0 0 1 ━ [ 𝘚𝘵𝘦𝘷𝘦 𝘏𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘵𝘰𝘯 ]

𝟏𝐌 𝐁𝐎𝐍𝐔𝐒 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm crying right now you guys, 1,000,000 reads! I started writing this story exactly three years ago today during a difficult time in my life and I never imagined that it would get this far. Writing this story was a way for me to get back into a hobby I'd all but given up, a way for me to find myself again. And with you guys, I have. I'm literally speechless. I could spend every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year for the rest of my life saying thank you and it still wouldn't be enough, but here's one for old-time's sake: Thank you ♥

FYI: This is a continuation of the 500K Bonus Chapter where One goes to the universe where the show takes place (and even though I wrote the 500K Bonus Chapter before season 4 came out, it somehow works perfectly that I can just jump right into season 4)! This chapter, along with the 500K Bonus Chapter, are not canon with my story. They're more of an AU of my AU, where I explore an alternate ending. This chapter will contain dialogue, scenes, and plots from the show, and credit for such goes to the creators of Stranger Things.

WARNING: This chapter will contain season 4 spoilers so please read at your own discretion. Also, for those of you reading "002", I changed some things to avoid spoilers (namely, you know who isn't you know where doing you know what) so please try not to spoil the sequel in the comments since others likely haven't read it yet.

Buckle up kids, because this is a long one!

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

"I need some air and quite possibly a whole bottle of 100-proof liquor," One announced, the color draining from her face upon the realization that her portal had not only taken her to another time, but another universe. She pushed through the closet door, nearly stumbling over her own feet as she rushed towards the front entrance of Family Video and out towards solitude. But of course, solitude had company.

"Wait up!" Steve called after her, the door slamming behind him as he joined her in the parking lot. At Steve's request, Mike, Dustin, Lucas, Max, and Robin had begrudgingly remained inside, their faces pressed against the glass as they watched the spectacle outside.

One paced back-and-forth, turning on her heel every seven steps. One hand rubbed her face anxiously while the other ran through her tangled hair. A faint ticking echoed in her ear although she was too distracted by her racing thoughts to realize that it wasn't her heartbeat.

"Are you doing okay?" Steve asked after the silence lingered too long.

"Five minutes ago I destroyed the Mind Flayer and quite possibly the Upside Down too, and now I'm in an alternate universe where my dad is dead and my sister is halfway across the country," One responded, her pacing not even faltering a step. "What do you think?"

"No...?" Steve guessed, his eyebrow arched. "Look, just come back inside for a few minutes. We've all got some questions and we can help you. We've dealt with stuff like this before."

"I'm sorry but I can't," One sighed, her arms hanging limply at her sides and her knees buckling from exhaustion. After everything she had been through in the last 24 hours, it was some sort of miracle that she was still standing. "I need to get back to my universe, back to my family and my Steve."

"'My Steve'?" Steve repeated but One ignored him because she was too busy searching the cracked pavement at her feet for something to focus on.

One found a splatter of dried yellow paint and pictured the Family Video in her universe. She wasn't sure how portal-ing between universes worked but she had to hope that it was a somewhat similar process to portal-ing between dimensions or through time.

"One," a voice whispered in her ear, so low that she almost didn't hear it. It broke her concentration, drawing her eyes from the ground to the edge of the parking lot where a dark figure stood, watching her. There was something vaguely inhuman about the figure's stature but One wasn't able to identify exactly what, because within a blink they were gone.

One's eyes lingered a moment longer until she shrugged it off as sleep deprivation and returned to her task. Within moments, a portal had appeared on the ground before her, bringing a smile to her face and a look of surprise to Steve's. One didn't have to look up to know that the others waiting inside were also equally shocked because she could hear their exclamations of disbelief from where she stood.

One took a moment to study Steve's face, imagining how her Steve would react when he saw her. Her cheeks burned and her heart skipped a beat. "Goodbye, Steve," she said with a smile before stepping forward and disappearing through the portal.

"Does Goonies go under family or horror?" Steve asked, picking up the next VHS in the towering return pile.

"What kind of idiotic question is that?" Robin retorted, shooting him a sharp look from where she stood behind the register. "Family, obviously."

"What, it didn't freak you out? When they put the kid's hand in the blender I nearly shat my pants. And that Slug guy? Stuff of nightmares." A shiver shot through Steve's body.

"His name is Sloth and you have absolutely no appreciation for good movies. Keith should fire you."

"Please," Steve said with a roll of his eyes. "You'd quit in a week if that happened."

"Nuh-uh, because then I'd finally get all the babes to myself."

"Don't blame your lack of game on me, Buckley. Besides, we both know that you wouldn't act on any of them. You've only got eyes for one 'babe' and that's Vickie."

"You're such a--" Robin began when she was cut short by a shout from outside.

"MOTHERFUCKING SHIT FUCKER!"

Steve's and Robin's heads whipped over to the window to see a blonde girl with bright red tips and a battered leather jacket standing in the parking lot, her head angled down towards the ground and her fists clenched at her sides.

"Is that..." Robin began to ask, her jaw fighting gravity not to hang open.

"Yup," Steve answered with wide eyes and a weird feeling in his stomach. The two hurriedly pushed through the doors of Family Video and out into the parking lot.

☆ ★ ☆

The splatter of yellow paint.

That's all One could stare at.

It teased her, it taunted her, it tormented her.

It was exactly as she left it, where she left it, which meant that she was still in the same universe. She was still separated from her real friends and family. The yellow was soon joined by a spot of red as a drop of blood rolled off One's upper lip; a warning that she was nearing her limit and needed to refuel or risk permanent residence in the alternate universe she found herself in.

"How long?" she asked the approaching footsteps with a defeated sigh. She didn't have to look up to know that they belonged to Steve and Robin.

"A little over a week," Steve answered.

"Did you just...travel through time?" Robin asked, her mind still not completely comprehending the abilities of the stranger before her.

One just nodded her head because she didn't have the energy to explain.

"So you can travel through time and space...holy shit," Robin said, her jaw once more fighting gravity and losing. "Are you Doctor fucking Who?"

"Apparently I am because I can't go home," One retorted, turning on her heel and heading in the opposite direction. Her pain propelled her feet, pushing her farther away from Steve and Robin.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Steve called after her, shooting Robin a dirty look to which she shrugged in response. He jogged after, putting a hand on her shoulder to stop her once he caught up. Upon contact, One's hands instinctively lit up, causing Steve to yelp in surprise and hop away.

"Sorry," One apologized once she saw the frightened look on Steve's face, the electricity that was jumping between her fingers slowly fading away. She immediately crossed her arms over her body and tucked her hands beneath them. The thought of Steve, any Steve, being scared of her tore her insides apart.

"Look, my shift is going to be done in a little bit and I've got two tickets for the basketball game at Hawkins High tonight. Maybe you could use a distraction," Steve offered. Robin was several feet away but she could still hear them, and she gave Steve a strange look.

"All right," One answered after a moment of thought and a deep breath. It took a brief argument with herself in her head, but she finally admitted to herself that she didn't have the juice to try to get back to her own universe just then and that she didn't have anywhere to go in this one until she did. After a good night's sleep, she could try again.

"Yeah?" Steve's mouth parted in a wide smile, which he immediately tried to hide but the corners of his lips kept fighting him.

"Yeah," One answered, a matching smile growing on her face.

The three returned to the inside of Family Video so that Steve and Robin could finish their shifts, with One burning time by perusing the titles on the shelves. When she was out of ear shot, Robin began to drill Steve on what exactly had happened in the parking lot.

"I thought you were taking Brenda to the basketball game tonight."

"I'll reschedule with Brenda, this seems a little more important," Steve answered, not taking his eyes off the pile of VHS's before him.

"Are you trying to help her," Robin began, her eyes glancing towards One, who was studying the cover of Back to the Future with a look of confusion. "or are you trying to help yourself?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Robin positioned herself in front of Steve, her head following his until he was forced to look at her. "For the past couple months you've been on this crazy spree to find a girlfriend and I'm just worried that you've finally gotten so desperate that your standards have widened to include women who quite literally appear out of thin air."

"It's not like that," Steve argued, his eyes flickering towards the ceiling. Robin's stare continued to bore into him. "It's not, I promise! This isn't for me, it's for us, all of us! She said that she defeated the Mind Flayer and destroyed the Upside Down in her universe, maybe she could help us to do the same in ours."

"The Mind Flayer is dead and the Upside Down hasn't been a problem in over a year," Robin replied, her arms crossed over her chest and the look of disbelief still firmly cemented on her face.

"Actually, we don't really know that," Steve retorted. "We may have just killed one of its arms or something. And just because the Upside Down hasn't been a problem lately, doesn't meant that it won't be in the future. It's come back before." A moment of uncomfortable silence passed between the two as Robin mulled over this information in her head.

At last, Robin finally sighed and rolled her eyes. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, Harrington."

☆ ★ ☆

"The Hawkins Tigers are playing Christian Academy for the championship," Steve explained to One as he led her into the crowded and noisy gymnasium. Luckily, Robin had had some extra clothes in her bag that One was able to borrow for the game. The striped purple sweater and black acid-washed jeans she now wore attracted a lot less attention than the torn, blood-stained clothes she had entered the universe in. "Of course, it doesn't happen until right after I graduate and leave the team."

One didn't respond, instead scouring the bleachers for the familiar faces of Mike, Dustin, and Max. After Steve had told her that Lucas played on the team, she expected to see the other party members there cheering him on but so far they were nowhere in sight.

"Where are the others?" One asked as she climbed the stairs behind Steve.

"Others?" Steve asked over his shoulder.

"Yeah," One replied, standing beside him in an empty section of the bleachers. "Mike, Dustin, and Max."

"Dustin called me about some nerd thing they had going on for Hellfire Club so I'm assuming that's where him and Wheeler are," Steve answered, his voice rising and falling above the crowd in order to be heard. "As for Max, well, Billy's death has been pretty hard on her. She kind of keeps to herself, nowadays."

"Billy died?" One asked, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. That hadn't happened in her universe. At least, not yet, anyways.

"Yeah, at Starcourt during the fire."

"Fire?" One asked. She realized that there was still much about this universe that she didn't understand, much that likely differed from her own. Multiple questions came to mind. Was the Mind Flayer in this universe also James? What happened to the Lab and Dr. Brenner? Where was she? Did she even exist?

One didn't get a chance to ask any of these questions because just then, the principal began speaking into the microphone down on the court.

"Everyone, now please rise for our national anthem. Singing for us tonight, we have a very special guest. All the way from Nashville, our very own, Tammy Thompson!"

Steve immediately exchanged a glance with Robin, who stood in the adjacent section of bleachers with the rest of the band, her trumpet held resolutely before her. Tammy began to sing the National Anthem, her voice hitting every note except the ones she was supposed to and Steve once again turned to Robin to rub it in her face. "Told you," he mouthed to her. "Muppet."

"Wow. She sounds terrible, doesn't she?" One pointed out, one eye screwed shut in pain as Tammy hit another painfully high note and the microphone whined in protest.

"If she's any indicator of the talent in Nashville, remind me to strike it from my bucket list," Steve replied with a chuckle, the corner of his lips cracking in a smile.

After several torturous minutes, Tammy finally finished and a sharp whistle echoed through the gymnasium, signaling the beginning of the game. Tennis shoes squeaked as they raced across the court, the dribbling of the basketball bouncing in rhythm with the heartbeats of the anticipatory crowd. The cheering alternated from each side of the gymnasium with every basket, the numbers on both sides of the scoreboard racing each other as they climbed higher and higher.

"I'm sorry I ruined your date," One said to Steve when the volume of the crowd had dimmed a bit.

"What?" Steve called over the noise.

"I'm sorry I ruined your date!" One repeated herself, this time louder.

"How did you know about that?" Steve asked, his head snapping to look at her as a bright blush rose in his cheeks.

"I overheard your conversation with Robin at Family Video," One answered with a sheepish smile. She hadn't meant to eavesdrop, but Steve's voice carried and her ears instinctively perked up at the mention of his love life. Even in another universe, she couldn't help but be a little curious...and a little jealous.

"Oh," Steve replied, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. "It's nothing, I already rescheduled."

One pressed her lips firmly together, trying her hardest to hold the next question in, but it came tumbling off her tongue anyways. "Is she your girlfriend?"

"What?" Steve called again, pressing his finger to his ear to indicate that he couldn't hear her over the roaring crowd.

One knew that this was whatever universe she was in giving her a second chance to drop the question, to pretend like it never happened, but her curiosity ignored it. "Is she your girlfriend?" she asked again, this time leaning in closer to Steve so that she wouldn't have to shout. Unfortunately, Steve had also had the same idea and during the movement, One's lips accidentally brushed against his ear. They both snapped back immediately, the unexpected touch sending shivers through their bodies and a bright blush to their faces.

An unsettling silence filled the gym and One's initial thought was that everybody had seen the awkward encounter between her and Steve, but when she looked up, she found all eyes glued to the court below. Her eyes searched out the source of their captivation and found Lucas standing on the three-point line, his knees bent, his feet firmly planted, and the ball gripped tightly in his hands. One's eyes flickered up towards the scoreboard to find a replica of her tattoo on the clock; one second left and Christian Academy led 69-68.

Everyone rose to their feet as the ball left Lucas's finger tips, flying through the air towards the net in a perfect arch. It ricocheted in the rim, bouncing up against the backboard before finally falling through the net. The ball didn't even hit the floor before the rest of the team surrounded Lucas, the cheerleaders waving their pom-poms as he was lifted into the air to meet the roaring cheers of the crowd. One and Steve joined in the cacophony, screaming their support for their friend until their voices were hoarse.

In the excitement, One temporarily forgot about her troubles. The fact that she was separated from her friends and family and stuck in an alternate universe nothing like her own didn't even cross her mind. Steve was right, it was a good distraction.

☆ ★ ☆

"So...what now?" Steve asked as they exited the gymnasium out into the fresh air. The ringing in their ears amplified the farther they moved away from the crowd, which was still cheering on Lucas and the big win.

"I'm...not sure," One answered with a shrug. She hadn't really planned beyond the basketball game. All she knew was that she needed to sleep before she could try opening another portal back to her universe. But where she would sleep, she had no idea.

"It's getting pretty late, do you have a place to crash?"

"Probably going to end up breaking into Hopper's cabin," One answered with an uncomfortable laugh.

Steve immediately shook his head and scrunched his nose. "That place has been abandoned for almost a year, you don't want to sleep there."

"I don't really have a lot of other options," One replied. She had to admit that the dusty, likely spider-infested cabin wasn't ideal, but she had slept in much worse places before.

"Stay at my place," Steve offered, the words rushing out faster than he intended. And once they started, they didn't stop. "My parents are out of town again and we have like, three guest bedrooms. I don't really know what the point in them is given that I'm the only one who ever sleeps there but I guarantee that they're a lot better than Hopper's cabin."

