A/N: I know, I know, no smut last chapter. I promise there will be some in the future! Also keep in mind that Mike and Eleven are now both 18 in this. Thank you all for the WONDERFUL reviews! You guys are so sweet and adore every one of you 3 I also apologize for the chapter being so short, I'm trying to figure out where exactly I want this chapter to go from here on. I have so many ideas for the future, but can't get to any of them yet!
CHAPTER 4
STORY TIME
MIKE POV
Eleven and I always had a bond not many understood. From the moment we first met in the forest I knew she was special, besides finding out she had special abilities. She was and still is the most beautiful woman I've ever laid my eyes on. We've always had some type of understanding with each other, and communicated differently than with everyone else. She was my saving grace, the light I could find in the dark. She held me tightly as I cried into her shirt. It was comforting to know I would always have someone who understood me.
"Shh, Mike. It's okay. You're okay." Her voice in itself was soothing. I clung to her tighter, gripping her shirt in my hands.
"I had a nightmare about one of the nights I was in the lab. It was awful El." Her hand combed through my hair.
"It's okay, Mike. You're not there anymore and you don't have to worry about it ever again. Do you wanna talk about it?" I knew I could tell her everything, and although talking about it was hard, it felt so easy with her.
"There was a day in the lab where they did a different experiment than usual. Dr. Adrian took me into a room, and they strapped me down to a chair, then proceeded to inject me with something. It wasn't the usual injections which hurt really bad. It put me out, and I went through my biggest fear. You and I were in the Upside Down together, everyone else was dead all around us. They had been killed by the demogorgon. I grabbed your hand to run from the scene, and the demogorgon, it, it got you El. It slaughtered you right in front of me. I remember specifically feeling like something clicked in my body, and that was when I first used the pyrokinesis ability I had just then developed. I woke up from that state and saw the room was burning. There were men coming in extinguishing the fires. That's when they first discovered I had the ability, and when I found out." It was incredibly hard to not choke on my words.
"Who is Dr. Adrian?" She asked.
"Adrian is who runs the lab now. I didn't even see Brenner once. It's just Adrian and all of his employees." She nodded in understanding. El didn't wince when I brought up Brenner, I assumed that it didn't affect her as much anymore hearing about him.
"For now, let's get some sleep and we can talk more in the morning, okay?" I nodded into her shirt and wiped away my tears. For the rest of the night, I fell into a deep sleep in her arms and didn't wake until the morning. She always made me feel better.
THE NEXT MORNING.
EL POV
"Mike said he never saw Pa- Brenner once while he was in there. Instead that someone new, Dr. Adrian, was running Hawkins Lab." I corrected myself, Brenner was not my Papa. He never was. Hopper and Joyce were talking with Mike and I about what happened in Hawkins Lab.
"So you're saying that they abducted you while you were riding home, and have been doing experiments on you this whole time, and Brenner never once showed up?" Hop asked.
"Not once. No one spoke of him except when they were doing tests on me, then they would talk in the recording about how it was one of Brenner's experiments. So they're following procedures and ideas Brenner must've left behind." Mike was understandably having a difficult time talking about everything, but it needed to be done soon before any information could even remotely be forgotten.
"That must be how Eleven developed her abilities, with injections of a sort to mess with your minds. You said you developed the pyrokinesis power after it was triggered out of rage?" Joyce finally spoke up.
Mike nodded. "Yes, I think that could be the reason behind El, too. I developed the enhanced strength several days ago out of nowhere. I punched a hole in the wall because I was angry and my hand went straight through. I started focusing the ability on small things just to test out the waters so they could never notice. Then last night I used it to break down the door for the cell they had me in, and escaped here. They knew I was gone right when I got off of the property." Hopper gritted his teeth, it looked like he was frustrated.
"And then 54 on your arm, that means there was 43 people between you and Eleven being in that place?" Hopper asked.
"I think so. That's what it seems like. I never saw anyone else like me in there the whole time I was there. Unless they kept us separated for obvious reasons." Hopper stood up from his chair when Mike finished.
"Okay, kid. Well, if that's all you know then that's all we can work with. They could still try to come after Eleven, so you two just need to be careful. I'm assuming your parents don't know yet since you stayed here last night?" Mike and I both nodded.
