"Singularity" Chapter 10: "Kill Or Be Killed" [10/49]
Title: "Singularity" Chapter 10: "Kill Or Be Killed" [10/49]
Fandom: The Last of Us (first game only)
Characters: Ellie, Joel, Tommy, Maria, OCs
Pairings: Joel/Ellie
Warnings: Underage
Word Count for this chapter: 8,365
Rating (for fic as a whole): R
~
The amplified voice from the jeep was like something from a movie: "Stop right there or we'll shoot!"
Ellie looked over her shoulder at the rapidly-approaching vehicle. "They have a gun on that thing!" she informed Joel... who still wasn't stopping the horse. At first, he was kind of weaving around the scattered cars in the parking lot, as if to make a harder target than going in a straight line. Now, there were no more cars to help them out. No cover of any kind. All he could do was try to make Fox zig and zag a bit. If we can just make it into those trees! Ellie prayed silently.
"Last chance!"
Joel didn't heed the warning, of course. She knew what he was thinking: stopping and talking to the soldiers was akin to suicide. Especially if he 'confessed' to killing Shelby (Ellie knew his heart was in the right place, but she couldn't help being somewhat annoyed by the ridiculous story he'd pulled out of his ass). If she could explain that she had done it in self defense... even that was a lie, really, but maybe she could conjure up some tears and soften them up, make at least one of them sympathetic to her plight... maybe they weren't all assholes... I don't think Parker TOTALLY hates me (yet? -he will if I royally fucked things up for him and Caleb, though) -- maybe he could get Caleb to--
A shot rang out!
Ellie took a quick assessment: I'm okay -- Fox is okay -- and it would pretty much have to go through me to hit Joel, so --
Joel veered sharply to the left -- heading away from the area that looked safest -- as another shot whizzed by without landing.
"What are you doing?!" she cried. "The trees--"
"Ellie -- get a bomb from my bag an' throw it back there -- hurry!"
Of course! She should've done that already. "On it!" Another shot missed them--
"Tell me when you're ready an' I'll keep straight -- hurry!" he repeated.
She only had to twist partway around now to get a good throw off. "Ready!" she said, even though she still needed a second to gauge it--
"Do it quick!" Joel urged.
Ellie chucked the nail bomb with all her might, nearly falling off the horse as she did so (Joel had to grab onto her), and watched it explode -- right in front of the jeep. "Fuck!"
The driver had seen it coming in time to avoid it, but at least it made him swerve -- and he must have slammed on the brakes! Ellie watched the jeep get smaller as they reached the street -- and suddenly they were out of sight as Joel made another sharp turn.
"Good job," he congratulated her. Even though she'd fucked it up. "How many were in there? I think I saw four."
"Four," she confirmed. "But I didn't hit them!"
"You got them off our tail long enough for us to escape -- that's all you needed to do. They won't give up that easily, though." And yet, he was slowing the horse down!
"They weren't like, right on our ass, or I would've hit them," she pointed out... feeling oddly defensive, considering he hadn't criticized her. "But... don't you think we should keep going fast? You just said yourself: they're not just gonna give up."
"Notice they weren't usin' the big gun?"
"...Yeah. Now that you mention it. Why the fuck not?" she wondered.
"Don' know. Maybe they were just tryin' to slow us down... not kill us."
"Or maybe it doesn't work? You think?"
"Or that, yes. Damn... our timing is lousy. If we had left just two minutes earlier..."
"Sorry. I didn't think they'd be here so early!"
"I know. It's all right."
Not YET it isn't! "Why didn't you go into those trees?" she had to ask. "That looked sort of safe. They couldn't follow us in very far, at least."
"That was my first thought, too," Joel replied. "But this is a real urban area here... with the ocean on one side, them on another... in a vehicle made for off-roadin’... I didn't like our chances. Felt like they might be able to close in on us. It might've been all right... just a gut feelin' I had, that we oughta come out here instead. Quiet now so we can listen for 'em... an' let me think..."
"I'll think, too." -Think about how much this sucks, at least! She wasn't sure she understood Joel's reasoning... but she trusted his gut explicitly.
They were still moving somewhat quickly, but not galloping. That was easier to understand: she figured Joel wanted to preserve Fox's strength in case they needed to make another quick getaway -- and besides that, galloping was noisy, which made it harder to hear.
"Shit... you hear that?" he hissed. "They ain't far back... they don' know which way we went, though... and they're louder than us. We have the advantage."
I don't even know which way we went! Joel had taken some turns and cut through spaces between buildings rather than sticking strictly to the roads... all randomly, she assumed. Not like their map covered this area. They passed a conference center, a... driving academy?! (was that actually a thing?)... cafés and bars, even a TV station... a school... a doctor's office... and then they came upon a bunch of houses. They were quite close together, and many had intact walls and fences which hindered Joel's shortcutting. After finding themselves in a dead end, Joel finally pulled up on the reins, directing Fox into a cluster of trees. The treetops were so dense and dark... like a huge umbrella, sheltering us from the storm.
Joel glanced at her (...well, as much as a person could glance while on horseback in front of the other person?). "I'm gonna think out loud... so you can brainstorm with me. I'm tryin' to decide if we need to kill these assholes. If they had no connection to our friends back on the beach, then sure. But four, plus the one you killed... ain't that a good portion of the men at that little place? Sands might catch some heat for it."
Which was totally unfair! Anyone could have come along and killed the soldiers out here. And she and Joel weren't even acting as part of that community anymore! But he was right -- they would probably lump it all together and take it out on Golden Sands. Anyway, Ellie liked that he was including her in the decision-making. "Um... yeah. It's not actually little, but there's not a lot of guys there. More when they're doing training, though. Apparently they have this fake city in there that they built specifically to train people for different situations... I kinda wanted to see it, and see if it looked real, or like... if I could tell why they designed something a certain a way, like what the point of the-- Sorry. You don't care right now." ...And yet she kept talking-- "I was gonna ask you if you'd heard about this place, cuz they did all that stuff before. Did you know it was abandoned even before the--"
"Ellie," Joel finally cut in. "Why don't you tell me all about it later, yeah? They had the top down -- did you recognize anyone?"
"No... I didn't get a good look, though. Why -- do you think Caleb was with them?" Ellie hadn't even thought of that possibility!
"Don' know. Be a shame to kill someone Parker cares about. But I don't want us to be lookin' over our shoulders the whole trip, either. And when it comes down to it..."
Kill or be killed. Or maybe it's us against the world. Same thing, really. "I get it."
"I was thinkin' maybe we just disable the vehicle. Shoot the tires. Strand 'em here. Do you know if they have radios like we have back home?"
"Like the walkie talkie kind? I didn't see any... but it was late, and it wasn't like anyone was working, so..."
"All right... do you know how many functional vehicles they've got? Keith mentioned a helicopter the other day."
"I didn't see one... fuck, I hope they don't have one. That would suck." They'd never be able to ditch something with an aerial view! "I saw a... jeep/tank sort of thing? It was big."
"A Humvee, prob'ly."
"Uh... yeah, I guess. And I did see a regular-looking jeep -- like the one they're in. Maybe it's the same one -- I didn't get a good look at it cuz it was dark and I only saw it for a second. Ugh, I don't know what they actually use, though. I'm sorry... guess I was asking all the wrong kinds of questions, huh."
"Well... for the helicopter, it feels like we might've seen it or heard it some time over the past few months if it's operational, with them bein' so close. Even if they can radio the base an' get more men out here to pick 'em up, it'd still take a little while... we could get a good head start... stay off the roads completely for a while so they can't find us that way... there's a good stretch of nothin' we could go through close to here."
"Nothing? Like fields and stuff, you mean. No buildings." She remembered seeing areas like that when they'd gone hunting.
"Yes. It'd be like hiding in plain sight -- hard for them to pinpoint where we're at... but it won't help much if they send a helicopter," he had to admit.
"Maybe we should try a forest instead?" Ellie suggested. "Like hiding not in plain sight? Somewhere the jeep can't go as easily?"
"Maybe... we wouldn't get as far away as quickly... but it would be much easier to hide from a helicopter... maybe lay low for a bit. When we hit the mountains... either way, it's gonna be hard to get through those without usin' the roads."
So much for a peaceful trip home. Fuck! "When do you think they'll stop looking for us?" she fretted.
"No idea. That's another reason not to mess with 'em... maybe they don't care enough about that piece of shit to keep up the search for long... maybe they value comfort over pride. Who knows."
"Pride?"
"I imagine it's a real blow to their egos, losin' one of their own on their home turf," he explained. "They haven't been to the resort yet, though... they don't even know for sure that it was us who killed him. 'Course, we look guilty as hell, runnin'--"
"I killed him," she reminded Joel again. Is he actually going to start believing his lie now?
"What happens to one of us..."
"Yeah yeah, okay. More like... what one of us does?" Because it hadn't just fucking happened. It wasn't like she had unwittingly stumbled upon a group of hunters or something and been forced to react. She had pretty much gone chasing after trouble without bothering to anticipate any consequences, and then... she just couldn't stop thinking that she had overreacted last night, making things so much worse than they otherwise would have been. And Joel was just... taking it all upon himself, as was his way. She snorted. "Except when you tell me 'that ain't on you, kiddo' -- kind of a double--"
"Will you just help me think? We might've pissed 'em off with that bomb, but it didn't hurt 'em..."
"Disabling their jeep would piss them off, too," she pointed out. "What a waste, hurting a car. That's like hurting a horse."
...And then the most brilliant idea ever smacked her in the face!
"Joel! Why don't we steal the jeep? We could drive it home!"
"...You wanna steal it."
"Yes! We totally could!"
"No."
