Work Text:
What is it that stays my hand now?
With so much misery, that I could mercifully put end to
For that animal I let slink off, into the undergrowth, unscathed
Do I not fear death, but just pretend to?
If I was easy to kill you would have done it already
hunter - Paris Paloma
Nancy sneaks down the hallway and peers into Mike’s room, then Holly’s, then her parents. Like clockwork. She is like a child, if she can not see them, they are not there. They have been killed. Taken. Kidnapped. The roof has fallen in on them. Hell has opened up and swallowed them. Or maybe they died in their sleep. Heart attack. If she can’t see them, they might be gone. So she looks into Mike’s room. Holly’s. Her parents’. They are home. They are safe. Check. Her guns and bullets are still in their place. Check. The doors are locked. Check. Parents asleep. Check. Mike. Check. Holly. Still there. Still there.
She goes back to her room. Goes through her routine. Brushes her teeth and washes her face. Everything is fine. Everyone is still here.
Nancy sneaks down the hallway and peers into Mike’s room.
Empty.
“Let me go. Let me go!”
She finds his body. In the middle of the street like some animal. Like roadkill. Arms and legs and fingers bent. Hollow eye sockets. She stumbles and falls to her knees in front of him.
“Oh god.”
Gone.
“Fred. Oh god. Fred.”
Nancy clenches her jaw shut to keep the pained noise inside. Reaches out her hand to him, then pulls back. Clenches her fists instead. He was just here. She was just talking to him. He was right next to her and she blinked and looked away for a moment too long then. Gone.
“Hey kid! Jesus christ.”
She’s not a kid. Not a kid. But Fred was. Was. Gone.
The officers have caught up. She doesn’t look at them. She thinks someone is pulling her to her feet. Thinks she was rocking back and forth. She wraps her arms around herself. Someone is asking her questions. Someone pulls her away.
“No.” She’s can’t leave him.
Someone turns her around. So she is looking away. She can’t look away.
She puts on a black dress. Again. Holly is holding her hand like she will never let go. Nancy would be fine with that. The kids - who aren’t kids anymore - keep giving her looks. Looking at each other and her and back. Nancy looks at the ground. Looks at the closed coffin. Wants to open it. Just to check. Just to make sure. She looks anywhere but at her mom. Face blotchy. Wrapped in the arms of her husband for what must be the first time in years.
Jonathan and Steve and Robin are around Nancy constantly. Like they think she is going to be next. They follow her. They think she doesn’t notice but she does. Her focus is always the sharpest, the clearest during a crisis. In the moments when all of her anxiety and paranoia becomes justified, her mind just, quiets. She finally stops thinking and just acts. She doesn’t always make the best decisions but at least she does something.
The military took her guns when they got caught. She has long since bought more. But for this she needs something else. Something specific. She shakes off her tail and enters the War Zone.
In the aftermath of the first time the world ended, Nancy had been sure that there were more monsters out there. Sure that they were just waiting for blood. And they would come back. So sure in fact, that she sneaks out at night with a lighter and her revolver and a knife and bikes to the woods near Steve’s house. And she wanders around until she finds it. The spot where she entered the Upside Down.
She looks down at the still healing wound on her left hand. Takes the knife in her right. Splits open the cut and lets her blood drip all over the forest floor.
Nothing comes that night. Nor when she tries the next time. Maybe three times, just to be sure. Just to check.
She goes home and Mike and Holly and her parents are asleep and they are safe and she breathes just a little easier.
Nancy drives home. She keeps looking over at the passenger seat where Mike sits. Watching like he is going to jump out of the car into traffic at any moment. Maybe he is. She gets him home. She doesn’t take her eyes off him. Not until he is safely under the protective gaze of their mom. Then for the first time since they left the quarry Mike speaks.
He looks at Nancy. Looks at their mom. And says horsely, “I’m sorry.”
Nancy can’t. Her feet move before she realizes what she is doing. But not towards him this time. Back. Away. Her mom has Mike. She’ll keep him safe for now. Nancy needs to move. She just. She can’t breathe. She needs to get out.
It’s maybe not the smartest move to drive right now. Nancy doesn’t even realize where the car is taking her until she is there. Knocking on the door.
Nancy stumbles forward into Robin’s arms.
“Nancy? What happened.”
“Mike. I was. He was. Quarry. I was almost too late.”
“Oh god.”
Nancy blinks and she is in Robin’s room. Blinks and realizes she is speaking. “What am I supposed to do? I have to- What do I do? I- it was supposed to be over.”
Nancy used to have very good hearing. She was always the first to notice when something sounded off. Always the first to alert the group. To hear what they didn’t. It helped her on so many occasions. Over the last year her hearing has been, less good. Not noticeable at first. Until it was all she could notice. She started wearing ear protection when she was practicing her shooting. But, well, she hadn’t always been practicing.
“We call it shooter’s ear,” the doctor at the Emerson student health center says. “The asymmetrical hearing loss in the opposite side of your dominant hand. You’ve been using a gun without proper ear protection.”
He acts like he knows something about her. Knows her because he knows she shot a gun too many times. As if she was being irresponsible. He knows nothing.
He doesn’t know that the worst part actually, is that she used to be able to use her ears to check. To make sure. A small comfort that if something were to happen, she would be the first to hear it. It’s fine. It doesn’t matter. She just has to pay more attention is all. More checks.
She gets Hopper alone under the guise of shooting practice. No, not practice. Just, for fun. To relax. Because it’s over and they don’t need to practice anymore. It’s not until they are far away from any prying ears that she dares say anything.
“You have to tell him. Mike. You have to tell Mike.”
“I don’t know what you’re-”
“Hopper,” she says flatly with a stern glare. “Don’t.”
He sighs. “You figured it out.”
She just nods. Yeah, she figured it out. Eventually. When enough of the bullshit cleared that she could hear her own thoughts. And start asking the question. How? How could El have stood there with the full force of those machines pointed at her. And not a single twitch. And how convenient then, that they knew another girl with the power to cause illusions. To make people see what she wanted them to see. Yeah, Nancy figured it out. But she was almost too late.
