Chapter Text
Hawkins, Indiana [November 6, 1983]
Quiet. Dark. Undisturbed. Then—
“—Something is coming.”
Mike let the words echo, just for a moment. Long enough for his friends to squirm in their seats, to shift forwards, to taste the terrified question at the tip of their tongues—
“—Something hungry for blood.” Glancing over his shoulder for effect, Mike spun the tale further with vigour in his voice: “The shadow grows on the wall behind you, swallowing you in darkness. It is almost here.”
Dustin and Lucas leaned in, looking very serious. Will perked up in his seat, that attentive expression on his face. “What is it?” he asked eagerly, eyes shimmering.
“What if it’s the Demogorgon?” Dustin guessed, eyes going wide at the thought, while Will groaned and slouched in his seat again. “Oh Jesus, we’re so screwed if it’s the Demogorgon!”
“It’s not the Demogorgon!” Lucas insisted.
Mike hid a small smirk behind his book, looking from one boy to another. He knew exactly what he had in store for them.
“An army of Troglodytes charges into the chamber!” he yelled dramatically, grabbing the D&D figurine and planting it down firmly onto the table.
Lucas laid back with a grin, satisfied that he was right. “Told you!”
“Troglodytes?” Dustin snorted disbelievingly, his own grin traced with relief.
Will laughed it off with them, only for his smile to drop when he met Mike’s plotting gaze.
“Wait a minute…” Mike started again, effectively silencing their giggles. They all watched as he looked around. “Do you hear that?”
Crickets. But then—
“—Boom. Boom. BOOM!” Mike slammed both palms against the table. His friends jumped and Dustin even gasped. “That didn’t come from the Troglodytes. No. That—that came from something else.”
Will shifted in his seat. Dustin looked to him, then to Lucas, who was giving Mike a deadpan stare, probably having predicted their fate at this turn of events.
Well, out it came. Bang, dead centre of the table. “The Demogorgon!”
A round of groans went around the trio who Mike was Dungeon Master for, and he felt himself want to grin a little despite it.
“We’re in deep shit!” Dustin protested loudly.
“Will, your action!” Mike yelled.
“I don’t know!” Will cried out.
“Fireball him!” Lucas shouted.
“I’d have to roll a thirteen or higher!”
“Too risky. Cast a protection spell,” Dustin suggested.
“Don’t be a pussy,” Lucas argued. “Fireball him!”
“Cast. Protection.”
That was enough. Mike slammed his hands down again, letting the thud resonate around them. “The Demogorgon is tired of your stupid human bickering! It stomps towards you—BOOM!”
“FIREBALL HIM, WILL!” Lucas hollered on Will’s right.
“Another step—BOOM!”
“CAST PROTECTION!” Dustin hollered on Will’s left.
“It roars in anger—”
“Fireball—!” Lucas.
“Protection—!” Dustin.
“And—!” Mike’s gaze locked onto Will’s.
“FIREBALL!” Will screeched at last and rolled the dice – hard. It scattered to the other side of the basement and landed somewhere by the steps. They all swore and jumped out of their seats.
“What is it!?” Lucas cried out.
“I don’t know!” Will cried back.
“Is it a thirteen?” Dustin asked frantically.
“I DON’T KNOW!”
They scrambled to find the dice and what number was rolled. Dustin’s hands were behind his head as the words “ohmygod” repeatedly streamed from his mouth. Mike joined Lucas and Will on the floor, feeling around for the shape of a polyhedral dice.
“Mike!” The door to the basement suddenly flew open.
Mike looked up, wide-eyed, as his mother’s figure loomed over the room. He raised his arms in a ‘what gives?’ gesture. “Mom, we’re in the middle of a campaign!”
“You mean the end?” His mother raised an eyebrow and tapped her wrist as if a watch was there. “Fifteen after.”
