Chapter Twenty-Nine ♰ 
Down the Rabbit Hole

  "𝕺h, this is quite literally my version of Hell," exclaimed Nadine, white-knuckling the grab-handle above the passenger door with one hand and burying the nails of the other into Billy's fancy, leather seat.

  Sydney Sommers was not a bad driver. Seriously, she was rather an accomplished driver, actually. But, she was used to her Jeep—a more rugged, high-rise kind of car, more sway in curves and a stronger centre of gravity...Billy Hargrove's kitschy Chevrolet was nothing like her trusty Wrangler. It was low-slung, sporty, eager and flighty at turns, twitchy in the brakes (fucking terrifying, really). 

  "Sydney, I thought you said you passed your test first try?" Dustin wailed, haphazardly nursing a wet-rag on an unconscious Steve's wounded head in the back of the car.

  "I did, you little shit!" she retorted, taking a sharp swerve to avoid running over a docile cat, lapping at itself in the middle of the road.

  "Are you sure about that?" Max demanded furiously, ducked under the glove compartment between Nadine's combats. "Billy'll kill me if we crash this car!"

  Sydney briefly squinted her eyes at the kid, indignant. "Oh, and he won't kill you for sedating him? I won't crash the jackass's car, all right? I'm a perfectly competent dri—agh, fuck!" The engine revved at a growling throttle as she shifted into first gear.

  "Suh-Sydney?" Oh, great. Her lover boy was awake. She heard him slur another garbled word, a fond, confused Nicks, most likely, and glimpsed at him through the rearview. He was slumped between a very squished Mike, Lucas, and Dustin, practically sprawled over their grudging laps, and looked very pretty with his butterfly-sutures and colourful bandages. She'd clean him up better, when all of this was done—an ode to their first night together, when they took in turns dressing and sterilising each other's wounds, and shared their first kiss. "Wh..." He groggily looked around the flying-bullet of a car, "What the f...Nicks, what's happening? What's—"

  "I told you he'd freak out!" Mike bellyached.

  "He's not freaking out. He's just...A little disoriented. Ain't that right, Stevie?" Sydney anxiously threw over her shoulder. 

  Stevie continued to yell and thrash out his aching limbs as they barrelled down a shadowy street. "Stop the car! Slow down, Sid. The bench. We said the bench—"

  "Dustin, press down a little on his bruises," she sighed, his panicking exacerbating the lingering pain in her throat. "Hopefully he'll pass out again." 

  "Hey, what—"

  "Lucas," she chirped, "directions?"

  Very professionally, Lucas flourished out the map in his hands and emptied his throat. "You're gonna keep straight for half a mile, then make a left on Mount Sinai."

  Sydney put her foot down on the gas, the speedometer flickering up to seventy miles-per-hour. A string of obscenities bubbled out of Nadine's mouth as she grabbed at Max's hunched shoulder. Similarly, Steve started to yell and thrash again in the car, launching his arm out far enough that he started to obsessively slap at the nape of Sydney's neck through the gap between the head-rest and her seat.

  "Steve," she snapped in reprimand, "I'm trying to fucking drive here!"

  "Well, slow the heck down, please!" he yelped, his thumb jolting over where her the top of her spine jutted against skin, then tucking under the dainty chain of her necklace and almost strangling her as the car practically soared over a speed-bump. "Sydney—"

  "Oh, wait," said Lucas, startling Sydney as he threw himself almost into the centre-console and jabbed a finger at the windscreen ahead, "that's Mount Sinai. Make a left, Ground Control!"

  "Aye, aye, Major Tom." Obviously bypassing the indicator, Sydney took a brutally sharp turn left, crashing the bumper of Billy's beloved car right into a dustbin, almost taking out a mailbox too. The lot of them exploded into terrified screams. 

  "Seriously, how do you have your license?" screeched Nadine, pitchier than Sydney had ever heard her.

  "I'm a good driver!"

  "My ass, are you!" Mike hurled back.

  Sydney was really getting sick of these kids. Billy Hargrove just almost choked her to an inch of her life after she hit him to protect them, now they're insulting her driving? Talk about ungrateful.

  "Right!" Lucas belched, wagging his finger again, only more frantically this time.

  "Right? He's right? I drive you everywhere, Sinclair!" she said indignantly, particularly affronted by his betrayal. "You know that I'm a good—"

  "No!" he wailed, almost girlishly. "Turn right! Up this hill. Right!"

  "Oh. Shit. My bad." 

  Another violent turn, and the car was hurtling up a steep hill, the engine groaning against the incline as she shifted into first gear. It was a bumpy, violent slant, and they all shrieked at every turbulent lurch, scrambling for purchase on any available surface for leverage. 

  "Here!" Mike bellowed, pointing at a mouth in the earth. "Stop, stop!"

