Steve, Dustin, Lucas, Max, and I were following the trail of Dart and the other Demogorgons to see where they went. I was walking in front of the kids with Steve listening to their conversation.

"You're positive that was Dart?" Lucas asked trying to wrap his head around the situation.

"Yes. He had the same exact yellow pattern on his butt." Dustin confirmed.

"He was tiny two days ago." Max said confused.

"Well, he's molted three times already." Dustin shrugged.

"Malted?" Steve asked.

"Molted." Dustin corrected.

"He shed his skin to make more room to grow. Like hornworms." I added and Dustin looked at me impressed while Steve looked confused. "What? I am smart, you know." I shrugged.

"When's he gonna molt again?" Max asked fearing the answer.

"It's gotta be soon. When he does, he'll be fully grown, or close to it. And so will his friends." Dustin said anxiously.

"Yeah, and he's gonna eat a lot more than just cats." Steve said and everyone stopped.

"Wait, a cat? Dart ate a cat?" Lucas asked Dustin.

"No, what? No." Dustin tried to lie.

"What are you talking about?" Steve said unaware that Dustin was trying to cover his own ass.

"He ate Mews." I added.

"Mews? Who's Mews?" Max asked trying to keep up.

"It's Dustin's cat." Steve answered.

"Steve!" Dustin yelled trying to control the situation.

"I knew it! You kept him!" Lucas spat angrily.

"No! No. No, I... No, I... He missed me. He wanted to come home." Dustin said trying to defend his actions.

"Bullshit!" Lucas yelled.

"I didn't know he was a Demogorgon, Okay?" Dustin defended.

"Oh, so now you admit it?" Lucas said continuing to argue.

"Guys, who cares? We have to go." Max said anxiously.

"I care! You put the party in jeopardy! You broke the rule of law!" Lucas screamed.

"So did you!" Dustin spat back.

"What?" Lucas asked confused.

"You told a stranger the truth!" Dustin argued pointing his flashlight at Max.

"A stranger?" Max scoffed.

"You wanted to tell her, too!" Lucas defended.

"But I didn't, Lucas, okay?" Dustin continued. Then there was a screech in the distance and Steve and I walked away trying to hear where it was coming from. "I didn't tell her! We both broke the rule of law, okay? So we're even. We're even." 

"No, no! We're not even! Don't even try that. Your stupid pet could have ate us for dinner!" Lucas argued.

"That was not my fault!" Dustin screamed.

"Guys?" Steve said trying to get everyone's attention.

"He wasn't gonna eat us." Dustin defended.

"He was crawling to come say hello?" Lucas scoffed.

"Guys!" Steve and I both yelled and they were finally listening when the screeching continued and we all immediately ran to follow the noise.

"No, no, no. Hey, guys, why are you headed towards the sound? Hello? Hello?" Max said trying to convince us to leave it alone, but eventually gave in and followed us. We all came up on top of a hill trying to listen for the screeching.

"I don't see him." Dustin said as we searched through the fog. Lucas looked through his binoculars to try to see where they were.

"It's the lab." Lucas said as we all saw the lights at the lab flickering. "They were going back home." He said with fear in his voice.  We continued our journey to the lab to see if there was any way we could help with the situation. We were getting close to the entrance when we heard a voice.

"Hello? Who's there? Who's there?" It called out.

"Is that? Jonathan?" I asked Steve and he shrugged continuing to move towards the voice.

"Steve? Frankie?" Jonathan and Nancy said confused.

"Nancy?" Steve asked as I said, "Jonathan."

"What are you doing here?" Nancy asked angrily.

"What are you doing here?" Steve fired back.

"We're looking for Mike and Will." She answered.

"They're not in there, are they?" Dustin asked fearing the answer.

"We're not sure." Nancy admitted.

"Why?" Jonathan asked scared and then there was a screech that answered his question.

"That's why." I said sympathetically. We were all in a circle trying to find out as much information from each other as possible.

"The power's back." Nancy said leaving the group to look at the building. We all immediately rushed to the gate to see if it would open. Jonathan pushed the button, but it wasn't working.

"Let me try. Let me try, Jonathan!" Dustin said pushing Jonathan out of the way and continued to press the button to no avail. "Son of a bitch! You know what..." Eventually the gate opened automatically and Jonathan and Nancy drove to pick up anyone still at the lab. Steve and I were left at the gate watching the kids.

"Guys?" Max said getting out attention to see two cars speeding out of the lab. Hopper's cop car came to a stop in front of us to pick us up.

"Let's go. Come on! Come on, let's go! Let's go! Come on!" He ordered as Steve opened the back seat for the kids. There wasn't enough room for me back there, so I had to sit between Steve and Hopper on the cupholders which wasn't that comfortable.

