Work Text:
“Mike, Mike stop!”
Will’s voice was hoarse from yelling, scratching painfully. Mike gave up on calling for help, dropping his head.
Mike seemed to give up, looking down as he stood on the desk beneath his feet. He plopped down into its surface, legs swinging over the edge.
Will hesitated.
Eventually, he gently sat down next to Mike, pulling his legs up onto the table, and hugging his knees to his chest. With a tired sigh, he let his head fall forward, resting it on his knees.
The strange grey goop continued to melt and splat into the room, occasionally spraying some in their direction, clinging to their clothes.
Mike lifted his walkie to about 6 inches from his face. He pressed down, and the walkie scratched to life. He didn't speak, just let the static fill the cold air around them.
“Dustin,” Mike's voice was low, tired in a way that made Will look at his best friend with a worry he hadn't felt for him in a very long time. “Do you copy?”
Silence filled the room. And, for a moment, Will thinks he'd rather be arguing with Mike again, if it meant escaping the deafening noise of Mike's steady breaths.
A chill, cruel and taunting, ran its way down Will's spine, and he tightened his arms around his legs, blowing air on his knees, seeking warmth.
Mike was staring at his walkie, brows furrowed and his grip firm. So firm that he was shaking slightly because of the strain— or.. No.
He was crying.
Heaving sobs, his whole body shaking violently. Will didn't even think about it, he just pulled Mike to his chest, the movement second nature.
Mike rarely cried, and in the odd cases that he did, it was only ever in front of his mother, and Will.
Will had seen Mike cry a total of 3 times.
The first two, from childhood. A bad dream at a sleepover, or a nasty fall from riding over a particularly rude pothole.
The third time had been when Will was in the hospital. Will can't remember much, but he had a vague picture of feeling a singular tear slip from Mike's to his own.
He remembers his mother mentioning that Mike had cried again, but Will had no memory of that day, or when Mike supposedly cried, so he ruled it out in his mind.
Not once had Mike sobbed. Not like this.
Will felt Mike's hands clutch the back of his shirt, pulling Will closer, wetting the fabric with tears. Will pulled back, catching Mike's eyes, hating the puffy quality of his usually sculpted face.
They held the eye contact. And Will searched.
He searched for a sign, a flicker of anything that could tell him how to fix this, how to take all the pain from Mike, Tammy be damned.
“I’m sorry,” Mike said, another tear spilling over and down his face, “i- i’ve been a shit friend.”
Will smiled, shaking his head in confusion. He reached up, collecting the tear from Mike's face onto his finger, he flicked the drop away without breaking the intense stare they had formed.
“Mike, its okay I really–”
“No,” Mike cut him off, grabbing WIlls wrist, his fingers curling over it. Mike was distracted briefly, his gaze locked on how his hand wrapped around Will’s wrist, his thumb overlapping his index and middle.
“No,” he continued, finally looking back at Will, “no-i- … i need to say this,”
Will nodded acutely, his eyes darting between Mike's own, the sugary hazel dark in the blue hues around them.
“I-Iv’e been ignoring you. For, like, two years, Will.” He shut his eyes, dipping his head slightly, his curls tickling Will’s chin. “I just— I was so scared, ”
Mike swallowed hard, his voice catching again. “I... I didn’t mean to—” He stopped, biting his lip. “It’s just... I didn’t know how to say it. Or if I even could.”
Will nodded slowly, feeling the weight of Mike’s words settle deep inside him. “Yeah,” he whispered. “It’s like... sometimes it’s easier to just... not say anything at all.”
The two sat in silence for a long moment, the only sounds their uneven breaths and the faint, sickening squelch of the grey goop inching closer.
Mike’s fingers trembled as they fidgeted with a loose thread on Will’s shirt. “I was, like, convinced," he said, voice barely there. “Convinced that you’d... hate me. Or maybe just forget I was even here.”
Will’s throat tightened. “You? Forget you? No way. I— I just didn’t know how to fix it. I’m not good at... this stuff. You know?”
