Francine

## Biographical information

### Age

10 (1970)
14 (1974)
16 (1976)
17 (1977)
18 (1978)

### Residence

Hawkins National Laboratory,
Hawkins, Indiana

### Family

Unnamed mother
Roy (father)

### Other relations

Ricky (boyfriend)
Jamie (friend, fellow test subject)
Marcy (friend, fellow test subject)

## Physical information

### Hair color

Ginger

**Francine**, also known as **Six**, is the central character in *Stranger Things: Six*, a four-issue comic miniseries. She was a Hawkins Lab test subject with precognitive abilities.

## History

Francine was born in 1960 and grew up in Illinois with an abusive father and a submissive mother.

### 1970

One evening, while Francine and her mother were heading home to make dinner, Francine suddenly has a premonition and screams for the car to stop. At first, there's nothing, but before her mother can scold her, a tree crashes right in front of the car, saving them both.

At some point, her father grew aware of her abilities and began using them to attempt to win the Illinois state lottery.

### 1974

On the night of April 7, 1974, Francine's father watches the television eagerly as they announce the winning lottery numbers. The number he had was off by one number, making him furious and storming to his daughter's bedroom to reprimand her. Francine tries to explain that her powers aren't something she can control, but her father says that he just hears excuses and tells her that he and her mother deserve better. Francine sadly says she'll try harder.

At some point, Francine correctly predicts a lottery number, causing the family to move and buy a new house.

### 1976

Francine's family moves to a new neighborhood, where she meets her new neighbor, Ricky, where they eventually become good friends.

### 1977

One night, her mother tries to persuade Francine to predict the names of the winners once again for her father. Francine says they're fine since they have a new house, but her mother explains that predicting the winners would make her father so happy. Angry, she storms to Ricky's house where he and his mother welcome her for dinner. This soon became a regular occurrence.

Sometime later, Ricky asks Francine to the prom, to which she happily agrees. On prom night, however, her father angrily berates her for not trying and says helping them win money doesn't pay back the trouble of raising her. He then points out how she won't even eat dinner with them anymore, to which Francine angrily replies that she didn't think he noticed anything that wasn't in a bottle anymore. Her father's anger begins to erupt as he calls her a freak, and Francine suddenly has a vision of him punching her, causing her to run out of the house. She finds Ricky outside and she tells him they have to leave. Ricky asks if her father hit her, but Francine says he was about to and she'll explain as soon as they leave.

The two rest at a diner where Francine struggles to explain her abilities to Ricky. He tries to encourage her and tell her how much good she can do with her powers, but Francine angrily says she can't control it. Ricky then asks her what if there was a way that she could.

That evening, Francine hides from her father in Ricky's house with him and his comforting mother. Ricky's mother says if Francine doesn't feel safe at home anymore, she has someone who could help her. She soon invites Dr. Martin Brenner, who offers Francine to join a new program that studies the human mind, what individuals are capable of. Francine, though hesitant, accepts.

### 1978

Sometime after being enlisted into the program at Hawkins National Laboratory, Francine underperforms during a trial, struggling to predict the results of twin sisters Jamie and Marcy's (two other experiments who are named 9 and 9.5) game of "Rock, Paper, Scissors". Later, Brenner noted her lower accuracy and insisted that she was not like other people.

She's soon escorted to her room where she shockingly reunites with Ricky, now named Three, who has the power of emotional manipulation. Angry to learn he was part of the program all along, Francine storms into her room and cries. She punches her bookshelf, where the punch mark begins to fester into a black hole and a claw pokes out of it to grab her. She screams, but she snaps out of it to find the hole is gone and the camera (being watched by Brenner) in the corner of her room capturing the whole thing.

Later, Francine eats lunch with Marcy and Jaime in the cafeteria, where she begrudgingly lets Ricky sit next to her. He explains that he was part of the program prior to the two of them meeting and Francine being enrolled in the program was only to protect her from her parents. Francine is skeptical of this being a safe place for her.

That night, Francine awakens from her sleep to find the hallways of the Lab to be deserted and covered in vines. At the corner is a large monster that looms at her, but she wakes up from the nightmare. She says, "Screw you, Dad." as she puts on her hospital gown for the day.