  Sydney slammed her foot firmly on the brake pedal and depressed the clutch at the same time, yanking the hand-brake up. The others, who might've complained less if they actually buckled up like she suggested when they left the bungalow, all went pitching forward, exclaiming swearwords. Sydney, despite the pang in her throat, personally had never felt so invigorated. 

  "Incredible," panted Mike, smearing a bit of sweat off his browbone. "I know I give you shit, Sydney, but—" he heaved out a great, relieved sigh, "thanks for not killing us."

  "She almost did!" Dustin yowled. 

  "I think you did great, Sydney," said Max, still crouched in the footwell between Nadine's knees.

  "I think I peed a little," retched Steve quietly.

  "All right," said Sydney, pocketing the car-keys and throwing open the door, "let's go."

  They all started to file out of the car, Sydney opening the boot for them so they could all start grabbing the supplies they gathered from the emptied toolshed—safety-goggles, old oven-gloves, scraps of fabric to use as bandanas, head-torches, an empty petrol-can...Steve, however, could hardly stand up without holding onto the door for support, and was slurring incoherent protests through a tied-tongue. 

  "Guys," he said unintelligibly, "guys, no, can—aw, man..."

  "Can someone shut him up?" Nadine muttered distastefully, the glare she cut his way still conceivable, even through the bandana obscuring the lower half of her face and the safety-goggles fixed over her eyes.

  Sydney grinned behind her own kerchief. "Don't be mean." Tucking the handgun Matt left with her into the waistband of her jeans, she glanced over to where Steve was still swaying weakly against the car-door and scorning Mike for draining Billy's gas into the petrol-can. At the thready alarm in his voice, rasping desperately against his throat as the kids started to tie some rope to the front structure of the Chevy, she felt a subtle throb in her chest that could only be put there by him. "I better..." 

  No other explanation was needed, not as she grabbed the nail-spiked bat from the trunk and started for Steve. 

  "Hey," she interjected as softly as she could through the rasp in her throat. When he didn't even look twice at her, too overwrought and busy chastising the kids, Sydney dropped the bat at both of their feet in the parched, sun-bleached grass and seized his faces. His underjaw trembled under the sweet press of her fingers, eyes blown and jittery in his fright. She could've swore his mouth fell into an anguished pout at the determined look in her own eyes, witnessing this pleading pinch of his brows and a desperate little expression of please, don't make us do this. In response, her thumb smoothed just around the perimeter of his sutures. "You gotta calm down, Stevie," she added, teasing him.

  "Nicks, your dad said—"

  "I know what he said. I also know what he's out there doing right now—what El's doing." She smiled at Steve with this ineffable feeling in her chest. Whatever it was, her fingers shook with it against his maimed skin. "Are you gonna make us do it alone?" 

  Steve's wounded gaze raked over the column of her neck, at the fingerprints there and the rosy welts of growing bruises. "Look at what he did to you," he mumbled mournfully. "I wanted to kill him."

  "That's sweet," Sydney laughed, figuring that earned him a kiss, and she delivered it ghost-like and featherlight to his mouth. He tasted like blood and she wondered, silently, if she did, too. "C'mon, hero. Let's save the world again, hm?" She knelt in the grass, one-knee in ill-timed humour as she mimicked proposing with his bat. "I know you secretly loved it, last year. Rushing in there like that, all white-knight and—"

  Swearing darkly under his breath, Steve crashed right down into the grass with her, snatching her face into his swollen, bloodied hands and pulling her into him, almost violently, but the kiss was enough but. Emphatic, sure—the taste of metal lingering, but romantically (Sydney swore)—only, righteously so. Billy was violent. Chris Sommers was violent. Whatever left Sydney in the hospital all those years ago, and ceremoniously dropped at the spleen at her feet in the lab earlier, that was violence. This, well. This was Steve. And it was good, and pure, and it felt holy in a way that churchgoing and consecrated graveyards and piety never really could. A ferocity to his mouth on hers that wasn't painful in the slightest. It erased all misery, all fears. He kissed her like sunlight and swelled Sydney Sommers with an inexhaustible warmth that was so uniquely Steve Harrington that she reckoned she'd never be able to free her lungs from the honeyed gold of it.   

  She loved him, she thinks. She really, really fucking loved him.

  "Are you two lovebirds done swapping spit yet?" barked Dustin, from the belly of the beast. Sydney glared dully over Steve's shoulder at where they were all descending into the tunnel. "C'mon, let's go!" 

  "He's my least favourite," Sydney whispered to Steve conspiratorially.

  Steve sighed in shameful chagrin. "I dunno. I think he might be my favourite."

  "What?" She smacked his collarbone. "How about Lucas?"

  "Hey, Sinclair's your kid. Boy Wheeler, too." 

  Sydney feigned disgust. "Mike? I hate that kid. Pretty sure he hates me, too."

  "Nah, he loves you." Steve stared at her, painfully predictable and soul-crushingly hers. He steadied one hand on the nape of her neck, so tentative and careful as to not worry her bruises, and caressed the other against the curve of her jaw. Then, secret and soft, a smile touching at his mouth with just the right measurement of adoration to self-deprecation (that she might stamp all over his heart), he said, "I do, too."