“You were in on it?” She asks Hopper, to confirm. Because one of the things that had confirmed it for her was the way that Hopper was acting. Grieving. But a different kind of grief than what she expected. Less self-destructive. Nancy wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but she can admit to herself at least, that her and Hopper are similar like that.
“Yeah. Yeah she told me.” Hopper exhales the weight of the world from his lungs. The weight of a superhero daughter. “You can’t tell Mike.”
“Why the hell not?” Nancy demands, even though she can guess his answer.
“Because the second he knows all his little friends know and then she’s in danger again and it was all for nothing. All it takes is one slip up. One mistake. No. Not now. It’s too soon. Maybe in the future.”
“He might not have a future,” Nancy says darkly.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“What do you think it means!” Nancy says, her voice breaking embarrassingly. She blinks back her tears in frustration. “I had a feeling. He went to the quarry. He was screaming for her.”
“You can’t tell him.”
“I can’t do anything. It’s bullshit.” That stupid familiar refrain that has not gotten any less true over the years. Bullshit.
“El didn’t want me to tell him,” Hopper says like he is pulling out a trump card. Nancy hates that he is. “She said he would figure it out when he’s ready.” Bullshit.
“I’m leaving. I’m going to school in Boston. You have to watch him. You have to- if he-” She can’t even say it.
“I’ll take care of him,” Hopper says to Nancy, more sincere and gentle than he has ever been with her. “I promise.”
When Nancy first sees Mike’s empty room. First sees the note he left. Note. Too brief to be a letter. When she realizes that his room is fucking clean. She is sure. Sure that it is over. His body will wash up in the quarry. Decomposing and haunting like Barb. Bones broken like Fred. Bloody and still warm like Eddie. Her little brother. Her baby brother. Is dead. She is sure.
But then. What if he’s not. She just. She has to know. Has to know. For sure. The uncertainty will kill her. And seconds pass. Turn into minutes. Into hours. Into days. Mike is dead. Mike is alive. She can never see him again. Either way. She will never see him again.
Her brother is gone.
Gone. Gone. Gone. Gone.
Her mom is screaming.
If it wasn’t for the communication issues it caused and the tinnitus, Nancy thinks she wouldn’t mind if she lost the rest of her hearing. The world is so loud. So much disorder and chaos all the time that it makes her want to scratch her skin off. If she were to lose the rest if her hearing, if she does, as time goes on, at least it will be quiet. Quiet instead of just muffled sounds throwing her world into an anxious in between.
At least she wouldn’t have to hear anymore terrified pained screams.
There is a knock on Nancy’s door. Holly. Eyes wide and streaked with tears. Small hand clutching at a necklace.
“Can I stay with you tonight?” Holly asks quietly.
“Yeah, of course you can,” Nancy says, pulling back the covers and inviting Holly in. Holly curls up next to her. She is so small. Like Mike used to be. Nancy would put her body between theirs and anything that might harm them. If only it were that simple. If only that were enough to keep them safe.
“Mike gave this to me,” Holly says, her hand on the necklace. “He said I was Holly the brave. But Nancy. I’m so tired of being brave.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Why did he leave us?” Holly asks desperately. “Why would he do that?”
Nancy doesn’t know how to do this. She doesn’t know what to say. She can’t deal with her own grief, let alone Holly’s. And goddamnit Mike. Damn him. Nancy chokes back her words. “He. He was tired of being brave too. He was.” Nancy’s voice breaks. She swallows. “He was in so much pain. And he’s not. Anymore.”
“You’re not going to leave me too, are you?” Holly asks.
“No. No I’m here. I’m here. I’m staying,” Nancy promises and hopes that she can keep it.
Fred called for her. In the woods. Vecna showed her. He called for her, not like Barb did, but he called all the same. Barb had screamed. Had begged. Had believed until the very end maybe, that Nancy would come back for her. Fred did not. He called like there was no one else there. And Nancy, she wasn’t friends with Fred. She couldn’t be. He was an annoying shit that reminded her of Mike and Nancy already had Mike to protect. There wasn’t room for more. But maybe if she had let herself be there for Fred…
She found him crying in the storage room one day and she just hugged him. But she didn’t say anything. She told herself he wouldn’t want to talk about it. After all, Nancy has done her fair share of crying in the bathroom and she never wanted to talk about it. But maybe if Nancy had asked. Maybe if she had reached out. Maybe if she had just been there. He wouldn’t have been alone.
“It’s not just trauma,” Max told them. “It’s people who isolate themselves. Push others away. So that there’s no one for them to go to. That’s how I escaped. Because I heard, and I remembered, that I wasn’t alone.”
Mike screamed. Not for her. Not like Holly had, floating in the air. Not like Barb had, desperate in the pool. Not like Fred had, trapped in a grave. Mike screamed at her.
“Let me go. Let me go!”
Barb was alone. Fred was alone. Holly was alone. And now Mike is alone.
“Nancy?” A voice, hesitant, calls to her. Nancy, no matter how much she might sometimes wish it, has never been alone.
“’I’m not going to jump.” Nancy hears herself say.
Robin reaches out. Sits down next to her and wraps her hand around her wrist and holds tight. Steve and Jonathan crouch down in front to her.
“Sorry if we don’t quite believe you about that, considering where we found you,” Steve says.
Where they found her. Staring down at the quarry like it held answers.
Nancy shakes her head. “He was going to jump. He did jump. She saved him,” Nancy starts to explain, probably nonsensically. “When they first met. These stupid bullies had Dustin so he. And El saved him. But she wasn’t there to save him this time. I wasn’t there. I should have known. He was happy. I should have known.”
Nancy can’t stop crying. Was Mike happy because he finally realized El was alive? Or was he happy because he finally decided to die? Her brother is dead, she knows it. Her brother is alive. She is sure.
