CHAPTER SEVEN
BACK TO THE FUTURE

Mavis' head was throbbing as Dustin drove the group through the facility halls, trying to get to the elevator. She was in the back with Steve and Robin, using a hand to hold a tissue to her bleeding nose while the other one held her head, trying to stop the pain. However, the bickering of the other two teenagers wasn't helping at all.

"Jesus, slow down!" Steve yelled.

"Yeah, what is this, like, the Indy 500?" Robin spoke.

"It's the Indy 300," he argued.

"No, dingus, it's 500!"

"It's 300!"

"Let's say a million," she said, and the two of them bursted out laughing, making Mavis lose her patience a little bit more.

"What is wrong with them?" Erica asked from the passenger seat.

"I don't know, but if they don't shut up I'm going to kill them," Mavis said as she held her head. "Also, it's 500. The Indianapolis 500."

"Ha! Told you, dingus."

"Why are you such a smartass, Mav?" Steve asked, looking at her.

"And why are you such an idiot, Stevie?" she replied in a slightly annoyed tone. However, there was a smile on her face.

He was about to answer her rhetorical question, but he got interrupted by a screaming Erica.

"Dustin, watch out!"

And just like that, they crashed against some barrels, filling the air with groans and grunts.

"You guys all right back there?" Dustin asked, turning around to face the teenagers.

"Yeah, we're fine. What is one more bruise, right?" Mavis said sarcastically.

The younger boy rolled his eyes at her sarcasm before he got out of the driver's seat and headed back to open the small door of the compartment where Mavis and the Scoops Idiots were at, the former getting out first. Her head was still aching, but at least her nose had stopped bleeding.

"Come on. We gotta go, now," Dustin urged the other two to get out of the van.

"Come on! Get out!" Erica joined in.

"Let's go!" he yelled one more time since Steve and Robin weren't being exactly quick.

"Ow!" Steve complained. "We're coming!"

Mavis rolled her eyes as she walked over to the elevator doors, taking the card out of her stolen uniform. "Here goes nothing," she said as she entered the card in the slot, hoping it would work. And thankfully, it did: the red light turned green and the doors opened.

"This sucks," Steve complained again as the kids pushed him and Robin inside the elevator.

"Stop complaining," Mavis said as she inserted the card again, now on the inside slot, and the elevator started to go up.

It wasn't going really fast, but it was fast for Steve and Robin, as they laughed and yelled trying to get ahold of something nearby to not fall off. Then, they found a small cart.

Worst thing that could happen.

Steve got on it, and Robin was holding it and moving it around, both still giggling like kids.

"Hey! You look like you're surfing!" the girl said between laughs.

"Surfing! Yeah!

Mavis, Dustin and Erica just watched the whole thing go down, too dumbfounded to do anything.

"They seem drunk," Erica said.

"Why would they be drunk?" Dustin countered, the girl's assumption making no sense to him.

However, Mavis knew exactly what was going on with Steve and Robin. And she was about to enlighten the kids when Steve interrupted her.

"Mav, check it out! I'm a natural!" He wanted to show off in front of the prettiest girl he had ever seen, but instead, the elevator moved, making him fall to the ground.

"Wipeout!" Robin chuckled hysterically, Steve joining in.

Mavis just sighed. "They're not drunk," she said, walking over to Steve. "They've been drugged."

She knelt down next to Steve, holding a hand to his forehead and touching it. "He's burning up."

"You're burning up, Wilson. Because you're hot!" he laughed.

She just ignored what he had said as she brought her other hand to his face. "Can you be still for a moment, please?" she asked softly.

Steve did as he was told while he looked at her, his mouth agape. God, she was really pretty.

"Thanks," she smiled slightly before she opened his right eye a bit. "His pupils are dilated."

Dustin sighed. "So they have been drugged."

Mavis nodded before turning around to face Steve again. "Do you know what kind of drugs they used?"

Instead of answering her, he just booped her nose. "Steve," she sighed, "this is important. What drugs did they use?"

