Other Friends

Chapter 17 - Unqualified Babysitting

"What the hell are you doing?" Windy questions, far too tired to be dealing with her brother's shit but here she was, watching Dustin empty everything out of the Byers fridge. Food, shelving, with zero regard or explanation.

"It should fit now." he says, but not to her turning to look past her, making her look to see Steve, holding the dead Demo-dog in a blanket.

"You two are idiots." she says before walking out of the kitchen and to the living room where the three calmer kids were cleaning up the broken glass from the window. "Why is he pacing?" she asks, see Mike not helping.

Lucas sighs at her question, "Mike, would you just stop already?"

The boy stops and faces them, "You weren't in there, okay, Lucas? That lab is swarming with hundreds of those dogs."

"Demo-dogs!" Dustin shouts his correction.

"Not the time!" Windy shouts back only to earn Dustin mocking her in a high pitched voice.

"The chief will take care of her." Lucas says ignoring the siblings.

"Like she needs protection." Max comments.

Steve sighs as he enters the living room, "Listen, dude, a coach calls a play in a game, bottom line, you execute it. All right?"

The pre-teens all look to Windy for an explanation of what Steve just said but she looked just as confused. "Don't look at me, I don't do sports."

Mike sighs, "Okay, first of all, this isn't some stupid sports game. And second, we're not even in the game. We're on the bench."

"Ri-So my point is..." the teen boy stutters trying to think of something to say, "Right, yeah, we're on the bench, so, uh, there's nothing we can do."

"That's not entirely true." Dustin starts, earning all their attention. "I mean, these Demo-dogs, they have a hive mind. When they ran away from the bus, they were called away."

"So, if we get their attention..." Lucas starts.

"Maybe we can draw them away from the lab." Max finishes.

"Clear a path to the gate." Mike adds on.

"Okay. No, no. We are not doing this. That is reckless and stupid and..." Windy pauses, seeing all eyes on her, "We can die, remember!"

"I'm with her, for once. We can all die." Steve tells them.

"That's one point of view." Dustin comments.

"No, that's not a point of view, man. That's a fact." The teen argues with him.

Mike walks past them, "I got it!" he says entering the kitchen making the rest follow after him. "This is where the chief dug his hole. This is our way into the tunnel. So..." he moves to another part of the tunnel drawings, "Here, right here. This is like a hub. So you got all the tunnels feeding in here." he explains standing on the largest part of the map. "Maybe if we set this on fire..."

"Oh god." Windy groans, hating this plan more and more.

"Oh yeah? That's a no." Steve tells them.

"The mind flayer would call away his army." Dustin says ignoring the teens.

"They'd all come to stop us." Lucas adds on.

"Bella's gonna kill me... I'm gonna kill them. Oh god." Windy groans covering her face. "This is why I don't babysit."

"Hey... Guys..." Steve tries to get the pre-teens' attention as they continue to bounce back and forth with their plan.

"By the time they realize we're gone-" Mike continues.