Chapter Seven | Army
"You're positive that was Dart?"
"Yes. He had the same exact yellow pattern on his butt." Dustin explained to us as we were walking across the trail track the same night.
"He was tiny two days ago." I recall.
"Well, he molted three times already," Dustin says.
"Molted?" Steven asked.
"Molted." Dustin confirmed. "Shed his skin to make room for growth like hornworms."
"When's he gonna molt again?" Max asked. We now full on believe all the shit that happened last year. Darts a monster.
"It's gonna be soon," Dustin informed us. "When he does, he'll be fully grown, or close to it. And so will his friends."
"Yeah, and he gonna eat a lot more than just cats." Steve states.
"Wait, a cat?" Lucas asked, stopping us. "Dart ate a cat?"
"No, what? No." Dustin obviously lied, shaking his head.
"What are you talking about?" Steve asks beside me. "He ate Mews."
"Mews? Whos Mews?" Max and I asked at the same time.
"It's Dustin cat," Steve tells us.
Dustin's eyes widen. "Steve!"
"Well, was." I correct with a small grin and Steve chuckled with me.
"I knew it!" Lucas cried out. "You kept him!"
"No!" Dustin denied "No. No, I... No, I... He missed me. He wanted to come home." He whines.
"Bullshit!"
"I didn't know he was a Demogorgon, okay?" Dustin exclaimed loudly.
"Oh, so now you admit it?" Lucas continued to argue back.
"Guys, who cares? We have to go." Max tells the two boys.
"I care!" Lucas yells. "You put the party in jeopardy! You broke the rule of law!"
"So did you!" Dustin fought back.
"What?" Lucas asked, clearly offended.
"You told not one, but two strangers the truth!" Dustin flashed the torch on both of us.
I scoffed. "A stranger?" I stepped closer to them.
"You wanted to tell them too!"
"Yeah, but I didn't, okay?" Dustin snapped. "I didn't tell them! We both broke the law, okay? So we're even. We're even."
"No, no!" Lucas glared. "We're not even! Don't even try that. Your stupid pet could have eaten us for dinner!"
"That wasn't my fault!"
"Guys?" Steve asked and I noticed he had walked a bit away from the group.
"He wasn't going to eat us," Dustin argued back.
"He was crawling to come say hello?" Lucas snaps, meaning what happened a few minutes ago.
"Guys!" Steve snapped and all four of us turned our heads towards Steve. In the distance, you could hear screeching which means we're close. Steve continued to venture forward. The boys following him.
"No, no, no!" I yelled out, grabbing ahold of Max's wrist, making sure she's not following them. "Hey, guys, why are you running towards the sound?"
"Hello?" Max called as they went out of our site, leaving us alone in the woods without a flashlight. "Hello? Shit!" Max pulled me along and we had no other choice but to follow them.
We now made it to some sort of lookout area of Hawkins, thank god we didn't lose them otherwise I would've lost my shit. They stopped at the edge.
"I don't see him," Dustin says.
Lucas puts his bicolours to his eyes. "It's the lab," Lucas says suddenly. "They were going back home."
We make our way towards the lab, we were at least five minutes away which gives me relief. The boys were our light as they had the flash torches.
"Hello?" We suddenly hear a voice call out and I frowned. Oh, God, someone's here. "Who's there? Who's there?"
"Steve?" Two teenagers exclaimed.
"Nancy? Jonathan?" Steve called out to them and we all walked towards them. Okay, so they know them.
"What are you doing here?" Nancy exclaimed, walking towards Steve and Jonathan following.
"What are you doing here?" Steve shoots back.
"We're looking for Mike and Will," Nancy answered.
"They're not in there, are they?" Dustin dared to ask. I looked over at the lab. Oh God, they probably are, let's be real.
"We're not sure," Nancy answered.
"Why?" Jonathan asked.
In the distance, a loud screeching sound was heard that could make my ears bleed. My heart pounded.
They were all chatting with each other but I noticed that the lights had turned on the lab. "The powers' back on," I stated and everyone looked at the lab.
We all run towards the booth that accessed us for us to get in. Jonathan was in there first, pressing some buttons and we all waiting outside.
