Chapter 22: The Eleven Search Begins
POV: Adam
January 1984 brings a new year but old grief, and Mike Wheeler spends every evening hunched over his supercom radio like a monk maintaining vigil at an empty altar. The basement that once echoed with laughter and campaign strategies now fills with the crackling static of desperate hope, Mike's voice breaking as he calls into the void for someone who may never answer.
"Eleven? El, are you there? Please, if you can hear this... just say something. Anything."
She can't hear you. She's locked in Hopper's cabin with no radio, slowly learning what it means to be human while you tear yourself apart believing she's dead.
Adam sits on the basement steps, watching his friend destroy himself one unanswered call at a time. The Party has developed an unspoken rotation—someone always stays with Mike during these sessions, partly for support and partly to prevent him from broadcasting their secrets to anyone with a radio scanner.
Tonight it's Adam's turn to bear witness to heartbreak that echoes through the basement like a physical presence.
"Eleven, it's me. It's Mike. Day 53. I... I still believe you're out there. I have to believe you're out there."
Day 53. He's been counting. Every single day since she disappeared.
Through the bond, Scout sends images from his patrol around Hopper's cabin—Eleven moving past windows, alive and safe and growing her hair out while learning to navigate a world that doesn't want to cage her. Adam has been monitoring her situation through creature surveillance, unable to interfere but needing to know she's protected.
She's twenty minutes away. Alive, healing, probably making lists of words she wants to learn and practicing telekinesis on household objects. But I can't tell him that without revealing how I know.
"Mike," Dustin says gently, settling onto the couch with the careful movements of someone approaching a wounded animal. "Maybe we should take a break. Try again tomorrow?"
"No," Mike snaps, his usual leadership composure cracking under the weight of prolonged grief. "She's out there. She's alive, and she needs to know we're looking for her."
Lucas exchanges a look with Adam that carries weeks of accumulated frustration. They've all tried interventions—gentle suggestions that maybe Eleven is gone, that perhaps it's time to focus on healing rather than hoping. But Mike's faith has hardened into something approaching obsession, impervious to logic or comfort.
"Dude," Lucas says with characteristic bluntness, "she's gone. We all saw what happened. She... she's not coming back."
The words hit Mike like physical blows, his face cycling through denial, rage, and desperate hurt before settling on something harder and more dangerous.
"She's alive!" Mike explodes, standing so quickly his chair topples backward. "I know she's alive! I can feel it!"
He's right. He's absolutely right, and it's killing him that no one believes him.
Adam makes a choice that feels like walking on glass—offering just enough support to keep Mike functional without revealing the truth that would save his sanity.
"Then we keep looking," Adam says quietly. "But maybe... differently. Less desperately."
Mike whirls on him with eyes bright with tears and fury. "You don't understand. You had El for like a week. I loved her. I love her. And she's out there somewhere, scared and alone, and we're sitting here doing nothing!"
I understand better than you know. I understand that she's safe and protected and learning to read while you torture yourself with guilt and helplessness.
"I know you love her," Adam says carefully. "That's why we need to be smart about this. Systematic. If she's alive, if she's hiding, she'd need food, shelter, medical care. Let's check those things instead of hoping the radio will work."
It's a tactical masterstroke—giving Mike purpose without false hope, structure without surrendering the search. Dustin immediately grasps the logic and jumps in with characteristic enthusiasm.
"Hospital admissions! Missing person reports! Food bank distributions!" Dustin bounces in his seat, pleased to have actionable intelligence instead of desperate prayer. "We can cross-reference everything, look for patterns!"
Even Lucas nods slowly, apparently relieved to have something concrete to investigate. "It's better than watching you destroy yourself with that radio."
And it keeps you away from the truth that would complicate everything.
Will speaks for the first time since arriving, his voice still soft with recovery but carrying surprising wisdom. "You're a good friend," he tells Adam later, as they walk home through January snow that muffles their footsteps. "Even when it hurts."
You have no idea how much it hurts.
The search becomes Mike's new obsession, channeling his desperate energy into spreadsheets and charts that map every missing person report within a hundred miles of Hawkins. Adam helps with careful enthusiasm, using his adult organizational skills to create systems that feel productive while subtly steering investigations away from Hopper's property.
It's during one of these research sessions that Adam notices Hopper's suspicious grocery purchases—cart loads of food that include staples no bachelor would buy, plus a suspicious quantity of Eggo waffles that could only be intended for one person.
He's taking care of her. Hopper's playing dad to the girl who saved the world.
Adam's meta-knowledge confirms what his investigation suggests, but revealing this information would expose foreknowledge he can't explain. Instead, he makes another choice—protecting both Eleven's safety and Mike's sanity by quietly redirecting attention whenever their research threatens to uncover the truth.
She needs time. Time to heal, to learn what it means to be human instead of a weapon. When she's ready, she'll come back. Until then, I'll keep her secret.
[MIKE WHEELER RELATIONSHIP: SHARED GRIEF (60%)]
[NEW SKILL UNLOCKED: INFORMATION CONTROL]
[HOPPER RELATIONSHIP: TESTED BUT MAINTAINED (58%)]
[QUEST ACCEPTED: PROTECT ELEVEN'S SECRET (+500 XP)]
Late one January night, when Hawkins sleeps under snow that makes even ugly things beautiful, Adam uses Scout's eyes to peer through Hopper's cabin windows. Eleven sits at a small table, carefully forming letters on notebook paper while Hopper snores in his chair, empty beer bottle balanced on his chest.
She's alive. Safe. Growing stronger every day in a cabin that smells like coffee and cigarettes and the kind of unconditional protection that doesn't ask questions about past trauma or future plans.
Stay safe, sister, Adam whispers to the darkness between dimensions. Mike's waiting for you. We're all waiting for you.
But take your time. Take all the time you need.
Through the bond, Scout sends acknowledgment mixed with protective satisfaction. The creature has taken to patrolling the cabin's perimeter, an unseen guardian ensuring that Eleven's sanctuary remains undisturbed by forces both mundane and supernatural.
Pack protects pack. Even when the pack doesn't know it's being protected.
Adam pulls back from the psychic connection and settles into Will's bed—his bed, now, officially and permanently his—listening to his brother's steady breathing in the darkness. Tomorrow will bring more desperate searching, more careful misdirection, more watching Mike tear himself apart over a loss that isn't really a loss.
But tonight, Adam falls asleep knowing that everyone he loves is safe, even if some of them don't know it yet.
Some truths are worth keeping. Some secrets protect the people we love from pain they don't need to carry.
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