Blood in the cut

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/39854787.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Category: Gen
Fandom: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Relationship: Robin Buckley & Steve Harrington
Character: Robin Buckley, Steve Harrington
Additional Tags: Canon-Typical Violence, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD,
Protective Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley & Steve Harrington
Friendship, Protective Robin Buckley, Robin Buckley & Steve
Harrington Are Best Friends, badass Steve Harrington, POV Robin
Buckley, Steve is hypereffective at monster hunting, not so much at
fighting people
Series: Part 6 of Stranger Teens (The bonding of the Fruity Four)
Stats: Published: 2022-06-24 Words: 2985

Blood in the cut

by PrincessAmericaChavez

Summary

"You’ve killed monsters."

“Yeah, so?”

“You really could’ve kicked their asses.”

The look Steve shoots her is so utterly bewildered that she can’t help but laugh.

“They’re just some assholes, Robin. They aren’t worth it.”

or

Robin tries to make sense of the Steve she knows and the Steve she's seen in the Upside
Down.

or

Robin tries to process the idea of her best friend being capable of violence.

Notes

See the end of the work for notes

It’s not that Robin didn’t know. She knew. Of course, she knew. Dustin wouldn’t shut up about it
for months, and even Lucas and Max had joined the constant reminder that Steve was, in their own
words, “a monster-hunting badass”. She’d seen him knock out a literal Russian soldier with a
phone and throw a car at their possessed schoolmate to save Nancy and the kids. She had even seen
the spiked bat he carried around at the bottom of his car’s trunk with which he and the kids
claimed he’d fought off a hoard of demodogs (whatever those are).

It doesn’t even surprise her when Steve is the first to reach for the nearest random blunt object to
use as a weapon. An oar, a lamp, the predictable “stay here” as he ventures out to face off whatever
might be lurking in the shadows, usually followed by them because it’s not like they will let him go
fend for himself alone.

She still isn’t ready for the demobats when they come. Or, to be more precise, she isn’t ready for
Steve facing off against the demobats. They all fight them, and to be fair she’s pretty sure they just
saved his life, but there’s still something about it when he fights back than sends a shock through
her nervous system.

The feral way he bites into one of them, like his mouth is made to tear apart creatures and not to
blow raspberries at her from across the auditorium during basketball games. The way he grips the
creature, with the same hands she’s seen delicately tapping on the counter as he waits impatiently
for the workday to be over. The sheer ferocity and strength with which he slams the monster
against the floor again and again and again, like his whole body is built for it, like he was born to
kill and not hug her tightly when he’s excited about getting a new date. Whatever it is, when he’s
left there panting, spitting blood, eyes hard and full of battle, she doesn’t dare approach that boy
brimming with the possibility of violence.

The shock passes quickly, though. Soon he is stupidly brushing off his own wounds, making
puppy eyes at Nancy Wheeler, and playfully acting exasperated by her. He turns into her best
friend once more, like whatever werewolf curse that took over him has passed without a trace. He
is her Steve, goofy and sweet and anxious and hurt (though he won’t show it). Robin doesn’t forget
it, though.

The sense of unease is still there later, after a few scares, after they return to their world, after they
manage to put together a plan. Steve is the first one that volunteers to go back in and hunt Vecna
down and, though all past logic would have suggested the idea was insane, everyone agrees. She
can see that they trust him to do it, to succeed, to survive. Steve Harrington, monster hunter.
Regardless, Robin volunteers even before Nancy does. She’s not leaving him alone.

It’s as they are gearing up for the fight that she notices it again. Steve puts on a leather jacket, and
combat boots and begins picking his weapons with the expert eye of someone built for war. His
shoulders tense and his eyes darken with that same edge from before. Robin has the terrible, awful,
unbearable feeling that her best friend in the world has turned into a soldier. She’s too smart to
have ever bought into the government’s propaganda. She knows what really happens to foot
soldiers in war.

“Steve,” she says as he fills glass bottles with gasoline to make Molotov cocktails. His brow is still
pinched, even as he nods absentmindedly at her. “I know you’ve done this before. I mean, I have
too, kinda, but not like this. The closer we came to fighting true monsters last summer was
throwing firecrackers at them. So not really. Not this ‘hunting them down and fighting them’
thing.”

“Yeah, it’s a bit different,” he concedes, still focused on his task. Like they are discussing movies
and not a life or death situation. “But I guess we’ll just do the same thing we did with the others:
hit them hard, and a lot, and set them on fire. That usually kills them.”
“To be fair, I’m pretty sure being set on fire would kill most people.”

Steve arches his eyebrows and tilts his head in a half-conceding nod. And just like that, they are
talking about monster hunting. About killing things. Robin has never killed anything other than the
occasional spider that crawled up her bathroom sink, and even then she prefers just setting them
free outside. This is different.

“You really think we can beat him?” She whispers. “I just have this terrible feeling that it might not
work out for us this time.”

And that finally gets Steve’s head to snap up. His eyes have the same hardness as before, his jaw
set, his brow furrowed… if someone had told her months ago that Steve Harrington was capable of
this seriousness she would have probably laughed it off. It would’ve been as unthinkable as
monsters, as incredible as him becoming her best friend in the world.

