Chapter Text
Healing was a process for all of them; Lucas was the first to adjust, taking Max to the movie as he promised, even though she couldn’t see it. (Max took far longer to adjust, not speaking for the first few months afterwards, then only speaking to Lucas for a quite a while, but then gradually warming up to all of them).
Will… hadn’t healed, and Dustin was trying to help even though he hadn’t healed either, honestly. Mike and El were happy, and Will was not well, to put it lightly. He was very obvious to about everyone except Mike himself.
Steve and Robin were okay, Joyce was okay, Jonathan and Nancy were okay, everyone seemed to be getting somewhat better.
Except Dustin, of course. Hellfire Club wasn’t the same without… him, and Dustin couldn’t bring himself to be a part of it again. He didn’t wear his Hellfire shirt anymore, and anytime anyone started talking about Hellfire or making fun of it - making fun of him - he would drown them out. Leave the room sometimes, go to the bathroom, cry a little, go back to class. It was routine.
He could still feel him etched into his arms, limp and bleeding out, could still hear his voice rasp out, “I think it’s finally my year, Henderson.” And it hurt so bad that he couldn’t breathe sometimes.
It was another day at school where stupid kids were making fun of him, of course, and he had run into a janitor’s closet and fought back the tears. He didn’t even notice the clock chime at first.
The sound started to close around Dustin, though, and the walls felt like they were pressing against him, and he covered his ears and pushed himself back into a corner, but it was no use. The sounds just got louder, the room smaller.
And suddenly it wasn’t a room at all, he was inside the upside down again, and he was there, Eddie was there, and Dustin sobbed as he looked at him, his wounds and blood still fresh, and he started running towards him.
“You didn’t stop me, Henderson.” His voice echoed through the air, and Dustin stopped dead in his tracks. “You knew I was going to die in here, I could have escaped, and you left me here to die.”
He curled into himself and choked out, “You wanted to save us, you didn’t want to run away again-“
“You fucking left me, Henderson, and now I’m here and you’re still alive and it’s all your fault,” Eddie screamed, his voice tinged with hate and pure, unfiltered rage.
Tears streamed down Dustin’s cheeks. “I’m sorry, Eddie, I’m sorry-“
“You will never be sorry,” he said, but his voice was warped, and he was melting away into a familiar figure.
Dustin started running as fast as he possibly could as Vecna chased him, and he faintly heard Master of Puppets playing, which only made him cry harder. It was his song, Eddie’s song.
He was pulled back into the real world when it finally hit him that it was his favorite song playing, and he was met with a very concerned Max and Will shaking his shoulders frantically. He wiped his cheeks, and when he opened his mouth to speak, it felt like he hadn’t done so in years.
“Why didn’t you get someone?”
“They would send you somewhere where they couldn’t help. We can help. Traces of Vecna are still around and we know it but no one will believe us,” Max murmured.
Will tilted his head. “It was Eddie, wasn’t it?” Dustin couldn’t even respond, his body shaking with sobs, and he nodded. Before he could even process it, Will’s arms were around him.
When he was finally okay enough to stand up again, a half hour had passed, and he didn’t feel like going to school, so he grabbed his bike and sped home. He got inside and grabbed the stupid Hellfire shirt and flicked open a lighter, and he stepped into the backyard. The dewy grass rustled under his feet, and the shirt blew in the wind.
“I can’t handle it anymore,” Dustin said to the empty air, and he lit the shirt on fire. “Munson, I can’t take it anymore, I can’t take you anymore.”
He threw the shirt into the garbage can, letting the fibers burn away into ash.