"How many times, sweetheart? I don't do drugs. It's only marijuana," he answered, booping her nose again.

"I need to know what they did to you, Steve," she said, worry written in her face. She needed to know, because if she knew, maybe she could help him. And she really wanted to help him.

"Is he gonna die on us?" Dustin asked worriedly, saying out loud the thoughts that were filling Mavis' mind.

"We all die, my strange little child friend," Robin suddenly spoke. "It's just a matter of how... and when."

Okay. That had been creepy.

Dustin walked over to Steve, kneeling down next to him, just like Mavis. But she stood up, leaving the two boys alone as she tried to come up with a plan. What she knew, which was little, was that Steve and Robin had been tortured by the Russians. They also had been drugged, probably to try and get information out of them. If that was the case, that meant that the drug, or the dose they had been given, wasn't deadly, and that calmed Mavis down a bit.

"They're gonna be looking for us up there, so I need you to tell me where you parked your car," Dustin told Steve.

"Oh, can we make a pit stop at the food court?"

"I would kill for a hot dog on a stick," Robin joined in.

Dustin sighed. "All right. Yeah, food. Yes, you can have as much food as you want, but only if you tell me where your car is parked."

"Uh-oh." Mavis' trail of thought was interrupted by Steve's voice. "The car's off the board."

"What does that mean?" she asked.

"They took the keys," the older boy explained. "The Russians, they took the keys. Like, forever ago," he laughed and Robin joined in. "That's a bummer, right?"

Mavis, Dustin and Erica just shared a look. What were they going to do now?

After a short while, the elevator reached the top, and using the keycard, the doors opened, letting the group out into the fresh air.

"Oh my god, that tastes so good," Robin exclaimed. "Steve, can you test the air?"

"I taste it! I taste it!" he said happily. And it made Mavis smile.

Until the chase started.

"Stop!" two Russians guards yelled at them.

"Shit! Come on! Come on!" Dustin screamed, and that was enough for him, Erica and Mavis to start running. Mavis grabbed Steve with one hand and Robin with the other, bringing them to the nearby door as Erica opened it.

"Why are we running?" Steve asked.

"Because we don't want to die, Harrington!" Mavis yelled as the doors closed behind them.

▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣

"Where are we going?" Mavis asked as she followed Dustin through the halls; Steve, Robin and Erica between them.

"Just trust me," Dustin replied.

She just sighed. She hoped he knew where they were going and that he wasn't just improvising. They couldn't exactly afford to improvise right now.

After a few turns, Dustin opened a door, and as they rushed inside, Mavis rolled her eyes.

"The movie theater? Really?" she asked, but the younger boy just shushed her and signaled her to follow him.

Mavis didn't have a choice, so she did as she was told and followed him into one of the rooms, not really keen on this idea.

However, when she looked at the screen, her mood changed: her eyes widened slightly and a big smile appeared on her face. She had been wanting to watch this movie ever since she had read about it in the newspaper. And now here she was.

Only she couldn't really enjoy it since she had to babysit two teenagers.

Steve and Robin were sitting a few seats away from her, Dustin and Erica, Steve holding a bag of popcorn that Mavis had no idea where he had gotten. And she couldn't help but wonder how long the drugs would stay in their systems. She certainly hoped it wasn't much longer.

"Okay, it's official," Dustin spoke after letting out a deep sigh. "I'm never having kids."

Mavis let out a chuckle at this. "Fair enough."

Erica just rolled her eyes before she looked at Dustin. "What are we doing here?"

"We're laying low. Cooling off. Like Oswald."

The older girl turned to look at him. "Lee Harvey Oswald? He was found in a theater and shot to death."

"A week later."

"Uh... no? He was arrested that same afternoon."

Erica nodded. "Mavis is right. But the point here is, his plan didn't work."

"Only because it was a setup."

"What?"

"He was just a patsy."

"Tell me you're joking," Mavis pleaded. She didn't tolerate it when people got facts wrong.

A woman that was sitting beside them shushed them, and the two kids shushed her back, making Mavis' eyes widen as she muttered a quick sorry. Maybe she was never going to have kids either, they could be a lot.

