Joel wakes up in a hospital bed (surrounded by Marlene and a couple of guards) and slowly sits up; upon seeing Marlene he jolts himself out of his slumber. "Ellie, where is Ellie" he says worriedly to Marlene. "Relax Joel, she's okay" Marlene replies. Joel breathes a sigh of relieve.
"I want to see her, what room is" Joel starts. "You will" Marlene interrupts "but I need to talk to you first." "About what" said Joel? Marlene says "about her condition... about..." Marlene turn around and looks out of the nearest window. "Well?" said Joel waiting for her to continue. Marlene finally continues, "In order to get the vaccination... look, she won't survive the surgery."
Joel tries to stand up but is stopped by something on his wrist and discovers he is hand-cuffed to the bed. While he is discovering this Marlene says "Sorry, I thought you might try". "Try what…" Joel interrupts, this time with anger in his voice. "…to stop you? Your damn right I will. Get these damn things off of me! I want to see her now! Marlene turns back around towards Joel, "You will..." she starts to yell, then calms herself down "see her. I've already talked to her about it. She's made her own decision; she wants to go through with it." Marlene turns and calls into the hallway, "You can come in now". Ellie walks into the room.
"Joel I" she starts. "What's this I hear about you wanting to go through with this" he interrupts? Ellie turns towards Marlene, "Can we have some privacy?" Marlene made a look of reluctance. Ellie continued, "look, you can stand outside the door" Marlene reluctantly gives a non to the guards in the room and they all leave.
Joel and Ellie stand in silence for a few seconds. Joel assuming that agreeing with this nonsense was the best way for her to get the two of them alone together he whispers to Ellie, "Hand me that scalpel and I can get these off." Ellie talking normally responds, "No." "No, what do you mean no" says Joel, this time still whispering but with more anger in his voice, "Stop mess'in around and hand that to me before they get smart and come back in here." Ellie responds, still talking normally "No Joel, we aren't running away from this." Joel contemplates the situation for a second, a look of anger and puzzlement on his face.
Joel grasping for answers asked "What was all that fighting for? Wh... what about all we've been though? After all it took for us to just survive, you just going to let them kill you?" "There not 'just killing me' " Ellie responds "I could save lives!" "You don't know that, what if it doesn't work? Huh? Then you would have died for nothing." "At least I would have tried; at least there's a chance! What's the alternative Joel!? Go back on the road? Live with your brother? On the way we can pass by all the families whose lives were cut short by this fungus! How many children did we see? Do there lives matter less than mine. Does the whole fucking human race matter less than me? No! It doesn't!" Joel quickly responding, "It does to me!" Both stand silently looking at each other, taking in what he just admitted. Ellie now sees why he's so obsessed with her not going through with it.
"It's not your fault she died" Ellie starts. Joel says, "Tess knew the risk". "Not Tess, your daughter". Joel responds with anger rising in his voice again, "You don't know anything about her, or about my loss." "I know you still blame yourself, you're constantly talking about it in your sleep. It's not your fault! You need to let the guilt go… (she holds Joel's free hand) …let me go."
"No! We can still make it out of here, we can go to Robert's, watch one of those movies he was talking about. I could teach you to swim." Ellie responds again, "It's not your choice! This is the reason I was born, I have to do this. I can't live on knowing how many people I could have saved." Ellie opens the door and starts to walk out, looking back one last time. "Thank you, for everything", Ellie leaves the room. Joel starts aggressively fighting with the cuffs and breaks the bed rails in order to get free. He runs toward the door only to be overtaken by the guards and knocked out.
Sad Music Starts to play as we see Ellie going to sleep on the operating table. She dreams she is on the plane again. Everyone is screaming as the plane falls. Then the future is shown as scientists create the vaccine. Ellie makes her way to the cockpit of the plane. Marlene and a government official shake hands and she hands them the vaccine. The government then takes a visibly worried 4 year old girl away from her parents and lines her up among other people to be scanned. She gets a positive scan while her parents watch. Ellie gets into the drivers seat and lands the plan safely. The little girl gets shot, but this time with a syringe of the vaccine. Everyone on the plane is relieved they're safe. They're smiling, happy, and congratulating Ellie. The little girl runs back into her parents arms very happy.
Game ends with Joel handing out vaccines, then going home to his brother, finally sitting down he reads 'Savage Starlight.' Fade to Black.
Why I wrote this - First let me say that I'm not a writer, this is literally the first thing I've ever written, so if it's crap, well that's why. Obviously I didn't like the original ending to the game. The thought that I just played through a game and invested into a story about the most selfish man in the world disgusted me. Everyone raved that this game was great and that they all cried. I felt my ending if done right would invoke much more of an emotional pull at the heart strings. Thank you for reading.