lost & found || Joel Miller

Leaving.

ᖭི༏ᖫྀ

"We settled here about seven years ago," Maria explains as she and Tommy led the trio through the
town, "Just a handful of us back then," They looked around at the place, at the people, the shops, the kids...It all seemed so normal. It was nice.

She points ahead to a section of the wooded gate "That section was already a gated community, so we built the wall out from there—We stopped most of the raiding parties, but we still find pockets of them."

"And you said Infected?" Joel asks.

"Yeah, but usually smaller colonies," Tommy nods, "Wandered off from the cities. All this country right here; country shoot. Still got my seven hundred, but I found a variable power scope. It's sub-MOA," He grins as he looks at Joel over his shoulder, "I can headshot those fuckers from a half mile out,"

August and Ellie look at each other, not understanding a single word that was coming out of his mouth.

"Shoot them from half a mile out?" Ellie questions and Tommy nods his head, grinning, "Can you teach me how?"

"No. He can't." Joel answers and Ellie rolls her eyes. She should've expected that, "How do you keep this place quiet?"

"Carefully," Maria answers, "Being in the middle of nowhere helps...Not advertising what we have...Staying off the radio." Joel looks at Tommy, who gives him a guilty glance back.

"House of worship," Maria moves on, pointing to a medium size shack, "Multi-faith...And then school, laundry—Old bank works as the jail, not that we've needed it,"

"You draw power from the dam?" Joel looks at the utility pole in front of him, scanning the wires and cables.

"Got that working a couple years ago," Maria nods, "After that; sewage, plumbing, water heaters, lights..."

"This place actually fucking works," Ellie scoffs, beginning to walk.

Maria leads them far into the town and to the green houses and farm and as they walked through the wooden gates, Ellie notices sheep.

She chuckles, turning to look at Joel and says, "Hey, Joel, check it!" followed by a very bad attempt at making a sheep noise.

Joel doesn't say anything as they walk around the group of sheep, "So, you're in charge of this whole place?" August asks her first question after being fairly silent.

Maria smiles, "No one person's in charge. I'm on the counsel—democratically elected, serving three hundred people, including children. Everyone pitches in, we rotate patrols, food prep, repairs, hunting, harvesting..." They begin to walk past the horses behind wooden fences.

"Everything you see in our town, greenhouses, livestock, all shared," Tommy adds, "Collective ownership."

"So, uh, communism?" Joel questions and Tommy scoffs shaking his head.

"Nah, nah, it ain't like that,"

"It is that!" Maria argues, chuckling, "This is a commune, we're communists."

Tommy stops walking, as if the thought just dawned on him and watches as his older brother gives him a little glance before following after the two girls, who had found themselves rushing toward the stables.