Chapter 16: "It Caught Me"
Consciousness slowly floated up from the deep sea, passing through layers of darkness and lightless void, like a drowning person finally struggling to reach the surface of the water.
Andy snapped his eyes open.
He tried to move, only to find his body exceptionally heavy.
It wasn't the heaviness of an injury, but the heaviness of being bound.
Something was wrapped around his limbs, torso, and neck, like countless cold snakes, tightly gripping every inch of skin; every breath was accompanied by a slight sense of suffocation.
He looked around and realized he was lying in a room.
No, not a room—more like a cave, or the cavity of a giant organism.
The surrounding walls weren't brick or wood, but some kind of organic, throbbing matter. The surface was covered in dark red veins that pulsated rhythmically, emitting a faint light.
Those veins were like blood vessels, like neural networks, interlacing into complex and dizzying patterns.
And he was suspended in mid-air.
Not hung up, but entangled and held in place by countless vine-like fleshy tentacles extending from the walls, ceiling, and floor.
Andy struggled slightly, and the tentacles immediately tightened.
Fear—pure, primal fear—flooded his chest like ice water.
"No!"
He focused his mind, trying to call upon his psychic power as he usually did.
He imagined the psychic energy surging from the depths of his consciousness, like a flood breaking through a dam, like fire igniting dry grass, instantly turning everything binding him into ash.
But nothing happened.
There was no surge of energy, no gathering of strength, none of that familiar, filling sensation.
Only emptiness.
An absolute, heart-stopping emptiness.
It was as if you were used to writing with your right hand, only to wake up one day and find your right hand didn't exist—not numbness, not weakness, but a complete absence, a physiological void.
Andy tried again.
Harder, more focused, squeezing every corner of the deepest parts of his consciousness, searching for any trace of that power.
The psychic energy did indeed begin to gather.
He could feel it, like a faint spark flickering in the darkness of his mind.
He tried to guide it, to let it leave his brain and extend outward as it usually did, transforming into an invisible blade.
But as soon as the psychic power left the boundary of his consciousness, it dissipated.
It wasn't blocked, it wasn't absorbed; it simply slipped away like sand through fingers, vanishing silently into the void.
It was as if this space itself was devouring energy, suppressing all extraordinary power.
"No, my ability? No... Ah!"
Andy shouted, his voice echoing in the confined space, sounding exceptionally lonely.
He tried again, more frantically, more desperately, almost burning his own consciousness in an attempt to wring out the last bit of strength.
But the result was the same.
The psychic power left his brain and, like light entering a black hole, vanished instantly without a trace.
And with every attempt came a deeper sense of exhaustion, as if his soul itself was being hollowed out.
He stopped, panting heavily, sweat mixing with the previously dried blood to form a sticky coating on his face.
The tentacles continued to tighten, continuing to inject cold liquid.
He could feel his body temperature dropping, his heartbeat slowing, and his consciousness beginning to blur again.
Despair.
A despair deeper than when he was lost in the Upside Down; back then, he at least had his abilities and the possibility of fighting back.
Now, he was like a snake with its fangs pulled, like a bird with its wings clipped, completely stripped of the weapons he relied on for survival.
Just as his consciousness was about to sink into darkness again, a voice rang out.
Low and hoarse, it sounded as if it came from deep underwater, or like an echo filtered through thick walls.
But that voice, that tone, that unique way of speaking with a certain twisted rhythm—
Andy recognized it instantly.
His body froze, and even his breathing stopped for several seconds.
Impossible.
Absolutely impossible.
But the voice continued, each word like a cold hammer striking his eardrums, striking his heart:
"Twelve, finally, you have come here."
Twelve.
That number.
The code name Dr. Brenner and his assistants used for him in Hawkins Laboratory; only those inside the Lab would call him that.
And the person who would call him that, who would speak in that tone... Andy struggled to lift his head, his neck making a faint crack due to the restraint of the tentacles. He looked toward the source of the voice.
Deep in the room, in the thickest shadows of the dark red light, was a humanoid silhouette.
Or rather, what used to be a person.
Now, it was a body completely encased in vines.
Thick, throbbing fleshy tentacles wrapped around that body like a symbiote, from ankles to neck, so densely that almost no bare skin was visible.
Where the tentacles met the body, there was dark red matter like scar tissue, firmly bonding the two together.
And the head, encased in vines, slowly turned around.
