Chapter Text
Hawkins, Indiana. March, 1986
It begins with the storm.
Dark red, swirling, with angry lightning bolts, the town is under constant assault by the rain that never ends. The power goes out, and never comes back on. Hawkins is dark at night, and those who have remained stay in their houses after sunset.
El tells them about portals opening and closing all around; nothing comes out of them, but they are there and gone, just the same. She knows where they are before they appear, but no one has made a move to find any of them, not until something dangerous comes out. They need time to rest, to think, to plan.
The Byers take to living in the Wheeler home, Will and Mike sharing a room, Nancy offering hers to Jonathan under the pretense of it being “the same as Will and Mike sharing!”, and Hopper and Joyce staying in the basement downstairs. El refuses to come, staying at what remains of the Byers home, claiming she can feel the most there.
Lucas spends almost all of his nights at the hospital, where a backup generator is all that is keeping Max alive. Dustin, more often than not, joins him, but he is less present than most of them, almost all of his mind on Eddie’s death and their potential upcoming ones.
Steve has Robin over at his house most days, and after a long explanation to everyone else, she introduces those who haven’t already met her to her apparent girlfriend Vickie, who apparently is in the loop on everything, although seems very shaken by the entire prospect.
They’re all on edge, waiting, watching.
Will is quieter these days, Mike notices, keeping mostly to himself after everything that’s happened. He doesn’t even talk to Jonathan, not for his brother’s lack of trying. He just sits in Mike’s room and stares out the window at the clouds a lot.
Mike tries to talk to him a bit, but Will is lukewarm conversation at best. It’s not entirely without reason, after California, but Mike misses his best friend more than he misses the blue sky.
It’s only four days after the earth split and the sky turned red that Mike steps outside by himself. It’s still warm in Hawkins, despite the pouring rain, and he grabs his bike, unsure of where to go, but he rides anyway.
He finds himself in front of the remnants of the Starcourt Mall, staring at where he used to go with his friends, visit Steve and Robin, laugh, enjoy life. He allows himself a small feeling of nostalgia, before he gets back on his bike home. It won’t do him well to stay out in the rain now, and his clothes are already soaked and the road slippery. The last thing anyone needs right now is for him to get-
An ice-cold feeling shoots through his veins, and his head is involuntarily snapped back of its own accord, his vision going white for just a second before flashes, like clips from a movie, fire through his head. Most of them are without sound, brief flashes, some are longer, voices echoing through Mike’s head.
He sees Dustin, a little older than he is now, being beat in a graveyard. He sees his parents, bleeding out on the floor of his childhood home. He sees Will, staring at a large group of people, himself included, tears in his eyes.
“I don’t like girls,” he whispers. Mike is hardly allowed a second of shock before the visions continue. Holly sitting with Henry Creel, a group of children gathered around. Max, hair tangled, her hand clasped around Holly’s arm in a forest. El’s sister, whispering plans for them both to die to shut the gate. Will, hand extended, eyes white, a demogorgon inches from Mike frozen in the air. Lucas, a gash across his stomach, gasping for breath. Holly, hands joined with other children in a circle, their eyes white as they face the ceiling. Robin, yelling over an intercom.
“There is a Demo headed your way!” she shouts breathlessly into it, and it echoes around a hospital. Lucas looks up, next to Max’s bed.
Lucas, running with an unconscious Max in his arms. El, standing in a gateway as it implodes. Steve and Jonathan, arguing. Jonathan and Nancy, an unknown substance holding them still in a room, crying with one another. El, flying through the air into the heart of a huge, spiderlike creature. Dustin, drawing on a board in front of everyone. His mouth moves, and Mike catches the word “wormhole” before the vision continues on.
A D&D game, himself, a few years older, speaking to Max, Dustin, Lucas, and Will. El is nowhere to be seen. A frantic feeling of something slipping as his hand runs along the spine of Will’s character binder. Himself, many years older, glasses slipping down his nose, alone at a typewriter. Even older, crying alone in a car. Older still, alone, in a house with no decorations.
Mike gasps as his knees hit the ground, pain spreading immediately, but it is nothing compared to the overwhelming voice in his head. He slams his hands over his ears, but it does nothing to stop the sound.
“What did you see, Michael?”
“Stop it!” he shrieks, terrified.
“Your future, Michael, what did you see?”
My future. My future. My future.
El, dead. Friends, gone. Who knows who else is gone?
The voice fades, but Mike is left with a ringing in his ears and a searing pain in his knee.
When he finally returns home, limping as he walks his bike up the steps, the door slams open, and Karen rushes forward, grabbing him by the arms and guiding him into the house.
“What happened to you? Are you alright?” she gasps as she heaves him to a dining chair. Mike shakes his head, still pounding, but relieved from the voice.
“Fell off my bike,” he croaks.
It wasn’t real. It can’t be real. It’s a trick, an illusion.
Karen patches him up, and he says nothing about his vision.
Vecna is messing with his mind. That is all.
**
He finds himself lost in writing to escape the vision, campaigns that will never come to fruition, fantasies where Max joins them on their escapades, small stories about the paladin and the cleric going on adventures.
It’s one of the latter that Mike brings to Will one day, just over three weeks after everything went to hell, and Will reads it silently, before smiling up at Mike for the first time he’s seen in forever.
“Is this how you see us?” he asks, his voice soft, and Mike can only nod, his throat caught.
I don’t like girls. I don’t like girls. I don’t like girls.
There’s one way to find out if the visions were real. Change them, before they can happen.
“Will-” he starts, and finds he doesn’t know how to quite end the sentence. Will looks up, eyes brighter than they’ve been in days, and Mike finds himself briefly stunned.
