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The pair stands off to the side of the living room in Hopper’s cabin, observing as Mike—or a paladin version of Mike—discusses something with Will. He’s kneeling in front of the shorter boy, his sword still in his sheath as his hands are cupping Will’s own with a reverence that makes Mike’s—real Mike, not D&D ‘Mike’s’—blood boil.
Robin watches them from her position beside Mike, a small genuine smile on her face. Her short hair, and the whole front of her shirt and pants, are dirty from getting pushed into the mud by the same boy that she’s watching with a gleam in her eye.
The other Mike had thought she was some sort of thief, apparently.
He doesn’t understand how she could be so happy when some random paladin they found in the woods is flirting with his Will.
There must be a cleric version of Will—if this is the D&D version of Mike, right?
Why can’t he just go back and flirt with him?
Mike’s short fingernails dig into the palms of his hands as he attempts to pull his eyes away from the couple, his heart beating faster and his stomach dropping lower the longer he looks at them. He doesn’t understand what’s happening; how is there an alternate version of him, why is he treating Will like he’s the only water in a desert, and what is his relationship with Will in the dimension-place-thingy that paladin Mike comes from?
It doesn’t make any sense.
He turns this thought over in his mind, examining it for solutions—how can he get the other version of himself out as soon as possible?
The room feels too cramped.
Paladin Mike is going to accidentally scratch the floor of the cabin if he doesn’t put his sheathed sword onto the couch. His armor will probably do the same; the heavy-looking silver plating on his knees and legs are going to make dents in the wood if he continues to kneel in front of Will like that.
“Do you think they’re gonna get married?” Robin asks quietly, breaking Mike out of his own thoughts while she casually leans against the wall beside him, her arms crossed loosely against her chest as she watches paladin Mike give Will his affections (god, now he’s starting to talk like some fantasy character).
“No.” His voice comes out strained, his gaze boring into paladin Mike’s back. He’s kissing Will’s hand as Will stands above him, unusually flustered. “He probably has his own version of Will back in his universe.”
“Mhm,” she hums, “Are you jealous? Because you seem jealous.”
Robin glances at him, her eyebrows raising slightly as she takes in the tension in his stance.
He isn’t hiding his contempt for the other version of him—and if he was (which, again he is not) he would not be doing a good job.
His back is straight as a board, and he isn’t leaning his body weight against anything—which is unusual for someone with such bad posture.
“I’m not jealous,” he wipes his sweaty palms against the sides of his jeans to try to dry them, “I just don’t know why he’s here—like, how did he even get into the woods anyways? I’m pretty sure that random portals leading to alternate dimensions don’t just appear out of nowhere.”
Robin glances at him. “...I mean, there are random gates to the Upside Down all around Hawkins. I honestly wouldn’t be too surprised if a gate to a D&D dimension just appeared. Besides, if you want to know how he got here that bad, just go ask him.”
After saying this, she brings her hand to his back, giving him a small push towards Will and the other Mike.
He stumbles forward, almost falling flat on his face before regaining his balance.
As he walks up to his Will and paladin Mike, the latter looks at him, an expression filled with confusion on his face as he stands up fully.
Paladin Mike is about an inch taller than him.
Okay, this is not fair.
“Hey Mike,” Will says, his body partially covered by paladin Mike’s atrociously bulky armor. Honestly, it isn’t even that bulky… he’s definitely just jealous.
Will’s voice is breathless, and his face is flushed with color as he looks at paladin Mike’s back.
“Michael the Brave,” paladin Mike says, holding a gloved hand out to him. He’s also more confident than him; cool. “And I am assuming you are the Michael of this universe?”
He nods, hesitantly taking Mike the Brave’s hand and shaking it slowly. “Well, I go by Mike, not Michael—but yeah.” He carefully eyes the paladin.
Now that he’s able to get a better look at the alternate version of himself—not that he wasn’t looking when Robin had first seen him wandering around the woods—Mike the Brave is very similar-looking to him.
His hair is longer; sections of his hair wavy to the point of almost becoming curly, all of it grown out to reach slightly lower than his shoulders—kind of like Mike’s hair when Will was in Lenora. The metal plates covering his knees and legs are slightly dirty, while his chest plate and the rest of the armor covering the upper parts of his body are perfectly clean.
