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━━━━ " 📂  "

𝙋 𝘼 𝙍 𝘼 𝘿 𝙄 𝙎 𝙀

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SADIE HAD NO IDEA what emotion it was that caused goosebumps to rise on her arms when she saw Eleven step through that door before it had even opened, buzzed hair grown into short curls and the dress Mike had once borrowed from Nancy replaced by jeans, a black top and blazer and a rather large amount of black eyeliner that covered her eyes. Her hand raised to her mouth in shock despite her previous prophesying and the bat fell limp.

Mike stepped forward first, the lowered weapons and the sight of the girl easing the tension in the house to a point that wasn't really believable. A smile broke on Eleven's face at the sight of him, the pain that had wracked her from the second-hand guilt that she had tried so hard to forget about through the year that Eleven had been dead, or supposedly so anyway.

It was something she couldn't describe, that relief. It radiated off of her, despite her being unaware of it all. But beside her, Steve could feel it, could feel the tension leave her body and something so blissfully grateful enter her expression. He could guess who it was in front of him, never having had the pleasure of meeting the person who ultimately saved them the year before and his head turned towards her, eyes flickering over a sight so pretty.

"Is that her?" He muttered. "Eleven?"

"Yeah, that's her." Sadie watched the tearful reunion with a smile. "That's El."

"I never gave up on you." Mike stepped back, his hands not leaving her shoulders. "I called you every night. Every night for-"

"353 days." Eleven finished. "I heard."

"Why didn't you tell me you were there?" He asked, voice hardening just a little in confusion. "That you were okay?"

"Because I wouldn't let her." Hopper inputted, eyes flickering towards him. It appeared that the Chief had been hiding her for every single one of those days, protecting her, keeping her safe. He stepped forward, Mike standing aside despite the look of abject betrayal in his eyes. "The hell is this? Where you been?"

"Where have you been?" Eleven returned the question before being pulled into a hug.

"You've been hiding her." Mike accused, although this was obvious enough at this point. "You've been hiding her this whole time!" His anger sprung forth and manifested itself in his actions, the group watching as he pushed the arm of the man.

"Hey!" Hopper held him by his jumper. "Let's talk." He said through gritted teeth, more than prepared to face the brunt of Mike's anger, but only elsewhere. They disappeared into the other room, leaving Eleven to stand by the doorway alone.

Sadie was the first to step forward, unable to hold back from this one, reaching Eleven quickly and wrapping her into a hug. Because she had managed to help her the year before. She had - she just hadn't been aware of it. And now she was here in front of her, very much alive. and that was maybe the best news she had heard in a long time.

"Hi." Sadie didn't dare let go of her just yet, her arms tightening around her. "I missed you so much - I'm so glad you're alive." She stepped back and met the dark eyes rimmed in eyeliner. "Oh - come here." She used the edge of her thumb to wipe off some of the powder that smudged too far below her eyes. "There."

"Thank you." Eleven replied, almost in the same stilted manner she would have done last year. But it sounded so human this time, so natural. It appeared in those past 353 days Eleven had grown up a bit, and felt more comfortable in her own skin. And Sadie couldn't be happier for her.

She stepped back to watch the reunion between Lucas and Dustin, falling back into place alongside Steve as he watched the scene. He, somewhat easily, moved all the more closer. "What's with the hair and the eyeliner?" Steve asked lowly, voice by her ear, as they watched Eleven reach forward and seize Dustin by his jaw, pointing out he had teeth.

Both teenagers recoiled as Dustin quite literally purred. "He should not do that again." Sadie muttered, a hand reaching upwards and hitting Steve's shoulder gently. "You should be the one to tell him. Good luck."

"What?" Steve blinked, head turning to look at her. "Why me?"

"He'll listen to you." Sadie remarked. "And Hopper's been looking after her, I suppose. Somehow, I don't know. They probably just let it grow."

"And she got her hands on some hair gel."