"Let me try," Dustin jumped in the booth next to Jonathan. "Let me try, Jonathan!" After trying, Dustin huffed. "Son of a bitch! You know what..." He continually pressed the button. It wouldn't budge. The gate then opens to our surprise. "Hey! I got it!"
We watch it open. "Jonathan, Nancy, you guys go get Will, Mike, whoever the hell else is out there with your car, okay?" I demand them. The teens looked at me like I was crazy. "Go! We might not have much time!"
They nodded and scrambled to the car and drove off towards the labs and all we had to now was wait. There was a lot of screeching in the lab, which made all of us worry some more.
"Guys?" Max suddenly asked and we looked over and saw that vans and cars were coming towards us.
"Look out!"
"Guys, get back!" Max demanded and pulled me to the side where the vans were zooming past us, my heart pounding once again.
It was the police. Hopper was there, in front of us in his police car. "Let's go," Hopper demanded and we didn't think twice and we all jumped into his car, and we all speed off.
-
We were all at the Byers' house now. Everyone was pretty much okay, other than Will. He was lying down on the couch, they had put him asleep in the lab.
Hopper was talking over the phone with someone, I think the police, Jonathan was talking to Will as if he was awake, Nancy was watching as well as Steve.
The rest of us were all in the kitchen, Steve had rejoined us. "They didn't believe you, did they?" Dustin asked Hopper as he slammed the phone back in its place.
Hopper turned to us. "We'll see."
"We'll see?" Mike exclaimed. "We can't just sit here while those things are loose!"
"We stay here, and we wait for help," Hopper tells Mike before walking off.
I let out a tiny sigh and rubbed my hands over my face. Joyce was grieving over Bob, her boyfriends lost. Darts friends' ate him, right in front of her. I'd be scarred for life if I witnessed that.
It was all silent now, no one had to say anything which was understandable. What we'd all witnessed tonight was a pretty shocking thing. I'm surprised I made it out alive and I'm thankful the others did, too.
I can't imagine what they had to do last year. Mike had left the room and into the lounge. "Did you guys know the Bob was the original founder of Hawkins AV?" Mike suddenly asked.
"Really?" Lucas questioned softly.
He turned to us. "He petitioned the school to start it and everything. Then he had a fund-raiser for equipment. Mr. Clarke learnt everything from him." Mike walked toward us. "Pretty awesome, right?"
"Yeah," Lucas and Dustin said in unison. He placed a blue block on the table.
"We can't let him die in vain," Mike said.
"What do you want to do, Mike?" Dustin raised his voice. "The Chief's right on this. We can't stop the demo-dogs on our own."
"Demo-dogs?" Max asked, scrunching up her nose at the names.
They all looked at her. "Demogorgon dogs." Dustin simply said. "Demo-dogs. It's like a compound. Its a play on word-"
"Okay," I cut Dustin off, nodding.
"I mean, when it was just Dart, maybe..." Dustin trailed off.
"But there's an army now." Lucas pointed out.
"Precisely," Dustin agreed.
"His army," Mike said.
Steve looked at him. "What do you mean?"
"His army," Mike says a little louder and we all looked at him. "Maybe if we stop him, we can stop his army, too."
Mike had grabbed the drawing that Will had drawn, the shadow monster and we all look at it.
"The shadow monster," Dustin stated.
"It got Will that day on the field," Mike recalled. "The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him."
"And so this virus, it's connecting him to the tunnels?" I figured.
"To the tunnels, monsters, the Upside Down, everything." Mike nodded.
"Woah. Slow down. Slow down." Steve tells us.
"Okay, so, the shadow monsters inside everything." Mike begins to explain. "And if the vine feels something like pain, then so does Will."
Poor Will.
"And so does Dart," Lucas added.
"Yeah. Like what Mr. Clarke taught us." Mike continued. "The hive mind."
"Hive mind?" Steve repeated.
"A collective consciousness." Dustin continued to explain. "It's a super-organism."
"And this is the thing that controls everything," Mike said. "It's the brain."
"Like the mind flayer."
"The what?" Steve, Max, and I all question in sync and Lucas snapped his fingers as if he understands.
Dustin brings out a book and opens it to a page 'the mind flayer page'. "The mind flayer."