"We need to get outta here," Erica said, looking around.

"I agree."

"All right," Dustin said. "You two watch Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Make sure they don't go anywhere."

"Where are you going?" Erica asked as Dustin grabbed his walkie-talkie from her bag.

"To get us a ride," was all he said before he stood up and left the room.

"And then there were two," Mavis smiled at the little girl.

"How do you know so much about almost everything?" she questioned.

"Well..." she had not been expecting such a question, but she was going to answer nonetheless. "I spend most of my free time at the library so I read a lot."

"So you don't have any friends."

Ouch. The harsh truth.

"Not really," she chuckled slightly. "At least I didn't until now."

"Hmm," Erica hummed. "Well, I think you're pretty cool. So it's their loss."

Mavis couldn't help her smile at the girl's words. It meant a lot to her.

"Thank you, Erica. I think you're pretty cool too," Erica smiled back and the two proceeded to watch the movie.

In fact, they were so immersed in the universe of Back To The Future that they didn't notice Steve and Robin slip away. Or Dustin come back.

"Do you have any batteries? Double-A?" he asked the girls. But Mavis didn't hear him, she was too focused on the movie.

"Why would I have batteries?" Erica countered.

"I always carry batteries."

"Then what's the problem?"

"I need eight."

"Eight?"

Dustin sighed. This was going nowhere. "Shit. Guess we'll have to go to plan B."

"Plan B? What's plan B?"

He was about to answer Erica, but when he looked behind her to where Steve and Robin were, or were supposed to be since the seats were empty, he freaked out.

"Where... are they?"

His tone was enough to get Mavis' attention, and when she looked in the same direction, her eyes widened.

"Fuck."

▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣

"I told you to watch them!" Dustin yelled at the two girls as they looked for Steve and Robin.

"Sorry! The movie was just too good," Mavis said, earning a glare from Dustin.

"I don't care about the movie! I care about Steve and Robin not getting caught by the Russians again, but now, we don't know where they are!"

He was right. She should have been watching them. If anything happened to them because of her irresponsibility... she would never forgive herself.

"I would never suggest what I'm about to suggest if we were in a normal situation. But this is far from normal, so..." she shrugged. "We need to split up."

"Are you crazy?" Erica blurted.

"Hear me out! The sooner we find them, the better. And we'll cover more space if we split up."

"I hate to say this, but she's right," Dustin spoke.

She looked at Erica expectantly, waiting for the girl to agree with the plan.

"Ugh, fine. But if something happens to me–"

"Your mom is going to kill me. Got it," she smiled.

Erica crossed her arms in front of her chest while Dustin smiled as well.

"Okay, I'm going to look on this floor, and you two are going to check out the food court. They mentioned wanting to eat, right?" Dustin nodded. "Well, then maybe they're there. Now... we need to find them, so let's do this."

And just like that, they split up. Dustin and Erica took the stairs and headed to the food court while Mavis started to look around. She noticed a water fountain, and a lightbulb went on inside her head. During spring break, she had read Go Ask Alice, a book about a teenage drug addict. And thanks to it, Mavis knew that drug use could lead to dehydration. Steve and Robin hadn't had anything to drink in a while so... they had to have been there.

She also remembered that the protagonist in the book would throw up after the effect of the drug had taken off, so maybe they were in the bathroom. She rushed to the closest one, and when she was close enough, she could hear Robin's laugh clearly. Thank God.

"She sounds like a Muppet. She sounds like a Muppet giving birth," she heard Steve's voice just as she opened the door, seeing the two sailors sitting on the floor, facing each other and now looking at her.

"Are you talking about Tammy Thompson?" she asked with a smile as she hopped onto the sink counter, sitting down on it.

"Yes!" Steve smiled at Mavis. He was very happy to see her.

"I really don't know how she wants to be a singer. She's tone deaf," she chuckled.

