Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Neil gripped his steering wheel tightly, his knuckles turning white with the force that he was using. Billy had disrespected him again. He did not understand the boy he had done a lot more than he needed to, to help him. He did not have to keep him around after Molly had left. Billy was her son not his. He did not have to give him a house, clothes and food but he did and yet he would still disrespect him.

Sitting next to him Susan glanced at her husband with a nervous look on her face. She did not think that people should be driving when they were angry. And definitely no if they got as angry as Neil did. But she needed to get him out of the house, he had started getting violent with Billy again and Susan did not want him to turn that anger and violence onto her daughter Max. So she had said that they needed to go to the grocery store because they were running low. This was not technically a lie, they did need some more groceries but she could have gotten them all by herself.

The couple sat silently in the car. The air was very tense. Susan not daring saying anything as to not set her husband off. And Neil was still seething in anger.

They were driving near the old steel meal when something hit and cracked the window. It looked like a slimy tentacle. Because of this Neil swerved the car and it went speeding into the steel meal.

They were driving near the old steel meal when something hit and cracked the window. It looked like a slimy tentacle. Because of this Neil swerved the car and it went speeding into the steel meal.

They both got out of the crashed car. Then suddenly two tentacles came out of the mill and dragged them down to the upside down.

Max sat down on her floor bedside of her door to her bedroom. She hugged her legs to her chest. She hated whenever this happened. 

You could always tell whenever Neil was going to get mad. There was an odd coldness in the room and the atmosphere felt tense. Everyone in the house knew that something was about to happen.Her mom always hurried out of the room whenever Neil was mad, Max would typically do this as well. She did not like leaving Billy alone to face his father, but she also did not want Neil to turn his anger onto her. 

You could always tell whenever Neil was going to get mad. There was an odd coldness in the room and the atmosphere felt tense. Everyone in the house knew that something was about to happen.Her mom always hurried out of the room whenever Neil was mad, Max would typically do this as well. She did not like leaving Billy alone to face his father, but she also did not want Neil to turn his anger onto her.

Tonight had been particularly bad. Max did not really remember what had set Neil off, but whatever it was it made him really pissed. Billy had been bleeding a lot by the time that Neil was done.

It had only stopped when her mom had told him that they needed to go get groceries. For some reason this had shifted Neils focus and he went with her mom to the store.

After they had left Billy had gotten up, and he left. Max suspected that he was going to the pool. She was not supposed to know that he would sleep at the pool, using his spare key to get in, whenever things got bad at home. But she did know this. That was one of the perks of having a best friend who could spy on anyone.

Max had stayed where she had went to when it had all started. On her bedroom floor, right next to the door.

Thinking that the close was clear Max got up and slowly opened her bedroom door. She peered out the crack . No one else was in the house.

Max got her walkie talkie. She wanted to talk to her friends.

The mind flayer stood above his new vessels. They were going to help him finally get what he wants.

Chapter Text

Max talked with her friends over the walkie talkie for several hours. Eventually the rest of the party had to go to bed. Max glanced at the clock, it was 12:30. She was a little surprised that her mom and Neil had not returned from the store yet. Max put on her pajamas and got into her bed, she went to sleep almost instantly.

Billy laid down in the chair in the break room at the Hawkins pool. His father had been particularly bad tonight and he did not think that he could face him again when his Dad and Susan would return from the store. He knew that realistically there would be hell to pay when he eventually went back to the house but he did not care. Right now he felt, and that was all that mattered to him right now.

The next day seemed a lot darker then the previous one. No one in Hawkins seemed to know why. It was not a day with particularly bad weather, and there were not a lot of clouds in the sky. It was just a day with a melancholy feel to it.

Max had woken up a few a couple of hours ago. At first she had found it odd that her mother had not woken her up for school, but then she remembered that it was summer and that they did not have school.

Max had also found it odd that her mom and Neil were not home yet. She knew that Billy would not be home until his shift at the pool was over.

They did eventually come home, but this happened while Max was eating breakfast.

When they came home they were acting really odd. Max could not say what was odd about them. But the fear that she felt was deep and terrifying.

Max left her house shortly after Neil and her mom returned. She said that she was going to El’s house. This was true, she was going to Hoppers cabin to see El,but she was doing this to see if her friend could find out what was wrong with her mom and Neil.

At first she thought about skate boarding there but then she realized that it would take to long to do that. So Max decided to ride her bike to El’s house.

The bike had been a christmas present fromBilly and her mom. It was a great bike. She did not like it more than her skate board of course, but it still felt nice to have something to share with her friends. This was what they had given her. Her mom, unlike Neil, was very happy that she had friends. Billy had seemingly warmed up to them.

