Risky Business ｡ Stranger Things

42 : Fright Night

The darkness of the night had consumed the community pool. The place was abandoned and eerie with shadows that leaped and the yellow glow of the streetlights didn't look golden or soft anymore, but gross as it bruised the damp concrete. The pool water shifted, lolling around but it wasn't a peaceful sound anymore, it was ghost-like and haunting and made Prue's skin crawl. The party was gathered outside the locker room, pressed up together in a line along the rough brick wall. The pool bathed in teeming shadows was before the teenagers with a surface of black, mirrored glass. For a moment, Prue didn't see the dark uncanny pool but two teenagers floating together, the stars blinking down on them. Two teenagers lost in an ocean of peace and each other, in a world just for them. A timeless moment that could have stretched out for eternity if fate was kinder, more forgiving. Treading water, skin smooth like silk. High cheeks from joy and smiles that were secret from the rest of the world. Soothing water and singing blood, freshly cut hair wet with chlorine and sculptured muscles that sliced through the water with ease and grace. Soft kisses that went nowhere but meant everything. Prue squeezed her eyes shut against the memory, her head falling back against the red bricks as she listened to the younger teenagers around her, all breathing hard with fear and adrenaline.

"Okay, let's move," Mike, the leader, whispered out, looking down the line. Will and Lucas nodded in agreement, both holding equipment for the sauna operation, Max gulped down her worry and El looked focused and Prue's hands were still shaking. The teenagers darted through the doorway and Lucas locked it behind them so Billy couldn't retreat. They stayed low, sneaking around the rows of lockers and keeping out of sight. Prue's knees scrapped against the wet ground as she crawled behind Max. There was a shower running and she knew Billy was close, washing the chlorine off his skin. Prue paused, eyes watching the cold spray from Billy's shower stall splashing against the floor. She rose from the wet ground, her knees sleek and red. He was meters away from her but the shadows were getting closer. She wanted to go to him, she wanted to reach out to him but fear kept her still, rooted in place. She couldn't deny that something was different with Billy, that something had changed in the summer boy, but she was desperate for it not to be the Mind Flayer's doing. She didn't want to believe that Billy was being taken over and destroyed by an alien from another world.

"Prue," Max hushed out harshly. The copper-hued girl could see the urgency and the hesitation in Prue's eyes even in the dimness for Max felt the same. "Come on," she added, waving Prue forward. Prue cast a glanced in Billy's direction, one last glance before hurrying after the party. They dashed into the gym cluttered with exercise equipment, heavy and waiting to be used. At the end of the gym was the sauna sitting there like a monster, still brimming with heat. Mike guided the party into action. They had all been given tasks for the sauna operation and they didn't have long to execute them either.

"Prue, you're the next tallest, come help with the dummy," Lucas uttered, keeping his voice low. That much was true—just barely—for Mike was practically a skyscraper now and he hadn't even finished growing yet.

"Sure," Prue replied, following Lucas and Mike into the steamy sauna. Will was looking for the light switch for the locker room and Max was muttering something to Eleven as they sourced out the small supply closet that the party would be hiding in soon enough. "Can you hold it up a little higher?" Prue asked Lucas as he hoisted the CPR manikin so she could secure it to the pipe on the roof of the sauna. Mike was below, using duct tape to hold the second Walkie-talkie to the dummy's chest as it dangled on fishing wire.

"Walkie-talkie is in place," Mike announced and there was a measure of excitement in his voice. Even though Mike knew this was dangerous, he couldn't tame the excitement for the operation and it reminded Prue of Grey and how he had gotten giddy over Mission Strange. Prue also realised that she wasn't the only teenager to turn her back on the ordinary in favour of the strangeness and that was something she had in common with Mike Wheeler and the rest of the party.