"He said he was building something. That it was all for me." El looked around at us.
"Building something... is he talking about the flayed?" Max asked.
"Sounds like it." I shrugged.
"So, he's building an army, just like we thought." Lucas paced slowly behind the couch.
"Yeah, but he's not building this army to spread." Mike started.
"He's building it to stop Eleven." Will finished for him.
"Last year, El closed the gate on him. I have a feeling that really pissed him off." Mike nodded.
"Like royally." Lucas stopped pacing momentarily.
"Probably lost his shit over that." I added.
"And the Mind Flayer now knows that she's the only thing that can stop him. But if she's out of the way-." Mike once again didn't finish his sentence.
"Game over." Lucas concluded his sentence.
"He also said he was gonna kill all of you." El sounded awfully hesitant about telling us.
"Yeah, well, that's nice." Max nodded slightly, sarcasm filling her tone.
"n'est-ce pas exquis." I knew I sounded sarcastic, though nobody understood me. (isn't that exquisite.)
It didn't sound the greatest.
My birthday potentially being my death day.
Yeah that would kind of suck.
There was a screeching noise coming from a distance, loud enough to mute the popping of the fireworks.
Nancy got up, walking over to the small window.
"Do you guys hear that?" Nancy still stared out the window.
"It's just the fireworks." Jonathan shrugged.
"Billy. When he told you this, it was here, in this room?" Nancy questioned turning to look at El, who slowly nodded her head.
There was a loud thump, and then I got the feeling.
He most definitely knew where we were.
"He knows. He knows that we're here." I spoke before Will could.
We all began to file out of the trailer, walking so that we could see into part of the woods.
The ground shook, and we watched as the fireworks lit up the sky, revealing the trees being separated and knocked down, and the Mind Flayer standing right where he could see us.
-
We all barricaded the walls of the trailer, trying to make it as Mind Flayer-proofed as we could.
"Hey, get away from the windows." Nancy demanded, picking up the gun.
We all stood in the middle of the room, waiting for death to come right at us in the form of a giant monster.
There was rumbling, and everything began to shake.
"It's close." Will stated as we all still braced ourselves.
And then it stopped. The rumbling, the shaking, the rustling, all stopped.
"Where'd it go?" Max asked us but nobody returned an answer.
And then coming right through the wall, which was thankfully remotely far away from me, a tentacle went straight through the middle of the room and we all rushed out of the way.
I backed up into the wall as far as I could, the tentacle coming a little bit too close for comfort.
Jonathan took and axe to it, hitting it multiple times before he got thrown right into a wall and fell to the floor.
The tentacle began to float around Jonathan's head but Nancy shot it before it could do any real damage.
It wailed and screeched, while Nancy cocked the gun and pulled the trigger, but nothing came out.
A look of pure fear came over her face as she walked backwards, hitting the wall and the tentacle shrieked and then went straight for her face, but it seemed as if it was being held by some chain when it couldn't reach her.
But when I focused my eyes off of Nancy, El stood with her hand out, focusing on the monster.
Eleven yelled, thanking the claw of the tentacle off and throwing it on the floor.
The tentacle snaked back through the hole where it came from, right in between Max and i.
"Holy shit." The both of us sighed right before it came back through the hole going straight for El.
Another tentacle came straight through the other side of the room, but El held them both off with her powers at the same time.
El held them there, as the creatures shrieked and strained against her force.
And then with a tiny bit of hesitation, she yelled and crushed both of the hands on the tentacles.
There was only a few seconds to breathe before the roof cracked open, and the mind flayer grabbed El by her ankle, dragging her to the floor.
Mike was first to grab onto her arms, me next, Max and then everyone else grabbed onto her.
We all pulled, trying to hold onto El.
"Nancy, shoot it!" Jonathan yelled over El's screams.
The creature snarled but we all held onto El and pulled her as Nancy shot it.
I hadn't managed to realize that Lucas wasn't helping.
"Lucas!" I demanded him to help us.
He grabbed an axe, getting onto the table and chopping at the tentacle.