"Apparently." Sadie raised an eyebrow, grin breaking on her face. "Want me to get her some Fabergé Organics? Maybe some Farrah Fawcett spray? Maybe let her-"

"Shush." Steve nudged her with his elbow. "You can't tell anyone about what?"

"Can't tell anyone about what?" Jonathan asked, finding that he had far too many questions at the sight of the pair together, and after what had happened with Nancy, there were questions and answers he wanted to give his friend too. And in this small lapse in tension before they set out their plan, he would take that offer.

"Nothing." Steve quickly interjected. It was enough that the Henderson siblings were aware of his plans without letting anyone else know.

"I just know his biggest secret." Sadie was grinning as she glanced up at Steve, the emotions transpiring between them not all unfamiliar to Jonathan who, in his knew experiences, recognised them exactly. Then, she turned back to him, eyes landing on Nancy and Joyce a couple feet away as they discussed what had happened, and she frowned. "Where did you go, by the way, you just sort of ran off the other day. I haven't seen you since... like Tuesday."

"Oh.. me and Nancy went to Murray Bauman's.. in Illinois," Jonathan replied, a little awkwardly.

"Whose Murray Bauman - he sounds familiar," Steve asked, having been unable to ask Nancy earlier given that it would totally interrupt the direction of their conversation. "

"He's the investigator that Mr and Mrs Holland hired to find Barb." Sadie replied. "He used to be an investigative journalist in Chicago for the Chicago Sun-Times." She continued her explanation without a thought. "Often ignored for his wacky behaviour, strange reports and the fact that he is a perfectly rationally-minded conspiratory theorist." There were certain looks shared between the boys that neither of them ever expected to share. "I did my research when they mentioned they hired him. But why did you go?"

"To shut down the lab, for good." Jonathan replied. The two he was talking to paused momentarily.

Sadie blinked. "Fair enough." She said. "How much does he know?"

"Absolutely everything."

"Ok, that's good." She nodded slowly. "You should tell Hopper, or your mom. You know, just in case. I don't think he'll say anything though."

"I will do, don't worry," Jonathan confirmed.

"Good, cause I'm not gonna." Sadie hummed, her gaze turning up to Steve as if to say something before Jonathan spoke up again.

"Actually... Sadie could I just speak with you about something?" He asked, taking the short opportunity he had been granted. It might not have been so obvious over the year that had passed, but Jonathan and Sadie were actually friends, they had been close friends for a long while before Sadie began to have a little more confidence in herself and expanded her social circle and he... well he was fine. But they could still talk, and they should talk. Especially about this.

"I'll go, make sure the kids are alright." Steve excused himself with absolute no doubt on how the conversation would go - he might be considerably dimmer than the girls and... well, children he chose to hang out with, but it was clear that Jonathan and Sadie's conversation might just go as his and Nancy's had gone, upon the same topics too.

Jonathan waited a beat, collapsing against his drawing-covered sofa as Sadie positioned herself on the arm, before launching into it. "You and Steve?" He asked, eyes unusually wide.

"We've gotten a lot closer over the last year." She replied. "I never expected to be friends with him after he was quintessentially a massive dickhead for several years, but.. here we are. He's nice." Sadie shrugged, as it was merely as simple as that. And it was, if she wanted to disregard all forms of details in favour of the bare facts; Steve had become a lot easier to be around since dumping the whole 'King Steve' persona.

Jonathan glanced her way. "Sadie, you know what I mean." He said.

"I don't know, okay?" She let out a sigh. "I don't know what's going on. We kissed at Halloween.. but that's it  - I swear and don't tell Nancy because I want to tell Nancy because they were broken up but because it was kind of... no, really fresh and by the way what is happening with you and Nancy?"

"Things."

"Yeah, okay, I get the message." Sadie's eyebrows were raised, eyes averted. "Okay.. so I can't say I never expected this. You and Nancy."

"And you and Steve."

She was quiet for a moment, repeating the words in her mind until they felt relatively normal, like her being paired with someone like Steve Harrington was a reality. "I guess it is." Sadie nodded, leaning back against the back of the couch. "Would you look at that?"

