The next morning came with the gang all discussing what we saw last night in the back room of the Scoops Ahoy. Dustin had went back up to the roof earlier this morning to get a better view of what was going on. Steve and Robin sat at the small table across from one another while I leaned up against the wall as Dustin spoke to us, pacing back and forth.
"That keycard opens the door, but unfortunately, the Russian with this keycard also has a massive gun. Whatever's in this room, whatever's in those boxes, they really don't want anybody finding it."
"But there's gotta be a way in." Robin said as she stared down at the table. Steve leaned back in his chair and spun his hat around in his hand. He sat back upright and blew into his hat.
"Well, you know," He began before he leaned into the table. "I could just take him out."
"Take who out?" Robin asked as she looked at Steve.
"The Russian guard." Steve shrugged. Robin nodded slowly and I chuckled at his proposition. "What? I sneak up behind him, I knock him out, and I take his keycard. It's easy."
"Yeah, maybe on a date." I remarked sarcastically. "Did you not hear the part about the massive gun?" I reminded him. He looked my way and I could tell he was annoyed that none of us believed him.
"Yes, (Y/n), I did. And that's why I would be sneaking." He said as he traveled his fingers across the table slowly in a walking-type manner.
"Well, please, tell me this, and be honest, have you ever actually... won a fight?" Dustin questioned as he crossed his arms.
"Okay, that was one time--" Steve exclaimed as he threw his hand in the air in annoyance.
"Twice. Jonathan. Year prior?" I interrupted him.
"Listen, that doesn't count." Steve spat as he tried defending himself.
"Really? If my memory serves me right, I'm pretty sure he beat the shit out of you and walked away with only a bruised cheek." I recalled the memory as I taunted Steve.
"It was different, okay?" Steve began but Dustin started talking over him.
"You got a fat lip, crooked nose, swollen eye, a lot of blood. Lots of blood." Dustin listed while him and Steve talked over one another.
"That just might work." Robin mumbled to herself before getting up from her seat and running out to the front of the shop. I watched her as Steve got up from his seat too to lean out the window. Robin grabbed the cash from the tip jar up front and ran out from behind the counter.
"Robin." Steve called out to her in confusion. When she continued running, he headed out of the door. "Hey! Robin! Hey, what-- what are you doing?"
"I need cash." She quickly said as she turned to face him.
"Well, half of that's mine." Steve complained. "Where are you going?" Dustin and I came out of the back room to watch where she was going.
"To find a way into that room, a safe way. And, in the meantime, sling ice cream, behave, and don't get beat up. I'll be back in a jiff!" She spat out before running in the opposite direction from us. We watched her leave before Steve glanced at Dustin, and I followed his gaze to see the curly-haired kid licking the ice cream scooper.
"Oh, dude!" Steve exclaimed as he looked at Dustin in disgust. He snatched the scooper away from Dustin before spinning it in his hand and placing it into his pocket. "Come on, man, not my scooper."
~
A little while had passed since Robin left, and I was starting to feel antsy. Maybe it's just because I've been so on edge with our mission, but I couldn't get the thought of everyone's safety out of my mind. Maybe it's because we've already been through so much that the idea that something terrible could go down is inevitable. Steve worked the counter while Dustin and I sat in the back, waiting patiently for Robin's return.
"Dustin?" I heard myself speak up. Dustin lifted his head and looked up at me.
"Yeah?" He asked.
"Are we... Are we actually going through with this?" I muttered, keeping my voice low. My foot tapped rapidly on the ground.
Dustin was quiet for a second, trying to think about what to say. "Yeah. We can't just sit around and do nothing while evil Russians invade Hawkins."
I nodded my head. "Of course, of course." I took a deep breath. "What I'm trying to get at here is... you really believe four teenagers are going to stop an evil Russian government agency that has set up its base in a mall that's guarded by bald men with large guns." I spat out.
Dustin simply just shrugged. "Why not?"
"No, not "why not". I don't want anyone to get hurt this time. I'm serious, Dustin. People can be scarier than monsters. What if something happened to you?" Dustin went quiet for a second. My guess is that the idea of safety hadn't really been much of a thought until now. "Once we're inside, then what? What if there's more guards waiting behind those doors for us, and we get kidnapped or something?"
"(Y/n), that's not gonna happen." Dustin said, quickly trying to stop me from worrying. "We've been totally fine before when we dealt with big stuff like this."
"This is different, Dustin. This is people we're talking about." I argued.
"So?" Dustin argued back to me. "We'll be okay! Steve won't let anything bad happen to us. I mean, sure, he's never technically won a fight, but he's got determination and heart." I didn't respond to him right away as I sighed to myself and sat in thought. Dustin reached over and grabbed my hand. "It'll be fine. Plus, we've got Robin to keep everyone in check."
