003. she's important, remember that

Ellie and Aurora are huddled by the door, their breathing heavy as they listen to the gunshots happening on the other side. Marlene is yelling at somebody, and there is another person voicing their opinion just as loudly. This must have been the person who the woman was going to speak with, to help her with something so they could get Ellie to the other Fireflies.

"Should we do something?" Ellie's voice is quiet, her gaze shifting to the older girl who shakes her head in response. The last thing Marlene would want is for Ellie to stumble out there and get herself killed before this big 'mission' they're going on. "What if she's dead?"

"I don't know," Aurora replies, pressing her ear to the door as she tries to listen in on what's happening. It's gone rather silent on the other end, no more voices or gunshots. Simple silence. "They're not fighting anymore,"

"Okay, so we should go out and see what's happening,"

Though she's rather hesitant, Aurora finds herself agreeing. If Marlene is dead out there, they need a new plan. She can't exactly say she'd be the best person for Ellie to travel with, but she isn't going to leave a kid here by herself. Aurora has been through that herself, she wouldn't wish it on anybody.

Aurora's hand closes around the doorknob and begins to twist when gentle footsteps can be heard from outside. She freezes in her place, not wanting to alert the person outside of their presence. If it's Marlene, great, if it's not they may be in trouble. Aurora doesn't have a weapon, Ellie only has a small pocket knife, they don't stand much of a chance.

It seems that the teenager doesn't agree with her, gently pushing Aurora out of the way and opening the door. Aurora watches as she lunges out. "Ellie!"

The girl is practically thrown into the wall outside, Aurora rushing out in order to check that she's okay. The man who's thrown Ellie grabs hold of Aurora and attempts to restrain her, the girl fighting against his grip as much as she can. "Get off me, motherfucker!"

Aurora manages to throw her leg back and kicks his shin, leaning down and picking up Ellie's discarded knife so she can defend them. Only, when she finally turns around to face him, the weapon falls from her grasp and clatters against the floor. "Uncle Joel?"

The man's eyes light up in recognition, the gun he'd previously been aiming at her now lowered. "Rory?"

Aurora can't even bring herself to move, almost as if she's frozen from the shock of seeing her uncle once again. It's been years, so so long, since Joel had been in her life — her own fault. He doesn't look any different since the last time she had seen him, a little older perhaps, but all in all it's the same Joel Miller.

Her lip is trembling at an alarmingly fast rate, her eyes filled to the brim with tears as she finally accomplishes the thing she's wanted to do for years — find her family.

Joel is the one who moves towards her, his gun back in his holster, putting his hands on either side of her face and surveying her in almost disbelief. His eyes are searching, looking for any sort of injury or imperfection. When he doesn't find any, Aurora finds herself in a rather desperate and familiar embrace that she's been missing for such a long time. Her head rests against his chest, his heartbeat echoing in her ears and providing a comfort that she can't even explain — it's almost as if they hadn't been apart.

"Joel?"

The sound of Marlene's voice seems to alert the man, who keeps one arm wrapped around his niece whilst aiming the gun in the woman's direction. Joel has also made sure to keep his foot on the knife that both Ellie and Aurora had been holding at one stage, stopping the teenage girl from being able to grab onto it and attack again.

"So this is who Robert screwed us over with? The Che Guevara of Boston? I mean, war must be going pretty shitty for you to be buying from scumbags like him,"

The sound of the familiar female voice causes Aurora's heart to flutter, a happiness surging through her. Tess is here, Joel had managed to keep her around even after all this time.

"Tess," Aurora breathes, finally pulling away from her uncle, smiling at the blonde haired woman.

"Hey Rory," Tess greets softly, the smallest of smiles pulling at her lips as her face portrays the deep fondness she has for the girl.

"It is," Marlene is responding to Tess' previous comments, interrupting the reunions. Her hand is pressing against the gunshot wound in her abdomen, keeping pressure on it as blood begins to coat the skin of her hand. "The merch was bad and he obviously didn't take fuck off for an answer,"

"Give me my knife,"

It's the first time Aurora has turned her attention back to Ellie, almost is if she'd forgotten she was even here. Her Uncle completely disregards the teenager, his eyes firmly situated on Marlene in case she tries anything. "What do you need a car battery for?"