  "Hate Mike Wheeler?" Sydney teased, her own heart full and sick.

  His face fell, a slow blink, and then he saw the lilt of her lips, the sparkle in those fawn-like eyes, and Steve tugged at a tendril of hair, damp-curled at the nape. "I take it back. How could I ever, possibly, love someone like—"

  She kissed him again. Sydney rather thought she could kiss him over, and over, and, over for the rest of her life. 

  "C'mon, lover boy," she said sadly, missing the taste of him as she pulled away and got to her feet, "let's be heroes."

  Steve sighed dreamily into the crown of her hairline, brushing his lips against it as she started to tie another handkerchief around his neck. Greedy, he stole another kiss to the tip of her nose before she could tuck her own bandana over it. His fingers hooked, greedier still, into her belt-loop. 

  "Hey," he said, just as she went to take his hand and lead them to the tunnels, "you stick with me, okay?"

  Sweetly, Sydney smiled at him and dipped her head into a gentle nod.

  "I need you say it, Sydney," said Steve desperately, slipping two fingers into the other belt-loop and tugging her closer. "Promise me."

  She swallowed thickly, staring at him for a beat, then she tucked the kerchief up and over his mouth before it could devastate her anymore. "Promise," she said breathily. She kissed him over the paisley material. "C'mon." 

  Steve swept his thumb over her knuckles, sacred and scared, and he only let go of her when he absolutely had to.

  The tunnels were even more gnarly and macabre than Sydney imagined. It was almost body-like, and organic, as if it were alive. Infected with all sorts of skeletal vines, spores, and breathing membranes, and it strangely felt like she'd been here before. As her fit squarely hit the flesh-like ground, her body was overwhelmed with a vile, tingling sensation that felt eerily like déjà vu. She wasn't sure what it was—a soothsayer premonition, a chemical glitch of her brain, or, perhaps, that sting of belonging again, that she felt back at the lab.

  Whatever it was, the weight of it felt significantly deflated by Nadine peering around at the serpentine tunnels and saying, "This place looks like the inside of an asshole. Like, a really, really big asshole."

  "Why are there tentacles in your butt?" asked Lucas in disgust.

  "Don't ask about my butt, twerp," she retorted, "you're eight."

  "We're thirteen!" said Max defensively. 

  "Okay," Steve interjected sensibly, that responsible lilt to him returned that made Sydney swoon, "that's enough talk of assholes, all right? Which way is it, Wheeler?"

  Mike and his torchlight consulted with the makeshift map. "Uhhh, yeah. I'm pretty sure it's this way!"

  "Pretty sure, or you're certain?" snarked Dustin. 

  "I'm 100% sure! Just follow me and you'll know!" He swept around again, slanting the white-light of his torch at the tunnelled tendrils ahead. 

  "Woah, whoa, whoa—hey, hey, I don't think so," Steve chimed in, stalking over to Mike and snatching the map off of him. "Any of you little shits die down here, I'm getting the blame. Got it, dipshit?" He turned back to the rest of them, almost blinding Sydney as he clumsily angled his own flashlight over each of their faces. Still, she'd be lying if she said she didn't find the whole 'stepping-up' thing extremely attractive. "From here on out, I'm leading the way. So, come on, let's go!"

  Sydney ushered them all forwards, snickering to herself when Nadine started to grumpily mutter about Steve's 'stupid hair' and 'stupid voice.' Privately, when Sydney was certain they were all ahead and she was on their coattails, she grinned coquettishly down at her feet, feeling like a girl alone in her room, twirling the cord of her telephone around her dainty-finger.

  "Toby was right," muttered Max, startling her. Sydney blinked. The girl hadn't scurried along after the rest of them, rather favouring to stick around waiting for Sydney. Even through the goggles, she looked disappointed by Sydney's swooning. "It is terminal."

  When Max started to confidently stroll after the others, Sydney frogmarched to keep up with her. "Erm, what? What's this Toby said?"

  "Oh, nothing," she said airily, "just that you've got a chronic Steve Harrington problem and only two months left to live."

  Sydney frowned unhappily. "Two months is a bit unfair."

  "A bit generous..."

  "What was that?"

  "Hey, a little hustle!" Steve called back over his shoulder from another tunnel.

  Sydney's lips twitched fondly.

  Max, pointedly, spotlighted her with her torch. "I give you a month."

  "You're all insufferable," Sydney mumbled, mostly to herself. "All of you. Even El."

  "You know Eleven?" prodded Max, intrigued.

  "Yeah, I know her. She's..." What? "Like my sister, almost. Well. The closest to one I ever had."

  Max toed surly at the slimy floor as they trudged. "I hope you treat her nicer than Billy treats me."

