Chapter Text
Lucas Sinclair knows the doctors are wrong.
They say Max is in an "unexplainable coma", that her body just won't function. But Lucas knows better. He can tell how every day she's fighting for her life, her body stuck in Hawkins Hospital, mind trapped in an endless battle against someone he can probably guess.
Vecna's done enough damage in this town. Last year, almost eighteen months ago, he tried to merge Hawkins with the dimension underneath it, the Upside Down.
His method?
Possessing four high school students, then brutally killing them when he got the chance.
And one of them happened to be Lucas' girlfriend. He knows Vecna did it by picking out people who were weak in their mind, finding their bad thoughts and making them bigger and bigger until their mind had been pried open like a window into their soul.
He used Chrissy Cunningham's trauma from her horrible mother, Fred Benson's survivor's guilt from a car accident, Patrick McKinney's memories of abuse from his father, and Max...
Lucas blames himself every day for not noticing sooner. Her obvious trauma from witnessing her stepbrother Billy's death at the hands of the Mind Flayer would have been easy for Vecna, that stupid fucker, to make himself at home there. He knew Max was acting differently from the normal bright flame of life she burned, but when he tried to ask her about it, she'd completely blank him and dismiss it as his own mind playing tricks on him.
But then she got possessed, right there in front of Lucas, and he vowed never to leave her side again. Since then, he's been at the hospital at least once a day to visit her, always with his boombox and her favourite song- "running up that hill" by Kate Bush. The song that had saved her life once before, reaching inside her mind in a way no-one else could.
Lucas just hopes it can save her again.
With a click, the tape restarts, the first beats of the song that had been playing in Lucas' ears for more than a year straight blasting out into the hospital room, the only other noise being the steady beeping of Max's heart monitor.
It doesn't hurt me, yeah yeah yo
Do you wanna feel how it feels?
Lucas takes Max's hand in his own, running his thumb over her white knuckles. At her wrist, the steady pulse of her heart reassures him that she's still there, still fighting to come back to him. Everyone he knows has someone. His sister Erica has her best friend Tina, Dustin has Suzie, admittedly only speaking to her on his radio, Steve has his best friend Robin, Mike has El and Will.. He doesn't actually know what's going on with those three. Mike and El broke up a while ago, but remained best friends. It's clear that they love each other, and after trialling dating for a while, simply decided that that sort of love wasn't right for them. El has also grown a lot closer to Will, her adoptive brother and Mike's childhood (and current) best friend. These three hang out more than anyone else in the Party, usually at Mike's house, where Will is staying with his older brother Jonathan and mother Joyce, whilst El and her dad Hopper are occupying Hopper's cabin in the woods, for El to use it as a training ground for her powers. Its clear that to defeat Vecna, they'll need El's powers from her time in the lab to be as strong as they can.
Hopper is testing her rigorously, Lucas is sure of it.
You wanna know, know that it doesn't hurt me?
You wanna hear about the deal I'm making,
Lucas squeezes Max's hand, the hand of the girl he's loved for as long as he's known her, the girl who is more comparable to a storm than anything else, powerful and wild and beautiful.
He swears, in the quiet of the bridge in the song, he feels a squeeze back.
Lucas sits up immediately, heart in his throat. "Max..?"
You and me
His eyes scan over her face, searching for any change.
And if I only could,
"Max? Max, are you there..?"
I'd make a deal with God
Max's heartrate on the monitor speeds up.
And get him to swap our places,
Lucas' stomach swoops.
He knows he didn't imagine it.
He definitely saw Max's eyelids flicker.
Be running up that road
Again.
Be running up that hill
Max is definitely gripping his hand back.
Be running up that building
And then, in a sudden swoop that stops Lucas from breathing, Max's ginger eyelashes flutter upwards, and the perfect, beautiful blue he hasn't seen in over a year of her eyes fills the room.
Max Mayfield smiles at him. Lucas doesn't know how this is happening, but he's too happy to care. Max is alive, and she is smiling at Lucas.
"Hello, stalker," she says softly.
Lucas hasn't heard this voice in more than a year. It's cracked and dry from disuse, but it still feels like home.
Then the tears start to fall. Lucas pulls her into his chest first, pressing both of their beating hearts together, then brings her head upwards so he can kiss her. She melts into it, letting her own sobs rack her body, until neither of them can tell whose tears are whose, mixing together in a salty soup on their cheeks.
Vaguely, he realises that in the background, Kate Bush is still singing.
"Welcome back, MadMax," is all Lucas can get out when they break the kiss.
Max doesn't say anything, just presses her face into Lucas' shoulder.
"I waited for you-" Lucas starts,
"-for eighteen months," finishes Max, "I heard. I heard you everyday."
She laughs wetly.
"I'm sorry it took me so long, I-"
Lucas stops her. "Hey. You came back. That's all that matters."
"I came back. Yeah," Max says, sounding like she's reassuring herself.
And Lucas pulls her onto his lap, not asking anymore questions. He's got his world back. And he's not losing her again. Even after the song finishes, and nurses bustle in busily, pulling Max away from him to conduct their necessary checks on her, only one thought floats around his mind.
Thank you, Kate Bush.