Ellie, thinking that everybody else is distracted by what's happening, makes a move to once again grab her knife. Except Joel seems to possess miraculous instincts, his gun pointed back at her within seconds. "Don't,"

"Uncle Joel, she's harmless. Point the gun at the ones who could actually kill you," Aurora mutters under her breath, the man flicking his gaze to his niece before aiming the gun at Marlene.

It's a rather scary sight for her, the man who had raised her seemingly willing to shoot at a kid. Aurora knows there's a certain part of him that probably thinks of Sarah every time he sees somebody Ellie's age, and for that reason she believes he never would truly put a bullet in somebody that young. She had apparently been there to witness the death of her cousin, although she was so little that the memory is practically non-existent, but her Uncle Tommy has told her the story.

Aurora wishes she could remember Sarah.

"I need it for a better reason than you. No offense but Tommy's just one man," Marlene states to Joel, taking in the someone stunned look on his face. "It's our business to know things,"

"What's wrong with Uncle Tommy? Isn't he with you?" Aurora questions Joel, who's face twitches in what she assumes is discomfort. If he'd needed a car battery, that at least means he's not dead. However, she easily comes to the conclusion that there is something further to the story. "I thought you two would've made up by now,"

"Not quite," Joel responds shortly, eyes narrowed at the Firefly across from him. "Marlene, you turned him against me. You're the cause of all of it,"

"Okay Joel," Marlene isn't convincing with her answer, obviously thinking differently to the man.

The other woman standing with Marlene, who Aurora hadn't really taken much notice of previously, finally pipes up. "That was a lot of gunfire. FEDRA's gonna be on the way,"

The idea of getting caught here with a bunch of Fireflies makes Aurora flinch, it won't end well for any of them if that's the case. Most of the group are shot on sight, and the last thing Aurora wants is to die when she's only just found her family.

"We're going to move Ellie out of the zone tonight," Marlene begins, eyes flicking between Joel and Tess. "But we won't make it anywhere like this. Not for a while anyway. So now I'm thinking you're gonna do it,"

"The hell we are,"

"I'm not going with them!"

The two responses come from clearly an unhappy Joel and Ellie, neither of them fond of the idea. Aurora, however, is a little more accepting of the proposal. Marlene was going to take her with her anyway, at least now she gets to go with Joel and Tess instead of the Fireflies. It'll be a lot less of an uncomfortable and anxiety inducing trip because she knows she'll actually be able to trust them — unlike Marlene who she doesn't know from the next person.

"Let me take her," the other woman speaks, sensing that this may be a bad idea.

Joel turns his attention to Tess who has mostly stood back and watched the altercation unfold. "Tess, we don't have time for this,"

"Oh, you don't have time?" Marlene sneers.

"Who is she?" Tess asks.

"To you, she's cargo,"

Aurora moves away from Joel and crouches down beside Ellie, the girl still leaning against the wall and rubbing at her shoulder. "You okay?"

"Besides the fact that Marlene is trying to offload me to some fucking stranger, I'm fine," Ellie replies, glaring at the man who is still standing on her only weapon.

"We don't smuggle people. Sorry," Joel's response is short and tense.

"I can do it," it's the woman again, clearly ready to take this mission on.

"Kim, you don't have a fucking ear on your fucking head, could you please?"

Aurora hadn't realised Kim's ear was missing upon first glance, but now it's hard not to see it. It must've hurt, she's surprised the woman isn't showing clear discomfort. Then again, adrenaline does amazing things to people — it'll more than likely ache astronomically later on.

"There's a team of Fireflies waiting for her at the old state house," Marlene begins and when Joel scoffs, she continues. "We were going with an entire squadron because of what is out there, but I know what you two are capable of. If anyone can take this on, it's you,"

"What are they capable of?"

Poor Ellie is ignored once again.

