The five kids had been alone in the gymnasium for quite some time. Jonathan and Nancy were supposed to have stayed with them, but they had both left the gym at the same time Hopper and Joyce had and had not come back, leaving Mike and Emily in particular very anxious. So anxious that they simultaneously decided to get up and look for them. Once they had exited the gym, they separated, Emily going down the hallway and Mike going outside. Emily found the hallway completely empty except for her and turned around to go the other way, planning on going outside with Mike, but he came back inside the building just before she did.
"They left, didn't they?" Emily asked him.
"Yeah. They did," Mike answered.
"Assholes," Emily muttered as the two of them went back inside the gym.
"They're gone," Mike told the other three.
"What?" Lucas asked.
"Nancy and Jonathan. His car's gone."
"They're probably just sucking face somewhere," Dustin said.
"Gross," Lucas said.
"No. No way!" Mike said.
"Yeah, Jonathan wouldn't have left us here unless it was for something important," Emily said.
"Did they go with the chief?" Dustin questioned.
"I don't know," Mike said.
"No," Eleven said.
"What? Did you see them? Do you know where they went?"
"Yes."
"Where? Where did they go?"
"Demogorgon."
Emily sighed, internally cursing her brother.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
"Guys, guys! This is crazy," Mike said. "We can't just wait around."
"Mike, in case you forgot, we're still fugitives," Lucas reminded him. "The bad men are still looking for us."
"Yeah, and we don't even know where your sister is," Dustin added.
"El can find them," Mike said.
"Mike, she's drained," Emily told him. "We need to let her rest for now."
"I thought you said you didn't want to sit around either?"
"I did, but we can't just use El whenever we have a problem. She has her limits and it's not our place to push them. This is up to us."
"I still think we should stick to the chief's plan," Dustin said.
"Exactly. We stay here, keep El out of sight and keep her safe," Lucas agreed. "That's the most important thing, remember? Besides, Nancy's okay. She's with Jonathan."
"Yeah, and she's kind of a badass now, so..." Dustin said before walking away.
"Well, where are you going? You just said stick to the plan!" Mike called after him.
"I am. I'm just gonna go get some chocolate pudding. I'm telling you, Lunch Lady Phyllis hoards that shit."
"Are you serious?"
"El needs to be recharged!"
Lucas followed Dustin out of the gym, leaving the other three alone for a moment before Emily and Mike exchanged a look, and they and Eleven left to the cafeteria.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
Dustin and Lucas had gone to the kitchen to look for the chocolate pudding, and Mike and Emily had sat Eleven down at one of the tables in the cafeteria to rest while they stood around at the doors, keeping an eye on the windows in case someone arrived.
"I found the chocolate pudding!" they heard Dustin yell from the kitchen.
"Okay!" they yelled back, not really interested.
After a moment of silence, Emily spoke. "It's weird, isn't it?" she said. "I mean, Will's gonna be home soon, and everything's gonna start going back to normal."
Mike looked over at her. "You think so?"
"Well, not really. I don't think it'll ever be like it was before. Not with El around."
The two looked over at the girl, who was resting her head on the table. She must have felt their eyes on her, because she turned and looked at them and gave them a small, tired smile. They both gave her a smile in return before diverting their attention away.
"No, what I meant was," Emily said, "we're gonna have to go back to school and everything like nothing ever happened."
"Oh," Mike said. "Yeah..." They fell into another silence, and this time it was Mike that broke it. "The Snow Ball is coming up."
"Oh, yeah, it is, isn't it?" Emily was familiar with this dance that their school put on annually just before Christmas, though she had never attended. "I've never gone."
"Me neither. But, uh... I was thinking, maybe... if you wanted to... we could go. Like, together."
Emily looked over at him and a smile grew on her face. "You really want to?"
Mike looked back at her, appearing very nervous as he awaited her answer. He nodded. "Yeah."
Emily's smile grew even bigger, and in the temporary happiness of the moment, without verbally answering his question, she leaned in and kissed him. A second or two passed and she pulled away, and once she did so, she suddenly realized what she had done, her eyes widening as she looked at his shocked expression.
"Um..." Mike finally said, "s-so was that a yes?"
Emily laughed, relieved that her impulsiveness hadn't ruined anything. "Yes, I will go to the Snow Ball with you."
Now it was Mike's turn to smile. "Cool."
"Cool."
