Lauren stared at the movie with wide eyes. She reached into the man's beside her bucket of popcorn. He gave her a dirty look and she gave him on back. "Do you mind?"
"Do you mind? I don't appreciate the dirty-ass look I got, sir." He gave her another dirty look. Lauren gave him yet another look and grabbed his drink, and stood up. She walked out of the theater and into the empty hallway. As she stumbled down the hallway, she had an overwelling urge to do a cartwheel. So she slurped down Coke. Despite the fact that she was in a dress, she did it.
But with her drug-influenced state, she fell on her ass with a laugh. She stayed on the ground for a moment before pushing herself to her feet. When she did this, she felt another urge to do a back handspring. She fought this one. If she hadn't, she would probably have died if she couldn't stick a cartwheel.
Lauren walked as if she were on a tightrope to the escalator. The water fountain caught her eye and sent yet another urge into her head. And so she pushed past the velvet rope and down the middle of the two escalators. The shoes she had on hit the floor and were immediately kicked off as she ran to the water.
Without hesitation, she stepped over the railing and into the water. It was cold. It was extremely cold, but she didn't care. She had goosebumps on her arms and legs and everywhere they could be. The water was a mere foot deep, so Lauren was able to float. Sometimes, she wasn't able to do her whole life.
Her eyes were closed as she relaxed in the water. She thought about Eleven a year and three-quarters ago floating in her pool. Then she started wondering what she was doing. What she and Max had done the last few days, considering they hadn't hung out, just the two of them before. She took deep breaths and really relaxed.
She was safe from the Russians, at least until they retaliated. Everybody was safe from them. "Lauren?" She pecked her eyes open to see a blond standing with his hands full of a popcorn bag.
"Walter?"
"Wha- what the fuck are you doing in- Hold on I'm coming down there." He pushed off the railing and ran over to the stairs. While he was doing that Lauren went back to relaxing. Walt kelt down on the edge of the fountain. "Lo? What the hell are you doing?" Lauren sat up and grabbed his wrist. "No."
"Yes, let's swim?" Walt saw her bloodshot eyes and pulled them apart to see them more. "What are you doing?" She swatted his hand away.
"Did I give you some bad shit?"
"This isn't your shit. I slept in my contacts,"
"Yeah, you and Steve skip out on me on the fourth of July. And you got high on someone else shit. So, who's shit?" Lauren pushed herself out of the water and sat next to him. Water soaked the ledge.
"Come closer so nobody hears." Walt looked around the empty mall. She pulled him closer and whispered into his ear. "The Russians."
"The Russians?" He pulled away from her. "You are seriously fucked up right now." Walt looked down at the rest of her body. "Lauren what the fuck happend to you?" His hand ran over the brusing on her neck and the other mans blood on her dress, but how was he supposed to know otherwise. "Did Steve do this to you?" He didn't even believe what he was saying, but his best friend was covered in blood. There was a lot to think about, so the word just felt out.
"What, no. He would never do that." Even high she knew he wouldn't.
"I'm sorry, I just want to know what happened."
"I'm fine. Come swim." She tried to pull him in the water.
"I've known you for how long, and you have never swam, why now?"
"Because I want to.
"You don't want to, and do you realize you are in a soaking wet white dress." Lauren looked confused and slightly nauseous. "I can see your hard-ass nipples and bright red underwear. Why are you in the water?"
"I think I'm gonna be sick," Lauren tried to hold back her vomit, but she couldn't. The shoe in Walt's hand was the best thing besides his lap, so she grabbed it and immediately released the vomit she was holding in. Walt's hand wrapped around her hair as he had done several times before. When it was full, she grabbed her other shoe. After she was done, she threw the shoes into the trash can.
"Lauren, do you have any other clothes or I guess shoes now too?" She looked down at herself. "Okay, let's dry you off," Lauren nodded still majorly under the influence of whatever that shit was. Walt grabbed he hand and led her to a closed bathroom. He pushed on the door but was getting equal force back. "It's locked. Let's go upstairs."
