Legendary | s. harrington (18+)

chapter sixteen

WHEN Evelyn emerged, arm successfully bound and cleaned the best they could, the pair of them giggling about something stupid and normal just to find some light in their situation, Mike stormed in front of them and grabbed a drawing Evelyn had seen before on Will's desk.

"Hey," Evelyn called out, stepping into the circle Mike and his friends had created. "Will drew that the other week." Mike nodded, looking at Evelyn.

"Halloween."

"It's the shadow monster."

"Yeah," Mike was saying, "it got Will the day in the field. The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him." Max's eyebrows knitted together just like the rest of the group.

"And so...this virus? It's connecting him to the tunnels?"

"To the tunnels, to the monsters, to the upside down, everything." Evelyn placed a hand to her forehead and Steve nodded in a silent agreement with her. They were lost - it was too much. He placed his hands out in front of him.

"Woah, okay? Slow down, slow down." Mike turned his attention to Steve and Evelyn.

"Okay so, the shadow monster is inside everything, and if the vines feel something like pain, so does Will."

"And so does Dart." Lucas added.

"Yeah."

"It's like when Mr Clarke taught us. The hive mind."

"Hive mind?" Steve was shaking his head, not understanding but Evelyn was nodding, now following every word.

"A collective consciousness. It's a super organism." Dustin declared.

"And this is the thing that controls everything." Mike said pointing at the drawing. "It's the brain."

"Like the Mind Flayer." Lucas clicked towards Dustin in agreement and Evelyn gasped in realisation. The boys looked to her and she nodded, getting it.

"Oh my god." She said with clarity. Steve looked cluelessly at Evelyn and then at the boys. Both him and Max said the same thing in unison.

"What?" Evelyn rolled her eyes but with a smile and crossed arms as she spoke to the group; Dustin, Lucas and Mike smirked with approval.

"I'll get the book." Evelyn brought back a thick hardback book from the basement, grunting as she flicked it to the page as it landed with a thud onto the table. With one of her slim fingers she prodded onto a section where a sketch of a monster looked back at them.

"The Mind Flayer."

"What the hell is that?" Hopper was mumbling.

"It's a monster from an unknown dimension, it's so ancient that it doesn't even know it's true home. Okay, it steals races of other dimensions by taking over their brains with its highly developed bionic powers." Hopper grunted and rolled his head around his shoulders.

"Oh my god, none of this is real, this is a kids game." As he was quick to dismiss it, Evelyn placed out a hand in the air between them from across the room.

"Just listen." And so he did. Dustin smiled at her in a silent thanks.

"Okay," Nancy leant forward. "So this mind flyer thing-"

"Flayer." Dustin corrected.

"What does it want?"

"To conquer us basically. It believes it's the master race."

"Oh-like uh...like the Germans." Evelyn swallowed her laugh and Steve looked at her innocently.

"Nazis." Evelyn whispered and cooed him through a quiet chuckle when he searched her face in confusion. Not having heard, Dustin straightened from the table and turned to Steve in disgust.

"The Nazi's?" Steve's eyes looked back at the book and then round the room.

"Yeah, yeah- the Nazis." Eve saw Hopper pinch the bridge of his nose and she had to look away to not laugh audibly.

"Uh, yeah. Totally. It sees other races like us as inferior."

"It wants to spread and take over other dimensions." Evelyn added and Mike nodded.

"We're talking about the destruction of our world as we know it." It was Lucas but Steve leant away from the table.

"That's great. That's great." He turned and wiped a hand through his hair. "That's really great."

"So if this thing is a brain that's controlling everything," Nancy said scooping up the book, "then if we kill it-"

"We kill everything it controls." Mike outlines.

"We win." Dustin finalised.

"Right, great," Hopper pulled the book from Nancy's hands. "How do we kill this thing, shoot it with fireballs?"

"No," Dustin was chuckling at the Chief's stupidity, "No, you summon an undead army because..." he caught Hopper's impatient eye and his trail of thought began to dim. "Because...zombies they have no brains and-"

"What the hell are we doing here." Hopper slammed the manual down and walked away from the table.

"I thought we were waiting for your military army." Dustin mocked.

"We are!"

"And even if they get here how are they going to stop this? You can't just shoot this with guns!" Mike shouted

"You don't know that!" Hopper bellowed over him, "We don't know anything!"

"We know it's ready to kill everybody in that lab!"

"And we know the monsters are going to malt again!" Lucas added

"And we know it's only a matter of time before those tunnels reach this town."

"They're right." At the sound of Joyce's broken voice, Evelyn leaped forward but Steve put an arm out to stop her. "We have to kill it." Her eyes were glassy and she looked broken. "I want to kill it."

"Me too, me too." Hopper approached her, "Joyce? Okay? But how do we do that? We don't exactly know what we're dealing with here."

"No, but he does." Mike was looking at Will and Evelyn immediately started shaking her head.

"No, no way Mike-"

"If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it's Will. It's connected to him. He'll know it's weakness."

"I thought we couldn't trust him anymore?" Max asked wearily. "That he's a spy for the Mind Flayer now?"

"Yeah but- he can't spy if he doesn't know where he is." Evelyn chewed her lip. She walked forward and beckoned Mike to one side.

"How about the shed?" Mike's eyes lit up, he nodded and Hopper told them to take him wherever they were suggesting. When they got there and pulled the door open, he nodded.

"Yeah. This'll work." Eveleyn immediately walked in, pulling the first box she could find and throwing it out into the grass outside. Hopper nodded. "Yeah, lets get it cleared."