"Let's go!" Steve said tapping the side of the car after he closed the passenger door.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We were all currently at the Byers's house trying to figure out our next move. I found out that Bob died trying to save everyone. He was a good man and didn't deserve that. I was standing next to Steve because I wanted to give Jonathan some space. Hopper was on the phone trying to call for some help. 

"Sam Owens. Dr. Sam Owens. I don't know how many people are there! I don't know how many people are left alive! I am the police! Chief Jim Hopper! Yes, the number that I gave you, yes. 6767... I will be here." Hopper said frustratingly hanging up the phone.

"They didn't believe you, did they?" Dustin asked deflated.

"We'll see." Hopper said cryptically.

"'We'll see?' We can't just sit here while those things are loose!" Mike argued angrily.

"We stay here, and we wait for help." Hopper said putting his foot down.

"Did you guys know that Bob was the original founder of Hawkins AV?" Mike said sadly.

"Really?" Lucas asked surprised.

"He petitioned the school to start it and everything. Then he had a fund-raiser for equipment. Mr. Clarke learned everything from him. Pretty awesome, right?" Mike said placing a puzzle on the table.

"Yeah." Lucas and Dustin both agreed.

"We can't let him die in vain." Mike said determined to make sure Bob didn't die in vain.

"What do you want to do, Mike? The Chief's right on this. We can't stop those Demo-dogs on our own." Dustin said realistically.

"Demo-dogs?" Max asked confused.

"Demogorgon dogs. Demo-dogs. It's like a compound. It's like a play on words..." Dustin explained.

"Okay." Max said annoyed.

"I mean, when it was just Dart, maybe..." Dustin said hypothetically.

"But there's an army now." Lucas sighed.

"Precisely." Dustin agreed.

"His army." Mike muttered.

"What do you mean?" Steve asked confused.

"His army. Maybe if we stop him, we can stop his army, too." Mike suggested grabbing a drawing of some monster and showing everyone.

"The shadow monster." Dustin said looking at the image.

"It got Will that day on the field. The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him." Mike fired off.

"And so this virus, it's connecting him to the tunnels?" Max asked.

"To the tunnels, monsters, the Upside Down, everything." Mike explained quickly.

"Whoa. Slow down. Slow down." Steve said trying to catch up.

"Okay, so, the shadow monster's inside everything. And if the vines feel something like pain, then so does Will." Mike continued.

"And so does Dart." Lucas said excitedly.

"Yeah. Like what Mr. Clarke taught us. The hive mind." Mike remembered.

"Hive mind?" Steve asked not sure if he wanted to know.

"A collective consciousness. It's a super-organism." I stepped in and Dustin smiled at me.

"And this is the thing that controls everything. It's the brain." Mike said pointing to the drawing of the shadow monster.

"Like the mind flayer." Dustin realized.

"The what?" Max, Steve, and I asked confused.

"The mind flayer." Dustin said grabbing his Dungeons and Dragons book and slamming it open to the page about the mind flayer.

"What the hell is that?" Hopper asked not convinced.

"It's a monster from an unknown dimension. It's so ancient that it doesn't even know its true home. Okay, it enslaves races of other dimensions by taking over their brains using its highly-developed psionic powers." Dustin explained as everyone listened.

"Oh, my God, none of this is real. This is a kids' game." Hopper said rolling his eyes.

"No, it's a manual. And it's not for kids. And unless you know something that we don't, this is the best metaphor..." Dustin said, but was cut off.

"Analogy." Lucas corrected.

"Analogy? That's what you're worried about? Fine. An analogy for understanding whatever the hell this is." Dustin explained frustrated.

"Okay, so this mind flamer thing..." Nancy began, but was cut off.

"Flayer. Mind flayer." Dustin corrected and Nancy sighed.

"What does it want?" Nancy asked.

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

"Like the Germans?" Steve said trying to relate it to something.

"You mean the Nazis." I corrected him.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Nazis." Steve said correcting himself.

"If the Nazis were from another dimension, totally. Uh, it views other races, like us, as inferior to itself." Dustin continued explaining.

"It wants to spread, take over other dimensions." Mike added.

"We are talking about the destruction of our world as we know it." Lucas said making us all worry.

"That's great. That's great. That's really great. Jesus!" Steve said anxiously pacing.

"Okay, so if this thing is like a brain that's controlling everything, then if we kill it..." Nancy started.

"We kill everything it controls." Mike finished.

"We win." Dustin said.

"Theoretically." Lucas stated.

"Great. So how do you kill this thing? Shoot it with Fireballs or something?" Hopper asked wanting to know.

"No. No, no Fire... No Fireballs. Uh, you summon an undead army, uh, because... ...because zombies, you know, they don't have brains, and the mind flayer, it... it... It likes brains. It's just a game. It's a game." Dustin said realizing that it sounded ridiculous.

"What the hell are we doing here?" Hopper asked frustratedly throwing the book down.

