bitchin'

Chapter 11

"Is the gate underground?" Hopper asks.

"Yes," Eleven answers.

"Near a large water tank?" he asks. She nods.

"How... how do you know all that?" Lindsay asks.

"He's seen it," Mike says.

"Is there any way that you could... that you could reach Will? That you could talk to him in—-" Joyce asks Eleven.

"In the Upside Down," Eleven says.

"Yeah," Joyce says. She nods.

"And my friend, Barbara?" Nancy asks, "Can you find her too?"

"Barb?" Lindsay asks.

"Yeah, she's been missing," Nancy informs her.

"Since the pool party?" Lindsay asks. Nancy's eyes light up, remembering that Lindsay was at the party.

"D-did you see something? Did you see something that night?" Nancy asks.

"I thought I did. But then Steve said it was nothing, but I swear I saw something out there," Lindsay exclaims.

"What did you see?" Hopper asks.

"I'm not sure. It was dark out, but it was tall and human-like maybe? I thought it was someone trespassing on the property, but there was nothing there when Steve came and checked," the Harrington girl explains.

"Eleven, let's have you search first," Hopper decides. She nods. The boys pull out the Supercomm and turn it to static. Mike sets it down in front of her, so she can hear. Nancy pulls out a picture of Barbara and lets Eleven look at it. Everyone surrounds her, quietly waiting for her to find them. She closes her eyes and within a couple seconds the light goes out. Then it flickers back on.

She opens her eyes, "I'm sorry."

"What?" Joyce stutters, "What's happened? What's wrong?"

"I can't find them," she sniffles. Joyce turns to Jonathan, Will's older brother, sniffling. Eleven gets up from the table and walks over to the hallway. Mike follows her, coming back a second later.

"She might need to recharge," Mike says.

"What do you mean?" Hopper asks.

"Whenever she uses her powers she gets weak," he explains.

"The more energy she uses, the more tired she gets," Dustin adds.

"Like, she flipped a van earlier," Lucas says.

"It was awesome!" the curly-haired boy exclaims.

"Yeah, I made eye contact with the driver as he went over my head!" Lindsay adds excitedly.

"But she's drained," Mike continues.

"Like a bad battery," Dustin adds.

"Well..." Joyce asks, "how do we make her better?"