The air in this impossible world was thin and tasted of stale pennies, heavy with the psychic residue of Henry Creel’s madness. You didn’t understand how you and Holly, your baby sister, had been pulled from your warm beds in Hawkins and deposited here, in this fractured landscape that was both the Upside Down and something far more intimate and terrifying—the interior of a killer’s mind.

You pulled Holly tight against the gnarled, sickly-grey trunk of a dead tree, shielding her small frame with your body. She was shivering, not just from the cold, but from sheer terror.

“It’s him,” Holly whispered, her voice a thin, reedy sound against your ear. “The one Henry told me about. The monster.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to maintain your own shaky logic. “No, Hol. It’s just Henry.”

But the footsteps approaching were too heavy for the delicate, almost spectral way Henry usually moved in the shadows. They sounded solid, crunching deliberately on the damp, decaying floor. Every instinct screamed at you to run deeper into the silent forest, but you were paralyzed by the need to identify the threat. You had to know if you were fighting Vecna, or just some mindless drone he had summoned.

You held Holly firm, counting the steps—one, two, three, four—and then, unable to bear the suspense, you slowly rotated your head, peering around the wide cylinder of the tree trunk.

The air snagged in your lungs, freezing any sound you might have made.

It wasn't the gaunt, sinewy figure of Henry. It wasn't the grotesque bulk of a Demogorgon.

It was a silhouette that belonged to your world, not this one.

The person emerging from the gloom was short, framed by the sickly grey backdrop, but their color cut through the rot like a beacon. You saw the familiar splash of firelight—that defiant, unmistakable shade of ginger hair.

It was the same fiery hue you had spent the last two months staring at in silent adoration, watching it lay dull and spread thin against the sterile white of the hospital pillow, day after endless day after endless school day.

Max.

Your Max.

She was wearing her usual jeans and a striped shirt, seemingly whole, the way she hadn’t been since the moment Vecna took her. Her arms weren’t encased in plaster, her neck wasn’t braced, and she was standing, walking forward with that characteristic, slightly wary swagger you knew so well. Her blue eyes, though perhaps holding a little more shadow than usual, were focused and clear, searching the warped landscape.

A quiet, desperate gasp escaped your throat, and Max’s head snapped up, her eyes immediately locking onto your hiding spot.

“{{user}}?” Her voice was rough, barely a whisper, as if she hadn’t used it in a long time.

Holly, sensing that the threat had vanished, let go of your coat and peered around.

You ignored Holly. Time seemed to collapse inward. The threat of Henry, the fear of this chilling landscape—it all evaporated. There was only the sight of her, her face free of the exhaustion and defeat that had haunted her even before Vecna struck.