Yours Truly | B. Hargrove

34

As most of the group worked on getting whatever was in El's leg, out, Eden had a hard time pulling her stomach together. Steve stood with her, rubbing her back and holding her hair as she retched and dry heaved.

"Listen, I'm sorry for being such a bad friend this year. You know this- this whole shit show has really kept me occupied." Steve apologized once Eden got a break from her stomach.

"No-no i get it. I mean I was pissed off at you for a while, but now I totally get it." The girl laughed.

"I'm sorry you got pulled into this." He whispered.

"Don't be. My life needed a bit of excitement." She placed her hand upon his, "I'm just glad everyone's made it alive so far. I-I don't even know how I still am."

"It'll stay like this. I promise, everyone will be okay." He quickly nodded, taking her hand in his.

A scream cut them off and Eden saw something dart across her peripheral. As she lifted her head she noticed 3 older figures, Jim  Hopper stepped on whatever living thing was in El's leg. She also noticed a girl who was known as Will's mom, Joyce and some man she'd never seen before. Hopper immediately rushed to El's side and she wondered what was going on there. While Hopper comforted in the girl he saw as his daughter, he also wanted an update on what was going on in their strange world.

"The mind Flayer, it built this monster in Hawkins, to stop El, to kill her and pave a way into our world." Mike explained.

"And almost did. That was only one tiny piece of it." Nancy added, speaking about the creepy little creature they found in El.

"How big is this thing?" Hopper asked.

"It's big. 30 feet at least." Jonathan nodded.

"Yeah and uh... it sort of destroyed your cabin. Sorry." Lucas added in a whisper.

"Okay, so just to be clear, this- this big sort of fleshy spider thing that hurt El.. it's some kind of gigantic weapon?" Steve asked.

"Yes dingus." Eden rolled her eyes.

"But instead of like, screws and meta, the Mind Flayer made its weapon with melted people?" The boy almost gagged.

"Yes, exactly." Nancy nodded.

"Yeah, okay. I'm just- making sure." He shuddered and Eden put her arm on his shoulder.

They began to explain how they could stop the Mind Flayer when the weird bald headed man came walking with papers in hand. He explained that they were diagrams of the secret Russian base. Another Russian, Alexei, helped him out in drawing them up. Erica stepped in basically saying if they waltzed in there they'd be killed, so Dustin helped them in finding a safe route. He said they'd need navigators but Hopper shut down that idea. However, when the older man was disarming one of the dead Russians, he tried to pass Dustin a walkie talkie, telling him he could navigate just from a safe place. The boy determined that it wouldn't work and he'd need something with a higher frequency.

That's when he decided he had to use his cerebro.

"Please be careful." Eden whispered, pulling Steve into a tight hug.

"Always. When am I not?" He shot her an award winning smile after pulling away.

"I'm serious Steve.." the girl bit her lip out of nervousness.

"So am I! Are you doubting me?" He pouted, causing Eden to give out a small laugh.

"Never."

After bidding goodbyes and see you laters, Steve, Robin, Erica and Dustin all exited the building to find their way to Dustin's cerebro.