- Behind the Iron Curtain, a risky rescue mission gets underway. The California crew seeks help from a hacker. Steve takes one for the team.
- El continues to relive her earlier experience at the Nina Project. Joyce and Murray come up with a plan to rescue Jim, and Jim comes up with a plan to escape. Mike and the others turn to Suzie to help them locate El, while the Hawkins group try to find the gate in their reality.—Gislef
- The police drive out to the lake and find Andy waiting for them. Andy takes them to Patrick's broken corpse on the shore of the lake, where Jason is holding it. They take Jason into the house, and he tells the police that Eddie is a vessel for Satan, and has Satan's power, and they can't stop the devil if they don't believe he's real.
In the depths of the lake, something kills the fish.
Sullivan and his men torture Wallace for El's location. Wallace says that he doesn't know, and Sullivan points out that most likely Brenner plans to sell his research to the Soviets. He repeats his questions, and when Wallace doesn't answer, Sullivan has his men beat him and then shove him in a box.
El sits on the bunk in her cell, and remembers Brenner saying that she lost her powers when she was attacked a year ago, but he figures she can turn to her full power. Brenner and his people showed video of what he did to her in his lab while she was otherwise in sensory deprivation, and he explained that she buried her memories of what happened. He told her that she has demons in the past, and they must proceed carefully.
The next day in Hawkins, Eddie steals a walkie from a worker at a construction site and then prepares to call Dustin, who is in Nancy's car with the others driving back from the Creel house. They come to the lake and see bystanders gathered watching. Chief Powell is giving a statement to the press about how they found Patrick's body, and there's an eyewitness to his murder by Eddie. Powell says that there'll be a town community meeting at 2:00 in town hall, and anyone is welcome. Eddie calls Dustin on the walkie and says that he's at Skull Rock, and Dustin tells Eddie that they're coming.
In California, Mike and his group drive in Argyle's van to Salt Lake City, and go to Suzie Bingham's house. A younger boy, Cornelius, let them in and shoots Mike with a sucker arrow. Other kids are in the house playing with toy weapons and filming it. They finally find Suzie's older sister Eden, and she directs them to Suzie's room. They go in and find out that Suzie has gone out the window and is on the roof adjusting the antenna. The group tells her that they're Dustin's friends and need her help.
In Russia, Joyce and Murray emerge from the crashed plane and Murray scouts the area, then return to where Joyce has started a fire so they can keep warm. He reports that he saw some smoke two miles away. They've tied Yuri up to a tree nearby. Murray gives Yuri one last chance to tell them where the prison is. Yuri says that he'll tell them for the price he quoted them, and Murray offers him half, much to Joyce's dismay. They haggle to $25,000, and then Murray says that he was joking. Yuri figures they won't kill him, and Joyce says that they won't but will just leave Yuri there for the animals. As they go, Yuri yells to them that they should go east, not north, to his warehouse with supplies.
At the prison guards let Jim and the other prisoners out of their cell and take them to a room. There's a table filled with food, and Jim stares at a bottle of vodka as the other prisoners sit down and gorge themselves. Jim finally drinks and then passes out, Dmitri and the other prisoners talk about how they saw other prisoners led in and gorged themselves, and then were taken to the pit and fought a monster... and were all killed by it. Another prisoner wonders why the guards would waste the food, and the first prisoner explains want them strong so they can put a good fight. He figures they should stick together and fight as a group, and they all toast themselves for the coming battle.
Jim describes the monster from past experience, and says the monster wants live prey and the guards are feeding them so they'll put up an "entertaining" fight for the monster and feed it what it need.
At the lab, El directs discs through a pachinko-like machine with the power of her mind but fails to get them into the right slow. She tells the friendly orderly what slot she's aiming for, and he sits down with her order to let her mind clear. El does but still fails, and the orderly indicates that he knows One and he exists despite what Brenner told El. The orderly says that sometimes Brenner doesn't tell the truth, and he spent years in the room with One but warns that One ended up doesn't have a happy ending. He says that El is like One, and everything was hard for him but one day he just became... better. One told the orderly that he found his strength in a memory from his past, and it made him sad but also angry. The orderly asks El if she has a memory like that, and reminds her of the day a strange woman came to see El, and then was taken away by guards. He says the woman was El's mother, and says that the people there are not what El thinks. Brenner comes in and all of the children line up, including El. He takes them to the room with the light circle,
In the real world, Owens and Brenner watch El in the sensory deprivation tank. Owens thinks that they should have told El the truth, but Brenner doesn't want to risk everything and figure El will find out soon enough.
Dustin and Steve go to Skull Rock in one direction, while the three girls and Lucas go in another direction. Max notices that Lucas is distracted, and he says that he's thinking about Patrick. He remembers a time Patrick showed up practice with a black eye, and figures one of Patrick's parents beat him. Lucas figures that Vecna kills people that have something haunting them in their lives. He apologies to Max for not being there for her, and he didn't look hard enough. Lucas says that he sees her now.
Robin asks Nancy if it would be terrible if she wished happiness for her friends. Nancy insists that she and Jon are good, but points out that Jon was supposed to be there for the break but then backed out at the last minute with no real excuse. She has felt him pulling away, then wonders if she and Robin are friends.
Steve finds Skull Rock despite Dustin thinking they went in the wrong direction based on his compass. Eddie drops down behind them and Dustin hugs him in relief, and the other group get there.
At the town hall meeting, people ask Powell how long he knew Eddie was the killer. Powell says that they've been following several leads and now believe Eddie is the prime suspect. He tells the townspeople that they will be enforcing a strict curfew, but the townspeople aren't impressed. Powell assures them that they will find Eddie, but Jason and the other team members come in and Jason says that they've all had enough. Jason takes the mike and says that he saw things he can't explain and the police don't want to believe, and now he believes the murders are ritualistic sacrifices. He insists that Eddie is the leader of a cult, and everything that has happened is because of the cult. When he says that Hellfire is a cult, Erica stands up and says that Jason's accusation is bullshit, and Hellfire is a club for nerds.