I slowly nodded and took a deep breath, trying to calm down. "Sorry. Yeah, you're right. We'll be okay. I'm sure this whole Russian business isn't even that big of a deal anyway." I said to no one in particular, or maybe to myself to convince myself that everything would be fine.
Dustin raised his eyebrows as he let my hand go and went over to the window to check up on Steve. Dustin ordered himself some ice cream from the teenager and got it back in a moments notice with a grin on his face. I took a seat and did everything in my power to distract myself from my worries.
Before I knew it, I heard the door to the back room open and a familiar short-haired girl came running in with papers in her hands. I got up from my seat as she laid out the papers on the table. Steve came in behind her and the four of us crowded around the table to see what the page was all about.
"It is fascinating what twenty bucks will get you at the County Recorder's Office." Robin mentioned as she smoothed out the page over the table. "Starcourt Mall." She said, looking down at the blue paper. It was blueprints for the mall, and it was incredibly detailed. "The complete blueprints."
"Not bad." Dustin grinned at her before looking back at the paper.
Robin pointed down at a square on the page. "So, this is us, Scoops." She slid her hand to the other side of the paper. "And this is where we want to get."
"I mean, I don't really see a way in." Steve mumbled as he looked at the map.
"There's not," Robin began as she grabbed the page. "if you're talking exclusively about doors." She pulled the page away to reveal another one underneath that showed a detailed layout of the ventilation shafts around the mall.
"Air ducts." Dustin said in amazement and realization.
"Exactly." Robin smiled at him before walking over to the whiteboard to grab a marker. She came back quickly. "Turns out, this secret room needs air just like any old room. And these air ducts," Robin began, circling the secret room she pointed out earlier before drawing a line down towards Scoops Ahoy. "lead all the way..." She traced a path towards Scoops that had a few turns in it. "here." She finished as she circled Scoops.
The four of us looked up to see the vent on the wall in front of us. Steve got up to go see if he could find anything that would help us open up the vent, and quickly came back with a screwdriver. Left in the room was a ladder that I helped set up beneath the vent for Steve to climb onto. He unscrewed the screws on the vent and took it off, and Dustin stood beneath him to hand him any tools he needed. Steve held the screwdriver in his mouth and turned to Dustin.
"Flashlight." He said through muffled words. Dustin handed him the flashlight as requested and Steve took the screwdriver out of his mouth to trade to Dustin. He grabbed the flashlight and turned it on, peering into the vent with it. "Yeah, I don't know man. I don't know if you can fit in here. It's, like... super tight."
"I'll fit." Dustin reassured him as Steve climbed down the ladder. "Trust me, no collarbones, remember?" Dustin said as he took the flashlight from Steve.
"Uh, excuse me?" Robin questioned in confusion to Dustin's statement.
"Oh, he's, uh... Yeah, he's got some disease. Chry... uh, it's chrydo, um..." Steve stuttered, trying to explain to Robin.
"It's cleidocranial dysplasia. It's a genetic condition." I corrected him as Dustin began trying to crawl inside of the air duct.
Steve shrugged. "Yeah, that. He's missing bones and stuff. He can bend like Gumbo."
"You mean Gumby." Robin corrected him as well.
"I'm pretty sure it's Gumbo." Steve told her as he rolled his eyes.
"Steve, just shut up and push me!" Dustin shouted at him from inside of the air duct. It was clear that the kid was stuck in there and couldn't go in any further.
"Okay." Steve scoffed as if his parents just scolded him. "I'll push ya." Steve grabbed onto Dustin's feet while Robin and I watched.
"Not my feet, dumbass. Push my ass." Dustin spat out.
"What?" Steve asked, taken aback by Dustin's request.
"Touch my butt! I don't care!" Dustin shouted at him, to which Steve took a step up the ladder and began pushing on Dustin's butt. "Come on! Harder! Push harder!"
"I'm pushing!" Steve shouted back at him.
"You're playing with my legs!" Dustin screeched.
"I'm not playing, I have terrible footing." Steve defended himself as he moved on the ladder to try and get a better stance.
"Come on!" Dustin continued screeching in the air duct. I noticed Robin shaking her head in shame.
"I'm just gonna shove you, ready?" Steve held onto Dustin's legs on his shoulders.
"Just shove me?" Dustin repeated in confusion.
"One, two..." Steve continued without letting Dustin fully realize what was going on. He tried shoving him in but it didn't get Dustin inside any further.
"Shit." Dustin spat out. The bell at the front of the counter began ringing over and over again, and Robin and I turned to see who was making all of the noise other than the two dipshits in front of us.
"Ahoy, sailors! All hands on deck!" A familiar little girl in very colorful clothing stood there. "Ahoy!" Erica continued pressing the button over and over again as she stared Robin and I down. I glanced at Robin who was staring back at Erica with a smirk on her face. She had an idea. "Get over here and serve me some samples."
