bezoar | searching home still

searching home still

"Wake up," Joel whispers urgently. He crouches down by the dirty mattress Ellie is asleep on; bracing a hand on her thin shoulder, he gives it a quick shake. "Wake up, baby girl."

In the distance comes an echoing thunder of gunfire. Someone shouting nearby. Footsteps pounding along the metal scaffolding just outside the room that's become Ellie's room in Tommy's settlement.

Joel's heart is pounding. He'd been downstairs with Tommy, rugged up in thick layers to keep warm against the oncoming winter, playing poker with a pack of old, tattered cards by the dim glow of a light overhead, using empty bullet shells and useless scraps of metal as chips, a half-empty bottle of contraband whiskey shared between the both of them, when the alarm sounded that the compound had been breached. Hunters, Maria had shouted as she came bursting into the room, breathing hard with angry panic in her eyes. Fucking Hunters. A whole pack of them this time. The compound is outnumbered. The fuckers had waited until the dead of night to ambush.

"C'mon," whispers Joel, whiskey on his frosty breath, "we gotta move. Now."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Near miss," he confirms dismissively. "Nothin' to worry about."

He's fared far fucking worse than a bullet coming a little too close for comfort. At worst, it might require a couple of stitches, nothing Ellie can't handle if need be. He's quick to head off in to the woods, the blaze from the settlement casting an eerie orange glow through the trees. Shit, it's damn cold.

"The cabin. Assuming it's still safe."

If it isn't... Well, they'll just have to deal with that when they come to it. For now, it's the only place Joel knows that's close enough and secluded enough to get them to safety.

A twig snapping somewhere behind them has Joel suddenly halting in his tracks. He whips around, listens hard, looks closely.

"You hear that?" he whispers.

"Put some pressure on it," Ellie tells him. Head wounds bleed like anything.

It seems like it takes forever to get up to side of the mountain, but her senses seem twice as raw. Ears ringing, eyes a little teary with smoke, blood still clogging her throat with the scent.

Even before Joel points it out, Ellie's pulling out her bow, sliding an arrow into place. She gives a short nod, peers into the trees, keeps moving towards cover. They know better than to stay in the open, or stay still.

Joel wastes no time in idling about. He's instantly on the move again, shoving his gun back into place and then reaching back for his bow. He whips an arrow out, too, nocks it ready against the string, throws a cursory glance over his shoulder towards where he'd heard the sound. If they are being followed by someone - or several someones - it'll be safer to take them down by stealth while running through the woods at night than to draw attention to themselves by means of gunshots.

He hears another twig snapping, followed by a scampering of faint footsteps. Shit. His own feet crunching over dead leaves and branches, regardless how quiet he's trying to be, sounds about as subtle as firecrackers going off to him.

"Take cover," he hisses in a whisper to Ellie, and trusting that she'll do exactly that, Joel leaps over a rock jutting out from the ground, over a thick log and then crouches down behind it. Listens hard, bow and arrow ready. Ready to launch attack without mercy.

Jesus, he's already had enough of this bullshit.

Ellie goes quiet, backing up and into the trees, melting into the cover of darkness in the moonlight. She wishes for snow, even if it would make their tracks easy to find. It's quiet.

Ellie follows him more slowly, cutting a track farther back into the thicket and then staying still. Even Joel may not be able to spot her from her vantage point, but it gives her a good view of the trail. Their wait seems to stretch onward, before the bandits finally appear.

Just one is visible, but he's whispering to someone else.

"Fuck, lost them. I thought they were taking the trail."

"There's no other good path up. They have to be here. If we get the girl first, the old man'll be easy. We've just gotta keep her alive."

Joel spots one of them. Only just - he can only just make out their thick bomber jacket, the hoodie pulled up over their head - but he can hear them talking. And the way they talk about Ellie makes his stomach twist with deep, coiling disgust and anger.

"That fuckin' little bitch is fast, though," replies the one.

"You go this way." Joel can't see the other one, but tries to make a guess where the guy is referring to. "I'll go 'round this way. Circle 'em. If you see the guy, take him out."

"And the girl?"

"Use her a bait if you get her first. Like you said."

"On it." Footsteps quietly taking off.

