SERENDIPITY | WILL BYERS ³ ✔

E Pluribus Unum - [Pt.2]

El was in the center of the living room now, into her... space... or whatever the hell you'd call the state she's in now.

The tv was crackling, El had a black blindfold on, and the rest of us were sitting on either the floor or the couch.

I may or may not have purposely tried to get a spot next to Will...

That's besides the point.

El was breathing rapidly and heavily.

She then suddenly ripped the blindfold off, and gasping and panting for air, but she still seemed just fine.

"What's he doing now?" Max asked.

El turned around and her head faced us all.

-

El was getting a drink of water, and the rest of us were sitting.

"And that's not normal, right?" Nancy asked. 

"Billy staying in his room on the fourth of July?" Max said. "No, that's not normal."

"He wants us to find him," Will said.

"Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of." Nancy said. "If we go to Billy, then the rest of the flayed know where we are."

"It's a trap, I agree. We'll be ambushed." Mike said.

"We won't be surprised," Lucas started. "We'll know that they're coming, and we will kick their flayed butts." He finished, with a grin, and Max gave him this idiotic look.

"You mean El will kick their butts." Max corrected, annoyed.

"It's too risky," Jonathan stated.

"Yeah, and unnecessary." Nancy said. "Killing the flayed won't stop the Mind Flayer. We have to fin out where it's spreading from. We have to find the source."

"Billy knows it." El said, coming into the scene. "Billy's been there. To the source."

"Yeah, but--" Mike began.

"It's a trap. I know." El interrupted. "We can't go to Billy, but I think there's another way. A way for me to see where he's been."

-

El explained everything that had gone down with her mom last year.

We all got back in place and the tv was crackling once more, and El was about to put the blindfold on. Mike crouched down next to her.

"El, I know you think you have to do this, but you don't." Mike said. Max rolled her eyes. "It's just, you've only done this before once. And your mom, she loved you, and wanted you to know what happened. And Billy's mind is-- is sick, diseased, the Mind Flayer is in him."

El looked at him. "He can't hurt me. Not in there."

"We don't know that."

El got closer to him and held his hand.

"Mike." She said, softly, looking into his eyes deeply, in almost a loving way since their breakup. "I need you to trust me."

Mike looked at Max, who just sassily shrugged him off. "Yeah." He said. "Just... be careful. 

Everyone else started coming around, and El tightened the blindfold around her head.

-3rd person view-

El got back into that place, where she saw Billy, sitting on his bed into the distance.

He looked dead inside.

El walked closer to him.

Even when she got closer to him, he didn't move a muscle.

El slid her hand into his, and held it. Surprisingly, he clutched her hand back.

"Billy." El said, her voice echoing. "Can you hear me?" No answer. "I want to see. I want to see what happened."

Billy's eyes looked at her then. His expression was almost the same, just a little softer.

He seemed... hurt inside.

After a few solid seconds, he jerked her arm and his face grimaced.

El started whimpering, and everyone in the room started getting concerned.

"Something's wrong," Mike said.

"Yeah, no shit," Kylie retorted, muttering to herself.

Billy's grip on El's arm got only stronger, and his facial expression grimaced more and more.

"Stop! No! No! NO!" She screamed and whimpered.

Suddenly, he let her go, and El started falling backwards.

But as she fell, new memories slid into her head.

Memories that were not her own.

The Mind Flayer, Billy's flaying, when he choked her, how the Mind Flayer flayes, when he saw her, Heather...

Then she fell down on a moist, sandy place, water slushing over her arms.

El spat some water out, and immediately sat up, not knowing where she was.

There was an ocean, and a squad seagulls flying away.

She got up, her clothes soaked, and looked at her surroundings.

"El, are you okay?" She heard Mike's voice say. "Are you okay?"

"I'm okay..." El whimpered. 

"What's going on?"

"I'm... on a beach."

"Okay... I may be dense," Lucas began, "But last I checked, there weren't any beaches in Hawkins."

"What else do you see?" Max asked.

"A woman," El responded. "She's... pretty. I... I think she's looking at me..."

She was cheering and clapping.

"Woo! Yeah!" She said.

A little boy then came into sight with a surfboard, which he then put down.

"You did it!" She said, as the little boy ran up to her.

"There's... a boy." El said.

"Did you see that?" He said.

"Yeah, I saw that!" The woman said, kissing his forehead.

"That was at least seven feet!" He giggled.

"I don't know what it was, but it almost gave me a heart attack!"

"Ten more minutes?" The boy pleaded.

"Yeah, okay, ten more minutes."

"Okay,"

"But any longer than that, Dad's gonna be mad, okay?" She said, as the boy gleefully ran back to his surfboard. 

"Okay!"

"Billy!" She called, and then El pieced it. "Watch out for rip currents!"

"I know!" He yelled back, with a grin on his face.

"It's Billy." El said.

"It's California," Max said. "A memory."

Billy rode out into the waves, as El spotted a storm coming in from the North.

"I think I see it." El said. "The source."

Everyone exchanged a look with each other.

El walked closer to the red storm less than two blocks away from her.