"Sure." Ellie said, with her head down. "Repeat it." Joel demanded, looking at the two. "What you say, goes." They both said at the same time. Joel sighed and stood up, looking at the two then looking in the distance. "There's a town a few miles out, there's a fella there that owes me some favors. Good chance he could get us a car." Joel said, looking over to them. "Let's get a move on." He motioned for them to follow, and they walked off towards the town.
Chapter 5
It had been a couple days after the events went down in the capitol. Everyone was still going through the backlash, but they tried their best to forget it. However, (Y/N) still seemed heavily affected by their journey through Boston. A little fact that was not unnoticed by the other teenager in the group. Ellie slowed her pace to match (Y/N)s and ended up next to him.
"Hey," she started, causing the boy to look over. "What's up?" He asked casually, trying to seem like it was alright. But he was trying a little too hard. "Are you alright? You've seemed pretty out of it ever since Boston." She said, recalling how he had acting when they first met. He seemed carefree and joking, then just before the capitol he had gone silent. He hadn't even pointed out Tess's bite.
"Yeah, I'm fine." He answered briefly, trying to close the conversation. "Bullshit, you aren't alright." Ellie claimed, staring at him and not backing down. "Fine, I'm not alright." (Y/N) conceded, but then explain any further, which prompted Ellie to try again. "I'm not going to stop bothering you until you tell me." She had declared, acting like a child.
(Y/N) sighed as he stared ahead at Joel, who was silently leading them. "That horde of infected, just before the Museum. I've had... some terrible experiences with hordes like that. And it just threw me off. But I'm fine." (Y/N) stated, ending the conversation and ignoring any further talk about it. They were silent again, until Joel called to them.
He pointed out the town and jumped the railing on the side of the road they had been walking on. "It'll be faster to go through here." He claimed as he landed a couple feet down, into a forest. (Y/N) sighed as Ellie followed, and soon he joined them. "Man..." Ellie started, looking around at the beauty. "What?" Joel questioned as he stopped to look at her. "Nothing. It's just that... I've never seen anything like this is all."
"You mean the woods?" Joel asked, stepping over some above ground roots from a tree. "Man that's what they're called? I just called them tree fields." (Y/N) claimed, causing Ellie to start laughing and Joel gave a small chuckle. "Yeah, I've never walked through the tree fields before." Ellie answered Joel in between fits of laughing. (Y/N) pouted at the mocking, but let out an unseen smile.
They kept walking until the approached a bit of a pond, with a White Crane resting atop the water. "Woah!" Ellie and (Y/N) both said, watching the beautiful creature fly off. After a bit more walking, Ellie seemed to get an idea. "Why don't you just take me back to Marlene?" She asked Joel, not noticed (Y/N) poking some suspicious flowers. "If she was up to the task, why'd she drop you off on us?" Joel asked back, looking at Ellie now.
"Well, maybe she's better now." Ellie claimed, looking right back at Joel. "Kid, I don't mean to upset you, but your friend's chances of survival weren't to high to begin with." Joel explained, causing Ellie to look a little disheartened. "Besides, if she's back in Boston, there's no way we could reach her. Not without running into even more infected." (Y/N) stated, now holding one of the flowers. That was, until it was blown out of his hand.
"I doubt I could get any of us back into that city, not in one piece anyways." Joel reasoned more, leaving Ellie to sigh and sulk back as they kept moving forward. "Yeah, and I kinda like all my pieces together, so how about we just go find this dude and get us a car?" (Y/N) said, hoping he could cheer Ellie up a little bit. "Yeah, Alright." Ellie relented as they came up to a gated enclosure.
Ellie and (Y/N) both messed around with some fireflies as Joel looked at them with a small grin. Then they used a plank to get across two small buildings and into the fenced off area. Naturally, there were two clickers standing still in the area. Joel tested out his new pipe; that has scissors attached to it for a one shot kill, while (Y/N) just throwing knifed the other one. "That was easy." Ellie said, who hadn't done anything. This gave the other teenager a little laugh.
They moved into a nearby building to loot it out, when Ellie attempted to whistle. The operative word there was attempted. It sounded like she was trying to imitate an airplane, which neither of the two teenagers had seen. "Are you alright?" Joel asked, turning to look at her. "I'm trying to learn how to whistle." Ellie said, and then (Y/N) started whistling himself. He had picked up on it from Jen, who taught him how to in order to help them sneak around more efficiently. "Does it sound like I know how to whistle?" Ellie asked, playfully shoving (Y/N) as he was whistling rather well.
