𝐁𝐮𝐫𝐲 𝐔𝐬 𝐀𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞 ; ᴹᶦᵏᵉ ᵂʰᵉᵉˡᵉʳ

The Nina Project

Max is zoned out listening to Running Up That Hill as she draws, attempting to show the friends that didn't see what she and Ian saw in their minds. She pauses her music as Nancy sits with her, conversing as they talk about the pictures.

Ian is silent, zoned out into nothing as he thinks. Dustin sits beside him, tapping him on the shoulder to catch his attention. Ian quickly looks up at him with a fake smile, attempting to assure his friend that he's okay. He glances over at Holly, playing with her LiteBrite at the table. He was merely happy to see that she could at least be a kid while she could.

Nancy flips through the papers, folding them as needed. Max and Dustin curiously watch as the drawings together form a house. Nancy uses a marker to fill in the gaps, mostly windows.

"It's not just any house,"

Max feels her heart drop as Nancy places the door down in the respective spot.

"It's the Creel House."

Nancy quickly stands up, heading downstairs to wake the others. Dustin steals Mr. Wheeler's coffee, dragging along Max and Ian with him.

"Thanks, Mr. Wheeler, fuel for the road!"

<•>

As they arrive at the Creel House, Ian sits on the front porch with his headphones, wanting to listen to the song he's obsessing over this week. God kid, you need to stop, it's gonna put your life on the line at some point.

He sits on the top step, slightly listening as the group enters the abandoned house.

"Ian, move for a sec" Nancy speaks, trying to get the curly haired boy to move so she and Steve didn't hit him in the back of the head with a large piece of plywood.

He quickly stands up, standing at the bottom of the steps as they reveal the door. The window was made of stained glass, a rose crafted upon it.

He sits back down in the lawn instead, wanting to just dive into the world in his head that brought The Mamas & The Papas' Dedicated To The One I Love to life. He lays down in the uncut grass, letting himself sink into another world.

He felt himself have an out of body experience, like he was floating, like he wasn't tired anymore, like he wasn't scared anymore. It felt like he had no worries, no fears, no guilt, no sadness.

It was the first time he'd felt happy in a long time.

Shocking, as he was laying in the lawn of some abandoned, creepy house, listening to his mixtape. He feels his whole head go numb, sleep overcoming him.

Oh, yeah, he'd gotten zero sleep last night because he was so scared that Vecna would come for him again and kill him. He spent most of the night crying over it, rotating the arms through the night in which he'd cry in. Every two hours, it'd rotate from Lucas to Dustin, and to Max, they'd mostly just cry together and try to hype each other up.

It wasn't until another three songs had finished that he started feeling uneasy. Like something bad was happening. They were taking far too long inside. He stands up, pulling his headphones down as he reaches the door.

He feels something, feeling like ocean waves crashing on the shore, in his brain, like it was warning him. He steps inside the house, trying to find his friends.

As soon as his foot hits the first stair, wanting to look top to bottom, he finds himself stuck in a trance. He's paralyzed, unable to move in the real world.

But he doesn't know he's been sucked into the weird Vecna dream world inside his mind. He continues up the stairs in his subconsciousness, shyly calling his friends names. He felt creeped out, getting awful feelings from being in this house.

As he reaches the landing, he looks out the window, eyes lying on the backyard. He creeps his way up into the attic, following some sort of sixth sense that was secretly telling him to stay away, but he's not the type to listen.

He carefully steps his way up the attic stairs, hoping to find his friends. He accidently sticks his hand in a spiderweb, causing him to pull his hand away in disgust and fear.

"Ian! Ian!" Dustin shakes Ian by the shoulders, seeing his glazed over eyes at the bottom of the steps. "Steve! Nancy! Robin!"

Ian stands frozen solid at the foot of the steps, paralyzed as he's separated between worlds. Dustin, in a panic, puts the headphones over Ian's ears and clicks the tape player. He quickly realizes he's only got a mixtape, so he pauses it, pops it open, and scans the track list for his favorite song.

As he does so, his heart is pounding in his chest, so hard and so stressed that he can hear it in his ears. He scans the first words for "I" a million times, flipping it front to back forty times before the older teens arrive. He finally finds it, clicks it back in, and fast forwards, wishing the tape could go faster.

He turns the volume all the way up, hoping that Ian would just snap back to reality.

And that he did, in silence.

He silently looks around, all his friends staring at him. He raises an eyebrow, pulling the headphones off his ears.

"What happened?" Dustin asks, worried and curious.

Ian shrugs before walking back outside, seeing his friends were okay. He clearly didn't want to talk about it, but it made Dustin wonder more about what happened.

"That's three, right?" Lucas asks.

Dustin nods, watching as Ian sits back down outside in the front yard.

"Why won't he talk to us?" Steve ponders aloud.

"It's traumatic," Max answers, "He hadn't spoken a word all day. He's scared and tired. Just leave him be"

<•>

A chandelier flickers rapidly.

"Like it's just there. Just on the other side," Steve speaks.

Nancy, Robin, Steve, and Dustin were gathered around as well, watching it flicker and die out.

"I think he just left the room," Robin mumbles.

Max glances around. "Did he hear us?"

Steve looks down at the younger girl. "Can he see us?"

Lucas quickly turns to Max. "Headphones"

She quickly pulls her headphones up, and clicks play on her player.

"Everyone turn off your flashlights and spread out," Nancy whispers to the others.

They comply, following her orders.

Then Robin had him, her flashlight let out a dim glow as they all rushed towards her in one of the bedrooms.

"I... I had him, " She says as the lights flickers out, but then it moves to Steve's.

"Oh, I think he's moving." He quickly follows the light, making sure it would stay strong. "He's moving. He's moving!"

They follow it back upstairs, then it goes out at the landing.

"Shit, I lost it,"

"No, you didn't," Max speaks, walking past Steve as she opens a door, revealing a light flickering in the attic hallway.

The group quickly followed her, and as they gathered around the center of the attic, their lights went absolutely bezerk.

They look at each other with worry and fear, assuming the worst.

Dustin quickly runs down the stairs, trying to get to Ian as soon as possible, not knowing if he's protected by his music or not, in a state of constant worry for his friend. Steve shares a look with the rest of the group, feeling bad for his younger friend.

Nancy quickly nods her head toward the stairs, wanting to get out as soon as possible.

The rest follow her, silently agreeing.