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Chapter Text

The night in Hawkins was a quiet one this time, something that hadn't been imaginable since the earthquake that broke the town. At least, it was until Mike Wheeler woke up to a strange sound coming from outside the cabin. He looked down and saw El, sound asleep in his arms, completely unaware of the noise he had just heard. He then looked over and saw Will in his bed and then Jonathan and Nancy in the bed beside his, all three of them sleeping. Careful to not make any noise, Mike slowly removed his arms from El's waist and stood out of the bed, opening the door in a way to avoid any creaking sounds. He then went outside the cabin, hearing the sound again, but still couldn't make out what it was. He walked into the forest ahead, wanting to find whatever was calling to him.

Mike heard the sound becoming closer and closer with each step he took. Once it became clearer, he realized that it was the sound of a clock ticking, which made him freeze in his tracks. That was when he turned and saw a grandfather clock in a tree, a distorted chime coming out of it as soon as his eyes landed on it. It continued to tick as Mike looked around for the predator that was attempting to get him. 

"Mike..." He heard a deep voice call out to him, one that sent chills down his spine. "You have made a terrible mistake."

"Aren't you supposed to be dead?" Mike questioned him, trying to not let his fear show. "I thought my sister killed you."

The teen then turned to see Vecna himself standing just a few feet away from him. "She was persistent, but a few gunshots and fire won't be enough to kill me," the monster told him as he stalked closer to him. "In the end, despite your confidence, you all lost. Hawkins is falling and there is nothing you can do to stop it."

Mike bit his lip, taking a few steps back to avoid him. "We can stop you," he firmly stated. "Why else haven't you shown yourself to us until now? You're afraid."

"I've been wanting to show myself to you for a long time now, Mike," Vecna said, ignoring his statement. "But you left Hawkins before I could. Maybe if you were here, I wouldn't have gone after Max. But now she's gone, and it's all because of Eleven."

Hearing those words made his heart sink, but Mike attempted to not let it look like that stung. He probably failed because Vecna smirked at him, though that didn't stop him from countering back. "You failed to kill Max," he told him. "El stopped you before you could and she kept her alive. You may think you have won, but you didn't. We're all still here and we are going to defeat you and your army."

Vecna then made himself appear right behind Mike. "You seem so sure that you can defeat me, despite your failures in the past," he taunted him, making the teen jump, but his counters didn't falter.

"We did defeat you, you bastard," Mike shot back. "El killed the Demogorgon. She closed the gate and we got you out of Will. Then we closed the gate and defeated your flesh monster. You're the one who's failed in the past, not us."

That was when the woods around him changed, and Mike was no longer where he once stood and Vecna was gone. Instead, he was inside Hawkins Middle School in Mr. Clarke's classroom, a familiar screech sound filling his ears. He turned towards the chalkboard, seeing the Demogorgon frozen against the wall, attempting to break free but failing to do so. No sign of Dustin or Lucas. His eyes widened when he saw El step out in front of him, walking towards the Demogorgon with a glare on her face. She looked just as she did that night with the dirty pink dress and blue flannel, bloody nose and ears, red eyes, and veins covering her pale face.

"EL!" Mike yelled, trying to reach her, but she just shoved him back with her powers, his back hitting the desk behind him, but this felt more painful than it had that night. He couldn't get up nor move, making him feel just as helpless as before.

She then turned around to look at him, but there was no hint of sadness on her face like there was back then. Now, there was nothing but anger written on her expression and it was all directed at him. "You could've saved me," she snapped at him. "You could've kept me from leaving. You say you love me? Then why did you let me sacrifice myself? Why did you let me die?"

"No, no El, please don't say that!" Mike protested, tears falling down his face as he tried to get up to get to her. "I do love you! I do!"

El ignored him. She screamed as she lifted up her hand and shoved him back. When he landed, Mike realized that he was in the Byers' shed, standing right where he was before when they were trying to reach Will during his possession. And there he was, screaming for them to let him go, but Mike was the only one there with no sign of Joyce, Jonathan, or Hopper. Will looked directly at him as he screamed, only making Mike's tears fall harder.

"LET ME GO! LET ME GO!" Will screamed, his voice turning into a growl sound. "YOU DID THIS TO ME! IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT! YOU CAN'T HELP ANYONE!"

Mike shook his head, backing away from his friend. "This isn't real... this isn't real..." he muttered to himself as he closed his eyes. "None of this is real. this never happened..."

When he opened his eyes, he was in a new setting. Mike was now in the men's restroom of Hawkins Community Pool, right by the sauna. There stood a possessed Billy Hargrove, holding El above the ground as he choked her. Max, Will, and Lucas weren't there, only himself, watching helplessly as his girlfriend couldn't do anything to save herself. Mike saw the metal pipe he had used before. picking it up and swinging at Billy. Unlike before, Billy had grabbed the pipe with his other hand, keeping the teen from doing anything. The possessed man then tightened his grip on El, breaking her neck, and he dropped her lifeless body to the ground.

"NO!" Mike screamed as he ran to her, holding her body in his arms. "EL, WAKE UP! PLEASE WAKE UP!"

When he looked up through his tears, Billy had turned into Vecna. "You may believe that your friends need you, but you're the one who can't help or save them," he taunted. "It is almost your time to finally help them. When you're gone, maybe you'll be able to save them."

...

Mike then woke up, sitting up as he gasped for air and looked around frantically. He was back in the cabin and sitting on El's bed, who was still beside him, though she had woken up once he did. She looked at him with a concerned expression, but Mike wasn't sure if she was actually there. It had to be another illusion that he was showing him. His eyes became blurry and he began to sweat, breathing heavily as he waited for her to say something about how helpless he was. How useless he was to the party. How he couldn't save the girl he loved and was the reason why she disappeared. How he couldn't help his best friend when he was in pain and even caused him some pain.

He could barely process the gentle hands of his girlfriend being placed on his shoulder, refusing to look up at her. "Mike?" she whispered to him, one of her hands moving to his cheek. "Breathe with me, okay?"

She then took deep breaths, Mike trying to follow along with her. Their breathing patterns matched up as they normally do together, in and out, through the nose and then the mouth. He moved one of his hands to her heart, reassuring himself that she was there and alive. Billy never snapped her neck and he was able to get him away from her. She didn't hate him or blame him for her disappearing. El was still here, but part of him was still unsure.

Once his breathing became steady and his vision came back, Mike rested his forehead against El's. "Is it really you?" He whispered to her as he gripped her shoulder with his left hand and felt her heart with his right.

"It's me," El comforted him, stroking his cheek. "I'm here, Mike. I'm here."

Mike sighed in relief, calmness taking over him as he finally felt like he was back in reality. "I'm sorry that I woke you," he finally spoke up after a few moments. 

"Bad dream?" El asked him, giving him an empathetic smile. "I get those sometimes."

"Something like that," Mike replied with a shrug. "I'll tell you about it in the morning, okay? I promise."

El nodded at him and she pulled her forehead away, giving her boyfriend a look of questions. Mike read what she was asking him in her expression and he nodded, giving her permission to give him a hug. She wrapped one arm around his back and another on his head, stroking his soft curls as she held him in her arms. Laying him down with her on the bed, El held him closer to her, hoping to protect him from any night terrors that would come his way. Little did she know then what she had to protect him from when the time came.

But for now, Mike slept soundly for the rest of the silent night, no more noises interrupting his slumber, but was only more afraid of what was to come next.

Chapter Text

When Mike woke up in the morning, El was no longer holding him steady in her sleep or laying next to him. He immediately shot out of bed and ran out of the bedroom, not caring if he woke up the others. He froze in his tracks when he saw her in the small kitchen area, standing by the toaster. She looked up when she heard him enter, giving him a soft smile. Mike sighed in relief, his brief moment of panic fading almost as instantly as it began. 

"Morning, Mike," El greeted him. "I'm making us Eggos. You had a bad night, so I thought we could have breakfast together."

Mike smiled as the toaster dinged, two Eggos popping out. "Thanks, El," he replied as he sat down at the table. "I should be making you breakfast since I woke you up in the middle of the night."

El gave him a look. "Don't feel bad about that," she scolded him as she put the Eggos onto a plate and grabbed two forks. "You've helped me through bad dreams. I want to do the same for you. Now, you want syrup on top or something else?"

"Syrup's good," Mike chuckled. Somehow, El always made him feel better, no matter what she did.

Once she put the syrup on top, El placed the plate of Eggos in the middle of the table and sat down in front of Mike. She handed him one of the forks and they began eating. The two of them always treasured moments like this. No interruptions, nothing life threatening approaching right this instant, just the two of them being together and enjoying one another's presence. Mike reached out his hand across the table, offering it to his girlfriend. El smiled at him and took his hand, squeezing it softly as they continued to eat.

When they finished eating, El pressed her lips together as she stared intently into Mike's eyes. "You want to tell me about your bad dream now?" She asked him.

Mike looked down, the smile leaving his face. "That's the thing, uh..." he muttered. "It wasn't... it wasn't exactly a dream."

El furrowed her eyebrows in concern. "What do you mean?" she questioned.

Mike sighed, trying to find the right words to explain what he had seen. "It was him," he told her. "One... Vecna... he showed himself to me."

Silence filled the room as El's eyes widened in horror. Mike caught a glimpse of her expression, but couldn't look at it for more than a second, choosing to stare at his empty plate instead. He hated seeing that sort of reaction on her, as she didn't deserve to live in fear, and it was worse now because he was the one bringing that fear to her. El squeezed his hand tighter, a way for her to encourage him to continue telling her what happened last night. She could always read his emotions and thoughts, even if he believed he was doing a great job at hiding them.

"I heard the clock that Nancy told us about," Mike continued after a few moments. "He taunted me a little and I... I tried to taunt him back, but he showed me... horrible things."

"Like what?" El questioned, fearing the answer based on what Nancy had said about the visions.

Mike felt tears pour into his eyes as he though back to the visions Vecna had made him see. "He would... take things that have actually happened, but twist them up. It was two with you and one with Will," he explained, a tear rolling down his cheek. "I can't get them out of my head... it was like he looked in my head and saw my deepest fears. He knows how much I love you and he knows I'm best friends with Will. He's using you both against me."

El's expression shifted from a look of fear to one of anger. "He heard you too," she realized. "When you spoke to me, you helped me fight back. He wants you gone so he can kill me without anything getting in his way."

"And maybe Will, too," Mike added, shaking his head in disbelief at what his girlfriend figured out. "He wants you both, and I'm in his way."

"I won't let him get to you," El reassured him in a determined voice. "I'll kill him before he can hurt you."

"Don't worry, El," Mike reassured her back. "Like I told you before, I'm ready for him. I just need to have a song with me at all times and he won't get into my head. But, now what we need to do is figure out a way to get to One before he can get us. He's all healed now if he's able to get into my head. That means it's now or never."

"What's going on?" A new voice joined the conversation. El and Mike turned to see Will walking over to them, a nervous expression on his face. "Are you guys talking about Vecna?"

Mike exchanged a glance with El before looking back at his best friend. "We were," he replied. "He's chosen me as his next target to get to both you and El. He showed me a vision last night, meaning he's strong again."

Will's eyes widened. "Oh god," he muttered. "I thought he would come after me? With the episodes coming back and that I can feel him in my head... and... and we were prepared for him if he ever did."

"Technically, he is coming after you. And El, too," Mike replied, looking down. "And that means that we have to get to him before he can get to the three of us. We need to kill him and put a stop to him taking over Hawkins."

"But we don't know where he is," El sighed. "His house was destroyed in the earthquake. He might have a different hiding spot."

"You can find him though, right?" Will asked, furrowing his eyebrows at his sister.

El shook her head. "I tried, but he's not there," she explained, looking down at her lap. "Something is keeping me from finding him. And... and Max too. I can't find either of them."

Mike thought about it for a while, trying to come up with some idea to stop Vecna. He had to do something to keep himself, Will, and El alive and to stop the Upside Down spreading the Hawkins. He was the leader of the Party. The heart. They needed him and he needed them, so he couldn't die a brutal death at the hands of Vecna. His mind then went to what Nancy had told him when catching him up on what happened in Hawkins. She was shown visions of Hawkins being destroyed by the Upside Down, with so many monsters and one huge monster with a gaping mouth. Mike then thought of all the events that occurred the past two weeks since the gates opened. The particles, the red storm, and the storm abruptly ending.

"Then we can't go to him," Mike stated, making El and Will look up at him. "When the storm started, we thought that was what was going to bring the monsters out, right? That, logically, would be the next step. Just like in Nancy's visions. But then, the storm just stopped. Like, Vecna changed his mind."

"What are you saying?" El questioned.

Mike stood up from his chair and began pacing around the cabin in thought. "He stopped the red storm before anything could happen," he speculated. "As if he decided on a different plan, which includes targeting me. He's putting the monsters on hold because he knows that we'll be able to kill them and then him. He knows that we will fight back. By getting rid of me, because of what I said to you, El, that gets rid of something that can help you fight back."

"Because you're the heart," Will realized, recalling what he had told Mike when they were locating El. "You are exactly what keeps the party going, what keeps us going, and by killing you, we no longer have our motivating factor, making it easier to hurt us."

"That's why you said that we can't go to One," El added, standing up from her seat. "He needs to come to us. So we can get him before he gets you."

"But how can we lure him out of the Upside Down?" Will questioned. "If he's changed his mind about releasing the monsters now, then how can we get him to do that to fight him?"

"Easy. We use the hive mind," Mike answered. "Lure out one monster, we lure out all of them."

"So, we go through the gate, bring out a monster, and that brings out all of them too?" El recapped, receiving a nod from her boyfriend in response. "Then what do we do? What if he doesn't come out?"

"Then I'll have to be the bait," Mike told them. El and Will immediately looked at him in concern. He gave them both a comforting smile, knowing exactly what they were thinking. "This won't be like Max, I promise. But, she was able to get into his head while he was in hers. That red lair that looked like remnants of his home, right? That's where he's hiding, and you can only access it if you yourself are being targeted by him. Or, in El's case, piggybacking."

El's eyes widened in realization. "Max..." she whispered. "When One killed the other numbers, he told me that they weren't gone. That they were with him. And Papa... he told me that One consumes his victims. He doesn't just kill them. I saw the three other victims in there too, their bodies against trees and held up by vines. Max might be in that lair too, but alive. That's why I can't find her. He has her captive."

"Then that adds another part of the plan," Mike stated. "Attack the hive mind, fight the monsters, lure out Vecna, kill them all, and save Max."

"I'll be the one to kill One," El declared. She then went over to Mike and grabbed both of his hands. "I'll give you enough time to find Max. Then I'm going in your head too. I'm not going to let him hurt you."

Mike squeezed both of her hands in reassurance. "I won't let him hurt me, okay?" He told her with a small smile. "No matter what he shows me, I'll fight him off. Then we can kick his ass together. I promised you that he won't hurt me, and I intend on keeping that promise."

El smiled back at him and kissed him on the cheek. "And I promise to protect you," she reassured.

"And I'll do everything I can too," Will added. "Don't know if I'll do much, but I'll try."

Mike grinned at his best friend. "Thanks, Will," he replied.

But in the back of his mind, Mike could hear the clock ticking and chiming loudly. It felt as if Vecna had heard everything that he was planning to do, but he couldn't let that show. El and Will were counting on him to survive this battle, but that nagging feeling in his head told him otherwise. Every time he looked at El and Will, he saw the visions that Vecna had showed them. El blaming him, Will blaming him, and El dying... things that he wished he had never seen. He didn't let any of this worry or fear show, wanting to keep up his leader guise to reassure his girlfriend and best friend. Both of them were the ones that needed to survive, even if he didn't make it.

Mike went into the bedroom, going past Nancy and Jonathan's sleeping figures to get to the dresser. There laid multiple Walkmans and many tapes of songs to play, which he guessed were all chosen by Jonathan based on the artists he saw. Then one song caught his eye and he picked it up, smiling as he remembered the moment the song played. Every Breath You Take played at the Snowball, where he danced with El and they officially became boyfriend and girlfriend. The happiest day of his life. Just by seeing the song, he knew that this was the one that would save him when Vecna would eventually try to kill him.

The plan had to work, not for his sake, but for the rest of the party. They were all counting on him, so Mike's plan had to work.

Chapter Text

Once he had told everyone about the plan to take down Vecna, Mike took in everyone's reactions. He noticed how concerned Hopper, Joyce, Steve, Robin, Jonathan, Erica, and even Argyle looked when he said that Vecna had cursed him. Dustin looked saddened, clearly thinking about Eddie and how he had lost a good friend, not wanting to lose another. Lucas looked numb, but a spark of hope appeared in his eyes at the mention of saving Max. Mike had expected these reactions from everyone, but what he did not expect was how Nancy had taken it. Her face was unreadable at first, but then tears were sparkling in her eyes, as if she was thinking back to something. She then walked out of the cabin, everyone watching as she slammed the door behind her. Mike wasn't sure how to take her reaction, but he figured that she just needed time.

Mike then sat down on the couch, El holding his hand to comfort him. "Do you guys still have the weapons you used when you went after Vecna?" he asked those who were in Hawkins at the time.

"Yeah, we definitely have some of them left," Steve replied. "And we can always make more spears and shields just in case of those bats."

"And I have plenty of guns in my shed," Hopper added. "Should be enough to go around."

"Good," Mike nodded. "Because we are going to need as much weapons as we can get if we are going to kill him and his army. I already have each phase of the plan worked out. Phase one will start when everyone is ready, especially Hopper and Mrs. Byers because you two will be the ones to go into the Upside Down to lure out one of the monsters. Meanwhile, Robin, Steve, Jonathan, and Argyle, you guys will be right there outside of the gate to fight. Nancy will be there too."

"What about us?" Erica questioned. "Where will we be?"

"I'll be the one that Vecna goes after since he's already targeted me," Mike explained. "El will be going in as well to protect me. You, Lucas, Dustin, and Will will protect us in case of any monsters finding us. And you'll also be there to turn on my music when El gives the signal."

Everyone exchanged looks with one another, nervous for what was to come when they followed through with the plan. 

...

Mike felt the dirt crunching beneath his feet as he walked outside of the cabin. He was holding a gun in his hand and he walked up to one of the targets that was set up behind the cabin, thanks to Nancy and Hopper. Taking a deep breath, Mike planted his feet firmly on the ground and lifted the gun. It was still heavy in his hands, but it did feel familiar with the amount of times he practiced using it. Closing one eye and taking aim, he shot at the target. He missed his first couple of shots, but he got the hang of it again and he began hitting the target.

Lowering the gun for a brief moment, Mike imagined a person that he would be planning on shooting. The target then looked like Vecna in his head, which made him lift up his gun again and began shooting. This time, each bullet hit the target, filling up each part except for the center. Still, Mike grinned at his accomplishment, the thrill of actually wielding a gun filling his whole body. 

"Are you planning on using that gun against Vecna when he comes for you?" Mike jumped and turned around to see Nancy behind him, a small smirk on her face. "I doubt you'd be able to bring it with you in your head."

Mike bit his lip when he saw her, remembering her abruptly leaving when he told her that he was having visions. "Where'd you go off to?" he asked. "You missed hearing the rest of the plan."

Nancy sighed, looking down at her feet as she rubbed her arm. "I... I just... needed some air," she slowly replied. "Hearing that... Vecna was coming after you was a lot to hear. He targeted me too and he showed me... awful things. I hate that he's doing the same to you. Did you know that this was going to happen? Did you get any headaches or nosebleeds?"

"I did have a headache before, but I didn't think much of it," Mike answered her. "Dustin had one too when I had mine, and I thought it was just because of the stress. And I did get one nosebleed, but I didn't think much of it either since I was scratching my nose when it happened."

"Ew," Nancy commented with a look of disgust.

Mike gave her a look. "It was itchy!" he protested. "And I... always have nightmares, along with... yeah..."

The teen sat down on a chair, breathing out a heavy sigh. Nancy sat down beside him, a sympathetic look on her face that was all too familiar, yet somehow comforting. Mike hated those kinds of looks most of the time. He constantly received them after El had disappeared. From Dustin and Lucas the first few weeks, from his mother even though she had no clue what the real context was, from Hopper, despite him knowing exactly where El was. Mike hated getting those looks because he hated looking weak. If he wasn't the leader of the party, the one that everyone looked to in time's of trouble, then maybe he would be okay with it. But now that it was Nancy doing it, someone who did understand his feelings of loss and never tried to make him look weak. 

"It's okay to admit that you have trauma, you know," Nancy told him. "No one here is going to judge you. We've all seen things that no one should ever see."

"I know, I know," Mike shook his head. "It's just... hard talking about it, I guess. It's hard."

Nancy pressed her lips together and nodded at her little brother. "I get it," she agreed. "I mean... I never really talked about Barb. How could I? I couldn't tell anyone that a monster took her away and killed her. I had to pretend that she just ran away, even in front of her parents, which was torture."

"And I couldn't talk about El because she was either made to be a Russian spy or they acted like she never existed," Mike added, looking down. "It felt like no one understood what I was going through because no one lost someone they loved. I know you cared about Barb, though. Maybe I should've gone to you about it. Then I wouldn't have felt so alone and you would have someone too. I did promise you that I would tell you everything, but I never kept that deal. I'm really sorry about that."

Chuckling, Nancy gave him a small smile. "You don't need to apologize," she reassured him. "I was the one who came up with that deal before you agreed to it. If anything, we're both guilty of that."

Mike chuckled as well and smiled at his older sister. "I do have... more to apologize for though," he admitted. "And... I need to say it in case something happens to me."

"Mike, nothing is going to happen to you," Nancy sternly said, smile dropping from her face. "I'm not-"

"No, stop talking because I don't know if I'll ever get the chance to say it again," Mike interrupted, holding up his hand while clenching his eyes shut. He then sighed and looked down at his lap. "I just... I haven't been the the best brother to you. Not since we started getting older. We were so close when we were kids, always playing together and you even joined in on our D&D campaigns while I joined in on your sleepovers. Then you got to high school and I got to middle school and all of a sudden, it was as if we were strangers. And I was such an asshole to you. I was a shitty fucking brother and I have no excuse for it. I'm really sorry, Nance. But if- when I get through this, I'll fix that. I promise, and I intend on keeping that promise this time."

Nancy smiled at him, taking her brother's hand. "Oh, Mike..." she said, which made Mike look up. "Thank you for saying that. I guess it's too bad that you didn't mean a single word."

Mike furrowed his eyes at his sister. "W-What?" he questioned. "I meant everything I said. Why do you think I was lying?"

"Well, isn't that what you do, Michael?" Nancy questioned, raising an eyebrow at him as her grip on his hand tightened. Mike looked up at the sky and saw that the cloud began covering the sun at a rapid rate, darkening the wooded area. "You lie to everyone you love. You refused to tell me about your struggles, you shut yourself away from your friends, and you even lied to your own girlfriend because you didn't want to tell her that you love her. Almost as if you wanted her to suffer."

Mike's heart began beating fast and he grew pale when Nancy's eyes went white with vines growing on her cheeks. "He showed me visions, Michael, but you already know that," she continued, her voice now sounding like more of a growl as she grabbed his wrist, holding him in place. "But what I didn't tell you was that I saw your death. I know that you won't survive him, and your sacrifice will mean nothing to your friends. As you lay there, broken and now a part of him, he kills everyone you love. And it's all your fault."

Tears poured into Mike's eyes as he started shaking. "No, no, you're lying," he breathed out.

"What kind of leader are you if you can't save your friends?" Nancy taunted him, her head tilting to the side. "Once the heart is ripped out, your party will not survive. No matter what plans you come up with to try and stop him, you can't win. Your time is almost up, Michael Wheeler. You'll be joining me soon."

Mike felt the tears falling down his face as he put his hands over his ears. "SHIUT UP!" he screamed. "SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP YOU BASTARD! SHUT UP!"

"MIKE! MIKE, WAKE UP!" Mike gasped when he finally awoke to seeing a frightened Nancy, the real Nancy, without any vines and color back in her eyes, desperately shaking him. She sighed in relief and hugged him tight when she saw that he was awake. "Oh my god, Mike!"

Mike clutched onto his sister, taking in everything that had just happened. He should've expected that Vecna would try and intervene any sort of conversation that he was trying to make meaningful. Now after that vision, did he even say what he always wanted to say to Nancy? Did she hear him before he was pulled into a trance? Everything he said was true, he knew that deep down, but something there was telling him that it wasn't. That he didn't care about his sister or anyone close to him. That he wasn't sorry for growing distant from her. And hearing that Nancy had seen him die in her visions was what made it worse. He wondered if that was even true, or if it was just Vecna trying to make things worse.

"Nancy?" he spoke up after a few moments. "Did... did you see me die?"

Nancy's eyes widened as she pulled away, her eyes wide. "Did he tell you that?" she asked, receiving a nod in response. "Fuck... you weren't supposed to know that."

"You saw me die..." Mike took it in. "What about everyone else?"

"I don't know," Nancy replied, looking down. "He only showed me you, Mom, and Holly. Hell, why do you think I was so adamant on getting our parents and Holly out of Hawkins when the red storm came? And please don't ask me what you looked like. I... I don't even want to think about it."

