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"Too Late for Goodbyes"

Now I know what you meant to me

I'm the one who should cry

And it's much too late for goodbyes

Yes, It's much too late for goodbyes

- Julian Lennon

They stood at the bars together, watching the guards march in their rotation, not talking. Hopper was trying to conserve his energy for whatever was to come. He was still battered and bruised and broken, but he might be El and the others' last hope to take this thing down before the Russians and the Upside Down went after his girl, and he was damned if he wasn't going to win today. Or tomorrow, or whenever they lined the prisoners up to be slaughtered.

Antonov nodded at him, sharply. He had seen something in the movements below that told him it was time, or would be soon.

Hopper turned away, ripping a long piece out of the lining of his jacket. It was thick enough, stiff enough, that he hoped it would burn well. Balling it up, he stuffed it into his pocket next to the lighter. He sank down onto the bench, already tired and they hadn't even begun.

"You know," Antonov said, "what we are to attempt is quite mad. Even by your standards, American."

"Yeah? You got odds for us this time?"

Coming to sit next to Hopper, Antonov considered. "I think … a thousand to one."

Hopper laughed, painfully.

"Even if we somehow kill this beast, we still must escape," Antonov pointed out. "We fail there, I don't think they will be so kind as to throw us back in a cell. They will shoot us on sight."

"We'd die as monster slayers. You'll be a legend."

Antonov chuckled, rolling his eyes. "But still a traitor," he said, his shoulders slumping. "You forgot traitor."

"Monster slayer trumps traitor. I bet Mikhail will be proud of his Pops, at least."

"Mikhail?"

"Mmm."

Shaking his head, Antonov laughed for real this time. "No. I can't do nothing right with him anymore, it seems. He will say, 'Papa, I bet that bald American did most of the monster slaying'."

Hopper laughed, too, to cover how much it hurt to think about El—and Mike, and Dustin, and Will, and all those bratty, brilliant, smartassed kids. "He's that age, huh?"

"Yeah. he is that age. It is same for you, American? With your new daughter?"

"The last time I was with El, she wanted just about nothing to do with me." That was the real hurt of it, how he had acted with her. The way he had tried to throw his authority around, the way he had yelled at her and not listened to her and not recognized that she was growing up and deserved his respect. "I was just in her way, really. I think back to the way I was with my dad at that age. I was the same way." And his father had been just as much of an asshole as he had been. "The exact same way."

He got up and moved back to the bars, looking out, but not seeing Russia. Instead he saw Hawkins. His old man, who had been convinced he'd never amount to anything.

"I think it must be hardwired into us to reject our fathers," he said. "So we can grow and move on. Become something of our own. I hope that's what she's doing. Coming into her own."

He tried to imagine her, grown and confident and sure of herself in the world, surrounded by friends, loved by Joyce and Will, part of their family. That was what it had all been for. All of it. For El's future, for her happiness.

"Still—" In his nightmares, he saw all the ways things could have gone wrong. Joyce dead in the blast, all the kids killed in the mall, Eleven alone, captured by Hawkins Lab again …

"You worry," Antonov said softly. "To worry for our sons and daughters, that is natural, isn't it?"

"Yeah. But nothing about what El has had to deal with is natural," Hopper pointed out. "That beast, that monster in there, it's a part of something that wants to hurt El. To kill her."

Getting to his feet, Antonov joined Hopper at the bars. "I don't understand."

"To be honest, neither do I. All I know is that thing—that thing shouldn't be here. It shouldn't be alive. Because it is, it means it still isn't over. I thought I was put here to pay for what I've done," Hopper said slowly. "But I might have been put here for some other reason. Maybe I—maybe I can still help El. Even if it's the last thing I do."

"You almost sound religious, American."

"Religious? I don't know about that. But maybe I should give that prayer thing a try. 'Cause if we want to get out of here, want to get back to El and Mikhail, you and me … we're gonna need a miracle."

They stared at each other. Neither of them was a man who believed in miracles, not really. And Hopper had seen too many people taken down by creatures half this one's size to think there was any real chance for him. Not in his condition, not with no weapons. But he was damned if he wasn't going to try. If there was any way he could manage to help El from the other side of the world, make sure this thing could never come after her, or Will, he was going to do it. He didn't know if his love for them was a miracle or not—but it sure as hell felt like one to him.

Softly, Antonov said, "Then let us pray, American. Let us pray for your miracle."

And together they bowed their heads and hoped that some deity somewhere might be listening.