( gif by ; -tzarrion )

━ CHAPTER EIGHTEEN ...

' look for the light '

( BEFORE )

Somewhere out in the open forest in an unknown place, the only sound heard is two pairs of running footsteps, and grunting from one of the figures.

The woman with brown hair was heavily pregnant, who held the hand of a young girl with (H/C) hair, both hurrying through the forest as distant screams were heard behind them.

"Come on, honey." Anna, the adopted mother of six year old (Y/N) urges the little girl, and tries to fight back the horrible pain contractions, as her focus was on getting her daughter to safety away from the things chasing them.

Little (Y/N) glances up worriedly to her mother, as she kept hearing Anna grunting, and goes to help her way through the forest of trees.

The distance screams get closer to them, and Anna spots an old farm house in front of them, "This way, this way." She leads her daughter through the long, dead grass field quickly, as they were exposed and made it up to the porch of the house.

Anna keeps the young girl behind her, as she hastily pushes the door open, and made sure to lock it behind them when they entered.

"It's us!" Anna goes to call out to the people inside, as (Y/N) clinged to her dress, but they saw no one in the living room, "Anyone?!"

"Mom, I think we should go upstairs-" (Y/N)'s small voice speaks up, her big eyes showing concern for her mother as she groans in pain, and hunches over.

Anna bites down on her bottom lip, nodding her head with heavy breathing, as she wraps an arm around her daughters shoulders for support, "Yeah, come on."

As the (H/C) haired girl helps her adopted mother upstairs slowly, Anna comes to a sudden freeze as she feels wetness down in between her legs, and realised that her water broke.

She curses under her breath, momentarily letting go of 6 year old (Y/N) as she stands on her tippy toes, and grunts as she heaves the door open for them, "We'll be safe in here, Mom."

They made their way inside of the room, making sure to close it shut also as Anna places a chair up to the doorknob, and hoped it would prevent something unwanted coming in.

(Y/N) helps her mother over to the back of the room, the best she could with her smaller arms, as Anna continued to groan and grunt from her second child about to be born.

(Y/N) wasn't dumb, nor was she silly. She knew what her mother was experience as she sits down next to her, and takes her larger hands in hers, reassuring her she was here, "It's okay, Mom, just breathe."

Anna listened to the little girls words, squeezing her hand tightly as she goes to say something, but paused hearing glass shattering downstairs, and infected shirking.

"Get behind me, (Y/N)." The mother was automatically entering protective mode, as she pushes the girl back towards the wall behind her form, and fumbles to grab the switch knife in her coat's pocket.

The sound of fast running feet up the stairs, and pounding on the door has (Y/N) flinching and getting teary eyed with a scared expression, as she wobbles out, "Mom, what is that-"

"It's okay, it won't hurt you while I'm here-" Anna's comforting words were interpreted by her pained groaning, and places a hand over (Y/N)'s on her swelling stomach, as the contractions were getting worse.

Suddenly the banging on the door came to a stop, as the door comes flying open and an infected comes crawling towards the screaming duo, snarling at its new prey.

Anna made sure to push her daughter to the side, as the infected crawled on top of her, and they wrestled each other, as the brown haired woman yelled, straining to keep the infected off of her.

(Y/N)'s teary eyes spotted her mother's knife by her boots, swallowing back any fright she had, and went to shakily grab the weapon. Th six year old wasn't about to lose another mother, and she couldn't sit back and do nothing.

She releases a small yell, blinded by her tears as she starts to stab at the infected on top of her adopted carer, and doesn't stop her attack until the infected drops dead onto the ground beside them.

She breathes heavily, and drops the knife to the ground as she stares with wide eyes seeing what she did. Not even acknowledging her first kill, she furiously wipes the blood away from her hands, and turns back to Anna, and saw her holding the newborn baby.

"Mom, are you alright?!" She frantically questioned in one breath, kneeling down beside her as Anna cries happy tears, and places a hand against her somewhat bloody cheek.

"I should be asking you that, brave girl." Anna gently speaks to her oldest daughter, wiping away the infected blood off her cheek, as she coaxes the baby in her arms to look at (Y/N), "This is your older sister, Ellie. She's gonna take good care of you."

She gently passes the calm baby into (Y/N)'s arms, making sure she was holding her properly as she smiles fondly seeing her two daughters together.

Tears start to fall from Anna's eyes, as she hated the fact that (Y/N) had to kill at such a young age, even if she was protecting her. Quiet cries escaped her even more, knowing she wasn't going to see her pride and joys grow up together into strong woman.

