METANOIA | Eddie Munson

The Piggyback, Part 3

3rd Person's POV

She was back in the hallways, restored to just how she remembered them, restored to their original glory.

She could tell, the floors were shinier, the walls less dull. All except for the lockers. The lockers had paint chipping off of its edges, they'd been covered up by a fresh coat after Valerie's class graduated.

She followed them, one by one, tracing her fingers along what used to belong to her friends. Her hand flinched as she reached hers, the door slowly creaking open.

She paused to take a look around, went ahead and opened it when nothing else happened.

Thankfully greeted by her books, stationery and a spare pack of gum she let out a sigh. She reached towards an old book when goosebumps overtook her entire body at the sudden feeling of eight legs crawling up her arm.

"Fuck!" She started shaking her arm, "Oh, shit-" and used her other to swat the creature off when that didn't work.

She raised her eyebrows to herself, watching the thing creep away, "Really? A spider?"

Her head snapped up into place at the one of a kind, eerie noise. One that sent shivers down her spine.

She spun around, but it didn't matter where she looked. All locker doors creaked open all at once.

Spiders.

Spiders coming out of them in heaps and piles as if they couldn't get out fast enough. And each of them headed towards her.

In the blink of an eye the whole hallway flooded with a sea of what she thought were tarantulas.

They started crawling up her legs, and no amount of shaking would be enough to get them all off. Her breath came out in short spurts. A claustrophobic feeling tightened itself all over her chest.

Her arms, her neck, her hair. They were everywhere. She wanted to rip all of the skin off her body.

She started running. She didn't care where, she needed to get away. She tried to ignore the insects she was stepping over, the crunch of their bodies.

She let her feet carry her to the nearest classroom, slamming the door shut when she got in. She stared at the door, panting.

Suddenly, not a single spider remained on her body. She didn't dare open the door and check whether it was all her imagination or not.

And then there were particles floating through the air. A large flash of scarlet lightning roared from behind her.

She found herself wondering if it was worth escaping to Hawkins High, only to have the memory of it stained and poisoned.

The door to the classroom slid open, but there were no spiders behind, only his voice.

Valerie took a deep breath, rolled her shoulders to ease out some nerves and closed her eyes. She started shuffling through her memories again, careful not to pick one too precious.

"You think I don't see what you're doing, Valerie? You think I don't see everything?"

Suddenly there was a flash of Jason in her mind, pointing his gun at Max and Lucas.

That wasn't a memory.

"You thought you could trick me?"

There was Nancy, Steve and Robin, all wrapped in vines, choking.

"You thought your friends could stop me?"

Eddie and Dustin huddled together in the van, trying to fight off creatures in the upside down.

"I see them."

Hopper running from a demogorgon.

Hopper... was alive?

They could be fake, she told herself.

They don't feel fake, she found herself thinking.

The flashes turned more frequent, each scream of agony blending into the other. Nobody was safe. Nobody would be safe.

"I can feel them dying."

Valerie forced her eyes open. Her body was thrown back against the floor, an invisible force choking her neck with a vice like grip.

She let out gasps of air, unmoving, helpless.

Then he stepped forward to appear in her line of sight, towering over her.

She had to buy more time. She could not.

"You are brave, Valerie. Perhaps braver than them all. So much darkness and yet you still hope." He raised his left arm above and Valerie felt her heart drop.

"But you will always be human."

Her eyes flew to the back of her head, as a mind numbing pain overtook her senses.

She failed to buy more time.

And then the pain went away, her body collapsed into the floor. The cold tiles were soothing.

But that couldn't be it. That wasn't how Vecna killed, it wasn't so easy.

She lifted her head up, eyelids fluttering open. There he was, suspended mid air, a position that completely mirrored his own victims.

And before him, Eleven.

Valerie's heart practically soared at the sight, but then dropped just as quickly. She was divided in two. There was the scared part of her, that almost died, so glad she came when she did. Then there was the other part who felt like she failed her friends, and that saving her was meaningless.

What a waste.

Because Eleven could've been with Nancy, Steve and Robin instead. Freeing them and obliterating Vecna's physical body, and thereby hopefully tearing this problem off at its rotten roots.

Eleven could've instead been protecting Dustin and Eddie.

Eddie, who, at that very moment was ready to run back down to the upside down alone and do what Valerie's been trying to do all this while.

Eddie, who was about to take on all the bats and buy his friends more time.