Chapter Text
It was pandemonium. Complete and utter carnage. Henry, who had just been staring down the barrel of a gun, now couldn’t help but feel like he was about to face a much worse fate. Infected were spewing from the ground like ants being flushed from an anthill. Screams filled the air as Fireflies shot at the wave of them uselessly. For every one they took down, it seemed like five were ready to take their place.
“Come on,” Henry cried out as he rushed over to Ellie. “We gotta go!”
Ellie met his eye for a moment and not for the first time, he was struck by just how battle-hardened she seemed. She was still holding Sam’s hand from when he had told her to run with him not two minutes earlier.
They didn’t get far before the infected caught up to them. The street was lit by flames from the smouldering remains of the burnt-out trucks and the still burning houses, making the situation that much more intense and horrifying. It was all Henry could do to hang onto Sam and keep him close as he ran. Ellie could take care of herself, couldn’t she? Henry spotted a nearby car and made for it, scrambling under it and pulling his brother behind him - they would have to wait for an opportunity to move.
Ellie’s heart was pounding so hard in her chest that she almost couldn’t breathe with it. She had almost been ripped apart by a damn child clicker! Joel was up in that house. He had to be looking out for her, right? She took a moment to look up and miraculously caught Joel’s eye. He nodded, hoisting the sniper rifle meaningfully. She nodded in return - they could do this.
She gripped her trusty knife tightly in her hand, looking around her quickly before making a run for it. Infected kept sprinting towards her but Joel picked them off before they could get to her. She had to get to Sam and Henry. She could hear Henry screaming from underneath the car as two clickers tried to get at them.
Uncaring for the danger around her, Ellie ran. Joel had her back and that was all she needed to know. It wasn’t until a Firefly truck barrelled into a bunch of infected behind her that she even realised that she had been being chased. Still, no time to worry about that now.
Ellie pulled the clicker that was going after Sam away, stabbing it in the neck ruthlessly. It made one last dying croak as it went slack. Now for the next one. But Joel shot it just as she got her knife into it. Ellie kicked it to the ground, grabbing Sam’s hand and pulling him to his feet roughly.
“We gotta fucking go!” Ellie yelled above the eerie noise of the Firefly alarm going off mixed with gunfire and the screams of she didn’t even want to know how many infected and dying humans.
Henry nodded, looking back for just a moment. Just long enough for them to spot what looked to be the biggest infected Ellie had ever seen. She had heard rumours about superinfected. The clickers had turned out to be real, but what was this?
Bloater, an old memory inside her bubbled up. Girls talking in her dormitory in hushed whispers late at night about people who, for whatever reason, didn’t simply curl up and die after a few years of the infection. People who continue to have the fungus grow and multiply across and inside of them, enhancing whatever immense natural strength they must have possessed in life. They apparently spat out bombs of spores, not that she was going to wait around and see whether that was true or not.
The three of them made a run for the trees, the sound of Joel shooting still ringing in her ears. Ellie refused to let herself hear what was going on behind them, it was all too much.
“Stop!” came a high-pitched voice from behind them.
They all turned around to see Kathleen. Henry’s stomach dropped. Just as he had been beginning to hope that he would make it out of this alive. His eyes flicked over to Ellie who looked stoic - ready to run. He let out a shaking sigh. He was about to trust a fourteen-year-old girl with the life of his brother, but what else could he do?
Ellie wasn’t staring at the woman, though. No, her attention was arrested by the clicker lurking behind her. So much of the little girl was still there. Ellie could make out a dirt-encrusted Blue’s Clues shirt. She had watched that show on a shitty old projector when she had been little at FEDRA school. Before the teachers had become instructors and lessons had become training.
Kathleen seemed to follow her gaze. Everything seemed to be in slow motion except for the clicker that leapt for her with animalistic agility, knocking her down.
Henry stared in horror at Kathleen who at one point he had considered a friend and mentor as she had her throat ripped out. Gurgling screams of terror and pain were soon cut short as the equipment to make them was ripped from her body.
“This way now! Move!” Joel said gruffly, forcing Henry to look away from the gore.
All four of them ran until they couldn’t anymore. Until the roars of whatever that massive infected had been were a distant rumble. Until the crackling of the neighbourhood as it burnt could no longer be heard.
“It’s dark,” Joel said gruffly.
“No shit,” Ellie muttered, still panting.
“So,” he continued, unfazed, “we have to find somewhere to hunker down for the night.”
“Agreed,” Henry said shakily. His hands shook as he signed to Sam, “We need to find somewhere safe.”
Sam looked up at him, nodding, though he didn’t reply.