Andy saw the face.
Or rather, the wreckage of a face.
The features were still there, but they were twisted and deformed.
The skin was like melted wax, covered in fine, vine-like patterns that were glowing, emitting a dark red shimmer.
The eyes... the eyes were still there, but the pupils had disappeared, replaced by two swirling masses of chaotic darkness, with occasional red sparks flickering deep within, like the explosion of distant galaxies.
But the outline of that face, the posture when looking at someone, the slight upward curve of the corner of the mouth—
"You... your voice..." Andy's voice was hoarse with shock, "Henry?"
The moment that name escaped his lips, Andy regretted it.
He didn't want to confirm it, didn't want to believe it, didn't want to face this possibility.
But the vine-encased figure let out a low laugh, as if squeezed from deep within the chest.
There was no joy in that laugh, only a twisted, nearly painful resonance.
"It seems that after all this time, you still remember me, Twelve."
The familiar tone. The familiar psychic fluctuations—though those fluctuations were now murky and twisted, like contaminated water, the core frequency, that unique "signature," was something Andy couldn't mistake.
No matter how much he didn't want to believe it, no matter how much the scene before him surpassed all his imagination and understanding, he had to admit it.
The monster before him was Henry Creel.
Subject 001 of the Laboratory.
Once Andy's "mentor," his protector, and also the person who, in the corridors of the Lab three years ago on that night, had let him go.
"Henry? No, you... how did you become like this?"
Andy's voice was trembling.
It wasn't a tremble of fear, but a deeper shudder of having his entire understanding overturned.
The Henry in his memory—the young man who always wore a clean white shirt, his hair combed neatly, his eyes calm to the point of coldness—how could he be the same person as this monster merged with vines, unrecognizable and hideous?
Henry didn't answer immediately.
His hollow eyes, swirling with darkness, stared at Andy as if examining him, or perhaps remembering.
A few seconds later, he finally spoke, his voice carrying an eerie calmness, as if stating a fact unrelated to himself:
"It was Eleven who turned me into this."
Each word was like an ice pick, piercing Andy's eardrums, piercing his brain.
Eleven.
That thin, always silent girl. The "sister" who had spent countless days and nights with him in the Lab. The person he'd been searching for and trying to protect for the past three years.
"Eleven? Impossible," Andy countered almost instinctively, his voice rising with agitation, "She wouldn't do that. She... she'd feel bad even if she hurt a bug."
Henry let out a short sound like a sneer. That sound came from his chest where he was merged with the vines, carrying an unsettling resonance.
"That day, in the Lab, after I sent you away, I intended to take Eleven and leave."
Henry continued, ignoring Andy's doubt, as if reciting a long-memorized story, "But Eleven, she was as foolish as you, and she wanted even more to kill me."
Andy was stunned.
He remembered that night.
That was the last time Andy had seen Henry—the Henry who still maintained a human form.
"But I didn't expect her to be so powerful." Henry's voice interrupted Andy's memory, carrying a strange, complex emotion mixed with resentment and admiration.
"She almost succeeded. Her power... pure, primal, uncontrolled. She tore through the walls of the Lab, tore through the structure of reality. She wanted to drag me into the void she created, to exile me forever."
He paused, those dark eyes looking upward.
"But fortunately, I didn't die. Or rather, I didn't die completely."
Henry's voice became low, almost like a whisper.
"Instead, I was sent by Eleven to this world. This... world she accidentally opened."
Andy's brain raced, trying to understand the meaning behind these words.
Eleven opened the gate? Not Henry?
The "accident" at the Lab, the event thought to be caused by Henry losing control and leading to the opening of the dimensional rift, was actually caused by Eleven?
"Sent to this world by Eleven? The Gate! You didn't open it!"
Andy blurted out, shock making his voice almost change pitch.
Looking at Andy's shocked expression, Henry's low voice let out a chuckle.
That laughter echoed in the confined space, absorbed and reflected by the vines and organic walls, forming an eerie harmony.
"Ha, of course it wasn't me," Henry said, his voice laced with obvious contempt.
"It was Eleven. Her power is innate; only she could open the gate."
He paused, those dark eyes turning back to Andy, his gaze pressing down on him like a physical weight.
"But now it seems, she isn't the only one who can do it."
Andy felt a chill crawl up his spine.
What was Henry saying? He could open the gate too?
