Chapitre 3: 3. Always Something There To Remind Me
[A/N: Thank you for the reviews/favorites/follows! This chapter is longer than the others so far so I hope you enjoy! Your feedback is welcome and appreciated! :)]
Chapter 3: Always Something There To Remind Me (by Naked Eyes)
"I walk along the city streets you used to walk along with me, and every step I take reminds me of just how we used to be..."
. . . . . . . .
An owl hooted in the distance, its call echoing over the lake in front of him as Hopper lounged against the wooden rail of his deck. An almost-full moon hung high in the sky, illuminating the surface of the lake and bouncing light off the rippling patterns in the water. The air was cold, the water even colder, but the lake wouldn't freeze for another few weeks if the years prior were any indication.
Clad in sweatpants and an open button-down flannel, Hopper took a long drag on his cigarette as he lost himself in his thoughts, his gaze fixed on the ripples in the lake where a fish was tickling the surface of the water.
He'd never gotten the best sleep since Sarah died. His dreams were always peppered with bittersweet memories that left him wishing to return to sleep whenever morning came. After bringing the Byers boy back from the Upside Down and, in doing so, sacrificing the telekinetic girl who'd helped them in their mission, his insomnia had only worsened. He hadn't seen it happen but he'd seen and heard the aftermath of what her disappearance had done to the boys. Especially that Wheeler kid. In strange ways he couldn't place, she'd reminded him of his daughter and he wasn't quite sure how to feel about that either.
Hopper watched as the smoke billowing out of his nose and mouth wafted through the night air, eventually disappearing in the moon's reflection.
As far as anyone knew, he'd moved on since the strange events surrounding Will Byers' disappearance and homecoming. That was the idea behind his new position, after all. Secrecy and covert operations were familiar to him as he'd spent the better part of the last several years living in a world without windows and doors leading to his inner world kept firmly locked. Even the people who knew about what had happened to his daughter were still kept at arm's length.
He was working on contract with the government, his experience in the Upside Down having been seen as an asset to the Department of Energy. With Dr. Brenner unaccounted for and much of the former staff of the agency having been killed by the monster last month, Hopper had grudgingly agreed. He did, in fact, owe them the girl in exchange for he and Joyce's release and venture into the Upside Down to find Will. But what the agents at the lab didn't realize was that he wasn't skilled just at keeping their secrets. He harbored a few of his own, keeping what he knew close like a good hand in poker.
He remembered the night they brought Will out of the Upside Down and took him to the hospital. Vivid memories hung in his mind like cobwebs in an attic, trapping him with every step and distracting his view from everything else around him. Joyce's frantic, hopeful crying as she clutched her boy who'd finally started breathing again, the eyes of the older Byers boy and the Wheeler girl that would always be filled with images more traumatizing than any person should ever have to witness, the quiet whimpering cries of a trio of middle school boys, a missing girl.
Eggos.
Mike Wheeler had mentioned to his sister that their friend - he'd called her Eleven - had loved Eggos. The same girl he'd just exchanged in a deal with the Devil, he could now imagine sitting at someone's breakfast table, dressing a stack of Eggo waffles with more syrup than he could stand to look at. The thought turned his stomach with the nausea of guilt.
The first time he'd seen the videos had been what really haunted him. They were always shot from above, likely a corner in the ceiling of each room. He'd known that the lab had security cameras everywhere and monitored everything that happened in their facility but he hadn't been prepared to see Eleven's past in all its grainy, heartbreaking detail.
It had been a late night at the lab. Most of the agents had already left for the evening, leaving a slimmer night crew on staff. Hopper had paid great attention to the subtle details around him during his escorted tours with the higher-ups and with his own access card, he was able to move freely through the majority of the facility. He wondered how the agents could trust him with that level of security clearance but then he remembered that these agents didn't always behave ethically or play by the rules.
But that was okay because neither did he.
