Chapter Text
Transferring from the NYPD to Hawkins PD had been drastic. You went from getting paid as a detective working homicide in the big city to working in a small country town as a Deputy on half the wage.
Your co-workers at Hawkins thought you were crazy for it, but they didn't know why you moved. They didn't know the reason behind the sudden shift across the country and you sure as hell weren't going to tell them.
It wasn't all bad though.
You and Hopper used to be partners back in New York in the homicide unit, until he moved away after his daughter died. It sucked when he left town, but you understood why he left, especially after him and his wife got divorced.
However, that understanding didn't make it any easier without him, especially when the boss introduced you to your new work partner a week later and he was a total dick.
"Have I ever told you guys about how much I hate paperwork?" Officer Callahan asked, looking over at you and Officer Powell across the room.
"I think you've said it nearly every day since I started working here." You answered, rubbing your face with your hands trying to wake yourself up as you stared down at the stack of files on your desk.
He was right though, paperwork did suck.
"Try every day for the last three years. It gets annoying, trust me." Powell mumbled, his head down busy working.
Callahan rolled his eyes, and you covered up your laugh with a cough while looking between the two men in amusement.
It had been a couple of weeks since you first stepped foot in Hawkins after leaving the busy city streets of New York behind. You had expected to feel like an outcast at the station. The other officers had all grown up together in this small town. Some had even been in the same courses at the Police Academy. They all had chemistry and strong connections to one another, and they were all men.
From experience, male Police Officers tended to dislike female colleagues, however, your new fellow Deputies had welcomed you with open arms. They were all friendly and treated you like an equal which was more than what any of your old work colleagues had done back in New York.
It shouldn't have been a surprise though because Jim Hopper wouldn't let any discrimination or hate slide when it came to you.
He had your back in New York and stood up for you when no one else would. Even after all these years, nothing had changed.
The Chief had put you on the same shift rotation as Powell and Callahan since your first day. The two Deputies had taken you under their wing without hesitation.
Calvin Powell was an older yet brilliant deputy. He was stern and tough when it came to the law, and was serious about his job, but was always up for a good laugh. He had taught you a lot in your short time with Hawkins PD and was always happy to answer any questions you had.
Phil Callahan was the exact opposite.
He was the jokester of the station and although he was always cracking jokes and acting some would say, childish, he was a damn good deputy. He was constantly the first one out the door whenever a job came up and was always ready to help with anything.
"This isn't a laughing matter, Jim. This is serious."
You looked up from your paperwork at the unfamiliar voice to find Hopper walking into the station followed by a balding guy with a beard who you had never seen before.
Hopper groaned dramatically at the stranger's words and hung his coat up on the rack by the front door.
Well, whoever that guy was, the Chief did not like him.
"I really got something here. I'm telling you." The guy insisted.
"Morning, Chief." Powell greeted, actually looking up from his desk as he spoke before he spotted the other guy and grinned, "morning, Murray."
"Got any proof on your butt probin' aliens yet, Murray?" Callahan asked causing your head to snap towards him.
"What? Who the hell is this guy?" You asked.
"Murray Bauman. Used to be an Investigative Journalist in Hawkins, now he's some kind of Private Investigator, but he believes all these weird conspiracy theories and stuff." Callahan whispered, leaning over your joined desks towards you as he spoke.
"That sounds... interesting." You answered, choosing your words carefully.
You looked back over at Murray just as Hopper grabbed one of the donuts from the bench, but Flo was hot on his tail and snatched the glazed donut from his hand and replaced it with an apple.
Hopper glared at her, and you tried not to laugh at the annoyed look on his face, but he accepted the fruit anyway and took a bite out of it.
"I believe there was, and may still be, a Russian spy presence in Hawkins." Murray continued to say.
"Russian spies?" Hopper asked, amusement clear in his voice as he began pouring himself a cup of coffee.
"Are the spies in cahoots with the aliens? Or how do they fit in here? I'm confused." Callahan commented causing you to snort softly.
Hopper just smirked and filled up another mug of coffee before grabbing both and walking over to your desk, placing the second mug down in front of you.
You smiled, "thank you. I needed this."
"I could tell. You look tired."
"Just what every girl wants to hear." You mumbled into the coffee cup as you took a sip and sighed at the warm taste of caffeine.
"I'm talking multiple reports now." Murray continued to say, his voice raised a little louder. "Multiple reports, okay? Of a Russian child in Hawkins."
"A child? What are you talking about?" Hopper questioned, now suddenly interested in what this man had to say.