When she walked off, Mike rushed after her, desperate to give them a bit more time. “Mom, wait! Just twenty more minutes!” he called, leaving the voices of his still-bickering friends behind.
“It’s a school night, Michael,” his mother chastised, stopping by the kitchen to scrape the leftovers off their dinner plates. “I just put Holly to bed. You can finish next weekend.”
“But that’ll ruin the flow!”
“Michael—”
“I’m serious, Mom! The campaign took two weeks to plan.” Mike couldn’t help the twinge of whininess in his voice. He really had put a lot of work into their campaign, and he had been waiting for this day keener than a child on Christmas morning. “How was I supposed to know it was going to take ten hours…”
His mother’s almost-sympathetic expression changed at that. “You’ve been playing for ten hours?”
Mike paused, huffing as he noticed the non-negotiable look from his mother. He turned to his father instead, who was adjusting the TV antennas. “Dad, don’t you think twenty more—”
“I think you should listen to your mother,” he responded dismissively, engrossed yet again with the electrical appliance. He grunted something incomprehensive as usual and gave the side of the TV several taps.
Mike looked from his father to his mother, annoyed by their refusal to hear him out.
When Lucas and Will emerged from the basement, Mike resigned himself to their fate and followed them out to say goodbye. “Dustin?” he questioned.
“Pizza,” Will replied. “He probably went to offer the last slice to your sister.”
Mike made a face. “What about me?”
Will giggled and Lucas snorted. So much for an answer.
They walked out and that was when Dustin joined them, door clanging behind him. “There’s something wrong with your sister,” he said, waving the criminally half-consumed slice of pizza in his hand.
Mike’s patience, which had dwindled since talking to his parents, only sizzled shorter at Dustin’s comment and the sight of the last pizza slice. “What are you talking about?” he muttered, barely restraining a sigh.
“She’s got a stick up her butt,” Dustin explained plainly, getting onto his bike. Mike watched him take a bite of the pizza and tried not to snap.
“Yeah,” Lucas piped up, swinging one leg over his own bike. “It’s because she’s been dating that douchebag, Steve Harrington.”
“Yup,” Dustin popped the ‘p’ while talking with his mouth full, “she’s turning into a real jerk.”
“She’s always been a real jerk!” Mike exclaimed, exasperated. He didn’t get why this was such an important topic anyway. As far as he knew, Nancy did whatever she liked and was the most annoying sister ever. End of story.
“Nuh-uh. She used to be cool. Like that time she dressed up as an elf for our Elder Tree campaign.” Dustin cycled off.
“Four years ago!” Mike called after him with a huff.
“Just saying!”
“Later,” Lucas said, cycling away as well.
Mike stared after them, lips pressed together to form a thin line. Between unoffered pizza slices and bothersome older sisters, he didn’t know which he less preferred.
“It was a seven.”
Mike’s head snapped towards the sound of Will’s voice. “Huh?”
“The roll. It was a seven.” Will was staring up at him, looking a bit meek on his bike.
Mike furrowed his brows, not quite catching up to Will’s words yet.
“The Demogorgon. It got me,” Will clarified. He shrugged a little, then began to pedal away. “See you tomorrow!”
The basement lights flickered.
Mike let his heart slow, wondering why Will had decided to tell him the truth. A simple lie would have benefitted Will, and Mike couldn’t even disprove it. Nevertheless, Will couldn’t lie. Not to him. And that warmed something in Mike, something small and significant that could be pushed aside but not forgotten. Something to get him through the night that hadn’t exactly ended to his liking.
Mike turned off the lights and headed back inside.
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[November 7]
Like every other day, Mike woke up to one of his comic books flat on his face – a result of reading too late into the night, right up until all the text started to blur and his eyelids slipped closed.
Mike peeled the comic book off his face, tossed it onto his pile of other comics, and rolled out of bed exactly how he was used to; sort of like a blanket-wrapped sausage that ended up splayed out on the floor. Not that Mike ever readily compared himself to sausages.