Max raced her bike to El’s house. When she got there she banged on the door with urgency. Chief Hopper ended up opening the door. “I need to talk to El. It is important!” She told him, almost out of breath as she said the words.

Hopper syncing the urgency in her voice told her that El was in her bedroom, not even asking her what was going on. Although the question appeared to be on the tip of his tongue.

Max bursted into El’s room. She hastily explained the situation.

El did not really know if it had to do with the upside down She knew how Max felt about her step father. Of course Max had never explained her home situation to her, but El was very good at reading people, and coming from a very similar situation herself she was able to see what was going on.

Even though she was not a hundred percent sure that something upside down related was going on she agreed to look because she could tell how worried her friend was, plus if this was related to the upside down they did not want to be caught off guard.

So El got ready to go into the void and spy on Max’s Mom and step father.

She felt the familiar sensation of going into the void. She looked around, eventually she saw them.

At first they seemed to be completely normal, but as El looked closer she realized that something was not normal. They did not look like normal people. The aurora around them was a lot darker than it was for most people, even the truly despicable ones. It was not human.

El told Max everything she had seen. After this they told Hopper, he was understandably concerned. Although he knew that there was nothing they could do about this until they had some concrete evidence.

They called the rest of the party giving them all of them information. Well all of them besides Steve, Nancy, and Johnathen. They were all at work.

Max wanted to stay at El’s house for a little longer. She felt a lot safer here, then she did at her own house. Of course some of this may had been brought about by the fact that her parents were possibly possessed by the mind flayer. But Max had felt this way long before this morning. She had never truly felt safe at her house ever since she was seven and her mom had married Neil. Even though Neil had never raised his fist to her, she had always knew that it would be a possibility. Of course back then Billy had been nicer to her and he actually acted like how an older brother should act. He had always been angry but that anger had not been directed at her until they had moved to Hawkins. She knew that he blamed her for their move, but Max knew that the whole thing would not have happened if Billy had just told child protective services what had happened. But after the events of Halloween Billy seemed to be slowly changing into the older brother that he had been back in Cali.

Despite how she had originally felt about the move Max did not regret it know. She had made amazing friends and she had met the love of her life.

She thought about Lucas. His house was probably the only other place that she felt completely safe. His parents were amazing, they had practically adopted her as their second daughter. She got along amazingly with Erica, Max thought of her as a little sister. And most importantly Lucas lived there.

Max knew that Lucas was her soulmate. That may sound completely cliche but it was true. Lucas made her into a better person and he helped her work through her anger issues and shitty home life. She also helped him with his own personal problems. Max knew that most high school relationships would not last but she was sure that theirs would.

Max told Hopper to call Billy at the pool and her mom and step dad at their house. She told hm to tell them that she was going to have a multi night sleep over at El’s house. Her mom answered the phone, she told her daughter to have fun in an unnerving monotone voice.

Billy opened his eyes suddenly, he looked around. He was not in the Hawkins pool break room. Of course it looked like he was, it was just a nightmare version of it.

Most people would have been freaked out and would be worried about where they were. Billy was one of these things. He was scared that he was here but unlike most people he knew where he was, he had been in this place many times before. Back in the lab in Cali and in his dreams for years afterwards.

He had not dreamed about this place since he was thirteen though, so it scared him that he was back here.

It did not last very long though because he woke up and he was back in the normal break room.

He got ready for his shift, he said hello to all of his fellow life guards as he tried to shove the thought of his dream into the back of his mind, it did not work.

Billy had very mixed feelings about his job as a life guard. He liked having his own money, he enjoyed all of his coworkers and being at the pool always made him think about Cali. But he hated how most of the moms looked at him.

He knew that he was attractive, but he still thought that it was creepy how they would all flirt with him. Ecspally Karen, he did not know the other people very well but he did know Mrs. Wheeler. He saw her every time he dropped Max off at her friends house, she knew him. She knew that he was younger then her daughter and yet she continued to try and sleep with him. It was fucked up.

Even though it was only one bad thing it was still a pretty large bad thing and it really bothered him.

When he was nearly done with his shift Heather came up to him and told him that he had a phone call. Since his shift was not over he could take it. About ten minutes later his shift was over, he was getting down from the life guards chair and Heather came up to him again. She told him that he had another phone call. Billy thanked her and he walked to the break room.

Billy liked Heather. She was super nice and caring. He did not really ever talk to her at school even though they were in the same grade. Billy was in a lot of advanced clases and the only other junior who was in those classes was a girl named Robin Buckly. Billy thinks that next year he will hang out with Heather, he would consider her his best friend.