“Come on,” Ellie said, taking the little boy’s hand and pulling him along.
Henry didn’t bother to fight it. In truth, he was grateful to have a moment to himself to calm down.
“Does your knowledge of the city stretch to a place we can stay?” Joel asked.
He considered for a moment. “If that road up there is what I think it is, then yeah. There should be a motel about a mile up.”
The older man nodded consideringly. “I’ll take your word on that, kid. Not like I have any other plan.”
Henry snorted. “Been a while since I’ve been called that, you know.”
“What? Kid?” Joel replied.
“Yeah,” Henry laughed weakly, picking up his pace so as to not let the two kids get too far.
“How old are you?” Joel asked, his tone measured.
“Twenty-one,” Henry replied.
Joel sighed. “I guess that’s old enough now, but you’re still a kid to me.”
Sarah would have been thirty-four now, he couldn’t help but think, if she had lived. Old enough to have kids of her own. He couldn’t let himself think about that, it was a grief that would no doubt incapacitate him if he let it. Still, his hand reached to cover his watch protectively.
“How old are you, then?” Henry asked, luckily pulling Joel from his thoughts.
“Too damn old,” Joel huffed. “Fifty-six, if you must know.”
“Oh, come on!” Henry replied, finding the levity less forced than he thought. “That’s not so old.”
As if on cue, Ellie cut in. “Joel! Hurry up, old man! I wanna get wherever we’re going before sunrise.”
Joel sighed. “Well since you don’t know where you’re going, why don’t you get back here?”
Ellie could sense the warning hidden in his words and tapped Sam on the shoulder, gesturing for him to follow her as she walked back.
“So what’s the plan?” she asked, hoping against hope that she wouldn’t get shut out again.
“Henry,” Joel said, “it’s your turn.”
“Alright,” he said, “so the FEDRA guy I was working with said there should be a motel not too far away. Said they used to use it as a base to smuggle drugs into the city. Said something about all the FEDRA soldiers needing a pill or two to get them to sleep.”
“Believe me,” the older man cut in, “I know all about that.”
“So you’re a dealer, huh?” Henry asked, smirking.
“Among other things,” he replied. “Smuggled whatever brought the best money. If that was oxy for FEDRA guys to sleep better at night? Well, I wasn’t gonna lose sleep over it none.”
Henry chuckled. “I respect the hustle, man.”
Sam waved to catch his attention. “How much longer?” he signed. “My feet hurt.”
“If Super Sam flies as fast as he can then not much longer!” Henry replied, exaggerating his expression as he signed Sam flying over the ground at super speed.
His little brother grinned. “Awesome!”
In truth, it ended up being closer to two miles than one and everyone’s feet hurt by the end of it. Joel insisted that he sweep the place himself, leaving Ellie to protect them as they waited outside. It was a little ridiculous to be protected by a fourteen-year-old girl, but then Henry had seen her take down a clicker by herself and he had to respect that.
“So, uh, you’re good with that gun, huh?” Henry asked to break the silence.
Ellie broke out into a grin. “Good enough, yeah. Not that Joel lets me get any fucking practice. He thinks I’ll shoot my ass off apparently.”
He chuckled. “That wouldn’t be good.”
Sam tapped his side. “What’re you saying?”
“We’re saying,” Henry said and signed, “how good Ellie is with that gun.”
“She’ll protect us?” he asked shyly, eyeing her.
Ellie smiled, though she didn’t know what Sam had said, holding her pistol up towards the sky. “Tell him you’re in good hands.”
Henry did so and Sam smiled. “How long is Joel going to take?”
Henry shrugged. “We’ve gotta make sure it’s safe.”
Turns out it wasn’t that much longer as Joel poked his head out of the door not two minutes later.
“All clear. No infected and from the looks of things, your FEDRA guy was runnin’ on old info 'cause it doesn’t look like anyone’s been here in weeks.”
“He’s not my FEDRA guy,” Henry sighed.
“Come on!” Ellie whined. “We’re hungry and I wanna take my shoes off.”
Sam looked over at her, awe painted all over his face. He nodded when she did. Henry smiled. He should feel jealous that his brother’s attention was being taken away. He had expected that. Instead, all he felt was relief that Sam was able to be around someone even vaguely close to his own age.
No one spoke as they set up their stuff for the night. Luckily there were beds for the two kids, who were happy enough to remain in each other’s company, leaving the adults to talk. Truthfully, Henry felt intimidated by Joel, especially without the kids as a buffer between them.
“You think they’ll be ok?” Henry asked warily, eyes fixed on the two kids as they read one of the comic books together - Ellie narrating uselessly and Sam somehow enthralled.
