𝐈 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐘𝐨𝐮'𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐧 𝐈𝐝𝐢𝐨𝐭 (𝘋𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯 𝘏𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯)

24: How many times do i have to tell you with the low battery?

┏━━━━━━༻❁༺━━━━━━┓
𝐘/𝐧'𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐯
┗━━━━━━༻❁༺━━━━━━┛

Steve, Dustin, Robin, Erica and I ran across the mall floor towards the escalators where our friends were coming down, just as eager to see us as we were to them.

El and Mike came down first, her arm draped over his shoulders, using his body for support as she limped.

As we got closer, I realized we were right in front of the gap, a memory of when El, Max and I went there, thinking this summer would be normal.

"You flung that thing like a hot Wheel!" Dustin laughed, grabbing my arm as he ran up to Mike and El and pulled us all into a hug.

"Yeah, we would've been Russian property if you didn't save us!" I chuckled, hugging El tightly.

"Lucas?" I heard Erica ask, making me pull away and turn to her.

"What are you doing here?" Lucas sneered.

"Ask them." Erica said, pointing to Steve and Robin. "It's their fault."

"True, yeah." Steve agreed.

"Totally true." Robin nodded her head.

"It's absolutely our fault." Steve added.

"I don't understand what happened to that car." Robin blurted out, her eyes darting around wildly.

"El has superpowers." Dustin explained shortly.

Robin's eyes went wide. "I'm sorry?"

"Superpowers." I said. "She threw it with her mind. She's a psychic."

"C'mon, catch up." Steve added.

"That's El?" Erica asked, pointing at Eleven with wide eyes.

"Who's El?" Robin pressed.

"I'm sorry," Nancy butted in, staring at Robin. "Who are you?"

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

"She helped crack the top secret code." Dustin said.

"Yeah, which is how we found out about the Russians in the first place." I said.

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

Honestly I think everyone was confused.

Steve pointed at the unconscious Russian men on the ground. "The Russians!"

"Those were Russians?" Max asked, eyes wide.

"Some of them." Erica nodded.

"What are you talking about?!" Lucas cried.

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

"Yeah." Mike spat. "And I couldn't understand half of what you were saying!"

"Goddamn low battery." Dustin said.

"How many times do I have to tell you with the low battery?" Steve asked, motioning with his hands.

"Okay, well, everything worked out, didn't it, Steve?" Dustin said.

"Worked out?" Erica scoffed. "We almost died!"

"Yeah, but we didn't, did we?" He put his hands on his hips.

"It was pretty damn close." I pointed out, raising my eyebrows.

"Okay." Lucas stopped us. "Russians? As in, they're working for the Russian government?"

I rolled my eyes. "No, Lucas, the Russians are working for the Mexican government. What are you not comprehending?!" I asked, sarcasm lacing my tone.

"Are we not speaking English? We have a full-blown Red Dawn situation." Dustin said.

"So this has nothing to do with the gate?" Max crossed her arms.

"It has everything to do with the gate!" Dustin said loudly.

"Then why-" Whoever had started speaking was cut short by groan and a thud behind us.

We all turned to see the source of the noise was El, now on the floor in pain.

"El!" Mike gasped as we all ran to her aid.

"What's wrong with her?" Erica breathed.

"What's wrong?" I asked, kneeling at her side beside Mike.

"My leg!" She sobbed. "My leg!"

"Her leg, her leg, okay." Jonathan said. He was the closest to her leg, so he rolled up her pant leg as I wiped some rogue tears from her face. "Get that off."

El grabbed my hand, holding it tightly as Nancy peeled away some bloody gauze that was wrapped around her shin.

We all grimaced and gasped when it uncovered a deep gash. It looked like it had started to get infected and it was bone deep, but that wasn't the most shocking part, no. It was the fact that it looked as though something white was moving around inside of her leg, like what dart looked like before he sprouted legs.

Holy, shit.

Word count: 711