Mike wipes his hand on his pants again, this time trying to get rid of the reminder of the paladin’s thin, almost leathery gloves.
“Where is your William’s ring?” Mike the Brave asks—he is not calling him Michael.
Mike looks up at the paladin, his expression mirroring the confusion on the face of the other version of himself, “What—what ring?”
He glances at Will, who has a small frown on his own face as he tries to figure out what Mike the Brave is insinuating. His cheeks are still flushed and his hands are clasped together in front of his body, his thumb rubbing the spot on the back of his hand that Mike the Brave had kissed him.
Mike shouldn’t be jealous—why would he?
Nothing’s wrong; an alternate, cooler, more version of him is just flirting with his best friend.
His Will.
That’s it. There’s no actual problem.
“You… are not betrothed?” Mike the Brave turns to Will, his eyes narrowing in question. Will shakes his head back and forth, the pink flush on his cheeks deepening in color.
“What—” he begins to ask, but his question is cut off by Mike the Brave.
“You have proposed, have you not?” He turns back to Mike.
“No?” Mike’s eyes widen, his fears and guilt curdling in his stomach before bubbling up his throat.
The lock of the cabin’s front door clicks, and all 3 of them look towards the noise. Robin had just left.
Thank god.
He can barely deal with her constant (playful) teasing. She knows the right ways to get under his skin—especially if she mentions Will.
The brown-haired boy moves to his side, “That’s not—that’s not allowed.”
The paladin stares at them blankly, somehow not understanding the concept that they are explaining.
“And besides, I’m not… in love with Will,” Mike adds. He can’t tell if he’s trying to convince the paladin, Will, or himself. “We’re best friends.”
Mike the Brave’s expression becomes one filled with guilt—with sadness. “Heavens, this universe is incredibly far behind.” He pulls the glove off of his right hand, revealing a thin gold band on his finger.
Will inhales audibly as they accidentally catch each other’s eyes. He can feel Will’s gaze remaining on the side of his face after he looks away, back at Mike the Brave’s hand as the paladin continues to talk.
“William the Wise has a matching one on his left hand.” The paladin smiles down at the ring, continuing to stare at it for a second before putting the glove back on his hand.
Mike’s heart twists.
Their dimension is far behind. It must be if the paladin and the cleric have already gotten their happy ending while he and Will are stuck fighting against an evil that’s starting to infect and invade their world.
“Do you… uh—need anywhere to sleep, or have you… got that covered?” Mike asks reluctantly.
It’s very obvious that he’s trying to change the subject. His skin is uncomfortably tight and the room is too small. He does not want to have to share a room with the paladin.
“I did in fact have a spot for rest, but I subsequently travelled to this universe.” Mike the Brave says thoughtfully, his gaze moving between them; from him to Will, then back to him… then back to Will.
What the fuck does subsequently even mean, he thinks, the annoyance in his thoughts seeping onto his face, turning the corners of his mouth down and causing his nose to scrunch up slightly.
Mrs. Byers, Jonathan, El, and all of the others—Dustin, Hopper, Lucas, Steve, Erica—are all off getting different supplies to bring back to the cabin so that El can continue to live here without the military getting on Mrs. Byers back for weekly visits to an apparently abandoned cabin in the middle of the woods.
Most of them are staying in the cabin, or hiding out in the WSQK building since no one can stay at the Wheelers’ house anymore.
He thought that they wouldn't be back before paladin Mike is gone, but now he’s not so sure.
“You could sleep… here? If you wanted. I mean, it’s already cramped—what’s one more person?” Will says. Mike whips his head to look at the older boy, his eyes widening with shock.
“What?” He tries to ask Will what he’s thinking telepathically. “But we’ve already stolen Hopper’s room—he literally has to sleep on the couch while El, Lucas, and Dustin room together! There’s not enough room for another person—”
“I am sure William would not mind sharing a bed, would you?” The paladin gives his Will a smile, “We have already made love in my universe, I’m sure your Mike would not mind.”
What.
Fuck.
No.