They finally left and dropped down, reaching another gate. This time, it seemed to have a crowbar jammed through it on the other side. "Ah shit, it's jammed from the other side." Joel stated the obvious as he tried to shake it loose. "Here-boost me up." Ellie said, pointing to the patch above the gate that was clear of barbed wire. "No, no, that's not such a good idea. (Y/N), you head over." Joel said, causing Ellie to huff as Joel sent the teenager over the fence. He landed carefully down and went to go remove the crowbar, when he heard something to his left.
"Oh shit." (Y/N) grumbled, pulling out his pistol as he ran from the fence. Joel and Ellie watched 4 clickers rush past in an attempt to hunt him down. "Shit, (Y/N)!" Ellie called, going up to the gate as they heard gunshots. "(Y/N)!" Joel said, trying to ram through the gate. "Chill out, you'll just attract more of them." (Y/N) had said as he walked back into view. His gun was hanging loosely from his hand, until he holstered it. He had some blood on his hoodie as he grumbled about the mess.
"Thank Christ." Joel muttered as the boy took the crowbar off the gate. "Good thing you didn't go over, huh Ellie?" (Y/N) asked, causing the other to blush slightly and elbow him. The other laughed, watching as Joel moved forward without them. They jogged to catch up, after a bit more looting they finally found an open alley way to cut through.
They moved to go through it, when they all spotted a clicker turning around it. (Y/N) and Joel both drew their guns, ready to fire, but the clicker ran into a thin wire they didn't spot. A nail bomb attached to the wall exploded, tearing straight through the infected, and leaving the group stunned. "Holy shit." (Y/N) said, looking at the display. "That would be one of Bill's traps." Joel said, stepping over the corpse. "Watch your step, you don't know how many of those there are." Joel said, as they moved. They made their way up a truck, where Joel found a bow and some arrows.
"How about I take that? You know, I'm a pretty good shot with that thing." Ellie bargained as Joel tested out the string. "How about we just leave this kind of stuff to (Y/N) and I." Joel said, causing Ellie to look upset as Joel scouted ahead. "I'm sure he had a reason for this. To be fair, I've kinda been shooting a gun ever since I could walk. And no offense, but you probably couldn't even figure out all the parts of this." (Y/N) said, pulling out his handgun, leaving Ellie dejected a bit.
"Is that why you're so good with that knife, you've trained before?" Ellie asked as they followed Joel up a ladder. "Yeah, I always preferred it to guns. You know, quieter and a lot lighter." (Y/N) said, watching Joel moved a plank over so they could cross rooftops again. "Fun." (Y/N) grumbled as they maneuvered across. They came across a lone clicker twitching below them. The teenagers continued their chat as Joel used his handy new bow. He sent the arrow straight into its skull.
"Now listen you two." Joel ordered as they all moved again. The other two stopped taking and listened closely. "Bill ain't exactly the most stable of individuals. So when we get there, you let me do the talkin'. You understand?" Joel asked, taking a quick look back at them. "Don't talk to the maniac, got it." (Y/N) said, and Ellie had to hold in her laugh. "We gotta be clear on this. He... he don't take kindly to strangers." Joel explained further, and Ellie agreed this time. "Bill is a good guy, he just needs time warming up to you is all." He finished defending Bill as they now moved off the rooftop.
They were now in another alley, and watching as Joel crouched under the wire. "You see this wire? Stay underneath it and keep your heads low." Joel said, helping the two across so the didn't get their heads blown off. Before they could get too far, though, a door started rattling. Ellie backed away from it as it stopped, and Joel walked towards it. After a moment, Joel opened up the door. "You're going in there?!" (Y/N) asked in shock. "I wanna see what I can find." Joel explained, now Ellie decided to speak. "You're going to find my body when I die of a heart attack."
They looted out the house, and sure enough a runner came sprinting at them when they weren't paying attention. Ellie and (Y/N) screamed and Joel seemed genuinely amused by it. They moved onward yet some more, avoiding getting their heads blown off by some more traps. Finally, they reached a building that they entered in. Joel grabbed a couple things then moved to open a door, which led to a warehouse. He took barely a couple steps, when a noise sounded through the warehouse. Joel looked down to see some rope tighten around his feet, and start dragging him across the ground, until it suspended him in the air.