Mike bit his lip, fear only growing now more than ever. The fact that Nancy didn't even want to tell him what she had seen terrified him the most. The look on her face told him enough, based on Max's condition and from what he was informed on how Chrissy, Fred, and Patrick had looked after they were killed. He wiped the tears away from his face and stood up, grabbing the gun and refilling the bullets. He then walked over to the targets, holding up the gun and aiming in front of him, Nancy watching him curiously.

"You asked if I was planning on using this against One," Mike stated as he closed one of his eyes to help him aim better. "Well, I was thinking that maybe I could. It's my head, and maybe I can practically think up anything I wanted, even if someone else was in my head. I can conjure up any weapon that I want, including this gun. Hell, maybe I can blow his brains out if I so wished. And based on everything I know about him, I would certainly love to do just that."

He then pulled the trigger, hitting the bullseye with every single shot, imagining it was Vecna's head as he did so. Nancy looked surprised at this action while Mike just smirked, looking back at his sister.

"Looks like I taught you well," Nancy told him with a small smile.

Chapter Text

Mike sat in the front seat of Nancy's car, leaning his head against the window. He had his headphones over his ears, "Every Breath You Take" blasting in his ears and filling up the silence that was in the vehicle. Soon enough, they would be beginning their plan to take down Vecna once and for all, Mike being offered up as bait. For now, he had to protect himself with this song, hoping that it would be enough to keep him safe from Vecna's clutches. The last vision he had, seeing a deformed Nancy... it was too much for him. He didn't want to lose his mind before potentially losing his life. 

Nancy parked in the lot right in front of the Hawkins Memorial Hospital. She gave him a nervous expression as she turned off the car. "You going to be okay in there?" she questioned him.

"Yeah, yeah I'll be fine," Mike replied, quickly nodding his head as he paused the song for a little bit. "I'll have the song on the whole time."

"Good," Nancy bit her lip. "I know that you need to do this, so I'll let you do it alone. But I swear to god, Mike, if anything happens to you while you're in there..."

Mike gave his sister a small smile. "Nothing is going to happen to me," he reassured her. He knew that it must have been terrifying for Nancy to see him go into a trance earlier when his last vision occurred, especially since she knew what the visions were like. While he couldn't promise anything, he knew that he would have to make it long enough for the plan to work. Everyone would die if he was killed before they could get a chance to even fight Vecna. "I'll be okay."

The teen then opened the door and stepped out of the car, walking over to the entrance of the hospital, turning the song back on. Mike checked in with the receptionist and went up the elevator. When he got off, he found Room 237, slowly opening the door as he entered the room. His eyes immediately landed on the still form of Max Mayfield, looking like she was just sound asleep instead of being in a comatose state. The casts were still on her arms, legs and neck, making Mike wonder if bones could even heal while the body was in a coma. He wondered if Max would be able to walk when she woke up, curious to know what exactly the consequences were of being the bait. Max had wanted to do this. She knew that it was the only way to get Vecna into position to be taken out by Nancy, Steve, and Robin. Mike wanted to do this too, but he couldn't deny the fear he felt. He wondered how scared Max was, or if she was feeling confident since she had survived him before. Mike hadn't, so he felt nothing but fear.

Sitting down in a chair, Mike sighed as he stared at Max, lowering the volume on his walkman. "Hey, Max," he spoke, playing with his hands. "I, uh... I know it's probably weird that you're hearing my voice. You probably only hear Lucas or El, maybe even Erica... if you can even hear them, but... I needed to see you. I need to talk to you because... I'm about to do what you did."

No response, but Mike didn't expect anything less. While he didn't talk much with Max, outside of fighting and him asking her if she was okay after getting a nosebleed during a math test. To think that the nosebleed was the first sign of Vecna choosing you as a target and no one knew then. If only he had known, but when he had asked her if she was okay, Max had just brushed him off and walked away. Maybe if he had checked in with her more, if he didn't just let her walk away, then maybe he could have helped her. Maybe she wouldn't have felt so alone when she realized the nosebleed and the rest of the signs were Vecna trying to kill her.

"One... Henry... Vecna, whatever you want to call him... he's after me now," Mike continued. "And he's already shown me some fucked up shit. That makes me not want to know what he had shown you. I wish I could've been there to help you. Not that I wasn't happy to be with El; she needed me, even though I though I thought she didn't. I guess I just wish that I could've been in two places at once. Maybe then, he would've gone after me instead of you. I mean, I deserve it after the way I treated you."

Before Mike could continue, he heard the door opening in front of him, so he looked up and saw Lucas entering the room. He seemed surprised when he saw his friend there, clearly only used to being along or having Erica or El with him. He held a book in his hand, Mike seeing that it was The Talisman by Stephen King. He had that book when he first visited Max after coming back from traveling across the desert. Mike felt his stomach sink when he realized why Lucas had this book with him, and it made him feel sick when he thought back to what he did when El had disappeared.

"Oh, Mike," Lucas said with surprise in his voice. "I didn't know you were here,"

Mike shrugged. "Thought I'd see her before we start the mission," he replied as he pressed pause on his music. "Erica with you?"

Lucas shook his head. "No, she's helping Dustin make spears and shields," he told him. "Robin, Steve, and Robin's friend Vickie actually dropped me off here since they're on their way to the War Zone stone. We need some more Molotovs."

"Vickie?" Mike questioned. "Why did Robin tell someone else about what's going on?"

"Robin said that Vickie saw the gates up close and noticed a Demodog through it," Lucas explained. "You kind of have no choice to tell someone the truth when they are already seeing it for themselves."

"That's true, but then again, Max didn't see anything before you told her," Mike pointed out. When he noticed Lucas's guilty look, he immediately kept talking to clarify what he meant. "Not that I blame you at all! Trust me, I would've done the same thing if El was in Max's position. I think it's more than just wanting to tell everyone the government's secrets. You want them to know everything about you, and it's like hiding a huge part of your life away. I know that feeling since I had to keep this all a secret from my mom of all people. You wanted Max to know the real you and the real shit that goes down here to try and keep her safe. You wanted her to feel like she was a part of the party, especially since I kept acting like an asshole to her."

Lucas sat down next to him, giving him a sad look. "Why were you so rude to her when she first joined the party?" he questioned, making Mike look away. "I never understood that."

Mike didn't look at his friend in the eyes, not wanting to open up. But, he knew he had to. Friends don't lie, and Lucas wanted to know the truth. He couldn't lie to him, not while he was in this state of not knowing if the girl he loves will wake up ever again. "I... I thought you and Dustin were trying to replace El," he slowly explained after a few moments. "It felt like you guys forgot all about her and everything she did for us just for some new girl who knew nothing about what we went through. And Will didn't mind either because he didn't even know El and just wanted to make you guys happy because you both liked her. And instead of talking to you guys about it, I took it all out on Max."

"I wasn't trying to replace El, and I doubt Dustin was either," Lucas reassured him. "Neither of us could ever forget her, even if we did want to become friends with someone else. It's pretty much impossible to ever find someone who could take El's place in our party. I mean, I was horrible to El too, so I shouldn't even be mad at you for being rude to Max."

"You had a reason to not trust El, though," Mike countered. "There was no reason for me to be so awful to Max. No reason at all. And... I didn't even try being her friend after that. I apologized, but that was it. Then we just kept arguing over what was best for El, and nothing came from that other than El almost dying and losing her powers. We barely talked to each other, and I never checked in on her. Maybe if I did, if I was there for her like you and Dustin were, she wouldn't be in this situation right now. You wouldn't have to feel like... like..."

Mike's breath hitched as he felt tears pouring into his eyes. He looked away from Lucas, not wanting to see him potentially cry or seem weak. Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, which made him flinch a bit, expecting it to be Vecna, but it was still Lucas when he turned to check. "Like how you felt when El disappeared?" he finished for him, receiving a small nod in response. "Look, you shouldn't have to feel guilty for not asking her if she was okay. She wouldn't have let you in anyway. I would check in on her all the time, even though we were broken up, and she just kept shutting me out. Dustin tried a few times too, but got ignored or she would sass him off. She wasn't interested in letting us know what was wrong. I could tell that she didn't want to feel like a burden, even though she could never be a burden on me. But now, I'm making sure that I'm here for her. I actually came down here to see if what you said was a lie and that she was awake, not in Vecna's mind scape or whatever hell she's being kept in. She's still there, though. Waiting for us to find her. Waiting for you, Mike."

That last statement made Mike look over at him, wiping his eyes of any tears that were threatening to fall. "You think I can save her?" he questioned, unsure of himself.

"I know you can save her," Lucas firmly stated. "You're the leader of our party, Mike. If there is anyone who can lead us to victory, it's you."

"You really think you can save me? Even after you treated me like shit ever since you knew of my existence?"

Mike froze in his seat and looked over at Max's bed. No longer was the redhead lying still, eyes closed, and showed no signs of life. Instead, she was sitting up, ripping off her casts one by one, eyes open, but there was no color to them. Her blue eyes were now a pale white color, her pupils no longer visible and had a haunted and glassy look to them. She was looking right in his direction, and Mike deeply inhaled when he saw blood beginning to drip from her eyes. Chills ran down his spine, looking away to look at Lucas, but he had felt the touch of his hand on his shoulder disappear before he fully realized that he was gone. Mike had no choice but to look at Max, who was now standing up from her bed.

"Don't deny it, you admitted it yourself already," Max continued with a sneer. "You hated that I was a part of the party. In fact, you had always wished that I would just disappear. That I never existed. And now you finally have your wish, yet you're using my death as an excuse to be the leader again. Michael Wheeler: the Paladin of the party, hoping to use his role to his own benefit in order to feel good about himself again. You're so fucking sick."

"W-what?" Mike asked, confused and concerned, standing up from his chair, backing away as Max stalked closer to him. "Max, that's not true. You know that's not true! I want to save you because I want to be your friend! Because I care about you!"

Max scoffed at him. "Oh, come on, you care about me?" she questioned. "If you care about me so much, then why weren't you here? You weren't here for us when he was trying to kill me, since you preferred to make out with your girlfriend rather than be there when Hawkins is about to fall. You could've saved me because if you were actually here, he would have gone after you instead. Then you could have actually put your leadership to good use rather than using me. You say you care? You saw me as an unwanted replacement, then a nuisance when I tried to help Eleven, and then just someone who happened to be there. But I was always a party member, whether you liked it or not. So why weren't you here when we needed you most? Why?!"

"I... I..." Mike stuttered, not sure what to say. "I didn't know... I didn't know what was going to happen. If I had known-"

"'If I had known', stop FUCKING LYING MIKE!" Max yelled. The lights around them began to flicker, the blood streaming down Max's eyes went faster, and Mike stumbled over a chair, trying to regain his footing as Max stalked closer to him. "That's all you can do, right? Lie after lie after lie. What makes you think I would believe you now?! I watched you lie right in Eleven's face several times! You've always told us that we would win, that we would all be okay. Now look what happened! I'm fucking dead and it's all because of you!"

Mike backed up to the door, fumbling with the door handle to try and open it. Unfortunately, it was stuck, so Mike kept trying to force it open as Max kept getting closer to him. "Will says that you're the heart? He's a liar too because he's blinded by how much he cares about you," she continued, her voice beginning to sound distorted. "What kind of heart of the party are you if you just let one of us die?! All because you hated me?! What did I ever do to you, Mike?! You are no leader. You never were. You're just a fucking coward who does nothing but hurt the ones he claims to love! You're no heart. You're a fucking cancer!"

Finally, Mike got the door to open, ending up in the hallway of the hospital. The lights continued to flicker, indicating that he wasn't out of this yet. Slamming the door shut behind him, he stared down both ends of the hallway, trying to see if there was anything there. A large bang on the door sent him running down the right end of the hall, not wanting to hear anything else that Max had to say. Tears streamed down his face as he took in everything that she had told him, trying to convince himself that it was all words to get under his skin. Fortunately for Vecna, it was working. He just kept running, hoping that Lucas had at least been real and that he would turn on his music. Why did he turn it off in the first place?!

"Where are you going, Michael?" Mike heard Vecna's voice in the distance, which only made him run faster. "Are you afraid of the truth? I see everything that goes on in your head. You know what everything I tell you is true. You can run, but you cannot keep away from the monster that you really are."

He could hear his voice getting closer, so Mike turned his head while still running. Nothing was behind him, only the flickering lights that kept getting faster as he kept moving away from the hospital room. When he turned his head again to face forward, Mike froze when he saw Vecna standing in front of him, his tall form glowering down at him. With a flick of the evil creature's hand, Mike was sent flying back, landing flat on his back. He groaned in pain and slowly sat up, realizing that he was no longer in the hospital hallway.

Mike took in his new surroundings, realizing that he was in an attic of some sort, covered in a dark blue lighting. He turned and saw Lucas, sitting on the ground and holding something, crying in a way that Mike had never heard him sound like before. It broke his heart to hear the way he was sobbing. When he got closer, he realized why he was crying. Lucas was holding Max in his arms, who was gasping for air after her last encounter with Vecna. Her arms and legs were broken, and she was staring up at nothing in particular due to her eyes looking glassy, blood streaming out from them, just like they did at the hospital.

"Lucas?" Max gasped out, sounding like she was about to cry. "I... I can't feel or... s-see... anything..."

"I know, I know, it's okay," Lucas reassured her through his tears, stroking her cheek. "We're gonna get you some help, okay? Just... just hold on!"

"Lucas, I'm scared. I'm so scared," Max whimpered, the fear evident on her face. Mike fell to his knees beside his two friend, tears beginning to fall once more as he watched the scene in front of him. Why was he being forced to watch this? Why did he have to see his friends in so much pain?

"I know, I know, I know," Lucas tried reassuring her, letting her know that he was there for her. Mike looked up at his friend, seeing his beaten and bloodied face, the blood mixing in with the tears that were falling down his cheeks, some hitting Max's brown jacket.

"I don't want to die!" Max wailed, shaking her head, crying, though no tears could fall. "I'm not ready!"

"You're not going to die!" Lucas told her, though even he sounded unsure. "Just hang on!"

"I don't want to go!" Max continued to sob, which made Mike himself begin to cry, pressing his hand against his mouth as he was being forced to watch this go down. "I'm not ready to go!"

"You're not going to die! Just hold on!" Lucas's voice got louder, not just begging her, but begging whoever was watching them to save her life. He then noticed that Max was no longer talking, instead gasping for air, trying to hold onto whatever amount of life she had left. "Max, Max, Max, no, no, Max, stay with me. Stay with me! No, no, Stay with me, Max! ERICA, HELP!"

Mike closed his eyes, but it was almost worse because he could only hear Max's gasps and Lucas's cries, which just made him want to see more. When he opened them, Max had stopped gasping and her eyes had slowly drooped shut. Lucas froze, staring down at her body as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing. Mike could no longer look away, choking on his sobs as he had to now see Lucas's pain only grow more. To think that El had seen this too, and she was watching in the void close by. It was worse than any description that she or Lucas had given him when he asked what happened to Max. Mike was actually witnessing her dying, someone who he had been so cruel to and wished that he could've gotten along better with. It was different than seeing her in a coma, where she could potentially wake up. Here, she was dead. And Lucas had part of himself ripped out.

"Max? Max, Max, Max, stay with me!" Lucas begged, his cries and tears only getting worse as he could barely process what had just happened. "Max, stay with me! No, no, no, no, no, Max! Max! Please, stay with me!"

Lucas screamed, eyes firmly shut as his grip on Max's body only got tighter. Mike couldn't take it anymore. He pressed his hands against his ears, sobbing as he closed his eyes tightly, wishing that this torture would just end. He had to witness Lucas lose the love of his life, just like he had when El sacrificed herself, though this was much worse than that. Max had actually died after enduring so much trauma after promising that she would make it out alive. But there laid her body, bloodied and broken as Lucas couldn't do anything to save her from death. Even though his eyes were closed, he could still see it in his head.

"Open your eyes, Michael, and look at what you've done," Vecna spoke out, his deep voice going past Mike's hands blocking his ears. Mike felt himself subconsciously obeying, opening his eyes and was now seeing Lucas sobbing over Max's body again. "This could have been avoided if you were here. Max could have been saved if you had let me get to you first. But you left before I could. You didn't help your friends. What happened to Maxine is all your fault."

Every breath you take...

Every move you make...

Every bond you break...

Every step you take...

I'll be watching you...

Mike looked up when he heard the song, seeing a portal open up in the wall. He saw himself, sitting in the chair in Max's hospital room, though he was in a trance. Lucas was still there, shaking his body and begging for him to wake up. Mike gasped, realizing what was going on. 

Every single day...

And every word you say...

Every game you play...

Every night you stay...

I'll be watching  you...

Mike stood up and ran to the portal, trying not to look at the vision of Lucas and Max anymore. He couldn't stand being in that room anymore, and if this was his way out, then he was going to take it. 

...

Gasping awake, the color in Mike's eyes came back as he collapsed back into the chair. "Mike! Oh my god!" Lucas sighed in relief, his hands on his shoulders. "I... I thought you had your music on. Then I saw it was off and... and I thought..."

Mike took a few deep breaths, trying to process everything that had just happened. He tried to come up with words, but nothing was forming in his head to tell Lucas what Vecna had just shown him. How he had just seen what had to have been the worst moment in Lucas's life. The amount of guilt that he felt. The fact that if he was there, then Max could still be alive and he would have taken her place. How when he looked at Lucas now, all he could hear were his screams filled with so much pain and misery.

He didn't realize that he was crying until Lucas pulled him into his arms, holding him tightly. Mike rested his head against his friend's shoulder, sobbing as he clutched onto him, seeking out anything that could help him remove the guilt he had. "I-I'm so sorry, Lucas," Mike whispered through his tears. "I saw... I saw..."

"You don't have to tell me if you can't or don't want to, okay?" Lucas reassured him, stroking his back. "It'll be okay. It's okay."

After a few moments, Mike lifted his head up and pulled away. "I'm going to help her," he told Lucas. "I'm going to save her. I'll make up for not being here. I promise, no matter what happens, Max is going to wake up. And you... you two can be happy."

Lucas gave him a look filled with hope and faith, especially in his eyes. And that was enough for Mike.

Chapter Text

Mike couldn't take it anymore after that vision. He couldn't get the image of Max dying in Lucas's arms out of his head, and he didn't think he ever could. Her blank eyes, blood pouring out of her eyes, broken arms and legs, Lucas's distraught face... Mike never wanted to see his friends in such a horrid state. Seeing El almost die several times and Will being possessed was already pushing him over the edge, and now he was free-falling off the cliff. He had no idea when he would reach the bottom, but part of him just wanted it to be over and done with.

However, he had to stay alive long enough for his friends to survive. Mike wasn't going to die if he thought that his loved ones wouldn't make it after their final confrontation because of him. He had already let Max down before, he wouldn't do it again.

When he had gotten back to the car, Nancy immediately noticed that something was wrong when she saw the look on her brother's face and his shaking body. Mike refused to tell her what happened, instead choosing to ignore her questions and just order her to go back to the cabin. Nancy sighed and complied, though she kept her eye on him the whole car ride back. The siblings arrived back at the cabin, and Mike immediately went inside before Nancy could even park. He saw everyone in there, besides for Lucas since he was still at the hospital, and they all noticed him. Mike was met with so many concerned faces and a lot of questions, which only made him shake more. He turned up the volume of his song on the Walkman and ran to the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.

"It's okay... it's okay..." Mike muttered to himself as he gripped onto the sink. "You're okay. You just have to get through this. None of it was real."

But it was real. That nagging voice in the back of his head told him that what he had seen was true. Max had died in Lucas's arms, and he wasn't there to help anyone. Mike took shaky breaths, trying to relax and trying to get the voice to shut up, but nothing helped him. Someone was knocking, but he quickly locked the door to the bathroom, terrified for anyone to come inside and see him in this state. He was supposed to be the one leading the party and protecting them, so they couldn't see their leader like this. They couldn't see how weak and scared he really was, not at a time like this. Taking deep breaths, Mike closed his eyes and turned on the sink, splashing water onto his face. He wiped away the tears from his face, which he had just noticed after looking at his reflection in the mirror.

"Mike?" Mike jumped when he heard the familiar, soft, and angelic voice of the girl he loved. "Can you let me in?"

"I..I, uh... I can't," He replied, squeezing his eyes shut when he realized how pathetic he must have sounded. "I'm... I'm on the toilet..."

There was a moment of silence before he heard her again. "Boyfriends and girlfriends don't lie," she told him. "Not anymore. Please let me in."

Mike sighed, knowing that he would have to open the door eventually. No one could see him like this though, so he splashed more water on his face, rubbing off the tear streaks that were there. His hand was hovering over the doorknob, his body hesitating from opening the door, but he knew he had to come out of the bathroom in order to make everyone stop worrying about him. Bracing himself, Mike finally opened the door, seeing El standing right in front of him. Behind her was Will, Dustin, Erica, Nancy, and Lucas, who must have just returned from the hospital. Jonathan, Steve, Robin, Vickie, Joyce, and Hopper were sitting on the couches and chairs nearby, but their eyes were still on the teen boy. Mike's heart began pounding, knowing that he was about to be bombarded with lots of questions.

"Lucas told us that you had a bad vision," El slowly said, a concerned expression on her face. "What... what happened?"

Mike bit his lip, staring at the floor as he rubbed his arm. "That's... that's nothing you need to worry about," he replied in more of a stern tone than he meant to. "In fact, none of you need to worry about what he's showing me. Are we ready for the plan?"

El looked as if she wanted to say something, but couldn't find the right words. "We do have all the weapons we'll need," Dustin answered instead of her, which brought a sense of relief to Mike. "And everyone is accounted for. We're just waiting to know if you're ready."

"And honestly? You don't look ready at all," Erica added, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Erica..." Lucas warned, but with less of an attitude that he would normally have when scolding his little sister.

Erica did seem to catch on to his tone, which got rid of the judgmental look on her face. "All I'm saying is that his face is wet and that he looks like he just went through hell and back," she pointed out. "Maybe we should delay kicking Vecna's ass for now? Wait until Mike himself is ready for this shit?"

"No!" Mike yelled, angry at the very thought of that being a suggestion. "We don't have any time! All of his victims, aside from Max, have had less than 24 hours to live after they had their first vision. I've already had three, two of which being just this afternoon. If he's doing the same with me, my time is almost up. We have to get moving now!"

"But Mike-" Will tried to protest.

"You heard what I just said!" Mike interrupted, glaring at everyone. He began to walk past them all in order to get to the door. "We don't have much time. Let's get out of here and get to the main gate."

"Mike, kid, you know that you can talk to us about what's going on," Hopper spoke up, making Mike freeze in his steps. He was facing away from everyone, but he could feel their eyes on the back of his head. "We're all here for you, and we're worried about you. Whatever he showed you... the last time I saw you like that was when I was hiding El away from you."

"Please don't bring that up..." Mike muttered, feeling the tears coming back.

"I'm sorry," Hopper apologized. "But I know what it's like to hide emotions. It's not healthy, and I learned that the hard way. It will just build up more and more until you just... explode. And when this is all over, when you conquer him, it won't get any better. Talking about it now... it can help you before it gets worse."

Deep down, Mike knew that the former chief was right. But he could care less about his feelings and everything he was being forced to see right now. Quickly blinking away the tears, Mike turned around to see everyone in the room again. Despite their concerned looks, it was still a beautiful sight to see them all there. Everyone he cared about, besides for his mother and little sister, was in this room, and it was nearly perfect. Adding Max into the picture again would make it even more perfect. They didn't need Mike in the party anymore once he led them to victory by sacrificing himself for them. 

"I'm your leader," Mike finally spoke after finding his voice. "I'm the one who's supposed to be worried about all of you, not the other way around. Just stop worrying about me and focus on the plan. That's what's important here. Stopping One and saving Hawkins is my goal, and I hope it's yours too. What kind of leader am I if I don't do everything I can to keep all of you alive? I failed before, and I'm not doing that again. Now... are we going to save the world or not?"

Before anyone could say anything, Mike left the cabin, walking ahead of everyone. It took them all a second, but they gathered their weapons and left as well, not saying one word. A few minutes of walking, and Mike felt someone grab onto his hand. He looked down to see his hand enveloped in another, looking up to see El walking beside him. She gave him a small smile, one that made his heart race and almost brought a smile of his own to his face. How he wanted to tell her everything, knowing that she was always there to listen to him. She listened when he told her how scared he was about Hawkins falling. They both promised that they would be there for each other, both of them knowing exactly how they felt for each other and fixing any problems that they may have had before. It felt like it was just the two of them against the world, exactly how Mike wanted it to be. But now, he didn't know what their future could be with Vecna being what they're up against. 

"You don't have to tell me what he made you see," El reassured him, squeezing his hand. "But I'm here. I'm right here, okay? And nothing is going to happen. I promised that I would protect you from Henry. I'm keeping that promise."

"I know you will," Mike told her, a smile finally coming onto his face. "I know. And I'm sorry that I'm... I just can't tell you what I've been seeing. I want to, but... it's hard."

