The One || Steve Harrington

The Flayed

Georgia stumbled into the wall, barely glancing at Steve, though she held his hand like it was her lifeline.

"I shouldn't have pressed the buttons!" Steve yelled half apologetically, half panicked, squeezing her hand. "I'll listen to the they next time, I promise!"

She could barely hear them over the Dustin, Robin, and Erica's screaming.

"There better not be a next time!" Georgia rushed, her shoulders shaking.

They were in actual free fall, and who knew how long it would last or when they'd end up when they finally reached the bottom.

What was at the bottom? Could they even take the elevator back to the top?

The room jolted much harder than it had before.

"We're going down!" Steve screamed, one hand tugging Georgia on stumbling feet closer to him, the other wrapped around one of the metal shelves, which seemed to be drilled into place.

"Yeah, no shit, Harrington!" Robin yelled; her expression was one of pure panic.

"Why don't these buttons work?" Dustin shrieked, frantically hitting more buttons in a useless effort to stop the elevator.

"Press the damn button!" Erica screamed, clenching her fists as she squinted at them.

"I thought we established that the elevator buttons don't work!" Georgia screamed, her voice full of panic. Her chest felt like it could explode from anxiety, and the further down they went, the worse it got.

The elevator jerked sharply, hitting what had to be the bottom of the elevator shaft. The sudden jolt sent the group flying to the floor and, in Georgia's case, directly into Steve.

They plummeted to the floor, Steve taking the brunt of the fall just as the box with the mysterious substance slid off the table and directly onto her stomach, effectively knocking the wind out of her.

Shit.

"Shit," Steve groaned, his hand fumbling around her until it hit the box.

"Oh, my God," Georgia wheezed, pushing the heavy box to the side with Steve's help and rolling off him.

That really fucking hurt.

Those boxes were much heavier than they looked and far pointer.

Steve rubbed her back, his hands working their way underneath her arms and helping her to her feet.

"I'm fine," Georgia groaned, bending until her chest hit her knees. "Those boxes are surprisingly heavy."

In one, two, three, out four, five, six.

"Is everyone okay?" Robin gasped, her hand gently prodding Georgia's shoulder.

"Yeah, I'm great, now that I know that Russians can't design elevators!" Steve shouted angrily, and he rushed forward, shoving Dustin to the side in his second attempt to hit the up button.

"I think we've clearly established that those buttons don't work," Robin muttered, clasping her hands over her head as she paced.

"They're buttons! They have to do something," Steve replied, equally as panicked and fearful as the rest of them.

"Yeah, if we had a keycard," Robin pointed dejectedly at the panel.

"A what?"

"It's an electronic lock," Georgia said frustratedly, gesturing at the black bump out on the wall.

Was dismantling the box an option? No, even if she did, the chances they'd no who to reconfigure it were slim to zero. "Like the one on the loading dock door, which means it won't operate because we don't have the card-"