Chapter 18: The Rescue
POV: Adam
November 20th evening, and the Byers house thrums with tension thick enough to cut with grief—Joyce pacing the living room like a caged animal while Hopper sits at the kitchen table, methodically checking equipment with the grim efficiency of a man preparing for war.
Adam lies in Will's bed, every muscle coiled with anticipation while his system counts down the hours until dimensional breach. Through the bond, he feels his creatures moving into final positions—living pieces on a chessboard that spans two realities, each one ready to guide, protect, and die if necessary to ensure the rescue succeeds.
Three hours until they enter the lab. Three hours until everything changes.
Jonathan moves through the house with forced normalcy, making coffee no one will drink and straightening furniture that doesn't need straightening. His eyes find Adam's whenever they pass in the hallway, seeking reassurance that the strange promises made at 2 AM will actually mean something when reality tears open.
He's scared. He's trying not to show it, but he's terrified of losing Will forever.
"You should try to get some sleep," Joyce says, appearing in Will's doorway with the kind of maternal concern that doesn't recognize midnight as an appropriate time for boundaries. "Tomorrow's going to be..."
She can't finish the sentence. How do you describe the day you either save your son or lose him forever? How do you prepare a twelve-year-old boy for the possibility that the family he's just joined might crumble before he's had time to truly belong?
"I'll be okay," Adam says quietly. "You focus on bringing Will home."
And I'll focus on making sure you succeed.
Joyce's smile is watery but genuine. "We will. I can feel it. Something's different tonight. Like... like the universe is finally ready to give him back."
She has no idea how right she is.
When the house finally settles into the restless quiet that precedes impossible missions, Adam closes his eyes and reaches out through the bonds that connect him to creatures positioned across two dimensions. His consciousness splits, fragmenting across multiple viewpoints while his physical body lies motionless in Will's bed.
Through Scout's eyes, he perceives the Hawkins National Laboratory—concrete and steel and the kind of institutional cruelty that turns children into experiments. Joyce and Hopper approach the facility with the determined stride of people who've moved beyond fear into something more dangerous: absolute purpose.
They're really doing it. They're actually going in.
The moment Joyce and Hopper cross through the gate into the Upside Down, Adam feels it like a physical blow. The dimensional barrier tears open with violence that echoes through every creature under his command, sending waves of psychic disruption that make his borrowed teeth ache.
They're through. Now the real work begins.
His Vine Crawlers respond to mental commands, releasing carefully timed bursts of bioluminescent spores that create a path through the toxic landscape. To human eyes, the glowing trail will seem like natural phosphorescence—just another inexplicable feature of an inexplicable place. But it leads directly toward Castle Byers, avoiding the dead ends and monster lairs that could trap unwary travelers forever.
Through Scout's enhanced senses, Adam watches Joyce stumble through the nightmare landscape with the desperate determination of a mother who's run out of reasonable options. Her terror is a physical presence that makes the air taste of copper and adrenaline, but underneath the fear lies something unbreakable—love strong enough to walk into hell itself.
She's lost. The darkness is disorienting her.
Joyce spins in a slow circle, flashlight beam cutting through shadows that seem to eat light without offering illumination in return. Her breathing comes in short, sharp gasps that fog the toxic air, and for a moment Adam sees her courage wavering in the face of absolutely alien horror.
Now, Scout. Show yourself. Just enough to guide her.
Scout emerges from concealment at the edge of Joyce's vision—a shadow among shadows, barely visible but definitely present. His movement is subtle, calculated to draw attention without triggering fight-or-flight responses. When Joyce's flashlight beam swings toward him, he's already gone, melted back into darkness that preserves the illusion of coincidence.
But the glimpse is enough. Joyce's gaze follows the direction Scout indicated, and she sees the faint phosphorescent trail left by the Vine Crawlers' spores.
"This way," she whispers to Hopper, voice thick with intuition she can't explain. "Will's this way."
Good. Trust your instincts. They're better than you know.
Adam's head pounds from maintaining multiple creature viewpoints simultaneously, the strain of coordinating actions across dimensional barriers pushing his abilities to their limits. Blood trickles from his nose in a thin stream that tastes of ozone and exhaustion, but he doesn't dare relax his concentration.
Hold on, Will. They're coming.
Through the Alpha Demodog's senses, he perceives Castle Byers in the Upside Down—a twisted reflection of childhood innocence, all rotted timber and surfaces that hurt to touch. The structure squats in a clearing where reality grows thin, surrounded by the kind of silence that suggests predators have learned to avoid this particular hunting ground.
Because I made them avoid it.
The Alpha has been working for hours, clearing the area of threats with the methodical efficiency of an apex predator that recognizes no equals. Smaller creatures flee from its presence, while anything large enough to pose a threat finds itself facing evolution given teeth and claws and absolutely no mercy.
Perfect. The way is clear.