"You don't have to," El reminded him. "I'll be in your head later anyway. I'll see for myself."

Mike looked down at the ground, not sure what else to say. He then felt El's arm wrap around his wait, which made him lean into her touch as they walked through the woods. He did the same, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, holding her close to him for as long as he could. For all he knew, this would be the last time he could be close to El. Mike could remember every single moment that they shared together, even what he was thinking when spending time with her. It was easy to remember his thoughts, as all he was thinking was just how much he was in love with her. How all he wanted to do was spend time with her, be with her, hold her, rest his forehead against hers, kiss her, and to just be in her presence. He didn't feel worthy of being in the presence of such a strong, beautiful, and kind girl, but he somehow earned her love in return. When El looked at him, she didn't see some nerd that was easy to bully. She saw him for who he truly was. She was the only person who knew him. And Mike was so grateful that she existed.

"I love you," Mike whispered to her, kissing her temple and stroking her back.

El smiled at those three simple words. "I love you too," she answered in a whisper, resting her head on his shoulder.

When they arrived at where the four gates met, the Hawkins library, it was time for the party to split up. Will hugged both Joyce and Jonathan while El hugged Hopper, savoring the moment before the kids had to go to their location for the final battle. Mike went up to Nancy, who immediately hugged him as soon as he was in close proximity of her. He squeezed his sister tight, feeling as if they were holding each other for a lifetime rather than just a couple of minutes. 

"Don't do anything stupid, okay Mike?" Nancy ordered him. "You find Max, lead El there, and get out."

"I'll be okay, Nance," Mike reassured her, but more to himself rather than his sister. "But you're telling your little brother of all people to not be stupid. Should've told me that a long time ago."

"Yeah, but then we wouldn't have been getting along like we are now," Nancy replied, pulling away from the hug with a smile. "You've got this. I know you do."

Mike smiled back at his sister, taking in the moment one last time. He then left with El, Will, Lucas, Dustin, and Erica to where they would be sending Mike into his very last vision. After a bit of walking, they made it. Hawkins National Laboratory. Where it all began seven years ago when Henry Creel was sent into the Upside Down, becoming the monster that threatened Hawkins and haunted Max, and now was haunting Mike. The very monster that they would defeat today with the help of their superhero. Chills ran up everyone's spines as they looked at the abandoned lab, knowing that this was it and whatever happened in there would determine theirs and Hawkins's survival.

"You sense him here, Will?" El asked her brother, noticing that Will was putting his hand on the back of his neck.

"He's in there," Will answered, staring at the tall building in front of him. "He's waiting for us."

Mike bit his lip, growing nervous at those words. "Then we're ready for him," he stated.

The six kids walked inside of the lab, no one having any idea of what their fates were as soon as they went into the belly of the beast.

Chapter Text

Once El broke the door open with her powers, the kids stepped inside the abandoned Hawkins Lab. It was dark inside, broken glass everywhere with dried up bloodstains on the wall and floor from the Demodog attack. No one had been inside for quite a long time, yet it still felt like they were being watched. If the chills on Will's neck was anything to go by, Vecna was the one who was watching them. He may already know that they were looking for him. But that was what the kids wanted. They wanted Vecna to know that this was it. This would be the last time that he would torture any of them.

"Where you do guys think he is?" Lucas asked, aiming his flashlight around the room.

"It would have to be somewhere he has a connection to," Dustin thought out loud. "He was in the attic at his house because that was where he would torment his family. Where did he torment the kids at Hawkins Lab?"

"The Rainbow Room," El immediately came up with. "He killed most in the Rainbow Room. He attacked me there and then I fought back. It brings back memories for him, like in his house. He would be in there."

The five other kids exchanged looks at what she said. "Have you been in that room since it happened?" Will asked.

El shook her head. "Papa never let me back in there," she told them all, staring at the ground. "I was in my room, the bath, the room where he watched me, or the dark room. I don't think he wanted me back in there. Brings back bad memories, not ones that could help me relearn my powers."

"El, if you don't want to go back in there, you don't have to," Lucas reassured her, putting a hand on her shoulder. "You can go into the void right outside the room if you're not comfortable."

"Thank you, Lucas," El replied with a soft smile. "But I have to go back in there. I need to face him and what he's done."

With those words, El led her friends through the lab. up to where the experiments were held on her brothers, sisters, and herself. Mike could almost feel some sort of dread filling inside of him as they got closer to the Rainbow Room. Part of him didn't want to go in there and face his demon, knowing the potential consequences of the last encounter they'll have. This would end in one or both of them dying, and Mike wasn't sure what he wanted the results to be. As long as everyone else made it out alive and Max was back, he didn't care what would happen to him. While he didn't know if he was ready to face Vecna once and for all, Mike knew that he had to do it for the sake of his family and the world.

Suddenly, El froze in her tracks. In front of the six kids stood a large pair of double doors, leading into the Rainbow Room. The darkness of the hallway only made it more ominous, beckoning them to enter the room. Taking a deep breath, El stepped towards the door and pushed her way inside, everyone else right behind her. What they saw in what used to be the playroom for the kids only made them sick to their stomachs.

Dried up blood covered the floors and walls, splattered over the rainbow designs throughout the room. Each toy was right where they last sat, but they also had blood all over them. There was barely any red left in the Rainbow Room, as each red spot was now a brown color, aging since the last time anyone was in there. Shapes were indented along the walls and floors, looking like a dead body had recently been there, even though it had been seven years since the massacre at Hawkins Lab. Right in front of them was the shattered mirror, glass lying in front of it. A cracked line was on the wall on the opposite side of the mirror, similar to the ones that the kids were all too familiar with.

"Ugh, nasty," Erica muttered, pinching her nose as a putrid smell of old blood filled her nostrils.

"I can't believe this," Dustin whispered, staring at the blood along the walls.

"This is disturbing..." Lucas breathed out, unable to get his eyes off of the bloody floor.

"He... he left it as it was before..." El whispered, tears pouring into her eyes as she slowly walked through the room. The pain in her voice made Mike's heart ache as his anger towards Brenner only grew. He wished that the evil man wasn't dead just so he could do it. himself for everything he's done.

Will reached his hand up and touched his neck, which made everyone look over at him instead of the blood. "He's here," he informed them. "This is where his presence is the strongest."

Erica look out her flashlight and turned it on, walking to the center of the Rainbow Room. Once she hit the center, the light being emitted got brighter and hummed louder than before. "And now we know his exact spot," she commented.

"When we did this before, we had notepads to communicate," Lucas happened to say, a forlorn look crossing his face. "Why don't we have them this time? If he's right here on the other side, he would know that we're here."

"Good," Mike spoke up, narrowing his eyes at the flashlight in Erica's hand. He walked up to the center of the room, glaring at what he couldn't see. "I want him to know we're here. I want him to know that I'm done running."

Mike sat down on the floor, ignoring the fact that he was sitting in dried up blood, and took a deep breath. This was it. This was where it began and where it would end once and for all. He could feel an evil presence nearby, a chill running up his spine. It made him feel more uncomfortable than before, especially when he felt the chills around his body. Is this what Will felt like when he could sense Vecna nearby? How Max felt when she was being haunted by Vecna? If it was, then he felt even worse for his best friend than he did before. It was an awful feeling, one that Mike wished he could push away. But he couldn't. Not now, anyway. He closed his eyes, trying to focus on the moment rather than what he was feeling. 

"I'm here, Henry," Mike called out as his friends circled around him. "I know you can hear me. You know that I'm here and you know that my friends are all here. Hell, I bet you're wondering why I even brought them with me if I came to you so you can take me away. It's because... they need to hear everything that I'm going to say. Everything you said was right. And I owe it to them to let them know everything that's been going on."

El, Lucas, Dustin, Will, and Erica all exchanged nervous glances, not sure what Mike was going to say. "I'm not a leader. I don't think I ever was," Mike said, looking at the ground, his leg beginning to bounce. "All I do is cause so much pain for my friends. Any plan or idea that I come up with goes to shit. My friends almost die and it's because of what I do, or what I don't do. I couldn't save El when she was fighting the Demogorgon, instead I just sat there like a helpless idiot. I couldn't help Will when he was possessed. I just watched him be in so much pain. And there was nothing I could do when the Mind Flayer was about to kill El. No ideas, no plans, just watching helplessly as the monster is about to kill her in the mall. If she didn't bring Billy back, she would be dead. And I wouldn't have done anything to help her."

Knowing that they couldn't say anything, El and Will just looked at each other with tearful eyes. Mike pretended that he didn't see them. He had to act like he was the only one in the room so he could finally get these words out. They have been on the tip of his tongue for a long time now, even before he knew who was really behind the Upside Down. Now that he was actually saying them, he felt even more scared than before, feeling as if he was giving Vecna more ammo to attack him. But he had to stay strong if the plan was going to work.

"A leader of the party is someone who does everything they can to save their party members and leads them to victory," Mike continued. "When have I ever done that? You just kept coming back with more, and each time, you've gotten closer to killing us all. You opened your gates when I wasn't even here to help my friends stop you. Max would still be here if I didn't leave Hawkins, just like you said. Instead, I would be dead. Not like that would matter anyway, since I'm useless. I can't do anything right. And now that I'm actually trying to be better, you're here to tell me why that can never happen. When I was trying to mend things with Nancy, you told me that I am nothing but a liar. When I was trying to open up to Lucas, you told me that I'm a cancer to the party. Both times, you said that it's my fault. And you showed me... you showed me Max dying. You made me watch her die because it's my fault. I wasn't there to take her place."

The sound of a sniffle made Mike take a shaky breath. He tilted his head down, but looked up to see his friends' reactions at what he had just confessed to. Erica had wide eyes and her jaw had dropped. Dustin had tears in his eyes as he put his fingernails into his mouth. Lucas somehow looked more miserable than he had been during the last couple of weeks, looking away and rubbing his arms. Will had tear streaks on his cheeks and his lips were trembling. And El... she looked horrified, angry, and sorrowful all at once with her tears falling, furrowed eyebrows, and wide eyes. It was as if they didn't want to accept that what he was saying was the truth, only saying it to tempt Vecna into his head. But it was the truth. Mike had vowed to himself that he would never lie again, so he was being completely honest with everything now. Even with feelings that he never wanted to delve into before.

"Part of me thinks that if I just... if I died, then things would be okay," Mike went on, his voice beginning to choke up as a few tears began to fall. "No one would be suffering anymore because of me. I've been feeling this way for a long time, since the night El disappeared. And you've tried to take her and the rest of my friends away from me since then. I feel so useless and I can't... I can't take feeling this way anymore. I can't fucking take it. So that's why I'm here now. For you to finally get rid of what I'm feeling. Because whether or not you kill me, at least I'll finally be doing something worthwhile."

"Mike..." El whispered, which made Mike look up at his friends again. They all looked so upset and horrified at everything he had just said about himself, which only made Mike feel worse. Even when he was finally opening up, he was making them feel saddened. Almost as if he was a burden on them.

But no... he wasn't a burden, he realized in that moment.

"I'm the heart," Mike whispered, more tears streaming down his face. "I'm the heart of the party. I may not be the leader that I want to be, but I am, somehow, what keeps this party going. And that's why you're so scared of me. You're scared of how much I love my friends and how much I love El. I couldn't help her against the Demogorgon or in the mall, but I did help her when she fought Billy at the pool. You tried to convince me otherwise, but it's not true. And I helped save her from you when your Mind Flayer tried to drag her away in the cabin. And I saved her when she fought you directly."

His heart began to pound fast as Mike looked down at the ground. "I may have fucked up a lot, but I'm still here, fighting you and anything that could endanger the ones I love," he continued. "Even though I blow up sometimes, I still remain at my friends' sides. I have acted like a bad friend before. I abandoned Dustin to hang out with El when he just got home from summer camp. I physically fought Lucas and didn't support him at his basketball game. I acted like Max was the enemy when she moved to Hawkins when she wasn't. I ignored Will so many times and treated him like a third wheel when he was going through a rough time. I lied to El and refused to tell her how I feel for such a long time. And I regret all of them. But I will never leave their sides again and I will never let him die."

Mike looked up at Dustin first. "I have been helping Dustin grieve Eddie and whenever he calls in a Code Red or just wants to hang out, I will never ignore him or try to ditch him," he stated. Then he looked to Lucas. "I won't let my anger get the best of me when having a disagreement with Lucas and I will support him if he ever decides to do basketball again." He then looked back down at the ground. "I will be better to Max and actually start being a friend to her, not just someone who hangs out with us." Mike then made eye contact with Will. "I will stop ignoring Will and actually include him because I never want him to feel left out. I also accept him for who he is, no matter what, because he's my best friend and nothing will ever change that, even if I do have a girlfriend." Will looked taken aback by this statement, almost like he was scared, but softened when he saw Mike give him a small smile. He smiled back through his own tears, knowing exactly what Mike was referring to. 

Finally, Mike looked at El, the girl he loves more than anything in the world. "And I will never lie to El again," he said determinedly. "I will never hide how I truly feel from her, because I love her so much. I've been in love with her since I first laid eyes on her, and that will never change. The only thing that has changed is the amount of love I have for her, because that has grown every second of every day. You may think that killing me will take that away, but my love will always be with her because I am the heart. Same with everyone else. And there is nothing you can do that will take away that love."

Everyone smiled at him, tears still falling, but seeing their smiles made Mike more hopeful than he was when he entered the Rainbow Room. "So, Henry, I didn't lie when I said that I want you to take away this feeling. No matter what happens in my head, that feeling will be gone," he declared. "Do your best, but I will live on in my friends' hearts, and we will keep fighting you until you are finally dead and rotting. Bring it on."

There was a long pause of silence, no one saying a single word. It soon became so deafening that Mike thought Vecna chose to leave him be, that maybe he had somehow scared him off. No chance there, but he certainly hoped that was the case. That was when he noticed that the blood on the walls and floor was no longer a dried up brown color. Instead, it was a freshly deep red color, dripping from the walls to the floor. Mike stood up and looked around, noticing that the bodies of dead children, all with shaved heads, tattooed wrists, and hospital gowns, eyes bleeding and limbs twisted. If he had thought what the Rainbow Room looked like in his time was messed up, this was an even worse sight. He turned back to where his friends were standing, but they had disappeared.

Mike was alone.

"You think that you're the heart, Michael?" Mike heard Vecna's voice as the lights around him began to flicker. "You just admitted how much you hurt all of your supposed loved ones. I hurt those who I was supposed to love and care for. My own brothers and sisters, but I own up to it because they're still with me. I remember every single one of their faces, and it only makes me stronger. You, however, have only owned up to it now. None of them stay with you. You are weak."

"If I'm weak, then why aren't you showing yourself, you bastard?" Mike challenged, refusing to let his guard down to any of these false taunts. "Sounds like you're scared."

"Regardless of your weakness, it is time for you to join me," Vecna continued, ignoring him. "You will be the ultimate sacrifice that will guarantee me full control over Hawkins. Because you will fail your friends one last time."

Mike shook his head at the ceiling. "You'll have to catch me first," he said.

He then ran out of the doors of the Rainbow Room, the lights still flashing behind him as he ran down the hall.

...

"Mike? MIKE?!" El cried out, shaking Mike's body that was now in a trance. His eyes has rolled to the back of his head, becoming a clear blue color, and the red veins in his eyes showed more. His body was twitching, along with his mouth and eyelids. No signs showed that he had heard El call his name or was affected by her shaking him back and forth.

"El! Don't shake him!" Will stopped her, putting both hands on her shoulders and pulling her away. "You can't get him out of there now. He's in, and there's no going back."

El breathed heavily for a few moments before calming down. She looked at the tranced form of her boyfriend, feeling more distressed than she did before. But she, unfortunately, had to let him stay this way instead of playing his music. Mike wanted this to happen, he said just as much, and she had to wait to play her part in the plan. If this was how they were going to save Hawkins and Max, then she had to go through with it. All she could hope for now is that Mike would find Max before Vecna could find him.

"Let them know that he's in," El turned to Dustin, who was holding his supercom. "Then have them tell us if it's time for me to go in."

Dustin nodded and pulled the antenna out. "Hey, Nance, do you copy?" he called. "Mike's in. Time for you to proceed with the monsters in Hellgate. Over."

...

"Copy that," Nancy replied, her heart beating fast at the mention of her brother now fighting Vecna in his own head. "We'll proceed and let you know when El can go into Mike's head. Keep him safe for me, okay? Over."

"Don't worry, we'll protect him," Dustin reassured her. "If he starts floating, we're playing the song before his feet are off the ground. Good luck over there with Hellgate. Over and out."

Nancy pushed the antenna back down and looked over at everyone else in the group. "It's time," she announced. She then walked over to Hopper and Joyce. "You're up with your part of Phase II. Find whatever monster, either a Demogorgon or Demodog or whichever one, and lure it out. That should be enough to lure an army. At least I hope so."

"We'll be luring out that army," Hopper declared. "I actually called in some backup. Speaking of which, looks like said backup just arrived."

A car had pulled up nearby, parking right in front of Hawkins Library. Out of the driver's seat came Murray Bauman himself, wearing a tank top and sweatpants along with a pair of gloves, who immediately went to the trunk of the car. When he opened it up, he took out a large flamethrower, adjusting it in order to hold it properly. Nancy's eyes widened at the sight of the weapon, exchanging a glance with Jonathan, who was equally surprised to see the conspiracy theorist with a flamethrower of all things.

"Where the hell did you get a flamethrower?" Jonathan asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Nice to see you too, Jonathan Byers," Murray greeted with a hint of sarcasm. "And we actually got this thing from Russia. Yuri decided that I should keep it, despite him and Dmitri living in my house for the past couple of weeks, and the KBG haven't come knocking for their missing flamethrower, so I think it's okay to use this in a new life or death situation with you alternate dimension bullshit."

Robin then stepped forward. "Wait a minute, you got that from Russia?" She questioned. "Now part of me is glad that I stuck around here instead of being off across the country or across the whole planet."

"I will still argue that being across the country had less life endangerment," Steve pointed out with a shrug.

"My dude, a LOT of crazy shit happened across the country!" Argyle spoke up with a grin. "First, we got shot at by bad government agents. Then we had to bury the body of Unknown Hero Agent Man, who was shot by the bad government agents. And then we visited a house of Mormons and I met the love of my life, Eden, like the garden. And THEN we shaved my little weird telekinetic superhero friend from the bad government agents, and after that, I helped with a crazy mind fight!"

Steve eyed Argyle up and down, then looked over at Jonathan for an explanation. He just shrugged, so Steve just stared at the Surfer Boy Pizza deliverer with nothing but confusion, Robin looking amused. "Yeah... you've said this... a lot..." he weakly answered.

"Hey, at least you guys knew what was going on!" Vickie then spoke up. "I thought there was a serial killer on the loose, but it just ended up being some undead demon guy from our world but living in an alternate dimension with an army of monsters. How are you guys acting like a flamethrower is the most outlandish thing you've ever seen when this is what's going on?"

"She's not wrong," Robin motioned over to her friend with her thumb.

Nancy rolled her eyes. "Okay, let's just get started with the plan," she brought the focus back. She looked over at Murray. "So, are you going in with Hopper and Mrs. Byers, or are you staying out here with us?"

"Staying out here with you, of course," Murray replied. "I can't show off our surprise weapon without the element of surprise, after all! I think this should piss off whatever you're trying to lure out here to kill us all."

Nancy grimaced at those last few words, but she nodded at the man. She then looked back at the ex-chief and Jonathan's mother, who were breaking a hole in Hellgate to get their path in. Once it was opened up more, they were ready to go. With a nod from Hopper and smile from Joyce, they went into the Upside Down for what would hopefully be the last time.

"And now... we wait," Nancy said, cocking her sawed off shotgun.

Chapter Text

El grasped Mike's hand, holding it tight enough to where she hoped he could somehow still feel her. Maybe a part of him could feel her hand, given that he was able to sense her in the void before, but nothing indicated that. He was just sitting there, eyes blank and lifeless, his hand cold, unaware that anyone was still at his side. His body shook a bit, showing that he was still alive, but he didn't respond to anything around him. It was a terrifying sight for El, and she had seen this from Max through the void. She wished that there could be another way to fight Vecna, but this was there one way of getting Max back and getting Vecna out of the Upside Down. She had to go through with it, even though she didn't like it.

"I'm going in," El spoke up after a few moments of looking at the state that the boy she loved was currently in. "Mike needs me, and I'm going to help him."

"Remember to keep us in the loop," Dustin told her as El began to get into position. "Just in case something happens."

El nodded at her friend, turning on the supercom that Mike had and changing it to just static. "I will, I promise," she reassured. "And let me know if Nancy says something about what's happening in Hawkins."

"We will," Will replied to his sister. "And El? Good luck."

El gave Will a soft smile. "Thank you, Will," she said.

With a deep breath, El closed her eyes and focused on the darkness, the silence, and the static of the supercom. She thought of Mike and how much she loved him, how he made her feel, and everything that happened between them ever since they met. When she opened her eyes, she was standing in the void. Mike was there again, still in the state he was in outside of the void. El immediately took his hand, keeping him there instead of making him disappear. What was strange was that Mike never disappeared from the void when she touched him, except for when she saw that he was in trouble. And now, his hand was warm rather than the cold it was before. Maybe a part of him could tell that she was there. That she was coming.

"Just hold on a little longer, Mike," El whispered to him, clutching onto him with her other hand. "I'm coming, okay? I'm coming. If you can hear me, I love you. And I'm coming to help you. Just hold on!"

El closed her eyes again, entering his head and seeing quick flashes of memories as she went in.

"I know it's very soon to say this, but I want to spend the rest of my life with you, El. You mean so much to me and I love you more than anything else in the world. When we get through this and save the world again, I want to marry you someday."

Mike and El were standing in the woods together while it was raining.

"El, I don't know if you can hear this, but if you can, I want you to know that I'm here. Okay? I'm right here, and... I love you!"

Mike was standing by El's side, holding her hand and encouraging her to keep fighting.

"I just have one more question. Do I look cool?"

Mike was sitting with El at Surfer Boy Pizza, making her laugh and smile before she fought Vecna in Max's head.

"It's really you?"

"It's me. I'm here."

Mike and El were hugging and resting their foreheads together in the middle of the desert, happy and relieved to see each other again.

"I don't know what's going to happen next, but... I just feel like - whatever it is - it'll be easier if we're working together. If we're friends again. Best friends."

Mike and Will were finally reconciling in Will's bedroom, right before they were planning to leave.

"Whoa! I'm so bad at this, I'm like Bambi on ice!"

"No, you're good! You got this!"

Mike and El were rollerskating together, holding hands and happy to be in one another's presence.

"Mike... I love you too."

El confessed her feelings to Mike and kissed him before leaving, leaving Mike surprised, but also happy.

"It's just... I've never felt like this for anyone before and... uh... they do say it makes you crazy."

Mike was sitting with El in one of the supermarket aisles, trying to confess his feelings for her while helping her with her injury.

"Does your species like M&M's?"

Mike was reconciling with El in the hospital waiting room, eating M&M's together and smiling.

"What, you don't like it?"

"No!"

Mike and El were making out in El's room, happy to be together.

"Do you want to dance?"

"I... don't know how."

"I don't either. You want to figure it out?"

El and Mike were dancing together at the Snowball, the night when they became boyfriend and girlfriend.

"Eleven..."

"Mike..."

Mike and El were hugging each other, happy to be reunited after such a long time of being apart.

"Byers!"

Mike, Lucas, and Dustin were running into Will's hospital room, excited to see him again after he came back from the Upside Down.

"I was just thinking that... I don't know. Maybe we can go to the Snowball together?"

Mike was attempting to tell El how he feels about her, resulting in their first kiss.

"I drew first blood, so..."

Mike and Lucas were making up after their fight, shaking hands after they escaped from the bad men.

"No. No, El, you're not the monster. You saved me, do you understand? You saved me!"

Mike was hugging El after she saved him from jumping off a cliff, Dustin joining in a few moments after.

"Well I call bull on your logic, because you're my best friend too."

Mike and Dustin were riding their bikes in search of El, Mike reassuring Dustin that they were best friends because you could have more than one best friend.

"Maybe we can call you El? Short for Eleven?"

Mike was introducing himself to El, giving her the nickname that she would treasure forever.

"Something is coming. Something hungry for blood. A shadow rolls in behind you, swallowing you in the darkness. It is almost here."

Mike was playing Dungeons and Dragons with Will, Lucas, and Dustin, their last moment of innocence before Will would go missing that night.

When El opened her eyes, she was no longer in the darkness of the void. Now she found herself in what looked to be a memory, one that took place on a playground in the back of a school. There were many little kids playing around, going down the slides, playing with chalk, running around and chasing each other, and just smiling and having fun. Though one kid seemed to stand out among the rest of them, and when El got closer, she knew exactly why he stood out.

"I found him," El reported to her friends on the other side. "But he's young. I'm in a memory."

Young Mike still had his black hair, freckles, and familiar face, but he looked so young. He also looked scared and alone, as he wasn't talking to anyone or playing any games that the other children were playing. El watched as his eyes landed on a swing set nearby, where another kid was sitting by himself. Young Mike took a deep breath and began to walk towards the swings. El followed close behind, wanting to know where this was going. The other kid looked familiar as well, which El noticed as he looked up when young Mike got closer to him.

