[ video ] » ❝my patience is waning; is this entertaining?❞

[ephemerios]

OOC: assume a 100% chance of Stranger Things spoilers in the comments.

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[ What's up, network at large? ]

So, after that disaster, I just have a question: Is anyone here from an actually normal, at least relatively not messed up, kind of place?

[ Honestly a serious question. Brought to you by someone from an absolute dumpster fire of a town. ]

Because aside from being home to everything in every HP Lovecraft story apparently, where I'm from is where dreams and ambition go to die, in the makeshift graveyards of its flat lands and corn fields. It's really great if you're looking for a quiet small town to raise a nuclear family and mind the business of everyone except yourself. Oh, and you'd better have an easily malleable attitude about it and enjoy your new home of a suffocating box, otherwise if you show even a hint of personality that doesn't fit into that idea — forget it, you're so screwed.

[ Is someone finally getting mad enough about her own suffocating box? MAYBE SO. This is how she's trying to light it on metaphorical fire. mic drop, truth bombs deployed, et cetera. ]

Which almost makes me wonder if the cosmic horrors are actually worse than everything else about it. [ It should at least be very close. ]

Comments

[work_wife]

Mostly one piece. Physically. Mentally I'm a mess. But that's usually true. Thus the rum.

Anyway, coming down now.

to action? to action!!

[ephemerios]

Totally fair.

[ story of their lives. she leaves the door to the room open, so Robin can find her easier. ]

Lights! Camera! Jonathan please make sure girls have shirts on before pictures.

[work_wife]

[IT takes Robin a few minutes, but she does come in with the bottle. And a few different bandages and other places she's patched up.]

Is it okay for me to walk in on the queen of Hawkins?

LMAO he better

[ephemerios]

[ that gets a laugh. ] Always. Did I not say you were the best?

[work_wife]

I will happily take what titles the current and former royals will bestow upon me.

[Best friend, Court of Buckley, the best, she'll take all three.]

You look intact. Thank goodness. I was really worried about you and Eddie and Hargrove in this.

[ephemerios]

I'll get you a little tiara to wear. I'm glad we're all intact, but I would be happy to never do that again - and I hope you don't have to do it a third time.

[work_wife]

[Listen, she would not wear a tiara normally, but for this conversation she could put up with a lot of things.]

Oh, there will be a third time. We clearly didn't solve it properly last time. But that takes a long time to explain. Which I guess I owe you.

[She produces the rum and hands it over.]

I guess I have a question for you first, if it's okay. It's... personal.

[ephemerios]

[ She lifts an eyebrow slightly, curious. ] of course. Ask away. [ She takes a sip of the drink to start. ]

[work_wife]

We noticed a pattern among... among the people that got hurt like you did. We understood why in their cases. But not yours. What... What was wrong that you were hiding? Is it something we can help you with here? Also, uh, what's your favorite song? Just in case?

[ephemerios]

Soooo when I said that part about "malleable attitude" and "new home of a suffocating box", I mostly meant my mom about me. She's obsessed with the image of perfection, and made sure I reflected that, along with teaching me that carbs and calories are the worst things that can happen to a person. [ An aversion she still has. Not enough to not drink rum at this moment, but still. AAAAAAAAND on a lighter note: ] Favorite song is Uptown Girl, though. Which is hilarious, by the way, that that works. [ She got a few mostly out of context puzzle pieces from Steve and Eddie, but that one she demanded more context on because what in the actual fuck, and she laughed so hard there were tears. creepy dude wrecked by music? HILARIOUS. ]

[work_wife]

[Ah. She... thinks she almost gets it then. But she's so sorry to hear that Chrissy had to deal with that.]

Guess we'll get you a tape of it. I'm glad that you already heard about the songs though. We should all have one now that the Upside-Down found us. Because the music helps you find a way out of your own mind.

punching myself in the feelings la la la

[ephemerios]

[ she's been trying to find her way out of her own mind for *checks notes* 18 years, but ok sure!! she passes the bottle back to Robin. ]

I think I might have had fun. Not because the horrific creatures that also feed off trauma or the whole Upside-Down place sound fun in a full dose, but doing all that would have meant the chance to become actual friends with you all. People who are calm and normal compared to people obsessed with who can become the most popular the fastest. Here I'm still just kind of the person who died before stuff got cranked up to eleven. [ accidental pun is accidental. and she doesn't even know it. ]

oh look, i'm tripping over Robin mood

[work_wife]

[Friends with all of them? Robin needs a moment to process that. Sure, maybe she interacted with Steve some, and clearly with Eddie. And she gets wanting to be friends with Steve. She's done that and really actually loved his dorky dingus self and all the kindness and warmth in his heart. But if Chrissy had been aware of Robin, it could only have been as 'Steve's female appendage that he's either not dating or she is okay with him dating other girls too' that people assume her as.]

I'd hardly call us calm and normal, but I can see why someone would think that way. But I can say that you'll find great friends in Eddie and Steve if you've always wanted that.

[Not including herself due to the aforementioned belief that of course Chrissy wasn't even aware of her.]

You're not the only one that happened to actually. From what I've heard, the first person that died because of all of this... Remember Benny? The guy that ran the diner? Killed by evil government dudes. Which I guess is almost the start of this. Um, it all kinda starts years ago, but where it's relevant to us starts the night Will Byers went missing.

[ephemerios]

[ Look, Robin got cool points by association too. That's just how it goes. ]

You're not allowed to sell yourself short. [ Gosh, Robin don't leave yourself out!!! Rude!! ] I've already seen enough from you here to know you're kind and smart, and probably carry around a good sense of humor.