"And... we're saving the world again."

"It seems like we're pretty good at it." Sadie hummed, her own pride taking over for just a second. "I really wouldn't trust someone else to do it."

"Neither would I," Jonathan added, watching as Sadie crossed her legs and fell quiet, eyes on the body of the Demodog across the living room. He knew that look all too well; she was thinking, considering something, and he almost expected the next question to come out of her mouth.

"Do you know if Nancy knows?" Sadie asked. "I realised she might just, and I'm making myself look like a dick by not talking to her yet."

"She does." He said, and she winced as he replied. "She and Steve talked when setting up the shed earlier."

"Right." Sadie blinked. "Okay. Why did nobody think to tell me this?" Her jaw grit, disliking of being out of the loop strikingly obvious in that moment.  However, there wasn't much of an opportunity for Jonathan to apologise for this because it became quickly known that they needed to be in the kitchen. They made their way through, without protest, coming to stop to where Joyce was stood with Eleven and the unconscious Will.

It appeared that, despite her stony reaction to meeting poor Max for the first time (Sadie's hand reached for her shoulder and squeezed gently, apologetic), Eleven knew how to fix the problem in the lab; the problem with Will; the problem with everything that had been slowly growing and festering since the year previous.

"It's not like it was before." Hopper began, obviously ready to help his ward in any way, shape or form. "It's grown. A lot. And, I mean, that's considering we can get in there. The place is crawling with those dogs."

"Demodogs." Dustin corrected.

"I'm sorry, what?" Hopper asked.

"I said, uh, Demodogs." Dustin repeated.

Behind Sadie, where Jonathan had just been moments earlier, Steve slotted into place. A hand far too familiar to make her jump crept across her waist before securing a position in the back pocket of her jeans, a thumb running over the embroidery there. It was evident that he was aware of her knowledge of what had transpired between himself and Nancy and therefore, felt a little more comfortable with the rather reaffirming action.

Sadie, as much as she had criticised public displays of such affection, didn't seem to mind this as much as she would've thought and swayed happily in her beat-up sneakers, trying not to smile as much in an unfortunate situation; her brother against Chief Hopper at the hands of his choice to correct him on his misuse of titles for the creatures that had infested the laboratory.

"How is this important right now?" Hopper questioned.

"It's not." Dustin looked away, slightly more remorseful than expected. "I'm sorry."

"I can do it." An alternate voice entered the scene, Eleven once more there and ready to announce her alliance to the team in helping them save the world, yet again.

"You're not hearing me." Hopper insisted as his head shook in denial of her promise.

"I'm hearing you. I can do it."

"Even if El can, there's still another problem." Mike brought up. "If the brain dies, the body dies."

"I thought that was the whole point." Max's eyes narrowed.

"It is." Sadie nodded, swallowing nervously. "But if we're thinking about this the right way and saying that the Upside Down is one big entity, then that means any of its parts will die too."

"Exactly. If El closes the gate and kills the Mind Flayer's army... Will's a part of that army." Mike looked more serious than he had in a long while. "Closing the gate will kill him."

Joyce stared, face a picture of fear and horror at the realisation and one of her own. Slowly, she rose from the table, and the group follows her to the room in which they had laid Will down. He remained still despite the intrusion, unaware of those around him. "He likes it cold." She announced to the room.

"What?"

"It's what Will kept saying to me." Mrs Byers nodded, convinced before starting towards the window and shoving it closed with enough force to rattle the glass in its poorly made frame. "He likes it cold." The woman repeated. "We keep giving it what it wants."

"If this is a virus..." Nancy spoke slowly, "and Will's the host, then..."

"Then we need to make the host uninhabitable." Jonathan finished her sentence. "We flush it out."

"He says he likes it cold." She said.

"We need to burn it out of him." Joyce finished.

"We have to do it somewhere he doesn't know this time. Somewhere new entirely." Mike suggested.

"Yeah, somewhere far away." Dustin nodded.

