Brave Like You (Steve Harrington)

Forty.

It was eerily quiet as we entered the Creel house. Vines nearly covered the walls and ground. "Oh shit," I said, "That's not good."

I led us through the house. We slowly made our way up the stairs. By the time we had made it to the attic, an earthquake hit, and we all grabbed onto each other for balance. Robin had her eyes closed, she was so scared. Nancy held onto her, gripping her tight.

Then a vine wrapped around Robin, holding her up against the wall. "Steve!" She shouted, her voice horace, "Candy! Nancy!"

Nancy jammed the butt of her riffle into the vines, and I began doing the same with my axe. Candy even got into it, too, using my old nail bat. A vine then grabbed me. I heard Candy shout, "STEVE!" And she ran over quickly and began swinging at the vines with the bat. Then Nancy was held to the same wall as I was. Candy couldn't save all of us on her own, but she sure tired, before she was also taken in by the vines.

"Robin," She called, "You're my best friend! I love you!"

"I love you, too," Robin choked out. "I love you, too, Dingus!"

Even though I was being choked, I managed to say, "I love you, too! All of you!" I looked over at Candy on the wall next to me. If this was the end, I wanted her to be the last thing that I ever saw. "I love you so much."

"I love you, too," she said, tears forming in her eyes.

"I'm a lesbian!" Robin screamed.

"We know!" Candy and I both said.

"What?" Nancy said, sounding surprised.

"I know," Robin said, "I just wanted to admit it out loud. I'm done hiding!"

The vines around her throat got tighter, and she could no longer speak. I let one hand go off the vine around my neck to reach for her, but I couldn't so I just had to deal with looking at her. We stared at each other, accepting our fate.

Then, after a while and thoughts of certain death, it all just stopped. Not because we had died, but because the vines unraveled, letting us go. We were freed. We all took a moment to catch our breath. "I don't believe in a higher power," Robin said, "Or Divine intervention, but that was merical."

Nancy looked towards the attic door, we still had some business to do. We entered the attic, and we saw Venca in a fleshy sort of web in a trance-like state. Robin began to disburse the molotov cocktails to Candy and I. Nancy stood guard with her sawed-off shotgun. I lit all of the cloths in our cocktails. I fling mine at him first. It exploded in a burst of flames.

His body dropped to the floor. Robin and Candy threw their cocktails at the same time, both hitting him in each of his arms. Nancy began shooting, she hit Vecna in both his shoulders and then his abdomen. Her last shot sent him flying out of the window. She lowered her gun, and we rushed out of the house.

I didn't like that there was no sign of Venca anywhere. Another earthquake hit, this one more intense than any of the others. We held onto the Creel's staircase for balance. When it was over, we ran through the woods until we reached the trailer park again, only to find that Candy's fear about Eddie was correct.

Dustin was cradling his dead body, tears streaming out of his eyes. "Oh Eddie," Candy said, "What did you do?"

She let go of my hand and ran to Dustin, who looked up at her crying. He spoke in a shaky voice. "It was the bats. He tried to take them all on himself. He got me safe and then left me up there. He waited until he knew I couldn't stop him."

"It's not your fault, Dustin," Candy said.

Dustin sobbed, and then he said, "I figured you'd want to say goodbye."