||𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐄𝐑'𝐒 𝐏𝐎𝐕||

"Still no sign?" Dustin asked.

"Jack shit,"

"Seriously, what is wrong with you guys? I thought we were coming here to play arcade games?"

"We came here to see if Max really is Mad Max."

"You mean stalking?" I smirked. "Hey listen, I'm not really into the whole idea of stalking some poor girl, so I'm gonna go inside and beat some high scores, okay?" I said nonchalantly, pointing my thumb over my shoulder in the direction of the arcade.

"Y/n! Are you crazy? You'll jeopardize our mission!"

I began walking backwards, hands in my pockets as I spoke to the slightly panicked boys.

"Yeah, mmhmm sure. Later guys, you both are welcome to join me if you like. Dustin? If you do end up heading home, just let mom know I'll be home by 7 at the latest."

Leaving them without time to respond, I turned around and head for the arcade doors across the parking lot as I heard their fading protests.

With that, I headed inside.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

"Well, shit." I mumbled.

I hated going to Kieth for stuff. I had only been here twenty minutes and one of the machines already fritzed out again and kept my money. So, I begrudgingly walked over to the counter.

"Well, well, well, look who it is. Little miss too perfect."

"And what is that supposed to mean, Keith?" I sighed, folding my arms on the counter.

"You act like your too good for everyone. It's obnoxious."

"Just because I prefer to practice basic hygiene doesn't mean I'm a snob, it means I have common sense. Who knows what you've contracted handling all these machines." I retort.

"Do you need help or not?" He asked lazily.

He looked me right in the eye and took a large, noisy bite out of his cheeto puffs knowing I hated the sound.

"Forget it," I sighed and turned around about to storm off.

I felt my shoulder collide with another and I backed up at the sudden impact.

"Sorry!"

"Watch it," a girl grumbled, obviously startled.

I looked up to see the girl from class, Max.

"Oh, hey. Max, right?"

"Yeah, how'd you-? Wait... you hang out with those creeps, don't you?" She asked with a frown on her face.

"I should explain," I said, a weak smile on my face. "For one thing, one of those creeps happens to be my brother. And two, yeah... they can be creepy. I'm sorry, I've been trying to get them to back off. They can be a real handful sometimes,"

Her arched eyebrow soften and a small smile creeps up and she visibly relaxes.

"I'm Y/n, by the way," I say.

"Max," she smiled reaching her hand out to shake. "But, I guess you already knew that."

The both us laughed lightly.

"So," She began. "Any particular reason as to why I'm the subject of their interest?"

We began walking side by side and found ourselves by DigDug and I pointed at my brother's name.

"Well, you practically obliterated my brother's top scores and they find it hard to believe a girl is responsible for that,"

There seemed to be a look of confusion on her face.

"Well, you play don't you?"

"Yep, but I guess to them, I don't count,"

"I see,"

I leaned in sort of close, turning her away from the windows when I caught sight of Lucas and Dustin. "Hey listen, I feel like I owe it to you to tell you that they are here right now and it was my mistake to think they wouldn't resort to crouching outside the windows and spying so would you like to go to the opposite end of the arcade where they can't be creeps?"

She looked at me with slightly widened eyes, "Wait, you knew they were here?"

"They tricked me into coming, I thought we where gonna play, but when I realized it was a stakeout to see if you were MadMax, I told them off and came inside to play, I swear."

"Oh," her face softened slightly. "Well, thanks."

She casually glanced over her shoulder, and grabbed my arm. "Come on, follow me,"

With a growing smile on my face I followed.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

Max and I had a surprisingly good time. We hid out in the corner behind one of the machines and messed with Keith. Eventually Max had to leave, this gross scuz showed up blasting AC/DC who I could only assumed was the notorious asshole of a stepbrother that she briefly mentioned.

She barely talked about him but with the what little knowledge I did have of him, I felt bad for her and I suddenly was reminded of how extremely lucky I am to have someone like Dustin as my brother.

Before I could even realize it, I was pulling into the drive way, parking my bike. I had biked home with Dustin who had been gnawing my ear off trying to pry information from me about Max but I tuned him out.

"Seriously, Y/n, why can't you just tell me what she was like?"

Dustin was parking his bike as I went through the front door ahead of him, assuming he was behind me.

"Because, for the last time Dustin, I'm not some spy that's gonna feed you information because you're too chicken to reach out and talk to her like a normal human being," I shed my coat and was hanging it up by the front door.