One studied Steve's face as she contemplated his offer. He began to sweat under the gaze of her icy blue eyes, trying his hardest not to chicken out and break eye contact. "Okay," One answered at long last, eliciting a sigh of relief from Steve. "But right away tomorrow, I'm going back to my universe."

"O-of course!" Steve stammered, a nervous smile splitting his face in two. "Here, my car is this way."

Steve led One to his car, opening the passenger door for her before she got in. The gesture reminded her of the time that the Steve from her universe had asked her out, after she had found him stumbling around the Byers' yard looking for her while she was looking for James. The memory caused her cheeks to glow in the darkness of the warm, spring night and her gut to drop. She wanted so desperately to get back to him.

The car ride was mostly silent, the only noise coming from the car stereo as Take Me Home Tonight by Eddie Money played; much to the discomfort of them both. When they finally pulled into the driveway of the Harrington estate, it dawned on One that she had never been to his house before, not even in her universe.

The mansion towered over them, blotting out a fair portion of the night sky and striking One with a blow when she remembered what Steve had said earlier; that he was usually the only one there. In her experience, One found that loneliness was often amplified by empty space.

While One was busy staring up at the castle before her, Steve had once more opened her door for her. "Thanks," she said with a small smile as she stepped out, slightly embarrassed that she had let him do that a second time.

The inside of the house was just as impressive as the outside, if not more. The shiny hardwood floors were blanketed with expensive rugs, on top of which sat high-end furniture. Antique vases, priceless paintings, and marble busts filled the spaces in-between, the accumulated total cost of which One couldn't even fathom. The most noticeable thing of all though, was the lack of family photos. The only indication of who lived there was a six-foot tall portrait of a blonde woman with smooth skin standing beside a middle-aged man with a wealth of silver hair hanging over the stone fireplace.

Like the house, this was One's first time laying eyes on Steve's parents and she found herself hating them without even meeting them. If it wasn't for the smile that so clearly belonged to his mother and the eyes and hair that so clearly belonged to his father, One would never believe that they were related. How could such cold-hearted, selfish people create such a warm-hearted, selfless person like Steve?

One glared at the painting until Steve's voice caught her attention and she turned to find him in the kitchen. "There's food if you're hungry."

One was about to decline the offer when her stomach answered for her.

"That's what I thought," Steve laughed.

Within ten minutes, One and Steve were seated at the granite island that could almost be a literal island, chowing down on reheated leftover pasta.

"So..." One said between bites. "Tell me more about this universe."

"Well, you know, aside from the parallel dimension full of monsters and the Russians operating a secret underground base beneath the mall, it's fairly normal."

"Russians?"

"Yeah, it's a long and painful story," Steve answered, instinctively rubbing his jaw. "But they're long gone now."

"So, the Upside Down still exists here?" One asked next.

"Yeah, I was going to talk to you about that, actually..." Steve said mid-bite, setting his fork back down on his plate. He found it hard to look her in her eyes, which watched him inquisitively. "I was thinking, you know, what if...what if you don't leave tomorrow? What if you stick around a little longer?"

One's eyebrow arched in confusion and Steve quickly continued before she could say anything. "You said that you defeated the Mind Flayer and destroyed the Upside Down in your universe so, what if...what if you help us to do the same here?"

"Steve..." One began, unsure of what to say next. She didn't want to tell him that she couldn't help save his universe but she had friends and family that she needed to get back to. Not to mention that she had very nearly failed trying to save her own universe, so what was to say that she could do it again?

"I know, I know," Steve continued, putting his hands up in defense. "You've got friends and family to get back to. There's no pressure to stay and I'll understand if you don't, I just thought it wouldn't hurt to ask."

For an agonizingly long minute, the scraping of forks became the only sound in the kitchen. 

"I'm sorry," One apologized, her eyes glued to the remaining noodles on her plate.

"You have nothing to apologize for," Steve replied, catching her eyes when they finally ventured upwards. He offered her a smile that told her he meant it. "It was selfish of me to ask, I'm the one who should apologize. I just..." Steve coughed, clearing his throat as the words got stuck. "I just..."

"You just what?" One asked gently after the silence persisted.

"I just get the sense that maybe...maybe there's something between us in your universe? I'm probably a total idiot, misreading things. It's just when we were in the parking lot of Family Video you said something and--"

"There is," One answered quietly, cutting Steve off. He stared at her blankly, his mouth opening and closing as he searched for the words to say next. One couldn't help but crack a smile at his dumbfounded look, a burst of laughter escaping her.

"There is?" Steve asked after he found his voice again, his face burning.

"There is," One confirmed with a nod of her head. "That's part of the reason that I want to get back to my universe."

"So in your universe..." Steve began, unsure of how to phrase his question. "what exactly are we? Friends? Enemies? Boyfriend and girlfriend...?"

One contemplated how much she should tell him but ultimately decided that it wouldn't hurt anything if he knew. "It's...complicated..." One answered slowly, stirring the noodles around with her fork. "We went on a date...and we kissed...but then everything happened...and now I'm here."

Steve listened thoughtfully, giving her time to finish. One wanted to leave it at that but she felt the need to say more. She found comfort in Steve's presence.

"I didn't think I was ever going to see you, fuck, sorry, him again so I told you, him--wow, this whole thing is still really confusing," One laughed anxiously after correcting herself. She took a big breath before she continued, determined not to mess up again. "What I was trying to say, was that I told him that I loved him."

"And did I, sorry, he tell you that he loved you back?" Steve asked, also slipping up, although somewhat intentionally.

One nodded, her smile so large that it made it hard to speak. "Yeah, he did. It was actually the last thing he said to me before I wound up here."

"Doesn't sound so complicated to me then," Steve replied with a thoughtful smile and One found her eyes lingering on his mouth. The urge to kiss him in that moment was incredibly strong but One restrained herself. She had to keep reminding herself that it wasn't her Steve. Her Steve was waiting for her in another universe, although he likely thought she was dead.

"It's getting pretty late..." One said as an excuse to change the topic, her eyes landing on an ornate grandfather clock in the corner of the living room, the minute hand nearing midnight and the second hand ticking closer and closer. She was too tired to realize that the clock hadn't been there when she first arrived.

"Oh, oh yeah," Steve said, his cheeks blushing. "I'll show you to your room."

After depositing the dirty plates and silverware in the sink, Steve led One up the stairs to a stretch of hallway with five doors; two on each side and one at the end.

"This is my room," Steve informed her, gesturing to the first door on his right. One tried to peer around the partially open door but she wasn't able to see much aside from plaid wallpaper. "You can stay in this one." Steve pointed to the door across from his. "It's the nicest guest room in the house."

And also the closest to his, One realized. She had a feeling that Steve was fibbing about the last part and instead had other reasons for wanting her to stay in that room but she kept her mouth shut.

"Well..." Steve began, his fingers anxiously tapping on his leg. "Good-night, then."

"Good-night, Steve," One said with a smile.

☆ ★ ☆

Sleep came quicker than One anticipated but with it, came nightmares.

She found herself in a room full of rainbows. But the bright colors were just a ruse to cover up the stale and sterilized whiteness beneath them; to distract from the cameras in every corner with blinking red lights, and the cross orderlies with batons at their hips. She was back at the Lab. And she wasn't alone.

Other kids with hospital gowns and shaved heads surrounded her, bringing the room to life with their minds. As her eyes scanned the room, she noticed that one of the other subjects was staring directly at her. It was a girl who looked to be around 16, her blonde hair buzzed to her scalp and her icy blue glare unwavering. Their stare-down lasted until One realized that the girl was herself. She was looking in a mirror.

"There you are," a voice said behind her, causing her to spin on her heel in a panic. She recognized that voice.

"James?" she asked, her eyebrows creased as she studied the boy before her. His dark hair was short like hers but his persistent curls still fought their way through and the freckles on his cheeks bunched together above his smile.

"James?" he asked, his smile not faltering. "Who's James?"

"Seven, I mean," One corrected herself with a shake of her head. If they were still in the Lab that meant they hadn't yet gone to the Upside Down where James had received his nickname. But One and James had escaped when they were fourteen and in this vision, dream, nightmare, whatever, they looked older than that...Additionally, she also didn't recognize the room that they were in. If it existed in the Lab in her universe, it was never a room that she was allowed inside...

"Come on, let's go play," James said, holding his hand out towards her. One instinctively reached for it but when she blinked, his arm turned into a smoking funnel like one of the Mind Flayer's limbs and she quickly drew her arm back towards her body.

One stumbled away from James, her back pressing up against the mirror as she stared at him in horror. With every blink, he changed; James, Mind Flayer, James, Mind Flayer, James. "Leave me alone!" she screamed.

A loud bang silenced her scream and One looked up to see the double doors to the room slam open so hard that the handles embedded themselves into the wall. A man stood in the doorway, his blonde hair slicked back with blood and his blue eyes burrowed into her. She cocked her head in confusion, a strange feeling growing within her gut.

Each step that the man took towards her was accompanied by the crunching of bones as the kids around her crumpled like paper bags, their eyes popping like squished grapes. Somewhere among the mess of blood and broken bones was Seven's lifeless body, but One's eyes never left the man and the man's eyes never left her.

"Hello, One," the man greeted her, his quaking voice shaking the ground beneath their feet. "You're just in time. It's about to begin."

"Who are you?" One demanded, the words bouncing around her chattering teeth.

The man smiled but said nothing, instead pointing his finger over her head. There was nothing behind her but the mirror, but she turned anyways and found something strange. The blue eyes she stared into weren't hers. In fact, her entire reflection was wrong. No, not wrong, gone.

Her reflection had been replaced with the man's.

One awoke to the sound of her own screams.

They had started from the nightmare but they continued after she was unable to recognize the room she was in and then persisted when she remembered that she was in a completely different universe.

"Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit," Steve's voice called from across the hall. She heard a loud thud that she assumed was his body hitting the floor after tumbling out of his bed. Ten foot steps followed before her door flew open. "What happened, what's wrong?"

Steve's hair was a mess and only one of his arms had found its way through a sleeve. One blushed when she realized that this meant that he slept half-naked.

"Nothing!" One replied, waving her hands to calm him down. "Just a nightmare!"

Steve sighed in relief and collapsed against the doorframe.

"Sorry I woke you," One apologized with a sheepish smile.

"It's okay," Steve replied. "You're much more effective than an alarm clock."

One threw a pillow at him in response, smacking him right in the face with a soft whoosh. Steve caught it and threw it back, missing her by a mile.

"Come on, I'll make us breakfast," Steve laughed, gesturing for her to follow him as he turned towards the stairs.

"Actually..." One began, stopping Steve mid-step. "I should really try to get back."

"Oh." Steve's smile dropped when he remembered. "Right."

After changing back into her own clothes so that she wouldn't take Robin's with her, One followed Steve down the stairs and towards the living room, which she had decided would be her ground zero for portal-testing. Now that she was somewhat rested, she felt confident that she would be successful in getting back home this time.

Steve sat on the arm of the couch, his arms crossed and his face crestfallen. He hadn't expected to be this upset about her leaving, given that they were more or less complete strangers, but whenever he was around her an intense feeling of déjà vu nearly knocked him off his feet.

"Steve, I--" One began before stopping herself. She had never been good at good-byes and this situation didn't make it any easier. "Thank you," she said instead.

"Anytime," Steve replied, forcing his frown into a small smile.

One turned in a circle until she found something to focus on: a small picture frame sitting on the end table next to the couch with the only photo of Steve that she had seen in the entire house. He was just a kid in the picture and at first she almost didn't recognize him without his signature hair style, his hair in the picture being much shorter and more unkempt, but the glowing smile was still the same and One couldn't help but smile back.

She pictured her Steve waiting for her back in their universe and what their reunion might be like. Would he be at Scoops Ahoy, the ice cream falling from his scooper to the floor when he saw her? Would he catapult the counter in a rush to hug her? Would they ever top the kiss that would ensue?

One's stomach jumped when a spark of light grew in the air before her, but just as quickly as it appeared, it disappeared.

"Um, was that supposed to happen?" Steve asked, having watched the whole thing.

One sighed. "No."

She tried again, this time envisioning Hopper and what their reunion might be like. Would he be at the cabin, sitting in his recliner watching another one of his corny horror flicks and nearly fling his popcorn bucket across the room at the sight of her? Would he make her Eggo's and watch Westerns with her all night? Would he cry?

More sparks. More nothing.

One gritted her teeth and tried again. This time, with Eleven. Would she be in the middle of a D&D campaign with the party, the die dropping from her hand mid-shake and landing on a one when she spotted her? Would she wrap her in a hug that nearly squeezed her insides to the outside? Would the rest of the party join in?

"I don't understand!" One cried in frustration when the portal once again failed.

Steve watched silently, contemplating his words. "I don't mean to rush you, but I've got to get to work or I'm going to be late..."

One shot him a glance.

"Why don't you come with me and keep trying there?" Steve suggested. "Who knows, maybe you can only exit the universe where you entered it."

One opened her mouth to speak but found that she had nothing to say. She couldn't stay at Steve's house by herself and his theory was just as good as any. It was worth a shot. "Okay," she agreed.

☆ ★ ☆

"So, what exactly is she doing?" Robin asked Steve, her eyes glued to One, who was standing in the Family Video parking lot staring at various things intently. One's ensemble had changed yet again, as Steve had kindly pointed out that she would draw attention in her own clothes and instead offered her access to his mother's wardrobe. The name-brand fashion was a little too overwhelming for One, but she managed to find a pair of jeans that fit. And out of Steve's closet, she had borrowed an old Hawkins High hoodie.

"She's trying to open a portal back to her universe," Steve answered as he re-shelved one of the VHS's from the stack in his arms.

"Okay..." Robin replied, her eyes still stuck on One. "Do we need to be concerned about her scaring away customers?"

"Just let her do her thing, Robin." Steve's head had disappeared from Robin's sight as he leaned down to put away another VHS but his voice still carried.

"Admit it, you're secretly hoping that she fails," Robin said with a sly smile. Steve's head immediately popped back up.

"Am not," he argued.

"Oh, come on, that's such bull," Robin retorted with a roll of her eyes. She huffed as she leaned against the check-out counter. "Why is that I've been trying for months to get a girl's attention but you bat your eyes and one falls right out of the sky?"

"That's not..." Steve began to say, but he didn't have the words to finish it. "It's more complicated than that. And besides, Vickie is totally in love with you. I saw you two at the game."

Robin pushed herself off the counter and meandered down the aisles until she found Steve, grabbing a VHS off the stack in his arms to help put away. "I mean...maybe. I told that Muppet joke and then Vickie laughed. And it wasn't like a cheap, fake laugh either. It was like...it was a real, genuine laugh."

"Of course she laughed, Robin. It's my Muppet joke. It's hilarious."

Steve continued to re-shelve VHS's and Robin followed after. "My point is that Vickie laughed and everything was just like...it was perfect," she continued.