"Karen came downstairs last night and Mike hid in the closet. She never found out, though." I said worriedly. Hopefully she didn't find out.
"I think Jim and I should talk with your family about everything, they might believe it more with the Chief in on the situation." That seemed like it would be the best option.
Later on that day, once Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler returned home from work, Joyce, Hopper, Mike, and I all headed over. We mentally prepared for the worst outcome, hoping things wouldn't go completely wrong. But it was time they found out, if we never told them, they could never know Mike was alive. Joyce and Hopper had us hang out in the car while we waited for a good sign to be able to go in.
"It's gonna be okay, alright? They missed you so much, they'll be happy to hear that you're home safe." Mike nodded. He was worried, I could tell. I just hoped that everything would go okay. We didn't need anymore trouble.
"Come inside." Hopper shouted out the front door. Mike and I got out of the car and walked slowly up to the door, hand in hand. Hopper followed behind and shut the front door. We made our entrance into the living room. Karen, Ted and Nancy were all in tears. Although Nancy already knew about everything, she hadn't figured out about Mike yet. Karen jumped from the couch first and grabbed Mike. She hugged him so tightly as she cried.
"My baby, you're okay. You're alive!" She grabbed his face smiling as she cried. "You have no idea how much we've missed you. Karen took a step back and gave Nancy and Ted room to talk to Mike.
About 20 minutes later, we all sat down and started talking seriously.
"You have to understand, that nobody can know about this. You can't tell anyone. As far as the lab knows, you all know nothing." Mike sat in the middle of the couch with his family surrounding him on all sides. They all nodded in understanding.
"So, you and El both have, well, powers?" Mike nodded and looked at me to explain further. He didn't seem like he wanted to talk much.
"Yeah, so I grew up in the lab until when Mike and the others found me. I can move things with my mind." I didn't feel like mentioning I could easily kill was needed at the moment. "Mike has pyrokinesis now, as well as super strength."
Karen looked over at Mike. "Can you both show me? I'm sorry this all just seems so unreal." I looked over at the vase against the window and knocked it over. Karen gasped. Mike then lifted his hand and started a flame in his palm.
"Does it hurt you?" Nancy asked.
"No, look." He aimed the flame towards his other arm and there was no burn mark left behind.
"Wow, I don't even know what to say." Mrs. Wheeler was shocked at all the news brought to her today, but she wasn't denying what was right in front of her which was good. Our expectations were lowered a lot with any possible outcome, so everyone was relieved at how well it went.
"So what now then? Mike can't go out in public now?" Joyce and Hopper thought long and hard. I didn't know a good cover up story for this, considering the police found his body in the middle of the road. Although it was a dummy, the rest of the town couldn't know about what was going on at Hawkins Lab. Nancy and Jonathan had done what they could, dumping all this information on everyone would be too much to handle and hard to believe.
"For now, no one can know about me being back. I've been gone for so long it'd be hard to create a cover up story, plus I don't want to be bombarded right now with everyone trying to come and say hello. I was thinking we could say I had been abducted, but again, it's too soon and I needs time." Everyone nodded in agreement. Saying he had been abducted would have been a great cover up, the town would think it was odd considering in the past they had also had a dummy body for Will, but it was believable and that's what mattered.
"What are we going to do about the lab? I want my family to be safe in this town, and they need to be stopped." Ted Wheeler spoke up.
"I'm going to have some of my deputies help us, they won't know the full story but everyone thinks that the lab was shut down due to illegal activity, so that's enough for us to get a warrant to storm the place and take them down." Eleven knew that they would be helping along with Hopper and his deputies, there was too many men for them not to be killed. We needed as much help as we could get. Now that Mike had abilities as well, we were at a larger advantage with him and I working together. Ted and Karen nodded in understanding.
"Well, we should have dinner tonight for everyone. A celebration that Mike is home safe with us. Everyone is welcome to come who knows, including your friends, Mike." Mike nodded. He smiled slightly, and I knew that something was up. He looked at me from across the room, and I could tell that all he wanted was to be happy with his family again, but at the same time he needed comfort more than anything. There was fear behind those eyes as well as pain. Mike had suffered so much, especially with how long he had been gone. All I wanted to do was just hold him forever and never let him go.