The two fell into another silence, both of them blushing furiously. Light shining through the windows distracted them and brought them back to reality. Thinking that Nancy and Jonathan had come back, the two rushed out of the building to meet them, but were instead greeted by the sight of military vehicles pulling into the parking lot and soldiers entering the building from a different entrance. The two kids ran back inside of the building to warn their friends. When they entered the cafeteria, they saw that Dustin and Lucas had joined Eleven at the table she was sitting at and had put the large amount of chocolate pudding they found on the table.
"Guys! Guys!" Mike said to get their attention.
"What is it?" Lucas asked.
"They found us."
Immediately, they left the cafeteria as fast as they could, abandoning the chocolate pudding. As they ran, they tried to remain as quiet as possible so as to not alert the 'bad men' of their whereabouts.
"How did they find us?" Lucas questioned as they ran.
"I don't know, but they knew we were in the gym," Mike said.
"Lando," Dustin said.
"Seriously, Dustin, shut up about Lando," Emily said.
Suddenly, the door at the end of the hallway they were walking down burst open, and beams of light were shining on the five pre-teens. They turned and ran the other way as fast as they could, but it seemed that down every hallway they turned into, there was a group of 'bad men' coming towards them. Eventually, they were surrounded on all sides, with nowhere to run to and soldiers and other officials pointing guns at them.
Lucas, Mike, Dustin, and Emily turned to look at Eleven and saw that she was staring down the three people who were pointing guns at her. They looked at the adults and saw that they were bleeding from their eyes. A moment later, every single one of the people surrounding them dropped to the ground, dead, and a moment after that, Eleven fell to the ground as well.
"El! El, are you okay?" Mike questioned as they all shook her, trying to get her to come to. "El!"
"El, come on, wake up," Emily pleaded.
"Something's wrong."
"She's just drained," Dustin said.
"No, no, no, she won't wake up. El!"
"El, please," Emily said, terrified that Eleven had been pushed too far.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
Emily leaned down close to Eleven's face. "She's barely breathing," she told the boys.
"We gotta go," Lucas said.
"Leave her," an unfamiliar voice said, startling the four conscious kids. They stood up and saw one of the men that chased them the day before accompanied by another man and two soldiers. "Step away from the child."
"No!" Mike said.
"You want her, you'll have to kill us first," Emily said. She and the boys stood in front of the unconscious Eleven.
"That's right!" Dustin agreed.
"Eat shit!" Lucas added.
Suddenly, Emily felt herself being grabbed from behind, and before she knew it, she and the boys were being restrained by soldiers and the man they had just been yelling at picked Eleven up into a sitting position and grabbed her face.
"Eleven? Eleven, can you hear me?" the man asked. "Eleven?"
"Papa?" Eleven questioned in a raspy voice.
"Yes, yes, it's your papa."
"Let her go! Let her go, you bastard!" Mike yelled at him.
"You evil piece of shit, let her go!" Emily shouted.
Eleven began to whimper, looking around with a frightened expression as she realized what was happening.
"Shh, shh, you're sick," the man told her. "You're sick, but I'm going to make you better. I'm going to take you back home, where I can make you well again. Where we can make all of this better, so no one else gets hurt."
Eleven looked up at the man she called 'Papa'. "Bad," she said. "Bad." She began to weakly reach out for Mike and Emily, who were still struggling against the soldiers along with Dustin and Lucas. "Mike. Em."
Just then, the lights in the hallway, which had been off, began to flicker at an alarming rate. Everyone became distracted by them, including the four kids being restrained, who stopped struggling.
"Blood," Mike said.
Emily remembered: Nancy and Jonathan had told them that the Demogorgon, the monster that had taken Will and killed Barbara, was attracted by blood, and they had a whole lot of bleeding dead people all around them.
"Oh, shit," she said.
Ahead of them, the brick wall on which was painted a paw print began to crumble and bend in unnatural ways, and Emily knew that on the other side of that wall, about to break through, was the Demogorgon. Finally, it broke through, revealing itself to be just how Joyce had described it to the police the night that Will's fake body had been found: long limbs and no face; in place of it's face was a large mouth that would open to reveal thousands of sharp teeth.
