A Reason to Survive
- Reads 133
- Votes 9
- Parts 8
MatureOngoing7h 22m
Last published Tue, Oct 28, 2025
*Disclaimer: I do not own The Last of Us or the characters. Conversations in the story are made up for original characters and their interactions with Naughty Dog's characters. Naughty Dog is the original owner of The Last of Us, which has inspired this fanfic.
When Joel and Ellie arrive in Jackson after returning from Salt Lake City, they have hopes of finding some sort of normalcy and routine. Joel isn't expecting to meet you, a doctor in Jackson who has a strange background. He remembers you from the Boston QZ, but you don't seem to remember him. You have a way of drawing people in unintentionally, and Joel is no different. Though you try to keep your distance initially, you feel a kind of comfort from Joel that you haven't found through anyone else.
When your plans to run away don't work out, and the more you learn about Joel and Ellie, you're reaching a point of no return where you feel that no matter how much you deny it to yourself, there is something darker going on. Joel can't hide the truth from you forever, and how will you react when you find out the truth?
*Credit for the cover art goes to Gauravi Mungekar on AI ArtStreet*
All Rights Reserved
Join the largest storytelling communityGet personalized story recommendations, save your favourites to your library, and comment and vote to grow your community.
You may also like
Silver ||Joel Miller||
Laura knew the dangers of her world. Between Cordyceps and the survivors, she often wondered how she'd made it twenty years. Lacking a purpose, she acted as a FEDRA plant for the Fireflies before she became the guardian of an immune kid. Ellie. But, of course, her life wasn't challenging enough already. And so, to stay with her kid she'd have to work with 'Texas'. He was a reminder of why it was dangerous to let people in - a reminder of her biggest regret. Joel never forgot 'Quebec', a person with whom he'd shared parts of himself he never wanted seen. It was safe to do so with her, because they'd agreed never to share their real names. It was a failed attempt at emotional detachment, which was why he'd never admit how much it hurt when she'd left four years ago. But when they have to cooperate to get Ellie across the country, he's confronted with their entwined history. Joel just wants to survive long enough to find his brother, and all he can do is prevent Laura from pulling him in again. He didn't realise he was already drowning until they made code words. 'Silver' meant 'help'... God help anyone that made Laura say 'silver'. ||Joel Miller Fan-Fiction - The Last of Us|| ||basically a season 1 rewrite with a new OC and an epilogue correction to what will happen in season 2 iykyk - 🏌♀️|| ||canon-typical violence, swearing, and trauma I guess|| ||complete - undergoing edits|| notable rankings: #1 in joelmiller #1 in tlou #1 in thelastofus #1 in mutualpining #1 in foundfamilyComplete
Firefly
Joel Miller x Reader (HBO Show) STOP! READ⬇️ (This will be an age-gap story.) Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Last of Us of the characters. I only own my characters and some plot and Dialogue I make up. Yn is neighbors with the Millers and watches Sarah. She has a close relationship with both of them. She lives across the street with her Grandmother who she has been living with since she was five years old after her parents had been killed in a car accident. She's with Sarah when everything happens with the Adlers and ends up staying with Joel and Tommy after Sarah dies. as time goes on and she gets older she and Joel grow closer and closer. She fills a big hole in his chest where his heart is supposed to be. He doesn't care about, love, or trust a lot of people. But her and Tommy are his family and he would do anything for them. Read the authors note for more about the story! It's is a request for all my stories. it has not only more of a description but also has triggers and warnings for the story.Complete
Look For The Light | Ellie Williams ✔️
Love isnt always beautiful though..sometimes you will reallt spend all your time hoping it'll eventually be something different. something better than what we have. then, before you know it, youre back to square one, and you lost yourself somewhere along the way. ~~~~~~ This story is fully written by me, although the characters belong to The famous game/show called The Last Of Us. this story does NOT follow the games storyline.Complete
This is Not the Last of Us
Ellie found traveling with Joel to be both rewarding and simultaneously frustrating. It was like talking to a cold, emotionless brick wall sometimes. So imagine her excitement when they run into another group of travelers heading in the same direction, and they agree to travel with Ellie and Joel. The most exciting part? The other group has a girl their age. This is essentially a Ellie/Reader slow-burn fanfiction. It's also a fix-it fic in regards to the Last of Us Part 2 because I have personal issues with it. Will involve spoilers for both games, but this is mostly a self-indulgent fic. The reader is unnamed and has no descriptors so pretty much anyone can be the reader. The reader has established parents that are involved in the plot.Complete
𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎 & 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄 || ᴇʟʟɪᴇ ᴡɪʟʟɪᴀᴍs
A young girl finds herself living in a disrupted and crumbling world, born into a camp with the intention of teaching girls of youth how to fight, training them to become warriors. Though, Three is completely against the idea of this, sick of the world she was born into, she makes the most of her life by causing plenty of trouble for herself and those around her. Despite her attitude, she is still one of the best fighters in the whole camp. Once her advisors finally get tired of her stunts, they decided to trade her to their most loyal allies, The Fireflies, for other supplies. She starts her journey to her new camp with a group of complete strangers, which Y/N protests against, eventually the trouble finds her once more and she attempts to escape, failing miserably and is transported as some sort of hostage. Plans are interrupted, and instead a group of 3 find her decimated group, Joel, Ellie and Tess decide that since Three provided them with information, they'll help her in return. Though, happiness never lasts forever. - Hey guys, it's been a very long time since I wrote this and I can guarantee you the writing probably isn't great. It does get better towards the end though, just don't expect some crazy poetic bullshit because I did not possess the capability to pull that out of my ass! For reference, I wrote it based on the show script so it is VERY oc inserted. Anyways, enjoy I guess since people are still for some reason coming and reading it? 🤷♀️ Female Reader's POV (Y/N) Ellie x ReaderComplete
