Chapter Text
Prologue
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November 6th, 1983
Hawkins Indiana
Hawkins Laboratory
U.S Department Of Energy
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018’s ears are little geniuses and they hear everything, 018 can hear screaming, the flickering of lights, the blaring of the alarms, the thudding of heavy bootsteps, the shots of bullets ricocheting and ringing out familiar in their intensity and useful in their volume.
With a prod and a nudge, the shots echo out easily covering 018’s escape. With nary a glance backwards, 018 runs.
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Jonathan knows better.
Jonathan knows he knows better, the shameful guilt of his deception roiling around in his stomach as he trudges back to where he’d left his bike, camera clutched in his arms. Knees damp and sticky with dirt and mud.
He knows better than to have stayed out so late, knows he should have been home hours ago, knows he shouldn’t have gotten so caught up in his pictures, and he knows no one is going to be waiting at home for him to tell if he got back at the right time or not, because of a lie he knows he shouldn’t have told. He knows everyone is going to find out either way and he knows that he really doesn’t want to be there when they do.
So caught up in his thoughts Johnathan almost misses the first noise.
Head snapping up to peer around in confusion Jonathan pauses as he realizes he’s not entirely sure where the hell he is, as the realization sets in a low growl rumbles through the air.
Jonathan takes a startled step backwards and falls. The soil is soft underneath his hands first finding its way into his fingernails, its an odd thing to focus on as he squints at the dense cover of the trees and watches as something, something melts right out of the darkness of the foliage.
Jonathan in his quiet, ever so quiet terror stumbles to his feet and runs.
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For maybe the first time in his twelve years of life Jonathan thinks he might just hate the forest, its an odd feeling, the anger rushing through him, chasing the terror pulsing through his skin, it’s the only thought he finds he can latch unto as he runs, tripping and crashing through bushes and thickets, branches scratching at his skin and pulling at his clothes as he races.
He’s lost, the world narrowing to the crunches and snaps of his shoes on the forest floor and the periodic growls of the thing following him, tracking him.
The fear, the terror curls high in his throat, thick and choking. Jonathan wants his mom, wants his brother, wants his dad, wants his sister, wants someone so desperately he might combust with it.
Jonathan wants-
He falls
The sharp pain shooting through his ankle as he falls brings tears to his eyes and suddenly he can't stop, gasping and shuddering as he sobs.
Glancing backwards Jonathan spots what's tripped him and a manic laugh forces itself out his throat, he’s incredulous at the twisted irony of it all.
The caving, hole hidden in a tree he’d found and stayed so late to investigate, obsessive in his fascination taking hundreds and hundreds of pictures of the stupid thing, theorizing the possibilities of it's existence.
The sound of a chittering growl echoes in the eerily quiet forest. Jonathan makes a split second decision.
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Crawling into the whole is nowhere as difficult as he’d imagined it, a large pile of dead leaves trailing into it breaks his fall as he scrabbles inside. It’s large enough to stretch his legs in wherever he’s fallen into and as he scrabbles around in the darkness he realizes rather hysterically that he’s lost his fucking camera at some point.
Huddling himself into a ball Jonathan closes his eyes and hiccups into his knees, he’s waiting, stalling.
The growling grows closer and closer, thudding footsteps. Something is glowing and Jonathan hisses in pain frantically fishing out his flashlight and flinging it away from himself, it glows brighter and brighter illuminating the hole he's in. Something stutters in his chest, he can’t can’t breathe, he can't , breathe he can’t breathe
Everything goes dark
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Jonathan Byers vanishes quietly in the forests of Hawkins Indiana.
He is the first