One of the biggest mysteries haunting Stranger Things 5 revolves around Vecna and what really happened to Holly Wheeler after her shocking disappearance. When the demogorgon burst into the Wheeler house and abducted Holly, fans immediately assumed Vecna had dragged her deep into the Upside Down. But as Volume 2 reveals, the truth is far more unsettling.

After weeks of speculation, Stranger Things 5 Vol. 2 finally gives us answers and completely flips everything we thought we knew about Vecna’s location and his endgame.

The season premiere opens with Hopper venturing into the Upside Down on what he calls “a crawl,” desperately searching for any trace of Vecna. Despite combing through familiar territory, Hopper comes up empty-handed—an early hint that something isn’t right.

Meanwhile, Eleven and Hopper track Holly’s psychic trail to a strange wall inside the Upside Down. At first, they believe Vecna is hiding just beyond it, using the structure as some kind of barrier or lair. But this theory quickly falls apart as the wall isn’t a gateway and most importantly, Holly isn’t there at all.

Holly Isn’t in the Upside Down

As revealed later in Vol. 2, Holly Wheeler, along with Derek and the other missing children, was never truly in the Upside Down. Instead, Vecna took them somewhere far older, darker, and more dangerous.

Dustin eventually names this place the Abyss.

The Abyss appears to be an entirely separate dimension, connected to Hawkins indirectly through the Upside Down, which now functions more like a bridge between worlds rather than the final destination. Some fans online have referred to this realm as Dimension X, but the show strongly implies it’s the same primordial world where the Mind Flayer and demogorgons originated.

In other words, the Upside Down was never Vecna’s home, it was just his staging ground.

The clearest confirmation comes in Episode 7, “The Bridge.” Holly awakens from her trance inside Vecna’s lair in the Abyss and manages to escape. What follows is one of the most visually striking sequences of the season.

Holly crawls through a portal and appears to fall through space and time itself, briefly returning to the Upside Down before Vecna forcibly tethers her back to the Abyss.

That moment confirms two huge revelations that The Abyss exists outside normal space-time, and Vecna has full control over movement between dimensions. This revelation also retroactively explains several long-standing mysteries in Stranger Things lore.

The Abyss is the same place Eleven banished Henry Creel to as a child. When Dr. Brenner later forced Eleven to search for Henry, her contact with the demogorgon accidentally reopened pathways between dimensions using the Upside Down as the connection point.

Even more chilling: Brenner already knew about this realm.

His father, while working on Project Rainbow in the 1940s (a program designed to make ships invisible), reportedly traveled to this dimension himself. That knowledge is what allowed Brenner to recognize where Henry had gone and why he was so obsessed with reopening the door.

So while Season 4 made it seem like Vecna ruled the Upside Down, Season 5 confirms the truth: Vecna was only borrowing it. After his defeat at the Creel House, Vecna didn’t disappear—he retreated home.

Vecna’s Real Plan, Finally Revealed

Volume 2 also sheds light on Vecna’s ultimate goal, thanks largely to Will Byers.

In a shocking twist, Will temporarily hijacks Vecna’s connection to the hive mind, allowing the group to glimpse Vecna’s thoughts. What they discover is terrifying: Vecna isn’t just kidnapping children, he’s awakening something inside them.

Much like Will himself, these kids appear to possess dormant abilities. Vecna is amplifying those powers, using them as conduits to merge dimensions and reshape reality.

Vecna has repeatedly said he wants to “build a new world,” and now we finally understand what that means. His plan is to overlap the Rightside Up with the Abyss, erasing the world as we know it and replacing it with something twisted and controlled.

In Episode 5, “Shock Jock,” Vecna—disguised as Mr. Whatsit—explains his plan directly to the children. Using A Wrinkle in Time as a metaphor, he tells them they are “the light” meant to drive away darkness.

But the kids aren’t saving anything; they’re becoming weapons. Vecna is turning their power into the darkness itself, using them to wipe out Hawkins and everyone fighting against him.

The final battlefield, it seems, won’t be the real world or the Abyss but the Upside Down, caught between both.