THATS SO 80s - Steve Harrington

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-One

Still, by the Skull Rock, Eddie unscrews the cap of a canteen. "When I got to shore, I tried calling you guys, but, uh..." He drinks, he squatted down, and we're standing around him. "My walkie was busted, man. Drenched. So, uh, I did the thing that I do now, apparently. I ran." He chuckled.

"Do you know what time this was?" Nancy asked beside me. "The attack?"

"Yeah, no, I... I know exactly what time it was." He takes off his watch. "My walkie wasn't the only thing that got soaked." Eddie chucks Nancy the watch.

"9.27." Nancy tells us the time it was frozen.

"Same time our flashlights went kablooey." Robin pointed out.

"Which means what, exactly?" Steve asked.

"That that surge of energy was Vecna attacking Patrick," Nancy tells us. She chucks Eddie the watch back.

"Well, we're one step closer," Robin spoke, and I nodded in agreement and side-eyed Dustin who was pacing around, looking at his compass. What was he up to? "We know how Vecna attacks."

"And where he attacks from," Lucas added on.

"So, now we just need to sneak into his lair in the Upside Down and drive a stake through his heart," Max concluded.

"If he even has a heart." Robin scoffed.

"A stake? Is he like a vamp?" Steve asked. "Is he a vampire?"

"It was a metaphor." Max had her arms crossed as she looked at Steve.

"A bullet would work on him, right?" Eddie asked.

"I say we chop his head off." Lucas spat out ideas.

"I like Lucas's idea." I agreed.

"Yeah, I'd say all of the above, but we can't do any of that 'till we find a way into the Upside Down." Nancy pointed out.

I sighed. "We need El to get her powers back."

"Everything was like, way easier." Steve agreed with me. He looked at Eddie. "We had this girl. She had superpowers."

"Superpowers, yeah, you mentioned her." Eddie nodded. "Hey, uh, Henderson's not, uh, cursed, is he?"

"Cursed? No, no." Steve shakes his head. "He's fine. Mental? Absolutely."

"Boom!" Dustin yelled, causing all of us to turn to him. He points at Steve. "Bada... Bada... Boom. I was right. Skull Rock was north."

"Seriously?" Steve asked, annoyed. "You're serious?"

"Yeah, who cares?" I asked. "We're here now. Isn't that all that matters?"

"Yeah, this is Skull Rock!" Steve points to the rock. "Okay? You're totally, absolutely, 100% wrong. Right now."

"Yes." Dustin leans forward. "And no."

"Oh, my God." Steve buried his hands in his face.

Dustin held up his compass. "This compass worked correctly when he left the Wheeler's. It was correct when we got in the car on Curly. But it started to slip the further East we went. Now its way off. When I was leading us here, I wasn't wrong. The compass was."

"So you're using faulty equipment. You're still wrong." Steve said, and I pursed my lips together.

"Compasses are never wrong, though," I spoke up, and Dustin pointed at me and Steve gives me a look. "What?"

"Expect it isn't faulty." Dustin continued. He turned to Lucas. "Lucas, do you remember what can affect a compass?"

"An electromagnetic field," Lucas said, in realisation.

"Yep." Dustin agreed.

"I'm sorry. I must've skipped that class." Robin frowned.

"In the presence of a stronger electromagnetic field, the needle will deflect towards that power." Dustin begins to explain. "So, either there's some super big magnet around here, or..."

"There's a gate." Lucas finished.

"But we're nowhere near the lab." Nancy pointed out.

"But what if, somehow, there's another gate?" Dustin asked. "A gate that we don't know about. It'd have to be smaller. Way less powerful."

"Snack-size gate," Robin speaks.

"How?" Steve asked. "Why?"

"No idea." Dustin shakes his head. "All I know is that something is causing this disturbance, and the last time we've seen anything like it, it was a gate. And I hope it is. Because that we'd have a way to Vecna. And a shot at freeing Max from this curse."

Suddenly, Dustin turned around. "Where are you going?" Steve called. "Hey, hey, hey." Dustin turned back around to us. "Eddie's still a wanted man. We can't just go hike in the woods."

"This little steel capsule might be the key to saving both Max and Eddie." Dustin held up the compass. "What say you, Eddie the Banished?"

Everyone turns to Eddie. "I say you're asking me to follow you into Mordor, which if I'm totally straight with you, I think it's a really bad idea. But, uh, the Shire... The shire is burning." Dustin hops up and down with excitement and Eddie stands. "So Mordor it is."