"You look lost."

"I'm sorry?" Diane asked, pulling her hand away from where it had been glued to her mouth and pushing herself off the side of her desk where she had been leaning. Adam stood in the doorway to her office, his arms crossed over his chest and a knowing look on his face.

"Lost in thought, I mean," Adam clarified. He took a couple careful steps closer, studying Diane's eyes in an attempt to surmise what was going on behind them. Diane had always been a tough person to read but in their long friendship, Adam thought that he had gotten close to cracking the code. In this moment, however, it felt like he was starting all over.

Diane sniffed. "Almost the complete opposite, actually," she replied with a smile, but the smile was hollow; empty. "For once it's very quiet in my head and I think I almost miss the chaos."

Adam nodded his head, his eyes glancing around the cavernous room. He wondered, not for the first time, how such a large space could feel so suffocating. The weight of leading Helia was a heavy one and one that he tried his hardest to help Diane bear, but it was hard to hold up his half when Diane refused to share exactly what it was that she was carrying.

"It's been a long, long path but we're almost to the end," Diane said, more to herself than to him. The words hung in the air long after they were spoken.

"You've said that before but you won't tell me what's at the end."

Diane's eyes lit up for a split second, signaling that the words she was about to say were the very thing that had been keeping her going. "The beginning."

Adam scowled, his brows knotted and his lips parted as he fought the urge to ask for an explanation. Even if he asked, he knew that she wouldn't answer. He'd asked before. But mostly, he was concerned. Diane had begun to look...older wasn't the right word, but closer; to what, he couldn't say nor wanted to, but her strength was weakening, her vibrance dulling, her spark fading...And she wasn't the only one. He could feel it too.

Diane pressed her blue eyes shut, inhaling through her nose. When she opened them again, they were nearly gray. "It's time."

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"St-Steve!" Sarah choked. She stumbled towards the car, the smoking engine hissing its warning of the gruesome tragedy that awaited her. She could see it without even laying her eyes on it, flashes of his dead eyes and bloody body polluting her mind, but she pushed forward with the smallest hope that there was still a chance to save Steve. That is, until a voice stopped her in her tracks.

"You're too late," the voice informed her, a golden glow emanating in the peripherals of Sarah's vision before it faded away a brief moment later. "He died on impact. It was quick, I promise."

"Oh, you promise? You promise?" Sarah snapped. She didn't have to look to know that the voice belonged to Diane. "Just like you promised that Steve would survive?"

"You're so close, I--"

"No," Sarah snapped, turning her red-rimmed eyes towards Diane. "You've been lying to me this entire time, why in the hell would I listen to anything else you have to say?"

"I-I know I don't deserve your trust, I know you're skeptical and you have every right to be but--" Diane continued, trying to maintain her stoic composure but failing.

"But? There is no but! This is it, I'm done with you! I'm done with everything! I'm..." Sarah choked, giving into gravity and collapsing to her knees. "I'm done."

Sarah's forehead fell to the pavement, her arms wrapped tightly around her stomach as her whole body shook with sobs. She was so numb that she didn't even feel the bruises, cuts, and slashes adorning her body as they screamed in pain. "I tried. Again and again and again, I've tried... so many fucking times. And no matter what I do, it's never different. I--I can't anymore. I can't. So I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. I'M DONE!" she screamed into the ground with the last shreds of her voice, a dribble of blood-stained spit spilling over her lower lip.

Diane was no longer able to watch from afar. She rushed to Sarah, her hands hesitating to reach out, briefly halted by the carefully constructed wall she had built around her daughter; the wall she had convinced herself was there to protect Sarah but was really there to protect herself. She pushed through anyways, wrapping her arms around her daughter and stroking her hair as they cried together.

"I'm done," Sarah continued on like a broken record. She was so tired, so exhausted, so drained that she barely registered Diane's touch. She had completely shut down; there were no more tears, no more thoughts, no more feelings, no more...anything. She was empty of everything except the following words, "I'm done."

"I'm sorry," Diane cried, burying her face in Sarah's back. "I'm so sorry. I'm going to explain everything now. No more lies. And for once, what happens afterwards will be your choice. It will be your choice."

"I'm done."

"When I told you that my people couldn't remain outside of Helia for too long, it wasn't the whole truth," Diane began. "We grow weaker, yes, but that's because our powers are tied to Helia; Helia gives us our powers and in turn our powers fuel Helia. And Helia is dying. It's been dying since we opened the first rift, since we started our exploration into other dimensions. Since you, El, James, Quinn, and the others were born. And when it's gone, its people will have nothing."

"I'm done."