[ Spoken like it's a Fact™. Because it is. ]

Why do I feel like you're going to tell me Will wasn't actually just lost in the woods or hitchhiking across the state?

[work_wife]

[Spend a few hours with Steve in full dork mode and maybe Robin will seem cooler. It's and absolute truth.]

I'm not selling myself short. I'm just aware that until recently I'm pretty sure I never really crossed your mind. And that's okay, Chrissy, it really is. I'm not bothered by it. I was never someone searching for popularity and recognition, so I really don't mind. But I am smart, I have a good sense of humor, and I'm kind when it suits me.

[She's also sharp and sarcastic and sometimes mean when it suits her too.]

Uh, do you have a spare shirt or something around? I need a visual aid here.

[ephemerios]

Proving my 'normal and calm compared to the people I used to hang out around' point, without even trying. [ A quick, small smile appears at the edge of her lips. ]

But yeah, shirt, hang on. [ she has no idea why a shirt helps, but, she digs around for a second and hands one over to her. ]

[work_wife]

[Okay, that's fair. She chuckles, but wow, that's a whole take on her.]

Alright. So it has to do with those gate things here. So... [She holds the shirt on her hand and touches the surface of it.]

So this is Hawkins. Right here. This is the ground and the town is on it and all the people and all of our lives. But it turns out that isn't the only dimension.

[She puts another hand inside the shirt, touching the inside.]

This is something else. Somewhere else. We call it the Upside-Down. It's like Hawkins but not. And see how my hands can't touch, because there is a barrier between them. There is supposed to be. The two sides, they aren't supposed to touch. Ever.

[ephemerios]

[ it's all meant as a positive - it's refreshing to be around people like that, especially after so long of, well, not. ]

So, when the barrier gets broken..? And how?

[ At least the name makes sense, if it's a Hawkins but not. Some jumbled mess of a Hawkins. ]

[work_wife]

Okay, so apparently the better metaphor is a string, because it explains the demogorgon but let's ignore that. The way for us to get between the planes is with a LOT of energy. Like... Like stabbing through the fabric. Now you can move between the two sides, right?

So there's... Well, there is this young girl. She was basically raised as a lab experiment and she's got these powers. She can move things with her mind, or find people with her mind. And apparently once she was tricked by this evil guy named Henry, into basically taking the restraints the government had on him off. And he killed everyone else like them. And was going to kill her. But She's really powerful. And in her grief and anger and betrayal, she sorta became the knife that pierced through the world. Sent him packing to the other side and closed it up.

But of course the government being what it is, they wanted to keep seeing what she could do, if she could do it again, if what's out on that other side could be useful against communism because blah blah blah Russians who we will get to later.

[ephemerios]

[ She might be more surprised by a psychic girl if she hadn't already seen what she has and heard the bits and pieces that she has. But honestly? It's not the weirdest thing in that group of information (that honor probably goes to being psychically murdered), so she just rolls with it. ]

So, young girl with powers accidentally breaks the universe basically, and the US government is like 'hey, I know what's a great idea and not a further violation of human rights or other general ethics: using our literal human experiment to do it or things like it again'.

[ @ the government: BITCHES, PLEASE - you can't do that and say communism is bad in the same breath.

The good sign is that Robin hasn't lost her yet. ]

So the Henry guy, he's also US government? Or Russian? Or something else?

[work_wife]

That sounds exactly like the government. I haven't been fond of any of their types we've had a brush with. And...

You ever hear about the Creel murders, back in the day?

[Geez, she's jumping around worse than the kids are. How is it even possible?]

[ephemerios]

For whatever truth is actually left in that story, sure, vaguely I guess. [ one of those things that sounds so fake after a while because people add a lot of ~flair~ to it to make it into a spooky story or urban legend. ]

[work_wife]

Well, uh... I met him actually. Mister Creel. He didn't kill his family. His son did. His son Henry.

[And surely Chrissy can put that name together with who Robin said had killed her.]

He's the one that killed the kids in the government facility. He's the one behind everything else that happened. So keep in the back of your mind that everything that happened was sorta just because of Henry Creel. I'll get to why he went after you later.

So, in the course of the research the government was doing, they were putting this psychic girl in a sensory deprivation tank to make her spy on people a long way away. And that's how she discovered a demogorgon, accidentally reaching across dimensions. It noticed her. In her fear she accidentally tore a gate open to the Upside-Down all over again. Something she'd forgotten she'd done in all of the mental trauma of basically everyone she knew getting murdered. And that creature escaped. Looked for its first victim... It kidnapped Will Byers.

[ephemerios]

[ She digs around for something else while Robin finishes speaking — she'd wanted to take in as much as she could before actually getting up to find a notepad and pen. Yeah, it's note taking time, otherwise she WILL get lost. ]

Henry equals Vecna, yeah? [ She's heard his other name before. Look at her little out of context puzzle pieces fitting together like that. ]

What did he want with Will? Will's not psychic too, right?

[work_wife]

[Maybe go for the rum, Chrissy. Robin sighs and looks at her nails, looking like she might bite at her cuticles just because she's anxious even talking about this.]

Yeah. Henry is Vecna. Also known as One. He was the first child experimented on. They tattooed the number on their arms. So far as we know, he's one of only three survivors, because eight escaped when she was a kid, and the girl, eleven, survived one and she escaped the facility.

As for what it wanted, we don't know what it wanted originally. But it rig Will up to some thing in the Upside-Down Library when it caught him. And then... well, we'll get there. So anyway, the demogorgon actually killed a lot of people who died in 'hunting accidents' and other things like that. Barbara Holland... she was taken by the demogorgon from Steve's poolside. It's part of why he got dragged into it.