“Yeah, I think…it’s easier when you’re a kid anyway,” he looked over to Henry meaningfully. “You don’t have anybody else relying on you. That’s the hard part.”
He considered that. It would be easier mentally without someone relying on him, though he knew he wouldn’t prefer it.
“Well, I guess we’re doing a good job, then.”
“What’s that comic book say? ‘Endure and survive’?” Joel asked, following Henry’s gaze for a moment.
“Endure and survive,” Henry confirmed. “That shit’s redundant.”
“Yeah, it’s not great,” Joel agreed, smirking ever so slightly in that way Henry already knew was as close as the older man ever got to a smile.
Henry laughed. “No.”
Joel swallowed hard, steeling himself for what he was about to say. “Look, I don’t know exactly how we’re gettin’ to Wyoming. I’m probably walking, but you know, if you want to…”
“Yeah!” he was quick to agree. “Yeah,” he repeated, just to make sure. “Um, yeah, I think it’d be nice for Sam to have a friend. I’ll tell him in the morning. New day, new start.”
The older man nodded but didn’t reply.
“You know,” Joel said a little while later, once he was sure the kids were asleep, “I made a little discovery when I was lookin’ around.”
Henry smirked, eyeing him knowingly. “You found pills?”
“Better,” the older man replied, fishing around in his backpack.
“I’m not even gonna guess,” he said, still looking amused.
It took Joel a moment to find it in the recesses of his pack, but he eventually pulled out a large and untouched bottle of whiskey. He held it up for inspection.
“This place was for more than smuggling drugs, clearly,” Joel said.
“Damn…” he replied, letting out a low whistle, “looks good.”
“You a whiskey fan, kid?” Joel asked.
Henry laughed. “I’m a fan of whatever I can get my hands on.”
“Pragmatic. I appreciate that,” he said. “Wanna split this?”
“Fuck yeah!” Henry enthused before looking at the open door where the kids were sleeping guiltily. “Did I wake up Ellie? I’m too used to sound not mattering.”
Joel snorted. “Nah. If you had, Ellie would be in here asking for a swig.”
“I’ll take your word for that,” though in truth, Henry had no problem in believing that. Ellie was a firecracker of a girl.
It didn’t take more than forty minutes for the two of them to practically empty the bottle. Joel, for his part, was simply too bone tired to care about being sober. Besides, he had a feeling that every infected for miles was still at that damn street where everything had gone south not three hours ago. Henry didn’t have as much as Joel since whiskey turned out not to be to his liking, but the kid sure did make a good effort all the same.
“God,” Henry sighed out of nowhere, swaying slightly in place, “I’m so fucking glad we made it out of there. It was pretty dicey for a bit.”
Joel hummed in agreement, tipping his head back against the wall. “Ain’t seen a massive pack of infected attack like that in I don’t know how long.”
He leaned forward, his interest piqued. “My parents, uh, told me about that,” he paused, his brain slowly figuring out how best to continue. “A bit, I mean. They, uh, didn’t talk about it much. The beginning, I mean.”
“Trust me, kid,” Joel said, groaning as he got more comfortable. “If you’d have been there, you wouldn’t wanna talk about it, either.”
“Come on!” Henry cajoled. “I’m pretty damn curious and no one will ever tell me what happened. Not really.”
“For good reason,” Joel insisted.
“I’m being for real,” the younger man protested, the alcohol making him a touch louder than he should have been. “I deserve to know, man.”
Joel frowned. His natural reaction of pushing the subject away was warring with an equally strong alcohol-fuelled desire to spill his guts. Joel could feel that Henry was filled with questions, so much like Ellie always was - must be the curiosity of youth. This time, though, he felt more obliged to share. This wasn’t someone whose innocence he felt like needed to protect. And he was still twitching from the adrenaline of it all. It couldn’t hurt to share a few war stories, right?
“Alright,” he said, acquiescing to Henry’s demands with a long sigh, “so, I was in Texas when the world went to shit. And I’ve been around enough to know that some places had it worse than others and well…Texas was way up there with New York and LA,” he grimaced, but forced himself to go on. “In the first few weeks, before the government, not FEDRA - before that, before they managed to bomb everything. They were roundin’ up civilians and evacuatin’ towns and who they couldn’t fit in the QZs they killed.”
Henry nodded, that much he knew, though he didn’t interrupt. The older adults in his life so rarely talked about this.
