Friends [Ep.2]

In the dining room, Mike, Lucas and Dustin were sitting around the table with Mike's parents and his sisters. They were having meatloaf that night, but the three kids had barely taken a few bits of the food. 

Karen noticed that they weren't eating their food, she studied them for a second, watching the three kids play with the food rather than eat it. "Something wrong with the meatloaf?" She asked them, lowering the fork in her hand. 

The three boys looked up at her, Dustin being the one to answer. "Oh, No, I had two bologna sandwiches for lunch." He paused, "I don't know why.' He chuckled a bit. Lucas chuckled slightly too, "Me too." 

Nancy then took this opportunity and said, in the nicest voice she could muster, "It's delicious, mommy."Mike looked over at her suspiciously before turning back to his food, "Thank you, sweetie." Karen smiled at her daughter. 

Karen took a sip of her drink, and when she put it down Nancy had started talking again, "So, there's this . . . special assembly tonight . . . for Will at the school field." She looked over at her mom, "Barb's driving." 

"Why am I just hearing about this?" Karen questioned her daughter, with her eyebrow raised slightly on her forehead. Nancy stayed quiet for a few seconds as she looked at her mom, "I thought you knew." 

"I told you, I don't want you out after dark until Will is found." Karen reminded her daughter, "I know, I know, but it'd be super weird if I'm not there." Nancy persisted, "I mean, everyone's going." 

Karen sighed, pursing her lips for a moment as she looked away from her daughter and down to her plate, "Just . . . Be back by 10:00." She finally gave in, Nancy nodded her head to assure her mother she knew.

Karen turned to look at the boys, "Why don't you take the boys, too?" She suggested but was startled when she received a chorus of loud and hurried No's! 

Karen looked at them, "Don't you think you should be there? For Will?" She asked, eyebrows furrowed. While the boys were trying to come up with a good enough excuse, Mike just so happened to look over at the stairs going up and saw Ten, El and Lev calmly walking down the stairs. 

He had grabbed his cup of milk, (Who drinks Milk with Meatloaf?) and had started to take a drink but when he saw the siblings coming down, He accidentally spit it out in the cup and almost choked. 

Dustin and Lucas happened to see them too and Dustin quickly pounded his fists on the table when he saw Karen start turning her head around. 

Karen quickly wirled her head back to the boys, startled and gasped. The loud sound made Holly start whining, "Sorry, Spasm." Dustin apologized as he shrunk in his seat a bit. 

The whole dining erupted in silence. A very uncomfortable silence. 

Until Holly started whimpering, Karen turned to her, "Oh . . " Holly was shrinking in her seat with tears in her eyes, "It's okay, Holly. It's just a loud noise." Karen told her, "Nice." Nancy said to Dustin, who was feeling guilty enough. 

. . . .  . . . . 

{A bit earlier}

Seconds after two siblings displayed their powers, Karen called them down for Dinner. Lucas and Dustin went down first, too shocked to even say anything. Mike on the other hand, while he was shocked too, told them to stay in the room. 

"I'll come get you when its safe but for now stay in here alright?" He told them, Ten nodded his head to show that he understood what he meant. Mike smiled at them, mostly El, before he left the room and closed the door behind himself, (Obviously). 

The siblings heard Mike walk down the stairs before they couldn't hear much any more. Ten, El and Lev were already bored. El and Ten were just walking around the room again, looking at everything while Lev lay on the bed cuddled up against the blanket with his eyes threatening to close. 

He let out a small yawn and snuggled deeper into the soft blanket with his eyes closing and a content smile playing on his lips as he slowly drifted to dreamland. 

Once El and Ten got bored of walking and looking at what Mike had in his room, they returned to the bed and saw Lev sleeping peacefully for once. They were glad, he hadn't had nightmares last night or now, which was a first. Back at the lab, he always had nightmares but he would never tell Ten and Eleven what they were about. It was probably one of the only things the three didn't share. They all had secrets but they only kept the most important and scary ones locked away from each other. 

Ten and El smiled at Lev but they were suuuuuper bored of this room. So they decided to go back down to the basement, it was funner down there cause there was more to explore. So, although they had some regrets with waking up Twelve, they both grabbed one of his arms and pulled him up and off the bed. 

Lev jolted and opened his eyes when they happened, he was confused and his mind was foggy. What was happening? He could vaguely make out the feeling of hands on his wrists and something soft in one of his hands. 

He was about to struggle when he heard a familiar voice calling out to him, "Lev, It's alright. Its just me and Eleven. You're alright. You're safe." It was Ten. 

Lev relaxed significantly and calmed down, allowing himself to be easily dragged out the room and down the stairs. His head was still slightly foggy so he couldn't quite make out where they were right now and that put him on edge again. But when he heard the familiar voice of the curly haired boy, he remembered where he was and relaxed once again.  