Between the gun firing, everyone screaming to pull El, El screaming herself, the monster roaring, and Lucas chopping the monster with an axe, i just about went deaf.
Lucas and Nancy had managed to cut off the monsters tentacle, and I fell to the ground, hitting my head before noticing that Max had landed on top of me.
She groaned and hurriedly moved, pulling me to sit up.
I hadn't seen what happened but I heard El scream once again.
I looked up as the monster roared down at us, clutching Max's hand in mine as tight as I could.
El stood up, holding her hands towards the monster and screaming, while the monster screeched and roared in pain.
I watched as El brought her hands down, and it's head split in half.
El fell backwards, Max and I both hurrying to stand up and catching her.
"Go, go, go!" Nancy demanded quickly.
"Come on, come on, go!" Jonathan also rushed us.
Max and I wrapped our arms around El helping her get to the car.
Mike squeezed into the back of the car next to me, trying to be as close to El as possible.
"Drive! Drive!" Mike yelled and Nancy started the car, speeding off away from the cabin.
-
The tires on the car squealed as we pulled up in front of the gas station.
Nancy threw a rock through the doors, letting us right in.
We walked quickly to find an aisle that we could set El down in.
Nancy grabbed some alcohol and gauze turning to us.
"Ok, put her down." She instructed and we did as she said.
"Ok, lemme see." Nancy lifted up the bottom of El's pant leg to reveal a giant gash in her ankle which basically just looked like giant holes in her leg.
Nancy opened the gauze, definitely going into that way too quickly.
"Woah, woah, woah." I said, stopping her from going on with whatever she was doing.
"Yeah what-what- what are you doing?" Max rested her hand on her arm.
"I'm cleaning the wound." Nancy motioned to El's leg.
Yeah Max was about to put her in her rightful place about dealing with that.
"No, first, we need to stop the bleeding, then clean the wound, then disinfect, then bandage." Max did exactly what I predicted.
Mike, Nancy and Jonathan all looked at her as if she didn't know what she was doing.
"I skateboard. Trust me." Max reassured them after reading their faces.
"Mike, hold this." She put the gauze on El's leg and put Mike's hand firmly on top of it.
"Keep the pressure on it, nice and firm, ok? We're gonna need water, soap." Max looked up at Nancy and Jonathan who immediately got up and went to go get the water and soap.
I heard a clattering from behind me and turned around.
Just to see that Lucas had dumped his whole backpack out on the floor of the aisle.
"Does any of this help?" Lucas shrugged looking at Max and I.
"No. Go get me a washcloth and a bowl. Uh, Jackie, go with them please?" Max looked at me pleadingly.
"Yeah." I gave her a small smile.
"Make sure they don't do anything stupid." Max called to her while they walked out of the aisle.
"Roger that." I turned and saluted, and then turned back to the boys.
"Why do we need a bowl?" Lucas looked at me for an answer.
"Because, Max said so." I replied simply.
"Ugh." Lucas rolled his eyes at me, earning him a punch to his shoulder.
"Bowl...bowl...bowl..." Lucas muttered mindlessly as we walked through the cereal aisle.
"It's not gonna be here." I told him.
"Why wouldn't it be with the cereal?" Lucas looked around us.
"Because cereal is a food and a bowl is a bowl".
We reached the end of the aisle and the boys turned to our left.
"Oh, shit." Lucas sounded surprised, and I turned to follow them bumping into the back of him.
"Jesus what are you- oh you've gotta be kidding me." I rolled my eyes, noticing that the boys were beaming at a stand of fireworks.
They barely stood for two seconds before walking over to the stand.
"Alright I'm going to get the washcloth and bowl that max asked for. Good luck not getting caught." I spun on my heel and turned to go the right aisle.
Once I had gotten the bowl and a washcloth I walked back to see if the boys were still at the fireworks, and I saw them standing there with Max in front of them, who didn't seem very amused, though I couldn't see her, it was evident in the way she was talking and standing.
"... AKA gun powder." Was the first thing I could make out Lucas saying as he tossed the fireworks to Max.
"Strap two of these together, and it's bigger than an M-80. Five of them, we've got ourselves a stick of dynamite." Lucas sounded as if he was proud of his knowledge of guns and fireworks.
