Chapter Text
It started with the dreams.
Some nights, they were elusive. Ghost like figures from another time, slipping through Mike’s grasp before he even awoke.
Other nights, they were vivid. They played out that night in graphic detail. Echoing screams, blazing fire, blood stains soaked through the knees of Mike’s pants and caked in his nail beds.
It was the night Will Byers had died.
Flames erupted in scorching bursts around the MAC-Z, swallowing soldiers whole as they spread. Mike watched in awe as they rose up on either side of Will, illuminating his white eyes and framing him like a portrait.
Just inches from his face, Mike had watched the demogorgon sent there to devour him hesitate in mid air. It’s thin, slimy skin pulled tight over its pulsing muscles as it found itself completely unable to move. One by one, its bones began to shatter. The wet crunch echoed off the brick walls of Main Street with each snap of its limbs. To Mike, it was nothing but background noise.
As the limp demogorgon came crashing down at Mike’s feet, all he could see was Will.
Will fell to his knees against the metal plated ground. His fingers twitched at his sides, still curled in like claws from how he’d used them to take control over the monster. His chest and shoulders heaved as he struggled to catch his breath.
Mike’s heart pounded out of his chest, threatening to burst straight through his ribcage. Will raised his head, and Mike bored into him as the whites of his eyes rolled under and his blown pupils fell back into place. They immediately locked onto Mike.
Mike thought he looked beautiful.
It was like Mike had forgotten how to breathe. Every breath in was foreign, his lungs burning from the stretch. His skin was flushed. He felt warm all over, his fingertips ached with the want to touch.
He ran to Will without hesitation, falling to his knees beside him. Will shuddered under his touch as Mike’s hands moved over him, pulling him in.
“Sorcerer,” Mike whispered, leaning in close to Will’s ear. “A real life, honest to god sorcerer.”
“Mike,” Will gasped, his voice thin. It was barely audible over the pounding in Mike’s chest.
Mike pulled back from the hug, kneading his fingers against the muscle of Will’s shoulders. Will stared up at him through half-lidded eyes. Beads of sweat trickled over his brow, his damp skin glowing under the still burning flames and flashing headlights.
Mike froze as Will’s dark eyes lost themselves to a milky white curtain. The sheer film crept up over his irises and hid them behind a dense layer of fog. Will’s brow furrowed. He blinked, tears beginning to spill as he squinted at Mike.
“What’s happening?” Will rasped, his wavering voice dry in his throat.
Mike’s hands came up to cradle Will’s face, thumbs stroking over his burning cheeks. “You’re okay, Will, I’ve got you. We’re gonna get you out of here.” The words caught against his teeth, breaking apart in fragments as they tumbled from his lips. “I’ve got you.”
Mike crouched over Will, wobbling on his toes as he attempted to stand. He latched onto Will’s waist, trying to steadily pull him to his feet.
Mike’s eyes widened in horror as blood began to pour from Will’s nose, spilling down his face and pooling between his lips. Will’s chest rumbled as a cough tore its way out, more of the red liquid sputtering out of his mouth and continuing to spill. His waterline welled with a wave of wine colored tears, falling over his cheeks in heavy streams.
Will’s nostrils flared as the blood kept pouring. Mike’s fingers swiped at the spill, shaky hands leaving smudges across Will’s face as the syrupy liquid continued to flow with no end in sight. It poured down his chin, staining the neckline of his shirt with a growing crimson splotch.
Will’s lips parted to speak, choking on the overflow that rushed past. “Mike,” he wheezed, voice but a whisper as he slumped forward in Mike’s lap.
“Will, no,” Mike’s voice broke. He could feel bile at the back of his throat threatening to spill over. “I’ve got you, c’mon Will.” He pulled at Will, at his shoulders, and his jaw, holding him upright as he threatened to topple over again. His mouth went dry as he stifled a gag, plush tongue pressed back to his throat like static cotton, no longer fitting into place.
“Don’t leave me like this,” Mike pleaded.
Will choked again, harsh coughs sending blood spraying over Mike’s mouth. The copper taste of Will bloomed on his tongue, replacing the burning acid in his throat as his mouth flooded with spit.
