When a beaten and lost, near-dead girl walks up upon the gates of Jackson unannounced, people are bound to be suspicious of why she's shown up. But, when she reveals that she knows something about an organization in Seattle planning to come to Jacks...
"No-one likes a mad woman; you made her like that."
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CHAPTER ONE Jackson County
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Ellie hadn't talked to Joel since he had told her what really happened when she went to the Fireflies. It was late summer, the days when the horrifying heat was finally over but it was still overbearingly warm mid-day. The weather wasn't ideal for Ellie, as all she occupied herself with each and everyday was going on patrols with Jesse, Dina, or just by herself. She didn't want to see Joel, and preoccupying herself with making sure that Jackson County was safe was the only thing that kept her mind off of Joel.
After a while of riding horseback up the back mountains and trails, she reached one of the patrol rest spots, making sure to write in her sightings and name in the sign-in book before wandering around the old abandoned and overgrown lodge. Ellie allowed herself to place down her bow, shotgun and her pistol down on one of the couches, deciding to clean them out thoroughly before she returned to her horse and left for the next post.
It was peaceful. Being alone and watching the breeze brush through the overgrowth in every area. She set her backpack down and ventured off through the lodge, looking in every nook and cranny for something she may have missed the last time. As usual, her search around the outpost gave her nothing new, other than an old comic book from the pre-outbreak days. Jesse must have left it there on his last patrol, he was obsessed with anything and everything he could find about superheroes.
Ellie opened a few of the windows to let herself get some fresh air. The pathway to the lodge was dried up and there were visible cracks in the concrete mixed with the sandy grass and dead bushes, and she could just barely see her horse, Shimmer, tied up around the corner of the walls. To anyone who had lived before the outbreak, it would be a sad sight to see, all of the plants and overgrowth turned brown because of the horribly hot summers, but to everyone else, it was better than having no place to stay at all.
A rustling from the bushes outside sparked Ellie's immediate instinct, and she grabbed out her pistol, stalking outside the back door very carefully, her sneakers stepping onto the old dried up pathway she used to arrive at the lodge. What if it was a WLF? Or an infected? An infected was the least of her worries, but she knew that the WLF had made their way from Seattle to all other parts of what once was the United States, so she kept a mind out for someone who could pack much more than a punch.
"Fuck!" A feminine voice exclaimed. A girl came out of the bushes, she looked around Ellie's age. But, from personal experience, Ellie knew that anyone could be a maniac and have the skill to snap her neck with one move. The girl noticed Ellie suddenly, a face of shock and worry on her face as she noticed the gun in front of her, pointed straight at her head.
"I'll blow your brains out if you don't tell me why you're at this post." Ellie spoke, breathing heavily in and out. She scanned the girl in front of her. She wore a green t-shirt and some tactical equipment with cargo pants. Scars were ridden all over her arms, and some even travelled to her face.
"Look, my name is Willow Green. I'm not infected." She spoke, holding her hands up slowly and standing up straight. Her voice was staggered, and only then did Ellie notice the rope burns scarred and red that laid on her wrists. Ellie shook her head and looked down at Willow, her eyes boring into her skull as if they were telling her to get a move on. "Catalina Island. There's a crazy freak cult there and I was captured for around a month. I escaped and raided a few camps, I spotted this lodge, came up and was just looking for supplies." She explained, taking a large breathe in between every few words. "Please, I swear to god I'm not infected."
"Scars?" Ellie asked.
"No, Rattlers. They operate on the coast of California and take their prisoners and imprison them on the nearby island. It's psychotic." Willow spoke, placing her hands down slowly as Ellie's face turned into one of skepticism, placing her gun back in her thigh holster.
"How the hell did you manage to walk all the way from California to Jackson County?" Ellie asked, still standing up straight and holding her hand on her gun, just in case whoever this 'Willow Green' character was began to turn hostile towards her.
The girl sighed. "To be honest, I don't know." Her eyes drooped, the large bags under her eyes evident of the lack of sleep she had gotten during her fifteen-day travel to wherever she had ended up. "There's more camps then you'd think with independent people. The WLF aren't very spread out yet, so it was easy to just grab some stuff from some buildings whilst they were out patrolling the area."
Ellie's eyes softened a bit. This chick had gone through hell. "Can you just prove to me that you're not infected? I can probably get you hooked up with some water and food for your travels." She stated. Willow nodded, letting Ellie take a look at her exposed skin. No bubbling, no bite marks, just deep, wounded scars and some bleeding wounds and bandages wrapped around her skin.
"Jackson doesn't let just anybody in, so you'll probably have to get scanned once or twice by one of the townsfolk, Maria." Willow nodded, sighing in relief. Her lips were chapped to hell and her skin was sunken and pale. It seemed like she hadn't eaten in days. "The hill's too steep to scale down if we want to get to town by noon."
"Alright, then what do you suppose we do?" Willow asked, her eyes bloodshot and her nails barely even stubs. Ellie glanced over to her horse, Shimmer. She had been her trusty steed ever since she got to Jackson County, and it never failed to let Ellie down.
"She can fit around two people. We should be able to get down in ten minutes tops." She explained, walking on the dried-up path and petting Shimmer.
Willow walked over as well, stroking her hand up and down the gorgeous horse's nose. It would've made travelling a lot easier if she had snagged one of the Rattler's horses on her way out. "Sounds good to me." She smiled. "Well, really about anything sounds good to me right about now."
"I'm Ellie by the way." The girl smiled tightly, shaking Willow's hand. "If you wanna get some of your cuts looked at, I can take you to Claire's, she's one of the doctors in Jackson."
Willow shook her head. "These'll heal up fine. I have a few stray bandages in my bag from some old abandoned camps I raided." She stated, pulling her foot in Shimmer's stirrup and hoisting herself up onto the saddle. "You'd be surprised at how much stuff they leave behind. It's like they were rich or something."
Ellie snorted, lifting up onto Shimmer's saddle and sitting in front of Willow, grabbing a hold of the reins and turning around onto the path that led to Jackson County. "Yeah, people are pretty fuckin' stupid nowadays."
