𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦 𝐠𝐢𝐫𝐥

008. An Overload.

WHEN ROBIN returns with Joyce, Will was still painting frantically all over the wall with the red paint. The Byers boy finished the painting and slowly begun to step back to get a look at the entire thing. "What is it?" His mother asked, as she's standing in a row with Robin, Valerie, Derek and Erica not far behind Will.

"I don't know, but I could feel it's important to him." Will explained to the group of five standing behind him. "To Mr... Whatsit?" Derek asked. "His real name is Henry." Will tells him. "AKA Vecna." Robin adds. "AKA One." Erica says next and Derek turns to her. "That's too many names." He complains. "Why won't you just zip it and listen, dipshit?" The Sinclair girl says. "I had this feeling he didn't want me there." Will goes on, shaking his head softly. "I wasn't supposed to see it." He adds as Robin steps closer.

"You've never been this close to the hive mind before." She said, looking at the Byers boy. "I mean, that thing was, like, feet away." She adds, glancing over to the wall again. "Sometimes at the Squawk, when a signal comes in too strong, it overloads the whole system. I think that's what this was, an overload." The Buckley girl explains. "You didn't just tap into the hive mind. You jacked right into the goddamn control center." She said as Will glanced over at her.

"And Holly? Where was Holly?" Valerie spoke up. "Holly. Holly, she was..." Will said before walking towards the paint can to pick it up. "She was attached to this... this spire." He says, painting in black this time. "And she became a part of it somehow, like it was doing something to her." He painted the stick figure as Robin glanced back at both Valerie and Joyce.

"And... and there were others." He said as he started painting, "there were three others." He added, painting three more stick figures. "I thought Vecna was just coming for dipshit." Erica gestured to the boy next to her. "So did I. But I only knew about Derek because he walked right past me." Will told her, spinning around to look over at the other five.

"Serendipitous timing." Valerie says, her brows furrowed together. "You hear that? Serendipitous." Erica told the Turnbow boy. "I don't know what that means." He sounded like he couldn't be bothered. "I'm really not loving all of these extra spires." Valerie said as she walked over, gesturing around the wall. "True. Night one, Vecna kidnaps Holly. Night two, he takes three more." Robin said and Val looks over at her, nodding. "He's escalating." She looks at Will who nods. "And he's coming for more."

"Yeah, eight more, if this is accurate, which brings him to a total of 12." Valerie said as she turns to the wall again, looking around at the painting. "What does he want with them? And why kids?" Joyce asked aloud. "And why 12?" Erica asked next. "I don't know. But we have to stop him before he takes any more and buy Dustin and the others time to find this place, to find Holly." Will said and Val nodded.

"Maybe if we can pinpoint his exact targets, we could get them out of Hawkins." Robin said, gesturing her hands around. "And out of Vecna's reach." Will told her. "Did you forget we're quarantined?" Erica asked the older teens. "That's not all!" Lucas shouted, riding his bike into the barn, along with Mike. "There's another problem." Mike added, dropping his bike before he and the Sinclair boy run over.

"On the way here, we saw soldiers load Debbie Miller onto a bus with a bunch more kids. And we followed them for two blocks more, and they loaded more kids onto it." Mike goes on and on as Lucas pants hard to catch his breath. "And I don't think they were taking them to school." The Sinclair boy said. "Vecna's not the only one who wants these kids." The Wheeler boy adds.

After learning about this, the plan was simple. Stakeout the MAC-Z and figure out where they were keeping the kids, so that they can next figure out a way to get to them before Vecna does. "Cargo has arrived. I repeat, cargo has arrived." The radio goes off just then, Erica speaking to them through it. Valerie quickly looked over at Robin standing behind Joyce who looked up at her. At the same exact time, Will and Mike look towards one another.