Hawkins Unraveling

CH 14 : Of Strengths and Weaknesses

June's heart felt like it was lodged in her throat, tight and unyielding, as she fell...and fell...and fell until, finally, she hit rock bottom.

Her fall was hard, eliciting a pained wheeze from her as she dropped on her injured side. It took her a long moment to react with all the breath knocked out of her, but eventually she was able to roll to her stomach and get up on her hands and knees, coughing as she did so. The air was cold, and the darkness surrounding her was even more unsettling than the Upside Down. It was as if she was in the middle of nothing, until a stream of red, hazy fog drifted into view, curling like vines in wispy tendrils along the ground. June stood, one hand pressed to her injured side, and backed up, trying to evade the red fog, but it kept coming, getting thicker and thicker.

"Why so nervous?"

June spun at the sound of what was her own voice just deeply distorted and came face to face with Mirror June. She gave June that corrupt smile of hers, adding a little finger wave for good measure.

"You're not real," June said, but her voice shook. She backed up a step.

Mirror June took two smooth steps forward. "No more than Cool June is," she sneered. "You're pathetic, actually, thinking that you could ever be someone else, someone better."

"You're not real," June repeated, taking another step back. "And your opinion doesn't matter."

"What about mine?" With a gasp, June turned and found Steve standing just behind her, a smile on his face and his hair flopped over his forehead adorably. "Hey, Junie."

June faltered. "This isn't... You're not..."

"Real?" He reached out, swept his thumb over her cheek. Her skin tingled at his touch. "Of course I am. I'm exactly who you expect me to be."

June wrapped her arms around herself and shied away from him, unsure. "I don't understand."

"Which part?" he countered. "The part where you'll never be like Nancy, or the part where I'll never love you like her?"

June knew this wasn't real, but it all felt like it was. It was some of her worst thoughts and fears come to life. "Steve wouldn't-"

"Choose her?" Vision Steve laughed cruelly, glee in his expression. "He already has. You don't compare to Nancy. You never will."

"Stop it," June whispered. "Just...stop it."

Vision Steve moved in closer, reached out for June again. "You're nothing, Juniper Jennings," he crooned, stroking the side of her face. She flinched away. "You'll never be good enough. You'll always be worthless, and you'll never be chosen first."

"Stop it!" she screamed louder, grabbing at her head like she could turn all of it off. "Stop it!"

But the visions kept coming. Out of the thickening red fog, more and more cruel manifestations of her parents and friends materialized, all chanting the same thing– "You don't matter. You're worth nothing. You'll never be good enough. You will always come second." She'd thought it was bad enough to have visions of her parents saying these things like they had in her childhood memories, but it was far worse to have the same words pour from Steve's mouth, from Eddie's, from Nancy's, from Robin's. While the chanting continued, the red fog thickened more and more until it was too hard to breathe, and between that and her tears June struggled not to panic.

Suddenly the red fog cleared out, returning to wisps, and every person-like manifestation disappeared, leaving June to gasp on the ground alone. At least, until she realized she wasn't alone, and that the veiny, mottled, and disfigured form floating ahead of her was Vecna.