The rotted wooden door gave out a deafening creak as it swung open on its rusty hinges. One and Seven stood in the doorway, staring in at the unknown. After taking a deep breath, One was the first to enter.

A small hope had been boiling in her soul that she would walk in to find her long-lost family. Perhaps she'd find her father standing at the stove cooking a nice meal while her mother and siblings sat patiently around the dinner table. Maybe they'd all be huddled up on the couch in the living room watching their favorite show. Or perhaps they'd be on the other side of the next door she opened, standing with warm smiles and wide-open arms, waiting for her after all this time.

Instead, what she found was more darkness and decay. One found herself stuck in the doorway, her feet glued to the spot in disappointment. Seven pushed past her to get inside, having heard another strange sound.

Before them was a kitchen, with broken appliances and dusty counters. The black and white checkered floor was severely cracked to the point where plants had begun to grow through any open spaces. There was a table with three legs and four chairs, one of which was disassembled in pieces across the floor. But even in its terrible glory, it still felt strangely familiar to One.

"Are you going to help?" Seven asked before he began to throw open cupboard after cupboard in an attempt to find food. His stomach growled so loudly that One could hear it from the doorway.

"Yeah, sorry," One responded quickly, shaking herself out of her stupor. She joined Seven over by the pantry and together they began to salvage anything they could.

After the rummaging was complete, they found only a handful of items that still looked somewhat edible: two cans of tomato soup, a can of black olives, and a bag of popcorn. They washed the black grime off the cans and began to search for any utensils to open them. Seven yelled in triumph when he pulled open a drawer to find a knife and a box of matches.

One pounded the knife into the top of each can and slowly cut them open. Seven waited impatiently at her side, his hand ready to snatch a can the second it was fully open. The two greedily slurped down a can of room-temperature soup each and shared the can of olives. After they had gotten out every last drop, including the juice from the olives, they decided to explore the rest of the house for a place to sleep.

The sound of Seven's feet clomping up the stairs to the second level rung around the house as One meandered into what looked like the living room; complete with a faded couch, moldy shag carpeting, and a shattered TV. She quickly lost focus as she was once more overwhelmed with the feeling of familiarity. In particular, she felt drawn to a framed photograph sitting on the coffee table.

The whole room seemed to spin and her breathing became heavier with each step that she took towards the picture frame. Would it show her the family she had been both dreaming and dreading? The glass was covered in the same thick grime that had covered the cans, and One slowly began to wipe it away. Her heart nearly beat out of her chest as shreds of the old photo underneath began to show.

Despite the surroundings in which the picture frame found itself, the people within all wore bright smiles. However, in an instant One knew this was not her family. A handsome family containing a Vietnamese man, a Vietnamese women, and their two Vietnamese children looked back at her through the cracked glass.

"Find anything?" Seven asked from the stairs.

One quickly set the picture frame back down. "Nothing."

"There's three bedrooms upstairs," Seven said as he joined One in the living room. "Two of them have beds that look decent to sleep in."

"Good," One sniffled, wiping away a tear in the corner of her eye before Seven could see.

Seven wound past her and began to play around with the TV. When the buttons didn't work, he slapped the side of the box several times until a loud static ripped through the room. The two threw their hands over their ears until Seven could find a way to turn the volume down.

"Anything good on?" Seven asked sarcastically. The screen flickered beneath the web of cracks.

One moved over to stand by him, opening the cabinet that the TV was sitting upon. A stack of plastic rectangles with colorful cardboard covers sat inside.

"What are those?" Seven asked, grabbing the one that One was examining from her hands.

"V-H-S," One spelled out, flipping another plastic rectangle over in her hands. She was startled when she turned it over to the front and was greeted with a set of familiar numbers. "Hey, look."

Seven crinkled his nose as he took the VHS from One to see for himself. "Roger Moore as James Bond in Ian Fleming's 'Live and Let Die'" was written across the cover. Two of the O's were replaced with red zeroes and a red seven sat underneath. 007. Seven held his wrist up next to the cover to compare.

"Maybe you're James Bond," One joked.

"How do you work this thing?" Seven asked, ignoring One's joke as he began to investigate the TV once more. He found the rectangular slot towards the bottom of the TV and tried pushing the VHS in. To his surprise, it worked. The black static on the screen changed to a title sequence that matched the VHS cover. Seven turned the volume back up as the movie began.

Curiosity shrouded the fear of the dark and unfamiliar world they had found themselves in as the two settled in on the couch and became absorbed in the film. It was hard to see much through the millions of cracks, but the two were determined nonetheless. One struck a match and held it under the bag of popcorn until it started to pop.

A movie and popcorn. This was something they never got back at the Lab.

One began to laugh once the titular character, James Bond, began to speak in the same foreign accent that Seven had. "He sounds like you. You really are James Bond."

"James," Seven pondered, feeling the name out on his tongue. "Better than Seven."

"James it is," One agreed.

The two once more got lost in the mystery and intrigue of the international spy movie, letting the fictional world encompass them and block out the nightmarish one they currently occupied. They got so wrapped up in the moving pictures and sounds that they didn't hear the back door creak open, or the low growls of a monster sniffing its way inside.

"You know, if you're planning on sticking around Hawkins I heard that Scoops Ahoy is hiring..." Dustin casually addressed. His words were accompanied by a wiggle of his eyebrows that One didn't quite understand.

"Isn't that where Steve works?" Lucas asked, also not quite picking up on Dustin's underlying insinuation.

