#immune!reader

[mywifeellie]

Just Like Me Chapter 1 (Test Chapter)

Ellie Williams X Immune!Reader

18+ only: Ageless blogs wil be blocked

Another immune person was something both you and Ellie had let go of the idea of a long time ago. When you find each other though, the world starts to make sense in a completely different way then both of you would have ever expected. As you two discover what it means to know each other, someone who gets something no one else seems to, can you make it out of it all alive?

Tags: (Will be tagged by chapter), Ellie X Reader, Immune!Reader, non graphic injury descriptions, Gun, She threatens it with you a little, This is so short but I wanna test the waters

When Ellie found you unconscious in the woods she couldn’t fathom what you could possibly be doing out there alive. You seemed to have barely any supplies and no gear for the rainy weather this time of year. Your leg had a long slice down the side and your head had a large bump that had scabbed over. Your shoulder had an arrow wound with splintering still stuck in various spots. Who knew how many bumps and bruises were under your clothes where a first check couldn’t see. You were in rough shape but she couldn’t just leave you to die there.

She took you to the nearest safety checkpoint she knew, trying to be as careful as possible with your various injuries. You looked sickly, and your wounds looked nasty. Keeping you on the horse was hard, your limp body useless to staying upright, Luckily Shimmer knew the trail well so Ellie could keep good attention on you most of the way.

She did her best to patch you up with what she had. Wrapping your leg cleaning at the open area on your shoulder until someone more qualified could wrap it properly. Little wounds were cleaned and patched wherever she found them. Anytime you were moved she notes your breaths were shallow and when you had a response you seemed to be favoring your side. Broken or bruised ribs maybe? She couldn’t be sure but she could wrap it to keep it from moving too much and hope it wasn't stabbing through anything crucial.

If you had been moving with it, she really had to give you kudos for that one. She grabbed the bandages and got to work trying to wrap your lower ribs the best she could around your dead weight. 

It was then when she noticed it. The bumpy discolored flesh of the edge of a bite. She froze and her eyes flickered up at you and then back to the spot. She shakily pushed your shirt up further to examine it. No mistake that it was clearly from an infected. Had she just wasted time patching an infected in progress? 

No.She gasped as she processed what she was seeing. Your wound looked like hers. It looked old and healed over, as if you had it for longer than the time you should have been infected. Could it be? Could she have actually accidentally stumbled upon someone else who was immune?

She couldn’t get too hopeful. If you woke up slashing and biting she’d have no choice but to take your life. But if she was ready… would it be worth the wait to check? Would you even wake up if she couldn’t get you to Jackson?

You groaned, snapping her out of her thoughts as her eyes locked on your face. You didn’t wake though. But you had shown signs you weren’t dead just yet so despite the warning signs she didn’t move. Instead she slid your shirt back over your wound and finished wrapping your ribs, and then placed herself a safe distance away with her shotgun ready. If you were unsafe she would blow your head off and if you were safe.. She wasn’t sure. 

Now all she could do though was wait and see.

–

When you did wake up it wasn’t screaming and looking for the nearest hunt, it was whining in pain and trying hard to understand if you were in danger from the gun pointed at you across the room. You moved so slowly sitting up and there was no gunshot. The room was shaded with only a bit of light coming through some boarded windows, and the air was old despite its cold crisp. 

You assessed that your head had something on it and that your shoulder hurt like a bitch. Your ribs were making it hard to do more than take a few small breaths at a time. You realized your ribs were wrapped the longer you focused. Oh no, had they- Your hand flew to your side to clutch at it.

“The bite.” You felt ice cold blood run through you as the fear set in. They had seen it, and didn’t sound pleased. “How god damn old is it?” Her voice was rough, like she hadn’t been using it for a while, but strong with confidence nonetheless. Her eyes were dark with something you couldn’t identify. Her face was hard set and her gun was held by a steady hand.

“It’s old. It’s old!” You gasped out. “Please believe me. I’m not infected, Not really. It’s been years. ” Your eyes welled with stressed tears and pain as your breathing picked up against your ribs. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. You didn’t want to die here alone at the hands of a stranger. Your eyes couldn’t move off the shotgun, aimed squarely for the center for your skull. “Please.”

But to your surprise the gun lowered a bit. “You’re not lyin’ to live? That bite’s really that old?” She squinted. “If you make one wrong move I’ll have to shoot you, so don’t waste my time if that’s you telling me a tale.”

You nodded your head slowly. “It is. I promise. I don’t know how- I just never turned. I swear I wouldn’t lie.”

The gun lowered into her lap and her hand moved to the sleeve of her right arm. You watched her curiously as she took a deep breath and slowly pulled up her own sleeve to show you something. The bite was just like yours. Or almost. It looked less like a bite, but the discoloration and the bumpiness was hard to mistake when you knew what yours looked like. Your jaw dropped. “That’s- I was told I was the only one.”

She nodded. “I just never found anyone else.” Her sleeve was put back down and she pushed herself to her feet, her gun left to the floor. She sighed and gave you a long stare that made you avert your eyes a bit. Then after a pause that was just slightly too long she spoke.

“You should sleep more. I need to take you to see someone who can heal you up right, and you can’t travel if I can’t keep you awake on Shimmer. I know someone who can help who won’t mind your bite.” You find yourself nodding slowly.  You found that you trusted her not to try anything funny, and after knowing that you shared something so important you doubted she’d let anything happen to you if she could help it. After all she had gone through so much effort to save your life out there. . Without a fight you shut your eyes and let your mind, reeling with new information, take you off to sleep.

#fics #my house #ellie x reader #ellie williams x reader #ellie tlou #ellie williams tlou #ellie williams fanfic #tlou fanfiction #immune!reader #x reader

[natashowlet]

Miguel O’Hara icons

#miguel o'hara #across the spiderverse #across the spider verse spoilers #spiderman: across the spiderverse #sm:atsv #miguel ohara #atsv icons #atsv spoilers #spiderverse #spiderverse icons #spiderman 2099 #Miguel O’hara icons #miguel o’hara x reader #oscar isaac #i have only seen like 15 mins of this movie #but I couldn’t resist #i too am not immune to Miguel O’Hara

[teddybeartoji]

suggestive; gn!reader

thinking about helping oikawa stretch after practice.

he's all sweaty and musty and he's clinging to you, asking – no, absolutely begging you with his pretty brown eyes, for you to help him. and obviously you can't say no to him, so that's how you find yourself in this position – he's on his back, scruntching his eyebrows as you press his knees up to his chest. his flexible body begs for you to angle your own hips against his in order to properly give him the stretch he needs. his cheeks are tinted pink and his bottom lip is caught in between his teeth and it's really hard to not get any ideas. it's wrong – you know it is! this is your good friend and you're just helping him and there's nothing weird about this position and—

a loud moan rips from his lips and your eyes almost fall out of your head as warmth creeps up your neck. he doesn't even say anything about it, he just grabs onto your wrists to make sure you don't pull away.

"d-don't!" you stammer when a quieter but no less lewd noise escapes him. you feel your hands get clammy as your fingers sink into his calves.

oikawa cracks his one eye open to ask what the problem is. he doesn't see what's wrong in the slightest. his brown hair is splayed on the floor like a masterpiece with some of the strands sticking to his forehead and nobody should be allowed to look this good after a rough practice.

"don't make those sounds..." you whisper as you lean more into him when you feel the resistance in his body falter.

"wha– ahh...t sounds?" his eyes shut again and he sucks in a breath, puffing out his reddened cheeks. his knees fall more to his sides, opening up the space between them and you move closer on instinct.

"tho- those ones, idiot! you're making it weird!"

your hips are now completely flush against his and he lets out another pained whine. taking one of your hands from his calf, you place it on top of his mouth instead and his eyes shoot open in an instant.

he didn't even think about this position like that, genuinely oblivious to the suggestiveness of it. the stretch in the backs of his thighs feels good but you on top of him feels even better. your body feels warm against his and his eyes flick down to where you're connected. at that you try to pull away, afraid that now you've made it weird but he stops you.

"c'mon.. don't go." his hands wrap around your biceps as his eyes burn into your avoidant ones. "you have to help me with the next one too."

blinking down at him, you gulp, unable to refuse him. oikawa twists under you, barely taking his eyes off of you as he straightens out his one leg and folds the other up and to the side.

this position is no less suggestive than the last one – it still requires you to press up right against him to help him out. his fingers grasp at your sleeve to break you from your haze and you shuffle closer again.

bodies glued together, your hands dig into his thigh as you try to not focus on your friends face. nor the proximity. from behind you, you hear a row of snickers – without turning around, you know his teammates are making fun of you for falling into their captains alleged trap.

"see, this isn't so bad..." oikawa's soft flesh is back between his teeth as he forces his body to relax under you. you quietly glare at him, just hoping he won't say or do anything weird anything, hoping that he'll let you just leave and breathe for a moment—

"h-harder."

...

you press your eyes shut as your body threatens to overheat. putting almost all of your bodyweight onto his, you watch his eyes roll back inside his skull and you hold back a flustered groan. why is he like this?

slowly peeking from underneath your eyelashes, his scrunched up face almost kills you and it's hard to keep your thoughts at bay – they just come flooding in and you feel like a terrible friend. he's like this with everyone, so why are you even thinking about it? you are the one who's making it weird and you should stop.

"hey! no more fooling around! we gotta lock up, so move your asses!" iwaizumi breaks your pervy little bubble and you find oikawa staring right back at you. his cheeks are still pink even though the practice ended a good while ago. he gives you one of his big bright smiles as he moves his leg from his body to your other side, leaving you kneeling right between his thighs.

"thanks for that!" his voice betrays nothing about what he really feels in this moment, about what he feels in his lower abdomen. he pushes himself up and before he goes to leave for the changing room, he looks down at you and boops your nose with a laugh.

you stay glued to your spot for a good moment, iwaizumi's loud voice being the thing to tear you from the floor. you stumble to grab the remaining bottles and towels from the floor and make for the exit, letting the man close up behind you.

you mutter a quiet goodbye to him and hurry off, telling him that you have some other stuff to attend to. he doesn't question it – he's fully aware of the effect oikawa can have on a person. and on their body.

+ inspired by this iwaoi art on twt!!!!! i thought it was so funny n cute so i had to write something for it!!!!

#😃😃 #I AM NOT IMMUNE TO PRETTY BOYS #I REPEAT I AM NOT IMMUNE #i died #oikawa #oikawa x reader #oikawa tooru x reader #oikawa drabble #oikawa blurb #oikawa smut #hq oikawa #hq x reader #haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu smut #haikyuu oikawa #tooru oikawa #oikawa tooru #wtf mickey can write #oikawa x you

[no-mercy-bby]

I can take them both (not in a fight)

#🤭🤭🤭 #aaron taylor johnson #kraven the hunter #sergei kravinoff #pietro maximoff #quicksilver #marvel #i am not immune to atj #kraven the hunter x reader #sergei kravinoff x reader #pietro maximoff x reader

[ghouljams]

I love the SCP au. Could you go more into detail about Laswell/SCP141-e?

Is he actually in their heads or is it that he can permeate technology in some way when it's near them? Is that how he gets his information?

Would it be possible for him to be heard by people outside of SCP141? Say, if he decided to see what the fuss is about a certain researcher/personnel?

Is he only able to be heard by the others when they're close enough to activate their anomalous properties? What happens when they're apart? What anomalous properties would he lose?

Special Containment Procedures Activated:

Given SCP-141-a's anomalous abilities it is recommended that personnel interviewing and interacting with him either: pass level 5 anti-memetic training, utilize psychic shielding either chemical or mechanical, or maintain a natural inclination against cognitohazardous anomalies. At present all interviews are to be conducted by senior research staff member of the psychic anomalies division on site ⬛️⬛️, ⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️.

No information is to be given to SCP-141-a, no matter the relevance, truthfulness, or perceived impact. SCP-141-a will be treated as a hostile in this respect, and it must be assumed any information provided to SCP-141-a will be used against the provider.

Do not believe his lies. Do not believe his truths. Do not mistake his smile for friendliness.

Interview Log, SCP-141-a:

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: This is interview ⬛️ on date ⬛️/⬛️/20⬛️⬛️ with SCP-141-A, going by the name of John Price.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: How are you today John?

SCP-141-a: Better seein' you sweetheart. You got special orders to keep talkin' to me?

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: (hums in assent) I'm afraid I just can't stay away.

(The click of a pen can be heard, the creak of leather as SCP-141-a makes himself comfortable in his chair.)

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: Do you know why I'm here today, John?

SCP-141-a: Don't suppose you missed me?

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: As much as I enjoy our talks, I'm afraid that isn't the case today.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: I'd like to talk about Laswell.

(There's about a 30 second pause before SCP-141-a speaks again)

SCP-141-a: What about Laswell?

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: I'd like to talk to them.

SCP-141-a: Her.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: I'd like to talk to her then.

SCP-141-a: Not possible.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: Why not? I thought you liked me John, that you wanted to help me.

SCP-141-a: Sweetheart I would-

(Static overtakes the tape for another minute, it can be assumed that SCP-141-a is interfering with the recording in some manner.)

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: Stroke- Strike that from the record please.

SCP-141-a: Anyone ever tell you, you got-

(Another minute of static. Add equipment interference to SCP-141-A's anomalies)

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: I think we're done here.

SCP-141-a: ⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️ ⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: What did you just say?