The man that Eleven called 'Papa' was no longer paying attention to her, and the soldiers restraining the kids let them go to open fire on the monster. The kids took this opportunity to grab Eleven up off of the floor and run.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
They ran to Mr. Clarke's classroom, shutting and locking the door behind them, all the while hearing the rapid fire of the guns shooting at the Demogorgon. Dustin, who had been the one carrying Eleven, set her down gently on one of the lab tables in the back. Emily took her hand in both of hers, trying desperately not to cry so that she wouldn't upset Eleven.
"Just hold on a little longer, okay?" she pleaded. "Just think of when this is over. You'll be back at Mike's house, and you can come over to mine whenever you want. That'll be fun. I mean, my house isn't as big and nice as Mike's, but you've already met my mom and Jonathan, and they like you. They're nice, aren't they? They'll be even nicer once everything goes back to normal and we don't have to worry about Will or that stupid monster anymore. Oh, and Will! You'll get to meet him, too, 'cause he'll be back soon. I bet you, my mom and the chief have already got him and they're bringing him home right now. It'll be great, El. You won't have to worry about the bad men anymore, and we'll all get to hang out all the time."
"Promise?" Eleven asked.
"Promise."
A sudden loud screech from the Demogorgon startled the kids, causing them to look towards the door. By the sound of it, there was only one gun shooting at it now. After a few moments, both the screeching and the gunfire stopped.
"I-I-Is it dead?" Dustin asked.
"No," Emily said, pointing up the ceiling. "The lights..."
Suddenly, the door was broken down, making it land flat on the floor. Standing on top of it was the Demogorgon.
As Emily stood frozen in front of Eleven, Mike and Dustin were screaming at Lucas to get out the wrist rocket. Lucas hurriedly did, shooting the Demogorgon once, but the rock simply bounced off of the creature, not fazing it one bit. He tried three more times with the same result, the monster walking ever closer with every second. One last time, Lucas shot the monster with his wrist rocket, and this time, when the rock hit it, it flew back, hitting the chalkboard on the opposite wall hard.
At first, the kids were amazed that Lucas's wrist rocket could do that, but when Eleven began to walk up to the Demogorgon, bleeding from her nose and ears, they realized it wasn't the wrist rocket at all.
"Eleven, stop!" Mike said, going after her, but he was thrown back into the cabinets.
Eleven continued her slow walk up to the front of the classroom, where she was using her powers to pin the Demogorgon to the chalkboard. When she stood just a few feet in front of it, she stopped and looked over her shoulder at her friends.
"Goodbye, Mike. Goodbye, Em," she said solemnly. Neither one of them responded as they watched her, tears streaming down their faces. She turned back to the Demogorgon, which was continually screeching as it struggled against the invisible force holding it still. "No more."
She lifted her hand up, and the monster began to roar so loud that the kids had to cover their ears. Their eyes screwed shut as well, so they did not see what exactly was happening; the only indication of what was occurring was the muffled screaming they were hearing coming from both Eleven and the creature.
When the terrible noise stopped, the kids finally uncovered their ears and opened their eyes, looking to the front of the classroom. It was now barren except for what looked like dust floating down to the floor.
The four that were left began to call Eleven's name, for she was nowhere to be found. Soon, though, they realized she was gone.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
Eventually, police and ambulances began to arrive at the school. Dustin, Lucas, Mike, and Emily were all escorted out of the building and each to a different ambulance. EMTs looked them over to make sure they weren't injured. None of them were, but the EMT that was looking over Emily insisted on checking out the wound on her cheek, and just like Mike had, he told her that she would need stitches.
Mike's parents arrived soon after, and not long after that, they drove the kids to the hospital, where a police officer told them Will was, and that he was alive. Of course, Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler were very confused by this news, but went to the hospital anyway. They arrived there at the same time Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve Harrington did, but the only people that were allowed to go back and see Will were Emily and Jonathan because they were family; everyone else had to stay in the waiting room with Hopper until Will was permitted to have visitors.
Already in the room by Will's bedside was Joyce, who pulled both of her conscious children into hugs when they entered. She was the one that informed them that it looked like Will would make it, and they were just waiting for him to wake up.
An EMT must have contacted someone at the hospital, for not long after Emily sat down in a chair by her twin's hospital bed, a doctor came in and said that they had to stitch up her wound. However, Emily refused to leave Will's side, so the doctor was forced to stitch up her cheek in that same room.
It was a while before Will woke up, but when he did, it was a huge relief for his mother and siblings.
"Hey," Joyce said in a gentle voice, beginning to stroke Will's hair. "Hi, sweetheart."