At Will's house, he had indeed forced open a passage, but it had nearly killed him, and the passage was extremely unstable... "Just as I said back then," Henry continued, his voice returning to that mentor-like, cold-to-the-point-of-cruel tone,
"You and Eleven are both special. It's just that you've never discovered your potential, to the point where you are now so... weak."
Weak.
The word struck Andy like a whip.
He wanted to argue—he'd escaped the Lab, he'd survived in the Upside Down, he'd fought off monsters, he'd protected Will and Barbara... but all these "achievements," in the current scene, in this state of being bound by tentacles, losing his abilities, and hanging like a specimen, seemed so pale and pathetic.
He was indeed weak.
At least for now.
"Henry," Andy forced himself to calm down, asking in as steady a tone as possible, "What exactly do you want?"
This was the most critical question.
Henry had brought him here, bound him, and was talking to him; there must be a purpose. It wasn't just catching up, it wasn't showing off his power, and it wasn't revenge for the "betrayal" of that year.
What did Henry want?
Henry was silent for a few seconds.
In those few seconds, the atmosphere in the room changed.
The tentacles wrapped around him seemed to relax slightly, and the dark red light flowed faster through the veins in the walls, as if something was excited, expectant.
Then, Henry spoke slowly. Not to answer Andy's question, but to begin a monologue, a declaration that seemed to have been prepared for a long time and rehearsed many times.
"Think about it; in all these years, you could have lived without a care in the world."
"But those humans," Henry's tone suddenly became sharp and full of loathing, "they make rules. They constantly oppress and bind us."
"Not just us, but the whole world," Henry continued, his voice echoing in the confined space like a preacher in an empty cathedral, "They forcibly implement their systems: nations, laws, currency, class, morality. They use these made-up concepts to draw boundaries, create conflict, and maintain control."
"They've destroyed the balance of this world. Like parasites on the planet, they constantly multiply, expand, consume resources, and poison the land, water, and air. They build cities, cut down forests, pollute the oceans, drive other species to extinction, and make ecosystems collapse."
Andy listened, his brain thinking rapidly.
Henry's words sounded like some form of extreme environmentalism or an anti-human manifesto, but something deeper was emerging.
A hatred for "order" itself, a complete rejection of "human civilization."
"They think it's order," Henry's voice dropped, becoming a dangerous whisper, "but in my view, it's nothing more than building a prison for themselves. Look at the world they've created: every living thing is stuck in place. They wake up every day, eat, work, sleep, reproduce, and then die. Day after day, year after year, generation after generation."
There was a fanatical, almost religious passion in Henry's tone:
"Everyone is just waiting for it all to end. Everyone is performing a terrible, meaningless charade, day after day. Birth, school, work, marriage, kids, retirement, death. A pre-programmed assembly line, a giant, self-sustaining illusion."
He paused, his dark eyes staring intently at Andy, as if he wanted to see through his eyes into the depths of his soul.
"What do I want?" Henry repeated Andy's question, then gave the answer, each word like a hammer blow, "I want to establish my order. To restore balance to this broken world."
Andy felt a chill. Not a physical cold, but a deeper premonition of something terrible to come.
"Restore balance?" he asked cautiously, "What do you mean?"
Henry didn't answer directly. He raised an arm, if it could still be called that.
"Look at this world," Henry said, his arm sweeping to point at the surrounding walls, at those pulsating veins.
"The Upside Down. A forgotten, primordial dimension. Here, there are no human concepts, no contamination of civilization. Only the most basic forms of life, the purest instinct for survival."
"In this world, I discovered a way to unlock my potential," his voice turned somber, "To transcend my human body and become the predator I was born to be."
Andy thought of those tentacles, those Demogorgons, those hostile monsters that seemed to want only to devour everything.
"My order," Henry continued, his voice taking on a solemn, almost sacred tone, "is purification. To clear away the human contamination. To restore both worlds to... their rightful state."
"Their rightful state?" Andy asked, though he'd already guessed the answer.
Henry wanted to destroy the human world, or at least, wipe out the "source of contamination"—humanity.
And the Upside Down, this primordial, "uncontaminated" dimension, would become some kind of... template? Or a sanctuary?
This was insane.
This went beyond insanity, entering some realm of pure, abstract evil.
But Henry clearly didn't think so.
In his view, this was righteous, necessary, the only way to "restore balance."
