Dawn: The Last of Us

You and Me

 We walked for several minutes in silence, Joel keeping his eyes open and scanning the plain around us while I followed at a distance, deep in thought.

We murdered her. After she saved us, we murdered her.

I shook my head, attempting to expel the thoughts of the now dead woman sitting, rotting in a cabin far behind us.

Joel slowed his pace and dropped to a crouch. I mirrored him, my hand closing around the switchblade in my pocket.

A minute passed by, then two, and a figure darted through a patch of long grass just ahead of us.

Joel turned back to me and put a finger to his lips.

I nodded.

Goddamn infected.

Joel crept forwards and disappeared into the long grass.

What the-- Joel!

I stood, my mouth hanging open, half angry, half concerned.

A sudden eruption of clicking told me that the clicker had sensed Joel sneaking around it. Then it was silence.

I waited, my blood beginning to rise.

The long grass began to move, and I pulled out my knife, taking a step back.

Joel stepped out, wiping the his mouth with the back of his hand.

"You okay?" I asked, lowering my knife.

"Yeah. Damn things must've followed us," he grumbled. "We aren't going to have to worry about him anymore, though."

"Good." I relaxed for a moment before speaking again. "Did you see anymore of them?"

He shook his head. "Let's just make it through this field and we can stop for something to eat."

"Okay." I let him take the lead again, trailing behind, listening and watching for anymore infected or hunters.

My mind began to wander again. Mostly about Riley and how we'd both been bitten together in the mall what seemed like forever ago.

Again, her words echoed in my brain: "Let's just wait it out. You know, we can... be all poetic and just lose our minds together."

Without realizing it, I had begun to cry. Silently. Not anything dramatic. Just a few tears.

Joel walked ahead of me, his head constantly turning, aware of anything and everything surrounding us.

I couldn't explain why, but at that moment in time, I felt like nothing. I didn't feel like humanity's cure. I didn't feel like a fourteen year old girl. I didn't feel like a survivor.
I felt like fucking nothing. Nothing at all. Not a player on the board, not a bump on the road.

Nothing.

Cooped up and alone like that, I felt like nothing.

After losing everyone else that I had ever cared about, I was sure that I was going to die soon as well. Even with Joel, I was sure of it.

Little Ellie was nothing. She didn't matter. She was going to get torn apart by a bunch of infected freaks, or roasted for dinner by hunters, or starve to death, just like everyone else in her life.
A sob escaped me and I covered my mouth. Joel must've heard it because he turned and came back to me.

"What is it, baby?"

I just shook my head and wrapped my arms around him, tears clinging to my face.

He froze, probably not knowing what to do, but eventually put an arm around me and patted my back.

"Hey. What's wrong, Ellie?" He softly said, taking a step back and looking at me.

I wiped my tears away and took a rattly breath.

"I don't know, Joel." I began to feel more tears make their way down my face, and I suddenly felt like the helpless fourteen year old girl I was.

Joel looked around us once, and put his hand on mine. He opened his mouth, but quickly shut it. Lost for words. Just like I was.

"Let's just go." I shook my head again and started forwards, my hands clasped in front of me, shaking ever so slightly.

Joel walked with me, this time staying in the same pace as my shorter legs.

The tears stopped flowing after a few minutes of walking through the long grass. The field that we had just crossed came to an end, meeting with a treeline.

"Great. More woods." I muttered, rubbing the back of my neck.

"We should do our best to avoid going too deep in," Joel advised, unslinging his shotgun from his shoulder.

We stepped a few feet in, but stuck to the edge, weaving around trees, through ditches, and over fallen logs and stumps. The woods weren't as thick as the one we had just escaped from, but the cloudy sky didn't help me see any further in.

As dangerous as it was to go near the dark forests, the open fields were just as deadly, if not more; an ambush was possible from any direction. All a few hunters or runners would have to do would be to hide in the long grass and wait for us to walk by before jumping out and tearing us to pieces. 

We lunched after a few hundred feet of walking, and continued on.

Soon the minutes turned to hours, and we had been marching for nearly half the day. The sun was starting to slightly dip down, and sweat coated our backs.

"How much longer are these woods going to go," I eventually groaned.

"Hang in there, kiddo." Joel said, adjusting his backpack. "Soon we--"

He was cut short when several rustles came from around us.

"Shit." We had our guns up and pointed towards the figures that rose out of the bushes faster than a snake strike,

"Freeze!" A gruff voice commanded.

Joel turned his gun on the one that spoke. It was a man covered in branches and leaves holding a long hunting rifle, which was pointed at my head.

"We're not infected!" I let out, recognizing that they weren't hunters. Hunters would've shot us on the spot.

They didn't move.

"How do we know if you're lying or not?" Another man asked, aiming his shotgun at Joel.

"We're not." Joel lowered his gun, and so did I.

The men stood motionless for a few seconds before the first one that had spoken lowered his gun.

"We're going to trust you."

"We're just passin' through the area," Joel explained, pointing back at me. "We were chased by infected and hunters few miles back, but we think we lost them."

One of the men looked back at his friends. "Hunters and infected?" He turned back to us. "In this area?"

"Few miles back. There's an old cabin that we hid in for a while before leavin'." Joel said.

"That ain't too far. Hopefully they aren't tracking you." The man with the hunting rifle grunted. He pulled off his hood, revealing a weathered face. He must've been fifty, with graying hair and a clean shaven face."I'm Father Samuel. These are my sons, Thomas and Stephen."

Joel looked at me. "I'm Joel, and this is Ellie."

"Hi." I holstered my pistol and stepped forwards.

"Joel and Ellie. Are you hungry?" Samuel asked. His sons looked at him.

"I..." Joel looked at me again.

I nodded.

"Yeah, we are."

"Great! We just brought down two deer. We can have a stew back at home."

Joel blinked. "Home?"

Samuel smiled. "Yes, home. Just beyond these woods."