She failed her promise to (Y/N)'s biological mother. And that would haunt her the most.

Baby Ellie's eyes fluttered open, as her fingers somewhat latched onto (Y/N)'s thumb subconsciously, which made her giggle and grin with her teeth, "Hey, baby sis."

Anna presses a quivering kiss against (Y/N)'s forehead, bringing her close to her side as the six year old continued to hold her younger sister, and the mother watched them interact with a loving expression.

Anna wouldn't tell her oldest daughter that her death was on its way, but instead chose to spend what she had left with her two beloved children.

...

Later that same night, crickets chirped outside in the darkness and a small group of people were walking towards the farm house with torches.

One of the male's went to try and open the door, but was met with it being locked, making him turn to Marlene, who was standing beside him.

She gives off a hesitant and suspicious look, as she motioned for the group to follow her around the back of the house.

Once they were around the back, she was the first to open the side door, and carefully entered the room with her torch shining around. The others followed inside right after her, as they all search around the farmhouse.

Marlene noticed the broken window as the glass was scattered all over the floor, and inhaled heavily as she knew something, rather someone was here.

She then heads towards the stairwell, walking up those quietly and made sure to keep her guard up as the sound of muffled singing is heard.

"Anna?" Marlene breathed out in shock, recognising that singing anywhere as she moves up more, and the stairs creaked underneath her.

The singing got louder the closer she got up the stairs, and she spotted one of the doors somewhat open. She pushes it open, and saw Anna with an asleep (Y/N) snoring in her arms while Ellie rested in the younger girls ones.

Anna stops her singing to her girls, as her switchblade was just stabbed a little bit into her neck to stop her from snapping to the disease, and exhales heavily.

"Oh god." Marlene whispered in slight horror finally noticing the bite mark on Anna's thigh, as she shined her torch on it.

"It's not your fault." Anna tells her through her dizzy state, face pale and sweaty as she brushes some of (Y/N)'s messy hair out of her sleeping face.

"We were delayed getting out of the zone. I'm-" Marlene tried to explain to the infected mother, but she interrupted.

"My girls are hungry." Anna spoke over her friends words, swallowing harshly, and went to shuffle the children in her arms, "They need some food, and I..." She trails off and motioned to Ellie with her head, "I didn't wanna nurse her."

Marlene gets a bit closer to the woman, a heavy upset frown on her face knowing what was going to happen to Anna, and her eyes landed on the sleeping six year old with the baby.

"I want you to..take them with you to Boston.." Anna starts to plead her demand, as she gently coaxes the six year old back to sleep hearing her noise of complaint getting move around, "find someone to bring them up, and make sure that they are safe."

"I can't do that-"

"And I want you to give them this." Anna once again talks over her friend, and clips her switch knife onto (Y/N)'s pants with a breaking heart, knowing she was about to let her precious daughters go forever.

"I can't-" Marlene breathes out weakly, shaking her head with tight lips, and gripped her torch more tighter.

"How long have we know each other?" Anna feebly questioned with laboured breathing, as she sniffles with tears wetting her eyelashes, "How long have we known (M/N) for? You, we made a promise to her, remember?"

Marlene closes her eyes shut for a second, trying her hardest to not let her emotions spill knowing Anna was speaking the truth, and nods her head shakily, "Our whole lives."

Anna nods back in agreement, as she tries to lean forward with her sleeping daughters in her hands, "So you pick them up right now.. keep your promise to protect (Y/N) for (M/N), and then you kill me." Her voice wavers out, and then starts to grunt as the cordyceps was affecting her more.

Marlene quickly bends down to the young childern, picking up (Y/N) by under the armpits, as the sleeping girl rested on her hip, and Marlene had Ellie in her other arm, cradling them both.

Anna watches this happening with glassy eyes, tears now falling down like waves against her cheeks as she singularly nods at her friend. Her lips tremble with emotion, as she wished to say a proper goodbye to her children, but didn't want them to see nor hear what was about to happen.

"I can't kill you." Marlene whispers dejectedly, as she backed away with the kids in her arms, and tried to ignore Anna's begs, and cries for her.

She made it outside of the room, and her shoulders slump with guilt knowing she shouldn't leave her friend like this, "Here, hold her." She gently passed over baby Ellie to one the male's in her group, while she kept the sleeping (Y/N) in her arms.

