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There’s a ticking noise sunken below Will Byers skin. He shouldn’t notice it when his feet are hitting the ground so hard that he is sure to split a bone at just the wrong angle. Yet he does. Maybe it has always been there and only now can he hear it bounce off his organs and ring in his ears. Or maybe he just didn’t want to hear it. He doesn’t know.
All he knows is to keep running. That’s all he has ever known.
He should only be aware of his own breathing scattered between those seven seconds of silence. But every time another bolt of red strikes the upside down, it is only Mike he desperately searches for. He needs to hear his feet hit the ground and his insistent need to waste his breath on cursing god knows who. It’s all Will needs right now. He needs to know he is safe and he won’t leave him behind. Not ever.
They make a break for the church. Throwing themselves at the doors and shoving anything in front of them to hold them shut. Neither of them know if they were still being chased but Will has a sick feeling it doesn’t matter.
“Shit” Mike mutters after ten long seconds of heavy breathing. He pushes his black curls from his forehead and sinks to the ground.
If the circumstances were different, Will would probably be elated to finally be alone with the boy he has been in love with since he knew what the word love is.
But things are different and Mike Wheeler cannot save his heart this time. Will is sure of it.
Mike is pulling off his backpack. Will thinks he pulled out his walkie, the comforting sound of the other’s voice fills the air but he tunes it out, only static remains. It’s cold here, just like the first time but Will no longer feels the urge to straighten up his jacket.
Will walks down the middle of the church, each step like a tick on his eternal clock, until his hand grazes the edge of rotten wood. There’s a slight tremor beneath his fingertips when he familiarises himself with this pew. A wish for who will sit there breaches his mind but tears have always come too quickly for Will. Instead he sits down to force them away.
It is then he hears a gentle calling of his name. It makes Will choke out a bitter laugh because even in these bleak circumstances, Mike calls his name just as soft as before.
Oh and Will? He tries, he tries and has tried his whole life not to cling to it but he is weak for this boy. He wonders how unlucky he must be to be with him at this moment… it’s almost cruel but that was just his life wasn’t it?
He never had a chance since the moment he was born. The clock would never stop ticking.
He closes his eyes and just prays to whatever god could still be left to hear his prayers. If it’s the same god they worship in Hawkins then he’s sure a sinner like himself, with the love that he harbours, would not even be worthy to utter this God’s name.
People spit on boys like him for sport. They would relish in his misery and maybe even throw in a kick or two just to make it stick.
Will still tries. Pleading and begging for whatever mercy, for whatever way he can repent that the hand on his shoulder is not Mike Wheeler’s. It can’t be. He is not strong enough to handle it.
This isn’t a word he can try to forget in his pillow in another sleepless night or a desire he digs in at his skin to inspire resentment.
This is his hand. He can’t delude himself.
Because he knows Mike. Fuck he knows him like he knows how to breathe. He knows every freckle on his skin and which ones fade in what seasons. He knows the current of his laughter and how it has always washed his sorrows away. He knows how he thinks and that cute move he does with his eyebrows after he just misses a great discovery. He knows how hard he has tried to be brave, to not flinch in the face of danger and to keep the ones he wants to protect with a spark of optimism. He just knows him. How can he know anything else? He doesn’t want to. He would stare at Mike his whole life and know every inch of him if he could.
But all Will sees now is an empty church and an omen that strikes every seven seconds.
“Will? What’s wrong?”
And he could cut his ears off and mutilate himself to escape that sweet voice but he knows even then he would still hear him. He could drop dead right now and still hear Mike’s voice.
“Nobody answered my code red but- but- everything is fine okay? Will? I’m sure that-”
“Do you hear it?” Will interrupts him, slowly opening his eyes. “Can you hear it Mike?”
Mike blinks and squeezes his shoulder a little harder. “Hear… hear what?”
A tear rolls down Will’s face and he locks eyes with Mike. There’s an unknown terror lingering in those big puppy dog eyes when Will takes just a second too long to answer.
“The ticking.” He finally gets out. “Do you hear it?”
Mike’s eyebrows are furrowed in that cute way he has always cherished. This time however he just wished he wouldn’t ask “what ticking?” because now he has to say those words out loud. Words he has been running from for so long.
But there’s nowhere else to run. There is a fleshy wall just outside and Will Byers has nowhere else to run.
“I think I’ve always heard it… maybe now it is louder because I’m not afraid of it anymore.”
“Will… what ticking?”