"Why the fuck not?" Sometimes she thought Joel just disagreed with her solely to be contrary.
" 'Cause if you thought we had a target on our backs before..."
"Who cares? We could haul ass if we were in that thing." The more she thought about it, the more she wanted to do it!
"We prob'ly couldn't do it without killin' 'em."
"So we kill them!"
"...And we prob'ly couldn't kill 'em the easy way without hurtin' the jeep..."
She assumed by 'easy way,' he meant by using explosives. "So we lure them out and pick them off one by one!"
Joel chuckled. "You're brutal. That thing might actually be hard to destroy anyway, if it's got military enhancements... but maybe it don't. I think they actually stopped usin' jeeps in the '80s or '90s."
"Really? So that one's like... fifty years old or something? As old as you?!"
"Uh... no. Nothin' is as old as me. I'm older than dirt, remember?"
"Whatever." (But secretly, she kind of agreed with him.) "So... if it's not old..."
"Never mind about that right now. Back to the soldiers: what if one of 'em is what's-his-name?"
"Caleb? Then..." Fuck, I don't wanna kill Parker's guy! "We kill everyone but him and I'll just talk to him. I'll make him understand."
"Oh, sure. We kill all his buddies, but he'll--"
"Well, I don't know! I don't wanna kill him, okay?" Shelby DID say they're all like brothers... he probably hates me too much to talk to me?
"We don' know what their intentions are, either. Why send four men to deal with one little girl?"
She supposed it was a fair question. "Maybe they were all pissed off... or maybe they were just bored and wanted an excuse to get out? ...Maybe whoever was left had to clean up the... mess... so this was more fun?"
Joel nodded. "Maybe it's all of those reasons combined."
"Anyways, I'm not so little," Ellie grumbled. "I did kill one of them."
"You know what I mean."
Maybe she wasn't being underestimated by others for once! Still... four men did seem a bit excessive. Caleb HAS to know it was me who killed Shelby... right?! He knew I wasn't looking to fuck him... She wondered if dicks stayed hard after death. It seemed like they would, with the whole body going stiff and everything... but EWW, not like they're going to even LOOK for that-- would they? To see if he had sex with me or not? If it's hard, then they'd know that he didn't get to like-- -Ick-- GET THAT IMAGE OUT OF YOUR HEAD, she commanded herself. Where were we... "Well, you're not little... but yeah, they wouldn't know that you're supposedly the one that killed their guy. Since that didn't actually happen."
Joel ignored that remark. "I gotta say... I do kinda like the idea of stealin' it. 'Specially if it is tricked out some. If we can get it all the way home..."
"Then we don't even need the horse!"
"We're still takin' the horse. We ain't goin' near that resort again... and besides, it was a fair trade. Bringin' home a vehicle that actually runs would go a long way towards makin' up for the two horses we've lost, too."
Two, going back to a year ago. It would more than make up for it, in Ellie's opinion. "We could say we found it on the way!"
"We might wanna tell Tommy'n'Maria the truth. Rest of the town can hear your version."
Ellie snorted. "Since when do you not wanna lie to Tommy and Maria? You lie to them about us..."
"Only 'cause I have to."
"Well, maybe not. I mean, you saw how--"
"Ellie, not now. We've got plenty of time to have that discussion on the way. As for this, if we don't say what really happened, my goddamn saint of a brother might report the 'found' jeep... maybe send it up on the next trade run... they trace it back to where it came from, find out what happened there..."
"And somehow make the connection to us." Ellie frowned. "But Tommy wouldn't turn us in if he knew... right?"
"I don't think so. He ain't that much of a saint." Joel chuckled. "In fact, I know he wouldn't. You look at him with those big green eyes full of tears, an' tell your story the way you told it to me? No way in hell."
What 'way' did I tell it? she wondered. "One problem with that: he's not in love with me."
"No, but he does love you. He thinks of you as his niece, you know. But... there are other people there who interact with the military. Might be some folks who feel like we oughta turn it over to them. So maybe we don't wanna take it all the way to Jackson. First things first, though."
First things first-- "Right. Okay, so... how do we steal it. ...We go find them... let them catch sight of us..."
She and Joel talked it through and agreed on a plan of action. Nothing fancy, just basically 'divide and conquer.' Even though it was far more dangerous for Joel than for Ellie, Joel felt it was too risky for her if things went wrong, and they wasted like five minutes debating his objection to it, but in the end, he grudgingly admitted it was the best option. Next problem: where the fuck did the soldiers go? She hadn't heard the jeep since taking refuge in their 'tree umbrella.' Joel said he hadn't heard it, either. They had a better chance of success if they found the jeep before it found them... and it was time to leave their shady shelter. At walking speed, for the moment. Scouting speed...
Ellie figured the soldiers would've noticed what general direction she and Joel had gone, but it seemed that they hadn't. Or maybe they'd gone the right way initially but not headed far enough south. Maybe their paths would never cross again... but man, I really want that fucking jeep now! Joel, on the other hand... Ellie got the feeling he cared more about eliminating the threat than stealing the jeep. (...Not a bad philosophy. She probably should adopt it herself. But... JEEP!) He speculated that Caleb and the dude she saw in the hall might have come along because they were possibly the only ones who could identify Ellie -- 'possibly' because if that security camera was recording, and they could zoom in... well, Ellie had looked straight at the thing. They would all know her face. She wasn't even sure that the hallway guy would remember what she looked like from just that one passing moment -- in the eerie lighting, at that. Joel, who hadn't even fucking been there, said he probably would, because who could forget Ellie's pretty face? Again, Ellie dismissed this opinion as invalid given the fact that he was in love with her and therefore biased. Anyway, Joel declared this an all-or-nothing deal: if they kill one, they kill them all. Leave no witnesses.
That was the part that Ellie didn't like... that she had to grudgingly agree to. It was easy to declare she wanted to kill them all when they were just abstract ideas and not actual human beings. As for the reality of going through with it... she just had to hope Caleb wasn't with them. It's possible, right? They don't NEED someone to identify a teenage girl who happens to be the ONLY teenage girl in the place... right?!?! Do THEY know that, though? Shelby must have known. He'd been waiting and waiting for his type to show up, hadn't he? And... she supposed that just because he hadn't been all leer-y and grope-y with her in the beginning, it didn't disqualify him from being a pervert. Joel had concluded that Shelby's friendliness was all an act... but was it really? All of it? Did he not actually enjoy talking to her at all? If she had liked him the way he'd wanted her to -- if she hadn't made him so angry... hadn't inadvertently made promises she never intended to keep... hadn't gotten him excited with no payoff, provoking him to--
Ugh-- FUCK that guy--
Maybe Shelby hadn't actually been a pervert... just an asshole. Or a sometimes-asshole. Whatever he was or wasn't, he was dead now, and she couldn't undo any of the things that had led up to it. She would have to live with it. And do what Joel said: put it out of your mind, at least for now...
Anyway, she was glad Joel didn't compare himself to actual perverts anymore. He might still make an offhand remark here and there (usually in jest), but he was way more comfortable with her touching him now. Totally cool with being affectionate with her in public, too. Proof that sex fixes everything! ...Except--
"You know, I really did wanna be with you last night," she blurted. "I wasn't just trying to trick you or something. If that's what you think."
"Not now, Ellie."
"But I really did!" she insisted. She had heard the bitterness in his voice when he'd made that remark about her knowing how to wear him out... she couldn't stand him thinking she hadn't really wanted him, or whatever the fuck he thought!
"All right."
What a liar! Ellie sighed. "You're just trying to shut me up. Do you think I would have come, like, six times, if I--"
"NOT NOW, Ellie," Joel muttered. "I think I hear somethin'..."
"Really?" Ellie listened. She didn't hear shit.
"Keep listenin'."
Ellie listened for a minute or so before realizing that Joel hadn't actually heard anything, either. "You're a dick," she whispered.
"I know you think I like to use this as an excuse to avoid talkin', but--"
"Because you totally do!"
"--we're Outside. In a city. Might be more than just the jeep out here, for all we know. Pay attention."
"Yes, sir!" She said it sarcastically, but he wasn't wrong. It seemed unlikely they'd find anyone camped out this close to the resort, though; a gatherer would have come across them at some point. I guess people could be passing through... like us...
"And don't address me like a goddamn soldier," Joel growled.
Ellie had meant it in a polite yes sir/yes ma'am sort of way (the way Joel himself sometimes spoke), but she decided it was cute that Joel found her mockery irritating for a different reason. And somehow, it hit her then -- for the millionth time -- how lucky she was to be with him. She sort of climbed up his backpack so she could hug his neck. "Love you, Joel."
He just grunted.
She kissed his cheek before plopping back down. "Fine, don't love me back, then," she said with a mock sigh.
"Ellie-- listen. For real this time. ...That way."
Ellie listened... kept listening... "...Oh yeah... I hear it... fuck, okay -- so how do we find them now without them seeing us?"
"We gotta guess a bit. Just listen." He directed the horse left, past a post office... and then right, down a street that led back toward where they had come from. "Jeeps are pretty loud... they might be farther off than it sounds like. These goddamn streets are so-- -We'll cut through here. I think they're comin' down that next street. If they keep on it..."
He urged the horse to go a little faster, through the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant... a Chinese one... then one that lacked a legible sign (she assumed it was another restaurant)... they kept glancing to their left, toward that street the jeep might be on. Ellie didn't know how Joel could be so sure of its exact location, but he did have this uncanny ability to pinpoint shit like that. Like a fucking Clicker!
"Joel, look up there -- a church! That would be good, right?"
"It's better than anything we've seen so far," he agreed.
Ellie could hear that they were running out of time to position themselves. The jeep sounded so fucking close... like right around that bend!
