FAMILIAR ↳ STEVE HARRINGTON

sixty-six.

"The mind flayer, it built this monster in Hawkins, to stop El, to kill her and pave a way into our world." Mike said, addressing the group.

"And it almost did. That was just one tiny piece of it." Nancy said,  remembering the giant monster from the  hospital.

"How big is this thing?" Hopper asked, El laid across his lap but still listening. Christine was standing between Max and Steve, the girl chewing on her bottom lip, the part of it that wasn't split open, as she listened.

"It's big. Thirty feet at least." The news was not the best to hear,  Christine feeling fear in her bones at the thought of a 30 foot monster.

"Yeah. It sorta destroyed your cabin. Sorry." Lucas said, Hopper giving him a frown as he said it.

"Okay so just to be clear, this...big fleshy spider thing that hurt El, it's some kind of gigantic...weapon?" Steve inquired, gesturing towards the super powered girl.

"Yes."

"But instead of like, screws and metal, the Mind Flayer made its weapon...with melted people." Steve said, the words out of his mouth sounding way to crazy to believe.

"Yes, exactly." Nancy confirmed, Christine shaking her head at this information as Steve spoke again.

"Yeah, okay. I—yeah I was just making sure."

"Are we sure this thing is still out there, still alive?" Joyce asked, Christine looking to Will and speaking this time.

"Do you feel it Will?" She asked, the boy shaking his head to show her that he didn't know.

"El beat the shit out of it, but, yeah it's still alive." Max said, looking between  Christine and Joyce.

"But if we close the gate again—" Will began,  Max cutting him off to finish the sentence.

"We cut the brain off from the body."

"And kill it. Theoretically." Lucas said, Christine remembering a conversation like this one from the last time they were up against the Mind Flayer.

"Yoo-hoo! Yoo-hoo!" Murray yelled, the man rushing in and waving handfuls of paper around in the air. He put them down on the table, quickly springing into a plan. "Okay. This is what Alexei called 'The Hub'. Now the Hub takes us to the vault room."

"Okay where's the gate?"

"Right here. I don't know the scale in this, but I think it's fairly close to the vault room maybe 50 feet or so."

"More like 500."

"Try something bigger Murray. I got my ass dragged all over The Hub and not once was any important room 50 feet from the other." Christine backed Erica up, Murray looking to Christine and then to Erica.

"What you're just gonna waltz in there like it's commie Disneyland or something?" Erica said, Christine chuckling slightly at her sass.

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Murray asked, looking at the difficult little girl with a dumbfounded look.

"Erica Sinclair. Who are you?"