When morning stretched its pale pink fingers across the sky, heavy mists still blanketed Hawkins. Ragged branches reached upward out of the gloom, and brown leaves rustled with every hush of wind.
Sheriff Hopper woke bleary-eyed and aching, sluggishly twisting on his couch to squint at the pile of empty bottles and pills at eye-level on his side table. Gears in his head turned slowly, and he reached a hand out to drag a bottle off the table to read the smudged letters.
What an awful way to wake up.
His memory jolted, and fingers tightened on the prescription-orange plastic.
No, he hadn't drunk himself to sleep last night, he KNEW that. The image of an organic sprawl of nastiness wasn't so easily forgotten.
His temper flared at the shitty attempt to get him to brush it off as a dream. Hopper swept his arm across the table. Pills scattered across a soot-stained carpet, feet grinding them in further as he staggered to his feet.
He was on to something, he KNEW it. They were covering it up. Why else go through the effort?
It didn't matter if he remembered or not. They could point to his alcohol and his pills, and say he hallucinated something. He rubbed his face with his hands, growling into the pressure.
Fuckers.
He picked up his phone, the first digits of Joyce's number halted mid-press.
Hopper set the phone back down in its cradle and stared at the old plastic.
Why go through the trouble…
Fury sparking again, he ripped the telephone clean off the wall. He ignored the sharp cut of plastic digging into his knuckles as he gutted the machine. He'd fixed plenty, he was familiar enough with tinkering to recognize-
He pulled a little wire out, and it didn't belong. The significance of it burned his fingers, but he tightened them, yanking it and a fair amount of cord out of the wall. He turned to his lamp, his outlets, light switches, anywhere with power. Pulled them apart, scattered their guts across his living room.
Only the telephone. Good.
Hopper sat on the couch, cradle and phone both hanging from his fingertips, long wires trailing up to his wall.
He cut out the spying microphone, made his call.
"Joyce, you wouldn't-"
"He's alive!"
Hopper could only grunt in confusion.
"Will, he's alive, he's home. My boy, we're at the hospital. Barb, too. They're both here."
Oh.
"I'll head over as soon as I can."
She hung up, and Hopper sat for a long moment, twisting the microphone contemplatively between his fingers. He knew what he saw. That room was real.
If Will came back with some convenient story about kidnapping or wandering lost in the woods… he didn't know what he'd do.
He grabbed his keys, and left the house.
Will relished the flood of people that bustled into his room the moment visiting hours opened up.
The more people he could stuff into the room, the better. Doctors and nurses, or family and friends, it didn't matter. He wanted to force some life into it.
Warmth. Energy. Human presence.
Will agreed with his own resolution even more when his brother rushed in with a breathless groan of relief, practically collapsing next to his bedside. He hovered with a distressed expression, hands shoved between his knees in an attempt to stop from just grabbing at him.
"You're alive."
The words tumbled repetitious out of Johnathan's mouth. The moment Will gave the OK, his brother's arms wrapped around him, head tucked to his shoulder. Their mom watched from Will's other side, still reading the pamphlets she'd been given by doctors. She had been trying to be discreet, but Will had already seen the word 'Trauma' in bold blue letters before she could hide it.
"Holy shit, I thought I lost you." Johnathan's voice was muffled through Will's thin blanket, "I was planning a funeral. You're here. You're here."
Will tried to offer a reassuring expression to battle the thick sound of tears in Johnathan's throat, but his brother wouldn't look up. Will made due, resting the hand not hooked up to a saline drip and heart monitor onto his brother's head to pat his hair.
He made a face at the smell.
"Dude, you need a shower."
His mom huffed a small, half sob of a laugh, and Johnathan finally sat up, eyes searching over Will's face. He offered a wane smile, letting his brother rake through his half-tangled hair, over the edges of his face. His mom had already tried combing a little, but the residue of the other world would need scrubbing to get out.
"Look who's talking, squirt." The last word cracked, and Will looked down from his analysis of sunken shadows under his brother's eyes, "You're filthy."
Will made sure to grab his brother's hand before he could pull away completely, anchoring himself in the warm palm and familiar feeling of his family around him.
