☆☆☆

Eleven sits beside you on Mike's Sofa, a blindfold wrapped around her eyes. Her breathing deep and shallow.

"Where is he?" Max asks El. El's nose begins to bleed as she responds, her voice hoarse. "In the woods, With Will's mom."

"M-My mom?" Will asks rhetorically, leaning forward, almost out of his chair; his mouth agape.

"They're going to I-Ill annoy." El adds, she stutters, a visible sign that she doesn't know how to pronounce the word. Then frowns after realizing she has mis-said it.

Loud banging resonates on the hard wooden floor, echoing down the steps as her shrill voice creeks the cold air of the basement. "Breakfast Mike!"

"Not now mom!" The banging stops and Mike turns towards El and you again. "Illonois, like the state?"

Eleven shrugs, "Ill-Annoy."

☆☆☆

You stand in the bathroom, looking at your figure in the bathroom mirror. Your E/C eyes are tired and black bags hang underneath them. Your limbs ache without end. It feels as though everything has gone wrong and ended up all on you.

The bathroom door opens, you turn around and El steps inside; holding a bag of ice cold pea's. "Hey." She says, closing the door behind her slowly.

"Hey." You respond gruffly, trying to avoid hurting your neck. You turn back to the mirror. El steps up beside you and looks at your face in the mirror's reflection; her worried eyes searching your eyes for injuries.

"Does it hurt?" She questions, you lift your neck upwards and look at it. Black veins line the large red strip wrapping around your throat, it looks like strangulation.

"Only when I talk. At least I'm not Mike. I'd be in constant pain." You joke, and laugh lightly. El chuckles, she hands you the bag of Pea's a bright smile painted on her face.

"Tha-" You begin saying but get interrupted by Mike yelling outside the door.

"Guys! You might want to come out here!" Mike yells, you open the door and step outside with El behind you.

All their eyes rest on you and Eleven. "You might want to take a seat." Nancy says, you look over at her and Jonathan in surprise, your eyebrows raising for a second before dropping.

You nod and take a seat on the sofa, El on the left of you and Mike on the right. Lucas, Max and Will sit on to the right of you.

As Nancy begins explaining Mrs. Driscoll and her situation. You zone out and think about the fight between you and Billy. It really was a close call, it felt so surreal.

You lean back on the cushions, unfortunately the feeling of your sickness has gotten worse. You can't move without an ache everywhere.

Mike stands up looks at the paper on the table in front of him before he speaks, "So, this crazy old woman who was eating fertilizer--"

"Mrs. Driscoll." Nancy interrupts, crossing her arms.

"Right, Mrs. Driscoll. When exactly did this happen?" Mike asks, titling his head questioningly.

"Why does that matter?" Nancy questions, eyeing Mike.

"When was it?" He repeats, Nancy twists her head slightly; in an attempt to try and remember the time.

"About 9:00." She says, nodding.

Jonathan looks over at her, his arms crossed. "You waited all night to call me?" He asks, Nancy looks over at him.

"I was waiting on the doctors to run some tests." She responds dismissively, she turns back to all of you.

"You weren't there?" Will questions, Jonathan throws his arms out.

"I'm here now." He says frustrated. You can tell he wanted to be there himself.

"Hallelujah!" Nancy adds, rolling her eyes.

Lucas groans in sympathy for Jonathan. "9:00 is when we trapped Billy in the Sauna." Will says, leaning forward.

"Well that proves my theory." She responds.

"She's flayed." You mumble, all eyes turn toward you in surprise. Nancy stares at you blankly, waiting for you to add onto what you said.

"The Mind Flayer, He Infects people." You add. Lucas raises his finger as if he finally understands.

"Then that means-" Lucas says.

"There's more infected." Will finishes his sentence. He looks over at Max as she begins to speak. "Heather."

"Ten.." You hear Eleven whisper from beside you, "I-" She stutters, trying to find a way to approach you on whether or not you're infected.

"I.." You whisper back. "I don't know. I don't feel like he's inside me, but you'll be the first one to know." You say, she looks like she wants to say more but in the end, she nods and turns back towards Nancy and Jonathan. You catch her giving you a few worried glances, but other than that she doesn't add onto it.