I turned to face my brother only to see he wasn't behind me. I walked towards the front door and peeked outside to see him cautiously stalking towards the garbage can.

"Dustin?"

He nearly jumped two feet in the air and whipped around to face me.

"Jesus! Y/n, don't do that to me!"

"I'm... sorry, are you okay? What the hell happened?"

He looked over his shoulder at the trash can once more and then back at me, sighing as he trudged inside.

"Nothing, thought I heard something,"

||𝟑𝐑𝐃 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍 𝐏𝐎𝐕||

The Byers household was filled with the smiles and the aroma of popcorn as everyone prepared for movie night. Jonathan could hear the sounds of his mother's voice as he made his way to his younger brothers room.

"Well, put the future down and get me a clean bowl."

Jonathan gently rapped his knuckles on the door to Will's room before opening the door. Will was sitting on his bed, his legs crossed as he colored.

"Hey, bud. I didn't know what you'd like, so I got a variety." He held up the VHS tapes to show his brother before putting them on a nearby shelf. "Take your pick."

Will lightly shrugged before returning to his drawing. "Whatever you want,"

"All right," Jonathan came forward and took a seat across from his brother on his bed. "What are you working on?"

He leaned over to see the picture of of a boy in ripped and ragged clothing with a snarl on his face, the words "Zombie Boy" next him.

"Zombie Boy? Who's Zombie Boy?"

Will looked slightly uncomfortable at the question before mumbling, "me,"

"Did someone call you that?"

Will didn't respond.

"Hey. You can talk to me. You know that, right? Whatever happened. Will, come on, talk to me."

Will's head whipped up. "Stop treating me like that." He snapped.

Jonathan was hurt, not by his brother's words but the fact that his brother was clearly struggling and he didn't know how to help.

"What? Like what?"

"Like everyone else. Like there's something wrong with me."

"What are you talking about?"

"Mom, Dustin, Lucas. Everyone. They treat me like I'm gonna break. Like I'm a baby. Like I can't handle things on my own. It doesn't help. It just makes me feel like more of a freak."

"You're not a freak."

"Yeah, I am. I am,"

"You know what? You're right." Jonathan picked himself up and sat crisscross on the bed across his brother. "You are a freak"

Will looked up at his brother, taken aback.

"What?"

"No, I'm serious. You're a freak. But what? Do you wanna be normal? Do you wanna be just like everyone else? Being a freak is the best. I'm a freak."

Will tried to make sense of this. "Is that why you don't have any friends?"

Jonathan chuckled, running a hand through his hair. "I have friends, Will."

"Then why are you always hanging out with me?"

"Because you're my best friend, all right? And I would rather be best friends with Zombie Boy than with a boring nobody. You know what I mean? Okay, look... who would you rather be friends with? Bowie, or Kenny Rogers?"

Will smiled, and shivered. "Ugh,"

"Exactly. It's no contest. The thing is, nobody normal ever accomplished anything meaningful in this world. You got it?"

"Well... some people like Kenny Rogers." Will offered.

"Kenny Rogers." Came a excited voice from the doorway.

The boys turned to see their mother's boyfriend, Bob standing in the doorway. "I love Kenny Rodgers." He chuckled.

The boys looked at each other with matching grins.

Bob walked in with a friendly smile on his face. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing" Will giggled, and Bob picked up the VHS tapes, examining them.

Suddenly his eyes lit up once he saw one of the movie selections. "Mr. Mom." Bob loud a loud cheer. "Perfect!" And he left with an enthusiastic grin.

As soon as he was around the corner, the brother looked at each other and burst into fits of laughter.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The worker at Hawkins lab only had an hour left to go on his shift. In his spell of boredom, he had brought along his Walkman and was blaring one of his favorite songs as he repeatedly bounced the rubber ball against the wall. He would bounce and catch. Bounce and catch. Bounce and then catch. Until, he noticed the light dancing off the wall he had been so focused on.

He turned around in his chair and felt his heart start pounding rapidly. The control panel he was supposed to be keeping an eye on was lighting flashing rapidly. He ripped his headphones of his head and it was only then that he heard the blaring of alarms around the building.

He knew what that alarm was.

Systems were down.

There was some monitoring systems out there. Out in the Nether. To maintain and feed back levels and information for observation.

"A fuse must of blown." The man told himself.

But then a dreadful thought popped into his head. He had no idea where it came from, and he had no reason for such paranoia. Almost as if something whispered it in his ear like the devil on his shoulder.

