a/n~ some big ellie moments are taken from her and given to josie because at the end of the day this is a joel and josie story and i need pookie to have some major bonding moments with our girl hehehe. ellie is obviously still a major / critical part to the story, but i need to insert josie into the bigger moments too.
hoping to wrap up episode 4 next chapter!

ALSO 30K READS!!! WHAT!!! THANK YOU ALL ♥️♥️♥️

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     AFTER THE CRASH, JOEL IS THANKFUL that he doesn't lose consciousness. But for a few seconds, he's disoriented as he looks around and doesn't remember anything. Then like a tidal wave, it all comes crashing back. Driving with Josie and Ellie, getting ambushed, and being forced to crash.

Fuck.

In a panic, he undoes his seatbelt as fast as he can. There's a small sense of relief when he sees Ellie already getting out of the truck. No obvious signs of any major trauma.

But all of that goes away and there's a new feeling of complete panic, when he realizes that he and Ellie never lost consciousness, but Josie did.

"No no no," Joel gets out of the truck and runs to the other side. He opens the passenger door, catching Josie as she'd been leaning against it. "Ellie you gotta help me quick, undo her seatbelt."

Ellie reaches over from the drivers side and presses the button that unbuckles the seatbelt. As soon as it's off, Joel takes Josie into his arms and gently lays her on the ground.

When Ellie takes her backpack and places it under Josie's head, Joel mumbles his thanks. If things weren't so serious, Ellie would've joked that this was the first time he's said those words to her.

"Josie, come on you gotta wake up," Joel shakes her awake, not using much force incase she has injuries that he can't see.

He hasn't felt a bigger sense of relief in years, than the one he feels when Josie does finally open her eyes and immediately tries to get up.

She wobbles a little when she's finally back on her feet, and Joel is quick to put an arm around her to steady her.

"What happened?" She looks around. She remembers the impact of the crash, but doesn't yet remember why they had to crash.

"Fuckers ambushed us," Ellie motions toward outside of the building, that is now missing the front wall. "Guy who was begging for help was just part of a set up."

"They're— they're gonna come here looking for us. We have to move."

They don't have time to do say anything else before the shooting starts. Thankfully, all of them hitting the truck. The trio crouches down on the other side of the truck, and Joel slowly opens the back door and reaches to grab his gun. Josie does the same with the front passenger seat, pulling her backpack out and getting her gun from the smaller pocket.

"Hey, you see that hole?" Joel points to one of the larger holes in the wall. "You can squeeze through. When I say go you both need to crawl to that wall, and do not come out until I say. Okay?"

More shots come their way, and Josie and Ellie both begin to panic.

"Hey. Look at me! They will not hit either of you. You stay down, you stay low, you stay quiet. Okay? Go!"

Joel is up on his feet, drawing attention to himself and firing at their lone attacker. Ellie scrambles to crawl to where Joel pointed as fast as she can.

"Joel I'm not leaving you." Josie checks to see how many bullets are in the chamber, then crouches down next to Joel.

He mimics her position, and the truck temporarily acts as a shield. "Josie no you gotta go. Please, I am coming to get you as soon as I can. I promise."

Hearing the desperation in his voice for her to get to safety, or as close to safety as she can, Josie nods and starts crawling. But just as she's about to throw her backpack in so she can follow Ellie, a shot hits the wall and misses her head by less than a couple of inches.

Josie falls back to the floor, eyes wide as it quickly sinks in that she was almost shot, her life only spared because of 2 inches.

Joel stands up again, firing off a few rounds. He sees the guy go down, but hears someone already running to take his place.

Josie crawls under the truck, and Joel puts a finger to his mouth, a silent signal to be quiet as the second attacker finally crosses the street to come find them. A hand over her own mouth to keep herself from screaming, Josie can only watch as Joel takes the second guy down.

He starts to reload his gun when suddenly the back door swings open. Joel barely has enough time to hit the guy with the butt of his gun, but this third guy seems faster than the others. He manages to get the upper hand on Joel, using his gun to hold Joel down by the neck.

Josie sees Ellie peek out from the hole in the wall, and she quickly shakes her head no, motioning for her to get back inside. She's just a kid, and Josie doesn't want whats about to happen to be on her.

Before the guy has time to realize someone else is in the room, Josie crawls out from under the truck and fires a shot into the guys back. Joel looks at her as he tries to sit up, but Josie just stares at the man. The gun remains aimed at him as he now begs for his life.

"No no no! It's okay. We're not fighting anymore. See? I'm gonna go home. I'll tell everyone you're good. I— I don't know what to do. My mom isn't far. Do you think— can you get me to her, please. We can trade with you guys. We can be friends. I'm Bryan. What's your name?"

Josie steps forward, and raises the gun so that it's now aimed at his head. Before she can shoot again, Joel steps forward and silently holds his hand out. Eyes never leaving the guy, who she realizes is probably a teenager like Ellie, Josie hands him her gun.

"Wait wait wait! You can have my knife, it's a good one."

Joel picks it up, and tells Josie to get behind the wall. But she remains frozen, and when Joel looks at her again he sees tears now in her eyes.

Ellie finally emerges from behind the wall, and gently tugs Josie backwards. Once both of them are temporarily safe, Joel finishes things.

He calls out, but not too loud incase others are nearby. "Guys I— I gotta get in there but I won't fit through."

"There's some stuff against the door. I think we— I think I can move it."

Josie gets up from where she'd been sitting on the floor, still remaining silent as she helps Ellie pull the desk backwards while Joel pushes on the door. Once he's able to enter, he immediately shoves the desk back so that it blocks the door.

