Chapter 22: Healing and Hell

The two finally manage to stand up, with Eleven's help. Crystal quietly heals herself because she's pretty sure that Steve landing on top of her bruised a couple of ribs... not that she minded. She keeps gazing at him in an almost hypnotic fashion. Her heart continues to race and her stomach turns as if there are butterflies inside of it.

Seriously? She thinks to herself. What a time to find someone attractive?

Sometimes she cannot understand the human actions of attraction and love.

"El, you okay?" Steve asks.

"Yes, what about you… Steve?"

"I could be better," he grimaces, and the girls had to agree with him.

His clothes are ripped and torn, but what is underneath is much worse. His entire body is covered in bruises and scratches from the lizard attack; his nose is bloody very similar to Eleven when she uses her powers, his lip is cut in multiple places, there's a thick gash across one of his cheeks, one of his eyes is blackening, and he appears to be bleeding intensely from that gash in the arm where the lizard had bitten him and taken out a chunk of flesh. "Where the hell are we anyway?"

"We know about as much as you do buddy," Crystal says. Despite her annoyance with it all, she feels the need to get closer to him. She knows she should heal him from his wounds, but as El had told her, where they came from, they didn't believe in magic, even though she had telekinesis and there was an alternate universe close to their town where Demogorgon's apparently lived. Would magic be a serious stretch for them? But Crystal knew that if Eleven had reacted so poorly to her abilities, she assumes that Steve's would be ten times worse.

"Where's Mike, Dustin, and the others?" Steve asks, suddenly panicking. Even though Nancy had chosen Johnathan over him, he still felt compelled to take care of her younger brother and his gang of misfit friends. His brotherly bond with Dustin was also really strong, to the point that he was afraid that his buddy was in danger.

"Somewhere in here," El answers vaguely.

"Damn it! Well, then let's find them," he insists. He tries to move forward, but grimaces in pain. Both girls saw why as he had a large gash on the back of his leg from the lizard that had lept at him just clawed wildly at his skin.

"You are in no shape to go anywhere," Crystal says, grabbing his arm. Both felt a jolt of what seemed like electricity between them. Steve gazes into the gentle, but tough blue eyes of this stranger… Crystal, she said her name was. Her brunette hair and shorter height reminded him of Nancy a little bit, except she has a different appearance. She wasn't as pretty as most girls, but he kept looking at her face. There was a mystery to her; a sense of innocence but also of wisdom. This girl had probably seen some shit like they had, which is why she probably wasn't freaking out about seeing Eleven's ability.

Crystal guides Steve over to a rock and tries to force him to sit next to her. She sucks in a deep breath, knowing he's going to freak out at what she was going to do.

"Look, I appreciate your concern, but medical attention can wait until we're out of this freakish hellhole."

"You're bleeding too much for us to even get that far," Crystal insists. To make her point, she shows him the sleeve of his jacket that is now soaked heavily in blood.

"I'm fine!" he shouts stubbornly.

"We don't know if those lizards had poisoned claws or something too," she snaps back.

"It would probably bleed out anyways, look I promised Nancy that I would take care of her brother and by default his friends and if they're lost in this godforsaken jungle…"

"You won't be able to help them if you pass out from your wounds!" Crystal says, grabbing his arm harder than she meant to. She rolls up the sleeve of his tan jacket to examine the gash on his arm. She tries not to gag at the oozing wound.

"Let go of me!"

"STOP!" a third voice rings out.

Both look to see Eleven, looking very annoyed at the two older kids' bickering; she felt like the adult and they were the teenagers. Instantly the older couple stops, both knowing better than to make the powerful young girl angry.

She turns to Steve. "Let her help you. She's a friend. An ally"

"Is she now? And how do you know that?"

"She told me."

"Oh, she told you, well that's very reassuring. You know Hopper and Mike have to teach you a little more about trusting strangers you meet in freakish jungles! You know…"

Eleven glares at him. Crystal can see the girl's hand twitch, as a voluntary reaction to being teased and she shakes her head frantically. She was teaching Eleven about controlling her powers and not losing her temper all the time, and now is an excellent time to practice.

In order to get Steve to shut up, Crystal lets her hand glow purple and waves it over the gash on his arm. It immediately closes and leaves no trace that there was ever a mark, except for the rip in his coat.

At first, the cocky boy doesn't notice until he sees a gleam of purple out of the corner of his eye. He turns to the girl and he can see purple light coming from her hand. He looks down to see that he's no longer bleeding from the arm. He panics, he jerks his arm from her grasp, falls off the rock he was sitting on and tries to scramble away from her.

"Oh GOD! Oh F***!" he screams, he manages to get to his feet and continue backing away, but this time it's towards the woods and not the cliff. He backs up until he hits a tree. He then tries searching for some kind of weapon, he attempts to break another branch to use. Crystal stands up calmly, feeling bad for scaring him. She extinguishes the light to calm him down and keeps her distance.

"W-What the hell are you?!" he screeches.

"It's okay Steve…" Crystal says gently.

"That… is not okay, whatever you just did. Are… are you like her?" he asks, pointing to El.

"Not exactly," Crystal says, knowing that this is going to be a long and complicated explanation in order to explain everything that has occurred to them since they arrived here.

"Then what are you?"

"Would you believe the daughter of Rumpelstiltskin?"

A/N: Crystal spilled the secret. Now watch Steve lose his mind LOL.