Always Be There For You ~ Dustin Henderson x Reader

Chapter 13: Will the Wise

We were all searching the school for Will. We had no idea where he was and we were terrified. Mike and I came from the East side of the field and spotted Lucas coming from the West side. Then, we saw Will standing motionless in the center. Mike and I sped over to Will as Lucas ran inside the building to go tell the others.

"Will!" Mike and I screamed, trying to wake him up. Everyone else burst from the back door of Hawkins Middle and came running towards us with Ms. Byers.

"We just found him like this!" Mike fearfully explained.

"I think he's having another episode!" I stuttered. We all shouted at him, trying to get him to wake up. Ms. Byers stood in front of Will and placed her hands on the sides of his face while telling him to wake up. After a few moments, Will gasped and woke up. Ms. Byers carried Will over to her car and comforted him, while we all stood on the field without a clue of what to do.

"Okay, that totally freaked me out. Did that not freak you guys out?" Max questioned.

"Two episodes in two days," I noted.

"It's getting worse," Dustin pointed out.

"You think it's true sight?" Mike asked.

"What's true sight?" Max inquired. I heard a car horn and turned my head to see Steve sitting in his car.

"It's nothing," I answered plainly, "I gotta go." I headed over to Steve's car and hopped in the passenger seat. Steve stared at me with a quizzical expression, before sighing and starting the car.

"What?" I asked.

"You're asking me that?" Steve responded, "What happened, why were you guys all just standing on the field?"

"Will had another episode..."

"Oh," Steve paused for a moment, "Was that Billy Hargrove's sister?"

"She's his step-sister, and she's cool."

"I'll take your word for it, but Billy's a real asshole."

"Is he giving the ol' 'King of Hawkins' a run for your money?" Steve chuckled and sighed.

"That's one way to put it."

The next day, I arrived at school. I was going to head over to the dumpsters where Mike had said we were meeting, but Dustin grabbed my hand and pulled me aside before they could even spot me.

"Hey, what's up?" I asked.

"Okay, Dart is back at my house, safe and sound." He explained.

"Perfect."

"Do you want to come over after school to see him?"

"I'll be there."

"Awesome!" Once we finished our conversation, I looked down and noticed Dustin and I still had our hands clasped together. I looked back up at him and then flicked my eyes back down to our hands. He noticed as well, pulled away, and quickly began blushing.

"We should probably go meet the group," Dustin awkwardly covered.

"Yeah, yeah, totally. One hundred percent," I stuttered. We moved away from the place we were talking and headed behind the school, to find Lucas rummaging around in a dumpster while Mike and Max watched.

"What the hell's going on?" Dustin questioned.

"What do you think?" Mike sarcastically responded, "We're looking for Dart." Lucas heaved a giant trash bag out from the dumpster, making a loud "squelch" noise.

"Well, well, well. Look who finally decided to show up," Lucas hopped out of the dumpster, "After I drew the short straw. Real convenient."

"You stink!" Max teased Lucas.

"Where's Will?" I asked.

"He'll be here," Lucas answered, "Are you just gonna stand there? Or are you gonna help?" He tossed Dustin and me two trash pokers and we began picking at the contents of the trash bag. Dustin and I both knew that we weren't gonna find Dart, but we had to keep up appearances. If the group knew that we had hidden Dart, they would be furious.

During lunch, Mike called all of us, except for Max, to the A.V. room. He explained that Will had confessed to seeing a looming shadow on Halloween that gave off a sinister energy.

"What kind of shadow?" Dustin asked.

"I don't know. But it scared him," Mike answered, "And if Will really has True Sight... I mean, if he really can see into the Upside Down, maybe he saw that shadow again yesterday."

"So that's why he was frozen like that?" Dustin questioned.

"Maybe," Mike responded.

"Can it hurt him?" Lucas inquired.

"I'm not sure," Mike cautiously replied, "Y/n?" The boys all looked over at me, I cleared my throat and thought back to the D&D manual I had at home.

"Well, theoretically, if you're in another plane, you can't interact with the material plane. So, no, the shadow can't hurt him," I answered, "Again, that's only theoretical."

"Yeah, if that's even what's happening," Dustin agreed.

"This isn't D&D. This is real life," Lucas pointed out.

"So what do we do?" Dustin inquired.

"We acquire more knowledge. I'll go to Will's after school. See what's going on. You guys stay here and find Dart," Mike instructed.

"Dart?" Dustin nervously questioned, "What's he gotta do with this?"

"Will heard him in the Upside Down. I don't know how yet, but he's gotta be connected to this," Mike responded, "He's gotta be. If we find Dart maybe we can solve this thing. Maybe we can help Will."

After school, Dustin and I arrived at his house. I was eager to see Dart, despite how potentially dangerous he was, I had grown attached to him. As we walked through the front door, Ms. Henderson was pacing around her living room.

"Where are you? Mew-mew!" She spotted us, "Hey Dusty. Oh, hi Y/n, I wasn't expecting to see you today."

"Hi, Ms. Henderson, lovely to see you. Dustin and I are partners for a group project and we figured we should do some work after school," I lied.

"Oh, well have fun you two little geniuses!" Ms. Henderson encouraged us as we walked over to Dustin's room.

"We will!" Dustin replied. The minute we stepped into Dustin's room, our faces dropped. I noticed a trail of blood leading to Dustin's small couch, whilst Dustin was focused on something else.

"Dustin" "Y/n" We both said each other's names at the same time. I noticed what Dustin was staring at, the glass on Dart's cage had been completely shattered. Shit. I looked back towards the couch and slowly followed the trail of blood. I peeked over the top of the couch, and there was Dart, standing over the gored body of Dustin's cat. Dart turned around and looked at me, my stomach dropped as his face began to open up familiarly, revealing dozens of lines of jagged teeth.