Flipped: A Steve Harrington Enemies to Lovers

The Flayed

The world has been pulled out from under you and you're falling and falling and falling...

You're not even sure how long you've been falling for. Forever, perhaps?

But maybe when you stop you'll find yourselves in Hell.

"Shit! Shit!" Dustin yelps, his voice impossibly high as it gutturally rips its way out his throat.

"We're going down! We're going down!" Steve screams.

You and Robin snap in unison, "Yeah, no shit, Steve!"

The elevator violently shakes, the shift in gravity scattering you all. You slam into each other, the boxes, the tables. At one point you bash your hip and suck in your teeth, certain the purpling of a bruise will form right there on the bone.

Steve clumsily topples into you and then some shelves, squawking and scrabbling with his hands to find something to steady himself.

Robin has lodged herself into a corner, using the span of her arms to hold herself up.

"Why don't these buttons work?!" Dustin screeches, mashing angrily at them by the door.

"Press the button!" Erica cries.

He grits out, still screaming at the top of his lungs with spit flying everywhere, "What do you think I'm doing?!"

Then, as if nothing ever happened, it all comes to a sudden, jarring halt. The abrupt stop sends everyone lurching forward to plunge into a bewildered silence.

All except for Steve, who unfortunately has a box topple onto him at an angle, the corner hitting him in a treasured and sensitive area.

"Oh!" He grunts, clutching between his legs. "My groin. It fell on my groin."

His face contorts with shock and agony, lolloping onto his side in a heap on the floor and scrunching his eyes shut.

"Dustin!" He wheezes. "Get this off of me! I can't move."

As the Henderson boy leaps to the rescue, you rise unsteadily to your feet, knees knocking, chest pounding, voice wobbling.

"Is everyone okay?" You call, offering a hand to Robin and helping her back to her feet. You lean into her. "Hey, are you okay?"

She just nods, unable to actually speak and tugging on the hem of her shirt. You then turn to your other best friend.

"Steve?"

"Yeah, I'm great, now that I know that Russians can't design elevators!" He growls, slapping with venom against the useless control panel, to no avail.

"I think we've clearly established that those buttons don't work." Robin helpfully remarks.

"They're buttons. They have to do something." Steve shrugs.

"Yeah, if we had a keycard," She offers. "It's an electronic lock. Same as the loading dock door. If we don't have a keycard, it won't operate, meaning..."

"...We're stuck in here." You press your lips into a line.

The very mentioning of the word stuck makes the walls feel as if they were closing in, looming all around you, growing dark. It isn't long before it dawns on you that despite appearances, this is no elevator.

It's a coffin.

"Just so you nerds are aware," Erin chimes, slicing through your train of thought, her voice dripping with contempt and a finger raised in the air. "I'm supposed to be spending the night at Tina's, and Tina always covers for me. But if I'm not home for Uncle Jack's party tomorrow and my mom finds out you four are responsible, she's gonna hunt you down, one by one, and slit your throat."