Dustin adopts a strange new pet, and Eleven grows increasingly impatient. A well-meaning Bob urges Will to stand up to his fears.
In flashbacks, Hopper finds Eleven in the woods and sets up his grandfather's hunting cabin as a place for her to live. In the present, Bob, Joyce's boyfriend, encourages Will to stand up to his fears. Nancy persuades Jonathan to help her on a mission to tell Barb's parents the truth. Hopper asks Dr. Owens to investigate the pumpkin-rotting incidents. Dustin tries to learn more about the strange creature he found, a small, slug-like animal that he names D'Artagnan ("Dart"), and shows it to the other kids at school. Will describes his hallucinations, and they conclude that Dart is from the Upside Down.
Eleven leaves the cabin to look for Mike; she sees him arguing with Max and mistakes them as flirting. Joyce discovers an image of Will's vision on the video camera Will carried while trick-or-treating. Dart escapes; Will finds it, which triggers another hallucination. Will follows Bob's advice and confronts the shadow monster, but it forces a shadow tentacle down his throat.