Mike gave a shaky laugh, raw and broken. “Yeah. Me neither.”
The air between them grew heavier, filled with all the things they wanted to say but couldn’t quite find the words for.
“Will,” Mike finally said, voice small and raw, “I’m sorry for... everything. For being... away. For not being better.”
Will’s eyes stung with tears. “Me too. For not... being there like I should’ve.”
Mike’s head dipped, curls brushing Will’s arm. “I wish... I wish I had said all this... sooner.”
Will swallowed past the lump in his throat. “Me too.”
Neither moved for a long time, as if afraid that breaking the quiet would shatter the fragile connection holding them together.
The grey goop slithered thicker now, pooling faster, filling the corners of the room with a wet, sickly sound that made Will’s stomach churn. The floor beneath their feet was slick, the air growing colder and heavier, like the walls themselves were closing in.
“Will,” Mike’s voice was barely audible, trembling as he pushed himself up from the table’s edge. His hands pressed flat against the surface, fingers digging in as the goop crept closer to their legs.
Will followed suit, shifting to sit more upright. The table creaked under their weight, a fragile island amid the spreading darkness. The sticky substance inched closer, slapping quietly against the wood, threatening to swallow them whole.
Mike’s eyes darted around the room, wild and desperate. “It’s getting... higher. We need to... sit up.”
Will nodded, swallowing hard, his throat dry. He pulled himself fully onto the table, pressing his hands onto the surface, trying to steady himself. The cold bit through his shirt despite the warmth of their shared body heat.
Mike’s breath was ragged now, shaky as he fought to keep composed. But the tears kept coming—slow at first, then spilling over in silent rivers down his cheeks.
Will didn’t know what to do, so he just stayed still, letting Mike cry, feeling the weight of it settle around them like dust.
“I’m sorry,” Mike whispered again, voice breaking. “I didn’t mean to... not be there. I just... I was scared, okay? I was so scared.”
The words hung in the air, fragile and raw.
Will blinked, lips trembling. “I know,” he said quietly. “I was scared too.”
Mike’s head lolled forward, resting on his knees as he tried to catch his breath. “It’s stupid,” he said after a moment, voice muffled. “I thought if I hid, if I ignored you, maybe... maybe things would be easier. But they weren’t.”
Will’s heart ached. “They weren’t.”
Mike’s hands trembled as he wiped at his face, smearing tears into his skin. “I hate that I made you feel alone. That I didn’t say anything when it mattered.”
Will’s own eyes stung, the tears coming now despite himself. “It just– it felt like you gave up on me, Mike..”
Mike’s gaze flicked up, meeting Will’s through the haze of tears. “You felt like I gave up on you?”
Will shook his head, voice barely a whisper. ”all the fucking time..”
The table groaned beneath their shifting weight, a fragile barrier between them and the creeping darkness below. The Goop hissed and lapped just beneath their feet, cold and merciless, swallowing the floor inch by inch. Around them, the room seemed to dissolve, walls bending and melting into shadows that threatened to consume everything—every breath, every heartbeat, every fragment of time they had left.
Mike’s fingers found Will’s, weak and trembling, and intertwined with a silent desperation. “I don’t want to be… lost anymore,” he said, voice cracking like fragile glass, “Not now. Not like this.”
Will squeezed Mike’s hand gently, a faint warmth that defied the coldness creeping around them. “Neither do I,” he whispered, his voice rough but steady, anchoring them both.
They sat like that for a long time, two souls tangled in the weight of regret and fear, the world collapsing silently around them, but their small light flickering still—a fragile flame refusing to be extinguished.
Mike’s voice cut through the silence again, quieter this time, almost a confession whispered on a dying wind. “I was scared of everything. Of… losing you, of being left behind, of not being enough.”
Will swallowed, the lump in his throat growing heavy, thick with words left unspoken. “You’re enough. You always were.”
Mike’s lips trembled, a single tear escaping and tracing a cold path down his cheek. “I wish I could’ve told you that.”
