Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Corinna didn't want to talk to anyone anymore. She felt like she had really lost Billy. He seemed too far gone to even come back to himself. She felt helpless, too. They needed help if they were going to do anything about the Mind Flayer coming back. "Knock knock." Julez spoke out instead of knocking on the door to Mike's room, which was where Corinna was napping in.
Corinna groaned and turned to look at Julez standing in the doorway. "You okay?" Julez asked her.
"As good as I'm going to be. Everyone still downstairs?" Corinna inquired.
"Yeah. They stopped talking about the Mind Flayer and began to whine about boyfriend and girlfriend problems so I left before it was too late." Julez chuckled, taking a seat next to her on the bed.
As soon as Julez got comfortable, a frantic Nancy and a stressed out Jonathan rushed into Mike's room. "Oh great, you two are here. Where are the others? We need to talk." Nancy spoke between her gasps for air. She seemed out of breath. Like she had been running for a while.
"In the basement." Julez spat out.
"Now." Nancy widened her eyes and nodded toward the entry to basement, then hastily hurried down there. Corinna and Julez looked curiously to one another, then sped downstairs to meet with everyone again.
"It was the same thing, the exact same thing that happened to Will last year. And look at this," Nancy tossed a piece of paper at Corinna, "look at the body temperatures."
It was a report of the old lady, Mrs. Driscoll's, body temps. Nancy was investigating the old lady since she had called into Nancy's newspaper office, which she and Jonathan now worked for, and told her about some crazy rats running around and eating chemicals. The body temps were oddly low for a normal human. Will peaked over Corinna's shoulder to take a look at the paper, too. "He likes it cold." Will whispered, placing a surprised hand over his mouth.
"Okay, so this crazy old woman who was eating fertilizer—" Mike began to repeat everything she told them.
"Mrs. Driscoll." Nancy corrected her brother so that he could be more respectful.
"Right, yeah, Mrs. Driscoll. What time was this attack?" Mike asked sharply, quite annoyed at her correction.
"Last night." Nancy shrugged.
"Yeah," Mike huffed, "but what time last night?" He reiterated.
"Around 9:00." Nancy answered him. "What time was your sauna test?"
"Same time." Corinna replied to her.
"Well," Nancy paused as she gathered her thoughts, "that proves it. That proves my theory!" Nancy seemed more excited than worried.
"She's flayed, just like Billy." Mike huffed in disbelief.
"Flayer?" Jonathan wasn't quite catching on to his term.
"The Mind Flayer. He flays people. Takes over their mind. Once they do that, they basically become him." Mike explained to the wide eyed Jonathan.
"If there are two flayed—" Lucas began connecting the dots, growing quite worried.
"We have to assume there are more." Will finished for him.
Eleven gasped. "Heather." She whispered to Corinna and Max. Corinna slowly leaned back into the couch as she realized this. "Billy was doing something to her. She was scared. She was screaming. Bad screams."
"...what's a good scream?" "Doesn't matter."
Lucas and Max's quick exchange was interrupted by Nancy. "I'm sorry. I'm lost. Who is Heather?" Nancy asked, wondering where she fit into the picture.
"She's a lifeguard at the pool." Max responded to her.
"Heather Holloway?" Nancy raised her voice as she realized who she was. The daughter of her boss, Tom.
"We've got to go." Nancy's throat went dry and she began to hastily walk out of the basement to her car. Jonathan followed at her heels, knowing who she needed to check on.
Everyone followed the two without hesitation and squeezed into the car. Nancy sped off to Tom's house as fast as she could. They all hopped out and hurried over to the front door. Nancy rang the doorbell. There was no answer. She rang again. Again, no answer. She turned to Eleven, and she instantly knew what she needed to do. El used her powers to open the door, allowing everyone inside.
They all creeped in and saw that the house was empty. Regardless, Nancy called out for Tom. "Tom? Heather?"
Upon entry, Corinna got the chills. The air conditioning was on blast in the whole house. It was freezing inside. They all entered the living room, but then Nancy stopped in her tracks. "You guys smell that?" Nancy asked the rest of the group. They all simultaneously sniffed the air.
They followed the smell into the kitchen and saw dozens of cleaning supplies opened on the counter. They seemed to be all empty. "Oh, god." Nancy gagged, knowing that the flayed must've ate or drank all those chemicals.
"You think they're guzzling this shit?" Jonathan asked the group.
"Yeah, either that or they just went on a hell of a cleaning spree." Nancy sarcastically replied.
"But last year, Will didn't eat chemicals." Max noted.
"This is something new." Will mumbled.
"What if they're making something?" Mike asked a returning question.
"In themselves? I mean, come on, if you drink this crap, it'll kill you." Max cringed as she imagined people scoffing powder and pouring window cleaner down their throats.
"Yeah. If you're human." Lucas scoffed.
They all moved on to the next room. The dining room. It was left exactly the same from when Corinna, El and Max confronted Billy about Heather. There was a wine bottle on the ground, and a spot of blood stained into the carpet next to it. "Yesterday, Tom has a bandage on his forehead. He was attacked." Nancy made notes about the scene they saw.
They followed the remaining spots of blood to the garage, only to find rope thrown on the ground. "They must've tied them. They must've taken them somewhere." Jonathon grabbed the rope and lifted it for everyone to see.
"Mrs. Driscoll. She kept saying 'I have to go back.' What if the flaying, it's taking place somewhere else? There must be a place where all this started, right? A source." Nancy began to ponder out loud so others could jump in if they had any ideas. Julez was quiet because she really hadn't seen much of what was going on and Corinna simply didn't want to speak at all. She wasn't in the mood. She was exhausted. Not just from running around chasing and fighting Billy.
"Somewhere he didn't want me to see." Eleven whispered to herself, but everyone could hear.
"If we can find the source, then maybe we can stop him. Or at least stop it from spreading or doing whatever the hell he's doing with those chemicals." Nancy raised her voice, confidently.
"How do we find it?" Eleven inquired.
"Mrs. Driscoll." Will spoke up. "If she wants to go back so badly, why don't we let her?" Will proposed. It was an amazing idea. But, one that was quite dangerous.
* * *
It was certainly a great idea to go see Mrs. Driscoll at the hospital and let her return to wherever she was going, to then follow her to see where that was, but... the front desk lady was too adamant to allow a group of kids that size to go see her. The rule was only two visitors at a time. And she didn't seem like she was going to let up any time soon for them. Nancy and Jonathan went ahead to go see her while the rest of the group stayed behind in the waiting room until they got word that they were on the move.