"Or maybe," he dismissed the thought as soon as fast it came. "Something else was responsible for this."

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

It was nearly two a.m. and the Byers house was dead silent. The only sounds that could be heard was the soft hum of the clock's gears as the second hand made laps around the clock and the soft rhythmic plink of the leaky faucet.

Will Byers awoke, lazily pulling himself out of bed and walking down the hallway, his feet patting across the floor to the bathroom.

The sound of the toilet flushing was slowly waking him up, but he was still plagued with drowsiness as he turned on the faucet and sleepily washed his hands.

Suddenly, he froze when he thought he heard the sound of low rumbling in the distance. He turned off the faucet, leaving the room quiet so he could listen. Sure enough, he heard rumbling coming from outside. Warily, he crept towards the bathroom door and opened it, surprised to see red flashing through the glass window on the front door. Deep violets and reds flashed across the living room accompanied by the sound of he could only guess to be thunder.

He fearfully crept towards the front door. He came to a stop when he heard the dreadful sound of wood creaking and he watched in horror as the front door slowly swung open to reveal a reddish purple sky, and the violent winds were carrying leaves and other debris with it. Something strange was growing around the outside of the house and he felt the familiar sensation returning.

His felt his blood run cold and his skin shriveled up and goosebumps broke out all over. His breathing picked up and he could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand up as he watched frozen in terror.

Suddenly, his body was moving without his permission, and his legs carried him through the front door and out onto his front lawn. His hair and clothes were swept up in the wind and he came to a halt when he saw the horrors in front of him.

The sky was a mess of black clouds and red lightning bolts shooting from the sky like daggers with thunderous booms. The clouds swirled together like a violent whirlpool in the sky and with every flash of lighting, the blood red sky was illuminating a dark towering figure.

It stood hundreds of feet tall and looked over the fields in the distance. It almost resembled a spider, only it it was all limbs. It's head was a large crescent arch and as Will stared on in terror, it slowly turned its head. And even though it had no facial features, Will knew it was looking right at him.

The Shadow Monster.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

Hopper pulls his car to a stop. He always hated the drive out here. He preferred his grandfathers cabin to his run down trailer by the lake, but driving in the woods at night was not something he liked doing. Regardless, he parked in the same spot he always did and put the car in park. He grabbed his hat and placed it on his head, stepping out of the car. He could feel the mud shift below his boots as he walked along the forest floor. Without even having to glance at the ground, his foot raised itself to step over the trip wire that was rigged around the area. He walked,up the porch steps and pulled open the screen door.

It took him less than a second to remember the rhythmic knock he had come up with and began knocking on the door.

Two quick knocks. Pause. Knock. Pause. Knock knock knock.

As usual, there a beat of silence and then the sound of the locks coming undone.

The man turned the door knob and stepped inside, he was greeted by the sounds of the TV and an otherwise empty room. He glanced over to see the spare bedroom door was cracked, soft yellow light spilling out from behind the door.

He closed the front door behind him and hung his hat and coat on the coatrack. He then made his way over to the small television and switched it off. He walked across the room to the kitchen, unbuckling his holster from his belt and setting it down on the counter and then retrieved a can of beer from the fridge.

He lazily trudged over to the kitchen table and frowned at the plate of a single, half eaten Ego that stood out against the trays of microwaveable dinner that were placed before each chair.

"Hey, what'd we talk about?" He softly called.

He pulled the yellow chair out and took a seat in his normal spot, anxious to eat after a long day.

"No signal," a young female voice carried across the cabin from the other room.

He sat down, a frown on his face.

"What?"

"No signal. It's 8-1-5. You're late." The voice scolded.

He took a deep breath, hoping she wasn't too upset with him.

"Yeah, I lost track of time. I'll signal next time, all right?" He looked up as he heard the sound of the bedroom door opening and the small patter of feet. He looked up as he saw the girl come into view and sit down across from him. "Uh, and it's 8:15. It's not 8-1-5." He informed the girl.

Eleven wore a baggy grey sweatshirt and a pair of overalls. Her hair was longer now. It was still short, but it had length. It was a mop of curly brown hair. She looked at Hopper and repeated slowly.

"Eight-fifteen."

Hopper rolled up his sleeves so as to not dirty his uniform with dinner. He looked at the girl with a soft yet stern look. "Now, what did we talk about? Dinner first, then dessert. Always. That's a rule,"

He leaned forward, and half smiled. "Yeah?"

"Yes," she replied.

They shared a smile and got started on their dinner, silently enjoying each other's company.