A Struggle Ensues

Hawkins, IN

June 12, 1986

Driving to the station, Hopper couldn't shake an impending sense of dread. Eleven had been lost in thought through most of breakfast and had hardly said a word. He hoped she was just trying to process everything she had learned in the last few days. He could understand completely how confusing it must be for her as he was struggling with it all himself. She hadn't seemed particularly upset, just distracted. Desperate to keep her from getting too lost in it all, he had given her a glimpse of a surprise planned for dinner.

"So Mike stopped by the station yesterday," he casually tossed out, as though it were a normal occurrence for him to visit Hopper at work.

As he had hoped, the usual smile his name elicited spread quickly across her face as she looked up, waiting for him to explain why Mike had stopped to see him.

"He asked if he could come over tonight for a little surprise he has been arranging," Hopper said, with some relief that she had taken the bait and was coming back from whatever thoughts were troubling her.

"What surprise?" she asked, hoping he would spill the beans on a few of the details. She had been feeling a little guilty about how little she had talked to him so far this week. She had been so focused on unraveling her past, and that of her sister, that she had missed a couple of their talks and even when they connected, she had said nothing about the journals or reaching out to find Papa and Twelve again. She didn't want to lie to Mike, but she also wasn't sure how much she was ready to share before having a chance to process it herself. She knew he would understand and not be mad, giving her all the time and space she needed to figure things out, and that made her feel even more guilty. Now, it turned out, while she had been doing all this, he had been planning some kind of special surprise for her.

"Nope," Hopper grinned, enjoying giving her something happy to ponder all day, "like I said, it's a surprise. I wasn't even sure if I should tell you he was coming over, but I figured you'd want to make sure you were ready. The only clue I can tell you is that you might want to take a nap this afternoon; it might be kind of a late night."

"That ought to keep her wheels spinning most of the day," he thought, quite proud of himself.

As he drove through town, Hopper hoped it had been enough to occupy her mind until he could get back to her tonight. He had been quite surprised himself, yesterday afternoon, when Mike had stopped by asking permission and laying out his plan. He would catch a ride over with Hopper at the end of the day and fix her favorite meal, Saturday-morning waffles with bacon, as a special dinner. After sunset, he had a night of stargazing planned with an early summer meteor shower. Just like Sara, Jane had taken a strong interest in the skies above and Mike had confessed he was saving up to surprise her with a telescope for her "real birthday" in August.

As he parked in front of the station, Hopper repeated his silent plea from the day before, "Please don't let her go looking for Brenner."

Sitting on her bed, Eleven was ecstatic, trying to figure out what Mike might have planned for tonight. Now all she had to do was get through the day without something ruining her mood. She knew deep down she was asking for trouble, but she decided to try and figure out just where it was that Papa and Twelve were. She pulled Hopper's United States road atlas off the shelf and flipped to the back to find the state of Washington. Near the middle of the map, she found Yakima, which she had seen on signs near where they pulled off of the highway. From there, she traced her finger back along the main highways that they had taken, back up through the mountains and down through several major cities. Sure enough, at the end of the tracing, she found McChord. According to the map, it was an Air Force base, which explained the enormous planes.

All of this, she filed away in her mind for later. She wasn't ready to share just where they were hiding with anyone else. She was at a loss when it came to her newly found sister. On the one hand, she was enthusiastically striving to please Papa and pass every test he threw at her without question. On the other, it was clear from his journals that Papa had brainwashed her too, doing anything he could to get the results he was looking for.

She knew there was someone she could talk to about all this who would understand. With some apprehension, she pulled on her blindfold and reached out to find Kali. After several minutes, much longer than it usually took, she found her alone in a dusty warehouse.

"Hello, Jane," she greeted, clearly tired and worn down.

"Are you alright? Where is everyone else?" Eleven asked.

"We had a difference of opinions and I took off," she admitted. "They thought we were moving too fast and taking too many risks. I disagreed. If we let up, they will slip through our fingers. So I am going out on my own for now."

She brightened up a little, obviously fine with acting as a lone wolf in her persistent hunt, and changed the subject. "So what brings you around today? It's been awhile."

Eleven was hesitant, but knew that Kali deserved to know whatever she knew. "A lot has happened," she began, hesitatingly, "I found Papa."

Kali sat up straighter, listening intently, though not particularly surprised that her informed hunch had turned out to be correct.

"Where?" she asked.

"He's in hiding," Eleven answered, vaguely, "But there's a lot more. He's continuing his work. He's not alone; he has another experiment with him." She paused, still unsure how to describe her sister. "He has another me."

The surprise crept quickly over Kali's face. She had been worried Brenner might be trying to continue the project, but had he actually found another subject? "What do you mean, another you?"

"My twin. Mama had two of us," Eleven explained. "Papa kept us apart, raised us different."

"Jane, you have to tell me where they are. He can't be allowed to get away again," Kali repeated.

"It's not that simple," she went on, ignoring Kali's demands. "I've watched her training. She is so strong. She will never let us get close to Papa."

"How can you know that? She might be looking for her moment to escape, just like we did," Kali countered.

"Because I read Papa's journals."

Kali sat stunned at the revelation, "What do you mean? How could you have his journals?"