"Not like I had access to running water, you know. You don't have that excuse."
He could feel the two of them sharpen in intensity, sharing a glance over him. The slimy anxiety curling hard in his gut seemed to pulse, unfurling in a quickening of his heart and breath. They'd ask about where he had been, wouldn't they? He'd have to recite it, have to relive unnatural hisses and unseeing eyes.
He… he would do it. He had to share information about that place, if they were going to get Danny back out.
Lucas and Dustin pushed into the room in a tumble of backpacks and wide eyes. They each grabbed a hospital chair from the side of the room, dragging it with a shriek across waxed tiles. Will winced at the pitch, hair on his arms and neck raising. He checked the window reflexively, then forced himself to relax his crushing grip on his brother's hand.
"Probably hanging out with his new girlfriend. "
"Elle is just shy, she doesn't mean anything by it." Dustin turned to Will, his bright smile reassuring. "He'll be up soon."
Johnathan squeezed his hand back, just a little. He could feel the eyes boring in the the side of his head for that. Will shook his head, trying to shake out the feeling. He offered his friends a forced smile, letting it relax into a real one as they started talking over one-another to update him on what had gone on while he was missing.
He relaxed back against his pillows, enjoying the feeling of being half-smothered under his friends and family. Their words washed over him and affirmed that yes, he was alive. He was real.
This wasn't a dream.
Barbara's parents were at her bedside when Nancy slipped in to visit. She offered them both a small, forced smile, setting a vase of white daisies on one of the tables. She fussed over the flowers for a moment, fluffing the petals apart to look a bit bigger.
"Thank you for coming, honey. It's good to see you."
Nancy turned to her friend's mom, dipped her head a little in greeting. The words felt caught on her tongue. Nancy rubbed her fingers over the edges of the ripped pictures, not sure how to articulate what she wanted to say when Barb wasn't the only one who could hear her.
"I… um, wanted to apologize."
She shifted uneasily, eyes flicking between both of her friend's parents. They were listening.
"To her, and… to you, I guess. I-" She swallowed, pushing the picture back into her purse. Now wasn't the time for that.
"On the night Barb disappeared, she and I got into an argument. I… said some really cruel things to her. I don't think I meant them, I just wanted- Well," Nancy forced a smile past building tears. "I wanted to do some pretty dumb stuff. Barb tried to stop me, and I lashed out at her to leave me alone. I didn't want…."
She swallowed past a lump in her throat, eyes skittering over the dip in the covers where a shin and foot should have been.
"I didn't want this."
"I know, honey." She startled a little when Barb's mother spoke through her tissue, face still a splotchy red. "You've been a good friend to her for a long time. I know this wasn't your fault."
Nancy shrugged helplessly, twisted her fingers together. It didn't feel like it wasn't.
"She was lucid for a little while, between surgeries." Her mom added in a whisper. "If you come back another day, she might be awake, and you can talk then. I'm sure she missed you."
Nancy nodded, sensing the dismissal.
"Yeah, I'll just-" She bumped into the doorway as she backed up, startling herself. "I mean, yeah, I'll see-" She looked at her friend's mom, down to Barb's missing leg, and back up. "I'll see you later."
She sagged against the wall outside, pressing the heels of her palms to her eyes, to her cheeks. Staving back tears. She heard Dustin shout something a few doors down, and remembered Ms. Byer's call that morning. She must have called everyone who knew their family with the news.
Still, it was a relief, to know her friend was here - in safe care now, if not unharmed.
Hopefully she'd wake soon.
Nancy trailed toward the Byers room, mostly intending to find Mike and give the Byers family some space.
She didn't see her brother inside, but the change in atmosphere was a relief. Excitement, happiness. Will was awake. He offered her a wave and a smile when she poked her head in to look. Johnathan glanced up to meet her eyes, then turned away too quickly to be casual.
"Have you seen Mike?" She asked, voice still rough.
Dustin answered, "He was down in the lobby with us, but had to use the bathroom."
Will tilted his head. "I thought he was with his girlfriend?"