"Uh, hi..." young Mike greeted the child, who looked just as nervous as he did. "I'm Mike. Do you want to be friends?"

"Yes. Yes I do," the young kid replied, his expression relaxing. "I'm Will. You want to swing too?"

Young Mike smiled at young Will, which made El smile as well. He sat down on the swing next to young Will, their smiles never fading as they hung out together for the first time. "He just met you, Will," El spoke, her eyes never tearing away from the memory she was seeing. "You both look happy."

"The first day of kindergarten..." Will said, sounding like he was reminiscing himself. "When we first met..."

El then sensed that something was off about the memory now. She looked behind her and noticed something strange, like it shouldn't be in the playground. She walked closer to it, seeing that it was a mailbox, and it looked kind of familiar to her. When she touched it, the setting changed to what looked to be Maple Street, where Mike lived in Hawkins. Young Mike was there too, standing by the mailbox and watching a moving truck and a family bringing boxes into their new home. El recognized the familiar looking house, and then her eyes went to the family. There was a man and a woman, a young boy around Mike's age, and a one year old baby girl.

"Lucas!" The woman called out to the young boy, Lucas, El's eyes widening at how young Lucas looked back then. "Why don't you take a break, honey? Spend some time outside. I need to feed Erica, anyway."

"Okay, Mom!" young Lucas replied, sitting down on the grass as his mother and father went inside with baby Erica.

Once he was alone, that was when young Mike approached him, looking more confident than he did in the previous memory. "Hi!" he greeted young Lucas, who looked surprised to see that someone was talking to him. "I'm Mike. I live close by to you."

"Oh, hi Mike!" young Lucas greeted back with a grin, one that El was the same smile that she would see on him when he was older. "Nice to meet you!"

"You want to come over and play at my house?" young Mike asked him, pointing as his house nearby. "My friend Will is coming over to play on my Atari. You can join us if you want."

Young Lucas's eyes widened at what he said. "No way, you have an Atari?!" he exclaimed.

"Yeah, I got it for Christmas!" Mike replied with a grin.

"I'll go ask my mom!" Lucas told him before running inside. El smiled at the interaction, her eyes tearing up at how young and innocent they were back then. Little did any of them know about the horrors that they would have to face when they got older. She watched as Lucas came back outside, his wide grin still on his face. "She said yes, but I have to be back before dinner."

"Awesome, let's go!" Mike grinned, leading the way to his house.

El began to follow, but then noticed another strange sight in the corner of her eye. It looked like a cafeteria table, recognizing the model from Lenora Hills High School, where she and Will would eat lunch together every day. When she touched it and turned around, there was a new memory taking place. This was curious to El, as she only went through one memory of Max's before she found her, Billy's mind just showed her one main memory and then flashes of others, and Mama's was a bunch of overwhelming flashes. Here, she was actively seeing all of the memories taking place. El looked around and saw young Mike, young Will, and young Lucas standing together, though they looked a bit older than in the previous memories. They were looking at a table in front of them. She followed their eye line and saw another boy sitting alone at a table. Just by the curly hair alone, El recognized him to be a young Dustin.

"Hey, that's the new kid, right? Sitting at our table?" young Lucas asked his friends.

"Yeah, that's him," young Will replied. "He looks kind of sad."

"Then why don't we go sit with him?" young Mike suggested. "We could use a fourth member of our party anyway."

Young Lucas and young Will shrugged in agreement, following young Mike to their table. El followed behind them, curious to see how it went when they met Dustin for the first time. He was the second one of her friends who showed her kindness, Mike being the first one, Lucas taking a little more time, not meeting Will until after she came back, she had to warm up to Max before they became friends, and she met Erica last. Seeing how the boys all met was bittersweet for El to watch, as this was long before she entered their lives, bringing a Demogorgon with her.

The three boys sat down with young Dustin, who looked surprised to see that there were people acknowledging his existence. "Hey!" young Mike greeted with a grin, El smiling when she saw it again. "You're Dustin, right? You're in the same class as us."

"Oh, uh, hey," young Dustin hesitantly greeted back, his lisp more noticeable than it was in current times. "Yeah, I'm Dustin Henderson. Who are you guys?"

"I'm Mike," young Mike introduced.

"I'm Lucas," young Lucas added in.

"And I'm Will," young Will smiled.

Dustin began to smile a bit, but El saw that he smiled with his mouth shut rather than it open. She was so used to seeing him smile with his mouth wide open, proud to show off the pearls he had gotten over the years with implants. Then she remembered that this was something that he was bullied over by the mouthbreathers, as they always liked to make fun of people for being different. El shook her head as she thought of Troy and James, glad that she hadn't seen either of them since they made Mike jump off a cliff.

"How come you have a lisp?" young Lucas asked, raising an eyebrow. "Retainers already?"

Young Dustin looked uncomfortable at the question, looking down at his sandwich while the three boys watched him in confusion. Then, after taking a deep breath, he opened his mouth up, showing just how few teeth there were in his mouth. Young Mike, Lucas and Will looked surprised, but neither of them looked freaked out, which El could tell that young Dustin was expecting. 

"Where's your teeth?" young Mike asked him.

"I have cleidocranial dysplasia," young Dustin explained, sounding unsure of himself. "I still have some my baby teeth, but I lost a lot of them already and my actual teeth haven't grown in. I'm also missing my collarbone?"

"Oh wow, you're missing a whole bone?!" young Will exclaimed, shocked at this new thing he was learning about.

"Yeah, but I can do this because of that," young Dustin said. He then did a movement with his arms, where a popping sound came out of it. The boys were all taken aback at first, but they were grinning immediately afterwards, which made young Dustin look down again. "Okay, if you're gonna make fun of me, just get it all out now."

"No, we're not gonna make fun of you!" young Mike clarified. "I was gonna say that what you did was pretty cool! I know it probably sucks to be missing a bone, but the fact that you can do that trick makes you cool! In fact, why don't you come over to my house after school with us? We're gonna play a new campaign I came up with for Dungeons and Dragons."

Young Dustin looked up again, eyes wide. "Oh my god, you guys play D&D too?!" he exclaimed.

"We do!" young Lucas grinned. "But just know that I'm gonna kick your butt at it."

"Is that a challenge?" young Dustin raised an eyebrow at him.

Young Mike smiled at Young Dustin and patted his shoulder. "You know what?" he said. "I think you'll fit right into our party."

El smiled, feeling some tears pour into her eyes at the memory. They were all so young and innocent, unaware of the horrors of the world and what she would bring to them in a few years. No, what Papa and Henry would bring to them, not her. She was just being used by both of them, and none of it was her fault. Everything that happened was because of those cruel men, not her. She may have opened the gate, but she did it because she didn't know what she was doing. Henry manipulated her when she was young, and Papa prevented her from having a normal life by using her to find Henry. It was because of them that Mike, Lucas, Dustin, and Will had to be tortured for so long, not El. She was tortured too.

"Hey El, you haven't talked in a while," she heard Dustin speak up. "Anything going on? Did you find Mike?"

"No, not yet," El replied, continuing to watch the young versions of her friends bond. "I'm seeing his memories instead."

"But, this didn't happen with Max, right? You just saw one memory," Will remembered. "How many have you seen so far?"

"Three," El answered. "I think I have to go through his memories to find him. He might still be hiding and running from Henry. I haven't seen a red storm yet, so he hasn't found him. I'm gonna keep looking until I find Mike or a red storm finds me."

"Well, let us know when you find him," Erica told her. "Keep us in the loop."

"I will," El reassured.

Out of the corner of her eye, El saw another out of place object in the cafeteria. There stood a tree in the center of the room, leaves pattering as heavy rain hit them, which made El have a feeling what this memory could be. She touched the tree, ready to see what was next.

...

Mike continued to run down the bloody halls of Hawkins lab. The lights flickered all around him as he fled from Vecna, refusing to be anywhere near the monster that wanted to kill him. As long as he kept away, he could survive long enough to find Vecna's mindscape and save Max. And once El found them, Mike had an idea in the back of his head that could get Vecna out of the Upside Down and into their trap. He just hoped that he could make it that far.

Every time Mike opened a door, there were wooden bars blocking his way out, as if that was the exit of his mind and Vecna was keeping him in. Only a song could break down the barrier, but nothing could play until El found him and Max. For now, Mike had to find a way to take control of his head again. He just kept running, ignoring all of the doors, worried that any one of them could lead to a trap instead of a dead end.

"Where are you going, Michael?" Mike heard Vecna's voice. He turned around and saw him at the opposite end of the hallway, slowly stalking up towards him. In between them were bloody walls from the massacre at Hawkins Lab, along with the dead bodies of children, scientists, and security officers. The sight made Mike sick to his stomach, only increasing the hatred he felt for Vecna and the sadness he felt for El. "You can't leave now. Not when it's time for you to join me. No one is coming to save you now."

Mike rolled his eyes at his taunts. "You'll have to catch up to me first!" he yelled at the monster, continuing to run as fast as he could. 

After a couple more moments of running, a door next to him burst open, the impact making Mike fall to the floor with a grunt. He looked up to see a bloodied up El from the night she took down the Demogorgon, with her dirty pink dress, blue flannel, and shaved head, her red eyes starring daggers into him. "YOU DIDN'T SAVE ME!" She yelled, the lights beginning to flicker faster. "YOU LET ME DIE!"

Though he did hesitate for a moment, Mike got back up and ran away again, trying to convince himself that what she said wasn't true. Another door opened up, and Will was there in a hospital gown, looking like he did when he was possessed, his black eyes furiously looking at him. "YOU LET THIS HAPPEN TO ME!" he yelled, his voice not sounding human. Mike looked behind him to see the bloody El there, but Will kept talking. "THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!"

"IT SHOULD'VE BEEN YOU!" Mike jumped to see Lucas in front of him, who looked beaten up and just as miserable as he did when Max died in his arms. "WHY COULDN'T YOU DIE INSTEAD OF HER?!"

"WHAT KIND OF FRIEND ARE YOU, MIKE?!" Dustin then appeared, his leg broken and his face tear stricken, just as how he looked when Eddie died. "WHY WEREN'T YOU HERE TO HELP US?!"

"YOU'RE A FUCKING LIAR!" Max then appeared, blood streaming from her blank eyes, looking like she did in the last vision Mike had at the hospital. "YOU'RE NO HEART, YOU'RE A CANCER TO THE PARTY!"

The five of them surrounded Mike, their taunts getting louder and louder. Mike covered his ears and closed his eyes, falling to his knees as the false versions of his friends all got closer to him. Panic began to fill his body, but he blocked it out, knowing that he had to focus on his plan to get away from this. He slowed his heavy breathing and thought of something that made him happy. His safe place. He blocked out all of the taunts that fueled his guilt, knowing that none of it was true and he couldn't tell himself that it was. Everything slowly drowned out as he felt himself shifting away from the bloody halls of Hawkins Lab and to a place in his mind where he could hide for now.

When he opened his eyes, Mike got up from the ground and saw that it had worked. No more taunts, no more dead children, the fake versions of his friends no longer trying to make him hate himself. Instead, he was in his basement, the place where he always felt comfortable with no judgmental eyes. There, he could be himself and let himself know that it's okay to have feelings. The table where they all used to play D&D was there, along with the couch, coffee table, bathroom nearby, snacks, posters on the wall, his D&D box, and, what made Mike smile, the blanket fort that he had built for El when she lived in the basement. He walked over to it, touching the soft blankets, imagining his girlfriend sitting there, playing with his supercom and eating Eggos. He missed those days, but now, he could use this spot to hide until El came or a sign of the mindscape appeared.

"Try getting me now, you bastard," Mike muttered as he crawled into the blanket fort, dropping the blanket down in front.

Chapter Text

Nancy watched the gate intently as she waited for Joyce and Hopper to emerge with an army of monsters behind them. Everyone gathered around, weapons at the ready to make sure that they could apprehend the monsters in time. Once they were out, they just needed to keep them preoccupied until they got the all clear from the kids. Luring out Vecna's whole army could easily become a disaster, so Nancy knew that she had to keep Hawkins from being destroyed like it did in her visions. The gates opening came true, but she would make sure that everything after that would never happen.

"Not getting a signal from their end anymore," Robin groaned, shaking her supercom up and down, which had gone completely static. "Now how are we supposed to know when they're bringing out that damn army?"

"I think we'll get a pretty clear idea when they come out of the gate, screaming," Steve commented with a shrug.

"How does someone use one of these things, anyway?" Argyle questioned, staring at his gun like it was an alien from Mars. "I mean, I have been shot at before, but I didn't actually see how they shot it at me?"

Nancy rolled her eyes at him, walking over to him and taking his gun. "This is how you hold it," she explained, getting into a proper stance. "Then you aim and pull the trigger. Safety is already off, so don't practice shoot on anyone."

Argyle grinned at her instructions. "Hey, thanks man!" he told her, earning a grimace from Nancy. "You know, you're a lot cooler than I thought you'd be."

Nancy raised an eyebrow at him, shooting a look at Jonathan, who just shrugged at his friend's comments. She just shook her head and went back to her position. Once she got back there, however, she noticed movement through the gate. When she looked closer, she saw that it was Hopper and Joyce, frantically trying to break through the gate. She immediately grabbed their hands and pulled them through, Jonathan, Steve, and Vickie helping out. That was when they heard snarls and familiar creaking sounds that were coming through the gate.

"We found one of those Demodogs," Hopper informed the group as they got their weapons ready. "And he brought his friends with him too."

Just then, a whole hoard of Demodogs came bursting through the gate, a few Demogorgons along with them. Nancy immediately started shooting, hitting any creature that came close to her. Hopper did the same, but he mostly aimed for the Demogorgons. Steve, Robin, Joyce, Vickie, Jonathan, and Argyle all joined in as well, fighting any Demodogs that attempted to attack. None of them were killed, given that they had tough skin, but they were incapacitated for the meantime with every few bullets, Molotovs, and nail bats that came their way. 

Murray, in the meantime, made his way over to the gate with his flamethrower once it seemed like the Demodogs and Demogorgons had stopped coming out from the gate. He readied the flamethrower, beginning to heat it up, but that was when he noticed something through the other side. He leaned in, seeing movement from something huge. The ground began shaking as it reached and touched the gate, making everyone stumble on their feet.

"Uh, guys?!" Murray called out, waving his hand. "There's some other thing that wants to come out!"

Nancy furrowed her eyebrows and ran over, taking a look for herself. Her heart dropped when she saw the creature, and it almost seemed like it recognized her due to the way it looked at her. "Shit," she gasped. "That's the monster I saw in my vision..."

"Your... WHAT?!" Murray exclaimed, clearly not caught up on the situation.

"Vecna showed me a giant monster with a gaping mouth that was destroying Hawkins," Nancy frantically explained. "And that's the fucking monster I saw! Murray, use the flamethrower on the gate NOW. We can't let that thing through!"

"Already on it!" Murray said, holding the flamethrower at the gate and shooting flames at it, causing for all of the monsters to start screeching and backing away.

Nancy ran back over to the group, now even more desperate to fight.

...

El looked around the new setting she was in after she touched the tree, seeing that she was now in a forest in the middle of a thunderstorm. As soon as she took in her surroundings, she knew exactly what memory this was. It all looked so familiar and she knew this memory all too well to not know it from the back of her hand. She heard voices nearby, seeing Mike, Lucas, and Dustin walking in the woods together, flashlights up and calling for Will's name. She smiled when she saw the boys, looking exactly how they did when she first met them.

"Dustin, shut up," Mike said, pausing in his tracks when he heard movement. 

"I'm just saying-" Dustin tried to continue.

"Shut up! Shut up!" Mike ordered, holding his hands out, hearing more rustling. "Do you guys hear that?"

More rustling was heard and the boys turned one way, shining their flashlights to try and find the source of the noise. El saw it right before the boys turned to their right, their flashlights shining right on the young version of herself. It was eerie for El to see herself, especially now that her hair was so short again and knowing how much has changed since this moment. Compared to her blue flannel, black shirt, and beige pants, her younger self was wearing nothing but an oversized Benny's Burger's T-Shirt, soaked from head to toe. El looked over at Mike, his eyes connecting with her young self to the point where she could feel the same sparks that she felt that day, as if she was actually reliving it.

"Hey, are you okay? What are you doing out here?" Mike asked after a few moments of taking it all in. He took a step forward, which made younger El take a step back, face filled with fear. Mike immediately looked apologetic. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you. Are you lost?"

"Mike, I don't like this," Lucas spoke up, sounding on edge. "We should go back."

"I agree," Dustin added. "This is really freaking me out, man."

Mike looked back at his two friends. "Guys, we can't just leave her out here," he sternly said.

"She?" Lucas and Dustin both questioned. El subconsciously reached up to touch her short hair, biting her lip at that comment.

Mike ignored them, his face softening as he looked back over at young El. "You can come back with us to my house," he offered. "We'll help you from there."

Young El still looked frightened, hesitant to even take a step forward. Mike smiled at her, his signature one that would always comfort El, even when she was feeling angry or distressed. "You can trust me, okay?" he reassured her. He then removed his backpack and put his flashlight on the ground in order to take off his brown jacket, slowly taking a few steps forward, young El frozen where she stood. "Here, you can wear my jacket."

Hesitantly, young El nodded, staying still as Mike put the jacket around her shoulders. She then stayed by Mike's side as she followed the boys back to their bikes that they left on Mirkwood, El herself following close behind. She watched as Mike lifted up his bike, patting the seat for young El to sit on. She slowly sat down, gripping onto Mike's shoulders as they rode away back to Mike's house. El could feel the tears well up in her eyes as she smiled, that moment always replaying in her head as one of the first times someone had shown her kindness. Benny had been nice too, but after he was killed, El thought that she would end up being alone. Then she met Mike, and the best decision she ever made was to accept his offer and go home with him.

El then looked around her, looking for the next out of place object that would lead her to the next memory. She noticed it out of the corner of her eye and walked towards it. It was a door, and a very familiar one at that. Once she touched it, El turned around and saw that she was in the living room of the old home of the Byers, covered in the drawings of the tunnels. Mike was there, pacing back in forth, while Dustin, Lucas, Max, and Steve were anxiously waiting on the couch. Car lights peered in from the broken window and Mike immediately bolted out of the door.

When El followed him outside, she saw Hopper getting out of his truck and going over to the back seats. She watched as he picked up her unconscious body, realizing that this was after she had closed the gate. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jonathan's car, seeing that he, Joyce, and Nancy had already been back before she and Hopper had returned. Mike looked absolutely terrified when he saw her, but seemed to relax when he noticed that she was still breathing. 

"She did it," Hopper breathed out as he brought younger El inside, Mike following behind for answers. "She closed the gate and it was... she was incredible."

"How long has she been out?" Mike asked as Hopper gently put her down onto the couch, Lucas, Max, Steve, and Dustin getting up to make room for her. Mike knelt down beside her, taking her hand and squeezing it.

"She was awake when I carried her out of the lab, but fell asleep when I put her in the car," Hopper replied. He then placed a hand on Mike's shoulder, which made him flinch a bit, El grimacing when she remembered the distant yelling she had heard between Mike and Hopper when she arrived at the Byers' home. "You should give her time to rest, kid. She's had a long day."

"I'm not leaving her side," Mike glared, as if daring the police chief to pull him away from her. El smiled at him, wanting to put a hand on his shoulder, but resisted the temptation in fear of the memory fading away.

Hopper sighed and shook his head, leaving the living room to most likely find Joyce. Max, Dustin, Lucas, and Steve also left the room to give them privacy, likely going to the kitchen for some snacks. El watched Mike the whole time, waiting with him for her younger self to wake up. It took quite a while, and El was impressed that Mike had never closed his eyes the whole time since it felt like it had to have been hours. Younger El slowly opened her eyes, Mike shakily taking a breath as she sat her head up, blinking as she took in the sight of the boy she loved.

"Mike...?" she whispered, squeezing his hand back.

"El..." Mike breathed out, still not believing the fact that she was here, right in front of him.

Younger El tried to sit up, but she was still so exhausted from closing the gate. Mike put a hand on her shoulder, not wanting her to strain yourself. "It's okay, you don't have to move," he reassured her with a watery smile. "I'm just... I can't believe you're here."

El felt tears pour into her own eyes at his words, feeling some guilt over staying hidden for almost a year. It wasn't her fault, she knew that, but seeing Mike in this state reminded her of the immense amount of guilt she had when she visited him in the void every night, hearing him call to her and begging for a response. She wished that she could go back in time and answer him, relieving them both of the hurt and the loss that they had that year. They should have never been apart, even if it was to protect herself and Mike from the bad men.

Luckily, El's younger self was there to comfort him. She gave him a smile, reaching her arms up and pulling Mike into a very awkward positioned, but sweet hug. "I'm here, Mike," she reassured as Mike sighed into her shoulder. "You didn't lose me."

Mike pulled back a bit, just so he could look at younger El. Tears were in his eyes, yet he still smiled. "I lo-" he pretended to clear his throat, which El's eyes widened at, but younger El didn't seem to notice. "I'm happy you're home."

Younger El smiled back. "Me too," she echoed the familiar words from when they were in the bathroom of the basement when she had run away for a day.

El then sensed something in the memory, looking around for the sign of a new memory. That was when she spotted a half eaten turkey in the middle of the floor, which she immediately walked over to and touched. When she turned around, she saw that she was in her home at Lenora Hills, which made her uncomfortable to be back in, given how the last time she was there, she got arrested. But if this was her path to find Mike and Vecna, then El would relive whatever memory this was. This didn't seem to be that awful spring break, instead back at Thanksgiving, given the turkey being the object that led her to this memory and the decorations around the house that she had helped Joyce put up at the time. 

There sat Mike in the living room with a version of El from a few months ago, and her heart broke at the sight of herself. Her hair was so long, before she had decided to cut bangs into it like Joyce did, but long and past her shoulders. El subconsciously reached up and touched her short hair, missing how free and flowing her hair was before she went into the Nina Project. She tried not to focus on that, instead just watching the memory.

"So... uh... there's actually something that I wanted to give to you," Mike changed the subject, immediately looking nervous. "Since Mrs. Byers said no to going back to Hawkins for Christmas and my mom wants us to visit my Nana, so I don't know when I'll see you next, I want to give this to you in person since... I do want to see your reaction and not just hear it over the phone or in a letter."

Long haired El sat up with interest. "What is it?" she asked with a smile.

El watched as Mike's hand reached into his pocket, nervously fumbling around. "Well, remember when I told you that I was trying to get a gift for you at the mall, but it was hard since I didn't have much money?" he asked, receiving a nod in response. "I, uh, actually saved up my money this time, even doing yard work and other small jobs for neighbors. Maybe I stole some from Nancy and I owe her a lot of money now. Anyway, uh... what I wanted to give you was... this."

Mike then pulled out a gold ring with a red gem in the center, El's fingers subconsciously moving to play with it, smiling as she remembered this moment. Her other self's eyes lit up as she stared at the beautiful ring. "This is called a promise ring," Mike explained, a nervous smile on his face. "This means that I promise to always be yours, no matter what. Even when we're apart, this is so I can always be with you. I know this is pretty cheesy and all, but I don't know, I kinda liked this idea."

"It's pretty, and I like the idea too," other El responded with a wide grin on her face. She then put her hand out, which Mike grabbed to put the ring onto her finger. They both gave each other a quick kiss on the lips before leaning in for a hug. "Thank you, Mike. I love you."

El noticed Mike's face of longing and desperation, as if he really wanted to say it back, but his own insecurities were keeping him from saying it. She felt sympathetic to him, now that she knew why he took so long to finally say the words. How could he ever think that she didn't need him? He saved her life, and she wouldn't be where she was now without him. At least he knew now, even if part of him was still insecure about it since Vecna was playing with that. Now El was going to prove just how much she loved and needed him by saving him, just as he saved her.

The memory then seemed to be over, as the important part passed by, but there was no sign of any path to a new memory. El furrowed her eyebrows, looking around but saw nothing to indicate a change.

That was when El saw a strike of lightning from outside.

...

Mike didn't know how long he sat in the blanket fort until he heard a large bang from outside. He peaked through the sheets, his heart pounding fast, and he saw that the door to his basement had shut. It was open before, but now it had suddenly closed. Biting his lip, Mike stepped out from the blanket fort, preparing himself for whatever was going to show up in his head. Luckily, he had a backup plan in case anything went wrong, even if he wasn't entirely sure that it would work. Lightning strikes and thunder were outside the basement windows, signaling that he was no longer alone.

"Come on, you bastard," Mike muttered to himself. The room around him began to change, the lights going out, the wallpaper rotting and tearing, and particles beginning to float in the air. "Is this the best you got?"

The blanket fort then toppled over, which made Mike jump. Breathing heavily, he went over to the couch and stood ready, keeping an eye on all of the doors in the basement, even the bathroom one. Vecna could come from anywhere, and he had to keep any and all entrances in his eyesight. Red light flashed through the windows, the storm outside getting wilder by the minute.