"But...?" Steve asked, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"But I'm having this problem where it's like, I should stop talking. I have said everything I need to say," Robin began to ramble, the words tumbling out one after the other. "But then I guess I get nervous, and the words keep spilling out...and it's like my brain is moving faster than my mouth or...or rather my mouth is moving faster than my brain. And it's like I'm digging this hole for myself and I want to stop digging, I'm trying to stop, but I can't...and I'm doing it right now, aren't I?"

"Yeah, you are," Steve informed her, leaning against one of the shelves after he put away the last VHS.

"I'm hopeless," Robin sighed, backing into the The Last Dragon lightbox with a thud.

Steve joined her, crossing his arms over his chest. "Eh, we both are."

Robin turned to face Steve, looking him up and down as an idea sprung to her head. "If only we could just like, combine," she said, her fingers knitting together in demonstration.

"Combine?" Steve asked skeptically.

"No, think about it," Robin continued, becoming more certain the more she spoke. "I know exactly what I want and I've found the girl of my dreams, but I just can't get the courage to ask her out."

"Mm-hmm," Steve agreed.

"Meanwhile, you go on a million dates and you have no idea what you want."

"Mm-hmm," he agreed again, this time less enthusiastically. He found his eyes darting towards the parking lot where One was still attempting to open a portal.

"So if we just combined, all our problems would be solved. Because I mean, alone, let's face it..." Robin said, her voice trailing off.

"We totally suck," Steve finished for her with a sigh.

"Totally and utterly," Robin agreed when her eyes landed on something. "Ooh, I think I found our morning movie!" Her line of sight pulled her across the store, where she picked something up from the shelf and displayed it for Steve to see. "Doctor Zhivago."

Steve pushed himself off the lightbox, waving his arms in protest. "Ugh, you know I don't do double VHS."

"But it's about doomed love!"

"Oh, well, that's relatable," Steve muttered to himself, his eyes once more glancing towards One. What was more doomed than starting to develop feelings for a girl who didn't even live in your universe? Steve tried to shake the intruding thought away but it lingered.

"Precisely," Robin replied, oblivious to Steve's inner turmoil as she wound her way towards the television. "Also, Julie Christie is b-b-bonkers hot in this. Like seriously, the most beautiful creature I have ever seen in my life."

Robin turned on the TV to switch the channel over to the VCR when the news caught their attention. A reporter stood in front of a crowd gathered before a trailer, the microphone held closely to her painted lips. "We're in Forest Hills Trailer Park in East Roane County," the reporter announced. "We don't have a lot of details right now but we can confirm that the body of a Hawkins High student was discovered early this morning. Police have not released the name, although we are told they're currently in the process of notifying the family."

"Holy shit," Steve muttered.

The bell above the door rang in agreement as One entered with a shake of her head and a look of frustration. "I don't get it, I don't fucking get it..." she mumbled to herself as she approached Steve and Robin. It wasn't until she reached them that she noticed the news report. "What happened?"

"Somebody died," Steve answered but One barely heard him because her eyes and ears were completely focused on the TV. Her stomach dropped when the voice of the man from her nightmare suddenly returned to her.

"You're just in time. It's about to begin."

"Is everything okay?" Steve asked, snapping One out of her stupor with a wave of his hand.

"Y-yeah," One stammered. The man's voice faded back to the depths but the bad feeling remained. She looked to Steve, repeating herself more confidently. "Yes."

"Portals still not working?" Steve asked, jumping up to sit on the counter and patting the space next to him. One reluctantly followed after.

"Nope," she answered with a huff. "Looks like I'm stuck."

"I can think of worse places to be stuck," Steve replied, the corner of his mouth turned up in a smile. He gently nudged One with his elbow until she returned the smile, even if it only lasted for a moment.

The bell caught their attention as it rang once more to announce the presence of two new people: Dustin and Max. "Hey, Steve!" Dustin called out as he marched towards the counter, his pace faltering when he noticed One. "Holy shit, you're back!"

"Never really left," One answered with a sigh and a sullen look.

"Did you guys see this?" Steve asked, referring to the news report that was still playing on the TV. He jumped down to join Robin behind the register.

"How many phones do you have?" Dustin asked, switching back on track.

"Someone was murdered," Steve continued, ignoring Dustin's question.

"How many phones do you have?" Dustin repeated himself, leaning in towards them to further emphasize the urgency.

"What? Two," Steve answered, looking to Robin for confirmation. "Why?"

"Technically three, if you count Keith's in the back," Robin added.

Max turned to Dustin and nodded her head. "Yeah, three works."

"What are you doing?" Steve asked as Dustin took his backpack off and slid it across the countertop, taking out a pile of papers with it. "Whoa!"

"My pile!" Robin shouted as Dustin followed after, knocking a stack of VHS's to the ground.

"No, no, no! My tapes!" Steve shouted, his arms flailing up in the air as he quickly stepped back to avoid being bulldozed by Dustin. "Dude! What are you doing, man?"

"Setting up base of operations here," Dustin answered as he began typing at the computer keyboard. Max rounded the counter and joined at his side while One remained seated on the opposite countertop, watching curiously.

"Base of operations?" Robin asked.

"Stop, get off of that," Steve scolded Dustin.

"No, I need it," Dustin argued, continuing to type away.

"Need it for what?"

"Looking up Eddie's friends's phone numbers," Dustin answered, his eyes glued to the computer screen.

"Oh, Eddie," Steve replied sarcastically with a roll of his eyes. "Your new best friend, Eddie, who you think is cooler than me because he plays your nerdy game?"

"Ed, yes!" Dustin exclaimed in frustration before turning to look at Steve. "I never said that."

"Seriously, you guys, maybe on a Monday you can play around in here like toddlers, but it's a Saturday," Robin grumbled as she re-stacked the VHS's that Dustin had knocked over. "It's our busiest day."

"All right, look, Robin, I totally empathize but this cannot wait until Monday."

"What, 'cause calling all of Eddie's friends is an emergency?"

"Correct!" Dustin shouted.

"Uh, do you want me to strangle him or do you want to do that?" Steve asked Robin as he joined her at her side.

"We can take turns," Robin answered with a smile.

Dustin sighed in exasperation. "Can you just fill them in while I do this?" he asked Max.

"Fill us in on what?"

Max's eyes glanced up to the ceiling as she tried to compose her thoughts and the bad feeling in One's gut once more flared up again. Whatever Max was about to say, something in the back of One's mind told her it was related to everything; to her nightmare, to the news. Something bad was happening in Hawkins and this was only the start.

"You're just in time. It's about to begin."

"Last night, I saw something weird at Eddie's..." Max began when she finally found the words.

"Something weird at Eddie's? Sounds pretty normal to me," Steve grumbled to himself and Robin elbowed him in the side.

"He was with Chrissy," Max continued ignoring Steve.

"Cunningham? The cheerleader?" Robin asked in disbelief.

"What would a cheerleader be doing with a freak like Eddie?" Steve asked.

"All right, enough of that, would you?" Dustin snapped, glaring at Steve until he put his hands up in surrender.

"I don't know what she was doing there, all I know is that not even twenty minutes later, Eddie was rushing out of the trailer park like...like hell was on his heels and now this morning, Chrissy is dead."

"What time last night?" One asked, her voice finally joining the conversation. Everybody turned to look at her before looking back to Max.

"I don't know. Maybe like half-past midnight?" Max answered. "Why?"

"Shit," One muttered to herself. Max's answer confirmed her suspicion: that was around the time she had the nightmare. One opened her mouth to tell the others about it but she was scared to put voice to it in case there was still the small, incredibly unlikely chance that it was all just a coincidence and that her nightmare was truly just that: a nightmare.

"That's not all," Max continued. "When it happened, the lights in my trailer went crazy. And I mean, sure, our electricity isn't the best and we get power outages like, all the time, but this was just a little too coincidental."

"You think it's the Upside Down," One replied, recognizing the terrified look in Max's eyes. Unable to speak, Max nodded in response and One sighed. The likelihood of everything being a coincidence dropped from 1% to 0%.

"So you want to find Eddie..." Robin said, putting the pieces together. "Because you think he saw something that could prove the Upside Down is back?"

"Precisely," Dustin answered.

"Well, then what are we waiting for?" Robin asked, her hands slamming against the countertop. "Let's get calling!"

Dustin, Max, and Robin each took a phone as they began to wind down the list of Eddie's friends. Since there were only three phones and five of them, that left Steve and One on the sidelines.

"So...you got movies in your universe?" Steve asked, looking for a conversation starter and failing miserably.

One laughed at the stupidity of the question. "Of course."

"All right then, what's your favorite?"

"I haven't seen a ton, you know, on account of living in the Lab for seven years and then the Upside Down for eight," One began, Steve's eyebrows shooting up to his hairline in surprise. "But I guess I'd have to say, The Muppet Movie."

Steve snorted and rolled his eyes playfully. "The Muppet Movie? You've got to be joking."

"What?" One retorted, faking offense. "It was one of the few VHS's I could find in the Upside Down that actually worked."

"Well, now that you're out of the Upside Down you need to expand your palate," Steve teased.

"What's yours then?"

"Doctor Zhivago," Steve answered, picking up the VHS set from where Robin had set it down on the counter. Robin rolled her eyes, having overheard him on her phone call. "It's a double VHS. It's long, but that's because it's filled with action and romance and a little bit of suspense."

"Sounds interesting," One replied.

"You know..." Steve began, running his hand through his hair. "If you still aren't able to get back to your universe, we could watch it tonight..."

One opened her mouth to respond when Max diverted their attention. "Hey guys, I might have a lead," Max announced.

"Seriously?" Dustin asked, immediately slamming his phone down on the receiver. Robin followed suit, cutting off the person on the other side mid-sentence.

"Yeah," Max answered. "Apparently Eddie gets his drugs from some guy named Reefer Rick and sometimes Eddie crashes there."

"That sounds promising," Robin said. "Where does this Reefer Rick guy live?"

"See...that's the thing," Max began, shifting her weight from one leg to the other. "No one knows. He's more of a legend than someone that people actually know."

"Well, what about a last name?" Dustin offered.

Max's face fell even farther. "I don't have that either."

"Bet the cops know a last name," Steve piped up, drawing everybody's eyes towards him.

"What?" Max asked.

"Cops," Steve repeated himself. "I mean, listen, if this Reefer Rick is actually a drug dealer, I guarantee you he's been busted at some point. Means he's in the system."

"The cops?" Dustin asked incredulously. "Really, Steve? That's your suggestion?"

"I mean I just think at this point that they should probably be filled in on what we know, what's going on."

"Steve, I don't think that's a good idea..." One voiced her opinion. Steve turned to her, unable to maintain his look of irritation when his eyes fell on her face. "If your Upside Down is anything like mine was, they won't be able to help."

"You think Eddie's guilty, don't you?" Dustin snapped, drawing Steve's attention back towards him.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Steve countered in defense. "I believe in innocent until proven guilty, all that constitutional shit...I just, you know, just don't think that we can rule it out."

"That's precisely what we're trying to do here, Steve," Max argued.

"And maybe, we'd have a little bit more luck if you spent less time trying to find a girlfriend and more time trying to find Eddie," Dustin added, his eyes glancing towards One to demonstrate his point. One immediately looked away to hide her rosy cheeks, feigning ignorance at what Dustin was insinuating. 

"I can't exactly be much help when there's only three phones," Steve argued, continuing to dig himself deeper. "And somebody has to attend to the customers!"

"Especially if they're babes, right?" Robin added with a wink, also throwing a glance towards One. One's cheeks burned even brighter.

"Hey, not fair. Okay? I attend to all the customers equally, babes and non-babes alike," Steve prattled on, his tongue nearly tying itself in knots as he tried to defend himself. "We've got a very big selection in here, okay? It can be super overwhelming for these people."

"Yeah..." Robin agreed, an idea suddenly striking her. "It can be..."

Robin rushed over to the computer, her fingers flying across the keyboard. The screen cast a blue glow on her face as her eyes scoured the text before her.

"What are you doing?" Max asked, joining beside her.

"Maybe we don't need a last name," Robin answered, her eyes never leaving the screen. She continued to click away at the computer keys until a list of names appeared on the screen. "Twelve Rick's already have accounts here."

"That's a lot of Rick's," Max mumbled to herself.

"So let's narrow it down," Robin suggested. She clicked on the first name. "Rick Alderman's latest rentals are Annie and Dumbo. What are the chances our drug dealer has a family?"

"Not likely," Max answered, Dustin shaking his head behind her. One wasn't familiar with the titles so she resigned to silently watching behind them.

"All right," Robin continued. "Rick Conroy...Sixteen Candles, Teen Wolf, and Romancing the Stone."

She was answered with a shake of heads.

Robin continued to click through names, Max, Dustin, and Steve offering a collective "no" to each one until they reached a name halfway through the list that yielded promising results.

"Okay, Rick Lipton," Robin announced as she clicked on the next name. "Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Cheech & Chong's Next Movie, Cheech & Chong's Nice Dreams, Cheech & Chong's Up in Smoke."

"Bingo," Dustin said, his eyes lighting up and a smile splitting his face.

"Lipton?" Max asked.

"Spelled like the tea," Robin confirmed. Her eyes shot to the top of the screen where she found the address listed for the account. "2121 Holland Road."

"That's out by Lover's Lake," Dustin informed them.

"Middle of nowhere," Max added.

Robin smiled in success. "It's the perfect place to hide."

The group rushed out of Family Video, Robin flipping the sign to "CLOSED" and locking the door behind her. In their rush, they hadn't even bothered to turn off the lights or the television and one unlucky customer got locked inside.

"So we're going to portal there, right?" Dustin asked One with wide eyes and an even wider smile as they strode across the parking lot.

"My portals aren't exactly cooperating right now," One answered in embarrassment. "Better to take a car unless you want to accidentally end up in Antarctica."

"I could go for some penguins," Steve said to no one in particular.

Dustin's face fell in disappointment but he nodded his head in understanding and piled into the back of Steve's car with Max and Robin. This meant that One was left with the passenger seat, and once everybody was buckled, Steve ripped out of the Family Video parking lot and off in search of Eddie.

☆ ★ ☆

The sun had settled beyond the horizon, slivers of stars taking their turn in the night sky by the time they had arrived at Reefer Rick's. The car's headlights barely cut through the thick fog that enveloped them, illuminating the dilapidated house in a hazy glow.

"Okay. Well, that's settled. I guess he's not here," Steve said as they approached the front door. Aside from their flashlights, there was only darkness.

"Eddie! It's Dustin," Dustin shouted, ignoring Steve as he pounded against the front door. "Look we just wanna talk, okay? No cops, I swear. We just wanna help."

Robin's, Max's, and One's flashlights reflected off the windows as they peered into the darkness inside. From what they could see, there was no sign that anybody had been there recently.

"Rick!" Dustin changed tactics when his previous attempt didn't yield results, banging his hands even harder. "REEFER RICK!"