  "You don't deserve that," said Sydney quickly, cutting a sideways glance at Max, a long, thoughtful one that felt heavier to either of them than it should've. This might've been the first time Sydney saw herself in Max Mayfield—same deficiencies and family-deep hurts. Or, it might've been when she plunged that bat right between Billy's legs. A girl of belligerence. "I know what it's like to not be treated nicely by someone who's supposed to take care of you."

  Max suddenly felt really vulnerable under her watchful eye, almost as if she could tell her anything and that Sydney wouldn't even flinch. That was probably why she said, so bluntly, "Sometimes, I wish he'd die."

  "I wish it could say that would make it better," she murmured.

  "It doesn't?" 

  "It doesn't."

  "Damn," said Max, laughing uneasily. "So, it's just always shit?" 

  Sydney exhaled a heady laugh, too, and craned her neck so she was looking off to the others, to where Steve was pretending to scold Lucas for a dirty joke at the expense of Dustin's sweet-natured mother and backhanding him upside the head. Affection bloomed, brittle and warm.

  "Nah," she said, "not always."

  Max looked, too, fair brows furrowed slightly in confusion. And then, she heard the shrill of Lucas's laugh. The droll mimicking of him pretending to be an insulted Dustin, guffawing at his own poor impression. Then, the pinch slackened. Understanding smoothed out the creases in her expression, softening it out into an almost peaceful smile—well, the closest to peace a girl could feel in a mirroring dimension, sputtering with spores. 

  They carried on plodding, deeper and deeper into the rabbit-hole of a network. The longer the went, the more Sydney felt like this place had a pulse. It was as if they were trampling through a system of large, membranous veins.

  Eventually, the vein opened out into an almost nucleus, splitting out into smaller capillaries. Large enough of a clearing for them all to step out into it at once, leering around and illuminating the permeable space with their torches. The whole thing was leaving a bad taste in her throat, and it wasn't only the swelling of her windpipe. It was something far more nightmarish.

  "God," marvelled Lucas.

  "What is this place?" asked Max, looking around at the porous walls of it.

  "The prostate of the asshole," Nadine told her solemnly.

  "Jesus," Steve muttered, shaking his head. He sensed Sydney next to him, and glanced at her dotingly. "Are you all right?"

  "M'fine," she said, unease betraying her. "I just...it feels off, right?"

  He smiled at her fondly through his kerchief. "It is a different dimension, Nicks."

  "No, I mean..." But, how could Sydney explain the unfathomable dread in her belly? So, instead, she nodded her head and sighed through her nose. "No, you're right. Probably that."

  "Mm. Stay closer, yeah? I don't like not being able to see you." He briefly ghosted his hand against the small of her back as he readjusted himself to retake the lead and address the others. "Guys, come on. Let's keep moving."

  On they went.

  As they started for one of the many tunnels branching off from the clearing, Sydney felt her head ring piercingly with some menacing and archaic. The honeycombed walls blurred into a sponge-like blur of sticky tar and flesh. Foreboding didn't feel a stronger enough word—this was a body-lengthened migraine, pulsing through her so potent and mean she barely registered the bead of blood blooming at her left nostril. 

  "Sydney?" Lucas's voice sounded like it was being siphoned through a narrow vent. His hand touched concernedly at her elbow. "Hey, Sid? Ground Control to Major Tom?" he sung, waving a hand in front of her unseeing eyes. Panic lurched right up his throat in a shout of, "Steve! Hey, guys! Sydney's—"

  A sputtering, animalistic growl suddenly opened out from the roof of the tunnel, spraying a cluster of spores right into Dustin's face. A piglike squeal left him as he stumbled onto his backside, limbs flailing. The others all rushed to him, sans Sydney and Lucas, the latter who stayed rooted at her side, convinced that Steve must've not heard his yells in the midst of Dustin getting attacked by the bacteria.

  "Hey, it's all right, Sydney," he told her shakily, totally unconvinced by his own reassurances. "Dustin's, he's just being a little bitch—you're okay. You're totally—"

  "—it's in my mouth!" the boy was wailing on all fours. "Some got on my mouth! Shit!  

  "Jesus," wept Lucas. He smeared his sweaty forehead against the inside of his wrist, then turned back to his babysitter. Sydney, however, stared into an abyss at the other end of the twin-like tunnel, out of view and gnarled. "Sydney, please! Snap out of it. What's a'matter with you?" 

  After Dustin finally retched up whatever he was choking on, Steve realised that Sydney hadn't rushed over with the rest of them, and came hastening over, hands grasping almost instantly at her limp, spindly arms.

  "Nicks? Nicks, hey, what's—" He looked at Lucas, horrified, and back at his girl, "what the hell's up with her?"

  "I, I don't know!" he stammered, arms gesticulating amok. "She just spooked! She isn't blinking, or listening to me, or saying anything—"

  "This is what happened to her back at the lab," said Nadine, paling as she crowded next to Steve, trying to squint at Sydney's face. Without thinking, she yanked down the bandana around her mouth and nose, demanding, "Sommers, can you hear us?" 