He bounded downstairs, where his father was already prepped with the daily newspaper and breakfast. The TV was on in the background and Nancy’s footsteps descended from the staircase.
“Sit down, Mike,” his mother said from the kitchen. “I’ll bring you some eggs.”
“Okay,” Mike mumbled, still only half awake. He rubbed the last of his drowsiness from his eyes and slid into the chair furthest from his father, whose newspaper spread was large enough to take up two seats on its own.
Nancy slid into the seat between them, already dressed, and Mike tried not to make a face at that. He hated early reminders about school.
Their mother brought out the scrambled eggs, smiling and gently putting down the plates. “Good morning, all of you.”
Nancy’s smile was quick and forced in return. Mike’s expression was probably worse. Somehow, their father gave even less of an effort.
That was when the telephone started ringing. Their mother sighed. “I’ll go get that.”
Mike grabbed the barbecue sauce bottle and poured some over his scrambled eggs, to which Nancy sneered at. “That’s disgusting,” she said, making a grossed-out face that Mike took great offence to.
“You’re disgusting,” he bickered back, faintly aware of Mrs. Byers’ voice over the telephone line. He grabbed the barbecue sauce bottle and instinctively poured some over Nancy’s eggs.
“What the hell, Mike!” she squawked indignantly.
“Hey, language!” their father warned.
“Quiet!” their mother snapped over her shoulder at the same time.
“Are you kidding?” Nancy scoffed. Mike couldn’t help his grin and laughed.
“Did I just hear Will back there?” he heard Joyce suddenly say over the receiver.
“Will? No, no, that was just Mike,” his mother replied.
“Will didn’t spend the night?”
“No, he left here a little after eight.” There was a pause. “Why? He’s not home?”
“Uh, you know what, I think he just left early for school. Okay. Thank you so much. Bye.”
“Oh, okay, bye.” The telephone line cut.
Mike looked up from where he was half trying to bat away Nancy’s frustrated bickering and half shovel spoonfuls of wonderfully saucy scrambled egg into his mouth. “Was that Mrs. Byers?” he asked.
“Don’t talk with your mouth full, Michael,” his mother said, then sighed. “Yes, that was Joyce.” She quickly looked to his father, but he wasn’t paying much mind to their conversation.
Mike frowned. “Do you think Will’s okay?”
“I’m sure he’s fine, sweetie. You’ll probably see him at school. Speaking of which, finish your breakfast and get going.”
Mike had never finished his food so fast in his life.
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Mike biked to school alongside Lucas and Dustin once all three of their streets crossed paths and they could merge into one.
“Where’s Will?” Dustin asked.
“I overheard my mom talking to his mom. Apparently, he went to school early,” Mike explained.
“Yeah, sounds like him,” Lucas said.
“I guess.”
“What, you worried?”
“No!” Mike didn’t like how transparent he sounded. “I mean, I’m sure he’s fine.”
“Yeah, don’t worry, dude,” Dustin chimed in. “Like Lucas said. It’s not out of the ordinary for Will to go to school early. We’ll probably see his bike once we get there.”
But they didn’t.
As the school bell rang, it became clear that Will’s bike was missing from where he usually put it in the bike rack with the rest of theirs. That feeling of wrongness stirred in Mike’s gut. “That’s weird. I don’t see him,” he said, trying to stay calm. Maybe Will had walked to school for a change.
“I’m telling you, his mom’s right. Probably just went to class early again,” Lucas reassured him. That would also support a random urge for Will to walk to school instead of biking there. Plenty of time for walking.
“Yeah, he’s always paranoid Gursky’s going to give him another pop quiz,” Dustin added. To Mike, it just sounded like an attempt to lighten the mood. After all, none of them wanted to jump to the conclusion that something had happened to Will. Something bad.
“Step right up, ladies and gentlemen!”
Of course Troy Walsh and James Dante had to appear at this very moment.
