Chapter Text
"M...e! W...u-"
It was a brief noise... like a itching in the back of his brain. Mike glanced back at his basement door... maybe it was just Holly and her friends downstairs? Despite this weak attempt to comfort himself, something felt... strange.
"Mike! Come on!" Karen called to him. "Your food is going to get cold!"
Mike jolted out of his daze. He rolled his eyes slightly and walked to the kitchen. "Right, sorry."
His friends were already eating at the table, chatting happily despite the emotional moments from before. Mike could still feel the phantom feelings on the soft weight of his DND book in his hands. He wasn't ready to say goodbye, not again. But did he really have a choice?
Mike sat down at the table, and any words he wanted to say felt... stuck. The lasagna seemed almost tasteless, and he felt like he was being watched by someone... or something. Probably just paranoia. It was a familiar feeling; however, he hadn't experienced it since all the... the "Upside Down stuff", as the Party called it. One would think they'd come up with a better name, seeing as it was way more than just 'stuff' (exhibit A: nearly getting arrested by the government), but they were still teenagers. Teenagers didn't always care for proper naming.
As Mike tried to think back further on it, he realized he may have forgotten more than he thought. The past eighteen months had felt like a blur in his grief, but this was... different. It was like there was a hole in his memory, one he hadn't bothered to think about until now, it seemed.
"Earth to Mike." Dustin said, snapping his fingers. "Hey, did you hear me?"
Mike blinked. "Sorry, man. What were you saying?"
"I was saying if we have time, we should maybe swing by the party that Stacey invited to us to. Y'know, get a taste of popularity before we're officially adults or whatever."
Mike frowned slightly. Since when did Dustin care about popularity?
He heard a noise. It sounded warped, cracked.
"Mike!"
His head whipped towards Will. That was his voice, right?
Will glanced up at him, some lasagna in his mouth. He raised an eyebrow and swallowed. "What?"
"I swear you just said my name." Mike said, frowning slightly.
"I didn't say anything... are you okay?" Will asked, those brown eyes growing soft. "You've been acting weird since you came up here. Did something happen?"
Mike sighed and ran a hand over his face. "No... no. I'm fine, I think I'm just... processing."
Lucas nodded, an understanding expression on his face. "You're good, man. I think we all still are."
Max rubbed the back of her neck, a sad expression on her face. "Yeah, I know I still am. Roller skating usually helps me forget, but..."
Mike frowned. Roller skating? "Wait, what?"
"I said, skate boarding usually helps me forget. Jeez, Mike, get your head out of your ass and listen?" Max said, a slightly tremble in her voice. "We're all still thinking about Ja- El."
"That's not what you said." Mike responded, his skin feeling cold. What is going on? Max had tried to call her Jane. Nobody ever made that mistake. "Why are you acting so weird?"
Will frowned. "H-Hey, guys, lets not argue, okay?" He offered Mike a small smile. "Maybe we should go to Melvad's for milkshakes?"
Mike looked at Will, and his best friend seemed like an alien to him. Something felt wrong. Very, very wrong.
"Melvad's is a general store. They don't sell milkshakes. And... you don't like them. They make you feel sick..." Mike trailed off, his heart racing. His stomach dropped with his realization. "...this isn't real."
Suddenly, it all made so much sense. The way everyone had been acting, the weird trip-ups when talking about a town that most of them had lived in since birth. The sudden change in the graduation gown's colors that was supposedly just for a 'change of pace'. All those times Mike saw the lights flicker and thought it was just some kind of PTSD.
It wasn't real. None of this was. The past eighteen months were a lie.
"Get ahold of yourself, idiot." Max snapped, standing up.
"Yeah, you're the one being weird." Dustin chimed in, his expression darkening.
"Maybe you should lay down..." Lucas added, a hard tone in his voice.
They looked like they were about to jump on him at any second. Mike looked at the kitchen, but neither of his parents were in there, just... gone. The sounds coming from the basement were no longer there. The colors felt off, like they were too bright. Little things that he had noticed in his subconscious were hitting him full force, and he didn't know how he didn't realize it sooner.
