Chapter Text

Mike has a headache. 

That in itself isn’t unusual. Consistent sleep deprivation and lingering paranoia from almost being killed one too many times will do that to a person. Mike has headaches all the time. But this one is weird. Not worse, exactly, just different. More insistent. Less of a low ache and more of a sharp throb. 

It started yesterday, and no amount of aspirin or Tylenol or ibuprofen has made the slightest dent. It’s making Mike’s already less-than-cheerful demeanor downright insufferable.

Chalk it up to stress. Not that he has much to be stressed about, considering there are no monsters afoot and he’s got a whole nine days before he has to go back to school. Nine blissful days in sunny California, hanging out with his best friend and his girlfriend (who also happens to be one of his best friends thank you very much). 

His best friend and his girlfriend whom he hasn’t seen in almost six months.

Come to think of it, maybe that is reason to be stressed.

It shouldn’t be. But things with them have been… weird. He and Will have completely failed to maintain any semblance of a friendship, much less a best friendship. They’ve barely talked at all. Mike misses him so much it aches, but he can’t seem to bridge the gap. When he tries to compose a letter, he gets writer’s block. When he tries to call, he gets a busy signal. His stomach ties itself in knots when he thinks about seeing Will again. He’s not sure if it’s excitement or dread.

Things with El are fine. Except… he’s pretty sure he misses Will more than El. He’s pretty sure that’s not supposed to be the case.

(It makes sense though, right? Before this, Will had been a constant in his life for pretty much as long as he could remember. They’d never been apart for more than a few days at a time, maybe a week or two for the odd family vacation. Whereas El is a more recent addition, and her presence has been intermittent. So it makes sense that it’s not as hard to be apart from her. Never mind that El is his girlfriend and Will is just his friend. It makes sense.

That’s what he tells himself, anyway.)

Bottom line, he has no idea how to be a good friend or boyfriend or anything right now. He feels like the Upside Down has been slowly eating away at him ever since Will went missing way back in 1983, every loss and near-miss taking its toll, every nightmare doing further damage, until the killing blow in October when the last remnants of his tattered soul drove away in a moving truck. Now he’s just a hollow shell. 

He knows Dustin and Lucas have noticed it. How he’s stopped inviting people over. How he’s grown distant, disengaged. How he’s not himself. Maybe Will has too, and that’s why he hardly ever calls back, why his letters are sparse and trite. Surely El will notice too, once she sees Mike in person. 

So yeah. He’s fucking terrified of facing them. Hence the headache.

But it’s fine. Better than fine, he tries to tell himself: it’s an opportunity. A chance to chase down some of those pieces of himself he lost. Apologize for whatever needs apologizing. Claw his way back to normalcy. There’s nothing to be afraid of; in less than 24 hours, he’ll have it all worked out and he’ll be tanning on a beach or something, Will on one side and El on the other.

For now, he’s got Hellfire as a distraction. And he better get his head in the game, because Lord Vecna just came back from the dead. Shit’s about to get real.

***

He’s still riding the high of their win, one of few things lately that’s been able to reach him through the insidious melancholia, when he spots Lucas across the parking lot. Lucas is already looking his way; by the slump of his shoulders, Mike guesses the Tigers lost. Their eyes meet and Mike raises his hand in a wave, taking a step toward his friend. He hasn’t gotten far when one of the basketball guys doubles back with a big grin, putting an arm around Lucas and guiding him toward the rest of the team, who have just started a raucous rendition of the school fight song.

Not a loss then.

Lucas perks up and joins in the song, pumping his fist as teammates clap him on the back in congratulations, Mike forgotten. He seems to have achieved his goal, finally being welcomed into their ranks, treated like one of the team. He’s made it off the bench.

Mike should be happy for him. Lucas is allowed to have other interests, other friends. But it’s hard not to see it as a betrayal when he’s currently being lifted in the air by the same guy who shoved Mike’s head into a toilet last week. For all Lucas’s talk of using his new social status to grant Mike and Dustin a reprieve from the bullying too, Mike knows that’s never going to happen. Maybe Lucas can assimilate. Find the balance between jock and freak. But not everyone can do both.

