❝𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙬𝙤𝙣'𝙩 𝙗𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙚𝙫𝙚 𝙬𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙝𝙚 𝙙𝙧𝙖𝙜𝙜𝙚𝙙 𝙢𝙚 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙤.❞
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Robin and Eddie had been paddling for a few minutes now, June put her hand in the water while it flowed the other way. She felt unbothered to join in on the conversation the other four were having.
That was until Nancy made them stop paddling, she showed the compass, which was going wild. It couldn't stop flicking to all sides, letting June know they were right above the gate.
"Guys, what's going on?" Dustin's voice rang through the walkie talkie, "Come on, guys, talk to me. What's going on?"
June looked up from the water as Robin took the walkie in her hand, "Uh, Dustin, your- your compass has gone from wonky to wonky with a capital "aah!"."
Everyone's eyes were casted on Steve when he started untying his shoes, "Steve, what are you doing?" Nancy asked him while he put his shoes and socks out.
"Somebody's gotta get down there to check this thing out." Steve explained, undressing further, "Unless one of you four can top being a Hawkins High swim co-captain and a certified lifeguard for three years it's gotta be me. No complaints, all right?"
June scooted closer to Eddie, rubbing her arms. It was freezing in the night in the middle of a lake. Especially when you're wearing a t-shirt and a pair of shorts.
Eddie put his arm around her, rubbing on her arm to make her warmer, "Hey, I'm not complaining." he replied, "I do not wanna go down there."
He took a plastic bag out of his pocket while Steve got rid of his shirt. June caught Nancy looking intensely at his back and had to hold in her laughter. But then again, Nancy had a boyfriend, so she wasn't sure if this was really a laughable situation.
Eddie emptied the plastic bag by throwing everything inside the boat, he took the flashlight he was holding and put it inside for Steve. This way it wouldn't get wet and Steve could continue using it underwater.
"Hey," he gave Steve the flashlight, "Good luck."
Steve thanked him before getting ready to dive into the water. Eddie wanted to light up a cigarette, but June took it out of his mouth and threw it as far away as possible, "Jesus, Ed." she expressed, "Not fucking now."
He gave her a hurt look, as if she'd just stabbed him in his chest. She laughed a little at his expression, feeling like he was being so dramatic. She liked that about him though.
Steve prepared to dive, but Nancy's voice stopped him, "Be careful." she pleaded. Steve nodded and dove in, the water splashing up where he left.
Eddie took the time to look back in the water behind June where she'd thrown his cigarette, "Why'd you even do that?"
"I hate smokers." she simply explained.
Nancy and Robin gathered at a map while Eddie reacted to her response, "So you hate me? That hurts."
"I won't hate you if you leave them." she decreed, giving him an exaggerated smile. He sighed, staring at her with a small smile then nodded, "Good boy." June stated sarcastically.
She shrieked when Steve's head came up on the surface right beside her, "I found it." he let them know. He swam closer to the boat.
"You found it?" Nancy repeated.
"I found it." Steve confirmed, "Yeah, I found it."
Robin spoke in the walkie talkie to Dustin while Steve started leaning on the boat, "It's more a snack-size gate than the mama gate, but still, it's pretty damn big."
June offered a hand to him so he could get back in the boat easier, only the two never reunited in the boat. Instead, Steve got pulled back in the water, because of their connected hands, so did Juniper.
Her still open mouth filled itself with the gross lake water, she tried coughing, but choked on the water even more doing so. June was suffocating in the lake, so much she didn't see that she got sucked inside a giant, red gate on the bottom.
Once through it, she could breath again, there was no water on the other side. That didn't mean she was lucky though, she felt vines strap around her ankles, dragging her away from Steve.
She screamed for Steve, but he himself was getting slammed against a pile of vines. June then screamed again, only this time the vines dropped with it.
It was like her scream had killed them somehow, it was strange but the part around her ankles didn't do anything anymore. June wiped her nose, feeling a small amount of blood coming from it.
She ran over to Steve, helping him up, "You okay?"
"Yeah, yeah, fine. You?" he replied, she nodded, but the two slowly realized they weren't alone.
In the background were shrieks of some kind of creatures. It was unclear what or where they were, until one of them showed up. The bat in the sky was followed by another one, coming from the other side and another one, until there were dozens of them flying around.
Steve ran to the nearest pile of shit and grabbed two paddles. He used one to slam one of the bats to the ground and threw the other at June, she caught it, starting to hit bats out of the sky as well.
One of them flew right at her, but she slammed it down on the ground. Juniper used the shovel-like paddle to cut off his head, she had to be sure it wouldn't come back to life.
A strained voice came from the other side, "June.." she looked to where the voice came from, seeing Steve on the ground with a bat's tail around his neck. More came, biting in his unveiled torso.
June ran towards him to help, but got held back by two more bats wrapping their tails around her legs. More came and started biting the both of them, June could see her life flashing before her and realized, she'd never actually done anything. If she'd die now, she wouldn't have anything to look back at.