Will’s own tears fell freely now, searing and unrestrained. “I wish you had.”
The Goop bubbled and climbed higher, a living tide swallowing the world they knew. Will looked down at the viscous blackness, watching as it hissed and climbed, relentless and cold. “We aren’t getting out of here… Are we?”
“No,” Mike said firmly, the finality in his voice cutting through the despair like a knife, “We aren’t.”
Silence overtook them. Will held Mike’s gaze, knowing it was the last chance he would have to do so. He drank in every detail: each freckle, each eyelash, each subtle movement of his eyebrows. The only sounds that reached his ears were their heavy breaths and the deafening splash of the room melting away.
“Hey, Will.”
Will saw the movement of lips before he registered the words, dazed and barely able to respond. “Yeah?”
Mike paused, opening and closing his mouth multiple times, wetting his lips with his tongue, coating them in a thin, trembling red sheen. He swallowed, throat bobbing, lips quivering under the weight of what he was about to say.
“I love you.”
Will’s chest tightened, a crushing weight settling deeper than the suffocating air around them. The Goop hissed and crept, as if the room itself was exhaling its final breath. His vision blurred, but he clung to Mike’s words like a lifeline.
“I love you too,” Will whispered, voice breaking, barely more than a rasp. His fingers twitched, reaching out, but found only empty space as the distance between them grew with the rising tide of the viscous, unforgiving Goop.
The last light in Mike’s eyes flickered like a dying star. Will’s heart ached at the thought of the silence that would follow—a silence that would swallow them whole, leaving only echoes of what was.
As the Goop swallowed the floor and began its slow, inevitable climb up the walls, Will closed his eyes, clutching the memory of Mike’s face, the sound of his voice, the warmth of his breath against his own lips.
“I love you, Will,” Mike sobbed again, “So fucking much.”
Will closed the distance with a devastating crash, pouring the last thirteen years of his life into the kiss.
The taste of salt and desperation mingled on their lips, a fragile tether in the collapsing world around them. Time fractured, each second stretching into an eternity where nothing else existed but the weight of their love and the cold encroachment of the Goop.
Will’s hands trembled uncontrollably as they clung to Mike’s face, tracing every contour, every rough edge and soft line as if by committing these details to memory, he could somehow hold Mike’s essence forever. His fingers shook against the warmth of Mike’s skin, the texture both familiar and achingly alien now, as if the very act of touch would be the last thread connecting him to a world slipping away. The tears that had been building for what felt like an eternity spilled forth in ragged, broken gasps, a raw, aching sound that tore through the silence of the dimly lit room. It was a sound so full of pain and sorrow that it seemed to bind them tightly together in a way no fear or cruel fate ever could.
Mike’s voice was a fragile whisper, breaking through the cacophony of despair that filled the room. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice cracking under the weight of unspoken regrets and the unbearable truth of their shared fate. “I’m so sorry we didn’t get more time.”
Will shook his head slowly, as if trying to dislodge the cruel reality from his mind. His tears fell freely now, tracing the lines of heartbreak across his cheeks. “No. No. Please, God, no,” he begged, as if pleading to any higher power that might still be listening. But the desperation in his voice was met only with the cold, unyielding silence of the encroaching darkness.
Mike reached out, pulling Will gently but firmly into his lap. He wrapped his arms around him, offering what small comfort he could in the dwindling moments they had left. Will sobbed into Mike’s shoulder, the sound raw and unfiltered, a testament to the depth of his anguish. “Will,” Mike whispered softly, “It’s alright.”
The Goop had risen to nearly the height of their table now. It lapped against the legs of the furniture, dripping and splashing as if mocking their helplessness. The cold liquid clung to the fabric of their clothes, seeping into their skin like a creeping frost that promised only oblivion. Will ignored the creeping darkness, focusing entirely on Mike, on the warmth of his body and the fierce, desperate love they shared. He kissed Mike again, a kiss filled with longing and the desperate hope to hold onto the moment, to freeze time just long enough to etch this kiss into eternity.