Joel barely even waited for the horse to come to a stop before dismounting, smoothly handing her the reins as he did so. "Go just a lil' farther down -- see those houses right there? -- Before that-- " -- he made a vague gesture, and Ellie knew he was indicating the more open area beyond said houses -- "Or maybe just around the corner here. Not too close -- but not too far!"
Ellie got settled in the saddle. "Okay!" Let's get this plan in motion! She watched him run into the church.
So...
...She started to do what Joel wanted her to.
Ellie always wanted to do as Joel said in these situations... but sometimes, a little deviation from the plan worked out better in the end. There was a major intersection there, where the road curves... shouldn't I make sure they don't go THAT way, so we don't lose them and have to go find another quasi-ambush place? Maybe she would just wait a few moments and see if she could tell... she did take the horse around the corner, though, because if they did come this way, she needed to stay out of sight. Those little house-looking things would be better for stashing Fox, but...
The jeep sound was growing fainter; they had taken a turn! They were going north. Sorry, Joel... I know YOU wanted to be the bait, but they might never come back this way if I don't help them out! Unbeknownst to Joel, Ellie flew up the little side street at a gallop, made a sharp left, and -- fuck, this street curves, too! They needed to be able to spot her while she was still far enough away... also, she figured it would look funny if she was riding toward them. She had to make it look legit somehow... like, turn the horse around and start galloping as if she was afraid of running into the jeep. And she had to be far enough down the street that it didn't look staged. I guess I could've been riding hard up the street, heard the jeep, and THEN turned around... or maybe she could pause at an intersection, seemingly paralyzed with indecision... just looking around, until whoops, there they are -- RUN --
... or am I overthinking this?
She went a little farther up the street, just past her comfort zone, because she wasn't as good at timing and shit as Joel was -- and the more street she had to ‘run away’ on, the better her chance of luring the soldiers to follow her without tipping them off, right? Right! "Okay, Fox, I know I'm being confusing as fuck, but we're gonna turn around and wait here a sec... and just listen for them... wait 'til they start coming... ...aaaaaaaand... go!" She leaned into the horse's mane, not even daring to look back over her shoulder as he galloped down the street.
She didn't have to look -- the escalating noise told her that the jeep was rapidly gaining on her! Faster than anticipated!
"Stop right there!" The bellowing movie thing again.
Ellie needed an escape route -- the jeep was too fucking fast! Thank God it's not shooting! Maybe they DON'T actually wanna kill me? She cut through the parking lot of the church rather than return to the street she'd been on; she needed to reach Joel quickly -- before he figured out what she'd done and tried to come after her or something!
The jeep turned the corner into the parking lot, but by then, Ellie was racing in between church buildings, darting through the overgrown shrubbery... a playground... she didn't hear the jeep in pursuit and assumed it had opted to try to cut her off on the other side -- which was exactly what she wanted. They had to pass a few more buildings to round the corner, which would at least buy her a few extra seconds to warn Joel. She brought the horse to a stop when she reached the far street -- the front of the cathedral or chapel (or whatever the prettiest part of a church was?), where she'd left Joel.
She spotted him immediately. I KNEW he'd go up there!
"What are you doin'!" he called to her from an archway on the second floor, scowling his disapproval.
"They saw me! They'll be coming from that way--" --she gestured for him, as if he couldn’t already hear the jeep-- "--I'll make sure some of them follow me and you can get maybe one or two to--"
"Never mind all that -- bring the horse around an' come on up now --"
"I can't! It's okay -- they're not shooting at me!"
"Ellie--"
"Bye! Don't hurt the jeep!" she reminded him as she started to take off-- "Whoa! Not so fast yet, oops... they have to see me again..." She wasn't even going to go as far as where the street curved. She wanted to take a different street this time, so she could circle back around and stay somewhat close to Joel. He might need her help!
She waited a few beats, then pressed Fox to gallop again, figuring if she fucked up the timing, she could take a really big loopy turn at the intersection. As it turned out, she didn't even make it there when the jeep came barreling around that corner--
Don't look back -- they MUST see you -- just go!
A shot rang out as she made her left turn. I fucking hope it came from JOEL's gun! But she also heard return fire, so either way, he was getting shot at -- FUCK!
It's okay... that's what he WANTED... he wouldn't have let them hit him, that would be stupid... and if he thought there was a good chance of that, he never would have--
But there was always a chance. Even if things had a 95% chance of going well, he could still fall in the unfortunate 5% group.
She just had to try not to think about that. "Focus on the task at hand," like Joel had told her.
She slowed the horse to a trot; she would have to wait for the jeep to catch up a little, because this street wound around to the right... man, it would be so easy to ditch them here! So many 'short-sighted' streets!
Okay okay... THINK. To her right was a hotel that had architecture similar to Joel's church -- if she could get up to the second floor... had Joel stalled the jeep enough?
She needed the soldiers to ditch it and pursue her on foot anyway, and she couldn't keep waiting for them to catch up to her at every bend in the road. It would look too suspicious. ...Not that they weren't already suspicious, finding Joel in the church and her racing around on the horse... what if they decided to gang up on Joel and then go find her? Fuck a duck-- why can't things ever just go as planned?! But, okay... the fuckers could also decide to go the other way: just ditch Joel there and all come after ME... how pissed would Joel be if I killed all the soldiers while he killed none?
No, she didn't want it to go down like that... four was a lot to face all at once, without Joel's help. She would have to be smart about it. Hide, wait for them to split up like they always fucking did, and pick her moments.
She hastily hitched Fox to the hotel's signpost, where he'd be in full view from the street. She feared that if she tried to hide him and then make her way up to the second floor balcony, the jeep might zoom right on by without seeing her. She just hoped they had less interest in stealing the horse -- and all her shit! -- than in catching up to her. Although, if she found a good spot to snipe from on the second floor, she supposed it wouldn't matter what they did -- she could take them out, or at least draw their attention. She might even be able to see the church from up there, although she was waaaaaay too far away to make any effective shots, even if she had one of Joel's long-range guns -- which she did not, unfortunately. She would be sniping with a 9-millimeter.
Ellie had no trouble entering through the front door, and man was it beautiful inside -- it reminded her a bit of the fancy hotel they'd cut through in Pittsburgh... only there were more of the fancy bits still intact in this one. The cheerful yellow paint everywhere made the place feel... happy. A sort of happy that pricked painfully at her heart, because she was anything but right now. The walls should be fucking BLACK... especially if the motherfuckers had just... if Joel was...
NO. STOP. It's YOU they really want, she reminded herself. Caleb must've told them it was me, so they'll probably just leave Joel alone and come after me...
There was a staircase conveniently just past the concierge desk. It looked like it had been cut right into the wall -- and if she hadn't been on the verge of freaking out, she might have been amused to note that it too had a curve to it, rather than being a straight shot or having a landing with a sharp turn. No straight passageways in this town! She flew up there as fast as she could, burst into a room on the street-side of the hall --
--and nearly screamed like a girl when she was greeted by a skeletal body on the floor. Eww! She had actually forgotten there might be other people out here besides these four soldiers. (Yes, even though Joel had totally just mentioned that; she could hear him lecturing her in her head already.) Well, obviously this one's been dead a while, no danger here... she stepped over it -- and found that the fucking balcony door wouldn't open.
Next room! Corpse-free. Balcony door wide open. The balcony itself wasn't all that fancy: a wood railing (she'd give it points just for being intact), two matching wood chairs, and a little table. It was a little... what would Joel call it... rickety? Ellie could imagine him frowning at her, telling her to get off the thing before it collapses. It's not THAT bad, Joel! ...It was almost like he was there with her, when she conversed with him in her head. Almost.
Ellie crouched so she could keep an eye on the street through the rungs -- the jeep is here already! Fuck! It parked just beyond the horse -- and there was only the driver! ...Is that good or bad? She decided not to retreat into the hotel... at least, not yet.
She heard two more shots in the distance... and just like that, Joel was no longer almost-with her. She tried not to fret about whether he was on the giving or receiving end of the shots. Obviously the first ones hadn't killed him, then, or there wouldn't have been any more. These two could've both come from his gun... they weren't like, overlapping or anything... -Focus! She watched the soldier approach the entrance. If it's not Caleb, JUST SHOOT HIM. She couldn't tell for sure, with that cap hiding his face, and being a little too far away to--
"Ellie? Is that you up there? ...It is Ellie, right? Or was it Elsie? I'm not too good with names."
She could see it was indeed Caleb when he turned his face toward the balcony. Shit! He was holding a rifle -- a normal-looking one, not an AK-47 or anything -- but not aiming it at her. "Ellie," she informed him. "If I stand up, are you gonna shoot me?"
"No! I just want to talk to you. That's it. ...I promise," he added when she stayed put.
She nearly warned him that she had a gun (two, in fact), in a don't-mess-with-me sort of way... then decided he didn't need to know that. What if he just shot her on the spot to be proactive and protect himself? And he could shoot her where she was; the railing wasn't solid, after all. Plenty of space to sneak a bullet through. Even if he missed, his bullet might just plow right through the wood, for all she knew. "You were shooting at us before," she pointed out... but she tentatively started to rise from her crouch.
"We only wanted to stop you. We didn't hit you, did we?" A rhetorical question.
Ellie didn't think they'd missed on purpose, as the bullets seemed to have come pretty fucking close to them. But... maybe he was telling the truth? "I heard gun shots over there." She nodded in the direction of the church.
"That guy you were with -- he fired at us," Caleb excused that. "Is he your dad?"