“They tried to kill everyone who was infected or might become infected or whatever,” Joel continued, his gaze distant, “but it didn’t work. God, I remember seein’ packs of hundreds of them. Coulda been thousands. They’d come like swarms of locusts. Mindlessly attacking the walls as the army firebombed them and whatever they could think of to do. They’d…” he swallowed, “the bodies of the dead infected got so high that they were able to scale the wall in Georgetown where I was. Damn near overran the whole fucking place.”
Henry shuddered. “I can’t even imagine…”
Joel shook his head. “I reckon you can imagine alright, but it won’t come close to the truth. Look at it this way,” he said, “there are just a lot less infected around than there were back then. Plenty of ‘em have died by now. Plus, there’s less people to make more of them. But back then…back when everyone was soft and there were whole cities bursting with infected... Spreading and multiplying…it wasn’t a good time for us.”
“No,” he agreed, almost wishing that he hadn’t pushed the subject. “I’m glad I don’t remember.”
Joel chucked humourlessly. “Wish I didn’t remember either. The army did just as much damage as the infected. More, I reckon. Everyone was so eager to come out on top, to be the firm hand that put this infection down, it was a goddamn bloodbath.”
“Yeah,” Henry replied, hardly able to bring himself to contemplate it. “I bet.”
The older man didn’t reply, rattled by how much he had spoken already. Henry, however, found himself unable to shut up.
“But maybe that’s a good sign! That there’s, um, less and less infected all the time, I mean,” he clarified. “Maybe,” he continued, looking over to where Ellie and Sam were sleeping, “maybe one day they’ll all just…die. I hope they live to see that.”
“So you’re not hopin’ for a vaccine?” Joel replied.
“Shit,” Henry chuckled, “that would be nice. Doubt it, though. Are you?”
The older man shrugged. “I don’t hope.”
He nodded. “Shoulda guessed.”
“Hopin’ is for fools. One step away from having your damn heart broken,” he said roughly.
“We’d, uh, better get some sleep,” Henry replied, eager to change the subject since he didn’t want his buzz ruined. “We’ve gotta be up early and I don’t know about you but I need to sleep the booze off.”
Joel chuckled. “Fine idea. I reckon I need to do the same.”
It’s got me talking too damn much, he thought bitterly to himself as he settled down for the night, using his backpack as a pillow. The floor wasn’t doing his back any favours, nor was it helping the ache in his shoulder from using that damn sniper rifle earlier. Still, he was worn out and old and sleep came to him easily. For the first time in a long time, Joel didn’t worry about sleeping on his left ear. Henry would no doubt hear anyone coming.
Joel was woken the next morning by the sound of cacophonous laughter. He groaned, feigning annoyance as he took a look at the scene in front of him. It didn’t take long to realise that Ellie and Sam were playing make-believe and had commandeered Henry as the villain for their game.
“Hands up, General!” Ellie called out grandly. “You can’t get out of this one.”
Henry narrowed his eyes, his hands moving as he spoke. “You haven’t beaten me yet.”
He sat up blearily, still being roundly ignored. Joel didn’t want to interrupt them, but they didn’t exactly have time to spare.
“Come on,” he said gruffly. “We’re burnin’ daylight and we’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”
Henry’s face grew serious. “Yeah,” he said, stepping away from where he had been cowering behind an overturned desk, “you’re right.”
Ellie groaned. “You two are no fucking fun,” she turned to Sam. “Right, Sam?”
Sam nodded bemusedly.
“See!” she enthused. “Sam agrees with me.”
Joel was just about to reply when Henry beat him to it.
“Aren’t you two hungry?”
The two children looked between each other conspiratorially in that magical wordless way they seemed to have.
“Fine, you’ve won us over…for now,” Ellie replied, smirking.
Henry chuckled. “We don’t have much, but it’ll have to do.”
“Sure, man,” Ellie said quickly. “I knew that.”
It was a meagre breakfast, but Ellie had never been fussy with her food. She could never have survived FEDRA school if she had been. It was a dog-eat-dog world in there and you took what you could get and you ate it before anyone could take it off of you.
“So,” Henry said meaningfully as he signed, looking between her and Sam, “me and Joel have been talking and…”
Ellie held her breath, hardly even daring to hope.
“We figured there’s safety in numbers and we should stick together. They’re going to Wyoming, Sam,” he said, spelling out the word carefully. “Figured, well, shit, it’s not like we have anywhere else to go.”
Sam let out a whoop of joy as the news sunk in which Ellie echoed. She didn’t know who she wanted to hug more. Maybe a group hug was in order? No, Joel would never go for that. Still, she shot a pleading look at him. Joel’s answering blank stare was all she needed to know.