“Mrs. Byers!” Mike called out. “Mrs. Byers, help!” He searched for her frantically, lost to the crowd of camouflaged men. “Joyce!”
It was no use, Joyce was long gone. Swept up by soldiers with their uniform steps and void expressions. Mike hadn’t even heard them take her. He was alone in the sea of bodies, completely helpless against Dr. Kay, and Vecna, and whatever other powers that be that were determined to drain the life out of Will before his very eyes.
He pulled Will flush to his chest, holding him tight. His bloodstained fingers brushed through his damp hair, falling down his neck to soothe at his back.
“I can’t lose you again,” he sobbed.
Tears soaked into the shoulder of Will’s shirt, where Mike's hidden face stayed buried. His fingers sprawled across Will’s back, leaving deep red fingerprints in their wake. Mike whimpered into the crook of Will’s neck, feeling his body slumped further into his arms with every passing second. His stomach churned, a sickness bubbling deep inside as his throat closed in on itself.
If this really was the end, Mike wasn’t going anywhere. He’d failed to uphold his sworn oath as a paladin. Nothing mattered anymore, not without Will. He would wait, not moving from that very spot, until Vecna rose back up from the rubble, and give himself to him right then and there. He would serve himself up on a silver platter, though it seemed to be tarnished by rusted stains that reflected scarlet in the light.
He closed his eyes, letting go of his restraint as he let himself meld with Will, colliding together on the bloodstained ground. It was the easiest thing he’d done all night.
Suddenly, a cacophony of shouting voices broke Mike out of his stupor. Hands grabbed at him from every angle, pulling and prodding at his back and arms. Dr. Kays men marched over in hoards, tearing the two boys apart. Mike clawed at Will’s back, refusing to let go. His nails snagged against the gray fabric of Will’s shirt as his fingers kept slipping.
November 10th, 1992.
Mike jolted awake, heart pounding in his head as he kicked his covers to the floor, sinking in a damp puddle of his own sweat.
The sky outside his window was a fading indigo blue, the first sign of sunlight starting to wash the night away. His room was still dark, just enough light to see the sweat stains seeping through his t-shirt where it clung to his chest.
Mike sat up in bed, raking the damp ends of his bangs back with shaky fingers. He turned to the side, throwing his legs over the edge of the bed and planting his feet firmly against the carpet. A sigh hummed in his throat, a deep exhale that’d been caught in his chest long before he opened his eyes. He stood up, too quickly, and settled back down before he stumbled over himself.
He pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes, rubbing away the lingering sleep an salty tears left behind. He stood again, carefully this time. Slowly, he trudged across the room, slipping out the door and down the hall. He made his way to the bathroom, flicking the soft yellow light on. The warm bulb stuttered as he squinted, letting his eyes adjust to the new hue that washed over the room.
He turned the shower on, twisting the handle until the water was scorching. His damp pajamas clung to his frame as he peeled them off, letting them fall in a pile against the cool tile floor. A layer of fog crept its way up over the mirror, and he watched his reflection fade away. He couldn’t ignore the way it enveloped his blurry shape the same way it had happened upon the glassy surface of Will’s fading eyes.
Mike pulled back the curtain and stepped into the shower. The heat felt like hands against his skin, igniting non-existent memories of being touched everywhere. The sensation felt he sensation felt like a bodily presence, standing close in the cramped space the tub offered. He could make out the outlines of phantom handprints tingling down his sides, hovering over his skin like they were just there.
He crossed his arms over his ribs, palms digging in to the tender skin along the sides of his waist. His fingers slotted into place between the gaps in his bones like muscle memory. The boiling water washed over his skin, leaving bright red splotches across his chest, but beneath the firm press of his hands he was cold to the touch.
Mike let himself go, the steam around him growing heavier, pressing down until it was suffocating. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt someones skin against his. Not a handshake, or a high-five. He couldn’t even remember the last time he hugged someone. He thought it might have been Will.
As he tried to rinse his hair under the water stream, he was overcome by a thick blanket of drowsiness. His eyes fell closed, shoulders relaxing as droplets of water beat down on them.
Behind his eyes he saw himself from a strangers perspective, slumped over on the ground with a body fallen slack in his arms. He watched how the indents on its arms grew deeper as his fingers pressed in with a bruising force.