When Billy got to the room he answered the phone, it was his fathers voice on the other end. There was something off about his voice but Billy could not really place what that was. Billy figured that his Dad was drunk.

His father told Billy that Max was staying at one of her friends' houses for a few nights and that he needed to drop off her clothes and toothbrush. Billy asked which friend and his Dad told him that it was the police chief's daughter.

Billy had dropped Max off at all of her friends house’s besides this one. Ge had heard Max talk about her friend El all the time but he had never met her. Truth be told he was somewhat excited too, Max did not usually take to people as fast as she did withher friend El so she must be very special.

He told Lance where he was going and that he would be back in about an hour, Lance told him that he would cover Billy’s shifts. Billy thanked him then he left.

He drove to their house. When he got there he went into Max’s bedroom and grabbed a few of her clothes, her tooth brush and her walkie talkie. He also grabbed Max’s skateboard from the garage, he knew that she liked riding it.

He asked Susan for directions to Chief Hopper's cabin. She gave them to him, but she acted really oddly. This was weirder than his Dad acting odd because his dad would get drunk often, but not Susan. Although he supposed that there was a first time for everything.

He followed the directions that she had given him. Billy ended up at a cabin in the woods.

Billy got out of his car holding Max's suitcase and skateboard. He knocked on the door the he starred down at his hands.

The police chief opened the door “You must be Billy.” He said. Billy nodded in confirmation, Chief Hopper motioned for him to enter his house. Billy felt a little bad because he was still a little wet from the pool but Chief Hopper did not seem to mind. At least he did not say anything about it. “Max, your brother is here.” he called out. A few months ago Billy would have corrected him and said that Max was his step sister. But not know, he knew that back then he was just better that she had caused them to move away from Cali, but he had gotten over that know. He realized how similar he had gotten to his dad and that scared him.

He saw Max and her friend El walk come out of the hallway. He gave Max her stuff then he looked eyes with her friend El. While he did this he realized something, it was shocking to him. Billy knew that El also realized this.

Billy quickly left, dropping Max’s skateboard as he did. He got in his car and started driving away quickly. El was like him. She was also an experiment.

Max glanced at El after Billy’s sudden and quick exit. Max could tell that Hopper was confused as well.

“What just happened?” She asked El.

El glanced between Max and her dad, she took a deep breath and said “Your brother” she said while pointing at Max “is my brother.” she said now pointing at herself.

“What?” Max and Hopper said in unison.

“He is like me, an experiment.” She explained trying to clear her statement up.

“How do you know?” Max asked in shock.

El explained everything. Max stood their in shock about what she had just learned about her brother. Max did not know a lot about the lab that El had grown up in. El obviously was not very keen on talking about that. But she did know something. She had been told a few things by other members of the party. From what they told her it sounded like a cold, metallic and drewery place, a place that no child should have to grow up in.

Max’s childhood had not been the best, but she had at least gotten parental love and she got to go outside. She could not imagine living in a lab.

She also knew a few things based on offhand remarks that El had made. Most of the stuff was things that she seemed to think was normal. Of course none of it was and it horrified Max to think that her best friend had been conditioned to think that that kind of stuff was normal.

Billy having spent some of her childhood in a lab made since know that she thought about it. Billy rarely talked about his childhood before age nine. Max had originally thought that this was because his mom had left him. But that had happened when he was eleven, and he did talk about her every know and then.

The mind flayer smiled. All of the pisces were coming together, he had his pawns in the game. He was very lucky, they had connections to the two people that he needed to succeed in his plan. And this time he would not fail.

Chapter Text

Hopper thought about what El was telling them.

He did not know a lot about the Hargrove kid, but what he did know he did not like. Billy had nearly gotten arrested several times for speeding. He also had beaten up Steve Harrington on Halloween night.

Billy had also allegedly gotten in many other fights although this was just rumors around Hawkins, and Jim knew first hand how the rumor mill in Hawkins worked.

So based on the information that he did have he did not know how he felt about this kid having super powers. This could be a problem.

Max then spoke up asking “What kind of powers does Billy have?”

El thought about this question for a minute, thinking about how to explain the only answer that she could give to this question.

“I don't know, I can not tell.” she told Max and Hopper.

Max was not satisfied with this answer, she knew that this was the best that her friend could do at this moment but it still made her upset. She had just learned some very shocking information about her brother, and she felt that she deserved to know what kind of powers that he had.

It affected her life more directly then it did for anyone else in the room.

Of course Max knew that her anger at her friend was an irrational one. El would have told them what it was if she knew, and it would be unfair for her to ask El to do something that was out of her capabilities. But her mind was spinning.