Mike clenches his jaw, trying to not ask if the paladin is insane.
Just because Will the Wise slept with him does not mean that this dimension’s Will wants to share a bed. His eyes catch Will’s, and the older boy shrugs, blush spreading across his face.
“I—I mean… I… guess we can share. Me and—and Mike have shared a bed before; we’ve had sleepovers.” Will says, his face becoming more red by the second. The paladin’s eyes close partially, his cheeks scrunched as his smile grows, and god, does Mike hate it.
What is his deal? What is he trying to do by sleeping in the same bed as Will?
Mrs. Byers practically dropped all of the groceries that she was carrying when she had walked into the cabin. Robin—who had taken a stroll around the woods while Mike, Mike the Brave, and Will were talking—was the one who had to explain everything; both Mike and her walking in the woods and stumbling upon an armored, more regal version of Mike wandering around the forest before bringing him back to the cabin, then keeping him moderately supervised until everyone else came back.
No one argued about him, Will, and the paladin sleeping in the same room, but they did have questions for Mike the Brave about how he was actually able to get into their world.
He had come up with as good of an answer as anyone else in the room could have.
Will thought his sister liked Michael the Brave, mostly because of the way he talked; he was just so formal, and El probably thought he was fun to listen to—that his accent (could it be called an accent?) was interesting.
He doesn’t really know how anyone else felt about the paladin—except for Mike.
He hates Michael the Brave.
Will doesn’t understand why, though.
They are basically the same person, aren’t they?
He sits on the edge of Hopper’s bed, the pads of his thumbs pressing against each other, almost like he’s trying to fit two puzzle pieces impossibly together.
He can still feel the softness of Michael the Brave’s lips on the back of his hand.
It’s stupid for him to wish Mike would reciprocate his feelings—like Michael had done for his William.
They’re supposed to be in every universe, but not this one, he supposes.
The familiar ache digs its way back into his heart, settling there like an open wound.
“Hello, my dear,” Michael the Brave says as he enters the room, closing the door to the bedroom behind him and sitting beside Will, beginning to rub his hand over the expanse of Will’s back.
Michael the Brave is not wearing his armor anymore, instead, he had borrowed one of Mike’s loose, comfortable shirts and some pajama pants—much to Mike’s annoyance. Michael looks nice; less like himself out of his armor, but nice.
His hair is still long and wavy, his face is a little bit softer looking—the scars on his face faint, almost unnoticeable in the light of the room—and there is still a ring on his finger.
The hand on Will’s body is a comforting pressure—one that he doesn’t want to leave for at least a little while.
He knows that Mike is still in the room, laying on a thin sleeping bag, sandwiched between the cushioning of the sleeping bag and multiple layers of blankets, almost in an attempt to shield himself from something.
Will doesn’t know what he could be hiding from.
Michael the Brave leans his head against his shoulder, all too comfortable with him for them having just met.
Mike is seething. His face is warm, and he can barely concentrate on actually sleeping (though it isn't that late); not when his alternate-dimension counterpart is practically feeling up Will. Granted, he’s not being… weird, but they literally met a few hours ago.
And now they’re cuddling.
The light’s still on, too. No one has even gone to bed yet, and Mike the Brave is still wrapped around Will like he’s a lifeboat and the cabin is filling with water.
“William?” Mike the Brave whispers, almost inaudible over the slow whirr of the fan above their heads.
“...Yeah?” Will mumbles back, his voice slightly gravelly and tired sounding, almost as if he had fallen asleep while cuddling with Mike the Brave.
Cool.
Awesome.
Mike finally sits up, turning his head to look at the pair lying on the bed. The paladin still has his arms around Will’s waist as they remain lying against each other.
“Would you like me to show you how to be worshiped?” His voice is muffled as he buries his face in the crook of Will’s neck.
Mike’s heart drops.
Holy shit.
He can’t be serious.
“What?” Will’s more alert now—still taking comfort in the warmth of the paladin’s body against his back—but alert.
Mike the Brave repeats what he had said, pressing a small kiss to Will’s neck.
Will doesn’t comment on how comfortable he’s gotten with the paladin in the past few hours, and he doesn’t respond to Mike the Brave with an answer that Mike wanted to hear.