SCP-141-a: That's your name isn't it?

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: Who told you that.

SCP-141-a: Watcher- Laswell, tells me a lot of things.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: (taking a breath) And where is Laswell?

SCP-141-a: Classified.

⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️: How is she able to communicate with you if she's outside the range of SCP-141? That shouldn't be possible.

SCP-141-a: Who said she's outside of range?

Interview terminated, site ⬛️⬛️ placed on immediate lock down. Site swept for invisible anomalous entities. Nothing found. SCP-141-a returned to cell. ⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️ tested for cognitohazards. Clean.

#cod x reader #x reader #captain price mw2 #captain john price #captain price x reader #captain price #john price #cod price #price mw2 #scp au #kate laswell #task force 141 #oc: witch #as our memetically immune interviewer :)

[cocoreallylovesraiden]

lin-kuei trio x chef! reader

pre-events of the mk1 cinematic; mostly with tomas that can be seen as platonic or romantic

ooc-ish? this is just my interpretation on how it would’ve been like before things got bad for the lin kuei

1.5k

You slide the plate of food onto the wooden lazy susan, quickly warning your guests not to touch the plate. Almost immediately, Kuai Liang decides to place his fingers on the plate’s underside.

You step back, unimpressed.

“With all due respect, Kuai Liang. Seriously?”

“You call this hot?”

Kuai Liang’s good-natured smile is useless against you, because yes, you call this hot; you had to carry it the entire way from the kitchen yourself because the Lin Kuei eat with in absolute privacy, and you also did not have FIRE POWERS. So yes, it was hot. You pointedly place one of two bowls of rice you brought before Tomas, who gleefully rubs his chopsticks together.

“Cease your antics, brother.” Kuai Liang chuckles at Bi Han’s almost embarrassed seething.

“Thank you, Bi Han. You get rice.”

The second bowl is (gingerly) placed before him. You would slam it down too for effect, but you would rather not be frozen alive for having bad manners with the new Grandmaster Of The Lin Kuei.

You internally roll your eyes at the title. Whatever, Bi Han was Bi Han at the end of the day. The brothers had come to the teahouse enough times for you to know that if you gave him food, he would be grateful and shut up to eat it- unless he was on another-

Bi Han pushes the bowl to Kuai Liang with a small motion before picking up his chopsticks.

“You’re on another diet.” You exclaim.

Kuai Liang accepts the bowl with a sigh, likely sharing the same sentiment. Tomas takes a morsel of the stir fry and hurriedly shoves it in his mouth to share his piece, but the food is too hot, and he makes a show of cooling his mouth. Bi Han’ sigh mirrors Kuai Liang’s prior one.

These brothers. It was like a chain reaction, where each one of them were disappointed in each other’s behaviour.

“The Grandmaster needs to be in tip-top shape to fit his grandmaster uniform.” Tomas chides. “So that his arms look good in- ACK!”

His statement is cut off by a small mound of rice being shoved into his mouth, courtesy of Kuai Liang. Whatever he meant to say was replaced by yelps of “Hot!” and whining. He eventually turns to you with an expectant look, like he was hoping you would come to his defence.

You shrug. What were you supposed to do? Scold a ninja-extraordinaire for lovingly feeding his brother? No, seriously. Your relationship with these people was extremely conditional, and there was no doubt they would put you in your place if you ever tried to boss them around.

Except Tomas. There was some leeway bossing Tomas around.

“Is there anything you want to eat today- not you Tomas.” You physically push away the cheeky man’s face to maintain your eye contact with Bi Han. “Since you three cleared out the place, my treat.”

Bi Han looked at his empty plate for a moment, as if he suddenly had forgotten every meal he’s ever enjoyed. You kissed your teeth, immediately understanding. You yourself were the oldest child, so you knew how it felt to suddenly be asked what you specifically wanted. Either that, or if he was considering cheating on his diet just to eat your fried pork.

“The sweet pork. That you made last time.”

Yeah, okay. It just was never as emotionally complicated as you expected it to be with him. Well, it was terribly flattering that he’d take up the precious calories to eat what you cooked- though it did make you question Bi Han’s resolve; you had never seen him in battle, so you couldn’t gauge his self-control other than him crumbling at the promise of your cooking.

Either way, you gave him a thumbs up and an appreciative grimace.

“Right away, boss.”

You scuttle back into the teahouse kitchen, where you thankfully had all the ingredients available. Thank God, there was no emergency calling Kung Lao for the delivery of flour or vinegar. What would that phone call sound like, even?

Hey bestie! Hope you’re not too busy harvesting cabbages because I need you to bring me a cup of sugar to make a meal for the grandmaster of an organised family! Yeah Grandmaster! Yeah, ‘family’! Hope to hear back from you soon!

Just as you’d gotten the oil up and frying, the jammed kitchen door tries to open with a groan. You settle the breaded pork into the ladle, throwing it into the bubbling oil with a satisfying sizzle. The door tries to open again, and it gets a little further before inevitably getting stuck once more.

You roll your eyes. With a single outstretched kick, you manage to send the damp wooden door to swing open like it was brand new, leaving Tomas standing there like a kid caught with his hand in the jam pots.

“Maybe we should recruit you into the Lin Kuei.” The silver-haired man allows himself into your kitchen, carefully side-stepping a hemp sack of flour then once again to avoid a crate of bok choy that toppled earlier in the day.

The kitchen was messy, but when there’s only one person to handle a mountain of orders you learn to improvise. It was a strategic layout that only you needed to understand.

“Nice of you to let yourself into my kitchen.”

“Thought I’d keep you company.” A lie. He just wanted to spend some time away from Kuai Liang and Bi Han, an understandable sentiment. The three of them probably spent too much time together leading the Lin Kuei, and Bi Han was insufferably stuffy to share meals with.

You whisked vinegar and sugar in a bowl, but arms worked in autopilot as you stared at Tomas making himself comfortable on the stool near you cooking station. It was comical, watching the tall man fold himself like origami paper to fit perfectly on such a small surface, tucking his knees to his chest and peering up at you like a child.

This stool wasn’t just any old chair, though. After a couple years, people like Tomas and Kung Lao had turned it into the taste tester’s throne since it was convenient for You to just raise your arm and feed them little bits.

As much as you wanted to be a stronger woman, his grey eyes and boyish smile did make your heart clench. He looked so much like San Bing, the stray dog that you fed in the village- they even begged for scraps the same way.

“You do the same thing as Kung Lao.” Tomas huffed at the comparison, resting his chin on the nearby counter’s greasy surface and blinking with his light glittery eyes.

“But cuter, right?”

You balked, almost letting missing your ladle’s handle and gripping scalding metal in shock. How ridiculous did this man get? At his grown age, acting cute just to gain you favour, all in the name for some bits and pieces? Seriously, if these were the values that the Lin Kuei taught, the world was in grave danger.

A tender piece of pork is pulled out the oil and dipped in the sauce, and then shoved in front of Tomas’ face in the effort to stop him from continuing whatever it was he was doing.

“Do that again, and I will ban you from coming in every again.” You gravely state, and it’s funny how quickly Tomas straightens his posture and nods. “Be careful, it’s hot.”

Tomas is also remarkably like San Bing with how he snatches the food into his mouth, chewing loudly in attempt to cool the food down as he eats it. You continue to fix up the rest of the portion while Tomas watches you, sitting obediently on the stool.

Once it’s on a medium-sized dish, Tomas beats you to picking it up.

“This isn’t just for you, greedy.”

“But the plates are hot, right? I’ll bring it over, don’t worry.”

Tomas smiles, nose wrinkling in a way that makes you want to pinch him. You thank him with a pat on the shoulder and helps him open the kitchen door and watch him walk over to his table. You then pretend not to see him slam the dish onto the table and frantically rub his probably burning fingers on Bi Han’s cold arms.

You bite back the growing grin on your face.

As much as you would’ve liked to hang around the three as they ate their meal, you still had an entire kitchen to clean (to the best of your ability) before the teahouse opened again for the dinner rush. You settle for occasionally peeking at the solely occupied table through the kitchen pick-up area, wholeheartedly laughing when Kuai Liang gives you a thumbs up after taking a bite of the pork. Bi Han gives you a nod, which you assume is as close to kissing him on the mouth as it gets. 

Just as you focus fully on preparing your produce, you miss Tomas waving his chopsticks in the air, but hear him enthusiastically call out your name. This time, you let yourself smile fully as you chop away at some carrots.

#mk1 x reader #mk x reader #tomas vrbada #tomas vrbada x reader #mk1 smoke x reader #bi han x reader #kuai liang x reader #mortal kombat x reader #HEAR ME OUT PLEASE #I DO THINK THAG THERE IS A WORLD WHERE BI HAN WAS A GOOD OLDER BROTHER #I just really love the idea of lin kuei bros and chronically younger brother tomas #let me have this happiness ok #and the idea of a chef reader who’s immune to all the politics bc HUH U WANNA KILL ME? THEN WHOSE GONNA MAKE UR FOOD #ok bye #bi han #mk1 bi han #mk1 scorpion #kuai liang

[kenjakusbraincum]

*JJK manga spoilers*

You know how Yorozu is obsessed with Sukuna and wants to marry him and teach him about love? Well, I can’t help but picture Sukuna already having a wife and her being amused by the whole thing. One; because of the expressions her husband makes whenever Yorozu is in his general vicinity. Two; because of the sheer audacity Yorozu possesses.

Just Sukuna’s wife hiding her grin behind her hand as she tries to smother her laughter at the ridiculousness of it all.

She isn’t worried about Sukuna in the slightest, as they both share the same sentiment; they don’t like sharing.

Godd Sukuna's disgusted faces when Yorozu is near him live rent free in my hear 😭 He does NOT look like he enjoys that type of attention at all.

Sukuna strikes me as someone who is very subtle about love, and he likes his partners to be too. I don't think he enjoys being seen engaging in very loving situations. It definitely ruins his image of being a monster in his eyes. Poor Yorozu wouldn't know, she doesn't know him as well as his partner, of course.

There's multiple reasons I think Yorozu fails. First is that, second I think she's too loud and proud. Sukuna prefers his partners more submissive, at least in the public eye if not in private. Lastly, I think she's trying to teach Sukuna the wrong kind of love. Everyone tries to teach Sukuna love through the language of fighting, that he already speaks fluently. In fact, I think the whole approach of "teaching" is what Sukuna finds disrespectful.

But if you had to teach him something, why not teach him something new? The other kind of love. The one he's inexperienced in, something he's maybe never felt before. Maybe it's foolish and maybe he will never be able to feel it, but at least it's more creative than what everyone else is trying.

And maybe it succeeds, and has Sukuna trembling and walking on eggshells when Yorozu is around, cause he fears his spouse's all seeing eye and the (playful) nagging that comes afterwards 😩

#sukuna x reader #ryomen sukuna #asks #sukuna is but a man and no man is immune to his spouse's nagging

[capricornlevi]

on the edge of a blunt knife

mid-shibuuya incident, nanami decides he needs some serious stress relief

(wc 2.9k, 18+ mdni. cw rough (but v consensual) sex, semi public sex, cursed energy as sexual tension lol, no gendered pronouns but reader has a vagina)

Nanami: Need you to come here.

Nanami: {location shared}

Nanami: As soon as possible. 

You blink down at your phone once, twice, three times, still unsure whether or not you actually understand the texts that are displayed clearly on the screen. 

His directions are straightforward – blunt, even. It’s not that you don’t understand what’s being asked of you. 

It’s just that you don’t understand why he would send texts like those; completely out of the blue, you can’t even guess the context. You haven’t heard from him for three days now.

For the past year or so, your relationship with Nanami Kento has been casual – in the most extreme sense of the word. A few hook-ups at his place, even more at your own, twice in a hotel he was staying in for ‘business’. You’ve met for coffee, shared some meals, never so much as toeing the line of anything more committed.

Sure, you know certain things about him, have garnered some understanding of his personality, but there’s so much you don’t know. More than you’d care to admit. 

You’ve never actually asked him what he does for a living, for one thing. 

You’ve caught glimpses of enough blood-soaked shirts to hazard a guess that it’s something sketchy, which does make it easier to avoid asking questions.

Still, he’s not your boyfriend. You don’t care what he does as long as you don’t get dragged into it. It actually helps things, you think, this barrier between the two of you, keeping either one from getting too attached.

But these unprompted texts, this uncharacteristic urgency … it all makes you deeply uneasy. As you reread them for the fifth time, your gut twists with a sense of foreboding.

... and perhaps the tiniest hint of anticipation.

Still wanting to cover your bases before diving into the unknown, you type up a quick response.

You: Is it safe?

You don’t have to wait long before your phone buzzes in your hand.

Nanami: For you, yes. 

The location pin he dropped you is based in a metro tunnel just outside of Shibuya. 

It’s dark out, you’re not familiar with the area, the October air is bitterly cold. There are a thousand reasons for you to stay home and wait until Nanami just comes over to yours as he usually does.

The other side of the argument has far fewer points in its favour.

But against all logic you slip on a jacket, shoving your phone into your pocket as your apartment door slams shut behind you.

___

The journey is unusually quick. Glancing at every side street as you pass them by, you see they’re all virtually abandoned, with no traffic to hold you up at the street crossings. 

You shrug it off; it has no connection to your meeting with Nanami, so why waste time worrying about it?

