𝔸 ℝ𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝔹𝕪 𝔸𝕟𝕪 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣 ℕ𝕒𝕞𝕖 - reddie

#𝟙𝟜: 𝕎𝕖 𝔸𝕝𝕝 𝔽𝕝𝕠𝕒𝕥 𝔻𝕠𝕨𝕟 ℍ𝕖𝕣𝕖

"You're quite the catch," Ben muttered sarcastically, scratching the back of his head. It was clear by his nature that he assumed I was kidding about adding Eddie to my poem. "Anyone would be happy to have someone with those types of artistic skills."

"Thanks, Haystack."

Bill seemed to speak loud enough so that everyone around the table could hear him and holt their conversations. "Alright, um, as much as I hate to do this, it should be said sooner or later. We all know why w-we're here," Bill momentarily glanced at Mike, as if hoping he'd take over.

I noticed the quiver in his voice, as the temporary stutter returned to haunt us all. 

Mike got the message and straightened his back, folding his hands tightly and neatly, clearing his throat. His voice was even deeper and twice as gravely as it used to be. It was a good speaking voice, I'd give him that much. "There were more children. Disappearing. I was walking down the street, and I saw the posters. Then I started hearing voices, and seeing shadows. That night I dreamt about the burnt hands, the ones I saw when I was thirteen.."

I seemed to doze off at my own thoughts, staring down emptily at a crack in the table's wood. The first time we had gone into that fucking crackhouse, Pennywise's crackhouse, I saw a missing poster. It wasn't just any missing poster; it was my missing poster.

It had my name on it. It had my picture, it had my birthday, it had my description. I had never gotten chills so horribly in my life. Part of me wasn't even scared of disappearing; I was simply terrified that I'd be taken and have to see the mutilated faces of the rest of the missing kids in Derry. That, that sounded worse than death at the time.

"It kept saying things..." Mike continued. "It kept making me believe things about myself that even I didn't know. It was disturbing, really; the nightmares were too real for comfort. It almost felt-"

"Like they weren't even dreams," I finished for him, maintaining the long eye contact I held with the table. I looked up when the silence got uncomfortable.

"Yeah," Mike said slowly.

"Yeah." I looked into his warm, brown eyes.

I could feel Eddie's stare on me, but I was almost certain that if I turned to look back at him, I would burst into the manliest fucking tears you'd ever seen. I hated the reminder of what the clown had told me; it sent a fresh wave of awful stomachaches all around.

"After that, I just... I just knew. There seems to be a pattern here in this devil town. I'd been stuck here ever since you guys left, and I've been doing shit tons of research about Derry's history in that time.  Apparently this sort of stuff has a rotating cycle. It's as if It's been hibernating for 27 years or something." Mike glanced around at each of our faces to make sure he still had our attention.

"The thing we see," he went on. "It's no monster or beast, or person in costume. It's a fucking demon, or a center of darkness, or something like that. Anything with the capability to transform and manipulate our biggest fears is..." he took a shuddering breath, as if he was trying to push away unwanted memories. "-Is not human."

"No shit, Sherlock." I said blandly.

Eddie looked troubled, as if he was suddenly realizing that he should have never agreed to coming here in the first place. "What are we gonna do? I barely even remembered what we did the first time. How the fuck are we gonna get this thing dead, and... and make it stay dead-?"

Mike glanced away and Bill looked up thoughtfully. "The first time, we didn't double check, like the stupid kids we were. We should've burnt It or something, we need to really make sure It's never coming back," Bill rubbed his small-haired chin. "We could send the whole sewer system down, on top of the damn thing. It can't come back if It's squashed like a fucking bug, wi-with no layer to return to."