“Oh,” he pauses for a moment, thinking. “Yeah—just don’t... you know.”
Mike’s still watching their interaction, though he wants to take his eyes away, to avert them somewhere else.
But something selfish deep inside him wants to watch—to know what makes Will blush and melt into him.
...Not him.
Never him.
It’ll be someone else, Mike’s sure. Some faceless, talentless man he found in college who puts on a performance around anyone and everyone.
Someone inauthentic… and still, someone who isn’t Mike.
Is this what it feels like to be loved?
Even while Michael the Brave begins to pepper kisses in specific spots over his shoulders, spots he doesn’t understand the reason behind kissing, Will thinks of Mike. The raven-haired boy is sitting up, watching them from his spot on the floor, an impassive expression on his face. One that, even directed towards him, Will knows isn’t for him.
Michael the Brave continues to kiss his body—his arms, back, and shoulders. His touch is warm, like how Will would imagine Mike’s to be if they did this same thing.
Will’s eyes remain on Mike’s; green-specked hazel and dark brown meeting in the low light of the room.
The paladin lifts his hand to Will’s cheek, slowly turning it so that Will is able to look at him.
Will thought that Michael would finally press his lips against his own—maybe even to the corner of his mouth—but he doesn’t.
He kisses above his mouth, almost directly under his nose.
“Okay, Will gets it. To worship him you need to kiss his moles,” Asshole. Mike can’t take it anymore. His anger is almost tangible; a heat under his skin, “You can stop showing off that you’ve memorized him, or whatever.”
Still laying on his side in the bed, Will’s eyes widen, and he looks away from Mike.
Mike watches as he changes his focus to the paladin, who has a small smile on his face. Mike the Brave pulls away from Will as he begins to sit up, his legs still tangled in the bed sheets.
He doesn’t know what all of that was for.
Was it some sort of humiliation ritual?
Because, god, it worked.
His heart’s beating too fast to be working properly; he wants the paladin to leave.
Will’s heart stutters in his chest as he looks between Michael the Brave and Mike. The latter’s eyes are narrowed, his annoyance continuing to be aimed at the paladin.
How does Mike know where his moles are?
Was he watching each time that Will was shirtless—in a bathing suit, or from the heat of the summer, or changing?
He can feel his face heating up, somehow warmer than it already was.
“How—how do you know where my… moles are?” He says the question aloud, his voice wavering with a mix of unease and a flustered sensation he can feel in the form of butterflies slamming against his stomach and gut.
“I—uh,” the look on Mike’s face is mirroring his—wide eyes, flushed face, a shocked expression as if he wasn’t supposed to say that.
Michael the Brave finally speaks up, his voice careful and controlled. He doesn't seem to be surprised at all.
“Your Mike has memorized all of the places that the goddess of nature has kissed you, just as I have,” he smiles, getting up from the mattress and moving to Mike’s makeshift bed. “I’ll let you two sort your affairs out, if you must.”
Will watches as Michael lays on Mike’s bed, uncaring of his alternate-universe counterpart still sitting with his legs covered by the blankets.
Does he want Mike to take his place in the bed beside Will?
…Apparently so, as Mike begrudgingly begins to get off of the pile of pillows and blankets on the floor and move towards, what Will supposes is now Mike’s side of the bed.
He had been sleeping on the floor for a while, like he had when the Mind Flayer was still targeting Will for the first time—just because he didn’t want to make it awkward between them, Will had thought.
Or it might’ve been because he had come out to his mom, brother, and Mike only days prior.
They had all accepted him—but he can never be sure. Will has been paying attention to how they’ve been acting towards him, if any of them seem less comfortable around him.
To be honest, Mike seems more touchy than usual.
The mattress squeaks as Mike gets onto the bed beside him, carefully laying down—almost as if he’s scared to get too close to Will. The overhead light is still on, alongside the fan, the low buzzing noise created by the old worn-down lightbulb filling the room.
Slowly, Will asks again, “Why did—why did you memorize my moles…?” He’s reluctant to do so—to ask the question.
Not because he’s scared of the answer, but because he’s scared of what the answer would mean.