"Nice try, Dustin, but One doesn't want to scoop ice cream for a living," Max piped up, rolling her eyes. Unlike Lucas, she had picked up on what Dustin was implying but she wasn't as much of a fan of Steve x One as Dustin was.

"Oh, and you know what she wants to do for a living," Dustin snapped, rolling his eyes.

"What do you want to do?" Eleven asked One while Max and Dustin continued to bicker.

"I've never really thought about it..." One began. From the Lab to the Upside Down, she had never thought she'd get to a point in her life where she would have the opportunity to work a normal job. She still might not. "I guess police work kind of sounds interesting."

"Hopper could probably get you a job at the police station!" Mike exclaimed.

"But I don't have any experience," One countered.

"Who needs experience?" Mike brushed her worry aside. "Nothing ever happens in Hawkins. Well, nothing ever did...But that's all supernatural shit. That's not part of normal police duties."

"I guess I could look into it..." One mused.

"I bet Hopper would even let you start now," Mike responded. "I mean, we're just sitting around waiting for things to happen anyway."

"Yeah, okay." One couldn't help but smile at the thought of her in a police uniform cruising around Hawkins in a cop car. Officer...One...She'd need to come up with a last name. And probably a first one. She'd also need to learn how to drive...

"I'll talk to Hopper," Eleven smiled encouragingly.

"So you want to become a police officer, huh?" Hopper asked One, who sat across from him at his desk in his office. Hopper had initially been hesitant when Eleven asked him to help One with becoming a police officer. He still wasn't sure whether he could trust her, but he couldn't say no to Eleven's puppy dog eyes. "Well, there's a few steps you'll need to complete prior...Like schooling, and written tests, and obtaining a drivers license..."

One anxiously sat on the edge of her seat as Hopper went over the requirements. Her face began to fall when she realized that she didn't have any of those things and that it would take a long time to get them.

"But for now I can take you on a ride-along, give you a sense of how it all works," Hopper offered in an attempt to lift her spirits. "Would you like that?"

One nodded her head eagerly as a large smile spread across her face. "Yes, I would really like that."

"All right, I just need you to fill out this waiver for insurance reasons." Hopper grabbed a sheet of paper from his top drawer and slipped it across the desk to One. One's cheeks flushed when her eyes met the first two words: "birth date".

"What if I don't know my birth date?" One asked nervously.

"Oh, um..." Hopper felt his own cheeks flushing. He hadn't thought of that. "Do you have an approximation?"

"I think...I think it's October 17th, 1963," One replied somewhat confidently. That was the birthday she had celebrated in her mind over the years. She didn't know why she chose that date specifically, the numbers had just felt right to her.

Hopper's ears perked up at the date. "Huh, that's my daughter's birthday."

"Eleven's?" One asked in confusion.

"No, um, I had a daughter before her. Her name was Sarah. She passed away when she was young," Hopper answered.

"I'm sorry," One sympathized. Albeit she couldn't remember, she too had dealt with the loss of family. She couldn't imagine what it was like to realize exactly what you lost.

Hopper nodded in response but he hadn't really been paying attention to her condolences. His mind was wrapped up in new thoughts. First the hair tie, then the same "alleged" birth date, and now he was caught up studying her eyes...They were such a familiar shade of blue.

No, it couldn't be. He had watched his daughter die with his own eyes. Heard the beeps that signified the end of her life. It was just a coincidence.

"Ready to go?" Hopper asked after he noticed that One had finished filling out the waiver. One nodded her head eagerly and followed Hopper out of his office, through the police department, and out to his truck.

"Since we haven't gotten any calls we'll just patrol for a while. Things usually stay pretty quiet but it will give you a good sense of the town," Hopper said as he slammed his truck door shut. The two sat in silence for a while as they pulled out of the station and began to wind around the silent residential streets. Neither was quite sure what to say to the other. "How's Hawkins treating you? How's everything at the Byers'?"

"Good," One answered sincerely. "Joyce, Will, and Jonathan are really nice. And I like hanging out with Eleven, Mike, and them."

They once more returned to an awkward silence. Hopper tried to fill it by turning on the radio and House of the Rising Sun began to blast through the cab. Hopper began to unconsciously sing the lyrics and One nodded her head along as she watched the friendly Hawkins scenery pass by out the window.

"There is a house in New Orleans they call the Rising Sun, and it's been the ruin of many a poor boy, and God I know I'm one," Hopper's deep voice sang.

"My mother was a tailor, she sewed my new blue jeans. My father was a gamblin' man, down in New Orleans." To the astonishment of Hopper and One herself, One's voice joined in.

"You like House of the Rising Sun?" Hopper asked in surprise.

"I guess so," One answered, just as surprised. The song had sounded so familiar and the lyrics had just come to her like they were always there. Like her birth date...

"I used to sing that song with my daughter..." Hopper began to trail off as his mind began to make comparisons again. No, just another coincidence...

"Chief," a staticky voice interrupted his thoughts. "Chief, are you there?"

"I'm here, Flo," Hopper picked up and said into the radio.

"Mr. Donegall keeps calling," Flo's voice weaved in and out between the crackles of the old radio. "Something has been terrorizing his cows. Three are dead."

"Copy that, on our way," Hopper responded. He looked over to One and raised his eyebrows. "Ready for the fun part?"

One didn't have time to respond before Hopper flipped on the lights and blared the siren. She couldn't help but smile and laugh as Hopper ripped down the gravel roads, kicking up mud and snow along the sides of the truck.

Something unknown awaited them ahead.

★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★