He hadn't been looking for anything in particular but the suppressed big city detective still lurking inside of him had a hunch, an inclination, a drive… he couldn't put a pin on it but he followed it. It had scarcely led him astray in the past. He'd found himself in the security tape room where about a dozen small screens showed grainy footage of several key areas around the facility. Everything was quiet from what he could see. There wasn't much hustle and bustle at 8 o'clock at night unless something serious was going on. For all intents and purposes, it looked like another quiet night.
Curiosity led him and he followed the scent like a bloodhound, scouting out the room. There were a few shelves with vaguely marked tapes lined up neatly and organized by number, then alphabetically. The walls of the room had several filing cabinets with key locks. After perusing the tapes on the shelves, he'd tried to open one of the cabinets, only to have it balk against him. He fingered through the tapes on the shelves once again, a single tape catching his eye. It was sticking out the slightest bit, as if someone had pulled it from the shelf recently and had failed to put it back with the same level of precision the other tapes had received.
011-67
He eyed the label on the side of the VHS case suspiciously, picking up the tape and looking for any other clues that could indicate more about the contents of this tape. He checked the TV screens to see if anyone was coming. One researcher was sitting at a desk, writing in a notepad somewhere on the other side of the building. A couple of other scientists were engaged in discussion in the lobby with one of the new agents the facility had hired. Hopper stepped to the door and peered into the hallway. Quiet. Looking around the room for a camera, he found nothing. It would be ironic to have a camera in this room, wouldn't it? And even still, would the footage show up in this room or in another room he wasn't aware of? Showing little prudence, Hopper plucked the VHS tape from its case and stuck it into the player. He watched one darkened screen come to life and he immediately knew his hunch had been right.
From the camera's angle, he could see a small child with a shaved head sitting at a table in an otherwise barren room. She had a device on her head with wires sticking out in every direction, attaching electrodes to her forehead, temples, and the back of her head. There was a window in front of the girl where he could vaguely make out the shapes of adults but none were recognizable and the faces were obscured. A voice came over the intercom in the video.
"You're doing very well, Eleven," The voice said and he suspected it to be Dr. Brenner. "We're going to try something new today. Is that okay?"
The girl barely moved, her head tilted down and her profile flickering with the grainy film quality. Two agents dressed in white then entered the room, carrying a cage with a fluffy white cat. It meowed loudly as they stationed it in front of Eleven and the girl darted her gaze from the cat to the window. Even despite the camera distance and poor film quality, Hopper could see the way her facial expression turned to one of anguish and despair, though she never said a word.
The cat rubbed itself against the bars of its prison, meowing loudly at Eleven as she looked at it in horror, her face trembling.
"Eleven," Dr. Brenner's voice said of the intercom. "Remember what we talked about this morning. Now, with your powers, I want you to kill this cat,"
The way he spoke the words so coldly, as if it were a completely normal thing to request of a little girl sent a chill down Hopper's spine. He watched as Eleven stared at the cat, her eyes brimming with tears as the once friendly, plaintive cat began to take a defensive stance. He watched as it hissed at her intense gaze and he felt a force inside of him begging to turn the video off. But he was a cop, first and foremost, and he'd developed the ability long ago to resist that force. He faced the horrific head-on and while it made him a good cop, it also hardened him quite a bit over the years.
Movement on one of the other screens had caught his eye and he saw that one of the agents, a superior of his, was heading down this particular hallway. He quickly ejected the tape and stuffed it back into its case, hiding it in one of the pockets inside his winter coat. When his superior had passed by the room, Hopper hiding against the wall and concealed by shadows, he'd decided to call it a night and head out. The next time he came to the lab, he'd picked the locks of the filing cabinets, those detective instincts at work once again. That was how he'd ended up with videos 1-77 of Eleven. It'd taken him a couple of weeks to get through each one and they'd varied in length, some lasting as long as 10 hours per tape. In the end, he'd never be able to erase the knowledge of what that little girl had been through. Guilt gnawed at him, reminding him that her fate had been his fault. He'd been quite despondent over it until he'd overheard some of the researchers discussing plans to find "the girl". Talk of hazmat suits and questionable lifeforms clued him in that they were talking about the Upside Down. At that point, he'd yet to be sent into the dark and dismal dimension but he knew that was ultimately their plan for him. After all, he and Joyce had been the only ones thus far to venture into that world and return unscathed.
