BEST OF YOU, stranger things | will byers

𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕖𝕟

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     "I DIDN'T TINK IT WAS ANYTHING AT FIRST." Will spoke, the entire party minus Dustin circled around him in Mike's basement the next day. "I mean, I think I just didn't want to believe it. The first time I felt it was at Day of The Dead."

     "The power went out that night too." Mike remembered.

     "And then I felt it again at the field near the Nelson farm the next day. Then again yesterday outside Castle Byers."

     "What does it feel like?" Max questioned.

     "It's almost like... You know when you drop on a roller coaster?"

     "Sure."

     "Yeah."

     "No." El shook her head.

     "It's like..." Will struggled to put the feeling into words everyone would understand, "Everything inside your body is just sinking all at once, but... this is worse."

     Miles frowned, putting a comforting hand on Will's shoulder from where he sat between him and Mike on the sofa's arm. Guilt consumed the boy for not realizing Will had been going through this.

     "Your body..." Will continued, "It goes cold and- and you can't breathe." He nodded his head, "I've felt it before, whenever he was close."

     "Max's eyebrows furrowed, "Whenever who was close?"

     "The Mind Flayer."

     "I closed the gate." El spoke slowly with a confused expression.

     "I know, but... what if he never left? What if we locked him out here with us?"

     After a moment of tense silence Will rose to his feet, the group following behind him as he grabbed a piece of paper and a piece of charcoal, slamming it down before he began drawing a picture of the Mind Flayer. "This is him. All of him. But, that day on the field, a part of him attached himself to me." He smeared his hand on the page, coating his fingers in loose charcoal, holding his hand out for them to see. "My mom got it out of me... and Eleven closed the gate. But, the part that was still in me," He flipped the piece of paper over, "What if it's still in our world?" He slammed his charcoal-coated hand down onto the blank side of the paper, "In Hawkins."

     Max shook her head, "I don't understand, the demo dogs died when El closed the gate. If the brain dies, the body dies."

     "We can't take any chances." Mike spoke up. "We need to assume the worst. The Mind Flayer's back."

     "Awesome," Miles smiled with a hint of sarcasm, "I'm great at assuming the worst." The group looked at him with a deadpanned expression, Will trying to hold back a smile. The boy put his hands up in surrender, "Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood a bit, okay?"

     Will shook his head in amusement before getting back to the topic at hand, "If he is back, he's gonna want to attache himself to someone again. A new me."

     "A new host." Said Lucas.

     Miles gave Will a look of concern, "But not you, right?"

     Will shook his head, "Not me."

     "How can you tell if someone is a host?" El asked.

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     "I DON'T KNOW, HE LOOKS PRETTY NORMAL TO ME." Max said as she watched Billy through a pair of binoculars. The group stood on the other side of the fence outside of the community pool, Billy sitting atop the lifeguard's post, a hat, a long sleeve, and a towel cover his legs, a slushy in his hands.