You breathe in and out, trying to recharge your mental battery; inaction causes problems. You learned that last year, you have to make the hard decisions.

You have to. Eleven can't bear it all.

"When we saw Heather, she was in pain, Billy was there. Standing over top of her, she was screaming, bad screams." El says, Lucas and you look over at her, confused.

"What are good screams then?" You and Lucas ask.

Eleven looks over at you. "Max sai-"

"Doesn't matter," Max interrupts her.

Nancy raises an eyebrow, "Uh, Who's Heather?" Nancy questions, looking between Eleven and Max.

"The lifeguard at the pool." Max responds.

"Heather Holloway?" Nancy asks, as though she can't believe it.

Jonathan and Nancy both look at each other, "Tom!" They say in Sync.

☆☆☆

Nancy leads the group to the car; Eleven, Max, and you both take the middle seats while Will, Mike, and Lucas sit in the back.

"Seriously?!" Mike complains from the back.

"Welcome to my world." You hear Will respond.

You sigh, your shoulder dropping. "Sorry will." You mutter, quietly barely loud enough for him to hear.

"It's not your fault." He says patting your shoulder from behind. You sigh, "Thanks." You respond, smiling. Wills been nice to you ever since he came back from his disappearance, and you want to be a good friend to him.

Nancy looks back, forming her hair into a ponytail. "Seat Belts." She says, all of you twist and fasten the seat belts.

After everyone is still, Nancy starts the car and reverses out of the driveway. She turns the car to the left and you speed down the street.

☆☆☆

No Ones POV

-Holloway Residence-

Nancy rings the doorbell to Mrs. Driscoll's house. After waiting a moment for someone to answer. Jonathan looks over at Nancy who nods, Jonathan opens the door while Eleven and Ten trade alerted glances.

"Cold." Ten mutters, everyone nods along with him.

Max looks over at the boy, "Mindflayer Ten?" Ten nods, his eyes searching the room while Max stares at the boy in disbelief for a moment before looking back into the house.

Nancy and Jonathan step in first with Ten and the group behind them.

Ten wipes sweat from his brow as they all begin looking around, "Heather?!" Nancy yells through the house, they wait patiently for a response that doesn't come.

After waiting, they begin moving deeper into the house, Nancy takes a right into the living room with everyone close behind. "Jesus it's cold in here." Max complains, looking around the room.

"Told you." You mutter, drawing a loud annoyed scoff from Max. You smirk lightly, crouching down to look at the rug.

Nancy stops in the middle of the living room suddenly, she turns around and looks at the group. "Do you guys smell that?" She questions, everyone stops and begins sniffing the air. Ten slides upwards silently, stalking forward quietly.

Nancy doesn't wait for a response, instead she steps into the kitchen leading into the living room. On the marble counter, multiple bottles of chemicals are placed on it, some of them fallen on their sides.

Jonathan walks over to the counter and picks up a bottle of the chemicals. Ten stops beside the marble counter and inspects each, realizing they're all empty or almost empty.

"Think they're drinking this stuff?" Ten asks, raising an empty bottle of chemicals. He hands it over to El to inspect.

"Yeah, either that or they went on one hell of a cleaning spree." Nancy responds, placing a bottle of fallen chemicals upright.

"But last year Will didn't eat chemicals." Max stops talking, she looks over at Will, as though she's not sure. "Right?" She finishes.

Will doesn't look over at her, instead focusing on the bottles of chemicals, "No, I didn't." He says.

Mike steps back, beside Lucas and Will. "Guys, Mr. Clarke. Fifth grade. What happens when you mix chemicals together?" He asks, looking between Lucas and Will.

"You create a new substance." Will and Lucas respond.

"So they're making something in themselves." Mike says, Lucas and Will begin to nod.

"But, if you drink this stuff it'll kill you." Max says, Lucas shakes his head and grabs his neck. "Yeah, if you're human." He says.

A faint pulsing feeling causes Ten to grab his neck, he walks out of the kitchen and to the living room. He crouches down over a part of the rug, El crouches beside him immediately and begins examining the carpet while the rest approach slowly.

"Blood." Ten says, touching a red piece of the white and black patterned carpet.