"I thought we were waiting for your military backup." Dustin said sassily.

"We are!" Hopper yelled.

"How are they gonna stop this? You can't just shoot this with guns." Mike yelled back.

"You don't know that! We don't know anything!" Hopper defended.

"We know it's already killed everybody in that lab." Mike stated.

"We know the monsters are gonna molt again." Lucas added.

"We know that it's only a matter of time before those tunnels reach this town." Dustin also added.

"They're right. We have to kill it. I want to kill it." Joyce said with tears in her eyes.

"Me, too. Me, too, Joyce, okay? But how do we do that? We don't exactly know what we're dealing with here." Hopper pointed out.

"No. But he does. If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it's Will. He's connected to it. He'll know its weakness." Mike explained walking closer to Will.

"I thought we couldn't trust him anymore. That he's a spy for the mind flayer now." Max asked confused.

"Yeah, but he can't spy if he doesn't know where he is." Mike said getting an idea. We all began preparing to make the shed unrecognizable for Will so we could question him. I was with Jonathan collecting cardboard to hang up.

"Hey, I just wanted to apologize to you." I said not really knowing what to say.

"For what?" Jonathan asked confused.

"For being mad at you for leaving to the party to take care of Nancy, it just seems stupid right now with everything that's going on." I said ashamed and embarrassed that I could be so mad about something so stupid.

"You don't have anything to apologize for. It was stupid and I shouldn't have left you there." He said making me feel better.

"It's just that- Never mind." I said not wanting to get into it.

"What?" He asked wanting to hear what I was going to say.

"We don't really spend time together anymore. It's weird. You're my best friend and I feel like we're drifting apart." I said not wanting to lose him.

"Frankie, we will never drift apart. I promise. We're gonna get through all this and we're gonna go off to a kick ass college and never look back." He said comforting me. 

"So, you and Nancy, huh?" I said changing the subject.

"What? No." Jonathan tried to deny.

"Come on, I see the way you two look at each other. It's obvious." I pointed out.

"I like her a lot." He admitted.

"I'm happy for you guys." I smiled. 

"Thanks, Frankie." He said genuinely. "What about you and Steve?" He asked.

"We're just friends. Nothing more." I said knowing where he was going with this.

"Really?" Jonathan asked surprised.

"Yes really. Why?" I asked.

"I just see the way he looks at you, is all." He shrugged.

"We're just friends. I promise." I promised as we finished collecting the cardboard and began taking it to the shed. We were all working on the shed making sure no inch was visible for Will. Then Hopper took Will in and they tied him to a chair to make sure he stayed put. We were all waiting to see if they could get anything out of him. After about half an hour they all came rushing in. Hopper grabbed some paper and began writing something.

"What happened?" Dustin asked confused.

"I think he's talking, just not with words." Hopper said writing down dots and lines.

"What is that?" Steve asked confused.

"Morse code." The boys and I answered.

"H-E-R-E." Hopper spelled out.

"Here." Everyone said.

"Will's still in there. He's talking to us." Hopper said and that gave everyone hope. Jonathan, Joyce, and Mike were talking to Will and Hopper was relaying the tapping through a radio. We were interpreting it and writing it down.

"Dash, dot, dash, dot." Lucas was calling out and trying to find it on the morse code chart we had.

"Yeah, got it. C." They called out and Nancy wrote it down.

"L." They called again.

"O." Another letter.

"S." Another one.

"E." Another one.

"G."

"A."

"T."

"E."

"Close gate." We all read and then the phone rang.

"Shit. Shit." Dustin yelled taking the phone and hanging it up. It rang again and Nancy tore it off the wall and threw it.

"Do you think he heard that?" Max asked anxiously.

"It's just a phone. It could be anywhere. Right?" Steve asked hoping he was right. A few seconds later a monster screeching sounded.

"That's not good." Dustin said nervously.

"Hey. Hey, get away from the windows!" Hopper yelled coming in with two guns.

"Do you know how to use this?" Hopper asked Jonathan.

"What?" Jonathan asked confused.

"Can you use this?" He repeated holding out the gun.

"I can." Nancy said and Hopper threw her the gun. Hopper looked at me and saw I had a bow and arrow and looked at me confused.

"What? I'm a good shot." I said notching an arrow getting ready.

"Where are they?" Max asked anxiously. We heard strange noises and were startled.

"What are they doing?" Nancy asked. The demo-dog was screeching and then all of a sudden it stopped. Then it came through the window, but it was dead.

"Holy shit." Dustin said as we all approached it.

"Is it dead?" Max asked anxiously. Hopper kicked it with his foot, but it didn't move. Then there was a creaking at the door. The door unlocked by itself and we all aimed at the door. The door opened and Eleven walked in alive and well. We all stood there, shocked, as she smiled at Mike.