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Will feels like his entire being is burning. Red hot, like molten metal.
Self-inflicted blows of a hammer. Hurting the Other, hurting himself. Bones snapped, reset into something else. Forged, he is not new. Same parts, reordered.
Slowly, it cools. An orange glow, silver whispering at its edges. Yellow now, before it solidifies.
When he can feel ordinary things again – things grounded in his own body, like sight and sound – he notes the trickle of something, inching toward his lip. He lifts a hand, bones leaden, swipes the back of it beneath his nose. Red again, but deeper this time, familiar and human.
His eyes are open, he knows. Yes. It is taking every ounce of his energy to keep them that way. Bones now welded together, still throbbing, waiting for the fog to clear. Eyelids like paperweights, jaw wound tight, gaze fixed on a blurred outline in the distance.
Finally, Will can see him. Alive. Fuzzy-edged, the image, but him no less. Lips parted, teeth flashing, the only reassurance he needs. Alive, he wants to whisper, but can’t.
The fiery ache, the torturous realignment of atoms, stronger somehow. Gravity calling out. Lay down, it says. It is done. You cannot tear yourself apart and walk on.
***
A warm hand on his cheek, gentle. With effort, he moves himself into the touch, his head lolling sideways.
“Will? Wake up, Will. Please.”
***
Flashes of memory. The boy from above, arms crossed in front of his face, protected from nothing. No one can save him from this.
A film reel, a past. A flickering future, a world without him. I can.
The pain again. Like someone is pulling him apart.
***
A softness beneath him. His eyes open slowly, gently, comprehending.
It’s dark in the small room. To his left, a desk lamp illuminates a circle on the floor. He is on the floor too, on a mattress. No sheet, a comforter tossed over him, half kicked off. The Squawk, he realises.
Something shifts against his shoulder. Someone.
A mop of hair to his right. Face pressed against his upper arm, hand a mere inch from holding his own.
Mike is clenching his fists, knuckles pale. He is sleeping, forehead resting on Will, just barely. His head sits below the pillow, curled in. Limbs sprawled out in every direction but Will’s, not even beneath the blanket. Breaths coming quick and even, he feels them now on his skin. Alive. He pauses and exhales.
Will is alive, too. He expected that. He’s been torn apart before, a pain that isn’t his own, cleaving him in two. This was the same. Different in some ways, but the pain the same.
He tries to remember how he had done it, walked through the fire. Had that power always been there, waiting for him on the other side?
The lives he could have saved if he had known. How had he not known?
Tears he can’t help spring to his eyes. He lets his head fall back against the pillow. He had watched as they dragged the children through the gates. He heard them struggle from behind, kicking and screaming against the icy grip. Tiny ankles, warm. He felt empty and angry, full of a purpose he couldn’t understand.
He has seen both sides of this war. He has been the taken and the taker, and yet he is missing something. Some core element he has overlooked, or that has been concealed from him.
If he could just… draw on that power again, deeper this time. Find the source and see. End it, maybe. But he can barely feel it anymore. It’s farther away than it ever has been, so far that he can’t tell if it’s really there or just a memory.
But isn’t that all he’s ever wanted?
For the first time since he was taken, Will feels normal. No interference and no threat of interference. No looming shadow. He’s just Will. Useless Will. He can’t save anyone, not like this.
Even if he could tap into that power again, it’s like a shotgun in a tool shed, no use in his hands. He couldn’t save himself then; how can he save anybody else now?
He wipes at the wetness on his cheeks, sitting up. Hands falling from his stomach to his lap. He stifles a groan at the pinch of muscle and pushes back against the wall. A dull pain behind his eyes.
A movement from beside him. Mike lifts his head.
“Will,” he says softly, scanning his face. At the sight of his best friend, awake, alive, Mike sits up straight, eyes wider.
“Hi,” Will answers with a shy smile, heart pounding for inexplicable reasons.
Mike grins. “Hi.”
“Are you okay?” Will asks, gaze tracing the gash beside Mike’s eyebrow, the exposed skin of his hands, neck, searching for blood or a bandage or-
A hand grabs his own.
“Am I okay?” Mike’s brown eyes sparkle. “Will, you- I should be asking you that. You saved us out there. Don’t you remember?”
He shifts so he’s facing him, legs crossed beneath him on the mattress. Will drops his hand, and Mike’s eyes trail away, thinking.
Hands raised again, trying to explain. His head shakes side to side in disbelief. “You were- You- You were like-,”
“Vecna,” Will inserts.
Mike’s head jerks backwards a fraction, and he frowns, an almost pout. “Vecna? No, no. I know I said that before, but no. You were like… like I said, a sorcerer. You were Will.”
He hadn’t felt much like himself. The heat, the hurt, the change, hardening him into something. A weapon.
“It was Vecna’s power, Mike.”
“And you used it for good. You pulled the strings. You saved me – us. You saved us.”
Eyes locked together; one tormented, the other amazed.
“But the kids,” Will whispers. "Holly."
“We can save them now. With you, we can save them.”
Will shakes his head, sits up further with a wince. Mike extends his hands, trying to help, failing. Nothing he can do.
