Beyond the Battle: Action & Consequence (Steddie, Stranger Things)

Chapter 40: The Realities of Hawkins

For a moment there was absolute silence. Steve was pretty sure he would have been able to hear a pin drop. Owens seemed to have the dramatic pause down perfectly.

"We didn't jump through your hoops and come here for hyperbole," Ted Wheeler said loudly as several other people commented their surprise, although not as brashly.

Of course Nancy's father would assume that. Steve knew the man had a rod up his ass.

"No hyperbole," Owens said, lifting his hands in a small gesture for quiet, "a simple statement of fact. The phenomena which caused so much damage to Hawkins have nothing to do with tectonic movements and were not an earthquake. Had the young people in this room, along with Jim Hopper and Joyce Byers not done what they did, the fissures would have eventually spread beyond this town as our reality was invaded by another one."

"Another reality?" this time it was Lucas' dad who got a question in before Ted could pipe up again.

"There is another dimension, a world if you will," Owens explained, "which almost touches our own in this location. Because the barrier is so thin here, gates can be formed to allow things to pass from one to the other."

"We call it the Upside Down," Dustin piped up.

"What a ridiculous name," Ted Wheeler muttered.

"It's because if you go through a gate, it's Hawkins but everything is upside down. You fall to the floor," Mike defended the choice.

"Hawkins Labs was studying the phenomenon in 1983 when Will Byers disappeared. A creature from the Upside Down came into this reality, took him, and trapped him on the other side," Owens went on, flicking the switch on his projector as he did so. "Regrettably, those in charge of the project at the time chose to cover up the disappearance rather than seeking to solve it."

Steve was a little shocked when a drawing of a Demogorgon appeared on the screen, even as he recognised the spin Owens was going for. It seemed the man was not pulling any punches while also making sure the blame was squarely on Brenner's shoulders.

"The official title for this lifeform is unhelpful, so we have adopted the children's term for it," Owens said as half the room stared at the illustration in horror. "This is a Demogorgon."

"Total nonsense," Ted said, standing up. "That is a drawing from a comic book. I don't know what games are being played here, but I have heard enough."

Steve watched Owens share a glance with El, clearly there was a plan for this. El held out her hand and the coffee table that had been pushed to the side rose into the air. She floated it to in front of where everyone was sitting and placed it gently back on the ground.

"Thank you for that demonstration, El," Owens said with a smile.

"Now parlour tricks," Nancy's father spluttered.

"Sit down and shut your pie hole, Ted," Hopper said in a flat, no-nonsense tone, "until you know what you're talking about."

"Ted, sit down," Karen hissed at her husband when he didn't immediately move.

"It is not a parlour trick, Mr Wheeler," El said politely. "I could lift you to prove it if you would like."

Ted sat down, shaking his head.

"As you can see," Owens went on with his presentation, "El has uncommon abilities. Moving things with her mind is only one of her gifts, closing interdimensional gates is another. El was an unfortunate victim of my predecessor's obsession with such abilities."

"El was a prisoner in the lab," Mike piped up. "She escaped after Will was taken and helped us get him back."

"Thanks to the children, El was kept safe and was able to send the Demogorgon back to the Upside Down, unfortunately to the detriment of her own health," Owens took up the explanation once again. "So much so that we all believed she had died. Luckily for all of us she had simply been displaced and was found and protected by Chief Hopper."