Robin, Steve, and Jonathan all have their arms wrapped around her. As if they can hold the pieces of her together while she falls apart. Her three best friends. Who she loves so much. Nancy suddenly can’t bear it. She removes them from her, as gently as she can. Stands and starts walking away from ledge, so they don’t freak out. Stands in the middle of the dirt road.
“I’m not going to do anything,” she repeats when they stand too and look at her. “The job’s not finished.” She glances back at the ledge and grimaces. “Besides, if I was. I wouldn’t jump. I hate the feeling of falling.”
“Real comforting Nancy.” Jonathan says sarcastically.
“What do you mean the job’s not finished?” Robin asks, ignoring this.
“Nothing.” Nancy says shortly.
“This isn’t like-” Jonathan cuts himself off before he can say Barb’s name. “There’s no one to go after for this.”
She looks at him incredulously. “Of course there is.” There were too many people to go after for this, was the problem. The same thing in Jonathan’s mind maybe, but not in Nancy’s.
“What are you going to do?” Steve asks.
Nancy frowns at them while they wait for her answer. Don’t they know already? Isn’t it obvious? “I’m going to kill them.”
It was selfish. That she never told Mike about El. That she waited for him to figure it out himself. But she knew that the second he did, he would be gone. She knew this day was coming. And she wanted to delay it as long as possible. Wanted to keep him here just a little longer. If not in her sight then at least only a phone call away.
She should have never left him.
Her mom begged her to leave. To not lose herself trapped in this town forever. Holly was doing better. Had friends who understood what she went though. Said she was okay. And Mike. Mike told her to go. Told her he could never move on if she couldn’t either. Bullshit. He didn’t have any plans of moving on. But she left anyway. She was making things worse, not better. Nancy is only useful in a gunfight. And maybe, maybe, if she was far away, the dark cloud, the curse, the poison inside her, it wouldn’t reach them. So she left.
“You have to go to college Nance. You’ve wanted to since you were like ten. You’ve waited long enough.”
“It doesn’t matter Mike,” she says incredulously. She feels like she is losing her goddamn mind. “It’s not important. Not now.”
“I need you to go.”
“What?”
“I need you to go Nancy. You, here. You’re just. A walking reminder of everything that went wrong in my life.”
Oh.
He wasn’t looking at her when he said it. He was lying. But did it matter if he was lying when he was actually right? She was making it worse. She makes everything worse.
The blood won’t come off. Nancy is frantically scrubbing at her hands. But there’s so much. Too much. She’s holding her mom’s hand. Putting pressure on the wound.
“No,” she whispers. “No.”
She’s in a bar bathroom. In Boston. She’s not at the hospital. She’s not. She’s not in Hawkins. It’s over. Her mom is fine. Dad is fine. Holly is fine. Mike is fine. And Nancy. She just needs to check. Just check. But she can’t. And the blood won’t come off her hands.
It keeps happening. Moments where she gets, lost. Some sound or sensation or feeling and then she’s somewhere else.
She’s holding a pair of scissors and then she is back in the hospital stabbing Bruce. She turns around and Vecna is there and she runs runs runs. She goes to a stupid collage party and holds a cold can of beer and then Barb is screaming for her. She spills wine and then there is blood on the floor, on her jacket, on her hands, pouring from her mom’s neck. Someone bumps into her and she is on the floor, her hands cuffed, her ribs breaking. And she is trapped. Trapped. Helpless. Useless. She overhears a movie playing and people on the screen are shooting and then she is shooting. She is killing. She can’t stop. She just keeps shooting. It’s easy. It’s so easy.
It all starts to blur together. The past and the present. One becomes the other until she can’t take it. She drinks and drinks and it doesn’t help. Nancy can’t stop. She needs to move. Needs to do something. She drops out of school.
“Nancy this isn’t you.”
This isn’t you. One more drink. This isn’t you. One more night with one more body just to feel something. This isn’t you. At the gun range. This isn’t you. At the gym, learning to fight. No. Learning more ways to hit. She already knows how to fight. This isn’t you. Nancy fights and fights and fights.
“Why don’t you just go home, Barb.”
Nancy,
I promise I’m okay now. I’ve gone to be with El.
Love Mike
They are sure. So sure that he is alive. With El.
They don’t get it. They don’t have memories of holding their little brother while he sobbed. While he begged for it to have been him instead. They never found him standing at the edge at the top of the quarry, shouting for El. And thank god that they had started locking up their guns.
They don’t hear his screams. His pleads.
“El? El! Eleven! El!”
“Mike! Mike!” Nancy can’t help the scream that rips from her as she runs to him. Grabs him by the arm. The shirt. “Stop.” He starts to pull away from her grasp. Struggling. “Hey, stop it. Stop it.”
“Let me go. Let me go!”
“No!” Nancy shouts. She is between him and the quarry now. If he tries to jump, she is going with him.
Mike deflates. And then starts to sob. “She saved me. She saved me. She’s gone. She’s really gone.”
The phone rings and rings and Nancy just lets it. Until it finally goes to the machine.
“Hey. Uh I guess you’re out, or busy. It’s me, by the way, Robin.” Robin. Of course it was Robin. “I was just calling to say hi.” Robin hesitates before saying, “I miss you. It feels like you’ve been kinda distant lately.”
Nancy should pick up the phone. She should. She can’t.
“You know Smith and Emerson aren’t that far. Just uh. Call me back okay?”
Nancy and Fred weren’t friends. But only because Nancy didn’t have friends. She had a boyfriend. She had people she sat with at lunch at school. People she talked to at Newspaper. But friends? People she shared things with. Let herself be vulnerable with. People whose losing would break her. No. Too dangerous.
But then. But then Robin. And Nancy can’t. She can’t. It’s dangerous. She wasn’t even friends with Fred. Not really. Not truly. But. It’s Robin.
Robin who calls her a genius and helps her break into Pennherst and figures out the way to save Max’s life. Robin.
“Does that make us friends? As in officially?”
“Yeah. I mean, right?”
“Right.”
And Nancy can’t help the smile.
