"Where are you?"

Trying to make up some kind of lie off the top of her head, Frankie was stuck. Sure, she could tell her mom the truth on how she's at the Byers' house with all the kids, the chief, and Steve Harrington, but she didn't think her mom would like the sound of that. Glancing at Jonathan kneeling down in front of an unconscious Will, she decided that maybe some of the truth would be okay. She wouldn't exactly be lying so if her mom did find out what was really going on, she'd totally be in the clear. Right?

"I'm at the Byers." She said softly into the phone. Twirling the cord around her finger, she waited patiently for her mom to start having a meltdown.

"W-what, why would you be at the Byers? Are you hanging out with Joyce's son? You better not be doing what I think you're doing Franny! I thought you were babysitting Dustin. Are you lying to me? I'm going to call Claudia right now!" Pulling the phone away from her ear, she let her mom continue with her rant knowing that was the only way for her to calm down. Seeing Dustin walk past her, she quickly grabbed onto the back of his shirt pulling him towards her essentially choking the thirteen year old.

"Talk to my mom!" She whispered, shoving the phone into his hands before speed walking to the sink. Splashing some water on her warm cheeks, Frankie couldn't believe what her mom said. She really thought she snuck off to have sex with Jonathan Byers?! Her mom was getting old if she thought she'd tell the truth of where she was if she was really doing that. Shaking her head, she walked back to Dustin who was nervously chatting away with her mom.

"Give me it." She said, pulling the phone out of his hands and listening to her mom talking about wolves or something.

"Mom, what are you talking about?" She asked exasperatedly wanting the phone call to end as soon as possible. No one loved their mom more than Frankie loved Denise, but she had more pressing matters to deal with. Like the fact that Will Byers was laying a mere ten feet away from her unconscious and possessed by the owner of the monsters that almost killed her earlier. Yeah, as much as she loved and even missed her mom at this moment, she needed to deal with whatever was going on right now.

"The wolves in the forest by our house! I heard them earlier when I was coming home. I called the station to tell them they were too close to us, but Flo said the Chief was out today. I hope he's doing okay, you know how we all worry about him ever since last year-"

"Mom, I'm sure the chief is fine," He's actually sitting in Joyce's bedroom right now, she wanted to say, "but really, I have to get back to Dustin, he's acting like a wild animal right now!" She said, smirking at the fuming kid sitting at the table with the rest of the group. Winking at the curly haired boy, she went back to making up an excuse to her mom. "I'll be home later mom, I love you!"

"I love you too, pumpkin."

Placing the phone back onto the receiver, she took one last look at the plastic before going to sit down. She'd be home soon, there was no doubt about it. Chief Hopper would come up with a plan, they'd save Will, and that'll be that. No surprises, no worries, no problem. Rolling her eyes at how pathetic she sounded in her head, she plopped down onto one of the chairs that was in front of the spot Steve was leaning against. It was like he was saving her the seat. Everyone was quiet and sat in silence. Frankie could only try to guess what everyone was thinking.

Seeing Dustin's friend Mike get up from his spot around the table, Frankie kept her worried eyes on him. He looked worse for wear, as did the rest of the people in the house, but for some reason she could tell that something more than narrowly escaping death was bothering him.

"Did you guys know that Bob was the original founder of Hawkins AV?" Mike's sullen voice rang through the stuffy and somber living area.

"Really?"

"He petitioned the school to start it and everything. Then he had a fund-raiser for equipment. Mr. Clarke learned everything from him. Pretty awesome, right?" Mike's voice filled with hope made everyone's heads pick up.

Frankie didn't know Mr. Newby that well. Other than the fact that he was the one who sold her her cassette player. She didn't know what brand or model or anything about what she wanted but he stuck by her and her mother, helping them out. Even with her mother's constant concern about breaking and sound waves and how expensive it was going to be, Bob helped them. She wished that she had known him better. That she understood the connection him and Joyce had. That she got to see that ridiculous vampire costume he wore on Halloween that Joyce had told her about when Frankie brought her water from the kitchen. Bob Newby deserved better and they weren't going to let him die in vain.

"What do you want to do, Mike? The Chief's right on this. We can't stop those Demo-dogs on our own." Dustin simply said, feeling the weight of the day finally catch up to him.

"Demo-dogs?"

"Demogoron. Dogs. Demo-dogs. It's like a compound, it's like a play on words."

"Not the time kiddo." Frankie whispered, closing her eyes and rolling her head back. Opening her eyes, she made contact with Steve. Sending him a small smile, she felt her heart warm up as he smiled back.

