The cemetery was empty.

Not silent—never silent—but empty in that hollow, echoing way that made every small sound felt louder than it should be.

The sky hung low and gray, like it was pressing down on everything. The air felt thick. Wrong.

You didn't leave.

You should have.

Everyone else did—his mom, his brother, his friends… even Hopper lingered longer than most, but eventually, he walked away too.

But you stayed.

Now it was just you.

And the grave.

A simple stone.

WILLIAM BYERS March 22, 1971 –-- November 10, 1987

The dates didn't look real.

Your fingers curled into the damp grass as you sat there, staring. The world felt… tilted. Like something was about to happen, and your body knew it before your mind did.

Then—

Scratch.

You froze.

It was faint. So faint you almost convinced yourself you imagined it.

Then again.

Scratch… scratch…

Your breath catches.

It was coming from—

No.

No, it’s not.

You leaned forward slowly, heart climbing into your throat.

The sound grew louder.

SCRATCH—SCRAPE—CRACK.

It was coming from the ground.

From under the grave.

Your body locked up. Every instinct screamed at you to run—but you couldn’t. You couldn’t move.

The dirt shifts.

Just slightly.

Like something beneath it… moved.

Then—

BOOM.

The soil splittered.

A hand bursted through.

You screamed, stumbling back so fast your heel slipped in the mud and you hit the ground hard—but you didn’t feel it. You didn’t feel anything except the sight of it.

The hand twitched.

Fingers clawing, nails split and packed with dirt, skin stretched thin and gray like wet paper.

It gripped the earth.

Pulled.

Another arm followed—bending wrong, elbow jerking too far, like the joint didn’t remember how it was supposed to work.

And then—

He dragged himself out.

Dirt collapsed around him as Will Byers clawed his way free of his own grave.

Except—

It was not right.

It was not right.

He was still wearing the funeral suit. Black, soaked, clinging to him in patches where the fabric has already started to tear from the inside.

His head hung too low, like it was too heavy for his neck. When he lifted it, it lagged behind his body, jerking into place a second too late.

A guttural sound ripped from his throat.

Not a voice.

Not human.

A growl.

He collapsed forward onto his hands, coughing—no, choking—

And then he spat.

A slick, writhing slug hit the dirt.

Then another.

Your stomach twisted.

Something moved under his skin.

You saw it.

A ripple—slow, crawling—like something was threading itself beneath him, mapping him from the inside.

He let out a sharp, animalistic hiss.

The light touched him.

And his skin—

Burned.

He recoiled violently, scrambling back, dragging himself into the thin strip of shadow casted by his own tombstone.

There, he stilled.

Shaking.

Twitching.

His hands clawed at his chest suddenly, frantic, desperate—fingers digging into the fabric of his shirt.

He teared it open.

Buttons scattered into the dirt.

The fabric ripped down the middle—

And you saw it.

You wished you didn’t.

A long incision carved down his torso.

Stitched.

Or—what used to be stitches.

Because now—

Blackened vines curled along the wound, woven into his flesh like something that grew there. They pulsed faintly, tightening when he moved, holding him together where he should have fallen apart.

The skin around it was wrong. Dark. Veined. Alive in a way skin should never be.

He made a broken noise, clawing at it like he wants it off, like it hurted, like it didn’t belong to him—

But it was him now.

Or part of him.

Or something wearing him.

Your breathing is too loud. Too fast.

You didn’t realize you’ve made a sound until—

He stopped.

Completely.

Slowly—

Too slowly—

His head turned.

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