SWORD

seventeen

|CHAPTER SIXTEEN|
THE BENCH

"thats the girl."
Steve leaned over and spoke to Armani, who shrugged. They had watched the encounter with the girl and Mike, and proceeded to look on as she reunited with the others. "she helped the last time?" Armani asked, taking a deep breath as Steve nodded.

Armani was still in shock that her father wasn't there, the tears wouldn't even come out anymore, and the possibility of the end to the whole mess was all she wanted.

"You opened this gate before, right?" Joyce spoke quietly, but enough for everyone to hear as they inched closer to her and the girl, Eleven, as Dustin and Lucas called her.

"Yes."
"Do you think, if we got you back there. That we could close it again?"

—

"It's not like it was before. It's grown."
Hopper spoke, everyone stood around the dining table. Eleven could close the gate to the upside-down, but it would take all everyone had. "That's considering we can even get in there, I mean that place is crawling with those dogs." He continued, only looking up when Dustin corrected him. "Demodogs."
"What?"
"I said, uh, demodogs. You know like Demogorgan and Dogs. You put 'em together, it sounds pretty badas-" Armani drew in a breath, rolling her eyes as Dustin explained the name.
"How is this important right now?" Hopper interrupted. "It's not, I'm sorry," Dustin turned back around.

"I can do it."
"You're not hearing me." Hopper shook his head.
"I'm hearing you. I can do it." Eleven insisted, looking from person to person before Mike spoke up.
"Even if El can, there's still another problem. If the brain dies, the body dies."
"I thought that was the whole point?" Max asked, "It is. But if we're really right about this. I mean, if El closes the gate and kills the Mind flayers army.."
"Will's apart of that Army." Lucas muttered.
"Closing the gate will kill him." Mike ended, everyone turning to look at Joyce, her eyes widened in realization as her face paled before she rushed towards Will's room.

"He likes it cold. It's what will kept saying to me." She said, everyone behind her as they filed into the room. She quickly closed the window. "He likes it cold. We keep giving it what it wants." "If this is a virus, and will's the host.." Nancy started. "We need to make the host uninhabitable." Jonathan said, standing next to will as he gulped loudly.
"So, if he likes it cold.." Nancy continued,
"we need to burn it out of him." Armani finished as she stepped closer to the unconscious boy.

"We have to do it somewhere he doesn't know this time," Mike looked at everyone, "yeah, somewhere far away" Dustin agreed. Hopper looked around at everyone, "I know where."

–

"Alright, it should fit now"
Dustin turned to Steve, who was carrying the dead demodog in his arms. "Is this really necessary?" The tired teen asked, Armani looked up from where she had been mindlessly playing with a puzzle her dad had left in the house. "Yes it is, okay? This is a ground-breaking scientific discovery, we can't just bury it like some common mammal, it's not a dog." Dustin yelled, Armani rolled her eyes. "You had to throw out all the food too? Joyce is not going to be happy," "Yeah. You're explaining this to Mrs. Byers, alright?" Steve said as he attempted to get the demodog into the refrigerator.

Armani watched in low amusement as the two struggled to fit the thing into the small fridge, a small smile on her face as she momentarily forgot everything that was happening.

The three began walking back to the living room, Steve stepping closely to Armani, as though being too far apart would hurt them.
"That lab is swarming with hundreds of those dogs," Mike argued in the distance, Armani's stomach flipped at the mention. "Demodogs!" Dustin yelled the correction. "The chief will take care of her," "like she needs protection." Lucas and Max chimed.

"Listen dude, if a coach calls a play in a game, bottom line, you execute it, alright?" Steve added in, trying to calm down the younger teens. "Okay, first of all, this isn't some stupid sports game. Second, we're not even in the game, we're on the bench." Mike countered. "R-So, my point is.." Steve stuttered as he tried to come up with an explanation, the others staring at him with furrowed brows before he gave up. "Right, yeah, we're on the bench, so, uh, there's nothing we can do." He muttered. "That's not entirely true." Dustin spoke, "I mean, these Demodogs, they have a hive mind. When they ran away from the bus, they were called away" "when they showed up here, they were called." Armani nodded.

"So if we get their attention.."
"Maybe we can draw them away from the lab." Max and Lucas added.
"And clear a path to the gate!" Mike spoke, before Steve interrupted them. "Yeah, and then we all die!" Dustin and Steve began arguing as Mike ran over to a spot on the map. "I got it!" He kneeled down, "this is where the chief dug his hole! This is our way into the tunnels, so here..." he ran towards another part of the map on the floor.
"Here. Right here! This is like a hub. All the tunnels feed in here. So if we set this on fire-" "oh yeah, that's a no." Steve interrupted, "the mind flayer would call away his army." "They'd all come to stop us" Dustin and Lucas spoke.
"We could circle back to the exit," Armani added in, scared of doing something so dangerous with the kids but knowing she had to do the most to help avenge her father. "So that by the time they realize we're gone.." she continued

"El would be at the gate!" Max concluded.
"Hey! Hey! Hey!" Steve clapped, yelling at the others to stop, "this is not happening," he shook his head, avoiding Mani's gaze. "Bu-" Dustin started. "no no no. No but's. Armani and I promised we'd keep you shitheads safe and that's exactly what I plan on doing." He looked at each of the younger kids, his voice stern.

"We're staying here on the bench, and we're waiting for the starting team to do their job, does everybody understand that?"
"This isn't some stupid sports game!" Mike spoke back,
"I said does everybody understand that!" Steve spoke loudly, startling everyone. "I need a yes," he said quietly, his hand tried to wrap around Armani's but she pulled away. Her eyes landed on the window, and she began to walk towards it when the revving of a car engine ripped through the area.

"Is that.." she drifted off when Max ran towards the window. "It's my brother." Her voice shaking slightly, "h–he can't know I'm here he'll kill me. He'll kill us." She looked over at Lucas, her eyes wide. Armani turned to Steve, who looked up in realization.

"Steve what are you doing," Armani followed him as he stepped towards the door.

"Keeping these shitheads safe." He walked outside and closed the door behind him.