𝐈𝐒𝐍'𝐓 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐋𝐘 | stranger things
Marleen thought that maybe after fighting an interdimensional monster everything would've come back to normal. And it did, at least for a year.
Then another monster decided to take a liking...
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chapter nineteen, trapped.
THE OLDER TEENS andDustin joined Erica in the room. It was as she had said, full of brown, delivery boxes and nothing more, but what was important was the thing it carried.
Steve, Robin and Marleen each grabbed a box from the places in the code and put them on the table, looking at them, the group waited.
"Which one do we open?" Steve asked, pushing one of the boxes with his pointer finger.
Dustin slapped it away. "Don't do that. What if there's nuclear shit in there?"
"Why would there be nuclear shit here?" Steve scoffed.
"Why would there be Russians in Hawkins?" Dustin sassed back.
"He's got a point." Marleen chuckled. "Maybe try, um... 'A trip to China sounds nice'." Marleen quoted, shrugging. "Try Imperial Panda first."
Steve nodded, taking out a switchblade and slicing the box open. He yanked the flaps, each one making Marleen even more anxious. Inside, a hermetic-sealed box sat in the middle. Everyone took a step closer. Marleen had never seen something like it, it felt... futuristic.
Steve opened it. Instead of food, the box contained four metal cylinders shoved in the metal box.
"That's definitely not Chinese food," Steve murmured. He went to grab one but stopped as he saw everyone hunching on the box, looking between the thing and Steve. "Uh, maybe you should, you know, stand back."
Robin and Erica both stepped back, putting a safe distance between them and the box; however, Dustin and Marleen stayed put.
Steve, noticing the two, gently shoved them back. "Just step back, okay?" He insisted, hand lingering in Marleen's shoulders.
"No." Dustin repeated, tone firm.
Marleen simply pushed Steve's hand out of her shoulders.
"Step back. Seriously." Steve insisted again, now more towards Dustin, still trying to shove him back.
However, Dustin stayed firm. "No! No!" He yelled. "If you die, we die." Dustin stressed, pointing to him and Marleen.
The overdramatic scene was enough for Marleen to flinch in awkwardness, while, yes, she would risk her life for any of her friends, declaring it like that felt too intimidating and embarrassing. But she stayed put. Plus, if what was inside the box was truly dangerous, they would've been more protected.
Steve glanced at the both of them for a split second before shrugging. "Okay."
Carefully, Steve twisted the top of one of the cylinders, air hissed as it decompressed and slowly but surely, Steve got it out. As he raised it to their eye level, Marleen examined it. It was a liquid of some kind, bubbly and green and definitely not natural inside of a glass cylinder reinforced with metal. It couldn't get more secret, evil Russian than that.
