Work Text:
El huddles closer to the tree, arms wrapped around her knees tight. It is not making her warmer. It is dark-night like the Dark Room except if everything went on forever. She is so, so cold.
Sitting on the ground and the white snow that looks like soft blankets but turns into wet and cold when she touches it. Her pretty dress is wet and dirty and not pretty anymore. She does not know how long she has been here since Mike but she knows that it is getting colder and colder and colder.
Her whole body is shaking, teeth clicking clicking clicking. It is cold, and even colder because it is dark and night. She is hungry. She wants Eggos, and she wants blankets, and she wants her friends. Friends.
The big blue shirt with all the squares is not making El warm. Curling up in a ball is not making El warm. She is getting colder and colder and colder. Tired. She is tired, too. She wants to sleep but she is shaking and cold and scared.
Her fingers are hard to move when she tries to pull the big blue shirt tighter across her chest. They do not hold the fabric in the way they are supposed to. They do not move the way she wants them to. El breathes in, slow and small and shaky. That does not work right either. She is cold on the inside too.
Tired. She puts her face down into her knees so the cold-fast-air does not get her even more. Breathes in cold air, small and slow as she shakes and shakes. Her head is tired and her body is shaking and all ice that cannot move.
Mike, she thinks, and the thought is slow and almost-warm, because Mike is warm. Mike is Eggos warm and out of the rain warm and blankets warm.
El wants to be warm. El wants to sleep. El wants… El wants… El wants…
"Mike."
He jolts awake with a gasp, sitting up so fast he's upright before his thoughts have time to organise into words and sense. El, his mind says in a way that is desperate and important. "El," Mike manages through his half-awake mouth, flailing in tangled sheets. He rolls off the side of his bed and lands on the ground.
He stares at the ceiling for a long second, vision blurry and thoughts a sort of morning mush. He does not move or blink as his brain starts to whir to life and then—"El!" He exclaims, kicking the tangle of blankets off his legs and leaping to his feet. She's cold, she needs help!
Where is it… there! In his desperate flailing to wakefulness he had knocked his walkie off his bedside table to the floor. Now, he grabs it, holds down the button and—
What would he even say? Now that the fog of sleep is clearing, he's realising just how stupid this would sound. Especially to Lucas. He'd tried to tell Lucas, a few weeks ago, about how he felt like she was there when he talked to her at night, like, really there, and his friend had given him this odd pinched-lips look and said "you talk to her at night?" Like he was crazy, or something.
Mike knows that that wasn't a normal dream. That was El, and she needs his help, she called to him. He knows, somehow, that she was cold and shaking and weak, her voice even smaller than usual as she said his name. El needs help.
He doesn't have time to call the Party, and hear worry and pity and "but she's gone, Mike." He knows, in his heart, that she needs help and she needs it now. He can't waste time.
So Mike's yanking on a sweater, hopping awkwardly into his pants because he pulled them on too fast and now they're caught on his foot. He's shoving on shoes and clipping his walkie onto his belt loop and grabbing a jacket as he dashes out the back door, to where his bike is on its side under a thin dusting of snow. The sun hasn't yet inched up over the horizon, but it's light out in that bluegrey morning way.
And then he's pedalling as fast as he can manage, turning down streets without knowing exactly why he's doing it or where he's going. It's like El's a super-strong electromagnet, spinning his mind-compass to point towards her. Like how birds can migrate back home every year.
It might be five minutes or it might be an hour, but Mike's dropping his bike at the side of the road and running into the forest. (Later, when he's less consumed with thoughts of ElElgottafindEl he'll try and figure out how he knew when to drop his bike and go tearing into the woods, how he knew that she was cold and in danger, how he heard her in the night. El's powers are a mystery to everybody, including El herself.)
The sun is mostly-up now, not visible through the even layer of clouds but clear by the light. Pale grey sky reflecting off the barely-an-inch of white snow, dead grass poking out occasionally.
"EL!" Mike yells, turning in a circle, looking in every direction. "EL!" His heart pounds desperately, breath forming pale clouds as it puffs from his lips. Where is she? Why can't he find her? He tears off in a random direction for a minute, spins again. No, no no no! Again, he picks a random direction and bolts in search of her.
She's here, somewhere. She has to be. It was real—his dream, her voice, whatever strange force had pulled him here. It was real. It is real. He doesn't know what he'll do if it isn't.
His lungs burn from sucking in gasps of cold air. The forests around Hawkins are vast, too vast, he could be here all day and by then it'll be too late, he knows it. He can feel it.
It goes like this for what feels like an eternity of fear but he knows has to be only a few minutes. Run in a random direction, yell desperately for El, take off again. There are tears on his face. He's not sure when that started.
Mike reaches a small clearing, skids to a sharp and sudden stop as he scans the surrounding woods. No, no, no—there! He's bolting on shaky legs, crashing to his knees in a way that hurts.
"El," he breathes, hands hovering over her tiny body curled on its side. Was she… no. No, no, no. He's not sure why he can't bring himself to touch her. Like he's afraid she'll just go up in a burst of smoke as soon as he tries to make contact. "El?"
No response. He takes her shoulder, shakes it gently—she's so cold. So cold he'd think she's dead, if not for the slight movements of her chest, the little clouds in the air in front of her nose. "El, get up!" He demands, and this time. This time she stirs, foggy confused eyes fixing in his general direction.
"M-Mike?" She breathes, quiet and frail and alive. She's alive. He knew it, he knew she couldn't be gone. She's not gone, she's right here in front of him with tufts of actual hair and hollow cheeks and. She needs help, she needs help now.
"It's okay," he says, and he's smiling even though he also wants to cry. "It's okay—here, take my jacket, okay?" They're close to the Byers' place, less than a ten minute's walk, and when they get there El can have hot chocolate or-or a bath, and he can finally introduce her to Will, and Mrs Byers will know what to do. "It's okay. It's all gonna be fine, okay El?"
She gives him a tired, shaky smile, and Mike smiles right back. El's here and she's alive, and everything is going to be okay.