She inhaled shakily, adjusting the six year old in her arms so her head was tucked in her neck, her legs were around her waist, and arms around her shoulders.

She pressed a hand onto the child's ear that was sticking out, and walked back into the room with her gun, not hesitating as the gunshot goes off, meaning Anna Williams was now gone.

(Y/N) stirs in the adults arms at the loud noise, as her eyes went to flutter open a little, "Mom? Where's-" She questioned in a sleepy voice, going to look around, but Marlene shushing her, and pushing her head back down gently makes her stop.

"It's okay, sweetheart. She's in a better place now with (M/N)." Marlene tearily whispered to the half awake child, as she clings onto the adult more, and walks out away from the dead body behind them to the crying Ellie.

They left behind the very woman who risked everything for her unborn baby, who was now born and (Y/N), even if she wasn't biological her daughter. She protected them both to her last breath.

The sisters grew up without knowing how truly, how much their mothers loved them.

...

( PRESENT )

(Y/N)'s eyes were closed shut as she was lost in her thoughts, and thinking about everything that recently happened. Beside her on the back of a truck, Ellie was holding her hand and stared worriedly, as her older sister hasn't said much since leaving the cold environment.

The familiar figure of Joel comes around the truck's front, as he calls her name to gain her attention, but all she could hear was muffle, and no sound expect the breeze brushing up against her cold cheeks.

"Hey, (Y/N/N)." Ellie gently judges her sisters arm, causing the older girl to flinch out of her trance, and blink rapidly as she stares down at her with big eyes, "Joel's calling you."

"(Y/N)! D'ya hear me?" Joel's voice was now clear to the girl, as he stands a bit behind them and she turns her head to look back at him.

"No...what?" She admits sheepishly with a head shake, and fiddles with her pants loose threads on her thighs.

"Well, I found this in there." He announced as he held up a can of food, and pointed at something behind him, "Beefaroni. Chef Boyardee."

She sighs a little bit at his attempt of small talk, and nods her head, "Oh, cool."

His smile fades at her half hearted response, and goes to walk up to where they were sitting, "And have you ever played this? Boggle? It's a word game." He shows them the game box, as Ellie leans over (Y/N)'s shoulder to see it.

The (H/C) haired girl hums at his words, rubbing up and down her sleeved arms as a distant looks comes across her face again.

Joel defleats watching this, sighing to himself a little bit and glances to the side, "Well, all right then. We're gettin' close. Hospital that way." He motioned to behind their backs, "May be the one we're lookin' for."

"Go it." Ellie chirps her agreement, as he goes to walk back towards his bag, and the sisters both hoped down from the truck, grabbing their backpacks also as they met him in the middle.

"Take this for me?" Joel asked the older girl, as he slid off his sniper from his shoulders, and she grabbed it while he placed his backpack on, "Thanks." He mutters quietly as he takes the weapon back from her, and they go to walk straight on ahead.

He looks at the campervan beside him, as he remembers what he found inside, and hopes this would somewhat make (Y/N) brighten up, "They had a guitar in the RV. It was all smashed up but got me thinkin', maybe I should find one. I haven't played in forever." He moves his brown eyes on her walking next to him, "In fact, I was thinkin' maybe I could teach you two. I bet you'd be great at it."

A slight chuckle escaped past her lips, as she had a feeling he was asking this for a reason, and knew he was trying to help her feel better after what she just went through.

"Do you wanna learn how to play guitar?" He questioned a bit timidly as he looks at her hopefully, and once again was meet with silence from (Y/N), making his heart clench in guilt, "(Y/N)?"

She hums at his name calling, glancing up from the floor with her (E/C) doe eyes, and nods her head in approval, "Oh, yeah." She swallows hard, and spots Ellie's wide grin at the idea of learning guitar, "That'd be great."

Joel simply nods his head at her short answer, giving a small lopsided smile as they all continued to walk up to their next destination along the broken, destroyed road.

...

Birds were chirping above in the blue skies, as the trio were now walking inside an quiet, abandoned town filled with buildings and vehicles in most back alleys.

Joel lead the sisters through the area like always, as they follow hand in hand behind him quietly. The male slows down a little, and walked beside them so he could talk about a plan.

"Okay, so this is what I'm thinkin'-"

"Cut through that building to get around that stuff, find the skyscraper, go up and look around." (Y/N) finished over him knowingly, and casually as their shoulders bumped together while walking.