"What the hell is that?" Hopper asked as he rejoined the group.
"It's a monster from an unknown dimension." Dustin begins to explain. "It's so ancient that it doesn't even know its true home. Okay, it enslaved 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." Hoppers exclaimed.
"No, it's a manual. And it's not for kids." Dustin added. "And unless you know something that we don't, this is the best metaphor-"
"Analogy," Lucas corrected.
"Analogy?" Dustin raised his eyebrow at his friend. "That's what you're worried about? Fine. An Analogy for understanding whatever the hell this is."
"Okay, so this mind flamer thing-"
"Flayer." Dustin corrected Nancy who was beside him. "Mind flayer."
Nancy sighed. "What does it want?"
"To conquer us, basically," Dustin said. "It believes it's the master race."
"Like the Germans?" Steve suggested.
"Uh, the Nazis?" Dustin corrected.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Nazis." Steve stammered.
"Uh... if the Nazis' were from another dimension, totally." Dustin nodded his head. "Uh, it views other races, like us, as inferior to itself."
"It wants to spread, take over other dimensions." Mike continued to explain.
"We are talking about the destruction of our world as we know it." Lucas said and my eyes widen.
"That's great," Steve remarks sarcastically. "That's great. That's really great. Jesus!"
Nancy sighed again. "Okay, so if this thing is like a brain that's controlling everything, then if we kill it... we kill everything that it controls."
"We win." Dustin nodded.
"Theoretically," Lucas said.
"Great, so how do you kill this thing? Shoot it with fireballs or something?" Hopper questioned, grabbing the book from Nancy.
Dustin chuckled. "No. No, no fire- no fireballs. Uh, you summon an undead army, uh, because... because zombies, you know, they don't have brains, and the mind flayer, it... it likes brains. It's just a game. It's a game."
"What the hell are we doing here?" Hopper asked and slammed down the book on the table.
"I thought we were waiting for your military backup." Dustin figures.
"We are!" Hopper turns around to us.
"Even if they come, how are they gonna stop this?" Mike demanded. "You can't just shoot this with guns."
"You don't know that!" Hopper defended. "We don't know anything!"
"We know it's already killed everybody in the lab!" Mike argued back, which was a good point.
"And we know the monsters are gonna moult again," Lucas added.
"And we know that it's only a matter of time before those tunnels reach town," Dustin added.
"They're right," Joyce stated, coming out of her room. We all turned to her. "We have to kill it. I want to kill it."
Hopper walked towards Joyce. "Me, too. Me, too, Joyce, okay? Bow how do we do that? We don't exactly know what we're dealing with here."
"No. But he does." Mike walked over to Will. "If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it's Will. He's connected to it. He'll know it's a weakness."
"I thought we couldn't trust him anymore." Max decided to say. "That he's a spy for the mind flayer now."
"Yeah, but, he can't spy if he doesn't know where he is."
-
"I get why El was your mage now," I tell Mike as we were in the kitchen, he was on his hands and knees under the sink and I was drawing out more duck tape.
Mike turned to me. "What?"
"Lucas." I started. "He told me all about her."
"Well, he shouldn't have," Mike said. My smile drop. "And just because you and Max know the truth, it doesn't mean you're in our party. You do know that, right?"
"Yeah, I- I know." I tried not to show the hurt on my face, because that stung, like a bitch. "I mean, why would you want a stupid zoomer in your party anyway? I'm just saying; El? She sounds like she was really awesome."
"Yeah, she was." Mike agreed, closing the doors to under the sink. "Until that thing took her. Just like it took Bob."
He then walks away from our conversation and I pressed my lips together. We were now all working together in the shed to make a boundary around the shed for Will to use.
Kind of like what we did for the bus, but for the shed.
We'd put Will in a chair and he was still knocked out, we had tied him to the chair and the pole. We'd put some lights on Will and another chair sat in front of Will.
Hopper, Jonathan, Mike, and Joyce were the only ones in there now. The rest of us were inside the house, waiting.
Max and Lucas were off somewhere, Dustin was in the kitchen and I laid on the couch, I was exhausted. I hadn't had any sleep and I feel like I'm about to snap.