Mike is starting toward the bike rack on his own, headache reasserting itself with a sharp pang, when Eddie slings an arm around his shoulder. “Looks like the conformists won their little ball game, huh?”

“Guess so,” Mike mutters, rubbing his temples in a futile effort to relieve the pain.

“You alright, kid?”

“I’m fine. Just a headache.”

“Want a ride home?”

Mike agrees, unlocking his bike and walking it toward Eddie’s van. When they get close, Mike sees Chrissy Cunningham standing by the vehicle, shivering in her cheerleader outfit and a thin hoodie. Her eyes are darting around anxiously as she picks at her nails. Mike slows, glancing at Eddie in confusion and apprehension. Mike hasn’t had any trouble with Chrissy herself, but the type of person who would date Jason Carver can’t be good news. 

“Oh yeah. We’re gonna have to make a pit stop at my trailer. Promised to get some stuff for Chrissy here,” Eddie explains casually. Mike doesn’t have to ask what kind of stuff. She’s probably bringing it to whatever party Lucas was just carted off to, although he’s a little surprised to learn that Jason and his straitlaced, corn-fed, apple-pie crowd mess with anything stronger than alcohol.

“Chrissy, this is Mike,” Eddie continues. “He’s cool.” 

Mike waves in greeting. She just glances at him, still twisting her fingers nervously. Clearly not excited to be stuck running this errand for Jason and his buddies, forced to interact with the lowly freaks. “Your carriage awaits, m’lady,” Eddie says, opening the passenger door with a dramatic flourish. Mike and his bike clamber into the back.

The ride to the trailer park is awkward. Eddie tries to make conversation—he and Chrissy seem to have an unexpected rapport, his good-natured teasing about her cheerleading routine drawing a small but genuine smile—but still her unease is palpable. Mike, too, is anxious. He keeps glancing at his watch, concerned that with the extra stop he’ll miss curfew. The trailer park isn’t exactly on the way to Maple Street—the opposite, in fact. But there should be time as long as they don’t dawdle. 

“Okay!” Eddie exclaims, lurching to a sudden stop in front of his place. “This should only take a sec, but you might as well come in.”

He lets them inside and starts rummaging around. “Sorry for the mess. Maid took the week off,” he jokes. This must be for Chrissy’s benefit; Mike’s been here several times. 

“You live here alone?” Chrissy asks tentatively while Mike makes himself at home, plopping down on the couch. 

“With my uncle. But, uh, he works nights at the plant. Bringing home the big bucks.”

Their chatter fades into the background as Mike’s headache pulses again. He bows his head and rubs his temples for a moment. When he looks up, Chrissy is staring anxiously after Eddie, who must’ve gone back to his room to look for whatever drug she’s after. Mike’s not surprised—for someone who’s basically running a business (albeit an illegal one), Eddie is hopelessly disorganized. 

Suddenly, Chrissy whirls around to look out the window behind her. Mike startles too, jumping up, instincts honed through years of monster skirmishes putting him on high-alert even though he’s not sure what she’s reacting to. 

“Did you hear that?” she asks. It’s the first time she’s addressed him directly.

“Uh… no?”

She peers out the window, eyes wide. Mike looks over her shoulder but sees nothing unusual.

“Sorry,” she mumbles. “I guess I’m just… paranoid.”

“It’s okay. I am too,” he shrugs, heart pounding. They share a weak smile, a small moment of camaraderie. She turns back to face the hallway Eddie disappeared into. 

“You can relax, you know. Eddie looks all tough but he’s a really nice dude,” Mike reassures. She doesn’t say anything, his olive branch ignored. “Okay, geez. You’d rather be anywhere but here, associating with us losers. Got it.”

She still doesn’t reply. Maybe it’s the lingering adrenaline from the false alarm a moment ago, but Mike suddenly has a bad feeling deep in his gut. Something is off. Slowly, he walks around to look at Chrissy’s face.

White eyes. Rapid blinking. Unfocused. Unseeing. 

Mike’s terror multiplies tenfold, heart rate ratcheting back up. He blinks and it’s Will standing in front of him, glaze-eyed and shaking, seizing, eyes twitching in their sockets, stuck in a waking nightmare as the Mind Flayer forces itself into every orifice. 