"Uhh, actually," Joel starts off with his correction, speaking serious even though he wasn't, "this time I was thinkin' we blast our way through that rubble." He tilts his head back to the vehicle behind them, "I found some dynamit in that RV back there."

She scrunched her nose up at him, knowing damn well that wasn't true as Ellie fell for the joke, and questioned with surprise, "Really?"

He doesn't say anything for a second, before bashfully looking to the direction they needed to go, "No, so we're gonna cut through that building, find a skyscraper, go up and look around. But I had you goin', didn't I?" He somewhat teases them.

Ellie grumbled at the male with an eye roll, while (Y/N) cracked an small amused smile, but it didn't reach her eyes like normal, and followed him around the broken car towards the red covered material building.

...

When they entered the new open building, the sound of water dripping somewhere inside was heard as they walk around inside.

"Look at this place. Talk about back luck." Joel comments as he held the sniper in his hands, "Military drops bombs...not one of them hits the building you're trying to demolish."

They walk towards the area where they thought was a way up, and found it to be blocked by rumble, "No way up." He stated as he glances around, and spotted the fence around a blocked off section. He goes to open the fence, and motioned for the sisters to following him in.

Joel walks around the section, hoping to find a way out of here, and saw a higher platform with a ladder sticking out, "I get you both up there, you can drop that ladder down, maybe we can go through that way. Come on, I'll give you a boost."

He turned back around, saw Ellie waiting next to him patiently, and noticed (Y/N) was back at the table, looking at something on it.

A heavy frown makes it way across his features, as he trails back to her side, and stands a bit behind her to make her comfortable, "You okay?"

She snaps her head to him hearing his voice, and blinks rapidly with an astray look, "Yeah, m'fine."

"It's just you kinda seem extra quiet today, so..." He talks to her carefully, not wanting to upset her even more as he concerned glaze was trained on her.

Her shoulders slumped at his words, not realising he was this affected by her silence, and shuffled in her spot, "Oh...m'sorry."

His eyebrows slant up as he quickly shakes his head, chest squeezing painfully hearing her ashamed tone, "No, it's fine." He assures gently, wanting to reach out and hold her hand, but choose not to right now, "Did you hear what I-"

"Yeah, boost. Go it." She stutters out fast, placing the piece of paper back on the table, as she rubs her nervous sweat on her pants and follows Joel towards the way out.

Joel goes to stand up on the crates under the higher platform, helping up Ellie first as she pulled herself up with a grunt, and wanted for (Y/N) to come up next.

She climbs up onto the crates where Joel was, exhaling heavily to herself as all these emotions she was going through where tiring her out.

He gently places his bigger hands on her waist, as he coaxes her right under the opening, and his thumbs subconsciously started to rub against her skin where his hands were placed.

She tries to ignore the overwhelming butterflies in her stomach, as she taps his hands on her hips, and he takes this as a go. He helps her up to the higher place, and she grabs Ellie's outstretched hand, grunting when she pulled her the rest of the way.

Joel waits for the sisters to grab the ladder and slide it down, and they do so quietly, but Ellie suddenly dropped the ladder down, causing (Y/N) to freak out as she went sprinting off finding something.

"Ellie!" She exclaimed in panic watching this happen, automatically getting up to chase after her, and ignored Joel's yells for them to wait, as he made his way up the ladder.

(Y/N) chased after her sister throughout the building, running up the stairs and turned around corners, as Joel continued to yell for them to wait, also right behind the running pair.

The male comes to a slow pause in his quick movements, as he spotted the sisters outside in a little opening filled with greenery, staring at a majestic giraffe that was eating the leaves off the trees.

He releases a surprised breath seeing this, taking slow steps towards the siblings, as he takes his sniper off from around his back.

"Don't scare it." (Y/N) warns softly with big eyes at the male, her standing in the middle between them all.

"I won't." He reassures her in the same tone, standing up from his squat position, and goes to pull off some leaves from the brunches for them to feed the animal, "Come here, hurry." He hands them pieces of leaves, as they take it gratefully.

The (H/C) haired girl was the first to walk forward to the giraffe, as she held her hand out with the leaves, and the animal grabbed it with her blue tongue, munching on it peacefully.

The giraffe comes back to her, grunting as her head gently bumps into (Y/N)'s stomach, which caused her to crack a genuine smile, "Hey there, girl." Her chuckle was real also, and feed her the leaves as the animals tongue sticks out weirdly to take it.

She looks back to Ellie, motioning her to join as she does with a bright grin, and stands beside her older sister while she fed the giraffe, giggles escaping their mouths doing so.