Dustin came over to me and sat down next to me. "I'm sorry, Aspen." Dustin suddenly said.
"What?" I murmured. "Why are you sorry?"
"For being an asshole on the bus, you didn't deserve it." Dustin sighed. I smiled and decided to forgive so I could snuggle up to him and maybe rest my eyes.
"Hey, Dustin..." I trailed off. "If he finds out where we are... will he send those dogs after us?"
"He won't find out," Dustin promised.
"Yeah, but, if he does..." I mumble.
"Judgment day." Dustin simply said. That's when the lights begin to flicker and I stood up, Dustin sighed and stood up too.
We all walked towards the window to see the shed, something must be going wrong in there.
They were trying to get Will to remember because apparently, he doesn't remember anything. And I'm not sure how this is going.
Hopper was the first to enter, then followed by Mike, Joyce, and Jonathan.
Hopper had grabbed a pencil and paper then sat down at the table which we all gathered around.
"What happened?" Dustin asked.
"I think he's talking, just not with his words," Hopper explained.
"What is that?" Steve asked as we looked down at the paper, some dots and lines were drawn on it.
"Morse code." The boys and I tell Steve.
Max and I made eye contact and we both smiled. We used to use morse code a lot to communicate when we were alone in awkward situations with other people.
"H-E-R-E," Hopper spells out.
"Here," most of us readout.
"Will's still there." Hopper figures. "He's talking to us."
We had a plan. Most of us knew morse Code, Hopper had a walkie talkie and would give us the morse code of what Will was saying.
We had the job of putting it down on the paper.
"Dash, dot, dash, dot," I mutter, writing it on the paper as I hear Hopper communicating with us.
"Yeah, okay, I got it. C." Lucas answered. Just kidding. We're using a morse code sheet.
Nancy writes down the letter C. "L." I called out the next letter that Hopper gave us.
"O."
"S."
"E."
"G."
"A."
"T."
"E."
We looked at the word in front of us. "Close gate." We all say in sync.
The bell then rings and I jumped alongside Max as we all looked at the phone. "Shit, shit," Dustin said and grabbed the phone, then put back on the phone holder.
The phone rings again and Nancy grabbed the phone box and threw it on the ground. "Do you think he heard that?" I asked.
"It's just a phone." Steve looked over at me. "It could be anywhere. Right?"
I could hear the loud screech in the distance, making my eyes widen. "That's not good," Dustin muttered.
"Hey, hey! Get away from the windows." I hear Hopper demand Mike, Lucas, Max, Dustin, and I. We all looked over at Hopper. We all did as he said and walked away from the windows. "Do you know how to use this?"
Hopper held up a gun to Jonathan, who's eyes widen. "What?"
"Can you use this?" Hopper asked sharper this time.
"I can." Nancy stepped forward and we all looked at her. Hopper shucks Nancy the gun and Nancy caught it. Hopper, Nancy, and Steve all stand in front of us with their weapons.
We had moved Will inside the house now. The thing had obviously heard the phone ring.
"Where are they?" I worriedly asked.
Lucas stood in front of Max and me with a slingshot in his hand, ready to fire. There was a loud thud and we all gasp, turning towards the sound.
"What are they doing?" Nancy breaths.
You could see the bushes moving. Another snarl in front of us and we all turned towards the sound.
We all screamed when a demo-dog comes crashing through the window and I jumped back into the wall.
It was dead.
We all inched closer towards the demo-dog. "Holy shit," Dustin muttered.
"Is it dead?" Max asked beside me.
Hopper had turned it over with his foot. The door then creaks making all over us turn around and stare at the door.
The door lock magically opens and all weapons were pointed towards the door. The door slowly opens, to reveal a girl who walked in. Her hair was slicked back and she wore dark clothes.
Everyone dropped their weapons, seeming to reconsigned the girl whose nose was bleeding. The only person who I can think this is was El.
A/N
Yay! El's back! Max and Aspen finally get to meet her! And they finally get to meet Jonathan and Nancy, too. She meets everyone, pretty much.
How did you guys like this chapter?
Final chapter coming up! Ah! Then we move onto season three!
Please, if you've seen seaosn three already, no spoilers down below cuz I've only seen the first episode! (And halfway through ep 2)
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