what i want//steve harrington

019: Interrogation

Steve and Jamie were leaning against the kitchen counters and the kids were around the table. Mike got up and grabbed a gift Bob had given Will. 

He then spoke, "Did you guys know that Bob was the original founder of Hawkins AV?"

"Really?" Lucas asked. 

"He petitioned the school to start it and everything. Then he had a fund-raiser for equipment. Mr. Clarke learned everything from him. Pretty awesome, right?"

Lucas and Dustin both replied, "Yeah."

Mike set the gift down on the table, "We can't let him die in vain."

"What do you want to do, Mike?" Dustin harshly replied, "The Chief's right on this. We can't stop those Demo-dogs on our own."

"Demo-dogs?" Max questioned.

Dustin looked at her, "Demogorgon dogs...Demo-dogs. It's like a compound. It's like a play on words-"

"Okay."

Dustin continued, "I mean, when it was just Dart, maybe..."

"But there's an army now," Lucas finished.

"Precisely."

"His army..." Mike said. 

Steve looked at Mike, "What do you mean?"

Mike's face lit up, "HIS army! Maybe if we stop him, we can stop his army, too."

They all followed Mike to Will's room where he grabbed one of his drawings. 

"The shadow monster," Dustin said. 

"It got Will that day on the field. The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him."

"And so this virus, it's connecting him to the tunnels?" Max asked.

"To the tunnels, monster, the Upside Down, everything."

"Whoa. Slow down. Slow down," Steve said.

"Okay, so, the shadow monster's inside everything. And if the vines feel something like pain, then so does Will."

"And so does Dart," Jamie realized. 

"Yeah. Like what Mr. Clarke taught us. The hive mind."

"Hive mind?" Steve asked.

Dustin rolled his eyes, "A collective consciousness. It's a super-organism."

Jamie gave him a look.

Mike continued and pointed at the picture, "And this is the thing that controls everything. It's the brain."

"Like the mind flayer," Dustin said.

Max, Steve, and Jamie all said, "The what?"

They all went back to the kitchen and gathered everyone. Then Dustin read the DnD manual, "The mind flayer."

"What the hell is that?" Hopper asked.

"It's a monster from an unknown dimension. It's so ancient that it doesn't even know its true home. Okay, it enslaves races of other dimensions by taking over their brains using its highly-developed psionic powers."

"Oh, my God, none of this is real. This is a kids' game."

"No, it's a manual. And it's not for kids. And unless you know something that we don't, this is the best metaphor-"

"Analogy," Lucas corrected.

"Analogy? That's what you're worried about? Fine. An analogy for understanding whatever the hell this is."