Beverly walked along the train tracks with Steve, Alicia, Lucas, Dustin, and Max. They assumed that the Demogorgons wouldn't be coming back for them since they waited for some time before deciding to leave the junkyard, no Demogorgon in sight.

They were using their flashlights to see in the dark, making sure there were no signs of other otherworldly creatures around them. Beverly carried the axe over her shoulder, still surprised at herself that she was able to fight back with it this time.

"You're positive that was Dart?" Lucas asked Dustin since the boy kept on saying that it was his pet.

"Yes. He had the same exact yellow pattern on his butt," Dustin described.

"He was tiny two days ago," Max pointed out.

"Well, he's molted three times already."

"Malted?" Steve asked in confusion.

"Molted," Dustin corrected him.

"Wha—"

"It means he shedded his skin to make room for growth, like a snake," Alicia explained quickly, rolling her eyes at Steve's dumbness.

"When's he gonna molt again?" Max questioned.

"It's gotta be soon. When he does, he'll be fully grown, or close to it," Dustin replied. "And so will his friends."

"Wait, so he'll be just as big as the one from last year?" Beverly queried with wide eyes and Dustin nodded. "Holy shit."

"Yeah, and he's gonna eat a lot more than just cats," Steve added, giving Dustin a look.

"Wait, a cat?" Lucas said, stopping Dustin. "Dart ate a cat?"

"No, what? No," Dustin denied, quickly shaking his head.

Beverly and Steve glanced at one another, puzzled. "What are you talking about? He ate Mews," Steve said and Beverly nodded, making Alicia's mouth drop.

"Mews? Who's Mews?" Max asked.

"It's Dustin's cat," Steve responded.

"Steve!" Dustin exclaimed.

"I knew it! You kept him!" Lucas shouted accusingly.

"No! No. No, I — No, I...He missed me. He wanted to come home," Dustin admitted.

"Bullshit!"

"I didn't know he was a Demogorgon, okay?"

"Oh, so now you admit it?"

"Guys, who cares? We have to go!" Max butt in.

"Seriously!" Alicia added, even though she did think Dustin was kind of stupid for keeping Dart.

"I care! You put the party in jeopardy! You broke the rule of law!" Lucas said.

"So did you!" Dustin bellowed.

"What?"

"You told a stranger the truth!" Dustin said, pointing his flashlight right at Max's face. "And your stupid sister!"

Max scoffed. "A stranger?"

"Uh, excuse me? Stupid?" Alicia voiced at the same time as the younger girl, holding her hands on her hips offensively.

"You wanted to tell her, too!" Lucas argued.

"Yeah, but I didn't, Lucas, okay? I didn't tell her!" Dustin yelled, talking about Max since he wasn't actually that mad about telling Alicia. "We both broke the the rule of law, okay? So we're even. We're even."

"No, no! We're not even. Don't even try that. Your stupid pet could have ate us for dinner!"

"That was not my fault!"

"And she's my sister, I couldn't have just not told her!" Lucas added.

"Hey, guys?" Steve called out, but the younger kids were too busy arguing to notice. Beverly looked over, seeing that Steve was gazing at something. "Guys!" he shouted louder, shutting all of them up. Something screeched in the distance, causing Beverly's stomach to drop.

"Oh, you've gotta be kidding me," Alicia muttered once Steve headed off towards the sound. They all began to follow the boy, apart from Alicia and Max.

"No, no, no. Hey, guys, why are you headed towards the sound?" Max questioned.

"Lucas, it's not safe, come back!" Alicia yelled. "Bev, come on!" But, none of them listened since they were already kind of used to this kind of shit.

"Hello? Hello?" Max tried again before the two girls gave each other a look. "Shit," they said at the same time before they followed the four.

They continued to make their way towards the noise, shining their flashlights to try and see better. But, when they came to the edge of hill going downwards, they stopped. "I don't see him," Dustin said.

Lucas put his binoculars up to his eyes, looking around to see if he could get a better look. "It's the lab," Lucas pointed out, lowering his binoculars. "They were going back home," he realized.

"Home?" Alicia repeated.

"The gate that Eleven opened, the one we talked about?" Lucas said to try and jog her memory, and she nodded. "It was there."

"Oh, shit."

"We should hurry, come on," Dustin urged.

The six them quickly rushed down the hill, being careful not to slip or trip on anything. They were also trying to keep quiet at the same time, not wanting any of the Demogorgons to potentially hear them if they were still outside.

As they got closer to the lab, they heard someone shouting, "Hello? Who's there? Who's there?"

Beverly and Alicia looked at each other worriedly, hoping it wasn't someone guarding the lab or something. But when they stepped out from behind the trees, the two people both said, "Steve?"

"Nancy?" Steve said in shock.

"Jonathan," Dustin said casually.

"Beverly?" Nancy then said.

"Alicia?" Jonathan added.

"What are you all doing here?" Nancy questioned loudly.

"What are you doing here?" Steve countered.

"We're looking for Chris, Mike, and Will," Nancy told them.

"Chris?" Beverly said in confusion, not knowing why he would be with Will and Mike.