However, your concern only deepens when you arrive at the metro station. On a night like tonight it should be bustling, packed with crowds of partygoers and drunken salarymen singing the wrong lyrics to pop songs, but as you slowly descend the concrete steps, you soon realise that there’s not a single soul waiting by the platform.

It’s quiet, too. Eerily so. All you can hear is the low drip-drip-dripping of rain trickling onto the tile from the grates above, mixed with the occasional screech of the tracks. It’s cold down here, smells of damp and stagnant water, and you can't see Nanami anywhere.

You wait, but no trains appear.

The air is heavy with mist, even underground. You hug your arms to your chest to keep warm. 

You’re just about to reach for your phone to text Nanami, demanding to know what the hell is going on and why he’s dragged you into it, but before you can do so, you’re distracted by the sensation of a strong hand on your shoulder.

You nearly choke out a scream when you’re the grip on your shoulder releases, the person pulling you in by the waist instead.

Nanami.

Though you held off on screaming before, you want to shout at him for startling you anyway, for giving you the fright of your life for no good reason.

However, as your mouth opens, you find yourself unable to do so.

For just a moment, you forget about how insane this all is; how he’s dragged you to an abandoned metro platform in the dead of night, with all sorts of other weird, unexplained shit happening just a few feet above your heads. Without a word of explanation as to what he needs from you. 

You forget about it all, instead letting yourself get lost in the feeling of being pressed up against his chest. 

The only thing to cut through your hazy train of thought is when you see –

“You’re hurt,” you murmur, lifting a hand to ghost your fingers over the scrapes on his face. 

“Not very.”

“How did you – what is – what happened?”

“It's a long, long story,” he answers softly, gentle despite the strength of his touch, the protectiveness in how he holds you against him. “Too long to tell in one sitting.”

“Then why did you bring me here?”

Nanami doesn’t answer at first. He takes a hand and tilts your chin so that you have no choice but to meet his eye, to watch as he scans your face, lingering on your lips.

“Remember New Year’s?”

Now it’s your turn to pause, brain processing the hidden meaning buried in his words.

This past New Year’s was the only other time Nanami had visited you in a state like this; exhausted, injured, but bursting with a sort of power and intensity you couldn’t begin to understand.

He put it down to adrenaline, a busy day at work leaving him pent up, but you knew there was something more to it. He crackled with an energy that you had never seen before. Something about him felt electric, a live wire, you could almost feel it against your fingertips as you ran your hands over his muscled chest that night, taking it all in. 

He came to you needing relief. It was an unspoken request that you happily answered; perhaps the energy he emanated during that visit was infectious. 

After he called to your apartment that night, you didn’t leave your bed for the better part of three days. Relief was all he sought, but it was never enough until he has burnt the last bit of energy from his body. It took time. 

Now, he searches your face for signs of recognition, any indication that you know what he’s asking of you.

You know he would respect your answer if you refused, if you got the hell out of this dingy tunnel and ran back to the safety of your apartment. He would never bring it up again. 

It would be so easy to refuse, to turn around and take the more sensible option.

But the only issue is that you really, really don’t want to. 

“I remember.”

The tiniest crack appears in Nanami’s facade – his jaw tightens, the sharp angles of his features looking almost pained.

“You do?”

Your nod confirms it.

“So you know what I’m asking of you?” he elaborates carefully, grip tightening in the fabric of your jacket.

“Yes. And yes,” you hastily add, sensing his follow-up question. “I want to.”

At that, Nanami lets go of your waist, lifting his hands to fist in your hair as he drags you in for a crushing kiss. 

He kisses you so hard it almost hurts but you give as good as you take, dragging your teeth against his bottom lip to the point it could nearly draw blood. 

It’s messier than it’s been before, even more so than New Year’s. You gasp into his mouth as he keeps you flush against him with one arm, barely able to take a breath before he slips his tongue against yours, ravenous in the way he’s capturing your mouth with his. 

He mumbles something against your lips, utterly incoherent, and you don’t bother asking him to repeat it. 

He kisses you, running his hands over your body as though he’s never had the chance to do it before now, mapping every inch of your frame even over your clothes. 

Soon you’re being guided away to somewhere more private – a nearby bathroom, just as abandoned as the rest of the platform, a place where he can take what he needs for as long as he needs it. 

You watch silently as he leads you there, feeling that energy radiate from his palm to yours. 

Inside the bathroom, you see that only one of the lightbulbs is still working; this bathes the room in a warm, dim light, a glow that’s just enough for you to see the transformed expression on Nanami’s face.

Your breath catches. 

In almost any other setting, he’s the picture of control. He’s polite, reserved, and keeps his emotions well-guarded from the outside world, never showing his secrets of vulnerabilities to anyone. 

But when this sensation overcomes him, his face twists into something unrecognisable. Hungry, primal, something that would send a bolt of fear through you if you hadn’t experienced something like this before; now, you find yourself wanting to spur it on. 

Before he loses himself in it, you take the chance to start undressing, your clothes dropping to the floor as your mind starts to swim with thoughts of what will happen next, what you know he is capable of doing with those hands.

His eyes darken until they’re almost black as you bare yourself in front of him. 

Back home in the safety of either of your apartments, this would undoubtedly take a lot longer. He’d use his mouth on you until your cries of his name disrupted your neighbours. You’d take him in your hand and stroke slowly, meanly, building him up to the edge until his knuckles turn white and broken swears echo around the room. 

That sense of languidity is gone now. It’s urgent, both of you needing this as much as you do oxygen, fearing you’ll die without it, and so you waste no time in bending over the sink and looking up at the mirror to meet his eye in the reflection. 

Here you are, in public, where anyone could just walk in off the street and see you bending over for him, completely soaked and utterly shameless – though for some reason, you’re almost certain you’re not going to be interrupted.

Nanami unbuttons his shirt, revealing the pinks and reds of bruises blossoming on his skin. Your brow furrows; somewhere in your pleasure-addled mind you think to ask him about it, press him on the cause of his injuries … on what he’s gotten himself into …

But once his hands reach for his belt, you refocus your attention on gripping the sink’s countertop to prepare yourself. 

He won’t hold back. One word from you and he’ll stop, but until that word is said then he will be merciless.

He tosses the belt to the floor and undoes his suit pants, stroking himself slowly.

You look to the mirror; a short nod, you skin already prickling with goosebumps, and you’ve started something you don’t know how to finish. 

He takes your ass in his hands and squeezes, spreading you open and running his length up and down, the reflection of him mumbling something to himself as he stares, transfixed at the sight of your folds ready to suck him in without so much as being touched yet. 

His throat bobs, a thin sheen of sweat on his forehead glistening under the low light; he slips inside with one smooth thrust. 

Your spine arches as you take all eight inches of him, thicker than anything you’ve had before, pressing in at such an angle that you worry it will render you a babbling mess before the hour is out. 

Already his name is spilling from your lips, voice breaking at the crescendo of each thrust, gasping for air as though he’s somehow hitting your lungs. You feel the fabric of his pants against the backs of your thighs as he fucks you half-clothed, too desperate to feel you wrapped around his cock to even fully undress.

It’s full, it’s a lot, but it doesn’t hurt – it never does. It’s why you think this … thing, this state that takes over him, that it has some sort of transferable nature to it. You need this relief just as badly as he does.

You feel the fingers of Nanami’s right hand fist in your hair, pulling you back to keep your eyes fixed on the mirror. The left stays gripping your waist, pulling your body back against him to meet the snap of his hips. 

You let out a breathless giggle which only serves to spur him on further; a tug at your hair prompts a pathetic-sounding mewl of pleasure to take its place, his hold on you as unmovable as it is possessive. 

It makes no sense for you to enjoy that feeling so much, to enjoy being his when you can count on one hand the concrete facts you know about this man.

You’re not thinking straight, though, not when you’re being bounced on his cock like this, no coherent thought staying in your brain for longer than three seconds.  You gush around him, wet and lewd sounds bouncing off the tiled walls of the bathroom.

The mirror is blurry with condensation from the mist and the once-cool air, but you can still make out the sight of Nanami holding your hair tight in his fist, the veins in his hand prominent as he speeds up his movements.

He pauses only to help you hike your knee up against the counter. Once stable, he’s back inside you again, telling you how good you’re taking him, how you’re the only person he needs for this, leaning down and pulling your hair back up so he can press a kiss to the nape of your neck.

You, on the other hand, are far less talkative. The change in angle is hitting that spot in your core that has you fluttering around him already, short little half-groans catching in your throat and dying before you can even breathe them out. 

The feeling of being wanted by him, of being the one who he seeks out to help with this ache, it is something you struggle to put into words. 

He’s so powerful, but you are too. It’s how he knows you’re perfect for this – he told you as much last time, when he thought you were too fucked-out to even comprehend what he was saying. 

His gaze meets yours again and you marvel at how he maintains such a solid grip in your hair, never slipping even as his rhythm turns more erratic and uncontrolled.

He seems to enjoy having you in his grasp, his lower lip bitten between his teeth as he holds you, adjusting the position when he needs to. His thumb smoothes soothing circles against your skin, a pleasant contrast to the unrelenting sensation of being filled.

This is a side of him only you can see.

It's so good, teetering dangerously close to being so good that you're ruined for anyone else, unable to take anything inside you that isn't Nanami's cock.

You feel yourself burning, that familiar heat starting to coil in your lower stomach, your limbs starting to lose strength as you brace yourself for the waves to wash over. 

Nanami keeps you steady, never faltering as he fucks you through it.

You gasp, clenching around him as it bursts within you, spreading like wildfire through every nerve in your body. Your body trembles beneath him and he slows mercifully. He moves slowly, careful not to overstimulate you too soon, waiting for the waves to subside before he fucks into you again, chasing his own pleasure with the closest thing to a clear mind he can hope to have in this situation. 

It doesn’t take long for him to follow you over the edge, spilling over the small of your back with a gutteral moan that makes you clench around nothing, only releasing his hold on your hair and waist once the rise and fall of his chest has steadied.

Sweaty and boneless and satisfied, you wait as he cleans you off before turning to him, pressing a soft kiss to his lips.

“Did it help?” you ask quietly, knowing he’ll understand.

His lips curl slightly, the divot in his brow having disappeared – the edge has been taken off momentarily. “Yes.”

His pupils are still blown out, though, and his demeanour tells you there’s more to come. 

“Is this … is what’s happening outside … is it over?”

He shakes his head once, twice. “No.”

He reaches for his pocket, fishing out a silver keychain which he immediately presses into your palm.

“Go to my place. Go there and stay there, and don’t open the door for anyone but me.”

You take the key, cold against your clammy skin, and look up to him again.

“You’ll come back later?”

“I’ll come back later,” he replies immediately, pressing a chaste kiss against your forehead while running a hand through his own hair. “Just wait there for a bit.”

Though still in the dark, you figure that it just might be worth the wait. 

#nanami x reader #nanami x you #nanami kento x reader #i am not immune to shibuuya arc nanami #doing backflips on it etc

[seiseimaru]

a small dump for halloween,,

#never immune to nunhyuk #orv #omniscient reader's viewpoint #yoo joonghyuk #omniscient reader #yjh #omniscient reader fanart #kim dokja #doodle

[l832]

[hungharrington]

Nononono DONT think about Steve lounging in your bedroom and looking so precious staring at the ceiling and talking nonsense that you’re not really paying attention to because his shirt is riding up and you’re staring at his happy trail and don’t think about going over to him and tickling it, nuzzling it, licking it, biting it, kissing it literally just doting on it doting on him because he’s so precious

DONT THINK ?? NONNIE SAYS DONT THINK ABOUT THIS??? bold of you to assume it’s not always on my mind 😵‍💫 

he’ll be doing that thing he does, like grabbing a baseball or smth that he’s got in his room and chucking it up over and over as he just talks to you — and you’re supposed to be getting ready so you guys can leave, but you’ve accidentally got stuck half hovering in the doorway to his bathroom to listen to him and honestly? getting ready goes outtt the window the moment he chucks the baseball too far back and his whole shirt rides up a bit when he reaches for it and fuckkkk, there’s that happy trail you actually cannot get enough of 🤤

steve is blissfully unaware of your staring, pouting over losing the ball, which has rolled out of reach. he flops back on the bed, arms tucking back under his head instead. he finally looks back over at you to check on you and catches your staring and gives a little chuckle, “what?” 

and you just sigh dramatically, and pad over to him and clamber up on the bed— slumping over so you’re resting your head on his tummy, looking up at him and steve is smiling all sweet at you, not at all having caught on to your antics. the first kiss is innocent enough, just a soft one to the warm skin of his tummy and steve smiles, cheeks going a bit pink, because listen, he knows you love his tummy. you have said it time and time again. so really it’s not that surprising when you dot another and another, nuzzling along the plains of his tummy and leaving hot wet kisses. it’s when you give the tiniest scrape of your teeth that steve sucks in a breath. 

“sweetheart,” he starts and you’re instantly pouting between your kisses. 

“what? m’not allowed to love on you?” you say, nosing along his navel, lips beginning to proper kiss and suckle along the skin, looking to see the faintest of bruises come up. steve releases a breath that sounds just faintly like a groan and it makes you grin like a cheshire cat. you continue, nose nuzzling the hair along his happy trail while you work a lovebite on his navel, nipping and sucking in a way that definitely has his hips shifting beneath you. his hands have long since moved down from behind his head to grip at the sheets but it’s not like that— well, not quite like that, honest :( you just want to dote on him! 