It had been a while since anyone had assumed Joel was her father. So long that Ellie had forgotten how annoying it was (and to think -- she used to like it!). She didn't see the point in correcting him, though. She just stared down at him sullenly. Maybe it's a good thing he thinks that... it means Parker probably didn't tell him very much about Joel... and if he's bad with names, maybe he won't even remember Joel's, if he ever knew it to begin with! Maybe it wouldn't matter that much in the end, but she couldn't help feeling like the less they knew about Joel, the safer he would be.
"I'll come up there," said Caleb, already moving toward the entrance. "So we can talk easier."
"No -- I'll come down." She ducked back inside before he could argue with her. Upstairs would have been better if she needed to hide, but she preferred to have huge amounts of open space between them. Plus, she'd certainly learned her lesson about talking to soldiers in bedrooms. ...Even gay ones, though? -Well, sure... he could be bi, right?
When she rounded the 'corner' of the curvy stairs, she found him waiting for her at the base of the staircase... a little too close for comfort. He got in here fast! She paused midway down, wondering if she should she ask him to move into the area with all the tables and chairs, or... fuck, we probably don't have much time... I'm supposed to KILL him, unless I can figure out how NOT to, and Joel will be coming here... of course, Joel still had to find her. He might choose the wrong direction at that intersection -- he had only a one in three shot of getting it right on the first try. Maybe his 'Ellie sense' will guide him here! Or... or he might be...
NO. NO HE'S NOT.
She stood there long enough that Caleb backed up a few steps and lifted his hands as if surrendering to her (and she only just now realized he'd holstered the rifle). "I won't touch you. Promise. Go ahead and lay those weapons down." She was wearing her holster belt, her two guns obviously visible now that he could see all of her.
"No way. They're in their holsters, just like yours."
"Then keep your hands up... away from them. Like I'm doing."
"Yes, sir," Ellie muttered under her breath, low enough to disguise the sarcasm this time. He's not really being a dick, though... and that's not an unreasonable thing to ask. She planted her palms on the walls on either side of her instead. By her estimation, she could whip out one of her guns faster than Caleb could swing that rifle into place -- but now she could see he also had a smaller gun on his hip. How did I not see it before? ...He kept the rifle in front of it maybe?
Despite his request, Ellie got the feeling Caleb wasn't afraid of her; she didn't know if that made her predicament better or worse. Better because maybe he wouldn't see it coming? But worse because it was definitely harder to kill people who weren't being all hostile or aggressive. She really, really did not want to kill this guy. He looked a little different in the light of day. More... real? I didn't notice that mole last night... or how his skin is more like mine than Parker's: sunburned rather than tan...
"Let's sit down and talk this through," he suggested, eyeing the area where she had just imagined them talking. The sun streaming in through those huge windows lit up the room brilliantly.
Really REALLY don't want to... She especially didn't want to kill him over there, for some reason. And didn't want to hang out in front of those windows. Maybe she should have... she could keep an eye out for Joel, or for the other soldiers... but she wanted to keep the option of fleeing to the second floor, which was rife with ambush opportunities should she need them. The lobby was too... open. What she had found appealing a minute ago now seemed like a bad idea. She did, however, descend to the bottom of the stairs, stopping on the last one so she could continue bracing herself between the walls, obligingly keeping her hands a 'safe distance' away from her guns. "I'm good. Why are you guys here?" she demanded.
"I think you know why."
So much for playing dumb! "Okay... let me rephrase that. What do you want?"
"I want to know what happened last night," he replied calmly.
"You were there," she said unhelpfully. And fucking BLAZED... maybe drunk, too?... but yeah...
"I wasn't in that room with you. It's a freaking bloodbath... -You got hurt. He hurt you."
A statement, not a question. I guess my face advertises that... Caleb might assume that her clothes were covering other bruises, but her face was it as far as physical wounds were concerned (and she'd definitely taken harder blows than that before). Still... Joel had taught her to play to her strengths, her advantages... one of which was the 'helpless little girl' façade that could lull her enemies into a false sense of security. Not only that -- maybe she could get Caleb to feel sorry for her. Soften him up, then move in for the kill. He can think I was fighting for my life last night if he wants to!
"Can you just tell me what happened?" His voice was surprisingly gentle.
Does he feel sorry for me already? Oh man... I can't kill a GENTLE person... ugghhh! She sure didn't feel like talking to him, either. She scuffed her shoe on the wooden edge of the step. Stared at her toes... but kept him in her peripheral vision; she didn't completely trust that he wouldn't try something.
"The boys are... really upset about this," Caleb continued. "Sarge grilled me hard before I even knew what... I hadn't even seen it yet. Your... handiwork. I couldn't tell him anything he didn't already know. He already knew why I brought Shell upstairs... whatever you two did after you left my room? No clue. I don't even remember Parker leaving."
It wasn't unusual for them not to say goodbye, according to Parker -- and Parker was supposed to just leave, not sleep there with him. Caleb had stirred when she finally returned to his room to fetch her friend, but since she never got the feeling he was fully awake -- and Parker said neither of them had heard anything unusual -- she believed that Caleb didn't know anything. So... what've they got? A bunch of guys who know there was some random girl upstairs looking to (allegedly) fuck Shelby? -And that was only if Caleb hadn't been discreet at the poker game -- which, it sounded like he hadn't, possibly, if someone else was able to tell their sergeant about her. Still -- only one guy actually saw me in the hallway, just walking... unarmed, as far as they knew... I mean, who says it was even me that killed him? It could've been any of those guys in the barracks. Maybe he pissed someone off. And I'm just a LITTLE GIRL: how could I have killed anyone so brutally?
But it was too late to go that route now. Joel hadn't even suggested it... meaning it probably wouldn't have worked. Because I'm a crap liar? Or because they wouldn't believe it even if I lied as well as he does? ...Or maybe cuz what Shelby said is true: NO ONE CARES. She couldn't keep thinking about him... about last night... have to stay cool here...
"What happened?" Caleb asked again. "He do something to make you mad? I mean... was it not your kink, whatever he wanted to--"
"I didn't fuck him!" she spat out angrily, looking up to glare at him. "I never even wanted to!"
He didn't seem surprised; in fact, he looked... triumphant? Was he just trying to get me to talk? I told him last night I wasn't gonna fuck Shelby, so--
"Okay... alright... so he... what, got too hands-y? All's you gotta do is just kick him in the balls. He would've got the message. You didn't have to kill the guy."
Ellie stared at him. 'Just kick him in the balls'? Really? Unbelievable! "Gee, thanks for the tip," she snarled. "Maybe I would've done that if I--" She stopped herself from giving him the details he was after.
"If you what?"
She ignored the question. If he was just goading her... well, he was pretty good at it, because it was definitely working. I think he actually means it, though... is that what guys expect? A kick in the junk if they go too far? The 'just' in his comment irritated her (seriously... had Caleb never been overpowered by anyone in his life? Yes, Joel, maybe I should've been a boy! Cuz it must be fucking NICE!)... but if she overlooked the ignorant wording, some part of her knew he had a point. Because she had taken it too far. She had injured Shelby, and gotten away from him... she should've left it at that. But what if she hadn't been able to escape, and all she could do was stab the fuck out of him until he died? Was she not supposed to do that? Was she supposed to just lay there and... let it happen, as the motherfucker had put it? He might have even seriously thought she would enjoy it... because sex is supposed to be fun? Did it count as self defense if he wasn't actually trying to kill her?
...Of course it does. FUCK HIM! I was DEFENDing mySELF from pain. That's literally self defense. Joel was glad I killed him...
But that's because he's JOEL. Possibly not the best moral standard to judge one's actions by.
She had only a vague idea of the bullshit story Joel had given Ray. It worried her that he would claim this murder to those dickwads in the jeep (to take the heat off her, if nothing else), and maybe piss them off enough to-- STOP IT, DON'T THINK ABOUT THAT. He's coming... ... ... so where is he?
"You don't wanna talk," Caleb finally concluded as she remained silent. "Okay so listen. If you just come with me, I'll--"
"I'm not going anywhere with you! Do you think I'm an idiot?" ...You would be RIGHT, actually... but I'm not THAT stupid. And something else he'd said earlier was bugging her-- "Oh, and as far as him getting the message -- did he understand English? Because I said no. That should've been enough."
"Okay then, see? You can explain all that. We can work something out."
Ellie stared at him, dumbfounded yet again. "Are you for real right now? I've seen how you guys work things out."
"I didn't mean it like that," he chuckled. (He fucking chuckled!)
"Then how did you mean it?"
He hesitated to answer. "I... don't even know, to be honest. I'm not sure what Sarge had in mind. Our orders were to bring you in for questioning."
She quirked an eyebrow at him. "That's it? And it takes four guys to do that."
"...I guess it takes more than that, seeing how this is going so far."
For some reason, the little smile he gave her there didn't annoy her like the chuckling had. She tried to put herself in his shoes. He's in a really awkward position... maybe he got in trouble too cuz of Parker... like, now they can't pretend that shit's not happening? And for being too shitfaced to know that his buddy was being murdered like three doors down?
But... sympathizing with Caleb's plight didn't change anything. "Dude... I can't go with you. You get that, right? Think about it from my point of view."
He shrugged. "Orders are orders."
...THAT's an automatic reply if I ever heard one! Maybe Caleb wasn't a complete asshole... but everything was black and white for him. For all soldiers, she supposed, as far as doing their jobs. She had thought Caleb might feel bad for her, maybe agree to 'look the other way'... while I steal his jeep?! Okay, no... but he didn't know that was her plan, for fuck's sake! These California soldiers might be more laid-back about some things, like locked gates and visitor schedules (and booze, and pot... and sex?), but regarding orders, there didn't seem to be much wiggle room. "And if I don't come with you?" she challenged.
He gave her a hard look; the smile was gone. "You will come with me, one way or the other. Let's not make it ugly."