When he puts a hand on her shoulder, his grip is firm, but she isn’t expecting the gentleness of his
tone:

“I’m not gonna let anything bad happen to you, Robin. I promise.”

The earnestness of his reassurance touches some cord inside her. She feels her eyes water and her
throat close with a sob she refuses to let out.

“I don’t think that’s a promise you can keep right now, dofus.”

He pulls her into a hug. A body built for fighting and violence wraps around hers carefully and it’s
suddenly like every muscle in it wasn’t born for killing but to hold her tight. “It’s gonna be alright,
Rob.”

She will think of that promise later, when he keeps volunteering to go in first, regardless of where
‘in’ is. She will think about it when vines are choking her against a wall and her friends keep trying
to cut her free with increasing desperation. She will think about his promise when he stupidly
jumps in and tries to kill the powerful evil dude with his hand ax when it miraculously works out to
buy the rest of them precious seconds to scramble away from his grasp and regroup. When
everything seems direr than ever.

And she will think about it again weeks later, when it’s over.

They are all still reeling, still trying to put together some semblance of normality after the latest
terrors. They won, but at a cost, and if Robin stops to think about it for too long the rest of her real
life (whatever that means at this point) will be unbearable. So she doesn’t. She doesn’t think of
creepy dark worlds or vines trying to strangle her or monsters trying to eat them alive. It’s better to
focus on the small things, like the way the temperature is slowly rising with the promise of
summer, or how Vicky laughed yesterday at one of her jokes during rehearsal, or how Steve will
not make up his mind about what movie to watch today.

Then there’s a noise out back and every nerve in her body prickles like she’s touched one of those
magic trick balls that make your hair stand up with static. Maybe it’s not even the sound that freaks
her out, but the return of that steely gaze in Steve’s eyes. Silently, he gestures for her to stay back as
he makes his way toward the store’s back door. Robin holds her breath.

The heavy metal door creaks as he opens it. From a couple of feet behind, she can see the tension
drain out of him as he steps out.
“Hey! What did I tell you punks?” Steve yells, stepping out, hands on his hips. There’s a scowl on
his face but it’s miles away from the hardness she saw before.

Robin steps out and finds a bunch of guys with spray cans still in their hands. Vandalizing. They
were Vandalizing the store. That’s it. A relieved chuckle escapes her lips and that was surely the
wrong reaction because four sets of eyes turn towards her furiously.

“Fuck off, assholes,” one of them says.

He’s big, at least a few inches taller than Steve, and twice as thick. There’s an arrogant twist to his
smile that is looking for trouble. Robin tries to think of Eddie, of how his tough-guy act hides
kindness and awkward earnestness. There’s none of that in this guy. It’s just anger and hunger for a
fight.

“Look, man, I don’t really care if you want to, like, express artistically or whatever, but you do that
during our shift and then we get in trouble for it,” Steve is saying, walking forward.

“Do I look like a care?” The large guy asks. He speaks very loud. He’s not talking to them, not
really. He is showing off for the others.

“I don’t care if you care! Grab your little cans and-“

Steve doesn’t get to finish speaking before he’s grabbed by his green uniform vest and slammed
against the freshly painted wall.

Robin freezes, staring at the scene, and deep down she knows what she’s expecting. The thing is,
this guy is big, sure, and angry and menacing, but he has nothing on Vecna or it’s flesh-eating
monsters. There’s a second in which that dark feral anger flashes across Steve’s face, but it comes
and goes like a flicker on an old film. He suddenly looks small and vulnerable compared to the
other guy.

“Whoa, man, woah! We don’t want any trouble!”

“And why should we listen to you?”

“I mean, you- you don’t have to, probably, but I bet you I make a call and Chief Hopper will be
here in under a minute.”

The other guy’s eyes narrow. The return (and miraculous survival) of Hopper has run across their
town like a wildfire. Speculations about the guy make him out to be some living legend or
government spy or something (they aren’t too far off). And Steve isn’t lying when he says they can
get him to come at record speed with a single word.

“Whatever,” the guy lets go of Steve. "No need to call your daddy, you wimp."

The other three guys, that like Robin have been staring expecting violence, slowly straighten up
and start picking up their stuff. Steve glares at them the whole time, though there's no vitriol in that
expression. It's far closer to the 'Disappointed Dad' look he's perfected around the kids than any
kind of anger.

“You’ve killed monsters,” she deadpans, once they are gone to their car and shoving their stuff
inside the trunk.

“Yeah, so?”
“You really could’ve kicked their asses.”

The look Steve shoots her is so utterly bewildered that she can’t help but laugh.

“They’re just some assholes, Robin. They aren’t worth it.”

"Don't look at me like that! I didn't say to kill them or anything, but just a little punching wouldn't
hurt."

"There's no such thing as 'a little punching', Robs," he twists his mouth sourly. "Once you throw
that first fist, it's all out. Things just get out of hand. Trust me."

She wonders, idly, what Steve would be like 'out of hand'. She could, if she pictured monsters and
other-worldly dangers around them, but right now, with his fluffy hair and the Family Video vest
both wet with paint, he's as far from a threat as they come.

