— CHAPTER 13 —
THE UPSIDE DOWN

( trigger warning: graphic descriptions of gore/blood )

FRIDAY 11th NOVEMBER,
1983

THE first inklings of consciousness trickle through Daphne like a dynamite's fuse; only small at first, tiny sparks nudging every vessel in her body. With it comes a slowly impending urgency as she relives it in her head — the blow to the head as she hit the ground, her body cutting a trail of her last moments in the leaves, and the sudden darkness that had overtaken as she was sucked in.

     Then with a deafening BANG she awakes fully.

     Daphne gasps sharply, and with it, inhales a lungful of something horrendous that lights her chest on fire. Daphne hacks and splutters until her chest aches, sleazily wheezing in the closest thing to a normal breathing pattern. Her head is throbbing. Each panicked pulse sends stars swimming in her vision, but not the kind ones she likes staying up late at night to see. These ones are cold and unforgiving... just like wherever she is right now.

     She forces herself to open her eyes wider and hisses at the sharp sting that whips her head wound. Gingerly, she dabs the cut just above her eyebrow — her fingertips come away slick with dark metallic liquid. Blood. "Shit," she whispers, looking up at the sky and hoping to be guided by the moonlight. But the moon has been blotted out — only an inky black abyss looms over her. And there's something else too...

     It is snowing.

     Or at least she thinks it is. Another closer look, and Daphne realises this isn't the case at all. The flakes slowly cascading from the sky, floating mindlessly like plankton in the deepest sea depths, is cold like snow but looks more like... ash. Altogether it paints a picture of Doomsday that prickles the hairs on the nape of Daphne's neck.

     Where the hell is she?

     Daphne attempts to sit up, but finds something is restraining her. It takes everything in her not to descend into hysteria when she sees the coils of vine writhing around her waist and legs like pythons; tendrils of them slowly inching up her back too. They have a life of their own. How long has she been out? Is she going to be stuck here now?

     Then she remembers what else she had packed.

     With her hands still free, she leans forward as much as her restraints will allow her, and pats her shoulders. To her utter joy, she finds her backpack is still there cushioning her back. Daphne does her best to slip her arms out of the straps and, still elevating her bag out of the reach of the vines for now, she unzips it quietly. She catches a glint of the lethal blade sticking out from the soft padding of Cath's stockings and feels herself relax — but only slightly.

     Positioning the kitchen knife under one of her coils, Daphne begins to saw at them. As she does they hiss in retaliation, convulsing in agony as though she has mortally wounded them, before they finally droop to the sides and retreat. She continues doing this for each coil. On the very last one, right at her ankle, she finds herself impatient and springing up onto her feet before she's cut it off, yanking her foot out of its prying grip.

Daphne shrugs her bag back onto her back and surveys her surroundings. She can only see a few metres in front of her before everything is swallowed by darkness.

"Hello?" she calls out, before stopping herself abruptly. Something happens to her voice as she calls out — it distorts itself, in some kind of shattered echo that reverberates in every direction at all the wrong volumes. She tries again. "Hello?"

Hello? HELLO? Hello-o-o...

Whatever this place is, she has to get out. Now.

     Daphne continues treading lightly along the ground, her knife raised should she encounter anything, trying to feel her way through the darkness. This place feels nothing like Hawkins... and yet strangely familiar. It is as if someone took the forest she had been walking in and dragged it to hell. There was still the crunching of leaves underneath her feet, but this time it didn't sound like glass — it sounded like bones.

     This is a dark fabrication of the world she knows.

     She's getting desperate now. She had dropped her flashlight before she blacked out, and there seems no hope in finding it now. "NANCY? JONATHAN?" she cries, panic clenching her throat. "ANYONE—"

Something suddenly clamps over her mouth — cold and somehow strong, despite the frailness of the claw — and Daphne lets out a muffled shriek. She tries struggling, kicking, but whatever it is it's dragging her towards somewhere. The thing doesn't stop until they reach a tree and it lets go. Daphne, free from its grip, is finally able to pose her knife and almost plunges it into the figure before it speaks to her—

"Daphne?" the voice croaks weakly.

She hesitates, the kitchen knife trembling in her hands. She squints through the darkness at the figure. Then she realises, and she thinks she could collapse right there and then.

"... Tonya?"

In the flesh. Tonya nods, weakly propping herself up against her tree trunk as she presses a finger to her lips. Daphne stands back and looks her up and down. The poor girl looks as though she has been dragged through hell and back — it's why it took a moment for her to recognise her. Her perfect, porcelain skin is muddied and torn and gaping with wounds; a giant gash in her shoulder, blood dried in her nostrils and on her teeth, and huge claw marks grazing her sides.

