Hopper, Callahan and Powell had just left the police station and were heading to Hawkins Lab to search around for Will. Hopper was driving and Callahan was in the back, annoying Hopper with his presence alone.
They were almost to the Hawkins Lab. Powell said, "There she is. Emerald City."
Callahan said, "I heard they make space weapons in there."
Powell asked, "Space weapons."
Callahan said, "Yeah. You know, like Reagan's Star Wars. I guess we're gonna blow the Ruskies to smithereens."
Hopper stopped the SUV next to the guard station. The guard asked, "Hey, can I help you?"
Hopper said, "Uh, yeah. We're here for a tour."
The guard said, "Oh, we don't give tours."
Hopper said, "Okay... A quick look around."
The guard explained, "You have to get clearance for that. You can contact, uh... Rick Schaeffer at the Department of Energy."
Hopper said, "Maybe you seen it on TV. We got a local kid that's missing. We have reason to believe that he snuck in here."
The guard sighed and said, "Like I said before, you have to speak to Mr. Schaeffer." Hopper shut of the engine and took off his hat.
Hopper leaned toward the guard and asked, "What's your name?"
The guard said, "Patrick."
Hopper said, "Patrick, I got a panicked mayor and I got reporters breathing down my neck and I got a very upset mother. Now, I know the kid's not in there, but I have to check off this box. Patrick, would you do me a favor? Would you speak to your boss and see what you can swing for us? I'd really appreciate it... I'm talking ten minutes, tops."
Patrick looked around for a second as he thought. Thinking about his kids, he nodded his head and walked into the guard station. He got on the radio and started to contact his boss. Hopper looked at this and turned to Powell and Callahan as he smiled triumphantly.
Meanwhile in Mike's basement, Eleven was sitting on the floor eating some of Dustin's snacks. She took one bite of a banana before she swallowed it and set the banana back down. She didn't like the taste, but she still ate it as she remembered being withheld food for being too picky. Eleven shivered some before she remembered she wasn't there anymore.
Eleven picked up some of the other snacks and enjoyed them thoroughly. Eleven finished her snacking and stood up before she sat down on the couch. Eleven looked at the toy Millenium Falcon and it began to float through the air. She played for a minute before she lost focus and it clattered to the ground.
El grabbed the radio from nearby and turned it on. All that came through was static, causing El to get a little frustrated. Eleven got off the couch and walked up the stairs slowly, she opened the door and peered out. She didn't see anyone, so she walked out into the hallway.
El turned left and walked into the living room before she sat down on the lazyboy and began to play by opening and closing it. Eventually, she got bored of this, so she grabbed the strange object she noticed laying on the end table.
She picked it up and observed it. She saw that there were buttons on it. She held it to her ear and heard a soft buzzing sound. Intrigued by the sound, she imitated it with her mouth. She grew bored soon and set the object back where it was before she stood up and walked over to the TV.
Crouching down in front of the TV, Eleven observed the box for a while and found some buttons. Pressing a button, the TV turned on slightly startling Eleven slightly. Looking at the bright moving pictures on the TV, Eleven was astonished. She had never seen something like this before.
On the TV she saw a well-dressed man, what she did not know was that this was the president of the United States of America. Quickly growing bored of looking at the man, Eleven pressed a button and the channel changed to Heman. Pressing the button, a couple more times before a commercial for Coke appeared on the TV screen.
A woman's voice was heard through the TV. She was singing a catchy tune. She sang, "On the beach in the sun. The real thing is so much fun. All the times of your life. And all the things that you do. Coke is right there with you!"
This commercial reminded El of her of a time in Hawkins Lab. Many sensors were connected to her head and wires ran all along her head and down the back if her neck. She looked through the glass window in front of her at Papa. He nodded at her and so she began to stare intently at the Coke can.
Straining from the pressure, El was finally able to crush the can in front of her. She was already breathing heavily however as just this was very tiring. El looked at Papa again waiting for him to say something. She saw him smile at her, but that smile soon disappeared when he saw the blood dripping from her nose. El quickly wiped her nose as the man continued to frown, but when she looked up again, she saw a wide grin on his face.
Eleven broke from her daydream as the commercial ended. Eleven looked a little dazed as she shut off the TV. She took a deep breath to calm herself. An image of John popped into her head, and she felt a little better. She felt that he would be able to keep her safe.