"You wanna kill that thing with fireworks?" Max said and even though I couldn't see her face from where I was standing, I could tell she was looking at Lucas like he was stupid.
"Do you have a better idea?" Lucas shook his head.
"Uh, yeah. Eleven." Max threw the fireworks back at Lucas.
"Against that thing? She's gonna need some backup." Lucas told her.
"Alright where's Jackie." Max shook her head, tired of talking to him.
"Your girlfriend is right over there." Lucas pointed at me.
Max turned around and smiled, seeing that I had gotten what she asked for.
"Thanks. I knew I could count on you." She walked over to me, took my free hand in hers and we began walking back to Mike and El.
-
We stood in the frozen food aisle with all of the freezer doors open.
El sat in front of them with a blindfold over her eyes.
I turned towards Lucas as he opened the pull tab on a soda and I clicked loudly.
I kicked his ankle making him turn to me.
"Shut up." I whispered.
"Oh, sorry." He replied but began to slurp the drink.
"How do you even drink that?" Mike said from next to Will.
"Because it's delicious." Lucas shrugged.
"What?" Max, Mike, and I all looked at him, baffled.
"It's like the Carpenter's the thing. The original is a classic, no question about it. But the remake..." Lucas slurped a drink of the coke and smacked his lips.
"Sweeter, bolder...better." Lucas looked at a different person for every word he spoke.
Everyone still looked at him like he had three heads.
"You're insane." Mike shook his head.
"You disgust me." I added in agreement.
"So, you prefer the original Thing?" Lucas looked down at Mike.
"What? No, we're not taking about The Thing, we're talking about New Coke." Mike spoke for all of us.
"It's the same concept, dude." Lucas shrugged.
"Uh, actually, it's not the same concept." Mike argued.
They went back and forth.
I rolled my eyes, starting to get annoyed about their bickering.
"Hey." El took her blindfold off from not being able to focus.
"Sorry." They both apologized.
"Did you... find him?" Mike asked as El stared at them.
El sighed while looking a bit disappointed.
-
"The movies? Dustin's so freaked out about the gate, he decides to go watch a movie? Yeah, makes total sense." Lucas pushed the cart.
"You're positive he said "gate" and not "great?" Max looked over my head and at Mike and El.
"Yeah, like, "this movie I'm watching is great." Will agreed.
"Sounded like "gate." El told them.
"Which would explain how the Mind Flayer's still alive." Mike added.
"Yeah, we just have to shut it again." Nancy sighed.
"Then the monster dies." Will said it as if it was that simple.
"But if not, we always have Lucas' fireworks." Max teased as she helped him carry the cart out of the door.
"Keep mocking my plan, Max. Keep mocking it. I wanna hear you say it again, because you keep doubting me." Lucas complained.
"Ok, wait can we please go back to the whole Dustin thing?" I brought it back up as we all got into the car.
"What is there to go back to? He's at the movies and we're all potentially going to die." Mike shrugged.
"Can you please not- I just have a feeling that he wasn't just chilling at the movies. I mean come on, that just isn't Dustin." I looked at Mike.
"Yeah well El saw it, and from what we've heard, it sure did look like he was just chilling at the movies." Mike stated.
"I know El saw it but it had to be out of context. Seriously just think about it- oh shit." I closed my eyes shut and mentally facepalmed at the realization I had just made.
They had me translate Russian to them.
Because he intercepted a secret Russian communication.
And he was probably planning on exploring the whole Russian thing after the whole horse situation at starcourt.
"What?" Mike kicked me slightly with his foot that was next to me.
"Alright uh, so I'm pretty sure I know what's going on with Dustin so Nancy if you could just hurry up and get us to the mall that would be great." I yelled up to the front of the car so that Nancy would hear me.
"Yeah but care to explain?" She looked at me through the rear view mirror.
"Not-not right now." I gave her a nervous smile.
"Seriously?" She asked pleadingly.
"Please, Nancy, just trust me we've gotta get there as fast as we can." I told her and she nodded back to me.