"Can you really see my nipples?" She looked down at her shirt as she was getting grabbed up the stairs.
"Yes, clear as day." Lauren looked down as he pushed this door open. This time, it actually opened. When Lauren was all the way in, she immediately pulled the bottom of her dress over her head. "Woah, okay."
"Hey guys," Lauren saw two of the people she had just been with, sitting on the bathroom floor. Walt pulled the flannel off himself and wrapped Lauren in it. "Thanks, Walt, I love you." Steve stood up on his knees, hands moving to the buttons.
"Hop, what are you doing? Why are you so wet‐"
"You normally like it," she laughed after interrupting him. Lauren pulled his head into her stomach, stroking his hair. "I kinda love your hair."
"Hop, why are you still...?" He turned to Walt, the best he could as he still was pushed into her stomach. "Do you know if she's thrown up yet?"
"Yeah, she has why?"
"She's still on drugs."
"Well, I don't think she's taking off her dress and floating in the fountain when she's sober, Steve."
"Is that why she's wet?"
"No, actually, she just poured a Dr. Pepper herself." Walt said sarcastically, Steve tried to pull away from her grasp but couldn't.
"Seriously, Hop, how are you still high?"
"I don't know. I've done more drugs than you two. Maybe I'm more used to 'em," she shrugged, letting go of Steve's head. She looked down at him, tapping his nose. "There's so much I love. I love Walt." She looked over at the boy who was blow-drying her dress. "I love Robin over there." She smiled at her and Walt. "You're both single, by the way." Lauren winked at them. Then she looked down at Steve on his knees in front of her. "And Stevie, I love you. Not the way I love them. I love you like, I don't know I don't care about how bad my gag reflex is I'll honestly don't care if I choke I want to suck yours," Lauren swallowed down her words. "I think I'm going to throw up again."
She stepped over him and over to the sink. Every last ounce of vomit left her body, and she started to feel like herself again. She began to regret everything that happened in the last fourty minutes. She couldn't believe that was how she told Steve she loved him. She pushed the hair out of her face and smiled at all three of them, staring at her.
"Sorry. I'll shut up. You guys didn't need to hear that." Lauren looked at herself in the mirror. She looked disgusting, at least to herself. Mascara all over her face, hair still practically dripping wet but still tame. Walt threw her the newly dry dress that took an insane amount less time than she thought it would. "Thank you," This time, for her little bit of modesty, she went into a stall to throw the dress back on.
"What the hell happened to you, man?" Walt asked Steve. Lauren unbutton the few ones that were actually done. Lauren ripped open the door and stuck her head out.
"Don't tell him. He doesn't need to know?" Saying that only made him more intrigued. Steve looked at Lauren and the boy that had seemingly become one of his best friends in mere months, and they were both stubborn as hell, but somehow a pushover all in one.
"Fucking tell me."
"No." Again his head moved from one to the other. "No sex." Walt tried to come up with something that would top that but nothing would motivate him more so the same almost a hundred percent went with Steve.
"I'll kick you in the balls." Steve moved away from him and thought he'd rather something not happen than happen.
"Russians." Lauren threw her hand up and slammed the stale door getting the rest of the way dressed. Walt looked like he did when Lauren was helping him with math.
"What the fuck are you guys talking about? Why the hell do you keep saying Russians? Did she tell you about the new Rocky movie I want to see with yall or something?"
"No. I'm talking about real Russians. Some commie bastards."
"What the fuck? Russians were beating the shit out of you for what reason? Why the fuck are they in Indiana. On the fourth of July nonetheless. Have a little respect am I right?" Lauren pulled her dress back over her body. Her underwear was still wet but there was no fixing that but time.
"Listen this is going to sound crazy as fuck-" the bathroom door pushed open right as Lauren pushed her open.
"What the hell," Dustin said staring at them. "I knew he was a goddamn Russian," Dustin said looking at Walt. "Kick his ass, Steve." Walt looked looking over at the boy.
