To the Light { a joel miller fanfiction }

Chapter One - Bearings

"I know you're tired but come, this is the way."
—Rumi, In Your Light

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She didn't know that places like this could even exist.

All twenty-five years of her life had either been spent outside of quarantine zones, fighting to stay alive alongside the small group her older sister had lovingly dubbed, The Outsiders, after some book she'd read when she was in high school. The rest of the time, most of the time, had been spent in the Kansas City QZ, that is, before it fell.

Even before it fell the QZ had never been like this.

She felt like she'd stumbled into some kind of fantasy, parallel universe, some place her brain had conjured up to cope. Surely this couldn't be real.

She almost hadn't gotten to stay at all, was almost sent back out that big, wooden gate the moment she walked through it, but Joel hadn't allowed that, wouldn't take no for an answer.

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"You can't just bring random people from out there into our home." Maria had her hands on her hips, face in a fierce scowl as her eyes flitted back and forth, from her husband to her brother-in-law, then down, to the small woman hiding behind Joel, eyes wide and feet completely bare.

"I told him that, I--" Tommy started before Joel interrupted him with a scoff.

"That leash she got wrapped 'round your neck make it hard for you to talk, brother?"

"Enough!" Maria spat out, rubbing at her face in pure exhaustion. "We don't take in strays."

Joel felt his spine snap straight, "Stop talkin' about her like she's not standin' right here." A growl, his eyebrows furled together, hands in shaky fists at his sides.

"What's gotten into you, man? You've never insisted on bringin' someone in like this before." Tommy chimed in, turning slightly so he was closer to his wife's side.

Joel didn't have an answer for him, not one that he could utter aloud, or even string into words. But he knew that if they forced her back outside, he was going to rain hell until they changed their minds.

Joel saw something shift in Maria's gaze, then. She glanced from him, down to Adeline, then back, her shoulders slumping as she let out a sigh.

"Fine." Defeated voice and a slow shake of her head, "I should have a place ready for her in a few days, but until then she stays with you."

Joel visibly calmed, his fists loosening at his sides, his joints creaking at the tight manner in which he had been clenching them.

Behind him, Adeline let out a small breath, her body wavering with exhaustion.

"Show her around tomorrow, the rounds unless she can do something else."

Joel nodded, a small thank you echoing from his lips.

He watched them leave, then turned to the small woman behind him.

"M'place is just this way." He gestured down one of the streets to their right with a wave of his hand.

She nodded, then began shuffling along behind him, heart pounding heavily in her head. He'd appeared like a mirage, stomping toward her after silently killing the men who had held her captive for the past week, two, five? Time had been impossible to keep ever since the incident. She hadn't known, in that first cloudy instant, whether or not he was her savior or another man with equally deranged intent.