his lap from where he was sitting. But then Billy stood up, testing out it’s weight as he had been trained. It felt good. Felt right. He gave it a few swings before the confidence started growing in him. Billy could do this. He stopped the flayer’s tongue with his bare hands, didn’t he? He could stop the whole thing with his axe. He could stop any of them!

Heading out from where he had bunkered himself, Billy found one of those bat-things headed towards him. It took a few swings through the air (five, if you’re counting), to get it, but hitting it with the dull side knocked it down to the ground to slice through it with the blade.

“Take that you creepy fucker!” he shouted at it, giving it another smack. Black blood stained his boots and jeans as he hit something in it, before he moved on to the next one.

“COME GET SOME, FUCKERS!!” he shouted, wielding the weapon with far more confidence than he had when it had been dropped off.

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"I know you think that, Billy, but I'm not gonna let that happen." Steve sounds extremely adamant about that as he cleans up the last of the glass, trying to make sure that nobody accidentally hurts themselves on any of it.

"We're gonna stay here and wait for it to pass." And then maybe Steve will go out and try to find another way to fight it besides hitting it straight on, since that isn't going to work out so well for him, he's pretty sure.

But right now, he can't leave Billy, so he'll hunker down and stay with him awhile. "Do you need more water? Space?" he asks.

The arrogance in Billy wants to kick the dustpan out of Steve's hand. Shower the glass everywhere. But God, he's so tired. So he doesn't kick or anything. He just stays against the far kitchen wall.

"It happens when I go home," and even though he breathes it out, there's anger in his tone. A hand presses at his midsection where he knows the ugly scarring is under the shirt. The lights of the kitchen catch small scarrings all of his hands, focused mainly at his wrists and finger where he held the creature back at one point. "Everyone can save me all they want. But it won't stop the inevitable, Rogers."

But he hasn't given up so bad yet that he just walks out to let the flayer finish the job.

Breathe in. Breathe out. "Water... water is good."

Steve goes to fetch him another glass, right after he disposes of all the shattered stuff. He needs Billy to be careful with this one though because he doesn't want to clean up another one but also because they have a limited amount of glasses.

"You can stay here," he says. "Or go somewhere else in the galaxy." He might not have to go back to that fate - he'd make peace with a fate where he dies, but he knows that no one else thinks the way he does, dooming himself to an icy grave for noble reasons.

"We can find a way to protect you." Of course Steve would think something is so simple. But he'd never taken no for an answer.

"Doesn't work like that," he corrects. He knows it doesn't. The aliens pull you out of your spot in time, then they put you back. He'll get put back and the final blow will hit. And Billy does not want to think about going somewhere else in a galaxy. Having an upside down version of Hawkins is bad enough.

This time the glass gets taken with a little more of a snatch than earlier.

He looks at Steve while taking a long drink. "Not that easy. Nothing's that fucking easy with this Upside Down bullshit or whatever the brats called it. No matter what you do or what you say, you can't change someone's fate, Rogers." There wasn't a power like that in his universe. Probably nobody's universe.

"Is that what you believe in?" he asks. "Fate?" Because Steve's asked himself this question about a thousand times. What does he believe in. Was he destined for something, or was that just a general fluke of the universe, or was there a guiding hand of the god he believes in, pushing him somewhere?

But all of that didn't matter because it led somewhere. It led to here. And if that's true, then: "If it's your fate to go back and die, why are you getting an extension?" he asks. Because maybe the whole point is that he's gotta fight it.

But Steve will also find a fight in everything.

"I don't believe in anything anymore." He lost his faith with his mom. Fate just meant an end to him. He knows there's no going somewhere else, no hiding in a different universe where it won't catch up to him. The others say that people get sent home.

His home just happens to be in the ground with made up headlines to cover up the real thing. A mall fire to cover up that Billy had created and brought a massive creature in to try and get one kid.

"I don't know why the fuck I'm living on borrowed time!" Billy doesn't mean to yell, he's just having a tough time emotionally right now. "Maybe the aliens think I'm fodder for all this bullshit, or useful, or something!" Billy doesn't get why Rogers is going to try and fight the inevitable. The blond is going to try and live while he can here, because it's over when he's home.

"And what if they do? Think you're useful, or fodder, or something?" He sits with Billy, and wonders if he ever just thinks how vast the universe is and how important it is to get a second chance.

"This is my second lease on life, too," he says, because maybe that'll be the thing that gets through to Billy, that Steve knows what that's like. And yeah, maybe he'd been a beloved hero when he'd died, but he'd been a nobody before that.

"And I don't think that's destiny. I don't think I run out of chances, Billy. I don't think you do, either."

"Why do you keep asking these questions like I fucking know or something? I don't know!" The fact of the matter was, to Billy, being in Temba was his second chance. There was no going somewhere else when the aliens were done with him. He had to be better and live here while he could because at any moment he could be sent back.