He blinks again and it’s Chrissy, going through the same thing. Or something very similar. 

Fuck. Not now. Not again.

“Chrissy!” Mike says firmly, urgently. He grabs her shoulders and squeezes. Snaps his fingers in front of her face. Fuck. How did they wake Will from these episodes? 

They didn’t. He woke up on his own, but only after he’d already been stalked and preyed upon and possessed. What does the Mind Flayer want with Chrissy? And who the hell opened a damn gate to give it a toehold? 

“Shit, shit, shit,” Mike mutters, scouring his memory for any idea of how to help her. They were able to get through to Will when he was possessed—or rather, Will was able to get through to them—but only after sharing a lot of deeply personal anecdotes. Even then, he was only able to communicate through a finger. 

But Mike doesn’t have any better ideas. “Your name is Chrissy Cunningham. You’re dating Jason Carver. You’re a cheerleader, and, and, and… you have an older sister, I think?”

“Found it!” Eddie calls from down the hall. “Peaceful bliss just moments away.”

Mike doesn’t stop his frantic rambling. “And you… you were in the school play one year. Alice in Wonderland, right? You played one of the flowers. And, and, uh…”

“Chrissy?”

“I think you worked at a shoe store in the mall last summer, and…”

“Mike, what the fuck is going on?”

Mike has already exhausted his well of Chrissy Cunningham knowledge. “Do you know anything about her?” he shouts at Eddie.

“Is this some kind of seizure? Chrissy, wake up!” 

“What do you know about her?! Personal details, stories, anything, please!”

“I don’t really think now’s the time for a campfire sharing circle, Mike!” Eddie hollers.

Mike opens his mouth to respond but stops short, looking around in dread when the lights start flickering. Just in case he needed further confirmation that this is not, in fact, a seizure.

Eddie seems to come to the same realization, because that’s when he really loses it, shoving Mike aside and shaking Chrissy’s shoulders, patting her cheek. “Chrissy, wake up! I don’t like this, Chrissy, wake up!”

Mike steps back, at a loss, chest heaving, eyes brimming with panicked tears. His facts are far too basic, too impersonal. He doesn’t know her well enough. Either she’ll wake up on her own, or she won’t.

That’s when he notices that Eddie’s hands, still on Chrissy’s shoulders, are rising.

Chrissy is levitating.

Eddie lets go with a jolt, crazed shouting abruptly cut off, and they both watch in slack-jawed horror as Chrissy hovers in the air. 

Mike knows, through some terrible instinct, that it’s too late for her.

Images flash through his mind: Will, writhing on the ground while vines burn in the tunnels. El, straining, bloodied, exerting so much power that she floats. Bob, relief fading into shock as he’s gored by a demodog. Billy, lifted into the air and impaled by the Mind Flayer. 

Chrissy, slamming into the ceiling. Bones snapping one by one. Arms. Fingers. Legs. Jaw.

Eddie, falling backward. Screaming.

Mike looking on every time. Helpless. Useless. 

Chrissy’s eyes are sucked back into her head with a sickening squelch. She falls to the ground, neck twisted, limbs askew. 

The lights stop flickering. For one moment, everything is still.

Eddie breaks the quiet. “Oh fuck. Oh shit. Oh fuck. What the FUCK IS HAPPENING?” he shouts, hysterical. 

Mike snaps back into focus. Now is not the time to panic, or mourn. Now is the time to think. “Eddie, calm down.”

“CALM DOWN?? Did you see what I just saw?” He scrambles up off the floor, fumbling for his keys.

“Eddie, just breathe—”

“Jesus Christ, fuck, shit, we need to get the fuck out of here—” He’s hyperventilating, eyes wide in terror.

“Eddie, please, we need to pause for a second—”

“No. No way, man, I’m out. Fucking… FUCK.” He leaves without looking back, rushing to his van. Mike follows, still pleading for him to slow down, but he’s already slamming the door and shoving the key into the ignition. 