"Looks like you couldn't hide for long," Mike heard the chilling voice right behind him. He was about to run, but Vecna used his telekinesis to shove him away. Mike yelled as he slammed into the wall, but he wasn't being held up against it. "Doing the same thing that Max tried. I expected better of you, Michael."

Mike glared at Vecna, standing up and running to the door to the outside, but saw that it was locked. He pounded on it a couple of times before he felt himself getting tugged away. He was now being held still in the air, gasping for breath as he struggled to get free, but it was no use. Vecna circled around him until they were face to face, sneering at him. Mike sneered back, not wanting the monster to get the upper advantage here. If he showed any sign of fear, then that would be his downfall in this fight. There was no way he was going to lose until he found Max.

"You may not want to join me yet, but you will," Vecna taunted him. "No one is coming to help you. Eleven won't be able to save you in time."

"Do you say the same shit to all of your victims, or just me?" Mike questioned. 

"You are a unique case, Michael," Vecna continued on. "I don't need you to let my army into Hawkins, like I did with the others. I just need you gone from this world and in mine. You won't be alone for long, because I will collect your friends once I am done with you. It is your time, and soon enough, it will be theirs."

A deafening clock chime could be heard, which made Mike shiver. God, he hated that sound. "I won't let you touch any of them!" he shouted. "You're going to lose, Henry. Just like you have lost before, only this time, you'll finally be in your long awaited grave. Even if I end up dying, at least I'll get the satisfaction that you're died with me."

Vecna growled, throwing the teen against the wall, pinning him in place there. Once he got closer, Mike took the opportunity and reached his arm out, grabbing Vecna's neck and ripping a piece out. He fell to the ground as he stumbled, regrowing the spot in his neck. Taking his limited chance, Mike closed his eyes, summoning something in his hand as fast as he could, just as he used his head to bring himself to the basement. Feeling it in his hands, he stood up as Vecna straightened himself out, aiming a gun right at the creature's head. He immediately pulled the trigger, shooting a bullet right into Vecna's forehead, making him fall back onto the ground, unconscious. Mike could see that he was, unfortunately, still breathing, so he shot another bullet for good measure.

"Looks like I can't blow your brains out," Mike commented, staring at his gun. "That still felt so good."

Vecna was still breathing, so Mike knew that he only had a certain amount of time. He ran up the stairs, opening the basement door as he summoned a pathway into the rest of his house. Once he got to the living room, Mike saw that a red mist was filling up into his head. Based on what he had previously been told, he knew that this was the way to get into Vecna's mindscape. This was where Max was being held. 

Slowly, Mike walked through the mist, making his way into the mindscape.

Chapter Text

Mike wasn't sure what he was expecting when he walked into Vecna's mindscape, as he was given descriptions of what it looked like by both El and Nancy, even a drawing that Max had made, but he was still surprised when he saw it. The first thing he saw was the grandfather clock floating above the place, which made him roll his eyes. God, he hated that stupid clock with a burning passion. He looked away from clock and looked around at what was a broken version of the Creel house. He walked around the door with the small stained glass window, seeing stairs that led to nowhere along with trees made up of vines.

Chills went down his spine when Mike saw what was strung up onto the trees by the door. The first body that he saw was cheerleader Chrissy Cunningham, then there was Nancy's newspaper friend named Fred Benson, and lastly there was Lucas's basketball teammate named Patrick McKinney. All of them looked the same, with their eyes no longer in their sockets and every single bone broken, their jaws hung open as if they were in a permanent state of shock. None of them deserved this fate, especially since they were all dealing with something that they needed help for. And now their souls were trapped here so they could unknowingly play a key role in Vecna's world domination. 

Maybe when Vecna was finally dead, their souls would be free since he would no longer have a mind to keep them in? At least Mike hoped so. They deserved some form of peace.

Mike continued forward, looking around for any sign of his friend. "Max?" He called out, hoping for some kind of answer. He kept his gun out, just in case of any sneak attacks. "Max, are you in here? Can you hear me?"

"Hello?!" He froze when he heard a voice respond. "Who's there?!"

Mike quickly followed the voice, circling around a tree that was by the staircase. His eyes widened when he saw his friend there, tied against the tree with vines, arms and legs broken and eyes misty. Max Mayfield looked panicked, as if she was expecting Vecna, but she could not tell who was there and who was talking to her right now. She looked similar as her comatose body in the hospital did, her red hair in braids and very pale. Her brown jacket was tattered and her clothes were dirty, but it was her. It relieved Mike to see her breathing and squirming around, knowing that El did save her and she could come home.

"Max! It's me, Mike!" Mike told her to help her relax.

"Mike?!" Max exclaimed, furrowing her eyebrows as she stared off into nothing. "What the hell are you doing here?!"

"Would you believe me if I said that I was on vacation?" Mike weakly said, looking around at the vines. "Vecna chose me as his next target, but I decided to use the opportunity to save you and defeat him."

"Good plan," Max commented. "Now, do you have a plan to get me down from here?"

"Yes, actually, I just came up with it now," Mike replied, putting his gun down. He closed his eyes, picturing another weapon that could help him get Max out of the vines. An axe formed in his hand and he immediately moved to grip it with both hands, not expecting for it to be so heavy. "Okay, hold still. I'm gonna get you down."

Max furrowed her eyebrows as Mike started hacking away at the vines and branches. "What the hell are you doing?" she questioned.

"Using an ax to get you down," Mike told her, taking a deep breath in-between strikes.

"WHERE THE FUCK DID YOU GET AN AX?!" Max yelled, sounding both shocked and concerned.

"It's my head, so I can think up anything I want," Mike explained. "Lucas told me about your plan of hiding in a happy memory, so I figured I could go farther with that theory and bring in weapons."

"Now why didn't I think of that?" Max wondered out loud.

"Okay, one last hit should do the trick..." Mike muttered. He took another swing, which made the vines pull away and Max fell to the ground, crying out in pain. "Oh shit!" He exclaimed, kneeling down at Max's side to help her sit up. "Sorry about that!"

Max groaned as Mike sat her up, helping her lean upright against the tree. "It's fine, just... I can't even feel anything either, so..." her voice drifted off, beginning to crack as she spoke. "Mike... I thought I was dead... why am I here?"

Mike cringed at the way she spoke with so much pain. It made him feel even worse for not being there when the party needed him to be, as any leader should be there for their party and friends. "You were dead," he told her in a small voice. "But El saved you. She restarted your heart because she refused to let you die. Your body is still alive, but you've been trapped in here for a few weeks now. El's been trying to look for you, but we only figured out that you would be in here when I started being targeted. El's on her way here now so we can get out of here."

"So... she was really there?" Max questioned, a smile etching onto her face. "I wasn't just imagining things when she showed up?"

Mike smiled at her and nodded. "Yeah, she was," he confirmed. "We heard what was going on in Hawkins, thanks to some government agents. Dr. Owens had El go through a program that would help her regain her powers, but then we learned that she was in danger with the military, so we went after her. When we finally found her in the desert, she had already learned everything going on in Hawkins. Vecna, the deaths, you being in trouble, El knew it all. So she came up with a plan help you, where we used a pizza freezer at a Surfer Boy Pizza place to use as a bath for her."

"That's what she meant by piggybacking from a pizza dough freezer," Max muttered to herself. "I don't know if I was imagining this at all, but when Vecna was killing me... I thought I heard your voice. I couldn't tell what you were saying, but it definitely sounded like you. Then I heard El scream and everything went dark until I woke up in... in Lucas's arms."

"You probably did hear me then," Mike nodded. "El... she was suffocating. The only thing that seemed to calm her down was me speaking to her. I told her how much she means to me and how much I love her, and that gave her the strength to fight back. And, just like you heard it, Vecna heard it too, so now he's after me."

Max shook her head with a groan. "Guess we didn't succeed in killing him then?" she asked rhetorically. "And since I died, that means that the gates opened, which also means that Hawkins must be in deep shit right now, huh?"

"We're fighting back," Mike said determinedly. "And we're going to win. For all of Hawkins, for you, for Will, for El, for everyone."

Max smiled at those words, though it didn't fully reach her eyes. Mike looked down at the ground, feeling nothing but guilt as he looked at how damaged she was after everything she was forced to endure. She didn't deserve what Vecna put her through. None of his victims did, but they had to be put to death for no reason other than they were having their own internal struggles. How he wished he could've been there to help Max and his friends, but he wasn't. Mike was making it up to her now by being here to save her, but any leader should be there for their party at any moment.

"Max?" Mike spoke up again, making Max look up in his direction. "I just... I wanted to say that I'm sorry." He noticed her confused expression, so he continued to speak. "I should've been there for you when you needed me, the leader of the party. I don't regret being there with El, don't get me wrong. I wish I could've been in both places. That way, none of this would have ever happened to you."

"Mike, what are you talking about?" Max questioned him.

Mike bit his lip, rubbing his arm absentmindedly. "Vecna told me that if I were here when he began his attacks, it would've been me instead of you," he admitted. "And that's what should've happened. I mean, I deserve it, not you. I've been nothing but an asshole to you while you were just looking for friends. And even then, we still haven't exactly been friends, only just people coexisting with one another. And... I'm sorry. It should've been me, not you. That's what a paladin does anyway, even for a zoomer."

To his surprise, Max started chuckling at what he had just told her. "Mike, you cannot seriously believe that he wouldn't have gone after me even if he targeted you first," she told him. "I mean, he's going after you anyway because you're close to El. I'm close to her too, and he sees anyone who is close to El as a threat, especially ones with their own trauma. That's how he gets you. He takes your deepest insecurities, even ones that you're not fully aware about, and uses them against you to try and make you accept that you are going to die. He tried to make me feel that way twice. I mean, he showed me Billy quite a few times and he even used my own mom against me. What has he shown you?"

The images of everything that Vecna had shown him flashed through his head, making Mike breathe heavily. El dying, Will screaming at him, Nancy blaming him, Max's bleeding eyes, everything came in all at once. He quickly calmed himself down, taking deep breaths and just hoping that Max wouldn't notice. He had a feeling that she did though, seeing a sympathetic smile on her face once he finally steadied his breath. "I... I can't repeat them out loud. I just can't," Mike murmured. "They were... things that I never wanted to see."

"He did the same with me, it's okay," Max reassured him. "You don't have to tell me anything that he showed you. I never told anyone what I saw, other than the mindscape. I just want you to know that you're not alone, okay? And you don't deserve any of this either. It shouldn't have been either of us, or Chrissy, Fred, Patrick... it should've never happened at all. But it did, and we're going to have to live with that. It gets better. It always does. Sadly, we had to learn that the extremely hard way, but it's true. Just know that I would never blame you for anything that happened to me. El needed you, and that's where you needed to be. There is no need for you to apologize for anything."

Mike weakly smiled, playing with his hands. Some of the guilt went away at her words, but some of it did linger, mostly for the way he treated her back when she first moved to Hawkins. "I am still sorry for how much of an asshole I was to you when you first joined the party," he told her. "You do belong in our party."

Max chuckled at that. "And I'm sorry for getting in-between you and El last summer," she responded. "You are a good boyfriend to her, I just misjudged the whole situation."

Mike shook his head with slight laugh. "It's okay, you still helped El a lot," he replied. "I made a mistake, but you were there for El when she needed a girl to help her."

"Which she definitely needed," Max snickered. Then her smile dropped, having a more pained expression on her face. "How... how is everyone in Hawkins? How's... Lucas? Is he okay?"

That was the question that he was dreading, as Mike wasn't sure how to answer it. "Lucas... he's, uh..." he struggled, trying to find the right words that wouldn't upset Max. "He's... hopeful. Ever since El got your heart started again, he's been at your side, waiting for you to wake up. Now that we know what happened after, he's looking forward to seeing you again."

"And I'm looking forward to seeing him again," Max replied with a weak smile. "I did promise him that we would go to the movies, after all. I can't break a promise to someone that I love."

Mike raised an eyebrow and smiled. "You love him?" he asked for clarification, though he knew what the answer was since he had just heard her admit it.

Max scowled at him. "Shut the fuck up, Wheeler," she told him, though she chuckled afterwards. "Now, when is El getting here? I want to get out of this place."

"I'm afraid neither of you will be leaving this place."

Chills went down Mike's spine as he turned his head to where the voice came from. There was Vecna, who had appeared right behind him, glaring down at the teen boy, more furious than ever before. Mike glared back at the monster, standing up from the ground to shield Max from view, not wanting her to get anymore harmed than she already was. His mission was to protect her and his friends, and he was going to do that, even if it did result in him becoming a corpse decoration like Chrissy, Fred, and Patrick. El would be the one to get Max out of there while he kept Vecna away.

"Both of you are a part of me, no matter how hard you try to fight back," Vecna continued to speak, circling around Mike as they glared at one another. "No matter what, you will give in to your deaths. Everyone else has, because that is how the human mind works. Humans await their deaths as each moment passes in their sad, pathetic lives. It gives me great pleasure to know that I can be the one to bring them not only death, but making sure that their deaths mean something in my spreading of the world that I have created. They help me gain more power, which makes their meaningless lives break the structure that they have created."

Mike gasped as he was lifted up from the ground, feeling his neck being squeezed by an invisible force as he struggled to break free. "Soon, you will be helping break the rules of the system that humans have created," Vecna slowly pulled Mike closer to him until they were face to face. He lifted up his larger hand, one of his fingers stroking Mike's cheek. "To humans like you, there always has to be a superhero that comes to save the day. A superhero that keeps the system working. Once you are a part of me, you will help me destroy that false idea of hope. Everything that you have ever fought for... everyone you have loved... it will all be for nothing."

All of a sudden, Mike felt himself flying through the air, his back slamming up against the Creel house door. He cried out in pain as four vines crawled towards him, grabbing his wrists and ankles, holding him in place. He could hear Max screaming his name, but all he could see was Vecna stalking towards him. El still wasn't here, which made Mike start to worry. What was going on that was keeping her away from the mindscape? Did Vecna know about the plan and was doing something to her? God, he hoped that wasn't the case. He needed to stall Vecna from killing him for as long as he could, knowing that he had to provide more time for El to get here to get Max out of the mindscape. 

"You are full of shit, Henry," Mike spoke up once Vecna was standing directly in front of him. "You may be right hat humans have created a system where all we do is wait for the next to continue on following the same bullshit rules, but you are doing exactly that with your plan of taking over Hawkins. You are creating a system with rules to destroy anything that your army sees. All your army does is wake up, eat, kill, reproduce, and die. While you see killing and torturing as your way of breaking the rules, you are only making one so you can be in command. Hell, you fucking killed children, who weren't even aware of the system in the first place. Ones who were in your exact position at the lab, and you murdered them in cold blood."

Mike smirked when Vecna didn't say anything in response to his accusations towards him. "See, I know why you are so against what humans can do. It's because you are scared of us. You see us as a threat to your whole world domination bullshit. Fuck, that is the oldest trope in the book, I should've seen this coming a long time ago. And I know exactly why you see us as a threat too, especially me. It's because you don't understand love. You're so full of anger and hate, that's all you can understand and use as your drive. But what you do know is that love has always overpowered your anger, El using her love to defeat you every time you challenged Hawkins. And I am the one who loves her, so you have to get rid of me."

"My power is much stronger than any love that Eleven possesses in her," Vecna snarled. "Your love couldn't stop me from killing Max, which allowed me to finally cross into your world."

"Then why is she still alive?" Mike questioned him. "Why is El still alive? Her love is stronger than anything you can do, and she has proved that countless times. You are scared of it, which is why you have to kill me. But even if you do, her love will never die. Love will always remain as long as she's alive, and she is going to kill you and stop your world domination plan. It's over, Henry. You can't kill love, but we can kill your anger."

"Love is weakness," Vecna sneered at him, sending another vine to wrap around Mike's neck, choking him. "And any love that you have for Eleven will be your own undoing. You see, this is the exact spot where I held Eleven and was about to kill her when you stepped in. But now, I can destroy the very thing that she relies on to fight back against me."

The monster lifted up his hand over Mike's head, closing his eyes as he focused his powers on destroying the teen from the inside.

...

Mike's body began to lift in the air, his walkman falling out of his lap, stopping shortly before it hit the ceiling. Will, Lucas, Erica, and Dustin all stood up in shock, staring at their floating friend with empty eyes and an emotionless expression. They all looked at El, whose body wasn't doing or saying anything. She just looked intensely focused on whatever she was doing in Mike's head. The four of them looked back at Mike, desperate for something to stop him from levitating in the air.

"Shit, shit, SHIT!" Dustin freaked out.

"Mike, resist him!" Erica shouted.

"Come on, Mike! Don't let him win!" Lucas screamed.

Will froze in his spot, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck rise up. He began to touch it as he looked over at El, whose face changed from a focused look to a furious one, as if she was about to fight back. Knowing what was about to happen, Will grabbed the walkman from the ground, finger hovering over the play button.

Once he hit it, Every Breath You Take began to play in the Rainbow Room. Will knew that it may have been too soon to play it, but just by seeing the look on his sister's face, he didn't need a worded signal to know that it was time to bring Mike and Max out of the mindscape.

"You got this, El," Will murmured.

...

Mike heard the song playing along with Max shouting his name as he tried to resist Vecna's chilling presence that was enveloping his whole body. He was shaking and choking, desperate to free himself from his grasp. He focused on the song, knowing that it was his only hope of getting out of there before El could come. There was no way he was going to let this monster win the war. Mike closed his eyes, thinking of his friends and everyone he loves, refusing to let Vecna take any of them away from him in the time that he had left.

Him reassuring Will that they would go crazy together.

Him shaking hands with Lucas as they made up from their fight .

Him giving El the blanket fort in his basement.

Him telling Dustin that he was his best friend too.

Him laughing as Max skateboarded around him.

Him reuniting with El after a long year of being apart.

Him hugging Nancy, who was relieved that he was okay.

Him hugging his mother after he had seen Will's fake body.

Him and El laughing together in the grocery store aisle.

Him hugging Hopper when he had returned to Hawkins from Russia.

Him making up with Will and telling him that they were still best friends.

Him and El in the woods in the rain, where he told her that he wanted to marry her someday.

Mike opened his eyes when he felt a presence coming closer to him. He smiled as he embraced the warm feeling that he had grown used to whenever he sensed it in the past. When he was trying to find a connection through his walkie in the blanket fort and knew one was made, when he looked at the police van and knew who was in there, when he looked out to the desert and saw a familiar figure, the same feeling presented itself here. Vecna looked perplexed when he saw Mike smiling, but had no idea what was coming his way. 

Through embracing the connection that was being made, Mike could hear a voice in his head.

"Mike... it's okay..."

Suddenly, Vecna was sent flying through the red clouds and far away from the hellish mindscape. At the same time, Mike was released from the vines and he fell to the ground, crying out at the impact as he gasped for air, rubbing his neck. He felt himself being lifted up just enough to see who had allowed for the warm and loving embrace of a connection to be made.

El, the girl he loved more than anything, one drop of blood streaming from her nostril, smiling down at him with tears in her eyes.

"I'm here, Mike."

Chapter Text

"I'm here, Mike."

Mike blinked a few times, making sure that what he was seeing was real. El really was here, smiling down at him and caressing his cheek, having flung Vecna far away to where he could not reach them, nose bleeding but she did not seem to notice. He smiled back at her and pulled her into a tight embrace, relieved that she was okay and that she had come in time to save both him and Max. It was as if nothing else mattered in the world when they were in one another's arms, but they both knew that they had a job to do. It was time to get the hell out of there and kill Vecna once and for all.

"You okay?" El asked when she pulled away, looking over her boyfriend to check for any injuries.

Mike nodded at her. "I'm okay," he reassured her. "My back is aching from getting slammed into many walls, but other than that, I'm okay."

El sighed out of relief, happy to hear that he was okay. Mike could feel that strong sense of relief and happiness that came out of her, as if it was a strong wave that was overwhelming each one of his senses. It was so strong that made him feel the exact same way, and he was not sure how that was happening. He just shrugged it off for now, saving that as another puzzle to solve for later after this was all over.

"Is that El?"

Max spoke up, which made El gasp when she heard her voice. She stood up from the ground and walked over to her best friend, tearing up as soon as she saw her. A smile formed on Max's face, as if she could somehow sense that she was there. Mike could feel nothing but joy radiating off of his girlfriend, standing up to see the reunion between the two best friends, smiling down at them as El leaned in and gently embraced Max. After all of the guilt that she faced when she had seen Max die, this was now confirmation that El had succeeded in saving her life from Vecna and that she could bring her home.

"Max..." El whispered as she carefully held her, not wanting to hurt her more by accidentally touching her arms or legs. "I'm sorry... I couldn't save you in time."

"God, what is with you two and blaming yourselves?' Max chuckled. "El, it's okay. You're the reason why I'm still here and why we still have a fighting chance. Hell, I would have died in my Snowball memory if you weren't there."

El gave her a tearful smile. "And now I'm getting you out of here," she said determinedly. She then stood up and pulled Max up as gently as she could, placing her arm over her shoulder. "Mike, help me," El motioned over to her boyfriend, who quickly went under Max's other arm. 

"Sorry if we're hurting you, Max," Mike quickly apologized, remembering that her arms were both broken.

"No, no, it's fine," Max reassured. "Let's just get out of this shit hole."

Every Breath You Take kept playing in the background as the three went over to the portal that had opened up with the song. They were all in the clear now that Vecna was no longer close by after getting thrown in the air. They just needed to get to the portal and get back into reality in order to fight the rest of the army off. Mike's eyes widened as he thought about what was currently going on, realizing that this was too easy yet filled with flaws. As they got closer to the portal, Mike could see Lucas, Will, Dustin, and Erica sitting by the trancelike forms of both himself and El, looking anxious. He was so close to going back to them, but he knew that it would have to wait for a bit.

"Wait, guys, something's wrong," Mike spoke, stopping in his tracks. El and Max looked over at him confused as he looked back towards the crumbling Creel home, trying to see if there were any moving forms coming towards them. He didn't see anything, meaning that they still had some time. "Vecna's not going to come out onto our side like this. He would just pull me right back in and kill me, then send his whole army on Hawkins. But I have an idea to get him out."

"Let's get out of here and we can talk about it," El told him, worried about why he suddenly froze.

Mike grimaced, knowing what he had to do. "The idea involves me still being here," he muttered, which made both El and Max's faces drop. "I need to keep Vecna in place so he doesn't try to do anything to anyone else. The only only one who can bring Vecna out to our side is Will. His episodes came back for a reason, and this is it. It's like his power, and he can use it to trap Vecna. And you need to be on the other side to help him and everyone else when Vecna comes through."

El shook her head, slowly putting Max down and went over to Mike, putting a hand on his shoulder. "I'm not leaving you here," she insisted. "I promised you that I would not let him hurt you."

"I know you did, and I promised that he would not be able to hurt me," Mike replied, looking over at her and taking her hands. He could feel her worry and fear, which only made him want to reassure her more. "I need to do this if we are going to win. It's up to Will to get him out, and I have to be here to set him up. Just make sure that the music is still playing so I can get out in case anything goes wrong. I will keep fighting for as long as I can, but you guys have to be quick. Vecna won't be happy when he comes back."

"No! I can't lose you, Mike!" El begged, tearing up. "Let's leave!"

"El..." Mike teared up, squeezing her hands tight. Those words were all too familiar, but he knew just how to reassure her. "You know I don't want to do this, but I have to. You need to get Max out of here and go join the fight on the outside. As long as this portal is open, I can still get out of here. I won't let him get to me. I promise."

Tears streamed down El's face, but she maintained a strong expression for him, although Mike could sense her true feelings. "Okay, I trust you. I'll tell Will what to do," she finally said. "And... I love you."

Mike gave her a watery smile. "I love you too," he whispered, wrapping his arms around her shoulder as she cupped his cheeks.

For what could be the last time, they both leaned in and shared a passionate kiss, filled with nothing but the love they had for one another. Mike could feel all of El's emotions like a huge wave crashing over him, but instead of drowning him, it lifted him up and empowered him. She was always a part of him, and this kiss only affirmed that. With the love that they had for each other, they would be able to beat Vecna. That connection was there, stronger than it ever was before, and Mike knew just how to use it. When they pulled apart, they rested their foreheads against each other, both determined to save the world.

"I'll see you soon," Mike reassured her, giving her his signature grin.

...

El awoke with a gasp, immediately standing up, Will and Dustin assisting her as soon as they saw her eyes open up. She was hounded with so many questions from her four friends, each of them asking her what happened and why Mike was still in a trance, but they all drowned out. Gazing over at Mike, who still has his blank eyes rolled to the back of his head, shaking in his spot, El felt more determined than ever. Her boyfriend trusted her to save him and to save the whole world, and Will was the key to making that goal come to fruition. She knew exactly what she needed to do.

"Mike is still in there, but I think I got Max out," El finally answered her friends, still looking at Mike. "He said that One would not come out if we escaped. He would just pull Mike back in if he left because he wants to kill him. But there is a way to bring him out."

"What do we need to do?" Lucas questioned, folding his arms.