A deep red puddle grew at his knees, reflecting the rippling image of his face as it crumbled.
Mike's fingers fumbled as he reached for the chrome handle, twisting it until the searing water stilled. He leaned forward, pressing his forehead against the sweaty tiles. The pipes rumbled on the other side of the wall, stilling as the pressure died down.
A chill ran down Mike’s arms as he stepped out of the steam cloud in the bathroom, towel slung around his waist as he softly padded back to his bedroom. He dressed himself quickly, not wanting to spend another moment staring at the Mike shaped hole worn into his mattress. It dipped under the weight of the unending grief that he had found lived beneath his bed sheets and woke only when he was sleeping.
The sound of his fathers brash snoring funneling in from where he slept on the La-Z-Boy left Mike groaning, rolling his eyes as he walked into the kitchen. He rifled through the cabinets, pulling out the half empty tin of ground coffee and spooning it into the machine. He leaned back against the counter as the machine hummed, waiting for it to brew.
The steady buzzing of the coffee machine getting to work pulled him back into his thoughts. His brain immediately fell back into the state it found itself in the shower. Mike mulled over the sensations he’d felt, tingly and warm where his skin turned frigid, the way they’d pulled his mind somewhere it had never gone before.
He couldn’t see it as clearly, even with his eyes squeezed shut, but he still felt the way his mind had warped and sucked him back into the place he’d only ever been in his sleep. The harder he concentrated on that place, the further the mechanical sound of the coffee machine drifted.
The image of the demogorgon rising off the ground became clear in the static black void of Mike’s closed eyes.
He was watching from the sidelines, now. Its long arms twitched, desperately trying to sink its claws into him. In front of the monster, he saw himself.
He could almost feel the weight of his damp hair, and the heat the flames buried within the confines of his gray jacket. He saw himself bracing for what he thought was his end, shielding himself with nothing but his own arm.
When nothing happened, he watched his own eyes trail up from behind his invisible shield, seeing the way the monster hung in the air before him. Then, his eyes found Will.
Mike watched his face begin to glow with sheer amazement. The frozen demogorgan started to snap, grotesquely contorting until in fell in a twisted mass at his feet. Mike could only see the way his eyes never fell from Will.
Water trickled into the coffee pot, echo ringing around in the glass confines.
Mike’s fingers tangled themselves in his curls, digging his blunt fingernails into his scalp. He tore his eyes open, mustering all his strength to relinquish the foreign memory. The change in perspective, familiar as it may seem, was something he only wished to forget.
He couldn’t let himself think about it.
The edge of the countertop dug into Mike’s hips as he leaned over it, grabbing a blue speckled mug from the cabinet. He gripped the handle tightly in his twitchy fingers as he brought the coffee pot to its mouth, filling the mug with the rich brown liquid.
As the coffee trickled down from the pot, the weight of the mug shifted in Mike’s clammy hand. The loose handle slipped straight down his fingers, shattering against the linoleum floor. Coffee continued to pour as Mike watched the mug crash, splattering across the tile and up the side of the counter.
Mike yanked the pot back, sending steaming droplets spraying onto the back of his hand. He abandoned the pot on the counter as he reached for the dish towel that always hung over the ovens handle. He wiped the reddish beads away from his now pink skin, tracing the round little marks etched over him through the towel.
The rag fell to the ground with a rustle, lopsidedly blanketing the remnants of the spotted mug. Dark brown stains seeped into the pale cotton, spreading fast and sinking as the warming fabric gave under the weight. Mike turned away, not yet ready to deal with the mess.
He pulled the cabinet open with a huff, snatching another mug down from the shelf. He had to restrain himself from slamming it onto the counter, or he’d have ended up shattering two mugs before the clock hit 7:30. He set the bright yellow mug down gently, reading the bold black letters across the front with a raised brow.
‘KISS THE LIBRARIAN’
Mike had no idea how that ended up in his families possession.
He slid the coffee pot over, carefully hovering it over the yellow mug. The dark, steaming brew pooled at the bottom, slowly filling the mug until it nearly spilled over. Mike slurped off the top, burning the tip of his tongue, before he pulled the toasty mug to his chest, both hands curled firmly around it.
