The two of them must've eventually made it back into the house at some point because Amanda was startled awake on a worn down couch when Will ran out of his room, screaming, "Mandy! Code red! We gotta go!"

    "Where are we going?" Amanda sat up with urgency as she watched Will shove on his shoes that were by the door. His mother would have his head if she knew that he was tracking water around the house in his wet sneakers. However, he seemed to be feeling better after last night's sob session. 

    "We're going to Mike's."

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'

"I didn't think it was anything at first," Will explained. "Then there was the piece of the Mind Flayer that attached itself to me out on the field. And then my mom burned it out of me. But what if that piece of him is still here? With us?"

"So the Mind Flayer is definitely back," Amanda concluded. "Well, duh," Mike piped up in a no shit, sherlock tone, "or else you wouldn't be here."

"There is the possibility that I could be here on my own accord. How? I don't know. But it's possible." Amanda gave him a look, challenging him. Mike took a few steps back, signaling his surrender.

     "Who are you talking to, dingbat?" Max looked at him incredulously. Right. Max didn't know that Amanda was here, let alone know her. "Uh, Max," Mike coughed awkwardly, "meet Amanda Schwartz. She went missing the same day as Will. You can't see her, but she's there."

"Is she like a ghost or something?" Max walked around to where Mike was pointing to Amanda and stood in front of her, which looked like nothing coming from Max's point of view. "Get the radio?" Amanda asked Will. Will nodded and went to go fetch Mike's radio from his room. When he came back, he turned it to channel six and let the static flow through. Amanda then closed her eyes and turned the radio on in her head.

"Hi, Max," Amanda spoke, which sounded strange to hear when she heard her voice come from the radio. Max's eyes widened at her voice. "What the hell?" she whispered. "Weird, I know. Crazy, right?" Amanda giggled. "I think the only reason you can't see me is because you haven't encountered the Mind Flayer. Not yet, at least."

Max's eyes widened a little more. "That's not possible."

"We're talking about getting a monster out from our dimension back into his own and you think talking to ghosts isn't possible?" Amanda's tone went flat and sassy and Max raised her brows. She turned to look at Will, who shrugged. "I know. Surprised me too."

"I can see her," El finally piped up. She got off the couch and went to go stand in front of Amanda. "Did I do this to you?"

"Kind of?" Amanda said, her pitch getting higher near the end of her question. "It wasn't really your fault, per se. Well, it kind of was because you're the source of all this chaos but — mmph!" Mike's hand came over her mouth as her babbling was starting to head in the wrong direction.

"What she's trying to say is that she doesn't blame you for what happened," he said to El as he uncovered Amanda's mouth but made no move to unwind his arm from her shoulders, "right?"

"Right," Amanda agreed, "so if there's a chance that part of the Mind Flayer is still out there, he would need a new host. Who would he want to be his new host?"

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'

"Why are we staking out Hawkins Pool?" Amanda asked out loud; it was a question anyone was allowed to answer because she didn't know what they were doing here.

The kids were hiding behind a car in the Hawkins Pool parking lot, spying on the lifeguard that was sitting atop his lifeguard chair. "El thinks that Max's brother is the Mind Flayer's new host," Will answered. Amanda nodded, then her eyebrows scrunched together in confusion. "But you said that the Mind Flayer likes it cold. Why is he out in the sun like a lizard sunbathing on a rock?"

     "He likes to hide," Will explained. "It's like. . .you're dormant. And then when he needs you, you're activated."

     "So we just wait for him to become activated." Max shrugged. "We can't risk that," Mike disagreed, shaking his head. "We can't wait for him to be activated. He could hurt someone."

     "Or kill someone," Amanda added. "But we need to find out if he's the host!" Max exclaimed as Mike made a break for the men's locker room. "Where are you going?"

     "I have an idea!" he yelled back. "Boys only! And Mandy too!"

     "Seriously?!" Max questioned.

     "They won't even see her! Just trust me on this one!" It was the last thing he said before he took off running with Will, Lucas, and Amanda.

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'

"Ew, what are we doing in the dudes' locker room? Better question: What am I doing in the dudes' locker room?" Amanda whined as Mike led the way to the sauna room in the back of the men's changing room. 

"We need a fourth brain. And they won't see you since you're invisible to the Mind-Flayer-free eye and all," Mike answered. Amanda looked at him quizzically. "It doesn't take four brains to figure out that we try to get the lifeguard from his post into — "

"Here," he finished her sentence as he opened the sauna door. "Hey, kid! Close the door!" a man yelled at him. Amanda made the mistake to look. "My eyes!" she squealed as Mike went to quickly shut the door to the sauna.

"Will it get hot enough?" Lucas asked. Will tapped the thermometer. "Two hundred twenty degrees. It'll be hot enough to get him out. It has to be."

"We just have to figure out how to get him in there," Lucas concluded.

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'

Later that night, when Hawkins Pool was closed, everyone came back to the pool and snuck in through the back and split up to find things that could possibly keep the guy (Billy was his name, Amanda later learned) inside the sauna while they burned the Mind Flayer out of him.

Amanda wasn't sure what she was looking for, but she sifted through what was there, looking for something. When she got to the back of the locker she was looking through, she saw Mike talking to El through the grate.

"Listen," Mike started, "I just wanted to say that I was sorry for lying to you about blowing you off. Hopper actually threatened me to back off because he thought I was spending too much with you or whatever. My nana isn't actually sick. She's fine."

"I know." El nodded. "Right," he agreed, "I mean, you're the most important thing in the world to me."

"What about Amanda?" El asked. "What?" Mike asked. "What?" Amanda whispered. "Amanda," El repeated, "is she important to you, too?"

"I. . .don't know how to respond to that."

"But if I see you more," El switched gears so quickly that it gave Amanda whiplash, "and you say that I should be with my own species, then I should be with my own species more."

"What?" Mike questioned, then gasped when he came to the realization. "Did you spy on me? That's totally against the rules!"

"I make my own rules," El smirked and walked past him. Amanda stood there confused for a second, wondering where El got that theory from. They barely knew each other. Why would any of the kids like her? With Will, she could understand because they share some of the same trauma. But Mike? The thought made her head light.

"Were you spying on me, too?" Mike asked as he stopped to see Amanda looking into the locker. Amanda snapped out of her thoughts and looked at him. "No, I wasn't spying on you," she answered as she started to walk past him, "I was eavesdropping. There's a difference."

"So you heard what El said about you."

"Yeah. I wouldn't know how to respond to that, either. I wasn't entirely sure what she was alluding to but it sounded like something that was leaning towards 'crush' territory."

"Yeah," Mike made a "pfft" noise after, "definitely didn't know what she was talking about. We don't even know each other all that well. I mean, I probably would've enjoyed hanging out with you while we were in school but. . ."

"Your really tough party rules exclude me from joining the club," Amanda finished for him. "Yeah. I heard about that. But it makes sense. Having new people join your party when you already have a tight-knit group is pretty stressful. Plus four is a very square number. Not too much, not too little. Just. . .right. Why haven't you shut me up, yet?"

Mike shrugged. "I dunno. It was either that, dead silence, or the silently thickening tension of our impending doom."

     Amanda nodded, finally going quiet.

    He nudged her shoulder and nodded his head towards the sauna room. "We should probably go. I can hear Will calling for us."