Nancy crouches on the left side of him and looks around, she reaches underneath the table and grabs a green glass bottle filled with alcohol. She holds it up and examines it. On the front part of the bottle, with the company name and label is a dark red mark. Similar to blood.

"Tom, he had a bandage on his head at work right?" Jonathan questions, leaning uneasily on his right foot.

"He was attacked." Nancy says, she looks at the hall, where multiple doors line the walls. She notices something she hadn't earlier, one of the doors are slightly open, the rug stuck between the door and door hinge, holding it open.

She stands up and everyone follows behind her uneasily. She opens the door; inside is a bedroom, everyone looks down at the carpet, a light red line leads to another room; past a dark wooden door.

Nancy opens the door, inside is the garage, without a car. A long table lines the left side of the garage with multiple boxes of tools on them.

A long rope lays tangled up on the middle of the floor, Jonathan walks over to it and picks it up off the ground, twirling it around in his hands as he examines it.

"They were tied up and driven somewhere." Jonathan says.

"Mrs. Driscoll, she kept saying, 'I need to go back.' What if the flaying is taking place somewhere else. There has to be a place where this all began from." Nancy finishes, turning towards the group of kids.

"Somewhere he didn't want me to see." El speaks up.

"If we can find the source, maybe we can stop him or atleast stop it from spreading." Nancy adds, pacing through-out the garage.

"But how?" Eleven asks.

"Mrs. Driscoll. If she wants to go back so bad, why don't we let her?" Ten responds with another questions, his E/C eyes looking between everyone intensely.

☆☆☆

Your POV

-At the Hospital, Waiting Room-

You hit the vending machine lightly, "Mother fucker!" Mike yells, kicking his foot against the vending machine. You look around the waiting room, catching El reading a magazine in a chair, you should go talk to her after you get some of this candy.

"Are you sure you can't just use your powers Ten? and get me my candy. I'll give you two pieces if you can." Mike says, holding up two fingers.

You concentrate on the Kit-Kat inside, you begin to try and use your gift to no avail, only making your entire body hurt worse.

Their leaving you, and you don't know why. It's scary, so scary in-fact you want to cry.

"This is so dum-" Lucas begins saying, The vending machine begins to vibrate and it bounces slightly, most of the candy inside shoots off the racks and into the bottom of the vending machine.

"Holy shit, Thanks Ten." Mike says, crouching down to reach into the Vending machine.

You look over your shoulder and see El watching, she wipes some blood from her nose onto a black part of her outfit. She nods, a light smile on her face.

You nod back and crouch down, you grab a few bars of candy and begin to walk over to El but stop in the middle of your walk. Max sits down beside El and begins talking to her as they both read their magazines.

You look around, unsure of what to do. Thats when you realize, Jonathan and Nancy aren't back where are they and whats taking them so long.

"Max! Can you come over here?" Lucas questions, he stands up from the vending machine. Max scoffs and places the magazine onto the chair as she gets up. Lucas gives you a small salute and crouches down in front of the vending machine as Max approaches.

You look over at Mike, he watches you closely. Once he catches you looking at him he turns away back towards the vending machine.

You take the seat next to El, placing the magazine under the chair, just out of reach from your shoes. You look over at Will, you nod slightly towards El and he gets out of the chair and walks over to the Vending Machine where Lucas and Max toss candy into each each other's mouths.

"Hey." El greets.

"Hey." You greet back, you hold out the candy you grabbed from the vending machine, "I have a question," You say, El looks over at the candy then up at you. "What?" She asks.

"Do you like candy?" You question, smiling charmingly at her, she grins in return. She laughs, "I think so." She says, nodding. You hand her all of the candy, she places the candy beside her and opens a bag of M&M's.

"Hold out your hand." She says, you hold your hand and she pours some of the M&M's into your hand.

"I like the new look by the way." You say, placing a brown M&M into your mouth.

She smirks and responds, "Thanks." She grabs a red M&M and eats it. "I've always liked the way you've looked." She says, a bright blush coming onto her face.

You begin to respond with something sly but the lights start to flicker, almost on cue, your limbs begin to hurt worse; a feeling of cold sends shivers down your neck.