  Steve batted her wrist away furiously, a panicky twinge spreading through his chest as he tenderly tucked the handkerchief back up. "Are you stupid, Munson? She can't breathe this shit in."

  "She's not breathing anything in, dumbass!" she snarled. "Look at her. She looks like she's had a lobotomy! Which, hanging around with you all the time, I don't blame her!"

  "That's enough!" screamed Max, worming stubbornly between them and planting herself right in front of Sydney. "Do either of you think this is helping her? Mike, how did she snap out of this when you were all at the lab?" 

  "She didn't," he said, "she just kind of blanked. Matt had to drag her to his car. I don't even know what made her come back." 

  Steve felt a small, mad splinter of hope. He thought of the bathroom, knelt on cold tile, feeling the warmth of her through the palms he laid steady on her lap, the way she held him like she needed him. He didn't want Sydney to need anything—to be deficient or starved in any regard. He wanted her to be full of life and sweetness. To get some colour back, have more flesh to her than bone. To be his, and warm, and happy again.

   But, fuck. What if it was him? What if it was Steve that made her snap back into it at the bungalow, after they all caged up in the bathroom like some trapped zoo-animal, to pace the lonely length of the tiles and think about what she'd done? What if she was just as devoted to him as he was to her?

  Cocksure and so hopeful that he was right, Steve cradled her jaw preciously but with enough fear that his thumbs sunk into the twin graves of her gaunt cheeks. 

  "Sydney," he murmured, giving her a little shake. "Sydney, c'mon. Snap out of it, yeah? I dunno what this is. I should've listened to you when you said something didn't feel right. That's my bad. I know. I'll always listen to you, from here on out. You gotta wake up though, Nicks. Please, you need to—"

  "This is ridiculous," sneered Nadine in contempt. "King Steve thinks he's royal enough to knock her out of some extraterrestrial stupor?"

  Lucas shook his head softly, watching his babysitter and her fluttering eyes. "It's working."

  "Oh, sure it is. Yeah. 'Cause what can't King Steve's hair do—"

  "No, seriously," breathed Max, "it is."

  Sydney touched unconsciously at the blood at her nose, then at Steve's fingers splayed over her cheekbone, before closing her whole hand around his wrist. Awake.

  "Steve?" 

  "Oh, thank God." He hugged her into him, feeling like he might cry. "You're all right. You're all right." He was saying it more to himself than her.

  "It's up there," she mumbled, cocking her head sluggishly up the tunnel. "The hub. Head of the hydra. Whatever. It's up there."

  Steve traced his fingers through her tangled hair. "How do you know?"

  "I just do," she said with a bone-deep tiredness.

  "Okay. No, okay. Yeah." He kept his hand on her, smoothing it down the curve of her skull, the scruff of her neck, and keeping it on her back. "Do you want to keep going?" 

  "Mhm." Nausea took such a deep root in her, saying anything else might've caused her to empty her guts right on his shoes. And she really didn't want to do anything else that might frighten him. She'd really like to just kiss him until she had no air left after all of this. Not much else mattered, right now.

  Steve nodded, a bit numb. "Okay. We will, then." He glanced shortly at the others, and they all looked rather spooked themselves. "You heard her. Let's keep going."

  Sure enough, Sydney was right. Another nucleus opened up further ahead, larger than the last, with more arteries branching out of it. If the last had been the stomach, this was the subterranean heart. (Steve kept his palm flush against the rosary of Sydney's spine the whole time).

  "You were right, Nicks," he lamented, "I think we found Wheeler's hub."

  Mike took a determined step forward into the mangled centre. "Let's drench it."

  They all got to work, even Sydney, despite all of their worried protests. Steve stayed close, expectedly. It was a little overbearing, but she couldn't really blame him for hovering. She guessed, lamely, she'd do the same if he suddenly went all Regan MacNeil from The Exorcist on her. Trying her best not to bite at him for his clinginess, she emptied two of the petrol-cans full of petroleum on as much of the uneven, cellular terrain she could cover. The others were doing pretty much the same—either that, or they were spraying it along the porous walls and ceiling. 

  By the time they were satisfied, they all gathered in the mouth-way of the tunnel they came in from, Steve crouched in front of them with a Zippo lighter and an air about him that almost made Sydney forget about her blip. Almost.

  "All right," he panted (was he trying to kill her?), "are you all ready?"

  In a shared breath, they all echo, "Ready." 

  "Light her up," said Dustin. 

  "I'm in such deep shit." Steve looked for Sydney. She was right behind him, crouched too, solemn, as quiet as a lamb. He waited. Only when she gave the nod—grave and just-as-low—did he turn back to the gasoline-doused centre, flick the lid of his lighter, and toss the Zippo. 

