S2 x E08 — The Mind Flayer
DONT FORGET TO VOTE AND COMMENT PLEASE!
——
The five of them left the junkyard after the demogorgans left. They went to search where they went off to. Melanie was walking next to Max while Steve was walking with Dustin and Lucas behind the girls.
Lucas sighed, "You're positive that was Dart?"
Dustin nodded, "Yes. He had the same exact yellow pattern on his butt."
Max scoffed, "He was tiny two days ago."
"Well, he's molted three times already."
"Malted?" Melanie and Steve asked confused.
"Molted. Shed his skin to make room for growth like hornworms."
"When's he gonna molt again?"
"It's gotta be soon. When he does, he'll be fully grown, or close to it. And so will his friends."
Melanie laughed, "Yeah, and he's gonna eat a lot more than just cats."
Lucas gasped, "Wait, a cat? Dart ate a cat?"
"No, what? No."
Steve cleared his throat, "What are you talking about? He ate Mews."
"Mews? Who's Mews?"
"It's Dustin's cat." Melanie and Steve spoke again in sync.
"Melanie! Steve!"
"I knew it! You kept him!"
"No! No. No, I... No, I... He missed me. He wanted to come home."
"Bullshit!"
"I didn't know he was a Demogorgon, okay?"
"Oh, so now you admit it?"
Max scoffed, "Guys, who cares? We have to go."
"I care! You put the party in jeopardy! You broke the rule of law!"
"So did you!"
"What?"
"You told a stranger the truth!"
Max scoffed, "A stranger?"
While the kids were bickering in the back Steve and Melanie stopped something.
Melanie turned to Steve, "You heard that too right?"
Steve nods, "Mhmm. Guys?"
"He wasn't gonna eat us."
"He was crawling to come say hello?"
Melanie yelled, "Guys!"
Lucas and Dustin follow Melanie and Steve leaving Max alone, "No, no, no. Hey, guys, why are you headed towards the sound? Hello? Hello?"
Dustin spoke, "I don't see him."
Lucas gasped, "It's the lab. They were going back home."
——
The group walked out of the woods seeing Jonathon and Nancy outside of the lab. "Steve?"
"Nancy?"
Melanie felt awkward being with his ex girlfriend. She pretended like she didn't notice Nancy so she wouldn't have to talk to her.
"What are you doing here?"
"What are you doing here?"
"We're looking for Mike and Will."
Dustin looked at them and pointed to the lab, "They're not in there, are they?"
"We're not sure." Nancy answered. Jonathon looked confused, "Why?" The sounds of monsters came screeching from inside the lab.
"That's why."
——
It's a few minutes later and lots of bickering later between the group. Nancy noticed something, "The power's back."
The group immediately ran to the gate controller and tried opening it. Jonathon pressed the buttons but nothing happened.
Dustin sighed, "Let me try."
"Hang on..."
"Let me try, Jonathan!" Dustin aggressively pushed the buttons looking at the gate, "Son of a b¡tch! You know what..."
Melanie rolled her eyes. Walking up to the gate she uses her vampire powers to make the gate drop down. She gave it on hard kick and the gate fell down.
Jonathon and Nancy looked at her in shock. Except for Steve he looked proud. She realized she didn't tell them about the whole vampire thing. So while people were thinking of a plan Melanie explained it to Jonathon and Nancy
It was a few minutes more of waiting and waiting but finally people came outside. Mike was with Hopper and Joyce. Hopper was carrying a passed out Will on his shoulder.
Jonathon was in a car with Nancy saving them from the front door, "Come on! Get in!"
Outside of the gates Max, Lucas, Dustin, Steve and Melanie were waiting for the second car. Max saw something, "Guys?"
A horn honks, "Let's go. Come on! Come on, let's go! Let's go! Come on!"
——
The group made it back to the Byers house hiding out for the demogorgans. Hopper had just called with the police about the situation at the lab.
"Did you guys know that Bob was the original founder of Hawkins AV?"
"Really?"
"He petitioned the school to start it and everything. Then he had a fund-raiser for equipment. Mr. Clarke learned everything from him. Pretty awesome, right?"
Dustin and Lucas agreed with Mike while Max, Steve and Melanie listened along, "Yeah."
"We can't let him die in vain."
"What do you want to do, Mike? The Chief's right on this. We can't stop those Demo-dogs on our own."
"Demo-dogs?"
"Demogorgon dogs. Demo-dogs. It's like a compound. It's like a play on words..."
"Okay."
"I mean, when it was just Dart, maybe..."
"But there's an army now." Lucas interfers.
Dustin agrees, "Precisely."
"His army."
Melanie looked up, "What do you mean?"
"His army. Maybe if we stop him, we can stop his army, too."
Mike grabbed a drawing that Will made. Dustin looked at it, "The shadow monster."
"It got Will that day on the field. The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him."
