There's No Place Like Hawkins//Stranger Things. SH

THIRTY THREE

"Will, what's wrong?" Mike asked, sitting up in his sleeping bag on the floor.

Will looked at the two of them, the fear clear in his eyes. The three of them scrambled out of Will's bedroom and into the living room where Joyce was sat on the floor in the middle of the room. Both Cat and Mike watched as Will spoke to his mom, eventually pulling her out of her thoughts. Joyce jumped slightly as Will placed a hand on her shoulder. "Yeah?" She turned around to face him.

"I saw him." Will told her.

"You saw who, baby?" Joyce asked.

"Hopper. I think he's in trouble. I think he's going to die."

Cat brought her hand to her mouth and began to bite her nails. There had to be a way they could save Hopper. There had to be. She couldn't lose the closest person she had to a father figure. She just couldn't.

***

Claudia Henderson entered her house after standing outside, calling out for Mews. "Dusty, baby, you're sure she's not in either yours of Catherine's rooms? Speaking of which, where is Catherine? I don't think she came home last night."

Dustin responded by holding a finger up to her, signalling that he was busy. "Uh-huh." He said into the receiver. "Thank you so much, Mr. McCorkle. Thank you so much. You are a true lifesaver. All right, this was great. Thank you. All right. Have a good one. Bye-bye, now. All right. You, too." He placed the phone down and turned to his mom. "All right, great news."

"They found her?" Claudia hopefully asked.

"No. But they saw her wandering around Loch Nora." Dustin told her, completely and utterly lying. "And Cat probably stayed the night at Steve's again."

Claudia started crying. "How did the poor baby get all the way out there?" She asked, her main priority being her cat as she now knew her daughter was fine and safe- which she wasn't seeing as a monster was trying to kill her in order to get to Will Byers, but the poor woman didn't know that. And neither did Dustin. Surprisingly, Cat didn't know that yet either as Joyce and Will had yet to tell her.

"I don't know. Lost, I guess. But they're gonna look for her. And I'll stay here, just in case they call again. And you're gonna go help look? Yeah? Yeah?" Mrs. Henderson wrapped her arms around her son, pulling him in for a hug. "Give me a hug. Give me a hug." The two pulled away and Mrs. Henderson headed for the door. "Go get her. You're gonna find her." Dustin reassured his mother.

"Okay."

"We can find her."

"We can find her." Claudia repeated, shutting the door behind her as the two exchanged 'I love yous'.

***

Geared up in old sports gear with a hockey stick in his hand, Dustin approached his bedroom door being careful to not step on the meat he had laid out threw his house for the creature to follow. "All right, Dart." He called through the locked door. "Breakfast time." He reached forward and with his oven glove covered hands he pulled the door open before turning around and running down the hallway, out into the garden- a string of 'oh, my God's' and 'shit's 'leaving his mouth as he did so.

The curly haired boy ran into the old green shed at the bottom of the garden, making sure to shut the door behind him. Panting, Dustin peered through cracks in the wooden panelling, watching and waiting for Dart to follow the trail of meat into the cellar.

"Come on." Dustin whispered. "Come on, I know you're hungry." His eyes widened as he saw Dart follow the trail through the front door and down the porch steps. The more baby Demogorgon got closer and closer, the more Dustin wished his older sister was there to help him- even if he knew she'd be furious at him for accidentally allowing her precious cat to be eaten.

"Yes, yes, yes." Dustin whispered as Dart ran down the path, eating the occasional piece of meat. He continued to repeat 'yes' over and over again as Dart approached the open entrance to the cellar.

Dart growled, suddenly turning around to face the direction of Dustin's hiding spot.

"Shit!" The youngest Henderson cried, jumping back away from the wall. He began to breathe heavily, pressing his back up against the wall adjacent to the shed's door- hoping with everything he had that he had not been spotted by the faceless creature.

Dart began to stalk towards the shed as Dustin worked up the bravery to face the small creature. It was only the size of a small dog, what harm could it do? Other than eat his family's pet cat. With a yell, Dustin threw open the shed door, and began chasing Dart towards the cellar. Using the hockey stick, he hit Dart with it, knocking the small but deadly creature down the steps of the cellar.

As Dart began to run back up the steps, Dustin dropped his hockey stick and quickly slammed the doors to the cellar shut, stopping the cat-eating creature from escaping. He laid his body on top of the red door.

"I'm sorry. You ate my cat."

***

Edited: 18/4/2020

Edit 2: 10/9/2021