As I expected, sleeping had been next to impossible that night. By the time the sun was up, light flitting through the blinds and into my eyes, I was already lying wide awake. I was 90% sure the pillow Murray had given me had something sewn into it as well, the suspicious lump making it impossible to get even a little comfortable. I figured I must have drifted off at some point however: I'd had a dream, though it was more like a memory, that there was something underneath us trying to break in through the floorboards. The feeling had been so visceral, so real, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up every time I even thought about it, but I tried to push it to the back of my head anyway.
"So," I said to Murray, who had appeared in the kitchen not long after I had gotten up, dropping an alka-seltzer tablet into a glass with a worn out look on his face. "Rough morning?" I smiled at him.
He didn't reply, only sent me a glare. "You teenagers don't realise how lucky you are," he said later on, "You can drink however much you want with little to no consequences, take advantage of it while you can."
It was a while before the 'lovebirds' joined us, making a point of entering the room separately, Nancy coming in first, and then Jonathan five minutes later. It was all sickening, I thought: their little glances at each other, their failure to contain their smiling. It took everything in me not to vomit. Murray on the other hand couldn't get enough of it, with his innuendos and his eyebrows wiggling at me from between them as we ate.
I called my mom before we left, telling her that I was at Shana's and that we had been studying and just lost track of time. She let me off with a warning about the car, promising me that if it didn't bring it back in one piece I'd regret it.
It was fair to say that all three of us couldn't wait to get back. The tapes had been sent off, and if Murray was right, we'd be seeing it all in the papers by next week. It was over now, I could finally get on with my life, find some closure. Murray also couldn't wait to get rid of us, herding us like sheep towards the door as we put on our coats.
"For your travels," he smiled once we were finally out, pulling from behind his back a bottle of vodka and handing it to me. "And to water it down," he added, revealing a bottle of water in the other hand, with a sly grin.
Nancy nodded politely, taking the water. "Thanks," she told him, "For everything."
Murray nodded, looking down between each of us, "Don't thank me yet, just keep your eyes on the papers." He paused, before adding humorlessly: "And if you need to reach me again, don't." He stepped back, shutting the door loudly behind him, in a way that made all three of us jump.
I shivered. "Weird dude," I said, crossing my arms. "exceptionally weird dude." I took the glasses out of my pocket again, placing them back on my face as I walked over to the car.
The rest of the ride back to Hawkins was spent in uncomfortable silence. It took most of the day to get back, the radio changing from station to station as we passed through towns, Nancy sleeping in the backseat.
It was approaching dusk by the time we pulled up to Jonathan's house. the was an immediate feeling of unease. I couldn't place where it came from, but something was wrong. Jonathan and I shared a look before he stepped out of the car, wandering over to the front door as he got out his keys, except when he slid the key in the lock the door swung open before he had even turned it.
His panic was evident as he rushed inside, calling out for his mom and Will to no answer.
I pulled the sunglasses off of my face once I reached the open door just behind Nancy, taking a look around. "Holy shit," I gasped.
The place had been torn apart, books thrown off of bookshelves, pots and pans tossed on the ground, but it was more than that: drawings, hundreds of them, in messy crayon, had been taped all over the walls, ceilings and floors, spreading like veins through the interior of house. They seemed to be everywhere, to the point where almost every inch of wall in the house was covered in them, with no sign of Joyce, Mike or Will anywhere.
"I don't shoot polaroid," Jonathan said when he reappeared, holding up an empty film cartridge in his hand.
"What do you mean?" Nancy asked.
"It's not mine," he said, "Someone else must have got here before we did." he looked between us. She cursed to herself.
"It couldn't have been your mom?" I asked, still clinging foolishly to some delusion of hope that all of this had a completely rational explanation.
"Definitely not."
"We should spread out and search the place for anything else out of the ordinary," Nancy started to say.
"Like what?" I asked her, gesturing around us. "I don't know about you but pretty much all of this looks extremely freaking abnormal to me."
"She's right," Jonathan said, "Nance, we have to figure out where they are."
"We should call Hop," I thought aloud, jumping to the phone and dialing the station.
"Good idea." It didn't take long until the phone started to ring in my ear.
"You have any idea where they could be, what any of this could mean?" Nancy was asking him.
"I dunno" he paused. "I have a hunch, but that's it." she nodded for him to go on, "Ever since last year Will's had these appointments at the lab, check ups, monitoring to see if there's any long term effects. He's been feeling pretty weird recently, like bad dreams, PTSD, that sorta thing - but I feel like if something really went wrong that'd probably be where my mom would take him, I mean, what other choice would she have?"