"And so this virus, it's connecting him to the tunnels? To the tunnels, monsters, the Upside Down, everything."
Steve got lost while Melanie was still perfectly on track, "Whoa. Slow down. Slow down."
"Okay, so, the shadow monster's inside everything. And if the vines feel something like pain, then so does Will."
Lucas realizes, "And so does Dart."
"Yeah. Like what Mr. Clarke taught us. The hive mind."
"Hive mind?"
"A collective consciousness. It's a super-organism."
"And this is the thing that controls everything. It's the brain."
"Like the mind flayer."
Max and Melanie looked up,
"The what?"
Eventually everyone came to the table to Dustin could explain what they were thinking, "The mind flayer."
"What the hell is that?"
"It's a monster from an unknown dimension. It's so ancient that it doesn't even know its true home. Okay, it enslaves races of other dimensions by taking over their brains using its highly-developed psionic powers."
"Oh, my God, none of this is real. This is a kids' game."
"No, it's a manual. And it's not for kids. And unless you know something that we don't, this is the best metaphor..."
"Analogy."
"Analogy? That's what you're worried about? Fine. An analogy for understanding whatever the hell this is."
"Okay, so this mind flamer thing..."
"Flayer. Mind flayer."
Nancy sighs, "What does it want?"
"To conquer us, basically. It believes it's the master race."
Steve stammers, "Like the Germans?"
Melanie gives him a slap on the back of his head with a glare, "Ow!"
"Shut up, dipshit."
Dustin continued, "Uh, the Nazis?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Nazis."
"Uh... If the Nazis were from another dimension, totally. Uh, it views other races, like us, as inferior to itself."
"It wants to spread, take over other dimensions."
"We are talking about the destruction of our world as we know it."
"That's great. That's great. That's really great. Jesus!"
"Okay, so if this thing is like a brain that's controlling everything, then if we kill it..."
"We kill everything it controls."
"We win. Theoretically."
"Great. So how do you kill this thing? Shoot it with Fireballs or something?"
Dustin chuckles, "No. No, no Fire... No Fireballs. Uh, you summon an undead army, uh, because zombies, you know, they don't have brains, and the mind flayer, it... it... It likes brains. It's just a game. It's a game."
"What the hell are we doing here?"
"I thought we were waiting for your military backup."
"We are!"
Melanie interrupts the arguement between Hopper and the kids, "How are they gonna stop this? You can't just shoot this with guns."
"You don't know that! We don't know anything!"
"We know it's already killed everybody in that lab."
"We know the monsters are gonna molt again. We know that it's only a matter of time before those tunnels reach this town."
Joyce walks into the room, "They're right. We have to kill it. I want to kill it."
Hopper nods, "Me, too. I... Me, too, Joyce, okay? But how do we do that? We don't exactly know what we're dealing with here."
Mike agrees, "No. But he does. If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it's Will. He's connected to it. He'll know its weakness."
Max spoke, "I thought we couldn't trust him anymore. That he's a spy for the mind flayer now."
Mike nods, "Yeah, but he can't spy if he doesn't know where he is."
——
Steve and Melanie are inside of the shed helping it be put together for Will.
Melanie cleared her throat, "Hey. What you did, um, helping me from that demogorgan at the junkyard... that was... really cool."
"Yeah. Sorry that you're dragged into this. Those little shits are real trouble, you know?"
Melanie laughs, "Believe me, I know."
"Can we talk?"
"About what?"
Steve sighs as he continues putting tape on corners, "Us. Whatever that night was,
just everything."
"Do you think now is the right moment?"
"At the junkyard I almost though I lost you. Twice, so.."
"Fair point.. I don't really know what to say?"
"Why did u leave."
"You mean two years ago or last week?"
Steve laughs, "Last week."
"I d-don't know. I'm just scared of knowing that I can hurt you."
"I don't care about how many times do I have to say that, Mel.."
"I know. I know. It's just us. I'm immortal, you're not. I can't have children. There's alot of stuff that I can't do that I know you want, Steve.."
"But we will never know if we never try.."
"I guess that's right."
"Can we just try?"
Melanie smiled, "Okay."
Steve smiled, "You know what that means right?"
Melanie nodded, "That i'm your girlfriend now?"
"That, and I can kiss you without problems." Melanie smiled as Steve leaned in to kiss her.
——
It's a few later and sadly they're plan had failed. The mindflayer found out were they were and they were currently preparing for a fight.
Hopper turned to Jonathon with a gun, "Do you know how to use this?"
"What?"
"Can you use this?"
Melanie sighed, "I can." Hopper nodded and handed her the gun.
Screeching was heard in the distance, "Where are they?" The monsters growling continues.
Suddenly there's loud thudding on the front door, "What are they doing?"
The noises kept going when suddenly they stopped. A demogorgan flew in through the window, but it was dead. The door creaked open slowly revealing the one person they didn't expect.
Eleven.