"Far, far away." Steve added in a mutter. Sadie turned to look up at him. "Just wanted to be included." He shrugged, small smile addling his features.

"I might know somewhere." Hopper said. "My cabin, you can use my cabin. Right - okay - I'll wrap him up again." It took only a moment for him to answer the questions that came barreling out; where Jonathan was to go, what he and El would be doing (going to the lab and closing the gate) and what the hell everyone else was supposed to do while they did that (they were to stay safe and stay there); before Joyce was helping him to wrap him up and the group was watching as Hopper carried him out to the car whilst his mother and brother followed, a walkie-talkie in hand.

The Chief had instructed them to find the portable heater that Joyce knew was in the junk they had thrown out of the shed in preparation for Will's questioning, and whilst the kids were happy to do it themselves, Sadie had nominated herself to go, and found that Nancy quickly followed after, Steve was left with the others.

It was silent for a moment as they flicked the switches on their flashlights and began to search the pile of items in front of them. "I think you should go with them." Sadie suggested. "With Jonathan and... and Mrs Byers and Will. I think you should go."

"Sadie?"

"Jonathan told me. I'm happy for you - really." The Henderson didn't have to force the smile or any inch of genuinity in her expression. "And Steve told me you two got to talking."

"We did, earlier in the shed." Nancy confirmed. "And it makes sense, you and Steve. More than he and I ever did. And you guys with Lucas and Max and Dustin and... it makes sense. You both make sense."

"I think so too, if that doesn't sound too self-centred." Sadie glanced up at her, as she found one of the heaters, lifting it upwards and holding it out to her. "Here. You should go, really."

"I can't." Nancy shook her head. "I can't abandon Mike again like I did last time. It's not fair."

"You won't be."

"What?"

"You won't be abandoning him. If anything you'll be leaving him in very capable hands." Sadie encouraged. "Honestly - I've been babysitting for years and I kinda think Steve was made for this sort of thing."

"Made for babysitting?" Nancy repeated. "Are you... are you sure?"

"Really - Steve loves this shit." Sadie could've laughed at the ease of the words exiting her lips. "You didn't get to see him with Holly last Christmas with our present exchange and he's been amazing with Dustin all day and... I sound a little like my mom right now."

"Just a little." She replied, twisting the heater in her hand. "I think... I think maybe I should go. For Jonathan."

"Yeah. You should." Sadie nodded. "And it's fine, Nance, don't worry, okay?" She smiled and flashed her torch down at the pile where she managed to find yet another hunk of plastic and cheap metal that could be used to help exorcise the Mindflayer out of Will. "There. Take that with you."

Sadie offered it towards her and watched as she took it, picking up the larger heater they had found herself and the two of them bringing it around the side of the house to the front porch, where Mike was saying his momentary goodbyes to El again, and they handed over the heaters to Jonathan, who placed them in the trunk of his car.

"Do you promise?" Mike was asking as she came back to the group, Eleven confirming it with teary eyes and leaning in for a brief kiss of good luck before-

"El," Hopper was flicking the remains of a cigarette to the ground and stomping it out with the cap of his boot, "come on, let's go. It's time." He said. El and Mike's eyes met for the last time, a nod of confirmation that it was quite alright for her to go shared.

"Be careful, okay?" Sadie smiled after her as she passed and watched as she and Hopper climbed into the sheriff's car, an uncertain Nancy sliding into the passenger seat of Jonathan's and then they were pulling out of the driveway, leaving Steve and Sadie with a bunch of kids with nothing to do to help save the world.

Which was totally a good idea, when it came to it.

✧

"Alright, everyone back in the house." Sadie swallowed back her nerves for the groups that had just left them and turned back to the five behind her. "Steve, Dustin, you gotta help me clean up this Demodog."

"The thing in the living room?" Steve blinked. "You mean like bury it, right? Because I think I saw one shovel in the shed and it was broken."

"No - no." Dustin shook his head as Steve herded them all into the house again. "We are not burying that Demodog."