Nancy closes Barb’s eyes. Closes her mouth. Douses her body in lighter fluid. Takes her hand and says that she is sorry. She is so sorry. And she loves her. Loves her still. Loves her always. She lets go. Drops the match. Steps back. Back. Sits down. Cross legged. Gun loaded and ready. And watches. And watches.
The fire is hot. Nancy forces herself to stay still. Stay where she is. Even though for a second, Nancy wants to lie down on the filthy pool floor and join her. To take her hand. So that they would be together in the end. The way they were supposed to be. These last three years nothing more than a giant cosmic mistake. But she doesn’t. She sits. And watches.
Mike is dead.
Of course he is dead. Of course he is. It is not like Hopper or Max or Will. The people nearest to her don’t miraculously come back to life.
When Vecna was in her head, it never crossed Nancy’s mind to do anything but survive. To climb out of the pool. Even though a part of her… A part of her wanted to stay there, with Barb. But she had long since shoved that aside, put it in a box and hidden it from herself. Hidden it so deeply even Vecna could not find it.
Nancy had people relying on her. Max was cursed and Eddie was being hunted and she needed to help them. Then Eddie was dead and Max was, gone, but the job wasn’t finished. Nancy had Vecna to kill. She had people to protect. She had Mike and Holly.
Now Mike is dead. And Holly doesn’t need her. And Nancy is tired.
She goes to leave flowers on their graves. Mostly because no one else is going to. Both Barb’s and Fred’s parents have moved. She passes by Eddie’s. Sees that it is covered in graffiti and frowns. She goes to her car and comes back with a water bottle and rag and cleans the grave.
“Well, well, well. Nancy Wheeler.”
Nancy stands calmly. Right hand on her purse casually. It’s the stupid mob who were after Eddie.
She gestures at the group with her left hand. “Is this supposed to scare me?”
Their stupid leader - whoever it was now that what’s his name was cut in half by the rift - glares at her. Then his face twists into a cruel smile. “I didn’t take you as one of the freaks. But then again, you were friends with that queer. What was her name, Barbara.”
He spits out the words, queer and Barbara both, like they are filthy. Nancy whips out her gun from her purse and points it at his head. She doesn’t say anything.
“What the hell!” One of the others shouts. She doesn’t spare him a glance.
“You’re not gonna shoot me.” But he sounds uncertain.
Nancy doesn’t flinch. Her hand doesn’t shake. It never does. She feels as calm as she ever has, standing in the cemetery holding a gun on some stupid man. “Try me. Let’s see what happens.”
Mike has a grave. Nancy does not visit.
After moving to Boston Nancy learns that phone conversations are, difficult. It takes so much effort to understand what is being said and her head aches after and her ears ring. Robin calls. A lot, at first. Nancy has to keep asking her to repeat herself and she can tell Robin is getting worried. Robin calls and Nancy just, stops answering. It’s too much on top of, everything. Nancy misses her so goddamn much but she just, can’t pretend to be okay. Not with Robin.
But when Nancy has a nightmare and she watches herself shoot Robin, holds Robin as she bleeds out in her arms, Nancy has to call her. Has to check.
“Hello?” Comes a sleepy voice.
“Robin?”
“Nancy, hey.”
Relief floods Nancy at the sound of Robin’s voice. She closes her eyes and tries to take deep breaths.
“Are you okay?” Robin asks when Nancy doesn’t say anything.
“I, yeah. I’m okay,” Nancy manages. “I just. It’s stupid. I had a nightmare… I needed to hear your voice. To make sure…”
“I’m here,” Robin says immediately. “I’m okay.”
“Can you just, talk?” Nancy asks, feeling pathetic.
“About what?”
“Anything.”
And Robin talks. Nancy can’t always hear exactly what she is saying, but she finds for once it doesn’t bother her. Just the sound of Robin’s voice is enough.
Nancy hasn’t wasted these last 18 months. Sure she dropped out of school but she learned more on the job anyway. She researched. She covered her tracks. Took her time. She thought she had time now. So she searched and she learned and she planned. She was right. It wasn’t over. It was never over.
She never let people into her apartment. She had what she called her evidence board, but what some people might call crazy. She didn’t tell anyone about it. Even the people who were there. Even the people who she loved and who loved her. Jonathan, who thought she was crazy when she chased after poisonous rats. Who didn’t believe her when she knew that people were being poisoned right in their own homes. Steve who just wanted to pretend that they were normal and everything was fine. Her brother who was too deep in his own trauma to see past El’s ghost. Her dad who grew more disinterested the more she found her own voice. The more she had to say the less he wanted to hear it. Even her mom. There were some things she just couldn’t tell her mom. She couldn’t bear to break her heart any more than she already has.
They would all tell her to stop. But Nancy can’t stop. And the one person who Nancy knew, who had proven, that she believed her. That she would drop everything not just because she wanted to be there for Nancy but because she really believed in what Nancy was doing. Believed her and wanted to be a part of it. Well. Robin had her own life now. Robin was in school. Was moving on. Had friends. Regular friends. And Nancy can’t bring herself to disrupt that.
So she writes on her evidence board. And doesn’t let anyone into her apartment. And tells everyone she is fine. School is great. As if it is not just a resource to her now. As if she doesn’t keep getting lost in her own mind. In the past. And that her only tether to the present is, ironically, to keep digging up the past. Nancy knows so many people would want to be here for her if they knew. It’s just. Complicated.
People have called Nancy a perfectionist. Obsessive even. A control freak. Nancy just likes to be prepared. She takes her job as Station Manager very seriously. She is in charge of the crawl plans. Marking the routes and getting the timing perfect. Making sure everyone gets back safe. Especially Hopper, who was incredibly insistent on her staying put after her foray into the Upside Down to bring Barb’s body home. Hopper who is, calling her name?
“Hey, Wheeler!”
“What?”
“Did you pull a gun on Andy?” Hopper asks. Andy? Was that his name?
Nancy scoffs. “He went to the cops? Seriously?”