“Mike,” Will teases, with a newfound confidence he’s had lately, and Mike’s throat feels tight.
“Do you- Have you ever-”
Will stares at him, waiting for him to get to the point. Get to the point, Wheeler. It’s a simple question.
“Do you like girls?”
Will’s eyes widen, his breath catching. “What?” he says, hushed and shocked.
“Do you- I’ve never- you never talk to us about girls. Or anything. It’s okay, if you don’t. I just- I wanted to know. You don’t have the answer.”
Will looks at him for a long moment, before standing from Mike’s bed, slowly approaching him. He tilts his head, looking up at Mike.
“Do you?” he asks, simply.
“Yeah, of course,” Mike laughs, oddly nervous. The proximity is making his heart race, his cheeks flush.
Will nods slowly, almost to himself. “I don’t,” he says simply, more open than Will’s ever been, and Mike inhales sharply.
“Oh. Okay. That’s- that’s cool. That’s cool. So- you-”
Will stares at him a moment longer. “I like boys, Mike,” he says slowly, casually, and Mike’s brain is crumpling in on itself. It dissolves completely when Will’s hand comes up, splayed fingers over his chest, cool skin tangible through the shirt Mike is wearing. “Do you?”
Mike stutters immediately, shocked by this new Will, this very forward Will, and leans back a bit. Will’s touch never leaves, and he leans in to follow, his lips just inches from Mike’s.
“Do you like me, Mike?” he asks, voice low and sultry, and so far from anything Mike has ever heard from Will. His heart stutters and pounds in his chest, so hard Will can surely feel it.
“I-”
“You’re breathing very fast,” Will whispers, and Mike can barely get his thoughts together, but one rings true, loud in his head over all of the fog crawling through his head.
Will, silently gesturing to things he wanted. Will, drawing Mike pictures. Will, writing small notes to him in class in second grade. Will, quiet, shy, nervous.
Will, who didn’t speak for almost four years straight, who didn’t utter his first word since toddlerhood until he cried for his mom when Mike had fallen off his bike in third grade. Will, who spoke in small, unsure fragments afterwards, working towards full sentences in a way that most eight-year-olds had already mastered. Will, who was careful with his choice of words, Will, who Mike taught various phrases and terms to, Will, who was always more comfortable letting Mike speak.
Will, who has never interrupted Mike in his life.
This Will’s eyes glint with something Mike’s never seen before, his expression too confident, his hand too cold, his body leaning too far forward. His lips are parted, eyes lidded, and he looks sinful.
He doesn’t look like Will, for just a moment, and Mike’s heart stops when he thinks of Will’s white eyes in his vision.
“You’re not Will,” he breathes, barely able to get the words out. “Not really.”
Will’s expression falls. He stares at him, horrified. He takes a step back, his hand falling, shaking his head. “What the fuck, Mike? Wh-” He breathes in, shaking his head harder. Another step back. He can barely look at Mike, and Mike feels sick. He can’t be right. Surely, he’s wrong. These are all of Will’s mannerisms, his pacing of speech, everything is right. He’s insane. He’s letting this vision get to his head.
“You’re not,” Mike says, his voice sounding more sure than he is. “You almost had it right. But you didn’t know six-year old Will. I did. Will doesn’t interrupt. He- he doesn’t have the capacity.”
Will looks devastated, crushed, terrified. He looks so scared Mike wants to crawl into a hole for saying anything at all. “I’m sorry I interrupted you, Mike. I thought- I thought you wanted this too.”
God. Fuck. Mike squeezes his eyes shut, forcing his tears back. Not real. Can’t be real. Need to be sure.
He takes a deep, steadying breath, and opens his eyes slowly to see Will’s tears. This is Will, always quick to cry, always emotionally raw. This is Will. He must be wrong.
He thinks about his vision. Vecna could have twisted his mind. He’s wrong. Vecna is turning them against each other. It’s exactly the sort of fucked-up mind game Vecna would play. It must be. How could this not be Will? Will, who just tried to come onto Mike and Mike rejected him, Will, who is now breathing shakily, Will, who he has hurt, again.
Mike knows Will like it’s breathing. Mike knows Will like it’s living. Mike knows Will.
Mike knows Will.
“I’m sorry,” he says, quietly, forcing the words out. “I’m sorry, my head lately…”
Will pauses, waits to make sure he’s done talking, that he can’t say any more. This is the Will he knows. “It’s okay, Mike. I forgive you.”
‘I forgive you.’
There’s nothing to be sorry for.
Forgotten.
For what?
You don’t need to be sorry.
I’m sorry too.
A thousand versions of himself apologizing, something he’s always had to force himself to do, fear of rejection crawling through his veins with every word, and every time he ever has, Will has pushed it away with ease. Accepted him immediately. His Will acts as if he’s incapable of making a mistake, of needing to be sorry. His Will has never, not once in twelve years, told him he’s forgiven him, because in Will’s mind, Mike, ever twisted and fucked-up in the head, has never needed forgiving. He’s needed acceptance, and Will has known that.
I forgive you.
I forgive you.
I forgive you.
Mike feels sick. Cold. “Thanks, Will.”
“Of course, Mike.” Will smiles at him, sure and kind. “Take your time.”
“Do you- do you mind if I step out, for just a moment? I need to breathe.”
Will nods immediately. “Of course, Mike.”
Mike, skin crawling, steps out of the door, shutting it quietly, and goes to Nancy’s room, opening the door silently. Jonathan is on her bed, quietly talking to her, and both of their heads turn to Mike in surprise.
Mike can barely speak. His throat feels like it’s closing, his heart is beating too fast, his veins are filling with ice, but he forces the words out, his worst fear imaginable manifesting in front of him as he does.
“That’s not Will.”