Another side

Chapter 14

The lights keep on flashing and Billy's hold on my hand tightens even more. Something bad is happening. Will touches the back of his neck. The panicked look in his eyes is enough to tell me everything I need to know. "He's here isn't he Will?" We don't even need Will to confirm before we rush off in the direction Jonathan and Nancy went in while the receptionist yells her "two people at a time" nonsense. 

We find Jonathan and he's banging on a room window with a fire extinguisher. "Nancy's in there." Eleven immediately tears the door off its hinges and my heart stops as my eyes make contact with the weird roaring monster thing on top of Nancy. The thing looks at us. "Jesus! What the f..." 

My swear is cut off by the thing running towards us. It doesn't get to close before El uses her powers to stop it and throw it around before throwing it out the window. Jonathan and I immediately run to Nancy. Jonathan gets there first and holds her face asking if she's ok. When he's done, I help her up and grab her into a tight hug. 

We run after the kids just in time to see the thing slither it's way down the drain. We go to Hopper's cabin and sit around as we wait for Eleven who is in another room looking for the Flayed. Mike is pacing around and ranting. "It can't be good for her to be in there for this long." Max sighs. "Mike, you need to relax." "What if she gets brain damage or something?" Lucas looks alarmed. 

"Oh, shit. Is that, like, a real thing?" I look at him reassuringly. "No it's not. He made it up." I look at Mike. "Mike, you need to stop worrying so hard." He glares at me and then Max looks at him. "You actually need to stop. You don't know what you're talking about." He looks at her. "And, you do?" They start arguing and I roll my eyes going to join Jonathan, Nancy, and Will. 

I tune in to what Nancy's saying. "There's a pattern, okay? A consistency to their behaviour. They've been feeding on chemicals since this started, and -- and, what, they just stop out of the blue?" I shrug. "Maybe they have all the chemicals they need. Maybe they've all turned into those... things." "But what about the source? I mean did the Mind Flayer just suddenly stop infecting people? And even if the flayed are monsters now, why can't El find them?" 

I nod she's making some pretty valid points. Suddenly Max and Mike walk in. "Okay, can you guys settle an argument for us? Who do you think should decide El's limits? Mike or Eleven?" "The way that you frame that is such bullshit." "It's not bullshit, Mike. This is your whole problem. And it's also precisely why she dumped your ass." Nancy doubletakes.

"El dumped you?" "Yeah, because she is conspiring against me. She's corrupting her." "No, enlightening her. The fact is, she's not yours. She's her own person, fully capable of making her own decisions." "She's risking her life for no reason." Nancy glares at him. "For no reason? Mike, the flayed are out there doing God knows what." "Killing, flaying..." "Transforming into monsters," Will and I finish off for Lucas before staring at each other.

I step in. "And El's not stupid. She knows her abilities better than any of us." "Exactly, thank you," Max says. "And she is her own person," Nancy adds on. "Exactly." "With her own free will," I add on. "Exactly. El has saved the world twice, and Mike still doesn't trust her." "You wanna talk about trust, really? After you made Eleven spy on us?" Lucas looks at him confused. "Oh, she didn't tell you this?" "No." "Your girlfriend used El's powers to spy on us."

"No, no, no, I didn't make her. It was her idea. And why are we even talking about this, seriously?" Will looks at Lucas and Mike. "Yeah, who cares?" "I care," Lucas yells. Mike starts yelling again. "I guess girlfriends don't lie, they spy!" He glares at Max. "We were just joking around." "Wouldn't it've been so funny if I was taking a massive shit or something?" I scrunch my nose. That's disgusting. "You weren't." 

"But what if I was?" "Then gross!" "Seriously Mike?" Nancy gives him a grossed out look. "I'm just trying to demonstrate how careless Max is with El's powers. In fact how careless you all are! You're treating her like some kind of machine, when she's not a machine, and I don't want her to die looking for the flayed when they've obviously vanished off the face of the Earth. So can we please just come up with a new plan because I love her and I can't lose her again!"

Mike freezes realising what he just said assessing the reactions in the room. I'm in shock so is basically everyone in the room. A second after the door opens and Eleven walks in with such perfect timing that I almost laugh but I hold myself together. "What's going on?" "Nothing," Mike says a little too quickly. "I found him." I breath in a deep breath. "Found who?" I know that we already know the answer to that question. El sits down and we turn the tv to static as we sit around her. She removes her blindfold breathing quite rapidly. "What's he doing now?" She turns to back to Max. "He's just in his room."

I listen to Nancy questioning Billy and Max. "That's not normal right?" "Sam staying in his room on the 4th of July? It's definitely not normal. He wants us to find him." "Yeah that's what I'm afraid of. If we go to Sam then the rest of the flayed know where we are. It's a trap, we'll be ambushed." "We won't be surprised. We'll know they're coming and kick their flayed butts." "That won't work Lucas." They all look at me. "What if there's more of those monster things? What if there's more flayed than we think they are? We can't just take stupid risks like that." They nod.

"Plus El would probably end up doing most of the work being the only one with super powers which would end up exhausting her a lot. It's way too risky." "And completely unnecessary," Nancy backs me up. "Killing the flayed won't stop the Mind Flayer. We have to find out the source." "Sam knows it," Eleven says as she finally walks back in. "He's been there. To the source" "Yeah but—" "I know it's a trap. We can't go to Sam but I think there's another way." We all look at her interested. "A way for me to see where he's been." She explains her plan to us and it seems like a good plan. We turn the TV back to static. El's about to put her blindfold on when Mike stops her. I almost groan in annoyance. 

"El, I know you think you have to do this but you don't, you've only done this once. And your mum, she loved you, and she wanted you to know what happened. And Sam's Mind is sick and diseased. The Mind Flayer is in him." Eleven looks at him. "He can't hurt me. Not in there." "We don't know that." Eleven turns towards him and grabs his hand. "Mike, I need you to trust me." He suddenly looks at Max and she gestures at him to do what she says. He looks back at her. "Ok yeah. Just be careful." He sits back on his seat as Eleven puts on her blindfold. For a few seconds she's just quiet then all of a sudden she starts whimpering. I panic. "Somethings wrong." "I told you we shouldn't have done this!" "Eleven told us she could and we're trusting her." "Look where that got us!" He looks back at El. "El, are you ok? Are you ok?" 

She sighs. "I'm ok." I can see everyone breath a sigh of relief. I look at her. "What's happening?" "I'm on a beach." Lucas looks at us. "Ok I may be a bit dense sometimes, but last I checked, Hawkins doesn't have a beach." Max looks back at El. "What else are you seeing?" "There's a woman. She's pretty, I think she's looking at me." We sit in silence for a little bit anticipating what she's gonna say next. "There's two boys." There's silence for a few more seconds then she talks again. "It's Sam and Billy." I look at Billy as a look of realisation goes through his eyes. "It's California. It's a memory." We're all quiet again but this time Eleven breaks the silence. 

"I think I see it." Everyone looks at her anticipatingly. "The source." She's quiet for several more minutes until she finally speaks. "I think I found the source." "Where are you El?" "Brimborn... Steelworks." Jonathan runs off to find it in the phone book. "Found it! 6522 Cherry Oak Drive." Nancy joins him. "That's really close." I look back at El. "Alright El we found it. Get out of there now." For some reason she doesn't get out immediately. What's happening? For a few minutes she sits with the blindfold on unmoving. Then suddenly she rips it off and screams. Mike is immediately on the ground. He wraps his arms around her and whispers reassuringly in her ear as she sobs. What did she see that's got her panicking like this?