Maybe Ellie wouldn't fret so much about killing Caleb after all.
~Continue to Chapter 11~
Fandom: The Last of Us (first game only)
Characters: Ellie, Joel, Tommy, Maria, OCs
Pairings: Joel/Ellie
Warnings: Underage
Word Count for this chapter: 8,365
Rating (for fic as a whole): R
~
The amplified voice from the jeep was like something from a movie: "Stop right there or we'll shoot!"
Ellie looked over her shoulder at the rapidly-approaching vehicle. "They have a gun on that thing!" she informed Joel... who still wasn't stopping the horse. At first, he was kind of weaving around the scattered cars in the parking lot, as if to make a harder target than going in a straight line. Now, there were no more cars to help them out. No cover of any kind. All he could do was try to make Fox zig and zag a bit. If we can just make it into those trees! Ellie prayed silently.
"Last chance!"
Joel didn't heed the warning, of course. She knew what he was thinking: stopping and talking to the soldiers was akin to suicide. Especially if he 'confessed' to killing Shelby (Ellie knew his heart was in the right place, but she couldn't help being somewhat annoyed by the ridiculous story he'd pulled out of his ass). If she could explain that she had done it in self defense... even that was a lie, really, but maybe she could conjure up some tears and soften them up, make at least one of them sympathetic to her plight... maybe they weren't all assholes... I don't think Parker TOTALLY hates me (yet? -he will if I royally fucked things up for him and Caleb, though) -- maybe he could get Caleb to--
A shot rang out!
Ellie took a quick assessment: I'm okay -- Fox is okay -- and it would pretty much have to go through me to hit Joel, so --
Joel veered sharply to the left -- heading away from the area that looked safest -- as another shot whizzed by without landing.
"What are you doing?!" she cried. "The trees--"
"Ellie -- get a bomb from my bag an' throw it back there -- hurry!"
Of course! She should've done that already. "On it!" Another shot missed them--
"Tell me when you're ready an' I'll keep straight -- hurry!" he repeated.
She only had to twist partway around now to get a good throw off. "Ready!" she said, even though she still needed a second to gauge it--
"Do it quick!" Joel urged.
Ellie chucked the nail bomb with all her might, nearly falling off the horse as she did so (Joel had to grab onto her), and watched it explode -- right in front of the jeep. "Fuck!"
The driver had seen it coming in time to avoid it, but at least it made him swerve -- and he must have slammed on the brakes! Ellie watched the jeep get smaller as they reached the street -- and suddenly they were out of sight as Joel made another sharp turn.
"Good job," he congratulated her. Even though she'd fucked it up. "How many were in there? I think I saw four."
"Four," she confirmed. "But I didn't hit them!"
"You got them off our tail long enough for us to escape -- that's all you needed to do. They won't give up that easily, though." And yet, he was slowing the horse down!
"They weren't like, right on our ass, or I would've hit them," she pointed out... feeling oddly defensive, considering he hadn't criticized her. "But... don't you think we should keep going fast? You just said yourself: they're not just gonna give up."
"Notice they weren't usin' the big gun?"
"...Yeah. Now that you mention it. Why the fuck not?" she wondered.
"Don' know. Maybe they were just tryin' to slow us down... not kill us."
"Or maybe it doesn't work? You think?"
"Or that, yes. Damn... our timing is lousy. If we had left just two minutes earlier..."
"Sorry. I didn't think they'd be here so early!"
"I know. It's all right."
Not YET it isn't! "Why didn't you go into those trees?" she had to ask. "That looked sort of safe. They couldn't follow us in very far, at least."
"That was my first thought, too," Joel replied. "But this is a real urban area here... with the ocean on one side, them on another... in a vehicle made for off-roadin’... I didn't like our chances. Felt like they might be able to close in on us. It might've been all right... just a gut feelin' I had, that we oughta come out here instead. Quiet now so we can listen for 'em... an' let me think..."
"I'll think, too." -Think about how much this sucks, at least! She wasn't sure she understood Joel's reasoning... but she trusted his gut explicitly.
They were still moving somewhat quickly, but not galloping. That was easier to understand: she figured Joel wanted to preserve Fox's strength in case they needed to make another quick getaway -- and besides that, galloping was noisy, which made it harder to hear.
"Shit... you hear that?" he hissed. "They ain't far back... they don' know which way we went, though... and they're louder than us. We have the advantage."
I don't even know which way we went! Joel had taken some turns and cut through spaces between buildings rather than sticking strictly to the roads... all randomly, she assumed. Not like their map covered this area. They passed a conference center, a... driving academy?! (was that actually a thing?)... cafés and bars, even a TV station... a school... a doctor's office... and then they came upon a bunch of houses. They were quite close together, and many had intact walls and fences which hindered Joel's shortcutting. After finding themselves in a dead end, Joel finally pulled up on the reins, directing Fox into a cluster of trees. The treetops were so dense and dark... like a huge umbrella, sheltering us from the storm.
Joel glanced at her (...well, as much as a person could glance while on horseback in front of the other person?). "I'm gonna think out loud... so you can brainstorm with me. I'm tryin' to decide if we need to kill these assholes. If they had no connection to our friends back on the beach, then sure. But four, plus the one you killed... ain't that a good portion of the men at that little place? Sands might catch some heat for it."
Which was totally unfair! Anyone could have come along and killed the soldiers out here. And she and Joel weren't even acting as part of that community anymore! But he was right -- they would probably lump it all together and take it out on Golden Sands. Anyway, Ellie liked that he was including her in the decision-making. "Um... yeah. It's not actually little, but there's not a lot of guys there. More when they're doing training, though. Apparently they have this fake city in there that they built specifically to train people for different situations... I kinda wanted to see it, and see if it looked real, or like... if I could tell why they designed something a certain a way, like what the point of the-- Sorry. You don't care right now." ...And yet she kept talking-- "I was gonna ask you if you'd heard about this place, cuz they did all that stuff before. Did you know it was abandoned even before the--"
"Ellie," Joel finally cut in. "Why don't you tell me all about it later, yeah? They had the top down -- did you recognize anyone?"
"No... I didn't get a good look, though. Why -- do you think Caleb was with them?" Ellie hadn't even thought of that possibility!
"Don' know. Be a shame to kill someone Parker cares about. But I don't want us to be lookin' over our shoulders the whole trip, either. And when it comes down to it..."
Kill or be killed. Or maybe it's us against the world. Same thing, really. "I get it."
"I was thinkin' maybe we just disable the vehicle. Shoot the tires. Strand 'em here. Do you know if they have radios like we have back home?"
"Like the walkie talkie kind? I didn't see any... but it was late, and it wasn't like anyone was working, so..."
"All right... do you know how many functional vehicles they've got? Keith mentioned a helicopter the other day."
"I didn't see one... fuck, I hope they don't have one. That would suck." They'd never be able to ditch something with an aerial view! "I saw a... jeep/tank sort of thing? It was big."
"A Humvee, prob'ly."
"Uh... yeah, I guess. And I did see a regular-looking jeep -- like the one they're in. Maybe it's the same one -- I didn't get a good look at it cuz it was dark and I only saw it for a second. Ugh, I don't know what they actually use, though. I'm sorry... guess I was asking all the wrong kinds of questions, huh."
"Well... for the helicopter, it feels like we might've seen it or heard it some time over the past few months if it's operational, with them bein' so close. Even if they can radio the base an' get more men out here to pick 'em up, it'd still take a little while... we could get a good head start... stay off the roads completely for a while so they can't find us that way... there's a good stretch of nothin' we could go through close to here."
"Nothing? Like fields and stuff, you mean. No buildings." She remembered seeing areas like that when they'd gone hunting.
"Yes. It'd be like hiding in plain sight -- hard for them to pinpoint where we're at... but it won't help much if they send a helicopter," he had to admit.
"Maybe we should try a forest instead?" Ellie suggested. "Like hiding not in plain sight? Somewhere the jeep can't go as easily?"
"Maybe... we wouldn't get as far away as quickly... but it would be much easier to hide from a helicopter... maybe lay low for a bit. When we hit the mountains... either way, it's gonna be hard to get through those without usin' the roads."
So much for a peaceful trip home. Fuck! "When do you think they'll stop looking for us?" she fretted.
"No idea. That's another reason not to mess with 'em... maybe they don't care enough about that piece of shit to keep up the search for long... maybe they value comfort over pride. Who knows."
"Pride?"
"I imagine it's a real blow to their egos, losin' one of their own on their home turf," he explained. "They haven't been to the resort yet, though... they don't even know for sure that it was us who killed him. 'Course, we look guilty as hell, runnin'--"
"I killed him," she reminded Joel again. Is he actually going to start believing his lie now?
"What happens to one of us..."
"Yeah yeah, okay. More like... what one of us does?" Because it hadn't just fucking happened. It wasn't like she had unwittingly stumbled upon a group of hunters or something and been forced to react. She had pretty much gone chasing after trouble without bothering to anticipate any consequences, and then... she just couldn't stop thinking that she had overreacted last night, making things so much worse than they otherwise would have been. And Joel was just... taking it all upon himself, as was his way. She snorted. "Except when you tell me 'that ain't on you, kiddo' -- kind of a double--"
"Will you just help me think? We might've pissed 'em off with that bomb, but it didn't hurt 'em..."
"Disabling their jeep would piss them off, too," she pointed out. "What a waste, hurting a car. That's like hurting a horse."
...And then the most brilliant idea ever smacked her in the face!
"Joel! Why don't we steal the jeep? We could drive it home!"
"...You wanna steal it."
"Yes! We totally could!"
"No."
"Why the fuck not?" Sometimes she thought Joel just disagreed with her solely to be contrary.
" 'Cause if you thought we had a target on our backs before..."
