Chapter Text
In a lot of ways, El and Will were pretty similar. They had the same plain brown hair, the same Joyce Byers’ kitchen bowl bangs, the same devotion to the Party, the same love for one Mike Wheeler. And for a minute there, they had the same psychokinetic abilities, and Will got to know what it was like to be Superman landing on Lois Lane’s doorstep.
But now Henry is dead, the Upside Down is gone, and Will’s connection to the Hive Mind has been severed. Permanently. Finally.
He should be trying to live a normal life. His friends are. Just last week, Dustin toured his fifth college. And Lucas and Max celebrated their who-even-knows-how-long-we’ve-been-together anniversary. But maybe, just maybe, it’d be easier to move on if a part of him didn’t die in the woods when he was eleven.
The Upside Down affected all of them in their own ways. Dustin still mourns Eddie deeply, and Max has recently confessed to Will a pervasive fear of silence, and he knows via Mike that Mrs. Wheeler is needing time to adjust to life with damaged vocal chords and gnarly scars on her neck.
But Will was the only one of them who had been kidnapped, assaulted, possessed, and haunted for years. He had touched evil, and it had touched him back. The version of Will Byers that thought hearing his parents argue was the worst thing that could ever happen to him was buried somewhere in the backyard of a house they didn’t even own anymore.
The only person who seems to be having as much trouble moving on as he does is Mike. Since they lost El, Mike has totally withdrawn. Will can’t even blame him. There are a lot of awful things that haunt Will in the middle of the night, and the sound of Mike’s screams as El sacrificed herself is no exception.
Will thinks he might have been screaming then, too. Losing El was a close second for the worst thing to ever happen to him. That was his sister. He didn’t even get to say goodbye.
He blames this lack of closure for the thought process that follows when he’s lying on bed, crying over the ensemble cast of traumas he’s endured over the past few years, and his bedside lamp flickers like a candle in a gentle breeze. A cold shock of fear runs through him, but when there’s no accompanying chill running up his neck, a tiny bit of hope flickers to life in his chest.
“El?” he whispers.
The cabin falls silent and still. After a moment, Will lets out a breath, and the hope winks out. Of course it isn’t El. She’s gone.
But can you blame him for looking for ghosts when he lives in a haunted house?
The second time the lights flicker, Will is home alone. It’s the early days of 1988, and he’s still off school, but the rest of his family has work.
He really can’t even say what triggers him. Maybe a branch tapping on a window like long claws, or the wind rattling the front door like a phantom hand slipping a deadbolt out of place. Either way, it ends with him on his knees on the floor, struggling to draw in a breath.
And then the lights flicker, on and off, on and off.
Will thinks he might throw up. Or die. Or both. “Please,” he whispers. “Please, let it be El and not…” Not him.
The lights blink on and off randomly. He stays there, curled up on the kitchen floor for maybe minutes and maybe hours, until the phone rings. At once, the lights stop flickering.
He drags himself up and over to the wall-mounted phone, gulps down some much-needed oxygen, and picks up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Hey, honey,” his mom says, “I just wanted to ask you if you could take the chicken out of the freezer. I forgot to remind you this morning.”
It takes a few moments for Will’s brain to reboot. “Oh. Sure. I can do that.”
She hesitates, her breath stuttering on the other end. “Will? Is everything alright?”
“Yeah. Sorry. Everything’s fine. Love you, bye.” He hangs up. Everything’s fine. He takes the chicken breasts out of the freezer and tries not to dwell on the feeling of the cold for too long.
The third time the lights flicker, Will is fighting with Mike. They’re hanging out in Mike’s basement, reading comics together on the couch, and everything was normal until one snippy comment snowballed into a bitter argument.
“Well, what do you expect, Mike? When I thought we would spend our lives playing D&D in the basement, I was stupid and childish and—and not normal, but now that that’s what you want to do, how dare I not be interested?”
“It’s not like that, Will!”
“Oh, really? What is it like, Michael?”
Mike crosses his arms and turns away from Will. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Will’s anger flares, and above him, the lights begin to hum. “Oh,” he says. “This is about El.”
Mike opens his mouth to argue, but no words come out. The chasm that’s been growing between them since Will moved to California grows another inch. But Will’s done ignoring it.
“You know, you’ve been really weird around me since I came out. Is it like—do you have an issue with me being…being different?”
“No!” Mike defends. “No. It’s just.”
