teddyurastar:

'Hi, Iris. I got this for you, since I missed your birthday. Not that it's like buying your forgiveness or something--'
'Hey, Iris, what's up? How was your birthday? Hey, do you have any allergi-- oh, really should've asked that one--'
'Hey, Iris! I got somethin' you're gonna love! ...great, now it sounds like one of Jordan's pick-up lines.'

Teddy Knight really isn't good at this stuff. Where he went wrong was relaying the whole dilemma to his father, Jack. When you tell a girl that she deserves fancy dinners and puppies from guys, there's always the chance she'll get attached to the idea of a puppy. From you. So what does it mean when a girl expects gifts from you? And what happens if you... well, don't give them?

Jack seemed to think the appropriate thing to do is follow up on the remark, but he kept smirking as he talked. Teddy's pretty sure his old man was just baiting him for a laugh, although how, he can't be sure. Jack never did have much luck long-term with women, and he was constantly telling Teddy to "get a girlfriend like everybody else." No matter how much Teddy protested that not everybody had a girlfriend, and that he only wanted to be Starman, not chasing the dream of Mrs. Kyle Theo Knight and sippy cups. Then his grandpa would usually chime in that some men are married to their craft, and it should be respected, admired, and encouraged! Once that ages-old argument would start between Jack and the senior Ted, Teddy could sneak away.

More than likely, the middle Knight was just showing some (misplaced) pride in his son for finally showing interest in a girl. Jack probably couldn't conceive of a single male under 50 not actively seeking a girlfriend. But Iris was just a nice girl, and she did deserve nice things, and, well, Teddy had to open his big mouth, didn't he? It's as simple as that.

'Adults complicate everything,' he thinks to himself.

Carefully shifting the box with holes in it in his arms, Teddy reaches up to ring the doorbell of the West house.

dc_eldritch:

No one in the world on this night escapes it. They find themselves wanting to just curl up for a few minutes for some sleep. Weather it is just a nap or actually going to bed they find themselves sleeping. They do not get to sleep well. Screams of hosts long since dead haunt them and many of the dreamers find themselves herded up like cattle by strangers in heavy robes carrying pitch forks and guns.

"Where are we going," a man asks.

One of the robed men speaks. "To see our lord. You do not know the way. We shall guide you."

A child cries that she wants her mommy as they are separated. A man is shot for trying to run away and the smell of something burning fills the air.

The world is on fire and no one can escape it. They must go with the strangers to see their lord.

The dreamers are brought to a boat that goes across a sea of blood and gore. They find themselves marched across an island and they enter a tall nd terrible temple. When they try to really look at it a few go mad and start to gibber nonsense as their hair turns white and their skin wrinkles and shrivels up. They are suddenly very old.

The chanting is heard as the dreamers enter the temple.

"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn," the terrible chant is burned into the minds of people who are truly insane. People who are blessed or cursed with knowledge of the magical world find themselves puking both in the dreaming and the real world. For reasons they can not explain in the dreaming world they know that this place is terrible.

And then they are brought into the main chamber of the temple. A scream goes out as a great clawed hand comes down and begins to grab people by the dozens and brings them into the mouth of a terrible creature. The people who are eaten are lucky if anyone who can be called that. They wake up.

The are not so lucky. They think they are awake. They think are safe. But there are things lurking in the darkness of their dream world, waiting.