"That's what I was saying!" he exclaimed excitedly, while Robin just shook her head playfully. "And if you could hold me tight..." he started to sing Total Eclipse Of The Heart by Bonnie Tyler, perfectly imitating a Muppet. Or well, Tammy in this case.

"We'll be holding on forever," Mavis sang along with him, trying her best with the impression.

Steve looked at her, the biggest smile plastered on his face. "Exactly!" he said before laughing, Mavis joining in.

Robin, also laughing, looked back and forth between the two of them, noticing the way they were looking at each other, and she just knew that Steve had been wrong a few minutes ago: he didn't like her. He liked Mavis. He just hadn't realized it yet.

The door burst open, revealing Dustin and Erica.

"Okay. What the hell?" he yelled at Steve and Robin, not having noticed Mavis yet. But Erica did.

"I found them!" she said with a smile as she hopped off the sink, making Dustin look at her. If looks could kill, she'd be dead.

"Come on, we need to leave."

Steve and Robin stood up, the boy smiling at Mavis while he mouthed the word 'Muppet'. The girl had to cover her mouth to hide her chuckle. He needed to stop being so funny. And charming. And handsome.

Dustin opened the door slightly, seeing the mall being filled up with the people who were leaving the movie theater. "And... blend."

His words were enough to have everyone follow him as they tried their best to hide under the mass. Looking around, she didn't see any of the Russian guards.

"Well, shit, that worked," Erica smiled as she looked at Dustin.

"Course it worked," he smiled proudly.

"Good work, Dustin."

"Thanks, Mavis. Now, we just have to get on the bus with the rest of these plebes, and home sweet home, here we come."

"Uh, Dustin?" Steve interfered.

"What?"

"Yeah, we might not wanna go to your house."

"Why?"

"Well, I might've told them your full name."

"What is wrong with you?" Dustin exclaimed.

"Dude, I was drugged."

"So?"

"So? So, you resist. You tough it out. You tough it out like a man."

"Oh, yeah, it's easy for you to say."

Mavis smiled at the interaction, but that smile disappeared when she spotted the Russian guards. And they were checking people's stuff. "Guys?" she said quietly, putting one hand on Steve's shoulder and the other on Dustin's, making them stop walking and see what she was seeing.

"Abort," Dustin said, but everyone was glued to their places. At least until the guards spotted them. "Abort. Abort." And they all started running.

However, they couldn't really go anywhere. There was no way for them to leave the first floor, and to top it off, the escalators were closed.

"Okay, follow me," Mavis said as she sat down on the ground and slid down the part that connected both escalators.

Steve smiled. God, she really was smart. "Come on, let's go, let's go," he urged the rest of the team as they all followed Mavis down.

"Quick thinking, Mavis," Robin complimented her once she made it down.

"Thanks, Robin," she smiled.

"We're not completely safe yet, so come on!" Dustin yelled, making everyone run again.

A while later, they came to a stop, hiding behind the counter of The Greek Cookie, one of the restaurants belonging to the food court. Everyone was panting, trying to calm down their breathing. They didn't know if the Russian guards were still after them, but they couldn't exactly risk it. Hearing footsteps, Mavis brought a finger to her lips, silently telling everyone to hold their breath and stay quiet.

The footsteps were getting closer, and she could feel her heart about to beat out of her chest. This was it. She was going to die there, without having achieved a single thing in her life.

Sensing her distress, Steve put a hand on her knee, giving it a slight squeeze. And surprisingly, it calmed her down. She gave him a small smile.

If she was going to die, then at least she was going to die alongside him. And alongside her friends. There was nothing more romantic than that, right?

However, it seemed as if they weren't going to die. Because suddenly, a car alarm went off, probably making the guards look in its direction. And it seemed like the car was going crazy, the horn honking and everything. She heard one of the guards ask a 'What the hell?', and shortly after that, the loudest sound she had ever heard.

"What the fuck was that?" she whispered.

Her friends shrugged, and they all decided that whatever that had been had killed the guards, and so it was safe for them to look.

And sure enough, the guards were lying dead on the ground, and a car had crashed against one of the restaurants. Mavis assumed it was the car from before, and that it had somehow been used to hit the guards. But how?