“we’re- you’re suppose… supposed to be getting ready,” steve reminds you, words a lot breathier this time and you’re wickedly delighted at the sound of him. your hands are half holding his hips still, half tracing your thumbs along his hip bones because it’s true, you just love his tummy, his navel, his happy trail — you could press kisses here all day happily. “s’just kisses, baby.” you break away for a moment to say. your continue working a nice hickie right beside his happy trail and murmur into his skin, “just love you. love your tummy,” you hum and steve actually does groan aloud at that, eyes screwing up a bit, pinker in the face. steve knows you mean it too; you adore him but especially this part of him & steve’s never had this kind of devotion before, it literally makes his head spin. least to say, you guys are very late to heading out :))

#just cos it’s alice’s brand to luv his tummy #does NOT mean i am immune to tummy thoughts #UR SO RIGHT ANON #I DO JUST WANNA LICK BITE AND KISS IT!!! #jay writes #hmmm i need a tag for things that aren’t fics #dunno! #this isn’t even ns/fw lol #it’s just love <3 #steve harrington #steve x reader #steve harrington x reader #tummy love #blurbs #sfw

[myfanfic-urfantrash]

Smooching that old man(Jing Yuan)

Man's got an oral fixation, kissing, bitting, you name it he wants it. He'll go down on his s/o for hours if they let him he doesn't care if his jaw hurts in the end he lives for the pain. Pull his hair while he's at it and he might very well cum.

#honkai star rail x reader #jing yuan x reader #I am not immune to jing yuan

[bisexual-froggie]

Usually I'm not the type to like "yandere" type characters or tropes, but Sunday just...intrigues me.

I'm still not very into the kidnapping or very dark tropes of yandere, but I'm interested in a very overprotective and possessive Sunday. Him watching your every move with his birds. His subtle manipulation. The fact that he has literal power over you to make you tell the truth...

Maybe it's the fact that he doesn't have bad intentions. He wants the best for you and Penacony. He's also very self sacrificial. I don't doubt he would do anything for you just as he would for Penacony. He truly cares and loves you. There are many moments where he treats you with gentleness and tenderness, but there's this twisted and dark side of himself that makes him act in unsavory ways sometimes.

#ig he's a soft yandere? #i just imagine very tender loving moments with him but also him just being very overbearing #im not immune to winged men #sunday x reader #hsr sunday

[hostilecandle]

Okay so I'm still sick as a dog so here's my own personal 141 headcannons and how they'd treat you while you're ill (could be romantic or platonic. Doesnt really matter here):

Ghost: Normally Ghost is a "tough love" kinda guy. Always pushing you past your comfort zone and getting you comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. When you're sick however, he's a bit softer. He's very down to Earth, do what you need to to feel better the fastest. So he'll set make you take your cold medication on a timely schedule, keep you in bed/laying down as much as possible, and constantly remind you to be drinking liquids. He's not a go out of his way to make things easier without directly being asked for his help, but he does genuinely want you to get better quickly.

Price: Price seems like the kinda guy that at first tells you to "suck it up". Not in a mean way but more in a don't let the sniffles get the best of you way. He's used to powering through when he doesn't feel well and sometimes forgets most people don't quite function like that. Once he realizes that you're sick sick, he makes sure you have everything you need nearby (meds, compresses, tissues, etc etc). He's still a very busy man but he'll message you every few hours to ask how you're feeling, what your temp is, and to take some more meds if it's been long enough. He's not the type to fawn over yo, but he shows he cares in his practicality. (He'd absolutely bring you dinner in bed after he gets out and lays next to you on top.of the blankets, just being a steady presence you can fall asleep against)

Soap: Soap panicks. He's never really had to take care of anyone who's really sick before so he thinks back to how his mom used to take care of him when he was ill as a kid. It's a little juvenile at first but he puts all his effort into it. He'd constantly ask if you need anything and be watching the clock like a hawk for your next doses. He'd wrap you in blankets (after your fever has broken!!) and bring you small snacks and flit about restlessly until you tell him all you want is to cuddle Nad then he'll settle down next to you, always ready to pop up to get you anything you might need.

Gaz: Gaz is by far the most normal and level headed of them. He just uses common sense and asks you what would best suit your needs. He'll run to the pharmacy for your meds and pick up some snacks. He'll remind you to stay hydrated and will ask what you'd like. The rest of the time, he'll just sit next to you and let you pick what you want to watch. Sometimes he'll just play on his phone until you need something and then he's up and getting it with no complaint. Just a solid steady presence you can rely on.

#someone pls help me i feel like im dying #having no immune system sucks ass #save me call of duty men.. save me #call of duty #john price #captain john price #captain price #soap mactavish #cod soap #john soap mactavish #kyle gaz garrick #kyle garrick #simon riley #simon ghost riley #simon riley x reader #john price x reader #soap x reader #gaz x reader #141 x reader

[j-eryewrites]

Please Hold to My Hand

Part Four of A Sinner's Redemption

SERIES MASTER LIST | MAIN MASTER LIST

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Word Count: 11.4k

Warnings: Canon typical violence, gun violence, people, death, gore and injuries, lots of feelings, horrible jokes (that I even laughed at), language. (Let me know if I have missed anything)

Author's Note: Finally! It’s out. I’ve been writing this between classes and really haven’t had time to review the work. Piper is finally letting down some walls and so is Joel! Yay! We get some more flashbacks and, of course, Ellie and Piper's shenanigans. I hope you enjoy this chapter. If you liked it, I’d love to hear from you either with comments or reposts! Thanks!

Dirty. Piper felt dirty as she stood in the moldy gas station bathroom. Moss grew from the cracks in the ceiling and she was sure the black substance behing the sinks was something otherworldly. Shivering, Piper squeezed her limbs as close as she could to her body making herself as narrow as possible. Behind one of the bathroom stalls was Ellie, taking a bathroom break. 

Piper couldn’t understand how her sister could relax herself enough to use the restroom in a place like this. With the creak and slam of the bathroom stall door, Ellie appeared with a care in the world. Again, Piper shivered and took a step away from her sister as Ellie stepped in front the the broken mirror. 

“Jesus Ellie let’s go,” Piper said before turning around to face her sister. “What are you–” Piper laughed and for a moment she forgot about the disease infested place she was in. 

“Pew, pew. Pew,” Ellie whispered. In her hand was the gun Piper had given from her. 

Piper shook her head at her sister’s antics. “No, no, no. Here’s how you do it.” Stepping forward, Piper reached out a hand to grab hold of the gun, but Ellie pulled away.  

“Hey, let me do my thing,” Ellie begged. 

Rolling her eyes, Piper crossed her arms and sighed. “Well you’ll shoots someone’s eye out. At least take out the bullets.” 

“Hmm,” Ellie hummed not realizing that was an options. She turned the gun around looking for a way to remove the tiny deathly objects in the gun. 

“Here,” Piper muttered as she showed Ellie how to remove them. The young girl watched and took note of everything that her sister did. The dull metallic bullets fell out the cartridge and into Piper’s hand. “See?”

“Hmm? Oh yeah,” Ellie said and she retrieved the gun from her sister’s hand. Once again Ellie raised the gun at the mirror and put on her best menacing face. It was practice for when she actually got to shoot the weapon. In her mind, Ellie wondered if she would be as good of a shot like Piper was. 

“Can we go now?” Piper asked. Her shivers got worse and Piper began to believe she could turn infected from just standing in the bathroom any longer. 

Cocking the gun back, then shoving it deep into her backpack, Ellie nodded and the two girls trudged through the mess and out the doors to the fresh dry air. 

Coming around the corner, they saw Joel just as they had left him; On the ground with one knee raised as support as he blew into a long straw like thing. 

“We have to do this every hour?” Ellie sighed. 

Piper could see Joel was just as annoyed as Ellie when it came to stopping every hour. “Gas breaks down over time. This stuff’s almost water. Back in the day, we’d drive 10, 12 hours on one tank. You could go anywhere,” Joel said. 

“So,” Piper asked, “where’d you go?”

Joel looked up at the two girls. His eyes squinted underneath the bright light of the summer sun. “Pretty much nowhere.” 

“Boring,” Piper muttered before finding a rock to kick around. 

Joel continued blowing into the big straw. 

“Nice!” Ellie leaned in close. “How does that work?”

“It’s a siphon. It’s when liquid…” Joel paused thinking about his words. “travels against gravity because pressure…”

Ellie smirked and chuckled. “You don’t know.”

“I know it works,” Joel quipped back making Ellie laugh even more. 

Once the laughter was over, the young girl soon sought other sources to still her boredom. Lifting her legs up comically into the air, Ellie began to peruse around the rusted cars that Joel was searching for gas from. 

As her eyes followed the rock on the ground as it rolled back and forth, Piper called out to Ellie. “No wandering”

With the biggest sigh she could conjure, Ellie replied. “Okay. This is your fault then.” She warned. Then dropping her backpack to the ground she pulled out a small book. Flipping it open she began to read. “It doesn’t matter how much you push the envelope, it’ll still be stationery.” Briefly, Ellie looked up to gage Joel’s and Piper’s reaction. Laughing, Ellie revealed the cover of the book. “No Pun Intended, Volume Too” by Will Livingston. “Volume Too.” Look. You get it? “Too”? Like, T-o-o.

“Jesus,” Joel grumbled. 

“What did the mermaid wear to her math class?” Ellie paused. “An algae bra. Like, algae bra. Okay, I stayed up all night…”

“No.” Joel tried to interrupt Ellie, stopping her from telling the next horrible joke. 

“wondering where the sun went…,” Ellie continued. “...and then it dawned on me.” 

This joke made Piper laugh. It wasn’t so much the joke, but how much Joel despised them. His face contort with each failed attempt at a joke and it made both of the young girls laugh. 

Joel sat up and glared at the two of them. “Feel free to wait in the truck.”

Piper’s eyes widened at the warning. “Going now,” She mumbled before leaving her rock on the ground for the safety of the boiling hot car. 

“Ugh, okay,” Ellie sighed. “but just know,” the young girl warned, “you can’t escape Will Livingston. He’ll be back. There’s nothing you can do to stop him.” 

As the girls hopped back into the car, Joel returned his mind back to retrieving gas. It was only a few more minutes for the dark liquid shot thorugh the hose into the gas canister and Joel was ever grateful for those few minutes of silence and solace from Will Livingston and his terrible jokes. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

Everything was the color of rust. Rust was the color of time and those forgotten and neglected, left to the mercy of nature. It was boiling and there was noting the air conditioning in the car could do. There wasn’t anything in sight except for dirt, sand, and crumbling cars. Even the normally blue sky was tinted a shade of brown. Piper felt like she was stuck in a valley of emptiness, not a living thing around. 

As the car drove further and further down the road, Piper moved her gaze away from the window and instead to the rear-view mirror. There in the mirror she saw something alive, something that kept her alive and going, Ellie. The younger girl sat lazily in the back of the truck using her bag as a head rest. Meanwhile, her hand gripped a pencil dragging it back and forth across a notebook. At least someone was entertained. 

Eventually, Piper brought her sight back onto the endless road in front of her. Cars were pilled high to the sides as if something huge parted the sea of metal carcasses. 

“Must’ve been some truck,” Piper mumbled. 

Joel glanced over the side at the girl. “Yeah, they used to stick big-ass plows on them, and clear the roads for their tanks and such.”

Piper nodded her head in response. It seemed like Ellie had tuned into the conversation, her sketch book forgotten beside her. “I wanna see a tank,” Ellie chirpped as she scanned the sea of vehicles.

“You will,” Joel assured Ellie. “Tanks, choppers, all that stuff. But they’ll fight the wrong enemy. Just scattered around now.”

Bitting the inside of her cheek Ellie pretended to listen beyond the words “You will” before changing the topic. 

“I got somethin’. Here,” Ellie passed up a small tape. Joel, curious, snatched it from her hands. “This make you all nostalgic?”

He had to pull the tape farther away from his face to read the fine print. His eyes pulled into a thin line finally making the words readable. Damn he was getting old. “This is actually before my time,” Joel corrected. 

Ellie’s smile faltered. “Great,” she mumbled. 

A strange tightening in his chest formed at the disappointment in Ellie’s voice and Joel couldn’t help but want to salvage the situation. “It’s a winner, though.” Ellie’s smile was back on her face. Upon seeing her smile, Joel placed the tape into the slot and hit play. 

♪ We met in the springtime when blossoms unfold ♪

Tapping her finger on Piper’s shoulder to the melody of the song, Ellie’s flashed with a wicked glint. Withdrawing her hand and shoving it into her bag she pulled out something new. “Oh, man. Got somethin’ else,” Ellie said. Joel and Piper mindless nodded at her words. “It’s, uh… light on the reading, but it has some interesting pictures.”

As Piper and Joel whipped around Ellie’s smirk grew. 

Gotcha! She thought.

“Oh. No, no, no. Put that back. That’s not for kids. Ellie!” Joel’s and Piper’s voices seemed to blend together as they tired to discourage Ellie from looking further. 

Playing align with the ruse, Ellie buried her face between the pages, getting a good look at the images upon them. “How would he even walk around with that thing?”

“Fuuuckkk,” Piper groaned as she placed her head between her knees.  