"Don't scream that," Steve cautioned him in a hushed voice. "He's not there."

"He could just be really high," Dustin countered.

While Steve and Dustin argued about whether or not an object they spotted was a foot or a shoe, Max continued ahead, the beam of her flashlight cutting through the trees until they landed on a structure down by the lake. "Hey, guys!" she shouted, pulling their attention towards her.

The five of them approached the boat house cautiously, their flashlights penetrating the holes in the siding and casting pinpricks of light on the other side. Their heavy breaths lingered in the damp air as they prepared themselves for what could be waiting inside.

"Hello?" Robin called into the boat house as the door slowly creaked open. "Is anyone home?"

"What a dump," Steve announced as he flashed his light around the space and found an assortment of old tools, life preservers, paint cans, and empty beer bottles scattered about the work bench and the floor.

While the others searched around the perimeter, Steve grabbed a wooden oar from a hook on the wall, his eyes set on the rusted fishing boat sitting in the center. Taking a deep breath, Steve lunged at the ratty tarp covering it, poking the indiscernible lumps beneath it with the oar.

"What are you doing?" Dustin snapped at him. "What are you doing?"

"He might be in here," Steve answered as he continued to prod the boat with the oar. 

"So take the tarp off."

"If you're so brave, you take the tarp off."

"Hey, look over here," Max called out, drawing Robin and One to her side. Her hands ran over receipts, food wrappers, and a half-drank bottle of beer that looked newer than the rest of the dust-covered items in the boat house. "Someone was here."

"Maybe he heard us," Robin offered. "Got spooked and ran."

"With how loud Dustin was, I wouldn't doubt it," One mumbled.

"Don't worry, Steve will get him with his oar," Dustin replied sarcastically, not having heard One's quip.

"I know you think you're being funny, Henderson, but considering the fact that everyone in this room has nearly died about a hundred times, personally, I don't find it funny in the slight--"

Steve was cut short when the tarp suddenly came to life, leaping from the boat and driving Steve back against the wall with a thud that shook the whole structure. When the tarp fell away, the group was surprised to find Eddie with a broken bottle pressed to Steve's throat.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, Eddie! Eddie! Stop!" Dustin called out, waving his hands frantically. Robin and One tried to push past but Dustin held them back.

Eddie turned his attention to Dustin but he held the bottle firm. The whites of his eyes glowed in the beam of Dustin's flashlight, reflecting the look of a wild animal that had been cornered.

"It's me, it's Dustin," Dustin continued calmly. "This is Steve. He's not gonna hurt you, right, Steve?"

"Right, yeah," Steve choked out.

"Steve, why don't you drop the oar..." Dustin gently instructed him.

Steve released the oar, letting it drop to the ground in a clatter. But the sound startled Eddie, who pressed the broken glass closer to Steve's throat. A drop of blood trickled down Steve's neck and it was at this point that One shoved past Dustin.

"Let him go," she warned Eddie, her hands lighting up with blue electricity. Eddie's eyes widened in shock, his grip on the bottle loosening until it fell from his hand to the ground with a clink. He immediately backed away from Steve, his eyes on her hands the entire time. Steve groaned as he buckled over in relief, his hand pressing to the spot where the glass had dug into his skin.

Once the electricity faded from One's hands and Eddie had a moment to breathe, he began talking. "What are you doing here? And who the fuck is that?" he asked, pointing wildly towards One.

"We're looking for you," Dustin answered.

"We're here to help," Robin added.

"Eddie, these are my friends," Dustin continued, gesturing to his friends in turn as he introduced them. "You know Robin, from band." Robin mimed playing a trumpet. "And this is my friend Max, the one who never wants to play D&D." Max waved a hand. "And this is One, she's kind of a new addition to the team and we still don't know a ton about her but we'll get to that." One shrugged and nodded her head. "We're on your side."

Eddie took a moment to think this over before backing against the wall and slowly sinking down. The caged look still hadn't left his eyes.

"Eddie," Dustin said as he approached him, leaning down to his level. "We just want to talk."

Eddie's lips formed unsaid words, his voice once more getting caught in his throat.

"We want to know what happened," Robin informed him.

Eddie sniffled, a tear drop snaking down his cheek. "You won't believe me."

"I think we will," One answered, her hands once more glowing blue. Eddie flinched at first, but after a moment he nodded his head.

The group helped Eddie to resituate somewhere more comfortable before he began his tale, all of them crowding around him in anticipation.

"Chrissy came over to buy some drugs from me," Eddie began, his elbows resting on his bouncing knees and his eyes staring at the vacant space behind them. "Our original deal was weed but she wanted something stronger. Why, man, I don't know. All I know is she seemed like...spooked about something. While I was in my room searching for the ket--" Eddie stopped himself when he remembered that there were children present. "-tle chips...that's when it started."

"What happened?" Dustin asked.

Eddie took a breath, his chin lifting towards the ceiling as he blinked back tears. "Her body...just like, lifted up into the air, and uh...and she just hung there. In the air. And her bones..." Eddie winced as the memory replayed itself in his mind. "Her bones started to snap. Her eyes, man...it was like there was something, like, inside her head, pulling. I-I didn't know what to do so I...I ran away. I left her there."

Eddie's eyes fell back upon his companions as he watched for their reactions. The others tried to keep a straight face but One's shocked features betrayed her and Eddie immediately turned away in shame.

"I'm sorry," One immediately apologized to him, his back still facing her. "I wasn't reacting to you leaving. I think you did the right thing. I'm reacting to what happened. I..." One paused before more words could come out. Once more, she contemplated telling the others about her nightmare but for some reason she couldn't bring herself to. What Eddie described was exactly what she had seen happen to the other subjects in her nightmare and if that part was real, then that meant the other parts of her nightmare were too; the parts that she didn't want to even consider, the parts that she had buried deep down. No, she didn't judge Eddie for running. How could she? Because right then, she wanted to run too. "I've never encountered anything like that in my universe.

"Your universe?" Eddie asked, turning back to her with a look of confusion.

"Look, what we're about to tell you might be a little...difficult to take." Dustin explained, waiting until Eddie's eyes met his to explain the rest.

"Okay..." Eddie said softly when the silence continued.

"You know how people say Hawkins is...cursed?" Dustin began, his eyes glancing uncomfortably towards the others. "They're not way off. There's another world, a world hidden beneath Hawkins. Sometimes it...bleeds into ours."

"Like ghosts and shit?"

"There are some things worse than ghosts," Max answered, her voice leaving a chill in the air.

"These monsters from this other world," Dustin continued with a sigh, his mind filling with memories. The Demogorgon. The demodogs. The Mind Flayer. "we thought they were gone. But they've come back before and that's why we needed to find you."

"If they're back again we need to know," Max said, her voice stressing the gravity of the situation.

Eddie watched them carefully, his features unreadable. Whether he believed what they were saying or not, it was hard to tell.

"That night, did you see anything?" Robin asked him.

"Dark particles, maybe?" Max offered.

Eddie just shook his head in confusion.

"It would almost look like dust," Dustin explained. "Swirling dust."

Eddie continued to shake his head no.

"Maybe you heard something?" One asked next. "Kind of like a chittering...or a howl...something that sounded like an animal but wasn't?"

"No, man, there was nothing you could see or hear or...touch," Eddie gulped. His eyes darted between the five people before him, pleading with them to understand. "You know, I tried to wake her, man. She couldn't move. It was like she was...she was in a trance or something."

"Or under a spell..." Dustin thought out loud.

"A curse," Eddie corrected him.

Dustin's eyes widened and his face paled. "Vecna's curse."

One cocked her head at the name. The name itself wasn't familiar but the feeling the name evoked was. Her heart raced and her palms became clammy.

"Who's Vecna?" Steve asked. Robin and Max listened intently for the answer, thankful that they weren't the only ones who didn't know.

A beat of silence passed before Dustin answered. "An undead creature of great power."

"A spellcaster," Eddie added.

"A dark wizard," Dustin confirmed.

One's stomach lurched as a vision of the man from her nightmare suddenly filled her head. Icy blue eyes staring out from behind strands of blonde hair dyed red with blood.

"Hello, One," he had said, his reflection encompassing hers until it was the only thing visible in the mirror behind her. "You're just in time. It's about to begin."

"Who are you?" she had asked, but she already knew the answer.

One's voice came out in a pale whisper, too quiet for anybody to hear but herself. "Me."

"How did you sleep?" Steve asked One in an attempt to make small talk as they drove to pick up Robin, Dustin, and Max on their way back to Reefer Rick's. He cautioned a glance at her, his throat suddenly dry.

Upon returning to Steve's house the night previous, One had immediately shut herself in the guest bedroom. One felt bad about this, as she had left Steve standing by himself in the living room with the Doctor Zhivago VHS set in his hands, but she had needed time to be alone with her racing heart and hurried thoughts.

She had wondered what happened to herself in the universe she was presently trapped in and it seemed she had an answer, although not one she liked. Even now, she found herself trying to deny it, to push aside the startling realization she had made the night before. But whether this man from her nightmare was truly her alternate self, or some sort of replacement, he wasn't just in her head. He was real. And he was threatening Hawkins.

And she was a coward. Her racing heart and hurried thoughts weren't the only reason she locked herself in the guest room and out of Steve's sight. While her friends likely laid awake, searching the ceiling for answers on how to protect their town, she had spent the whole night trying to open a portal back to her universe, to escape.

When she had destroyed the Mind Flayer and the Upside Down, the thought of running was never even a blip on her radar, but now it was all she could think about. Who was she? That morning, after finally building up the courage to look in the mirror, she had asked the girl who stared back at her this question and the girl had responded, Tired.

"Good," One lied, rubbing at the corner of her eye when Steve wasn't looking.

After that the car ride remained silent, even after picking up Robin, Dustin, and Max. When they finally arrived to Reefer Rick's, everyone grabbed a grocery bag from the trunk of Steve's car to bring into the boat house. Steve and One had made a run prior to picking up the others, grabbing some essentials for Eddie until they could figure out the next step.

"Delivery service!" Dustin announced as he kicked open the boat house door, startling Eddie who had been anxiously waiting inside.

Eddie immediately dug into the first bag he could get his hands on, pulling out an assortment of random items that he didn't look twice at before collapsing onto the edge of the boat to fill his starving stomach.

"So we got, uh, some good news, and some bad news," Dustin informed Eddie as Eddie shoved a handful of Honey Combs into his mouth. "How do you prefer it?"

"Bad news first, always," Eddie answered between bites, washing the half-chewed food down his throat with Yahoo.

"All right, bad news," Dustin confirmed. "We tapped into the Hawkins PD dispatch with our Cerebro and they're definitely looking for you. Also, they're uh, pretty convinced you killed Chrissy."

"Like one-hundred percent, kind of convinced," Max added.

Eddie looked between Dustin and Max, his mouth struggling to stay closed. "And the good news?" he asked hopefully.

"Your name hasn't gone public yet," Robin answered from where she sat on a pile of boxes. "But if we found out about you, it's only a matter of time before others do too. And once that get's out, everyone and their shallow-minded mother is going to be gunning for you."

"Hunt the freak, right?" Eddie sighed, his eyes beginning to water and his heart beginning to race.

"Exactly," Robin agreed with a sympathetic look.

"So before that happens, we need to find Vecna, kill him, and prove your innocence," Dustin listed out the plan.

"That's all, Dustin?" Eddie asked him sarcastically. "That's all?"

"Yeah, no, that's pretty much it."

"Listen, Eddie," Robin began, drawing Eddie's attention back towards her. "I know everything Dustin is saying sounds totally delusional, but we've actually been through this kind of thing before. I mean, they have, a few times, and I have...once. Mine was more human-fleshed-based and theirs was more smoke-related...and I-I'm not really sure what One's experience was..."

"Also smoke-related," One explained. "With just like, a sprinkle of illusion."

"Okay, another tally for smoke-related and also one for illusion...but bottom line is, collectively, I really feel like we've got this," Robin finished with a forced smile and two thumbs up.

"Yeah, see, we usually rely on this girl who has super powers but those went bye-bye so..." Steve began, his eyes darting over to One. "So now we've got...a temporary replacement."

One snapped her head towards Steve, her brows furrowed in frustration. Steve's doe eyes offered her an apologetic look but One turned away. She knew she couldn't actually be mad at Steve but she still felt angry nonetheless. Or more accurately, afraid.

"See, I still don't entirely understand who she is..." Eddie said, his eyes glued to One.

"Eddie Munson, One. One, Eddie Munson," Dustin quickly introduced them. "She's from another universe, she can travel through time and space, and also apparently create electricity with her hands...which we just learned recently. We'll figure all the other shit out later."

Eddie nodded his head without actually having comprehended anything that Dustin said.

"Munson?" One asked Eddie, the name bringing to mind Dr. Brenner's boss from her universe. "Do you have a relative that works for the U.S. Department of Energy?"

"Yeah, I think my grandpa did before he retired," Eddie answered.

"Does he still have both his arms?"

"What?"

"Nothing."

"See? There...there's nothing to worry about," Dustin said with a smile that looked more confident than he sounded. Steve nodded his head in agreement, earning a doubtful look from Eddie. And that doubtful look only amplified when sirens began screaming nearby.

"Tarp!" Robin shouted as the others raced to the windows to see where the sirens were coming from. "Tarp, tarp!"

Eddie spread out flat across the bottom of the boat, flinging the tarp over himself and lying deadly still. He didn't even dare to breathe. From the windows, the others watched in surprise as several cop cars and a firetruck flew down the road in front of Reefer Rick's house. A collective sigh escaped their mouths when the vehicles continued on, not even slowing down.

"Where do you think they're going?" Dustin asked after the last cop car had disappeared, their siren only a buzzing in their ears.

"I don't know..." Steve answered, his eyes still glued to the window.

"We should check it out," Robin suggested. "It could be related."

"What about Eddie?" Dustin asked, looking over his shoulder at the tarp.

"He'll be fine here," Robin answered as she strode towards the door. One and Max were right behind her and after sharing a look of disbelief, Steve and Dustin were close after. "Eddie, stay put! We'll be back!"

A thumb shot up from the tarp to signify that Eddie had heard her.

☆ ★ ☆

"So...you're saying that this thing that killed Fred and Chrissy, it's from the Upside Down?" Nancy asked the others, who were sitting around her at a picnic table in Forest Hills Trailer Park.

After Steve, One, Robin, Max, and Dustin had once more crowded into Steve's car, it hadn't taken them long to find the source of the commotion. The emergency personnel had worked quickly, blocking off part of the road with yellow caution tape, the broken body of Fred Benson barely visible in the middle of the scene between all the movement. But perhaps what had almost been more surprising than the sight of Fred, was Nancy, who was busy talking with Chief Powell when they had pulled up.

After Nancy had finished talking with the cops, she joined the rest of them back at Forest Hills Trailer Park so that they could catch her up on what they knew.

"If the shoe fits," Steve answered.

