"I swear, if I'm dying tonight because of you, I'm gonna haunt your ass so hard, Harrington!"
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah! I'm gonna go full Poltergeist and shit!"
"Then bring it, Graveswood."
"Challenge accepted."
***
In which after years of suppressing their...
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Chapter One-Hundred-And-Fifty-One: Frozen In Time
(The Massacre At Hawkins Lab, Pt. 3)
***
Rowan's heart pounded inside her chest as Nancy slowly opened the door. Lightning flickered in her veins, unease and adrenaline mixing together, sparks fizzing over her hands with each creaking inch of the door. It was feasible there was nothing inside—Rowan hadn't sensed anything—but that didn't mean it was safe. Hence, the lightning barely kept under her skin.
When the door fully opened, the group of seven slowly walked inside, one after the other, until they were standing in the foyer of what was the Wheeler home. Rowan eyed it, saw the same slime and vines that were present everywhere else in the Upside Down, the spots of mould, rot and other signs of decay, the same ashy flakes drifting in the air that serrated Rowan's lungs with each breath, when it wasn't sticking to her lungs and throat with a cloying poison. And yet, this was still a place she knew, a place she was familiar with. It was strange, and slightly violating, to see it so warped and twisted with the Upside Down's rot.
As they crept forward, Robin eyed their surroundings and quipped, "Might be time to get a maid, Wheeler."
"I don't think any maid could clean all of this, Robin," Leo muttered, also looking at the rot uncomfortably.
"Come on. I don't want to stay here any longer than we have to," Nancy said as she moved to the stairs.
"Agreed," Rowan said, eyeing the basement as she too moved to the stairs. As unlikely as it would be, Rowan didn't want to know what could be lurking in the basement of this house. Because if horror movies and fighting the Upside Down taught her anything, then only monsters could be hiding in it.
As Rowan climbed up the stairs behind Nancy, the creaking steps telling her the others were right behind her, she tried to ignore the creeping feeling something wasn't right, telling herself it was the feeling of the Upside Down, that maybe she was sensing the Mind Flayer, lurking somewhere in this hell-world, but a niggling thought in her head told Rowan that wasn't it. That it was something else.
Still, Rowan pushed it away as she followed after Nancy into her bedroom. As she, Robin, Eddie, Valerie and Leo crowded around in it, Nancy opened her wardrobe and pulled down the box Rowan knew was the box her guns were in from the top shelf before heading over to her desk. Rowan looked over to see if Steve was there, but he wasn't. Rowan frowned, a spike of worry shooting through her, especially with her weird feeling, but Steve was probably fine. Probably.
So, she joined up with the others as Nancy lifted the lid of her box, revealing... tissue paper and purple pumps.
Rowan's eyebrows rose at seeing it. She knew Nancy didn't pick the wrong box or misplace her guns, not with Holly in the house, that was definitely the box her guns were in. So where the hell were they?