"When the lab closed, Daddy's friend managed to save Papa's files. I've read my journals, and my sister's. Her name is Twelve. He never told her about me, either. In all his notes, she was the loyal weapon he could never turn me into." Eleven shuddered, recalling the proudly penned memories in his journals, "She killed the cat for him. She did it when she was four."

"You're files were there to," she went on, hoping to lead the conversation away from Papa and Twelve. "I haven't read your journal, I thought you deserved to be able to see it for yourself. But I read about the night you escaped. Were you really trying to get to my room the night you left?"

Kali looked down, saddened at the memories dredged up by such a simple question. "I tried. I knew I couldn't leave my little sister there, knowing what they were doing. It's like I told you the night you found me, I was devastated when they took you away from the rainbow room. I tried for a long time to convince myself you were just somewhere else in the lab, still happy and healthy. Then one day, I saw you. It wasn't supposed to happen, they were always careful taking us through the halls, timing it so we never saw each other. But I saw Papa carrying you back to your room. You looked so frail, barely conscious, face covered in blood. Your hair was gone and they had stuck you in that flimsy gown. I knew right then I had to get you out."

Kali stopped to catch her breath, tears silently falling at the recollection. Across the distance, alone in her room, Eleven was crying tears of her own. In her darkest moments in the lab, there had been someone who cared, who wanted to get her out, even then.

Kali went on, "I started planning that very night; trying to find a weakness in their schedules. I knew there had to be a time when I could slip out of my room, try to find you, and get us both out of there. But I messed up. The night I tried to go, they found me. I had no idea how far away they had moved you. I'm so sorry I had to run. I knew what they would do if they caught me."

Having read the files, Eleven had a good idea as well what could have happened if Papa and his men had found her.

"I'm so sorry," she repeated.

Eleven wished she could be there, wherever Kali was, to take her in her arms and tell her it was okay. "I understand. You don't have to be sorry. They might have killed you, or worse."

The regretful sorrow on her face slowly dissolved back into a deep and festering rage at everything related to the lab. "Do you understand now, why we have to stop him, once and for all? Do you really want to leave your sister with him? How many more lives does he have to destroy?"

"I know he has to be stopped, but we have to be careful about this. I've watched her, she's not like us. She is going to do everything she can to protect him," Eleven cautioned.

Kali tried to reason with her, "Maybe she could stop one of us, but together, we are stronger than she could possibly be. I could come and get you and we can finish this together. We will never be safe if he is still out there."

"I'm sorry, but I already told you, I can't tell you where they are until we figure this out. I'm not going to risk our lives rushing into this."

Kali's anger took on a new focus, directed straight at Eleven. "Jane, I'm trying to be nice about this. You're going to tell me where…"

"No." Eleven said, so determined it almost came out as a growl.

Resigned to what she had to do, Kali apologized, "I'm sorry Jane. I didn't want to have to do this."

Eleven watched in confusion as Kali balled one hand into a fist and slowly closed her eyes. A moment later, Eleven could feel her there, somewhere deep inside her own mind. It was like hundreds of angry termites chewing their way through her brain, searching for something locked deeply away.

"Get out of my HEAD," she screamed, clasping her hands to the sides of her skull. She could feel Kali searching, digging through every corner, trying to find where Papa's location was hidden.

Kali was unmoved, peacefully sitting there while she tore apart Eleven's brain, frantically looking for that one precious memory. Eleven began to panic, trying to force Kali back out of her mind, but it was no use; this wasn't any kind of physical connection she could repel, this was something brand new. Not knowing what else to do, she reached up and ripped the blindfold from her eyes. Her room snapped back into focus before her eyes, and yet, she could still see Kali and the warehouse as well. Worse yet, she could still feel her, deep in her mind. Somehow, she knew Kali was getting close to what she sought.

Eleven called up the memory of McChord and Yakima and tried to throw a barrier around it. She visualized a large, heavy safe, with the locations locked deep inside. She could feel Kali grasp onto the safe as well and start to pry. Eleven fought as hard as she could to hold tight to the memory. As Kali pulled harder at the memory, Eleven's vision began to go black. She gave one last desperate tug, and she felt her grip on the memory slip away into Kali's eager grasp. The last thing she remembered was the sound of a loud SNAP ringing in her ears, and everything went black.

Hours later, Hopper pulled his Blazer into the driveway and an eager Mike jumped out and gathered the bag of supplies he had brought for the evening. He had a batch of chocolate chip cookies he had baked that afternoon. He had a big wool blanket to lay out in the grass for stargazing, and another to throw over them against the chill. Hopper had eyed the blankets with fatherly suspicion but decided to give him a pass on the usual harsh scrutiny for the evening. He had promised Mike that, while he could and would be checking on them at ANY time, he wouldn't be standing on the deck glaring at them all night.

They walked in and headed to the kitchen to start getting things ready for dinner.

"Jane, we're home," Hopper called, a little surprised that she hadn't been on the front porch waiting to pounce on Mike the second they pulled up. Turning to Mike, he hazarded a guess. "I had told her she should rest up this afternoon, she's probably still asleep. Why don't you go wake her up, I'm sure she'd rather see your face than mine when she wakes up," he teased.

Mike grinned at the thought, and took off through the living room and down the hall toward her room. Hopper set about pulling out the waffle iron and putting a big pan on the stove for bacon. He was just reaching into the fridge to pull out the pack of bacon when he heard Mike scream down the hall in utter panic.

"Hopper!"