"All of my chances are here! Don't you get it? You little fucking stick, this IS MY CHANCE! I fucking mentioned fate but it's not that deep! I get skewered by some monster I fucking created!"

This time the glass gets thrown. And not at the floor, or wall, but Steve. Because he doesn't know how to process a lot of what's going on properly, and isn't in the right mindset to be doing it.

This time, Steve reaches up and catches the glass. It almost falls out of his hands, but he manages not to let it slip too hard, though he fumbles with it. "Okay. I'm not getting you any more of these."

Steve is wet now, and he stands up to put the glass away and wring out his shirt. What he wants to ask is, if Billy's so aware that this is his second chance, then why does he keep pushing everyone away?

But he doesn't. Because that's not going to amount to anything.

"You wanna tell me what happened? From the beginning?"

Those kind of questions are just going to incite more anger from Billy, who's not exactly in the right headspace to be answering them. Some of his worst fears are outside, so polite conversation is not here in the room with Billy and Steve.

He breathes hard, like he's just finished exercising, when Steve comes back and asks a different question. "I... I don't think I can." And that's the truth of it. "Being possessed, it was like I was asleep in the passenger seat of my car. I woke up and took the wheel once, then back to sleep."

Billy takes some breathes. In and out. "I can't tell much else."

Steve nods. "Okay," he says. He won't ask again. He'll remember. "I'm not gonna let that happen to you," he says. "You're in control."

He imagines that could be scary, getting possessed. He knows that happened to a couple good friends of his - getting totally brainwashed, carrying out things that they could see themselves doing, but being completely unable to stop themselves.

It's hard for them to deal with, so he imagines it'd be even harder for a kid with existing anger issues. "You're doing well," he says, because he really thinks, for all that's being thrown at him right now, that Billy is doing well.

"The others from Hawkins might be able to tell you." Billy just can't because of his self being pushed out of pilot's seat. It's not a normal thing, possession, to have to deal with, so no wonder he's been acting out since Rogers found him. Even if this is a scrawny, off-brand version of him.

He breathes out again, leaning his head against the wall and letting the coolness of it ground him. Breathe in, breathe out. Then Rogers speaks, tells him that he's doing well and Billy just...

Stares at him. In disbelief. It's written on his face as his gaze searches the guy's face for any indication of a lie. "...What?"

"You're getting control back," he says. "You're breathing." He decides to explain. "I used to be a soldier. Guys who see combat, a lot of them end up shutting down like this from time to time. Just happens to people sometimes, no real way to predict who it'll happen to."

He gives a noncommittal shrug. "So you're doing well. Recovery's gonna take awhile. But I have known a lot of guys who put the work in, and then, it becomes manageable."

This feels like what therapy might feel like. Like what a conversation with a counselor would be like back in the school if he got to live through the summer. It just hit like a baseball out of nowhere to hear someone older than him acknowledge that he was doing well.

Because this? All of this mental bullshit? Doesn't feel manageable.

"If you're a soldier, why the hell are you still in here with me? Shouldn't you be fighting those fucking monsters?" Soldiers were supposed to protect people. This, to Billy, didn't feel like Steve was doing his 'job'.

Well, right now Steve is tiny and asthmatic so fighting the monsters seems like a very bad idea, but he'll probably go out and do it anyway.

"It's just as important to walk you through this, 'cause we're a little short staffed on medical and I'm pulling double duty."

"Those guys, they're not gonna go down 'cause I punch them. So I'm gonna need heavy artillery." And if Billy wants to help him get to the data point and then to an armory, sure. He can consider it.

There's a frown and he wants to just curse the medical staff because he absolutely loathes Wesker and knows that Tae hates him. But Kaplan's okay. Maybe Rogers is too. For now, anyways. Even if he looks like he'd snap in two if you blinked at him.

"Then you're a shit soldier that probably shouldn't have been let in." But he's thinking in his modern terms, and not WW2 terms where they needed more men to go to the frontlines and such. "I'm not going out there. I'm not gonna let them possess me again, not with all the other Hawkins people out there. Fuck you, I'm staying in here."

Good thing Steve didn't give him another glass, because that would've been thrown at him, too. Again.

"Then stay," he says. "But I'm not leaving if I don't think I can leave you here by yourself, or until someone else comes in."

Truthfully, even by 1940s standards he was rejected by the military a total of four times until he lied on his forms and he was accepted. As far as physicality goes, he is kind of a terrible soldier, but he's got the heart of one. And he refuses to give up.

Plus, he would really need to get access to the security data point and he's planning to see how he can do that, though he'll get intercepted on the way.

But, and he wants to make this clear: "No one's making you do anything."

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Heaven's on Fire - KISS

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