“Step right up and get your tickets to the freak show.” Troy’s grin was malicious, cutting where it curved and peered into Mike’s insides, curdling it like spoilt milk. “Who do you think would make more money in a freak show?” He hummed, like he was thinking about it, then stepped forwards.
“Midnight,” he said, pushing Lucas first – hard against the shoulder. Mike could see the way Lucas’ expression flickered from the corner of his eye. Scared.
“Frog-face,” Troy spat next, this time to Mike, who only looked down as he was shoved. He could be a paladin in D&D all he wanted, but in real life, he was nothing but a coward, and the thought gutted him worse than any insult out of Troy’s mouth could.
“Or Toothless,” Troy snickered last, hitting Dustin’s shoulder particularly hard. At once they each realised where this was going, an undeserving repercussion of last week when Dustin had talked back at Troy and James in order to defend himself.
James hummed and pretended to think about it. His eyes cruelly scanned over the three of them, before he smirked and pointed at Dustin. “I’d go with Toothless,” he said, spittle flying from his mouth as he mocked the way Dustin spoke.
“I told you a million times, my teeth are coming in,” Dusin muttered. “It’s called cleidocranial dysplasia.”
“I told you a million times,” James mimicked in that weird frothy voice that really sounded nothing like Dustin.
“Do the arm thing,” Troy interjected.
Mike clenched his jaw. Lucas remained completely still. They were both helpless to Dustin and to themselves.
“Do it, freak,” James snapped.
And so Dustin took off his jacket with his bag and did ‘the arm thing.’ His body made a cracking sound and their bullies gagged and groaned exaggeratedly.
“God, it gets me every time,” Troy jeered, sneering and laughing as both he and James shoved through them to walk away.
“Assholes,” Lucas muttered once they were gone.
“I think it’s kind of cool,” Mike said quickly as Dustin began to pick his bag and jacket up from the floor. “It’s like you have superpowers or something. Like… Mr. Fantastic!”
He wasn’t lying, either. Some quirks, despite what Troy and James had to say, were cool. Interesting, at the very least. And the next closest thing to humans having powers.
“Yeah, except I can’t fight evil with it,” Dustin huffed, but a smile peeked through anyway, and Mike had to call that victory enough.
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There was no sign of Will.
His absence gnawed at the back of Mike’s mind. Wherever Mike went, so did Will. That was how it usually was between best friends. And even if it wasn’t a best friend thing, it was a Mike Wheeler and Will Byers thing.
Besides, it wasn’t normal for Will to miss class. So, all in all, Mike was worried. He tried not to let it show, but he was pretty sure Dustin and Lucas had caught onto his stupidly dreary mood.
Whatever. Just, whatever. Was Mike not allowed to be worried for his best friend anymore?
Whatever.
At least he could look forward to Mr. Clarke’s class. Something that could occupy his mind without revolving around Will. Except, it kind of did. Will deserved to see their promised radio station at the same time the rest of them did.
But Mike had to look on the bright side. He just had to. Otherwise, all this worry would get to him, and maybe he really was worrying for no reason at all.
At least Hawkins wasn’t known for sad endings. Maybe sad beginnings, but not sad endings, right?
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Mike, Dustin, and Lucas stood right in front of their science teacher’s desk and stared.
Mr. Clarke stared back. He had just trailed off on a speech about the upcoming test which absolutely nobody had paid attention to.
“So, did it come?” Mike asked, unable to contain his excitement any longer.
Mr. Clarke sighed. “Sorry, boys. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but…”
Mike let the disappointment settle in and knew Dustin and Lucas felt it too.
“… it came!”
Mike’s head snapped up along with two others and he grinned at the sight of Mr. Clarke’s smirk.
“You’re the fricking best, Mr. Clarke!” Dustin exclaimed.
“Settle down, settle down,” Mr. Clarke said as they all gave a whoop of celebration, though his own smile was proof enough that he didn’t mind their excitement. “This way, boys.”