Mike opens the passenger door to make one last plea. “Just wait, man, I know a little bit about this kind of thing, I can explain—” Wrong thing to say. If anything, Eddie looks even more freaked out, shaking his head rapidly, eyes wide and frantic like a deer caught in the headlights, frozen with his hand on the gear shift. Like he’s starting to think maybe Mike is responsible for this. Starting to wonder if he’s about to suffer the same fate as Chrissy. 

Mike holds his hands up in surrender. “Eddie,” he implores. “I didn’t do this. I can help you.”

Eddie swallows, not looking away from Mike. Not even blinking. “I don’t understand why you’re not running screaming right now, and I don’t want to know,” he says in a low voice. “Let me go. Please.” His voice cracks on the last word.

Mike turns his upturned hands into a shrug. “I can’t stop you,” he replies weakly, resigned. Eddie keeps eye contact for a beat, like he’s scared that Mike will pounce as soon as his focus wavers. Then he steels himself, wasting no more time as he peels out of the trailer park, passenger door still hanging open, a cloud of dust kicking up in his wake.

Mike takes an unsteady breath, shaken by the fear and suspicion on Eddie’s face. Hurt that, even in the haze of panic, the absence of any other obvious suspects, Eddie would ever think Mike capable of hurting him or Chrissy that way. 

Mike glances across the road to Max’s trailer, sees her peering out the window. Thank god she lives here too, or else Mike would be completely alone and stranded, his bike long gone in the back of Eddie’s van.

Mike walks back up the steps to Eddie’s trailer, averting his eyes to the gruesome scene, peering around the doorframe just enough to flip the light switch off before closing the door behind him. 

Wayne is in for a nasty shock when he comes home in the morning.

Mike darts over to Max’s trailer. When he gets close, the curtain falls shut and she opens the door, hurriedly letting him in.

“What the hell is going on?” she whispers, eyes wide. 

“Chrissy Cunningham is dead. It’s the Mind Flayer. Or… something. Something new. Definitely Upside Down. There wasn’t anything there, nothing corporeal at least, she just went into some sort of trance and then… she died.” He can’t find the words to relay the gory details just yet.

“Shit,” Max says. No shock, no fear, no anger in her tone. Just flat resignation. 

“Yeah. Shit,” Mike agrees. 

“So what do we do?”

“Get your walkie. Call a code red. We have to find Eddie.”

“Is that really our biggest concern right now?”

“They’re gonna think he did it. As soon as they find the body, there’ll be a huge manhunt.”

“So? Let him run, get as far away from here as possible! We have bigger problems!” she whisper-yells.

“He has to turn himself in!”

Max pauses, expression frozen in disbelief, before she bursts out, “Are you insane? It’s not like there will be any evidence to exonerate him! I don’t know if you know this, but the thing about interdimensional monsters is that they don’t leave fingerprints!”

There’s a creak from the next room, causing them both to startle and go quiet. 

“Just my mom rolling over,” Max whispers. “She sleeps like the dead, she won’t wake up.” Mike sees the empty bottles on the coffee table and knows that’s code for She’s passed out drunk. Mike’s mom drinks nice wine instead of cheap whiskey, but the effect is the same.

He stays silent for an extra second just in case, then picks up the thread of conversation, speaking in a low voice just above a whisper. “There won’t be any evidence against him either. It’s all circumstantial. If he runs, and more bodies show up while he’s MIA… that’d be enough to convince a jury. But if he turns himself in he has an alibi. Even if they’re still suspicious, they’ll never be able to convict.”

“An alibi? It’s too late for that, she’s already… oh shit.” Max sits back, realization dawning. “You’re hoping for more murders to clear Eddie’s name?!” she accuses.

“Not hoping for! Jesus! I’m just being pragmatic!”

“Oh, good, you’re being pragmatic about the girl that just got killed right in front of you.”

“Stop it,” Mike says sharply, fists clenching as the image of Chrissy’s mutilated body flashes vivid in his mind. He closes his eyes against it but it doesn’t help. When he opens them again, Max looks marginally more sympathetic.

“What are the odds that we figure out what’s going on and stop it before anyone else gets killed?” he says softly. “Seriously, I’m asking.”

Max hesitates. “Not good,” she admits. 