  Flames lapped at it instantly like forked, blazing tongues. From there unfurled an inferno of them—engulfing and hot, like a scorching balm against the flesh of all their awestruck faces. A network of snarling tentacles started to thrash against the licking fire, writhing in agony and twining into sinister shapes. Sydney could swear, amongst them, she saw the figure of her mother. Of a car on the road-side, overturned and scorched too. Her mother's charred body, melded metal, a fractured windshield. A funeral pyre for the first person to love and hurt her.

  "Let's go," barked Steve, ushering them all up to their feet and down the tunnel, "go, go, go!" When Sydney stayed crouched, staring into the fire, he seized her hand and dragged her up. "Not this time, baby!" he yelled at her, the pet-name satirical but a sweetener as he hauled her along hard enough for her wrist to feel sore. 

  "I was coming!" she protested shrilly. 

  "Not fast enough!" 

  The lot of their footsteps' thundered down each winding passage like a sequence of heartbeats in Sydney's skull, but she kept up. For Steve, for the kids. For how petrified Nadine had been, back in the lab. The hand in hers—the one that would never bite.

  And it was all seemingly going off without a hitch. They didn't seem far from the exit, the warmth of the fire not near enough to claw at their necks and heels with a hellish heat. Sydney thought they might really make it. That they saved the day without a loss—without enough body, torn apart and ravaged by her own fuck-up. That, maybe, Sydney Sommers really could be a hero.

  Then, a tentacle snaked out from the angry limbs of the living creature they were in, snatching around Mike's gangly anklet and yanking him down hard onto the floor with a yelp.

  They all skidded to a synchronised stop, rushing back for him. The kids started to pry at his arms, trying to yank him by force. Clearly, that hadn't been enough. Steve, who had been holding onto Sydney for dear life, had to finally let her go, retreating quickly to beat at the tentacle brutally with his bat. It squealed and wormed, trying to tighten its hold on Mike, until one of the nails severed it clean in half, and the whole thing went dead. 

  Mike staggered up to his feet, supported by the frantic, grasping hands of his friends who were all haphazardly checking him over for scrapes.

  "Dude, are you alright?" wheezed Lucas.

  "M'okay. I'm okay." 

  "We gotta go," panted Dustin, "now!" 

   Sydney couldn't have agreed more, but before any of them could carry on their hasty escape, a belly-deep, animalistic growl behind them stopped their party once again. Spearheaded, this time, by her.

  She turned around, and all the noise in her head went as quiet and still as the severed tentacle at Steve's feet. It was one of the demo-dogs. Another mutt, unmoving and bowed at its mutated spine, guarding the tunnel they needed to leave through. Its mouth opened in a caterwauling, primal screech, revealing rows of jagged canines and an organic mess of fleshy innards. Sydney wondered how miserable of a life it must be, to be the afterbirth of some loveless underworld—to only want to kill, and to eat, and to hunt. To be a predator, rather than prey. 

  It must be such a lonely and starving existence, to be this doglike creature. That's what made it different from It. A heart of her own. The grief as the meat was ripped from Bob Newby's bone. Her shame, in the bathroom afterwards. She wasn't a trapped creature in there, at all. They didn't leave her to rot or stew in guilt. Hopper said they wanted to keep her away—keep her safe. Who cared for this thing?

  "Let us go," Sydney asked of it, because a part of her knew she'd granted her whatever she wanted. Like that spleen. Like safe passage out of the lab.

  "What the hell are you doing?" Steve asked scathingly, tugging at her hand. "Sydney, we'll find another way out—"

  "Move," she commanded, eyes flitting between the demo-dog and the way out.

  And, with a deep, gratifying howl, it did. It stooped low and aside, out of her way. Head tucked between its deformed shoulders. It let them go.

  "Quick," she told the kids, jutting her chin at the exit, "I'm right behind you."

  "But—" they all went to object, but Sydney was quicker, "Now." 

  Nadine steered them off. Steve didn't leave Sydney's side.

  "That's enough, Sydney," he told her, distress tightening his voice. "It's time to go. We're leaving—"

  When he tried to pull her way, she dug her heels in, staring at the still creature. "I want to see what It will do. What else I can make it—"

  "I love you." He practically spat it out, like a punishment, or a warning. That he wouldn't leave her, maybe. That she was being cruel, staying here, playing with fire and death. Treating her life like it was meaningless. When her neck almost sprained in whiplash to meet his gaze, Steve dragged the goggles off, flattening down his precious hair with them, and pulled down the kerchief as well. He was staring her, rugged breaths and all, so soulfully it hurt. "I love you," he said again, more breathless this time but no less emphatically. "I'd do anything for you. Can that be enough, for now, until we're out of here?" 

  Sydney looked between him and the surrendered monster, and decided rather quick that it absolutely was enough. That Steve was enough. Not a moment after her fragile nod was it before he was smiling at her prettily in relief, covering himself back up, and pulling her along after the others. 

  Halfway through the tunnel, the ground started to tremble with the tremors of a pseudo-earthquake. More thundering footfall, but the belligerent and ravenous stampede of more creatures. Enough so that Sydney doubted the same would work on them as it had with that lone mutt in the clearing. 