"I'm okay, I'm good," Ellie reassures Joel. But she motions to Josie, who sees her wipe her tears as she unzips her backpack.

"Josie, hey can you look at me for a second? We gotta move but I need to make sure you're okay."

It's as if all that just happened hits her at once. More tears fall as she stands and looks at Joel.

"I sh— I shot him. He was just a kid and I... but he..." She walks towards the hole to look at him, but Joel puts a hand on her arm to stop her.

"Hey. Hey none of this is on you."

Josie shakes her head as she looks around the room.

Joel puts a hand on either side of her face, softly saying her name until she finally looks up at him. She's starting to hyperventilate, and Joel now worries she'll have a panic attack.

"Baby you gotta look at me. None of what just happened is your fault. It's on me. I killed him, not you."

"He was gonna kill you." Josie whispers, putting her arms around Joel and initiating physical contact for the first time in who knows how long.

"I know. You saved my life, okay? All you did was stop him. I killed him. That's on me." Joel puts a hand on the back of her head, feeling the need to have her as close as possible. "You're okay. You're okay." A statement meant to reassure himself as much as her.

Josie's breathing slowly returns to normal as she nods, finding comfort in Joel's words. Neither of them comment on his nickname, and Ellie decides to store that moment away to ask about later.

Ellie inventories what's in her backpack, saying each item out loud to give Joel and Josie a better picture of what they've got left. Josie does the same.

"We gotta get up as high as we can. Best case, we find a clear route out."

No one says it out loud, but they're all thinking that the worst case scenario is someone or multiple someone's following them and trapping them in the building.

Joel opens the door, looking around first before putting a hand on Josie's back and leading her. He turns around and tells Ellie she better stay close, and Ellie nods so he knows she heard.

Josie remains silent, and Joel knows it's because she's understandably still shaken up by what happened. When they hear men calling out for Bryan, and listen to the moment they find his body, Josie looks to where the men are.

Ellie crosses the road after some sort of military looking vehicle, and another truck, pass by. She slowly opens a door that leads to an unknown building, before turning and nodding to Josie and Joel, a silent signal that they can go in.

Again, not wanting to overthink, this time Joel takes Josie's hand and pulls her along. He only lets go once they're in the building and Josie can afford to move a little slower.

They cut through buildings so that there's less of a chance to be seen, until they end up in an abandoned bar.

"They're not FEDRA, they're not Fireflies, so who are they?" Ellie stands back with Josie as Joel peers through an opening in the newspapers that block the windows.

"People."

"Are we okay in here?"

Joel watches as the people drive around in military trucks and other vehicles. "For a little bit. Looks like they're checking out apartment buildings first. We shouldn't get too comfortable though. They'll start checking places like this soon enough."

"That tall building like four blocks away. Is that the one?"

"As soon as we don't hear truck, we move, alright?"

"Are you okay?" Joel and Ellie are surprised that it's Josie who speaks up next. She's asking Ellie, who nods.

Turning to Joel, Josie asks him the same question.

"I'm alright. Are you, alright?" It's a stupid question, but he's just relieved she's speaking. And speaking to him at that. He's still remembering how it felt to hold him in her arms, as terrible as the situation was.

Joel gets up from the chair and slides down next to her on the floor. "Thing is, I didn't hear that guy coming. And you shouldn't have had to. You know?"

A tear slowly falls down Josie's cheek, but she quickly wipes it away. "But I did the right thing, right? He would've killed you and I was just trying to—"

"Hey, look at me." When she listens, Joel feels a small sense of relief. "That's not what I'm getting at, at all. I just mean, you're... you shouldn't have to know what it means to do something like that for me. And like I said before, you didn't kill him. But, I just know what it's like, that's all. I mean... I'm not good at this."

"Yeah you really aren't," Ellie chimes in.

When a smile appears on Josie's face, even just for a second, it's Ellie's turn to feel relieved. Maybe Josie is okay after all.

"I just mean it was my fault. Josie, I'm sorry. You shouldn't have had to defend me like that."

"It's not your fault," Josie speaks so soft that it's practically a whisper. And if she wasn't on the side of Joel's good ear, he knows he wouldn't have been able to understand what she's saying.

"You don't have to—"

"I mean it, Joel." She turns to face him, and looks up at him. "The only reason we've gotten this far is because of you. I would... I would do it again if I had to. I'm just not used to using a gun." Josie motions to the bow and arrows sticking out of her backpack. "Didn't think I'd have enough time to use those."

Joel borrows Ellie's gun that he discovered she stole from Bill's collection. He motions for her to move closer while he shows her and Josie how to properly use a gun.

"Show me your grip," Joel tells Josie first. Once he's satisfied that she knows how to hold a gun, she passes it to Ellie. When he sees she keeps her finger directly on the trigger, Joel lets out a sigh. "Now where did you learn that?"

"FEDRA school."

Another sigh. "Figures." He motions for Josie to take the gun back, and Ellie hands it over.

Trying to be as gentle as possible, Joel puts his hands over Josie's as he talks her through what to do. He tries to pull the gun, and gets a laugh out of Josie and Ellie when she holds tight and he's unsuccessful.

Reluctantly, after the lesson is finished, he hands the gun back to Ellie. Yet another sigh as she goes to put it in her pocket and he says to put it in her backpack, unless she wants to shoot her ass off.

Joel removes the wood meant to board up the door, and sees Josie fidgeting with her hands. "We'll get through this."

"I know." The clear trust Josie still has in Joel, despite their argument that seems to be forgotten, at least for now, and despite him still feeling like he has let her down her yet again, makes him that much more determined.

God, he really can't fail her again.

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