She felt that the small bit of information that El had given them was turning everything that she thought that she knew about her step brother upside down. And she could not even get the full picture.

Max sat back and thought about everything that had happened today. It had been a very chaotic and confusing day for her. First her mom and Neil had come home after being away over night acting extremely odd, then El had said that it could possibly be because of the upside down, and then finally it turned out that Billy had powers.

She wondered how they were going to explain all of this to the rest of the party.

Billy paced around the employee room at the Hawkins pool. He wondered anxiously about what he was going to tell Max.

Even if her little friend did not tell her what she had surely figured out about the past that they had in common, Max would have definitely figured out that something was wrong based on how they both reacted when they locked eyes.

He was having to make a plan for two different scenarios.

The first situation that he was planning for was that Max’s friend had told her what she had realized about him. He figured that if this were the case Max probably already knew about the experiments so he would definitely have less to explain here. For this reason Billy hoped that Max’s friend had told her. It would be a lot less complicated to just explain his story and what happened to him rather than explain everything he knew about the experiments.

The other scenario was that her friend had not told Max what they had in common. This would need a lot more complicated explanation. He would most likely have to explain everything to her and he did not want to do that. Billy was also not sure that he could explain, he did not know the full story himself, how could he explain it to Max? Of course he could always lie about what had happened but he did not think that he could come up with a convincing enough lie that could fole her.

Of course there was another solution to his problem but he was not even going to consider it.

The pool had closed several hours ago, his fellow staff had left a while ago. But not Billy.

He was going to stay here for a little while, he wanted to put off going back home as long as possible.

This was for two reasons.

The main and obvious one being he did not want to confront Max about what had happened. This would probably not happen for a while because she was sleeping over at her friends house so this gave him more time.

Billy also did not want to see his father, Neil seemed to be a lot more on edge today and Billy knew that if he were to go home he would probably be subjected to his rage.

So Billy thought that he would most likely stay over night at the pool again.

A couple minutes later Billy heard a sound coming from the the pool. Part of him wanted to go investigate what was happening. No else should be in the pool.

Hell, technically Billy should not even be here after hours.

Billy walked slowly and carefully to the door.

When he got there he looked out the window. He saw an unmarked van unloading tanks of something into the storage room that him and the rest of the staff were not allowed to go into.

There were two people that he could see, they seemed to be wearing a janitorial uniform, but something about it seemed off, like they bought it at party city or something like that.

He quickly ducked underneath the door so as to not be seen. Then he tip toed back to the staff room.

He thought about what he saw. There were several completely logical explanations as too what they were doing.

But something about what he saw made Billy think that there was a much darker explanation.

Least to say, he was not getting any sleep tonight.

Max sat in El and Hopper’s living room. The whole party was at their house.

They ended up having to wait a day to have to wait a day to meet up. That day had been one of the longest of her life.

She had tried to concentrate on her sleep over with El, but she could not. Her mind was racing with all of the information that she had gotten over the past day.

Based on everyone else's faces she could tell that they were also all shocked at this information.

Lucas sensing her emotions went to hold her hand. Max squeezed it in a grateful gesture. She was lucky to have such a caring boyfriend.

The party was discussing what they were going to do. El was pretty insistent that Billy was not a threat to them and that they did not need to worry about him.

Most people did not seem to be fully convinced of this, but they also all trusted El’s judgement. And they all knew that they all had bigger fish to fry if the upside down was truly back.

Steve and Dustin also mentioned that there was something odd going on at the mall. Although they did not think that this was upside down related.

Then Ms. Byres mentioned that her magnets were not working.

Everyone agreed to find out all of the information they could.

Max thought about how she was going to ask Billy, this was going to be difficult.

Chapter Text

The town of Hawkins was unusual quite tonight. The only sound that could be heard was the sound of Billy’s car driving down the long road. The trees were the same ones that they had driven by dozens of times, but this time they seemed darker, more ominous.

The two step siblings sat in the car silently. Both had something they needed to talk to the other about, but neither had the courage to do that.

Max continued to think about how she was going to breach the subject with Billy. Billy had decided that he would not mention anything until Max mentioned something.

Max could not think of a way to breach the subject, she had not even decided by the time that she had reached the house.

They both walked into the house silently, Billy opening the door for her.

When they walked into the house they saw Neil standing right in front of the door way, he opened his mouth and said “Your mother made dinner.”

Then he walked to the table and sat down. Max and Billy starred at each other in slight confusion.

Billy thought that it was odd that his father was not mad that they were five minutes late. Of course he was glad that his dad was not mad but it was still odd. His dad was always mad when he was late, hell he was sometimes mad when he was on time.

