"Seek" - Part Four

Part Four

            Si awoke with a raspy, wheezing cough.

            She was unable to rightly remember how she lost consciousness in the first place, but that was the least of her worries.

            As she regained focus, she discovered that she was back in the dark dimension.

            A twisted version of the Byers’ living room around her, complete with overgrown ropy, root-like tendrils and biological membranes covering every inch of it. Joyce’s wall of alphabetized lights was even there, partially obscured by the tendrils.

            And the worst part of it all was that Si did not have her sonic screwdriver.

            “Shoot,” she cursed her lousy luck.

            The screams of a frightened child lured her outside.

            She was amazed to see it to be Will Byers himself, running away from the dark version of his house.

            “Will,” Si called to him.

            He stopped, looking back at her in confusion. “Who are you?!”

            “I’m here to help,” Si caught up to him.

            “There’s nothing you can do to help me. You’re stuck here, too.”

            He was right. Si arrived there by total accident twice already; only this time it was not by her T.A.R.D.I.S. Without it, she was as trapped as Will was.

            But she could not let him know how scared and helpless she felt.

            He needed to have hope.

            “I’ve had many experiences with parallel dimensions – even the twisted, upside-down ones like this,” she told him. “I’m the Time Lord you messaged your mother about. Now I don’t know how you know that I am one, but I…”

            “I never sent my mother any messages about a…whatever it is you said.”

            Si winced with suspicion. “You didn’t? Then who did?”

            She saw Will’s face snap with horror, seeing something behind her.

            She turned and noticed the source of Will’s fright: a gargantuan, spider-like being far in the distance.

            It appeared to have spotted them, giving chase immediately.

            “RUN!” Si didn’t have to bother with that command, as Will’s feet were already moving before hers, fleeing from the horrifying creature.

            Steve Harrington’s Halloween bash kicked into high gear, thanks to the super popularity of one guest: the kid in the sick devil bounty hunter costume that he called “Hellboy.” The other kids cheered him on, chanting his name, as he successfully drank ten straight kegs of beer and was not the least bit wasted afterward.

            Nancy Wheeler, a guest at the party and Steve’s girlfriend, developed much curiosity about him. “Your costume’s very…lifelike,” she observed. “You must be incredibly rich to make something so extravagant.”

            “My mom’s just got some serious sowing skills, you know what I mean?” Hellboy fibbed, puffing on a cigarette.

            “Hey, what’s up with Barb?” Steve diverted the topic. “I saw her heading out back by the pool, all by herself.”

            Nancy sighed and griped, “She’s been a total buzzkill since we got here. She didn’t even bother wearing a costume. I’m gonna go out there and talk to her. Maybe try and get her to lighten up a little.”

            “I’ll take care of it, kid,” Hellboy offered. “You just keep havin’ fun.”

            Nancy was grateful for him stepping in like that; it gave her more time to spend with Steve, the only actual reason she came to this raucous party.

            Hellboy found Barb desolately sitting alone on the diving board, dangling her bare feet over the water. “You O.K., kid?” he asked her. “Quite the bash happenin’ in there. You ain’t interested in bein’ part of it?”

            Barb took one look at him and fell into instant disgust. “If you don’t mind me saying, your costume is hideous.”

            Hellboy chuckled. “Well, we all can’t be runway models.”

            “I just don’t belong with this type of crowd,” Barb stated. “A bunch of rowdy, alcoholic, sex-crazed jerks.”

            “Jeez, kid,” Hellboy uttered, impressed at her bluntness. “Am I in that category?”

            “That depends,” Barb said. “Is there anything better you could be doing with your life right now, instead of getting drunk?”

            This question she posed to him made Hellboy feel deep shame.

            There was something better he could be doing: watching over Eleven in Si’s T.A.R.D.I.S.

            He left her there alone, thinking only of himself.

            In his self-loathing, he failed to see something tall and ominous emerge from the shadows and loom over Barb. It was the creature he fought back in the dark dimension – the one with the flower-like head of teeth, which it used to consume Barb’s entire head, decapitating her.

            Her lifeless body fell into the pool, turning the water crimson as it bled out.

            “You ugly…!” Hellboy vengefully insulted the creature, firing bullets from the Good Samaritan into its body to no avail.

            Again, he clashed with the monster.

            Their tussle crashed into Steve’s house and the Halloween bash altogether.

            At first, the guests took the battle between the flower-headed creature and half-demon to have been a cool Halloween spectacle that Steve arranged for the party. They should have known from Steve’s unsettled demeanor that was not the case.

            Unfortunately, the partygoers found out the hard way.

            One guest – a boy dressed like Indiana Jones – was impaled at the chest by Hellboy’s monstrous opponent.

            Convinced this to have not been part of the entertainment, the panicked guests barreled out of the house. This included Steve and Nancy, both of whom Hellboy decided to flee with in Steve’s car. He continued firing on the pursuing creature, slowing it down to provide them with a flawless escape.

            Steve’s nerves were shot as he sat behind the wheel. “What was that thing?!” he frantically asked.

            “Something we thought we dealt with in another dimension,” Hellboy dejectedly answered. “Only now it’s reared its ugly head somewhere it doesn’t belong.” He then instructed to Steve, “Drive out into the woods. There’s someplace safe we can go to figure out how to deal with this thing.”

            “I don’t think we should be doing this, Mike.”

            “We got to, Lucas. It’s been a week and Will still hasn’t been found.”

            “Besides, with Halloween canceled, we gotta do more than just sit on our butts.”

            Mike Wheeler and his friends, Dustin Henderson and Lucas Sinclair, biked out late that night, taking it upon themselves to investigate the disappearance of their missing friend, Will Byers.

            They began their search for clues near the location of Will’s house.

            What they ultimately came across was something neither one of them could explain or comprehend.

            A tall, flat black rectangular solid standing out in the middle of the forest.

            “What is this thing?” Lucas inquired of it. “Where did it come from?”

            “I dunno,” Dustin said. “But it looks like a giant VHS tape.”

            “You guys think this thing could be what happened to Will?” Mike pondered.

            “Alien.”

            The boys jolted with surprise at the voice speaking behind them, not expecting anyone else to have been out in those woods.

            A girl. A shaven-headed girl stood there in front of them.