Mr. Clarke took them to his office, where Mike raced against Dustin and Lucas and was first in. “Yes!” he breathed out, promptly sitting on the comfy office chair and putting on the headphones. They had been waiting way too long for this radio station.
“The Heathkit ham shack,” Mr. Clarke introduced. “She’s a beauty, isn’t she?”
“I bet you could talk to New York on this thing!” Dustin cried out, grinning.
“Think bigger,” Mr. Clarke said.
“California?” Lucas guessed.
“Bigger.”
Mike gaped, turning to look at their teacher. “Australia?”
Mr. Clarke grinned and nodded. Mike heard Dustin gasp and found himself laughing alongside him.
“Oh man!” Lucas hooted. “When Will sees this, he’s totally going to blow his shit!”
“Lucas!” Mr. Clarke scolded, though clearly not that appalled by Lucas’ choice of word.
“… Sorry.”
When Will sees this.
Mike really needed to stop thinking about Will today. He smirked as he tuned the radio and leaned up to the microphone. “Hello, this is Mike Wheeler, president of Hawkins Middle AV Club,” he greeted in an Australian accent.
Suddenly, someone grabbed the headphones off his head. Mike turned to see Dustin put them on and lean in. “What are you doing?” Lucas exclaimed, giggling.
“Hello, this is Dustin, and this is secretary and treasurer of Hawkins Middle AV Club,” Dustin said in a similar Australian accent, grinning from ear to ear. “Do you eat kangaroos for breakfast?”
Mike and Lucas laughed at his impression and the comment. Just as Lucas reached over and yanked the headphones off Dustin, there was a knock on the door, left wide-open from their initial entrance.
“Sorry to interrupt, but may I borrow Michael, Lucas, and Dustin?” said the principal. For some reason, the Chief of Police was standing behind him.
Slowly, Mike realised something very, very awful had happened. And that it definitely had to do with Will.
He knew it. He knew it.
There was a tense silence for a moment, broken by the sound of Mr. Clarke clearing his throat. “You may,” he said shortly, glancing at the three of them with a concern he couldn’t quite properly conceal.
Mike shared a glance with Dustin and Lucas, before the three of them hurried to follow their principal and the town sheriff.
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They were led to the principal’s office and sat down opposite of two police officers, one of which was very clearly Hawkins’ Chief of Police. Mike’s eyes strayed to the sheriff’s name badge. Hopper.
“I believe you three are close to Will Byers, yes?” the blue-shirted police officer asked, to which they all responded with quick nods. “If you don’t know already, your friend has been reported missing since last night. According to sources, he was last at the Wheelers’ house with you three but did not return home. Do you know which way or where he could’ve gone?”
Immediately, Mike started to talk, exactly at the same time Lucas and Dustin opened their mouths. Which was annoying, but he was too concerned for Will to care and eager to tell the cops everything he knew to find him.
“Okay, okay, okay. One at a time!” the sheriff, Hopper, ordered.
They all snapped their mouths shut and nodded sheepishly.
“Alright?” Hopper gave them a serious look, then gestured to Mike. “You.”
Mike nodded so fast he heard a crick in his neck.
“You said what?”
“Mirkwood,” Mike answered instantly.
“Mirkwood?”
“Yeah.”
Hopper glanced at his police partner. “Have you ever heard of Mirkwood?”
“I… have not,” the police officer responded. “That sounds made-up to me.”
“No,” Lucas interrupted, “it’s from Lord of the Rings.”
“Well,” Dustin interjected, “The Hobbit, actually.”
Mike restrained the urge to groan loudly and tuck his face into his hands. Not only were they wasting time that could be spent figuring out where Will was, but they were embarrassing themselves in front of the Chief of Police, who could very well deem them useless, and then Mike couldn’t do anything to help Will. Ergo, they were ruining their reputations and sacrificing an explanation as to what could have happened to Will.
