Time After Time (a Stranger Things fanfiction)

Every Rose Has Its Thorn

"Every Rose Has Its Thorn"

Every rose has its thorn

Just like every night has its dawn

- Poison

Joyce let Hopper go inside first to see his girl, while she made a beeline straight for her boys. The relief she felt at having both of them in her arms again, holding them tight, looking at them, making sure they were okay ... She was never leaving them again, she promised herself. Not ever.

And they seemed to feel the same, whatever they had been through, because no one seemed likely to let go anytime soon.

Hopper and El came out onto the porch, and he watched her face light up when she saw Joyce and the boys holding on to each other. He put a hand on his girl's shoulder. "You aren't the only one that didn't stop believing." He still had a hard time fathoming it—this brave, amazing woman had come all the way to Russia, had faced innumerable dangers, all to save him. This beautiful girl standing next to him, she called him Dad. These incredible kids ... they were his family, and he was back with them, the way it always should have been. El leaned her head against his chest, and everything was perfect, if you didn't stop to think about the way Hawkins had been destroyed.

As the boys let go and moved aside, Joyce saw her girl there, leaning against her dad, looking so poised and so much herself. El waved and came down off the porch and Joyce sighed happily, holding her girl tight again.

They let go and El said, "I'm happy you went to your ... conference." She looked up at Hop and smiled.

"That was quite the experience." And then she hugged El again, seeing from the shorn hair and the circles under her eyes that she, too, had undergone quite the experience.

Hopper came down the steps off the porch. He caught the eye of the woman from Hawkins Lab, who had been standing in the open door of the car all this time. He saluted her with his ballcap, and she nodded and got back into the car. He hoped to hell he never saw her or anyone from her screwed-up bureau again. Maybe the Doc, if he survived being 'indisposed'.

Mike came over to him, smiling. "Hey."

The punk was tall now. Too damn tall. "You've grown," Hopper told him.

"Yeah. You shrunk."

Hopper grinned at him, the smartass, and then pulled him close. "Thank you. For taking care of my girl."

"Our girl."

"Right. Our girl."

But their joy at being together didn't last long. Above their heads, the sky rumbled and darkened as clouds rolled in. Joyce wanted to think maybe it was rain, but ... it didn't feel like rain. It felt—wrong. She reached for El's hand.

And then flakes began to fall. Not rain. Not snow. Not even ash. They were the corrupted decaying particles of the Upside Down.

El let her go and moved forward, her eyes on the sky.

Hopper led the way through the woods, keeping a sharp eye around him. Whatever was happening, the danger felt imminent, like something was coming for them. Well, they'd known that. And the kids would know more, he was sure of that. Whatever they had been through in the past few days, whatever they had fought—it was pissed.

Joyce followed Hopper into a clearing, all the kids behind them. A green hill covered with flowers ... until abruptly both green and flowers ended, and everything was gray. Moldering. Particles flying up from it, as if it was decaying even as they watched.

The Upside Down. It was coming up out of those slashes in the earth they had driven past. It was coming for them. For Will. For El. For ... all of them. Joyce and Hopper drew near each other. Mike and Will stood together, and beyond them, Jonathan and Nancy. El on her own approached the line where green became gray, watching as the flowers died in front of her.

Far away, in Hawkins itself, lightning flashed in the columns of smoke. Red lightning.

Hopper reached for Joyce's hand. This was bad. It was the worst they'd faced yet. But thanks to her, they would be facing it together. They would be facing it with the kids. And somehow, some way, their family would win. He didn't know how, but he knew they must. They had been through too much, suffered too long, lost too many, to give up now. Whatever asshole ran the Upside Down, his day was over ... he just didn't know it yet.

A/N: This story is going on indefinite hiatus from here, waiting (impatiently!) for season 5 to be completed and aired.