"Why the hell not?" Max frowned, looking back at them as voices grew louder. "It's dead, right? And there's more than enough of them to go around?"

"Well... well..." Dustin spluttered, as they gathered around the body of the Demodog. "This is a scientific discovery! This - this has never been seen before! We can't just bury it like I haven't been keeping one of these things alive because this is a herpetological discovery like no other! No other, I tell you!"

"Alright, we get it, Dusty-buns." Steve's nose wrinkled. "But the thing has to go."

"No!"

"Sadie - come on, you have to agree with us, we can't keep the weird creature." Steve turned towards her. "It's stupid to keep it, right?"

She pursued her lips in automatic reply, legs crossing as she swayed from side to side. "Well... if I'm looking at it from a scientific viewpoint-"

"Forget the science, Sadie, forget it." Steve stopped in front of her, hand on her shoulder and pointing towards the corpse of the dog. "This is a creature from an alternate dimension, we cannot keep it."

"Asking me to forget science is like asking me to forget my left leg, dingus." Sadie scoffed. "From my, personal viewpoint, we keep the animal, we donate it to science, we call it the Henderson... something - because like hell am I letting you take all the claim for this after the trouble you put us through - and we become famous for scientific studies done on it."

"There we go." Dustin clapped his hands together. "Sadie agrees, and we all know when Sadie's right - you said so Steve, so you can't even argue with me."

Steve stared. He pulled a hand through his hair before allowing them to settle on his hips and let out a sigh. "Fine. Fine. We keep the stupid fricken thing." He said. "If you two want to keep it so badly, then what do we do with it?"

"We clear the fridge." Sadie hummed.

"What?"

"We clear the fridge. That's how you keep dead bodies in a morgue, so we keep the dead Demo-dog body in the refrigerator so it doesn't start rotting all over Mrs Byers' nice... not dirty at all carpet." Sadie said, pointing over at the body.

"So then we let it rot in the fridge?" Steve repeated.

"Weren't you listening?" Max blinked, eyes resting on Sadie with slight admiration before turning towards Steve, stance changed. "The fridge keeps the body cold. We're keeping the stupid body in the fridge, so clear the fridge, Harrington."

"Hey - I like the new girl." Sadie beamed, "you heard her, clear the refrigerator, Harrington."

"Then whose gonna carry the thing?"

"I... Dustin?" Sadie turned to her brother, to find that he was already making his way through to the kitchen and the older girl, who was forced into listening to Steve's mutterings and whining, helped wrap the body in a blanket.

Then, with Dustin tipping groceries from a shelf all over the floor, the pair of them lifted the body of the Demodog and carefully carried it towards the kitchen.

"Dustin, you severely underestimated the size of this thing." Sadie hummed, her eyes hardly moving away from the head of the dog, which she was so carefully cradling, to the cleared fridge. "C'mon, get the whole rack out."

"...Steve? Do you agree?"

"You heard her, man, can't fit the thing on one shelf." Steve replied, just as absent-mindedly as Sadie had done. But instead of his gaze being solely focused on the creature they were carrying (and by 'they', Steve meant pretty much just him; Sadie wasn't holding any of the weight, but he didn't mind so much) it was on the girl who was staring so intently at the wilted flower head of the Demodog.

It was odd; he had never been so disgusted by something he was holding - it was so slimy and seemed to already be reeking of death and damp - but Sadie was gazing at it with a look of such abject wonder that he would hold the stupid thing until his arms ached and threatened to drop off entirely. He supposed that this was her version of the state-wide swim meet that he had led the Hawkins swim team to so many times.

And he was right. Sadie couldn't even begin to describe the enthusiasm that coursed through her veins at the chance to examine a creature like this up close. It was a predator like no other she would ever encounter, and it wasn't even from their world, it was from a world that, unless she found out otherwise, had no proper food source, was a completely uninhabitable environment, and ultimately, the Demodog was a part of a hive mind.

