come_sailaway | [open] and they could call it the great

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[open] and they could call it the great

Who: Steve and you!
What: November catchall feat. the infamous weed party and also breaking things, possibly other things as they strike me
When: Early November
Where: Tauva, Stellar
Warnings: drugs (weed)

A. i could make my return back to planet earth

[ One morning Steve receives a gift: an indiscriminate amount of marijuana. He doesn’t immediately trust it because it’s too good to be true, right? No way the hell boat is just going to give him pot. But… it looks good, and it smells good, and the insatiable need to chill the fuck out wins over his suspicions in the end, so he grabs some snacks and heads to Tauva.

It’s been a while since he smoked. The last time he had, his dad caught him and it hadn’t gone very well, and it’s not exactly like he can afford much on a VHS-Rental-Store-Guy salary, anyway. So forgive him if he’s really excited about it, is what I’m getting at.

He settles in the very far back of the lounge, seated in one of the cushy armchairs and hunched over a table as he tries to wrangle his tragically out-of-practice joint-rolling prowess. If approached, he will welcome company and maybe even offers of help.

Later on, it might be the skunky smell of weed that draws you towards the back of Tauva. There you’ll find Steve, way more relaxed than he has been in a long time. He’s still quite open to company, might even offer you the joint if you want. Or, alternately, he might just be asleep in a position that can’t possibly be comfortable or puzzling over a copy of Jurassic Park.

Seeing as it is an indiscriminate amount of marijuana, he is very willing to share with friends and strangers alike. Come to the weed party, bring your snackies, have a good time. ]

B. all I've got to do is pray that time's been put in reverse

[ So a few days after the mysterious pot arrives, Steve receives another gift. This one is familiar, and comforting in the worst kind of way. He hasn’t driven around Hawkins with a nail bat in his trunk for the fun of it. He likes the sense of safety it brings and having it here now should….probably not make him feel great? But it does. He’s glad to have it.

So! He does what any stressed out 19-year-old boy might do: he heads to the souvenir shop and loads up on as many model ships as he can carry. He may or may not have even made two trips. Then, he brings those ships to the fanciest shmanciest place he can find: Stellar. From there he creates an artful arrangement of ships and glassware on a few of the tables and… you can probably see where this is going.

So! One might encounter him with armloads of model ships or even just walking the halls with a nail bat over his shoulder. He might even be willing to discuss his plans.

One might head to Stellar in hopes of a nice meal, only to find Steve already there, setting the scene for what’s to come.

Or! One might just be drawn to Stellar by the sounds of shit being smashed to pieces. If asked, he’ll explain that, you know, he’s just practicing his swings. It has absolutely nothing to do with pent up stress from arriving here, dying, dying again, then spending three weeks in a void.

Absolutely nothing at all. ]

C. misc.

[ I KNOW this is not much of a party post but I wanted to condense. Please feel free to still make your own top levels for the weed thing! Tag each other. Go wild. I don’t care. Also, wildcard goes here. We can do whatever your lil heart desires. Hit me up at

commodore

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If there's one thing Arthur is too adept at for his own good, it's dropping the rope. And even though it's a few days into November now, he still hasn't contacted Steve.

He should have gone to Steve's room on that first day, when it seemed like half the ship was waking up in horror at 6am, and made sure he was back to himself. But a thought in the back of his head kept saying: what if he's not? How would you tell? You've been fooled before.

He should have contacted him when word started to get around that people really did seem to be back to normal, and made sure he was all right. But he kept telling himself that if Steve didn't remember his possession, he didn't need Arthur showing up out of the blue to harass him. And if he did remember, then... that would be worse.

The sound of Arthur coming into Tauva is different than usual. For a little while now, his movements have been accompanied by a rattling pair of little wheels. Now, instead, there's the soft rhythmic swish-swish of a cane that's actually designed to be a cane, rolling from side to side in front of him.

"All right, you're starting to make more sense."