Then, Henry finished his speech. He looked at Andy, and for the first time, something like... expectation appeared in those dark eyes.
"Twelve... no, Andy."
He used the name Andy had chosen for himself, a detail that gave Andy a wave of eerie discomfort.
"Join me. You won't have to hide anymore, won't have to worry about the Lab hunting you, won't have to fear those who don't understand you and want to hurt you."
Henry's tone softened, almost like a temptation:
"You can be free to become whatever you want to be. Here, in this world, power isn't a curse, isn't an abnormality, but... a law of nature. We can build a new order, an order that belongs to us. You can have a real home, real family, a real... purpose."
Andy looked at Henry, at this person who had once comforted, taught, and protected him.
Now he'd become a monster living in symbiosis with vines, talking about purifying the world and establishing a new order.
His mind was racing.
Three years ago, at the gates of the Lab, Henry had given him a choice.
Andy chose to leave.
He fled the Lab and began a life on the run, worrying every day about being found, missing Eleven every day, and trying every day to understand what he really was, where he should go, and what he should become.
Now, three years later, he faced Henry again, faced another choice.
A more extreme, more dangerous, more... insane choice.
Join Henry and become part of this "new order."
Help him "purify" the world and build their kingdom.
No more hiding, no more fear, no more loneliness.
Andy hesitated.
Not because he agreed with Henry's philosophy, but because... the temptation was real: to stop running, to have family.
To have freedom was what he'd craved most for these three years.
He could feel Henry observing him, waiting for his answer.
The tentacles binding him relaxed slightly, almost as if expressing goodwill, and the glow of the veins on the walls softened, as if in comfort.
Time passed in silence, every second feeling as long as an hour.
Andy opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but the words were stuck in his throat, unable to take form.
"I..."
Just as he was about to give some kind of answer, perhaps a refusal, perhaps a request for more time to think, or something else, a sound came from the entrance of the room.
A slimy, liquid-flowing sound.
And... the sound of dragging.
Andy turned his head (the tentacles allowed this limited movement) toward the source of the sound.
Then, his heart stopped beating.
It was that monster.
It crawled in from the room's entrance, its faceless head turned toward Henry as if reporting or waiting for instructions, while its "hand" dragged something.
A person.
Will Byers.
Will's clothes were torn, stained with dark red slime and black grime.
There were scrapes on his face, blood at the corner of his mouth, and his eyes were tightly shut, as if he'd lost consciousness.
But his chest was still faintly rising and falling; he was still alive.
The monster dragged Will to the center of the room, placing him on the ground not far below Andy.
Then it stepped aside, like a loyal dog that had completed its task, waiting for its master's next command.
"Will!" Andy shouted, his voice hoarse with shock and fear, "Let him go! Henry, what did you do to Will?"
He wanted to struggle, to rush down, to use every means possible to protect Will.
But the tentacles immediately tightened, and some cold substance began to be injected again, leaving his muscles weak and his consciousness blurred.
Henry manipulated the vines to bind Will to the wall. He looked down, surveying the unconscious boy with those dark eyes.
"He will join us," Henry said, his voice terrifyingly calm, "He will help us."
Andy's brain couldn't process this sentence for a moment.
Join? Help? Will? A normal twelve-year-old kid without any superpowers, who was just desperately trying to survive?
"What are you talking about?" Andy was almost screaming, "Let him go! Henry, this has nothing to do with him! Let him go!"
Henry ignored Andy's protest.
He raised a "hand," a limb like a vine ending in tentacles, and reached toward Will's face.
Slender tentacles separated from the cluster at the tip, probing out like snakes, swaying in the air, then slowly descending toward Will's face.
"What are you doing? Henry, stop!"
Andy struggled frantically, but the tentacles were as firm as steel; his struggling only made the vines bind tighter and caused more pain.
The tentacles stopped at Will's mouth.
Will seemed to feel something; even in his unconscious state, his brow furrowed slightly and his lips unconsciously pressed together.
Then, the tentacles moved.
They were like a living drill, the tips becoming sharp, and then—
The tentacles entered through the gap in Will's lips, slid over his teeth, deep into his mouth, and advanced toward the depths of his throat.
Will's body jerked violently. His eyes suddenly snapped open, but his pupils were dilated and unfocused.
He wanted to struggle, wanted to gag, but more tentacles reached out from the ground, pinning his limbs and holding down his head so he couldn't move.