Robin gestured for Erica to come into the back of the parlor, and we told her that we needed her to get inside of the vent. By that point, Dustin and Steve had given up on trying to push Dustin into the vent. Erica stood on the ladder with the flashlight and peered into the tight space. She got back down and turned to us after a moment.
"Yeah, I don't know." She said as she leaned up against the table.
"You don't know if you can fit?" Dustin asked.
"Oh, I can fit. I just don't know if I want to." She shrugged. Steve crossed his arms.
"Are you claustrophobic?" Robin questioned in a higher pitched voice that she used a lot with younger kids.
Erica snickered. "I don't have phobias."
"Okay, well, what's the problem?" Steve asked, getting annoyed with her already.
"The problem is, I still haven't heard what's in this for Erica." She said dramatically, talking in the third person. She sure was bratty, but I had to give it to her, the girl was super smart for her age.
~
The four of us sat around a booth with Erica seated directly in the middle. On the table in front of us sat bowls, cups and cones of just about every flavor of ice cream Scoops had to offer, milkshakes, and a banana split that Steve had just given to her. Erica took one good look at the banana split before pushing it back towards Steve. "More fudge, please." She requested. Steve stood in place and stared at all of the ice cream on the table in front of her. Erica waved her hand in a shoo-like matter. "Go on."
Steve took a deep breath before grabbing the banana split and heading back into the parlor to get her some fudge. Robin turned and took out the blueprint page from her bag beside her. "All right." She held it up so Erica could see. "You see this?" She asked as she pointed to the red marker lined across the page. "This is the route you're gonna take." She flipped over the page to reveal the second half of the route. "Then we just wait till the last delivery goes out tonight. Then you knock out the grate, jump down, open the door." Robin told Erica.
"Then you find out what's in those boxes?" Erica asked sarcastically.
"Exactly." Robin nodded as she placed the blueprints beside herself.
"And you say this guard is armed." Erica mentioned.
"Yes, but he won't be there." Dustin reassured her.
"And booby traps?" Erica asked.
"Booby traps?" Robin repeated, confused as to what she meant.
"Lasers, spikes in the wall?" Erica elaborated.
Robin chuckled and looked away. "What?" Erica turned to Dustin and I.
"You know what this half-baked plan of yours sounds like to me?" She asked as she stared the two of us down. "Child endangerment." The girl said dramatically.
"We'll be in radio contact with you the whole time--" I began but was cut off by Erica waving her finger in my face.
"Ah, ah, ah!" She spat, quickly shutting me up. "Child endangerment." She repeated even more dramatically this time.
Dustin took a breath before speaking up. "Erica?" The girl looked at him. "Hi. Uh... We think these Russians want to do harm to our country. Great harm. Don't you love your country?"
"You can't spell "America" without "Erica"." She remarked with a grin before grabbing one of the many milkshakes and sipping out whatever remained at the bottom, causing a loud slurping noise to come out from the cup.
Dustin took a minute to think about her statement before he nodded. "Uh, yeah, yeah. Oddly, that's, uh, totally true. So, so, don't do this for us." He said as he turned back to her. "Do it for your country." Erica continued slurping, not looking at him. "Do it for your fellow man. Do this for America... Erica."
Erica stopped slurping and put down her milkshake with a large smile, looking at Dustin. "Ooh! I just got the chills." Dustin smiled at her. "Oh, yeah, from this float, not your speech." Dustin's smile turned quickly into a frown as Erica faced away from him and looked between the three of us as she leaned on the table. "You know what I love most about this country? Capitalism." She turned to Dustin. "Do you know what capitalism is?"
"Yeah." Robin and Dustin said, clearly annoyed with her wits.
"It means this is a free market system. Which means people get paid for their services, depending on how valuable their contributions are. And it seems to me, my ability to fit into that little vent is very, very valuable to you all. So, you want my help? This USS Butterscotch better be the first of many. And I'm talking free ice cream for life." Erica dramatically stated before ending her little speech by eating a cherry off of its stem.
~
"Erica, do you copy?"
"Mm-hmm. I copy."
The day flew by and it was incredibly dark outside, despite the luminating lights of the Starcourt Mall shining brightly. Dustin, Robin, Steve and I all sat perched on the roof above the secret Russian storage while Erica was down inside of Scoops Ahoy, getting ready to crawl through the tight vents to let us inside. The guards had finally left to go home from the night, so we knew it was go time.
"You nerds in position or what?" Erica asked over the walkie talkie.
"Yeah, we're in position." Robin mumbled. "It's all quiet here, so you've got the green light."
"Green light, roger that. Commence Operation Child Endangerment."