Some things don't change, though: you give him an inanimate object, he talks to it.

He comes up short at the smell rolling through Tauva. That's definitely not cigars.

"Oh-- eugh."

At this point, Steve has just a bit of a buzz going on but he's still lounging in his armchair like he owns it, staring at the back of his borrowed copy of Jurassic Park. He's in the middle of reading the synopsis for what must be the fiftieth time —

"An astonishing technique for recovering and cloning dinosaur DNA has been discovered. Now humankind’s most thrilling fantasies have come true. Creatures extinct for eons roam Jurassic Park with their awesome presence and profound mystery, and all the world can visit them—for a price.

Until something goes wrong. . . ."

— and wondering if he really, actually wants to read this. The library man had said it's good though so...

Oh! Wait a minute, listen to that. It would appear he's been saved from having to start (shudder) reading by a familiar voice. Is Arthur the only person who actually frequents Tauva? It sure seems that way. Regardless, Steve does feel a little bad for stinking it up with pot, even if cigars are waaaay smellier.

"Hey, sorry," he calls out. "I think this is the only place I can do this. You want me to go?"

He doesn't actually want to go, and his tone of voice says as much. Also, the damage is sort of done, isn't it?

Edited (80s boy language, WHOOPS i keep editing) 2022-11-02 14:28 (UTC)

Arthur sighs, but it's not like he had plans in here that he couldn't do anywhere else. "No, no, you were here first, I'll..."

Wait.

He'll level with you. Without visuals, and with only a couple of months of practice, it's very hard to tell people apart by voice unless there's some unique aspect to it: if the only person with a certain accent, for example, or if they have some audible quirk. Steve has neither of these, and so it takes a moment to recognise him.

When that recognition hits, though, Arthur's voice trails off, and his eyes open wider.

"Steve," he says, but when it comes to following up on that, he's got nothing. "I..."

So Steve knows... a little. He knows that he was murdered in October, lost ~three weeks of time adrift in Nothing, and woke up on November 1st as if everything was fine. He knows there was an absolutely horrific tragedy of a Halloween party, and that he'd been functionally absent from Eddie and Chrissy's lives after their arrivals. He knows he dreads to hear whatever Arthur has to say because he has a feeling it can't be anything good.

Is there ever such a thing as good news here? He's beginning to doubt it.

Forgive him if he sounds less than excited, perhaps even apprehensive, when he responds, "...Yeah?"

Edited 2022-11-02 20:31 (UTC)

There are, as you might imagine, a lot of things Arthur might say here. That he's glad Steve is back (but it sticks in his throat, haunted by a lingering paranoia, remembering how easily he fell for the fake). That he knows about Hawkins, and the Mindflayer (but does he? Did Billy pull that from Steve's memories, or did he invent it?). That he's sorry to have hurt him (but he didn't, and Steve wouldn't remember it if he had, and Arthur unfortunately knows these things first-hand).

He draws his cane up next to him, the end nearly as high as his chin, and rests his hand on it so that the elbow dangles down.

"I... a-are you all right?" he asks at last, because that, of all concerns, is very important. "It- it's been a hell of a month."

Steve considers that question for several seconds. By and large, the answer is no. He isn't all right. He's even less all right now than he had been on his first day here. He hates this place so much, and even more so he hates the feeling of powerlessness it gives him. He hates that he can't realistically plan an escape, a way to take down the captain, a way to save everyone. So, no. He isn't all right at all.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm good," he says eventually, and — shit — he should really be more open, shouldn't he? "... I'll be honest, I don't really remember, like. Anything. From the last few weeks."

"Small mercies," says Arthur, with a hint of relief, before he can stop himself.

He'll be happier not remembering any of that, says a kinder part of his brain. One less person who might talk about what you did to Smith, says a part of his brain that he's less okay with.

"I, I-- that is..."

In his ear there's a short sharp shh, but all it gets in acknowledgement is a slight movement of his head. Even by his own standards, Arthur hasn't slept properly in a while.