"A girl who may have psionic abilities."
"'Psionic'?" Powell asked in confusion.
"Psychic." Murray corrected.
"Hey Chief. What about that girl that made that kid pee himself?" Callahan asked and okay, what? Now you had questions.
"It was just a prank." Hopper answered, dismissing his Deputy quickly before turning to Murray. "You got five minutes. Not a second more."
You watched as Hopper led Murray across the room into his own private office, closing the door behind him. You glanced over at Callahan and Powell who both shrugged their shoulders and went back to work, like it was normal for a man to walk in and start talking about Russian spies and kids with powers. Maybe it was normal for Hawkins.
Within 60 seconds, the Chief's door opened and a rather pissed off looking Murray stepped out. He spared one glance at the rest of you before he turned and walked out the station before Hopper emerged from his office.
"Who wants to get out the office for a bit? We got a job."
"Me!" You and Callahan both quickly said at the same time.
Hopper looked between the two of you, "Y/N, let's go."
"Oh, come on!" Callahan whined. "You always choose her."
"Maybe I like her better than you. Ya ever think about that?" Hopper asked, grabbing his jacket from the rack, and slipping it on.
"We all know why you like her." Callahan mumbled under his breath causing Powell to kick his feet under the desk.
You looked between the two of them suspiciously, Hopper just bluntly ignoring them before you chugged the last of your coffee and followed the Chief out the station.
You jumped into the passenger seat of his Chevy Blazer, instantly reaching for the dial of the heater and cranking it up as Hopper reversed out the parking lot.
"So, what's the job?"
"Pumpkins that have been contaminated by a vengeful neighbour." He answered causing you to look over at him in disbelief.
"You're shitting me, right? Pumpkins?"
He chuckled softly, "I shit you not."
"How'd I go from investigating murders to investigating pumpkins?" You asked aloud causing him to laugh.
"You're the one who put in your transfer to Hawkins. This is on you." He reminded.
Yeah, that was true.
You nodded, knowing he was right, and you glanced out the window as Hopper drove, the faint music from the radio filling the silence.
"Why did you transfer here? Not that I'm complaining, I just... I thought you loved it in New York."
This wasn't the first time he had asked. Hell, it wasn't even the second, but you kept dodging the question.
"Just needed a fresh start. A change of scenery I guess." You answered, which wasn't a total lie.
You could feel Hopper staring at you out the corner of your eye, but you kept your head forward, knowing if you looked at him, he would be able to see straight through you. After all those years working together, you had gotten to know each other really well, to the point where you knew when the other was lying.
Hopper just hummed in response, despite knowing there was more to the story, but to your relief, he didn't try to pry, and you were grateful for that.
It didn't take long to reach the small pumpkin farm on the outskirts of Hawkins. If you were being honest, you forgot these kinds of farms existed. But of course, they did, you just never really thought about it until now.
The farmer was adamant that his neighbour had poisoned his crops. Stating that the pumpkins were perfectly fine yesterday, but when he woke up this morning, they were rotten.
After inspecting the large fields of pumpkins, every single vegetable was in fact rotten and Hopper told him that he was going to look into it before you both climbed back into the car.
"There is no way these pumpkins turned rotten like that overnight." You said, the second your car door was shut. "What do you think happened?"
"I honestly have no idea. It's been cold, maybe frost got to them."
"Good theory. Try telling that to him though." You said, nodding at the farmer who was still standing by his ruined crop.
Hopper grunted, "he can accept whatever I tell him."
He turned the key in the ignition, bringing the old Chevy to life with a roar before tapping it into gear and driving back down the dirt road to Hawkins.
Instead of going back to the station like you assumed he would have, Hopper instead pulled up to the diner on main street and before you knew it, the two of you were sitting inside and eating breakfast.
"I missed this." You found yourself saying before thinking better of it.
Hopper looked up at you from across the booth, his fork halfway to his mouth, "missed pancakes?" he asked in confusion.
"No." You chuckled, shaking your head. "No, I missed this. Us. Working together. It feels like old times."
Back in New York, you were the first woman to join the homicide unit. All the guys hated it. They didn't believe a girl could do the job as well as men and they despised you for it. They all treated you like garbage despite the fact that you were better than half the team, but they still hated you, except for Hopper.
He was the only one who treated you like a normal person. At first, he was a little apprehensive, but that was because he had been used to working solo and wasn't expecting the Superintendent to suddenly give him a partner, especially not some random chick he had never met before.