He allowed his older siblings to drag him down the stairs to the basement, glancing at the dining table once more before the door closed and he couldn't see the boys anymore. 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Down in the basement, Ten was, once again, walking around the basement and looking at everything there was. Eleven was sitting in the fort, in front of Lev, while playing with the supercomm again and Twelve was . . .  Well, He was back to sleeping in the fort. 

El was messing with the supercomm, making it emit some radio static. She was pretty concentrated on what she was doing so she didn't hear when Mike called out for her and her siblings, but Ten did. 

"El? Ten? Lev?" Mike's voice echoed slightly from the top of the stairs, Ten looked up from his spot on the couch. Ten watched Mike and his friends walk down the stairs, He threw a crumpled up piece of paper at El to get her attention. El scowled at Ten, who just gave her an innocent smile, before directing her attention to the stairs. 

The three boys were each carrying a tray with food on it, El tensed slightly when she saw the other two boys. She looked over at Ten, and saw him smile at the three boys but she could see that his left hand was clenched into a fist. He was on guard too. Good. 

Mike saw how tense the two of them were, so he reassured them, "No adults. Just us and some meatloaf." He set the tray in his hands down while Dustin and Lucas set the tray's in their hands down on the table in front of Ten.

Ten waved at them both, Lucas just rolled his eyes and ignored him while Dustin gave him a wave back. Ten leaned forward and took a bit of the meatloaf on the table, he looked over at El and saw her look at Dustin and Lucas from over Mike's shoulder. 

Dustin and Lucas had turned their attention towards to Eleven and Mike, they were still considerably uneasy around the siblings and vise versa for the siblings. 

"Don't worry. They won't tell anyone about you." Mike reassured El and Ten, "They promise. Right?" Mike turned to look at his friends, El watching them with her uneasy and wary eyes. She felt Lev move a bit in his sleep and push himself against her back a bit. She fought a smile but still kept her eyes on the boys, "We never would've upset you if we knew you had superpowers." Dustin smiled, resulting in Mike smacking his leg, "Ow!" He shouted. 

El had slightly raised eyebrows as she watched the boys antics, waiting for Mike to continue speaking. 

"What Dustin is trying to say is that they were just scared . . . Earlier. Thats all." He told Ten and Eleven, Ten having moved from the couch down to the tent with El and Lev. 

"We just wanted to find our friends." Lucas blurted out, causing El and Ten to furrow their brow. 

"Friends?" El repeated, there was clear confusion in her and Ten's eyes. 

"Yeah, Friends. Will and Rick." Lucas clarified, "What is friends?" Ten asked this time, his right hand finding Lev's hair behind him. 

"Is she serious?"Lucas asked, Dustin shrugged his shoulders next to him. Lucas stutterd a bit as he spoke again, "Um, A friend-" 

"-Is someone that you'd do anything for." Mike cut off Lucas, not really trusting the explanation he was gonna give, "You lend them your cool stuff, like comic books and trading cards." El and Ten glanced at each other, exchanging silent words before looking back at the boys, What were Comic books and Trading cards? 

"And they never break a Promise." 

"Especially when there's spit." Lucas added, confusing the siblings even more, "Spit?" They both repeated, wondering if they heard the black skinned boy correctly. "A spit swear means . . ." Lucas spit in his left hand, ". . . You never break your word." He held Dustin's left hand with his wet hand and shook his hand slightly, It's a bond." He explained, taking is hand back away from Dustin and resting his arms on his hips. 

Dustin looked down at his hand in disbelief, like he couldn't comprehend what had just happened. He looked up at Mike when he started speaking before looking back down at his hand and then Lucas with disgust, Really Lucas? 

"That's super important, because Friends . . ." Mike began, "They tell each other things. Things parents don't know." He finished. El was looking down and had a solemn expression on her face, Ten was looking at Mike and his friends but his face also held a solemn expression. 

El then looked up at the boys, she looked determined and so did Ten. They wanted to help these kids, even if it meant they might die along the way. 

. . . . . . . . . . . 

The three boys were currently talking amongst themselves in a small circle they made, The siblings didn't know what they were talking about nor did they really care. Lev had been woken up a little bit after Mike explained what a friend was to the two older siblings. 

Lev was still clutching the blanket and he still looked a bit sleepy as he kept yawning and rubbing his eyes with his sweater paws. Lev was thinking about nothing in particular but was snapped out of his daze when he felt a hand gently grab his hand. 

He looked up and saw Eleven looking at him, she was crouched down in front of his, as he was still in the fort, she gave him a determined look before pulling him up from the ground. She dragged him over to the boys D&D table they use for their campaigns. 

Ten was sitting on the couch when he saw the two start moving, He got up and walked with them too. El sat down at the table, resulting in Lev and Ten sitting down too. Mike saw this from the corner of his eye, he turned to look at them and tapped his friend's shoulder to get their attention. They were all paying them attention now, "What are the weirdo's doing?" The three boys walked over to the siblings, wondering what they were doing. 

Eleven and Twelve were holding hands at the table, they both took a deep breath before closing their eyes as their free hands laid flat on the table in front of the D&D map.