In the library, Francine reads *Carrie* when Ricky once again tries to talk to her. He explains her powers and what he can do to manipulate people's decisions. She asks if he used it on her while asking her to prom, to which Ricky confirms that he never used it on her and that the program has helped him control his abilities. Francine says that even if Ricky was telling the truth, he still lied about who he and his family was and why he was here. She asks how can she trust him, but Ricky asks would she believe him if he said he was apart of a government program that helped kids with abilities. Francine says she would have it had been him to tell her that. She chucks the book she was reading at him and says it was probably good they didn't make it to prom.

After leaving, the twins ask Francine to play with them. She asks the two if they ever miss their home and being outside of the world instead of the lab. The two admit they only have very few memories of the outside world due to being enrolled in the program so young, but their favorite memory is going to a toy store with many toys. Francine then says maybe someday all three of them can go to the toy store together. But they are soon interrupted by Brenner, who asks Francine to walk with him. He says it doesn't do any good to remind the twins of things they can't have, explaining that as long as they're in the program, they cannot leave the laboratory. Francine objects, saying they're only children, but Brenner says they're so much more than that and Francine doesn't realize what their lives were like prior to coming to the lab. Brenner says he knows Francine's life before she came to the lab and says the twins were trapped in similar circumstances before their house burned down, killing their family. He brings Francine to a near lab with a window, watching a little girl perform telekinesis by knocking down a house of cards with her mind. The girl asks if the guard next to her if he'll tell "Papa". Francine, confused, is explained by Brenner that "Eleven" came to the lab young under tragic circumstances as well and one day will understand what the lab is trying to do.

Francine asks if they're bad things coming, and Brenner asks if she saw anything. She thinks about the hole she saw the other day, but Francine lies and says it's more of a feeling than a vision. She asks Brenner if he knows what it could be. He says he doesn't but there's a possibility to find out if Francine is willing to take the next step. He then takes Francine to a still under construction wing of the lab and showed her a large sensory deprivation tank.

A few days later, Francine was submerged into the tank in the direction of Dr. Brenner, stating that it was necessary to unlock her full potential. While in the tank, Francine had a series of disturbing visions, witnessing a creepy monster, flashing alarms, a flat line on an electrocardiogram machine, light shining out of a door, Eggo waffles, Christmas lights, and a puddle of blood. Francine began panicking, and the scientists quickly pulled her out of the tank. Dr. Brenner rushed over to her with a clipboard and asked her to describe everything that she saw. Francine claimed that she saw waffles, and said that she thought it was because she was hungry, causing Brenner to storm off angrily with the clipboard on the floor.

Later at dinner, Francine eats waffles while Ricky sits with them, approving of lying to Brenner.  Francine then asked whether Ricky was going in the tank, which Ricky said was unlikely. Jamie then interjected that Brenner said she could enter the tank if she showed enough progress. Later that day, as Francine was walking somewhere with a lab worker, Ricky came over and asked if he could talk to her. When the lab worker objected to this, Ricky then used his powers to persuade the worker, saying that it was important. Ricky then collapsed against the wall, blood coming out of his nose. Francine carried Ricky to an empty bathroom that didn't have a security camera, where Ricky asked Francine about how she's doing. Francine told Ricky about how she feels that something bad is coming and that she still didn't trust him, after which they proceeded to kiss.

The next day, Dr. Brenner, Marcy, Ricky, and Francine sat in on a test Jamie was about to take that involved heating up coal doused in flammable liquid. As Jamie began trying to heat up the coal, Francine had a vision in where she saw a drop of blood land in a puddle of blood. Francine yelled for them to stop the experiment, but it was too late. A lab technician screamed and pounded on the glass, his face covered in blisters. Jamie was bleeding from the nose and eyes, a puddle of blood forming on the table, telling herself that she was almost there before passing out in the chair, failing to ignite the coal. Jamie was then placed in the Hawkins Lab hospital, and Brenner told Francine and Ricky that they can visit her again later.

Later that day, Brenner visited Francine and told her that they believe Jamie lost control of her powers and heated up the warmest spot in the room, in this case, lab technician. Francine then asked why they weren't shutting down the program, and Brenner responded that this is proof that the program should continue, telling Francine that she could have saved Jamie and that with more training, she could save more lives and stop more tragedies, asking Francine if she understood, to which Francine begrudgingly said she did.

At dinner, Francine sat down next to Ricky and shoved a piece of paper into his lap. They then both looked at each other before going back to eating. Ricky looked down at the piece of paper, which read "WE'RE GETTING OUT OF HERE".

That night, Francine had a dream in which she was walking down the Hawkins Lab hallway, covered in vines and debris. She heard a weird sound, and then suddenly a door at the end of the hallway burst open, showing a human figure with the head of a monster pointing a gun at her. Francine then woke up in her bed with a smile on her face.