"Who cares? We could haul ass if we were in that thing." The more she thought about it, the more she wanted to do it!
"We prob'ly couldn't do it without killin' 'em."
"So we kill them!"
"...And we prob'ly couldn't kill 'em the easy way without hurtin' the jeep..."
She assumed by 'easy way,' he meant by using explosives. "So we lure them out and pick them off one by one!"
Joel chuckled. "You're brutal. That thing might actually be hard to destroy anyway, if it's got military enhancements... but maybe it don't. I think they actually stopped usin' jeeps in the '80s or '90s."
"Really? So that one's like... fifty years old or something? As old as you?!"
"Uh... no. Nothin' is as old as me. I'm older than dirt, remember?"
"Whatever." (But secretly, she kind of agreed with him.) "So... if it's not old..."
"Never mind about that right now. Back to the soldiers: what if one of 'em is what's-his-name?"
"Caleb? Then..." Fuck, I don't wanna kill Parker's guy! "We kill everyone but him and I'll just talk to him. I'll make him understand."
"Oh, sure. We kill all his buddies, but he'll--"
"Well, I don't know! I don't wanna kill him, okay?" Shelby DID say they're all like brothers... he probably hates me too much to talk to me?
"We don' know what their intentions are, either. Why send four men to deal with one little girl?"
She supposed it was a fair question. "Maybe they were all pissed off... or maybe they were just bored and wanted an excuse to get out? ...Maybe whoever was left had to clean up the... mess... so this was more fun?"
Joel nodded. "Maybe it's all of those reasons combined."
"Anyways, I'm not so little," Ellie grumbled. "I did kill one of them."
"You know what I mean."
Maybe she wasn't being underestimated by others for once! Still... four men did seem a bit excessive. Caleb HAS to know it was me who killed Shelby... right?! He knew I wasn't looking to fuck him... She wondered if dicks stayed hard after death. It seemed like they would, with the whole body going stiff and everything... but EWW, not like they're going to even LOOK for that-- would they? To see if he had sex with me or not? If it's hard, then they'd know that he didn't get to like-- -Ick-- GET THAT IMAGE OUT OF YOUR HEAD, she commanded herself. Where were we... "Well, you're not little... but yeah, they wouldn't know that you're supposedly the one that killed their guy. Since that didn't actually happen."
Joel ignored that remark. "I gotta say... I do kinda like the idea of stealin' it. 'Specially if it is tricked out some. If we can get it all the way home..."
"Then we don't even need the horse!"
"We're still takin' the horse. We ain't goin' near that resort again... and besides, it was a fair trade. Bringin' home a vehicle that actually runs would go a long way towards makin' up for the two horses we've lost, too."
Two, going back to a year ago. It would more than make up for it, in Ellie's opinion. "We could say we found it on the way!"
"We might wanna tell Tommy'n'Maria the truth. Rest of the town can hear your version."
Ellie snorted. "Since when do you not wanna lie to Tommy and Maria? You lie to them about us..."
"Only 'cause I have to."
"Well, maybe not. I mean, you saw how--"
"Ellie, not now. We've got plenty of time to have that discussion on the way. As for this, if we don't say what really happened, my goddamn saint of a brother might report the 'found' jeep... maybe send it up on the next trade run... they trace it back to where it came from, find out what happened there..."
"And somehow make the connection to us." Ellie frowned. "But Tommy wouldn't turn us in if he knew... right?"
"I don't think so. He ain't that much of a saint." Joel chuckled. "In fact, I know he wouldn't. You look at him with those big green eyes full of tears, an' tell your story the way you told it to me? No way in hell."
What 'way' did I tell it? she wondered. "One problem with that: he's not in love with me."
"No, but he does love you. He thinks of you as his niece, you know. But... there are other people there who interact with the military. Might be some folks who feel like we oughta turn it over to them. So maybe we don't wanna take it all the way to Jackson. First things first, though."
First things first-- "Right. Okay, so... how do we steal it. ...We go find them... let them catch sight of us..."
She and Joel talked it through and agreed on a plan of action. Nothing fancy, just basically 'divide and conquer.' Even though it was far more dangerous for Joel than for Ellie, Joel felt it was too risky for her if things went wrong, and they wasted like five minutes debating his objection to it, but in the end, he grudgingly admitted it was the best option. Next problem: where the fuck did the soldiers go? She hadn't heard the jeep since taking refuge in their 'tree umbrella.' Joel said he hadn't heard it, either. They had a better chance of success if they found the jeep before it found them... and it was time to leave their shady shelter. At walking speed, for the moment. Scouting speed...
Ellie figured the soldiers would've noticed what general direction she and Joel had gone, but it seemed that they hadn't. Or maybe they'd gone the right way initially but not headed far enough south. Maybe their paths would never cross again... but man, I really want that fucking jeep now! Joel, on the other hand... Ellie got the feeling he cared more about eliminating the threat than stealing the jeep. (...Not a bad philosophy. She probably should adopt it herself. But... JEEP!) He speculated that Caleb and the dude she saw in the hall might have come along because they were possibly the only ones who could identify Ellie -- 'possibly' because if that security camera was recording, and they could zoom in... well, Ellie had looked straight at the thing. They would all know her face. She wasn't even sure that the hallway guy would remember what she looked like from just that one passing moment -- in the eerie lighting, at that. Joel, who hadn't even fucking been there, said he probably would, because who could forget Ellie's pretty face? Again, Ellie dismissed this opinion as invalid given the fact that he was in love with her and therefore biased. Anyway, Joel declared this an all-or-nothing deal: if they kill one, they kill them all. Leave no witnesses.
That was the part that Ellie didn't like... that she had to grudgingly agree to. It was easy to declare she wanted to kill them all when they were just abstract ideas and not actual human beings. As for the reality of going through with it... she just had to hope Caleb wasn't with them. It's possible, right? They don't NEED someone to identify a teenage girl who happens to be the ONLY teenage girl in the place... right?!?! Do THEY know that, though? Shelby must have known. He'd been waiting and waiting for his type to show up, hadn't he? And... she supposed that just because he hadn't been all leer-y and grope-y with her in the beginning, it didn't disqualify him from being a pervert. Joel had concluded that Shelby's friendliness was all an act... but was it really? All of it? Did he not actually enjoy talking to her at all? If she had liked him the way he'd wanted her to -- if she hadn't made him so angry... hadn't inadvertently made promises she never intended to keep... hadn't gotten him excited with no payoff, provoking him to--
Ugh-- FUCK that guy--
Maybe Shelby hadn't actually been a pervert... just an asshole. Or a sometimes-asshole. Whatever he was or wasn't, he was dead now, and she couldn't undo any of the things that had led up to it. She would have to live with it. And do what Joel said: put it out of your mind, at least for now...
Anyway, she was glad Joel didn't compare himself to actual perverts anymore. He might still make an offhand remark here and there (usually in jest), but he was way more comfortable with her touching him now. Totally cool with being affectionate with her in public, too. Proof that sex fixes everything! ...Except--
"You know, I really did wanna be with you last night," she blurted. "I wasn't just trying to trick you or something. If that's what you think."
"Not now, Ellie."
"But I really did!" she insisted. She had heard the bitterness in his voice when he'd made that remark about her knowing how to wear him out... she couldn't stand him thinking she hadn't really wanted him, or whatever the fuck he thought!
"All right."
What a liar! Ellie sighed. "You're just trying to shut me up. Do you think I would have come, like, six times, if I--"
"NOT NOW, Ellie," Joel muttered. "I think I hear somethin'..."
"Really?" Ellie listened. She didn't hear shit.
"Keep listenin'."
Ellie listened for a minute or so before realizing that Joel hadn't actually heard anything, either. "You're a dick," she whispered.
"I know you think I like to use this as an excuse to avoid talkin', but--"
"Because you totally do!"
"--we're Outside. In a city. Might be more than just the jeep out here, for all we know. Pay attention."
"Yes, sir!" She said it sarcastically, but he wasn't wrong. It seemed unlikely they'd find anyone camped out this close to the resort, though; a gatherer would have come across them at some point. I guess people could be passing through... like us...
"And don't address me like a goddamn soldier," Joel growled.
Ellie had meant it in a polite yes sir/yes ma'am sort of way (the way Joel himself sometimes spoke), but she decided it was cute that Joel found her mockery irritating for a different reason. And somehow, it hit her then -- for the millionth time -- how lucky she was to be with him. She sort of climbed up his backpack so she could hug his neck. "Love you, Joel."
He just grunted.
She kissed his cheek before plopping back down. "Fine, don't love me back, then," she said with a mock sigh.
"Ellie-- listen. For real this time. ...That way."
Ellie listened... kept listening... "...Oh yeah... I hear it... fuck, okay -- so how do we find them now without them seeing us?"
"We gotta guess a bit. Just listen." He directed the horse left, past a post office... and then right, down a street that led back toward where they had come from. "Jeeps are pretty loud... they might be farther off than it sounds like. These goddamn streets are so-- -We'll cut through here. I think they're comin' down that next street. If they keep on it..."
He urged the horse to go a little faster, through the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant... a Chinese one... then one that lacked a legible sign (she assumed it was another restaurant)... they kept glancing to their left, toward that street the jeep might be on. Ellie didn't know how Joel could be so sure of its exact location, but he did have this uncanny ability to pinpoint shit like that. Like a fucking Clicker!
"Joel, look up there -- a church! That would be good, right?"
"It's better than anything we've seen so far," he agreed.
Ellie could hear that they were running out of time to position themselves. The jeep sounded so fucking close... like right around that bend!