Lucas narrowed his eyes and slowly turned to Dustin. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Hey.” Hopper’s voice.
“He asked!” Dustin disputed defensively.
“Hey!”
“‘He asked,’” Lucas mocked.
“Shut up, guys!” Mike yelled.
“Hey! What’d I just say?” the sheriff reprimanded. “One. At. A. Damn. Time.”
They quietened.
Hopper’s eyes went to Mike again. “You.”
Mike inhaled sharply. “Mirkwood. It’s a real road. It’s just the name that’s made-up. It’s where Cornwallis and Kerley meet,” he explained, swallowing through the sudden dryness in his throat.
Hopper leaned back, nodding at the police officer next to him. “Yeah, alright. I think I know—”
“We can show you if you want!”
“I said that I know it.”
“We can help look,” Mike pressed on, determined.
“Yeah!” Dustin agreed.
“No.” Hopper shut them down. “After school, you are all to go home. Immediately. That means no biking around looking for your friend, no investigating, no nonsense. This isn’t some… Lord of the Rings book.”
“The Hobbit,” Dustin corrected, obviously unable to resist.
“Shut up!” Lucas hissed, swinging an arm over to slap Dustin’s knee. Mike pressed his lips together as they fought, limbs tangled in front of him. He wouldn’t have chosen to sit in the middle if he knew this was going to happen. Their bickering was beginning to piss him off, maybe even more than the fricking town sheriff.
“Do I make myself clear?” Hopper asked, voice low this time. He had leaned forward, surveying the three of them intensely. Then he stood up, towering, and Mike swallowed hard. Lucas and Dustin had stilled on either side of him. “Do I make myself clear?”
Mike forced himself to look straight into the sheriff’s eyes and answered along with Dustin and Lucas: “Yes, sir.”
And if Mike was secretly crossing his fingers behind his back (in his imagination, of course), then that was for him and only him to know. For now.
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“I know that face,” Lucas pointed out dryly, narrowing his eyes at Mike. “That’s your I’m-Up-To-Something face.”
Mike rolled his eyes. “Worry about yourself, Lucas.”
Lucas shook his head and hopped onto his bike. “Whatever. Get home safe, Mike.”
Feeling a bit guilty, Mike nodded. He knew, in some way, that they were all in this together. “Sure. You too, Lucas.”
Dustin joined them then, pulling over his bike, oblivious to the tension in the air. “This is so, so crazy. Will’s missing!”
“Yeah, we know that, Dustin,” Lucas groaned. “I’m going to head off now, before my parents make sure I never bike out alone ever again.”
While Lucas did exactly that, Dustin turned to Mike with a flabbergasted look on his face. “What did I do?”
Mike shrugged. “Don’t know. Catch ‘ye later, Dustin.”
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Mike hated nights like these.
“We should be out there looking for him right now!” Mike argued. He couldn’t stomach dinner knowing he could be doing something far more useful. “We should be helping look for him.”
“We’ve been over this, Michael,” his mother said, wiping off the spills on Holly’s shirt. “The Chief said—”
“I don’t care what the Chief said!” Honest. Maybe too honest.
“Michael!”
“Will could be in danger!” Mike cried out. Why did it feel like nobody in this house was listening to him?
“More reason to stay put,” his mother countered.
“Mom!”
“End of discussion!” she expressed, delivering the final blow.
Mike looked away, not bothering to hide his scorn for her opinion. Or any of theirs, matter of fact.
After a short silence, Nancy hesitantly spoke up. “So… me and Barbara are going to study at her house tonight. That’s cool, right?”
Of course Nancy had plans. Will was missing, and Nancy had plans.
Their mother sighed, long-winded and exhausted. “No, not cool.”
“What? Why not?”
“Why do you think!?” their mother cried out. “Am I speaking Chinese in this house? Until we know Will is okay, no-one leaves.”
“This is such bullshit!” Nancy exclaimed frustratedly.