"Our working theory is that he attacks with a spell...or a curse," Dustin explained. "Now, whether or not he's doing the bidding of the Mind Flayer or just loves killing teens, we don't know."

"All we know is that this is something different," Max continued. "Something new."

Nancy stared at each of them in turn, her brows furrowed as she absorbed the information they were telling her. When her eyes came to One, she did a double take, not having noticed her before in all the commotion. "And who is this?" she asked, the question coming off more aggressively than she had intended it to.

"My name is One," One introduced herself with a small smile. She had never really gotten the chance to meet Nancy in her universe, although she had heard many things about her. Among them, that she was Steve's ex.

"One?" Nancy asked, her eyes widening. "Like...Eleven?"

One nodded her head and lit her hands for Nancy to see. "I can also create portals but they're not really...cooperating with me right now."

"She's from another universe," Steve explained. "But she's dealt with the Upside Down and the Mind Flayer in hers and even destroyed them. She's been helping us."

"So you can defeat this Vecna?" Nancy asked, her hands clutching the edge of the picnic table as a hopeful smile grew on her cheeks.

"I..." One began, unsure of what to say. "I don't know. I only barely defeated the Mind Flayer and that was...complicated." One's heart dropped as she glanced at the disheartened faces around her. Even though these were different people from the ones she knew and loved, they still looked the same when they were sad. She didn't like to disappoint them. "But I'll try."

Their somber looks lifted a little while One's fell. Even if her portals did work, she didn't know if she'd ever be returning home at this point. She couldn't leave them to deal with this mess on their own, especially when she, or some version of her, played a part in it. She had to stay and help, as much as she wanted to run and forget.

"We won't let what Vecna did to Fred or Chrissy happen to anyone else," Steve tried to reassure Nancy but Nancy was too deep in thought.

"Doesn't make sense..." Nancy mumbled to herself with a shake of her head.

"It's only a theory," Dustin replied.

"No, Fred and Chrissy don't make sense," Nancy explained, her hands slamming against the table in frustration. "I mean, why them?"

"Maybe they were just in the wrong place?" Dustin offered. "They were both at the game."

"We were at the game," Steve said once the realization hit him, his eyes glancing towards One who nodded nervously.

Nancy cocked her head at this, looking between the two curiously. When they had arrived at the trailer park, she had noticed that Steve had walked around the picnic table, passing several empty spots just to sit next to One. She also recognized the Indiana Hoosiers t-shirt and the gray windbreaker that One was wearing as Steve's. She found herself wondering just who this girl was and what she meant to Steve but blushed in shame when she remembered Jonathan.

"And Chrissy and Fred were near the trailer park," Max added, bringing Nancy back to the conversation at hand.

"We're at the trailer park..." Steve repeated himself, a bead of sweat dripping from his brow. "Uh...should we maybe not be here?"

"There is something about this place," Nancy agreed as the others looked around anxiously for any signs of danger. "Fred started acting weird the second we got here."

"Acting weird as in...?" Robin asked, awaiting Nancy's answer.

"Scared...on edge...upset..."

"Max said Chrissy was upset too," Dustin pointed out.

"Yeah, but not here," Max said. "She was crying in the bathroom at school."

"Serial killers stalk their prey before they strike, right?" Robin began. "So maybe Fred and Chrissy saw this...Vecman..."

"Vecna," Dustin corrected her. Robin just rolled her eyes.

"I don't know about you guys but if I saw some freaky wizard monster I would mention it to someone," Steve said and the others nodded in agreement.

"Maybe they did..." Max replied. "I saw Chrissy leaving Ms. Kelley's office. If you saw a monster you wouldn't go to the police, they'd never believe you. But you might go to your..."

"Your shrink," Robin finished for her, her eyes wide.

They all stood from the picnic table at the same time and rushed back towards where the cars were parked. When they got closer, Steve noticed that Nancy was heading towards her own car instead of his.

"Whoa, whoa, Nance!" he shouted, jogging to catch up to her. "Nance, where are you going?"

"Oh, there's just something I want to check on first..." Nancy answered as she continued walking towards her car.

"Something that maybe you want to share with the rest of us?" Dustin asked, his arms spread wide, inviting her to continue.

"I don't want to waste your time," Nancy replied with a placating smile. "It's a real shot in the dark."

"Yeah...okay...are you out of your mind?" Steve asked in disbelief. "Flying solo with this Vecna creep on the loose? No, it's too dangerous."

"Well, we can't all fit in one car anyways unless somebody wants to ride in the trunk," Robin pointed out. Dustin shrugged in contemplation but Robin immediately shook her head no.

"I can go with Nancy," One offered, looking to Nancy. "If that's okay?"

"Y-yeah," Nancy replied. Both her and Steve wore a matching look of surprise.

"Then I'll go with Nance too," Steve announced, tossing his keys to Robin and heading towards Nancy's car. "You guys take the car, check out the shrink," he instructed Robin, Max, and Dustin.

"I don't think you want me driving your car..." Robin informed him, fumbling with the keys in her hands and nearly dropping them.

"Why?" Steve asked.

"Because I don't have a license."

Steve stared at her incredulously. "Why don't you have a license?"

"Because I'm poor," Robin answered with a shrug.

"I can drive," Max offered innocently.

"No, no, never again!" Steve nearly shouted, his finger pointing at her accusingly. "Please, anybody but you. No."

Dustin caught Steve's eyes, his brows raised and his shoulders shrugged in suggestion.

"No chance," Steve shot him down.

"Come on!" Dustin whined.

"All right, okay, this is stupid," Robin said, grabbing the walkie-talkie from Dustin's backpack and shoving the keys back in Steve's hands. She stood beside Nancy and One. "You can drive your car and us ladies will stick together. Unless...you think we need you to protect us?"

Nancy stifled a laugh and One smiled. Steve looked between each of them with his hands on his hips, his expression evident that he didn't appreciate Robin's joke.

"Be careful!" Steve called after them as they clambered into Nancy's car, leaving Steve, Dustin, and Max on their own.

"You just gonna stand there and gawk, Harrington?" Dustin asked when Steve continued to stare at the spot where Nancy's car had been as they drove away.

"Shut up and get in the car. And wipe your feet," Steve ordered Dustin. Dustin obliged by wiping his feet on the side of the car. "On the outside, not the inside!" Steve shouted. He sighed as he climbed into the driver's seat, slamming the door shut behind him and turning the key in the ignition. Grumbling to himself, he shouted, "Always the babysitter. Always the goddamn babysitter!"

☆ ★ ☆

"Okay, help me get this straight," Robin said to Nancy as they climbed the steps to the library. One followed behind, her eyes scanning downtown for any differences from what she remembered of the downtown in her universe. From what she could tell, the biggest difference was that the RadioShack was two stores down. "Eddie's uncle Wayne thinks that Victor Creel escaped from Pennhurst Asylum and that he's the one running around Hawkins committing all these murders?"

"Pretty much," Nancy answered with a tight smile.

"But Victor committed the eyeball murders like, way back in the '50s..." Robin pointed out, trying to keep pace with Nancy's quick strides.

"Well, '59," Nancy corrected her, pulling open the door to the library and letting Robin and One enter before her.

"So that means that these murders predate Eleven and the Upside Down by about 30 years?"

"Yeah."

"Which makes spooky Victor Creel like seventy years old..."

"Yup." Nancy strode towards the front desk, ringing the bell to call for the librarian.

"So...he's a...grandpa murderer..." Robin said, her head resting on her chin as she leaned against the front desk. "Who can turn invisible and lift people into the air..." Robin paused and turned to One. "Do you have a grandpa murderer in your universe?"

One shrugged and shook her head. "Not that I know of."

"It doesn't make sense, I know," Nancy replied with a shake of her head. She rang the bell again, the chime echoing her irritation. "That's why I said it was a shot in the dark."

"I know, I just thought that by 'shot in the dark' you were being modest or hiding something super solid up your sleeve that you were going to wow us with later. But this is really, truly a shot in the dark...Like we are snipers with blindfolds on who have been spun around fifty times..."

Nancy's finger jabbed the bell rapid-fire until Robin stopped talking.

"Coming!" the librarian shouted as she rounded the corner, a stack of books in her arms.

"Hi, sorry," Nancy apologized. "We're in a bit of a rush. Could we get the keys to the basement archives?"

"Of course," the librarian answered. "Give me one second."

Robin turned to look at Nancy, her fingers weaving in and out of themselves. "Did I come off mean or condescending or something?" she asked.

"No," Nancy answered, her mouth opening before the word could even come out. She glanced towards One and One's eyes shot to the ceiling, pretending like she hadn't overheard their entire conversation. One had never met the Nancy in her universe and the Robin in her universe only a handful of times, so it had been an interesting experience sharing a car with them.

"Sorry," Robin continued. "It's just, you seem annoyed. You don't know me very well. I don't really have a filter or a strong grasp of social cues. So If say something that upsets you just know that I know that it's a flaw. Believe me, my mother reminds me daily."

"Got it."

"All right, ladies," the librarian said, interrupting their conversation to hand them the keys. "Here you go, have fun."

"Yup, we'll...try," Nancy responded, her eyes flashing towards Robin before she turned to head for the stairs. One glanced between Robin and Nancy before following after. Left alone at the front desk, the librarian offered Robin a questioning smile and Robin shrugged in response.

"I'm not annoying you, am I?" Robin whispered to One after catching up with her. Nancy was still several steps ahead of them.

One immediately shook her head no and Robin sighed a breath of relief. "I never got to know you very well in my universe, but I always wished I had," One answered with a genuine smile, which Robin returned, and together the two rushed to catch up to Nancy who had already disappeared down the stairs.

☆ ★ ☆

"Anything...juicy over there?" Robin asked Nancy and One as she scrolled through an endless number of newspaper articles detailing prize winners at the county fair and uneventful town hall meetings. She had already gone through three microfilms and the words were starting to blur in her eyes.

"Nothing new," Nancy answered for the umpteenth time.

"I'm not having any luck either," One added with a sigh from where she sat at the table next to the microfilm readers. There were only two microfilm readers available and One didn't know how to work one anyways so she resolved to scouring the physical newspapers that the library hadn't yet to converted to microfilm. There were numerous times that she had to remind herself to focus on the task at hand as she got caught up reading about all the different things that had happened in this universe. One article in particular caught her eye about Hopper becoming the Chief of Hawkins Police and One found herself unable to look away from the grainy picture of Hopper standing beside a man who was labeled as the mayor.

"Same here," Robin thirded. "Victor seemed like a normal guy...dead family, missing eyes, took a plea deal, sent to Pennhurst, blah, blah, blah..." Robin's stool creaked as she leaned over to look at Nancy. "What are we looking for exactly?"

Robin knocked on the side of the table when Nancy didn't answer her and Nancy reluctantly leaned over to meet her eyes. "Nance? Any mention of dark wizards or alternate dimensions? Things in that vein?" Robin asked.

Nancy shook her head in frustration and abruptly stood from her stool. "I don't know, okay?" she replied as she began to pace. "It's starting to seem like this was just a big waste of time. And you're obviously bored so why don't you just call Steve? I'm sure he'll just come pick you up and I mean, I'm not in any danger here, so..." At the mention of Steve, Nancy glanced towards One and One felt her cheeks turn red.

Robin exchanged a look with One as Nancy disappeared down the stairs to the archives and the two quickly followed after. One stopped Robin at the top of the stairs, gesturing that she was going to go down first.

"Is something wrong?" One asked Nancy, stopping at the bottom of the stairs. Nancy was digging through a drawer of microfilm, the back of her head offering One no answers.

"No, nothing's wrong," Nancy answered, her voice clipped. One cautioned another step down.

"If this is about Steve..." One continued. "I'm not trying to step on toes."

Nancy continued to dig through the microfilm but her pace slowed. One turned to head back up the stairs when Nancy sighed and One paused.

"I guess it kind of is...about Steve," Nancy answered, her back still facing One. One waited patiently for Nancy to continue. "Jonathan was supposed to come visit for spring break and he didn't...and it's just another reminder of how far we've fallen apart since he moved to California and how much long-distance sucks. And I guess...I guess maybe I've just been feeling lonely."

"You don't have to," Robin stated, suddenly appearing on the stairs next to One. She had been eavesdropping from above, finally finding a reason to join the conversation. "Maybe you don't need a boyfriend, maybe you just need...friends?"

Nancy turned to look at them, her eyes watering. A smile forced itself across her face, followed by a giggle. "You're right," Nancy agreed, wiping away a meandering tear. "Maybe I do."

"Well, friends help," One said with a clap of her hands, turning to look at Robin. "So let's help."

Robin nodded in agreement and skipped the rest of the way down the stairs, picking a set of drawers at random and beginning to dig through it. One joined her, placing a gentle hand on Nancy's shoulder as she passed. They both smiled at each other, an unspoken friendship cementing itself in that moment.

"Holy shit, the Weekly Watcher. I can't believe they have this," Robin exclaimed as she pulled a microfilm out of the drawer before her.

"Don't they write about like, Bigfoot and UFOs?" Nancy asked with an arched brow that illustrated her incredulity.

"First of all," Robin began. "UFOs are absolutely real. Bigfoot, I'm still on the fence about." One nodded her head in agreement. "But may I remind you that we are looking for information on dark wizards. If someone is going to write about that, it's going to be these weirdos."

Robin, Nancy, and One rushed up the stairs with the microfilm, threading the reel through the tray and crowding their faces around the screen. The first article to appear headlined, "ELVIS CLONED BY ALIENS" in bold black text.

"Ah, Elvis cloned by aliens," Nancy read aloud sarcastically. She took a deep breath and stepped away from the microfilm reader to calm her nerves. They had gotten so desperate that they were searching for answers in a tabloid paper. Nancy nearly laughed in disbelief.

"You never know," Robin said with a shrug. She continued to scroll through the microfilm until she came to a particularly interesting article. In a low voice, she read, "Victor Creel claims vengeful demon killed family. The murder that shocked a small community."

"Ha-ha, that's very funny."

"I'm. Not. Kidding," Robin replied. "Get over here."

Nancy reluctantly returned to the microfilm reader, taking her place back beside One. The two of them stared over Robin's shoulders as she continued to read the article out loud.

"According to several insiders, Victor believed his house was haunted by an ancient demon. Victor allegedly hired a priest to exorcise the demon from his home. Pretty novel for the '50s," Robin said, turning to look at Nancy and One. "Exorcist wasn't even out yet."

"Keep going," Nancy encouraged her.

"Okay, so, Victor claimed this exorcism failed but it angered this demon, which then murdered his family, removing their eyes. Victor believed he was spared as a punishment..."

"Yeah, well, that's pretty convenient for Victor," Nancy mumbled to herself.

"Yeah, or super inconvenient," Robin countered. "Victor was declared legally insane by the court, right? Well, what if this is why? I mean, it sounds pretty insane, maybe he just didn't go public because--"

"The plea bargain!" Nancy finished Robin's sentence for her once the thought struck. "The records were sealed."