The wooden legs groaned against the tile as Mike slid a chair from the table with his foot. He sank down onto the floral cushion, slouching further back as he took slow sips from his cup. Warmth spread in his gut as he gulped them down. The bitter taste in his mouth kept him present, anchoring him to his body as he let his racing thoughts clear.
Mike felt heat pull through the gaps in his teeth as he swished the liquid in his mouth. His thoughts drifted, nothing important, the question of what to do with himself for the rest of the day, the quick string of words he conjured up for his novel that he’d forget before he could write them down. He kept drinking as the warmth in his chest spread down his arms, erasing the ever present goosebumps he couldn’t remember appearing. He hadn’t thought about his skin before them, never registered the familiar chill as they raised, and would have never noticed their existence without their absence.
He kept drinking until the mug ran dry. He tipped it upside down, catching the last remaining droplets on the tip of his tongue and pressing them against the back of his teeth. His head lolled forward, staring down at his lap as the walls of the yellow mug tunneled between his palms. He let the illusion stretch, watching the bottom of the mug fall deeper and deeper until it was endless.
He didn’t notice when his mom walked into the kitchen. “Michael, what happened in here?”
His heels dug into the round rug beneath the table as he straightened himself.
“Sorry, Mom,” he winced. “I dropped the—“ He set the empty mug on the table. “I was gonna clean it up, I just needed a minute.”
He heard her groan, then heard the clinking of glass shards as she cradled them in her palm.
“I’m starting breakfast,” she said, somewhere behind him. “Are you just going to… sit there and wait?”
“I guess.” Mike shrugged.
“I—“ his mom hesitated. Mike imagined her, apron tied to her waist, her hand firmly on her hip as she shook her head. He didn’t look back. She huffed, and didn’t finish her thought.
Mike folded his arms against the kitchen table. His forearms were tender as he laid his head down. He stared into the dining room, tracing shapes that didn’t exist in the gaps between the floral wallpaper.
Before he knew it, plates piled high with pancakes and bacon so greasy it shined clattered onto the oak table’s surface. Holly was first to appear, tugging on the back of her chair and slotting herself in right next to Mike.
She cocked her head at him, eyebrows raised. “You kept me up all night,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Really,” Mike deadpanned.
“Yes,” she kicked his shin under the table, “really. Why were you crying all night, anyway?”
“I— Crying?” His brows knit together, face scrunching in confusion.
Mike tried to picture it, him crying himself to sleep. Nope, nothing. Yet, as he tried to picture himself falling asleep normally, shutting his eyes and letting time do the rest, he found that he couldn’t recall anything at all. The only lingering thing he was certain of was his nightmare. Same as every night, same as always. That, he knew well.
How could he forget, when it had been right on his heels since he got out of bed?
“I can hear everything, you know.” Holly smiled unkindly, adding a superficial nod to punctuate her sentence. “You were all like, ‘Wahhh… Agh… Nooo…’”, she whined, mocking him.
Mike sucked in a short breath. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember…” he mumbled, trailing off. His hand in the air waved that thought away.
Holly squinted, recoiling slightly. Mike ignored her, grabbing a pancake from the stack with his bare hand and taking a bite.
“Gross,” she muttered.
His dad sat down in the chair across from him, Mom following, after the muffled thump of her apron hitting the countertop. Mike loaded his plate with the greasy, buttery breakfast laid out before him. He tried to keep a mouthful of food between his teeth at all times, his excuse to avoid any and all conversation.
He only hoped his parents didn’t also hear him crying.
He stuffed everything down in a hurry, fork clattering against his plate as he jumped up from the table.
“Gotta write,” he excused himself without waiting for permission.
Mike pushed his drooping glasses up the bridge of his nose with his index finger. The page sticking out of his typewriter stared at him, its blank, matte surface taunting as his hands hovered over the keys.
His fingers started moving, slowly, pressing down with vigor, as little inky words grew across the top of the page.
‘Fuck this shit’
He tore the page from the machine, fresh ink smudging as he crumpled it in his fist. He tossed it over his shoulder, blindly aiming for the trash can. He missed.
He slipped another page in, rolling it up and sliding the carriage into place. His hands froze as he frowned, reluctant to press his thoughts onto the page. He shook off his hesitance, hands flailing out to the side before he resumed position.
