The Last of Us

Chapter XLV

Joel's POV

"Absolutely not." Maria argues with Tommy as I sit on a crate. "You tell him to go find someone else."

"Maria, I can't have this hanging over my head." Tommy argues.

"Do you have any idea how many men we lost here today?" Ellie walks up to me and I look at her, she's looking at Tommy and Maria.

"Hey - what's that all about?" Ellie asks. I shake my head a little and look back at Tommy and Maria who are still arguing. "Does that have anything to do with me?" I look back at her.

"We'll talk about it later." I say and she looks at me. Ellie walks in front of me.

"Did he tell you where the lab is?"

"We'll talk about it later." My voice has risen a little. I look to the side.

"Later..." Ellie scoffs and walks away. "Right." I look to her.

"E-" I begin but she's gone.

"It takes one. One fuck up. One fuck up and then I turn into one of those widows. Okay?" Maria yells.

"I have to do this." Tommy says and Maria shakes her head. "I don't know what else to say."

"Fine." Maria puts her hands up defensively and starts backing up.

"Maria." Maria walks to me.

"Maria!" Here we go.. I stand up.

"You." Maria says looking at me. "If anything. Anything at all happens to him. It's on you." Maria walks away. I look down.

"She's thankful, you know." Tommy tells me.

"Yeah, I know." I answer and look at Tommy.

"I'll take that girl of yours to the Fireflies. You don't have to worry about it." I nod my head and walk to Tommy.

"I need to talk to Ellie." Tommy nods and starts to walk away.

"Say again I didn't hear ya." Tommy says into the walkie talkie and I look around. "Joel!"

"What - what is it?" I turn to look at Tommy.

"That girl of yours, she took one of our horses and rode off." He walks ahead of me and I follow him.

"Damn it. Which way?"

"C'mon."

Tommy and I run to the horses and two of them are already ready for us. "I just saw her riding outta there." A worker says.

"Go back inside. Help the others clean the place up." Tommy instructs.

"Okay." Tommy and I hop up onto our horses. "Careful out there." We start riding.

"There." Tommy says.

"Yeah." I answer.

"See the tracks?" We ride forward and get onto a street. We keep going. The horse jumps over a tree trunk. "She couldn't have gotten far. We'll find her. Don't worry."

"Stubborn kid." We keep going forward.

"She usually pull these stunts?"

"Nothing like this. I don't know what's going on." We ride through a tunnel and keep going forward. We get to a dead end. "She didn't go this way." I turn the horse around and then go down a path on the side of the road.

"Horse tracks. She went into these woods." We keep riding forward.

"Ellie, what're you thinking?" I keep going forward and go down a little hill. I go forward and down another. "There." I point. "More tracks." We keep riding forward.