"They're not in there, are they?" Dustin asked.

"We're not sure," Nancy answered.

"Why?" Jonathan said in concern before something, what they assumed to be the mini Demogorgons, screeched from the building. The group all looked over, their faces darkening. "What was that?" Jonathan asked slowly.

"Demogorgons," Dustin responded, blinking slowly.

"What?" both Nancy and Jonathan bellowed in shock.

"Well, they're baby Demogorgons," Beverly quickly clarified, even though that didn't make things any better.

"I thought Eleven killed the Demogorgon last year," Nancy pointed out, her brows furrowing.

"She did, but there's more of them!" Dustin explained. "Apparently, Will saw a slug version of it last year and we think the same one ended up in my trash can: D'Artagnan."

"Dar — What?!" Nancy exclaimed.

"Yeah, don't ask," Alicia muttered, shaking her head.

"Wait, how do you know about all of this?" Nancy asked her, her eyes wide.

"Don't ask," Alicia repeated, holding her hands up.

"Wait, Will saw them last year and didn't say anything?" Jonathan queried, ignoring the other conversation since he was worried about his brother.

"He didn't know what it actually was," Lucas vouched for him. "But this dumbass," he gestured to Dustin, "decided to keep it!"

"Hey, I didn't know what it was either!" Dustin argued.

"Yeah, well, that doesn't matter now because apparently there's more of them," Steve butted into the conversation, his hands placed on his hips.

"Shit. Have any of you seen Will recently?" Jonathan quickly asked since he had been out with Nancy this whole time, not knowing what had been going on.

"We haven't seen Will—"

"I haven't seen him since—"

"The power's back," Nancy cut both Steve and Dustin off. The group looked over towards the building to see that all the lights had gone on. "Let's try the button again," she said to Jonathan and he nodded.

"Button?" Beverly asked.

"To open the outside gate," Jonathan told her. They then all rushed over to the security box where the controls were, and Jonathan pressed on the button multiple times. However, it wasn't working.

"Let me try," Dustin quickly said, going inside the box.

"Hang on—"

"Let me try, Jonathan!" Dustin yelled, shoving Jonathan out of the way so he could press on the button. The group stood outside, anxiously waiting for the fence to open so they could figure out what the hell was going on.

"Yeah," Jonathan said once the button wasn't working for Dustin either.

"Son of a bitch! You know what—" Dustin stopped himself from talking, banging on the button as if that would make it start working.

"Why is it not working?" Beverly mumbled under her breath, placing her hands behind her head as she released a breath. She hoped that the two Wheeler boys and Will weren't inside, not wanting them to be in danger. Even though Chris had cheated, she still wouldn't want to see him hurt...or worse.

"It's gonna work," Steve assured her, placing his hand on her elbow that was pointing towards the sky. Beverly looked at his hand on her elbow with her brows furrowed, a sensation flowing throughout her body. He noticed the odd look on her face and quickly took his hand away, looking back toward the gate.

Then, all of a sudden, the button buzzed, making the gate start to open. "Hey! I got it!" Dustin cheered, laughing. He then pointed at Jonathan. "I got it."

The group all waited until the gate opened, peering into the other side of it of fearfully. "What should we do?" Alicia asked, not wanting to get any closer to the building than she had to.

"It's too dangerous to just walk in there," Beverly pointed out and Alicia nodded quickly, agreeing with the girl.

"Maybe we don't have to walk," Nancy spoke up, looking at Jonathan's car before she looked at the owner of it. "Come on."

"Wait, Nance, what are you doing?" Steve questioned, following after her since she had started walking toward the car.

"Don't worry, we won't get out unless we have to," she assured the boy, getting into the car while Jonathan got into the driver's seat. "Stay back with the others."

"But—" Jonathan didn't wait for Steve to finish his sentence since he drove off towards the building, leaving them all there. "Shit. Shit. Shit!"

"Either they're really stupid or just insane," Max breathed out, her eyes wide.

"Probably both!" Lucas exclaimed.

"What if they don't come back?" Alicia questioned fearfully.

"They'll come back. They have to," Dustin said and Steve nodded slowly, running his hand through his hair. Beverly noticed that that was the first time he actually looked scared all night, something twinging at her heart because of it.

After what felt like hours to them, Max heard tires screeching coming from the building. She looked over to see two incoming cars. "Guys?" she said, getting all of their attention.

It seemed like the cars weren't slowing down anytime soon. "Look out!" Dustin shouted and they all ran out of the way as the first car beeped. Beverly felt someone take her hand and pull her away quickly, her body jerking forward into that same someone.

She looked up to see that it was Steve, who's hand was around her's against his own chest. The both of them breathed out, blinking slowly at one another before Beverly let go of his band and turned around to see the second car.

In the driver's seat was Chief Hopper. "Let's go," he said as he stopped the car. The six of them quickly rushed into the car without asking any questions, shouting at one another to hurry up and get inside. Once they all squished inside together, Hopper quickly drove off to get away from the Demogorgon infested lab.

authors note
i kinda hate this chapter
for some reason idk why
it's kinda boring honestly
lmaooo but lmk what u
think in the comments anyway