Chapter Text
It had been seven days since I had managed to kill Henry with the help of my friends and family. Six nights of nightmares of pinning Henry against the old column of his childhood home, my hand over his head, just as I had seen him do to Max, and took his life, almost draining myself completely in the process. I could feel the darkness inside of me, his darkness, hidden in the back corner of my mind.
It scared me, but I didn't tell Mike or Hop for they wouldn't understand. Will would probably understand, he had Vecna's darkness inside him, but I didn't want to talk about it just yet. I didn't regret what I had done. Ultimately if I hadn't of killed him, he would have hurt more people and I could not have lived with that.
I remember the look Mike had when I had turned to face him, blood coming from my nose and eyes after Vecna fell to the ground with his bones snapped. I believed him when he told me he wasn't scared of me, but the look his face showed for a brief second lingered in my mind. I didn't feel like the superhero he thought me to be. This wasn't the first time I had killed someone, but this was the first time it was purely intentional. Henry was a predator and I had to be the more dangerous one to stop him so he couldn't harm any more of my friends or family.
I finished waking up and got up to get ready and gathered my stuff. My mind still felt a little hazy after last nights endless dreaming. I had already told Hop I was going to go see Max today at the hospital. Mike had offered to come with me, he had barely left my side since Vecna but I needed to go by myself. Today was Wednesday and I had picked it on purpose knowing Lucas would be at his uncle's house. I didn't want to see him there reading to Max as it was just a reminder of how I failed to protect her, how I failed him as well as he set up there almost every day, reading to her, hoping to see some change in her condition.
It didn't take long for me to shovel eggos in my mouth like I hadn't eaten for days. After Hop finished his coffee he decided it was time to go, his walk to the car was slow, like he wanted to talk to me about something before we left but he didn't open his mouth.
The ride up there was quiet as well and I could feel Hop sneaking glances. I could feel he wanted to ask me how I was doing but he didn't ask and I didn't find myself willing to say because I wasn't even sure. Flashes of memories came to mind as I watched the scenery outside of the window. They were not my memories though. I could see Billy saving me from afar against the Mind Flayer. No, these were Max's memories as I could see myself on the floor behind him, scared. I had seen these memories every night in my dreams as well. If I could feel Vecna's darkness inside of me, maybe I could find Max inside me as well, I just wanted to be near her alone to try in case nothing happened. I sighed aloud and Hop reached over and took my hand and held it the rest of the way there to the hospital.
"Do you want me to wait out here while you're visiting or do you want to call me whenever you get ready and I'll come back to get you?"
"I'll call you."
I slung my backpack around my shoulders, holding the straps as I walked into the hospital. I remembered the hallways to turn down until I finally managed to get to her door. I knocked softly just in case someone else was there but no, it was empty except for Max, stiff on that bed. Only her chest rising up and down signaled any signs of life. There was a small vase of flowers on the window sill and the book Lucas had been reading, The Talisman, had been left there beside it.
I put my backpack down in the chair beside her and got out the cassette player that Hop had given me. It wasn't yellow like Max's but red. It reminded me of Max's red sunglasses she had bought at the mall when they went shopping for the first time. I put in the Madonna cassette tape I borrowed from Max's home and pressed play. Angel by Madonna filtered into the whole room softly and I moved to sit on the bed beside Max and softly grabbed her fingers as best I could with them being in the cast. It was the last song they had listened to together before everything went downhill. Before we thought Billy had murdered a girl, before we found out about the Mind Flayer, before everything became complicated and dangerous. I thought back to Max skipping back and forth in her room, singing this song while I looked at the magazine on the bed.
I closed my eyes as tightly as I could, drowning out the music until I heard nothing around me. I focused on finding Max, with her beside me, possibly inside of me like Henry. There had to be a reason why I was about to bring her back to life. There had to be a reason why I saw memories that could have only been seen through Max's eyes. Henry, One, Vecna, he couldn't have won this.
'We make our own rules.' I hoped that was true now.
'Eleven hey um I'm Max.' I should have shook her hand.
'I don't want to die. I'm not ready.' I'm not ready for her to go either.
~You must be a angel, I can see it in your eyes~
Energy surged around me, the lights I could hear buzzing, the music started to creep back in my ears and the fingers that I was holding felt warmer until I heard a pop. The light on the nightstand cracked the bulb. I opened my eyes and nothing had changed, my teeth hurt from grinding them together out of frustration. I closed my eyes again to focus, feeling blood trickle down my nose. I poured every bit of energy I had into it and opened my eyes to find myself back in the hospital room but it was slightly darker and beside me was Max laying on the hospital bed except she wasn't in her cast. She opened her eyes with a start, breathing hard and ragged.
"Max?" I reached out and grabbed her arm, to feel if she was real like she had done to me when I had come to her mind before fighting Vecna.
She looked confused, her eyes weren't cloudy like they had been before when she had technically died, it was beautiful, she didn't appear to be blind. She clutched the arm I had on hers like she was going to sink.