The next day, Francine sat down next to Ricky in the cafeteria and reminded him of their plan, which Ricky said he was ready for. After they were done eating, a lab worker approached the two of them, telling Francine that Brenner wanted her in the sensory deprivation tank in thirty minutes. Francine said that she was not feeling hot and asked if they could postpone, with Ricky stating that he thought she was going to puke on him during breakfast. The lab worker joked that he knew they were in love, and said that maybe he could schedule a date for them later. Francine then bit her tongue, causing her to fall to the ground and begin coughing up blood. Ricky used this as a distraction to head back to his room. Francine was placed in the hospital bed next to Jamie and asked Marcy how she was doing. 9.5 then stated that her sister's real name is Jamie, and that her name is Marcy, and that she wasn't sure if Jamie was going to wake up. Francine then told Marcy to come over to her and told Marcy that she'll watch out for her and make sure nothing happens to her. Marcy responded by pointing out that Francine is stuck in a hospital bed, and Francine told her to lie next to her, which Marcy did, stating that now she was stuck in a hospital bed as well, after which they both went to sleep. A few hours later, Francine woke up and told Marcy to say goodbye to her sister, as they were going to be leaving soon, and that if somebody is watching them, they can't know what she's doing. Marcy hugged her sister and said that she loved her, and then suddenly an alarm began ringing throughout the building. Francine jumped out of the hospital bed and they began running down the halls, with Francine stating that they needed to find Ricky. While they were running through the halls, Francine quickly pulled Marcy behind a corner, and they watched as a mysterious woman walked down the hallway, calling out for Jane. After she turned the corner, Francine and Marcy met up with Ricky, who stated that he didn't have any time to gather any other children.

Francine, with Ricky and Marcy in tow, ran through Hawkins Lab. Francine used her powers of precognition to see where the guards would be located and managed to make it to the parking lot through a basement area. However, before they could make it to the woods, they were stopped by Connie Frazier and a group of security guards pointing their guns at them. In a vision, Francine witnessed Ricky getting shot in the chest by a guard. Francine then turned to Ricky and yelled at him to run, and as Ricky and Marcy turned towards the forest, Francine was shot by the security guard and fell to the ground. She screamed at Ricky and Marcy to continue running, and they fled into the woods. At the same time, Dr. Brenner came out of the building, asking what was going on. After hearing that Six was down, he yelled at the guards to search the woods for Three and Control. As Francine lay in a puddle of her own blood, Brenner stood over her and said that he would find Three and 9.5 and that they would not be free for long. In response, Francine said that she changed the future and that she knows his fate, and afterward succumbing to her injuries.

## Abilities

* **Precognition** - Francine possesses precognition, an ability that lets her see visions of the future.

## Trivia

* There are some inconsistencies regarding her appearance; on the cover for the first issue, she is shown to have brunette hair and green eyes. However, in the actual comic, she has red hair and brown eyes.
* Francine does not have powers that have to do with the mind; as she can see into the future. Unless she perceives things with her mind.
* She was the first test subject to have used the sensory deprivation tank before Eleven.
* She was the the first test subject to be revealed to be deceased.
* Brenner either lies about Francine's performance at predicting the outcome of rock, paper, scissors, or needs to learn statistics. He claims an average person would predict the outcome of rock, paper, scissors 15% of the time. If predicting the outcome of combinations, there are 9 possible combinations of the three variables. A person would therefore statistically make a correct guess 1 out of 9 times (approx 10%, not 15%). But what Brenner is testing is actually permutations (in which the order of the 3 variables matters), not combinations, which further decreases the chance of a correct guess to 1 out of 18 times (approx 5% of the time). That would make her guesses 3 times more accurate than an average person's, and therefore significant.
* The fact that in this story 11 has been in the experimental program years longer than 6 suggests the children are possibly named randomly instead of in numerical order. It would therefore be a complete coincidence if the program actually wound up with 11 children numbered from 1 through 11.

## References

1. ↑ "New Stranger Things prequel comic will introduce one of Eleven's fellow test subjects — exclusive" *Entertainment Weekly*. February 20, 2019

### Canon hierarchy

1. ↑ Information from *Stranger Things: Six*, a Tier 3 source, conflicts with what's presented in the main series.

	* The comic versions of Six and the other test subjects are at odds with what's presented in the fourth season.