“Please get rid of it,” Joel begged. His hand reached back to take the magazine away from her. 

Ellie swatted his hand away. “Hold your horses. I wanna see what all the fuss is about.” She quickly perused the rest of the magazine, except for a few pages. “Why are all these pages stuck together?”

Piper gaged like she was about to throw up. 

“Uhh… the…” Joel was speechless. 

Then Ellie burst out laughing. Her head thrown back as the giggles overcame her small figure. “I’m just fuckin’ with ya.” A window rolled down. Dusty wind blew around the car. “Bye-bye, dude!” Ellie had thrown the magazine to the wind. 

♪ Alone and forsaken by fate and by man ♪ Oh Lord, if you hear me, please hold to my hand ♪ Oh, please understand ♪ Oh, where has she gone to ♪ Oh, where can she be ♪ She may have forsaken some other like me ♪ She promised to honor, to love, and obey ♪ Each vow was a plaything that she threw away ♪ The darkness is fallin’, the sky has turned gray ♪ A hound in the distance is starting to bay ♪ I wonder, I wonder what she’s thinkin’ of ♪ Forsaken, forgotten without any love ♪

꧁_____________꧂ 

The scene had changed now. It was green. There were trees and fields of grass. It was a welcomed changed to the drylands they had just drove through. The air was cooler now and the car wasn’t as hot. Piper could even imagine she was on a real roadtrip driving through the world before the outbreak. She felt normal. 

She pressed a button and the passenger window opened. A brisk air kissed Piper’s face blowing the freed stands of her hair behind her. Yet she wanted more, so she slowly pulled out the hairtie. Her scalp groaned as the pressure was released. Then came the bliss as the wind weaved between the strands of her hair massaging her scalp. Her eyes close shut opening her arms to the comfort the wind gave her. 

A shiver creeped up Joel’s shoulders and he turned his head to Piper. His mouth hung open with his forgotten wish to close the window. She seemed at peace as the music played and wind blew through her hair. She looked like what a kid like her should look like: Brow not filled with the worry of survival, hair not tied up and closed off to the world, happy, calm, and content. A thought of pity grew in Joel’s chest. This is how Piper should be living. Both her and Ellie. Afterall, they’re just kids. Kids with the future of the world on their shoulders. It was a weight they shouldn’t have, that no one should have. Joel knew that better than anyone. 

“All right,” Joel sighed. “That’s enough for today.” 

The wind release Piper’s hair from it’s hold as the window rolled back up. Rocking side to side, the truck turned away from the road into a grassy field. They were headed to the forest up ahead. A forest that would give them shelter for the long night. 

Together, they did their part to unpack and get food started for dinner. Sitting down on the ground, the three of them ate. Piper wasn’t quite sure what they were eating, but it was cold and good. The square like noodles just slide down her throat easing her stomach’s plea for food. It was delicious. 

A slurping noise came from beside her. “Jesus, Ellie. Slow down,” Piper said. 

Ellie was slouched over her bowl devouring the food. Red sauce encased the skin around her mouth. “This is slow,” She mumbled with her mouth full of food. “What am I even eating?” Ellie asked. 

Joel using his fork to point to the food inside his bowl answered. “That is 20-year-old Chef Boyardee ravioli.” His tone made the two girls think that this was the best food ever created on planet earth. 

Ellie shoved another fork full of food into her mouth. “That guy was good.”

“I actually agree,” Joel added. 

“Hmm…” Piper hummed. “How long we staying out here?”

Placing his bowl down into his lap, Joel replied. “I figure I sleep tonight… and drive tomorrow all day, all night, get us to Wyoming by next mornin’.”

Ellie sighed and rubbed her now fully belly. “So can we start a fire? I’m freezing.”

“No.” There was no hesitation in Piper’s answer. 

Ellie rolled her eyes. “Well, you’re not in charge, now are you Piper?”

“Hey, hey,” Joel interrupted and waited for the two girls attention to be on him. “Now, why am I gonna tell you no?”

Sinking into the ground with disappointment Ellie answered, her voice as monotonous as they come. “Because Infected will see the smoke.” 

Joel shook his head. “No. Fungus isn’t that smart. This is too remote for Infected, anyway.”

“People?” Ellie guessed. “So what are they gonna do? Rob us?” There was a hint of sarcasm in her voice as if being robbed was so horrible. 

It was Piper who spoke next. There was no emotion as she spoke. The peace Joel had seen her face earlier evaprotated and he could almost see the ghosts hiding behind Piper’s brown eyes. “They’ll have way more in mind than that.”

“Okay.” Joel softly said as he observed Piper. There it was again, that same tightness his chest, but he couldn’t bring himself to say anything to her. Instead he told the girls to hurry up and eat then get ready for bed. 

“Actually smells kinda good,” Ellie commented as she flung her sleeping bag out, laying it onto the ground. 

“Well, that would be Frank’s then,” Joel replied doing the same with his sleeping bag until a shuffling nearby caught his eye. “What are you doing?” Joel asked Piper. 

Her sleeping bag was still bound. Instead, she stood by the truck grabbing something from her bag. It was a gun. 

“Getting ready for watch,” Piper said. Her focus on checking her gun. 

Joel pushed himself off the ground and approached the girl. “No. We’re all sleeping.” 

Piper ignored Joel as she checked the bullets, counting them out. Joel did the only thing he thought would work. Placing his hand on the gun, her forced Piper to lower the weapon and look at him. 

“Trust me,” Joel said. “No one is gonna find us.” His voice was clear and full of comfort. It was the same voice he’d use whenever Sarah cried to him at night about the monsters in her closet. 

The teenager scoffed. “Bullshit…” Yet the longer she looked at Joel, the more she felt like letting go of that gun and letting the walls fall just this once. Her eyes fell to the ground. “jesus fuck…fine.”  

Removing his hand, Joel returned to his sleeping bag. He watched as Piper placed the gun next to her sleeping bag, which now laid out on the ground next to Ellie’s. Eventually the girl did lay down, pulling the covers over her shoulders. Satified Joel followed suit and the lamp light dimmed until it was dark. 

“Joel,” a small voice whispered. “Joel.”

Joel groaned. “What?”

“Can I ask you a serious question?” It was Ellie. 

“Ellie…” Piper warned with a tiredness in her voice. 

“I’m serious!” Ellie said. 

“Yeah,” Joel said giving her the go ahead. 

“Why did the scarecrow get an award?” 

Joel was silent for a moment before he answered. “Because he was outstanding in his field.”

A whispered wave of giggles escaped the two girls. Both of whom didn’t expect the answer. 

“You dick! Did you read this?” Ellie asked a bit louder. 

“No. Now go to sleep.” Joel commanded. 

“Hm,” Ellie mumbled before settling back down. “...Those people you said… there’s no way anyone knows we’re here, right? No one’s gonna find us.”

With those words, Joel was thrown back into his past and all he could hear was his daughter crying in the dark of her room. All sign of sleep and exhaustion evaded him now. “No one’s gonna find us.”

“Okay. Goodnight Pipes” Ellie whispered. 

“Night Els…,” Piper replied. “...night Joel.” 

꧁_____________꧂ 

There was no way Piper could ever sleep. Her sister’s words floated around her head and Piper had to be sure. Ellie had to be safe. It felt like eternity waiting to hear Joel’s breathing slow. Once the old man had fallen asleep, Piper peeled herself free from her sleeping bag. Each movement was carefully calculated to achieve the least amount of noise as possible. With her gun in hand and jacket zipped up to the top, Piper climbed on top of the truck, finding a seat on the roof of the car. 

She had to admit, the forest was beautiful at night. There was a low chirping noise rumbling throughout the trees. Crickets, Piper guessed and she prayed it wasn’t something more. After a moments, contemplation the teen concluded her original hypothesis was correct and she soon tunned her ear into the other sounds of the night. 

Piper was glad that they had the truck. It proved to be a useful vantage point. Even in the dark, Piper felt as if she could see more of the forest, than she would on the ground bringing the teen comfort. 

The girl and the woods fell into a rhythmic cycle as the minutes passed. There was the cricket’s song, the breeze tickling the trees, and her own breathing. Again, and again this cycle came. Crickets, breeze, breath. Crickets, breeze, breath Crickets, breeze, breath, shuffling. Piper froze. Her head whipped around, and her gun raised defensively. She was ready to shoot. 

“Kid?” A gruff voice spoke. It was Joel. Piper’s shoulders lowered at the sight of the man. “What are you doing?”

Piper didn’t answer for a moment. “On guard.” Not wanting any more conversation, she whirled back around, her sight on the forest once again. 

Joel stood up and his hands found their place on his hips. He looked at Piper as she sat defiantly on the truck. Her back turned to him. The sight almost made him chuckle as he saw himself reflected in her figure. Almost. Instead, a worry fell over him. She was a kid. A kid who deemed sleep just as pointless as him. Releasing his hands from his hips, Joel pinched the bridge of his nose. Piper needed to sleep, but she was stubborn. Just like him and if he guessed now, Piper wouldn’t go to sleep without a fight. 

He was too tired for this and too old to fight a headstrong teenage girl. Instead, Joel kept his mouth shut, picked up his rifle and turned his back to her, guarding the other half of the forest. 

The two held their ground in silence and the forest fell back into the rhythm again. As the pattern repeated, the more Piper felt unease. Sighing, she turned around to find Joel. 

“I’m sorry,” Piper said. She wasn’t even sure why she said it, but she knew she needed to. 

Joel turned his head around at her voice. He wasn’t sure why she apologized yet still he replied. “It’s fine.”

Silence fell over them again and Piper bit the inside of her cheek. It was awkward to say the least. She waited, but then realized Joel wasn’t going to say anymore, so she turned back around. 

“...the stars…are nice,” Joel noted.

Piper looked up for the first time that night. There they were. The stars were breathtaking. She hadn’t ever seen them that clear. “Yeah,” she agreed. Together, Joel and Piper withdrew their attention from the forest to the sky. “You know, Ellie is a fanatic for the stars, space, whatever else is up there.”

Joel glanced at Piper and there he saw it once more. The very expression in the car he saw on her face, now bloomed under the night sky. There was the kid she should be. 

“...that one, the one that looks like a demented spider. Apparently its called Hercules.” Piper pointed up into the sky.

“Huh,” Joel hummed. 

“Yeah, that’s about all I know. Ellie, I swear, knows them all.”

Joel tore his eyes away from the demented spider constellation. “Kid, you should get some sleep,” Joel suggested. 

“In your dreams, Joel.” 

꧁_____________꧂ 

It was official. Ellie hated sleeping outdoors. This was the second time she woke up with a knot in her back. Groaning she pushed herself off the cold ground of the forest. Looking around, she saw the rolled up sleeping bags nearby. 

“Look who’s finally awake,” Piper commented as she walked by Ellie carrying her supplies to the truck of the car. 

Ellie waved her middle finger in the air for Piper to see earning a laugh from her sister. Soon the young girl’s stomach began to rumble. Fueled by her hunger, Ellie crawled over to the pots and dishes piled together hoping to find something to munch on. 

Lifting a lid, she found a boiling liquid. Taking a brief sniff, she pulled back and slammed the lid back on. “Ugh! The fuck is that?”

“You don’t like coffee?” Joel asked.

Whipping her head around to face him, Ellie replied. “If it smells like that, no.” Piper walked up beside her sister and crouched down, lifting up the lid to the coffee pot. Ellie saw the darkened circles underneath her sister’s eyes. “How’d you sleep?” Ellie asked Piper. 

“Like shit,” Piper replied. She eyed the coffee. “Can I have some?” Joel nodded and Piper grabbed a cup and poured the black liquid into it. She raised the cup to her lips and drank. 

Ellie gagged. “You are no longer my sister.”

Piper chuckled. “You’ll get it one day.” Ruffling Ellie’s hair, Piper stood back up to help Joel finish packing the truck. 

“Is that seriously what those Starbucks in the QZ used to sell?” Ellie questioned. 

“Well, theirs was a lot fresher than what Bill saved up, but, yeah, this is what they sold,” Joel explained.

Ellie shook her head. “Smells like burnt shit.”

Piper laughed once more. “Alright, hurry up and eat. We’ve gotta leave soon.” Leaving Ellie, to scavenge once more for food amongst the pile of  dishes, Piper sipped her coffee. She hoped that maybe the caffeinated liquid would keep her sinking eyes awake and the exhaustion in her bones far away.  

꧁_____________꧂ 

“Eyes on the map,” Joel instructed. His voice clear and firm.  

Piper shot up in her seat. Her eyes wide open. She observed she was in the car. The vehicle hummed as it traveled along the road and Piper couldn’t recall how she even got into the car in the first place.

“Alright,” Joel said as the car pulled off to the side of the road, coming to a stop. When the shift stick was in park, Joel turned to the back seat. “Ellie, switch with Piper.”

Shaking her head, Piper replied. “No, I’m fine, just–”

“In the back,” Joel said and Piper knew she couldn’t fight him on this. 

Unbuckling her seat belt, Piper reluctantly opened the passenger side door and crawled into the back. On the other hand, Ellie was esctatic to sit up in the front next to Joel. Jumping in her seat and getting a feel for the cushioned leather, Ellie beamed. 

“Wow, it’s so much nicer up here. I’m never sitting in the back again!” 

Just as Ellie was about to fiddle with the stereo, Joel shoved the map into her hands. 