"The shadow monster. It got Will that day on the field." Mike explained showing everyone a hand drawn picture. Frankie looked at the drawing, feeling a little sick. If that really was what was out there, she didn't want to meet it anytime soon. "The doctor said it was a virus, it infected him."

"And so this virus, it's connecting him to the tunnels?" Max asked Mike, slowly understanding what he was getting at.

"To the tunnels, monsters, the Upside Down, everything." Taking a deep breath, Frankie tried to keep up with what was coming out of the brown haired boy's mouth. Steve was also a little lost and told them to slow down. Everything was going by so quickly.

Frankie held the drawing in her hands trying to wrap her head around what was going on. It was a lot bigger than just monsters and kids with super powers. Will was unconscious and being controlled by some sort of virus. This thing was in charge of everything and if they wanted this to be over they had to stop that thing before it became even more powerful. It sounded impossible, but she held hope that they could do it.

Surrounding the table as Dustin began to explain whatever the heck a mind flavor was, Frankie tried to take in as much information as possible. Extending her head so she could read Dustin's game manual, the girl was easily distracted as a warm hand placed itself next to hers. She tried to keep her eyes on the boring black and white words in the surprisingly thick manual, but they kept straying to the big hand almost on top of hers. It was just a hand, she kept telling herself, but the warmth she felt radiating from it made goosebumps cover her skin.

"Okay so this mind flamer thing-" "Flayer. Mind Flayer." "What does it want?" Nancy asked from her spot on Dustin's other side.

"To conquer us, basically. It believes its the master race." Dustin explained carefully.

"Oh, like the Germans." Steve put in his two cents. Frankie just turned over her shoulder to look at him and began to shake her head grimacing. "Uh, the Nazis?" Dustin asked while correcting Steve in a gentle way. The rest of the people stared at Steve awkwardly. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Nazis." He said realizing his mistake, when he saw the look Frankie and Nancy were giving him.

Frankie went back to reading the book's text carefully, unaware of the inner turmoil going through everyone as Dustin, Mike, and Lucas explained the creature further. Steve on the other hand was on the verge of panic and left the table to pace by himself. Lifting her head as Nancy took the book from under her face, the brunette blinked with an annoyed expression.

"Okay, so if this thing is like a brain that's controlling everything, then if we kill it," "We kill everything it controls." Mike finished Nancy's sentence looking up at his big sister. Frankie stared at the kids before her, gauging if this was even worth talking about. She didn't want to be the one to say it, but this was Dungeons and Dragons for pete's sake. It was a game and what was going out beyond the Byer's walls was real life. Looking at the chief for guidance, her shoulders slumped as he mentioned fireballs.

"No, no you don't use fireballs. Uh, you summon an undead army, uh," Throwing her hands in the air as Dustin mentioned zombies, Frankie was on the verge of going into one of the rooms and taking a nap. It wasn't like they were coming up with anything substantial. True, she wasn't helping as much as she'd like but quite frankly she hasn't had a good idea since '81 and her brain wasn't going to start now all of a sudden.

"They're right." Heads turning to the sound of Joyce Byers coming out of her room, everyone stopped making noise. "We have to kill it. I want to kill it." Heart breaking at the sound of her voice filled with such sorrow and anguish, Frankie took in a deep breath. It was time to get serious about this. There weren't any second chances and every moment they had right now, needed to be spent working together to destroy the flame thrower creature.

"We don't know exactly what we're dealing with here." The Chief tried to reason with the older woman.

"No, but he does." Mike said, walking up to Will's still body. Staring at his best friend, Mike knew what he had to say. "If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it's Will. He's connected to it. He'll know it's weakness."

"I thought we couldn't trust him anymore." Max questioned softly from her spot behind Mike. "That he's a spy for the Mind Flayer now."

"Yeah, but he can't be a spy if he doesn't know where he is."

It was like a light went shooting through everyone's mind. The Chief gave instructions on what they should do and they all got straight to it. Running around the house looking for the supplies they needed and going back and forth to the shack in the backyard, the plan was on. They were going to do this thing. Feeling the adrenaline pump through her veins, Frankie was ready to kick some mind paver ass.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

first of all so sorry for the ten year wait, I seriously wrote like half of this chapter before spring break and planned on finishing it before I went out of town but unfortunately didn't have enough time and stuff but I am back and I already have 2 more chapters typed up I just need to clean through them before I publish them through out the rest of the week. Also I typed an amazing version of this chapter yesterday and it somehow didn't save and I was so heart broken but it's okay anyways thank you all I love and miss you guys so much!!!