"Uh, I mean-"
"Mike's girlfriend had to go to the bathroom, and he didn't want to leave her alone. She's from out of town, really nervous about everything. You know the sort." Lucas's smile was blinding, and Nancy nodded.
"Thanks, Lucas. I'll try to make sure he gets some visiting time before we go home. I don't want to overwhelm Will."
"Don't worry about it!" Will piped in, smile genuine despite the purple cast to his skin where capillaries showed through. He looked exhausted, and ill, but still delighted to see her. "You can wait in here for him, if you want." Nancy glanced back out into the hallway, but obligingly scuffled in.
Without further ado, the boys resumed their conversation, Johnathan and Joyce sitting by with sharp eyes.
"Will, you were saying?" Lucas invited, watching as his friend took a fortifying breath.
"Right. I wasn't kidnapped. Not by a person. I know you probably won't believe me, or think I'm crazy or something, but I was taken by monsters."
"The Demigorgon!"
"I knew it."
The boys turned to Nancy, and Nancy turned to Johnathan, pulling a picture out of her pocket. She hesitated only a moment, but Joyce was already watching her keenly, without judgement.
"I found this in the pictures you took- um, that one time." She stood up, laying the picture's pieces on the bed and arranging them together. She pointed out the dark shape through the trees, and Will nodded.
"That's probably one of them, yeah. They're humanoid, and really tall, with big gross heads that open up like a flower, and it's just one big mouth inside. Do you have some scrap paper? I can draw one for you." Will spoke more than he was comfortable with, forcing the words out.
If he clammed up now, they'd never come, and his wasn't the only life on the line. Even if those memories scared the sense out of him, they needed to know. He didn't know if Danny was even still alive for sure, but the teen had survived in there for a long time already. Hopefully he could survive a little longer.
Joyce shakily passed her son a pencil, pulling a scrap from the notepad left behind for notes.
"Wait, you're serious?" Dustin squinted at the photo. "We were right?"
Will nodded.
"I didn't really have the courage to name them when I was there, so I guess you can call them whatever." His sketch was rough, but it showed the general shape of the things that had terrorized them. Long arms, hunched back, the almost-human head and shoulders, then the blooming profile of their scream.
"We were theorizing that you got sent to a different dimension, like planar travel or something. A dark reflection of this world."
His mom took the drawing as Lucas spoke, set it next to the photo, and made a small, horrified sound of realization.
"That's a weirdly accurate guess. How-?"
He watched his friends exchange a secretive look, staring back to Joyce before laughing nervously. "I'll tell you later?"
"Dustin Henderson, You will NOT hide secrets about this!"
Will gave an apologetic shrug, pulling the blankets a bit tighter to his waist as his friend shrank back from the fierce tone.
"I mean, it's not really my secret to tell-"
"I agree with mom." Will interrupted, then fiddled with his blanket when his friends stared at him in surprise. " I mean, there's still someone else in there, and we need all the information we can get."
"Someone else-?" It was Johnathan who spoke, watching Will closely.
"Yeah. The reason I'm fine, and why Barb is alive, is because of Danny. He's been stuck in there for a while, and figured out some of their weaknesses. He's been living in a fortified apartment - You were right, about the dark mirror thing. The world in there is just like this world. Same locations and everything, but everything is gross and rotted." Will paused, sipping at the water his brother handed to him when his voice cracked.
"Danny protected me, and stitched up Barb after she was attacked. He got us food and water, and was the one who shoved us through the wall after Mom axed it open." He shot her a shy smile. "That was really cool, by the way."
His mom nodded, still staring down at his drawing.
"If there's someone else in there, then we need to get them out. But!" She looked up at him, voice still sharp. "Not if it puts you in danger."
Will nodded quickly. "I don't want to go back there, but… someone might have to, to give Danny a shot of getting out."
His mom laid a hand on his head, smoothing down his hair. "For once, can you leave this to the adults, sweetheart?"
He shrugged awkwardly, picked at a loose thread.
Nancy spoke up. "What kind of weaknesses?"