El looked away from Mike and looked at Will, noticing the concern and fear on his face. "It's up to Will," she stated, walking closer to her brother. "He has true sight, so he can communicate with One on the other side. He can bring him out and free Mike."

Will shook his head. "But... but I can't control my true sight," he admitted, rubbing his arm. "My episodes just happen randomly, not because I wanted it to happen or anything like that. I... I don't... I don't think I can do anything to help him."

Knowing exactly what he was feeling, El gave him a sympathetic smile as she grabbed his arms. "You can," she reassured. "I thought I couldn't control myself either. I didn't understand my powers for a long time. But I learned that a strong emotion can make you stronger and more in control. One... he uses anger and fear to control his powers, but I use love. My love for my family, my friends, Mike... if it weren't for Mike's, I would have been killed. I know you love him too."

Will's eyes widened at that last statement. "I mean... I do, but..." he stuttered, unsure what to say.

"It's okay," she smiled at him. "I know. But you can use that love for Mike to help you control your true sight. Think of him when you go to the other side, and then bring Vecna to Hellgate. I'll be right behind you."

"Me too," Dustin spoke up.

"Same here," Lucas added.

"And I'll stay here to keep an eye on Mike," Erica offered. "Make sure he doesn't start floating again."

Will looked around at his sister and friends, feeling nothing but love and understanding from all of them. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and focused as hard as he could. He thought of Mike, his best friend and first crush, and how he was in danger right now. The tingle on the back of his neck increased in intensity, spreading throughout his whole body as he continued to think of how much he loved Mike, his family, and his friends. When he opened his eyes, his friends were no longer there, white particles floated in the air, and vines were spread all around the room, the dark atmosphere surrounding him as red lightning flashed. 

The Upside Down.

"Will, are you in there?" He could hear his sister ask him.

"Yeah... yeah, I'm in," Will confirmed. He then looked up at the ceiling, noticing some of the vines going up there, forming into some sort of spiderweb, the giant spider himself in the center of the web, eyes shut and focused, yet a hint of anger and frustration lingered on his face. It was Vecna, hunting down Mike at this exact moment, furious at the fact that he kept escaping from him. Will could feel every emotion of the monster through his being, but he chose to ignore it, focusing on the mission instead.

"Okay... I can do this..."

...

Nancy reloaded her sawed-off shotgun, her eyes continuing to gaze over at the center of the gates, seeing the large monster that was threatening to come out. Every time she looked at the creature, it seemed to be getting closer to crossing over into Hawkins, despite Murray's constant usage of the flamethrower. The Demogorgons and Demodogs seemed to be multiplying as they continued to attack the group, but they all continued to fight as hard as they could. Unfortunately, the bats had also decided to join the fight, so they began swarming the sky, screeching down at the teens and adults as they threatened to attack at any moment. The monsters were beginning to grow weaker due to the flames that were surrounding Hellgate from the flamethrower.

"I'm beginning to think that this was an incredibly stupid idea," Steve muttered as he held up his nail bat to an approaching Demodog. "You hearing anything from the kids?"

"Nothing," Robin answered, a long spear raised up to fend off the Demodog that was coming closer to her. "Absolutely nothing. What the hell is going on over there?"

"They are facing Vecna himself over there," Jonathan reminded them. "I'm sure that if something happened, we would know by now."

The group then stumbled when the ground began to rumble, each of them falling down to the hard pavement below. It seemed to have been caused by a large screech sound, which could not have been caused by any monster that was over on this side already. Nancy looked over at the gate and saw three large heads peering through Hellgate, looking to be angry and furious at what was going on. Her eyes widened as she realized that this large monster was beginning to break through into Hawkins.

"Murray?!" Hopper yelled out, seeing the conspiracy theorist smacking the flamethrower over and over again. "I thought you said you were going to bring plenty of fuel for that thing?!"

"Well, Jim, I'm sorry that I didn't expect to be the one holding off whatever the fuck this thing is!" Murray yelled back, though he seemed to be more scared than frustrated.

Nancy immediately lifted up her shotgun, aiming at the giant monster and taking her shot. It barely seemed to be affected by the bullets, though it did look angrier than before. "Shit!" she cried out. "It's coming through!"

"What do we do?" Joyce asked, looking to both Nancy and Hopper. "We don't have a working flamethrower anymore and if we let that thing through, it'll destroy Hawkins before we can even bring Vecna out."

Nancy furrowed her eyebrows in thought, then she looked over at the former police chief. "Hopper, pull out the molotovs and the matches" she asked, hopeful.

Hopper searched through his satchel, pulling out multiple molotovs and matches, which Nancy took and began passing out to Joyce, Jonathan, Robin, Steve, Vickie, and Argyle. While Argyle just looked at it as if it was some kind of strange device in his hands, the other five knew exactly what Nancy had in mind. They all had gathered a huge stock from the War Zone store when they first visited, thanks to the late Eddie Munson's recommendation, and gathered some more once Mike had told them his plan. Using the extra flames they had could be their only hope of fending off this huge monster that threatened to destroy Hawkins.

"This isn't the kind of alcohol I'm used to," Argyle gazed at the bottle and the match in his hands. "I've never drank anything that was on fire!"

"And you haven't had any alcohol before anyway, buddy," Jonathan reminded him with a look. "Besides, this is meant to be a weapon."

Argyle grinned at the explanation. "Hey, thanks man!" he gleefully said. "Now I get what we're doing here!"

Nancy rolled her eyes, but lit up one of her molotovs, ready to throw it at the monster.

...

Mike took a deep breath and readied himself when he saw the shadow of Vecna coming back over to him. He had his gun ready, aiming for the monster's head in case he tried anything again. Surprisingly, he wasn't immediately thrown again a wall or a tree, rather they just circled around each other, ready to attack if needed. It was curious to Mike, but he decided to not question it too much, grateful that he was still alive in order to set up the trap accordingly. As long as he stayed alive long enough, Will could make his move if he successfully made it to the Upside Down through true sight. He tried to keep an eye on his friends through the portal, but it was hard to tell since he couldn't make it obvious and give away the plan to Vecna.

"You just keep refusing to join me," Vecna snarled. "And here, I thought you wanted to die."

"Maybe I do, but not by your hands," Mike countered, a smirk on his face. "I'd want my body still intact."

Vecna narrowed his eyes at the teen boy, tilting his head. "You and Eleven just keep fighting, which is something to admire," he told him. "Most humans would just succumb to a new power that threatens their system, but you and your friends have been fighting me for years. That is why you would be the perfect candidates to join me, especially with that connection you have with her."

Mike furrowed his eyebrows. "Yeah, that's called love, asshole," he reminded him. "I just went through this with you. I'm not here to give you some history lesson on love when you are clearly incapable of understanding it."

"It's not love, though that may be the case for the beginning of this connection. This is a mental line between you and her," the monster informed him. "And she made it stronger when she arrived here, which she may not have realized she did. I sensed it as soon as she entered your head. It is both similar and different to the mental connection that I share with your friend, Will Byers."

At that last statement, Mike felt his stomach drop.

Chapter Text

"I've sensed this connection between you two ever since you stopped Billy from choking Eleven to death in your little sauna test," Vecna began, circling around Mike, who kept his gun held up and aimed at his head. "I sensed it even more when you spoke to her when she was in here trying to save Maxine. And as I've gone through your head, I've seen many moments between you two that only confirmed my theory, and it got stronger when she came in here to try and save you and Maxine. She went into your head and you touched back, cementing it and forming a direct line between your heads."

Mike narrowed his eyes at the monster, unsure of whether or not to believe him. It definitely made sense, as he was able to feel what El was feeling, even though she was no longer here in the mindscape. Looking back, it made even more sense as he remembered the times when he was able to feel her presence. Almost every night when he called her over his supercom when she was in hiding, when he looked at the police van in Lenora and knew El was in there, and when he spotted her among the many figures in the desert from a distance. Right now, Mike could feel her determination and fear all over his body, chills forming on the back of his neck as the emotions got stronger. His hand subconsciously moved to his neck, the movement making him realize where Vecna was going with this. 

"It's a similar direct line that you share with Will, right?" Mike asked, though he already knew the answer. "I can sense El, and Will can sense you. How the hell did it even start?"

"It began when I first linked him to my hive mind," Vecna told him. "He may have been good at hiding, but he couldn't stay hidden for long when one of my creatures found him in his fort. I didn't want to kill him like the others, so I had my creature take him to the center, where it stuck him to a wall and a vine crawled down his throat. All of my creatures are connected to me through the smoke particles that flow through the air and that came from my subconscious predator. Will gained the connection through the vine, but it only got stronger when I had him join my army. Although you got him out of my army, he's still connected to me and we can sense one another. It was weaker when he left Hawkins, but now that he's back and I can cross to the other side, it's only gotten stronger."

All of this was a lot to take in for Mike. He remembered vividly how Will was when he became the Mind Flayer's spy, seeing him in so much pain and unable to remember those that he loved and cared for. The fact that it was Vecna who made him feel that way only made him more disgusted, especially since he had only used Will as a pawn for so long. Then he remembered the other missing cases that came up when Will disappeared, such as Barbara Holland. She was killed by the Demogorgon, not attached to the hivemind or becoming a part of the army like Will was forced to. She was killed without a second thought, along with the other bodies that Joyce and Hopper had found when they went into the Upside Down to save Will.

"Why him?" Mike questioned, just wanting to get any answers that he could while he was here. "What made Will so special to you that you ruined his life?"

Vecna then began to smirk, which made the teen nervous for the answer. "Will was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, riding home on his bicycle when he ran into the creature that I let loose once Eleven opened the door," he explained. "But once he crossed over to my world, he brought over the rest of Hawkins. All that was there before were storms and rocky terrain, the only buildings being the lab and my childhood home. Will brought the rest from everything he could remember from that day in time."

"That's why it's stuck on the day Will disappeared," Mike realized, remembering what Nancy had told him when she was in the Upside Down with Steve, Robin, and Eddie. "November 6th, 1983. The Upside Down is the way it is because... because of Will."

"He is too important to kill, unlike the others," Vecna continued. "I could sense much potential in him, which would have been perfect for my army if you didn't remove the particles and close the gate."

"So, what's your plan with him after you kill me?" Mike asked, desperate to know what would happen to his best friend. Hearing all of this only terrified him more, not wanting any of his friends to get killed or get possessed by the hands of this monster. "You're... you're not going to kill him, right? You said yourself that he's too important."

"No, I am not going to kill William Byers. In fact, I cannot kill him," Vecna replied, the smirk on his face growing as he spoke. "Our mental line grows stronger as time passes, which makes us all the more connected. I can feel his emotions and I can also feel whenever he is in physical pain, feeling it myself. If I were to kill him, then I'm afraid... that would kill me too."

Mike dropped the gun in shock, the dots connecting in his head. "And... if we kill you..." he breathed out, unable to say the answer.

Vecna chuckled darkly. "Will dies," he finished.

A ringing noise filled his ears as his vision blurred. "No... no..." Mike muttered to himself as he fell to his knees. As he tried to process this horrible information, he thought back to what Vecna had said before. "You... you said that El and I have a similar mental line that you and Will have... shit... is... is this your plan with me?"

That was when Mike felt himself being lifted off the ground, floating in the air and being brought closer to Vecna. He could no longer muster up a courageous face or any witty comebacks to try and throw the monster off from killing him. He felt completely numb, struggling to cover his ears with his hands due to Vecna's powers holding him in place in the air, desperate to stop the ringing in his ears. Once he was close enough to the monster, Vecna lifted one of his giant fingers and stroked Mike's cheek, making him flinch at the touch.

"I kill you... Eleven dies."

Mike was then thrown back against the door, the vines immediately wrapping around his wrists, ankles, and neck. He was right back where he started, awaiting his death and desperate for El to come and save him. But this time, El wasn't coming to save him and he struggled to fight back against the vines. The song kept playing, but it was drowned out by the nagging words that Vecna had said and the ringing that kept tormenting him. Vecna stalked towards him, hand already raised as he prepared to practically suck the life out of the teen boy. Mike felt tears streaming down his face, desperately trying to get out of the vines, but they just got tighter with every move he made.

"Don't be afraid," Vecna whispered as Mike trembled. "It'll all be over soon. Just stay... very still."

The monster then lifted his hand up to Mike's head, preparing to end the war before it started.

...

A huge sensation overcame El as she collapsed on the ground, gripping her head as a sudden pain began to grow there. She, Lucas, and Dustin were on their way to the center of town, following their plan, but now she could only feel pain, fear, sadness, and overwhelming anxiety fill her up all at once, which made her even more scared as to what was happening to her. Or, rather, to someone else. Her vision became so blurry and a ringing noise filled her ears, making the figures of Lucas and Dustin nothing but a blur, though she could tell that they were worried about her and what was happening.

El knew that it had to do with Mike and that something was going wrong back in the mindscape. Taking a deep breath and attempting to regain her focus, she closed her eyes and found that precious connection that she had made with her boyfriend, touching the direct link between their minds and filling it with as much love as she could. Mike was not answering or touching back, so she poured in any power that she could, desperate to help him against Vecna. With every touch, she made their connection much stronger than before. While she had known about this mental link for a long time, El had never made it realize its full potential until now. She was willing to do anything to save her boyfriend.

Still nothing. Either it wasn't working or Mike was getting overwhelmed by Vecna to even realize what was going on.

Not wanting to give up and lose the love of her life, El knew the one solution that could help Mike.

"Mike... it's okay. I'm here."

...

Mike could feel an overwhelming sense of love flowing through him, but Vecna held him in place, keeping him from doing anything. The vines were so tight, he was pretty sure that his blood flow was no longer circulating through his wrists, ankles, or neck. He gasped for air as tears fell down his pale cheeks, eyes rolled to the back of his head as Vecna's hold on him got even stronger, the monster clearly desperate to kill him as soon as possible.

"Mike... it's okay. I'm here."

At the sound of her voice, Mike felt himself feeling comforted and loved, but he was still unable to breathe or fight back. It was hopeless, though it was good to at least hear El before they both dropped dead. 

"Mike... I love you. I know you're scared and Vecna is doing something to you, but you are stronger than him. I love you so much and I cannot lose you. I need you, Mike!"

She was speaking to him like he had spoken to her when she was in his exact position. He somehow managed a small smile just by hearing her voice, despite the pain that he was currently experiencing. 

"This connection can help you, I know it can. It makes us stronger. We can move mountains and fly together, but you have to fight back. You are stronger than him."

Mike wasn't sure if what she was saying was true. Every time he tried to get out of the vines, they only got tighter around him and Vecna increased his hold on his whole body, keeping him in place and making him accept the inevitable.

"Remember when you showed me your dad's comfy chair? It was the first day I was at your home, and you made me feel safe and happy for the first time. I was still scared, but you helped me not feel scared. You made me laugh and have fun with what you saw as a normal thing. You showed me a new life that I could live. That was when I knew that I loved you. I still do and I always will. Mike... you're my superhero."

Mike chuckled wetly, remembering that day like it was yesterday. Even then, all he wanted to do was hold her hand and keep her close to him, protecting her and loving her for the rest of his life. His mind clutched onto the link that they shared with one another as if it were a lifeline, the ringing in his ears fading away as he could finally hear Every Breath You Take again, running on a long loop to keep the exit open. 

"You can fight, Mike. You can fight. Use our connection and fight him! I can feel you touching back. I know you can fight him. Fight!"

El was right; he could fight back. His girlfriend was sending him as much love as she could, allowing for her power to flow into him. Mike could feel his body jolting, reacting to the sudden changes in his mind, but the warmth and love that he felt only made him stronger. He closed his eyes, focusing his energy onto freeing his right wrist from the vines. He could feel them slipping away, releasing its grip on his wrist, allowing for the blood to circulate through again as the power given to him flowed to his hand.

"That is it, Mike! FIGHT!"

Mike glared at Vecna, lifting up his right hand, pulling it back, and sending him flying back against a tree, the very one that Max was being held onto. As the monster groaned in pain, Mike sent the other vines away, freeing himself from their hold and dropping to the ground on his knees. Blood trickled down his nose, but he barely even noticed it, instead choosing to run towards the portal, getting back to his body. From what he could see through the portal, his body was still there with Erica next to him. Will was there too, but he looked far away and acting as if he wasn't even there, which had to mean that he was using his true sight power. It was time for him to go.

"I'm okay, El." Mike reached out to El as he ran. "I'm coming."

...

El sighed out of relief when she heard him, getting back up from the ground as she could feel his confidence and determination again. Lucas and Dustin helped her up and held her steady, both of them confused as to what just happened. She did just randomly collapse onto the ground while they were running towards the Hawkins library, so it made sense as to why they were so worried about her.

"El, what happened?' Lucas asked.

"Are you okay?" Dustin asked as well.

The girl nodded at them, giving them both smiles. "I'm okay," she answered. "I just... I needed to help Mike."

The two boys still looked concerned, but they looked like they believed her. That was when they heard a muffled voice coming from Dustin's backpack, which caught the three friends off guard more than El's sudden fall. Dustin opened up his bag and took out his supercom, a voice coming out of it. Lucas looked both shocked and surprised as tears filled his eyes, grabbing the supercom out of Dustin's hands and pulling the antenna up. 

"M-Max?" Lucas spoke into it, Dustin's jaw dropping and El smiling.

"Lucas?!" Max replied, sounding a bit frantic. A choked sound came out of Lucas as he began to sob in relief. "Why do you sound like that? Are you here?"

Lucas looked like he was about to collapse himself as he clutched onto the supercom for dear life. "No, no I'm not," he told her. "I-I'm with El... and Dustin. We're going into the war zone and you're... you're in the hospital. I left my supercom there so I... I could know if you were freed or not."

"So... it actually worked..." Max breathed out. "Mike's idiotic plan worked... I wish I could be there to help you guys, but I can't-"

"No, no, it's fine," Lucas reassured her, sniffling a bit. "There should be a doctor or a nurse still there, call out for one. And... once all of this is over... I'll come over straight away."

Max chuckled from the other side. "Good, because we still have a movie date to plan," she reminded him, which made Lucas chuckle himself. "Good luck out there, stalker. Give Vecna hell from me."

"We will, over and out," Lucas told her, pushing the antenna down. He looked over at El and Dustin, who both had tears in their eyes. "She- she's alive... El, thank you. I... I don't know what else to say but thank you."

El smiled at her friend and put a hand on his shoulder. "Friends do anything for each other," she reminded him, which made him chuckle a bit. "Now, let's go. Will could bring Vecna out any moment."

The three friends then ran off in the direction of the Hawkins library, ready for the final fight of their lives now that they knew that their other friends were okay.

...

Vecna opened his eyes, looking more furious than ever before. Will could sense that anger, but chose to push it away, not wanting any distractions for his part of the plan to get the monster to the other side. His heart beat fast and he could feel himself shaking where he stood, but he was somehow able to muster a glare on his face, attempting to look intimidating to Vecna, the one who had ruined his whole life when all he wanted was to be a normal kid. Though, he never really was normal to begin with, but Will knew that it was okay to not be normal, using what made him an outcast to many to save the world.

Before Vecna could even attempt to bring Mike back into the mindscape, Will jumped up and grabbed one of the vines, yanking it off of Vecna's back. The disgusting creature's head snapped over to the teen boy, his eyes narrowing when he saw him. "Will Byers," he growled, lowering himself to the ground.

Will slowly backed away, but he glared back at him. "If you want me, you're going to have to catch me yourself," he told him. "It's time for you to stop hiding and actually fight us yourselves."

"Why do you fight for him, Will?" Vecna asked, stalking towards him. "He will never love you back, and you know it. Why are you fighting for someone who would just see you as a disgusting queer?"

Will likely would have fallen for this trick if he didn't remember what Mike had said to him before he went into the mindscape. "He's my best friend and I am perfectly fine with just being that," he declared, confidence slowly building up in him. "And I don't know if you heard him earlier, but he told me that he accepts me for who I am, and that's what a true best friend does. And that's why I will always fight for him."

The teen boy then took off running, Vecna following him with a glare on his face.

...

Mike woke up with a gasp, falling down onto his back as he took deep breaths to get air. Erica was right there, helping him sit up before they both watched Will, who was staring off at something that neither of them could see. When Will spoke about how Mike was his best friend and why he would fight for him, Mike couldn't help but smile, happy to know that his best friend would always have his back. Will then took off running out of the Rainbow Room, beginning his next step in his part of the plan to lead Vecna to the gates. That meant that it was time for Mike and Erica to leave as well, needing to be there for the fight.

"Mike, you alright?" Erica asked him, a look of concern on her face.

"Yeah, I'm okay," Mike replied. "Thanks for staying here to look after me."

"Eh, it's nothing," Erica waved off as she helped Mike stand up. "Though you did float in the air twice and it was scary as shit. Also, your nose is bleeding."

Mike reached up and touched the skin under his nostril, a drop of blood now on his finger. Guess he probably should have expected that after what had just happened. He then wiped the rest away with the sleeve of his sweatshirt, feeling more determined than ever to stop Vecna and end this interdimensional war that plagued this town for so long. He immediately walked out of the Rainbow Room, Erica following him as they began to make their way back to Hellgate.

"Erica, we might have a change of plan when it comes to stopping Vecna," Mike told his friend's younger sister as they exited the lab.

"What the hell do you mean?" Erica questioned, raising an eyebrow at him. "I thought we were going to chop his head off or break him limb by limb so his ass never wakes up again."

"It has to do with Will," Mike explained. "He's connected to Vecna to the point where if Vecna dies, he dies too. He told me back in the mindscape."

"What?!" Erica exclaimed. "Come on, he has to be tricking you. He just doesn't want to get his ass kicked again."

"No, everything he said is true," the teen confirmed, looking down at the ground in front of him. "I know this because El and I have a similar connection. That's why he was targeting me in the first place. He didn't just want to get rid of the heart of the party, he wanted to use me as a way to kill El. If I die, she dies, and that was his plan all along. He's known about this connection for a long time. I guess he wants El to know that she lost me before she dies, securing his win on Hawkins and the whole world."

Erica shook her head at this news, now looking even more worried than before. "Do you have a new plan, then?" she asked.

For the first time in his life, Mike did not have a plan. He was stuck.

Chapter Text

El's eyes widened when she saw what was in front of her. She, Lucas, and Dustin had arrived at the library, now witnessing the rest of the party throwing molotovs at a giant monster that was trying to break through the center of the four gates, Demogorgons, Demodogs, and bats running amok. It was a creature that she had never seen before or even sensed in the void, its three snakelike heads peaking through and snarling at the people below it, shrieking at every flame that hit it. Remembering what Nancy had told them about the visions, this had to be the monster that she had seen with the gaping mouth. El did not want to know what would happen if they let that thing through, so she was going to do everything she could do to make sure that would not happen.

"Holy shit..." Lucas muttered when he saw the monster. "What are we gonna call this one, Dustin?"

"Reminds me of the Thessalhydra," Dustin replied, rubbing his arm. "And shit, it is ruthless as hell in DND."

"Then we will kill it," El spoke up, glaring at the giant monster. "I will not let it hurt anyone."

She then began running over to the group, throwing her hands up with a yell as she used her powers against the Thessalhydra. Its three heads fell back as it let out a large scream, causing for the ground to rumble beneath everyone. They all fell to the ground in surprise, which made El lose her grip on the monster. When the earthquake stopped, everyone looked over at El, Dustin, and Lucas with confused expressions on their faces, realizing that there were a few kids missing in their party.

"What are you guys doing here?" Nancy questioned, her eyes wide with fear. "Where's Mike, Will, and Erica?!"

"On their way here, according to El," Lucas told her. "Mike stayed behind to keep Vecna in place until Will got in position to use his true sight to lure Vecna to our side while Erica stayed behind to make sure that Mike doesn't get killed and that his music would still play."

"But Mike is okay," El immediately cut in. "He told me he is coming now."

Nancy furrowed her eyebrows at that statement. "How... exactly did he tell you?' she asked.

Before El could say anything, the Thessalhydra let out a huge roar as red clouds began to form in the sky, lighting striking nearby. The particles were falling a bit faster now, as if trying to spread its disease in a quicker matter. The bats flew through the air, screeching loudly, as the Demogorgons and Demodogs surrounded the party, snarling as they were about to attack at any moment. Hopper immediately lit up another molotov and threw it at one of the Demodogs, causing for all of the monsters to cry out in pain due to the hivemind. El then threw most of them back with her powers, her nose beginning to bleed as she did so.

Everything was slowly falling into motion now that the storm was back. As the party fought off the monsters that tried to kill them, El noticed out of the corner of her eye that Will had arrived, still using his true sight to look at the unseen figure that he had lured here. El wiped away the blood that was trickling down her nostril, ready to face the evil that has haunted her and her friends for the past few years once and for all.

Will grabbed onto the invisible figure in front of him, holding on tight with a glare on his face.

...

Will had no idea how long he had ran for, somehow making it to the Upside Down version of the Hawkins library without taking a single break. He could feel Vecna's presence following him, boosting his adrenaline to get to his destination as he felt the chills grow on the back of his neck and spread down his back. When he turned around, the monster was right behind him, his tall figure glaring down at him as he slowly approached him. Will did his best to have an intimidating look on his face, but his shaking hands and shaky breath immediately gave away that he was still afraid.