“Wheeler.” Hopper’s tone is scolding.
“What? It’s not like I shot him. I didn’t even shoot at him.” Which, Nancy thinks, was a great show of restraint.
“You can’t just aim guns at people,” Hopper says exasperatedly.
Nancy ignores this. “Teach me how to fight,” she demands, the idea springing to mind suddenly. Yes. That is good. Something she can do.
“What?” Hopper says, surprised. “Are you serious? You don’t need to know how to fight.”
Nancy rolls her eyes. “Really?” She gestures at the board where the next crawl plan is in development.
“Wheeler, what are you going to do, punch the monster?”
“Well, seeing as I was just cornered by an angry mob of guys,” Nancy shrugs and smiles as sarcastically as she can. “Might be helpful.”
“You’re already armed.”
Nancy scoffs. “But I bet you’d teach Jonathan, right, if he asked? Or Steve.”
“What? No,” Hopper says offended. He glares at her and she glares back.
“Then why not?” Nancy snaps.
Hopper scoffs at her. She wants to hit him. “Because.”
“That’s not an answer,” Nancy says frustratedly. And she is not a goddamn child.
“I said no.”
“Yes.”
He looks at her. Calculating. “I don’t hit little girls.”
Nancy stares back for a beat. Just as calculating. Then. She punches him in the face.
Hopper’s head snaps back and his hand comes up to touch his jaw. His expression doesn’t change. He closes his eyes for a moment and then sighs deeply. “I’m gonna regret this,” he mutters to himself. Then he says, to her, “Twist your hips more. Put whatever weight you have behind the punch.” He holds up his hand, palm open. “Again.”
Nancy strikes again.
The day of Mike’s graduation sees Nancy on the rooftop with her three best friends. It’s incredible that after everything they’ve been though, they’re able to end up here. The four of them together. With no more animosity or awkwardness or resentment. And Nancy is a writer. Writes for a living even. But she doesn’t have words to describe the feeling that surrounds her. The love she has for all of them. Her friends. She never really thought she could have that again.
Nancy considers, really considers, for the first time, telling them what she’s actually been up to. Telling them about her research and her plan and maybe even, telling them about how it’s the only thing that’s keeping her afloat. Maybe this will be the start of a new leaf. Maybe Nancy doesn’t have to do everything alone.
Nancy lets herself believe, for a moment, that Barb would be happy for her. That Barb would be proud of her.
Mike is alive.
Alive.
Nancy knows it. Can feel it. He is with El and El is alive and so Mike is alive. Nancy just has to help him. Make it so that he can come home. So that they can both come home. She has to bring him home.
Her evidence board may have gotten a bit more, well crazy, as of late. The idea that has been brewing in the back of her mind where she tries not to think about it is pushed suddenly to the forefront. It is so easy to slip back into that place. That place where she would do anything to bring her sibling home. Whatever the consequences.
Nancy checks her guns. She is ready. One last fight.
“You’re role in this plan...” Hopper says sounding unusually hesitant.
“Someone has to do it. We need a second shooter,” Nancy says nonchalantly. Then, more firmly. “I can do it.”
“I know you can.” He pauses. “Don’t hesitate. Aim to kill.”
Nancy doesn’t flinch. “I know.”
Nancy has killed before. Not just monsters. She bludgeoned her ex-boss’s head in with a fire extinguisher. And sure, he was flayed, wasn’t really him anymore, but she saw it, felt it, the moment he died at her hand. At least with this there would be some distance.
Her hands are cuffed in front of her and she pulls at them frustrated. She’s stuck in this stupid interrogation room when El is- and Mike is- She has to get to Mike. Get Mike and Holly home. Get Mike and Holly home.
“You’re an interesting one, Nancy Wheeler,” the woman who is apparently interrogating her says. She must be Dr. Kay. “So stoic. So calm. Like a veteran soldier.”
Nancy says nothing. Just stares. El is dead. Dead. Mike is. Get Mike and Holly home. She has to get Mike and Holly home.
A series of pictures are slammed down onto the metal table in front of her.
“Do you recognize them?”
Of course she does. It was only a few hours ago that she killed them.
“How about now.”
More pictures. Woman. Kids.
“They had families.”
Nancy stares.
“Your opponents are always going to be bigger and stronger than you,” Hopper says one day during their training.
Nancy scoffs. “No shit.”
“That means fight dirty,” Hopper continues as if she hadn’t spoken. “Go for the eyes, the groin, throat, hair, joints, anything. If you end up in close combat we’re already screwed. Your only job then is survive.”
Nancy can do that. She’s good at that.
Nancy’s ears are ringing. And this woman won’t shut up. She just needs to make it out of here and get Mike and Holly home.
Nancy catches Dr. Kay say something about prison. Trouble. Mutual destruction.
“-keep this quiet. Don’t you agree? You keep your mouth shut, and you and Jim Hopper don’t go to federal prison for the rest of your lives.”
“What’s the catch,” Nancy asks, speaking for the first time.
“No catch. Just a small punishment.” Dr. Kay smiles. “The guilty must be punished.” She turns around, opens the door and three soldiers come in. “Don’t kill her. The others would be such a pain about it.”
Nancy stands abruptly. Knocking the chair over. In an instant her mantra of get Mike and Holly home changes. She falls back to her baseline when everything else is stripped away. Survive. Survive. Survive. Back against the wall she kicks the first one between the legs. The second one hesitates and she uses the moment to swing her cuffed hands at the his head. She dodges. Swings. Fights. She doesn’t last long. But she goes down fighting.
She hits the floor. Hands reflectively going to cover her head. Feels searing, blinding pain in her ribs. Screams. She is yanked back up against the wall. More pain. Her head this time. She spits out blood. She is grabbed and dragged to the table. Her hands are uncuffed but it doesn’t make a difference. Her right hand is laid flat on the table. She squeezes her eyes shut.
Hopper is the only one waiting for her when she stumbles out after the soldiers are done beating their vengeance into her. He has blood on his face and is grimacing uncomfortably. He is staring at her with something she can’t recognize. Not right now. She is too tired. She hurts too much.