"Fire," Will started listing off. "They don't see, only smell and hear, so if you're inside and they're outside, they might not sense you. Blunt impact seemed to work? I made a flamethrower out of some hairspray and they hated that. And-" He stopped himself, about to say 'Danny's blood' before realizing that likely wouldn't be a good thing to share. "And that's about it. They probably don't like loud noises." He added the last as an afterthought.
When Hopper arrived at the hospital, half the morning had already passed. He inquired at the front desk about the Holland and Byers rooms, about the missing persons case suddenly resolved. He had few questions, he said, and they gave him the room number.
He passed someone knocking angrily on a unisex bathroom, jiggling the knob. They noticed his badge and his tired expression, and decided abruptly to be elsewhere. Hopper left the door alone - it wasn't his business.
Hopper took a slow breath, tried to keep his nerves steady. Tried to keep his mind open to any story.
Barbara Holland wasn't awake yet, but her parents graciously invited him inside. She hadn't said anything about where she was, they said. Badly injured, sleeping for her own health. Tomorrow, maybe. Come back tomorrow. Hopper tilted his hat and stepped as quiet as he could to leave.
The Byers door opened quickly when he knocked and announced himself, Joyce at the door far more serious than he expected.
"Is Will-"
"He's fine, Hopper." She tilted to the side and let him see the boy and his friends chatting around a few bits of paper, Johnathan and a teenage girl both on the edges of their seat to talk in low tones.
"I actually wanted to talk to you-" she started, but he interrupted with a forced smile "-Great, excellent, lets take a walk." Anywhere away from the bugs inevitably saturating the hospital.
"Outside?" He offered, and Joyce cautiously accepted.
Please trust me.
"Hang tight, everyone. I'll be back in a few minutes." The kids all waved at her call, and Joyce shut the door behind her.
"Outside-Outside." Hopper clarified softly, and put on a cheerful smile as they walked. "It's so good to see things sorted out so neatly! Everyone home, a real Christmas miracle." Joyce was clever. She caught on to the reason for his merriment, eyes tracking the official-looking folks in the waiting room as they passed. Behind dark sunglasses, she could swear they tracked her back.
"Maybe a bit early for Christmas, but it's still good to have him back, you know? I'm so relieved."
"Of course you are! Can't wait to get everything settled and back to normal."
The two of them made their way to the outside of the hospital, giving anything tech-based a wide birth as Hopper dropped his voice to a low whisper.
"I broke into the Hawkins National Labs last night."
Joyce whirled on him. "You WHAT?" In her own harsh whisper.
"I broke in. I found WIll's fake body. It was stuffed with cotton, they planned to trick you. They caught me, and drugged me, and bugged my house, but not before I got a look at what they're hiding. It's a doorway- Please don't think I'm crazy, Joyce, I'm dead serious, I'm so sorry for doubting you before."
"A doorway to another dimension?"
"It was a door to-" He stopped abruptly, hair prickling up his arms with a hopeless sort of dread. "You knew."
She knew. Was she in on it? Had he shown his hand to the wrong person? Betrayal and nausea rose in his throat.
Joyce shook her head. "Not like that, no, I found out this morning. Will was talking about what happened to him. The kids had been looking for him as well. They've been saying he was in another dimension, with monsters that dragged him in." She gave a shaky exhale. "My eldest took a picture of one of those things the night Barbara went missing. My youngest is offering illustrations of the monsters, and Hopper, I pulled the two of them out through a bleeding hold in my wall."
He stared at her, dumbstruck. The whiplash of emotions took a bit to sort out.
"Yes, A literal hole in my wall. I could hear them calling from the other side, and I could see this nasty looking blister. I took an axe and I hacked it open, and managed to pull the two of them out through my wall. There's probably still slime on my carpet that hasn't dried yet. I saw Barb's wounds when I pulled her out of there, and they match the bite-pattern Will has been drawing. The monsters are real."
Hopper's face scrunched up and he turned away, bowing his head to put his hands on his knees, half-crouched on the hospital garden path.
"Oh fuck." Hopper groaned.
