"Hey, you remember what I said last year, right? We're Zombie Boy and Ghost Boy. I'm not ever gonna leave you."
"Promise?"
"One hundred percent."
***
In which Alistair fights the monster that possessed his friend alongside his friends, while trying...
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Chapter Eighty-Eight: Max's Fate
(The Piggyback, Pt. 2)
***
The waiting was the worst part.
It was all Alistair could think about as he sat in this hospital chair, waiting and waiting for news of Max, for that door to open and the doctor to tell them she was okay. To see doctors and nurses rush in and out, trying to save her, to keep her alive, as ghosts congregated—sensing Max, how precariously she balanced on the line between life and death. He glared at them when they did. Max wasn't joining them—she was going to be alive, the doctors would keep her alive, she had to be okay.
She had to be.
Because if she wasn't, Alistair didn't know what he'd do. He didn't know what he'd do in a world where Max wasn't in it, where she... she...
Blinking back the tears and ignoring both the ghosts and death—that had Alistair want to glare at it too, because death wasn't taking Max again, wasn't taking Max like it took Eddie, it wasn't—as around him everyone else sat, desperate for news that Max would be okay, that she was alive. None were more anxious than Lucas and Rowan, and Alistair kept an arm around Lucas' shoulders as Cami did the same, Erica giving looks to her brother as Dustin sat, unusually quiet—the terrible reality of losing not only Eddie, but Max as well in the same night, silencing him.
At some point, the nurses had noticed Dustin favouring one leg over the other, the rings around Rowan's, Steve's, Nancy's and Robin's necks, the the bandaged bite peeking out from under the bandana on Valerie's neck and the bandage underneath the jacket sleeve on Rowan's left wrist. Immediately they flocked to them, then Steve when he winced and had them discover the bites on his sides, treating them as best they could. It left Dustin having his leg in a splint, that the rings were bruises around the Vecna-killing group's necks, and that Steve, Rowan and Valerie were given cream to have over the bites. If any questions were made about how the bites had been mysteriously burned, none were asked before the nurses left to treat patients who needed them more, leaving them in this haze of waiting.
It was during this that Rowan and Leo left—maybe so Leo could find a place to grieve more properly, Rowan going with him as support, to grieve with him—and Alistair finally sensed Hugin, the bond flickering faintly as he heard Hugin.
Alistair back.
Alistair smiled, trying to hide his sheer relief of feeling Hugin again. Yeah, I'm back. Vecna... he got me, but I'm back.
Rage burned like a fire through the bond as Hugin said, Vecna got red friend too. Cami nearly got hurt—but protected her. Protected Lucas and others. Just like Alistair said. Couldn't protect red friend.
You did your best, buddy, Alistair assured as he looked at Cami—when Dustin, Steve, Rowan, Valerie, Robin and Nancy had been medically treated, Cami had confessed to him that Jason had pulled the trigger, but Hugin had taken the bullet instead, saving her life. Thank you, for protecting them.