Andy watched all this, his mind blank, filled only with pure, indescribable horror.
He could see Will's throat convulsing, could hear the muffled, choking whimpers coming from him.
Some substance was being pumped from inside the tentacles, injected into Will's throat.
Will's body spasmed violently, like he'd been electrocuted, his eyes rolling back.
"No... no..." Andy murmured to himself, his voice so small it was almost inaudible.
He could feel it.
Not by seeing with his eyes, but by sensing with his remaining, faint psychic power.
Will was changing.
Not a physical change, but a deeper change at the level of existence.
Will's psychic "signature" was twisting.
That warm, curious, and brave consciousness fluctuation belonging to a twelve-year-old boy was being eroded, covered, and replaced by something cold, dark, and full of primordial aggression.
Like ink being poured into clear water, it rapidly turned black, losing its original clarity.
"Stop... please... Henry... stop..." Andy's voice turned into a plea, then into sobbing.
But Henry didn't stop. He watched Will intently, watched the injection from the tentacles, watched the boy's transformation. In his dark eyes, a light of near-ecstasy flickered.
This process lasted for about a minute.
To Andy, it felt like a century.
Finally, Will's body stopped convulsing and went limp on the ground, his eyes closed again, and his breathing became steady, but abnormally slow and deep.
The tentacles holding him loosened and retracted into the ground.
Will lay there motionless, like a corpse.
But Andy could feel that he was still alive. And... different.
That warm, human presence had almost completely vanished, replaced by a cold, hollow sensation that was yet full of some primordial power. Just like... just like those tentacles, those vines, those native creatures of this world.
Will had been "contaminated."
Transformed.
Turned into... one of Henry's kind.
"No..." Andy whispered, tears streaming uncontrollably from his eyes, mixing with the blood and sweat on his face, "No... Will... I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..."
He remembered Will's brave figure in the living room, actively drawing the monster's attention to save him.
He remembered Will's anxious voice on the phone, trying hard to send a message to his mom.
That Will, that brave, smart, kind Will Byers... might be gone.
Turned by Henry into some kind of... something else.
Henry slowly turned toward Andy.
On his vine-covered face, there seemed to be a trace of... regret?
"It seems you've made your choice," Henry said, his voice returning to that calm, almost indifferent tone.
Andy looked up, his vision blurred by tears, but he could clearly see Henry's eyes.
"I... made a choice?" Andy's voice was broken from crying, "You... what did you do to him? What did you turn Will into?"
"I gave him a new life," Henry replied calmly.
"I cleared away the human contamination and let him return to a purer state, just like me. Just like what you... could also become."
Andy shook his head, shook it frantically, though the restraint of the tentacles made the movement difficult and painful.
"No..."
"Will is still there," Henry said, a hint of impatience in his tone.
He paused and added, "Just as you originally could have been."
Andy looked at Henry, at this man who was once his mentor, now turned into a monster he couldn't understand.
He looked at Will bound to the wall, the boy who had once saved him, now seemingly turned into some non-human existence.
In his heart, all hesitation, all temptation, all wavering disappeared completely at this moment.
In its place was anger.
Pure, cold anger, like burning ice.
Not for himself, not for his lost abilities, not for the pain of being bound.
But for Will.
For that innocent, brave kid who shouldn't have had to go through any of this.
"Henry..." Andy's voice suddenly became calm, terrifyingly calm, "You're going to regret this."
Henry seemed to pause for a moment.
Those dark eyes narrowed slightly, as if evaluating the weight of Andy's words.
Then, he laughed.
The laughter was low, distorted, filled with a condescending pity.
"How unfortunate, Andy," Henry said, the last trace of anything resembling human emotion vanishing from his voice, leaving only pure, inhuman indifference.
"You chose the wrong path. Just like three years ago. You could have had so much more, but you chose... weakness."
He raised a "hand," those tentacles swaying in the air as if preparing for some ritual.
"Now," Henry said, his voice becoming distant, as if coming from a deep well, "it's time for you to sleep."
Andy felt a powerful wave of drowsiness wash over him.
Not natural fatigue, but some external, forced hypnosis.
The tentacles wrapping around him began to release more cold liquid—not an anesthetic this time, but something stronger, acting directly on his consciousness.
His eyelids became heavy, his vision began to blur, and his consciousness began to sink into darkness.
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