Down.
Down.
Down.
The elevator fell as Dustin, Steve, Robin, Erica and I screamed.
"Shit! Shit!" Dustin screamed as we all held on for dear life.
"We're going down! We're going down!" Steve yelled.
"Yeah, no shit, Harrington!" Robin snapped.
"Why don't these buttons work?" Dustin spammed the buttons, still shouting.
"Press the button!" Erica walked over to the panels and shouted at Dustin.
"What do you think I'm doing?!" Dustin yelled back.
"Come on. press something! Just press the button!" Steve yelled back. I held one of my arms by my side, trying to use my powers to slow the elevator but it was too heavy. Erica and Dustin continued messing with the panel as Steve looked over and noticed what I was attempting to do. Eventually the elevator stopped as I fell over onto Steve and a box fell over him.
"My groin. It fell on my groin." Steve groaned as I tried helping push the box off him, but my arms felt woozy from trying to slow the elevator. "Dustin! Get this off of me! I can't move." Dustin pulled the box off him as I grabbed Steve's arm and helped him up.
"Is everyone okay?" Robin asked.
"Yeah, I'm great, now that I know that Russians can't design elevators!" Steve pushed Dustin out of the way and walked over to the button panel.
"I think we've established that those buttons don't work." Robin said.
"They're buttons, they have to do something." Steve yelled.
"Yeah, if we had a keycard."
"A what?"
"It's an electronic lock. Same as the loading dock door. If we don't have a keycard, it won't operate, meaning-"
"We're stuck in here." Dustin finished for Robin as I laid on the floor in frustration, but also exhaustion.
"Just so you nerds are aware, I'm supposed to be spending the night at Tina's, and Tina always covers for me. But if I'm not home for Uncle Jack's party tomorrow and my mom finds out you four are responsible, she's gonna hunt you down, one by one, and slit your throat." Erica sassed us as Steve snapped.
"I don't care about Tina! Or Uncle Jack's party! Your mom's not gonna be able to find us if we're dead in a Russian elevator!"
"Hey. What if we climbed out?" Dustin pointed to a vent in the ceiling. Steve and Dustin rearranged the boxes as we climbed up through the vent above the elevator. We look up to see hundreds of feet of cement walls around us.
"What were you saying about climbing?" Steve asked.
"I guess that's off the table then." I said as I jumped back through the vent onto the floor of the elevator. Dustin and Steve followed as we all attempted to come up with different ways to get out. We tried ramming into the doors for it to bust open with no luck there. Steve even went back up on the ceiling and made it up about 3 feet up climbing the cable until I said "What if the people up top need the elevator and it immediately shoots back up and squishes you?" and Steve immediately hopped off. Hours upon hours passed of failed attempts trying to at least get somewhere as Dustin and Erica dozed off. I sat on the ground next to Dustin and let him use my shoulder as a place to rest his head, until eventually I fell asleep too.
Eventually I woke up to Dustin back on top of the elevator with his walkie. "Code red, I repeat, a code red. Does anyone copy? This is a code red, I repeat, a code red. Does anyone copy? We are innocent children and we are trapped under Starcourt Mall. The Red Army has infiltrated Hawkins, and if we are found, they will torture and kill us."