Mike kissed him back with equal fervor, clinging to Will with a fierce, aching need that spoke volumes. His grip was tight, desperate—clawing for something tangible in the face of the intangible shadow that was swallowing their world. It was as if holding Will’s very soul in his hands could stave off the creeping darkness, and could keep the shadow at bay just a little while longer.
Will wrapped his arms around Mike’s neck, licking into his mouth with a desperation that only someone standing on the edge of death could understand. The taste of Mike—the salty tears, the trembling breath—was seared into his memory, a final proof that they had existed, that their love had been real and fierce and unyielding. It was a bitter, beautiful truth that would endure beyond the cold embrace of the Goop.
The Goop rose higher, swallowing the legs of the table, sloshing over the edges in slow, inexorable waves of darkness. The room, once a place of safety and warmth, was now a shifting nightmare of shadow and cold, a void that threatened to consume everything in its path. The familiar colors and light were drained away, replaced by the bleak nothingness that promised oblivion.
They clung to each other, two fragile bodies pressed against the inevitable, their hearts beating in a fragile, shattered rhythm that seemed to echo in the vast silence. Their breaths came faster now, shallow and ragged, each inhalation a struggle against the ever-tightening grip of the cold shadow.
Mike’s words came again, broken and raw with emotion. “Will… promise me something.”
Will pulled back slightly, his eyes heavy and red-rimmed, the tears flowing freely down his face. “Anything,” he whispered, his voice cracked but determined.
“Promise me you won’t forget,” Mike said, his voice barely audible over the sound of their labored breathing and the ominous lapping of the Goop. “Not even when we’re gone. Promise me you’ll carry us in your heart.”
Will’s voice broke under the weight of it all. “I promise,” he said, the word fragile but sincere, a vow forged in the crucible of their shared pain.
A brittle smile flickered on Mike’s lips, a small spark of light in the growing darkness. “Good,” he whispered. “Because I’ll never forget you.”
The Goop had reached their knees now, cold and unforgiving. It was a suffocating presence, an icy tide that crept relentlessly higher with each passing moment. Their breaths grew faster, shallower, the air thinning as the shadow closed in. But neither dared to break the fragile connection between them—their fingers intertwined in a desperate plea against the quiet end.
“I’m not ready to die,” Will confessed, his voice barely audible, trembling with the raw vulnerability that came with facing death.
“Me either,” Mike admitted, voice trembling as well, “But I’m not alone.”
Will nodded, tears spilling freely, mingling with the cold wetness of the Goop. “Neither am I.”
The darkness crept higher, swallowing their legs, their torsos, inch by merciless inch. The room around them faded into a void, the last traces of color and light drained away by the ever-encroaching shadow. Will’s hands still held Mike’s, fingers entwined in a desperate plea against the quiet end.
“I love you,” Mike whispered, voice barely a breath, fragile but fierce.
“I love you,” Will echoed, his heart breaking with the weight of the words, the promise, the loss.
The Goop reached their chests now, cold and suffocating. The air grew thin, each breath a laborious fight against the darkness closing in from all sides. They held each other tighter, bodies trembling, hearts shattering in the unbearable finality of the moment.
Mike’s tears slicked down Will’s face, warm and real against the cold shadow. “Mike,” Will sobbed, desperation breaking through his lips, “Mike—I can’t breathe.”
But the Goop was relentless, swallowing their bodies, their breaths, their last moments of life and love. It was a flood of oblivion that showed no mercy, no hesitation.
They both tilted their heads in a futile attempt to breathe just for a few seconds longer.Will’s vision blurred, the edges of the world dissolving into shadow, the light extinguished by the cold, impenetrable dark. The last thing he saw before the darkness claimed him was Mike’s face—pale and trembling, eyes full of love and fear, a reflection of his own soul laid bare.
He moved his head under the surface, nuzzling into Mike, letting his last breath bubble out of his lungs.
And then, silence.