Nancy finds herself sitting in the passenger seat of his car.
He looks at her visibly broken right pointer finger. Trigger finger. “You need to go to the hospital.”
“No,” Nancy says automatically. Bruce is at the hospital. Vecna is at the hospital. Her mom- “Yes. Mike and Holly.” They will be there.
By the time they get to the hospital her head is spinning and her ears are ringing even worse. Hopper had to pull over so she could throw up. She stumbles and limps into the hospital. Hopper’s hand gripping her arm and steering her. Too crowded. Too many people.
“Nancy?”
“Oh my god.”
“What the hell did they do to you?”
Too many voices. She tries to leave.
“Where are you going! You need to see a doctor.”
“Mike and Holly,” Nancy mumbles.
“That’s not the right direction.”
“I think she has a concussion. She threw up on the way here.”
“Nancy-”
There are too many people. Too close. The lights flicker. Someone grabs her arm. Vecna? “No! No!” She jerks away. Survive. Then. Mike and Holly. “Where are my brother and sister!”
“Nancy breathe.”
She can’t breathe. She is suffocating. The air is poisonous. Everything is hazy, blurry, loud. Someone is there. Speaking calmly. Robin.
“Robin,” Nancy chokes out. She grabs onto the front of Robin’s jacket like it’s a life vest. “Help me,” she begs. “Get me out of here.”
Robin will save her. Robin believes her. Robin won’t let her suffocate.
Robin’s hands are on her face.
“Nancy, do you know where you are?” Robin asks her gently.
Nancy blinks. Mike and Holly. “Take me to Mike and Holly.” She takes a shallow breath, the pain in her ribs flaring. Everything hurts. “Take me to my mom,” she whispers. “Please.”
“Okay. Okay I’ve got you.”
Mike and Holly are with her mom. They are asleep but her mom is awake. Staring at them like she will never let them out of her sight again. Until she sees Nancy. Nancy watches Mike and Holly breathe for a moment. Checks. Alive. She sits on the bed next to her mom.
Her mom is crying, is reaching for her. “Oh my baby.”
And Nancy is suddenly, firmly, present. She screws up her eyes and whispers into her mom’s arms. “It was really bad mom.”
She drinks. More than she maybe should. Enough to fall asleep. Enough to stay numb. That’s not new. Her budding alcoholism has always been functional at least. She thinks she was going to stop. In the future. When things were less hard. Things were supposed to get less hard.
“I’m fine. I’m fine.”
Nancy confesses to her mom when her parents are both out of the hospital. Feels like her mom probably won’t even want her around Mike and Holly, when she knows the truth.
“You were worried about me becoming someone else. If you knew who I am now, you wouldn’t recognize me.”
She is breaking her mother’s heart.
“I was so. So. Calm. Everything was so clear. It was easy. There’s something wrong with me. It shouldn’t be that easy,” her voice trails off into a whisper but she forces herself to keep talking. “I killed three people. Shot them. It was easy. The easy part they said.” Easy. She was calm. She was proud even. For doing her part. When Hopper complimented her. Proud. Calm. Killer.
Her mom hugs her.
“Nothing about this has been easy for you Nancy.”
Nancy stops talking. Then she stops listening. It’s too hard. Takes too much concentration and energy that she just doesn’t have. She listens to the ringing in her ears instead.
Gone. Gone. Gone! Gone!
“Wheeler? Are you listening to me?” Hopper.
She jerks her head. Nods.
“He’s not dead,” Hopper says gruffly. “No body.”
She says nothing. Gone.
“Do you, understand?” Hopper asks.
Nancy nods.
“I’m going to forge some paperwork. Say you identified him.”
Nods again.
“Nancy?” She looks in his general direction. Has he ever said her first name before? “There needs to be a funeral. We need to keep up appearances or else it was all for nothing. But you should tell your mom the truth. After.”
Nancy shakes her head. Swallows. “You? Or Joyce.”
“Yeah,” Hopper says softly. “Yeah okay.”
He’s not dead.
Gone.
Not dead.
Gone.
“I’m not leaving until you tell me to go.”
Nancy opens her mouth. Closes her mouth. Tries again. “Go away Robin.”
“No,” Robin says flatly. “You’ve been alone long enough.”
“Robin, I can’t-” Nancy looks at her, pleading. She can’t. Can’t speak. Can’t hear. Can’t move. Can’t pretend. Can’t think.
She is going to break.
“You don’t have to say anything. Or do anything. No pretending. Just let me be here, okay? Let yourself feel.”
Nancy breaks.
Her brother is alive and she is still grieving. Her brother is dead and she’s just never going to know for sure. She can’t fix this. It’s too much. Too big. She is never going to see him again. She didn’t even get to say goodbye.
Joyce and Hopper talk and Nancy watches as her mom comes out of her haze of grief with something like hope.
“I’m sorry mom.”
“Oh baby. It’s not your fault.”
Nancy shakes her head. She was supposed to protect her siblings. That was her job. Her sister was kidnapped and her brother…Her brother didn’t trust her. Didn’t talk to her. Didn’t tell her. Her brother left her. Nancy failed.
“I’m really, really sorry.”
Nancy had a plan. Before. A plan before Mike- She had evidence. She had access. Resources. Experience. She had the article written and typed. Two versions. One with the truth. And one that was watered down. She knows she can never tell the truth. Rips it into tiny pieces in fury. She is so tired of doing the smart thing. Nancy had a plan. And then Mike- and Nancy has a new plan.
Hopper pulls her over as she drives out of the War Zone. Of course he does. She wasn’t even speeding. He looks in her trunk. Looks at everything she bought. Then gets in the passenger seat.
Nancy clutches the steering wheel. Stares straight ahead at the empty road. “Don’t tell me not to do this.” Then, cruelly, but calculated, bites out, “You’re not my dad.”
Hopper grunts. “No. And you’re an adult. You make your own bad decisions.”