He started again, quicker this time, pressing each letter with intention.
‘Dear Jonathan’
Mike stared at the letters for so long they etched themselves into his pupils. They flashed behind his eyelids when he blinked, and lingered over themselves on the page as he opened his eyes. Mike wanted to ask him how he did it. Moved on. He wanted to ask how he was able to do anything, knowing everything he did was something Will never could.
Did Jonathan also feel the way time kept pushing them further and further from him? How what once was right there has slowly faded into obscurity, marked only by memories with nothing but time to be forgotten? Mike was pretty sure it wasn’t just him, but the looming, unspoken rule to not talk about it left all of that up for interpretation. He always wondered how much anyone truly remembered, if they were never able to let themselves see it.
He gripped the edge of the page between his fingers, carefully pulling it free. The sound of his clacking keys and his knee knocking against the desk every so often was replaced by the sort of wobbly echo of the paper fluttering as he flipped it over, letting it fall face down on his desk.
He set his glasses down on the desk and stared up at the ceiling.
The cracks in the plaster blurred together, almost as if they were never really there. Mike found himself nodding off again, unable to peel his droopy eyelids back any longer.
The warm glow of flickering lights captivated him, drawing him further from reality. The image of himself, afraid and bracing for something, quickly became clear through the haze.
Mike looked down at an angle, finding the familiar picture of himself squinting right back up. The flashing lights behind his head clung to the dampened ends of his hair, casting an incandescent halo around him.
Mike knew this scene better than he knew himself. He couldn’t see it from the new angle, but he’d been watching the moment that demogorgon came crashing down before him for so long that he could recognize it from anywhere.
Down below, Mike watched as the shuddering arm he had cast over his eyes fell to his side. A look of pure horror grew on his blanching face as he bored into himself. It sort of felt like looking in the mirror. The Mike beneath him stared upwards, completely stunned and unable to tear himself away.
He watched as that Mike’s gaze fell, no longer interlocking with the one that loomed over him. As he turned away, the terror in his expression softened, slowly melting into something warmer. The distant version of him gasped, breathing rapid and unsteady. He blinked, disbelieving, as his wide eyes glimmered with astonishment.
The version of Mike below gaped at something—someone—in the distance, breaths coming out in short, uneven bursts. The corners of his mouth twisted, pulling into a wide grin.
Mike squeezed his shut eyes tighter, desperately trying to erase the awestruck boy underneath him.
The facade of himself trailed off, running ahead to collide with his Will. His footsteps lulled in the distance as he fell out of view, taking the dream-like vision with him as it wavered until it dispersed, blown away like a dandelion wish.
Mike pried his eyes open. His head fell forward as he glanced around, readjusting to his own body.
He knew he’d been having nightmares—he’d been having them for three years—but there was something about the last one that still felt present in its wake.
Physically, Mike sort of felt like he was still in a dream. His muscles carried a tired ache, but as he moved throughout the house he found his limbs felt weightless. Walking down the stairs felt like floating.
The other strange thing was the way his skin felt alive. It became something separate from his body, like it was its own entity. He felt the vivid touch of fingertips and dry, scratchy palms, something so unfamiliar he wasn’t sure how he’d conjured it up. The constant sensation simply couldn’t exist outside of his own imagination, but it wasn’t like he was trying to feel it. It just was.
The worst of it all was the way he felt himself… slipping.
It was nothing like falling asleep, or even letting yourself daydream so intently that you forget where you are. It was far more intense, a sudden drowsiness crashing down on him, causing his limbs to fall slack and his skin to shudder at a coldness that wasn’t there before. Memories of the MAC-Z peaked in his mind, flickering on like massive screens of light in the shadows where they usually stayed hidden. His wet mouth tingled until it went numb and flooded with a bitter taste. At the same time, a deafening pitch rang throughout his ears, stark and increasing until it was so loud he questioned if he could even hear it anymore.
His vision went fuzzy, slowly building as it became television static, until his eyelids fell so heavily that he could no longer fight them, and everything around him was lost.
He was also finding that, if he gave way to the memories of his repetitive and familiar nights, it only seemed to manifest in another slip.