So Eleven was alive somewhere in the Upside Down and the researchers wanted to find her. For what purpose, he couldn't be sure but based on the content of the videos he'd found, it wouldn't be good.
He couldn't let that happen. He couldn't just sit idle, leaving that girl to such a fate. He'd made a choice once before that, despite the overwhelmingly positive nature of the outcome, had still left him with considerable guilt. This could be his chance at redemption. At atonement. He needed to find her first.
Hopper took a final drag on his cigarette and flicked it into the lake, exhaling slowly. His decision to find Eleven had been weeks ago. He'd already explored the Upside Down twice at this point with little trace of her to be found. Maybe the researchers had been wrong and maybe he actually had died that day at the school. Still, he couldn't give up yet.
After stuffing his feet into his boots and slipping into a big winter coat, Hopper headed out on a familiar route. His breath came in clouds in his truck until the heat finally kicked in but by that time, he was already almost to his destination. He pulled over along the side of the road, his front bumper scraping against a mound of old snow that had been shoved to the edges of the street by a snowplow. Most of the snow from last week had melted at this point, leaving only icy mounds leftover from shoveling and plowing, but the weather forecast was calling for more in a couple days.
Hopper trudged across the icy snow barrier and into the woods, following a familiar path that had once been clearly marked by his tracks in the snow.
He knelt beside a dropbox, pulling out a pair of Eggos wrapped in cellophane that he'd prepared earlier that evening. Opening the lid to the box, he found the food he'd left there the day before was gone. He liked to think that it was because Eleven had found the food in the Upside Down and taken it but there was no way to be sure. For all he knew, he could be feeding the animals in the woods or a homeless person - but he returned every day to find an empty dropbox again and again and in his mind, it was Eleven. That was the only way he got any sleep at night.
. . . . . . . .
The boys were planning to meet up at Mike's house the following day to begin their search for Eleven. Mike had talked to Lucas and Will earlier that morning to confirm the time the boys were supposed to show up. Since Dustin didn't live close enough to use the super-com, Mike called his house.
"Hey Dustin," Mike greeted when Dustin picked up the phone. "Can you be here at 10:30?"
"Yeah, sure," Dustin agreed, a tinge of sleepiness still left in his voice though he'd been up for a little while now.
"Okay, good," Mike nodded.
"I'm gonna stop at McDonald's on my way," Dustin said. "I already asked Will and Lucas but do you want anything?"
"I want El back," Mike said stubbornly, remembering his dream and how real it had felt. She had to be out there.
"Yeaaaah," Dustin quipped. "I've got ten dollars,"
Mike let out an exasperated sigh. "See you soon," He said, hanging up.
By the time his friends had arrived and were mostly finished eating, Mike was more than a little agitated. He paced back and forth in his basement as Will, Lucas, and Dustin finished their breakfast.
"Mike, do you want some of my hash brown?" Will offered.
"No, I'm not hungry," Mike said brusquely, then added, "But thanks,"
"Alright," Lucas said, rolling up the wrapper from his breakfast sandwich. "So what were you saying about some dream you had?"
Mike stopped paced. "It was really weird," He began, then gestured to the blanket fort a few feet away. "She was right there and she was talking to me and everything was really dark and gross,"
"Like the Upside Down," Will breathed thoughtfully.
"I guess?" Mike shrugged. "I dunno, but she said she was tired and I promised her we'd find her,"
"But this was a dream," Lucas said bluntly, one eyebrow raised.