How is she still alive?

Something clicks, a guttural sound coming from far too nearby. Tonya pulls her down to the ground by her shirt, both of them crouched as far down as they can. "It can hear you," she whispers to Daphne, her eyes wide and alert like a deer caught in headlights.

     "What can?"

     "The... thing..."

     The monster. Daphne understands immediately. As it gets closer, she recognises it — the low growl, the wheezy cackle which had filled the walls of Joyce's living room when she first saw it. She looks to her side and sees Tonya waiting for it to leave, almost as if she has tracked its movements before. She wonders guiltily how many times Tonya has had to outrun the creature.

     "Did it take you too?" Tonya asks sadly once it's gone, looking onto her with the deepest of guilts.

     "Kind of..." Daphne whispers. Looking to check if the coast really is clear, she shuffles closer to Tonya, their knees rubbing. "But I also did what I came here to do. I found you."

     "Found me?"

     "Yeah. And I'm not alone. Nancy, Jonathan, they're out there somewhere, wherever here and there is... we were looking for you, Tonya."

     Suddenly Tonya starts to shake with sobs — silent, muffled ones that look more like she's slowly choking on the stale air. "Oh, D-Daphne..." she whimpers, curled up like a wounded fawn as she clenches a fistful of Daphne's shirt in her hand. "I thought I was gonna die here, I really did... I-I don't even know how I got here..." she sniffs, wiping her eyes with her wrist. "... one minute I was just driving home, a-and then this thing went into the road, and I swerved and—"

     "I know, we found your car. In the woods."

     For some reason, Tonya furrows her brows at her, a single teardrop slipping down her cheek as she stares at Daphne. "What woods?" she asks.

     Daphne blinks at her. "You know... the woods? Near where Will Byers lives?"

     "I... I wasn't anywhere near them," she whispers. "I was coming up to the exit road from Hawkins. I live just outside Hawkins."

     "We saw the car wreck, and it looked like you'd been dragged through the windscreen. Maybe you were unconscious—"

     "No, I was... I was awake when it took me. I... remember... all of it."

     "... What?"

     There is no time to even question it yet. A shrill shriek rings out surprisingly close by and Daphne feels her heart lurch into her throat, rattling her skull with each frenzied heartbeat. She dips lower behind the tree trunk but Tonya shushes her, almost in a reassuring tone. The wounded girl crawls out to the side and Daphne wants to yank her backwards, shout at her, but it's no use. Tonya then hastily shuffles back, her stare alarmed. "It's here," she gulps.

     "Tonya, look at me," Daphne barely whispers — she is almost just mouthing the words. "Can you show me the way out?"

     "I don't know where that is," she mouths back.

     "... Then we just stick together. We will find it."

     Daphne holds out her hand; she tries to tense the muscles in her fingers to hide how severely they are shaking. Tonya nods slowly and slips her fragile fingers into hers. Slowly but surely, not wanting to attract the monster's attention, they stand up on their feet — Daphne grimaces at the movement. Every limb of her body aches like hell.

     There are rows of trees, almost standing like pillars in a shadowy temple, for as far as they can see. Daphne figures if they hide behind each one bit by bit, they can inch their way towards an exit. Daphne had to come in here somehow — and she has a feeling that portal, as it were, is closer than they think.

     Hand-in-hand, Daphne and Tonya scurry over to the next tree and duck down again. She had forgotten how badly injured Tonya was — every step the girl takes seems to cost her twice as much pain, and she is limping very obviously. They peer around either side of the tree — surely enough the monster is right there, and so is the deer she had seen before with Nancy and Jonathan. She gazes in horror at the animosity of the creature, the gnarled claws skinning the poor thing, the face that blossoms like a deadly flower to reveal set after set of razor-sharp teeth.

     "Feeding time," Tonya mouths to her, dread pooling in her eyes as she chews her chapped lips anxiously.

     Daphne nods. A minute must pass, she is sure, of just sitting there and waiting... waiting... waiting. It's agonising — wondering if they might make it out alive or not. For now, the adrenaline is coursing too furiously through her bloodstream to even consider that. She is in fight or flight.

     That minute has just passed when a beam of light rips a hole through the pitch black. Tonya manages to hold back a frightened gasp, gesturing to Daphne a slice-across-the-neck — "turn it off." But Daphne shakes her head back at her, trained on the blinking beam with a new instilled hope. "Not me," she mouths to her.

     "DAPHNE?" a voice calls out, shaking slightly.