Erica's mother pulls her down and Jason continues, saying that Hellfire wants people to think they're harmless. The rest of the team pass out flyers, and Jason says that the cult is hiding Eddie. He quotes from the Bible about overcoming evil with good, and asks the townspeople to join him in the fight against evil. a man gets up and tells everyone to come with him. Other townspeople follow him, and Powell says that anyone who interferes with the investigation will be arrested. The townspeople ignore him and more go.
Mike and the others tell Suzie that the Nina Project is a video game console they need the location for, and the new console is a surprise for Dustin's birthday. Eden comes in and tells Suzie to help with the babysitting, and an enraptured Argyle stares at Eden as Suzie shoves her out. Suzie tells them that her father learned she was dating an agnostic, and took away her computer. She says that there might be a way, but they'll need a lot of help.
The parents of the kids all drive to the Wheeler house and discover they're not in the basement and "back from the movie" they supposedly went to. Erica tells Ms. Wheeler that they lied to her about the movie, and the older woman calls the police.
At Skull Rock, Eddie tells the group what happened. He confirms when the attack on Patrick happened, and Nancy figures it was the same time the lights flickered at the Creel house. Max figures that now they know how and when Vecna attacks, they can track him down in the Upside Down and kill him. Dustin realizes that on his compass, "north" has slipped the further east they got, and that's why Skull Rock wasn't where he thought. He figures that there's a stronger electromagnetic field, coming from another gate to the Upside Down they don't know about. Eddie agrees to follow Dustin to the gate, and the others go along.
El relives her memory of Brenner testing Two and Six, who he had blindfolded and stand in individual chalk circles. He tells the subjects not to let emotion enter their thoughts, and Two pushes Six out of his circle. Two continues winning, until he faces El. The orderly wishes her luck as he blindfolds her, and El draws on her memory of losing her mother to push Two out of his circle and into the wall.
Murray and Joyce take a tied-up Yuri east, to the town with the church he uses as his "warehouse". They go in and Yuri realizes someone was in his peanut butter. He takes them to the rifles and they have him show them on a map where the prison is. Yuri figures that they'll have him take them in as "prisoners", and once they're they'll free Jim. He points out that he can't be tied up for their plan to work, and Joyce tells him that he'll be Murray while Murray will be Yuri. Murray gags Yuri so he can't give them away.
At the prison, the guards take the prisoners to the pit. Jim insists to the lead prisoner that at least he'll die knowing who he is, with the truth. A fight breaks out, and Jim takes down one guard. Another one knocks him out and they drag him to the cell, with Dimitri. When Dmitri asks if it was worth it, Jim tells him that the monster--a Demogorgon--has a weakness to fire and he stole the bottle of vodka under his jacket to use as fuel and a lighter from a guard during the brawl. Dmitri laughs in triumph, and Jim joins in.
At Suzie's, the power goes out again because her brother Cornelius plays with the circuit box. Her father Mr. Bingham goes from his study where the computer is to investigate, and Suzie and the boys sneak into the study and lock the door behind them. Argyle isn't there, and Cornelius the power back on just as Suzie told him. The other kids pin Mr. Bingham in with their toy weapons then set a cooking fire in the kitchen, while Suzie dials up the number and hacks the site. She traces the Project's location and prints it out, then they run out and downstairs just as Mr. Bingham comes back. The group go out and find Argyle and Eden smoking marijuana in the van.
Powell and his deputy drive past vigilantes in their pickup truck, and get a radio report that Nancy's station wagon was found near Skull Rock. The chief drives there, while the kids run through the wood following Dustin's new compass bearing. They come to the lake and they take a boat out to where the compass indicates the gate is, and Dustin and Lucas stay behind to watch Max.
In the hallucination, El keeps working with the pachinko board. She hears screaming from coming outside the common room, and goes to investigate. She peers in through the window in a door of a test room, and sees two of the other orderlies using cattle prods on "her" orderly as Brenner looks on. She ducks back as the orderlies drag the unconscious orderly out and away, and Brenner goes with them. El goes back to the common room and finds Two and three other children telling her she shouldn't have gone out, and Two says that El shamed him. He says that he was holding back and telekinetically shoves El to the floor, and then the others join in. Two tells her that if she tells Papa they did it to her, they'll kill her. Once they leave, El sees a reflection of herself when she was younger, covered in blood. El looks down and sees herself cover in blood, and then she mental visions of all the children there, dead. Brenner and Owens bring her out the tank, and El tells Brenner that she knows that she killed the others.
Eddie, Steve, Nancy, and Robin row out to where the gate is, underwater, and Steve undresses, says that he used to be on the swim team, and dives into the water, after Nancy tells him to be careful. Steve swims down and finds dead fish on the bottom, and a flowing red gate in the water. Cops approach the trio on the show, and Lucas and the others hide. In the water, Steve touches the gate and tentacles emerge. He swims to the surface, while the cops approach the shore. Max runs and draws them of, and Dustin and Lucas go after her.
Something grabs Steve and pulls him under, into the gate. He emerges in the Upside Down, and the tentacles pulls him across the landscape. Nancy dives in after him.
Dustin trips and the cops grab him.
Robin goes in after Nancy, and Eddie goes in after her, cursing that it's stupid.
In the Upside Down, the tentacle lets go of Steve. He stands up and looks around, and he grabs an oar to fend off the bird creatures coming after him. They grab him anyway and start plunging their beaks into him.
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