It's all a lie.
Mike instinctively looked to Will. Will's mouth opened to speak, but his body jolted and something in his eyes changed, rolling back.
"Mike, you need to wake up!"
Just like that, everything went up in red dust around Mike. The illusion of domesticity was gone, and he was only surrounded by a stormy red plain with stony formations that looks like monstrous claws. He stumbled a bit, his heart beating out of his chest. What was this? He could feel the panic rising in his throat, his hands trembling. Mike took a deep breath.
Will survived a week in the Upside Down when he was twelve... I can figure out how to get out of here. Regroup, refocus. What could this be?
Mike took a deep breath, trying to rearrange his thoughts. El had said something about this, after what happened to Max.
"We were in his head. It was... very red, with these big rocks and weird tentacle things that are in the Upside Down."
Great. Wherever he had been before, it seemed he had now traded it for Vecna's gross brain instead. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo.
Focus.
If he was really in Vecna's head, Mike was sure El or Will would be coming to get him. Will. Mike couldn't believe he had powers. He'd looked so incredible, and thinking back on it, he felt a sense of pride that it was his best friend in the whole world who'd been able to do all that. The sight of Will standing, that stormy look in his eyes with his hair all ruffled as he wiped the blood from his nose...
Focus, you dumbass, or you're going to fucking die.
Mike tried to think of more of what El had said. Something about memories. Maybe he had to think of his own memories and he could somehow hop into one of those? It was a stretch, but it was close to what El had described when she'd been trying to save Max. Though, he really hoped he wasn't in a Max situation, or he might be done for. He tried to think, to remember... his happiest memory, and then escape to it. Something to lead him back to himself, like after Will got possessed. Mike wouldn't let his best friend or El suffer even more by dying. He wouldn't give Vecna the satisfaction of hurting his friends.
When he thought of happy, warmth, and light... that memory showed up. The day he became Will's friend. Looking back, it seemed like only a small moment in their history... but it'd been the best choice Mike had ever made. It'd been the first day of kindergarten, and Mike was nervous. Alone. Up until then, he'd always been alone. A little oddball. Then, he'd seen Will sitting on the swings. Small, scared, also alone. So Mike had thought, hey, maybe they could be alone together. He'd taken a breath and walked over to him. Sat on the swing next to Will.
A few moments had passed before little Mike had found the courage to speak.
"Do you want to be friends?"
Mike still remembered the way Will had looked at him. Those big brown eyes had widened, and for a second, they had gotten a little shiny. It'd been clear to Mike then that he hadn't been wrong, that Will had been just as scared and alone as he had.
"Y-Yeah!"
Will had smiled. One of his front teeth had been missing, so he had a small lisp and a cute stutter.
"Cool! My name is Mike!"
"...I-I'm Will! Do... do you like DND?"
After that, the rest had been history.
Mike got lost in the memory a bit, his heart and body growing fuzzy with warmth the way it always did when he thought of it. But, he was jarred out of his thoughts when he saw something forming in the distance. A portal. On the other side was Will, holding Mike's lip body. Shaking him. Crying. Joyce was holding both of them close, and she seemed panicked and unsure. Will's hair whipped in the wind, and Mike could see the tears falling from Will's eyes onto Mike's skin. Mike could feel the warmth of Will's arms chasing away the cold from his damp clothing, he could feel the concrete touching his hands and the tears falling onto his cheeks from Will's eyes. A brush of the hand as Will moved Mike's hair out of his face.
"Mike, please! You need to wake up!"
Mike could hear Will's voice all around him, and it jarred something awake in him. He took a shaky step, then another, and then he was sprinting towards that portal. Back to himself, back to his best friend. It was the fastest Mike ever ran. Possibly one of the only times he's ever ran. He wasn't known for hauling ass, but his best friend was screaming and crying his name, and that broke something within him. As he ran towards the portal, he could feel the blood rushing in his ears and the tentacles on the ground trying to grab at his ankles. Mike's heart raced, and his hand reached out.
It's okay. I'm coming.