  "They're coming!" Mike shouted over his shoulder at them. "Run, run, run!"

  The dangling rope they climbed down on came swinging back into view, and Steve hauled Sydney ahead of the others so he could sink to his knees in front of it.

  "Max, you first," said Sydney, beckoning her.

  Steve gave her a leg up, Sydney's hands hovering just near enough that if she fell, she'd catch up. The two of them did the same for Lucas next, then Mike, Nadine, and blinked impatiently at Dustin to follow, but he was already staring at the jaws of the tunnel—the growls were becoming louder and louder. Hungrier, with it. The kids above the surface were yelling for Dustin, outstretching their hands. 

  When it became obvious he wasn't leaving this place without Steve and Sydney, she threw her arm forward, wrapping it around the front of him, and yanked him back into her. As the shadows of the dogs started to ghost into view, she grabbed the pistol from her waistband with her free hand, thumbing off the safety and raising it right at the tunnel. In her periphery, Steve was readying his bat. Steve, who loved her. Steve, who'd do anything for her. Her Steve. He must've sensed her looking, and he tore his eyes away from the burrow long enough to meet hers. When he did, he gave her a single, collusive nod. The kids' yells melted away. Even the oncoming charge of feral mutts. Just him.

  Then, they descended. Hundreds of them. But, not a single one attacked or bit. Not as much as claw-scratch. They all trampled past, speeding like cannons right by them. Sydney's arm that was holding the gun started to droop to her side, though the one around Dustin never once slackened. If anything, as the dogs brushed their legs by hair's-widths, her fist balled tighter at the neckline of his tee, stretching it out of shape.

  When the ferocity of the stampede almost knocked her right off her feet, Steve hooked an arm strongly around her waist and drew her closer into his side, a bit wobbly himself, but so firm in holding her that she didn't flinch at all.

  Eventually, it went so still and quiet, emptied of anything but them, that it felt like the prime opportunity for a Western-style tumbleweed to come rolling by their ankles.

  Steve shook his head, dumbfounded. "What the...?" 

  But Sydney knew exactly. So, it seemed, did Mike. The two of them stared at each other through the rabbit-hole, in instant agreement.

  "Eleven."

  "C'mon," mumbled Steve, kneeling again, "they could come back. Let's get out of here."

  Dustin blinked dolefully at Sydney as he slipped out of her hold, but she just grinned at him, gently knocking her knuckle under his wobbly chin. 

  "You first. Duh." 

  He sniffled, not happy about it, but obeyed anyway. Steve gave him a leg-up, tilting his neck as Sydney did, the two of them watching with warm hearts as the kids all embraced him. Even Nadine ruffled his unruly curls, glad to see him alive. 

  Then, Steve turned to her, taking his bandana off entirely this time, and gave Sydney this smile that made her feel weak.

  "Please don't say some hero bullshit like you're gonna stay down here," he said lightheartedly, "that you're gonna build a house, or something, make it your lair—"

  "Why?" mused Sydney, kneeling right down next to him, thudding against the squelchy ground. Neither of them paid the unpleasantries much mind. (How could they?) "Would you stay with me?"

  Steve slanted her a droll look. "You know I would."

  "God," Sydney swooned, cheesing at him, "you know how to make a girl melt."

  "I meant what I said, you know?" he mumbled, a little insecure, brave enough to trace the line of her jawbone with his finger. "I love you, Nicks."

  Sydney's eyes roamed slowly between his and his mouth. "I didn't think you were lying..." 

  "Well?" Steve asked anxiously, his nerves unfairly endearing. He tilted his head at her, the doe-like sweetness in his eyes worsening as he hooked a finger into her handkerchief and tugged it off. Goggles, next. (It hadn't even occurred to Sydney she was still wearing all the protective-gear, not with how reverently he'd been looking at her). "What do you think? About...what I said?"

  "Hmm. What did you say again?" 

  Steve flattened his palm against the back of her neck, bringing her closer, laughing at her in that baffled, boyish way that made her immeasurably glad she was already kneeling, else she might've lost all feeling in them.

  "You're torturing me," he mumbled, resting his forehead worshipfully against hers.

  Sydney felt life and love trickle through every vein, artery, and capillary. He was like a shot of espresso. Like swallowing sunshine. 

  "I love you, too."

  "God." Steve shivered, smiling so big it hurt. "I love you. 'Loved you since you called me a pervert, actually. I love you so bad."

  "Just kiss me," Sydney breathed, dimpled and saccharine, unable to resist adding, "pervert." 

  So, he did. And again. And, he kept kissing her. Showering them down on her, as if they weren't knelt in the middle of an underground network of tentacles, infested by rabid dogs. When he tasted blood, he kept going. Tongue against hers, breathing in her air. He'd be quite happy only breathing air she gave him, for the rest of his life.