"You think they're at the lab?"
The ringing stopped. 'Hello, this is Hawkins' Police, how may I help you?'
"Hello?" Jonathan and Nancy both turned to face me as I spoke. "I need to speak to Hop, it's an emergency."
Flo let out an exasperated sigh on the other end. "You know you're the second person to say that today. What kind of emergency?" she asked, boredly.
"An urgent one?"
"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to take a message."
"Look, can't you just put him on the line?"
"I'm afraid the chief isn't here right now -"
"What do you mean he isn't there?"
"If there's a message I can take -"
"Well, where is he?"
She sighed again, "Even if I knew, I wouldn't be able to tell you."
I was tapping my foot, "Okay, okay. Just tell him that I called when he got back," I said quickly before hanging up. "Thanks for nothing," I groaned. "No Hop," I said, turning back to Nancy and Jonathan, looking between them, "Anyone else got any ideas?"
It was a shit idea. The worst idea. And I had made sure to tell them just as much. Even Murray had specifically warned us to stay the hell away from the lab, to avoid anybody even associated with it, not to mention the rather important fact that the last time the two of them had been there they'd been threatened, something that both of them seemed to have forgotten.
"You know, you didn't have to come?" Jonathan commented snidely from the passenger seat, his arms crossed over his chest.
"No, there's no way I'm letting you drive my mom's car," I replied, rubbing my thumb on the leather wheel protectively as I spoke. "Anyway, I'm just gonna wait outside, there's no way I'm going inside that place. God knows what they've got hidden in there! Just hop in, find your brothers, and hop-the-fuck out again! 'Cause I'm not going to sit around waiting forever either." I finished, acutely aware of the sun going down, the sky getting darker by the minute.
Nancy was peering out her window as we turned onto the road that led up to the lab, the ominous, cement cube of a building finally coming into view. "Why are the lights off?" she asked, taking the words right out of our mouths. The entire place looked dead, windows black, the only light a reflection of the stars in the night's sky.
"Maybe it's closed?" I offered.
"And security just took the night off? I don't think so,'' Jonathan replied as we slowed down in front of the gate, stepping out.
He ducked into the security booth, pressing the button to open it, but nothing happened.
"It's not working?" Nancy asked. He pressed it again.
"No," he replied, "Power must be off?" his brow furrowed. I cut the engine and stepped out with them, pressing the button myself this time. Still nothing. I wasn't sure what I had expected.
"Guys," Nancy said uneasily, tapping me lightly on the shoulder to get my attention. "I think there's something in the woods," she finished. I felt the hairs on my neck stand up all of a sudden and froze. She was right, there was something there, rustling in the bushes or the trees somewhere and getting closer.
"I hear it too," I told her, squinting to see in the dark.
A bright light was moving out from the trees, coming towards us, pale and luminescent, unnatural. I felt a lump growing in my throat as Nancy brushed past me, walking towards whatever it was.
"Oh yeah, walk towards it, that's a great idea," I whispered sarcastically, mostly to myself, but I followed her slowly nonetheless, car-keys held tightly between my trembling knuckles.
There were two figures emerging, or maybe more? It was difficult to tell when they had that light in front of them, shielding them from view. It wasn't until they stepped out into the open, the car headlights sending a stream of light out across the grass, that I recognised who it was.
"Steve?" all three of us said at once.
"Nancy?" he said.
"Jonathan!" another voice called in surprise.
"Y/n?" I was all of a sudden blinded by the light shining right at my face, "What are you doing here?" Steve asked, finally lowering the flashlight, and walking towards us.
"What are you doing here?" I asked back. There were four of them, Steve in the lead with a bunch of kids trailing behind them, friends of Nancy's brother who I only vaguely knew from all that had happened last year.
"That's a long story," the kid beside him answered.
"We're looking for Mike and Will." Nancy said looking between them all.
The kid spoke again, "They're not in there, are they?"
"We're not sure?" she replied.
"Why, what's in there?"
As if on cue a roar erupted from the lab, echoing all around us as the windows flashed red. Like a haunted house from a movie.
"What the hell was that?" I asked. But when I turned back to Steve the look on his face was all the answer I needed.
It was as if my whole body had been dropped into a vat of ice water, as everyone around me started to talk over each other, asking questions and talking about monsters: demogorgons, tens of them, on all fours, 'like huge dogs,' one of the kids had said.
"We would have died," Dustin added dramatically.
"Where did they come from?" Jonathan asked, his forehead a tight knot of stress.
"I dunno."
"The upside down, I guess," Lucas finished.
"But she closed the door," I said sternly, "She killed it, the girl, right?"
