Stranger Things (Season 2)

Chapter 9: The Gate (Part 2)

At the lab

Hopper and El finally got to the lab, parking outside. While Hopper was getting his things, El was talking.

"You let me do the heavy lifting. Save your strength until we're below, okay?" Hopper told her, looking at her. She just stared at the lab, not saying a word. "You okay?" He asked her. El nodded, beginning to walk to the lab with Hopper following behind.

Elsewhere

Joyce, Jonathan, and Nancy arrived at the house they were told to go to, strapping Will to a bed. Will woke up, immediately telling the others to get him out of the bed he was strapped to. Joyce then remembered that they needed to burn it out of him. So Joyce started turning on everything that was heated. Every heater that they had was turned on, facing Will.

Will started screaming, black veins starting to show around his skin. Jonathan started thinking that maybe it was too much. But Joyce refused to stop. She was tired of the mind flayer torturing her baby boy. So she turned up the heat, making him scream more and shake around to try and get free.

Jonathan couldn't take it anymore, and looked away as he hugged Nancy. "It's okay. It's okay" Nancy tried to calm down Jonathan as he cried. No one knew if this would work or not.

Meanwhile

Max was driving, listening to the directions that Lucas was telling her. She then heard Steve slowly waking up. "What's...what's going on?..." Steve said, looking around as his vision was a little blurry. "Hey, shh, it's okay. You got your ass kicked, but you put up a good fight" Dustin told him. Steve's vision then began to get more clear, seeing that they were now in a car. "Oh, god. Stop the car. Stop it!" Steve said. "I told you he'd freak out" Max said. "Make a left! Now!" Lucas pointed. Max saw the turn coming up and didn't have time to slow down. She turned which made everyone in the car scream, as she almost went off the road.

Ashton was still following behind her, seeing how reckless she was driving. "Huh, she's better than I thought" he teased to Poppy, who was now fully awake. "She's only driven in a parking lot" she pointed out. This made Ashton start to get scared a little.

The group finally arrived at the hole Hopper dug back when Joyce told him about the veins killing the pumpkins. "You did better than I thought, kid" Ashton told Max, teasing her a little. Max just glared at him jokingly before talking to Poppy to see if she was okay. Ashton saw Steve fall out of Billy's car, helping him up.

"Guys, no, no, we're not doing this" Steve said trying to stop them. "Steve" Ashton put a hand on his shoulder, making him stop. Dustin walked up to Steve. "I know you're upset, but right now, a party member is in trouble. We need to help them. So keep your promise to Nancy, and keep us safe" Dustin handed him his bat. "He's right" Poppy pointed out. "We'll all keep them safe" Ashton assured Steve. Steve sighed and grabbed his bat from Dustin.

Ashton went down the hole, then Steve, Poppy, and the kids. They all had swimming goggles and bandanas on to keep themselves from inhaling the toxic air. Before the kids went off, Ashton stopped them. "I'm leading. Any of you little shits die, it's on us" he said, referring to himself, Poppy, and Steve. The group continued.

The group eventually found the core. "We're here. Hurry, we need to burn it now before El and Hopper get overrun by those dogs" Mike said. The group drenched the place in gasoline, enough to light the whole thing on fire. Ashton took out his lighter, throwing it on the ground. Suddenly, the whole place started going on fire.They started running back to the opening, before a demo-dog stood in front of them. "Shit" Lucas said. Dustin then realized who it was.