While the Party were meeting with each other, they watched the television and focused on the news; the gates ripped open, torn into the world by Creel, were being met with a lot of resistance. Already there were stories of soldiers from different countries fighting against the Demogorgons and Demobats while they tore the cities to shreds.
In London, there were swarms of Demobats tearing through the infamous pigeon population, and ripping into everyone; crowds of people, screaming as they tried to escape.
In the New York subway, there was a gate open, but nobody had even known about it until the Demogorgons started ripping people to shreds; a few brave journalists and camera technicians had documented and recorded the carnage, while the NYPD had struggled to fight back along with whatever criminals had guns.
And it was the same with everywhere else. In all of those places, there was a general call for people to just try to stay safe at home, but so many people didn't listen, or they didn't hear it, despite the enormous amounts of damage and carnage.
While the Party in Hawkins chatted about their long-term plans, they often paused and watched the chaos unfolding.
"Whatever you saw in the Upside Down hasn't come out yet, Nancy, do you think what he showed you was just…a trick?" Karen asked hopefully.
Nancy bit her lip. She wasn't unsurprised by her mother's question, "I hope so, Mum, but I don't think so," she said, much to her mother's upset.
Holly shook her head, looking scared. "It's falling apart, the whole world."
"I think the world has been falling apart for a long time," Dottie replied.
Hopper turned seriously to his daughter. "Well, the world is fighting back," he said, "Are you sure you want to go into the Upside Down?"
"Want to, no. Need to, yes," Jane replied.
"Do we have any weapons, or do we need to find them?" Will asked.
"We've still got some of the guns and weapons from when we tried to stop him from killing Max, but we might need more," Robin replied, and she smiled as she got an idea. "What if we steal from the army?"
"Are you mad, they need them to keep the Demogorgons at bay!"
"No, I don't mean from the living. I mean take them from the dead, surely we can do that?" Robin said.
"We could," Hopper replied thoughtfully, "but the best way to kill a Demogorgon is to use fire. If we had the time, we could make petrol bombs."
"Couldn't we do that anyway, just drive into town, pick up the supplies we'd need?" Mike asked, but Ted shook his head. "Nah, the last few days have been chaotic, with everyone trying to get out, and God alone only knows what the state of the store is."
"I can, it's a mess," Dustin pointed out, "Lucas and me, we were getting some supplies for the school, and the store was practically stripped to the walls."
"Maybe, but I wish we had something that could give us a weapon we could use more than once on everything coming out of the Upside Down," Lucas said.
"What if we don't need to worry about that?" Kali suddenly said as a radical idea sprang to her mind. "What if we can use fire without using fire?" She asked.
"What do you mean, Kali?" Joyce asked.
"Well, I can create illusions, what if I form an illusion they are on fire?" Kali asked the group at large.
Jane's eyes lit up, but then her enthusiasm for the idea faded a little bit. "I like it, but how do you know their minds would work with it?"
Kali deflated herself. "Oh yeah," she sulked a little as her plan didn't seem so great after all.
"It was a good idea," Hopper reassured her, "but I think we should come up with other plans. I like the idea of taking more weapons into the Upside Down, but can we get them?"
"We still have the weapons we took," Erica said.
Karen didn't like the idea of kids talking about this, but then again she knew her two eldest children had been fighting this evil for years. She would have to get used to it, even if she knew she couldn't.
"Did you bring anything with you?" Jonathan asked Kali and her gang.
"We did, but we could only bring so much," the woman they were sure was named Mick replied.
"We brought a couple of guns, some baseball bats, but we didn't bring any bombs," Funshine added with a sad shake of his head.
"Every little helps," Joyce said reassuringly.
"I brought a chainsaw with me; it's petrol-driven, but before you ask, no I didn't bring enough for petrol bombs," Axel said.
"That's even better," Nancy smiled. "Demogorgons and Demobats are nasty enough, and we might need a chainsaw."
Axel grinned back. "I'm looking forward to it."
The Party felt he was a bit too enthusiastic. Kali and her gang didn't know what to expect from this, but they had heard Axel was a bit…mad.
"No," Dustin shook his head with a sigh. "I don't like any of this; we know the Demogorgons react badly to heat and fire. So why can't we find some gas, dump it into the Upside Down, and simply set it alight like we did when we first fought the Mind Flayer?"
"That's a better idea than using petrol bombs," Lucas said.
"The only problem with that is where can we find the petrol in the first place?"
Jane sighed, tired of the never-ending talking; every minute they wasted, the more the world became worse. "Why don't we go into town and find a place where we can get it, make our plans then?" She asked looking around. "At the same time, we can reach Eddie's trailer, get inside the Upside Down from there, and get close to One while we still can."
"I don't like the idea of you going out there, Jane," Hopper said, with a weary sigh. "But I know you have to," he added resigned.
Jane sent him a sad look. "I know. I never wanted this any more than you did. But I have to make up for my own mistakes; just because I've accepted the fact I'm not completely responsible doesn't mean I'm not."
Karen shook her head. "I don't like this, I wish you kids weren't responsible for ending all of this…this hell," she got out.
"We've been involved ever since Will went missing, Mum," Mike said sadly.
"And when Barb was taken, too; I made a mistake there, as well, and I've been trying to make up for it since," Nancy added.
Karen bit her lip, wishing her children hadn't needed to grow up like this. It was horrifying. Joyce sent her friend a worried look, but before anyone could say anything else, come up with a new idea, Erica gasped. "Mum? Dad?"