Mike found it hard to believe just how much had changed in three short years. They still had their rough patches, times when the past seemed determined to creep back into their minds, refusing to let them forget. The nightmares would come and go, and once in a while he would still find himself waking up in midair, moments before slamming into a wall. But, as time passed, the bad days came fewer and further between, and the good days came much more often. Today was a good day.
Sitting on the porch of the cabin, warm sun on his face and a cold lemonade in his hand, Mike looked out across the gardens of World Eleven. The space was bigger and more beautiful than he ever could have imagined that first day when he brought El through. She had added her own touches everywhere, beds of flowers and delicate shrubs carefully tended. The original stream had been split and split again, until it formed a whole chain of pools and tiny waterfalls, winding their way throughout new beds and paths. In the middle of it all, Mike watched her walking slowly among the blooms, hand in hand with the other important girl in his life.
Little Theresa Wheeler, named for her grandmother, loved the garden nearly as much as her mother. Though only 18 months old, she greeted the space with delighted squeals every time they stepped through the portal. She was always eager to help in her little ways, poking at the ground with a tiny shovel of her own whenever they planted something new. Watching her toddle along the curving paths, Mike found himself lost in thought, reflecting on the life that had seemed an impossible dream only a few years before, and wondering just what the future will hold for Terry. As Will had warned him would happen, Mike tried to look at the world through her eyes, envisioning just what life would have in store for his little girl, and how they would help her navigate it all.
One of the biggest questions he and El worried over, with both excitement and dread, were the traits she may have inherited from each of them. Will she be brave and strong like her mother? Will she move heaven and earth for the ones she loves? If El and her mother both had their special abilities, it stood to reason their daughter may show similar gifts. Would they be able to keep them hidden without leaving her feeling like some kind of monster or an outcast from the world where she belonged. Mike already knew, if she did someday show abilities of one form or another, El would be the one who could best help her to understand what it all meant.
They had discussed it at length, and agreed that someday they will have to sit her down and tell her about all that had happened, the good and the bad. Probably not all at once, and certainly only what she could handle at the time, but they would make sure she got the full story: the lab, Brenner, the demogorgon, Uncle Will, the basement and the search. He knows the story won't be an easy one to tell to a child he wants to shelter from the hurt of the world, but he can only hope it will help her understand her own place, and that of her parents, in all of it.
The world will change in drastic ways during her life, and she will unknowingly be at the very heart of it. To the world, Michael Wheeler will come to be known as one of the more enigmatic figures in scientific history: the man who turned nearly every discipline on its head and then walked away from it all to become a best-selling fantasy novelist. As much as he wanted to keep his name out of prominence, it would follow him all the same. But to Terry, he will still just be dad. In high school, she will understand why her father's name appears all throughout the later chapters of her physics textbook. She may grumble at the more difficult chapters his work added to her math classes and he will have to remind her he was creating those equations when he was her age.
The full story will help her understand her mother, too. Author of the 'Recipes for Little Monsters' children's cookbook series, El will help guide the next generation of aspiring chefs. Terry will recognize in a handful of the recipes, inspiration that roots back to the meals El had to scrape by on in her basement refuge. She will understand why her mother sometimes wakes in the night, screaming at nightmares that wont go away and why her parents sit up through the rest of the dark hours talking in hushed tones and sharing a box of Eggo waffles. She will understand why an old stick with a large kitchen knife strapped to the top sits propped in the corner of their bedroom.
On top of everything else, she will understand that her parents love each other, with a love that crosses all boundaries of space and time. There isn't a thing they wouldn't do, and a distance they wouldn't travel, for one another. And she will understand that a promise made will always be kept. Whatever else he did in life, Mike was determined to help Terry understand.
The latest theories being explored by the team spoke to the possibility of worlds parallel to their own, not dark reflections but truly identical, save for minor details. Somewhere, it was likely there were other Mikes, possibly still locked in their own desperate search for the Els they had lost. The thought saddened him a little, knowing what their parallel selves might be going through, but he took comfort in knowing somewhere deep down they would all find one another someday. As for himself, he had stepped through Hell and brought home his angel.
The sky was turning pink, the sun dipping low on the horizon. El reached down and scooped little Terry up into her arms, turning to start back toward the cabin. Mike watched El's face light up in a bright smile as she caught him watching them, and he couldn't help but break out in a warm smile of his own.
Today was a good day.
Across the cosmos, a trillion, trillion realities away, Jane Hopper stood in her basement, one hand pressed hard against a glowing red portal that refused to yield. She still had a few hours before her father was home from the station, and she was determined today would be the day she finally made it through. Growing up, she had never been one for science, engineering, any of that, until she had something important that forced her to dive in and study them all. It was still hard to believe, she recalled with some measure of guilt, that five years had already passed since the week that had forever changed her life.
She and her sister, Sara, along with two of their friends, had just been playing out in the woods the day they found Mike, escaped from a nearby lab where he'd been raised like a prisoner, and was now on the run from evil forces from this world, and from worlds beyond. She couldn't explain it, but she had felt drawn to him nearly from the start. She had brought him home, cleaned him up, and given him somewhere warm to sleep while they figured out what to do next. He spoke very little, shy and terrified of the world he'd never been exposed to, but she came to understand the unique and amazing person he was and vowed to do whatever she could to keep him safe.
In the end, he was the one to save her. The bad men who had held him captive managed to track them down. The creature from another dimension he had accidentally set free found him as well. He had killed the men, all to keep her safe, and then pulled the creature and himself down through the dimensional rift. As suddenly as he had come into her life, he was gone. Everyone told her she was crazy, that he was never coming back, but she could still feel him there, close beside her. When a year passed and he didn't come back, she decided she would find her way to him instead.
Five years, almost to the day since he disappeared, she had a portal before her, stubbornly refusing to let her pass. It had defied her for days, but she wouldn't let it best her. In a stroke of frustration, she went out back to the tool-shed and grabbed a pickax. Squaring up her shoulders, she took a hard swing, intending to bury the sharp point in the portal's face. Instead, the heavy implement bounced back without making so much as a dent. She dropped the pick and hung her head, breathing hard in frustration. Only when she looked up, determined to try again, did she realize the surface had changed, no longer solid.
She put a tentative hand forward, her fingers disappearing as they passed through the now-yielding surface. She had done it. She had made it through. She was going to find Mike and bring him home, to the place where he belonged. Grabbing the pickax from where it lay by her feet, Jane stood before the portal, ready to step through.
"I'm coming, Mike. Hang on."
AN: And so our story draws to a close. I just want to give one final, heartfelt, thank you to everyone who has left a comment, a follow, a favorite, or even just taken the time to read a chapter or two. It really means a lot to me that so many of you have followed along with this story for the last year-plus.