Also my post season two fic while I'm thinking about the car.
Look my hobby is *outlining* fics not writing them okay?
(Dustin POV because Steve doesn't have a single coherent thought in his head atm)
Steve wins the argument about getting to drive back to the Byers' house, which turns out to be not a great idea after all. Gets to experience being blinded by the super LED headlights a couple decades early and all that joys. Also keeps getting confused because the Camaro is an automatic, including putting it in neutral trying to shift to second gear. Cue another 'no really, I can drive back' and 'no, no, never again absolutely not. No'
But they make it and Billy is gone which is actually kinda a problem, but it can be a later problem since she's already going to be in trouble for sneaking out. Max tries to make a case for her getting to drive herself home, but Steve throws the keys in the driveway somewhere in a 'nope, not possible' type deal. (It's a really bad throw. He basically drops them right outside the door, they are NOT hard to find.)
All they can really do is wait around for Hopper or Jonathan to come back and tell them what happened. Can't call anyone since Nancy broke the phone, can't use the radio since they're out of range. (Definitely out of range, can't possibly be that there's no one to answer them, nope not an option)(alternatively the batteries died in the start of Steve's 'how many times do I have to tell you with the low battery' and they can't find enough to power it since Joyce is Broke Broke and doesn't have 8 laying around.)
So they're waiting and Steve's Not Doing Good™ which is made even worse by Dustin trying to keep him awake with Bob's brain teasers. Made EXTRA worse by Mike and Lucas attempting to board up the front window despite only one of them (Lucas) being able to use a hammer. Mike doesn't want want to let Max help, until she watches him miss the same nail like six times in a row, grabs the hammer from him, and sinks it with two hit first try.
This is when Hopper and Nancy show up, intending to take everyone home. Jonathan and Joyce stayed at the cabin with Will and El. And of course this whole plan gets shot to hell because there's a strange car outside (and hopper knows who it is kinda because there have already been calls about Billy speeding). Get in the house and it's a whole sequence of 'what the fuck' because their tunnel gear is all over the living room, Steve looks like shit, and no one wants to explain what happened. The only hint (again, beyond hopper already having the clue of Billy) is Max saying that it's been dealt with and Hopper doesn't need to do anything about it because that will just make things worse.
It's too late to deal with any of this. New plan. Nancy will stay with the kids and Hopper will take Steve- and ONLY Steve -to the hospital. He will not be babysitting them all night, and doesn't want have a 13 year old involved while piecing together a felony battery arrest.
The problem is that Steve is trying to claim he doesn't need to go, and Dustin outright refuses to let Steve go anywhere without him, pointing out that he's the only reason Steve was there in the first place, so he *deserves* to go to the hospital with him.
Fine. Whatever. Taking them both, on the condition that Dustin calls his mother as soon as they get there.
Dustin does most of the talking, and sticks to their story of having it handled and there's no need to get involved. Hopper reminds them that he doesn't actually need them to say who it is since he can run the plates, and that he doesn't need to listen to Steve telling him not to handle it, because Steve is still a minor (turning 18 at the end of the month, I just decided) while he's chief of police and can do what he wants and WILL if it turns out Billy is over 18 (he isn't). Even points out that it's not their job to try and protect someone, if that's what they're doing. Noble as it is, leave that to the police. But Steve uses his last lucid thought to say one final time that it has been handled, and there is something in his voice that finally gets Hopper to drop the subject.
(Since this is Dustin POV a lot of this back and forth flies over his head/isn't revealed to the reader. He's mostly concerned with keeping Steve from falling face first into the dashboard.)
Hopper also asks Steve about his parents, but he insists that he does not want to go home and that he doesn't even know if they are home since they're at another conference 'until Saturday'. And this, of course, gets hopper even more concerned because it's technically Monday and it looks like Steve doesn't know what day it is, which would be bad. But no- he does know the date, but he doesn't remember what day they're getting home because they didn't really tell him and don't always come home right away.
(Hopper wants to ask more questions about this, but it's pretty obvious that thinking hurts right now, so he decides to leave it for another day)
They get to the hospital, Steve gets X-rays taken and staples in the cut on his head from the plate (after begging them to leave his hair alone, not realizing they don't have to shave anything for said staples) He has a broken nose (not a surprise), grade 2 concussion (not a surprise), hairline fractures in several spots (also not a surprise), and is going to be bruised to all hell (again, not a surprise), but nothing is displaced and nothing needs surgery (a surprise). Gonna be a really shitty couple weeks and he is out of basketball for his senior year, but he'll be okay.
Claudia of course has been worried sick about them since they never came home or even called after telling her Mews was 'hit' by a 'car' and then disappearing into the woods the next morning to do whatever kids do these days. All she knew was Steve's car was still at her house when she left for work that night, that Steve's mother didn't care where he was or how he was, that Karen thought everyone was at Wills, and that Joyce's phone was continuously busy.
Dustin can't tell her the truth, obviously, but the tells her the part that he can't lie about. Steve got hurt in a fight, but they're both okay ish and will be home soon. Soon being a relative term- Hopper drops them off like 5 minutes before her shift ends at 6am. But, the important part is they beat her there and can pretend they've fallen asleep while waiting.
Or, well. Dustin can pretend. Steve is passed tf out on the couch in the den and will be for the next several hours.
