"Another big push, Mrs. Hopper! You've got this!" the doctor instructed in the buzzing hospital room as several nurses frantically raced about.

Diane Hopper gripped the armrests on the bed and clenched her teeth as another contraction ripped through her body. An ear-curdling scream escaped her throat and traveled down the hallway to the waiting room where Jim Hopper was anxiously awaiting the birth of his child.

Upon hearing his wife's scream, Jim sped over to the main doors of the hospital wing and frantically paced while he waited to catch a nurse or doctor through the window. He couldn't stop running his hands through his slicked-back hair and his fingers were starting to stick together from the copious amounts of hair gel. Did it always take this long? Was Diane okay? Were there complications? This being his first child, Jim was full of questions that he had no answers for.

"Excuse me, miss," Hopper called out to a nurse who had pushed through the doors and started across the waiting room. The nurse paused for a moment and turned to look at Jim expectantly. "My wife, Diane Hopper, she's in room 103, is she doing okay?"

The nurse gave a patient smile before answering, "Your wife is doing fine, Mr. Hopper. It shouldn't be too much longer now."

Jim gave the nurse a nod and watched her finish crossing the waiting room to the other side. Right as she disappeared through the second set of doors, another scream pierced through the space and rung in Jim's ears. This one had been louder than the rest and was accompanied by the flickering of lights across the ceiling.

Jim looked up to watch the fluorescent lights tremor in a strange pattern when they suddenly went out and bathed the waiting room in dark anticipation. As quickly as they had gone out, they trickled back on, and a new scream entered Jim's ears: the scream of a newborn baby.

Despite the multiple signs warning Jim to wait for a doctor or nurse before going past the designated waiting area, Jim pushed through the swinging doors into the hospital wing and took a sharp right into the room Diane was in. The doctor and nurses gave Jim a strange look, but the only thing he could focus on was the scene before him. The barrage of scoldings from the medical staff about entering the wing before he was collected were drowned out by the beating of his heart as he looked upon the tiny bundle in his wife's arms.

Diane's warm smile guided Jim as he took one small step after another towards his newborn child. The baby was tightly wound in a bright pink blanket that accentuated its bright pink face. Its tiny eyelids were squeezed shut and Jim could hear tiny breaths escaping its tiny nostrils. He had seen infants before, but this was like discovering something new. Something perfect. Something his.

"Congrats, dad," Diane smiled at Jim as she held the baby out to him.

"No, no, no," Jim mumbled, his concentration focused on the tiny human that Diane had placed in his arms. He continued to stare at the newborn as he spoke. "Congrats to you, you did all the work."

Diane pursed her lips and gave a small nod. "I suppose you're right. I did a pretty good job, didn't I?" Diane gave Jim a playful smile and he returned it with his own goofy grin.

"So...pink, huh?" Jim asked, referring to the blanket wrapped around the baby, who was now growing fussy in his grip. He began to rock the infant back and forth gently until the fussing stopped.

"Yup," Diane answered. "We have a little girl."

"Hmm...I always thought I'd have a son..." Jim said with pursed lips before they were broken by a smile. Diane gave him a knowing look and rolled her eyes. "But this is better."

"What are we going to name her?" Diane asked.

Jim stopped rocking his daughter for a moment to think. He had been so anxious thinking about Diane's labor that he had forgotten about that part. He looked down at the little girl in his arms and studied her face in an attempt to come up with an answer. Even though her eyes, nose, and mouth were still so small, he could see Diane when he looked at her. The tiny tendrils of blonde hair that curled up underneath her pink cap and her tiny pink lips definitely belonged to Diane. It was yet to be seen what color eyes she had, but Jim thought that her nose almost looked more like his. She was a sight to behold and Jim couldn't stop looking at her.

"Earth to Jim." Diane waved a hand in front of Jim's face and broke his fixed stupor.

"Oh yeah, right," Jim said and cleared his throat. "Well, we had talked about naming her Dorothy, after my mother."

"Or we could name her Mary, after my mother," Diane added. The two looked down at their daughter and then at each other and immediately shook their heads. Neither name seemed to fit.

"I've always liked the name Sarah," Jim mentioned after a moment of silence.

"Sarah?" Diane pondered the name before a warm smile spread over her lips. "Sarah," she repeated contently. "I like it."

"Sarah it is then," Jim announced.

He sat next to Diane on the bed and held the baby out for Diane to see. Diane rested her head on Jim's shoulder and began stroking the baby's little arm with her finger. Jim kissed Diane on the head before looking over to his daughter, who was now sound asleep in his arms.

"Welcome to the world, Sarah Diane Hopper."

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Yet again, you guys have been an incredible audience. Getting to 50,000 reads already seemed crazy enough to me when I started this story, and only a couple months later, "001" has doubled that! This is literally a dream come true! To thank you all for all your reads, comments, and likes, I wanted to answer some questions that you guys might be wondering about the story! If you have any other questions that I didn't address here, please let me know!

1. What inspired you to write this story?

Music has always been a large inspiration for my writing and this story was no exception. After rewatching Stranger Things for the umpteenth time, I was listening to "Plastic Beach" by Gorillaz and started to envision a girl standing on a hill over Hawkins with electricity flowing through her hands. This later became the second part of the first chapter of this story and I developed it from there. Hopper was always a favorite character of mine and I thought his daughter, Sarah, had been left open-ended enough by the show that I could create a story around her and make her the girl I envisioned while listening to "Plastic Beach".

2. Did you always plan for this ending, or have you made changes along the way?
From the beginning I had always planned for One to go against the Mind Flayer, but the inspiration to create James/Seven and make him the Mind Flayer didn't come until after I started writing the story. I was also inspired to create the Diagonal through questions I had developed myself after watching the show. I wanted to know more about how and why the kids at the Lab developed their powers, so I decided to try to come up with the answers myself.

3. Why did you decide to make Sarah Hopper older in this story?
After watching the show it was never clear to me exactly when Sarah was born so I decided to be creative with it. I think something may have been released stating that she was around the same age as the party, but by the time I found that information I had already had my heart set on her being in her early twenties. I thought that age would better fit the narrative of her being the first experiment and also open up Steve as a potential love interest.

4. What has been the most surprising response to this story?
I'd have to say the THIRTY-NINE comments on the line: "Call me Papa". Ya'all have dirtier minds than I anticipated 😂

5. What is your favorite chapter that you've written?
That's a tough answer. I think I'd have to say "The Nightmare" because that was a scene I had developed before I even started writing the story, but I was most excited to write "The Diagonal" because I wanted to see how you guys would react to the big plot twist. I'm pretty proud of how "Three Paths" and "Thriller Night" turned out too because of the transitions. What is your guys' favorite chapter(s)?

6. Are you going to make a sequel after this story is finished?
I really want to! I already have an idea for it that I think you guys will like and it will explore more of the Diagonal and other questions the show hasn't answered yet. When it will be released is hard to say, because there's another project that I want to work on after this, but if I'm eager enough I may slowly release chapters alongside it.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━