Neighbors - Strangerthingsau

Chapter 19

Hawkins Labs

The next day after school, the party decided to take the long route home. Meaning, going through the woods, on the train tracks. You may be wondering why, there are two reasons. One, everyone just wanted to spend some time together. And two, Max had a really bad fight with her older stepbrother, Billy, and didn't want to go home with him being mad at her. In fact, she was the one who suggested taking a longer route because she didn't even want to be in the same room as him.

Everyone was close together, but walking in a line of pairs. In front, leading the way was Max and Lucas just talking about the most random things they could think of. Behind them was Will and Dustin talking about a new comic that had just recently came out and how they were saving up their money to buy it. And finally, the last people to fall in line was El and Mike just enjoying each other's company.

They walked in comfortable silence, often sneaking glances at each other and getting caught by the other person every now and then. But after walking like that for a few minutes, Mike decided to start up conversation.

"So," he said looking up from the ground over to El. "What other things can you do with your powers?"

Everyone fell silent hearing the question. They had been wondering the same thing for a while now, they just didn't know how to ask.

"Well," El began. "You already know I can make things float, but I can do much more than that with them."

The group observed her talking, seeing her grow a little more uncomfortable as she talks more.

"El," Max said looking her in her eyes. "You don't have to tell us if you don't want to. Yes, we're curious, but if you don't feel comfortable, you can just tell us to back off."

El smiled gratefully at her. "Okay... I, umm... I can go into this void. It's basically this place that's all dark and whenever I go there I'm standing on water, and I can find people all around the world."

"Like a spy?" Dustin asked.

"Yeah, because they can't see me when I'm there."

"Cool!" Will spoke up.

Even though her powers were cool, they brought a lot of harm to people. That's what got El so scared to tell the party about all her abilities. Her powers can kill, she has killed. She was scared to tell them because she thought that once they know about what she has done, they wouldn't want to be her friend anymore. That they would be scared of her.

El knows how to use her powers. She knows when or when not to use them, and she knows who to use them on. Back at the lab, she would sometimes hurt and kill the people that hurt her. People who locked her in tiny, dark rooms and tortured her when she tried to defy them. But of course the party didn't know that, and she knew that if she tried explaining it to them, they would start freaking out and not let her get a word in. All they knew was she was experimented on and was punished if she didn't help. That's all she wanted them to know.

El tried to shake the thoughts of the lab from her mind. She looked around at the group to see they all had gone back to talking within the pairs.

"You alright?" Mike's voice cut in her thoughts.

"Yeah, why?" She whispered back, not wanting anyone to hear the conversation between them.

"Your looking a little pale."

"I'm fine." She said gently.

"If I crossed the line by asking that-"

"No, no it's fine." El said quickly. "It's just... my mind making me think things I don't wanna think."

Mike chuckled looking at El. "Eleven-" he began but was quickly cut off by Dustin grabbing everyone's attention as he was looking in the distance with a curious look on his face.

El couldn't hear whatever Dustin was saying, all she knew was that he said something before running off trail deeper into the woods followed by everyone except El. She was frozen to where she stood on the railroad, hearing Mike's voice say her full name for the time ever. He didn't say 'El', he said 'Eleven'. Usually, hearing someone call her that brought a bad feeling, a memory. But this time it was different. There was no flashback, no memory, no PTSD as Hopper would call it. Instead, it brought a warm feeling in her heart, like someone who had been standing outside in a winter storm for a long time had just walked into a warm cabin.

It made El... no, Eleven happy. Like she just started a new life, one where there was no bad past, or bad men. A life where Eleven isn't just a number she was given, but a name she was happy to have.

Eleven snapped out of it and quickly followed where the party went. She didn't have to go far off the trail to catch up with them. They were stopped at a linked fence with barbed wire at the top, she saw as she got closer to them, something on the other side of the fence had their attention long enough for them not to notice she was left behind.

She stood beside Mike as she looked out to the distance and a building with military cars in front, along with white vans that had words on the side saying Hawkins Light and Energy. Obviously, this building was new to the party because they were all questioning one another on how long this place had been there for.

Eleven stayed quiet as her eyes looked around, taking in the building. Her eyes stopped as she saw something familiar, something that made her "new life" idea seem like a complete joke. Something that made her want to scream and run away. Someone who haunted her nightmares.

She let out a small gasp just loud enough to be heard by the party.

"What's wrong?" Mike asked trying to see what she was looking at. El didn't say anything, she couldn't say anything she was so scared. All she could do was point the a white haired man in a suit while the rest of the party looked at who she was pointing at.

"El, who is that?" Will asked starting to become worried.

"Papa." She replied, her voice barely a whisper.

"Who?" Max asked at the same time Lucas asked, "What?"

"That's papa." She said again, only this time her voice was above a whisper. She turned her gaze away from the man to face her friends. She looked at them with fear ridden all over her face. The next thing she said to them brought shivers down their spine.

"He's the bad men."

Authors Note
Thanks so much for reading!

Again I was being lazy and didn't proofread so if anything needs to be fixed please let me know!!

Until next week!!!