"After all these years, you are still a coward," Vecna taunted him, shaking his head at the teen. "There is no one to hide behind or anyone to save you this time. It is just you and me."

"Says the guy who only made himself known to us after he stole El's powers," Will shot back, feeling an overwhelming sense of confidence fill him, despite how much he was shaking. "Besides, I'm done hiding."

With a glare on his face, Will reached forward and grabbed onto Vecna's shoulders, holding him tight. He then closed his eyes and focused on his thoughts of his friends, thinking about how they were on the other side and that they needed his help. His mom and brother, his closest friends, the girl who he had come to know as a sister, Mike... all of them were counting on him to bring Vecna out to destroy him, and he was going to succeed. He loved them all so much and Will was going to do anything possible to make sure that they would survive. While it did sound dangerous to do this, it had to be done in order to be rid of the Upside Down once and for all.

Will opened his eyes, seeing that his surroundings have changed. He and the monster were back in the real world, his friends and family right there, fighting off hoards of Demo-creatures, including a gigantic one with three heads, just like the one in the painting he had made for Mike. His eyes widened when he saw it, distracting him from the one that was still in front of him. Angered, Vecna grunted as he threw Will into the air with his abilities, holding him there as the teen strained to get free.

"How dare you..." Vecna growled, narrowing his eyes at Will. "You ruined my plans..."

"LET HIM GO!"

El screamed as she lifted a hand up, shoving Vecna into a nearby car, causing for him to let go of Will, El making sure that he landed safely on the ground. Vecna groaned in pain at the impact, the other monsters flinching as well due to the hive mind. The girl slowly approached the one that used to be her brother, holding him in place as her other nostril began to bleed, her signature glare looking right into his soul and seeing nothing but darkness there. That darkness would soon be eradicated, El being the one to make sure that Vecna would never come back to hurt another person she loved.

"You hurt Will," El said once she got closer to the car that Vecna was on. "You hurt Max. You hurt MIKE!" She lifted up both of her arms, making Vecna start to yell out in pain as she began to rip him apart from the inside. "You won't hurt anyone else. Not anymore and not ever again. You have lost."

El concentrated on her enemy, focusing on the inside of his body as she kept him frozen, unable to resist the inside of his body being slowly torn apart. Unbeknownst to her, Will felt nothing but pain overtake him, collapsing onto his knees along with the rest of the monsters. Joyce and Jonathan immediately ran to him, asking him what was wrong, but he could not answer them due to the amount of pain he was in. Vecna did notice this though, forming a smirk on his face that confused El, but did not deter her from her main goal of destroying the one that caused so much damage for years.

"You are making a grave mistake," Vecna taunted her. "You will not win if you kill me."

El ignored him, glaring intensely at him. "We'll see," she replied, focusing harder and starting to speed up the process of ripping him apart.

"EL!" A familiar voice cried out. "EL! STOP! YOU CAN'T!"

Confused, El turned her head to see Mike running towards her, grabbing onto her arm with a terrified look on his face. This made her stop using her powers on Vecna, stopping the pain of his body being ripped apart, Will taking deep breaths as his feelings of pain stopped as well. He was still being held in place against the car, though a much bigger smirk spread across his face once he noticed that Mike was there.

"Mike?!" El questioned, furrowing her eyebrows. "I was about to kill him. Why stop?"

Mike was breathing heavily as he gripped onto El's arm, thankful that he was not too late in getting there. Once he had arrived, he saw Vecna up against the car and Will on the ground, both clearly about to die if he had not stepped in right on time. He and Erica were brainstorming ideas on how to get around the connection between Will and Vecna, but nothing had come to mind for any sort of plan. They had to kill Vecna, but they could not lose Will, not after everything they had been through together. El was about to kill them both, and Mike was not going to allow her to feel anymore guilty than she already was over Max. There had to be something he was not thinking of, so the best plan of action he had for now was to stall Vecna for as long as he could.

"You can't kill him. Not now," Mike replied, still out of breath form how much he had run. "El, there's a huge problem. When you were trying to kill Vecna, Will... he was feeling exactly what he was feeling, just like the Demogorgons."

El's eyes widened at that, her invisible grip on Vecna beginning to falter. "W-What are you saying...?" she questioned, fearful of the answer.

"If you kill Vecna... then Will dies too," Mike admitted.

"No..." El muttered, tears pouring into her eyes.

"What...?"

Mike and El turned to where Will was lying on the ground with his mother and brother by his side, a horrified yet heartbroken expression on his face. It was as if everything he had been through flashed all at once in his head, realizing that it was no longer worth it and that it would all be in vain. Joyce and Jonathan looked horrified at the news, tears pouring into their eyes just at the mere idea of losing Will again, but permanent this time. It only angered El more when she looked back at Vecna, still with a smirk on his face. He had done so much to ruin their lives to the point where even if they did finally kill him, there would still be so much loss and pain.

"He's telling the truth, Eleven," Vecna taunted, his voice sending chills down everyone's spines. "You know, because you have the same connection with Mike that I have with Will. If you hadn't opened the gate for me, you wouldn't have endangered your boyfriend or your brother."

El glared and slammed Vecna's head against the car with a furious scream, Will clutching his head as a result of this move. Mike noticed this and his eyes widened, moving his hands to put them on his girlfriend's shoulders. "This is what he wants, El," he told her. "He wants you to be the one to cause Will pain. Don't give him what he wants."

Hearing this, El loosened her grip on Vecna, though her glare did not let up. "None of this is my fault," she said in a determined voice. "This is on you and Papa. You used me for what you want, and I will not let you do the same again."

El continued to hold him in place, though she did not do anything that would kill him in fear of what would happen to Will. Mike sighed in relief, grateful that they had more time to figure out a plan. "We need to figure out a way to kill Vecna that won't end up killing Will," he told the others, walking over to them. "Erica and I were trying to come up with something, but since Will isn't possessed and we can't close this gates, I'm not sure what we can do."

"Are you sure that Vecna isn't lying?" Steve asked, folding his arms over his chest. "I mean, the guy clearly doesn't want to die."

"That's what I said," Erica remarked.

"He's telling the truth," Will said in a monotone voice, making everyone look over at him. "I can feel everything he feels, and I have been since I got back from the Upside Down whenever a gate is open. Now I'm feeling them again since I got back from California. It's why my episodes started again and it's why I have true sight. I have to die if he's going to die."

Jonathan shook his head at his little brother. "No, you're not," he reassured him, trying to blink away tears. "You're not going to die, not on my watch. There has to be something we're not thinking of that could save you."

"Hold on... California..." Mike muttered. His eyes widened when he came to a realization, turning to where his best friend was sitting. "Will, you didn't feel anything of Vecna in California, right? Not even during spring break when Vecna was actively killing people and opening gates?"

Will shook his head. "No, nothing," he replied.

"Then that's our answer!" Mike determined. "You just need to get out of Hawkins! Maybe once you're past Vecna's line of power, the connection will be too weak to kill you. And once you're out of Hawkins, we can kill Vecna and you can still live."

"It could work," Nancy suggested, nodding her head. "Someone needs to drive Will past the Hawkins sign and report in when he doesn't feel anything from Vecna anymore."

"I'll do it," Jonathan volunteered, immediately standing up and helping Will up. "I'll get you out of here, buddy."

Mike nodded at him, tossing him his supercom. "It's already connected to the channel we're on, so you can reach us without switching channels," he instructed. "As soon as you're out of Hawkins, let us know."

Jonathan caught the supercom and nodded at him, grabbing Will's hand and leading him to a nearby car. Nancy helped out by hot-wiring it to make sure that it would work, giving her boyfriend a kiss on the cheek for good luck. Joyce hugged Will so tight that she was practically suffocating him, but no one could blame her after everything that happened. She was terrified to lose her son again, this time possibly for good. After she let go, Will got in the front seat, looking down at his lap as Jonathan drove away, foot on the pedal as he got away from the center of town as fast as he could.

Vecna glared at the car, furious that they were trying to get around his plans. Freeing himself from the restraints, he lifted up a hand and threw El back with his mind, making her land on her back in front of the rest of the party. They watched as he looked up at the Thessalhydra, as if he was commanding it to follow his orders, which only terrified them due to the massive size of the creature. It roared loudly, causing another earthquake that was much stronger than the previous one. Everyone held onto each other as they fell to the ground at the impact, cracks forming on the ground from how strong this earthquake was. It was slowly destroying Hawkins more and more, meaning that they had to do something to stop this thing quickly.

"What exactly is that thing?!" Mike questioned, looking to Dustin and Lucas. "Is that the thing that Nancy saw in her visions?!"

"Exactly that, but we're calling it the Thessalhydra due to its multiple heads," Dustin replied. "And if the rules of DND apply here, we have to destroy its heads."

"And we have to keep it from getting to the exact center of town by preventing it from crossing through the gates or else it will destroy everything," Lucas added. "Basically, kill it before it can kill all of us."

Mike nodded, trying to come up with a plan. "I might have a really stupid idea," he said.

Before Lucas and Dustin could question him, Mike stood up and ran towards the Thessalhydra, ignoring the yells of protest from everyone else. He lifted up both of his hands, restraining the creature and keeping from moving. Everyone stared at him in shock as his nose began to bleed, never having expected that to happen. Even Vecna looked shocked, despite him being the first one to witness Mike's new abilities back in the mindscape.

"Oh, so that's why his nose was bleeding back at the lab," Erica commented, though her eyes were still wide.

"Uh, when did that happen?!" Robin questioned, pointing at the teen.

"I have two brave little superpowered friends?" Argyle grinned, his eyes wide in excitement.

"Mike..." El whispered, feeling both proud and scared for her boyfriend at the same time.

"Do we have something that can cut off these heads?!" Mike yelled, beginning to feel tired as his other nostril began to bleed. "Quickly!"

Hopper had an idea and he hoped that Murray was on the same page as him when packing up weapons. He immediately ran to the car that the conspiracy theorist had arrived in, avoiding the other monsters that were trying to attack again, and quickly searched through the vehicle, trying to find the weapon that he was thinking of. After a couple seconds, he found it under the car seat. It was the sword that Hopper had used against the Demogorgon in the arena, which he had given to Murray for safekeeping after they had escaped Russia, just in case they would need it again when they got back to Hawkins. The former police chief silently thanked the man, happy that he had thought ahead as he usually does.

"Hey, Wheeler! Try this!" Hopper yelled out, tossing the sword over to the teen. Mike glanced over at it and his eyes went wide, not expecting to see a sword of all things.

El decided to step in to help her boyfriend, lifting up her hands to restrain the Thessalhydra to allow for Mike to grab the sword. It was surprisingly lighter than he expected, but it was sharp enough to do the trick in defeating this creature. The Thessalhydra roared again, attempting to align its three heads together to cause an even stronger earthquake, but El was able to keep the heads apart just enough to have the impact be much less than before. Everyone fell to the ground from the shaking earth, but El and Mike remained standing, using their abilities together to face the monster.

Mike lifted up one hand, grunting as he used his powers to yank one of the heads to the ground. "Hold it there, El!" he called out. El nodded and moved one of her hands to that head, keeping it still on the ground. As the monster screeched and struggled to escape, Mike ran forward and sliced the head off with the sword. The other two heads cried out in pain, the Demogorgons also screeching while all the bats fell to the ground. Vecna looked angry at this move, snarling as he began to command the Thessalhydra again.

"Holy shit!" Dustin yelled out with a grin. "Just like in DND!"

"Just two more heads," Mike said, looking over at the love of his life. "You ready?"

El looked back at him and nodded. "Ready," she answered.

The Thessalhydra, obeying Vecna's commands, began to try and combine its other two heads after recovering from the pain of losing a head. Mike and El lifted up their hands, keeping that from happening and preventing another earthquake. This time, they yanked down both of the heads at once, El holding them in place as Mike got the sword ready. He charged forward again, swinging his sword down and slicing off the middle head, the monster screeching in pain again as he ran and cut off the last head. The three headless necks were then flung backwards, the body swinging back and forth as blood spurted out from the necks. For good measure, Nancy, Robin, and Hopper threw fiery molotovs at it, setting it on fire and causing for every creature in the hive mind to cry out in pain. The dead creature then sunk back down the gate, no longer a threat to the party or Hawkins as a whole.

Mike dropped the sword as he took deep breaths, wiping the blood away from his nostrils. El put her hands on his shoulders, keeping him steady as she knew all too well that an overuse of an ability for the first time can cause exhaustion, feeling it herself due to their mental connection. Despite this, she did not regret sharing her powers with him because it did save him back in the mindscape and it would continue to save him during this battle. Whatever means necessary to keep them both alive and to defeat Vecna once and for all. 

"I hope you're not mad that I shared my powers with you," El spoke up, even though she did not feel any sort of guilt about it. "I sensed you in pain in the mindscape and I had to save you somehow."

To her surprise, Mike smiled at her. "Why would I be mad? You saved me, like you always do," he told her, taking both of her hands. "Besides, that was pretty awesome, what we did just now. We can fight together." El smiled back, clutching his hands tight and pressing her forehead against his.

Their moment was interrupted by Vecna's growl of anger now that his biggest beast was just killed by his enemies. He lifted up both of his hands above his head, the library behind him breaking apart into many pieces, which he then threw at the party. Everyone jumped to the floor and dodged the incoming debris, but Mike and El stepped forward, freezing the debris of the library in midair and sending it flying back to Vecna. He moved out of the way just in time, sending the couple flying back and landing hard on the ground, both of them gasping in pain.

"You may have defeated my strongest creature, but I still remain," Vecna taunted them as he slowly stepped forward. "You made a grave mistake by having Will bring me out to your world. Now that he did that, Hawkins is finally my kingdom."

The red storm began to get stronger as lightning struck the edges of town. The party watched as large vines began to rise out of the ground all around the border of Hawkins, reaching up to a long height that nearly touched the sky, becoming a sort of wall that kept them locked away from the rest of the world. Hawkins was now a part of Vecna's kingdom, keeping the normality out as the monsters within began to spread even more than they already were. Vines began to pour out from the gates, wrapping around the streets and going up many of the surrounding buildings. The sky got darker and particles began to fill the air more, leaves on the trees falling off all at once, flowers beginning to wilt, and grass drying up until there was barely anything left. 

"Shit," Nancy cursed, not expecting this to ever happen.

"Will and Jonathan..." Mike muttered, fear spreading through his body. "What if they didn't make it out?!"

Dustin grabbed his supercom from his bag. "Jonathan?! Will?! Come in!" he shouted. "Do you copy?! Please tell me you got out of there!"

...

"No... no, we're still in Hawkins..."

Will and Jonathan stood outside of the car, staring up at the wall of vines that stood right in front of them. They had just reached the leaving Hawkins sign when the lightning struck and vines sprouted out of the ground. Jonathan had tried driving through them and using a weapon against them, but the vines refused to budge. They were trapped there and there was no getting out of Hawkins to go through with their plan.

With nothing left to do, Will only had one option left.

Chapter Text

Will stared at the vines that had sprouted up from the ground, blocking him and Jonathan from leaving Hawkins. Jonathan had tried everything to break through them, such as driving his car through it, shooting at it, but nothing worked. He had now resorted to banging his shoulder against the vines, growing more desperate by the minute, but Will knew that all attempts were in vain. They were stuck in Hawkins and there was no leaving, meaning that the connection between him and Vecna was only growing stronger by the minute. Tears came into his eyes as he began to accept his fate.

Will Byers had to die.

"Jonathan, please!" Will begged his older brother, holding him back from attacking the vines. "It's no use! We're stuck here!"

"No, I can get us out!" Jonathan protested, ripping himself out of his younger brother's arms to try and break the wall. "I have to! I have to save you!"

"There's nothing we can do! We can't get out!" Will exclaimed out of pure desperation. "We have to go back to the others. I... I have to..."

Jonathan stopped in that moment and looked at his brother, a stream of tears falling down his face. He knew what had to happen whether he accepted it or not. Will did not accept it himself, but there was no other option anymore. Jonathan walked over to him and threw his arms around him, both brothers crying into each other's shoulders as they held each other as tight as they could for the last time.

Will thought back to the hug they had shared in the kitchen of Surfer Boy Pizza. Jonathan had figured out what he was hiding from the world, but reassured him about it in the best way he could. The acceptance, love, and care that Will had felt was still in this hug, though the circumstances were different. Jonathan reassured Will that it was okay to like boys that time. This time, they were both saying goodbye and neither of them could accept it. Will cried harder as he thought back to all of the times his brother comforted and loved him, even when he was struggling too. He would do anything for him, saving him several times before, but there was nothing he could do to save him from his inevitable death. They could only only that it would at least be quick and painless.

Once they were forced to let go, they got back into the car and began to drive back. Will's only thought on the way back was that he wished he could say goodbye to his mother and sister too.

...

When Jonathan had reported that they did not make it out of Hawkins, everyone froze in place. Walls of vines covered all of Hawkins, keeping everyone on the outside away while everyone that was still in the town was trapped inside. If Will and Jonathan were still in Hawkins, then Will was still in danger of dying if they killed Vecna. Joyce looked as though she would collapse if Hopper was not there to hold her up. Mike and El exchanged horrified glances with each other, as they were the only ones who could stop Vecna, but that would mean killing their best friend and brother in the process. There was nothing they could do to stop it.

Vecna chuckled darkly as the realization set in for the party. "You're in my world now," he spoke, stepping closer to everyone. "And so is Will. The boy that you have been trying to protect for so long. You have failed. I have won."

El glared at him, and it was the most ferocious one that Mike had ever seen her make. She screamed and threw her hands up, but Vecna was faster, using one hand to throw her back onto the ground. He did the same to Mike before he could do anything to defend himself. Then he threw everyone else back against a nearby rift, vines coming out and wrapping around the rest of the party, holding them in place. Demogorgons and demodogs surrounded them, preparing to strike whenever their master gave the order. 

Mike and El stood back up and looked at their friends and family that were being held by the vines. Mike made eye contact with Nancy, his sister looking desperate as she tried to break free from the vines, but she managed to give him a nod. He nodded back at her, knowing that they could still fight. El, meanwhile, grabbed the blue hair tie on her wrist as she looked at Hopper, a determined look now on her face.

The couple turned to face Vecna, walking towards him. "You didn't win shit, Henry," Mike spat at him. "As long as we're here, Hawkins will never be yours. The world will never be yours."

"If you kill me, Will Byers dies. If I kill either one of you, the other will die," Vecna reminded them both. "No matter what, you lose."

"Not true. I have a plan," El spoke through her mind, Mike being the only one who could hear her through their mental link. "It's what I did in Max's head."

"Okay, I'll follow your lead," Mike replied through his mind. He trusted his superhero with his life, after all.

El lifted a hand and Vecna was in the air once her nose started bleeding. Mike followed suit, helping his girlfriend hold the monster in place. Vecna tried to move his arms, but he could not, both of them overpowering him. Following what El was doing, Mike closed his eyes and found himself searching through Vecna's memories, though they were just quick flashes of his past. He could barely keep up with them with how fast they flew by, as if Vecna did not want him or El to see them. They took each other's hands combining their strength to slow down the memories and be able to see them properly.

"You're going to hurt things. You're going to kill me aren't you? You're going to kill a lot of things."

"Of course you're not normal, but why does that have to be wrong?"

"You can't tell US what to do!"

"You couldn't even scream do you know why? I do, you were too afraid the fear had already taken the root and it's been eating you for years. Where's your sweet little boy now?"

"I'm not a freak, I'm Henry Creel, I'm normal."

"I'm Dr Brenner, I'm here to help."

"You can't outrun the shadow, Henry, you are the shadow!"

"Hello, Eleven. I'm here to help."

It all stopped suddenly and Mike and El were no longer in Hawkins. Instead, they were in an unfamiliar area that looked similar to the Upside Down, but also different since its sky was yellow rather than blue or red when there was a storm. They walked through the memory together, holding hands and refusing to let go, wondering where this was going. There stood a young Henry Creel nearby, looking scared and confused, holding a spyglass in his hand. He was not the same age as he was when El initially banished him, he was a child. Long before the same child would murder his mother and sister and frame his father for the crime. 

"Where.. where are we?" Mike asked, staring at the young Henry Creel in awe.

"In a memory," El replied. "I don't know where we are but... there's a reason why we landed in this memory."

"How are we here?" Mike then questioned. "I thought we'd have to be in the bath or we need radio static in the background."

"Our bond strengthens us," El told him. "We are keeping Vecna still. As long as we are in here, he can't hurt us or our friends. The Demogorgons are standing guard, waiting for him to tell them what to do. They won't touch our friends either."

"Keeping him in a trance, like he did with me, Max, and his other victims," Mike realized. He then approached the young Henry, who did not notice either him or El there. "What do you think this place is? Is this what the Upside Down was before Will accidentally made it look like Hawkins?"

"Not the Upside Down," El shook her head, looking around and gazing up at the yellow sky. "No. This is different. A different place."

Mike narrowed his eyes as he looked down at the child in front of him. Henry was so different from what his current demonic form was now, actually showing emotion other than anger and hatred at humanity. He looked utterly terrified, frantically looking around the place. He was lost, just like Will was when he first entered the Upside Down. Mike could hear the familiar chittering and growls of Demogorgons nearby and so could Henry, which made him jump in fear. A gust of wind blew next to him, but when Mike looked to his right, he saw that it was not just any gust of wind. It was the black particles that made up the shadow form of the Mind Flayer.

He waited for the shadows to take shape in the spider-like form, but it did not. It just swirled around him, El, and Henry, Mike watching as it seemed to analyze a fearful Henry. It completely enveloped the boy, surrounding him and covering him up from Mike and El's sight. They both sped the memory up to where the particles flew away, leaving a dazed and confused Henry in its wake. He was no longer scared of this place or the creatures that were there within it. Instead, he seemed more comfortable. More like the person that he became when he killed his family, the rest of the kids in the lab, and more like the creature that he was now. It reminded Mike of when Will was possessed by the Mind Flayer a few years ago on the school field. He was frozen in place, going from scared to numb in a matter of moments.

It made Mike wonder. The Mind Flayer became a part of Henry Creel. Was the real enemy the Mind Flayer? Was Vecna was ever in control of the Mind Flayer?

Suddenly, the scene shifted and they were no longer in the dark place with the yellow sky. They were back in the normal world, the Right-Side Up. They were in a cave, where they saw pieces of scientific equipment that had rapidly flashing lights all over it. It was dark outside of the cave, and Henry dropped his spyglass without a care, slowly leaving the cave. 

"This is how Henry got his power," Mike thought out loud as he watched the child leave. "He was there in that... place due to that equipment, and came out of it after being exposed to the Mind Flayer."

"Then I know why we are in this memory," El said. She held up a hand, stopping the memory from moving, the young Henry Creel now frozen at the cave's exit. "This is how we can stop him."

"I like the sound of that," Mike commented, realizing what she was implying. "Tell me what we need to do and I'll follow your lead."

El furrowed her eyebrows as she stared at the frozen young Henry Creel. "We need to be quick before he finds us and realizes what we're doing," she told him.

"I hope it works," Mike muttered to himself. He then looked at his girlfriend and took her hand. "Whenever you're ready."

Together, they lifted up their hands and made the scene change. Once they stopped, they were still in the cave, only there was daylight outside rather than the night sky. Henry walked into the cave, a smile on his face as he looked through his spyglass. He approached the science equipment, only this time, there was a doctor using it. They made eye contact and the doctor's eyes widened, clearly not expecting for a kid to wander in. He started pressing many buttons, causing for the lights to flash rapidly, just as it was in the previous memory Mike and El were looking at. 

El quickly stepped forward, using her powers to freeze the memory before they were sent into the other dimension. Before she could do anything else, the familiar white particles of the Upside Down began to fall. Mike immediately grew concerned, as the memory was frozen and not doing anything to cause this to happen. The sun disappeared outside too, replaced with the red storm and dark blue sky. This was not the memory or either of them.

"What are you doing here?"

Vecna's voice sent chills down Mike's spine to the point where he had to remind himself that this was not one of the horrific visions that he was forced to be in for the past 24 hours. This was Vecna's own mind, and he could not decide if that was worse or not. "I knew you were full of shit, Henry," Mike taunted him. "You think you're so special and above everyone else? Look at you. Look at you! You are normal and human, just like us."

"That is a false version of who I am," Vecna growled, sounding angry at the memory. "You think that by entering my mind, you can stop me? That you can stop the inevitable? You're too late. You will lose this fight. Both of you will die, then your friends will die, and Will shall become part of my army again. We will expand my world and kill everyone on this planet. Everything will be my kingdom."

"No, it won't!" El yelled, glaring. "Nothing is yours, Henry. Nothing. You are not the one in control. The Mind Flayer is controlling you!"

"You've convinced yourself that you're the main power of the Upside Down," Mike added. "You're nothing but a pawn in some game."