Joel watched the scene with a soft smile, heart bursting with adoration as he was able to make (Y/N) happy. Even if it was just this single moment, he would forever keep that smile she wore in engraved inside his memories.

The giraffe eating from the siblings hands turns away suddenly, and went to walk off towards the opposite direction, "Aw, where's she going?" Ellie whined with a pout.

"Come on, come on!" She urges excitedly, and tugs on her older sisters hand, as she drags the poor girl through the building again, leaving Joel to sigh and follow straight away after.

They make it to outside as the sunlight hits their faces, making them squint a little bit. Ellie continued to pull her sister with her to the edge of the small cement wall, and watched many more giraffes in the grass fields vocalising with each other.

Joel makes his way down towards them, and stands beside (Y/N) with barely any gap between their shoulders, much different to when they first met, "So..is it everything ya hoped for?"

Her lips twitch up at his words, quickly glancing at her sister who was now a bit down away from them, preoccupied by the giraffes, "It's got its ups and downs..but you can't deny that view." She quoted Ellie's word from right at the beginning.

He tilts his head to her, an amused chuckle escaping him as that was music to her ears, and continued to stare at the side of her face. However, a forlorn expression took over him, "Look, I don't know where this hospital is-"

"Yeah, we'll find it." She assures with a steady voice, keeping her gaze locked in front of her as this talk was one she didn't want to have.

"Sure. It's just-" He trails off with a face scrunch, and looked out to the open space in front, "Maybe there's nothin' bad out there, but so far there's always been somethin' bad out there."

(Y/N) sucks air between her teeth, nuding her head to the side with a small smile as she now faces the male, "We're still here, though."

"I know." Joel agrees gently, nodding his head tightly with a lick to his lips, "I'm only sayin' there's risk." He moves up from his leaning position, and gets closer to her side, "We don't have to do this. I just want you to know that."

She turns to him fully as well, giving him a confused and slight incredulous stare, "What do you mean? What else are we supposed to do?"

"Nothin'. We just go back to Tommy's. We forget about the whole damn thing." He offers with a strong expression, placing a hand next to hers on the cement wall, as he knew this was her decision, and hers alone, no matter how much he wanted what he said to happen.

She pursues her lips in thought as she grazed her hand against his on the cerment, causing him to intertwine their fingers together gently as she talks, "After all we've been through...everything I've done..." She trails off with a glum and purposeful tone, "It can't be for nothing."

He listened to her every word closely, sometimes squeezing her hand that was in his, as his thumb rubs over her knuckles soothingly.

"I know you mean well. I know you wanna protect me, and Ellie. You have." She smiled softly in gratefulness at him, taking a small step forward so their was only a small gap between their chests, "And when we're done, we'll go wherever you want. Tommy's, sheep ranch, the moon."

Joel released another chuckle at her last mention, gazing down at her with warm brown eyes, as he momentarily looked away for a second with an amused head shake.

(Y/N) utterly surprised him when she went to reach out with her free hand, and gently cupped his cheek which made him turn back to her, "I'll follow you anywhere you go." She confesses with a loving smile, it growing feeling his facial hair tickling her skin, and strokes her thumb against his face.

"But there's no halfway this this, Joel." Her face now changes into a serious one, as her hold on him didn't move, wanting her message to get across to him clearly, "We finish what we started."

He takes in her serious face, and words as he nods against her palm firmly, understanding this what she wanted even if it did somewhat make his heart ache.

She gives a firm nod back, rubbing her thumb over his cheek once more before removing the hand, and squeezed the other one intertwined with his, before letting that go as well.

Their hands slipped from each others slowly, as she went to turn away and up to Ellie, who was waiting for her older sister near the stairs to the exit.

Joel watched her figure leave him with Ellie, as he grips his shirt a little bit near his fast beating heart. He wasn't a stupid man, he knew what this emotion he was feeling for (Y/N) was.

He couldn't deny it any longer, no matter how hard he tried to.

( gif by ;
sporadicstarsx )

AUTHORS NOTE;; listening to mitski made me get into my feels with this help ebcjcbjwc. i won't lie but this section of the story is coming close to an end and im so sad about that☹️☹️☹️

despite that, i hope you guys continue to support me with this cause i genuinely appreciate it so much. thank you guys i love you sm <333

side note; if anyone likes jack champion and him in scream vi, i've posted a new fic about him on my page. check it out if you want to :) until the next update! mwah 🫶