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"Jesus! What the hell was that? What the hell was that?" Steve screamed for what seemed like the millionth time, backing into the bedroom with the girls as Jonathan made sure the door was shut and secured tightly.

"Shut up!" Nancy and Jonathan whirled around and yelled simultaneously, while Ringo decided to take a less offensive approach. She felt partly guilty that he was here in the first place - after all, if she hadn't made him give her a ride to the Byers he wouldn't even be here.

"It's a big scary monster thing!" Was unfortunately all she could come out with at that moment, the sounds of screeching echoing through the wooden door causing her heart to hammer in her chest. It was a sound unlike any animal she had ever heard and sounded throughout the entire house.

Despite the differences between the four of them, they all huddled together and glared intensely at the door, ready to jump should it burst through the wood and reach them. Jonathan held a lighter in the air - for what reason, Ringo wasn't aware of, but she didn't fail to notice the series of traps set up on her journey to the bedroom. Nancy clutched the gun tightly in her hand, making Steve wonder where on Earth she got it, and how she felt comfortable enough to use it. Ringo held the biggest weapon of all, the wooden handle of her axe was gripped tightly in her hand.

The creature's screeching began to quiet down, but its breathing could still be heard from the other side, mixing in with the sounds of their quick panting.

"What's it doing?" Nancy demanded, straightening the arm that held the gun.

"How the hell should I know?" Ringo fired back, throwing all manners out the window from the stress of the situation.

The lights in the house had been steadily fluttering since it had arrived, but with a sudden jolt, it stopped flickering and the lights now permanently remained on. The house was completely silent.

"Do you hear anything?" Nancy whispered to them, not daring to move her eyes from the door.

"No," Jonathan snapped his lighter shut, prompting the rest of the group to finally take a breath. Reaching down to pick up a modified baseball bat that he had left on the floor, Jonathan raised it high and moved towards the door. It looked as if he had hammered a box of nails through the wood for maximum effect.

"Are you crazy?" Ringo whisper-shouted, her eyes wide as she watched Nancy follow his lead and head towards the hallway.

"How about we don't go straight towards the big monster thing, guys?" Steve echoed, shuffling in so he was beside Ringo, their shoulders brushing against the others.

But their complaints fell on deaf ears, Ringo let out a huff of frustration as she was forced to follow after her cousin and friend into the hallway. The second she rounded the door frame, she peered down, but the monster was nowhere to be seen. Her eyes fell to the bear trap that sat on the floor, completely untouched.

"Is it gone?" Nancy murmured, but Jonathan didn't answer, because it more than likely wasn't.

Ignoring the shake of his hands as he gripped the bat, he persevered down the hallway slowly, the three of them following after, dutifully. Steve felt awfully under-equipped being the only one without a weapon.

When they reached the living room and were reassured that the coast was clear, Ringo sighed and let her axe fall from the air, holding it down beside her leg.

"Well, that'll teach him to mess with Mystery Inc.," she muttered, looking around at the ground for any sign of footprints. Or paw prints. Or hooves.

"Mystery Inc.?" Jonathan rolled his eyes, "really, Ringo?"

Nancy stayed silent, she knew Ringo long enough to know that her humour was a mechanism she employed to hide her fear or nervousness. And technically she wasn't exactly far off, they were a lot like the Scooby Doo gang - all they needed was a dog.

The distraction from Ringo's comment had shifted their attention from the fact that Steve was having a minor breakdown behind them. Now that he could see his life wasn't in immediate danger, the reality of the situation hit him at full force.

"This is crazy, this is actually crazy, this is crazy," he muttered to himself over and over, an amused undertone in his voice as if he couldn't quite grasp the fact that this wasn't a practical joke Ringo had led him into as revenge for the cinema incident. As he continued to repeat the phrase, his voice quickly descended from amused to outright panicked, encouraging him to reach for the telephone on the wall.

"Hey!" Ringo shouted to capture their attention, "quick! Steve's snitching!"

Nancy marched up to her boyfriend, or perhaps her ex - none of them were quite sure, and snatched the phone straight from his hand, flinging it to the ground.

"What are you doing? Are you insane?" He begged desperately, Ringo's heart clenching at the sight.

"It's going to come back!" Nancy shouted. "So you need to leave. Right now."

Steve wanted nothing more than to sprint out of the front door and never think about this incident again, but he just couldn't leave without her.

"Ringo," he turned to the blonde, stood a few feet away, "come on, please. I'm not leaving you here."

She looked surprised at his words, her mouth falling open slightly as her eyes glanced back and forth between Steve and her cousin. Nancy looked slightly offended, but for only a second. There were far more important matters at hand than the fact her possible ex-boyfriend wanted her cousin out of danger instead of her.

"Steve," she began, trailing towards him with a sheepish expression, "I can't leave them. Just go, okay? I'll call you later, if I.. you know."

He knew exactly what she meant. If she made it to later.

"I can't leave you here, please just get in the car and come with me," he begged her, his gaze pleading with hers. Ringo could only shake her head sadly.

"I can't."

Steve stayed for a few seconds, staring at her and hoping she would change her mind, but it became clear eventually that she wouldn't. Nancy placed her hands on his chest impatiently, and started to shove him towards the front entrance. Steve's flight response kicked in then, as he grabbed the door handle and roughly pulled it open, practically sprinting towards his car.

With absolute terror consuming him, he tried to shove his keys into the door, but his hands shook too terribly to get it right on the first try. When he finally unlocked it, he swung it open and almost leaped inside - but the sight of an object on the passenger car seat stopped him in his tracks. He recognised it instantly as Ringo's cassette player, which probably held her infamous mix tape inside of it. More than likely, it fell from her pockets as she was getting out of the car. Or perhaps she trusted him enough to take care of it while she handled what was going on inside.