Back in Will's bedroom, Adam's physical body begins to convulse as the strain of remote consciousness fractures his concentration. His borrowed nervous system protests the impossible demands being placed on it, sending pain signals that feel like electricity dancing through his spine.
Almost there. Just a little longer.
Through Scout's eyes, he watches Joyce and Hopper reach the clearing where Castle Byers waits like a monument to interrupted childhood. Joyce approaches the structure with the careful reverence of someone entering a sacred space, while Hopper maintains tactical awareness that keeps his weapon ready despite the apparent absence of threats.
And there he is.
Will Byers lies in the exact spot Adam knew he would—unconscious, barely breathing, a feeding tentacle down his throat pumping toxins that will kill him if they're not removed soon. Joyce's scream of recognition echoes through both dimensions, a mother's anguish given voice that makes Adam's borrowed heart clench with sympathetic pain.
Cut it out, Hopper. Cut it out now.
As if responding to Adam's desperate thought, Hopper produces a knife and begins the delicate work of removing the tentacle without causing additional damage. Joyce cradles Will's head in her lap, whispering promises and prayers in equal measure while her son fights for life in a place that exists to steal it.
That's when the real Demogorgon arrives—not the juveniles Adam has been taming, but the apex predator that took Will in the first place. It emerges from the deeper shadows with the fluid grace of something that exists purely to hunt, drawn by the scent of interrupted feeding and the psychic disturbance of a rescue in progress.
Now. Everything now.
Adam's consciousness explodes across his creature network as he commands full assault. The Alpha Demodog launches itself at the approaching threat with evolutionary fury, while Scout and the surviving pack members converge from multiple directions. It's not about winning—his creatures can't defeat an apex predator in direct combat. It's about buying time, creating enough chaos for the humans to escape.
The battle is brief and violent and utterly one-sided. Adam feels each of his creatures fall through the bonds that connect them—loyalty repaid with death, love answered with sacrifice. But their deaths mean something. Their sacrifice creates the window Joyce and Hopper need to carry Will to safety.
Go. RUN.
As the rescue party disappears through the dimensional rift with Will's limp form, Adam's consciousness snaps back to his physical body like a rubber band released under tension. The impact sends him into full seizure, every muscle contracting as his nervous system tries to process the trauma of multiple deaths filtered through psychic bonds.
Blood pours from his nose in a torrent that stains Will's pillow with evidence of sacrifices no one will ever understand. The room spins around him like a carousel operated by someone who's forgotten the meaning of mercy, and consciousness fades in and out like a dying lightbulb.
Worth it. All of it was worth it.
[RESCUE MISSION: SUCCESSFUL]
[WILL BYERS: EXTRACTED ALIVE]
[CASUALTIES: ALPHA DEMODOG, 2 VINE CRAWLERS, 1 SCOUT INJURED]
[EXPERIENCE GAINED: +2500 XP]
[LEVEL ADVANCEMENT: 10 → 12]
[HIVE CONNECTION: 10% → 13%]
[PHYSICAL TOLL: SEVERE MP DEPLETION, PSYCHIC STRAIN]
Adam wakes to Jonathan shaking him frantically, his adopted brother's face white with panic and relief in equal measure.
"They got him! They got Will!"
Through the window, Adam sees the ambulance pulling away from the house, red lights painting the November night in colors that speak of medical emergencies and second chances. Joyce sits in the passenger seat, still cradling Will's unconscious form, her face transformed by joy that makes her look ten years younger.
He's alive. Will Byers is alive and safe and going home.
The system notifications scroll past like celebration made digital, each message confirming what Adam's bleeding nose and exhausted soul already know—the rescue succeeded, the family is whole, and the price paid in creature blood was worth every drop.
My first real save. My first unqualified victory.
"How did you know?" Jonathan asks, settling onto the edge of Will's bed with careful concern for Adam's obviously fragile state. "How did you know they'd succeed?"
Because I made sure they would. Because I positioned an army across two dimensions and sacrificed pieces of my soul to guide them through hell itself.
"I just... believed," Adam says instead, the lie tasting like copper and necessity. "I believed they'd bring him home."
Jonathan nods, accepting the explanation with the kind of faith that doesn't require evidence to feel true. Outside, the night settles into the peaceful quiet that comes after storms pass and families reunite and impossible things turn out to be possible after all.
Will's coming home. The nightmare is over.
And somehow, impossibly, we all survived.
Through the tattered remains of his creature network, Adam feels Scout limping through the woods toward home—wounded but alive, loyal to the end despite everything it's cost him. The last loyal soldier in an army that died so a family could be whole.
We did it, old friend. We actually did it.
Tomorrow will bring explanations and medical procedures and the slow work of healing from trauma that goes deeper than physical wounds. But tonight, Will Byers is alive, Joyce has her son back, and Adam Byers has found his place in a family worth dying for.
This is what victory feels like. This is what it means to matter.
And for the first time since waking up in Subject 017's body, Adam falls asleep smiling.
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