"And as an act of good faith, I'll let you take your niece without any strings attached,"

"Let me? She wasn't staying here. You lot would likely get her killed," Joel hisses between clenched teeth.

"You get Ellie there safely and you'll be given everything you need, not just the battery. Fuel, guns, supplies — all of it," Marlene proposes, now seemingly desperate.

The two adults, those being Tess and Joel, look at each other for a few moments before the woman gestures him over with a nod of her head. Joel moves towards her, sending Ellie's knife to the other end of the hall with a flick of his foot.

"Asshole!" Ellie calls.

Whilst Tess and Joel discuss whether to take the deal, Aurora turns her attention back to Ellie. "You're going to be fine. My Uncle is one of the best when it comes to runs like these,"

"Your uncle is an asshole,"

"I think a few people might share that opinion with you but he'll keep you safe,"

"You going to come too?"

Aurora nods her head, assuring the girl she won't have to go with two complete strangers on her lonesome. "Of course,"

"Okay, here's the deal. We'll get her to your crew at the State House but before then, we get everything that we want. If not, we kill her," Tess walks to Marlene and proposes her offer.

"Deal," Marlene responds quickly.

"Really?" Ellie sounds as if she's in total disbelief. "That fast?"

"You're all that matters. My team will not jeopardise that. Remember what I told you? Now go get your backpack,"

Ellie huffs and pushes herself upwards, stomping into the room the two of them had been previously. Aurora also gets back to her feet, turning when Marlene calls out her name. "You remember what I said to you? She's important, okay?"

Aurora gives a short nod, diverting her gaze when she feels Tess and Joel looking at her curiously. Ellie rejoins them moments later, her bag on her back as she looks at Joel and Tess with distaste.

"Don't fuck this up Joel," Marlene calls as the small group begins to move.

The QZ is just how Aurora remembers it, dreary and rather ugly. However, it's home and she's happy to be back. Joel sticks the key in the door as lightning flashes around them, thunder ricocheting through her ears. When it opens up, she's hit with a bunch of memories all at once, a smile gracing her face.

Ellie and Aurora both walk in, and when the door shuts behind them Ellie doesn't take to kindly to it. "What the fuck!"

With an annoyed sigh, Ellie begins to search around the room curiously. She finds a rather thick book, one that looks like a phone book of some sort, and begins to read through it. Aurora can only imagine how much her uncle is going to dislike Ellie going through his things, but the brunette can't bring herself to stop the teen — she's just curious.

"So, who's Bill and Frank?" Ellie questions Joel the moment he steps back into the room. Those are two names that Aurora hasn't heard in a long time. "The radio is a smuggling code, right? Sixties song, they don't have anything new. Seventies, they do. What does eighties mean?"

Joel snatches the book out of Ellie's hands, turning to look at his niece. "You let her go through my stuff?"

"She was just looking," Aurora defends, holding her hands up.

Joel sighs and throws the book back on the table, plopping down on the lounge and laying down. When his eyes close, Ellie begins to question him again. "What are you doing?"

"Killing time," Joel responds.

"What am I supposed to do?"

"I'm sure you'll figure that out,"

Aurora rolls her eyes and grabs the book off the table again, handing to Ellie. There isn't much else to do in here, so even if they don't know what the codes mean, Ellie can read through the things in it. Aurora, on the other hand, settles for watching the rain splash against the glass window.

"Your watch his broken," Ellie says to Joel, walking over to sit beside Aurora.

The watch hadn't left his wrist for the entirety of Aurora's life in the apocalypse, even though it was broken. She'd questioned him numerous times and never got a concise response, the man happy to deflect the question and change the topic. She assumes it's something of importance for him.

There's also another accessory that she had always seen him wearing. A bracelet that was seemingly hand woven, small pictures intertwined within the brown material of the band. A giraffe, a few stars and a car. It's a beautiful piece of jewelry, but it's begun to fray a little around the edges.

Even now, that same bracelet can be seen below his watch.

A few hours pass, the two girls happy to sit in silence for quite some time until Ellie decides making conversation may help the time go faster. "So, you two are family?"