Mike sounds more concerned now, his hands are slightly shaking but he isn’t there yet. He can’t hear it. It’s like he won’t accept it.
Will stands up and brushes Mike’s hand away because if he is going to be the one to say it then he can’t look in his eyes, he can’t feel his hands on his skin. He just can’t.
It’s just not fair.
Curling his fingers into his palms to break just a little skin. Another deep breath and two tears escape. He has his back to Mike.
“I feel like my life has been one big timer… a clock I just couldn’t shut off. I used to wonder why waking up everyday would feel so… hard? I can’t explain it but… it’s like- it’s like I always maybe knew.” He spits out a laugh but there’s no joy in it. “Maybe not a clock then-”
“Will stop-”
“Ever since I came back here. The upside down. I’ve felt this ticking grow louder and louder but I- I didn’t know what it was or what it meant.. I thought that you or mom or even El could hear it but they can’t can they? They can’t hear it, can they, Mike?”
“What are you talki- Will what is going on-”
Will turns around to swat the hand Mike had reaching towards him away, their eyes meeting in the middle. “You can’t hear it can you?”
“I-I-”
“I don’t think I can either but it’s there, I know it is and you must know it too Mike. You have to know it because you’re smart, you’ve always been smart and brilliant and you can’t miss this. Nobody could- not even me!”
“You’re not dumb Will!? What- what are you saying- slow down-”
“Don’t you see it? All I have ever done is slow down. Stop this. Delay this. You, me, mom, Jonathan, El, Lucas, Max- god everyone!” His voice has fallen off that careful edge of just being too loud, any creature could sense they're here but Will knows they already know. It’s been too perfect… too lucky.
Will Byers doesn’t get lucky, he only gets time.
“There’s… there’s a reason I can control them. A reason I can feel him… I wasn’t just some other kid Vecna snatched up Mike. You have to know that.”
Mike swallows and Will sees a wobble on his bottom lip. His deep dark eyes that Will used to seek the world in at one point are now too scary to explore. He knows he himself is no better, his throat is scratchy and his face is drenched in those silent tears. Truthfully he is a hypocrite because even now he won’t even admit he doesn’t want to go. For the first time in his life he wants.
He wants to reach out and hold him, kiss him, feel him but he can’t. Not here, not ever.
These three days have been everything Will could have ever dreamed for, even amongst the chaos and death. He has been looking over his shoulder his entire life and yet now, only as he is facing death has he found a sense of peace. A reason to look away and to instead look forward.
He saw his future and for a fleeting moment it was big. It was bright.
Now it collapsed in his hands like grains of sand. It escaped through the cracks of his fingers and faded away into the eternal night, too small to see and too scattered to complete again.
It was as if his hourglass had finally shattered but it had run out so long ago.
That was the funny thing about fate. You could run from it, delay it, confront it with both eyes open but you could never truly escape it. The moment Will biked away from the Wheeler’s with a promise of tomorrow, Mike was destined to hear that goodbye again and this time he couldn’t meet it with silence. There were no more unspoken promises of tomorrow.
“We can’t- we can’t lie to each other anymore.” Will speaks up once more. “I won’t leave with any regrets and so I just won-”
“Leave?!” Mike interrupts, his voice is scattered with a million emotions Will cannot place. It bounces off the church so hard it makes him snap his mouth shut. “Will you are not going anywhere. You aren’t- we don’t… we don’t lie to each other. We never have so stop this- whatever this is!” He throws his hands up in the air and tries to force a smile but Will can see his eyes water. He knows. “Whatever this is, whatever you are thinking it is not true okay? We have beat this before we are going to do it again-”
“Mike…”
“You took the powers from Vecna, remember?! That was you. You’re a sorcerer just like I knew you were okay? We stick to the plan and we meet the others at the gate by-”
“Mike…”
“Once we get out of this fucki- ugh when the others call me back and they will then we can get out and we can work this out together okay? Like we promised. Like I promised alright?” Will has shut his eyes, silent as Mike’s rambling comes to a sour end. “Will I promised I’d bring you home and that’s what I am going to do.”
“I know”
Mike grabs his shoulder again and Will can hear the smile through his voice. This just makes him clench his eyes shut even tighter. “Then stop this- all of this okay? Just- Will I… I won’t let you leave. We don’t lie to each other, so don’t- don’t start now.”
Will sniffs and shakes his head. He smiles so so tired and meets Mike’s eyes at last.
If only he knew.