Joel barely even waited for the horse to come to a stop before dismounting, smoothly handing her the reins as he did so. "Go just a lil' farther down -- see those houses right there? -- Before that-- " -- he made a vague gesture, and Ellie knew he was indicating the more open area beyond said houses -- "Or maybe just around the corner here. Not too close -- but not too far!"
Ellie got settled in the saddle. "Okay!" Let's get this plan in motion! She watched him run into the church.
So...
...She started to do what Joel wanted her to.
Ellie always wanted to do as Joel said in these situations... but sometimes, a little deviation from the plan worked out better in the end. There was a major intersection there, where the road curves... shouldn't I make sure they don't go THAT way, so we don't lose them and have to go find another quasi-ambush place? Maybe she would just wait a few moments and see if she could tell... she did take the horse around the corner, though, because if they did come this way, she needed to stay out of sight. Those little house-looking things would be better for stashing Fox, but...
The jeep sound was growing fainter; they had taken a turn! They were going north. Sorry, Joel... I know YOU wanted to be the bait, but they might never come back this way if I don't help them out! Unbeknownst to Joel, Ellie flew up the little side street at a gallop, made a sharp left, and -- fuck, this street curves, too! They needed to be able to spot her while she was still far enough away... also, she figured it would look funny if she was riding toward them. She had to make it look legit somehow... like, turn the horse around and start galloping as if she was afraid of running into the jeep. And she had to be far enough down the street that it didn't look staged. I guess I could've been riding hard up the street, heard the jeep, and THEN turned around... or maybe she could pause at an intersection, seemingly paralyzed with indecision... just looking around, until whoops, there they are -- RUN --
... or am I overthinking this?
She went a little farther up the street, just past her comfort zone, because she wasn't as good at timing and shit as Joel was -- and the more street she had to ‘run away’ on, the better her chance of luring the soldiers to follow her without tipping them off, right? Right! "Okay, Fox, I know I'm being confusing as fuck, but we're gonna turn around and wait here a sec... and just listen for them... wait 'til they start coming... ...aaaaaaaand... go!" She leaned into the horse's mane, not even daring to look back over her shoulder as he galloped down the street.
She didn't have to look -- the escalating noise told her that the jeep was rapidly gaining on her! Faster than anticipated!
"Stop right there!" The bellowing movie thing again.
Ellie needed an escape route -- the jeep was too fucking fast! Thank God it's not shooting! Maybe they DON'T actually wanna kill me? She cut through the parking lot of the church rather than return to the street she'd been on; she needed to reach Joel quickly -- before he figured out what she'd done and tried to come after her or something!
The jeep turned the corner into the parking lot, but by then, Ellie was racing in between church buildings, darting through the overgrown shrubbery... a playground... she didn't hear the jeep in pursuit and assumed it had opted to try to cut her off on the other side -- which was exactly what she wanted. They had to pass a few more buildings to round the corner, which would at least buy her a few extra seconds to warn Joel. She brought the horse to a stop when she reached the far street -- the front of the cathedral or chapel (or whatever the prettiest part of a church was?), where she'd left Joel.
She spotted him immediately. I KNEW he'd go up there!
"What are you doin'!" he called to her from an archway on the second floor, scowling his disapproval.
"They saw me! They'll be coming from that way--" --she gestured for him, as if he couldn’t already hear the jeep-- "--I'll make sure some of them follow me and you can get maybe one or two to--"
"Never mind all that -- bring the horse around an' come on up now --"
"I can't! It's okay -- they're not shooting at me!"
"Ellie--"
"Bye! Don't hurt the jeep!" she reminded him as she started to take off-- "Whoa! Not so fast yet, oops... they have to see me again..." She wasn't even going to go as far as where the street curved. She wanted to take a different street this time, so she could circle back around and stay somewhat close to Joel. He might need her help!
She waited a few beats, then pressed Fox to gallop again, figuring if she fucked up the timing, she could take a really big loopy turn at the intersection. As it turned out, she didn't even make it there when the jeep came barreling around that corner--
Don't look back -- they MUST see you -- just go!
A shot rang out as she made her left turn. I fucking hope it came from JOEL's gun! But she also heard return fire, so either way, he was getting shot at -- FUCK!
It's okay... that's what he WANTED... he wouldn't have let them hit him, that would be stupid... and if he thought there was a good chance of that, he never would have--
But there was always a chance. Even if things had a 95% chance of going well, he could still fall in the unfortunate 5% group.
She just had to try not to think about that. "Focus on the task at hand," like Joel had told her.
She slowed the horse to a trot; she would have to wait for the jeep to catch up a little, because this street wound around to the right... man, it would be so easy to ditch them here! So many 'short-sighted' streets!
Okay okay... THINK. To her right was a hotel that had architecture similar to Joel's church -- if she could get up to the second floor... had Joel stalled the jeep enough?
She needed the soldiers to ditch it and pursue her on foot anyway, and she couldn't keep waiting for them to catch up to her at every bend in the road. It would look too suspicious. ...Not that they weren't already suspicious, finding Joel in the church and her racing around on the horse... what if they decided to gang up on Joel and then go find her? Fuck a duck-- why can't things ever just go as planned?! But, okay... the fuckers could also decide to go the other way: just ditch Joel there and all come after ME... how pissed would Joel be if I killed all the soldiers while he killed none?
No, she didn't want it to go down like that... four was a lot to face all at once, without Joel's help. She would have to be smart about it. Hide, wait for them to split up like they always fucking did, and pick her moments.
She hastily hitched Fox to the hotel's signpost, where he'd be in full view from the street. She feared that if she tried to hide him and then make her way up to the second floor balcony, the jeep might zoom right on by without seeing her. She just hoped they had less interest in stealing the horse -- and all her shit! -- than in catching up to her. Although, if she found a good spot to snipe from on the second floor, she supposed it wouldn't matter what they did -- she could take them out, or at least draw their attention. She might even be able to see the church from up there, although she was waaaaaay too far away to make any effective shots, even if she had one of Joel's long-range guns -- which she did not, unfortunately. She would be sniping with a 9-millimeter.
Ellie had no trouble entering through the front door, and man was it beautiful inside -- it reminded her a bit of the fancy hotel they'd cut through in Pittsburgh... only there were more of the fancy bits still intact in this one. The cheerful yellow paint everywhere made the place feel... happy. A sort of happy that pricked painfully at her heart, because she was anything but right now. The walls should be fucking BLACK... especially if the motherfuckers had just... if Joel was...
NO. STOP. It's YOU they really want, she reminded herself. Caleb must've told them it was me, so they'll probably just leave Joel alone and come after me...
There was a staircase conveniently just past the concierge desk. It looked like it had been cut right into the wall -- and if she hadn't been on the verge of freaking out, she might have been amused to note that it too had a curve to it, rather than being a straight shot or having a landing with a sharp turn. No straight passageways in this town! She flew up there as fast as she could, burst into a room on the street-side of the hall --
--and nearly screamed like a girl when she was greeted by a skeletal body on the floor. Eww! She had actually forgotten there might be other people out here besides these four soldiers. (Yes, even though Joel had totally just mentioned that; she could hear him lecturing her in her head already.) Well, obviously this one's been dead a while, no danger here... she stepped over it -- and found that the fucking balcony door wouldn't open.
Next room! Corpse-free. Balcony door wide open. The balcony itself wasn't all that fancy: a wood railing (she'd give it points just for being intact), two matching wood chairs, and a little table. It was a little... what would Joel call it... rickety? Ellie could imagine him frowning at her, telling her to get off the thing before it collapses. It's not THAT bad, Joel! ...It was almost like he was there with her, when she conversed with him in her head. Almost.
Ellie crouched so she could keep an eye on the street through the rungs -- the jeep is here already! Fuck! It parked just beyond the horse -- and there was only the driver! ...Is that good or bad? She decided not to retreat into the hotel... at least, not yet.
She heard two more shots in the distance... and just like that, Joel was no longer almost-with her. She tried not to fret about whether he was on the giving or receiving end of the shots. Obviously the first ones hadn't killed him, then, or there wouldn't have been any more. These two could've both come from his gun... they weren't like, overlapping or anything... -Focus! She watched the soldier approach the entrance. If it's not Caleb, JUST SHOOT HIM. She couldn't tell for sure, with that cap hiding his face, and being a little too far away to--
"Ellie? Is that you up there? ...It is Ellie, right? Or was it Elsie? I'm not too good with names."
She could see it was indeed Caleb when he turned his face toward the balcony. Shit! He was holding a rifle -- a normal-looking one, not an AK-47 or anything -- but not aiming it at her. "Ellie," she informed him. "If I stand up, are you gonna shoot me?"
"No! I just want to talk to you. That's it. ...I promise," he added when she stayed put.
She nearly warned him that she had a gun (two, in fact), in a don't-mess-with-me sort of way... then decided he didn't need to know that. What if he just shot her on the spot to be proactive and protect himself? And he could shoot her where she was; the railing wasn't solid, after all. Plenty of space to sneak a bullet through. Even if he missed, his bullet might just plow right through the wood, for all she knew. "You were shooting at us before," she pointed out... but she tentatively started to rise from her crouch.
"We only wanted to stop you. We didn't hit you, did we?" A rhetorical question.
Ellie didn't think they'd missed on purpose, as the bullets seemed to have come pretty fucking close to them. But... maybe he was telling the truth? "I heard gun shots over there." She nodded in the direction of the church.
"That guy you were with -- he fired at us," Caleb excused that. "Is he your dad?"
It had been a while since anyone had assumed Joel was her father. So long that Ellie had forgotten how annoying it was (and to think -- she used to like it!). She didn't see the point in correcting him, though. She just stared down at him sullenly. Maybe it's a good thing he thinks that... it means Parker probably didn't tell him very much about Joel... and if he's bad with names, maybe he won't even remember Joel's, if he ever knew it to begin with! Maybe it wouldn't matter that much in the end, but she couldn't help feeling like the less they knew about Joel, the safer he would be.