"I am American Henderson, and you think Steve over there can kick my ass?" Steve tilted his head. If there is anyone he could beat up it's him but whatever.
"I don't know Jordan, you look pretty skinny."
"Why do you always call me skinny."
"Because you are."
"Oh yeah, and you're a fucking dwarf."
"Stop calling me that. We can't all be six feet tall."
"It's six one, dipshit, get it right. And stop calling me skinny." Lauren rolled her eyes. They were only joking but it was annoying because it was like this everything they hung out.
"I'd really love to stay and watch this stupid argument all day but we got to go, people are leaving." Erica cut into the argument. Dustin didn't exactly what she imagines when she reads 'sprung to action'.
"Come on," Dusin reached for Robin who was still sitting on the floor and had been watching the crazy sequence of events that had happened in the last ten minutes. Everyone watched him pull her up, "what are you doing watching me? Go," He yelled making them all file through the door. "Go join the group."
"Home free right?" Robin asked Lauren who was right next to her.
"Home free." Lauren nodded and grabbed onto her hand she was still scared but it didn't seem Robin wasn't. So she took comfort in that. Walt looked over at his best friend.
"Lauren what is going on?"
"Shh, in a minute I swear. I'll tell you everything." She took his hand too. She took comfort in his blissful ignorance.
"Are you okay though?" Lauren nodded then he looked over to Robin. "How about you Robin are you okay?" She looked over when she heard her name. She hadn't expected him to ask her. Despite Lauren talking about how awesome it would be in they dated they only ever talked a few times.
"Umm yeah, I'm good." Steve was walking infront of them, but he was looking around. He seemed as paranoid as Lauren, and she was extremely paranoid and scared and felt like everything wasn't going to be okay as long as there were in the mall in the clothes they were wearing.
"Shit that worked." Erica said as the pushed further into the group of people.
"Of course it worked. We just have to get on the bus with the rest of these plebes, and home sweet home her we come."
"Uhh, Dustin. Yeah, we might not wanna go to your house." Steve said looking forward and not at the boy his words were directed at.
"What why."
"I might have told them your full name."
"What is wrong with you?"
"Dude, I was drugged."
"So. So you resist. You tuf it out. You tuf it out like a man."
"Easy for you too say-"
"It's fine we can just go to the cabin. There's plenty of room and nobody's going to find us. It's secluded enough-" Lauren cut off their argument to get cut off by Robin.
"Guys," she tried to hold everyone back. When they really looked they saw some burley man checking IDs.
"Abort." They stood there and stared only to catch on of the men's eyes. "Abort. Abort." Lauren had broke from both her friends. Walt started running with them what else was he going to do. The whole Russian thing had to be a joke they made up when they were tripping.
They pushed through people and pushed over a trash can. They reached the same velvet ropes intoxicated Lauren had already faced that night so she did what she just had done. Everybody followed her down the middle of the escalators. Lauren's feet hit the floor followed by Dustin, Erica, Steve, Robin, and Walts.
"Here," Steve jumped over a counter and so did others Walt grabbed Erica and throw her legs onto the other side after she struggled to get over it. The group sat there and held onto and laughed breaths. Lauren squeezed her eyes shut and started praying in the real chance there is an actual God. Steve's hand interlocked with hers and Lauren started squeezing. "It's going to be okay, Hop."
She didn't bother to open her eyes. The only time she remembered having to be this quiet was when the men from the lab broke into the trailer. This time though she was more scared for everyone else's life. Every one of them was more important to her than herself. Her heart felt like it was going to beat out of her chest when she heard the heels of one of the man's boots walking around. With everyone, she nearly jumped out of her skin. But when he stopped walking that made it worse.
There were quiet words shared between the men. This was it. Lauren couldn't help but think of anything. If they weren't going to die they were at least going to be tortured, and the thought of the Russians hurting the people she loved would be worse than death. When the footsteps moved in unison towards them only confirmed her suspicions.