It should be relieving that for once he can read this boy so well but right now it breaks his heart. There’s no trace of that Mike hope and blind optimism he embraces so dearly. All that’s left is a mirror. All Will sees is himself in Mike’s eyes.
All that remains between them is the brutal truth.
Because all Mike can see right now is Will and all he can feel is the fading warmth of his shirt that is twisting in his grip, his slender fingers digging in like he can’t bear to let go. Will’s eyes catch a tear rolling down that perfect face he’s dreamed of holding far too many times. He would trace it across that sharp jawline but he himself cannot look away. He can’t run from his fate any longer, not even in the eyes of the boy he loves.
Will huffs out a faint chuckle and attempts to wipe some of the tears from his cheeks.
“I’m not lying.” Will firmly replies. “You know it too. The reason I’m so connected to him- to Henry. Isn’t it obvious by now Mike? Something happened to me he did something to me and-”
“-he took you that’s all-”
“-and now we are linked. We are so linked I can pull from his strings just like you said I could! I can tap into the hive mind when I am close to another monster from this place and I can do it on my own too. You believed I could control a demogorgan but this is too impossible for you? Mike please… you know it too.”
Mike shakes his head and uses his other hand to grab Will’s wrist, the one that he was using to wipe his tears.
“You- we don’t know shit. Okay?” He speaks so resolutely but the way his jaw tenses betrays him. “We wait for the others to call back. That- that is what we will do.”
“Do you hear it?”
“No Will. I don’t hear this ticking so stop it okay! Stop it-”
“- I don’t either.”
“... what?”
Will glances at the fingers wrapped around his wrist, a tiny smile appears on his face like some lame movie Robin told him about. It feels like forever since he was in those tunnels, his only worry then being that he just embarrassed himself in front of Mike.
All that seems so impossible to fixate on anymore. He doesn’t care what it says about him as he twists his wrist to hold Mike’s hand in his own. He doesn’t even care to over analyse the hitch in Mike’s breath after he does so.
“Anything.”
Mike raises an eyebrow.
“Why can’t we hear anything Mike?”
There’s a beat before it hits. Will sees exactly when it does because all of a sudden Mike is as close as he’s ever been to Will and the next he’s pulling away as if his touch burns. He opens and closes his mouth several times but nothing comes out. It’s at Mike’s panic that Will lets himself be overcome with grief at last. He lets the dam break and he crumbles. He completely falls apart.
Because there should be a struggle, there should be something trying to break its way in, to tear them apart or tear the flesh from their bones.
But there isn’t.
“It doesn’t want me dead” Will manages to get out through his sobbing “it knows it can’t kill you either. I wouldn’t let it.”
“Will sto-”
“-and what Mike?! Pretend everything is okay? Pretend I can’t hear it- that I can’t see with my own eyes? This is what he wanted and now he’s making me choose- and I- I can’t fucking choose-” Will cuts himself off with another choked sob. It’s not the time to tell Mike the truth but he so desperately wishes he could. Maybe if he was braver before they stepped foot in this hellscape he wouldn’t have to regret this.
He never wanted to regret the day he finally told Mike he loved him but like everything else in Will Byers life, he doesn’t get what he wants.
“You’re wrong. If- if what you- no it can’t be it would have never let us get this far and we’re so close-”
“-Mike please…”
Mike’s eyes are red and his face is contorted in agony. It’s a look Will has never seen before and he selfishly wishes he never had.
It makes this next part so much harder.
Because when those big beautiful eyes finally meet his own, searching for a way out, for proof that he’s misreading, that Mike got it wrong… he simply cannot find it. It’s not the first time Mike can’t find the answers he wants from Will. But it is the first time he can’t run from it. The truth.
Mike has never given up so easily, it’s one of the reasons Will fell so deeply in love with him. That hope was contagious, it brought him to life in ways he never thought were possible and took his hand through every hurdle life threw at him. It didn’t matter if they fell apart because as long as they both lived, they’d always find their way back to each other.
It wasn’t fate or destiny… it was a chance and from the second they met they kept taking that chance. They never truly stopped.
“You’re not going anywhere okay? Just give me- give me time I can figure something out okay?”
“Mike…”
“Okay?” Both Mike’s hands caught on Will’s elbows, holding him in place. His tone was soft like before and Will was just so weak for this boy. So he nodded back.