“Here.” Joel pointed to the map. “We’re here and need to go here. Remember.”

Ellie’s eyes narrowed, following Joel’s thick finger as it danced across the map. “76 west and then… 70 west for, like, ever.”

“Yep. Now eyes on the map.”

Rolling her eyes, Ellie glanced back down at the map. Her small fingers ran along the path that Joel had shown her moments before. Each time she got to the end, the image in her mind only grew more potent until Ellie was confident she could recite the map from memory. However, there was only so much of “eye on the map” she could take and soon Ellie diverged her attention elsewhere. 

First, she experimented with the rearview mirror. It wasn’t something Joel particularly needed, so Ellie had free rein, so long as she didn’t annoy the old man. The small rectangular mirror, let her see the dusty road behind her. She ogled as the cloud of dust rippled out behind the truck clouding the green scenery behind her. Soon Ellie discovered that the mirror could move, tilting up and down and side to side. She tilted the mirror to look at Joel for a brief moment before she caught his glare. Quickly, she turned the mirror to herself. She extended her legs, leaned in close, and chuckled. Her face looked more stretched out than it normally did, and her eyes looked funky. 

Ellie could have looked at herself for god knows how long if it weren’t for the pothole the truck conveniently rolled over. Thumping down in her seat with a huff, Ellie found a new target in the rearview mirror. Piper was fast asleep. Her body limp as her head rested on the stacked up sleeping bags in the back seat. Ellie thought Piper looked weird sleeping. It seemed against her older sister’s nature to relax and be at peace. Afterall, Piper was always on guard with a battle happening deep in the pit of her eyes. Yet, the sight of her sister asleep in the back seat created a warm feeling in Ellie’s chest. Even if the sight of Piper in a dormant state was bizarre, Ellie knew it’s what her sister need. It’s what Piper deserved. 

“Where in Wyoming did you say your brother was?” Ellie found herself asking now that the mirror was back in place after Joel corrected the tilt. 

“Last contact came through a radio tower close to Cody,” Joel replied. 

Nodding Ellie peered down at the map scanning the tiny words and roads for Cody. “Cody, Cody. Ah, man. That is deep up in there.” 

“Yeah,” Joel said. 

“...And if he’s not there?”

“Then odds are he’ll be near a settlement, probably close to another city out there. Ain’t too many of ’em in Wyoming,” Joel explained. 

Soon, Ellie found herself finding the other cities in Wyoming. “Chee-Yen,” she read aloud. 

“Cheyenne,” Joel corrected. 

Ellie’s eyes widened at Joel’s correction. It couldn’t be right. “Che… really?”  Joel nodded. Ellie continued to look for cities. “Cheyenne… Laramie… Casper? What’s his name?”

“Whose name?” Joel wondered. 

“Your brother,” Ellie clarified. 

Joel breathed in deeply before answering the curious girl. “Tommy.”

“Younger or older?” Ellie curiously asked. 

“Younger.”

Peering back at Piper, Ellie asked yet another question. “Why isn’t he with you?” Afterall, her and her sister were always side by side. Never apart and always together. 

“A long story,’ Joel said hoping that it would satisfy Ellie. It did not. 

Ellie scanned the map once more. “Is it longer than 25 hours? ‘Cause I think that’s what we got.”  She peered up at Joel with the most convincing eyes she could conjure.

Joel could feel her expectant gaze on him. Biting his tongue, he continued to drive in silence until Ellie’s stare grew too much.  Finally, Joel “Tommy’s what we used to call a ‘joiner.’ Dreams of becomin’ a hero. So he enlisted in the Army right outta high school. A few months later, they ship him off to Desert Storm. It’s what they called that war. It doesn’t matter. Point is, bein’ in the Army didn’t make him feel much like a hero. Cut to 12 years later, outbreak happens. He convinces me to join a group makin’ their way up to Boston, which I did… mostly to keep an eye on him, keep him alive. It’s where we met Tess. And that whole crew, we, uh… Well, for what it was, it worked. And then Tommy meets Marlene. She talks him into joinin’ the Fireflies. Same mistake he made when he was 18. Wants to save the world. Pipe dream. Him, Fireflies, all of ’em… delusional. ‘Course, last I heard, he quit the Fireflies, too. So now he’s on his own out there, and… I gotta go get him.”

“If you don’t think there’s hope for the world, why bother going on?” Ellie asked. Joel glanced at her with his brows raised. “I mean, you gotta try, right?”

He shook his head. “You haven’t seen the world, so you don’t know. You keep goin’ for family. That’s about it.”

“I’m not family,” Ellie blurted.

“No…,” Joel paused to look at the young girl next to him. “You’re cargo. And I made a promise to Tess. And she was like family.” There was a flash of change in Ellie’s expression. “But you have Piper. Piper’s your family.”

“Yeah she is,” Ellie said with a dejected tone. “You know she reminds me of you.”

“How so?” Joel wondered as his eyes glanced into the mirror to catch sight of the sleeping teen. 

“You’re going for Tommy. Piper goes for me.” Ellie said. “What if you don’t find him?”

“I will.”

“How do you know?” There was a challenge in the young girls voice.

“I’m persistent,” Joel answered. 

Ellie smiled. “Yep, exactly like Piper.”

There was an uneasy feeling growing in the pit of Joel’s stomach at Ellie’s conclusion. It was to similar to the thought he buried deep in the back of his head. Piper was like Joel. It was something he didn’t want. Piper shouldn’t be like him. Joel was damaged, old, broken, and cruel with walls built as high as some of the skyscrapers that existed before the Outbreak. Piper was a teenage girl. She was still a kid. She shouldn’t be like him at all. 

“Ya got up pretty early,” Joel mentioned. “If you wanna grab more sleep like Piper…”

Ellie waved Joel off. “Pfft. I’m not even tired.”

“Sure,” Joel said trying to fight of a smirk. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

A quiet snore escaped the young girls mouth as she dozed off in the passenger seat. The smirk on Joel’s face finally won when Ellie had closed her heavy eyes. It was now peaceful in the car with the two girls sleeping. Their inhales and exhales were in tandem. Both of their faces were calm as the mid-day dreams over came them. 

Joel’s momentary peace and quiet was never meant to last. Soon, there was a stirring in the back seat and a head of dark brown hair sat up. Piper’s hair had frizzed up in her slumber and the young teen tried to soothe the mess with her hands before giving up. 

“How long I was out?” Piper asked as the sleep slowly left her voice. Her eyes scanned the scenes passing by the car windows. 

Turning his head back to face her, Joel replied, “A few hours.”

Piper nodded before carefully peering over the front seat to find her sister fast asleep. “How long has she been out?” 

“Not very long,” Joel said. 

“Hmm…,” Piper couldn’t help but softly smile at Ellie as she brushed some stray hairs from her sister’s face. “Where are we now?” Piper grabbed the map from Ellie’s hands. 

“Not far from Kanas City,” Joel explained. 

She scanned the map and her surroundings for any signs to signify where they were. It didn’t take long for the teen to estimate their spot along the highway. Joel was right. They weren’t far from Kanas City. “We should go around,” Piper whispered. 

Joel’s brows raised as his ears caught Piper’s words. “What do you mean?”

Piper solemnly glanced out the window. Her eyes darted back and forth as the sight flew by them. “Heard the QZ is horrible. Definitely not a place we want to be.” Once she had finished speaking, Piper had grown eerily quiet.  

Joel wanted to say something. To ask if she was okay, but his vocal chords refused to make a sound. Soon the shuffling of the girl in the passenger seat drew everyone’s attention.

Piper smiled. “Hey there sleepy head.”

Ellie’s eyes closed and opened as they adjust to the harsh light of the day. “Fuck you,” she groaned. Her response made Piper laugh, but her laugh was cut short by the slowing of the truck. 

The teen hadn’t been aware of how close they actually were to Kanas City. The road between all the cars and trucks was significantly more narrow than before. In front of them was an obvious barricade. They weren’t able to drive through this. Piper’s jaw clenched as she watched Joel unbuckle his seat. She wanted to tell him to drive back and go around the city. She was sure she saw a route they could take, but it was Joel’s voice that spoke instead. 

“Stay put,” Joel told the girls. 

Piper and Ellie watched the man look around the cars and underneath the larger trucks before he trekked back with a scowl on his face. 

Fuck, the girls thought. 

“Where are we?” Ellie asked as soon as Joel got back into the car. 

“Kansas City,” Joel grumbled. He motioned for the map and Piper placed it in his hands. 

“How far back do we have to go to get around this?” Ellie peered over Joel’s shoulder as worry spread across her face. 

Joel sighed looking at the map. They’d have to turn around and drive a few hours just to get around the barricade. To Joel, it wasn’t worth it. Tommy was waiting. Time was precious. “Screw it.” Without another word, Joel pulled away from the barricade and drove the car onto the exit ramp. The road led straight to Kanas City. 

Panic filled Piper’s being. “What are you doing?!” She yelled at Joel, “No, no, Joel. Away from the city. I’ve heard some things back in Boston QZ, we don’t–”

He knew the fear in Piper’s expression well, but a teenager’s fears weren’t going to add more time onto their trip than needed. “We can jog right around this tunnel… take the next ramp… and we’re back on the road. Minute tops,” he hurriedly explained to calm the girl. 

Piper glared at Joel as she bit her lip. Tears began to well up in her eyes from the pain. The disturbing turning in her gut only got worse as they drove deeper and deeper into the city and the only comfort she could find was gripping the handle of her gun. 

“Where the fuck is the highway?!” Joel fumed. His eye frantically over the map and then the road in front of him. 

Ellie did her best to help. “I can’t tell from this. I’m all turned around!” 

“Don’t look at the state map, Ellie. Look at the inset.” Piper was on the verge of snapping. “That there!”

The younger girl’s voice began to break. “Well, I don’t know where we are in that either! This is my second day in a fucking car. I mean, I think we’re heading north?”

“It’s gotta be the right,” Joel muttered, before swerving the car to the right. 

The car jolted everyone as Joel tried find a way out of the labyrinth like city. 

“Stop!” Ellie hollered. 

The car came to a halt. Tires screeched and Piper barely had time to brace herself on Ellie’s seat. “What the fuck?” She asked her sister. Ellie just stared at pointed out the window. 

“Is that the QZ?” Ellie asked. Everyone was now looking at the burned down gate. Smoke was still in the air. “Where the fuck is FEDRA?”

Piper wanted to spew. “Joel–” 

“Hey! Please help!” The voice came from outside the car. It was a man. His right leg hung limp behind him and his arms waved in the air. 

Her eyes widened and, using her free hand, she grabbed Joel’s shoulder with a painful grip. “Joel, we need to get the fuck out of here!”

Joel’s eyes darkened. “Put your seatbelt on,” he said with a low voice. 

Ellie searched his eyes. “Aren’t we gonna help him?”

“No,” Piper and Joel said simultaneously. 

There was a click. Then a stomp. Soon the car jumped forward as Joel pressed his foot down on the gas. The truck was headed straight for the man. 

“Joel! Reverse!” Piper screamed.

“Fuck!” the man yelled as he jumped out of the way. “Go, go, go!”

In an instance, there was a deafening thud. The car slid. Joel turned the wheel to a nearby building’s glass doors. Gun shots fired. Their heads ducked down as they braced for impact. With a crash, the car came to a halt. 

“Fuck,” Joel groaned. He turned to Ellie. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Ellie wheezed. 

Quickly, he turned to Piper. “You’re not hurt? Nothin’?”

Piper shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

Their momentary relief was destroyed by bullets firing. They had hit the truck’s windows. 

“Belts off. Fast!” Joel shouted. 

The girls did not waste time unbuckling the seat belts and opening the doors of the truck. 

“Let’s see you, motherfucker! Give us your shit, you make it through this! I promise!” One of the raiders yelled. 

Once all of them had left the truck and found brief cover, Joel looked around the room. “Hey, you see that hole?” He pointed to a small hole in the drywall. “Can you two squeeze through?”

Ellie and Piper followed Joel’s hand. With one scan of the hole, they knew they could fit. 

“Last chance!” the raider snarled. 

“When I say go, you crawl to that wall, and you squeeze through, and you don’t come out until I say, okay?” Joel instructed the teens. 

Ellie nodded her head. The shock evident in her eyes. 

Piper shook hers. “No, let me help.” She raised her gun up for Joel to see. 

Joel growled and his jaw clenched. “This is not a negotiation. You’re going.”

A gun shot echoed around the room. They seemed to be getting louder and louder with each fire. Ellie felt her legs go limp and a cold sweat over come her body. 

“they’re not gonna hit you. Look at me!” Joel told Ellie, “They’re not gonna hit you.”

Bang!

“You stay down, you stay low, you stay quiet,” Joel explained and Ellie absently nodded her head. 

“I’ve got you Els,” Piper whispered to her sister. 

“Mm-hmm,” Ellie hummed back with tears in her eyes. 

“Okay,” Piper said before turning to Joel and nodding. 

“Okay,” Joel commanded. “Go!”

Immediately, Piper shot off the ground and grabbed Ellie’s jacket collar dragging her along. They stayed low to the ground until they reached the hole. “Come on, go!” Piper yelled before shoving Ellie through the hole.

Bang! 

Piper cried out in pain as she examined her shoulder. She was shot. The bullet had grazed her arm. “Fuck!” She cried before crawling through the hole. 

Another shot was fired. 