“Come here,” Henry said as if reading her mind before signing. “Gimme a hug.”
Sam launched himself into his brother’s arms, but Henry reached out to pull Ellie in as well. It was awkward and short-lived but none of them minded.
“We gotta eat and then head off,” Joel said before adding. “Quickly.”
Henry nodded. “Yeah, sure.”
“Whatever you say, boss,” Ellie snarked. “Let’s eat about two atoms of dry old beef jerky and get to making new blisters, shall we? Oh, joy…”
Though Ellie had been mostly joking when she had been trying to annoy Joel, it turned out that her prediction hadn’t been too far off from the truth. They needed to scavenge up some food and fast. Not for the first time, Ellie found herself grateful for Joel’s obvious expertise. Unfortunately, she hadn’t been wrong about getting new blisters, either. There was only so much that doubling up on socks could do. Still, she was determined not to complain. Joel didn’t seem to be having any issues, leading the pack as he was.
“Hey, Henry,” she asked to take her mind off of her feet as they walked, “what do you remember about before?”
He frowned. “Before what?”
“You know,” she said meaningfully, sidling up closer towards him, “before.”
“Oh!” Henry replied, his eyes flicking to the sky for a moment. “What do you wanna know?”
Ellie shrugged, overwhelmed by the choice. “I don’t know. Um, what was your favourite stuff back then?”
He hummed in consideration. Briefly, he caught Joel’s eye, who looked at him with an expression as if to say ‘Well? What’ve you got, kid?’.
“Where to start?” Henry said dramatically, grabbing Sam’s attention with a tap to the shoulder. “There used to be this ice cream truck that would go round my neighbourhood, right?” He said before signing, “You remember me telling you, don’t you, Sam?”
The little boy nodded enthusiastically, he loved these stories. His brother didn’t tell them often but he soaked it up every time even if it was one he’d heard before, like now.
“The truck would drive around and this song would play and all the kids knew that meant ice cream. So I’d run and grab my mom and get her to give me whatever change she had so I could sprint towards the truck along with all the other kids,” he paused to chuckle, though his hands twitched in the air as if they had a life of their own, eager to continue. “Damn, the ice cream man was fucking evil or something, ‘cause he’d always just roll along and let us all run behind him for just a bit too long, you know?”
Ellie giggled. “I can imagine that. But seriously, you’re not shitting me? A dude drove around and all the kids would run out and buy ice cream?”
“I mean, it wasn’t exclusively kids,” Henry said defensively, quickly translating Ellie’s comment for Sam. “But yeah. It was the best part about summer. Almost made the boiling hot days worth it just ‘cause you knew the ice cream truck was gonna show up.”
Henry went on to regale the two kids at length about stories of boyhood fun and outings to the zoo with his parents and going strawberry picking. Anything he could think of to keep the smiles on their faces. Eventually, they got bored, preferring to play amongst themselves, leaving Henry to himself. At least, until Joel fell back so they were in step with each other.
“You were what, one, when the shit went down?” he asked cynically, dry amusement colouring his tone.
Henry sighed. “Your math skills haven’t failed you.”
“So you don’t remember any of that shit,” he replied.
“Doesn’t matter. I’ve heard enough stories to make it seem like I do. I can almost picture it sometimes, like I was really there,” he said wistfully.
“Why not tell ‘em you don’t remember?” Joel prodded.
“Isn’t it better to give them something nice to think about?” Henry replied, shrugging. “I just lied to Ellie like I do to Sam. Shit’s easy.”
Joel snorted. “Yeah,” he agreed. “You’ve gotta lie to your kids some, I reckon.”
“It’s harmless,” he said.
“Those kids are awful quiet,” Joel mused, looking behind him to where they were straggling behind a little, heads miraculously buried in a comic as they walked.
“How much longer till we can have a fucking rest?” Ellie groaned.
Henry snorted. “You jinxed it, man.”
“Go to hell, Henry,” he replied, all bark and no bite.
Henry wasn’t put off though. Instead, he nudged Joel playfully in the ribs. “They’re gonna be terrors for the rest of the day now ‘cause of you. Accept it. You might as well take a break now.”
“Hey,” Joel replied, “if your feet hurt, just say so, kid.”
“Fuck you, man,” he laughed. “My feet are fine.”
Joel rolled his eyes. “If you say so.” He sighed. “Alright, might as well have a rest.”
“Thank fuck!” Ellie replied.
“A short rest,” he emphasised.
Ellie groaned but didn’t protest as they veered off from the road to find some trees to sit under. Henry followed behind, finally catching up with him Sam as Joel took the rear, gun ready in his hands.