     A silhouette emerges in the distance, distinguishable by its ponytail and the flashlight in their hand being tapped repeatedly to stop it from blinking. Nancy. Daphne waits, nerves shot, until she is looking their way before she attempts to wave and get her attention. Like a lighthouse glow, the flashlight's beam pans across to where they are sat — still not bright enough to penetrate the darkness completely, but evidently enough for Nancy to notice them.

     She starts slowly edging her way to them, but Daphne shakes her head. As a signal she holds out her palm as a sign for Nancy to stop, right behind a tree, and gestures to she and Tonya before pointing her way. Nancy seems to pick up on the meaning instantaneously — "stay there, we'll come to you" — and nods.

     After what feels like an eternity of crawling, stopping, crawling, stopping, Nancy Wheeler is just in reach of them. Daphne shudders through a sigh of relief as she grabs Nancy's jacket, almost checking if she is real. Tonya points to the flashlight in her hand and gestures a swift slicing motion. When Nancy stares back quizzically, she points for emphasis to the monster not far away.

     "DAPHNE? NANCY?" Is Jonathan in here now too? No... it sounds external almost, too far away to be in this place. "WHERE ARE YOU?" he yells. "I'M RIGHT HERE!"

     The volume of his cries make Daphne cringe. Nancy looks as though she is about to call back, but she violently shakes her head at her. They cannot disturb the monster more than they already have.

Right on cue, a growl vibrates through this twisted mockery of the woods, the creature suddenly having halted its feast on the deer. It peers slowly around, peeling apart every shadow to look for more prey; the source of the light interrupting its feeding time. Daphne doesn't dare to release a breath. A few moments later its hunt subsides, returning back to tearing apart the flesh of the deer.

Daphne knows Tonya must be thinking the same thing as her — how on earth did Nancy get in here, and so unscathed too?

     "GUYS!" Jonathan yells again, the omniscient voice. "JUST FOLLOW MY VOICE!"

     Nancy turns and points to a tree about a few metres away from them. In the trunk is a giant hole, cloaked in slime and wiry vines. But it's an exit — a portal. Something Daphne would only expect to see in her favourite movies. If they inch bit by bit very carefully... they might just make it.

     On the count of three, Daphne mimes to the other two, make a run for that tree. The next one is further away than the others have been thus far, but they can make it if they try. Tonya slings an arm around each of their necks to support her weight — her limping is the last thing they need.

     Daphne mouths the countdown. One... two... three.

     They lunge forwards. On the second or third step, Daphne dares to steal a glance to her right. Her heart for stops a moment. The only thing she can see is empty mist and ash floating over the deer. Where did the monster go?

     She gets her answer when she looks back. A towering silhouette stands metres away, so horrendously human-like in its stature, but far from natural as its mouth opens up and spits out an angry hiss.

     They're in deep shit.

     "RUN!" Daphne cries, dragging the two of them to the side as the tear into a full-on spring, Tonya painfully limping in-between them.

     "JONATHAN!" Nancy shrieks, and Daphne doesn't scold her this time; they need all the help they can get. "JONATHAN, WHERE ARE YOU?"

     "NANCY? I'M RIGHT HERE!"

     "JONATHAN!"

     "JUST FOLLOW MY VOICE!"

     They stop behind a giant, creaking tree, not even sure if they were headed in the right direction — but they need a hiding place and Tonya needs a moment to scrape together what little remains of stamina she has left. She clutches a trembling hand to her abdomen, blood trickling between her fingertips. All of this movement is opening her wounds again; even in the darkness Daphne can notice her rapidly paling.

     Daphne feels a sharp nudge in her shoulder, and she turns to Nancy, who nods in the direction of the closest tree. Her jaw drops in disbelief. She cannot believe their luck — if they can call it that at this stage. Surely enough, only a stone's throw away is the portal tree, illuminated from the outside by a bright beam of light...

     Jonathan...

     "Nancy should go out first," Tonya whispers, rasping as she leans her head back on the tree trunk.

     Daphne whips her head around back to her, eyes wide in disagreement as she glares at her. Why on earth would she suggest that?

     "Someone needs to see if it actually works," she justifies. "And she isn't injured."

     She opens her mouth to protest but falls short. As much as she hates to admit, she can see her point. Although all of this feels a little bit too risky... Daphne looks to Nancy for some sort of affirmation, and watches the determination set in the girl's face. Of course she can handle it. She is Nancy Wheeler, miracle sharpshooter who miraculously locates portals into other dimensions.

     Nancy checks either side of her, as if she were crossing the road, before rapidly tip-toeing over to the portal. She crouches down and thrusts a hand through the slime, slowly beginning to climb through it...