"Where... Where am I?" Will questioned in a quiet voice.
"You're home. You're home now," Jonathan said, tears beginning to form in his eyes. "You're safe."
"Jonathan," Will said, his voice happy though still slightly weak.
"Yeah, it's me, buddy. We missed you. We really missed you."
Will looked down at Jonathan's bandaged hand, which Emily was noticing for the first time as well. "Are you okay?"
"What, this?" Jonathan held his injured hand up. "It's just a cut. It's nothing."
"That's what they all say," Emily said jokingly.
Will looked at her, no doubt noticing the stitches in her cheek. "What happened to your face?"
"Really, dude? I just helped save your ass and you're calling me ugly?"
"Emily!" Joyce exclaimed as Will laughed.
"That's not what I meant," he said.
"I know it's not, I was just messing with you," Emily told him. "No, but really, it's just a cut, and it's obviously stitched up now, anyway. Nothing to worry about."
"Really?" Jonathan said, calling out the hypocrisy of her statement.
"Okay, but mine's actually a cut."
"So is mine! Would you like to see it? It's still fairly fresh, I'm sure it's disgusting."
"Okay, you two, that's enough," Joyce said, although she was smiling, clearly glad to have all three of her children back with her and in good spirits.
After a bit more good-natured conversation and catching-up (Emily gladly left out the fact that she had been spending so much time with Mike and had even kissed him just hours prior), Jonathan briefly left the room to tell Dustin, Lucas, and Mike that Will was awake. Moments after he did so, the boys came rushing in, Mike reaching Will first and gently hugging him.
"Byers!" Lucas exclaimed, he and Dustin coming over to lightly hug Will as well.
"Be careful. Be careful with him," Joyce advised the boys, leaving the room to give Will some alone time with his friends and sister.
"Guys, guys," Jonathan said, chuckling. "Go easy on him."
"You won't believe what happened when you were gone, man," Lucas said.
"It was mental," Dustin said.
"You had a funeral."
"Jennifer Hayes was crying."
"Which was really weird," Emily said. "Has she ever even talked to you before?"
Will shook his head to confirm that Jennifer had never spoken to him before.
"And Troy peed himself," Lucas said.
"What?" Will said, astonished.
"In front of the whole school!" Dustin said.
"He went crazy after that, you wouldn't believe it," Emily said.
The kids fell silent, watching Will in concern as he had a coughing fit, reminding them that even though he was back from the Upside Down, he still had yet to recover from any effects the experience may have had on him.
"You okay?" Mike asked him when he had finished coughing.
"It got me," Will said. "The Demogorgon."
"We know. It's okay. It's dead. We made a new friend."
"Besides my sister?"
"I mean, yeah, her, too, but this isn't who I'm talking about. She stopped it. She saved us."
"On multiple occasions," Emily said.
"But she's gone now."
"Her name's Eleven," Dustin told Will.
"Like the number?" he asked.
"Yeah," Emily answered. "Sick, right?"
"We call her 'El' for short," Lucas said.
"She's basically a wizard," Dustin said.
"She has superpowers," Lucas said in a whisper.
"More like a Yoda," Mike said.
"She flipped a van with her mind," Dustin said, "and these agents were trying to shoot us-"
The four friends continued to tell Will about Eleven and their endeavors with her until they ran out of tales to tell, Will being amazed by every single one of them.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
ONE MONTH LATER
CHRISTMAS EVE
Will had been out of the hospital for a few weeks now, and he seemed to be fully recovered. Eleven was still missing, and there had been no sign of her since the night that she defeated the Demogorgon. With her new friends wanting to hang out all the time and having no excuse to not attend school, Emily had hardly any downtime to think, but when she did, her heart ached as her mind wandered to Eleven, wondering where she was, what had happened to her, if she was okay, or if she was even alive.
When it came to her and Mike, they had not yet discussed the kiss, and they decided to skip out on the Snow Ball that year to spend more time with Will. Emily hadn't told anyone about the kiss, and she didn't think Mike had, either, because certainly their friends would never shut up about it if they knew. Even though neither of them had said anything, Will had been able to figure out for himself that there was something other than friendship between his twin sister and his best friend, which had only been confirmed when he asked Dustin and Lucas about it in private, who had told him everything they knew.
