The Last of Us

Chapter XLIII

Joel's POV

"What, you know these people?" The lady asks my brother.

"I know him." Tommy answers. "He's my goddamn brother."

"Tommy." I say looking at him.

"Holy shit." Tommy says and he gives me a big hug, I hug him back.

"How you doin' baby brother?"

"Goddamn." He keeps hugging me.

"Yeah." I smile.

"Let me look at you." We break the hug and he looks at me. "You got fucking old." I push his hand off my shoulder.

"Easy - it's gonna happen to you too."

"This is Maria." He motions to the lady who almost shot me. "Be nice to her, she sorta runs things around here."

"Ma'am. Thanks for not blowing my head off."

"Would've been embarrassing. Considering you're my brother-in-law." Maria says.

"We all gotta get wrangled up at some point." Tommy says looking at me then at Maria then back to me.

"Ellie, right?" Maria says and looks at Ellie.

"Yeah." Ellie answers.

"What brings you through here?" Ellie looks at me then back at Maria.

"Uh... It's kind of a long story." Tommy puts his hand on Maria's back.

"Why don't we being 'em inside?" Tommy asks.

Maria looks at Tommy "Yeah. You hungry?" She asks us.

"Starving." Ellie answers and we all walk through the gate, Tommy shuts them.

"False alarm. They're friendlies." Maria shouts and we all walk straight. "We've been dealing with raids. Lots of bandits in this area."

"It's been quiet for a few days." Tommy notes.

"What the hell are you doing here? I thought if find you in Jackson." I tell Tommy and we all keep walking forward.

"Been trying to bring the plant back to life."

"We had it working before, but one of the turbines went south." Maria assures us. We walk and I see some horses."

"We have electricity, Joel... had. We'll get it running again soon." Tommy tells me, we keep walking.

"No way." Ellie says. "You guys have horses."

"We got a whole lot of 'em." Tommy answers and a worker of his talks.

"Hey, Tommy, give me a hand with this."

"Sorry, I'll be right back." Tommy tells us and Ellie and I approach the horses, followed by Maria.

"Can I?" Ellie asks.

"Yeah. Of course." Maria answers. "He likes when you pet his ears." Ellie pets the horse. "You ever ride one?"

"I actually have." Ellie answers and I pet the horse.

"When have you ridden a horse?" I ask Ellie.

"Winston, this soldier back in the zone. He have me lessons."

"You know if you want, we could take him riding later." Maria offers and I keep petting the horse.

"That's be awesome." Ellie accepts her offer.

"There!" Tommy says.

"Hey thanks, Tommy." The worker says.

"No sweat." Tommy walks back to us. "All right, let's continue the tour." We walk straight and up some stairs then through a door.