type: angst & fluff (at least they’re very in love)
warnings: spoilers for the finale
in which steve almost dies, but the entire time you’re the only thing on his mind. selflessly, he’s whipped.
a/n.: back in my steve harrington era and since i haven’t found much about this particular scene, i decided to try myself. this could have a part 2 post-fight where they have an emotional talk/ almost argument where reader feels guilty and steve just wants to make clear how much he loves them :P (idk u tell me). hope u guys like it!
w.c.: 2.088
my masterlist
you weren't sure what would kill you first; your heart beating at about 300 times it's normal speed, your lungs not allowing nearly enough oxygen to enter your system, or your shaking hands that made it almost impossible to hold onto the railing of the radio tower. it would probably be the brutal fall from this high up, when el ultimately would not be able to stop the planet descending upon you soon enough, resulting in you — and all of your loved ones — plummeting to a brutal, ugly death.
you couldn't stop thinking about your current situation. no really, even if you'd wanted to, you couldn't have. you desperately needed to focus on the plan ahead, but with the emerging danger of plummeting to your death, your brain just couldn't stop attempting to process the scene at hand, repeatedly failing. it made your head feel like it was going to explode.
great. another thing to possibly kill you.
"hey. hey, y/n, look at me,” softly, but also firmly, your boyfriend spoke to you. he placed his hand at the small of your back, keeping his other one steady on the railing. with his worried expression you knew all to well after years of battling vecna and the upside down, he scanned your face. he let go of the railing to touch you, to smooth out the crease between your eyebrows you didn't even know was there. the moment his hand lifted, you felt your heart drop for a second. your eyes shifted to where he had moved it from and steve saw how scared you were. his heart broke at the sight, knowing he couldn’t do anything for you right now.
"i need you to calm down, sweetheart. can you do that, keep your cool?"
he knew he was asking too much of you and you did too, but you nodded anyways. he kissed your forehead before diverting his attention to dustin, who was desperately communicating with hopper.
it seemed like you all just had to wait and see whether you could survive this one.
a few more seconds passed, but they felt like hours.
and then the planet hit the tower and the entire structure shook. you couldn't help but think that this was it, that you would die in the upside down when the radio tower collapses. no one left to remember you, not only because all of your friends were to die with you, but also because vecna would win. it would’ve all been for nothing. after years of fighting, you’d suffer the greatest loss imaginable.
your grip on the railing tightened and you immediately looked for steve. in his own distress, like many of the others, he had walked a few steps away from you. never far, but right now it felt like you were miles apart.
your eyes met his, but he was already walking back towards you. the structure shook again and you looked up to see the big antenna slowly crumble.
everything happened so quickly, you had trouble comprehending. maybe the upside down air had finally gotten to you, or this was just what dying felt like. terrifying.
"steve-" you turned towards him fully, he was now right in front of you. without thinking, you lifted both your hands from the railing to touch his face. you didn't think you were going to die in that moment because you weren't able to think at all. all you knew was that you wanted him. to speak to him, to touch him, in case you'd never get to do it again.
"no. baby, you have to hold on," he immediately interrupted you, though his eyes softened at your shaking voice. he took your hands in his and lead them back to the railing before pressing a small kiss against your temple, hoping it would calm you down just for a second.
steve was scared shitless, everyone probably was, he wouldn't know. he barely took his eyes off you in that moment. he so badly wanted to protect and look out for everyone, but with death emerging, as long as el didn't do something, his head was only screaming one thing — your name.
you were that little spark of hope that grounded him in that moment because you couldn't die. you were too good for that, you didn't deserve it.
he couldn't let you die.
there was no way he'd ever let that happen and despite the odds, this thought gave him strength. strength he would need.
"steve, i need you to know that i-"
"y/n, no. don't do this."
before you could argue, before you could tell him how much you wanted that future you two never really discussed, but wanted oh so badly, he looked up and saw the antenna fall.
"look out!"
he screamed and everyone else scrambled towards safety. instinctively, you looked up as well and that's when it hit you. not the antenna, but something way worse.
steve was not holding on to anything.
from that point on, everything happened so fast. the tower shook hard, you were first pushed into the railing and then into robin next to you. your ribs started hurting immediately, the pain almost unbearable, if it hadn't been for all the adrenaline in your body.
steve tried so hard to reach you and he was close, really close, but it just wasn't close enough. he still had his hand outstretched when he was yanked across the platform, a terrified expression on his face. when your eyes finally found his again and he saw how equally terrified you looked, his eyes softened.
he was about to die, but his eyes softened with pity because he didn't want you to see. he knew he could never recover, if he lost you, but the thought of having to watch you die, was something that had been causing him many sleepless nights. and now you would have to deal with that alone.
yes, in his final moments, steve worried about how you would cope with his death.
you screamed. you couldn't hear yourself, but you know you screamed. it felt like he had ripped your heart right out when he fell. you were in so much actual, real pain.
somehow, steve managed to hold onto the platform and when you saw his hand, you fell to the ground. it was so hard to move, the unbearable pain in your chest made any sort of movement impossible and your bruised rips didn't help either. still, you tried to crawl towards him. you were so far away.
he knew he wouldn't be able to hold on, he was lucky enough to not have fallen off immediately, but in that moment he almost would've preferred that. instead, he had to listen to his friends crying out his name. dustin, robin and worst of all, you.