By long after sundown on Christmas Eve, the Byers twins had spent the whole day at the Wheelers' house. The boys were all down in the basement playing Dungeons & Dragons while Emily was upstairs in the living room watching Christmas movies with Nancy, Steve, and Mr. Wheeler. Even over the movie, they could hear the boys downstairs yelling.
"Are they okay down there?" Steve questioned.
"They're more than okay," Emily told him.
"Yeah, trust me, this is completely normal," Nancy assured him. Steve seemed to take the girls' word for it, because he turned his attention back to the movie and learned to tune out the boys.
Soon after, the doorbell rang, and Mrs. Wheeler answered, allowing Jonathan in and telling him that Will was in the basement. Emily followed him downstairs, knowing he was there to pick up her and Will and wanting to say goodbye to Mike before she left. When they had opened the door and began their descent down the stairs, Emily smelled a foul odor and pulled the collar of her shirt up over her nose with a disgusted noise.
"Jeez, what's that smell?" Jonathan asked, smelling it too. "Have you guys been playing games all day, or just farting?"
The boys laughed. "Oh, that's just Dustin," Lucas said. "He farted."
"Should have known," Emily said, shaking her head, her voice muffled by her shirt.
As Lucas continued to tease Dustin, Jonathan motioned for Will to get up.
"Bye, guys," Will said to his friends, grabbing his backpack.
"Bye, Will. Bye, Emily," they replied.
Jonathan and Will started up the stairs and Lucas and Dustin got up from their seats and began to play fight, creating the perfect diversion.
Emily bent down and kissed Mike's cheek while no one was looking, making him blush. "Bye, Mike," she said.
"Bye, Em," he responded, watching her follow her brothers up the stairs with a goofy grin on his face.
When she got upstairs, Jonathan and Will were in the kitchen talking to Mrs. Wheeler, who was making Christmas desserts. "Wish your mom a merry Christmas for me, okay?" she told them.
"Yeah, thank you. Uh, merry Christmas," Jonathan said.
"Merry Christmas."
"Bye, Mrs. Wheeler," Emily said, following her brothers as they made their way to the front door.
"Bye, Emily, see you later."
"So, uh, you win?" Jonathan asked Will.
"Yeah," Will answered.
"Awesome."
"Hey, Jonathan, wait up," Nancy said, coming down from upstairs and meeting Jonathan in front of the front door. She handed him a wrapped gift. "Merry Christmas."
With a knowing grin, Emily looked at Will. "We should probably go wait in the car," she whispered to him.
Will nodded. "Yeah, for sure," he said. The two then showed themselves out of the house, giving Jonathan and Nancy a moment alone.
Jonathan came out and joined them not too long later. Spotting the gift, Will asked to open it, and Jonathan told him he could. Emily watched as Will took off the wrapping paper to reveal a brand new camera.
When they arrived back at their house, Emily and Will went over to the Christmas tree to check out the presents that had shown up under it while they were gone. While Jonathan took pictures of them with his new camera, the twins found presents with their names on them and tried to guess what they were. Meanwhile, Joyce was setting the table for Christmas dinner.
"Yes!" Emily said in a low voice, picking up a medium-sized present with her name on it. "I think these are the paints I wanted."
"I think this one's an Atari," Will said in an equally low voice.
"You better let me play that sometime if it is."
"Only if you let me use those paints sometime."
"Deal."
They soon left their presents alone and sat down at the kitchen table, knowing that dinner was done.
"It's definitely an Atari," Will said.
"An a-what-i?" Joyce asked.
"The green present. It's an Atari. I felt Dustin's today, it's the same exact weight."
"Really? Well... We'll have to see, won't we?"
Suddenly, Will got up from his chair and walked away.
"Hey, no more snooping," Joyce called after him.
"No, I forgot to wash my hands. I'll be right back," Will said, walking down the hall to the bathroom. Emily could tell he was lying and watched him go with a look of concern but didn't say anything.
A few minutes later, Will came back to the table and sat down, seeming a bit shaken.
"Are you okay?" Joyce asked him.
"Yeah, I'm okay," Will told her with a smile on his face. However, Emily watched the smile vanish as soon as their mother looked away.
"Are you sure you're okay?" she whispered to him.
"I'm fine, Em." He didn't bother putting a fake smile on his face for her, and Emily knew it was because he didn't mean it. She didn't press him about it any further, though; she would find out eventually.
[word count: 4366]
[written: 12/28/20]
[published: 12/28/20]