A single tear fell from her eye as they got closer. Every single one of them jumped when a car alarm when off but they stayed in the same spot. There was a series of loud crashes, every time one of them jumped. When the crashing stops the group cautiously pecked their heads over the counter. Their eyes met for men laying in pools of their blood, broken chairs, dented floors and an obliterated car. "What the fuck?" Walt asked in a decently quiet monotone voice.
Everyone else looked at the girl standing on the balcony. Dustin climbed over the counter sending a domino effect through the rest of them. Walt couldn't stop looking at the dead bodies. "Walt. Come on." Lauren tried to pull him to everyone else.
"But the car...? They're dead... What the fuck is going on." He asked himself watching as the bodies got further away. As they approached the rest of the group Lauren let go of him and ran to Eleven. "Buckley? Buckley? What the fuck is going on? The car was over here correct?" Robin nodded. "And now it's over there. How the fu-" Robin shrugged.
"I don't know."
Lauren wrapped Eleven in a hug. A tight one. "God, I love you, kid." She only pulled her tighter.
"Lauren, I can't," she let go of her still looking at her, being so grateful for her.
"Erica? What are you doing here?"
"That's a hundred percent Steve's fault," Lauren added to the conversation.
"True, yeah. Totally true. It's absolutely our fault." Lucas gave him an extremely dirty look.
"I don't understand what happened to that car."
"Yeah, I don't understand half the shit that's going on right now." Nancy looked at Walt and looked confused why he was there.
"El has superpowers."
"Wha-"
"Superpower. She threw it with her mind. C'mon you two, catch up." They were understandably confused. If Lauren hadn't lived it she would thing she took some LSD.
"That's El?" Erica asked pointing at the girl.
"Who's El?" Robin asked.
Robin received several answers such as, Me, Her, my sister, that one, and Eleanor. Lauren had forgotten that he thought she was living with her cousin Eleanor. Some of them looked at Walt confused.
"Is that not her name?"
"No," came from the majority, and Lauren replied with another later. That was what she was saying to him all night.
"I'm sorry, who are you?" Nancy asked pointing at Robin. Lauren turned to her friend.
"Robin, I work with Steve."
"Wait your Robin?" Nancy looked at Lauren and received a nod. Lauren glanced at Robin.
"See I told you she doesn't know who you are," Lauren said,
"See cracked the top secret code," everybody looked so confused, including Walt, at this point he was just going to stop asking. He could just wait.
"Yeah, which is how we found out about the Russians." Steve said with his hands on his hips.
"Russians. What Russians?"
"The Russians," Steve yelled.
"Those were Russians?" Max asked. Finally a little something was clarified for Walt. At this point, he wished he would have just stayed at the festival and not come to see a movie.
"Some of them," Erica added looking over at the dead bodies on the ground. Not fazed at all.
"What are you talking about?" Lucas screamed.
"Didn't you hear our code red?" Dustin looked at everybody and wondered why they didn't know. And if they didn't why were they here?
"Yeah. And we couldn't understand what you were saying."
"Goddamn low battery," he trailed off.
"How many times do I have to tell you about the low battery?" Steve did his lovely fatherly yell.
"Well, everything worked out, didn't it?" Dustin yelled back at him.
"Worked out? We almost died, because you couldn't leave the goddamn American hero shit alone. We're four teenagers and a ten-year-old were hardly American heroes. If anything were American dumbasses."
"Yeah, but did we Lo? Did we die? No."
"It was pretty damn close," Steve remarked. Eleven walked away from the half-conversion half-argument.
"So Russians? As in, they're working for the Russian government?" Lucas wanted conformation.
"What it is you're not comprehending?" Dustin yelled at him again. "Am I not speaking English. We have a full-blown Red Dawn situation."
"So this has nothing to do with the gate?" Max asked.
"This has everything to do with the gate..." out off the corner of her eye Lauren say Eleven fall.