‘oh y/n’, was the only clear thought he had in that moment. he was hanging off a platform, barely holding on for his life and all he wanted to do was to pull himself up. not to save himself though, no. solely to hold you. his entire body screamed for you, but he couldn't. he registered your piercing scream before he was able to process his hand slipping. his expression turned even more intense than before and in that moment, nothing but fear overtook him. he was really going to die right now. his life was over.
no six little nuggets, not even a single babygirl that he would get to love to the moon and back.
he would have. not only because steve would've made an amazing dad, but because she would've been your exact replica — a little you, he would have never been able to not fall in love with, even if he fought his hardest.
he wouldn't get to live any of his dreams and worst of all, his death would've been another stupid mistake of his, one he wouldn't be able to make up to you, or to dustin, or to anyone else.
because he had been careless.
you weren't in a state of mind to notice much of what else was happening around you, and you didn't, but lucas did drop to your side and wrapped his arms around you. trying so hard to somehow use his body as a shield for the grief, he knew so well. he pressed his eyes shut, holding back tears.
you also didn't notice when jonathan threw himself onto the floor to save steve, stretching out his hand at the last possible moment to grab his wailing arm.
steves wide eyes looked onto jonathans while they held onto each other for dear life.
"i've got you."
was all his saviour said. he tried to smile at him encouragingly, but it came out weird. scared. then he mustered up all his strength to pull him up.
as if some part of your body understood before you could, your vision cleared. lucas grip on you loosened as he looked over his shoulder.
the second steves face was in view, you jumped to your feet, but froze in disbelief.
you were sure you had just watched the love of your life fall to his death.
before you could and before steve was even fully standing upright again, dustin ran up to him to embrace him. that pushed the last bit of air out of his lungs, but he didn't mind and didn't waste a second to hug his best friend back.
there was another short moment where jonathans and steves eyes locked, there was a silent nod between them and they both understood.
then his eyes found yours.
dustin felt his arms loosen, but he knew. the boy tightly hugged his best friend once more, before letting him go and taking a step back.
as soon as he was free, steve stumbled towards you. he wanted to run, to sweep you off your feet, but the shock of his near-death experience still hit deep.
when he was two steps away, you finally closed the distance between the two of you and stormed into his chest. his left arm wrapped around your body immediately, while his right hand found its place at the back of your head.
he buried his head in your hair, smelling it. it smelled of sweet vanilla, like the shampoo you always used at his place. the smell made his heart ache, bringing back the situation he had been in just seconds before. tears sprung to his eyes and he pressed a kiss to the side of your head, without backing away though. he needed to take it all in for a second. he wasn't really planning on letting you go ever again.
the others watched you for a moment. a mixture of emotions in the air, before most of them turned their focus elsewhere.
"steve," you were crying. so hard. he could feel his upper layer soaking, but he didn't mind, as long as you were okay.
at this train of thought, he would've chuckled, if it hadn't been for the situation at hand. he was really whipped, wasn't he?
"yes, sweetheart?", he spoke softly, lifting his lips from your head just enough. with his hand he began stroking your hair. he was shaking too, you could tell. "i've got you, i'm here." you weren't sure whether he was talking to you, or himself. if you had asked him, he couldn't have told you either.
"i-i almost... you almost died," at your words, he sobbed once. "i think i just saw my.. life flash before my eyes, steve. w-we almost didn't get to live together, but it's the only thing i'm certain about. it's the only thing in my future i can count on. steve, you're the only part of my future i want, the only thing i insist on."
it took steve everything to not break down at your words. his eyes were glossy and he moved both his hand to hold your face, so that he could look at you. everything you said deeply resonated with him and despite all the pain he was in, physically and mentally, a small smile fought its way onto his face.
and the moment you, despite all your pain, reciprocated that smile, his lips crashed onto yours. it was a beautiful, passionate kiss. emotional and heated, while nothing but purely loving at the same time.
"you're never getting rid of me now, y/n. never, i can promise you that."
in the end credits scene mike puts his folder next to will yes... well..
well on noah's Instagram post titled "the end", will and dustins folders are weirdly... swapped. not saying it could be something but it could show that the duffers definitely knew what they were doing having mike put his folder next to will.
also the yellow/blue imagery here is glaringly obvious
oh, but it could be nothing because none of it means anything 😹
i don’t think Will was ever chosen at random. I think he was found. Or maybe more honestly, I think Vecna reached for a reflection of himself and didn’t realize what love could do to a child like Will. Their lives echo each other in strange, deliberate ways, two quiet boys, too gentle for the world they were born into, punished for their sensitivity, taught early that being different is dangerous.
Henry’s pain curdled in isolation, left alone to rot until it turned into something cruel and vast, while Will’s pain was always met by hands reaching for him in the dark, a mother who refused to stop searching, friends who never stopped believing, and a boy who called him a sorcerer, when he felt like nothing at all.
Vecna tried to unmake Will the same way he was unmade himself, by dragging him through fear, through violation, through the destruction of the few safe places he had, hoping those memories would hollow him out and leave him obedient and empty. But Will’s mind never belonged to Vecna, because it was already full. full of laughter, of bikes and basements, and castle byers of shared glances and unfinished sentences, of Mike’s voice telling him he mattered long before Will knew how to say it out loud.
Where Henry lost Patty and became a wound that kept widening, Will kept Mike, and that single difference changes everything. That’s why Vecna will reach for Mike next, why love becomes the battlefield, because Vecna cannot understand a power that grows stronger when shared instead of hoarded. The Upside Down itself feels like proof of this not a world, but a scar, a place frozen in time because a terrified boy refused to leave home, because Hawkins was the last thing Will knew how to hold onto. And maybe that is why Will will live.
His story was never about being consumed by darkness, but about moving through it without becoming it, about choosing tenderness again and again in a universe that keeps asking him to harden.
If Henry and Patty were the story of what happens when love is taken too soon, then Will and Mike are the answer the quiet insistence that some bonds survive the void, and that not every broken thing has to stay broken forever.