It acted upon its own instincts and had its own variation of thoughts, sure - it wouldn't be able to attempt to attack them as it had done at a variety of points during its growth period - but it was fundamentally controlled by the Mindflayer, or if not that, the Upside Down as a whole. A hive mind. And that wasn't something that Sadie was so accustomed to seeing. Nobody was, which was why herself and Dustin had been so insistent on keeping it.

And she knew that they absolutely had to put the Demodog corpse in the fridge because it already smelt horrendous and was strangely warm but if she could just have a couple of moments to study the composition and pattern in the scales then-

"Alright, there we go." Steve was moving forward and she was too, blanket-covered hand slipping from under the lolling head of the Demodog and watching as Steve shoved it in. "You two are explaining it to Mrs Byers. And thanks a lot for the help, Sadie.

"Sorry, sorry." Sadie held her arms up in surrender.

"Nah, it's fine." He smiled back at her, before his stance slipped a little. "Shit - help me out man." His mind changed far too quickly but Dustin stepped forward regardless, trying to help him push the rest of the Demodog into the refrigerator. "No - no."

"What the hell am I supposed to do, then?" Dustin frowned.

"Get the door, man." Steve replied.

"Alright, I got the door." Dustin did, in fact, have the door, and once Steve managed to push the mass of the creature into the fridge, the door slammed in front of it, held closed for a moment, just in case. There was no shifting in position and so, Steve could step away, ruffling Dustin's hair through the means of squishing his baseball cap and turning away, eyes alight as he found Sadie leaning against the wall behind him.

There was the crinkle of glass being swept up where the Demodog had landed, Max and Lucas hard at work. Steve came to a stop in front of Sadie, expression still far too happy for the position they were in and a shrug echoed in his actions. "I got you your intermittently shedding, constantly growing, interdimensional slug." He smiled sheepishly.

Sadie stared at him for a moment before a smile broke on her cheeks, hidden by the curve of her hand. "Shut up." She whispered, although her grin hadn't disappeared. "We're trying to save the world, albeit on the sidelines, and you're... flirting with me."

"That I am, glad you noticed." Steve hummed, looking momentarily proud of himself. "But hey, I got you an awesome slug."

"It's a little more than a slug, if I'm honest." Sadie eyed the pile of ready-to-be-ruined groceries on the floor. "But thank you for my intermittently shedding, constantly growing, interdimensional slug. It is awesome." She assured.

The sound of brushing glass stopped. Sadie turned away from Steve, taking a cautious few steps towards the destroyed living room. Lucas had stopped cleaning up the mess and instead focused his attention on Mike, who was pacing the distance of the open wall between the dining room and the entrance way.

"Mike, would you just stop already?" Lucas spoke up, evidently dizzy from the constant movement back and forth.

"You weren't in there." Mike replied, and although he was easily agitated and completely filled with confusing, overwhelming emotions (that definitely wasn't aided by puberty), he had stopped pacing. "Okay, Lucas? That lab is swarming with hundreds of those dogs."

"Demodogs!" Dustin corrected, his voice coming out a shout as he passed by Sadie.

"The chief will take care of her." Lucas reassured his best friend, and he was right; Hopper was right there with her and he had been protecting her for almost a year.

"Like she needs protection." Max muttered, eyes wide with the reality of it.

Steve stepped forward now, hoping to follow his track record from that day with further emotional support and settling into what his true passion was; babysitting. "Listen, dude," he began, "a coach calls a play in a game, bottom line, you execute it. All right?"

"Wrong crowd, Stevie." Sadie mumbled, without even thinking. But she was right. It wasn't likely that any of them in that room other than Steve - and maybe Lucas, who spent some evenings throwing a ball around with his dad in hopes of him joining some kind of team when it came to high school - would ever be that focused on a sport.

Mike seemed to share this view. "Okay, first of all, this isn't some stupid sports game." He said. "And second, weren't not even in the game. We're on the bench."

"Right... so... so my point is..." Steve trailed off. "Right. Yeah. We're on the bench, so, uh, there's nothing we can do."

