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Everyone in the search party was scouring the woods, urgently trying to find Will Byers around the area his bike had been found abandoned. The goal was to find Will. And it was, for the majority of the time. That was until Angela, one of Hopper's officers, found herself separated from the group in the pouring rain. She didn't even realize she had cast off on her own, her mind preoccupied with needing to find Will as the weather worsened.
She had been in Hawkins for a few years now, but she had trouble from time to time in situations where she'd steer off the beaten path. Her navigation skills weren't the best, and it didn't help that there was a missing boy, the rain was relentless, her radio wasn't working, and her flashlight barely illuminated enough light to guide her path.
She called out for anyone around but the rain overpowered her voice. "Fuck," she muttered under her breath. With every tree appearing identical, she became confused of the direction she had been walking from.
Faced with no other option, she closed her eyes and hoped for the best, blindly choosing which direction she believed would guide her back to the search party at the very least. But the further she trekked, the harder the rain came pouring down.
By some miracle, she found a tree up ahead, its trunk split in half, wide enough for her to fit. There was something strange about it, a strange discoloration but Angela was desperate. She needed to seek shelter, anything to get her out of the rain.
It wasn't until she stepped inside the tree did she realize she should have kept walking.
Hopper immediately knew something was wrong when he came into the station the next morning and Angela wasn't at her desk nor were her belongings. She was always on time for work, never late for a single shift. Truth be told, her presence at the station was the only reason why he even bothered going to work on time anymore. He didn't like getting up that early, but if getting to work on time meant he had more time to be around her, he was damn sure going to do it.
So when he saw the empty desk, he promptly asked where she was. No one had any idea.
It wasn't like her to not show up without at least a week's notice to him or Flo, especially with Will Byers missing. Hell, she had even fought with Hopper the day before for his lack of effort to call in a search party when Joyce first told them what was going on. She wouldn't do something like this. She couldn't.
Hopper turned back to the door, set to go look for her and make sure she was okay. But Flo beckoned him back, his duties as Chief demanding his utmost attention. There was still a missing kid out there and Joyce was starting to lose it. He knew he needed to do one thing at a time or he too would lose his mind again and be of no service to anyone.
With a defeated sigh, he stole one last glance at the empty desk and walked out to find the missing kid. Tonight, he thought to himself, I'll drop by her place and make sure she's okay. She has to be okay.
It took Hopper more than a day to finally have time to check in on Angela. As the search widened, the call came in about Benny's apparent suicide, which only led to more unanswered questions as to what was happening to the once-peaceful town where nothing ever happened.
He knocked on her front door a few several times, letting her know it was him, but there was no answer. The lights weren't on, there was no movement inside. Yesterday and today's newspapers were still on her driveway. The worst immediately came to Hopper's mind.
She, too, was missing.
Unlike his slow, initial response to Will's disappearance, Hopper made a mad dash to his Blazer and set out to find her, thinking of the last place he had seen her.
She was still angry at him for not acting quickly enough and went with a group going the opposite direction his group was assigned. That was the last he had ever seen her that night.
He cursed at himself for all the stupid things he'd ever done to lead up to that point. What if that was the last time I would ever see her again- pissed off at me? Refusing to even look in my general direction? Before I could even admit-
Hopper slammed on the brakes, his mind running wild at the million possibilities and what-ifs. He couldn't think like that, like she was gone already. She was a fighter. She could protect herself from any danger, and he needed to hold onto that hope until he saw her again.
Getting back on the road, Hopper kept his eyes peeled for her as he passed through downtown, in desperate hope she had decided to play hookey for the past two days. But out of all the faces he saw, none of them were her. He was getting nervous again.
He was approaching the train tracks when he saw something move behind the treeline. He immediately swerved off the road and investigated the movement, but he didn't get far. The cause of the movement slowly revealed itself.
Angela.
Her clothes were disheveled. Her ankle was twisted. She was covered in dirt, leaves, twigs, and a strange gooey substance neither had ever seen before. But she was there, alive and breathing. However, she was never going to fully recover from what she experienced the past two days in what she could only be described as an alternate version of Hell.
Hopper didn't hesitate for one second. The moment he saw her standing in front of him, he scooped her into his arms and held her against his chest. Hiding his feelings, be damned. He was in his own Hell, not knowing where she was or if she was hurt. But now that she was with him, he was able to breathe a little easier.
And the same could be said about Angela. She wasn't sure if she was going to see another day or be given the opportunity to apologize to him after her petty behavior. She was so sure she was going to die when she heard the screams. Someone screaming so loud, so terrified then nothing. The screaming ceased only to be replaced by a high-pitched screech.
"I'm here. I'm right here," Hopper softly whispered into her hair as she broke down into tears, the adrenaline from her flight-or-fight instincts slowly dissipating. The past two days running and hiding, no food or water catching up to her. "You're safe now, okay? I'm right here."