"What if a demon did invade Victor's home?" Robin proposed, her eyes flickering between Nancy and One. "It's just, this demon wasn't any old demon."

"It was Vecna," One whispered.

"Dustin, do you copy?" Robin barked into the walkie-talkie as her, Nancy, and One dashed out of the library. They were in such a rush that they had left the microfilm in the microfilm reader, the article about Victor Creel still prominently displayed.

"Yeah, I copy," Dustin's voice responded after too many excruciating moments of silence.

"So, Nancy is a genius," Robin informed him. "And also me, and One too, for helping. But anyways, get this...Vecna's first victims date back all the way to 1959. Her shot in the dark was a bullseye!"

"Okay, that's totally bonkers but I can't really talk right now..."

"Wait, what are you doing?"

"Breaking and entering in the school to retrieve some confidential and extremely personal files." Dustin's voice crackled, making it hard to hear.

"Can you repeat that?" Robin asked, the feedback on the walkie whining.

"Just get your ass over here, stat!" Dustin shouted, nearly deafening Robin who had brought the walkie closer to her ear. "We'll explain everything!"

"I thought they were talking to Ms. Kelley," Nancy said as she pulled open the door to the driver's seat. A slam signified that One had already taken her spot in the back.

"We leave them alone for two hours," Robin sighed with a roll of her eyes as she snapped the walkie antenna shut and climbed into Nancy's car.

☆ ★ ☆

"I'm an idiot for suggesting that the only responsible people all go together," Robin muttered to herself, her head resting on her fist as she stared out the passenger window. Glowing lights illuminated her face as they whizzed past, giving life to a sleepy city that was closer to the brink of ruin than it realized. "What are they thinking? We need all hands on deck, not some hands in jail!"

"That's just it, they're not thinking," Nancy replied, her hands gripped tightly onto the steering wheel and her foot pressed firmly to the gas pedal.

"I mean, Steve, I get," Robin continued. "All that hair is just a cover for the pea-brain beneath it. If birds made a nest in it they'd be surprised at how spacious it is. But Dustin...well, okay, Dustin I'm not totally surprised about either...but Max. She seems somewhat sensible! I thought she'd be the one to rein those two idiots in!"

Nancy nodded her head and laughed. "It's like they all share a brain cell and that brain cell is currently on vacation."

One laughed along in the backseat, her eyes fixed to the passing scenery as they drove past. For a split second she almost forgot that she was in an entirely different universe, because everything looked the same in a blur. Except for one thing.

"One," the voice returned to One's mind.

"Stop the car!" One shouted, her eyes wide and her chest heaving. Nancy slammed on the brakes so hard that everybody's seatbelts strained against them, leaving future bruises.

"What?" Nancy asked, pulling a strand of hair out of her mouth and turning to look at One with wide eyes. "What is it?"

One's eyes wouldn't leave the spot out the window she was staring at and Robin and Nancy strained to see what she was seeing.

"What is she looking at?" Robin whispered to Nancy, who only shook her head in response. All they could see was a grassy bank with a lone street light standing in the middle of it. But that's not what One saw.

Under the fuzzy glow of the street light sat the same grandfather clock that One had seen at Steve's, its pendulum swinging back and forth as the second hand ticked closer to meet the minute hand and the hour hand at midnight. One bent in half, her hands pressed against her ears as a loud chiming suddenly erupted in her head.

"What's happening?" Robin asked, her voice frantic as she fumbled to unlock her seatbelt. "What's happening?"

"I don't know!" Nancy shouted, her words highlighted by her hands hitting the steering wheel.

"One? One, talk to us!" Robin pleaded, her body twisted around in her seat. "What's going on? We don't know how to help you unless you tell us what's going on."

Nancy watched nervously through the rearview mirror, her eyes wide and her face pale as One continued to writhe in the back seat. When she could take it no longer, she twisted the key in the ignition, bringing the engine back to life. "That's it, we need to get her to a hospital."

"We can't take her to the hospital!" Robin snapped. "She's got powers, what if they find out? What if the bad people find out?"

"Well, we can't just let her die in the backseat!" Nancy retorted. The two continued to argue over the best course of action until One's voice silenced them.

"You guys, I'm okay!" she shouted, her weak voice barely rising above their shouts. "I'm okay!"

Nancy's and Robin's heads turned so fast that they nearly gave themselves whiplash.

"What the fuck was that?" Nancy yelled, her heart drumming in her chest.

One took a deep breath, her eyes glancing between Nancy and Robin. Right as she parted her lips to speak, her mouth became dry and a chill caressed the back of her neck. "Vecna."

☆ ★ ☆

The second Nancy's car screeched to a halt in the high school parking lot, three doors swung open in unison as Nancy, Robin, and One scrambled out. They raced through the hallways, their feet slapping against the linoleum, until they came across Max, Dustin, and Steve standing outside of Ms. Kelley's office.

"One!" Steve shouted in surprise, a smile briefly lighting up his previously grim features. His eyes swiveled towards Robin and Nancy standing beside her and he coughed in embarrassment. "And Robin and Nancy! My three favorite people who I'm each equally excited to see."

"Something happened," Nancy said breathlessly, ignoring Steve.

"Something happened here too," Dustin replied, glancing towards Max, who stood off to the side, staring at the ground with her arms wrapped tightly around herself.

The group followed Max through the maze of high school hallways until they reached a dead end with nothing but a blank brick wall waiting for them at the end. Max halted mid-step and Steve and Dustin nearly ran into her.

"It was here," Max swore, her brows furrowed as she searched the wall for any indication of what she had seen. "Right here. It was so real. And then, when I got closer suddenly I just...I woke up."

"What did you see?" Robin asked gently.

"A grandfather clock, but it was like, in the wall," Max answered. Robin, Nancy, and One all exchanged glances.

"That's what I saw too," One explained, Max's, Steve's, and Dustin's heads all snapping towards her. "But it was on the side of the road under a street light."

"When did you see it?" Steve asked, his weight bouncing from leg to leg.

"Like ten minutes ago, before we got here," One answered.

"That's when Max saw it too," Dustin replied, a shiver running through his body. "Did your eyes turn white?"

"What?"

"Max's eyes," Dustin explained. "it was like they rolled back in her head. And she wasn't responding to us. It was like she was in a trance or something...Exactly what Eddie said happened to Chrissy."

One just shook her head, a past memory springing to mind. One instinctively wiped at her throat as she recalled the time that James had taken control of Will, forcing him to choke her. "I don't think so...I've experienced something like that in my universe, but it was the Mind Flayer, not Vecna."

"Wait, hold up," Steve said, holding his hand out to stop her. "You think Vecna did this?"

"It's the only logical assumption," Dustin replied with a shrug.

Max turned towards them, her whole body shaking. "That's not even the bad part."

Max led them back to Ms. Kelley's office, shuffling through the papers on the desk until she found what she was looking for. "Fred and Chrissy, they both came to Ms. Kelley for help," Max explained. "They both were having headaches, bad headaches that just wouldn't go away...And then...then the nightmares...trouble sleeping, they'd wake up in a cold sweat...and then they started seeing things. Bad things. From their pasts. And these visions, they just kept on getting worse and worse until eventually...everything ended."

Have you been experiencing the same symptoms?" Dustin asked One.

"The visions...and the nightmares," One answered reluctantly. "But no headaches."

"Vecna's Curse," Robin muttered.

"Chrissy's headaches started a week ago," Max continued, tears pooling in her eyes and her voice wavering with every word. "Fred's, six days ago. I've been having them for five days. I don't know how long I have. All I know is that...for Fred and Chrissy, they both died less than twenty-four hours after their first vision. And I just saw that goddamn clock, so...looks like I'm going to die tomorrow."

One shook her head in confusion. "I had my first vision over a week ago, right before I opened the first portal, and I'm not dead."

Hushed whispers echoed around her.

"You deviate from the pattern," Nancy pointed out. "But why?"

One opened her mouth to answer, to tell them about the nightmare that had been plaguing every waking and sleeping minute since she had had it, but she was cut short by a sharp screech that echoed through the hallways, making everybody jump.

"Stay here," Steve instructed them, heading towards the source of the noise. He grabbed a lamp before he left Ms. Kelley's office, holding it out before him as he cautiously entered the hallway. Ignoring Steve's orders, the others slowly filtered out after him.

Another slam echoed in the distance, followed by the heavy beat of footsteps. As the sound drew nearer, Steve tightened his grip on the lamp and raised it higher, ready to swing. In what felt like too much time and not enough, a blur darted out in front of them from a conjoined hallway and everybody screamed.

"It's me!" Lucas shouted, holding his hand out to protect himself from Steve's lamp. "It's me!"

"Jesus, what's wrong with you, Sinclair?" Steve shouted, his heart in his throat. "I could have taken you out with this lamp!"

"Sorry guys," Lucas huffed in apology. "I was...I was biking for eight miles. Give me a second. Shit." Lucas put a finger up, turning away to catch his breath. "We've got a Code Red."

"What?"

"Dustin," Lucas said, using the last of his energy to march towards Dustin. "I've been with Jason, Patrick, and Andy, and they've gone like, totally off the rails. They're trying to capture Eddie and they think you know where he is. You're in terrible danger."

Dustin's face paled. "All right," he said after taking a breath. "All right, that definitely sucks but we've got bigger problems than Jason right now."

Lucas followed Dustin's eyes to the two people standing behind him. The first person Lucas almost didn't recognize, until his brain reminded him of the strange girl they had run into at Family Video the week prior. The second person was Max, who offered him as big of a smile as she could manage, and Lucas's heart sunk in his chest.

☆ ★ ☆

When One laid her head on the pillow that night, she had thought that maybe for once, she'd finally get a somewhat peaceful sleep. Despite the multitude of questions that plagued her mind, she was exhausted. Even Steve had turned in the minute they got back to his house, not even offering to watch Doctor Zhivago again. It had been a long day and for One, it was about to be an even longer night.

Her nightmare returned her to the Rainbow Room, but this time it was empty. One followed her reflection to the mirror where she found her 12-year old self looking back. But then she blinked, and it wasn't her, but a boy. A boy with blonde hair and icy blue eyes.

"What do you think, One?" a voice asked from behind her, and One turned to meet the inquisitive eyes and sinister smile of Dr. Brenner. "With your help, we will do great things together. We'll save the world."

One tried to speak, but no words came, only silence. Dr. Brenner stared at her expectantly, his impenetrable gaze cutting through her until his face flickered like a mirage, the scene becoming blurry. When it became clear again, she found herself somewhere different, but she knew herself to still be in the Lab. Her eyes caught her reflection in a silver cart deposited along the side of the hallway, and she found that she was no longer the boy, but herself.

"I'm proud of you, One," Dr. Brenner said, his eyes peering into hers and his hand resting on her cheek. In the distance, she heard screams. "We'll do great things together, we'll save the world."

Before she could even register the familiarity of what she had just seen, the scene changed once more, nearly giving One whiplash as she was thrust into another setting. Now she was sitting in a chair, her wrists and ankles strapped tight. She tried to wriggle free, but the more she moved, the more the restraints tightened, until they started to cut off her circulation. The two-way mirror to her left reflected the boy again, a pained look glued to his face.

"You've been a real disappointment to me, One," Dr. Brenner said from where he sat in the chair next to her, a large syringe in his hand. But One blinked and the scene shifted. Now Dr. Brenner wasn't sitting in a chair, but standing, and the syringe was gone. She, too, found herself in a different position; no longer sitting, but lying down on a flat surface. The only thing that remained the same was that straps held down her arms and legs, and now her head too.

A volt of electricity ripped through One's body, tearing a silent scream from her mouth. She didn't have to check her reflection to know that she was once more herself. She remembered this moment vividly.

Dr. Brenner leaned over the table, his eyes meeting hers. There was something different about them that she wasn't able to pinpoint until he started speaking. "Don't you see," he began, his voice distorted. It almost sounded like two voices were coming from him, his own, and one much deeper and more ancient. The lights flickered above them and Dr. Brenner's face changed in the darkness, his flesh stripped away and replaced with snaking vines. "You and I, we're the same."

One tried to shout but her voice was still missing.

"We may come from different universes and different families," the monster standing in Dr. Brenner's place continued. "But we are still the same person. And you're going to help me. You want to help me, I know it."

No, she screamed in her mind. No, no, NO!

"I'll see you soon," the monster said, his skin tearing as a gruesome smile grew on his face. "Real soon."

And then she awoke.

"I haven't been completely honest with you guys," One announced, her eyes struggling to meet the others. Herself, Steve, Nancy, Robin, Max, Dustin, and Lucas were gathered in the Wheeler's basement, One sitting in the center of the couch and the others huddled around her. Her hands folded and unfolded themselves as she contemplated exactly what to say. "I...I think I know why I don't fit the pattern of Vecna's victims..."

The others leaned in, listening closely and waiting patiently. Dustin coughed and Lucas elbowed him in the side.

"What is it?" Nancy prompted gently when One still hadn't spoken.

One gave her a nod and took a deep breath before continuing. "It's because I don't think I am a victim...I've, um...I've been having nightmares but I don't think they're really nightmares...I think they're...messages. Messages from Vecna."

A resounding gasp echoed around the room.

"And in these messages..." Robin began her question, leaning forward on her knees. "What is he saying to you?"

One struggled with the next part. These people didn't know her, not really. She was still a stranger to them. How would they react to finding out that her and their mortal enemy were much more similar than they thought? "Vecna wasn't always Vecna," she began. "He used to be a man. I don't know what his name was when he was born, but I do know what his name was before he became Vecna."

"What was it?" Lucas asked.

Unable to put the next part to words, she stretched her left arm out and pulled back her sleeve to display the small black tattoo on her wrist: 001.

"He's you?" Dustin exclaimed.

"Not me, I don't think..." One answered. "But my counterpart, the Subject One of this universe. He showed me things. His past, his future. And all of it was...terrifying. I saw him do the same thing to the other subjects that he did to Fred and Chrissy. The nightmares and the visions...he's been trying to get my attention."

"Why?" Steve asked, his hands grasping tightly onto the arms of his chair.

"He wants my help," One answered, her eyes finding his. "And he thinks I'm going to give it."

"But you won't," Max blurted out. She found herself on her feet when last she remembered, she had been sitting. "Right?"

One locked eyes with Max, her own reflection staring back at her in their glassy gaze. "I don't know how to get rid of his curse, but I do know this...I've taken down one monster before and I'll do it again."

☆ ★ ☆

"Okay, be honest..." Steve said as he paced around the Wheeler's basement with a newspaper article gripped firmly in his hands. The words swam in his eyes until he became partially convinced that he was reading another language. After One had informed them about her nightmares, Robin and Nancy had set to work on finding an in with Victor Creel so that they could discover more answers, leaving the rest of them in the Wheeler's basement to do research. "You guys understand any of this?"

Lucas shook his head. "No."

"Pretty straightforward," Dustin answered with a shrug.