"I'll come up there," said Caleb, already moving toward the entrance. "So we can talk easier."
"No -- I'll come down." She ducked back inside before he could argue with her. Upstairs would have been better if she needed to hide, but she preferred to have huge amounts of open space between them. Plus, she'd certainly learned her lesson about talking to soldiers in bedrooms. ...Even gay ones, though? -Well, sure... he could be bi, right?
When she rounded the 'corner' of the curvy stairs, she found him waiting for her at the base of the staircase... a little too close for comfort. He got in here fast! She paused midway down, wondering if she should she ask him to move into the area with all the tables and chairs, or... fuck, we probably don't have much time... I'm supposed to KILL him, unless I can figure out how NOT to, and Joel will be coming here... of course, Joel still had to find her. He might choose the wrong direction at that intersection -- he had only a one in three shot of getting it right on the first try. Maybe his 'Ellie sense' will guide him here! Or... or he might be...
NO. NO HE'S NOT.
She stood there long enough that Caleb backed up a few steps and lifted his hands as if surrendering to her (and she only just now realized he'd holstered the rifle). "I won't touch you. Promise. Go ahead and lay those weapons down." She was wearing her holster belt, her two guns obviously visible now that he could see all of her.
"No way. They're in their holsters, just like yours."
"Then keep your hands up... away from them. Like I'm doing."
"Yes, sir," Ellie muttered under her breath, low enough to disguise the sarcasm this time. He's not really being a dick, though... and that's not an unreasonable thing to ask. She planted her palms on the walls on either side of her instead. By her estimation, she could whip out one of her guns faster than Caleb could swing that rifle into place -- but now she could see he also had a smaller gun on his hip. How did I not see it before? ...He kept the rifle in front of it maybe?
Despite his request, Ellie got the feeling Caleb wasn't afraid of her; she didn't know if that made her predicament better or worse. Better because maybe he wouldn't see it coming? But worse because it was definitely harder to kill people who weren't being all hostile or aggressive. She really, really did not want to kill this guy. He looked a little different in the light of day. More... real? I didn't notice that mole last night... or how his skin is more like mine than Parker's: sunburned rather than tan...
"Let's sit down and talk this through," he suggested, eyeing the area where she had just imagined them talking. The sun streaming in through those huge windows lit up the room brilliantly.
Really REALLY don't want to... She especially didn't want to kill him over there, for some reason. And didn't want to hang out in front of those windows. Maybe she should have... she could keep an eye out for Joel, or for the other soldiers... but she wanted to keep the option of fleeing to the second floor, which was rife with ambush opportunities should she need them. The lobby was too... open. What she had found appealing a minute ago now seemed like a bad idea. She did, however, descend to the bottom of the stairs, stopping on the last one so she could continue bracing herself between the walls, obligingly keeping her hands a 'safe distance' away from her guns. "I'm good. Why are you guys here?" she demanded.
"I think you know why."
So much for playing dumb! "Okay... let me rephrase that. What do you want?"
"I want to know what happened last night," he replied calmly.
"You were there," she said unhelpfully. And fucking BLAZED... maybe drunk, too?... but yeah...
"I wasn't in that room with you. It's a freaking bloodbath... -You got hurt. He hurt you."
A statement, not a question. I guess my face advertises that... Caleb might assume that her clothes were covering other bruises, but her face was it as far as physical wounds were concerned (and she'd definitely taken harder blows than that before). Still... Joel had taught her to play to her strengths, her advantages... one of which was the 'helpless little girl' façade that could lull her enemies into a false sense of security. Not only that -- maybe she could get Caleb to feel sorry for her. Soften him up, then move in for the kill. He can think I was fighting for my life last night if he wants to!
"Can you just tell me what happened?" His voice was surprisingly gentle.
Does he feel sorry for me already? Oh man... I can't kill a GENTLE person... ugghhh! She sure didn't feel like talking to him, either. She scuffed her shoe on the wooden edge of the step. Stared at her toes... but kept him in her peripheral vision; she didn't completely trust that he wouldn't try something.
"The boys are... really upset about this," Caleb continued. "Sarge grilled me hard before I even knew what... I hadn't even seen it yet. Your... handiwork. I couldn't tell him anything he didn't already know. He already knew why I brought Shell upstairs... whatever you two did after you left my room? No clue. I don't even remember Parker leaving."
It wasn't unusual for them not to say goodbye, according to Parker -- and Parker was supposed to just leave, not sleep there with him. Caleb had stirred when she finally returned to his room to fetch her friend, but since she never got the feeling he was fully awake -- and Parker said neither of them had heard anything unusual -- she believed that Caleb didn't know anything. So... what've they got? A bunch of guys who know there was some random girl upstairs looking to (allegedly) fuck Shelby? -And that was only if Caleb hadn't been discreet at the poker game -- which, it sounded like he hadn't, possibly, if someone else was able to tell their sergeant about her. Still -- only one guy actually saw me in the hallway, just walking... unarmed, as far as they knew... I mean, who says it was even me that killed him? It could've been any of those guys in the barracks. Maybe he pissed someone off. And I'm just a LITTLE GIRL: how could I have killed anyone so brutally?
But it was too late to go that route now. Joel hadn't even suggested it... meaning it probably wouldn't have worked. Because I'm a crap liar? Or because they wouldn't believe it even if I lied as well as he does? ...Or maybe cuz what Shelby said is true: NO ONE CARES. She couldn't keep thinking about him... about last night... have to stay cool here...
"What happened?" Caleb asked again. "He do something to make you mad? I mean... was it not your kink, whatever he wanted to--"
"I didn't fuck him!" she spat out angrily, looking up to glare at him. "I never even wanted to!"
He didn't seem surprised; in fact, he looked... triumphant? Was he just trying to get me to talk? I told him last night I wasn't gonna fuck Shelby, so--
"Okay... alright... so he... what, got too hands-y? All's you gotta do is just kick him in the balls. He would've got the message. You didn't have to kill the guy."
Ellie stared at him. 'Just kick him in the balls'? Really? Unbelievable! "Gee, thanks for the tip," she snarled. "Maybe I would've done that if I--" She stopped herself from giving him the details he was after.
"If you what?"
She ignored the question. If he was just goading her... well, he was pretty good at it, because it was definitely working. I think he actually means it, though... is that what guys expect? A kick in the junk if they go too far? The 'just' in his comment irritated her (seriously... had Caleb never been overpowered by anyone in his life? Yes, Joel, maybe I should've been a boy! Cuz it must be fucking NICE!)... but if she overlooked the ignorant wording, some part of her knew he had a point. Because she had taken it too far. She had injured Shelby, and gotten away from him... she should've left it at that. But what if she hadn't been able to escape, and all she could do was stab the fuck out of him until he died? Was she not supposed to do that? Was she supposed to just lay there and... let it happen, as the motherfucker had put it? He might have even seriously thought she would enjoy it... because sex is supposed to be fun? Did it count as self defense if he wasn't actually trying to kill her?
...Of course it does. FUCK HIM! I was DEFENDing mySELF from pain. That's literally self defense. Joel was glad I killed him...
But that's because he's JOEL. Possibly not the best moral standard to judge one's actions by.
She had only a vague idea of the bullshit story Joel had given Ray. It worried her that he would claim this murder to those dickwads in the jeep (to take the heat off her, if nothing else), and maybe piss them off enough to-- STOP IT, DON'T THINK ABOUT THAT. He's coming... ... ... so where is he?
"You don't wanna talk," Caleb finally concluded as she remained silent. "Okay so listen. If you just come with me, I'll--"
"I'm not going anywhere with you! Do you think I'm an idiot?" ...You would be RIGHT, actually... but I'm not THAT stupid. And something else he'd said earlier was bugging her-- "Oh, and as far as him getting the message -- did he understand English? Because I said no. That should've been enough."
"Okay then, see? You can explain all that. We can work something out."
Ellie stared at him, dumbfounded yet again. "Are you for real right now? I've seen how you guys work things out."
"I didn't mean it like that," he chuckled. (He fucking chuckled!)
"Then how did you mean it?"
He hesitated to answer. "I... don't even know, to be honest. I'm not sure what Sarge had in mind. Our orders were to bring you in for questioning."
She quirked an eyebrow at him. "That's it? And it takes four guys to do that."
"...I guess it takes more than that, seeing how this is going so far."
For some reason, the little smile he gave her there didn't annoy her like the chuckling had. She tried to put herself in his shoes. He's in a really awkward position... maybe he got in trouble too cuz of Parker... like, now they can't pretend that shit's not happening? And for being too shitfaced to know that his buddy was being murdered like three doors down?
But... sympathizing with Caleb's plight didn't change anything. "Dude... I can't go with you. You get that, right? Think about it from my point of view."
He shrugged. "Orders are orders."
...THAT's an automatic reply if I ever heard one! Maybe Caleb wasn't a complete asshole... but everything was black and white for him. For all soldiers, she supposed, as far as doing their jobs. She had thought Caleb might feel bad for her, maybe agree to 'look the other way'... while I steal his jeep?! Okay, no... but he didn't know that was her plan, for fuck's sake! These California soldiers might be more laid-back about some things, like locked gates and visitor schedules (and booze, and pot... and sex?), but regarding orders, there didn't seem to be much wiggle room. "And if I don't come with you?" she challenged.
He gave her a hard look; the smile was gone. "You will come with me, one way or the other. Let's not make it ugly."
Maybe Ellie wouldn't fret so much about killing Caleb after all.
~Continue to Chapter 11~