Aurora removes her eyes from the rain, giving the girl her full attention. She nods her head slightly, her Uncle's mumbles filling the air around them.

"You don't live with him? I mean, it looked as if you hadn't seen each other in ages," Ellie adds on, curiosity evident on her face.

"I did, but I did something stupid a few years ago and left the QZ. I'd been trying to find my way back ever since but it's been pretty hard," Aurora admits, shuddering at the things she's seen during her time out there.

"Why'd you leave?"

The question causes Aurora to bite her lip softly, the memories of that day flooding back to her at lightning speed. The argument, the crying, the stupidity — it hadn't even been something worth fleeing over yet she didn't believe that when she was so young. "Stupidity,"

Ellie looks a little surprised by her response but nods her head nonetheless. The two of them turn to Joel when he begins to stir, the man opening his eyes up to look at them. "You mumble in your sleep," Ellie tells him.

Joel doesn't give any indication that he heard her, even though he most certainly did. Instead, he simply sits up and looks at them.

"I've never been on the other side of the Wall. Look how dark it is. You guys go out there a lot?" Ellie asks Joel, eyes wide in wonder.

"I guess,"

"When was the last time?"

"Maybe a year. What's it matter?"

"But you know where to go. So we're gonna be okay,"

She sounds so vulnerable, afraid. Aurora reaches over and gives her shoulder a comforting squeeze, an action that catches the girl by surprise and causes her to flinch slightly.

"Yeah," Joel responds.

Looking to change the subject, Joel then speaks again. "So, what's the deal with you anyway? You some kinda bigwig's daughter or somethin'?"

No just a possible miracle cure to the whole infected problem, no big deal.

Aurora is glad he hadn't directed the question towards her, she's never been a very good liar. Tommy had told her she'd gotten that from her mother.

"Something like that," Ellie answer him. "Oh, the radio came on when you were sleeping,"

"What? What was the song?"

The radio had not come on at all, and yet Aurora thinks she knows where this is going. Ellie is trying to wind him up, crack his code.

"He kept saying something like "Wake me up before you go-go,"

"Shit,"

"Gotcha. Eighties means trouble. Code broken,"

Aurora is ready to intervene in case Joel decides to yell at the girl, but the door opens and Tess walks in. She's incredibly glad to see the woman. "The spot under Lancaster looks good. You got a jacket in your pack?"

"Yeah," Ellie replies.

"Okay, get it. It's time to go,"

Tess passes a spare jacket to Aurora, who clearly doesn't have one on her. A gun is also slid in her direction, the brunette sliding it into the worn out holster she'd found when on the run.

The group travel through the sewers, which Aurora would like to say is pretty gross. As expected, it's incredibly dirty and whilst her clothes aren't exactly in the best shape, this is seemingly making it even worse. However, it's the only way for them to sneak out undetected, so Aurora tries her hardest to block it all out — even as her shoes sludge in the incredibly filthy water beneath her.

"Observe mandatory curfew to fight the infection and insurrection,"

The sound of the curfew message blasts over the speakers, something she'd heard throughout her entire childhood. Being caught out here is almost certain death, especially after curfew. They don't care who you are.

Aurora watches as Ellie moves out into the open arena with wide eyes and an amazed smile on her face. "Holy shit. I'm actually outside,"

It's rather odd to watch her, knowing from first hand experience that being out here is anything but nice. The outside is simply a cesspool of death, destruction and infection — not necessarily in that order. It must be pretty cool for Ellie though, admittedly Aurora had been amazed her first time out here too. It's a childlike mentality, one that has quickly left Aurora once she was forced to face her first infected.

The flood light, which had previously been pointed elsewhere, moves towards them and the group duck behind one of the cars to stay out of its sight.

"Okay, we're gonna take the left edge around the buffer zone," Tess instructs. "You stay close and you follow my lead,"

Tess crawls beneath one of the buses, her hands and knees sinking into the thick mud as she moves with Ellie following closely behind. Joel gestures for his niece to go next, keeping an eye on what's happening behind them just in case somebody sneaks up.