"You likely didn't notice during your time in Helia because I made sure that you didn't spend a lot of time in it, constantly sending you off on missions. And the others...they may feel it but they don't know what it is. Just like you, I've hidden this from my people because I didn't want to worry them...and because I'm ashamed that the only solution was to put it all on your shoulders. All of this...it's been leading to this moment. Letting the Lab take you so that you would meet James. So that you would take him to the Upside Down where he would become the Mind Flayer. So that his powers, along with Malcolm's, would become yours and that you would use those powers to..." Diane paused, struggling to say what she knew she needed to.

"I'm done."

"I used Quinn to push you away from Steve so that you'd become reliant on James, so that you'd learn how to use your abilities, all of your abilities, to prepare yourself for this very moment. I only ever communicated with Quinn through letters because if she looked me in the eyes she'd know the truth; we aren't using you to recreate the Upside Down, to bring back her father like she thinks, we're using you..." Diane paused to correct herself. "I'm using you...to create a new Helia."

"I'm done."

"And I could have told you all of this but I didn't because I was a coward; because I thought it'd be easier to cope with what was to come if I treated you more like a tool than a daughter. So I hid behind the lie that telling you would change the outcome but the reality is that it wouldn't have mattered. It never has. The outcome always remains the same."

"I'm done."

"My abilities aren't as all-powerful as they seem. When it comes to small things, like deciding what to wear or what to say, I can see multiple paths that lead towards all sorts of different outcomes. But when it comes to big things, like Sam's and Hazel's death or your false cancer diagnosis...there may be different paths but they all lead to the same outcome. The path where I warned Sam and Hazel about their death...they were killed by the Demogorgon. The path where I ordered them not to go on the mission...they snuck away at the last minute and suffered the same fate. The universe had decided that it was their time to die and so they did."

"I'm done."

"Just like the universe had decided that no matter what I did, Dr. Brenner would get you. And that's no excuse. Knowing what I knew, I still should have at least tried to fight it. I shouldn't have let it happen so easily and there is no apology that exists on the planet to make up for that. But I won't use you anymore. I don't know what happens next. For once in my life, I can't see anything. But I do know that it will be your choice and I trust that your choice will be what's best."

"I'm..."

Diane paused, waiting silently for the "done" that would cement their fate to follow but it never did. So she continued, mindful of the fact that another Sarah, an earlier version that had yet to learn of the pain that awaited her, would be appearing in the next fifteen minutes. "Each universe has a predetermined course. In this one, Helia dies and Steve dies. But I believe that you can change that. As you already know, the abilities that you acquired from Malcolm and James are linked, so that when you use one you use the other. You saw this when you turned Mark back and the Upside Down appeared around your father's cabin. And it started happening again when you traveled back to this universe but it needs one final push. By using your abilities to control the course of the universe so that Steve lives, I believe that you can save my people as well by creating a new dimension for them to live in. Like Malcolm tried to do, but this time you'll have the power to succeed."

Sarah remained where she was but her shaking ceased. The temptation to just shut her eyes and never open them again, to finally get the rest that she hadn't been given in her thirty-one years of life was still incredibly strong. But she knew that she couldn't rest peacefully if she had the chance to save Steve, as well as a whole dimension, and she didn't take it. Success or failure didn't even matter to her at this point. She just wanted to be done and she knew she couldn't be until she finished this one last step.

Sarah slowly rose from her huddle, her hunched shoulders straightening as she pushed herself off her knees. Diane offered a hand to help her up but Sarah declined and soon she was on her feet despite how badly her body wanted to be on the ground. She exchanged a brief glance with Diane that said everything she couldn't in that moment; that her being done included being done with Diane. Diane gave a small nod in understanding, trying her hardest to contain the tears gathering in the corner of her eyes.

As James had taught her, Sarah focused on what she wanted to happen and willed it to the universe without even batting an eye. There were no "James' abilities" or "Malcolm's abilities", there was just her abilities, and now that she had accepted that, they came to her like breathing.

At first, everything was still. Everything except her beating heart and Diane's anticipatory breathing. And then time began to bend backwards, slipping and sliding around Sarah and Diane as the wreck before them reanimated.

Shards of glass and plastic rose from the dirt and the grass, shooting through the air towards the car where they reconstructed themselves into the windshield and the headlights. The pools of blood that had collected beneath Steve's body crept back up the rivulets they had followed, returning to the source. His cuts wove themselves together with invisible seams and his bruises faded as his body was flung from the hood to the driver's seat, the whites of his eyes widening as life returned to them. As this was happening, rumbles erupted overhead, accompanied by streaks of blue lightning that rippled across the sky.

Sarah and Diane watched from the side of the road in their own bubble, removed from the events before them as the bumper peeled away from the tree and reformed. The tires followed the tread marks they had left in the dirt, erasing them as they reversed over them. Puffs of smoke appeared out of thin air and chased after the brakes until the car returned to the road and disappeared around the bend it had came from. And then, once more, everything was still.

This was it. If she went any further back, a portal would open and a second Sarah would appear and the cycle would resume. This was where she needed to make the change.

