It was the day of Will's funeral, and my whole house was pretty quiet.
As I slipped my doc martens on, I sighed. I had told Ten to stay at the Wheeler's last night with El since we were going to be going there after the funeral, and so she wouldn't be lonely while I was gone.
I go into my bathroom, fixing my hair and re-applying my lip gloss one last time before my mom calls my name, telling me it's time to go.
I flip the light switch and my bathroom light turns off. My parents were waiting at the door for me before they both walked out, and I followed behind.
I climb into the backseat, watching as the trees blur by out the window. After a short ride we arrive, and I quickly get out, going straight to Lucas, Dustin, and Mike.
"Hey, guys." I greet, pulling down my dress. It was all black and had long sleeves, but it was a bit short.
"Hi," Mike smiles, "Wow! You look great!"
"Thanks." I do a playful spin.
"Guys, we need to act sad. This is a funeral, remember?" Lucas shakes his head.
My parents join me as everyone started grouping together with their family, and the Priest says his words. It was starting.
"Just wait till we tell Will that Jennifer Hayes was crying at his funeral." Dustin smirks.
"Dustin, you sound craz-" I start, but get shushed by Mike's mother. I quickly close my mouth.
|
"Hey, uh-I just wanted to say sorry, for Will," I stutter as I take a seat next to Will's mom, Joyce. She knows that Will's alive, I just don't want to say anything, "I didn't know him that well at school, but I've heard from the boys he is really sweet."
"Oh, thank you, sweetie," Joyce smiles, but furrows her eyebrows, "Did you say he is?"
"Hey, Lizzie, come on." Lucas ushers me up, pulling me with him to the boys who sat with Mr. Clarke.
"Oh! Um, bye!" Joyce yells after me.
"Lucas, I was talking-" I start, "Ah, hey Mr. Clarke!"
"Hello, Liz." He greets as Lucas and I take a seat.
"So, you know how in Cosmos, Carl Sagan talks about other dimensions? Like, beyond our world." Mike begins.
"Yeah, sure. Theoretically." Mr. Clarke nods.
"Right, theoretically." Mike corrects.
"So, theoretically, how do we travel there?" Lucas asks, getting straight to the point.
"You guys have been thinking about Hugh-Everett's Many-worlds Interpretation, haven't you?" Mr. Clarke asks. We all share hesitant looks, "Well, basically, there are parallel universes. Just like our world, but just infinite versions of it. Which means there's a world out there where none of this tragic stuff ever happened."
"Yeah, that's not what we're talking about." Lucas states.
"Oh."
"We were thinking of more of an evil dimension, like the Vale of shadows," Dustin informs him, "You know the Vale of Shadows?"
"An echo of the Material Plane, where necrotic and shadow magic-" Mr. Clarke starts.
"Like a dark and creepy place." I intervene, pressing my lips together.
"Yeah, exactly," Mike agrees, "If that did exist, a place like the Vale of Shadows, how would we travel there?"
"Theoretically..." Lucas adds.
"Well..." Mr. Clarke picks up a paper plate, taking out his pen and drawing two parallel lines and a tiny stick figure, "Picture...an acrobat standing on a tight rope. Now, the tight rope is our dimension. And our dimension has rules. You can move forwards, or backwards," He draws two arrows on either side of the stick figure, facing away from it, "But, what if...right next to our acrobat, there is a flea," He goes onto drawing a small bug next to the figure, "Now the flea can also travel back and forth, just like the acrobat. Right?"
"Right." Mike nods.
"Here's where things get really interesting. The flea can also travel this way," He draws two arrows facing away from each other on the inside of the two lines, "along the inside of the rope. He can even go..." He draws an arrow pointing under the 'tight rope', "underneath the rope."
"Upside down." We all chorus.
"Exactly." Mr. Clarke confirms.
"But, we're not the flea, we're the acrobat." Mike points out.
"In this metaphor, yes, we're the acrobat." Mr. Clarke repeats.
"So, we can't go upside down?" Lucas asks.
"No." He sighs.
"There has to be a way for the acrobat to go underneath." I say, but it sounded more like a question.
"Well...you'd have to create a massive amount of energy," Mr. Clarke explains, "More than humans are currently capable of creating, mind you, to open up some kind of tear in time in space, and then..." He folds the plate in the middle, poking a hole in it with his pen, "You create a doorway."
"Like a gate?" Dustin questions.