Despite being the group’s storyteller, Mike has never been able to get through an argument without clamming up. And Will has always known when to back down and let Mike retreat into himself and find the words that are stuck behind whatever keeps his emotions so bottled up. Now is one of those times. Will stands and wordlessly heads for the stairs.
“Will, wait,” Mike says, hurrying after him. He reaches for Will, but his touch is too much for Will to bear.
“No, Mike! Just stop!” he says, and when he pulls his arm out of Mike’s grip, the lights above them go out with a series of pops.
They stand there, breathing hard in the dark, until the lights flicker back on.
When he can see again, Will finds that Mike’s brown eyes are blown wide. “Will,” he says, voice thin, “your nose is bleeding.”
As soon as Mike says it, Will tastes the copper in the back of his throat. He reaches up and touches his fingers to his upper lip. They come back red.
And then, just like every other time Will has used his powers, he passes out, right into Mike’s waiting arms.
Will wakes up to Mike absolutely panicking. Nancy is there, too, doing her best to calm him down.
“Code red!” he yells. A burst of static answers him, so he must be talking on the walkie. “Dustin! Lucas! Max! Code red!”
“Mike,” Nancy says. “Mike, relax.”
“Relax? How can I relax when Will just almost blew up our lights with his mind?”
“I didn’t almost blow them up,” Will mutters, finally cracking an eye open. “I just kinda made the power surge.”
“Oh my God,” Mike breathes. He drops the walkie and leans over Will, his hands ghosting over his face like he wants to touch but isn’t allowed to.
Nancy leans over him, too, her hands on her hips. “Is it Vecna? Can you feel him?”
“No,” Will says. “He’s dead. I know it.”
“Are you sure?” Mike asks.
Will sits up, fighting the headache beginning to pound at his temples. “I was connected to the Hive Mind. I felt him die.”
That shuts both Wheelers up.
“Besides, this feels different. When I tapped into Henry’s mind, it was like putting my hand on a power line. This time, it felt like I was the power line.”
“So I was right,” Mike says, his eyes shining with excitement. “Your powers are innate.”
And there it is again. The way Mike’s looking at him, he feels like Superman. He feels strong. He feels loved. This time, he doesn’t fight it. He just nods.
“We should tell the others,” Nancy says. “I believe you, Will, but this is still a big deal.”
“No!” Mike and Will say at the same time.
Will gives Mike a weird look. He knows why he doesn’t want to tell anyone, but why doesn’t Mike? Wasn’t he just trying to call the rest of the Party?
“I don’t want to worry anyone,” Will explains. “I’m sure it’s just…an echo. It’ll go away with time.”
At least, he hopes it will. He really doesn’t need another thing that makes him different.
“Yeah,” Mike says, oblivious to Will’s internal turmoil. “Let’s keep this to ourselves for now. Please, Nancy.”
Nancy looks between them for a long moment. She sets her jaw and says, “Fine. But if anything else happens, I’m telling everyone. Okay?”
They agree, and Nancy finally leaves the basement after casting one last look at the pair.
Mike sits down on the couch beside Will, his hands on his bony knees. A familiar awkwardness is back between them, and Will doesn’t know what to do besides sit in it. He takes a tissue from the coffee table and starts scrubbing at the drying blood on his face. It would be easier if he were in the bathroom and could see what he’s doing, but a childish part of him doesn’t want to leave Mike’s side.
After he’s thoroughly stained the tissue, Mike turns to him with his big puppy dog eyes and says, “Can you do it again?”
“Um, I don’t know,” Will says. “I guess I could try.”
Mike leans over and grabs one of the empty Coke cans he must’ve shoved off the couch to lay Will down. He plunks it down on the coffee table and looks at Will expectantly.
Will reaches his hand out, palm up, like he’s pulling that power, that electricity, through him. Then, he remembers that El always did it palm out, like the electricity was coming from her.
He isn’t syphoning someone else’s power this time. It’s his. He flips his hand over, reaches for the electricity inside of him, and pushes. The can crumples, completely untouched.
“Holy shit,” Mike says. “Holy shit! Will!”
Another wave of pain blooms at his temples, and more blood leaks from his nose. “Ow,” he says.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay. Just lay down again.” Mike pulls Will’s legs into his lap, which really does nothing but make him more lightheaded.
“I think I’m a long way from flipping vans,” Will jokes.
“That’s okay,” Mike says. “You’re still a sorcerer.”
Right. All he’s missing is the purple robe.