"Before you do this, I have to remind you," Diane stopped her. "Malcolm was one of the most powerful of us and when he attempted this, it consumed him. I believe that you're much more powerful than he was but there may still be consequences. Are you sure you want to continue?"

Sarah didn't need to respond because the answer was already apparent on her face; mouth set firm and brows furrowed in determination. Her life had been full of consequences, what was one more? She willed time to resume, for Steve's car to continue on, this time the road clear. She felt what seemed to be some resistance from the universe at the prospect of change -- a tugging in her chest, a quaking at her feet -- but she pushed through it, snapping it like a rubber band.

The sky erupted into chaos. Blue streaks of lightning zig-zagged across the clouds towards a large, glowing rift, similar to the one that Diane had entered through from her dimension but ten times larger in scale. It would surely be seen several cities over. It continued to grow, slicing through the stars and briefly blocking out the moon, and as it waxed, Sarah felt something within herself wane. But she barely noticed it because her focus was fixed on Steve's car coming towards her.

Steve's BMW sped past, clearing the spot where Sarah had been standing in another time and passing the tree that had claimed his life in another world. Sarah tried to catch a glimpse of him through the window but it was too dark. She smiled anyways. Steve had survived. A new dimension hovered overhead. For once, she finally had control over her life. Had she any more tears to shed, she would have cried on the spot; both out of relief and out of joy. She was done, she was really, truly, finally done.

"Thank you for saving my people," Diane said, her cheeks slick with tears. Sarah nodded her head, an establishment of the last time that she would acknowledge her mother.

The sharp squeal of brakes echoed in their ears as Steve's car came to an abrupt halt a little farther up the road, his brake lights glowing red as the car sat still for a moment before it began to reverse. Sarah panicked for a second, worried that something had gone wrong and that the universe was trying to correct itself but her anxiety was squashed when the car came to a stop beside her, the window rolling down until Steve's face appeared.

"I'll leave you two to catch up," Diane informed Sarah. A glowing rift cutting through the air at her side. "I have some other apologies to make."

Sarah didn't even glance at Diane as she disappeared through the rift because her eyes refused to tear away from Steve.

"Sarah?" Steve asked, his brows knotted in confusion. "What are you doing out here?"

"Steve." Sarah smiled so hard that her cheeks crested her vision.

"Are you okay?"

"I am." And for the first time, she meant it.

"There she is," Hopper growled, his car slamming to a stop in the park's parking lot. He could just barely make out Quinn's outline kneeling in the grass where he formulated that the west wing of the Lab once stood. A screech to his right informed him that Dustin's car had also arrived.

Hopper pushed open his car door, his feet scrambling to find the ground as quickly as possible but a hand on his shoulder stopped him and he looked over to see Joyce still seated.

"Remember, we need her to talk," Joyce reminded him, her expression firm. A nod of his head released the buckle from Joyce's seat belt and they joined the others congregated in front of Dustin's car.

"If she tries anything, I'll take care of her. But she could be dangerous so be careful," Eleven informed the group. Hopper rested his hand on the holster at his side and Joyce gripped her pocket knife uncomfortably, hoping with everything that she wouldn't have to use it. The others held out their empty hands and exchanged worried glances.

"Yeah, I'd rather not be turned into a duck. I've already got enough bills to worry about," Dustin joked, trying to lighten the tense mood but nobody laughed or even cracked a smile. "Nothing? Oh...okay. Never mind then."

"Let's go," Hopper announced, taking the lead. Joyce and Eleven immediately followed at his side, the others trailing closely behind. As they walked, everyone except Hopper, whose tunnel vision only led to Quinn, finally noticed the large rift in the sky over their heads but they kept their mouths shut. One problem at a time.

Quinn didn't even flinch as they approached her, her focus fixed on someone or something standing before her that they couldn't yet make out. As they got closer, whatever she was staring at took on a more human shape but it wasn't moving.

"Quinn!" Hopper shouted but even that didn't capture her attention. He stormed towards her, his eyes unwavering until Joyce prodded his side.

"J-Jim," Joyce choked, her shaking finger pointing over Quinn's head. Hopper's eyes glanced upwards and he stumbled backwards, unable to comprehend what he was seeing.

At first glance it looked like a statue of Diane but the features carved into the smooth stone were too life-like. She was frozen with her arms hanging straight at her sides, her fingers bent at unnatural angles and her chin fixed forward, her wide eyes staring at the empty space over Quinn's head. It was clear from her posture that she had been in excruciating pain in her last moments but the corners of her mouth were stretched straight and her brows were uncreased. Whatever had happened to her had been something she had accepted.

"What did you do?" Hopper asked Quinn, the words trembling off his lips in a pale whisper.

Quinn remained still, her watery eyes dark and her voice steady as she spoke. "I looked her in the eyes."

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