"El," she ran over to the girl and kelt down next to her. Mike kelt down on the other side of her. Lauren held the girl's head in her hands. "What's wrong? Eleven? What's wrong?"
"My leg. My leg." She grunted in pain. Lauren looked down as they took a bandage from her leg and her jaw dropped.
"What the fuck happened to her?" Something moved inside her leg making all of them gasp a little and her grunt again.
"El! El! Are you okay?" Mike yelled trying to get her to respond. The girl began to scream.
"What the hell happened to her?" Lauren yelled wanting answers, because just as she thought everything was going to be okay, her sister shows up in more pain than she could imagine and it was killing her.
"What is that?" Erica asked.
"These's something inside." Jonathan ran over to go knows where while everyone esle stared at the thing moving around in her leg. The girl continued wimpering in pain. Eleven's eyes were futtering open right after they'd close for a moment. "Hey. Hey. Hey. Stay awake, stay awake. Let's get her on her side," Miked started to move the girl. "On this side.''
"Easy, easy,"Steve said helping to move the girl along with Dustin and Nancy. Eleven sat with her body in between Mike's legs.
"You know, it's not bad I've seen someone's bone sticking out of there leg," Lauren had too infant most of them had. It was Lauren's leg from the first of there near death exercise.
"Robin," Lauren and Steve said. "Not helping."
"Yeah right. I'm sorry." She said rubbing the back of her neck. Just then Jonathan came running back with a knife and a spoon in his hand.
"Okay. All right, El? This is going to hurt like hell okay." Jonathan looked down at the knife. "Need you to stay real still." He picked up the wooden spoon. "Here, you're gonna want to bite down on this, okay?" Eleven nodded and put the wood between her teeth. Jonathan lowered the knife to her leg.
"Wait, Walt, he's the one in the med classes. Let him do it." Lauren said. Every one glanced at him and he had big eyes.
"What?"
"You know where the arteries and shit are you do it." Jonathan didn't think twice before handing Walt the knife, on wrong move and she could easily start bleeding extensively. Walt knelt down if front of her.
"Fuck fuck fuck, I got this." He said under his breath. He shook out his shoulders out before setting the knife to her skin. "You got this, El." he took a deep breath and slowly began cutting down her leg, making sure to avoid any vains he knew ran through the calf. As the knife went into the girl's skin, she screamed, and everybody esle seemed to tense up not being able to look away from the horrific site.
Once her skin was open and the cut was big enough, Walt looked up. "Do I just go in?" Everyone nodded, and he slowly pushed his fingers in her leg and began moving around in search for whatever had been moving around. This hardly stopped the weeping only adding to it. The girl spit the wood out from her mouth and screamed.
"Stop it, stop, stop," Eleven screamed. Walt pulled his had out quick instead of slow. In an attempt to 'rip of the bandaid.' "I can do it," Eleven whimpered, pushing herself off of Mike. "I can do it." Walt moved out of the way as Eleven started to move the creator out of her leg. After a lot of screaming, glass shattering behind them, confused looks from Walt, and Robin, the red glob ripped out of her leg and flew across the room.
The red glob started to crawl away, and everyone's eyes were locked on it until a foot stepped on it. When they looked up to see who the foot was attached to the saw Jim, Joyce, and a man Lauren had only ever heard of. The trio walked over to group surrounding Eleven. "What the fuck happened here?"
"Father like daughter," Steve whispered to Lauren, she rolled her eyes.
"So fucking much," Eleven said pushed off the ground with the help of Mike. He tried to protest, but she's was going to get up.
"Again, father like daughter." Eleven started limping over to a bench. Everyone followed behind. Jim helped take the girl and sat down. Eleven sat down, laying on his legs.
"Who is, umm?" Joyce lips smacked together, pointing over to the dead people just laying in pools of their blood.
"Russians," Everyone besides the newest edition said in a nonchalant way.
"That makes sense. How'd you guys get involved?" Joyce asked. Every one of them that was involved in the Russians part of the night tried to talk at the same time.