She noticed her friends were looking at the first floor, and so she followed their gaze, her eyes widening slightly when she saw none other than Jonathan, Nancy, Mike, Lucas, Will and Max. And in the middle, a girl she had never seen before.

That had to be El.

▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣

"You flung that thing like a Hot Wheel!" Dustin exclaimed between laughs as he ran towards Mike and who Mavis assumed was El, hugging the two of them.

"Lucas?" Erica called out, surprised to see her older brother.

"What are you doing here?" the oldest Sinclair questioned.

"Ask them. It's their fault." Fair enough.

"True, yeah. Totally true. It's absolutely our fault." Mavis nodded at Steve's words.

"I don't understand what happened to that car," Robin said.

"El has superpowers."

"I'm sorry?"

"Superpowers. She threw it with her mind. C'mon, catch up."

"That's El?" the younger Sinclair asked with a smile.

"I think it is," Mavis smiled.

"Who's El?"

"I'm sorry, who are you two?" Nancy asked, looking at the two girls standing on each side of Steve.

"Mavis," Jonathan spoke, a smile on his face. It had been a while since they had seen each other.

"Hey," she smiled at him, not noticing that Steve was looking at the small interaction with a frown on his face.

"I'm Robin. I work with Steve."

"She and Mavis cracked the top secret code."

"Yeah, which is how we found out about the Russians," Steve explained.

"Russians? Wait, what Russians?" Jonathan asked.

"The Russians!"

"Those were Russians?" the redhead girl asked. Mavis knew her name was Max, and that she was the stepsister of Billy Hargrove. How did she know all that? Well, Mavis was very observant.

"Some of them."

"What are you talking about?" Lucas asked. He didn't understand a thing about what was going on.

"Didn't you hear our code red?" Dustin questioned.

"Yeah. Couldn't understand what you were saying," Nancy's brother Mike said.

"Goddamn low battery," Dustin cursed.

"How many times do I have to tell you with the low battery?" Steve scolded him.

"Well, everything worked out, didn't it?"

"Worked out? We almost died," Erica blurted out.

"Yeah, but we didn't, did we?"

"It was pretty damn close," Steve said.

"Enough with the arguing," Mavis glared at them.

"Okay, Russians? As in, they're working for the Russian government?"

"What are you not comprehending? Am I not speaking English? We have a full-blown Red Dawn situation."

"Oh, good comparison, Dustin," Mavis said as her and Dustin shared a smile.

"So this has nothing to do with the gate?"

"It has everything to do with the gate..."

As the group continued to talk, Mavis noticed that El had separated herself from the group, and that her hands were covering her ears. Growing worried, she started to walk towards her when the girl suddenly fell to the ground. Mavis' eyes widened and she rushed over, along with the rest of the group.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Steve exclaimed.

"El! El!" Mike knelt down next to her.

"What's wrong with her?"

"What's wrong? What's wrong? What's wrong?" he asked the girl. And Mavis couldn't help but assume the two had a special connection.

"My leg. My leg," she said struggling.

"Her leg, her leg. Okay," Jonathan started to unwrap the bloody bandage that was wrapped around her left leg. "Get that off," he told Mavis.

"Okay," she did as she was told. When the bandage was off, she brought her forearm to her mouth as everyone exclaimed in disgust. And those exclaims only intensified when something started to move under her flesh.

"What the hell was that?" Mavis asked, standing now next to Steve.

The girl started to wail, and Mike rushed over to her again. "El! El! El! El, are you okay?" the wailing continued. "El! El! El!"

And then Mavis heard the most heart-wrenching scream she had ever heard.

『••✎••』

everyone's back together now, yay! but this also means shit is about to go down, so... i don't know how to feel😶 steve flirting with mavis while high has to be my favorite part of this chapter, but them mocking tammy thompson is a close second😂

anyways, don't be a ghost reader & i'll see you next chapter! 💙

▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣▣

PUZZLE © storyofanotherpaola, 2022.