Vecna's physical form appeared then, glaring down at the two of them. Mike and El held hands again, but they maintained eye contact with the monster that wanted to kill them both. This was it. The final confrontation between the monster, the superhero, and the heart. The very thing that would determine the fate of Hawkins and their friends. The people they loved.

The final battle.

...

Will and Jonathan arrived back at downtown to see nothing but chaos. They saw Joyce, Nancy, Lucas, Dustin, Erica, Hopper, Steve, Robin, Vickie, Murray, and Argyle trapped in the vines that emerged from the gates, Demogorgons and Demodogs surrounding them as the bats flew overhead. Luckily, none of the monsters were doing anything to their family and friends, instead just standing guard and preparing to strike when they were told to. Mike and El were nearby, holding hands while their other hands were up, their noses bleeding. Vecna stood in front of them, trapped in the same type of trance that Mike was in at the lab. 

"Oh god," Will muttered to himself, taking everything in.

Before either of them had a chance to react, a vine grabbed Jonathan's leg and pulled him towards the edge of the gate. Will screamed for his brother and tried to catch him, but a Demogorgon jumped in front of him, keeping him away from the rifts. Jonathan was put next to Nancy, his arms and legs being held by vines. Will noticed the discarded flamethrower nearby, quickly grabbing it as the Demogorgon began to approach him again. There was one gasoline can left, so he grabbed that as well and fueled up the weapon. As he looked at the monster that had haunted him for years, chasing after him both in the Upside Down and in his nightmares, he nearly froze like he usually did.

No, he refused to freeze this time. Will was done being scared. Today, he would be the brave and wise cleric and sorcerer that he pretended to be in D&D campaigns.

He was not a coward or a Zombie Boy. He was Will the Wise.

"Fireball!" Will yelled, pressing the trigger of the flamethrower. 

The Demogorgon screeched as it caught on fire, the rest of the monsters also screeching due to the effects of the hive mind. The vines from the rifts also fled, releasing everyone from its hold. They quickly ran from the gates, wanting to be as far away from the vines as possible before they came back. The bats in the sky also all fell dead, being the weaker of the monsters. Will then aimed the flamethrower towards the rest of the monsters, setting them on fire as well. The Demodogs quickly died too, only leaving injured Demogorgons behind.

Nancy grabbed her sawed off shotgun and aimed right at the Demogorgons. "Barb, Fred, this is for you," she said to herself as she began to fire at the monsters. Hopper joined in as well once he grabbed his gun, the two of them making sure that each monster was wounded and distracted. Lucas then grabbed the sword that Mike used earlier, approaching each Demogorgon and severing their heads. 

All of the monsters were dead and gone, the only one left being Vecna.

"You can do this, guys," Will whispered as he watched El and Mike.

...

Mike closed his eyes, his own memories flashing through his mind.

Him seeing the painting that Will made.

Him and Lucas sitting together at Max's bedside .

Him giving El the nickname that she would use as her real name.

Him and Dustin playing D&D with Eddie and the rest of the Hellfire Club.

Him and Max finally coming to an understanding in the mindscape.

Him dancing with El at the Snowball.

Him learning how to shoot guns with Nancy.

Him hugging his mother after the Byers and El moved away.

Him and El sharing a kiss after she told him that she loves him.

Him being hugged by Hopper and crying into his chest after reuniting with El.

Him reassuring Will that he accepted him no matter what.

Him finally telling El that he loved her.

As he thought of each memory, Mike could feel himself getting stronger. He opened his eyes, seeing Vecna lifting up a hand as he prepared to attack him. Mike was quicker, using his power to throw Vecna back against the cave's rocky walls, holding him in place. Mike smirked to himself, recalling how Vecna constantly did this to him in his mind. He loved forcing him to receive a bit of payback there. El then lifted her hand and kept him in place too, glaring daggers at the person who used to be one of her brothers.

"Mike, now!" she exclaimed, her nose beginning to bleed.

Mike nodded and waved his hand, unfreezing the memory and reversing it just enough to get the young Henry farther away from the equipment. The doctor was still there, tampering away with the equipment and taking notes as he did his studies. Mike then grabbed Henry, holding him back from going towards the equipment. Vecna roared in anger, resisting El's hold on him as he lifted a hand and tried to attack Mike. El managed to deflect the attack just in time, preventing Mike from flying back. His attempted having failed, Vecna focused on El instead, lifting up both of his hands as she lifted her other one up, their feet moving backwards as they mentally fought.

The lights on the equipment began to flash, which made the doctor freak out, just as he did in the previous version of the memory. El and Vecna were both up against the cave's walls on opposite sides, El's other nostril now bleeding, but she did not falter or grow tired at all. She remained strong, Mike sensing nothing but love fueling her power. Vecna was the one that was growing weaker by the minute, his knees beginning to buckle as his eyes were drooping. Mike maintained his hold on the young Henry, pulling him back towards the entrance of the cave and farther away from the doctor and his equipment. The kid did not resist, not recognizing that he was being kept away from this mysterious man and his equipment. The lights flickered more and more, the colors only getting more rapid as the doctor continued to press as many buttons as he could.

Just then, the doctor disappeared from sight, the lights fading away, but the young Henry Creel remained, holding his spyglass as he stared at the spot where the doctor once was in shock. He did not realize that Mike was still holding onto him or that his future self was fighting who would become his worst enemy. He just clutched the spyglass in his hands, looking around the cave frantically.

Mike let go of the kid, letting him run out of the cave without dropping the spyglass this time. He ran to El and took her hand, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath.

...

When he opened his eyes, Mike and El were still holding hands and standing tall while Vecna fell to his knees. The monster took deep breaths while Mike looked behind him to see that the party was out of the vines's hold, Will and Jonathan were back with them, the decapitated bodies of Demogorgons laid on the ground alongside the burnt bodies of the Demodogs. No vines were in sight, the ones that created a wall around Hawkins now going down. The Demobats were also dead, all of them lying lifeless on the ground. The red storm was beginning to clear up. The red light from the rifts was fading away. Mike squeezed El's hand and she squeezed back, reassuring themselves that they were still there. 

Mike then looked at Vecna, who brought his hand up to try and attack. Nothing came out. He groaned as he tried and tried to use his power, but nothing happened. Nothing at all. 

"What... what did you do to me?" Vecna questioned, sounding weak.

"You're normal again, Henry," Mike told him, kneeling down to match his eye level. "The thing you despise most in the world. Congratulations. You're just a deformed human being with no power."

El looked over to Will. "Sorry if this hurts you," she warned her brother. She then looked back at Vecna and did what she did before, causing him pain, this time making him scream. Will did not react at all to what was happening to the monster. He did not collapse and writhe in pain like he did earlier, his eyes widening as he realized what was happening. El smiled as she stopped, relieved that her plan had worked.

"We're not connected anymore," Will breathed out, a smile now beginning to form on his face. "I'm... I'm not going to die." Joyce and Jonathan cried out of relief, hugging him tight in their arms.

Mike stood up and took the sword from Lucas, walking back over to Vecna as he held the weapon up to his neck. "Any final words that you wish to say?" he asked.

"Taking my power away won't change anything," Vecna growled at him, ignoring the sword that was being pointed at his neck. "Every life I took won't come back. My mother, my sister, the numbers and doctors in the lab, Barbara, Bob, Billy, Chrissy, Fred, Patrick, and Max... they are still dead. And no one will ever believe that I did this. They are foolish enough to believe that the Munson boy was capable of doing what I did. Hawkins will never believe you. And you... you're still nothing. You're no leader. You're no true friend."

"That's where you're wrong, Henry," Mike countered. "They may be dead, but they are no longer a part of you. They can finally rest without you using their souls to fuel your power. And we saved Max from your mind. She's alive and well and far away from you now. And once Hawkins sees your body here, they will see proof that Eddie didn't murder anyone. It will take time, but they might end up believing us."

Vecna seemed to falter at this, finally showing the human emotion of fear. Mike did not let go of eye contact with the monster as he lifted the sword up above his head. "And you really think that's going to work on me? Like I said before, you're nothing because you don't understand love," he continued. "You never even tried."

The paladin swung the sword and Vecna's head fell to the ground.

Mike dropped the bloody sword to the ground as El hugged him tight, tears falling down both of their cheeks. He knew that she was not upset this time, sensing happiness and relief in her, the same emotions that he felt. Will soon joined them, along with Dustin, Lucas, and Erica as they sank to their knees. Nancy, Jonathan, Steve, and Robin were next, hugging the teens from behind. Hopper and Joyce hugged everyone as well, Hopper mainly hugging El while Joyce hugged her sons. It took Vickie, Murray, and Argyle some encouragement, but they joined the hug too, Vickie staying by Robin's side, Argyle by Jonathan's, and Murray awkwardly hugging both Joyce and Hopper from behind. Somewhere in a hospital bed, they all knew that Max, their zoomer, was smiling in pure relief.

"We did it," Mike whispered.

As the rifts began to close up around them and military helicopters flew in above, the party knew that it would be finally over soon.

Chapter Text

Mike stared at his reflection in the mirror, barely recognizing himself. His black hair was matted and tangled, his shirt was torn at the collar, his face was covered in dirt, and there were dried blood streaks under his nostrils from using his newfound powers. There was also some blood spatters on his face and shirt that must have come from Vecna's neck when he chopped his head off. Mike did not even notice that there was blood spraying onto his face, only recognizing the relief and exhaustion he felt when Vecna's head hit the ground. His mind flashed to all of the times that monster sent him flying up against a wall, the vines that held his wrists, ankles, and neck. That was when he noticed the bruising around those spots on his body, wincing as he moved his wrists and gently touched the sore spot on his neck. 

Even though most of these injuries happened while he was in Vecna's mindscape, they all translated into existence. Mike felt so sore and exhausted, finally taking in everything that was done to him in the past 24 hours. He may have survived with his limbs and eyes intact along with only a few physical scars that would fade overtime, but he would never get the images of Nancy with white eyes and vines around her face, Max with blood streaming down her faded eyes, a beaten and broken Lucas in tears, Dustin with a broken leg and tears falling, a possessed Will with dark eyes, and a bloodied El with red eyes, all of them screaming the most vile things at him. The image of Vecna taking pleasure in trying to kill him was seared into his memory and he did not think that he would ever forget it. Mike had not slept since the first vision, but he was sure that each of them would return in his dreams to haunt him. 

No one would ever understand the things he had seen and Mike would not know where to start when explaining them. Not even Max, who had also seen similar visions, would understand. El was in his head too and even though she would try, she would not fully get it. These were things that Mike would have to carry with him until the eventual end of his life, but he was surprisingly okay with that now that Vecna was dead.

The last time he looked at himself in the mirror, Mike felt weak and angry at himself for not doing better for his friends and family. They needed him and he felt like a failure there. Here, as he looked at a battle-hardened version of himself that had seen the worst, he no longer felt weak or angry. He did what a paladin should do for the party, and that was leading them to victory and taking the head of the monster that threatened their lives for years.

Mike was not weak. He was a survivor.

The bathroom door opened and Will stepped in, breaking Mike out of his thoughts. "Hey, we can see her now," he told him.

Mike smiled at his friend and nodded. "All of us together, right?" he asked as he exited the bathroom with his best friend.

"Yeah, I think the receptionist is a bit freaked out by us that she's just gonna let us do what we want," Will said with a chuckle. "As long as we don't get kicked out, that's okay."

"And as long as we can all make sure that she's okay," Mike replied. They walked a bit towards the lobby, but then Will suddenly stopped. Mike furrowed his eyebrows when he noticed and turned around to see his friend looking nervous. "Hey, you okay?" he asked, now worried.

"I'm okay. I'm just..." Will started saying before his voice drifted off. "I've been so focused on making sure that you would be okay and trying to save you that it's only now setting in that... we could've lost you today. And if we lost you, then we would've lost El too. And then I keep thinking about the fact that I could've died too if you and El didn't take away Vecna's powers. When those vines rose out of the ground... I didn't want to accept what had to happen. I really thought I was going to die and I only ended up accepting it because it was better that it was me rather than you and El."

"Will, don't say that," Mike reassured him, putting a hand on his shoulder. "It wouldn't have been better at all. You are just as important as everyone else in the party, don't even think otherwise. I was not going to kill Vecna if you were going to die with him. I'm never sacrificing anyone. Never. I'm not going to let my best friend die on me, especially after everything that happened to you. You deserve to live."

Will smiled at him. "Thanks, Mike. It feels good to hear you say that," he said. He then looked nervous again, playing with his hands. "And... you're really okay with... me liking guys?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Mike smiled back at him. "You are who you are. In my party, we don't shut out anyone. Well, unless you betray the party, but you would never do that."

"Of course not, a cleric doesn't go back on his word," Will grinned. They then began walking again back to the lobby and to their friends. "Found him. We're still allowed up, right?" Will asked when they rejoined their friends.

"We've still got the all clear," Dustin confirmed as they headed towards the elevator. "They were about to turn us away since Mike was taking forever, but El, Lucas, and Nancy convinced the receptionist that we're pretty much the only family left here."

"Still nothing with her mother?' Mike questioned, concerned.

"No, we haven't been able to reach her," Nancy said, pressing the button to bring the elevator down. "Mom, Dad, Mrs. and Mr. Sinclair, and Mrs. Henderson, yes. They should be on their way back here to see us now."

"I hope they're all okay," El folded her arms across her chest. 

Nancy sighed and nodded. "Me too," she murmured.

Mike, El, Lucas, Dustin, Will, Erica, Nancy, Jonathan, Steve, and Robin all entered the elevator once the doors opened, everyone in a comfortable silence as they went up to the second floor. Lucas was in the front of the group when they reached the door to Room 237, hesitating slightly as he put his hand on the doorknob. Even though he knew what he would find on the other side, there was still part of him that was terrified that it was all an illusion. El put a hand on her friend's shoulder, giving him a reassuring smile that allowed him to gain the confidence to open the door.

When they walked in, she was in the same position on the bed as before, her arms and legs bandaged up and her body under a blanket. Her hair was still in two braids that went past her shoulders and she was still in a hospital gown. The only two differences this time was that her neck brace was gone and her eyes were wide open, her head moving towards the sound of the door opening. Her eyes were still that faded white color that Mike had seen her have in his visions, but there was no blood this time. It was as if she sensed that the people coming into her hospital room was not a doctor or a nurse since a wide smile spread across her face.

"I take it you guys killed that motherfucker if you're here," Max Mayfield spoke.

A sob escaped from Lucas as he instantly ran to her bedside, taking her hand and putting his other hand on her cheek. "Max... I... I can't believe it..." he cried, his lip quivering as he took it all in. "I was here everyday... waiting for you to wake up. I'm sorry that I wasn't there when you did."

"It's okay. Really," Max reassured him, still with a smile on her face. "Killing Vecna was more important. I'm just glad you're okay. You are okay, right? I can't see if you are or not."

"I'm okay, we're all okay," Lucas replied. He then let out a soft chuckle. "You're really asking me if I'm okay?"

"Yes! You're the one who faced all the end of the world shit while I was stuck in Vecna's mind and then here!" Max exclaimed.

They both laughed together as tears fell down their faces, Lucas squeezing Max's hand tight as he never broke eye contact with her. "I'm so happy you're alive, Max," he quietly spoke again, stroking her cheek with his thumb. "I... I felt your heart stop. I'm sorry I couldn't protect you from him."

Max gave him a sympathetic and caring look, squeezing his hand back. "Hey, please don't blame yourself," she said in a comforting tone. "I knew the risks and I accepted them. I told you that I survived him before and that I could survive again. I don't have my sight anymore, but I'm alive. I'm not going anywhere. Especially since you promised me a movie date, stalker."

That made Lucas laugh again in pure relief, leaning in and giving Max a desperate but passionate kiss. This sudden action took her by surprise, but she immediately kissed him back. Mike watched them with a smile on his face, thinking back to the conversation he had with Max in the mindscape. She was so upset about causing so much pain for Lucas, but now she gave him his happiest moment in his life. She had also told him that she loved Lucas and Max could finally express it now that the monsters were finally gone from their lives. She did not have to be scared anymore, just like how Mike did not have to be scared anymore either.

Mike and Max were both survivors. 

When they broke apart, El ran over to the other side of the hospital bed and hugged Max with tears streaming down her face. Even though she did get her out of the mindscape, actually seeing Max alive and awake made her feel as though everything was worth it. "We did it, Max," she murmured. "He's gone."

"Hey El," Max replied with a grin, leaning into her best friend's touch. "Thanks for getting me out of there and for killing that motherfucker. You never stop being awesome, do you?"

"You're the awesome one. You survived," El replied, pulling away. "And I didn't kill him. Mike did."

Max's eyes widened as her jaw dropped. "Mike? Mike Wheeler got the final blow?" she questioned in shock.

Mike laughed as he stepped forward. "It was a group effort, but yes, I decapitated Vecna," he told her.

"It was so cool, it was straight out of a D&D campaign!" Dustin exclaimed as he, Will, and Erica got closer to Max's hospital bed. "He had a sword that Hopper got from Russia!"

Max looked even more confused. "Hopper? Huh? Isn't he dead?" he asked.

"No, my mom and Murray Bauman rescued him from Russia," Will explained. "We do need to figure out how we can explain that away."

"They also got a flamethrower from Russia that Will used to fry those ugly monsters," Erica added. "I'm just surprised that they were able to fit all of that in a helicopter and get it past security on the way back here."

"Anyway, apparently El and Mike went into Vecna's head and did something to block him out from using his powers like the badasses they are," Dustin continued. "Oh yeah, Mike has powers now because of some mental link he has with El. Vecna and Will also had that mental link, so that's why they went inside his head in the first place."

"Vecna actually looked scared too," Will commented, a satisfied smile on his face. 

"And then Mike cut his damn head off," Erica finished.

Max groaned and threw her head back. "Ugh, I wish I could've seen it!" she said exasperated. "Well, like I said, that motherfucker is dead and that's all I care about."

Mike then decided to change the subject, tired of the attention being on him and Vecna when it should be on Max instead. "What did the doctors say about your condition?" he asked her. "Your neck cast is off, so clearly some progress is being made. How about your arms and legs?"

"Since I've been out for two weeks, they said that my bones should heal in around six weeks or so," Max told him. "I'll definitely be in for a lot of physical therapy once they remove the casts. My sight... they said it's not coming back. They're too damaged to be repaired on its own or through surgery."

Mike could sense the shift in El's emotions as Max recounted how her healing process would work. Despite Vecna being dead and the Upside Down finally being gone for good, there was still a long road to recovery ahead of Max after the amount of physical trauma she went through. El was still feeling guilty over what happened a couple weeks ago and hearing this news was bringing it back. The casts on the arms and legs would be gone before they knew it, but Max would never be able to see again. There were still permanent scars that would actually be noticeable by others, even by the ones who had no idea what the truth was.

"I'm sorry, Max," El spoke in a quiet voice, rubbing her arm in shame. "This should not have happened to you. I... I should have done more."

Max gave her a small smile. "Like I said, I knew the risks," she reassured. "None of this is your fault, El. Or anyone's fault, for that matter. Not being able to see... sucks, but I'll just have to get used to it. You guys are the reason why I'm still here. All of you."

"You're our zoomer, Max," Mike told her. "We'll always be here."

"And I'll always be here too, paladin," Max replied.

"Does that mean you'll play D&D with us for once?" Dustin asked her.

"Absolutely not, I have better things to do," Max remarked. "Now, tell me everything I missed. If Hopper is still alive, then I clearly missed out on a lot of shit."

Lucas, Dustin, Will, and Erica immediately began rambling about everything that happened since the earthquake. It was definitely a bit overwhelming for Max, but she seemed to look like she was managing to keep up with the four voices, even with them overlapping. Mike had pretty much already told her what he knew and what he experienced back when they were in the mindscape together, so he did not chime in. He thought back to that conversation again, wishing that he was able to have it much earlier. They felt like proper friends now when they were just people that were forced to be near each other before all of this. Mike still hated himself for how he treated Max when she first moved to Hawkins and he would likely never forgive himself for it even if she seemed to, but he was glad that they were on much better terms. 

El looked over at him and squeezed his hand, sensing his shift in emotions that quickly went from guilt to happiness, just like hers. Mike smiled at her and squeezed back, the voices of their friends drowning out behind him as he looked at his girlfriend. El stood up from the side of the hospital bed and led her boyfriend out of the room, telling Nancy, Jonathan, Steve, and Robin that they would be back in a few minutes. Mike had no idea where she was taking him, but he would gladly follow her anywhere she wanted to go. 

The couple ended up outside of the hospital and near the edge of the forest, lying down on the grass as they looked up at the sky. While a few military helicopters were still there, the sky was a clear and bright blue with white clouds in the sky. Such a contrast of what the sky was for the past few weeks since the rifts opened up, being so gloomy with grey clouds that soon became a red storm the angrier and stronger their enemy got. For the first time since November 6th, 1983, it felt as though peace finally made its way back to Hawkins. 

"It's so pretty," El commented, her eyes glued to the sky. "I missed when it looked like this."

"Yeah... it is," Mike replied as he looked at her, unable to stop the smile that his girlfriend always made him have whenever she was nearby.

El smiled back at him with a blush on her face. "Do you think my dad and mom convinced them?" she asked.

"The military? I hope so," Mike said, thinking back to when the military had surrounded them after Vecna's defeat. He and Hopper had guarded El from view until the teens could all get out of downtown to get to the hospital to see Max. "Vecna's body was right there and all of the rifts are closed. They'd be complete idiots if they still think you're the culprit."

"I could finally have a normal life," El thought out loud, leaning onto her side to fully face Mike. "I won't have to hide anymore."

Mike copied her position, fully facing El and taking her hand. "That'd be amazing," he grinned. "We could go on more proper dates, like the movies or dinner. I could take you to so many places outside of Hawkins too. Well, maybe not until I go to college, but you can come with me! We could live together in an apartment, I can start saving up now. Hopefully it won't be too expensive since I don't know where I want to go for college yet."

El smiled wide as she listened to her boyfriend ramble. "That sounds incredible," she approved. "Just no college in the desert. I don't want to go back to the desert."

"Oh don't worry, no deserts. I'm not the biggest fan of a shit ton of sand. We could live near a beach, but I don't want to live on sand," Mike chuckled. "A city would be pretty cool. Or somewhere with a little more grass and nature surrounding it. Maybe somewhere with three waterfalls!"

"Three waterfalls?" El questioned, amused. "That exists?"

Mike furrowed his eyebrows. "What? We fought an alternate dimension, fought monsters, you have superpowers, we have a mental bond, and you think that three waterfalls is outlandish?" he teased her.

El laughed at that. "I hope it exists, it sounds beautiful," she replied.

"Anywhere is beautiful when you're there," Mike complimented, making El blush again. He then sat up and El followed suit, holding hands with her. He looked down at the ring on her hand, brushing his finger against it. "And I meant what I said before. I want to marry you someday. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, El. I love you so much and I want to be with you for as long as you'll have me."

A gentle and warm hand pressed against his cheek and he melted into her touch with a smile. El smiled at him as she caressed Mike's cheek with her thumb. "I will always have you, Mike," she reassured him. "No matter what. You showed me what a life outside of the lab could be. You gave me my name and a home. Without you, I would not have my family, my friends, or a roof over my head. I know you're scared that I won't need you anymore, but the truth is, I will always need you. I love you, Mike."

It was everything Mike needed to hear, feeling tears come into his eyes as he felt her love radiating from her. "Thank you, El," he whispered as they stood up from the ground together. "I love you too."

Their lips fell together as El brought her other hand to Mike's face while he wrapped his arms around her shoulders. Mike never wanted to stop kissing her, wanting to be in her arms for the rest of his life. Any reeling thoughts he had of the visions he was forced to experienced were wiped away in that moment as he kissed the girl that he fell in love with in the rain when he was twelve years old. He thought the last kiss they shared together in the mindscape would be their last, but now they were survivors of an inter-dimensional war that was finally over. There was no sense of danger, whether it was from the government or from beasts from another dimension. It was just them now, and Mike would not have it any other way.

As their lips moved in sync, Mike no longer felt the ground beneath his feet. He did not want to pull away from El, but he wanted to make sure that he was not imagining anything. Sure enough, they were no longer standing in the grass. They were rising in the air, nearing the top of the tree line already. Mike looked at El astonished, unable to believe what was happening before his very eyes. She was surprised too, giggling at the feeling of being in the air. There was nothing but joy and love radiating off of her and it only made Mike smile more and never want to go back down.

"Hey, your nose isn't bleeding," Mike pointed out as he looked at her face.

"Neither is yours," El responded, giggling.

"I told you that you can fly," Mike reminded her.

El blushed at that. "We learned to fly together," she told him.

Mike gave her his signature grin. "Want to go move a mountain next?" he asked in a joking manner.

"Maybe later," El said, moving one of her hands into Mike's curls. "For now, I want to stay like this."

"Perfect," Mike whispered as he leaned in again.

Their lips met again and Mike and El felt themselves lifting higher in the air, no longer afraid of what would come next in their future. They could finally rest knowing that Hawkins was intact, their friends and family were safe, and they could finally be themselves in a world that did not accept them. 

As the sun rose higher in the bright and endless sky, so did they in each other's arms.