𝐎𝐍𝐋𝐘 𝐈𝐍 𝐇𝐀𝐖𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐒

thirty-two

"only one person knows what really happened."  dustin said, looking between max and her sister.

sam nodded. "yeah. but how do we find him? we've already established he's nowhere in sight."

"we make some calls? i don't know!" dustin replied. "have you talked to anyone else?"

max shook her head. "no. i can't get a hold of lucas, or nancy, and mike's-"

"in california," both teens realized at once, looking between each other, "dammit."

"shit shit shit." dustin added, putting a hand to his hat. "we need to go find steve and robin."

sam smiled, gesturing to dustin's hat. "now you're using that thinking cap."

as the three made their way to the door, claudia looked up. "where are you going?"

"uh.. seeing some friends." sam replied.

"you heard the news. it's not safe!" dustin's mother responded, but she didn't make a move to get up from her spot on the couch.

dustin smiled. "good point, we'll be careful."

"thanks. love you. bye." dustin spoke as he closed the door behind him, following sam to her car.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

when they arrived at family video, sam burst through the doors immediately. "hey!! what are you-" steve's smile at the sight of his girlfriend dimmed when he noticed the two kids that sprinted in front of her to the register. "what are you two-"

"how many phones do you have?" dustin demanded.

robin leaned over to meadow. "hey, did you see this? someone was murdered?"

sam nodded. "yeah, that's kind of why we're here-"

"how many phones do you have?"

"two. why?"

sam looked over to dustin. "technically three, if you count keith's in the back?"

max nodded. "yeah, three works."

"what are you doing?" steve asked, watching as dustin took his backpack off and hopped over the counter. "my tapes, dude!" he complained as he knocked nearly everything off of the counter. "what are you doing, man?"

dustin sat down in front of the computer. "setting up base of operations here."

"base of operations?"

"what are you doing? get off of the computer."

"no, i need it!"

"need it for what?"

"eddie's friends' phone numbers!" dustin explained.

steve then rolled his eyes. "oh, eddie. your new best friend eddie who you think is cooler than me because he plays your nerdy game?"

"yes." dustin sighed before he processed his words, making a face. "i never said that."

robin reorganized the tapes on the counter. "seriously, you guys, maybe on a monday you can play around in here like toddlers, but it's saturday. it's our busiest day."