Joel takes aim with the arrow. Fucking assholes. They ain't gonna get anywhere near his girl. With his head cocked slightly to the side, eyes fixed sharp on his target, he draws the string back to a firm tension, waits to make certain he's got a good angle. One of the men steps into better view. Perfect headshot.

Joel releases the arrow with a soft ping. There's a wet thunk and a strangled wheeze as the arrow cuts straight in through the guy's windpipe.

"Bowers? Hey, Bowers!" Joel hears the other guy softly calling out to the man Joel had just taken down. "That you?"

Joel's already reaching back for a second arrow as he watches the guy clawing at the air and at his throat as he sinks to the ground, gurgling.

Behind Joel, there is a creak of wood against wood, and all is silent but the wind. There is a soft crackle in the leaves, farther down the trail.

The footsteps get closer, but not into range, then come to a dead stop, probably within sight of the corpse.

"Oh, shit-"

The man takes off running, back down the trail, back towards Jackson. But Ellie comes bursting out of the brush, aims, and lets the arrow fly. In the dark, it whistles through the air, landing home with a thunk and a splitting scream, a heavy stumble.

"Fuck!" Ellie hisses and takes off down the trail, towards the guy now hollering his lungs out for help.

"Ellie!" Joel hisses at her as she begins taking off. "Ellie!"

The sound of the guy's screams for help is like a deafening alarm going off, bound to attract attention, but Ellie running straight for him--

Fuck. Fuck. What if there are more of them nearby? What if they're nearby and are making a beeline for the guy's screams? The guy's gotta be finished, Joel knows that, but protective instincts kick in: clutching his bow tight in his hand, he vaults over the log and launches into a fast pounding run.

"Up there!" he hears someone shout not too far away down the steep outcrop, and Joel finds him ducking madly for cover as a bullet suddenly fires off into the night, whizzing right past his head.

Down the steep path, the screaming stops with a cutting gurgle, and Ellie's footsteps flutter off into nothing, silence as she melts back into the shadows.

Joel gets to cover just in time, as four more men come pounding up the path, hot on their trail.

Ellie is nowhere in sight, and they immediately spread out, talking in hushed, angry voices and sticking together, within sight of each other.

One of the men is nearly on Joel, when a soft gagging noise cuts the night, and one of the men falls to his knees. The one next to him gives a wordless yell of alarm and shoots wildly into the dark.

There is a stumbling sound, a soft yip of pain, very close, across the path from Joel. All three of the remaining men are between Joel and Ellie, and all of them know where she is.

There's a dull thunk of something clattering to the hard earth when the first one drops to his knees. Joel spots it as he's ducking down behind another log: a metal pipe. The sound of the gunshot firing aimlessly off into the air cuts into Joel's head like a knife, sending his eardrums ringing.

And then he hears Ellie. That soft sound of pain she makes. Sees the remaining men turn sharply in the sound's direction. Starting charging off towards where Ellie is.

Oh no, they don't. No, they fucking don't. Leaping silently over the log, he crouches down low, reaches for the metal pipe, snatches it up in his grimy hand. It's heavy; he can feel the warmth where the man now dead on the ground had been gripping it just moments before. Clutching the pipe in both hands, he creeps up behind one of the men. Brandishes the pipe against his shoulder.

There's a sudden sickening crack of metal striking a skull as Joel leaps up and takes a swing as hard as he can. The man lets out a stunned howl of pain, which Joel is quick to cut off with another savage blow, this time to his back, rupturing the man's liver. And then another slam of the pipe down on the guy's head again and a fine mist of blood as he goes stumbling to his knees in a gasp of breathless pain.

The other two men have their weapons drawn. One fires; it just misses Joel, goes shooting off into the woods, and Joel reels around and lands a fierce blow against the guy's face with the pipe.

"Ellie!" he shouts over the top of the commotion.

Getting shot always stings. Thankfully, it's another graze -- she ducked in time -- but it feels like somebody raked the back of her shoulder open. She's bleeding. No telling how badly, but her arm still works.

She's only just pulled her gun when she hears Joel leap out and start laying into the men, and she peeks over the side of the log, lining up the closest guy in her crosshairs and firing. Good, clean headshot.

He drops, which leaves Joel smashing the last guy in the face with a pipe. It's too close, and they're moving too much for her to risk hitting Joel. She picks up a rock from the side of the trail, throws it at the bastard.