“Yeah, I do,” Nancy says bitterly.
“Jane’s sister, Kali. She spent her whole life going after them. The people who hurt her. All it got her was more pain. And death.”
“Someone has to make them pay,” Nancy snaps. And no one else was doing anything about it. She had the plan. The job. The resources. She had done the work. And now she has the firearms.
“Either you will die or they will put you in prison for the rest of your life. Do you understand that?” Hopper says loudly.
“Maybe they should,” Nancy says quietly avoiding his gaze.
Hopper seems to deflate. “I’ve been down that road. Thinking I was a curse. Thinking I needed to sacrifice myself to save everyone. That kind of guilt, it’ll eat you alive. Doesn’t lead anywhere good.”
“But I am guilty.” Nancy says simply. Guilt is not a new emotion for her. She has been feeling it her whole life. Even before Barb. Guilt for taking up space. For asking too many questions. For not being good enough. Normal enough. Guilt for being alive. It is a statement of fact for her. Nancy is a sister. A daughter. A woman. Nancy breathes. Nancy survives. Nancy is responsible. Nancy is guilty. “I killed those soldiers.” She killed-
“You did what you had to do. To protect your family.”
“They had families too.” Nancy says. She looks at Hopper finally. “I don’t regret what I did Hop. I would do it again. I will do it again. And you can’t stop me.”
She states it matter of fact. Doesn’t raise her voice. Nancy is calm.
It’s after normal work hours but she knows every one of her targets stays for another two hours. Nancy picked the lock and snuck into a closed business across the street from her targets. She feels sick, but her hands are still. She’s ready. She has a plan. Flash bang first. The two security guards. Then Dr. Kay. Then close combat. She has a plan, and nothing can stop her. Nothing, except-
“Nancy!” Robin yells, frantic, coming around the corner from the back entry.
Damnit, Robin. “How did you find me,” Nancy says, calmly. She’s not even in Indiana anymore for Christ sake.
Robin is breathing heavily. “Saw your notes,” she pants out. “Your uh, board.”
“Evidence board,” Nancy supplies automatically.
“Sure. That.”
“Wait,” Nancy realizes, “you broke into my apartment?”
Robin rolls her eyes. Actually rolls her eyes. “Because that’s what’s important right now,” she says sarcastically.
Nancy huffs. “If you saw my notes you know what I’m doing. And why.”
“I know you have a plan,” Robin says. “A stupid plan-”
She says more but Nancy, honestly, stops listening when she hears Robin call her plan stupid. “Great,” Nancy interrupts. “So you’ll let me get on with it then.”
“Nancy this isn’t you,” she says, so sincerely. Like she knows Nancy better than she knows herself.
This isn’t you.
And Nancy. She is so fucking angry. So angry she wants to throw herself into the jaws of a demogorgan and fight it with nothing but her bare hands until it rips her apart and the outside of her body will finally match the inside.
This isn’t you.
Nancy snaps.
“This is me!” She yells. Screams. She gestures at the guns. “This is me.”
Nancy Wheeler. Feels the most calm in a crisis. The most capable with a gun in her hands. The most herself when the world is ending and she can pretend that the monsters are only on the outside.
She looks at the gun. Breathes. Lets herself be calm. Calm. Proud. Killer. Everything ends eventually. Why not now? Why not like this? The way that it started.
“Just go home, Robin. Go home.”
Robin snaps back. “No. You’re not a killer!”
Nancy scoffs. “Of course I am.” Did you forget what you did? When I kill someone, I don’t forget.
“Bullshit.”
“Why do you even care?” Nancy deflects. “They tortured and experimented on kids. On pregnant woman. And they’re doing it again. They’re never going to stop. Until someone stops them.”
“I don’t care about them! I care about you!” Robin yells. Her eyes fill with tears. “I know you Nancy. This guilt will kill you.”
Robin is wrong. It already has. She has been living on stolen time. “Stop trying to save me Robin.”
Robin is fully crying now. “You’re going to die. If you do this. You’re going to die.”
Nancy shrugs. “At least I’ll go down fighting.”
“The war is over.”
“No. It’s not. It’s never over.”
“You dying won’t bring them back!” Robin states. Nancy flinches. That cuts through the noise. She shakes her head. Begs Robin silently to stop. Robin continues. “It won’t bring back El. Or Mike. Or Barb. Or any of the other deaths you blame yourself for. It won’t bring back the soldiers you killed to save us. You can’t fix it Nancy. Your death won’t right some cosmic wrong. You’ll just be dead. And the rest of us have to live with it.”
Nancy wants to scream. Wants to drown. Wants to break. “So what then? I just grieve forever? I just always feel like this. Like this, this open wound. Bleeding everywhere. Ruining everything I touch.”
“No,” Robin says so emphatically. “You can heal. You can be happy. There’s more to life than this. There’s more for you. I promise. Just come home. Please. Come home with me, Nancy. You have so many people who love you.”
And Nancy wants to believe her. She really wants to believe that she can just walk away. That it can be over. That she can be happy. That they can be happy. But it’s too late. Too much has happened. She’s done too much.
“I’m sorry,” Nancy says.
“No,” Robin answers. “I am.”
For a second Nancy doesn’t understand. Then, from around the corner, Jonathan and Steve appear. They stand on either side of Robin, boxing Nancy in.
“No,” Nancy says quietly shaking her head at them and taking a step back. Her three best friends. Her three stupid asshole best friends.
Then there is a sharp pinch on her neck. She twists around and Hopper is there. “No!” Nancy shouts. His arms wrap around hers. She can’t move. “Let me go. Let me go!” Nancy tries to fight. She tries.
“Sorry kid,” Hopper says. “I’m not doing this shit again.”
The drugs are kicking in. All the strength is leaving her body. Her legs give out and Hopper lowers her to the ground. “Let me go,” Nancy slurs as the world starts to go fuzzy.
“I didn’t want this for you,” Hopper says, his voice full of something like guilt.
When Nancy wakes, she’s in a bedroom that isn’t hers. Her mom is holding her hand.
“Mom?”
“Nancy. Oh Nancy.” Her mom pulls her up and hugs her. Nancy breathes and tries to remember. She had a plan, and then, Robin and, Hopper.
Hopper is standing in the corner of the room, his arms crossed, frowning.
“Where are we?” Nancy asks, fully sitting up and trying to extract herself from her mom who won’t quite let her go.
“Iceland,” Hopper answers flatly.
Nancy feels her eyes go wide in shock. “What?” Then she quickly does the math and mutters “Jesus how long did you keep me unconscious?”
Her mom, still holding on to her, says, “We though it would be better for you to wake up when it was, over.”
“Over?” Nancy says, confused.
“They’re going to prison,” Hopper says flatly. “Buckley gave us your evidence. You had enough. Between the rest of us, we knew some good lawyers. Agents, people in the government who can be trusted. They’re going down for what they did. All of them.”
“I don’t understand,” Is all Nancy can say.
“You did it Nancy,” Her mom says. She sounds, proud.
“But if everyone knows-”
“No one knows,” Hopper says. “Murrey said something about watering it down?”
Nancy sits and tries to process what is happening. She had enough evidence. They had lawyers. It was, over?
“It’s really over?” Nancy asks Hopper.
“It’s over,” Hopper says firmly. “It’s over.”
Nancy nods and bites her lip. She’s not crying in front of Hopper.
Her mom says gently, “There’s a couple of people who really want to see you. Come on.”
Nancy follows her mom out of the bedroom into the living room. Hopper trailing behind them. A couple people was underselling it a bit. They are all here. Robin, Steve, Jonathan, Will, Max, Dustin, Lucas, Joyce and Murrey. Even Holly. They are all here. And not just them.
El is here.
Mike is-
Nancy freezes. “Mike?”
“Hi,” Mike says, waving awkwardly.
Nancy steps towards him. Stops abruptly in front of him. “Mike,” she gasps. “You’re here. You’re alive? You’re really alive.”
A mix of horror and confusion crosses Mike’s face. “I told you I was?”
Nancy shakes her head. “I couldn’t check.”
His expression shifts into one of understanding and deep sadness. “I’m sorry Nance. I’m really sorry.”
“You idiot,” she says hugging him though her tears. “You stupid asshole idiot.”
“I know. I am,” Mike agrees hugging her back. “I know.”
“You can’t- you can’t-”
“Neither can you okay.” Mike grabs her by the shoulders. “Neither can you Nancy.” She nods. Hugging him again. Holly throws herself into the hug. Then their mom. Wraps herself around all of them.
Nancy only pulls away to turn to El. To pull El into a hug. “El. Oh god it’s good to see you.”
“I’m sorry,” El whispers, still in Nancy’s arms.
Nancy shakes her head. “You have nothing to be sorry about. Okay? Not you. You’re here. You’re alive.” Nancy squeezes El harder. El is alive. El chose to live. After everything. El is a hero.
Nancy is alive. But she did not choose it. Not then. She is now. She looks around at everyone. She is now.
“Hop?” Nancy says to him, knows he can see the apology on her face when his expression softens.
“Yeah kid?”
“Thank you.” She turns to the others. “All of you. Thank you.”
They smile at her, and all of them are crying now. Her included.
“What is family for?” Jonathan says with his tearful smile. Steve and Robin nod seriously on other side of him. Nancy can’t help it. She goes and hugs the three of them too.
They all take a little hike together. Their ridiculous ragtag group. El brings them somewhere with three waterfalls. Nancy has never seen Mike look so happy.
“Do you hate me?” Nancy asks Robin when it is finally just the two of them, staring out at the beautiful scenery.
“Of course not,” Robin says softly. “I couldn’t.”
“How did you do it?” Nancy can’t help but ask.
Robin flashes her a grin. “Inquiring investigative journalist minds want to know?”
Nancy just nods. Robin shrugs. “You did most of it. I just, set it in motion. Organized the others. Pooled resources.”
“When?”
“As soon as Mike…”
Nancy inhales sharply. She knew then? As soon as it happened. She knew what Nancy would do. Before Nancy did.
Robin explains. “The kids believed he and El were alive. They told us.” She gestures over where Steve and Jonathan are looking at the waterfall. “The kids didn’t know what to do, but I knew you wouldn’t believe it until you saw him. No matter what anyone said. I knew you were going to do something reckless.” Robin pauses and, seemingly to herself mutters, bait, like it’s a curse.
She continues. “I knew we had to be faster. I went to your apartment. When I saw…I couldn’t believe that’s what you’ve been doing the past eighteen months. But, of course it was. You’re a genius Nancy,” she states it like a fact, and Nancy, in spite of the circumstances, blushes. Robin adds, “And you’re the most stubborn person I’ve ever met.”
Nancy huffs with what is probably inappropriate laughter, given everything, but Robin gives her a wry smile. Robin turns to fully face her. “I knew that the only way to stop whatever reckless plan you came up with, would be with your own plan.”
Nancy stares at the incredible person across from her. All she can think to say is, “You saved my life. Again.”
“Yeah and you don’t make it easy,” Robin says with a grin.
Nancy lets herself smile back for a moment before her face crumples. “Do you really believe it?” she asks Robin. “What you told me. That I can be, okay?”
“Of course I do,” Robin says earnestly. “You’re going to heal.” A statement of fact. A certainty. Simple. Nancy almost believes her. Robin adds, “It’s going to take time. And it’s going to suck. But you’re not going to do it alone.” Robin offers her hand and Nancy grasps it tightly.
“You’re going to be okay,” Robin says. “We all are. We’re going to be happy.”
Nancy with the hand not holding Robin’s, wipes at her tears. “And the, the other part? Robin, can we, can we go home?” She bites her lip. Leaves the last part unsaid. Knows Robin hears it anyway. Together?
Robin smiles at her so, so softly. “Yeah Nancy. Let’s go home.”
Together.