CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

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the mind of the flayed

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the mind of the flayed

the mind of the flayed

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. ✧ ・゜. +・o ✧

    It only took a couple minutes for El's quickly explained idea to become a reality. Apparently, in order to find Kali, El's fellow subject, last year, she had gone into her mother's mind, because Terry Ives was permanently disabled and unable to speak from the torture that had been inflicted upon her at Hawkins Lab. Terry had shown El the rainbow room, where El and Kali used to play together, thus advising her to go and contact her spiritual sister. Which El then had done.

Alina, who was sitting cross-legged, swiping her nose with a tissue, had her mouth agape. "So, you're saying we can go into Billy's mind and find the source?" she asked. The thought made her a little queasy. The prospect of going into Billy Hargrove's mind, which, even if it wasn't completely taken over by the Mind Flayer, would evidently be a sick and twisted place to be. This was the boy who'd nearly given Steve brain damage. This was the boy who'd broken into her house. And they were going to waltz right into his mind?

"Yes," El replied. "It will work. He can't hide it if we're in there." She turned slightly, meeting Alina's eyes. "Will you come with me?"

"I—" Alina wanted to say yes, but there were so many new factors involved. "Will we be together? In there? Or will we be split up?"

"I... don't know," El admitted. "I've only done this by myself. But I'd feel better if you came with me."

How could she say no to El? Her best friend, the magnet, the girl she'd risked everything to find? Alina took a deep breath. "Okay," she said. "I'll come into Billy's mind with you."

El smiled, and settled down beside her. Gabe, looking anxious, helped set the TV to static again, the buzz a familiarity to all of them. Alina and El stretched out their limbs and were preparing to put their blindfolds on when Mike knelt beside them.

"El," he began, "I know you think you have to do this, but you don't."

"Oh, here we go," Alina muttered.

PAROXYSM- Lucas Sinclair ³Where stories live. Discover now