-
We stood behind El on the second floor of the mall.
I could see a bunch of men in black outfits with guns looking around.
Russians.
One of them whispered something into his walkie before signaling the rest of the Russians to go over to The Great Cookie.
Which I was pretty sure that Dustin, Robin, and Steve were all hiding behind.
They all only got a few steps in before El used her powers to sound the alarm on one of the cars on display.
They all turned around looking at the car and then up at El.
El then, with no hesitation, flung the car at the Russians sending them into the tables as the car crashed into a different counter.
After a few seconds, Dustin, Robin, Steve, and somehow Lucas' little sister Erica all rose from behind the counter.
They looked at the car, and up at us as we all got closer to the railing.
"You flung that thing like a Hot Wheel!" Dustin laughed and hugged El and Mike.
"Lucas?" Erica stopped in her tracks.
"What are you doing here?" Lucas asked her.
"Ask them. It's their fault." Erica pointed to Steve and Robin.
"True, yeah. Totally true. It's absolutely our fault." Steve nodded in agreement.
"I don't understand what happened to that car?" Robin looked back at the crushed car.
"El has superpowers." Dustin told her nonchalantly.
"I'm sorry?"
"Superpowers. She threw it with her mind. C'mon catch up." Steve told her.
"That's El?" Erica pointed to in fact, El.
"Who's El?" Robin definitely had no idea what was going on.
"I'm sorry, who are you?" Nancy directed her focus towards Robin.
"I'm Robin. I work with Steve." Robin answered quickly.
"And she's Jackie's cousin." Steve added making Nancy look at me which I responded with nod.
"She cracked the top secret code." Dustin smiled.
"Yeah, which is how we found out about the Russians." Steve's voice slightly trailed off.
"Russians? Wait, what Russians?" Jonathan spoke up.
"Those Russians." I pointed towards where the whole car thing happened.
"Those were Russians?" Max asked me.
"Some of them." Erica shrugged.
"Hold on, you knew about this?" Max turned it back to me.
"Didn't you hear our code red?" Dustin asked before I could respond to Max.
"Yeah. But I couldn't understand half of what you were saying." Mike told him.
"Goddamn low battery." Dustin shook his head.
"How many times do I have to tell you with the low battery?" Steve scolded Dustin.
"Wait is this what you had me hurry and get here for? The Russians?" Nancy asked me.
"Yup." I responded.
"How did you know that something was happening with the Russians?" Dustin questioned, but he sounded happy that I had remembered.
"Well I'm not stupid, and because I knew that after you had me translate you were just going to leave it alone after the horse thing." I said it as if it was easy for me to figure out, but it did take me a minute.
"When did you translate Russian for them?" Max was trying to figure out when I had time away from her when I would do it.
"That night when I left you and El to come here I was translating." I told her.
"Ok, Russians. As in, they're working for the Russian government?" Lucas asked.
"What is it that you're not comprehending? Are we not speaking English?" Dustin looked at Lucas like he was stupid.
"Wait Steve what the hell happened to you?" I looked at his swollen face.
"Oh they drugged us." Robin simply replied.
"Damn." I sighed trying to think about how they even got close enough to Russians to get drugged.
"Seriously." Robin muttered in agreement.
"So this has nothing to do with the gate?" Max questioned.
"This has everything to do with the gate." Dustin told her firmly.
I heard a thump behind me and we all turned to see El laying on the floor groaning.
"El! El!" Mike yelled as we all ran over to her.
"What's wrong with her?" Erica asked.
"What's wrong." Mike held her arm.
"My leg. My leg." She whimpered.
Nancy and Jonathan peeled the gauze off of the gash that looked worse than before we had bandaged it.
Everyone groaned in disgust.
I gasped when something inside her leg began to squirm.
El grunted and wailed as the thing moved inside her.
"El! El are you ok? El! El!" Mike held her arms again.
El only responded with an ear wrenching scream.
Authors Note
Hey look at me, updating before a week has passed. We are coming close to the end of season three but this time I have a plan in store. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and a lil reminder that I love you and to maybe eat and/or drink something if you can. Byeee eee
-a raging lesbian