“Language,” their father droned, barely audible over the heated tension between mother, daughter, and son.
“So we’re under house arrest?” Nancy complained. “Just because Mike’s friend got lost on the way home—”
“Wait, this is Will’s fault!?” Mike snapped. He was already on edge, and his own sister’s carelessness was going to make him puke on her.
“Nancy, take that back,” their mother scolded firmly.
Nancy scoffed, clearly disdainful. “No!”
Mike turned to her, enraged and upset. “You’re just pissed off because you want to hang out with Steve!”
Silence. Dead silence. Nancy’s eyebrows were so far up her forehead Mike thought they might as well disappear up her hairline. In fact, their parents’ eyebrows were in a similar lethal position.
In hindsight, Mike didn’t know where that had come from. He was more emotional than he’d thought, especially to bring up a topic he knew would forever put him in a row with Nancy.
“… Steve?” their father grumbled first.
“Who is Steve?” their mother jumped in immediately afterward, eyes narrowed.
“Her new boyfriend,” Mike told, too heated to care that he was probably going to be at the brunt of Nancy’s anger for a while after this. Cat was out of the bag now anyway.
“You are such a douchebag, Mike!” Nancy shouted. He avoided the daggers her eyes were throwing at him.
“Language!” their father hollered.
Nancy huffed irritably, standing up and strutting off with all the stampede of a firecracker at her heels.
“Nancy, come back,” their mother ordered in that controlled, calm voice she had whenever she was trying to piece things together. But Nancy didn’t respond, only storming upstairs like a woman on a mission. To kill. And it was probably Mike’s head on a pike first.
Their mother shook her head and started to comfort Holly, who looked on the verge of tears.
“You see, Michael? You see what happens?” their father said in that voice that made Mike’s skin crawl. Dismissive. All-knowing.
“What happens when what?” Mike snapped. “I’m the only one acting normal here! I’m the only one who cares about Will!”
A pause; stilted and awkward. “That is really unfair, son,” his father held up his fork, “we care,” then shovelled food into his mouth. Food that Will might not be able to eat right now. Food that he didn’t have access to.
Mike, shocked but at the same time not, slammed his hands against the table and left as well. Nancy had the right idea. He didn’t know if it quite had the same effect, because his footsteps didn’t unleash fire wherever he went, but it felt— liberating.
“Mike!” was the last word he heard before heading upstairs, followed by the mumble of Ted Wheeler: “Let him go.”
Mike breathed in shakily. Yeah, just let me go, he thought. Out there. Where Will is. So I can bring him home.
He slammed his bedroom door shut and immediately dove for the covers. Even the atmosphere of his room felt deafening. He shuffled over to his cassette player and looked through some tapes while blinking through tears until he found— something. Anything.
In the quiet of his room, he thought about Will and where he could be and what he was doing. Was he scared? Sad? Unconscious? Mike hated each and every possibility.
He itched to do something. He couldn’t just stay in his room, sulking away every minute that could be spent helping Will.
An idea popped into his head. Impulsive, but impossible to disregard.
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“Lucas, do you copy? It’s Mike.” He waited. “Lucas!”
Static, then a voice. “Hey, it’s Lucas.”
“I know it’s you. And say ‘over’ when you’re done talking so I know when you’re done. Over.”
“I’m done. Over.” Lucas’ exasperation was obvious, but Mike was relentless and convinced that his friends would do the right thing.
“… I’m worried about Will. Over.”
Lucas sighed. “Yeah… this is crazy. Over.”
“I was thinking…” Mike drummed his fingers against their D&D table, having gone to the basement to ensure some one-on-one walkie-talkie privacy. He could still vividly remember the way Will had looked at him the night he disappeared. “Will could’ve cast Protection last night, but he didn’t. He cast Fireball. Over.”
“What’s your point?” A pause. “Over.”