Max also found it odd that Neil was not mad at them for being late, in fact he seemed to be almost emotionless. Max chalked that up to the mind flayer.

When they sat down they both looked down at there food and then looked at each other in a mix of confusion and disgust.

The food that Max’s mom made seemed to be some kind of soup. It was a dark black color, it had what appeared to be chunks of tomatoes. When Billy moved his spoon around in it he noted how incredibly thick it was, it reminded him of the “medicine” that they made him take in the lab. Even though it looked like soup the consistency was not.

“Umm, mom. What kind of soup is this?” Max asked, clearly confused at what they were being told to eat.

“It is potato soup.” Susan said sharply.

“Really, then why does it look so………..” Max started trying to ask in a way that was not suspicious or rude .

“Different then the soup that you normally make?” Billy said, Max gave him a thankful glance.

“It is potato soup!” Susan said, this time clearly ending the conversation.

The fact that she had not answered the question was not lost on the siblings.

As Neil and Susan both ate, Max and Billy picked at it. Neither of them wanted to eat it, it looked disgusting, Max knew that her mom had ulterior motives and Billy did not want to eat the “soup” because of his child hood in the lab.

When Neil and Susan where done eating they both got up and said that they were leaving to go to the store. Before they left Neil said that they better eat all off the “soup”.

Not a minute after their car had pulled out of the driveway Max and Billy both got up and poured it into the sink.

There was a small room. It had white concrete walls and a small bed. This room was in a lab in California.
Inside of this small room, there was a small boy.

He had blonde hair and blue eyes, he also had very pale skin due to his lack of sun.

The boy was laying in his bed staring up at the ceiling. Then he heard a door open, he looked up and he saw his mother.

He got up and ran to give his mom a hug.

After the weird acid trip that was dinner Max went up to her bedroom. She opened her bedroom door and went straight to her desk and grabbed the walkie talkie off of it. She was very eager to tell her friends the nights events.

Eventually she got them all and quickly explained what happened in a quiet voice, she did not want Billy to hear.

Max quickly explained what happened at dinner to the rest of the party, every one agreed that it was odd and that something was definitely off.

“Ok, you guys can come over at 11:00 tomorrow. My mom and Neil both have to work from 1:00 to 5:00 and Billy has to work from 10:30 to 3:00, although he sometimes stays late.” Max told the party because they were formulating a plan.

The rest of the party agreed to this, then El suggested that she could sleep over and try and since the mind flayer.

Max instantly agreed to this, she would be able to find out what was wrong with her Mom and step father and she would get to hang out with El.

After this Max got out a Wonder Women comic book and tried to read it to take her mind off of everything. She still did not know how to breach the subject of powers with Billy, she figured that she would ask the party to help her think up ideas.

She read multiple comic books while waiting for her mother and Neil to come back. They ended up coming back around 11:45. They had been out for over three hours.

Something was definitely off in Hawkins, Max just hoped that they could stop it this time.

Billy sat down in his bed, he had a horrible sinking feeling in his stomach after tonight's dinner. He knew that what Susan and his Father had tried to feed him and Max was not soup.

At first he thought that maybe they were trying to poison them, but this theory was thrown out the window when he remembered that they had eaten it too.

Something was off though, he just did not know what.

The mind flayer seethed in disappointment. His plan had failed, but he had plenty more up his sleeve. He would get what was due to him, then it would all be over.

Chapter Text

Billy tossed and turned in his sleep. He had not had nightmares like this in years.

He dreamed of white walls and needles and other things. These were all so terrifying.

He dreamed that they would all come back again and take him, that had always been one of his greatest fears. He remembered back when he had been in fifth grade and some one had reported his dad to CPS. He had just needed to say that his dad had hurt him.

But he did not, because he knew that they would take him away and they would take him back there, to the lab. At least, that is what he had thought.

He woke up with a scream nearly escaping his throat.

Steve felt like his fingers were about to fall off as he scooped the ice cream that lay in the freezing cold freezer.

He had to get a job over the summer, because his parents were mad that he not had not been accepted into college, and they said that he had too work too stay in there house.

He actually really liked working here, he had a great coworker and he got free ice cream which was a great bonus.

As he made the orders of the customers he thought about the meeting that the party had yesterday. Billy Hargrove had powers. This was not a good thing, at least that is what he thought.

El seemed to think differently. But then again, she had never met Billy before yesterday.

Steve wondered what kinds of powers Billy had. Of course the only way to truly know this was to ask him but there was no way that he was doing that. Max had said that she would ask him and then tell them all what he said.