Time After Time (a Stranger Things fanfiction)

Eye of the Tiger

"Eye of the Tiger"

Went the distance, now I'm back on my feet

Just a man and his will to survive

- Survivor

The table full of men had grown very quiet, and very still. The sound of them stuffing themselves had ceased as they sat there staring at the food, unable to eat another bite now that they knew what it meant.

The guard came back in for them, lighting a cigarette, while they all sat waiting, the weight of their very short future resting hard on them.

Hopper, with the bottle of booze squirreled away in his coat, really wanted to get his hands on the guard's lighter. They needed fire, if they were going to have a chance against this thing. And more than anything in the world, Hopper wanted to kill it. He didn't know how the Russians had a demogorgon, or why, or what they eventually intended to do with it ... but he was going to take it down, if it was the last thing he did, before it could threaten his girl, or Joyce's boy. Whatever happened here, they deserved to be safe. Or, at least, as safe as Jim Hopper could make them.

Mocking them for leaving such good food on the table, the guard motioned to everyone to get up. They followed him, slowly and dispiritedly, out into the courtyard.

Hopper almost welcomed the bite of the cold. It had been too hot in the room with the food; it had made him feel sluggish. The food would have, too, if he'd eaten it. He was used by now to working hard without adequate food—eating the way the other men had would have made him nauseous by now, and slowed his reactions.

Antonov glared at him over his shoulder. "You want to make a fool of yourself, go ahead. But to bring down these men, leaving them with no hope, what is the purpose of that?"

"I tell them truth. You feed their delusion." Facing facts was always better than pretending, in Hopper's view.

"Not delusions. Hope!" Antonov turned to face him. "I believe we can fight. I believe we can win." Before Hopper could point out that he'd never seen a demogorgon, he continued, "I have a son, Mikhail. I cannot leave this world with him believing his father is a traitor. I need to get back to him, and I will get back to him."

While he was talking, Hopper had decided how he was going to get to the lighter. He deliberately laughed in Antonov's face. "Is he slow?"

"What?"

"Mikhail, your son, is ... is he slow? Is he stupid?"

The guard paused near them and ordered them to stop talking, but Antonov was irked, as Hopper had intended him to be. "No, he's very smart. Top of his class."

"Be silent!" the guard snapped in Russian.

This was going exactly the way Hopper had hoped. "Then you're not his father."

As the guard continued to scream, Antonov frowned. "You are drunk, American. I would stop speaking unless you wish to die sooner."

"I can. It doesn't really matter. I know that I'm gonna die today." That much was absolutely true. "But guess what? I know who I am and what I've done, unlike you and these men, who can't face the truth. You know that you're the reason why we're in here." He struck Antonov in the chest, just enough to rile him. "You're going to die today. Your son is not your son, and your wife—"

In the face of Hopper's stream of abuse and the increasingly hysterical orders of the guard for them to shut up, Antonov was pushed to do exactly what Hopper had hoped he would—haul off and punch him in the face. He landed a few more blows before Hopper caught his arms and pushed him backward, and then the two of them were at it, their fellow prisoners shouting encouragement. And, just as Hopper had hoped, the guards waded in to pull them off each other. He pretended to stumble and fell into the guard holding him, knocking him off balance, and both he and Antonov got free and crashed into each other again.

The guard with the lighter was reaching for his sidearm, and Hopper disengaged from Antonov and charged him instead, lifting him and throwing him over his shoulder, the two of them landing on the ground, Hopper's elbow smashing the guard in the face. He was out like a light. Of course, soon after that, so was Hopper, when the butt of a rifle connected with his forehead, but it was worth it, because he had the lighter.

He came to back in the outdoor cell. So. He had bought them some time, as well as a weapon to fight the creature with. Hopefully by the time they dragged them out into the courtyard again, the others would have digested enough of their meal to be back in full fighting condition.

The guard he had taken the lighter from was back on his feet, standing outside the locked cell door. Quietly, in Russian, he said, "You do that again, we shoot you on the spot. Fools."

"You happy now, American?" Antonov snapped at him. "Was that worth it? Was that worth it?!"

Hopper dragged himself slowly and painfully to a sitting position. Once he was sure he had enough breath back, he said, "We call it a Demogorgon. I don't know how they got it here or what the hell they're doing with it, but everything I said about it's true. Except it has one weakness. Fire. Hates fire. So I figure, if we want a shot at killing this thing, we need some fuel, and I need something to light it with." He took the booze out of his coat, and the lighter, flicking it so the flame came to life. "So you asked me if it was worth it? To answer your question ..." He blew out the little flame. "Yeah. I think it was worth it."

Antonov caught on quick. His mouth curved up in a smile. "You son of a bitch. You son of a bitch!"

Hopper started laughing, which was a very painful experience. "Oh, don't make me laugh. My ribs are broken. Don't make me laugh."

And the two of them proceeded to sit there and cackle like hyenas, even as Hopper groaned with pain in the process.