"Would you be adverse to company?" And then, in deference to Steve's apprehension: "I-- I won't bring it up unless you do. October can be persona non grata as far as I'm concerned."

Small mercies.

Steve leans over the side table and gently snuffs his joint out in an ashtray there, leaving it behind as he slumps down in his chair again. This is feeling less and less like a cool, fun, chill time by the second.

"No... I mean, yeah, you can stay, but —" He exhales through his nose, a sharp sigh. "I want to talk about it. I need to know what happened."

The bits he'd heard so far (that haven't been written yet and are therefore purposely vague) sound so insane he can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like. He needs to know where the hell he was through all of it.

(He dreads finding out.)

"Well."

Ah, now it's Arthur "Buzzkill" Lester's turn to sound apprehensive.

"All right, I can help you with that."

A beat. An exhale. Then he pushes his cane out in front of him again and starts to walk in a Stevewards direction, brisk despite his reluctance.

(He wrinkles his nose at the Smell as he gets closer. Should he be, uh, worried? He's not an expert but doesn't this stuff make you jump out of windows or something? Ah, Steve probably knows what he's doing.)

First things first, Steve notices Arthur's expression. Yeah, yeah, it stinks. He gets it. He's not exactly a huge fan of the smell, either. BUT! That doesn't stop him from saying, "Hey, come on. Seriously? You can't tell me you think the cigars smell better."

If he sounds e v e r s o s l i g h t l y snippy it's only because he is truly, truly worried about whatever grim stories of October Arthur might be preparing to regale him with. He scrubs his face with his hands, running them up through his hair, and debates just how he'd like this crap delivered. Piece by piece? All at once? Preferably not at all but, tragically, not an option.

"Sorry," he says. "Look, I just. Don't try to do the whole let-him-down-easy, don't-shoot-the-messenger shit, okay? Just tell me. I know it's bad, whatever it was."

"I can, and I will." Arthur, to the shock of the audience, doesn't sound snippy himself. He sounds distant if anything. There are a lot of things he's been putting off figuring out how to say, and now all of a sudden he has to figure out how to say them really fast.

He finds a chair that seems to be across from Steve, and drops down into it. His hands are restless; his cane sits across his chest like an over-long seatbelt. How is he visibly avoiding Steve's eyes when he technically can't even meet them? He's just that skilled, baby!

He nods, though, at Steve's request. Yeah. Yeah, that's respectable.

All the same, he's compelled to say: "It reflects more badly o-on me than it does on you. You weren't yourself; I'm the one who failed to realise it."

His left hand is held tightly in his right. "There were... possessions, but I- I assume you know that much." He waits for confirmation, though, before he goes on. Boy he hopes Steve knows at least that much.

"Yeah, I heard something like that," Steve says with a grim note to his tone. He's not stupid. He already had suspicions on what that meant for the gap in his memory. What Arthur's said now only confirms it.

He's sick to his stomach thinking about it. The pleasant buzz he'd had going is now a hindrance more than anything — he'll be adding this to the list of offenses in Arthur's call-out post, thank you very much.

Until then, he goes quiet until the quiet is too much, and he knows he has to say something, and he knows what he needs to say but he doesn't want the answer.

He says it anyway.

"Did I hurt people?"

Or worse, had he coerced Arthur into doing so?

Arthur opens his mouth to say no, and then stops. Because while the answer is no -- and that's not letting Steve down easy, it's not sparing his feelings, it's just true -- he knows that's not what Steve is asking.

"The ghost that got you was called Billy," he says instead, his tone factual. "He tried to beat up a couple of people, but he picked his targets badly. Smith..."

(His voice drops off, and for a moment there's a pause, and it's where the whole story would go, if he were telling it.

He will. Soon.)