Normally, his memories of the MAC-Z only plagued him deep into the night, when he was already tucked into bed and waiting anxiously for them to find him. He preferred it that way even, having grown used to the daunting routine. After three years, it had become something he just did without thinking, like blinking, or breathing.
Clearly, that had begun to change. Try as he might, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. In turn, he couldn’t keep his thoughts from willing him right back into it. As his morning took shape, the vulgar image of that night slotted itself into its new place as the center piece of his puzzle.
He was seeing himself from the outside, as if the memories had been stolen from someone else’s head. Watching from the sidelines, from behind, even from above. He hated them. The loop he was caught in kept going, anyway. It beckoned him to move with it, and even as he braced himself with stiff muscles and his breath held in tight, he could feel his body sway.
What Mike hated most about the new reflections he saw of himself, was the hope he found in his eyes as he watched himself watching Will. He remembered being that version of himself, grinning ear to ear with excitement as he watched his sorcerer in awe. It may have been fleeting, but he knew he would never experience wonder like that ever again.
More than that, he remembered the way his chest swelled with the feeling that he was loved by Will. If anything, he was loved enough to be saved by him, but he often found himself wondering what it might have meant in another life. It was the best moment he’d had in this life, he thought, as long as he forgot about everything that followed it.
Mike slotted the abandoned piece of paper back into the typewriter.
He asked about New York, Nancy, and even Robin. It wasn’t easy for him to say what he really meant, even if it was just on a stupid piece of paper he didn’t actually have to send. Still, he stalled, painstakingly avoiding writing anything of substance until he ran out of what little stories he could share about his own boring life.
When his ruminations of Will inevitably fell onto the page, he nearly ripped it from the machine again and tossed it away with the other crumpled scraps scattered on the floor behind him.
He didn’t, though. He took a deep breath in, holding it there for a little longer than he needed too, and then he kept writing.
As Mike finished typing, he looked up from the keys and noticed the sky was beginning to darken.
5:34 blinked at him from the face of his alarm clock. His mom would’ve been clattering around the kitchen by then, preparing a dinner that Mike would’ve rather not sat through. His dad was probably glued into place as he watched whatever at least slightly offensive T.V. program flickering on the screen that grabbed his attention that afternoon. And, who could ever know where Holly disappeared too during the day, Mike surely didn’t.
Mike decided that dinner was highly overrated. He stacked the finished pages of his letter in his hands, tapping them against the desktop until the corners all aligned. Standing up from the desk, he unbuttoned his dark blue jeans, which had never gotten the chance to see the light of day, and kicked them off into a shriveled lump at the end of his bed.
His blankets still laid in a pile on the floor, where they’d been left since he’d abruptly woken that morning. He bundled them up in his arms and dumped them in the center of the mattress, not bothering to straighten them out. As he shuffled into bed, fitting himself into the worn dip that always held him, he weakly tugged the rumpled blankets over his legs, just enough to cover the exposed skin below his boxers.
Mike fell back onto his flattened pillow. A thinning beam of silver light captured his face as he turned over, watching the window. Outside, the barren trees were still, melding with the dimming sky like tar black vines crawling across a desolate land. The frigid air around them was still, leaving each branch to wither away in complete silence.
The ends of Mike’s overgrown hair tickled the top of his cheek as he nuzzled into his pillow. His hands found one of the lost corners of his duvet, buried in the mass of his blankets and top sheet, as he twisted it out and tugged it over his face to shield his eyes from the lingering moonlight. He smoothed the cool cotton against his face, his palms firmly pressing into the plush down.
Mike let himself relax, gently falling deeper into the concave mattress until he felt swallowed. His pinched brows smoothed over, easing the tension he unconsciously held in his hardened expression as he slowly drifted off.
The room fell quiet, just enough to hear the movement of his lungs slow, softly expanding as each breath in grew longer, and the ringing in his ear began to crescendo.
Mike felt Will’s shoulders slipping through his grasp.
Soldiers yanked him up off the ground, sending him stumbling back in their grasp. He writhed against them, kicking and screaming, but they didn’t relent. He watched through teary eyes as Will fell limp onto the damp ground, and faded out of view behind the swarm of steel-toed boots.
As the heels of Mike’s converse dragged against the steel ground, he heard the ghost of a familiar voice whisper over his shoulder, “Mike…”