Mike pulls him into an embrace. One of his hands is tangled in Will’s hair and the other is at the base of his neck. If Will focused just a little on anything other than those hands he used to dreamily sketch then maybe he’d feel the delicate coldness sliding down his neck.
But then again he was already overcome with his own tears and hands that he did not know where to place.
They eventually found their home clutching at Mike’s jacket and just for once he let himself be selfish. He let himself seek out this warmth he had denied for so long.
For a long time they just stood there, holding onto each other like this was one of Will’s dreams. Only without the tears and the dark abyss that surrounded them.
This was no dream and that reality came crashing down as Will spotted silver peaking from the inside of Mike’s bag.
“Mike” He spoke carefully into the crook of his neck and when he didn’t get a response, he pulled a little back. Surprisingly the other let him.
Yet this time when their eyes met, it was as if nothing needed to be said at all and every moment of their lives together flashed before Will’s eyes.
The truth was… they were both hypocrites.
Neither of them would say the words nor would they attempt to lie about them, not to each other, never to each other.
Mike’s breathing was rough and his voice was shaky, even now he was holding himself back from breaking down but there were tears endlessly flowing and he couldn’t stop shaking. Will could tell he wasn’t any better.
He rested his forehead on Mike’s and held him there by cupping his cheek when he tried to pull back. Through broken sobs Mike was trying to speak the word “no” and he shut his eyes, clutching at the strands of Will’s hair. Holding onto anything for a little hope.
When Mike looked at Will he always felt sure but now all he wanted was to look the other way.
Will couldn’t hear the ticking anymore, he couldn’t hear the lightning or the monsters beyond the walls.
No this time all Will could hear was the sound of Mike’s heart breaking and that was the worst of them all.
There had been a time Will thought that everyone would’ve been better off with him gone but he felt that feeling was too selfish of him to harbour. Everyone had fought too endlessly, sacrificed too much to keep him around and so how could he question that? Why would he even dare?
Yet he never fully let that doubt go… not until now.
Because as Mike leaned into his space further. Their noses bumping, their breaths mixing and their tears falling in sync. He realised for the first time he was wrong. He had spent so many years with thoughts of tomorrow and only now did he realise how much of a waste that had been.
Dreams are not for boys like Will Byers or Mike Wheeler and this dream has come to its bitter end.
“You promised…” Mike whispered, his voice was still hoarse and his eyes still closed. He then slid a hand from around Will’s neck to cup his cheek. His thumb swiped uselessly against Will’s tears. “Will you promised.”
“Technically only you did.”
At that Mike huffed out a laugh. “How can you joke right now?”
“I don’t like seeing you cry.”
“Too bad.”
Will let the hand holding Mike’s cheek fall to his shoulder.
“You can’t go… not- not yet.” And oh that crack in Mike’s voice was just horrific and if Will wasn’t so deeply in it with this boy he would take his hand and run out of there right now. Escape this hell hole and this town.
But Will cannot doom Mike to a life that was never even his to begin with. This would always haunt them and Will… he couldn’t put him in danger. Not again.
Mike’s thumb moved from his cheek to under his nose and touched blood. His eyes snapped open. “Will?”
But it was already too late. “I’m sorry.” Is all Will said and he raised the hand on Mike’s shoulder directing a vine to wrap around his arms and pull him to the wall. Mike gasped as he was ripped away from Will and watched in horror as Will finally opened his eyes to reveal pure white.
“I’m sorry.” He spoke again and turned swiftly on his heel towards the entrance. He could hear Mike yell his name, beg him to stop and turn around but he just couldn’t do that.
Reaching down into Mike’s backpack he grabbed a torch and the gun he had stashed away thinking Will wouldn’t see. If Will couldn’t stop the inevitable he could at least delay it one last time.
It didn’t take long for him to get the doors open and by then Mike was screaming at him and it hurt. It hurt that Will was the one to make him feel such anguish but he can’t do this anymore.
He won’t let Mike be hurt by his fate… not anymore.
He turns one last time to look at him and with a final smile, so genuine and pure he says those three words he should’ve said in California. No, what he should’ve said the day they met.
Will should not be happy as he says it but even now as he faces what comes for him next he couldn’t be happier to tell the boy he loves just how much he means to him. He doesn’t need anything more than that.
Because that’s the funny thing about fate right? It doesn’t matter what twists and turns interrupt its path because you will always find yourself retracing the same steps.
So, Will never waited for a reaction nor a response. He just left.
Because if he could die with just the knowledge he loved Mike Wheeler, then that would be enough.