Wrapped Around Your Finger - Eddie Munson

Chapter Sixteen: The Plan

"It's very metal what you did, is all I'm saying." I heard Eddie say to Steve from the back of the group.

"For your modesty, dude." I said to Steve, taking off my dad's old flannel and tossing it to him.

"Wait, what about you?" Eddie asked.

"I'm fine without it." I lied.

Eddie huffed as he took off his battle jacket and handed it to me, insisting I put it on. I allowed Eddie to slip the oversized denim over my shoulders. He placed a kiss to the bite on my right shoulder that he graciously bandaged with scraps from his tshirt.

"I still can't believe you jumped in after them." Eddie laughed, "You, Hannah Grove, will never fail to surprise me. You're the one deserving of the Brave Knight title, not me. Nope. Outside of DnD, I am no hero. I see danger and I just turn heel and run, or at least that's what I've learned about myself this week."

"Run? Eddie you've been practically up my ass trying to make sure I don't die. I wouldn't call anything you've done recently cowardly."

"The only reason I came in here was cause you jumped in here and I couldn't handle the guilt of possibly letting you die alone. I love you."

"And you think that's not bravery? Putting yourself in danger for someone you love?" I argued.

"You know I'm not the brave type."

"Neither was Frodo, but event the smallest person can change the course of the future. You don't have to be the brave type to be brave, Eddie."

The bats were circling the gate we came through, trapping us here. Nancy dropped the nuclear bomb on us that she owns guns and, since the Upside Down is a mirror of Hawkins, we should be able to go retrieve them from her house. Eddie and I were filled in on how the hivemind works, to avoid the vines and stuff. We set off for Nancy's Upside Down house, taking the extra time to make sure we don't step somewhere we shouldn't.

"I don't understand." I said as Nancy was rummaging around her dilapidated mirror room, explaining what happened to her guns.

"They're not here, but this shouldn't be here. I threw this away years ago, but the reason it's here is because this is years ago. It's like it was frozen in time."  She faltered.

"So does this mean we're trapped here? I mean, if the watergate was open then one of the others must be open too, right?" I asked, looking around nervously.

"Eddie's trailer, there should be a gate there." We all left Nancy's house for the trailer park. I radio's in Dustin and told him our plan and letting him know to meet us there.

"It's kinda freaky, isn't it?" Eddie was keeping pace with me towards the back of the group. "Seeing Hawkins like this."

"Yeah, it's definitely not a comforting sight." I shuddered.

Entering Eddie's house was more unsettling than I thought. Seeing the place Chrissy died again and seeing it like this, it's something I won't forget. The pulsating, fleshy gate on the sealing was torn open to reveal Dustin and the others on the normal side.

"Hi!" Dustin waved. We pulled the mattress out of Eddie's room, him awkwardly trying and failing to explain away the stains. "So, not quite sure how these physics work, but here goes nothing." Dustin threw a rope of tied sheets through the gate and to our surprise, it hung there between the two worlds. Robin climbed up, followed by me and then Eddie.

"Nancy. Hey! Hey! Nancy, stay with me!" Steve cried. Nancy was under Vecna's curse, her eyes rolled back and she wouldn't move.

"What are you even looking for?" I asked Robin.

"Madonna, Blondie, Bowie, Beatles? Music! We need music!" She cried.

"This is music!" Eddie bellowed.

"He showed me things that haven't happened yet. The most awful things. I saw a dark cloud spreading over Hawkins. Downtown on fire. Dead soldiers. And this... Giant creature with... a gaping mouth. And this creature wasn't alone. There were so many monsters, an army and they were coming into Hawkins. Into our neighborhoods, our homes and then... He showed me my mom and Holly, Mike and they... They were all..." She sobbed.

"Hey hey thats not real though, right?" I asked.

"Not yet, but there... there was something else. He showed me gates. Four gates spreading across Hawkins. And these gates, they looked like the one outside of Eddie's trailer, but... they didn't stop growing. And this wasn't the Upside Down Hawkins. This was our Hawkins. Our home."

Four kills. Four gates. All we needed to do was prevent Vecna from opening the last gate before we killed him. It was down to Max and I, the only two left that we know he's marked. We decided the best course of action was to arm ourselves. As the others went off to the army supply store, Eddie, Robin, and I headed for my house to get my own.

"Hello beautiful." I threw the doors to my closet open to reveal my prized possession, a red oak crossbow.

"Have you had that the whole time?" Robin pointed at it.

"Yeah, had her most of my life."

"Of course you call it her."

"You know how to use that thing?" Eddie asked.

"Bullseye." I said smugly, turning away from my makeshift archery targets.

"I stand corrected." He conceded.

"When El remote-travels, she goes into this sort of trance-like state. I bet the same is true of Vecna."

"So, when he's doing his weird floaty thing in the attic, he's vulnerable?" I asked.

"Bingo." Dustin answered.

"So, what are we waiting for? We have our plan. Max and Lucas go to his house in Hawkins and I go with Dustin and Eddie, we both try and draw Vecna's attention. Erica will help on lookout and communications. Eddie will distract the... demobats? Nancy, Steve, and Robin go straight to Vecna in the Upside Down." Everyone nodded in agreement. "Let's go then."

"You have your Walkman?" Eddie asked me.

"Yep, have Black Sabbath queued up as we speak." I tapped the cassette player on my hip. "You ready for the most important concert of our lives?"

"As ready as I'll ever be." We got to Eddie's Upside Down trailer, keeping a close eye out fir demobats. "It's like she was made for another dimension." He grabbed his guitar from the wall, marveling at it like usual.

"Keep it in your pants, babe, we have a fight ahead of us." I kissed his cheek, Dustin gagged. We climbed up to the roof of the trailer. I helped Dustin hook up the amps as we radiod in to confirm the next phase.

"Hannah." Eddie grabbed my wrist while Dustin was inside, "Please, just promise me you won't try and play the hero. Ok? This isn't Jason we're up against."

"Hannah, you're up!" Dustin called. I gave Eddie a quick kiss before pulling my headphones off and casting them aside.

"Chrissy, this is for you. Now come and get me motherfucker!" I screamed.

"Eddie, now!" Eddie picked up his guitar, looked at me, and began playing. Master of Puppets blasted through the air as the demobats screeched and swarmed over us.