“My point is, he could’ve played it safe, but he didn’t. He put himself in danger to help the Party. Over.”
“…”
“…”
“Meet me in ten. Over and out.”
The static went off. Mike grinned.
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It wasn’t Mike’s first time sneaking out of the house.
And somehow, he got the impression it wasn’t Steve Harrington’s first time sneaking in a house.
Because as Mike had biked out, he’d turned and seen the figure of the one and only school jock and Mr. Popularity trying to climb through his sister’s window. The guy even had the gall to turn around and act casual when he’d realised Mike had spotted him.
Mike just shook his head and cycled away. There were more important things than his sister’s new and awful relationship with Harrington.
Like Will.
Mike pedalled until he saw two other figures cycling in the darkness. “Lucas, Dustin, that you guys?” he called out.
“No, it’s the bogeyman,” came Lucas’ sarcastic retort.
“Yeah, and I’m Gandalf,” Dustin muttered.
Mike snorted as he caught up to them. “Thanks for coming with me.”
“For Will,” Lucas added. “We’re all doing this for him, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Dustin agreed quietly.
The words washed over Mike and settled somewhere in his chest, a reassuring and unspoken feeling that intertwined each of them.
“Ah man, this is it,” Lucas uttered as they came to a stop at Mirkwood. The thunder roiled above them.
“Hey guys, you feel that?” Dustin said, looking up at the sky and wiping something off his cheek. He flinched as the sound of lightning pierced the sky. “I think maybe we should go back…”
“No,” Mike snapped without delay. He wasn’t going to let a bit of rain scare them out of finding Will. “We’re not going back. Just stay close. C’mon.”
“Just stay on Channel Six,” Lucas encouraged. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
At least Lucas had emboldened himself to do this with Mike.
“Hey, guys, wait up. Wait up!” Dustin cried out.
Mike waited with Lucas for Dustin to catch up to them, as they had trodden into the woods a little already without him.
“We can do this,” Mike said, looking once at Lucas and once at Dustin. “For Will.”
Lucas and Dustin glanced at each other.
“For Will,” they synchronised, nodding.
──── ⋆｡˚ ✴︎⋆ ⛉ ⋆✴︎˚｡⋆ ────
The sky had darkened and spread ominously across the treetops. Their bikes were somewhere beside the road they couldn’t precisely track back to. Still, they trooped further into the woods. The sound of rain and lightning overshadowed their voices.
“Will!” Mike kept yelling. “Will!”
“Byers!” Lucas called. “Byers!”
“I’ve got your X-Men 134!” Dustin baited. He flinched as another lightning strike shook the skies. The rain began to pelt downwards at a harder and faster pace. “Guys, I really think we should turn back…”
“Seriously, Dustin?” Lucas snapped. “You want to be a baby, then go home already!”
“I’m just being realistic, Lucas!”
“No, you’re just being a big sissy!”
Mike ignored them, moving his flashlight steadily across the forest ground to make sure he was looking into every crook and nanny.
“Did you ever think Will went missing because he ran into something bad?” Dustin mumbled, a tremble in his voice. “And we’re going to the exact same spot where he was last seen? And we have no weapons or anything!?”
Mike refused to answer that. “Dustin, shut up.”
“I’m just saying, does that seem smart to you?”
“Shut up, shut up,” Mike said, quick this time, not really listening to Dustin. He reached out a hand to stop them from walking further. He was sure he’d heard something. “Did you guys hear that?”
Crunch.
Mike whipped around, nearly knocking his flashlight into Dustin as he and Lucas also turned.
There was a screech, somewhere far away. Otherwise, nothing.
Crunch!
Mike gasped, turning back around and holding his flashlight in front of him like a sword. At the same time, Lucas and Dustin shrieked.
There was a person’s figure there. A child, their age.
Mike focused his flashlight on them, and two other flashlights joined in pursuit of seeing who it was.
Small, mousy, with a shaved head and a quivering chin.
A boy.