Chapter 1: Welcome to the Dungeon
"My Owlbear claws your Rust Monster's guts out," Dustin shouts, practically spraying the board with his spit.
"Says you!" Lucas says back. "I play Gelatinous cube to consume your owlbear, nothing's going to be left of it."
"It's your deciding move Will," Mike says. He sits with his Dungeon Master set in front of him, Eleven watches with curiosity and confusion. She doesn't stray far from Mike's side the entire time. He gives her pointers on what monsters to play and explains what the best strategy was. She didn't really care about the game at all, just being with Mike and being treated like one of their Party was enough... She thinks she's being called a Mage.
"I summon my Spectre to cast the spell..." Will says eagerly.
Mike rolls the dice.
"It takes effect!"
"What? No, come on!" Dustin groans.
"What will El the Mage do?" Mike asks encouragingly.
El is staring intently at the board, waiting for her turn.
"I play... the Tarrasque," El says with a smirk. She uses her powers to move it over and knock all the other figurines off the board.
"WHAT?!" Dustin shouts.
"NO FAIR!" Lucas screeches.
"I think our Mage just won," Mike says.
"No fair dude, you were helping her the whole time!" Dustin whines.
"Beginners luck," Will shrugs, taking his pieces back. Personally, he was just relieved that everyone was playing D&D again, after a rather difficult summer of girl drama and Russian conspiracies.
"And she won... Do you really want to protest Dust?" Mike says.
El smirks and wipes a dribble of blood from her nose. Dustin leans back in defeat, knowing not to push the matter any further with their superhero of a friend.
"Does this mean it's over?" Max groans pulling out her Walkman headphones having lost interest in the game long ago. She had been reading a random magazine that was lying around the house. Both she and Eleven had been invited to Mike's basement for some "fun" times, instead of a boring board game. The only thing she found remotely interesting was how Will could fit ten Cheetos in his mouth and Lucas could suck root beer out of three straws at the same time.
"It is, and here's your prize," Mike says, wrapping El in a big hug. "You did great El... sorry, Jane."
None of the four boys were used to calling Eleven by her adopted name, even after so long. She was always El to them, but in order to protect her and give her a sense of normality, they had to call her Jane.
Eleven accepts the hug gleefully, managing to laugh a little bit.
"You know Max, you could've saved us if you stayed in the game," Dustin says.
"What can I say, I'm a zoomer, I don't like staying in one place for very long."
"You know a zoomer is not..." Dustin begins, but Lucas stomps on his foot.
"Ow! What the hell Luc!"
"She's a zoomer and that's what she is," he smiles at Max and she blushes slightly under her freckles. Despite how many times she'd "dumped" him, he still had a way of making her smile, the loveable goof-ball.
"Now can we please do something else, something more interesting?" Max asks.
Just then Mrs. Wheeler sticks her head down into the basement.
"Max, your Mom just called, she wants you home now to get ready for school tomorrow."
"Oh, come on!" the redhead mutters under her breath.
"Will, your brother is coming to pick you very soon and Jane, Chief Hopper called, he'll be over to pick you up, he's running a little late directing traffic."
Eleven swallows. "Thank... you," she says quietly.
Mike gives her an encouraging smile, knowing social interactions were still not her strongest suit. Max picks up her skateboard and begins trudging up the stairs, the rest of the group following behind her.
"I can't believe school starts tomorrow," Will sighs, grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl in the kitchen. "High school..."
"So what? It's like that hive we burned down," Max grumbles as well. "Dark, ashy and upside down..."
"Come on guys, it's high school. It's a whole new world," Lucas says, trying to be upbeat.
"Yeah, and we better be ready for the big leagues for D&D," Dustin says. "Hellfire Club."
"Like I said, dark and upside down..."
Everyone shoots a look at her and she shrinks back from her statement. It had been almost half a year since Eleven had closed the gate to the Upside Down and Will had been slug-free, but the wounds still felt fresh to the group. The trauma was immense for all of them and they were all taking baby steps to recover. Will shrinks slightly at the mention, but says nothing else and continues eating his apple.
There had been another near encounter this past summer on the Fourth of July, where Dustin, Steve, Lucas' sister Erica, and Steve's friend, Robin, had discovered a secret Russian base underneath Starcourt Mall, who were attempting to re-open the gate. Fortunately, the plot had been foiled before any serious damage had been done and while the Mall had caught fire at one point, the local hangout spot was still intact.
"Sorry," Max says.
Mike stops at the door when he sees Johnathan pull up in the beat-up family car. He nearly vomits when he sees his sister get out of the passenger door, the stupid giddy look in her eyes he saw when she'd been dating Steve.
"You think they've done it yet?" Dustin asks randomly.
Mike slugs his curly-haired friend in the shoulder and Will stomps on his foot.
"OW! Again, with the abuse."
"That's my sister you're talking about," he hisses.
"And my brother," Will mutters, turning away to finish his apple.
"What? They look like they're in love, don't they?" Dustin protests.
"Love?" Eleven asks, tilting her head to the side. "What kind of love?"
Mike swallows hard, not sure how to explain it to the girl he had deep feelings for. He wasn't sure if it was love... maybe it was, but he was far from ready to have that conversation with her.