"Fabulous." Sadie hummed. "Awe-inspiring."

"Shut up, Henderson." Steve turned back to look at her. "There's nothing we can do."

"That's not entirely true." Dustin added. Gazes turned back to him. "Well, I think with the help of Sadie we've established that these demodogs have a hive mind. When they ran away from the bus they were called away."

"So if we can get their attention we can draw them away from the lab." Sadie finished. "Leaving the Gate free for Hopper and Eleven without disruption."

"Yeah, and then we all die." Steve interrupted, voice raised and not caring about who exactly he was speaking to; it was an utterly stupid idea.

"That's one point of view." Dustin remarked.

"No, that's not a point of view, man. That's a fact."

"I got it!" Mike evidentially didn't care about the risk that came with their wish to clear a path to the Gate and pushed passed the two Hendersons and their currently favourite senior in Hawkins and into the kitchen, following around the map created by Will's drawings before coming to a stop and crouching. "This is where the chief dug his hole. This is our way into the tunnel. So... Here, right here." He turned back, the rest of them following behind him. "This is like a hub. See how you've got all the tunnels feeding in here?"

"Like the heart." Sadie murmured. "Everything feeds into the heart; it is an integral, central part of the system."

"Exactly." Mike nodded. "The heart. You guys set the Demogorgon on fire last year - so we all know it reacts poorly to heat and fire. Maybe if we set this on fire-"

"Oh yeah?" Steve shook his head. " That's a no."

"The Mindflayer would call away his army." Dustin nodded.

"They'd all come to stop us." Lucas said.

"Hey!" Steve attempted to interrupted.

"We circle back to the exit." Mike continued to map out his plan regardless.

"Guys!"

"By the time they realise we're gone-" The Wheeler continued.

"El would be at the Gate." Max added.

"And then we've saved Hawkins." Sadie nodded, not caring too much about a promise made to keep certain people safe and way more concerned about actually helping out.

"Hey! Hey! Hey!" Steve shouted, each word enunciated with a clap of his hands to bring attention back to him. His hand came to rest of his hips, other pointing haphazardly. "This is not happening."

"But-"

"No, no, no, no, no." He continued regardless. "No buts - Sadie, stop encouraging them."

The blonde frowned. "Hey!"

"No." Steve faltered on her for a moment, feeling an indescribable, almost irritable need to give in to the expression. "No." He repeated, but a little softer, before his words because necessarily harsh once more. "We promised we'd keep you shitheads safe, and that's exactly what I - exactly what we - plan on doing. We're staying here. On the bench. And we're waiting for the starting team to do their job. Does everyone understand?"

There was a beat of silence. "Steve, don't be so pessimistic." Sadie hummed.

"Sadie Louise Henderson, do you want to die?" Steve rounded on her, eyes alight with something similar to fear, even at an only hypothetical question. She seemed to understand, then, that there wasn't quite space for her to argue with him on this. And besides, she had promised, and it was stupid that she had encouraged them to put themselves in such danger. "C'mon, Henderson, do you want to die?"

"Not particularly." She didn't quite sound committed to it, though.

"Thank you." Steve nodded slowly. "We're staying here on the bench. Does everyone understand?"

"This isn't some stupid sports game-" Sadie might have given in to the reality of the danger, but that didn't mean that Mike had and he spoke up once again, only to be interrupted.

"I said, does everyone understand that?" The cloth that had been laid folded up on his shoulder was pulled off and waved about rather aggressively. "I need a yes."

There wasn't quite time for him to actually get his request, though, because instead of a chorus of agreements there was the sound of an engine revving that replied for them, a sound that had Max moving towards the window in stark realisation, Sadie following all too quickly after.

Because Sadie knew that car. She knew the growl of the engine, could see the gleam of metallic blue and the curve of the spoiler that decorated the back in the very forefront of her mind. Sadie would know it anywhere.

But what she really didn't know was why the hell Billy Hargrove had pulled up on the dirt drive belonging to the Byers.