"Can we maybe not call it that?" I asked, leaning over Robin's shoulder to speak into the walkie. I was already feeling guilty enough by letting two children in on a dangerous mission.
"See you on the other side. Nerds."
Robin, Steve and I all exchanged glances of worry that Erica would get stuck or lost in those vents. Dustin kept lookout with his binoculars, but quite frankly, I didn't think he needed them. A few minutes of silence passed before the radio spoke to us.
"All right, nerds. I'm there."
"Do you-- Do you see anything?" Robin questioned.
"Yeah, I see those boring boxes you're so excited about."
"Any guards?" Robin continued.
"Negative."
"Booby traps?" She finished.
"If I could see them, they'd be pretty shit traps, wouldn't they?"
"Thank you for that." Robin said sarcastically into the walkie. I chuckled a bit at Erica's words. A few seconds passed before the walkie began once more.
"I'm in."
"Oh, God." Steve groaned as he put his face in his hands. I could tell he was just as worried about this whole thing as I was.
The gray doors below to the storage unit opened by themselves, and out stepped a small figure wearing a helmet and shoulder and knee pads with a bright and colorful outfit to match. "Free ice cream for life." Erica spat as she put her hands on her hips, emphasizing the "for life" part.
The four of us got up from our spot and started heading down the building, in awe at the fact that she managed to pull off our plan. We got down to the ground and followed Erica inside of the room where the doors shut behind us. Steve pulled out a pocket knife and got to work on opening up the cardboard boxes. He opened up the lid and what laid inside was definitely not Chinese food. There sat a large, metal box that seemingly had a handle on the top of it. Steve grabbed onto the handle and glanced my way for a second before he turned the handle and lifted the lid, causing the air that was once compressed inside to hiss. Inside of the box sat four circles with handles on each of them.
"That's definitely not Chinese food." Steve mumbled as the five of us peered down inside of the box. Steve put a hand on the box before he looked at us. "Uh, maybe you guys should, you know, stand back." He said as he motioned for us to move away from him.
"No." Dustin protested.
"Just-- Just step back, okay?" Steve demanded, putting a hand on Dustin's chest and pushing him away.
"No." Dustin continued.
"Step back. Seriously." Steve began, but it was clear Dustin wasn't listening.
"No! No! If you die, I die." The two stared at one another, Dustin's face in complete seriousness while Steve just looked a bit dumbfounded. I took a deep breath and stepped away with Robin and Erica.
"Okay." Steve shrugged, not really taking Dustin seriously. He turned one of the handles on the circle, causing it to click before Steve pulled it up slowly. The air hissed as he brought it up out of the box to show us what he found. It was a tube of sorts that kept a weird, bubbly, green goo-like substance inside. "What the hell?" Steve mumbled to himself as the five of us stared in utter shock.
"What is that?" I asked, but my question would go unanswered as the room began rumbling slightly.
"Was that just me, or did the room move?" Dustin spat out, looking up at the ceiling.
"Booby traps." Erica whispered before the room seemingly began moving more, some type of mechanics up above whirring.
"You know what? Let's just grab that and go." Robin quickly spat, going over to Steve to take the tube. She took it from his hand and headed to the door, waiting for it to open. Erica and I followed her while Steve put the lid back on the box and Dustin went to open the door with the control panel. He pushed the buttons over and over again.
"Which one do I press, Erica?" He asked in a panic.
"Just press the damn button, nerd." Erica spat back.
"Which one? I'm pressing the button, okay?" Dustin said, his tone worrying.
"Press "open door"." Erica argued.
"I'm pressing "open door"!"
"Just open the-- Press the other button." Steve demanded, hearing the commotion from the two kids. Steve pushed Dustin out of the way and began pushing on the buttons instead but to no avail.
"Guys, get out of the way so she can push the button--" Robin began in a panic. Dustin and Steve fought on the control panel and Dustin tried pushing buttons as did Steve.
"Would you stop?" Steve spat.
"I'm trying." Dustin mumbled.
"Would you let me just do it? Would you stop?" Steve continued, his voice raising as the worry set into all of us.
"Just open the door!" I shouted at them in a panic. Rather than opening the door, a large, metal, red wall came down from the ceiling and placed itself over our exit, making a clanging sound when it hit the floor. The five of us stared at it, but a second later, the lights began flickering violently, and everyone's stomach dropped at the feeling of falling quickly. Robin, Dustin and Erica began screaming loudly, and I immediately lost my footing, falling into the wall in the corner.
I felt a pair of hands wrap themselves around my waist tightly from behind, and I immediately recognized the feeling to be Steve's. I held onto his arms tightly and shut my eyes, the feeling of falling getting worse and worse by the second. "Oh, shit." Steve mumbled to himself, realizing we were all in deep shit now.