Mike, laying on his back, one bare leg still exposed to the slightly chilly air circulating around the room, stares at the ceiling for a moment.
His eyes flick to Will’s own, raw sincerity and—fear—mixing together in his gaze.
He turns on his side, and Will does the same, turning away from Michael the Brave and towards his own Mike. They watch each other for a few long seconds, and Will swears that Mike looks at his lips.
Multiple times.
He doesn’t say anything about it, instead waiting for the younger boy to answer his question.
Michael the Brave is sleeping now—Will can hear quiet snores coming from his spot on the floor.
“I—I don’t know…” Mike bites his lip in conflicted thought, “I guess I just—my eyes were drawn to you—or something…”
The younger boy trails off, and they sit in a heavy sort of silence—where whole conversations can be had without either person actually speaking.
Mike’s eyes are heavy-lidded, and he glances at Will’s lips.
This time, Will watches him do it, following the raven-haired boy’s gaze towards his mouth before whispering, “Are your eyes drawn to my moles like they’re drawn to my lips?”
Mike blushes and, after a moment, gives him a small, barely perceptible nod in response.
He smiles, bringing his hand, previously resting under his chin in a loose fist, to the back of Mike’s neck. Will tangles his fingers in Mike’s hair, watching him—looking for silent signs that he should stop, that what he’s doing is wrong or disgusting.
There aren’t any.
Mike’s tilting his head forward so that he has to look up just to be able to meet his eyes. Will can see the younger boy’s internal battle, perfectly mimicking the thoughts inside of his own head: should they do this? Even if it’s frowned upon—even if it’s wrong?
The thought makes him pause, his hand stilling on the other boy’s neck, beginning to pull away. Before he’s able to bring his hand back to his body—before he feels the shame beginning to curl in his stomach—Mike brings his own hand to Will’s cheek.
His thumb caresses Will’s cheekbone, slowly and lightly.
Will can feel the heat of Mike’s breath against his face and the warmth of his body pressing against chest and leg—the touch causing a jolt of shock to move through his body; both electric and comforting at the same time.
When they kiss, it’s nothing special—it’s a normal kiss, or at least what Will would assume is a normal kiss.
And yet… it’s everything.
The most any boy had done with him before this was what Michael the Brave had done—kiss his body, mostly over his clothes, but sometimes, over exposed skin.
Will had felt good when Michael the Brave had kissed him, but this… this is different.
Mike's lips are soft, just as soft as Will had imagined them to be all of the times he had thought about kissing him—the taste of the shitty diner food that they had picked up and brought to the cabin for dinner still lingers on Mike's lips.
He sighs into the younger boy’s mouth, their breaths mingling as his hand tightens in Mike’s hair.
He accidentally pulls at the hair on the base of Mike’s neck, too caught up in the other boy’s lips—the feel of his mouth—to notice. And Mike fucking whimpers, pulling Will’s body flush to his own as they continue to kiss.
Will hums, the noise muffled by Mike’s mouth until he pulls his head back.
“What—did—fuck. Did I do too much?” Mike’s eyes search Will’s, as if he’s looking for the reason they stopped. “I’m sorry—shit—uh—”
He cut the younger boy off, looking down into his eyes, his gaze steady as he mutters, “No—I… I really liked it. I just—Michael the Brave’s still in here, and everyone’s here… Hop’s on the other side of the door. We—we need to stop before we get too loud.”
His face heats as he talks, watching Mike’s sad, stupidly convincing puppy dog eyes appear—but, he can’t get them both caught.
He kisses Mike’s forehead, then regretfully climbs off of the bed, pulling off his pants and socks—keeping only a shirt and his underwear on—before getting back into the bed, Mike watching him all the while.
When he falls asleep, Mike laying beside him—so close their bodies are practically on top of each other—Will doesn’t dream of Vecna, of the beasts that could be roaming around under him in that other-worldly, awful place below Hawkins.
Nor does he dream of the feelings that are always digging into the back of his mind, calling him disgusting or weird.
He doesn’t think of the monsters they’ll have to defeat in the future, that could kill them at any moment.
Instead, Will thinks of the inevitability of him and the boy beside him.
Destined to be. In every universe.