"Why do you keep looking at me like that?" He huffs. "Do I have something, or-"

"Yeah, actually, there's pain all over your back."

"Ah, shit, they are totally gonna charge me for it, aren't they?"

"Let's go inside, maybe if we put it in water with salt or something."

"HEY," a voice makes them turn right before they walk in. It's the big guy again.

"What?" Steve sighs. "You forgot something?"

"Yeah, this."

The punch is hard and it's angry and it's aimed directly at Steve's stomach where she knows the
stitches from their latest misadventures haven't healed yet. She sees in shock how his knees buckle
and he falls down, bending over himself. But, if she's being honest, it's the sound he makes —a
strangle whimper— that sets her off.

And Robin is a lot of things, a lot of great things, but a fighter was never one of them. But she's
fought monsters and evil wizards and Russians and she'll be damned if she's going to stand here
and watch some idiot hurt her best friend.

She gets two hits in: one connects her knuckles to the asshole's jaw (she's never felt more alive)
and one finds her knee sinking into his stomach (a proper vindication, she thinks). It shouldn't be
this exciting, this freeing, this natural to choose violence, but she can feel all the anger she's bottled
up from the past few weeks explode out of her and she feels great. She is finally fighting back,
finally standing up, finally defending her best friend instead of watching him take risk after risk for
their sakes.

The euphoria lasts about three seconds, until the big guy recovers his footing and pushes her off.
The shove is strong enough to knock her to the floor and shake her out of the victorious feeling
from before. She looks up at the furious man like he's one of those Russian soldiers again,
completely powerless to defend herself or fight back. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. He's walking toward
her and she's suddenly unsure of how to proceed. Should she stand up? Should she stay down?
How does a fight end?

It ends, apparently, with Steve intercepting the guy before he can even get to her. He grabs the
taller man by the wrist and twists his arm outwards like he's trying to pop the shoulder out of his
socket. With his right hand, he slams him against the wall, hard enough that Robin sees the man's
head bounce against the concrete.

"Walk away. Right now," he demands, in a tone so un-Steve that it sends chills down Robin's
spine.

There's nothing eery about him. No superpowers or supernatural vibes or dark curses. Whatever
makes Steve dangerous right now is very real and feral, in a way his opponent seems to recognize
somewhere deep in his brain, judging by the look on his face. Steve presses his arm against the
man's throat until he nods frantically and, after a pause, he lets go. They watch as the man, twice
their size, speeds off towards the street and hear his tires screech against the pavement as they run
away. From them. From Steve.

Steve, whose eyes are still hard as he crouches next to her. His shoulders are tense and his
breathing heavy, still ready for a fight.

"I'm good."

"What were you thinking?" He asks and, despite the violence in his features, his voice is back to
his own gentleness.

"He punched you."

"I can take a punch, Robin. Many, actually."

"So can I."

It's the wrong answer, judging by the way the harshness hasn't dissipated from him. He helps her
up and they walk back into the store, locking up behind them. Steve is quiet. He paces around the
store, pretending to work, huffing like a bull. At war. He looks at war, again.

"Steve?" She calls half an hour later when the silence is unbearable.

He turns his head towards her, one sharp movement.

"I'm okay, really."

"You should put your hand on ice," he sighs, finally approaching the counter.

"It's fine, it doesn't hurt."

"It will, believe me. And then, when it's all swollen and you can't do band rehearsal for a week,
and can't see Vicky during rehearsals, you're going to be complaining at me and, seriously, it's not
worth it. Just put your hand on ice. Here, I think there was some frozen stuff in the fridge."

She lets him ramble, because he finally sounds annoyed rather than angry and she can see whatever
tension he still had slowly fading away with each word. By the time he returns with a pack of
frozen noodles (who freezes noodles, for god's sake) he's back to himself. His hands are gentle as
he sets the pack over her knuckles, holding her hand carefully, like she might break.

"You shouldn't have done that."

"It felt good," she admits. "Fighting back."

"I know."
 He still doesn't look up.

"Good thing you're scary when you're angry," she quips.

That makes him finally snap out of it and look up at her, big brown eyes wide. "Angry? Robin, I
was fucking terrified, I thought that guy was going to hit you or something!"

Terrified. The missing piece in her puzzle sets in as she understands what's behind that violence,
that fire she's come to know in him. Fear. Every time they fought the unthinkable and he threw
himself in, he looked so fearless, so daring, it never even occurred to her that it could be the other
way around. It's not like Steve to fear for his own life either, no, he will take a punch and be called
a wimp and brush it off even as his stitches reopen, but of course, he freaks out if someone else is
hurt. She feels a rush of affection for her stupid, headstrong, selfless friend.

"I'm sorry I scared you, okay?"

"Just don't do that again," Steve averts her gaze. "We don't get paid enough for this shit."

And that, that, startles a laugh out of her. Thankfully, he laughs too, and for a moment she can
forget about monsters and violence and even punks that keep vandalizing their stupid place of
work. For now.

End Notes

This feels kinda inconclusive to me, but it's just because the next thing i write for this series
will definitely deal with Robin's PTSD post-Vecna.

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