Believing Lies|| The Last of Us fanfic
Twenty years later after the outbreak, Devyn Collins sets out to find the answer to why she's different from everyone else in this post-apocalyptic world. Until one day, she meets Joel and Ellie in Pittsburgh after saving them from a dangerous ambush, and hears out their plan to take Ellie to the Fireflies to find a cure, realizing that she wasn't the only one with the same condition. Although she lies for the safety of her own life. A/N: This follows the main storyline of the game. I added more and changed a few things for the purpose of my oc Devyn, that includes her backstory and such. This is mainly focused on her and Joel. The Last of Us is owned by NaughtyDog. Warning|| This is a JoelxOc fanfic. This story contains gore, sexual content, & strong language. Ranked #6 - #thelastofus 10/8 Ranked #1 - #thelastofus 10/13 Ranked #1 - #thelastofus 11/1 Ranked #1 - #thelastofus 11/15 Ranked #3 - #thelastofus 12/17 Ranked #2 - #thelastofus 1/2 Ranked #2 - #thelastofus 9/9Complete
Our Future Days - Joel Miller x Reader
Moving from Oregon to Texas, You had no idea what to expect. All you knew was that you were going to be getting a position at the local hospital in Austin. What you didn't expect however, was to fall madly in love with your neighbor. Only to be stripped away from him on that dreadful night, September 26th 2013. This series is not a oneshot collection. This series does feature NSFW content. This series is from the POV of a female. Enjoy. I do not own any of the characters in this collection (Aside from original characters) all rights are reserved to Naughty Dog.Complete
Shadow of Death
For the last six years, you've lived in relative comfort as a citizen of Jackson, Wyoming. You should feel lucky to be part of a strong, thriving community and dwell safely behind sturdy walls. But you don't. Not when you didn't deserve it. The real story behind your sister's passing is a truth you can't bear anyone to know. You try to smother the guilt, try to keep your days full with work at the stables and other tasks of mundane nature, but the ghost of her continues to hang over you after all this time. Things threaten to boil over when your best friend Tommy asks an important favor of you involving his surly older brother - one you'd really rather not agree to, but find yourself signing up for without much of a choice. Putting up with him is no walk in the park at first. But, much to your surprise, the shadow of death clings to Joel Miller too, and so maybe it was only inevitable that a connection was to be made between a pair of tortured souls with dirty little secrets. "Everything you love is very likely to be lost, but in the end, love will return in a different way." - Franz Kafka
Dark Paradise - Joel Miller x OC
''If he's a serial killer, then what's the worst That could happen to a girl who's already hurt? I'm already hurt'' Aged 8 when the world fell appart, Chloe had to go through a lot to survive in one of these Quarantine Zone set up by FEDRA. When two men find her while she's escaping her persecutors, more than twenty years later, the life they offer her seems too good to be true. But the safety of Jackson's wall appears to be real, and soon she's getting attached to people around here. And to him. ¤This is a JoelxOC story, starting in summer 2035. There will be spoiler from TLOU2, so if you haven't played it, I don't recommend to read this. ¤Trigger warning are reported at the beginning of each chapter, so you can skip them. It includes : past abusive relationship, mention of rape (non-descriptive), rude language, drug allusion, suicide allusion. But stay around, because there is also a lot of fluff and tenderness, and some smut. /!\ Age gap, OC is ~30, because we all have daddy issues for Joel and I don't even care anymore.Complete
take on me, joel miller
The world ended, but people didn't. Not entirely. Twenty years after the outbreak, survival has become second nature. But when Althea agrees to help smuggle a girl across the country, everything shifts. There's Joel: quiet, brutal, impossible. The gruff, closed-off man with blood on his hands and grief in his bones. There's Ellie: foul-mouthed and sharp-eyed, with too much riding on her small shoulders. And there's Althea, stuck somewhere between running from her past and crashing headfirst into a future she never dared to want. Love isn't safe. Hope isn't smart. But some things are worth the risk. Because in the end, it's not about what you've lost, but what you're willing to fight for, even when the world seems beyond saving.
Laura knew the dangers of her world. Between Cordyceps and the survivors, she often wondered how she'd made it twenty years. Lacking a purpose, she acted as a FEDRA plant for the Fireflies before she became the guardian of an immune kid. Ellie. But, of course, her life wasn't challenging enough already. And so, to stay with her kid she'd have to work with 'Texas'. He was a reminder of why it was dangerous to let people in - a reminder of her biggest regret. Joel never forgot 'Quebec', a person with whom he'd shared parts of himself he never wanted seen. It was safe to do so with her, because they'd agreed never to share their real names. It was a failed attempt at emotional detachment, which was why he'd never admit how much it hurt when she'd left four years ago. But when they have to cooperate to get Ellie across the country, he's confronted with their entwined history. Joel just wants to survive long enough to find his brother, and all he can do is prevent Laura from pulling him in again. He didn't realise he was already drowning until they made code words. 'Silver' meant 'help'... God help anyone that made Laura say 'silver'. ||Joel Miller Fan-Fiction - The Last of Us|| ||basically a season 1 rewrite with a new OC and an epilogue correction to what will happen in season 2 iykyk - 🏌♀️|| ||canon-typical violence, swearing, and trauma I guess|| ||complete - undergoing edits|| notable rankings: #1 in joelmiller #1 in tlou #1 in thelastofus #1 in mutualpining #1 in foundfamily
More detailsContent Guidelines