Don't Let Me Go

Chapter 3

The next morning, Max woke up in the same place she had fallen asleep: in Lucas's arms. She looked around and saw that everyone else was gone and then she felt Lucas's hand running through her hair. "Where is everyone?" she asked in a sleepy voice. "They went upstairs for breakfast." he said. She turned her head and looked up at him and asked, "Why didn't you go with them?" He simply replied, "Because like I said last night, I'm not going anywhere. Plus I figured you would rather wake up in my arms than on Mike's basement floor." Max giggled at that. "I guess you have a good point Stalker." 

Max crawled off of Lucas, much to her mind's silent protest, but not before she gave him a sweet peck on the lips. Lucas was caught very off guard by this, which Max thought was funny. "What can I not kiss you?" she teased. "No you very much can. I just would rather be prepared for it. Like this." Lucas pulled her into a long, gentle kiss. When he pulled back, it was Max who was red. "You wanna go upstairs for breakfast?" he asked nonchalantly. All Max could get out was "Mhm" as she felt slightly tipsy from her first kiss with Lucas in a long time. 

Lucas helped her up from the ground and insisted she went first up Mike's basement stairs, much to her protest. "Well, well, well look who finally decided to join us!" Dustin said. "Morning lovey dovey cutie pies." Mike teased as he made smooching sounds. Max just flipped them off, as per usual. "Mike don't act like you didn't spend all summer making out with El last year." Max said. Mike turned red at this and turned around and continued to eat his breakfast.

Mrs. Wheeler had made them pancakes, Eggos for El, eggs, bacon, and she got some orange juice for them too. Max and Lucas sat down at the very crowded table and scarfed down their breakfast since they hadn't eaten since lunch the previous day. "Damn you two are acting like starved puppies." Eddie remarked. "Ok well you were scarfing down cheerios and chugging chocolate milk when we brought you the food when last week." Max said. "Fair enough, Red." he said.

After breakfast, the kids went back to the basement to further discuss the plan. The same plan Max had missed out on. "Ok so our approach is what we did last time. Max baits Vecna, Eddie and Dustin draw the bats away, we sneak in, send Vecna out the attic window. But this time El, Mike, Will, and Jonathan will be there to tie him up and take him out of the Upside Down where we will all meet to chop his head off and burn him to a crisp." Nancy said. Everyone responded with "yep, sounds about right" except for Max.

"Guys if we use the same approach, I don't know if Vecna is gonna fall for that again. I mean we literally just did that to him not even 5 days ago. I highly doubt he is gonna fall for the same shit again. We need to come up with a new plan. We need to wait a little bit and see if he is going to pick a different victim. I know I said no to that last time but if we use me again, he isn't gonna fall for it." 

She was right. None of them had thought of that. "If you're still in Hawkins, he isn't gonna pick another victim. He is just gonna keep trying to get you. And he won't stop until he does." Will said. "Ok so I leave Hawkins for a couple days. Wait for you guys to call or something like that, we meet with this new victim, tell them the plan, and get them to do it. If Joyce agrees to this, we can find somewhere to stay." she paused for a second and then continued. "And I'm taking Lucas with me." she stated very matter of fact.

"Ok well that sounds like a great plan but how will we find his next victim?" Robin asked. "I mean we can't possibly track down everyone in Hawkins and ask if they are having headaches and seeing scary shit." Robin said. "I can find them." El said. "I mean if we start with the people around us who we know have trauma and go from there, I can do it." she insisted. "Ok then that's what we are gonna do." Max said. 

"Where are we gonna stay?" Lucas asked. "I mean you could always stay with Murray." Nancy said. "His house is like a fortress. And it's in Illinois so that's outside of Indiana and it's probably a good idea to take some extra precautions because we don't know if Vecna can reach outside of Hawkins or not." Lucas and Max looked at each other. "Murray? As in the same Murray who snuck into a secret Russian base with Hopper and Joyce last summer?" Max said. "Yes that one." Nancy said, confused. 

"You want me, Maxine Mayfield, to stay with Murray for god knows how long until we get this figured out?" Max said. "Max, I don't wanna seem harsh, but if you don't there is a high chance you are gonna die. So I suggest you get over it and just do it because this is your safest option besides leaving the country. Which, before you even say anything, is not a very good option." Nancy said in a stern tone. Max just sighed and said whatever under her breath.

So Lucas and Max went to talk to Joyce and, not surprisingly, she said yes. A little annoyed that they would be staying with Murray but she would do anything to protect those kids. So they packed their bags and Lucas told his parents Max had a family emergency in Illinois and that Max really wanted him to go with her to be there for her. He did say he didn't know when he would be back. But he said Joyce was going and that he would call as often as he could. And that was enough to convince his parents. After all, they did feel bad for the poor girl.

So, on Wednesday, April 2nd, 1986, Max, Lucas, and Joyce set out for Illinois to go see Murray and stay with him for an indefinite amount of time whilst the gang back in Hawkins searched desperately for Vecna's next victim. Max hoped that they could go through with this plan because if they couldn't and if they could never find a way to kill Vecna and rid Max of this curse, the only other way to get rid of it, was to die.