     The seconds passing after Nancy has disappeared into the tree feel like hours. Is she okay? Did she make it out? Will she be able to talk to them? A loud clicking getting nearer and nearer sets Daphne on edge. Come on, come on, come on...

     "I'M OUT!" Nancy finally cries, her voice wobbling. She sounds scared out of her wits but she's outside — it has that same quality of Jonathan's voice. However, Daphne won't finish holding her breath just yet...

     She turns her attention back to Tonya, who gazes longingly at the portal out. They're so close. They can do this. Daphne adjusts one of her bag straps, elongating it, and offers it to Tonya. She watches carefully as the girl's knuckles almost protrude from her skin with how tight she holds on — good. She had better hold on like her life depends on it, because it does.

     With Tonya practically strapped to her, Daphne does the same as Nancy — right, left, right, left. The coast is clear. Too clear for her liking... everything is a little more quiet than she would hope. But it's better than that grotesque creature towering over them. Nothing to lose. Her brain goes into autopilot. Daphne starts treading carefully along the leaves, feeling the small tugs of Tonya on her bag strap behind her as a sign she is still here. Still here. Still here. Still here.

     Daphne feels Tonya fall before she hears it — her bag strap suddenly too flimsy, the sudden lightness back there plunging her into a panicked cold sweat.

     Then there's the THUD as she hits the ground. The grunt as she makes contact, the crunching of leaves like bones underneath her body — it's too much. They're screwed. Daphne spins around and freezes, watching a crumpled Tonya try to unfold herself back into a standing position. She cannot think straight if she tried. All she knows is that her next move is critical. The monster is bound to turn up any second now, more aware of their location than ever. She can't risk making any more noise than she has to.

     She extends her arm out to her to grab without moving her feet. They are too far away — Daphne already lingering by the portal in the tree, and Tonya a metre away. An ocean apart. A universe in distance. But if Tonya gets up now, right now, and makes a lunge for her they will be fine. She hopes.

     Tonya staggers to her feet, clocking Daphne's arm outstretched. Her face is scarred with vivid trepidation as she takes one step, good, two steps—

     A clawed arm bursts through Tonya's chest.

     Blood spurts. Daphne screams so hard she feels bile shoot up her throat. Everything seems to pass in slow motion — Tonya's mouth gaping open wide, her hands flying to the gnarled thorns sticking out of her, fingers mindlessly yanking at each blood-drenched one impaling her lilac blouse to try and pull them out. But soon they go limp, her rapidly ailing body catching up to her. What Daphne can't look away from is her eyes — she sees the life die from the chestnut brown pools, right when her arms drop to her sides and swing back and forth like pendulums at first, each one counting her last heartbeats. Tonya coughs, a small choking noise, and with it hacks up a mouthful of blood that surfaces at her lips and just starts to dribble down her chin.

     With one clean thrust, the monster removes its claw — it still looms over her as Tonya, suspended in the air for a moment, drops to the ground in a permanent, glassed-over stare.

     Dead weight.

     Daphne cannot move. She is rooted to the ground, unaware of time, not sure if she is even still breathing. She knows she can hear Jonathan and Nancy screaming at her from the other side, but it's all white noise. She can't hear them.

     All she can see is the monster's face, opened up before her like a nightmarish lily. It stomps her way, all of its limbs writhing like the vines she had been caged by when she first woke up here. Its mouth opens wider as it towers over her — so tiny and curled up, only inches away from her escape — clicking and cackling evilly, taunting her as it steps over Tonya's body.

This is it, Daphne thinks. I'm going to die.

She is breathing faster than her lungs can keep up with, taking several breaths too many all at once. Hopelessly, she clamps her hands over her ears and squeezes her eyes shut, blocking everything she can out. If she's going to die, she doesn't want to be here. She wants to be somewhere happy — all at once Daphne sees her father, sneaking her into the projectionist's booth at the Hawk Theatre; a little Cath, snugly tucked into bed and her gentle blue eyes alive in awe as she listens to her stories; her angel mother, laughing that beautiful laugh as she scoops handfuls of bubbles onto Daphne's head during bath time—

     Plonk!

     Abruptly, the monster falls silent. And that sound... what the hell was that?

     Daphne opens her eyes. The creature's head is turned away from her, otherwise distracted by something. She dares not move again, nor does she wish to avert her eyes downwards and look at Tonya bleeding out on the ground.

     Plonk!