"El," Dustin corrected.
"But she did it, it's over now, that's what they said! That nothing can get through anymore!" I was only half aware of my voice shaking as I spoke. "Are you sure you weren't just seeing shit?" I asked, looking directly at Steve.
"Would anybody make something like that up?" Dustin snapped before he could answer, "It's not like we were on drugs!"
"How would you know?"
"We know!" Lucas interjected.
"He fought them!" Dustin said, pointing to Steve.
"Guys, look!" Nancy interrupted, hitting Jonathan on the arm, "The power's back." she said. Each floor was lighting up one by one, even the perimeter lights had come back on.
We ran back over to the booth, Jonathan up ahead. He pressed the button again but the gate still wouldn't budge. "Let me try," Dustin insisted, shoving Jonathan out of the way, but it didn't make any difference, "Son of a bitch!" he exclaimed, pressing it again, harder now.
"What's wrong, why's nothing happening?" the girl, Max, asked.
"It should be working!" Dustin whined, hitting the button with his balled up fist now. Just as soon as he had spoken, the gate suddenly came to life, opening slowly to reveal the shadowy road ahead.
I fumbled in my pocket for my keys. "Car," I called over to Jonathan. He froze as I threw them to him, looking down at them in his hands perplexed. "Take it!" I cried, looking over at Nancy as well, as he slid over the hood and climbed into the driver's side. Once they were both inside the engine started and the car went racing up towards a lab, only a set of headlights in the dark.
Just in time another roar echoed over the landscape.
"And what, and we just stay here?" Dustin shouted, watching as the car disappeared. "Mike and Will are our friends!"
"We wait," Steve told him, walking over to lean against the side of the booth.
It was awkward as we stood there, waiting. Lucas was talking to Max about something, while Dustin watched them from the security booth, sadly , in silence. I had been avoiding Steve's gaze, watching for anything on the road and looking down at my nails. Carol would never have approved, the polish was all chipped from biting them. I must be nervous.
"So," Steve eventually said from beside me. He never could stand silence.
"So?" I said, still not looking up at him. I wasn't sure why I was acting like I was mad, but for whatever reason it made me feel better.
"Nance said anything to you?" he said, flipping a can of insect killer in his hand absentmindedly. Of course that's the first thing he asks, even now.
"What'd you think?" I replied sourly, "I already told you, she doesn't like me." He didn't bother arguing with me this time.
Just then a car horn sounded from above us. My mother's car came barreling down the road, coming out of seemingly nowhere, at dangerous speeds. An arm pulled me back and out of the road before I could even react, catching a flash of blood red across the bumper as they went by.
"Get in!" Hop yelled from his truck, braking with a loud screech in front of us and leaning over to open the door.
Steve got the kids in first, counting them as they each climbed into the back of the truck before turning to me, but there was something that had caught my eye, something on the road behind them, bounding down on all fours. I felt myself freeze, unable to pull away my eyes, only slightly aware of Steve screaming at me, tugging at my arm. "Snap out of it!" he was saying, but it wasn't until the thing, looked up that I finally broke out of it. I couldn't even be sure if it had eyes, but somehow I knew that it had seen me. It had been looking right at me.
"What the hell was that?" Hop was yelling as he drove, racing away from them. But my eyes were still stuck on the road behind us, watching through the window, heart hammering in my chest, waiting for it to emerge from the darkness.
"Nothing, I just -" I didn't know what to say. I had frozen. "I thought it was over," I said quietly, though nobody heard me over the sound of the engine.
It took awhile for me to even notice the blood, caked over the chief's hands and shins. "It was a bloodbath," he was saying to Steve, shaking his head as he continued to drive way over the speed limit. "We're lucky we got out in time," he said, "most of us at least."
I had only met Bob Newby a couple of times, and only ever because he worked at RadioShack. When I was little he had given me a toy dinosaur to play with while my mom had been arguing with one of the other workers, trying to get a discount on a VHS player, and another time he had sold me my walkman - something I would always be thankful for. He was one of those rare people who was nice to everyone, even the ones that didn't deserve it, even Carol. She had always called him lame, was bitchy about it, laughing after she came out of the store when all he had done was try and start a friendly conversation with her. It made me feel sick now. Nobody deserved to die like that, especially not someone like him, it didn't matter how little I knew him.
It was quiet once we got back. Will was passed out, apparently under some kind of sedative, and Nancy's brother Mike looked like he'd just about seen a ghost, forehead pale with thin beads of sweat running down it as he sat in silence. Although Joyce was in a much worse state.
Demodogs. That was the name for them the kids had come up with. From what Hopper had said there could be hundreds of them and they could be anywhere by now, scrambling around in those tunnels.