“Exactly. I know it seems callous, but… we can’t save everyone. That’s just a fact. But we can keep someone innocent from taking the fall. This is Eddie’s best shot at not living the rest of his life a fugitive, or worse.”

“Okay. Okay. So we have to find Eddie. Hang on, I’ll get my walkie.” She disappears momentarily. When she comes back, Mike is rummaging in her cabinets, tossing granola bars and bottled water into a rucksack. “What are you doing?”

“Give me that,” he says in lieu of answering, grabbing the supercom from her and putting it in his bag. He zips it up and slings it over his shoulder. “I’m taking your bike too.”

“What? Mike—”

“People saw me leaving school with Eddie. I’ll be a suspect too. Or wanted for questioning, at least, and when I can’t provide satisfactory answers…” He shrugs and shakes his head. “Not to mention if I go home now I’ll be grounded all week for missing curfew. If I want to stay free, I need to stay hidden. I’ll put out the code red, have Dustin or Lucas call you in the morning. Then you can meet up with them and use their radios to get in touch with me.”

“What, so you’re on the run now too? You aren’t gonna turn yourself in?”

“Can’t help anyone if I’m in a holding cell.”

“What happened to ‘this is the best shot at not being a fugitive forever, or worse’?” 

Mike sighs. “Eddie’s never been a part of this before, and he shouldn’t have to be now. He needs a plan that has the best shot at letting him get on with his life. I, on the other hand, am not about to be a sitting duck while my best friends risk their lives fighting interdimensional horrors again. Worse comes to worst, at least I’m a minor. That’ll probably spare me the death sentence.”

“That’s not funny.”

“I’m not joking. Don’t worry, if no one sees me they’ll probably think I’m another victim instead of a suspect.”

“Yeah, until the dust settles and you turn up unscathed.”

“I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.” He pulls the door open and a rush of chilly air flows in. “Stay here until morning so no one’s worried or suspicious of you. Try to get some sleep. We can all reconnect and figure out a game plan tomorrow.” 

“Mike, wait.” He stops halfway out the door to look back at her. She shifts her weight nervously, feeling like she should stop him from leaving but not sure what she could say. Finally she just asks, “Will you be safe out there?”

He looks at her with somber, tired eyes. Eyes that have seen far too much. (She knows the feeling.) “I don’t know what did this, or why it targeted Chrissy, but… I don’t think it mattered where she was.” It’s not a direct answer, but Max can read between the lines: walls don’t do shit when the thing trying to kill you doesn’t have to be physically there. He won’t be safe outside. But he wouldn’t be any safer here. Neither will she. 

Max swallows. Nods. Tosses a sweatshirt at him. “Take that, it’s cold as shit.” She watches him pull it over his head. Even that won’t be enough; it’s the first day of spring, but that means little in the Midwest. They’re in the middle of a cold snap and the temperature is below freezing. “Don’t do anything stupid,” she forces out around the embarrassing lump in her throat. 

She’s actually grown sort of fond of Mike over the last six months. They don’t exactly hang out much—neither of them is particularly sociable these days—but sometimes he’ll bike home with her from school, even though it’s the opposite direction from his house, or pop into the laundromat to keep her company when he sees her through the window. 

She finds she doesn’t mind his company anymore. Their mutual pessimism, their inability to shake off the events of last summer, has cultivated a strange sort of kinship. He understands her better than she ever thought possible. 

She appreciates his quiet presence next to her in math class, the way he doesn’t ever ask her how she’s feeling, doesn’t push or coddle. Doesn’t do more than she feels she deserves. Just subtly passes her snacks like he has a sixth sense that tells him when she’s skipped breakfast, or slides his homework over so she can copy it when she shows up with a blank worksheet, or offers tissues when her nose bleeds (which has been happening weirdly often this week). 

It’s nice to have someone looking out for her without being overbearing. Somehow, Mike went from someone she couldn’t stand to one of the few people she can tolerate. 

“Talk to you soon,” he assures, but his voice shakes too. 

He slips out the door, closing it quietly behind him. She watches from the window, heart twisting with dread as he hops onto her bike and disappears into the night.