"Sure. Like a gate," Mr. Clarke shrugs, "But again, this is all-"
"Theoretical." Lucas finishes with a nod.
"But-but what if this gate already existed?" Mike quizzes.
"Well, if it did, I-I think we'd know," Mr. Clarke dismisses Mike's thought, "It would disrupt gravity, the magnetic field, our environment. Heck, it might even swallow us up whole," I raise my eyebrows, sitting up in my seat, "Science is neat. But i'm afraid it's not very forgiving."
"Uh-thanks, Mr. Clarke," I clear my throat, pushing my hair behind my ears, "Hey, Dustin, where'd you get those Nilla Wafers?"
"They aren't even real Nilla Wafers." Dustin moans as we both get up from our seats.
|
Mike was showing Ten and Eleven what Mr. Clarke had shown us, and I was pacing the room, "It would take a lot of energy to build a gate like this. But that's gotta be what happened. Otherwise, how'd Will get there, right?"
"Right." Both girls sputter out.
I sigh, taking a seat next to El on the couch, "Pretty."
"Oh, me? Thanks." I smile, she does the same.
"What we want to know is, do you guys know where the gate is?" Lucas asks. They shake their heads, "Then how do you know about the Upside Down!?"
They stay silent.
"Dustin what are you doing?" Mike questions, "Dustin?"
"Dustin!" We all call, finally catching his attention.
"I-I need to see your compasses." Dustin says.
"What?"
"Your compasses. All of your compasses, right now!" Dustin demands.
We grab all the compasses we could find, tossing them onto the table.
Dustin lines them up as Mike asks, "What's exciting about this?"
"Well, they're all facing north, right?" Dustin asks.
"Yeah." I nod.
"So?" Lucas shrugs.
"Well that's not true north." Dustin informs us.
"What do you mean?" Mike questions.
"I mean exactly what I just said. That's not true north." Dustin repeats in a duh-tone.
"Okay, so what is 'true north'?" I ask, raising my eyebrows.
"Are you guys seriously this dense," Dustin spits. I lick my lips in frustration as Lucas shrugs once again, "The sun rises in the east, and it sets in the west, right? Which means that's true north," He points behind Mike.
"So what you're saying is the compasses are broken?" Mike asks.
"Do you even understand how a compass works," Dustin sighs in exasperation, "Do you see a battery pack on this?"
"No." Mike shakes his head.
"No, you don't. Because it doesn't need one. The needles naturally drawn to the Earths magnetic North Pole." Dustin explains.
"So what's wrong with them?" Lucas questions.
"Well, that's what I couldn't figure out, but then I remembered. You can change the direction of a compass with a magnet. If there's the presence of a more powerful magnetic field, the needle deflects to that power." Dustin rambles in his 'scientific talk'.
"Wait, Mr. Clarke said something about the gate disrupting the magnetic field," I snap my fingers in realization, "That's what's wrong with the compasses, Lucas. The gate is messing with them."
"Look at you, being smart for once." Dustin grins.
I scowl at Dustin as Lucas pieces it together, "Meaning, if we follow the compasses north..."
"They should lead us to the gate." Dustin finishes.
|
As we walked the rail roads, our compasses in hand, I noticed that Ten had kept her head down low most of the time, and was constantly wiping her face. But I didn't question it.
We had stopped at a junk yard when Dustin breathes out, "Oh no."
"'Oh no'? What's, 'oh no'?" Lucas asks.
"We're headed back home." Dustin states.
"What?" Mike asks.
"How?" I question.
"Are you sure?" Lucas queries.
"Yeah, I'm sure," Dustin confirms, "Setting sun, right there. We looped right back around."
I groan, "I don't have the patience for this."
"And you're just realizing this now?" Lucas snaps.
"Why is this all on me?" Dustin shouts.
"Because you're the compass genius!" Lucas yells.
"What do yours say?" Dustin asks.
I look down at the compass, and we all answer in unison, "North."
"Makes no damn sense." Dustin shakes his head.
"Maybe the gate moved." Mike suggests.
"The gate? Don't think so, Mike." I sigh.
"I think it's something else screwing with the compasses." Dustin shares.
"Maybe it's something here." Mike shrugs.
"No. It has to be like a super magnet." Dustin turns him down.
"It's not a magnet," Lucas states, pointing to the girls, "They've both been acting weirder than normal. If she can slam doors with her mind and she can make things float, they can definitely screw up a compass."
"What? Them? Why would they do that?" I ask, stepping beside Lucas.
"Because they're trying to sabotage our mission. Because they're traitors!" Lucas exclaims.
Lucas stalks over to them as Mike asks, "Lucas, what are you doing?"
He gets in El's face, "You did it, didn't you? Neither of you want us to reach the gate. You don't want us to find Will."
"Lucas, come on, seriously, just leave them alone!" Mike shrieks.
"Admit it." Lucas presses, oddly calm.
"No." El whispers.
"Admit it!" He yells, scaring the both of them. He picks up both of their arms, looking down at their sleeves, "Fresh blood. I knew it."
"Lucas, come on!" Mike urges.
"I saw both of them wiping their noses on the tracks! They were using their powers!" Lucas shouts.
"Bull! That's old blood. Right, guys?" Mike asks, and I silently hope it was true. They say nothing, "Right, guys?"
"It's...not..." El trails.
"It's not safe." Ten mutters.
Mike and Lucas begin to yell at each other, and I stand back with Dustin, biting my lip.
"What did I tell you? They've been playing us from the beginning!" Lucas yells.
"That's not true. They helped us find Will!" Mike retorts.
"Find Will?" Lucas repeats, "Find Will? Where is he then, huh? Huh? I don't see him."
"Yeah, you know what I mean." Mike grumbles.
"No, I actually don't," Lucas hisses, "Just think about it, Mike. Either of them could have just told us where the Upside Down was right away, but they didn't. They just made us run around like headless chickens."
I hate to say it, but he had a good point.
"All right, calm down!" Dustin steps in, but Lucas pushes him away.
"No! They used us, all of us!" Lucas glowers, "Poor Lizzie here thought she had made a friend with this weirdo but no, it was just the opposite!"
"Hey, don't bring Elizabeth into this, okay?" Mike grunts.
Lucas rolls his eyes, "They helped just enough so they could get what they want. Food and a bed. They're like stray dogs!"
"Screw you, Lucas!" Mike screams. I bite down harder on my lip.
"No! Screw you, Mike. You're blind...blind because you like that a girl is not grossed out by you," Lucas shouts back, "But wake up man! Wake the hell up!"
"What about me?" I mumble, but I don't think it was heard over the banter of the boys.
"They know where Will is," Lucas motions to them, "And now they're just letting him die in the Upside Down."
"Shut up!" Mike fumes.
"For all we know, it's your little girlfriends fault." Lucas continues.
"Shut up!" Mike repeats.
My teeth unlatch from my lip, I could feel the liquid drip down, and taste the metallic taste in my mouth.
"We're looking for some stupid monster..." Lucas pushes Mike a little, "But did you ever stop to think that maybe she's the monster," He points to El, than to Ten, "and this girl here is just one of her poor victims?"
That's a stretch.
"I said shut up!" Mike hollers, grabbing Lucas and tackling him to the ground.
"Stop!" El, Ten and I order.
"Knock it off, you idiots." Dustin screams.
I drop my bag, getting up to them, and trying to pull them apart, but Mike knocks me back, and I fall to the ground.
"Stop it!" Eleven screeches. She screams, and Lucas gets punted off of Mike, and launched through the air.
"Jesus!" Dustin yells.
"Holy fuck!" I shout, grabbing a water from my bag that was for some reason all ready open, chasing after the boys who were running to Lucas.
"Lucas! Lucas! Lucas, are you all right?" Mike stammers, Lucas was knocked out.
The boys were all over him, shaking him and pleading with him to wake up.
"Back up, back up." I order, pouring some water out of the bottle and onto his face.
"Why would you do that?" Mike shouts to Eleven, "What's wrong with you?"
I pour a little more water on his face, all of us exhaling a sigh of relief when his eyes flutter open.
"Lucas, Lucas, how many fingers am I holding up?" Dustin asks, holding up three of his fingers, "Lucas, how many fingers?"
"Let me see your head." Mike says, going to touch the back of his head.
"Get off of me!" He snaps, slapping their hands away.
"Just, Lucas. Lucas, let me see." Mike sighs.
"Get off of me!" Lucas repeats, his voice breaking.
Mike tries chasing after Lucas, but Dustin and I hold him back, Dustin telling him to let Lucas go.
Mike slowly turns his head, "Where's El?"
I follow his gaze, seeing that both Ten and Eleven were gone, "Ten!"
"El! El!"
"Ten!"
"T!"
"Eleven!"
"El!"
"Ten!"
"Ten! Eleven!"