  When their lungs felt blue, they still didn't stop. Mouths hot and heavy against each other's, passionate kisses ebbing into slow, sensual pecks. A blinding light swept over their heads, from the world above. Stronger than sunlight, but not brighter than Steve, Sydney thought, so she didn't pull away. Not even for a second. She imagined the headlight beams shattering into millions of little stars, fracturing and scintillating, far prettier than the spores around them. 

  He tasted like summer, she figured.

  "Do you swear you won't start dating another girl after this?" she murmured, kiss-swollen against his mouth.

  He laughed against her. "God, no. You're the only girl for me, Nicks. My girl."

  "Funny," she mused, moving away just enough to let her thumb rest against his pillowy bottom-lip. She smiled at the sight of that. "I don't remember you asking me to—"

  "Be my girlfriend." It was more of a hoarse plea than a question. Good enough, though, Sydney settled rather quickly. A giggle bubbled up from her bruised throat, and she moved other hand to his hair, grasping at the silky strands. Steve stared at her, huge pupils and bigger smile. "Is that a yes?"

  Instead of answering, Sydney started to girlishly fan herself and sway back, pretending to faint and making Steve roll his eyes, tightening his hold around her waist. "Oh, my," she was saying, in a botched Transatlantic accent, "the Steve Harrington's my boyfriend! The most popular guy in school! Everyone's going to be so jealous—"

  "Can you idiots get out of there?" bellyached Mike. "We want to go home!" 

  Sydney scowled, staring at her boyfriend dead in the eye. "Can we leave him here?"

  "I don't think so," Steve sighed miserably. 

  "Ugh. Fine. Let's get our kids home," Sydney groaned, standing back up. Steve, of course, stayed right where he was. She rather liked seeing him on his knees, deciding to grant him a sweet kiss to the forehead in return. He practically preened at the gesture, fumbling to put his hands out to help her up. "These school-runs are getting so much work," she muttered as the rope bit coarsely into her hands. 

  The kids all grudgingly helped her up onto her feet on the other side, complaining about her kissing Steve and them being 'gross.' Still, they attentively brushed all the dirt off of her, and even Mike couldn't hide the fond roll of his eyes when Steve came crawling out of the hole after her, immediately settling his hand on her hip.

  (Which, as it turned out, was just a hoax for him slipping his fingers discreetly into the pocket of her jeans to snatch Billy's car-keys before she could get any bright-ideas about driving again. The lot of them, exhausted and still worried about the rest of the loved ones, scattered across the town and bone-weary themselves, still managed to laugh as Steve dangled the keys high above in his head, out of Sydney's reach...

  And in the car, driven, in the end, by Sydney—the boys, and Nadine, all giving Steve shit for being so pathetically whipped—the kids would fall fall asleep on each other, a mess of tangled limbs. Nadine, too, snored softly in the cramped footwell in the back behind the passenger seat, almost drooling against the leather. Sydney and Steve, on the other hand, awake, wouldn't really say anything. 

  There was plenty to say, just not yet; and they both knew it. They just kept sharing long, meaningful looks, his palm warm on her thigh. And, for now, it was enough.

  Sydney didn't hear a single clock-tick for the whole drive). 

AUTHOR'S NOTE.

aaaaaand we're almost done with season 2 - just an epilogue, of sorts, left to go. 

sydney and steve - after 20 chapters - are officially boyfriend & girlfriend. here comes the summer of love, season 3. not my favourite narratively or even overall, but definitely no.1 for aesthetics and dynamics! (& sydneysteve's prime...) 

a few things: first, nadine. if u think she's just kind of here hovering uselessly, good! that's kind of my intention. she's a flailing background character at the moment because that's how she feels. she feels melted into the background of this relationship that sydney has with all these people - most significantly: steve - after a very intense afternoon they both shared at that bellwether outpost. she feels knocked aside. she feels forgotten about, and like she has no idea what she's doing. it's all a part of her narrative, and massive character development fuel for her in season three (where we meet robin!!!) 

second: agnus dei/bellwether/sydney re: the upside down. it's a gradual thing. it's good that it doesn't make complete sense to u guys - because it doesn't make complete sense (if any) to sydney! you'll learn as she does. it's supposed to be confusing and still nonsensical. her whole life's a bit up in the air right now. she's def got this bit of a god complex/saviour complex because thinks she's got this thing - not a power, exactly - and that she can save people with it (like getting the demo-dog to not attack them/having it obey her), but she also she's still very much blaming herself for bob. she's likening herself to these creatures but also trying to separate herself from the upside down for the sake of her dad and steve and the others - that's what the little section of her thinking about how lonely and hungry the demo-dog must be. it's also very much the start of her thinking, she doesn't have to be hungry. she doesn't have to deprive of herself. she can eat, and she can love things, and be human. she isn't a monster. she's not her mother either.

this is all very much subtle and probs buried in subtext - but sydney sommers is getting better. and act iii is summer. she's gonna thrive, guys! 

anyways, let me know what you thought!!! love, as always.

Dani.