"...And, ah, a man called Klaus, who I don't... I don't know if you know. Then he spent the rest of the month doing hard time in the brig, until a pretty ill-advised Halloween event, when all the ghosts, in bodies or not, made a- a failed play for- for everybody. He tried to kill me; I got him first."

Yep, the ghosts on the ship tried to possess and/or murder all the living people and almost succeeded and now they're back to manning the restaurants and so on, invisible and everywhere, like it all never happened and Arthur :) sounds :) fine :) and not like he's permanently screaming inside :) about it :)*

*this is a lie

"That ghost sounds like a total moron," Steve says dryly. "I've won maybe one fight in my entire life. I'm the last guy to use for beating people up."

It isn't the time for jokes; he knows it's not. He's just really fucking tired. A lot of thoughts were running through his head as he listened to Arthur, and it's horrifying to imagine his body doing these things while he was, what, dead and adrift in nothing? Is that was death is? Nothing?

Jesus.

"I'm sorry," he goes on. "I just wish I could remember."

It's not that he's dying to remember attacking friends and strangers but it might help him process it, or something. At the very least it might make his apology feel like it actually means something, because right now it rings hollow.

The joke does get an exhalation that under better circumstances could be a laugh. If you can't make light of your own horrible possession, then who can?

"Look, it's not--" Arthur's going to have to do better than just 'not your fault'. "Think of it as, as... it's not your fault if somebody steals your car and hits somebody with it, a-and you're no more at fault for this."

A beat.

"I know that's not a, a perfect analogy." In fact it's horrifying to contemplate to its logical extremes! Arthur backtracks, reaching for something else that might reassure Steve. God, he should really be better at this conversation, having been on the other end of it more than once now.

(If what Billy said about Steve was true, then maybe Steve's had this conversation before as well. But it's hard to know how to ask. It's not like you can just turn to someone who was possessed and go 'first time?')

"But I-I've had some experience in that area," he says, too abruptly to chicken out of it, "so I... I sympathise."

"Shit," is what Steve has to say to that.

Much like little Skeve had once a few weeks back, Steve reflects on the Mind Flayer. This is a little like that, isn't it? Only the Mind Flayer's victims had still been inside, aware of what they were being made to do. Had Arthur gone through something like that? Was he awake as something else piloted his body, forcing him to do things against his will, or was he blissfully unaware? Drifting in nothing?

Steve also wonders what it was like for Will, and Heather, and for Billy.

Oh. Oh.

Like... it has to be a coincidence, right? Billy's a pretty generic name. The odds of it... shit. He has to ask.

"So... the ghost. Billy?" he begins, carefully, carefully, as if picking his way through a minefield. "Was he like — Did he say anything about himself?"

"Yeah," says Arthur, who also said 'shit' about it a great many times.

He grimaces faintly as he recalls Billy. The intervening time hasn't made him dislike the guy any less at all. Even Arthur's brief experience of Nothing... well, it contextualised him a little, but by then Billy was beyond his empathy.

"That's a... surprisingly difficult question to answer, if I'm honest," Arthur admits. "He said some things, but now I-I don't know if he was talking about himself, or your memories, or just making things up out of whole cloth. If a town called Hawkins and a thing called a Mind Flayer ring any bells, then I'm afraid he's probably told me about you."

"I mean, yeah, Hawkins is where I'm from, but..." Steve trails off. Whoever was in his body had to have access to his memories, right? Because Billy Hargrove wouldn't have known the name Mind Flayer, but neither would a stranger.

He's been quite tight-lipped about the truth back home since he's been here for many reasons. It doesn't seem relevant, he's used to keeping quiet, maybe he even likes the feeling of normalcy he gets by not talking about it which is pretty stupid given their situation, but still.

He doesn't particularly feel like opening up about it now but he will. A little. Just because he's really fishing for a bit of the ol' "oh no way it's not the same Billy that would be totally insane haha" or something along those lines.