"Oh, straightforward, really?" Steve asked in disbelief.

"Well, what's confusing to you?" Dustin retorted. "So far everyone Vecna has cursed has died, except for this old Victor Creel dude Nancy found."

"And One," Steve added.

"And One," Dustin agreed. "But besides One, he's the only known survivor. If anyone knows how to beat this curse it's him."

"That's assuming he was cursed, Henderson, which we don't even know," Steve snapped. He rubbed his temples, his mind trying to fit the puzzle pieces together and failing. "How could Vecna have existed in the '50s? It doesn't make sense."

"As far as we know, Eleven didn't create the Upside Down. She opened a gate to it," Dustin theorized. "The Upside Down has probably been around for thousands of years. Millions. I wouldn't be surprised if it predated the dinosaurs."

"In my universe it was created by somebody from another dimension full of super-powered individuals just like me," One said, joining the conversation as she hopped down the stairs. "At least, that's what the Mind Flayer told me."

"So you're saying that you're from another dimension?" Dustin asked, his insatiable curiosity once more piqued.

"And another universe," One replied with a shrug. "Shit's complicated."

"Okay," Lucas said, trying to steer the conversation back on track. "But if a gate didn't exist in the '50s, how did Vecna get through?"

"And how's he getting through now?" Steve asked, pointing at Dustin as the question came to him.

"He was a subject at the Lab like me," One contemplated. "Maybe he has powers that enable him to do so?"

"But if he did, then why now?" Lucas asked.

"And why then?" Steve continued, pacing back and forth. "Just pops out in the '50s, kills one family, and he's like, 'eh, I'm good'? And poof, he just disappears, just...gone. Only to return thirty years later and start killing some random teens? No, I don't buy it. Straightforward my ass..." Steve stopped pacing to lock eyes with Dustin. "You know, honestly, Henderson, a little humility every now and then...it wouldn't hurt you."

"Sorry," Dustin apologized, his eyes downcast.

"That was a little much, Steve," One scolded him with a scowl, her words catching Steve off-guard.

Steve's eyes flickered between One and Dustin, his cheeks burning in humiliation. "Sorry, Henderson," he apologized after clearing his throat. He sat down on the chair and began perusing the newspaper again, his eyes glancing towards One after his face had cooled down. Catching his eyes, she offered him a warm smile and he matched it.

"Any idea what she's writing?" Dustin asked, leaning over to watch Max, who sat with her back faced to them at the desk. They all turned to glance at her, somber looks sewed on their faces. "Did she sleep?"

"I mean, would you?" Lucas asked.

The door to the basement slammed open, the clicking of shoes cascading down the steps. "Okay, so..." Nancy announced, Robin appearing over her shoulder. "We have a plan."

"Thanks to Nancy's newspaper minions, we are now rock-star psychology students at the University of Notre Dame," Robin explained after they had all situated back around the couch.

"I'm now Ruth," Nancy introduced herself.

"Ruth?" Steve asked with a raised brow, to which Nancy replied with a shrug.

"And I'm Rose," Robin added.

"Nice GPA," Dustin commended them as he glanced through their paperwork. "But what do you even need these for? Can't One just portal you in and out?"

One shook her head no. "Even if my portals were cooperating with me, which I now think is the work of Vecna, I can't portal into a place I've never seen unless I'm focusing on someone instead of someplace. And if I focus on Victor Creel..."

"You might end up in the cell with him," Dustin finished for her, nodding his head in understanding.

"There could also be guards," Nancy continued. "There's just too many variables. So we called Pennhurst Asylum, told them we'd like to speak with Victor Creel for a thesis we're co-writing on paranoid schizophrenics..."

"To which they said no," Robin finished Nancy's sentence with a roll of her eyes.

"But we landed a three o'clock with the director," Nancy continued, a hopeful smile pressed onto her cheeks.

"Now all we have to do is charm him and convince him to let us talk to Victor."

"And then maybe we can rid Max of this curse," Nancy said, her eyes glancing towards Max, who was still at the desk, still writing.

"Yeah, about that..." Steve interrupted. "We've been doing our Victor Creel homework and, um...we've got some questions."

"Lots of questions," Lucas added.

"So do we," Nancy agreed. "Hopefully, Victor has the answers."

"Wait, wait, wait a second..." Steve said, frantically flipping through the pages on his lap. "Where's mine and One's?"

Nancy and Robin exchanged a glance. "You're...not coming," Robin answered. One's face fell a bit at this news, as she had been enjoying her time with Robin and Nancy.

"What? Why?" Steve asked.

"Somebody has to stay here with Max, to look out for her," Nancy explained. "She's in danger and we figured that the best person to protect her was One." Nancy looked to One, who nodded her head in agreement.

"And we figured that wherever One went, you'd go," Robin added, looking pointedly at Steve.

"I--what? That's not..." Steve stammered, his cheeks burning. "Okay, that's true."

☆ ★ ☆

"So what are we like in your universe?" Dustin asked One as a means to pass the time, but also to sate his starving curiosity.

"Pretty much the same," One answered thoughtfully, a smile splitting her face at the thought of her universe. "The other Dustin is incredibly determined, although I fear he may have a small gambling problem..." Dustin shrugged and nodded his head. "The other Lucas is annoyingly good at Monopoly. I refuse to ever play with him again."

"Same is true in this universe," Lucas replied with a smug smile that made Dustin roll his eyes.

"The other Steve is..." One began before she paused, her eyes studying Steve's face as she tried to find the right words. "He's a giant scaredy-cat but he'll rush into danger without a second thought, he thinks he's smooth but he trips over his words, and he's...he's one of the most caring people I've ever met."

Steve's cheeks hurt from the smile that pushed them apart and the two stared at each other for a long while, instantaneously forgetting where they were and who they were with.

"What about Max?" Lucas asked, disrupting their moment. Everybody's eyes turned to Max, who still hadn't left the desk.

One took a moment to think. "The other Max is one of the strongest people I've ever met. And I have no doubt that this Max is too."

They continued to pass their time by asking One questions about her universe, One reveling in the opportunity to relive moments with the family and friends she loved. Every so often, their eyes would glance back towards Max, almost as if they were worried that she wouldn't be there the next time they looked.

"I know you guys are staring at me," Max paused her writing to say over her shoulder.

"What, sorry?" Steve said, picking up a baseball from the coffee table and tossing it in the air.

"You said you needed something?" Lucas asked, peering up from a newspaper he was pretending to read.

"We're just hanging out," One said nonchalantly, studying the creases in her palm.

"How you think your eyes boring into the back of my head is protecting me from Vecna, I don't know," Max sighed, standing from the desk and walking over to the couch. Steve, One, Dustin, and Lucas tried their hardest not to look at her as she approached. "You can look at me now."

They all apologized collectively.

"For you," Max said, handing an envelope to Dustin. "For you." She handed one to Steve. "Um, for you." She handed one to Lucas, her reach lingering a moment longer than it had for Steve or Dustin. "And I still don't really know you but you're trying to help me so...for you." She handed one to One. "Oh, and um, give these to Mike, El, and Will. If you can ever get a hold of them again," she said, handing the rest of the envelopes to Lucas, except for one which she kept for herself.

Dustin began to open his and Max immediately stopped him. "Hey, what are you doing?" she exclaimed. "No, don't! That's not for now, don't open it now."

"Don't...okay," Dustin replied, shoving the letter back in the envelope before he could read it. "I'm sorry, what is this?"

"It's um," Max answered, looking down at her hands. "It's a fail-safe. For after. You know, if things...if they don't work out."

"Wait, whoa, Max," Lucas said. "Things are going to work out--"

"No!" Max shouted, cutting him off with a shake of her head. "No, I don't need you to reassure me right now and tell me that it's all going to work out. Because people have been telling me that my entire life and it's almost never true. It's never true." Max took a breath, her eyes glancing up towards the ceiling to trap the tear that was threatening to spill over. "I mean, of course this asshole curses me. Should've seen that one coming."

"He'll learn to regret it," One replied, her brows furrowed and her voice steady.

Max walked over to the table and picked up the walkie-talkie. "If we go to East Hawkins, will this still reach Pennhurst?" she asked.

"Of course, yeah," Dustin answered.

"Wait, why are we talking about East Hawkins?" Steve asked. Max only had to look at him for him to understand the answer. "No, no, no!"

Without a word, Max headed for the stairs and the four immediately stood to follow after.

"Max, Max, seriously," Steve called after Max as he chased her down the driveway and towards his car. "Seriously, I'm not joking. I'm not driving you anywhere."

"Steve, if you think that I'm going to spend what is likely the last day of my life in the armpit that is Mike Wheeler's basement, then you're out of your mind," Max retorted, her pace not faltering a step as she marched ahead. "So you're either going to take me where I need to go or you're going to have to tie me down. Which is technically kidnapping of a minor and if I live to see another day, Steve, I swear to god, I will prosecute."

Max pulled on the locked door handle, looking to Steve with raised brows. "Open the door," she demanded.

"Uh...no."

"I know a good lawyer," Max replied with a straight face. Max continued to stare at him unblinkingly until Steve shook his head and grabbed the keys from his pocket.

"Henderson," he barked, pointing to Dustin as he unlocked the car. "That super walkie of yours better reach Pennhurst."

Everybody scrambled into the car, except for Max, who paused partway in. The chiming of the grandfather clock in One's own head gave her the answer why and she offered Max a reassuring smile when she finally climbed in, but Max struggled to return it.

☆ ★ ☆

"All right, this better be fast, Mayfield," Steve said as they pulled in front of her trailer at Forest Hills Trailer Park.

"Twenty seconds," Max promised as she slammed the door shut behind her.

"This thing has got batteries in it, right?" Steve asked, turning to Dustin and holding the walkie-talkie up for him to see.

"I'm not even answering that question," Dustin sighed. When Steve continued to stare at him, he snapped, "Yes, it has batteries!"

"Yeah, I got it."

The four of them anxiously watched every step Max took until she disappeared inside.

"Do you think she's okay to go in on her own?" Lucas asked, sitting up in his seat in the back.

"If something happens," One answered, turning to meet his worried eyes. "I'll know."

Lucas nodded his head and fell back against his seat, his eyes glued to the front door of Max's trailer.

"Why don't we play a game or something while we wait?" Dustin suggested, his toothy grin reflecting in the rear-view mirror.

"Like what?" Steve asked.

"How about I Spy? My mom and I always play it on road trips," Dustin answered. When nobody voiced their objection, he continued. "I'll go first. I spy with my little eye..." Dustin began, his eyes scanning the surrounding trailer park. "Something...green."

"Something green?" Steve retorted. "Henderson, everything is green!"

"The lettering on that 'When you're beer you're family' sign?" One guessed.

"Nope," Dustin answered.

Steve sighed, finally giving in and taking a guess. "The skirt of the luau lady on the dash of that car?"

"Good eyes, but nope," Dustin replied. "Lucas?"

"Pass," Lucas said, his eyes still watching the front door. The other three didn't push it, instead continuing the game without him.

"Hmm..." One thought aloud, scoping the area. She struggled to find anything green that wasn't the trees or the grass, when her eyes flickered down to the dark green knit sweater Steve had let her borrow. "My sweater?"

"Correctamundo!" Dustin smiled with a thumbs up.

"You can't choose stuff in the car, you little cheater!" Steve exclaimed, glaring at Dustin through the rear-view mirror.

"We never established rules," Dustin argued.

"It's common knowledge! You--"

"I'll go next," One interrupted the two before the quarrel could continue any longer. Her eyes surveyed the surrounding area for her target when they landed on a yellow dress hanging from a clothesline in the distance. "I spy with my little eye something yellow."

Steve and Dustin swiveled their heads around, searching for anything yellow.

"That slide?" Steve asked, his eyes settling on a small plastic playset. One shook her head no. He continued to glance around but after several minutes of searching, he came up empty. "I give up, what is it?"

"What, you don't see it?" One laughed incredulously. "It's so obvious!"

"I'm with Steve on this one," Dustin replied. "I don't see anything yellow other than the slide."

One just rolled her eyes and shook her head. "It's right there!" she exclaimed, her finger pushing against the glass in the direction of the clothesline. "The yellow dress on the clothesline, don't you see it?"

Steve and Dustin exchanged a glance, their eyes wide with worry. "One, there's no clothesline..." Steve said slowly.

"Of course there is, there's..." One stopped herself, the smile on her face immediately disappearing. "Oh. Oh shit."

The four of them scrambled out of the car but they didn't make it far when Max rounded the corner behind the trailer, her face pale and her eyes wide.

"Are you all right?" One asked, rushing to meet her halfway. "I saw it too."

"I'm fine, just drive," Max said, pushing past her and heading towards the car. She shut herself in and locked the door before any of the others could even take a step.

"What happened?" Lucas asked her after he climbed in on the other side.

"Can we please just go," Max sniffled, refusing to look anywhere other than out the window. Steve and One exchanged a glance before Steve turned the key in the ignition and backed out.

They drove along in silence for a long while, everybody wanting to ask but nobody willing to. It wasn't until they were nearing the cemetery that Max finally spoke.

"Turn here," she instructed Steve.

"Here?" Dustin asked but Max didn't respond.

Steve turned in without question, winding around the thin road that led through Forest Hills Cemetery. They came to a stop once again at Max's instruction, watching her silently as she opened the door and got out, the single envelope in hand. Only Lucas dared to follow.

Steve and Dustin pressed their ears to the glass, trying to overhear the conversation that Lucas and Max were having, but the glass was too thick. They could all make their own assumptions, though. After several minutes, Lucas finally returned to the car, defeated. He sighed as he collapsed in the backseat, slamming the door behind him.

The three of them tried to hold their questions at bay but Dustin's tongue betrayed him. "What did she say?" he asked.

Lucas sighed again, his eyes staring out the window. "Nothing," Lucas responded, a watery sheen coating his eyes. "She said nothing."

The car plunged back into silence after this, each person unsure of what words would float and what words would sink in the tense atmosphere. Unable to take the heavy air in the car much longer, Dustin got out to pace and Lucas followed soon after, taking his spot on the hood so that he could have a clearer view of Max from where she sat at Billy's gravesite.

"The Mall Fire," One began, turning to look at Steve who had remained in the car with her. "What exactly happened?"

"The Mind Flayer...it flayed Billy," Steve began. "It flayed a lot of people, but Billy was its puppet. In the end, it nearly killed El, but Billy stopped it and he died in the process. Max has blamed herself for it ever since."

One looked back to Max up on the hill, her small figure glowing in the afternoon sun. And then suddenly, it was dark.

"One," the voice called to her, dotting her skin in goosebumps.

"Something's happening," One said, her eyes opening wide and her hand gripping tightly onto Steve's shoulder.

They simultaneously pushed open their car doors so hard that the hinges creaked in protest. Upon seeing the frantic looks on Steve's and One's faces, Dustin stopped his pacing and Lucas jumped off the hood of the car.

"What's happening?" Lucas asked, his forehead sweating.

