Chapter 7 - Code Red
Hope dialled the police department's number from the phone hanging on the wall as she watched Dustin try to reach his friends via the walkie talkie. "Mike, we have a code red, I repeat, a code red." Dustin was saying when Florence who was the chief of police's secretary answered on the other line that Hope was calling from. "Hello, Flo speaking." She spoke into the receiver and Hope cleared her throat, "Hey Flo, It's Hope Henderson here, is the chief in?" Hope asked, casually and Hope heard Florence groan on the other end, "No he's not, I have no idea where he is, I think he clocked out for the evening!" Florence informed Hope who nodded to herself. "Thanks, I'll relay the message that you're looking for him." Florence added before she hung up the phone. "Chief Hopper isn't available." Hope told Dustin who was opening a cupboard that held his hockey gear that their mom had bought him once upon a time but was never used. "Shit, none of the party are answering either." Dustin confirmed to Hope who frowned. "We need to get this thing out of the house!" Hope cried while chewing on the skin of her thumb.
"That's what this is for." He said, gesturing towards the stick. "I saw some lunch meat in the fridge, we can lure Dart outside to the storm cellar." Dustin added and Hope nodded at the plan. "Okay, okay… then what?" Hope asked and Dustin frowned, "I can't think of everything Hope, let's just do this and then we'll see from there…" He told her, his tone laced with frustration and Hope frowned at him this time, watching him go grab the meat from the fridge. Hope stood by his bedroom door while Dustin laid the lunch meat on the carpet in a straight line leading out the front door to the outside storm cellar. "DONE!" Dustin called out from the front door. "Okay, I'm going to open the door now, prepare to run!" Hope called back and she turned the doorknob on Dustin's door and dashed down the hallway, almost pushing Dustin down the porch steps as they both headed for the shed opposite the storm cellar. Dustin slammed the door when they were both in the shed. "What is this for?" Hope asked her younger brother, pointing at the hockey stick, Dustin's eyesight averted away from the front of the house as he stared at the hockey stick Hope was holding up, "Precautions" he advised her and grabbed at the hockey stick when Dart made an appearance on the porch, gobbling up the meat on his way.
The creature hopped down the steps with ease, taking in each mouthful of meat that was left for it. "Come on Dart…" Dustin egged on his newfound pet and Hope looked down at him, "You named it Dart?" She asked him, eyebrows nearly disappearing into her hair and he nodded before shushing her as Dart faced it's back to the teenagers, inspecting some of the lunch meat that was right outside the storm cellar. Hope's scar throbbed even worse than before. She pressed her thumb down on it trying to ease the pain, but it persisted, almost becoming as bad as the day before when she saw the shadow over the middle school. She gasped as the pain increased and Dart spun its head in their direction. Dustin's head whipped around to Hope who was squeezing onto her left arm. Dustin looked back to Dart who had started galloping towards the shed. Dustin let out a warrior cry before he burst open the door, holding the hockey stick and hitting Dart, like a hockey ball, down the storm cellar steps. Dustin slammed the doors closed and locked them. He was lying on the doors when he remembered his sister in the shed. He rushed back to the shed and cried out "Shit!" when he saw Hope's scar, she had slid the sleeve of her leather jacket up her arm and was staring at it, horrified. There were three or four small black veins, about five centimetres long, protruding from the scar itself. It had not opened like yesterday, but the black veins were wriggling from the scar like worms.
"Hope?" Dustin spoke to his sister, to see if she was still there with him. Hope looked up and Dustin backed away into one of the walls of the shed, noticing her eyes were dark and wide and just staring but just as quickly as they had turned black she blinked and the green was back, brighter than ever and the veins were gone. Dustin stared at her in shock and Hope blinked a couple of times before she shook her head, clearing her foggy mind. "Did you trap him?" Hope asked Dustin, acting as if nothing had happened while shifting her sleeve back down to her wrist. She got up from her crouching position and Dustin stared at her, maybe he had just imagined what had happened? "He's in the cellar." Dustin said, his eyes darting towards Hope's left arm. Hope caught him staring at it, but she decided to ignore his worried looks and walked out of the shed.
Dustin and Hope decided to wait until the next morning to try and do something about Dart. They were glad that he was trapped in the storm cellar since they knew he could not get out.
Hope, who had little sleep, walked into Dustin's room the next morning after throwing on a pair of washed out jeans, combat boots and a white oversized t-shirt with her curls in a ponytail. She did not knock but she found Dustin awake and staring at the corner of the room where they both knew Mews' body lay in a pool of blood. "I'm going to go over to Mike's to see if anyone is there." Dustin told Hope who nodded. The Henderson siblings waltzed into the kitchen to find a note from their mom. "Gone to Loch Nora again, will be back later." Hope sighed in relief. "I'll clean up your room…" Hope said with a short nod and Dustin grimaced. "I'll bury Mews in the back yard." Hope added before disappearing into the kitchen to get the cleaning supplies. "I'll be back with help!" Dustin called out and Hope heard the door close behind him as he was trying to contact the others again.