“Fuck! You motherfucker!” One of the raiders screamed. 

There was another shot and Piper could hear the sounds of guns falter. Joel was doing it. He was taking them out one by one. 

Crunch. 

Glass had been broken and there was heavy breathing. It was breathing that did not belong to the old man. A shadow covered the hole. Ellie’s eyes widened and Piper pulled her back against the wall. 

There was a grunt. “Now you’re gonna fuckin’ pay! What you fuckin’ did, you fuckin’ killed yourself, motherfucker!” A raider yelled. The girls could hear the voice so clearly. 

Bang.  

Something had run into the wall. Piper flinched and Ellie was no longer by her side. Turning her head, she saw her sister at the hole. Her gun in hand. 

“Ellie, no,” Piper pleaded as Joel struggle with the raider. 

Ignoring her sister, Ellie crawled through the wall. 

“Fuck,” Piper groaned before following her sister out the hole. 

The sight in front of her was pure chaos. Joel had his head tilted back with a long rifle underneath his chin. Behind him stood a raider. Piper didn’t care to note the specifics about him except for the fact he was choking Joel. It wouldn’t have been long before Joel would lay unconscious on the floor of the abandoned laundromat. 

A clear shot rang through the air. The raider fell to his knees. The rifle choking Joel was gone. Ellie had shot the man. Her shoulders were stiff and her eyes were cold. Her skin was paler than white as the gun followed the man as he dragged himself across the floor. 

The demeanor in the raider had flipped. Tears screamed down his eyes as the violence in his voice fled. It was replaced by terror as he pleaded with Ellie. 

“No, no, no, no, no! It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s over. We’re not fighting anymore. I’m gonna go home. I’ll tell everyone you’re good,” his voice broke as a cry escaped his lips. “I don’t know what to do. My legs don’t work. My mom isn’t far, if you could get me to her. We could trade with you guys. We could be friends. I didn’t know.” Ellie stood unwavering. “I’m Bryan. I’m Bryan. What’s your name?” Bryan whimpered. 

Joel stepped forward. “Wait, wait, wait!” Bryan pleaded, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife. “You can have it… It’s a good knife.” He tossed the knife to Ellie. It fell to the ground beside her feet. 

“Get back behind the wall,” Joel muttered to Ellie. He was still out of breath. His hand came to her shoulder, breaking her from her trance. Lowering the gun, Ellie turned her back to Bryan and crawled back through the wall. “Kid,” Joel said to Piper. 

“I’m not a kid,” Piper whispered. With Ellie’s gun was quickly replaced by Piper’s. Joel’s eyes widened. 

Bryan’s cried got louder. It annoyed Piper. Someone who moments before seemed to strong, now was at her feet begging for mercy. Something she didn’t have. Not anymore. “No, no, no, no! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please, please. We could just talk. I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please, please. No, no, no! Please! No, please! Please! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please! You don’t have to! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please! No, no, no! We can just talk! Mom! Mom! Mom!” 

Piper’s heart clenched at Bryan’s call for his mother. It was a brief moment, before her finger squeezed. A shot thundered around the room. Then there was silence and a small hole in the forehead of what used to be Bryan. Piper wanted to revel in it, but instead she felt sick. Swallowing down the rising bile, she lowered her gun. In the silence, adjusted the straps of her backpack and moved to the hole in the wall. 

“Let’s go,” she mumbled. 

“I can’t fit through,” Joel said. 

Piper sighed and grabbed her shoulder massaging the pain. “There’s a door to the next room just around the corner.”

Joel nodded as he shuffled around to the door before turning the knob. The door didn’t open. It wasn’t locked, but it just didn’t open. 

“There’s some stuff against the door,” Ellie voiced. 

“Well, can you move it?” Joel asked. 

“Uh…yeah.”

It didn’t take long for Joel to hear scrapping and shuffling behind the door. Soon the blockage was free and the door swung open. Joel stepped inside and closed the door behind him and darkness flooded the room. 

“You okay?” Joel asked to either girl.

Piper didn’t answer. Ellie did. “I’m okay… I’m good. I, uh, got some food in here still, and I got your light still.” Ellie handed Joel the light. “What now?”

“We go up,” Joel answered. 

Ellie looked up at Joel. “To get a better look?”

Joel nodded. “Hopefully, we spot a clear route out.” Leaning back, Joel peered out the door, briefly shutting it. His eyes flitted between the girls. 

“Ready?” He asked. 

Ellie nodded. The two of them turned to Piper. The elder teen gripped her gun close and raised her head up an down. 

Light spilled into the room. The bright light momentarily blinded the three of them as they rushed outside. Their bodies crouched down low as they ran. One fact rang clear in their minds. They had to get far away from here. Some place safe, although it seemed as if they’d never be safe again.

꧁_____________꧂ 

“You fingers go here and then…Piper are you listening to me?” Levi asked with a knowing smile on his face. 

“Huh? Oh yeah. Totally,” Piper chirped back. 

“Right. How was I telling you to hold the gun?” Levi knew Piper’s reaction before the guilt on her face could manifest. 

“Like…this?” Piper fiddled with the gun in her hand and Levi shook his head. 

“No. Here,” Levi said as he reached over to fix Piper’s grip on the gun. Fingers go here and use both hands.”

“But that’s not how–,” Piper muttered. 

“I know that’s how you were taught by FEDRA. It’s wrong. Now listen to me sweetheart,” Levi continued on with his demonstration. “...Soon enough you’ll be able to shoot.” 

After some adjustments, Piper finally mastered her grip on the gun. Levi beamed. “See, now. I want you to try your hand at shooting. Don’t be afraid to miss.” 

Piper huffed and moved her feet to a better stance, the very one she saw Levi take when he used his gun. Her small eyes narrowed to the targets on the other end of the room. They were old beer bottles, but viable targets nonetheless. Taking a slow breath in, Piper pulled her finger back, trigger the gun to fire. She missed. 

“Fuck,” Piper hissed. 

Levi chuckled. “Hey, what did I say? You can miss. You’re safe here. You miss here so that when your shot counts, you don’t miss. Got it?”

The young girl nodded before turning to look back at the targets. Piper puffed her cheeks with disappointment. She wanted to hit the target. She wanted to never miss again. She wouldn’t make a shot that night. She wouldn’t make a shot until it counted. Yet, time and time again, she heard Levi’s voice saying, “Try again,” and she’d get back up to fire once more. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

Refuge was found in a broken down bar. The windows were sealed with old newspapers. To pass the time, Ellie tried to read the clippings. Some were stories about dead people. Boring. Then there were some stories about what the local school board was doing. Also boring. As she jumped from story to story, Ellie concluded that the news was boring. Instead she took to peeking out the window in the cracks where the news didn’t cover. 

“They’re not FEDRA, and they’re not Fireflies, so who are they?” Ellie asked. She peered up at Joel who was also looking out the window. 

“People,” Joel grumbled. 

Ellie nodded and drew her knees in close. Her tiny body crumpled together on the wooden floor. “Are we okay in here?” Ellie’s voice was small. 

Joel’s ear’s perked at the sound of uncertainty in Ellie’s voice. He withdrew from the window and sat down on an abandoned chair. “For a little bit, maybe. Looks like they’re checkin’ out apartment buildings first. But they’ll be coming through these places soon enough.”

There was a sigh from the corner of the room. Piper’s head fell back against the wall. “There’s a really tall building, like, four blocks away,” she noted. Her long dark hair fell to the side as her eyes cast down. She had lost her hair tie a while back during the chaos of running from building to building. 

"Yeah. Saw it,” Joel said. 

Ellie sat up and peeked out the window once more. Her brown eyes darted around until they landed on the building, she believed Joel and Piper were discussing. “So that’s the one?” She pointed to the building. 

“As soon as we don’t hear a truck, we move,” Joel instructed. “Fast as we can.” There was a loud hum as an armoured truck drove by and Ellie ducked down. The group froze as they listened. Their shoulders were tensed and backs stiff. 

The rumbling of the trucks dispersed and a laboured groan escaped Piper’s mouth. 

“Are you okay?” Joel asked. He was now standing up and moving towards the young teen. 

Piper made a noise that was a mix of a scoff and a snicker. “I’m not the one you should be asking.”

Joel groaned at Piper’s stubbornness. “You were shot, weren’t you?”

“No.” Piper shook her head. 

“I saw you got s–,” Joel rebutted. 

“The bullet grazed me!” Piper heaved. “It’s not the end of the fucking world. I’m fine.” She squeezed her arm in hopes to divert the pain. “Ellie, how are you doing?” Piper tensely asked. 

“I’m alright,” Ellie replied. “Joel?”

Roughly running his hands through his peppered hair, Joel answered Ellie. “Yeah.” Taking a few more steps closer to Piper, Joel crouched down. His body only a few feet away from the girl. “Thing is, is I didn’t hear that guy comin’, and… you shouldn’t have had to… both of you shouldn’t have had to…you know?”

“Well, you’re glad we did,” Piper concluded. 

Joel shook his head. He was glad to be alive, but not at the expense of child. “You’re just a kid,” Joel pinched his nose. “You shouldn’t know what it means to… But… shootin’ or… I know what it’s like… first time that you, uh, hurt… someone like that. If you, uh… w… uh…I’m not good at this,” Joel confessed. 

“Yeah, you really aren’t,” Ellie commented. 

“I mean, it was my fault,” Joel apologized. You shouldn’t have had to. And I’m sorry.”

Those two words echoed in Piper’s head. They were such simple and unthreatening words, yet their delivery broke down her walls. I’m sorry. Piper gulped and dug her nails into the palms of her hands. I’m sorry. A new ache formed in her body at the sound of the words and the pain from her shoulder only dulled in comparison to the pain of her heart. I’m sorry. Instantly, her vision grew blurry, and against her will, a few tears escaped and trailed down her dirtied cheeks. 

“It wasn’t my first time,” Piper sniffled . She looked up forcing the tears away. 

“Right. Show me your grip,” Joel looked at Piper and never for a moment did he dwell on her tears. Piper was grateful for that as she pulled out her gun and showed Joel her grip. He took a step closer to check. “Good.” Then Joel turned to Ellie asking her to do the same. “Finger off the trigger. Now, who taught you that?” Joel asked Ellie. 

“FEDRA school,” Ellie mumbled. 

“Figures. Your thumb…over your thumb. Left hand… squeezes down on the right. You got it?”  Ellie nodded. Suddenly, Joel’s hand reached out and tried to yank away Ellie’s gun. Her grip stayed unwavering. “There ya go. Look,” Joel noted. 

Piper smiled as Ellie’s grin grew from Joel’s praise. 

“How come you didn’t check Piper’s grip?” Ellie asked Joel. 

Piper chirped up before Joel could reply. “FEDRA didn’t teach me to shoot,” She said and all elements of a smile has vanished. 

Joel looked back at Piper before standing up. The joints in his knees and hips were displeased at this sudden movement. His movement created a wave of action from the other girls. Piper stood up and Ellie placed her gun in her hand. 

Tapping Ellie on the shoulder, Joel shook his head. “Uh-uh. You’ll shoot your damn ass off.”

Piper snickered. “Be fucking hilarious.” 

Ellie whipped her head around to face her sister. “You fucker.” 

“Hurry it up, girls,” Joel grumbled as he retrieved his things. The girls quit their bickering to do just as Joel had. 

Soon enough, the three of them were standing at the door. They shared a cautious breath as they awaited Joel’s cue. 

“We’ll get through this,” Joel found himself saying. His eyes flashed with worry as he glanced at the weary expressions on the girl’s faces. 

Ellie shrugged her backpack and looked up at Joel. “We know.” 

For a moment, they waited. All their ears tunned into the sounds of the world outside the degenerating bar. With bated breathes they stood. Ellie gripped the straps of her bag tightly finding comfort in the constriction. Piper stood low behind Joel. The pain in her arm was now blaring at her. She clenched her eyes shut, waiting for the pain to subside. All Piper had to do was wait it out. Soon they’d be safe. Soon they’d be out of this god forsaken city. 

“Go,” Joel commanded. The door shut behind them and a bar was left empty once more. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

Joel was old. It was a fact that he knew quite well. It seemed to be Joel’s downfall that he was old in a world that favored the young. Especially when it came to survival. Except now, Joel had youth on his side, except this youth seemed…well, partially incompetent. 

“You’re just gonna put your foot here,” Joel explained. “One, two…” With all his strength he raised Ellie into the air. The young girl’s arms flailed around trying to find stability. 

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit,” Ellie cursed. 

Piper couldn’t contained her laughter as she watched Joel and Ellie struggle. 

Joel huffed and rolled his eyes at Piper’s reaction. “You could always help.”

“Nah, you’ve got it,” Piper replied. 

Ellie cried out as Joel’s muscles struggled to keep her up. “Straighten up. I got you,” Joel said. 

It took a moment, but then Ellie followed Joel’s advice. Her hands reached the opening and her fingers scrounged around for a grip. It didn’t take long for the weight on Joel’s shoulders and arms to lessen. 

“Okay, I’m in.” Ellie’s voice echoed around the opening. 

“Take a look around first. Ellie.” Joel instructed. There was silence from the other side. “God damn it,” Joel muttered. 

“Hey, that's my sister,” Piper reprimanded the old man. 

As if on cue, a nearby steel door swung open and Ellie’s head appeared. “Where would you be without me, huh?” Ellie smiled. 