The group watches as Johnathan kisses Nancy on the cheek before she turns to kiss him fully. The preteens look away in slight disgust, except for Eleven, who watches with curiosity.
"That's a kind of love," Max explains. "It's this feeling you get inside yourself, it makes you say stupid things, you feel like you're going to vomit, your head feels like it's drifting away..."
El looks at her in confusion.
"It's hard to describe," Mike says quickly.
"Just think if they get married, you guys are brothers-in-law," Dustin continues to tease.
He backs away before Mike and Will can hit him again. Lucas and the others follow suit as Nancy starts coming up the driveway towards the front door, wrapped in Johnathan's jean jacket.
Johnathan honks the horn indicating it was time for his brother to join him.
"I'll see you guys tomorrow," Will says, grabbing his coat and opening the door. He nearly runs into Mike's older sister.
"Oh sorry, Nancy," he says, not even looking up.
"Bye Will," she says kindly as the kid heads towards his brother's car. She passes the other group members, not caring if they saw her and Johnathan, Mike would pay for that later. She goes upstairs without a word to anyone.
"Oh yeah, also everything else becomes invisible to you," Max adds in her explanation. "Anyways, I'll see you, nerds, tomorrow."
"You sure you don't want me to come with you?" Lucas asks.
Max blushes but shakes her head.
"No, I'm good," Max says. She walks out onto the front lawn, putting her board down and getting onto it, she rides along the sidewalk and down the street.
Johnathan honks at the other kids, waving as Will gets into the front seat. The others wave in response before the elder teenager starts to turn around. That is until he must veer to the side to avoid an oncoming car travelling into the cul-de-sac.
"Who's that?" Will asks, curiously as a station wagon with a trailer hitched to the back and bicycles tied to the roof pulls into the vacant house nearby.
"New neighbours I guess," Johnathan shrugs as he begins driving home.
The appearance was not lost on the other onlookers.
"Who the hell is that?" Dustin asks, hopping onto the couch to get a better look out the front window.
"Looks like new neighbours," Lucas answers, joining his friend and peering through the window too. "They're moving into the Winchester's old house."
"You mean that weird couple that used to throw golf balls at cars and steal Mike's dad's Playboys?" Dustin asks.
Mike turns red and is relieved that El doesn't know what Playboy was. The curiosity gets the best of him and he and Eleven go to the window to get a closer look.
"Where do you think they're from?" Mike asks.
"I can't read the license plate..." Lucas squints into the graying front yard.
He and Dustin hop off the couch and go outside. Mike follows with Eleven trailing. Usually, Mike Wheeler couldn't care less about people moving in, but it was something new and normal happening in their small town compared to what's happened in the past.
The four of them watch as a tall man, a woman and two kids climb out of the parked station wagon. One looks about five or six years old, he races around up to the front stoop with childish excitement. The other kid looked to be just about their age, maybe a little bit older, taller, and lankier. He looks around nervously until he spots the group looking at him.
Bill swallows and looks back at the kids, standing in an almost perfect line. They were curious about the people moving in. He looks away just as Georgie races by.
"George Elmer Denbrough, settle down!" his mother orders. Bill's father, with a box in his hand, unlocks the front door and his wife follows him in.
"Look Bill, kids!" Georgie says excitedly. Before Bill can stop him, his brother races across the cul-de-sac towards the group.
"G-G-GEORGIE! C-Come back!" Bill calls, racing over to grab his brother.
The six-year-old runs up to the group.
"Hi, I'm Georgie," he says cheerfully to the group. "What's your name?"
Everyone is a little shell-shocked by the forwardness of the kid but decides that he's harmless enough.
"Uh... I'm Dustin, that's Lucas, Mike's over there and that's El... I mean Jane."
"G-Georgie," Bill says, coming over to grab his brother's arm. "S-Sorry if my b-brother is b-bothering you."
"It's okay," Lucas shrugs. The young boy reminds him of his sister Erica but is much less annoying.
"I'm Mike, this is Dustin, that's Lucas and this is Jane," Mike says, re-introducing them to the older kid. Bill can see that this Mike, looks a lot like his friend Richie, minus the coke-bottle glasses. It was uncanny the way the two looked alike, they could be identical twins. The boy on the far left... Dustin wore a ball cap over what seemed to be an afro of curly hair. Next to him was the Lucas kid, he had a bandana tied around his head and one around his wrist. There was a girl next to Mike, probably shyer than the others because she stood behind Mike as if for protection. She had hair that was about shoulder-length and slightly unruly with curls. He locks eyes with the girl for a moment before she looks away.
"I'm B-B-Bill," the stuttering preteen says nervously. "Bill Denbrough."
"Where did you guys just move from?"
"D-Derry, Maine," Bill answers.
"Oh, are you guys part of that evacuation project my mom was talking about?" Dustin asks.
Bill nods, trying to guide his brother back to the house.
"S-See you around," Bill says as casually as he can before walking back with Georgie to the house.
"They're nice," Georgie says brightly as he goes inside the house. Bill can still feel the group's eyes on him. He was very nervous about his brother's statement, he wonders if they'll treat him well or like garbage because they were from a different town. He picks up some of the boxes before heading inside. He pauses once to see the girl in the group waving to him. He struggles but waves back.
A/N: Bill and Georgie meet the Party.