"No - Yes… I think so?" Mike groaned in frustration. "I'm telling you; it wasn't like a regular dream,"
Lucas shook his head in disbelief.
"Come on, you guys!" Mike exclaimed. "What if she's really been out there all this time? She saved us, don't you remember?!"
"Of course we remember!" Dustin chimed in. "But it's kind of a wild goose chase. Will doesn't know how to get to the Upside Down voluntarily and even if he gets there, then what?"
"And the portal's closed," Lucas added. "Chief Hopper told us that like, a week after the fact,"
"Exactly," Dustin agreed. "Dude, we all miss Eleven but we need an actual plan and from what I can see, it looks like we're S.O.L. at this point,"
"But we can't just sit here!" Mike said, his frustration growing.
"Actually," Will's small voice piped up amidst the louder arguing of his friends. "I think we do have something to go on,"
"Really?" Mike turned to his friend, his eyes brightening with hope and his voice rising in pitch.
"Really?" Lucas parroted in a more pessimistic tone.
"Yeah," Will said, leaning one arm against the back of his chair, his friends' eyes focused intently on him. "On my way here this morning, it happened again. I was crossing through the woods near Mirkwood and all of a sudden I was in the Upside Down again,"
"Did you see Eleven?" Mike asked quickly.
"No," Will said and Mike deflated slightly. "But I found this weird box out in the woods. I was in the Upside Down so it was really dark and slimey everywhere but when I opened the box, there was food in it,"
"Food?" Dustin repeated, one eyebrow quirked.
"Yeah," Will nodded. "It was wrapped in plastic wrap but it was still weird that it wasn't like, moldy and gross, you know?"
"What's your point, Will?" Lucas asked impatiently.
"Well, when I switched back out of the Upside Down, it was still there," Will shrugged. "I don't know, I thought it was weird,"
"That makes sense though," Dustin said. "The Upside Down is like this parallel double of our dimension so solid objects like tables and chairs and boxes would be the same across both dimensions,"
"Except life-forms," Lucas added, nodding. "It's weird that someone's leaving food in the woods but I'm not surprised it was in the Upside Down version, too,"
"Wait a minute," Mike finally spoke after having been quiet for several minutes, deep in thought. "Will, what kind of food was it?"
"Oh yeah!" Will suddenly exclaimed, catching the other boys off-guard. "That was the weird part. You said Eleven liked Eggos, right?"
. . . . . . . .
The sky was grey and overcast as the boys raced to Mirkwood on their bikes.
"You're sure it was Eggos?" Dustin asked, panting slightly as he peddled.
"Pretty sure," Will nodded, focused on the path ahead as Mike led the group to the fateful road. The sun had begun to melt several patches of snow but Mirkwood was one of the last streets to get plowed and as a result, had mounds of icy snow lining the edges, grey with grime from car exhausts. With the constant melting and refreezing of snow, ice patches were scattered around here and there.
"What do we do when we get there?" Lucas asked as the group turned onto Mirkwood.
"We look for El," Mike replied over his shoulder, turning back slightly. "Maybe she's not in the Upside Down at all. What if she got out and is lost somewhere in the woods or something?"
"But what about your dream?" Will asked.
"I… don't know," Mike said. "But we'll figure it out,"
"What if she's like, sending you messages in your mind or something?" Dustin suggested. "That's something she'd do right?"
"Can she even do that?" Lucas asked.
"I dunno, maybe?" Mike said, casting another look behind him as his friends following his lead.
He didn't turn around in time to see the crushed patch of ice and snow in front of him or to avoid his front tire going through it and losing traction. As his bike flipped, Will, Lucas, and Dustin quickly dodged the patch and stopped their bikes, watching as Mike was catapulted off his bike.
"Mike!"
"Aughhhh!" Mike yelled before colliding with the pavement and immediately losing consciousness.
. . . . . . . .
"If you should find you miss the sweet and tender love we used to share, just go back to the places where we used to go and I'll be there..."
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone