Trust - Lucas Sinclair

E Pluribus Unum (Part 1)

"Where are they?" Mike asked in a panicked voice as the group raced up the stairs of the hospital. After getting yelled at by the lady at the front desk and completely ignoring her, the group raced to the staircase hoping that in some way they would figure out quickly where Nancy and Jonathon were. Obviously, it wasn't going to plan.

"I don't know!" Will said as they paused on the stairs. "What room were they going to?"

"We have to go up the stairs more," Nikki said, feeling the way she had when she was searching for Gwen.

"How do you know?" Max rushed out the question.

"I just know," Nikki answered, turning to go up the stairs. "Follow me."

She ran up the stairs with the others in tow and stopped on the fourth floor and tried to open the door. Something was stopping them from entering, so she made a small blue orb in her hand and threw it at the door making it burst open. They were greeted by the sight of Jonathon trying to break down a door to another room.

He looked at the kids panicked and pointed to the door. "She's in there with that thing, I can't get in!"

"Move!" Nikki said louder than she meant for it to be. She once again made an orb and threw it at the door, this time breaking the door off it's hinges.

It took a second for Nikki to realized what they were facing. It was a creature that looked a gaint bloody spider that was not happy Nancy who was laying under it.  The door must have hit it and got it angrier because it faced Nikki and let out a horrible screeched.

"Jesus!" Mike exclaimed as Max swore.

It ran to Nikki, ready to kill but El stood in front of her and held you her hand. With a scream, she threw the Mind Flayer into one of the walls and then the other. She slammed it into the ceiling before finally tossing it back on the floor and releasing it from her grasp.

It got up to start a round two but both El and Nikki held out their arms. An orb hit it with El holding it midair and made it fly through the window.

A crash was heard from outside, making them think something might happen out there. The kids ran back down the stairs and through the hospital doors, looking around for the thing. they didn't have to look too hard to find the big pile of goup slowly shrinking in size as it went down in the sewer system, leaving behing bones and a trail of blood.

Nikki got a deja vu feeling once again at the sight.

This just keeps on getting worse, Nikki thought, looking at Nancy who looked like she just walked through hell.

***

"It can't be good for her to be in there for this long," Mike said, pacing the cabin. After the whole thing at the hospital the group decided to go back to Hopper's cabin to have El try to find any of the people they thought were flayed. So far there was no luck and El had been in void for a while not wanting any distractions from anyone.

"Mike, you need to relax," Max sat down in one of the free seats, grabbing a handful of a cereal Lucas was snacking on.

"What if she gets brain damage or something?"

"Oh, shit," Lucas looked at Nikki who had her head resting in his lap with a nervous look. "Is that, like, a real thing."

"Not that know of," Nikki shrugged.

"He made it up,"Max shook her head, not in the mood to deal with Mike. "Mike doesn't know what he's talking about."

"Oh, and you do?" Mike continued the arguement.

"Okay, I'm out," Nikki told Lucas quietly as they continued fighting with each other. Nikki got up from the couch and quietly walked to the room she and El share. She walked into the room and closed the door behind her so the noise they were making outside didn't make El lose her focus.

Static filled the room as El sat in the middle with a pile of bloody tissues to her right.

Nikki sat on her left and saw El tense next to her, letting her know El knew she was there.

Nikki laid her hand on El's expecting her to brush her off and tell her to leave her alone. Instead, El grabbed her hand and gave her a light squeeze as a thank you. Nikki let some of her energy transfer to El, making her sit up straighter and take a more energized breath.

After a minute of silence, El ripped off the blindfold she had over her eyes and looked at Nikki. "I found him."

"That's good," Nikki responded with a nod. "Let's go tell the others."

Nikki got up and started to walk towards the door, but El stopped her before she could reach for the handle.

"Nikki," El said, making the girl look back at her sister.

"Yeah," Nikki noticed El start to play with her hands out of nerves.

"I just..." she trailed off before taking a deep breath. "I know we have been fighting a lot and..."

She trailed off again, struggling to come up with words. "I know," Nikki noticed her struggle and decided to skip it all, worried it might end up turning into a fight itself. "Let's just leave those in the past."

El looked slightly disappointed but nodded as she joined her sister by the door. An awkward silence hung between the two of them. Luckily, it was broken we they heard all of the commotion outside.

"And I don't want her to die looking for the flayed," Mike rushed, fighting with whoever was listening to him on the other side of the door, "when they've obviously vanished off the face of the Earth. So can we please come up with a new plan because I love her and I can't lose her again."

The girls looked each other with the same shocked expressions before El grabbed the door handle and opened the door, stepping out into a crowd of shocked faces.

"What's going on?" She asked with Nikki standing behind her, leaning on the wall with her arms crossed.

"Nothing," Mike answered quickly. "Nothing."

"Just family discussion," Lucas shrugged, holding back a laugh. It made it hard for Nikki to keep a straight face.

"Oh," El said, before going back to the real reason they came out here. "I found him."

"Found who?" Nancy asked.

"Billy."