THATS SO 80s - Steve Harrington

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Four

It was chaotic in Eddie Munson's trailer. We were rushing around, trying to find Nancy's favourtie song. "Come on, Juno, what's her favourtie song!" Robin rushed out as we searched through Eddie's music.

"Uh—Uh—" I stuttered over my words as she pulled out discs. "We have this one song, but I'm not sure if it's her favourtie song!" I cried out. "Eddie! Do you have Girls Just wanna Have fun?!"

"Girls Just wanna Have fun?!" Eddie yelled back, his eyes widening. "No, I don't have—"

"Oh, my God!" I panicked.

"Steve says you need to hurry!" Erica runs to us in Eddie's bedroom.

"Yeah? No shit!" Dustin snapped back.

"We're trying. We can't find anything." Max informed her.

"Seriously? What is all this shit?" Robin asked, clutching all the music tapes.

"What are you even looking for?" Eddie yelled back.

"Madonna, Blondie, Bowie, Beatles?" Robin fumbles around with the tapes. "Music! We need music!"

Eddie snatches the tape from her. "This is music!"

"She's woken up!" Steve yelled, and I rushed over to the riff, seeing Nancy standing inside Eddie's trailer in the real world. I quickly ran over to Nancy and hugged her, she hugged me back tearfully.

We walked over to Max's trailer, and Nancy then sat down and began to explain to us what had happened. "He showed me things that haven't happened yet. The most awful things. I saw a dark cloud spreading over Hawkins. Downtown on fire. Dead soldiers. And this... Giant creature. With... A gaping mouth. And this creature wasn't alone. There were so many monsters. An army. And they were coming into Hawkins. Into our neighbourhoods. Our homes. And then... He showed me, my Mom. And Holly. Mike. And they..." A tear streams down her face. "They were all..." She breaths shakily.

"Okay," Steve spoke up, noticing Nancy wasn't going to share the rest of it. But she didn't have to. We all got the picture. "But... He's just trying to scare you, Nance. Right? I mean... I mean, it's not real."

"Not yet." She whispers tearfully. "But there... There was something else. He showed me gates. Four gates. Spreading across Hawkins. And these gates, they looked like the ones outside of Eddie's trailer, but they didn't stop growing. And this wasn't the Upside Down Hawkins. This was our Hawkins. Our home."

"Four chimes," Max spoke up, and I turned my head to her. "Vecna's clock. It always chimed four times. Four exactly."

"I heard them too." Nancy continued.

Max shakes her head lightly. "He's been telling us his plan this whole time."

"Four kills." Lucas pointed out. "Four gates. End of the world." I bite my lower lip anxiously.

"If that's true..." Dustin stood with his hands on his hips. "He's only one kill away."

"Oh, Jesus Christ," Eddie whispered. "Jesus Christ."

"Try 'em again." Steve pointed at Max. "Try 'em again." We've been trying to get in contact with El, Joyce, Jonathan, Mike, and Will. But they keep not answering.

Max reaches for her phone. Max puts down the phone. "Anything?" Dustin asked.

"No," Max responded. "Rang a few times, then it went to signal."

"Maybe you punched it wrong. Try again." Steve suggested.

"I didn't punch it wrong." Max shakes her head.

"Well, I don't know." Steve shrugged.

"I think she knows how to use a phone." Dustin rolled his eyes.

"I'm just saying," Steve continued. "She could've typed it in wrong."

"Here, let me try." I walked over to the phone and took it from Max before punching in our home phone number. Max was right; it rang a few times and then went to signal. I put the phone down. "She's right. It's the same shit."

"How is that possible?" Lucas asked.

"I told you, Joyce has this telemarketer job." I pointed out. "Always on the phone."

"Yeah, Mike won't stop whining about it," Dustin added on.

"Okay, yeah, but, this phone's been busy for, what, three days now?" Max questioned. "That's not Joyce. No way. Something's wrong."

"She's right." Nancy agreed. "It can't be just a coincidence. It can't be. Whatever's happening in Lenora is connected to all of this. I'm sure of it. But Vecna can't hurt them. Not if he's dead. We have to go back in there. Back to the Upside Down."

"Whoa, no, no, no. What?" Steve asked, acting as if she was crazy. But, I reluctantly agree with her. We have to help them.

"Nope. Nope." Eddie waves his hands about.

"Let's think this through." Steve stands up, walking over to her.

"What is there to think through?" Nancy snapped.

"We barely made it out of there." Steve pointed out.

"Yeah, because we weren't prepared." I stand up, standing next to Nancy and Steve's eyes widen. "But this time, we will be. We'll get weapons and protection. We'll go through the gate, and we'll find his lair, and we'll kill him."

"Or he'll kill us." Steve looked at us like we were crazy. He looked at Nancy. "The only reason you survived it was because he wanted you to. He's not scared of us."

"And for a good reason." Robin stands up. "We were wrong about Vecna—Henry—One. Sorry, what are we calling him now?"

"One." Lucas and Dustin spoke.

"Vecna," Erica added.

"Henry," Nancy spoke up.

"Definitely One." I agreed with the boys.

"Right." Robin agreed. "We learned something about Vecna/Henry/One. He's a number like Eleven, only a sick, evil, male, child-murdering version of her with really bad skin. But my... My point is, he's super powerful. He could turn us inside out with a snap of his fingers. It's not a fair fight."

"So then, why fight fair?" Dustin asked. "You're right. He's like Eleven. But that gives us an upper hand. We know Eleven's strengths. And weaknesses."

"Weaknesses?" Erica asked.

"When El remote travels, she goes into this sort of trance-like state," Dustin explained. "I bet the same is true of Vecna."

"That would explain what he was doing in the attic." Lucas pointed out.

"Exactly." Dustin agreed, pointing a finger toward Lucas. "When he attacks his next victim, I'll bet you he's back in that attic, physical body defenceless."

"Defenceless?" Steve questioned. "What about his army of bats?"

"Right. True." Dustin nodded. "We'll have to find a way past them. Distract them somehow."

"And uh, how do we do that, exactly?" Eddie questions who was sitting next to Erica but stood up.

"No idea," Dustin whispers. Eddie sits back down. "But once they're gone, he doesn't stand a chance. It'll be like slaying sleeping Dracula in his coffin."

"That all sounds good in theory, but there is no pattern to Vecna's killings." Robin makes a good point. "I mean, not one that I can decipher. We don't know when he's going to attack next. We don't even know who he's going to attack."

"Yeah, we do," Max states quietly. We all looked at her. "I can still feel him. I'm still marked. Cursed. I ditch Kate Bush; I draw his focus back on me."

"Max," Lucas whispered, shaking his head. "You can't. He'll kill you."

Max looked at him. "I survived before. I can survive again. I just keep him busy long enough so that you guys can get into that attic. Then you can chop his head off. Stab him in the heart. Blow him up with some explosives Dustin cooks up. I honestly really don't care how you put this asshole in his grave. Just... Whatever it is... Whatever you do... Try not to miss."