They then move on to crouching behind some large rocks, moving quickly but as quietly as they can. Tess leads them through what Aurora believes must have once been a pipe, the group coming out the other side to a seemingly abandoned area — in comparison to where they'd just been anyway.

A small sigh escapes Aurora's lip, the palm of her hand itching where the cut from earlier is. She's thankful that Marlene had somebody patch it up, because she'd be facing all sorts of infection out here.

"What the hell?"

Aurora stops in her tracks, knowing that they must have been spotted when she was off in her own world.

"Hey, hey! Don't, don't, don't move," The man speaks as he zips up his trousers. He wears a FEDRA uniform, a gun in his hands and his eyes firmly on them. "Don't move!"

His moves his flashlight and surveys their faces as the small group gets up and holds their hands up in surrender, Joel making sure to stand in front of Aurora as best he can.
"You gotta be shittin' me," the soldier says when he takes in Joel's appearance.

So, evidently, he knows Joel.

"Okay, let's talk this out," Joel speaks quietly, still keeping his hands up in surrender. He doesn't want to provoke this man, one shout and FEDRA soldiers would surround them and likely shoot them on sight.

"Turn around," the soldier says. "Get on your fucking knees!"

Aurora doesn't argue, falling to the ground on her knees as her Uncle follows suit. Ellie kneels down on the ground beside her, anxiously playing with her hands behind her head as the soldier approaches with a piece of equipment. Shit.

Ellie is going to show up as infected — he's going to shoot her.

The scanner zaps as Joel continues to try and bargain with the soldier, to no avail it seems. "Unauthorized exit, they'll hang you for that,"

A shuddered breath leaves Aurora's lips, the idea of feeling the rope rubbing the skin of her neck frightening. Whilst she seems to be thinking of the after effects of their capture, Ellie is living in the moment as she turns around and slashes at his leg with her knife. He yells out in pain, stumbling away from the two girls before hoisting his gun up once again and aiming at an aggravated Ellie.

Aurora is quick to get to her feet, placing herself between the man and the younger girl. Tess and Joel then position themselves in front of the younger two.

"Fuckin' bitch! Get out of the fuckin' way!" The man yells at Joel.

"We can fix this," Joel speaks.

"Move,"

Seemingly realizing that he won't be able to talk this soldier down, Joel lunges at him with a yell and tackles him to the ground. Aurora cringes at the sound of his first pounding against the man's face, the quiet cracks indicating several broken bones. The soldier's blood is beginning to coat Joel's skin and splatter against the ground around them.

Ellie and Aurora are both watching him, two different reactions on display — Aurora's being one of fear and Ellie's one of, well Aurora doesn't know how to explain it. It's almost as if she's enjoying it, enjoying the fact that Joel is beating this man up for her.

Behind them, Tess' eyes seem to have caught the equipment from before, the thing lit up red. "Aurora! Get away from her,"

Aurora spins to face Tess, eyes widening when she realises what's happened. Ellie, who had heard Tess' calls as well, has now also seen the situation. "No, no! No, I'm not sick!"

"Joel! Joel, Joel!"

"I am not sick! I'm not sick!"

Aurora steps in between Ellie and Tess, wanting to protect the younger girl from a fate that she definitely doesn't deserve. Ellie rolls her sleeve up and shows it off to Tess. "Look! Look! This is three weeks old,"

"Nobody lasts more than a day!"

"Does this look a day old to you? You would've killed me!"

"I should fucking kill you! Did you know about this?"

Aurora nods her head slowly when Tess directs the question at her. "Fuck. When did it happen?"

"It doesn't matter! You have to trust me! They're gonna catch us if we don't run!"

Tess considers her words for a few moments as more soldiers seem to be closing in on them. Then she finally says something. "Joel, we gotta move. We gotta move, Joel!"

Tess lightly pushes Aurora forward, the brunette dragging Ellie along with her gently as they move further away from the safety of the QZ and into the danger of the unknown. 

NOTE!

Episode one is finally done! Can't wait to move onto episode two. Hope you enjoyed!