Chapter Text
Mike watched in horror as Vecna traipsed slowly back through the doors of the gate, leaving Will dazed as he dropped to his hands and knees. He’d heard from the others the description of Vecna: an evil sorcerer covered in creeping tentacles, with a skeletal face and piercing eyes filled with vengeance.
After over a year of only imagining, Mike finally saw him face to face.
His eyes slowly moved from Will to the demogorgon that was lurching toward him, breaking its way through the charred asphalt. It galloped into a leap, jumping straight for him with an outstretched claw. Mike shielded his face with his arm, as if it could somehow block the demogorgon from ripping him to shreds.
Suddenly, time seemed to stop.
Mike had expected that he would be dead by now, or at least be getting mutilated. Instead, he uncovered his face to see the demogorgon frozen in the air, screeching in pain as it was held up by some kind of force. His gaze fell from the demogorgon to what stood behind.
It was Will.
It was the same shy Will who he’d been living with all year. Little Will who he met on the swing-set so long ago. That same Will, his best friend of over a decade, held his arm up as he used it to hold the demogorgon in place.
Awestruck, Mike stared at him. His arm was outstretched, similarly to when El used her powers, but almost more similar to Vecna in the way he reached out, palms facing toward the sky as he siphoned the energy within him. His eyes were rolled back, and his breathing was uneven.
As Mike watched Will, wide eyed, another arm sprung up from Will’s side. He thought about how earlier Will had talked about his visions, where he could see what the demogorgons were seeing. He wondered if he was seeing something similar in his current trance. Will stood, both arms lifted as he shook, when his head flicked upward, seemingly grasping at something invisible to Mike once again through his vision.
Will’s breathy snarls increased as the demogorgon in front of Mike began to levitate even higher. Mike had never seen one of Vecna’s victims float before, but he had heard from Lucas that Max had risen into the air in a similar matter back when he had claimed her. Mike couldn’t breathe. He watched in horror as Will pulled his arms towards his sides with one continuous movement, and triggered the demogorgon before him to quiver as its limbs snapped one by one. It fell to the ground within seconds, lifeless.
Will fell to his knees, looking up to wipe the stream of blood that fell from his nose.
Mike was completely speechless.
He thought he would be scared, scared of what Will had transformed into. He thought back to his conversation with Will as they walked from The Squawk, when he had reassured Will that his connection to the Upside Down could mean that he might be able to harness power similar to Vecna’s in order to have control of the hive mind. He wasn’t scared as Will glanced at him from his knees, exhausted from his exertion of energy, blood still smeared under his nostril.
No, not scared, but proud.
Will was finally able to stand up for himself, refusing to be the victim once again. He was finally able to see the strength that he held within himself. He had never been able to see it before, no matter how much those around him tried to tell him. He was Will the Wise, he was a sorcerer, he was a survivor.
But then, as Will tried to get up onto his feet, he collapsed.
His head hit the pavement with a thump.
In the span of a second, all of Mike’s memories that he tried his best to bury came flooding back. Everything that had happened throughout the years. His pain when Will was missing, snatched in the night by the demogorgon. His need to protect Will while he was possessed by the mindflayer. And now, as Will lay still on the floor, Mike considered if all of it had finally been too much for Will. If he had finally used up every ounce of strength that he had left after fighting so many battles.
Feelings of dread consumed Mike. He ran over to Will, shaking him in an attempt to wake him up, but he was out cold.
“Will!” Mike screamed, tears forming in his eyes. “Will, wake up!”
Joyce was suddenly by his side, trying to pat Will’s cheek in order to get his eyes to open. “Will!” She called, her voice breaking, “My boy… please….!”
And then it all hit Mike.
All the feelings that he had been trying so hard to suppress. All the thoughts that pounded at the back of his mind. It all came rushing to the forefront of his brain. There was no denying it now, not as Will held on to life by a fraying thread.
It all rushed through him as he clung to Will, his sobs unable to be stifled. There was no sign of him waking up, and maybe he never would again.
“Will, please,” he cried, “I can’t lose you again. You can’t leave….”
Now all of the events from the past year made sense, he thought. Maybe even the past ten years. The unique nature to their friendship as kids, the unanswered questions revolving around their relationship as of late, the events that occurred recently in the Wheeler basement…
He finally understood why it had felt so weird seeing Will in Lenora, and why he felt so guilty after their fight in the rain, when Will ran off to destroy Castle Byers. He saw now why the tension between them never subsided through their time together the past year and a half, but only grew stronger.
He thought back to Will’s painting, the one that Will had spent so much time perfecting. The one where he was depicted as Mike the Brave, leading the party into battle. Will had given it to him that day in the back of the pizza van. He had told him that El had commissioned it for him to paint, but it had never made sense to Mike. El didn’t even understand Dungeons and Dragons, let alone understand the party’s character roles. It also didn’t make sense to Mike when it made him so disappointed to learn that Will did it only because El wanted him to, and not because he wanted to give Mike a present.
Now, it all fell together for Mike.
And he had only started realizing it last year, when Will came to live with him.