The two of you had hit it off straight away though. You didn't take any of his crap and he respected that, and you made quite a team.
"Ah, yes. Because we used to deal with crime scenes of rotten pumpkins and eat in diners all the time back in New York." He said sarcastically, snapping you out of your thoughts.
"Well, if you replace pumpkins with dead bodies. The farmer with a serial killer and these pancakes in this diner for a packet of candy in the stakeout van, then yes."
Hopper snorted, taking another bite of his pancakes as he shook his head with a smile.
"I missed working with you too." He admitted once he finished his mouthful. "I still can't believe you transferred here though."
"I'm starting to regret it after that thrilling morning on the farm." You joked, but Hopper shook his head.
"Nah, you don't. You'd miss me too much if you left Hawkins."
Yeah, you would.
"In your dreams." You said instead because like hell you were going to admit that.
You liked Hopper. You even had a crush on him back in New York when you first joined, but after finding out that he was married with a kid, you quickly pushed your feelings aside and the two of you became best friends.
"You seeing anyone?" He randomly asked causing you to nearly choke on your coffee.
"What?" You asked, covering your mouth as you coughed.
"Are you seeing anyone? You got a boyfriend or anything?" He clarified.
"Oh, no, no. I'm single." You answered, shrugging your shoulders hoping it looked casual. "What about you? Have you found someone in this town to settle down with?"
Hopper opened his mouth to answer before his eyes widened like he just realised something, and he quickly rolled up his sleeve to look at his watch.
"Shit. Shit. I was meant to meet Joyce at the lab ten minutes ago."
Joyce? Who was Joyce?
"I need to go. I'll drop you off on my way." He said, throwing down some money on the table and eating his last pancake before the two of you left the diner and climbed back into the car.
"Hawkins lab?" You asked, looking over at him as he pulled out the parking lot and sped in the direction of the station. "What's at Hawkins lab that's so important?"
"Nothing. It's nothing important. Just promised Joyce I'd help her out with something." He dismissed, not going into any detail.
You wanted to push for an answer but decided against it. He would tell you if he wanted to and frankly, it wasn't any of your business, but you couldn't help but feel a little sad hearing about Joyce.
Was she his girlfriend? He never did answer your question earlier.
Hopper dropped you off back at the station and the rest of your shift was mainly just sitting behind the desk doing paperwork, until an old lady called about a noise complained, so you went out with Powell and Callahan to deal with that.
The day went by surprisingly quickly and before you knew it, you were standing back in that pumpkin crop the following day with Hopper because now it wasn't just one person's crop that had turned rotten. It was several.
"Now, you try telling me with a straight face that cold did this." The farmer said, pointing at his destroyed crop.
Yeah, he had a point.
Frost might have gotten some of the pumpkins, but not this many and this quickly. Plus, for October, it hadn't been super cold yet, so it didn't make any sense.
"How far does it go?" You asked curiously, wondering if whatever was destroying the pumpkins was hurting other plant life in the area.
The farmer just motioned for the two of you to follow him as he walked towards the woods by the boundary line of his crop and your jaw dropped when you realised that the trees and bushes on the edge of the woods had turned rotten too.
Okay, this was definitely not the cold. What the hell did all this?
"What the fuck?" You whispered to yourself, lifting your hand, and touching the rotten tree trunk to find this gooey slimy substance all over it.
Hopper appeared beside you and quickly grabbed your wrist, pulling your hand away from the slime.
"Hey, Chief, you copy?" Powell's voice called over the radio.
Hopper grabbed his radio from his belt and held it to his mouth. "How's it looking over there?"
"Like a giant pissed all over Jack's bean field. Smells, too. It smell over there?"
"Where doesn't it smell?" You questioned, grimacing at the gross rotten stench that covered the entire farm.
You'd nearly rather the stench from old dead bodies than this... okay, no, that's a lie. There was nothing that smelt worse than that, but this was a close second.
"Yeah, little bit. Listen. I want you guys to track the rot, see how far it goes. Just, uh, mark anything that's dead." Hopper instructed through the radio.
"That's gonna take some time." Powell pointed out.
"So take it. And look, we don't know what caused this. Could be poison. So don't touch anything without gloves." He ordered, pointily staring at you with the last sentence and you gave him a guilty look.
"Copy that, Chief."
He slipped the radio back into the pouch on his belt before turning towards you with a questioning look, "you good to work some overtime?"
"I got no plans tonight. Let's get started." You said and Hopper nodded his appreciation before the two of you got to work.