"Before we say anything, I want to make it crystal clear. I was opposed of every single decision that was made. Including getting the ten year old involved." Dustin rolled his eyes.
"It all started when I got back. When you guys left, I stayed so I could talk to Susie-"
"Susie?" Jim asked.
"My girlfriend. To keep it short, I was trying to get into contact with her when a russian broadcast came across the radio. I recorded it and brought it to Steve and Lo and they tried to help me translate it but until Robin got involved we had no luck. She translated in less than a day it was some criptic message like, umm."
"The week is long. The sivercat feeds when blue meets yellow in the west. A trip to China sounds nice if you tread lightly." Robin said.
"What?"
"It's the code. She cracked it in hours."
"The silver cat was Lynx Transports. Umm, bule meets yellow in the west." She pointed up at the clock. "A trip to China sounds nice." She pointed over to the Chinese food store. "If you tread lightly," she pointed to the shoe store.
"That's where Erica comes in we figured out it was the Chinese food and shoe boxes were they come in. But it was surrounded by burley men with guns. We had to figure out what it was so we needed someone small to shimmy through the vents. She's what got us down there."
"You, my daughter, sailor boy, sailor girl, and Erica got down there and back up and are still alive?" Jim looked like he didn't believe it.
"Not easily," Dustin threw his hand up to Steve's bludgeon face. "That's not all of what happened but what happened to you guys?" Dustin asked the group that saved them form the Russian men.
"The mind flayers back." Lauren's eyes shut and she took a deep breath thinking that it couldn't happen again. "Only different with different infected people."
"Who."
"Billy, and-"
"And?"
"And Heather-"
"Holloway?" Walt asked with pecked interest. He didn't a hundred percent know what it meant but he sensed it was bad. A few of them nodded. Lauren took his hand. Him and Heather had a little thing going on but they never established it.
"The mind flayer is using the infected people the flayed if you will to build an army. But umm," Mike tilted his head, trying to come up with the right words. "The army is one."
"One? Hasn't it always been one? Hive mind thing, right?" Steve asked, crossing his arms on her chest. Lauren nodded, having thought the same thing.
"It's more than a hive mind this time. This army was a hive mind. Okay, I don't know how I'm going to explain this. The people. The flayed melted and became one." Mike said. The look on most of their faces was all the same disgusted face.
"I'm sorry melted people?" Walt asked.
"Like if you put people into a blender and poured them together. Then, they became like one extremely large creature. Almost like a spider" Max said Walt nodded like it was the most normal words that could possibly come from her mouth.
"The mind flayer it built this monster in Hawkins, to stop El, to kill her and pave a way into our world." Mike said to clarify.
"And it almost did. That was just one piece of it." Max added.
"How big is it?" Lauren crossed her arms on her chest and started biting her nails. Something on everything about this trying to kill Eleven was making her more nervous.
"How big is this thing?"
"Big. Thirty feet, at least."
"Shit," she whispered into her hand. When they said big, she wasn't thinking thirty feet.
"Yeah. It sorta destroyed your cabin." Lauren sighed again. This didn't seem to be important to the rest of the story. "Sorry."
"Okay, so, just to be clear, this big fleshy spider thing that hurt little H... El, itsome kind of gigantic weapon?" Nancy answered with a simple yes. "But instead of, like, screws and metal. The mind flayer made its weapon of melted people. Like people we know. People from town?"
"Yes, exactly." Nancy replied.
"Yeah, okay. I just wanted to make sure."
"Are we sure this thing is still out there, still alive?" Everyone looked from Steve to Joyce from her words.
"El beat thr shit out of it, but, yeah, it's still alive."
"But if we close the gate again-" Will added.
"We cut the brain off from the body." Max finished Wills words.
"And we kill it. Theoretically." Lucas then finished Max's sentence.
"Yoo-hoo," Murry yelled from cross the mall, making everyone look over to him. "Yoo-hoo," he yelled again, waving his hands full of papers.