Chapter 26

Alexei's plan wasn't necessarily a good one, but for all Hopper and Andrei's griping, neither had anything better. They split into teams. Tanya was screaming at the village party chairman to evacuate his people now, to try to deprive the thing of more human fuel, and was scrambling for planes and cars to rescue anyone still alive in the prison by the time this was over. Andrei was mobilizing the guards to form a defense and even arming some of the prisoners to fight the monster he'd told them the Americans had unleashed on their Motherland. He'd promised them their freedom if they redeemed themselves by their valor. It was a cruel joke. They weren't meant to survive, just to keep the monster busy long enough to let his plan work.

The defense relied on the prison walls. It was built to survive a fire bombing, if not a nuclear blast. They'd withdrawn everyone inside and told the prisoners to kill anyone trying to leave. If they were lucky, the monster wouldn't break through. If that failed, then came the rings of prisoners with bottles of gasoline, rags and matches to try slow it down. Then, in the lowest level of the basement, the guards with their Kalashnikovs and pistols were patrolling the entrance to the lab.

Inside, Hopper and some of the guards were armed, ready to kill any demogorgons the thing sent at them once El opened the portal. Some prisoners had been assigned to Alexei's team to move the key through the portal. If all went well, he would blow it and, if not kill the Mindflayer, at least weaken it enough that it would think twice before attacking humans again. He was setting a delay mechanism, to try to give everyone a chance to get out before El closed the portal and left them to die in a small-scale nuclear blast, but he was under no illusions about surviving himself. He couldn't run on his injured leg, and he doubted Hopper or any of the guards and prisoners would risk their lives to help him.

El was testing the limits of her powers while Nancy and Jonathan were solving parts of the equations he needed checked. It was a delicate balance, creating something unstable enough to explode, but keeping it in check long enough to get it into place, and he wasn't functioning at his best. Mike had gotten weapons from the interrogation room and was going on about how he'd use the rubber club if the thing got in. He was swinging it around, and Alexei jumped every time he heard the familiar slap.

"Please tell your friend to be qviet," he whispered to Will. "I can't – I can't."

Will didn't ask any questions. "Quit screwing around," he said to Mike. "We need to focus on barricading this place."

Whether they did or not, Alexei wasn't sure. Nancy and Jonathan brought him the calculations. Everything looked like it should work. He took a deep breath and made the last adjustments. "Ve go over de plan?"

"I open the gate when you're in position," El said.

"We carry your machine which you won't explain into this place you won't tell us about to do something we don't understand," said one of the prisoners, who must have been a particularly educated and independent-minded man. No wonder he'd been arrested. "And the guards are going to protect you from whatever is in there. I don't know that they'll extend us the same consideration."

"I vouldn't bet on it," Alexei acknowledged.

"No, I wouldn't either."

"Some of de guards and Hopper kill anyding it sends out. Joyce, you and de kids stay in de control room. You're de last line," Alexei said.

"I track what the Mindflayer is doing and try to warn everybody if I can sense a plan," Will said.

"And I close the gate," El said.

"And then we all run like hell," Hopper said.

"Dat's de plan." Alexei took a deep breath. "So is everyvone ready?"

"As ready as we're going to be," Hopper said. "And we'll figure it out when everything goes to shit after the first five minutes."

Alexei ignored the slap at his plan. It was time to go, but he wasn't going to step through that portal with anything left to say. He slapped Hopper on the back, then winced when Hopper slapped back harder. "Take care of them," he said.

"I'm so sorry," he said to El.

"It wasn't your fault," she said, and gave him an awkward hug. El had never gotten the hang of hugging. "What's he sorry for?" Hopper demanded, but no one answered.

He didn't have much to say to Mike, so he wished him luck, then hugged Nancy, Jonathan and Will. "Ve finish dis," he said to Will, who nodded.

Then came Joyce. He took a breath, then hugged her, longer than he probably should have. Hopper would have feelings about that. "I'm so sorry I put you in danger," he said. "But so happy to see you vonce more."

"Once more isn't the right word," she said. "Again."

He nodded, because if she wasn't ready to accept it, who was he to force the issue? "See you on de udder side, yes?"

"Yes."

They got into position. He gave the nod to El, who was in the control room with the others. She held out her hands and the air seemed to crackle with some form of energy he couldn't name. And the crack in the rock before them started to spread, like a wound opening.

"For the Motherland?" the dissident professor quipped.

Alexei looked back at the control room. "For our families," he said. And they plunged in.