Although Steve had more bats on him, June had two of them, trying to bite through her t-shirt. One more came to bite her thigh, she yelled in agony. She looked to her side, seeing the paddle laying not too far away from her, she tried grabbing it, but her fingers couldn't reach it by an inch.
"Fuck!" she screamed when she realized her arm was too short, "Here goes nothing, I guess.."
She screamed and the bats flew to all sides, exploding by themselves. June'd learned her screams had some sort of force to blow things away, though she had no clue how to control it.
She looked to her side to see Nancy with one of the paddles and Robin and Eddie behind her. She'd hit one of the bats biting Steve's skin. Robin stepped on the bat whose tail was around his neck.
Nancy continuously hit the bat, hoping to free Steve from suffocating. June speed-limped to Eddie, hugging him briefly. It was a close hug, like it would be their last one ever, like she was saying goodbye.
Well, she knew one thing for sure: saying goodbye to him was the last thing she wanted to do.
Eddie checked her for wounds, "Are you hurt?" June didn't reply, she instead stared at the sky where she heard more shrieks, but didn't see any bats, "Juniper, I said are you hurt?!" Eddie screamed as he put his hand on her arm.
She shook her head, but her gaze remained on the shrieks. Eddie followed the trail of her glance and saw what she was staring at, "Shit!" he yelled, he hid June behind him before smashing the bats to the ground.
It was pure chaos in the upside down. Nancy had a bat on her back, Robin was still trying to kill the bat choking and Eddie.. well Eddie just swam in between them while hitting bats.
June grabbed the tail of one of the bats from out of the sky, "Watch out!" she yelled, she twirled around with the bat in her hands. The bat hit a few of his friends, but it didn't quite kill them.
She hadn't noticed one of them sneaking up on her and biting her right in her neck. She cried out in pain, but the pain soon turned into anger. June's eyes hardened as she turned around to where multiple bats were roaming the skies.
"Try sticking your hand out!" Nancy yelled, "Eleven used to do that and it always worked!"
June tried focusing enough to see only the bats. She stuck her hand out, like Nancy instructed, but nothing happened. She tried even harder, but still, she summoned nothing.
In the meantime the rest had killed all of the vicious creatures, Steve ripping the last one in two.
Eddie stomped with his feet on his place, "Jesus H. Christ!" he threw the oar on the ground before stepping back to June. He took her hand in his, trying to find some comfort.
June on the other hand didn't have much comfort to give, she looked down at her bleeding thigh and touched her open neck with her hand before wincing. Eddie noticed immediately and looked her over, only now seeing the wounds.
"You okay?" he asked, worry laced in his voice.
"My hair is going to kill me tomorrow." she referred to having her hair wet without putting in any products with a small chuckle.
He replaced his hand on her shoulder to stabilize her when walking to the group, "Uh, do you guys think these bats have, like, rabies?" Robin asked from her crouched state next to a dead bat.
"What?"
"It's just that rabies are, like, my number one greatest fear." Robin stood back up, "And I think we should get you to a doctor like really soon because once symptoms set in, it's too late. You're already like dead." she rambled to Steve.
She then looked at the other two teens of which one was arguably badly injured, "Oh, God, not you too." she whined, "Do you feel any of the symptoms? Dizziness? Headaches? Itching sensation?"
"I'm not discussing this-" June's sentence got stopped by the creatures shrieking in the sky, Eddie pulled on her hand so they would all stand closer together.
Only the bats didn't come at them, instead they huddled up at the gate, going through it, "All right. There's not that many." Steve theorised, "We can take 'em. June could do something, maybe. Right?"
"Sure, Steve, let the girl without control kill everyone." she sarcastically replied, holding her neck with her free hand, "Sounds like a fantastic plan."
More bats appeared from out of the sky, "You were saying, Steve?" Robin added.
Nancy's head turned to the other side, trying to find a temporary solution to the bat problem, "The woods. Now." she started running towards the woods on the other side. Steve followed her closely and then Eddie and a limping Juniper and then Robin.
June thought the woods looked super scary like this, the vines that were once dragging her across the ground everywhere. Goosebumps across her entire body came up at the sight of the trees, lightened by the red light that shone in the Upside Down.
"Who knew we'd be running through the woods in a different dimension together, huh?" Eddie pointed out to her while still following Nancy and Steve closely.
"Yeah," June chuckled, but the sound was cut short by a groan, "Who knew."
Turned out, Nancy'd been leading them to Skull Rock - or, back, to Skull Rock. They sat under the rocks, waiting for the shrieking bats to leave their presence. Eddie and June anxiously held hands while looking at the filled, red sky.
June was flummoxed as to why Eddie stuck with her like this, but she certainly wasn't complaining. In her stormy, dark state of mind, he was the light at the end of the tunnel. The one that made her laugh in the most sorrowful situations.
He was it. How could she not have known before?
note:
we got a confession ‼️
AAHHH