Alice the Amazing ⇒ STRANGER THINGS

[28] Ice Queen

{The Spy, Part III}

Steve and Dustin followed Alice the rest of the way to the junkyard, watching how she angrily threw down beef and wondering if they should tell her about the dead leaves.

"She must be corrupted," Dustin whispered, stepping over a piece of semi-frozen meat. "When Will became unconscious at school, she tried to heal him and he zapped her. Maybe he's still connected to the Upside Down, and because of that her powers got turned all dark and scary. And deadly!"

"That would explain why she's so angry all of a sudden," Steve replied. "But wasn't she starting to get more irritable before that stuff happened with Will?"

Dustin nodded.

"This isn't good at all," he said darkly. "We need her powers to go back to normal in case Dart doesn't recognize me and goes postal."

"Maybe she can freeze him in an ice cube," Steve pointed out. "This might work in our favor."

Alice, consumed by her own emotions, couldn't hear this conversation. All she could do was play the past few days—weeks—months!—over and over in her mind, thinking of people to be angry at: her mom, her brother, Nancy, Steve, Jonathan, Hopper, Dr. Owens, the rest of the people at Hawkins Lab...

The more she ruminated, the colder she got. The icier her hands felt. The more her nose bled before freezing on her pale skin. When she finally ran out of beef, she threw her bucket down and ripped off her gloves.

"Hey!" Dustin said, picking up the bucket after her. "Don't be a litterbug!"

Alice grumbled something unintelligible as her nose continued to bleed, this time from both nostrils.

"C'mon," Steve said, ignoring the almost feral look in his friend's eyes. "We're almost to the junkyard."

❄️ ❄️ ❄️ 

When the trio made it to the Hawkins junkyard, Dustin and Steve dumped out their remaining beef.

"This'll do just fine," Steve said, tossing his bucket aside.

"I said medium well!"

The group turned to see Lucas entering the junkyard with Max Mayfield by his side.

"Who's that?" Steve muttered to Alice, clueless. Alice didn't respond, and instead tried to rub the frozen blood off her lip.

"You told her?!" Dustin said, eyes narrowed.

"So what?" Lucas said with a shrug. "You wanted to tell her, too."

"But I didn't!" Dustin said. "We agreed not to tell her and to look for Dart."

Lucas gave Dustin a once-over.

"Who you conveniently found," he said, voice dripping with suspicion.

"Are you suggesting I'm lying?" Dustin asked.

The boys continued bickering, and Steve, Alice, and Max jumped into action. They began collecting things to fortify the old school bus and make it a demogorgon-free zone.

Steve watched out of the corner of his eye as Alice dug through a pile of old PVC pipes.

"You still pissed at me?" he asked quietly.

Alice grunted in reply. She started to step away, but Steve reached for her hand. He continued to hold it, even when the cold of her scar burned his skin.

"Listen," he said softly, "I don't know what's going on with you, but I want to let you know I'm by your side. Even if you try to push me away. You can't get rid of me that easily."