"Get away from him, fucker!"

The rock hits the guy square in the face, bounces off, very nearly hits Joel against the side of the head just as he's about to take another swing. It lands with a heavy thud on his shoe and Joel lets out a vague hiss of surprise, but it's forgotten in an instant - he's bringing the pipe down on the guy again, and then again, beating him down to the ground.

The guy is screaming. Shouting for help in a strangle of choked wheezes and a gurgle of blood. Joel stands over him, stares down at him with hatred and fury, and brings the pipe down again. Strikes the guy so fucking hard across the chest that the pipe bends slightly.

"Stop!" the guy is shrieking, holding a trembling, bloodied hand up at Joel. "Stop--"

Switching the pipe across to his left hand, he whips his pistol out with the other, stamps on the guy's face, slamming his head hard on the ground, and then takes aim and fires. Headshot. Bits of brain and skull shatter out across the earthy ground. The guy goes completely silent. Just a quick dying twitch of fingers and feet.

Joel throws the pipe away from him and makes a beeline for Ellie. He's covered in blood - his and the men he's been taking down, and as he reaches her, he's shoving his gun back into his waistband with one hand while reaching out to seize her shoulder with the other.

"C'mon, quick. You okay to run?"

It's not like she hasn't watched him do it dozens of times. Watched them beg, and scream, and tried to plead with them. Watched Joel not listen. The first few times, it scared the shit out of her. Now, she can't imagine ever giving in.

Part of her, though, a deep, sad part of her, has been wishing they were done. That maybe in Jackson those days could be put behind them. Instead, she watches Joel put a bullet in this guy's brain, and closes up that part of herself that ever believes there will be peace.

Joel's hand on her shoulder hurts like hell, and his touch instantly slicks him up with blood, but she nods, barely flinching.

"I'm good," she insists, and leans down to grab a rifle from one of the corpses, an extra clip from his belt. They can't carry the extra guns, but the ammo was going to be helpful.

"Ready."

Joel feels the warm wetness of blood smearing over his palm as he touches Ellie's shoulder. Oh, shit. This isn't a safe place to stop and get patched up, though; if they can make it to the cabin, if the cabin's safe--

Like Ellie, he steps over to one of the other bodies, snatches up the gun, empties out the clip. He quickly checks the pockets for any other ammo. Everything he collects, he pockets or reaches behind him to stuff into the side pockets of his backpack.

"C'mon," is all he says once they're done, and then he's off, running as fast as he can up the uneven track. The fire down in the settlement is full ablaze now; it provides enough light so that Joel doesn't need to hit his flashlight on, but he has to make himself not look in the fire's direction. Don't look back. Never look back. Push forward. Just keep pushing forward.

Soon, finally, he sees the cabin up ahead in the distance, forlorn and dark and hopefully deserted. The fire is far back behind the trees by this point; the only light that shines down is from the moon up in the cold night sky. Joel doesn't want to risk putting on his flashlight, not just yet, in case he draws attention to them both, and so he resorts to crouching low and approaching the cabin with careful stealth.

Just as he's about to head out into the clearing that leads directly to the cabin's front steps, he turns and looks at Ellie. "I'll take point through the front. You go 'round the back. If it's clear, secure what you can."

By the time they get up to the cabin, Ellie is breathing a little hard. It's not much worse than anything they've had before, but her shoulder hasn't stopped bleeding quite yet, and she hadn't put pressure on it. It's sluggish, but still going.

Ellie doesn't complain. Joel's head wound is probably making him feel worse than just her little cuts, and she's not about to suggest they stop. It's still too close to the firefight.

"Gotcha. Meet in the main room."

Carefully, Ellie moved through the greenery at the edge of the meadow, never coming within sight of the cabin's windows. They'd been there enough times for her to know the range, and where the best spots to camp the place were. There were plenty, but there were also blind spots.

In the back, Ellie found the shaft of darkness thrown by the chimney and crept up to the side, following along the base to a loose part of the foundation in the back. Carefully, she slipped underneath the house, listening for any sign of voices or footsteps.

So far, nothing. She waited, knowing Joel's approach would be louder. If anybody was in there, they'd be roused by him, and she'd have his back.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

searching home still

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject