-8-

Once they'd finished their meal, Owens and Jane went out into the desert. The journey took all night, and by morning Jane was especially drained, and even Owens, who had a lot of energy, was feeling the strain. During that time, Jane had asked the scientist more about what was happening now. Owens had, fortunately, anticipated her interest and he respected it. He had brought with him a folder with copies of photos and autopsy reports on the state of the bodies that had been found already.

Jane didn't recognise the faces of the people in the photos, but as she stared down at their faces, fixed in a mask of terror and agony…she…recognised the way their limbs had been snapped, twisted out of joint. She didn't know where and when she had seen it before, but then she experienced a flash of memory; she was in the Rainbow Room, back in the Hawkins Lab, and there was blood congealing all over the usually clean floor, with broken, twisted bodies….

Shuddering at the memories, Jane decided to keep quiet about what she was experiencing despite being troubled by them. She had always known something was wrong with her before she had opened the Gate originally which let the first Demogorgons into Hawkins at around the same time Will went missing. Jane…didn't really remember what had happened, but she had memories of waking up…and not having a clue beyond the basics about who she was, where she was, and what the daily routine was. But she had been worried, especially whenever Brenner came in and asked her to look for someone with the void, before that fatal experiment which opened the Gate.

Her concerns had only grown when she had met Kali; her big sister had been surprised by her lack of memory of the times they'd spent together, and Jane had seen how much it had bothered her, and ever since, deep down inside of her, Jane had asked herself what she had forgotten and what happened.

It was a little voice which had been growing more and more as the years passed.

Now that voice had grown louder until it was shouting at her, and these memories of blood and Brenner's horrified voice demanding to know what she had done.

It didn't really help, but thinking about her memory troubles took her mind off what she was about to find in whatever new Lab Owens and Brenner had set up.

Brenner….

Jane was trying hard not to think of the times when she had disappointed the man, and he'd had her hauled away, her screaming for mercy, only to face his cold mask like face lined with disappointment and even disgust as he looked at her while she was clad in that disgusting gown with her hair cut short, to their last meeting when she had been so weakened during her battle with the Demogorgons that invaded Hawkins.

"What exactly has he been doing all this time?" Jane asked, cutting off Owens.

Owens blinked at her in surprise. "Who?"

"Brenner. What's he been doing?"

Owens sighed. "I should have expected this," he said to himself before he addressed her properly. "After his…injuries from the creature you call a 'Demogorgon,' it took a while for him to recover; there were so many things we didn't know about the creatures. We had no idea if their bites were poisonous, so he was kept under observation. When he pulled through, I had been put in charge of the Lab."

Jane nodded, starting to see now how it happened. "Go on."

"He came out here, to focus on other sides of his work."

"Why didn't he go back to Hawkins?" Jane asked curiously. The Lab had been Brenner's pride and joy.

"Honestly? I didn't want him to. He would have restarted the program, and we didn't have the resources for that; we were still trying to understand the dimension you and your friends call the Upside Down. At the same time, so many kids like you had died already, or they escaped."

Jane swung around in surprise. "What do you mean, so many kids like me have died already?" Ice was starting to settle in her chest.

Owens sighed again, visibly regretting having said what he'd just said. But instead of dismissing it like she had thought, he decided to answer her. "Tell me, Jane; when you left the Lab the first time after opening the Gate, did you ever once think how odd it was you didn't see anybody else like you there? And I mean kids?"

Jane felt as if the ground was about to swallow her up because she had thought it odd when she'd gotten over her fear and her panic after she'd managed to get out of the tank she was imprisoned in. Later, and especially now, she knew it was odd she was alone there, and Hopper and Joyce hadn't seen any evidence of other kids when they'd visited; Hopper had visited her old room, but he hadn't had the time to visit more.

But when the Mind Flayer appeared during the Upside Down's second attack, there was still no sign; at the time, they had assumed kids had been moved away.

But now…Jane was starting to get scared; those images she had in her head, of the blood, in the Rainbow Room…what was going on? "There were others like me?" Her mind conjured up that image again, of those bloody, twisted corpses. "They're dead, aren't they?"

Owens nodded solemnly. "Yeah, or, like you, and the girl named Kali, they got out."

While she was pleased Owens had used her and Kali as examples of kids who'd gotten lucky enough to escape, Jane's sharp mind caught something more. "It's connected, right?" She said, starting to realise that it was; her brain was going like bingo. "These deaths in Hawkins now, they're connected to the deaths of the others, my brothers, sisters?" Her voice was small, but hard, and her glare was intense enough to stop the scientist from even thinking of lying to her. "That's it, isn't it? That's why you're so concerned. How many like me were in that Lab, and what happened to them all?"

Jane wanted answers now.

Once…just once, she would like to know more about her past and the hidden lies and mysteries in it. Ever since she had met her mother, her aunt, and Kali, Jane had discovered for herself there were so many things she just did not know.

Owens sighed, but he nodded gently, solemnly. Grimly. "Yes, Jane."

"But how?" Jane said, "And why can't I remember… Wait, those memories of the Rainbow Room?"

"What memories?" Owens was insistent.

Jane hadn't wanted to reveal this, but she had no choice. With a sigh she confessed to remembering the flashes of being in the sterile white Rainbow room gazing down at the corpses of other kids, wearing hospital gowns with their hair cut short. Owens stared at her in surprise.

"They were memories, Jane, but memories you lost; I can't tell you the details now, but you will soon remember them. In fact, it's part of the treatment," Owens told her.

"How?"

"You'll see; it is just too complicated to go into details right now, and Brenner will probably tell you more when we arrive, but it was part of that reason and the revelation you had vanished and believed to be dead, that took a toll on Brenner and stopped him from restarting the program. And this is the strange part, but when I broke the news you were believed dead, I don't think I've ever seen anyone look so brokenhearted in my whole life," he finished absently.

"What?" Jane wasn't sure how to take the revelation, and she didn't have a clue whether to laugh or scoff at the thought of Brenner being heartbroken. "He has a heart?"

Owens flashed her a smile. "I know, it's hard to believe, but I think in Brenner's own way, he considered all of the children in his care as his own."

"Considered all us his own?" The look Jane sent him made him cringe and shiver in terror; he had thought Joyce was terrifying, but either Jane had been taking lessons or she had gotten even more scary. "He had a funny way of showing that love, Dr Owens; I still have nightmares of what that man did whenever I didn't please him."

Images of him slapping her, of standing coldly and immobile as the orderlies dragged her away, screaming bubbled in her mind…

Owens conceded with a nod. "I understand that," he replied. "But at the same time, and I can't believe I'm saying this, when he was told you were gone, presumed dead, he looked like his own daughter had died."

Jane didn't bother dignifying that with any kind of answer since she had never seen Brenner like that in her life once she moved on with her life, and she didn't care if she was seen as rude by Owens at that point. "Did he try to take me away from Joyce and Hopper when he found out I was alive?"

"No, by that point I'd persuaded him you were better left alone, especially as you grew far more outside of the confines of a Lab," Owens replied. "He agreed to leave you alone, but together we kept you under watch. Our operatives were told just to observe; we were a little baffled by the decision for you to just be hidden away since it wasn't necessary before the move to Lenora."

"They did that to keep me safe," Jane didn't tell Owens how she'd felt about the times she was meant to visit her friends, but finding out how those precautions weren't even needed was a bitter pill for her to swallow; she had never liked being caged up, and she had resented not spending time with friends and enjoying life as a normal person. "So, how will this treatment work; I know you just said Brenner will tell me, but can you tell me the basics?"

"Do you remember the immersion tanks you were put into?"

"Yeah."

"Well, you're gonna be put in one, and you will watch the parts of your life you've forgotten."

"And you think it will restore my powers?" There was pure scepticism in Jane's voice.

Owens chuckled. "I know what you mean, kiddo, but it apparently works; it's not uncommon for amnesia sufferers to recover their memory if they receive a shock, or if they watch or listen to recordings of their past. And besides, some kids Brenner experimented on lost their memories, and it worked."

"But this is different, surely?" Jane argued, looking at the desert out of the corner of her eye. Just because she was cooperating did not mean she wouldn't think of an escape route if things went wrong.

Owens shrugged. "Truthfully, we don't know, kid."

Jane sighed. "Okay," she answered, too fatigued to really argue.

-8-

While she wanted her powers back, the thought of spending any time with Brenner made her skin crawl, so she kept watch on the landscape in the hopes of finding a place she could escape to in case things went wrong.

But after a while, Jane abandoned her thoughts of escaping. There wasn't much point; they were miles out into the desert, and miles away from the nearest town. Even if she could escape, she would have nowhere convenient to hide, and she would be picked off easily since the Bad men would have helicopters and cars.

She had only gotten away with it before because the Lab had been in the middle of a forest with a town nearby.

But not out here.

A part of her wondered if Owens and Brenner had done this deliberately, but she didn't voice her thoughts. She wasn't too surprised when she found out the new Lab was deep underground since the last one was, but why would anyone want to build anything out here? Okay, sure, she was able to see the logic in building a top-secret missile platform out here.

One thing Jane wasn't entirely able to shake off was the fact these people, according to Owens, saw her as a legend, a hero. She had never seen herself as anything like that, and she was a bit nervous despite doing her best to be polite. While she didn't really care, she was a bit perturbed to find these people had left their lives behind, just for her.

Jane followed Owens through the corridors into a huge room dominated by hissing machinery, and silver bell shaped…thing. Just by looking at it, Jane knew this was what they were going to stick her into.