The farmer had supplied marker flags, so you and Hopper spent the next few hours walking through the woods and placing a flag by everything rotten while Powell and Callahan did the same at the other farm.
By nightfall, it was finally finished, and Hopper gave you all permission to start late tomorrow morning so you could actually get a decent night's sleep.
"I have to basically drive past your house to get home, want a lift?" He asked, climbing into the Chevy.
"My truck is at the station. I won't be able to-"
"I can pick you up in the morning."
You nodded, "that would work. Thank you."
You climbed into the passenger side of his car before Hopper started the Chevy and began to drive away. He barely got a few metres down the dirt driveway before he suddenly slammed on the brakes and put the car into reverse.
"What are you doing?" You asked, figuring he must have forgotten something.
He didn't answer though, instead he rolled down his window and stuck his head out and called out to the little kid walking towards the farmhouse, his Halloween outfit on and bucket full of candy in his hand.
"Hey, kid. Give me some of that candy, would you?"
"No way." The boy answered and you saw that coming from a mile away.
Kids cherished their Halloween candy. But why did Hopper want some?
"Alright, how about now?" He asked, pulling out a couple dollar bills from his wallet.
The kid hesitated a little before nodding in agreement and jogging up to the car, taking the money and handing over his bucket of candy. You just watched, assuming Hopper would explain why he needed the candy, but he didn't say a single word before he tapped the car into gear and continued to drive.
"Umm, is there a reason you bribed the kid for his candy?" You asked curiously.
"Forgot it was Halloween, I don't have any at home. Wanted to be prepared in case any kids came trick or treating to my front door."
You glanced over at the clock on the dash which indicated that it was nearly midnight, and you raised your eyebrows, "how many kids do you think will be trick or treating at this time of night?"
Hopper glanced over at the clock and seemed surprised by how late it was but shrugged his shoulders.
"Can never be too prepared."
Guess he had a fair point. But you didn't plan on getting any candy. You planned on going straight to bed and if anyone knocked on your door for trick or treating at this time of night, you were not answering it.
"What's your address?" Hopper asked a few seconds later, turning out onto the main road.
"Thought you said my house was on the way to yours. Don't you know it?"
Hopper didn't say anything for a moment, "I lied. I have no idea where you live."
"Why?"
"Because you haven't told me your address."
"No, I meant why did you lie? I could have driven home myself, you know?"
He sighed, rubbing his face with his free hand, "maybe I wanted to spend more time with you."
Your heart fluttered at his words, and you couldn't stop yourself from smiling.
"Aww, you really did miss me all these years, didn't you? That's sweet." You responded in a teasing tone as you leant over and nudged his arm with your elbow.
"I hate you." He muttered, but the small smile on his face told you how untrue those words really were.
"You love me."
"Love is a real strong word. More like tolerate."
"Ouch." You said, resting your hand over your heart dramatically causing Hopper to stifle a laugh as he shook his head at you.
"But, seriously, where do you live because I have no idea where I'm driving."
"Oh, take the next two lefts and I'm number 32." You answered.
Within a couple of minutes, he was pulling up in front of your house and you climbed out the car, pausing as you held the door open.
"What time will you pick me up in the morning? Just so I'm awake and ready."
"I'll swing by around nine." He answered and you nodded, about to close the door before he continued talking. "Oh, and Y/N? Stay out of the woods, okay?"
You frowned a little but nodded, "wasn't planning on going for a stroll through the woods, but alright."
He nodded and you gave him a friendly wave before closing the door and watching him drive off.
You made your way inside the house kicking off your muddy boots by the door and making a mental note to clean them in the morning. You dumped your duty belt on the back of the couch before noticing there was a little red light flashing on your answering machine.
Who had tried to call you?
You didn't keep in touch with anyone from New York and the only people you knew in Hawkins were the ones you were with today. So, who was it?
Pressing the play button, you made your way to the kitchen to grab a glass of water but froze in the doorway when the voice spoke through the machine.
A sickening wave of terror welled in your stomach. Your body grew tense to the point of shaking as you grabbed hold of the wall listening to the voice you had hoped to never hear again.
"You think moving to Hawkins will save you? It won't. I'll be seeing you again real soon, sugar."
Blood drained from your skin and breath caught in your throat as you slowly slid down against the wall and sat on the carpet. You buried your face into your hands trying to remember how to breathe as you thought back to the last time you heard that voice... the voice who was the reason for your transfer to Hawkins.