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EVERYTHING WENT SILENT once the lights went out.
It was a heavy, reverent silent. For some reason, Lucas decided, in the dark, you feel the need to be quiet. As if not to disturb... something.
A slumber. A threat.
A monster.
Dark thoughts flitted through Lucas's head. He let out a sigh of relief when the lights flickered back on again, illuminating the terrified faces of everyone in the room.
Dr. Owens walked over to the wall of security camera footage, pointing at the one in the middle. "Look, this is us, and this is the nearest exit. But even if we somehow make it there, there's no way out."
"What do you mean?" Hopper asked, his expression darkening.
"The locks are fail secure," Owens said.
"Fail secure?" Joyce repeated. She looked back at her unconscious twins, clearly wondering how she could possibly get them out of here.
Lucas was wondering the same thing.
"If there's a power outage," Owens explained, "the building goes on lockdown."
"Dumbass settings," Lucas muttered from his spot on the floor.
Bob Newby ignored him. "Can it be unlocked remotely?"
"With a computer, sure," Owens ran a hand down his face. "But somebody's gotta reset the breakers."
"So... we're stuck in here?" Lucas's throat tightened, and he had the urge to grab Caroline and close his eyes, just block out the rest of the world.
"Not necessarily," Hopper told him. He looked back at Owens. "Where are the breakers?"
"Breakers are in the basement, three floors down."
Hopper set his jaw. He grabbed the flashlight from a side table and turned it on.
Bob Newby stood in front of the door, blocking Hopper in. He spoke before Lucas could ask the same question. "Hey, where are you going?"
"To reset the breakers," Hop said, annoyed. Clearly, he didn't seem to like the idea of being stopped by Joyce's boyfriend, especially when he was so obviously jealous of the two.
It was at this moment that Lucas would have nudged Caroline if she'd been awake, so they could joke about her mother and Hop. He felt a sudden surge of sadness when it really dawned on him that Caroline wasn't waking up any time soon.
Lucas would have to do all this by himself.
Without Caroline, the world seemed a lot more lonely.
Bob was standing straight, looking unblinkingly at Hopper. "Okay, then what?"
"Then we get out of here," Hopper said angrily.
"No," Bob shook his head. "Then the power comes back on. If you wanna unlock the doors, you have to reboot the computer system, and then override the security codes with a manual input."