Hope scrubbed down Dustin's carpet, removing the blood as she scrubbed harder. She wiped at her forehead as the sweat droplets started to form. When she was done cleaning, she grabbed a black bag and carefully put Mews' lifeless, bloody body into it and took it outside into the back yard. As she started digging a small grave with the shovel which she found in the shed, she heard the familiar sound of the blue Camaro's engine roar down her street. Hope poked her head over the tall, wooden picket fence while leaning on the shovel which was digging into the grass and her eyes spotted the car parked in her driveway and Billy was getting out of it. "Shit!" Hope cursed to herself as she looked back at the plastic bag. She dropped the shovel and jogged into the house, forgetting about the rubber gloves she had on and the blood stain that had appeared on her white shirt from the cleaning. She reached the door just as Billy rang it and she waited a few seconds before she opened it. "Hey." He said to her, tilting his head to the left as he eyed out her choice of outfit.
"Hey." Hope breathed out. "How do you know where I live?" She asked him, noticing his eyes drift over to the rubber gloves she was still wearing. She hastily took them off and placed them on the nearby kitchen counter. "I went to drop Max off at the arcade hoping you'd be there, but you weren't so that Keith guy gave me your address, said he'd prefer we do our business elsewhere." Billy said with a chuckle and a shake of his head. "Aren't you worried that Max is hanging out with my weirdo brother and his friends, surely you should be keeping an eye on her if I'm not at work right now?" Hope asked him sarcastically and Billy's facial expression darkened. "I thought we sorted that out?" Billy asked, his perfect eyebrow raised in confusion. Hope's butterflies which had been relatively quiet suddenly came to life and Hope looked away from him. "Are you going to invite me in?" He asked, stepping forward suddenly and Hope backed away, looking to the back door where she knew she still had to bury Mews, and spoke in a quick, even tone to not raise suspicion. "Not right now, my brother will be back any second…" She told him and he rolled his eyes taking another step forward. "I'm sure he could learn a few things from us, don't you?" Billy asked, his eyes trailing down Hope's body, flirtation seeping through his words as he spoke. His eyes landed on the blood stain on Hope's shirt and she looked down and immediately covered it with her arms. "I'm kind of busy at the moment." Hope told him, but all she really wanted to do was climb him like a tree. He took a step closer and Hope felt the warmth radiating from his body. "Can we meet up later then?" He asked her, Hope was taken aback by his directness. "I can pick you up since I now know where you live?" He asked, his smirk turning into a genuine smile. Hope thought about it for a minute, she knew Dustin would be back soon with whoever he could find to help them with Dart and she needed to get Billy out of her house so she could finish what she was meant to do. "Like a date?" Hope asked and Billy shrugged, "I don't do dates but if that's what you want to call it, sure?" He ended and Hope smirked back at him, the butterflies in her stomach were doing circus tricks which made her feel dizzy. "So, I'll pick you up at seven o clock?" He asked, backing away to leave. Hope's eyes darted to the clock on the wall in the lounge, it was eleven o clock now, hopefully they will sort his whole Dart mess by that time, so Hope decided to agree. "Sure. Seven o clock." She said with a nod as Billy turned around and walked out the still open door. "See you later." Billy said as Hope waved him goodbye. She closed the door when she heard the engine start and ran to the backyard to finish burying their mothers' dead cat.
Once Hope was done, she hovered by the grave while she smoked a quick cigarette before Dustin got back but he was back sooner than later so she had to stomp half her cigarette out into the sand and headed into the house where she was met by Dustin and Steve who was holding his nail bat from last year. "Steve?" Hope asked and Dustin looked up at his sister and nodded, "I found him at the Wheeler's, apparently Mike went to Will's last night but never came home and Nancy stayed at some girls house." Dustin told Hope who nodded but was still staring at Steve and his bat. "Steve is the next best thing I could come up with and besides, he still has the nail bat which could come in handy." Dustin advised, beaming up at Steve who was looking at Hope. "What is that?" Steve questioned, pointing to the stain on Hope's shirt. Hope looked down at it and sighed, "This thing that Dustin calls Dart ate our moms cat Mews, so I had to bury her in the garden." She told Steve who gulped "So, you ready for this?" Hope asked Steve as the siblings led Steve to the storm cellar in the front garden. "Guys, if this is some sort of prank?" Steve asked staring at the two Henderson's who looked at each other. "I wish it was, trust me." Hope sighed and beckoned for Dustin to open the doors to the cellar. Steve went down first, followed by Hope who held a flashlight. "Uh, I'll stay up here in case he tries to escape." Dustin slowly said, looking around carefully. Hope rolled her eyes, as she continued to follow Steve down the stairs.
Once the two were down in the storm cellar Steve spoke, "I don't see anything, do you?" He asked, turning to where Hope was illuminated by the flashlight. Hope shone the torch to where she knew the light hanging from the ceiling would be and pulled the switch. It was surprisingly dark in the storm cellar and the two teenagers' eyes adjusted to the light and Steve whistled when he saw the gooey, moulted skin and picked it up with the end of his bat.
Dart was no where to be seen and Hope gasped at the sight on the end of the bat. "GUYS, IS EVERYTHING OK?" Dustin called from the top of the stairs. "Get down here!" Hope ordered her brother who stumbled down the stairs. "Oh shit!" Dustin swore when he saw what Hope and Steve were looking at. Hope bent down and saw the tunnel that Dart had dug through the wall, she shone the torch down the tunnel which went on and on and Hope could not see the end of it. "He must've moulted again." Dustin spoke as they walked back up the stairs.
"So, what now?" Hope asked the two boys who looked at each other and then back at Hope and shrugged.
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