Fallout || Stranger Things [2]

twenty-seven || bombs and blankets

     "Sending children to war is the United States' favorite thing to do," she snapped despite the guilt clinging to her chest. "It was us against that facility. Yes, I should have thought it through, but I did exactly what they beat me for months to do. I used something that this government did to me to get us out of there. The same government that failed to notice a thousand-manned Soviet facility built underneath the same town that they experimented on innocent people for decades in. You can blame me for this but don't forget who started it."

     "We can't bomb the Soviets," Hones flatly replied, unmoved by her speech. "We're barely keeping this war cold as it is, secret science divisions aside."

     "We've bombed the hell out of other places for less," Hopper stated between deep drags, smoke drifting slow out of the veteran's mouth.

     Owens waved a hand, finally opening pinched shut eyes. "No one will clear this. We were cleared to collect you. We were told not to breach the border if we could help it."

     "Now you can't help it," pressed Hopper as he leaned forward on the table, his voice grave as the bright orange and red flashes of the gate below Hawkins flickered behind his eyes. "November nineteen eighty-four, Doc. You saw what they did just under Hawkins. You know the damage those tunnels did."

     "We are not-"

     "I'll let you run tests on me," Tate said with a raised voice, cutting off Hones as she locked eyes with Owens.

     Orlo and Martyn's eyes widened, quick glances being shot around the table.

     Tatum held up a finger. "Just me," she clarified. "If you do this, I will let you run whatever tests you want on me." Her eyes flickered from Hones to the doctor. "That's what you want isn't it?"

     Hopper shook his head, waving a hand before plucking the cigarette from his mouth. "No, no we're not doing Hawkins Lab again. She's gone through enough-"

     Tate dropped a half-clenched fist on the table, silencing the room. "I have had every choice taken away from me for months. I'm done. Doc, if you do this for me, I'll let you run your tests. No spying, no government bidding, but real science. Maybe we can figure out what changed, what's different."

     "Tate..." Hop whispered, gently shaking his head.

     "I'll go to school near a lab. We can figure that out, but I'll do it. I'll show you what I know how to do and we'll...we'll do it for the right reasons. We'll be different from Brenner."

     "Sir," Hones piped up. "We could offer the Soviets their POWs from the Starcourt raid. That's what Ozerov's been after. They will want to keep this quiet. They wouldn't have to publicly admit defeat. It could work."

     Owens' eyes flickered from Hones back to Tatum.

     She nodded gently. "Stepanov's the only one left. He must've known that Ozerov was going to Kamchatka to visit us. We don't have long before they get there first."

     "If that happens, we won't be able to control their reaction," added the Air Force captain. "If we're going to do this, it has to be soon."

     Owens inhaled, gaze locked to Tatum's grey eyes. Grey. His jaw clenched ever so slightly and he released the breath through his nose. "I'll call the President."

||

Tucked under the cover of the back bunkbed and having excused herself from first call to dinner, Tatum dragged a blue ink pen along a sketchbook brought over from the base's commissary in short, strong lines. She shaped the frame of the machines stacked in Zharkov's office within the prison, etching it out from crystal clear memory. Her aching hand paused as she started a line of the chair beside his desk.