His heart lurched in his chest with guilt, Steve's mind screamed at him to turn back and drag her from the house, kicking and screaming. He would rather have her hate him than let her be harmed. As he was having this internal debate, flickering in the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he turned his head to see that the lights inside the Byers house had begun to violently jerk on and off once again- which made his mind up for him.

The atmosphere in the living room had just begun to calm down until the electricity in the house was on the fritz again. Instantly, they raised their weapons and retreated back into each other, turning around on the spot so that it wouldn't get the chance to sneak up on them from behind.

"Where is it?" Nancy pressed, her voice was high and frightened and for a second, she sounded like the child she truly was.

"Come on, you son of a bitch," Jonathan taunted, his grip on the bat so tight his knuckles turned white.

"Come on!" Ringo screamed, fed up with the building tension and the anxiety. But after her shout, the lights had switched off completely, plunging them into the darkness. Nancy whimpered in fright, and Ringo's body began to shiver violently.

A low, grumbling growl could be heard behind them, the Wheeler girls turned to find its source and just about made out the shape of the creature by the moonlight streaming through the window.

"Jonathan!" They yelled simultaneously, but it was still too late, the creature had wrestled Jonathan down to the ground and was currently hovering on top of him.

Ringo was completely frozen in horror as its mouth opened out, ready to devour Jonathan's head by the looks of it. She was only broken out of her stance at the sound of Nancy shooting at it, but that didn't look to have much of an effect on the creature, except to take its attention away from Jonathan. Finally, Ringo broke out of her fear and stepped forward, lifting the axe and whirling it through the air, embedding the blade into its shoulder.

The demon screamed in pain, the axe was stuck in its body and Ringo could only back away out of its immediate reach before it could grab her, not having the chance to grab it back. Now left completely defenceless, she continued walking backwards, eyes filling with tears as it advanced towards her. The blonde let out a soft cry of surprise when her back met the wall, now she was completely trapped by both her fear and the monster in front of her. Nancy had continued to shoot, but the tell-tale clicking sound told them she had just run out of bullets.

Terrified, Ringo shut her eyes closed and prepared for impact, but instead, the sound of a grunt and contact with something met her ears. Her eyes snapped open, drinking in the image before her of her best friend, who was now hitting the creature with the nailed bat Jonathan had dropped.

"Steve!" Ringo exclaimed in relief, watching with shock as the man in question was expertly belting the demon with the bat. She noticed he was leading the it back into the hallway. As it plunged forward, desperate to get at Steve but being stopped by his hits, the axe fell from its shoulder to the ground with a clang. Instantly, Ringo dived forward for it and lifted it up again. Now that she was facing its back, she felt less afraid to wield it against the thing.

Ringo swung the axe, this time slicing it through its side with a sickening crunch. It squealed louder in agony as she ripped it out, deciding to never let go of the weapon again. With that distraction, Steve lifted his bat and whacked the brute under its chin, forcing it to stumble backwards and straight into the trap.

"He's in the trap!" Jonathan howled as he scampered off of the ground, "Ringo and Steve, move back!"

Steve instinctively wrapped his arm around her middle and dragged her backwards, just as Jonathan moved in front of them and lit his lighter once more, letting it fall to the ground and igniting flames to take its place. The fire flooded through the hallway and reached the creature within milliseconds.

The gang watched as the creature screamed in agony, Steve and Ringo didn't yet notice that his arm was still wrapped around her and that she was backing into his chest for safety. Deciding to stop the fire before it burned his house down, Jonathan reached for the extinguisher and angled its nozzle down the hallway.

When the fire successfully went out, they were left coughing with the smoke from the flames, Ringo dragged her t-shirt up to cover her mouth and nose as they moved closer to where the creature had been trapped. But of course, it was gone. Leaving singed meat and an empty, sizzling bear trap in its absence.

"Where did it go?" Nancy questioned.

"Jesus Christ, if it isn't dead by now then I'm hanging up my axe and accepting sweet death," Ringo moaned, voice muffled by her t-shirt.

"It has to be dead," Jonathan replied exasperatedly.

They might not have been sure if it was alive or not, but one thing they were certain of was that it definitely wasn't with them now.

"Phew," Ringo let out a puff of air, "nice one, Shaggy."

Her eyes trailed down and suddenly she had realised that Steve was still holding on to her, and that she was subconsciously leaning into his touch. The contact made her freeze, which brought their stance to Steve's attention too. Immediately, they practically jumped apart from one another as if they had been electrocuted.

Nancy watched the interaction from the corner of her eye, suspicion and doubt filling her mind now that there wasn't a demon trying to kill her as a distraction.

"Wait," Jonathan called out suddenly, the groups heads snapping forward to see that some of the lights were lit up again. The sudden surge of electricity followed down the hallway, lighting up no more than a bulb or two at a time. It was undeniable, the difference in the air this time.

Steve took point with the bat and followed it, prepared for yet another battle. But Jonathan knew better, he wasn't frightened at all of the sudden presence.

"Mom?" He whispered, catching everyone's attention. Ringo narrowed her eyes in confusion.

"Your mom was here the whole time and didn't fucking help?" She demanded.

"No," he grunted in offence, pointing towards the lights, "I think she just arrived."

In a daze, Jonathan followed after the trail left, quietly murmuring to his mother. Nancy was the only one who understood, knowing full well about the other dimension by now. But of course, Ringo and Steve had missed out on the last few hours.

Because they were together, a small voice in her head added.

Jonathan continued on none the less, the rest following after him until he was stood outside, staring intently at the street lamp that had now began to flicker as well.

"Where's it going?" Nancy asked.

"I don't think that's the monster," was all Jonathan could reply.

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