At the Byer residence, Joyce can be seen frantically dragging a box labeled "X-MAS" out of a closet and to the middle of the living room. Quickly opening the box, Joyce looks around inside before she finds what she was looking for. Joyce grabbed a long strand of lights from the box before she set them aside and walked out of the house to the shed.
Grabbing a hammer and a box of nails from the shed, Joyce makes her way back into the house. Going into the living room, John grabs a chair to use as a stool. Standing on the chair, Joyce began to hammer nails into the walls. Moving a painting in her way and standing on the couch, Joyce continues to put nails into the wall. When she finished, she set down the hammer and box of nails on the table before she grabbed the Christmas lights and began to hang them from the nails.
She finishes hanging up her only strand of lights when she realized that she didn't have nearly enough lights. Sighing heavily, Joyce walks out of the house and gets into her beat up car and drive speedily to the store. Walking inside she walks straight to the isle and grabs all the Christmas lights she could find, then she grabbed a phone as her other phone had been destroyed.
Finished grabbing the things she needed, Joyce walked down the aisle and to the cash register. She set all of the lights on the counter, along with the phone. Her boss looking at her with a pitiful look, Joyce growing annoyed asked curtly, "Can you just ring me up please?" The old man starts to ring up all of the stuff and when he finished, Joyce pays for all the stuff before she sped out of the store and drove back home.
When she arrived back home, she brought all of the lights into the house and then set up the new phone, just in case someone called about Will. She started to hang the lights as fast she could, but she could only move so fast as her body was exhausted from the lack of sleep and other necessities, such as food and bathing.
Hopper and his fellow cops were allowed into the facility about 20 minutes later. They parked their car before they got out and a man followed them as they looked around the area. They made their way to the pipe that the cloth was found on and began to look inside.
As Hopper was looking into the pipe, the man asked skeptically, "You think the missing boy crawled in through there?"
Hopper answered, "Well, that was the idea."
The man said, "Yeah, I just don't see that'd be possible. We've got over a hundred cameras installed throughout the facility. Plus, we have men patrol throughout the facility on a strict schedule. If he came inside, we would know for sure. No one breaks in here. Certainly not some snot nosed brat."
Hopper ignored most of the monologue and asked, "Those cameras, you keep the tapes?" The man sighed before he nodded his head and began to lead the group into the building. Walking through the glass door, they saw the clean white interior of the building.
Following the man down the hall and into an elevator, they arrived at the 3rd floor before they got out and walked through another series of halls. Hopper said, "What is this? A goddamn maze!"
The man chuckled but didn't answer as they continued walking. Walking past a quarantined area, Hopper asked, "If you don't mind me asking, what exactly do you do here?"
The man said, "You're asking the wrong guy."
Hopper asked, "Staying one step ahead of the Russians?"
The man said, "I expect. Something along those lines, I'm sure.
Hopper asked, "Who's in charge here?"
The man replied, "That'd be Dr. Brenner."
Callahan asked, "And he builds the space lasers?"
The man asked confusedly, "Space laser?"
Hopper said gruffly, "Ignore him."
They finally arrived in the security room and walked inside before the man talked to the men in charge of surveillance and asked them to play the footage gathered for the past couple days. Hopper asked to confirm, "This is the night of the 6th and 7th we're seeing here?"
The man confirmed, "That's correct." Hopper immediately knew that the man was lying because of a key detail missing in the footage. Hopper kept quiet however as he continued to look at the small screen. Suddenly the footage stepped playing.
Hopper asked, "Is that it?"
The man said, "Like I said before. We would have seen him waltz into our facility. Hopper thanked the man before he was led out of the building, and he began to walk to his car with Callahan and Powell.
As they walked down the walkway, Hopper said, "The night of the 7th, we had a search party out for Will. You remember anything about that night?"
Callahan said, "Mmm, not mush to remember. Called it off."
Powell said, "Because of the storm."
Hopper said, "Yeah, a lot of rain that night. You see any rain on that tape?"
Powell asked, "What are you thinking?"
Hopper said, "I don't know. But they lying to us." They all climbed into the vehicle before they sped out of the facility, only stopping for a moment for the gate to open for them.