Stay or Go

Chapter 66

It is dark now as we trample through the woods with still no sign of the gate. "Dustin wait up!" I call as my brother falls too far in front of us. He turns and calls back "I think we are almost there." We break through the trees and Eddie grabs ahold of shoulders "Watch your step, big guy." He says, I watch as Steve glares at him. "Oh man." he says as the others come through the trees "You gotta be shitting me." We shine our torches on what appears to be a lake. Things just got incredibly more complicated. "I thought these woods were familiar." I say "Lover's Lake." 

Dustin stands at the front of the group in amazement "This is confounding." He says, Max comes up beside me "There's a gate in Lover's Lake?" She asks and Nancy speaks "Whenever the Demogorgan attacked, it always left an opening. Maybe Vecna's the same way." Max clutches my arm and I give her a comforting look despite what is happening. "Yeah, only one way to find out." Steve says. We uncover a boat that is resting near us and Eddie and Steve push it into the water. 

"Easy..." Steve warns "I said easy, man." Eddie looks at him bashfully as the boat splashes into the water "Sorry, dude." He replies. I step over them and Robin joins me, then Eddie, Steve and Nancy join us. Dustin tries to join us and Eddie stops him by placing a hand on his head "You trying to sink us Henderson?" He asks and Dustin looks at him with disbelief "This thing holds five people tops, okay?" I say "So get your ass back on solid ground." He pouts and Nancy gives him an apologetic look "It's better this way, okay? You guys stay here with Max.  Keep an eye out for trouble."

Dustin throws his hands up and retorts "You keep an eye out." I roll my eyes at the level of maturity coming from him right now. "It's my goddamn theory." He argues but then Steve stands up "You heard Nance and Lori." And Dustin points at us "Who put them in charge?" I roll my eyes. "This is not an argument that needs to be had Dustin." I say pointedly before holding out my hand "Compass?" Dustin glares at me and I hold it, he gives away after a few seconds and hands the device to me. 

As we paddle out onto the lake, Robin calls out "Bedtime at nine, kiddos." I snort and the younger teens do not seem impressed. 

Once further out on the lake I watch as the compass starts to go crazy "Woah, woah. Slow down." I say to Eddie and Robin who are paddling to the best of their abilities. They do and we all gather around the compass and we hear Dustin on the radio "Guys, what's going on?" Robin picks up the radio hesitantly and responds "Uh, Dustin, your compass has gone from wonky to wonky with a capital aah!" Steve starts taking off his socks silently causing Nancy to question "Steve, what are you doing?" He continues to strip as he explains "Someone's gotta go down and check this out." 

I frown "And why does that have to be you?" I ask, he looks over briefly "Unless one of you court can top being a Hawkins High swim co-captain and a certified lifeguard for three years." I tilt my head to the side and narrow my eyes "Are we just going to forget that I am more durable than you are? Any of you? And stronger?" Steve snaps his head towards me and says with a level of seriousness I haven't seen in a while "You always sacrifice yourself for us, it's someone else's turn." Awkwardly, Robin clears her throat and shifts around in her seat "Maybe Lori has a point, Steve." He glares at her "I wasn't asking." He says before falling backwards into the water.

We sit in silence, waiting for Steve to come back until my nerves become too much so I ask "Where are we at, Wheeler?" Nancy looks down at her watch, just as nervous as I am "Closing in on a minute." She tells me and I nod, keeping my eyes trained on the water around us. Just then Steve splashes up from under the water and I feel my chest loosen with relief that he didn't drown or get sucked into the gate. "I found." He says, carefully treading water, Robin grabs the radio "Dustin, you are a goddamn Einstein. Steve found the gate." 

Steve swims over to us and grabs onto the side of the boat casually "It's more a snack-sized gate than a mama gate." He explains to us "But still, its pretty damn big." I lean forward to help him up, but I am not quick enough and he gets dragged back down into the water by something. We all scream and lean over the side of the boat. "What the hell was that, man?" I hear Eddie ask over the rest of us but I ignore him and start to strip down to my underwear. Once my clothes are off, I do not even hesitate before jumping into the water after him. 

I find my way towards a glowing red light, I have no hesitations about following him in there. Steve is only human and the things in there are definitely not. As I fall into the red glowing light I hear screams.

-

I look around the dark space I have entered and see Steve being attacked by what appear to be bats several paces away. "Steve!" I scream, racing towards him. Using my strength, I rip one of the creatures off of him, sending it flying backwards. It rights itself before speeding towards me, using my other gift however, I disintegrate it before it can reach me. I turn back round and pull another of the creatures off of him, the one around his neck and rip its head off.

"Have I ever told you how grateful I am that you can do that?" He asks and I shrug, smiling casually "It would be nice to be recognised a bit more." I tease and he just rolls his eyes. The others join us unexpectedly. "Are you okay?" Nancy asks, using this as an excuse to check him out. I cross my arms and glare at her "He's fine." I say and I don't fail to notice the look that Stece gives her. "Do you guys think these bats have, like, rabies?" Robin asks, pointing a flashlight at the one on the floor. "What?" Steve asks and Robin explains nervously "It's just like that rabies are, like, my number one greatest fear. And I think we should probably get you to a doctor soon because once the symptoms set in, it's too late. You're already dead."

We all stand in stunned silence for a second before I joke "We are in a completely different dimension with a crazy creature trying to kill everyone. Maybe rabies shouldn't be you're first fear?" Robin opens her mouth to answer but is abruptly cut off by a noise coming from a short distance away. More bats come flying towards us but stop several steps away at a whole in the ground leaking that familiar red light and screech at us. "All right, there's not that many." Steve points out "We can take em." Just as he says that however, a swarm of them appear in the distance. More than any of us can take on. 

"The woods." Nancy says looking behind us "Come on." And we all race off, away from the swarm the other way. We head into the woods, red lightning storming above us angrily and I silently hope we make it out of here alive.