"I don't know, just come on!" Steve shouted back to him, already halfway up the hill with One on his heels. Dustin and Lucas exchanged a glance before bolting after them. 

"Max!" Steve called out as he neared her. She was sitting cross-legged with her back faced to them and made no indication of having heard them approach. "Max! Time to giddy-up, yeah?"

"Max?" One asked, kneeling down so that she was at eye-level. Only, Max's eyes weren't their usual shade of blue, they were completely white.

"Max!" Steve continued to shout, shaking her shoulders. But she didn't return to them. "Max! MAX!"

"You've got to get out of there!" Lucas shouted, his hand wound tightly in hers. "Max, please!"

"Call Nancy and Robin!" Steve shouted, gripping Dustin by the jacket and pushing him towards the car. Dustin wasn't able to secure his footing before he came upon the lip of the hill and gravity dropped him onto his back, rolling him partway down until he found his feet. He barreled the rest of the way down, nearly tripping several times as Steve encouraged him on. "Go get 'em! Call Nancy and Robin! Go!"

"Uh, maybe...maybe if we move her..." One proposed, her hands running through her hair and coming back slick with sweat. "Maybe if I portal her somewhere else? S-somewhere where Vecna can't find her?"

"Do you think that would work?" Steve asked.

"I don't know!" One replied, her heart beating in her throat. "But I don't know what else to do!"

"Do it!" Lucas shouted, catching One's eyes and holding them. "Do it!"

One nodded her head and stepped aside to focus on a spot for a portal. She picked Billy's headstone, her eyes glued to the "O" in Hargrove. She once again pictured her universe, but not for herself. For Max. Come on, come on, come on, she urged herself. Do it, you good-for-nothing piece of shit!

One just about fell backwards when it actually worked. Hovering in the place where Billy's gravestone had been was a portal...and on the other side was home. She could see Hopper's cabin on the other side, the warm glow radiating from the windows...And she could hear the laughter of Hopper, El, and Steve echoing over the bangs and yee-haws of one of her favorite Western movies. One broke down in tears, her foot stepping towards the portal before she remembered Max.

"Help me!" One shouted at the others, grabbing a hold of one of Max's arms and dragging her towards the portal. Steve and Lucas each took a limb, hoisting Max's unresponsive body into the air. One rushed ahead first, her foot breaking through and dropping to solid ground on the other side. She turned back to hurry Steve and Lucas through, but when she turned around they were gone. And so was the portal.

"Lucas?" she called out in the direction of where the portal had been. "Steve?"

One turned in circles until she was dizzy but they were nowhere in sight. Her heart began to race. Did the portal shut before they could get through? Did she just ruin any chance of saving Max's life? On the seventh rotation, she found Steve.

He was standing on the front steps of the cabin, his hand gripped so tightly on the doorknob that it threatened to shatter. "Sarah?" he called to her, his face turning pale.

"Steve?" One asked cautiously, taking a slow step towards him. Was this him? Was this her Steve?

"Oh my god, it really is you!" Steve shouted, jumping down the remaining steps and rushing towards her. He didn't even slow down as he wrapped her in a hug, nearly toppling her over.

"Steve?" One asked, still incredulous. He smelled exactly like she remembered, like tacky cologne and vanilla. She allowed herself to get lost in his scent, the warmth of his body bringing the life back to her cheeks.

"We thought you were dead!" he replied, pulling back to look her in her eyes. "You just said good-bye and dropped us through a portal! We tried to get back to you but the only way back was sealed!"

"It's okay," One reassured him, pressing her forehead to his. "I'm okay. The Mind Flayer is dead. The Upside Down is destroyed. We're back together."

"Sarah?" another voice called out from the front stoop, and One looked up to find Hopper and Eleven waiting for her. Hopper nearly collapsed on his way to her, Eleven having to grab his arm to hold him up. When they reached her, they too, wrapped their arms around her, enveloping her in a feeling of warmth and home.

Tears were freely falling down her face now, her cheeks slick and her vision blurred. This had been the moment she had been waiting for her entire life, even if she didn't always know it. But then she remembered.

"Max," One whispered, a vision of white eyes flashing across her mind.

"You're home now, kid," Hopper said, his cheek resting on her head. "What do you say we head in and make some waffles and watch some Westerns, just like old times?"

One tried to push her way out of the group hug, but their grip remained tight. "I need some air," she told them. "Please, let go." But they didn't listen to her. "Steve, dad, El, please! I've got to get back to Max, she's still in danger..."

"You're not going anywhere," Hopper replied, but his voice wasn't his alone. Another voice distorted it, just like Dr. Brenner in her nightmare. One craned her neck back as far as she could and when her eyes found Hopper's face, she quickly realized that it wasn't Hopper's face she was staring at. "And neither is Maxine."

"Vecna," One choked. She strained against his grip, kicking and punching with her free limbs, but he wouldn't let go.

"Did you really think it would be this easy?" Vecna asked, the sharp-toothed vines snaking around his body.

"I've defeated worse than you!" One shouted.

"The Mind Flayer is nothing compared to me," Vecna replied. The bright sunshine that had previously been pouring down upon them had receded, a coldness left where its warmth had touched. A storm began brewing in the sky, the clouds blood red. "The Upside Down is my playground and soon, you will be one of my toys. You miss the Upside Down, don't you? You can't tell me that some part of you didn't enjoy your time there."

"It wasn't exactly a vacation," One retorted breathlessly, all her energy having been wasted on her useless attempt at breaking free. She was still stuck in his grasp, the vines tickling her skin as they snaked past.

"The Upside Down misses you and soon you will be reunited," Vecna laughed, his cackle filling every particle in the air. "Soon everyone will."

"Kill me then," One offered. "Spare Max and take me."

"If you're dead you can't be of any assistance," Vecna replied. "I need your portals to spread the Upside Down to other dimensions, other universes...until there's nothing left but death and decay and me. There is a place for you in my vision, if you help. I will leave you a corner untouched, where everything you saw here will be yours."

"I don't want it!" One screamed. "Not if it means helping you!"

"You'll change your mind," Vecna said, his voice as much a threat as a promise. A darkness rolled in, consuming everything one-by-one. "By the time the fourth gate opens, you'll join me."

One felt Vecna's grip loosen and she broke free. Her body immediately twisted in the opposite direction and her legs lifted to run, but she was met with a wall of darkness that towered over her on every side. As it closed in on her, she searched for Vecna in the inky blackness but she couldn't find him.

The only indication that he was still there was his voice, which echoed from within her, "After all, we are the same."

☆ ★ ☆

"One! One, come back to me! ONE!" a shout rang in her ears as she returned to consciousness, her blurred vision slowly clearing to reveal Steve's face hovering over her.

"Steve?" she asked, her voice weak.

"Holy shit, she's back!" Steve shouted, turning to look away from her at something she couldn't see. "She came back!"

One tried to push herself out of Steve's arms but her strength returned slower than her vision. Her eyes squinted at the bright sunlight, trying to find answers as to where she was and what had happened. Then it all hit her.

"Max!" she called out, her voice so hoarse that it came out closer to a whisper than a shout. "Where's Max? Is she okay?"

"I'm right here," Max responded, her voice as rough as One's.

One felt a hand touch her shoulder and she turned in the direction it came from to find Max leaning against Lucas, her limbs like jelly but her eyes no longer white.

"I'm sorry," One broke down immediately. "I'm so sorry. I left you."

"You didn't leave me," Max replied, tears streaking down her cheeks. She reached out for One's hand and One took it, their grip strong despite their weakened muscles. "You saved me. Vecna was split between us and that made him weak enough for me to find an opening. With a little extra help from Kate Bush, I made it out alive."

"What?" One asked, her head cocking in confusion at the name. "Who's Kate Bush?"

"We'll explain everything later," Steve answered. "Right now, we need to get you guys somewhere safe where you can rest."

One nodded her head, her eyelids fighting gravity to stay open. After a couple heavy blinks, she gave in, and for the first time, sleep took her mercifully in its embrace. 

"You turned to open the portal and then your eyes were just like, full on white," Dustin explained. The party had once more taken refuge in the Wheeler's basement, having driven straight there from the cemetery the night previous. Max had been given Mike's empty bed to sleep in, while One awoke to find herself on the couch, Steve passed out on the floor at her side. After everybody had awoken and stretched the extra sleepiness out of their bones, they convened around the couch to recount what had happened at Forest Hills Cemetery and Pennhurst Asylum. "Just like Max."

"And Max started floating in the air," Lucas picked up where Dustin left off. "And we were totally losing our shit because all of a sudden you were both just gone."

"But Nancy and Robin learned that music soothes broken minds, that it could be like an antidote for Vecna's curse, and it was, it worked!" Dustin continued.

"But only because you distracted him enough for me to slip into his mind," Max added with a smile, shifting One's attention to her right, where Max was sitting next to her on the couch. "In there, his defenses were down."

One reached over to take Max's hand, giving it a squeeze. "You saved me too," she replied. "Vecna made me think that I had actually made it back to my universe...he almost trapped me. But then I remembered you."

One's smile held until more pieces of Vecna's vision fell in place and his parting words echoed in her ears.

"After all, we are the same."

"Why did he go after you?" Steve asked from the other side of the couch. "I thought he wanted to use you, not kill you."

"He does," One confirmed, her mouth set in a grim line. "He told me that he plans to use my portals to spread the Upside Down to other dimensions and other universes. He wants everything to rot and die."

A silence settled upon the basement as each person envisioned what this would look like. The very image was enough to set their hearts racing and their lungs pumping.

"He's still convinced that I'm going to help him," One continued with a shake of her head. "He told me that by the time the fourth gate opens, that I will join him..."

"But you won't," Robin replied. She gazed up at One from the floor, her arms wrapped around her knees.

"But what if I do?" One had tried to keep it locked away, but the question slipped out in a pale whisper. Vecna's confidence had rattled hers. What did he know that she didn't? "What if he makes me? He's different than the Mind Flayer, I knew the Mind Flayer. Vecna is...I'm...I'm scared."

"You need to go home," Steve stated, his voice drawing all eyes towards him. He hung his head in defeat, holding back the gathering tears. A chorus of opposition grumbled around him. "Shit. Yeah, you need to go home."

"What?" One asked, her head snapping in his direction. She studied him curiously, trying to surmise his thoughts. Of all the people in the room, he was the last person she expected to say that.

"If you're not in this universe then he can't use your powers to spread the Upside Down," Steve explained. In a quieter voice, he added, "And he can't hurt you anymore."

"But what about you guys?" One asked, looking around at each of her new friends in turn. "I can't just leave while Max is still cursed, while Hawkins and all of you are still in danger. I promised to stay and fight!"

"Leaving us may be the only way to keep us safe," Nancy pointed out, nodding her head as it all started to click into place. "We don't want you to go but we might not have a choice."

One choked back tears, a burst of incredulous laughter serving as cover. "But even if I wanted to, I can't, remember? The whole point of that vision last night is that I can't leave. Vecna won't let me."

"You might be able to now," Steve informed her, taking her hand in his. One glanced down at their entwined fingers, the warmth grounding her. "Music helped Max to break free, maybe it can help you to regain control of your portals."

One opened and closed her mouth, searching for the words to say. She had wanted to run since the beginning but now that she finally wanted to stay, she had to go.

"You just need a song that holds some sort of meaning to you," Dustin explained. "Any come to mind?"

One racked her mind, an answer coming to her immediately. "House of the Rising Sun by The Animals."

"I have that one," Nancy said, her eyes lighting up as she jumped to her feet and raced up the stairs. A few minutes later she returned with a Walkman and a cassette, holding them out for One to take. One reluctantly took them despite a small part of her wanting to push them away, but then a thought struck her. How would Nancy get them back? Her inquisitive gaze was answered by Nancy, who shrugged with a smile. "My birthday is coming up anyways."

"Hey Dustin, this is Eddie the Banished. You there?" a staticky voice came in over the walkie-talkie sitting on the table. "Dustin, can you hear me? Dustin! Earth to Dustin..."

"Shit," Dustin said with a sigh. "I almost forgot about him."

The message from Eddie reminded the group that there was still much to do and that they needed to get moving.

"Do I have to say good-bye now?" One asked, her bottom lip trembling as she turned to Steve.

"It won't be good-bye because you'll see us again," Steve answered, his eyes brimming with tears.

One knew that what Steve said wasn't technically true, but she held onto it anyways. "We never watched Doctor Zhivago," One gasped once the realization hit her. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay." Steve waved it aside, wiping away an escaped tear. "I'll find someone else to watch it with."

One smiled and for moment she felt like everything would end up okay. "Promise?"

"Promise."

One placed the cassette in the Walkman and the headphones over her ears. With a nod, she pressed play, and the opening twangs of the guitar filled her ears. Pushing herself to her feet, she stood and faced the wall, her back to everyone else. Her hands twitched at her side, her heart racing. There was still a chance this would fail, just like every other portal she tried.

♪ There is a house in New Orleans... ♫

She spotted a drawing on the wall that Will must have made, the artful crayon strokes depicting a picture of the party playing D&D around Mike's table. A smile came to her face and she took a deep breath.

♪ They call the Rising Sun... ♫

She conjured up not only the image of home, but the feeling of it as well. She let it spread throughout her until her whole body was warm. She was still at a loss of how exactly inter-universal travel worked, but something told her she was on the right track.

♪ And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy... ♫

Before a portal could appear, One glanced back to the group behind her. Their hopeful smiles and tear-stained eyes offered encouragement and it was that encouragement that finally created a portal where Will's picture had been.

♪ And God, I know I'm one... ♫

The other side of the portal was difficult to see, thin rays of light narrowly cutting through the darkness. She didn't recognize it as home but she did recognize it as her own portal, not a trick of Vecna's. This time she was sure.

Building up her courage, One didn't allow herself a second thought as she stepped through to the other side. Whether it was home or somewhere else entirely, she was ready, because as long as she was far away from Vecna, her friends were safe.

☆ ★ ☆

One hit her head as she passed through, the low ceiling above her sending her stumbling to her knees. The commotion snapped the portal shut, not even affording One a chance to wave good-bye to her friends. One cursed to herself, rubbing vigorously at the bump on her head as she tried to make sense of her surroundings.

Her head began to throb even more when she found an unfamiliar setting before her. Whether she was in an alternate dimension or an alternate universe, she couldn't tell. All she could tell that she was in the back of a parked van with nothing but sand surrounding her through the windows.

One crawled closer to the back doors, her hand reaching out for the handle to let herself out of the metal trap she found herself in when the door flew open on its own. The bright sunlight temporarily blinded her and she threw a hand over her face to block it. As her eyes adjusted, they fixed on four figures on the other side, details becoming clearer with every blink.

The figure in front, who she assumed had been the one to open the door, became visible first and One's heart shot into her throat when she realized that she recognized them. She pulled the headphones down to her neck, the music spilling out into the simmering air.

"Will?"

★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★