"El, what happened? Where am I?" She asked sharply, quickly like it was rushed.
I wiped the hair out of her face and hugged her, not knowing if I believed it was really her yet, it could still be a trick of my mind playing with me, not real, not tangible. I would give anything to undo what was done. Had I been strong enough in the first place, this wouldn't have happened. If friends don't lie, then none of this would have happened if I hadn't believed Henry to begin with back in the lab. Some might see me as a superhero, special even, able to do miracles, but it all came back to a full circle. It started with me. The supernatural danger, Will disappearing, the grief Joyce had when she couldn't find her son. Barb, Bob, Billy, Eddie, Max. Everyone's close encounter made me sick to my stomach.
Max had admitted to wanting something bad to happen to her. The pain of watching Billy be killed, even if he was an asshole, affected her. Ruined their family.
"You died and I brought you back but it wasn't right, you won't wake up, I couldn't find you." My hand raised to touch her cheek, it didn't feel cold or hot. That didn't prove anything though. "Mike said you were in a coma."
Max didn't say anything and the silence hurt until tears came to my eyes. She reached out and grabbed my shirt, pulling me to her and hugged me tightly. The tears fell from both of us while I said I was sorry over and over until my throat burned. I couldn't have felt more sorry for everything than I did right now. Would I wake back up to a quite still room with Max still unresponsive, almost lifeless?
"It's okay. This isn't your fault." She whispered against my neck but it only hurt worse. Any forgiveness she gave me burned as if I didn't deserve it. I took in her words slowly.
I hadn't realized how much I had kept in, had guilt riddled inside me, until it poured out in this moment. This moment that I was not sure if it was real in the first place. Maybe I was finally going crazy or had conjured all of this in my own mind. It could be possible that I had pushed my powers too far when I killed Vecna and it fried my brain like my mother, a short circuit Dustin would have called it.
"I killed Vecna."
"Good. Is everyone else okay?"
Everyone else was alive, whether they were okay, that was a different story. "We didn't lose anyone else."
Max held me tighter, "Do you think I'll wake up?"
I nodded against her chest. "Lucas and the boys will be happy to know I finally found you. I couldn't for a while."
I felt her fingers running over my short hair, it was relaxing, calming even. I had missed her. Missed her witty remarks and mouth, her smile that made it seem like nothing bad was going to happen. Her laughter. She was the one in a coma yet she was holding me and I was fine.
"I don't want them to know anything until I wake up, I don't want to get their hopes up if I can't wake up El."
I didn't understand but I would do as she asked. There was still a chance that her eyes would open when I left her mind. I wasn't ready to leave yet to see if that possibility occured. I told her about the final battle, everyone's contributions and risks they took to help save Hawkins. Told her how her mother had not had a drink since Max went into a coma. I replayed everything that had happened from when she died until now.
Max tried to interrupt me when I apologized again, but I wasn't having it. Dustin explained the difference between facts and opinions until I could decipher the difference and the fact was everyone made their own choices. There wouldn't have been choices to make had I not trusted that Henry was a good person trying to save me when I was just a child in the lab. I had been too confident in my fight with Henry the first time when Max died and I had not made the same mistakes the second time.
We talked for what seemed like hours until I heard a nurse come and knock to tell me visiting hours were almost over. I gave her a rushed goodbye and hugged her, silently hoping this wasn't the end of our conversations and that it would be continued when I left her mind. The small smile Max had was the last thing I saw until I opened my eyes back up into the living world.
"Max." I said softly, running my finger over hers. Nothing happened. Did I just imagine that whole moment happen in my mind? Somehow I would find a way to wake her up. I would finish what I started when I restarted her heart and refused to let her just stay in that hospital bed the rest if her life.
I gathered my stuff, the music had already played all the songs on the cassette tape. I headed to the door to leave, glancing one last time back at Max before I went to the nurses station to call Hop to come get me. He was already here and had not left when he dropped me off earlier.
It took me five mins and twenty two seconds to reach the exit, Hop leaning against his truck when I came outside the door. "How was she?"
"Still in a coma."
He took my backpack and set it in the backseat, hopped in and put on his seatbelt. "Don't give up hope kid. You never know when people will just wake up like they haven't been asleep for weeks.. Max is a fighter."
That she was. He told me Mike had been calling every thirty minutes to check on me and I couldn't determine if I thought that was sweet or a little too much.
"I love you kid, we will all get through this together."
I grabbed his hand and squeezed it, "I love you too."
When we got back home I went straight to my room and looked for my blindfold. I felt antsy the entire ride back. I fumbled with the radio until I heard clean static and focused again on Max and there she was right before me as if I had not left her hospital room. The dread I felt when she didn't wake was washed away with sweet relief when I found her once again.
I walked over just close enough to grab her hand, to make sure I felt her hand touching mine, to make sure she was still there and still real.
"You weren't gone long." Max said, a sheepish smile on her face.