"God, I wish I had some grass right now." Joyce muttered, pulling a pack of cigarettes from her purse and lit one to breathe in. Hopper choked his agreement, holding his hand out to beg one off her. Joyce put a lit cigarette between his fingers, watched him suck on it like it was the last butt in the world.
"Extra-dimensional monsters. They drugged me, Joyce. They tried to cover it up." He gasped the words, face still red when he stood up. "There's a whole damn world out there, they have a fucking DOOR in their basement. People are in danger, and they're covering it up. I dug up a bunch of dirt on a woman named Terry Ives trying to find Will, and I think they were running human experiments in there. It's nasty, whatever it is."
Joyce nodded."For the sake of the two of us freaking out all at once, he says there's another person still in there - Someone who helped him out. Protected him, got the two of them to safety. The boys already want to launch a rescue mission."
"Fuck." The cigarette twitched between his lips, and he reached a hand up to steady it, muttering "Fuck" once more, with feeling.
They shared a look, and as one decided to head back inside.
Neither of them missed the federal agents still in the waiting room.
Danny lingered in the tunnel between places. The chilly quiet was much nicer to endure than the fear outside. He entered each of the doors as they swing open invitingly, watched old memories replay.
Different girls endured experiments. Some of them adult, most of them underage. Sometimes they were lucid, other loops they could barely keep their head up to listen to the orders they were given.
Each of the doors had a different number, and each performed a different task.
Making plants grow. Making a vegetable fall apart into rot. Making a man thrash about like he was seeing something. One girl vomited up a yellow-white egg, sobbing as it was confiscated from her - something dark moving about inside it.
Each of the visions ended, restarted in the same place it started, and Danny moved on.
He drifted deeper down the hallway, opening some doors on his own. They revealed different areas of this town. A school cafeteria. An office. A bathroom. A laboratory. All abandoned, full of rot. The doors connected each part of this world together in a tangled cobweb.
The final door stood alone at a dead-end, where no rot crawls. Just old, dirty white tiles.
Danny eased it open a crack, then a bit more when nothing jumped out from the black void. He squinted in, peering past a whole lot of nothingness.
A shape shifted slightly, and his eyes snapped to the figure of a girl standing alone, as if in the middle of a dark room.
Danny flicked his fingers to light his hand up with green. He stepped into the thick black, shivering when the doorway's light stopped at its threshold, not spilling in an inch. Thankfully, his own glow was not stopped.
There was only him and her, faintly illuminated by a green light.
He waited for the memory to start.
He sighed, and twitched slightly when she quickly twisted to look at him. Her brown eyes were so wide that they flickered green with reflections, head shaved bald like the other girls.
Small.
"Who…?"
She's here. Real. She can see him.
He took a few quick steps forward.
"Are you alright? Are you hurt? How'd you get in this-!" He stumbled as something punched against his chest, like a huge hand was shoving him back. He held a hand to his chest, watching her. Message received.
"Just to be sure, you're… not hurt?"
The girl shook her head, but kept her arm outstretched in warning.
"That's good. Can you leave this place?" The girl nodded. Danny felt relief bubble up.
"Please do. It's dangerous here. You shouldn't stay."
"...And you?" Her voice crackled around the edges from disuse, dark eyes solemn and focused.
Danny agreed. "Yeah, I shouldn't be here either, but I can't get out."
Something growled in the darkness.
Danny tensed, ears pricking toward the rasp of something breathing. He didn't see anything but more void when he turned to check, and when he turned to look back, the girl was gone.
He stood in the darkness for a long moment. Listening. Waiting.
When nothing else happened, Danny retreated, closing the door behind him.
The plaque on this one wasn't scratched or smeared with blood. Two little numbers.
11
Back in the hospital unisex bathroom, a girl named El let her friend hold a damp tissue to her face, not sure how to explain that she's gotten used to the taste of blood dribbling over her lips. She could always lick it away. No need to fuss.
She watched her own reflection in the bathroom mirror, dark purple smudges under brown eyes. Hollow cheeks and translucent skin. The boy in the darkness almost looked as bad as she did. That same terrified, hungry look.
He wasn't scared for himself, though, was he?
He was scared for her.
How strange.