Bloody Negatives {Stranger things}

Chapter Thirty-Four

《Chapter Thirty-Four》
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Robin is laughing at me again.

I know why. And it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is that Nancy is here. And she's okay. And everything else is okay. For now.

Maybe not for long, but for now.

Tally had noticed the way Nancy leaned into him every time she talked about 001/Henry/Vecna. Like she was trying to ground herself. It made him feel good. Like he was being useful.

"It's never going to be a fair fight," Robin said, her eyes wide.

"It could be," Dustin replied, adding to the argument Tally was only half-listening to. "We already know all of 001/Henry/Vecna's powers, the same as Tally and El's, right?"

Tally perked up at the sound of his name. He wanted to help, though he wasn't sure how.

"Yeah, only he's twice as powerful as Tally," Robin pointed out.

"That's probably true," Tally agreed, nodding with what he could only assume was a clueless expression on his face.

"No," Dustin groaned, elbowing Tally's shoulder. "Why so hopeless?"

"Vecna already killed Chrissy, Fred, Patrick," Tally said, counting on his fingers. "He's trying to kill me, Max, probably others—"

"It was a rhetorical question," Dustin said grimly.

"Oh."

Dustin pressed his forehead against the wooden table they were all gathered around. "Come on. If we don't go down there and... and try to fight him off then... then we all die anyways, right?"

"Eh," Tally shrugged. "We could drive to Ohio and—"

Nancy smacked him lightly, cutting off his sentence.

"I was joking!" he said, throwing his arms up in the air, causing her to laugh lightly.

Tally slumped back in his chair. Heart racing as he thought. "Do El's powers work in the Upside Down?"

"What?"

"I don't know, the Upside Down is... weird. Do her powers still work down there?" he chewed on his bottom lip.

It was entirely possible that Tally was just chasing and empty idea. A delusional one that his mind had made up to give him hope. But maybe it wasn't completely insane.

"Yeah, yeah, they work," Max said, nodding solemnly.

"That's— that's great, um," Tally furrowed his brow, trying to articulate all the words he wanted to say. "Would mine?"

Everyone froze for a moment, staring at him.

"Yeah, yeah probably," Nancy said, squinting. "But, Tally, all of this is new for you. You don't have the control that Vecna does."

"We don't even know how you got your powers," Steve agreed. "You don't have a tattoo like El and Vecna."

Tally nodded, chewing on his lower lip, which had now begun to bleed. He let his head drop a little. He was useless once again.

Nancy rested her hand on the side of his face. "We know you want to help, Tally," she tilted his head to make him look into her eyes. "It's just too dangerous."

"Yeah, yeah, of course," Tally looked away from her, gulping down the lump that had formed in his throat. "I need some air."

He pushed himself up from the Mayfields' dining room table and marched towards the back door, trying to keep his body from trembling, though as soon as he got outside he practically collapsed.

All of this was so exhausting. He was so tired. He couldn't believe that the rest of the group had been doing this for years.

Tally pressed his back against the trailer's outer wall, breathing heavily. He refused to cry again. All he'd been doing was crying. That was possibly the least productive thing he could ever do.

Crying didn't help Chrissy.

It felt like nothing helped Chrissy.

He understood Jason now. Understood the absolute anger he had. He wanted to help her. He'd loved her so much. The kind of love that Tally would look at and envy.

He'd have gone crazy if he'd lost that love, too.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there. Maybe a few minutes. Maybe an hour. But soon enough, Robin poked her head outside.

"Tally?" she'd asked, voice soft, as if she didn't want to risk upsetting him again. "We have a plan."

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