     This time she sees what made the noise — a small rock ricocheting off the shoulder of the creature. It's so small, and yet grabs the undivided attention of the monster. It turns its entire body away from Daphne, allowing her to finally make out the silhouette of her daring saviour in the distance. They're so small, almost child-like in size, but she is unable to make out anything else. The silhouette then tears off in another direction, vanishing into the darkness once again as the monster shrieks and follows it blindly.

     Somehow, just like that, she is free.

     "DAPHNE, WHAT HAPPENED, ARE YOU OKAY?" Jonathan and Nancy's cries from outside merge together. "DAPHNE! DAPHNE TALK TO US!"

     Reality comes crashing down on her like a pelting of rocks, suddenly bringing back all her aches and wounds. Daphne spins around to check the portal — it's shrinking in size, and fast. Shit! Shit, shit, shit! Daphne punches through the ever-solidifying wall of slime, wriggling through the small space. She resists the urge to gag as her skin becomes coated in the thick sludge, gathering in gloopy strings on her fingers. The claustrophobia is imminent as the sides of the tree close in on her, crushing her by the waist — unless that's just her imagination.

     "JONATHAN! NANCY!" Daphne screams, the sound scratching her throat and making her cough violently.

     "DAPHNE!"

     A hand wriggles through the slime on the other side, the gap sealing more and more with every passing second. She doesn't question who it belongs to. Daphne latches onto it with her own, letting the combination of their weight and the frantic kicking of her boots against the earth help to push her out. She holds her breath and shuts her eyes as she starts being pulled out of the other side, slime blanketing her face. A muscle twinges in her shoulder and she hisses in pain.

     Then all at once, she tumbles out onto a blanket of dead leaves, crunching like glass underneath her — re-birthed. She is half sprawled out on the ground, half entangled over Jonathan's leg as he sits up and shuffles over to her.

     "Daphne, you okay?"

     She shakes her head. The air is so fresh here. Daphne rolls over onto all-fours, on her hands and knees staring at the leaves. After a couple of false starts, she retches and bile gushes out pathetically in a puddle. It's acidic and burns her throat, makes her eyes water and her nose run.

     "Daph, you're shaking like a leaf," Jonathan says, gently placing a hand on her back.

     Exhausted, Daphne rolls back into a sitting position and lets her head fall against the bark of the tree, relieved to find it feels like natural, normal bark. Nancy and Jonathan kneel in front of her, concern colliding with relief at her return etched in their faces as they stare expectantly at her and wait for her to gain breath again.

     "... Where's Tonya?" Nancy asks. Something in the hesitance of her question seems to guess the answer already.

     Daphne tilts her head Nancy's way, back round the side of the tree where the portal was, and shuts her eyes. She relives it all over again — Tonya falling, the impaled chest, Daphne's own life flashing before her eyes until her mysterious knight in shining armour distracted the creature.

     "It... it all happened so fast..." Daphne finally whispers.

     Nancy's hand flies up to her mouth, tears springing to her eyes, while Jonathan's head falls as he stares to the ground in defeat. Neither of them can quite believe it yet, especially Daphne, but the nightmare will soon meld into reality:

     Tonya McCarthy is dead.

     One out of three unreachable.

     Daphne stares mindlessly at the hole in the tree. She imagines Tonya on the other side, being dragged away by the monster, being dismembered bit by bit and devoured. What was that place? Either way, she knows she just went through hell and back. She replays the rocks bouncing off the shoulder of the monster. If it hadn't been for that hero, Daphne would be dead. She is sure of it. She would be lying there, gaping wounds at all, so close yet so far from going home. Where are they now? Who risked their life for her? Jonathan helps Daphne to her feet, carefully keeping an eye on both she and Nancy as he carefully guides them through the woods by flashlight. As they clear space from where they emerged again, Daphne looks over her shoulder back at the tree trunk one last time. She wonders if Tonya is lost forever in that other world, along with her mysterious saviour...

     ... Meanwhile, on the other side, Will Byers looks right back through the same sealed hole, crouched beside Tonya's blood shadow. Stranded and only split seconds too late from his escape.

━━━━━━

A/N;

... i literally have no idea what to say in author's notes when it comes to character deaths. i'm so sorry tonya, you deserved better. hopefully you will get the justice you deserve.

if you couldn't tell from the ending, inspired by a little detail from one of the stranger things comics, it was actually will who was daphne's mysterious saviour! he pelted the rocks to lure the demogorgon away from daphne and had intended to make his own escape, but he had been only a small margin too late as the portal closed and sealed him in. poor will... OUR HERO! (in the comics it was basically the same thing but instead it was nancy he saved)

— Imogen

[ Published: August 9th, 2021 ]