"That's it, isn't it?" She asked.

Owens nodded. "Yep, we call her NINA."

"Yes, I can see that," Jane felt for sure she was channelling her biological aunt's snark, and Max's spunk when she gestured to the 'NINA' stencilled on the side. "But what does it mean?"

"If we told you, it would ruin the surprise."

Jane sighed and closed her eyes at the sound of the voice even as she went rigid, old fears bubbling away within her soul. She took a deep breath to centre her nerves and control her suddenly pounding heart. She opened her eyes and turned, looking up. She had been dreading this the moment she had learnt he was still alive.

Coming down a flight of steps was the same man who had experimented on her mother and so many others, and very probably found ways of silencing them without a care about the damage he was causing.

This was the same man who had kidnapped Kali from her family.

The same man who had orchestrated the experiments leading to the opening of the Gate, the same man who had ordered a fake body of Will to be found, even organising the examination to say it was Will before being buried.

This was the same man who had threatened Mike, Dustin, Lucas, Joyce, and Hop.

This was the same man Ray Carroll claimed was still alive, but she had told him he was mistaken, but now she knew the truth she felt like such a fool.

She hadn't seen him for years. But he had cast a shadow over her life, her nightmares. Oh, she had found so many things to be frightened of that made everything Angela and her friends had done to her during her time at Lenora seem like a petty argument.

She would have preferred it if Owens was the one in charge.

But Brenner…

As she stared at him, Jane clenched and unclenched her fists. Every fibre of her being, everything in her soul, screamed at her to turn, to forget this whole thing, and just run away. Let the USA deal with this new threat from the Upside Down since a large chunk was their own fault in the first place, but the part of her that wanted to get her powers back made her stand still.

But another part of her wished she could rush him, and pummel him into a bloodied mess for every single thing he had done, for the lives he had ruined, not only hers but so many more that were uncountable. Brenner would not expect it, he was an academic, but she didn't. She needed him.

He hadn't changed that much since she last saw him. He was still tall, thin, and lean, and he still had that shock of white hair and a lined face while he wore an immaculate suit. But he looked older now as if the years had been both kind and stressful at the same time. She didn't care.

"Hello, Eleven," he gave that unsettling smile of his that had never failed to terrify and reassure her at the same time.

Jane had to bite her tongue to stop herself from either screaming or lashing out. "Hello, Dr Brenner."

Brenner had the nerve to look hurt. "Aw, you're not going to call me-."

"Don't!" Jane lost the battle and shouted, taking him and everyone else by surprise with the anger in her voice, glaring at him fiercely just so she wouldn't hear that damn title he had forced on all of the children he'd taken. "Just don't. I'm not here to play your games. I'm here to get my powers back. Can we start soon, please?"

She noticed he looked…hurt by her hostility, but she didn't care.

Owens stepped forward. "She's agreed, but she has….conditions, Martin."

Brenner's expression turned dark and cool. "Conditions? What conditions?"

Owens turned to Jane expectantly. Jane held her head high, and she gazed at him with the same cold, expressionless mask she usually wore before a fight. "One, I am doing this of my own free will. I don't want to be cooped up. That's why, from time to time, I would like to walk outside in the open air. And before you argue, we're miles from the nearest town, and I think it's fair to have it as a reward, don't you think so?"

Brenner was still for a second, but then he nodded. "Very well," he agreed, surprising Jane with how quickly he had accepted her terms, and she wondered why. "But only as a reward if you do as you're told. We reserve the right to keep you in the base should you disobey us."

Jane lifted a brow, making a mental note to be cooperative so she wouldn't lose this privilege. "Agreed."

"What are your other conditions?"

"Second, you are going to leave my hair alone."

"We cut your hair to help us better access your mind, you know that-."

"Surely you can still do that?" Jane argued back.

Brenner sighed, not looking especially impressed or happy, but he looked resigned. "Alright. Anything else?"

"Third, don't call me Eleven. My name is Jane, so please use it," Jane said calmly, but it was a fight for her to remain calm and polite after her last explosion of temper.

To her surprise, Brenner smiled at her. "Jane? Yes, I'd heard you were using your birth name again."

Jane fumed, her mind flashing back to what she had seen in her mother's mind. "Fourth," she bit out, furious with him, "I want to know precisely what's going on in Hawkins."

Owens stepped forward, and out of her peripheral vision she could see he was just as horrified he would throw in a little crack about Terry Ives in such a manner. "I think those conditions are fair," he began.

"Fifth, I'd like something meaningful to do from time to time, like maybe listening to music or drawing sketches. I've become reasonably good at art, and I like doing something to keep my brain going," Jane said.

"I think we can arrange that," Brenner replied, but he let some of his guard down. "I must admit, I wasn't expecting our reunion to go like this. I'd expected you to run away. But you're home now."

Jane glared daggers at him.