Hopper had called the Military, but from how it had sounded they just thought he was a nut-job. I couldn't exactly blame them. I had spent months feeling as if I had lost my mind the first time around, unable to grasp that it had been real, that I had actually seen what I had seen and survived it.
"The mind flayer," Dustin was saying, pointing to the open book in front of him. He had called us all to the dining table for some reason, interrupting me as I had been pacing and smoking a cigarette outside, trying to collect my thoughts. "It's a monster from an unknown dimension, so ancient that it doesn't even know its true home. It jumps between dimensions, enslaving whole races by taking over their brains using its highly-developed psionic powers, just like the virus Will has. Like a hive mind."
"Hey, woah woah woah, slow down," Steve interrupted, "A hive mind?"
The kid rolled his eyes, "A collective consciousness, like a super-organism." This cleared up nothing.
"So, what are you tryna say? This thing, that's what's inside Will?" I asked, pointing to the picture. It looked like something out of a comic book.
"Oh my god, this is a kid's game. None of this is real!" Hop interrupted, running a hand across his face.
"No," Dustin argued, "Actually it's a manual. And it's not for kids!"
"Okay okay, so this 'mind flamer' thing -"
"Flayer," Dustin corrected.
"Whatever," Nancy went on, "What does it want?"
"To conquer us, basically," he answered, "It believes that it's the master race."
Steve clicked his fingers, "Uh, like the Germans." We all turned to look at him in disbelief.
"You mean the Nazis?" Dustin said.
"Yeah, that's what I said," he replied.
Dustin paused. "Uh, I mean, yeah, sort of like Nazis, if they were from another dimension, totally," he said. Hop had started walking away again, taking deep breaths and holding the bridge of his nose. "It views other races, like us, as inferior to itself," Dustin continued.
"It wants to spread, take over other dimensions," Mike added for clarity.
"We are talking about the destruction of our world as we know it," Lucas finished, looking around at all of us.
"Well, that's great," Steve started to say, throwing up his hands, "That's great! That's really great!" he turned around, cursing to himself as he walked away shaking his head.
"But if that's the thing controlling everything, like a brain, then if we find it and kill it?" I said, thinking I followed.
"We kill everything else along with it." Nancy finished, picking up the book from the table and reading it over.
"In theory," Lucas replied, nodding his head.
I turned to Nancy, "So how do we kill it?" I asked her.
"It doesn't say."
"Oh! You, uh, summon an undead army," Dustin replied, "Because zombies - well, zombies don't have brains, and the Mind Flayer, it, uh," he cleared his throat, "it likes brains…" he trailed off at the end awkwardly, "I'm sorry, it's just a game."
"You've gotta be kidding me," Hop interrupted again, walking away completely this time, "What the hell are we doing here?"
"I thought we were waiting for your "military backup"?" Dustin called after him
"We are!"
"Well, even if they come, how are they gonna stop this? You can't just shoot this thing with guns!" Mike argued.
"You don't know that! We don't know anything!" The room had descended into a screaming match at this point.
"- We know it's already killed everybody in that lab!"
"- And we know the monsters are going to molt again!"
"- And we know that it's only a matter of time before those tunnels reach this town!"
In the silence which followed a quiet voice sounded from the door to the hall: "They're right." It was Joyce. She looked shaken, with blood still smeared across her scrubs from the lab. "We have to kill it," she went on, with a balled up fist, "I want to kill it," she finished, looking Hop in the eye.
He approached her, holding out his hands "Me too, alright, I get it - but we don't exactly know what we're dealing with here."
"He does." We all turned back to Mike again with looks of confusion. "Will," he explained, with eyes wide, "if anyone knows how to destroy this thing it's him."
"But I thought he was infected? That we couldn't trust him anymore?" Max pointed out.
"Yeah, but, he can't spy if he doesn't know where he is." he finished.
"What?"
"We disguise his surroundings, make it seem like it could be anywhere!"
Hop was still apprehensive. "There's no guarantee it would work..." he started to say, shaking his head.
"So what? We just sit here?" Mike argued back at him, "It's only a matter of time before they find us anyway, and by that point it'll be too late!"
"He's got a point," I said as Hop sighed, some eyes in the room turning on me. "It could work, doesn't that make it at least worth a shot?" I looked to Jonathan.
He seemed to think it over, face still contorted with a tense and haunted look. "There's the barn outside, we could use that?" he finally suggested, giving his okay.
We all turned to Hop, waiting for his reply with bated breath.
"Alright," he said, swallowing, "Alright, fuck it, let's try it."
