Divided In War

Chapter 13

Abby...

Ellie didn't sleep much, if at all. A roaring thunderstorm tore it's way through the night and into the early morning. Ellie was crouched, in the same position she'd been in for several hours. Clenched jaw, she pulled a deep breath into her lungs. And in front of her, the map she had found with the red circles over the W.L.F bases scattered around the huge city, and her simple little blue circle she'd created to mark where the theatre was in the area.

Her whole body went rigid as Tommy walked out of the breakroom rubbing the rest from his eyes.
"What are you doing up?" Tommy asked, yawning.

"... Thinking..." was her reply.

"Listen... I want Abby dead as much as you do. Tommy crouched, matching Ellie's stance and looked into the now empty, deep, sorrowful light green eyes Ellie looked back with. "I think I should go find her while you stay here. Look at you... you're shaking, you need sleep.

Ellie chose to ignore Tommy's plea, " Are you sure Sylvia is safe? Can you promise me she won't end up like... Joel." Ellie said his name in a hushed whisper, not wanting to picture Sylvia in Joel's spot that evening.

"..."

"..."

"Just focus on Abby." Tommy stood, taking the map with him as he lays it out onto the table.

"Abby... right..." Ellie's head hung low as she also stood and made her way next to Tommy, repressing any thought of Sylvia that rushed to her.

"Over the radio, there was a channel from here." Tommy pointed to a big building about an hour walk from them, a hospital.

"The hospital?"

"Yea, they were asking questions about Abby, and where she could be... Looks like she's gone against the Washington Liberation Front."
Ellie nodded.

"Your best shot is going there and getting information on where Abby could be hiding out." Tommy turned to look at Ellie and leaned against the table with his fists onto the wood. She didn't meet his gaze.

Ellie turned away from the table to go pick up her back pack, but halted when she caught the stare of Jesse and Dina, who has an arm wrapped around Jesse's.

"I'm going with you. It's not safe going alone." Jesse commanded, but fruitfully Ellie refused.

"Absolutely not. Stay here and please look after these two... I'll be back before sunset." She points to Tommy and Dina who were watching from the sidelines.

The three of them stood in silence, eyeing Ellie's awkward stance, her legs apart and her chest clearly heaving for the air round her. Ellie didn't stay any longer as she blinked away her scattered thoughts and rushed herself out of the theatre, turning right to trek for the hospital.

-

She was halfway to her destination, about thirty minutes in is when her ears perked at the low sound of what she thought was chatter. Looking up into the sky, her eyes darted to the bending wooden walkways that have been made to scale across the multiple large sky scrappers that sat on the city's skyline. Her thoughts jumbled, "Are the voices coming from up there? How are they doing that?..... Heh, Sylvie would love that." She reminded of the countless times Sylvia would stand at the edge of mountain cliff just to get a 'good view'.

Shaking off her thoughts, she focuses back to the road in front of her.

-

Forty-five minutes into her hike, she spots the large building now surrounded by W.L.F soldiers.
It was a huge building, to outside was littered with chipped off-white paint, and ivy vines that attached themselves to the scaling walls.
To the side of the building was a creek, nearly dried up but still had trickling water. The further down, the creek became larger. Fuller.