Dungeons and Dragons- Stranger things

2.9 The Gate

"Eleven." Mike said surprised.

"Mike." Eleven said relieved to see him. 

"Is that..." Max asked.

"I never gave up on you. I called you every night. Every night for..." Mike started, but Eleven cut him off. 

"353 days. I heard." She admitted.

"Why didn't you tell me you were there? That you were okay?" Mike asked confused.

"Because I wouldn't let her." Hopper interrupted. "The hell is this? Where you been? Where have you been?" Hopper asked shifting his attention to Eleven and bringing her in for a hug.

"You've been hiding her. You've been hiding her this whole time!" Mike asked Hopper angrily.

"Hey! Let's talk. Alone." Hopper said taking him to another room. 

"We missed you." Lucas told El breaking the silence that fell over the room. 

"I missed you, too." El admitted.

"We talked about you pretty much every day." Dustin told his friend. 

"Teeth." El muttered.

"What?" Dustin asked. 

"You have teeth." El said surprised.

"Oh. You like these pearls?" Dustin asked as he growled and El gave him a weird look.

"Eleven? Hey. Um, I'm Max. I've heard a lot about you." Max said holding her hand out for El to shake. Eleven ignored it and went to Joyce.

"Hey. Hey, sweetheart. Hey." Joyce said hugging Eleven.

"Can I see him?" El asked referring to Will. Joyce took El back to see Will and left the rest of us in the living room.

"So, Eleven's alive and we're still totally screwed." Steve said from beside me. 

"Yeah, I guess we are totally screwed." I chuckled and then I broke into a full laughter fit. Everyone was staring at me weirdly because I was laughing so hard. "I'm sorry, it's just how did we manage to get into this situation twice? I mean once is enough for anyone, but twice? It's just funny." I said still laughing. 

"Yeah, well, I guess the universe likes to keep testing us." Steve said joining in on the laughter. 

"I usually great at tests, but this is just getting ridiculous." I said still smiling, but not laughing as much. El thought that she could close the gate, so we were all discussing a plan to make that happen.

"It's not like it was before. It's grown. A lot. And, I mean, that's considering we can get in there. The place is crawling with those dogs." Hopper said.

"Demo-dogs." Dustin corrected.

"I'm sorry, what?" Hopper sighed.

"I said, uh, Demo-dogs. Like Demogorgon and dogs. You put them together, it sounds pretty badass..." Dustin said and Hopper grew more annoyed.

"How is this important right now?" Hopper snapped.

"It's not. I'm sorry." Dustin apologized.

"I can do it." El said determined.

"You're not hearing me." Hopper said not wanting El in danger.

"I'm hearing you. I can do it." El insisted.

"Even if El can, there's still another problem. If the brain dies, the body dies." Mike informed.

"I thought that was the whole point." Max said confused.