𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦 𝐠𝐢𝐫𝐥

039. Make Him Pay.

THE RV is parked in the woods near the trailer park, the group of five watch as Nancy stood at the front of the RV, "okay. I wanna run through it one more time." She turns to them. "Phase one," she raised a finger. "We meet Erica at the playground. She'll signal Max and Lucas when we're ready." Robin says as Nancy rasied another finger, "phase two."

"Max baits Vecna." Steve says, looking at Nancy, "he'll go after her, which'll put him in his trance." He added. "Phase three?" She asked next. "Me and Eddie draw the bats away." Dustin points over his shoulder at the man standing behind him who then shakes the boy's head gently. "We head into Vecna's hopefully newly bat-free lair, and..." Val says and Robin raised one of the molotovs, "flambé."

"Nobody moves on to the next phase until we've all copied. Nobody deviates from the plan, no matter what. Got it?" Nancy now asked and the other five all nod and say "got it," in sync. They all got up and got ready, following behind Nancy through the woods and all the way to Eddie's trailer where Steve heads in first, switching the light on and walking in.

Nancy, Robin, Val, Dustin and Eddie follow in after, with the Munson shutting the door behind him. "Be careful." Dustin tells Steve who was getting ready. "Thanks, buddy." The older pats his shoulder gently before stepping up. "Here goes nothing." He starts climbing and Eddie stands by Val, staring up at Steve. They all watch him slowly climb through then flip over, he then looked up at them.

He shrugs lightly and Eddie just smirked as Robin raised her hands, "whoo, what does he want us to do, applaud?" She looks at Nancy who had been smiling, a bit impressed and Val turns her head to look up at Eddie to her side who was still smiling just slightly, lips quirked up to the side as he stared up at the gate. "Eddie." She says, giggling quietly.

"Get off my back." He tells her quickly as Steve brought over the other Upside Down mattress that belonged to Eddie. "Alright, let's go." Steve told them so Val shoves Eddie to the rope. "Ladies first." She says and he just stuck his tongue out at her before he began climbing through, Val then watched happily as Steve pulled Eddie up, patting his back as the two shared looks at one another. Nancy goes next, taking off her bag and Robin plops down, patting her knee. "Thanks." The Wheeler says before she steps onto her knee, going through next, then both Eddie and Steve helped her up, they toss over a few things next.

Then Valerie went through next, being pulled up rather easily by Eddie. Then Robin came through the gate next and Valerie held out both hands to her. Robin took both and mostly pushed herself up because Valerie was tiny compared to her. Dustin came through the gate last, being pulled up to his feet by both Steve and Dustin. The group of six gather up their things, before leaving the trailer, Nancy first, Robin and Val right behind her, with Steve also behind her, then Dustin and Eddie.

"Hey, guys, listen." Steve suddenly turns to the other two so Nancy, Val and Robin stop as well, turning to look at them. "If things here start to go south, I mean, at all, you abort." He tells them and Valerie glanced between the three boys. Why was Steve coming with her, Robin and Nancy anyway? "Okay? Draw the attention of the bats. Keep 'em busy for a minute or two. We'll take care of Vecna. Don't try to be cute or be a hero or something. Okay, you guys are just--" "decoys." Dustin says in sync with him then Valerie walked over.

"Don't worry, you can be the hero, Steve."

"Absolutely. I mean, look at us. We are not heroes." Eddie looks at Steve, smiling and Valerie pats Steve's arm before grabbing the bag aggressively from him. "Steve," she says when she saw his confused look and she pointedly nods towards Dustin and Eddie who then share a glance at one another. Nancy looks over at Robin who shrugs.

"Us, ladies, will be fine. We don't need big, strong, manly Steve Harrington. We have big, strong, womanly Nancy Wheeler. And her big gun. We'll be fine. Stay here with the dinguses..." She says and he glanced at the other two boys, mostly at Dustin before finally looking at Eddie who's staring at him with an unknown stare, almost as if hoping that he'll stay and help them out or something.