“By now, Wyoming,” Joel responded as he walked passed Ellie into the building. 

Ellie’s shoulder’s dropped. “Oh, yeah. Walked into that one.”

Once they were all in the stairwell, Joel at the two girls. “All right. We’ll make our way up, and come morning, I’ll take a look at the city, and find our way out.”

A large white sign flared in the dark of the stairwell, illuminated by the flashlights of the group. Ellie groaned upon reading the mixture of numbers and words on the metallic surface. “We’re goin’ up 42 flights?”

“Forty-five,” Joel corrected and then shook his head. “But no… not all the way.”

Piper slumped against the concrete wall with a bang. The contents of her backpack were squished between her and the unmoving force of the wall. “Jesus. How far?”

The man’s brow furrowed with thought as he calculated an answer for the girls. “As far as I can make it.” 

And so their ascent up the stairs began. Their footsteps clambered along the thick walls echoing to and fro. The stair case had a supreme level of acoustics. It was a fact acknowledged by all three of them, especially Ellie. By floor ten, the young girl’s thigh muscles contracted and with each step the burning sensation only grew stronger. In her mind she prayed Joel could only take so many more. Afterall, he was old. However, Ellie realized she had misjudged Joel’s determination and strength by floor seventeen. Her body was heating up and sweat oozed out of her skin. She was suffering, and it seemed like no one else was. Piper stood stoically as she climbed each step. The only hint of their physical stress was a slight shade of pink that tinted her cheeks. On the other hand, Joel’s brow shimmered under the light of his flashlight. He was sweating. He was feeling the effects of their activities. He was suffering, but not enough. 

“What did the policeman say to his belly button?” Ellie asked with a devious smile as she watched Joel’s shoulder’s slump with defeat. 

Piper snorted before rolling her eyes at Ellie. “I don’t know…um…hi?”

“Nope,” Ellie bit her lip trying to contain her laughter. “You’re under a vest!” 

“Jesus,” Joel mumbled and Piper wasn’t sure if it was a prayer or a curse. 

The stairs now echoed a new sound, Ellie’s giggles. “Okay, okay. Next one.” She cleared her throat. “What’s the difference between a well-dressed person on a unicycle and a poorly dressed person on a bike?” Dark brown eyes darted to Piper and Joel for any hint of an answer. “No one? Okay,” and throwing on her best posh accent, Ellie drove the punch line home. “Attire.”

Again, the young girl was thrown into a fit of giggles as Joel grumbled to himself occasionally sending her a warning glare when he broke free from his elderly annoyance of the youth present. 

With each joke Ellie delivered, the laboured and steadfast demeanor Piper held up slowly chipped away. She wasn’t sure if it was the fact her body no longer had the will to fight against the abominable two-liner jokes, or if it was the sight of Ellie at such ease and joy from tormenting her and Joel. Although, Piper had to admit seeing Joel at such loose level of discomfort was quite funny. It was moments like these she had to remember when Joel would eventually discard her and Ellie just like everyone else. 

“Ooo! This one. Okay,” Ellie cleared her throat. “What did the fisherman say to the magician?” She paused waiting for the internal drum roll to conclude. “Pick a cod, any cod.” 

Piper sinched her lips together to contain the outburst waiting to pop. She was so focused on not laughing that she almost ran into Joel. The man had stilled and with his hands on his hips he glowered down at the girls with an unknown look in his gaze. 

“No more jokes,” Joel said. 

“Okay, just trying to lighten the mood,” Ellie mumbled as she shoved her joke book into her back pocket. 

Upon seeing the book placed away, Joel collected his breath and the marched up the stairs continued. 

They had passed four more floors when Ellie spoke again. “Hey, you know that guy who said he was hurt?” She waited for Joel’s acknowledgement. “How did you know it was an ambush?”

Joel’s chest rose pushing his shoulder close to his ears. “I’ve been on both sides.” He glanced back at caught Piper’s knowing stare. “It was a long time ago. We did what we needed to survive.”

“You and Tess?” Ellie asked. It was strange to think of Joel and Tess like the man who attacked them. They were protectors and that’s all Ellie had known them to be. She didn’t think she could imagine Tess hurting anyone. Joel on the other hand, she could see it…sort of. 

“And the people we were with,” Joel explained. “My brother, too.”

Ellie took in a shaking breath, which she blamed on the physical exertion. “Did you kill innocent people?” Her voice faltered. 

Joel was silent. 

“Ellie,” Piper interjected. “Save your breath for the stairs.”

Joel’s jaw unclenched at Piper’s words. He was grateful for her interruption. He knew the answer and it was not an answer he wanted to tell Ellie. In a world full of death and decay around everyone corner, sometimes all you could do was kill. So, yes. Yes, Joel had killed innocents. Back then he wasn’t ashamed. He did it to survive. He had to. Now…now Joel just wanted to lie. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

The stairwell door slammed open and Ellie toppled inside. Her knees hit the carpeted floor as breath hit her lungs like a tidal wave. “Holy shit,” she tiredly said. 

Piper plopped down next to her throwing her head between her knees. “Yeah,” she agreed. 

“Thirty-three floors ,” Ellie barely voiced. “That’s good.”

“It’s gonna have to be,” Joel panted. He placed his coarse hand on the wall for stability. Everything burned: his lungs, his calves, his thighs, hell, even muscles he didn’t know existed burned in a frenzy. 

Pushing herself off the floor, Piper crawled to a standing position. “Come on,” she huffed. 

Ellie shuffled around before reaching her hand out to Piper. Together the two of them got Ellie to a stand. 

Joel looked at the two girls with a puzzled expression. The power of the recovery in the youth astounded him. “Gimme a minute,” Joel begged. 

Ellie chuckled. “Get up, you lazy ass.”

“Lazy ass,” Joel grunted as he stood up. “Fifty-six years old, you little shit.”

Piper and Ellie laughed at his response as they watched Joel waddle down the maze of hallways on the floor before entering a large office. The office was in a pristine condition considering the start of the apocalypse two decades prior. The carpet was free of dirt and Piper could still see the design within the fabric. Ellie was in awe at the fluffiness of the couch cushions in the seating area. They were a little stiff but practically new. She smiled to herself as she laid a few of the cushions out on the floor for the three of them. 

“Better than any bed I’ve ever slept–Joel?” Ellie turned her attention to Joel who had just shattered the glass door. “Joel.” He didn’t respond. Ellie looked at Piper with a worried shine in her eyes. “Joel!” Ellie yelled. 

The man in question turned around with a quizzical look. “What?”

“What are you doing?” She pointed to the glass now on the floor. Not the best sleeping conditions, if she was saying anything. 

Joel furrowed his brow as if his actions are obvious. Piper sighed and dropped her bag onto the floor before laying down next to Ellie. “He doesn’t want someone sneakin’ up on us while we’re sleeping.”

“Ohh, I get it. Crunch, crunch, crunch,” Ellie animately said. Her hands marched around in the air like feet ‘smashing’ the shattered glass. “Are you sure you’re gonna hear it?” The young girl asked Joel. 

“Of course, I’ll hear it,” Joel said. “That’s the damn point.” He glanced down at the ground. The glass was evenly spread out. It’d be difficult to not step on the makeshift alarm. Satisfied, he shuffled over to the girls and sat down on the open cushion next to Piper. 

“If he doesn’t,” Piper added, “I will.”

“Okay. Well, good night,” Ellie said. She snuggled into the couch cushions and drew her jacket tightly around her body. 

“Yeah, good night,” Joel whispered back as he laid down settling in for the night. 

“Night,” Piper mumbled. 

A darkened shade of blue encased the room. Everything was a different shade and Piper could make out each of the objects in the room. The desk was a darker blue than the chair behind it. The ceiling was a light blue, and the young girl was sure she could hear the buzzing of the fluorescent lights, even though they were turned off. Shifting around on the cushion, Piper let out a disappointed sigh. Sleep evaded her. 

“Hey,” Joel spoke. 

“Yeah?” Piper hesitantly responded. Behind her, a small snore escaped Ellie’s mouth. Piper could hear Joel let out a heavy breath. 

“When we were talkin’ about hurtin’ people…,” Joel paused. “What did you mean it wasn’t your first time?”

Piper rolled around onto her side. Her eyes glued to Joel’s back. “…I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“All right,” Joel quietly said.  “…You don’t have to. I’m just sayin’… it isn’t fair, your age… havin’ to deal with all of this…”

Piper’s nose scrunched up and a line between her brows formed. “There’s a lot I’ve had to deal with…” Tears built up in the corner of her eyes. Piper wasn’t going to cry. She didn’t want to cry, but why was it so easy to cry at night? “The first time I…I was twelve…does it gets easier when you get older?” Piper sniffled. 

“No, not really.” Joel rolled over and found lips pulling into a tight line. Piper was crying. The dark hid her tears well, but Joel was a father. He knew when a child was crying. “But still.”

Piper gulped and took in a shaky breath. She wasn’t crying. She refused to cry, but it was a lie. She knew and she knew Joel knew. Yet, there was an ease that filled her being as she cried on the floor of that office with Joel laying across from her. Even as war and torment surged outside, as people searched for them, Piper felt safe. She was safe under the shadow of Joel’s figure. Piper was safe, so she could cry. 

“The reason Ellie asked whether you’d hear the glass or not is ’cause both of us have noticed you don’t hear too well from your right side… Is it ’cause you were shot there?” Piper pondered once her tears had subsided. 

“Probably more from shootin’,” Joel honestly replied. “So if you wanna keep your hearin’, you stick to that knife.”

Piper chuckled and a small smile crept onto her face. “Too late.” Piper asked, “Joel?” 

“Hm?” Joel raised his brow. 

“Did you know diarrhea is hereditary?” Piper smirked. 

“What?” Joel’s head turned to look over his shoulder. Utter confusion was placed on his face at Piper’s words. 

“Yeah,” Piper whispered. “It runs in your jeans.” Then she laughed. It was a quiet laugh given the circumstances, but a laugh nonetheless. 

Joel rolled back over. “Jesus,” he said before laughing along. “That is so goddamn stupid.” He shook his head at himself for laughing at the joke, yet he couldn’t stop. He laughed and then Piper laughed. He feared it be an on going cycle that would awaken Ellie. 

“You laughed, motherfucker,” Piper noted. “Just wait till I tell Ellie.”

“I didn’t laugh,” Joel gruffly said. There was still a hint of laughter in his face. 

“Yes, you did,” Piper said. She wouldn’t let him deny it. 

“Jesus, I’m losin’ it,” Joel smiled. His face felt funny and alien as the smile stretched across his features. His cheeks hurt and his eyes crinkled in a way that they hadn’t in years. Piper had made Joel smile. 

“You’re losin’ it big time,” Piper giggled and Joel laughed once more. 

“Go to sleep,” Joel gently said. 

Piper fondly smiled. “You too, Joel. You too.” 

꧁_____________꧂ 

Sleep found Joel quickly that night. It must have been the thirty-three floors of stairs, the fight for his life, and driving consistently for days that finally brought him some rest. His mind was blank. He didn’t dream and didn’t think of Sarah, of Tess, or of Tommy. He felt at ease. Soon the pleasantry of slumber escaped him. The room was lighter and faded color crept into his view. 

“Joel?” A muffled voice was calling out to him. It sounded worried. It sounded scared. Joel’s eyes widened. “Joel!”

He grunted as he lifted his head. There was Ellie and Piper. Ellie was looking down at him. Her dark eyes reflected the fear and confusion in Joel’s. Piper sat with her jaw clenched. Her shoulder were held back and an inferno was a lit in her eyes. The thing that scared Joel the most was where Piper was looking. She wasn’t looking at him. No, Piper was glaring down the barrel of a gun. 

Something cold touched the back of Joel’s head. He whipped around. There in front of him was a child with paint around his eyes. In his hand was a gun. 

Well, fuck. 

꧁_____________꧂ 

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꧁_____________꧂

#a sinner's redemption #what if ellie had an older sister #ellie and piper are sisters #ellie williams x sister! reader #joel x platonic!reader #dad! joel miller x reader #joel miller x platonic!reader #joel miller comfort #joel miller x daughter!reader #joel x daughter!reader #joel the last of us #hbo the last of us spoilers #hbo the last of us #hbo tlou #tlou hbo #the last of us hbo #ellie and piper are sister's forever #ellie williams x sister!reader #ellie is immune #ellie williams #ellie tlou #ellie the last of us #joel and ellie #took long enough for me to finally write this fic #thanks for the support

[rafasbiscuits]

"why do you love and read alot of angst? doesn't it make you sad?"

me: is a fan of omniscient reader's viewpoint, banana fish and jujutsu kaisen.

#THE SUPREME BIG 3!! #actually theyre the main reason why im an angst writer bHAHAHAH PAIN PAIN PAIN!!! (affecionate and totally in a non sadistic way) #no..nah angst isnt- its not in my rule book. im immune to that shi- #i- i dont think its. #banana fish #sorry guys i just rewatched banana fish im actually sobbing rn #omniscient reader's viewpoint #ash banana fish #ash x eiji #ash lynx #eiji okumura #kim dokja #yoo junghyuk #yoo joonghyuk #yoo sangah #geto suguru #gojo satoru #haibara yu #nanami kento #jujustu kaisen #jjk #orv #anime and manga #anime #novel #webnovel #manhwa