Will looks once more inside himself, for an inkling of something. “I can’t feel him anymore. Even if I could… I don’t know.”
“Because he’s not nearby.” With conspiring eyes, Mike smiles again. “You probably scared him off with your awesome powers.”
Cheeks flushed, Will accepts this begrudgingly. Gaze landing on the wall across from him, he ponders Mike’s words.
“You think I scared him off?” Mike nods in his periphery, slow, attention burning hot on Will’s skin. “And was it? Scary, I mean.”
Leaning forward, Mike scratches at the comforter above where Will’s knee is. “I mean, I thought I was gonna die. I thought we were all gonna die, so yeah. I was terrified.”
Absently, Will tugs at the end of his shirtsleeve, brows knitting. “No, I mean me, Mike.” He turns his head to face him. “Was I scary?”
Mike’s expression is still, hesitant. “Not scary, no.”
Will’s minuscule movement closer, worried. “No?”
“No.” The quiet honesty of his voice, truthful but avoidant. “I could never be afraid of you.”
Frozen in time, Will pockets this memory. The certainty in Mike’s face, the movement of his lips, the flash of light in his eyes. Invisible freckles, lashes, the curve of his jaw. He could never be afraid of you.
Mike blinks, straightens. That little shake of his head. “It was pretty cool, actually. Probably- No, definitely the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. Did it feel cool?”
Will flushes again, fails to hide his smile, only speaking when it subsides. He pulls his knees to his chest and rests his heavy head on top of them. “It’s all a little… blurry. Like pieces of reality, mixed with the hive mind, and then my own thoughts too.”
Mike leans in, interested. “What were you thinking about?”
All the breath in his lungs passing through his lips, deflated. “It was like with my Mom, when the Demo was after her. I was so… angry, I wanted to kill you.”
Mike nods, urges him on. Unafraid.
“And then you had this look. I don’t know, I’ve never really seen you scared like that before. You’ve always been so brave.”
A sound of disagreement. “I-,”
“That’s what started it. And then I was thinking about something Robin had said, about having the answers already. I knew I could try to control them, the Demos, but that wouldn’t be enough. And I could see Robin and Lucas and you, and- I had to kill them, I had to cut them off from the hive mind.”
A thumb brushing a tear from his cheek. A pause. He hadn’t even realised-
“Go on,” Mike insists.
A shaky exhale. “I felt this… current? The same electricity that I feel when he’s nearby, just stronger, and this time it was tangible. I could reach out and touch it. I remember tapping into it, taking a hold of them, but that’s where it gets a lot less clear.”
Mike smirks. “That was when you snapped their bones with your mind.”
Will attempts a smile. “Yeah, that.” He wrinkles his nose. “But… you know how, when the Demos get hurt, I hurt, right?”
Mike’s bottom lip drops a fraction. Playful gaze now hardened. “Yes.”
A chill up Will’s spine as he recalls, hums an affirmative.
“Does that mean- Did you feel it?”
Will gnaws at the inside of his cheek. Another hum.
“Shit.”
“It wasn’t that bad.”
Mike scoffs. “Yeah, right. Just regular people pain, right? You break your neck often?”
Will rolls his eyes. “Okay, maybe it was. But it was worth it.”
Guilt-ridden, Mike’s wringing hands in the half-light. Such a stark difference from the care in his expression. “Thank you,” Mike says.
Mouth opening to dismiss him, mind deciding otherwise. “You’re welcome.”
An eternal silence in the dark, two sets of eyes. The briefest of connections, of understandings. Will has given something, become something.
For you, I have changed myself, he wants to say. Maybe I’m stronger, but I’m scared. So scared.
Words unspoken but unnecessary. The time and distance between them, a universe. Closed for just a second.
I would do it all again, Mike.
A whisper. “We'd better go talk to the others,” Mike says.
Will nods.
A clumsy smile. “I told your Mom to get some sleep, that I’d keep an eye on you.”
Will chuckles, letting the moment dissipate. Grateful that it happened at all. “A closed eye on me, you mean?”
Mike shoves Will’s knees, knocking them together. “What, you can sleep and I can’t?”
“Pretty sure I was knocked out, Mike, not sleeping.”
“Details,” he says, swatting at the air. He pushes to his feet. A hand extended down to his friend.
Will clasps his hand with Mike’s. Pulled to his feet, he stops, his world spinning. Knees aching and spine tingling.
“Will? Will.”
He raises his free hand. “I’m good.”
Mike tightens his grip on the other. Warily, he says, “Okay.”
“Okay,” Will answers. He drops Mike’s hand and steps away from the mattress. “Let’s go.”
Fingers wrapped around his wrist. “Will?”
Feet halted. Will turns, expectant.
Awkward hands, not sure where to go. Mike rubs at the back of his neck, pink cheeks cloaked in shadow. “Just… now that everyone realises how incredible you are, remember I knew it first, okay? Way before this, I knew.”
Will, quiet, smiling. “Alright.”
Mike nods. “Good.” He bumps his shoulder with Will’s and moves toward the door. “Let’s go then.”