"Hawkins is... Look, things are just weird there, okay? I'm not gonna get into it," is what he settles on. "But yeah, there was a thing called the Mind Flayer. It took control of some people in the town and one of them was this asshole named Billy. It's gotta be a coincidence, though, right? Like there's no way he would be here. That's nuts."

Oh. That would be a pretty big coincidence, but... not unbelievably big. Not after... Arthur frowns. Not after someone from either his or John's world showed up on Halloween as well. So this is... what? Yet another baffling pattern that he has to figure out. If it turns out this really was the same Billy.

"Well, did it take over you?"

And then, realising how abrupt that question is: "He- he said he had been controlled by it. Or, well. Didn't say it, in a way that made it pretty obvious." His voice gets icier. "That I-I thought made it obvious. If he was putting that on, then I..."

He struggles momentarily for the appropriate words for someone who can fake that story and those emotions, trick some of Arthur's own story out of him in sympathy, and play him so well that he goes and hurts an innocent third party. He feels like a fucking monster, and on top of that he feels like an idiot.

What he settles for is a muttered and deeply hateful: "Fucking prick."

Edited (i'm done editing probably i swear) 2022-11-10 16:52 (UTC)

"No, it ... no. Not me," Steve says. "But Billy... yeah. It got him. So I guess if it was him, he was telling the truth. He's still a prick, though."

It was already creepy beyond belief. Knowing it might have been Billy Hargrove makes it so much worse. Steve can barely even process the feelings he has about it, so he won't! Let's take them and stick them in a drawer for later, next to the various other things he's been neatly packing away since he arrived here.

"Do we know, like... why it happened?" he asks, steering the wheel away from any weird fucking feelings he has about the town's dead resident bully taking over his body for a few weeks. "I was taking a damn walk, and boom. Nothing. I'd kinda like to know if there was a reason."

That's not... entirely true. It wasn't just a walk. But he doesn't know if Arthur knows the grisly details and sees no reason why he ought to introduce them.

"Shit," says Arthur, although Billy telling the truth doesn't change much at this point. He's still a body-stealing piece of shit, and Arthur still doesn't know if he could have chosen to stay in that suffocating not-place if he was trapped there and offered a chance to change places with a stranger. He'd like to believe he would, but... fuck.

"Just walking?" No mishaps at all? Arthur had thought the possessions were related to dying, at least from what he's seen and heard. Then again, some people (looking at you, Crichton) died repeatedly without picking up a single ghost. So, christ, maybe he just really wants to think he understands it.

"Apparently Friday was the first," he says. "She died o-or... I'm not sure, maybe was just very injured, and because the Captain wasn't maintaining things, one of the ship's ghosts managed to slip out of-- out of where they are, and possess her. And then it used her powers to... well. Make possible the rest of it. This is all per the ghost in question, by the way." He exhales heavily. "If you ask me honestly what that means for whether or not we're now in the clear... I-I don't know. But those do seem like two significant points of failure that had to line up, and one of them would be impossible to miss if it happened again. So I hope-- I- I think we're all right for now."

Yes, he's attempting to be comforting.

It's probably a good thing Arthur can't see Steve's face, because he listens to that attempt at comforting with an expression sort of like this but less, you know, appreciative. That face, but if you're trying to understand the workings of ghosts and possession rather than admiring women in tight clothing doing Jazzercise.

"Okay," he says, with a touch of hesitation that implies he's not entirely confident that they're really all right for now.

He considers whether or not he should be truthful. Whether he ought to admit that he wasn't just out walking and, boom, possessed. His only reason for not going into it is that he's sick of having these "poor young Mr. Harrington, sorry you died" sort of talks. (Not that he's had all that many, but he's had enough now to last a lifetime.)

Ugh. It's probably best to just get it out there.

"I drowned, alright?" he admits a bit snippishly, as if Arthur had been trying to pry the information out of him. "I was walking and I heard someone calling for help at the pool and some guy drowned me. I really don't want to talk about it."

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[open] and they could call it the great

A is for 'An OTA can happen but this should happen first'

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