A/N: A little late on this chapter, but not too bad. I typically don't like making solid update schedules while I'm in school, but I'll still keep aiming for a general timeframe like I have been. Gives me a sense of spacing.

This chapter will serve as the next significant divergence from the original story. It's actually pretty small in the grand scheme of things, but it's uncharted (no pun intended) territory from this point onwards. I'm really glad you're liking my portrayal of Tess so far. That's something I was genuinely worried about when I started this, so it's good to know I'm doing something right.


Chapter 4: Coping

"If you ask me, there's something else to this," Bill said, leading them through a decrepit bar and into the street. "Because when the inseparable Tess and Joel are separated, sounds like there might be trouble in paradise." He stopped in the doorway to face Tess. "Am I mistaken?"

Tess gave him a warning stare. "Look at it anyway you want," she said flatly. "What Joel does in the off hours is his own business."

"And since when isn't it yours?" Bill didn't wait for an answer. He turned back around and advanced into the fleeting daylight.

The growing pains that were eating away at Tess were proving difficult to keep at bay. They came with the reminders Bill was dishing out to her that Joel wasn't there. It was over for him, for them. Subtracting one from Joel and Tess meant only bad things from then onward. But she wasn't supposed to be thinking about that. She was supposed to be thinking about the future, not the past.

Bill of course didn't know, and what did Bill do when he didn't know something? He kept pressing to find out. If he was denied that knowledge, he made his own assumptions and became skeptical of what he thought was going on. This time, however, he was fairly on point. And it made Tess sick.

Ellie apparently sensed this discomfort in her and made persistent efforts to draw Bill's attention away from the subject, much to Bill's continued annoyance. "So," Ellie said as she walked into the street, filled with forlorn cars in varying states of disrepair. "Why don't you fix one of these cars?"

Bill turned to her with an expression of feigned astonishment. "Oh my god, you're a genius!" he said mockingly. "I mean, the whole time, why on earth hadn't I thought about fixing one of these cars?"

Tess rolled her eyes at the same time Ellie did. Then again, she couldn't be picky about her distractions. "Okay, don't be a dick," Ellie rebutted.

"Their tires are rotted and their batteries are dead." Bill walked alongside one of the police cars and kicked its tire once. "Can't even begin to think what the inside of the engine blocks look like. Only ones making new car batteries are the military."

Before he finished the sentence, several screams came from the far end of the street. All three of them looked in that direction to see several runners clamber over the barricade of RVs Bill had set up. One of them set off the trap just beyond it and blew apart. The rest charged down the street. "Aw, shit. Lock and load," Bill called, drawing his pistol.

"Ellie, stay back," Tess ordered instinctively.

She first went for her 9mm, but then noticed the two clickers approaching from the left side of the barricade, closely following the sounds of the runners. Tess located a point where they would likely converge before getting too close and instead took out a molotov. In one fluid movement, she opened up her lighter, sparked a flame and held it to the cloth tied around the alcohol-filled bottle. The cloth burned easily, just like infected bodies did. Tess drew her arm back and flung the molotov into the pavement where the clickers and runners met.

The ball of fire that ensued consumed the Infected in a fury that went too fast for Tess to count how many were killed. To her right, Bill dropped another runner with two bullets and drew his machete to meet the last one. Tess quickly searched the rest of the street for any remainders. The only movement came from the burning Infected as their bodies dropped to the ground, convulsed wildly, and then went still. She risked counting how many went down in her attack. She counted only one clicker…

The other screeched as it charged her from the left. She didn't have time to work out where it came from before it was upon her. It nearly pushed her over, flailing its arms wildly, giving her no time to reach for her gun. Her feet skidded on the ground trying to push it back. It brought a boil-covered arm up and punched her left shoulder, throwing her arm back and exposing her neck. The clicker thrust its head forward to bite her and she had just enough time to think that her luck had finally run out.

But the clicker stopped, its jaws inches from her neck. It took Tess a second to realize that Ellie's switchblade was protruding from the side of its neck. With surprising strength, Ellie pulled it away from Tess and drove her blade home into the clicker's neck. "Oh, fuck…" she whispered as it fell. Her eyes lingered on the body a couple moments, and then went to Tess. "You all right?"

"Yeah," Tess panted, trying to get her thoughts back together. How had that happened? She never let herself be that unaware of her surroundings. How had a clicker blindsided her like that? The answer was obvious: she was so used to having Joel cover her, even when Bill had just reminded her that he wasn't there this time. Or maybe she'd just slipped up. She didn't watch to see if any Infected escaped her molotov. Maybe it was both. "I'm good. I, um…" Ellie looked at her, shaken but composed. "Thanks for the save."

The faintest hint of satisfaction came across the girl's face. "No problem."

Tess held eye contact for a couple seconds, and actually felt some degree of admiration for her. She was holding her own through everything they'd gone through so far. Just several hours ago, she'd pulled a clicker off of Joel. Now…

The thought quickly dissipated. Her eyes went back to the street. The only other movement now was Bill moving towards the gate across the street, mumbling to himself as he went. Tess followed behind him at a distance. "Okay, well now he's talking to himself," Ellie said wearily.

"Yeah," Tess replied. The man talked more to himself than he ever did to her. She wasn't sure if that was a curse or a blessing. "Hey, Bill?"

"Tess?" Bill asked rhetorically. "This way."

They passed through the gate and climbed a stone stairway to the base of an ancient church building. An ironic place for Bill to hole up, Tess thought. "Where's this armory of yours?" she asked.

"Right here," Bill gestured to the church's lower level. "In the cellar. Through here." He moved past and opened the wide, slanted doors into the basement and descended. "All right. Here we are." He pointed a finger to Ellie. "You don't touch anything." He turned to Tess. "And you, close the door."

Ellie heaved an exaggerated sigh and glanced at Tess, who held a hand up to silence her. She pulled the cellar doors shut and joined Bill in the basement. He lit a lantern and then turned to his weapon racks. "Let's gear up," he said.

Out of the corner of her eye, Tess saw Ellie move towards the racks. Tess extended an arm in front of her. "Hold on there," she warned.

"What?" Ellie said. "I need a gun."

Tess eyed her and considered it. She still wasn't comfortable with the concept of the girl becoming a mercenary, but she was certainly just as capable and didn't seem too adversely affected by her experiences. Then again, she hadn't ever spent much time outside of a quarantine zone. Tess obviously deliberated a little too long. Ellie looked askance at her. "You can trust me. I can handle myself," she said.

That much she had proven time and time again, most recently only a couple minutes ago. Hell, I owe her my life now. She didn't have Joel anymore. She had the girl.

After thinking it over another few moments, she removed the bow from her shoulder and pulled the arrows out of her backpack. Ellie's eyes lit up as she did. She handed them over to her and said, "Let's start you off with this and go from there. Sound good?"

Ellie plucked the weapon out of her hands and tested the bowstring on her fingers. "Sure," she said, that hint of satisfaction returning.

"Tsh," they heard from Bill as he hauled a shotgun out of its case. Tess shook her head and walked over to Bill's workbench. "You know, you've taken some really shitty jobs over the years, but I think this one goes on record as the worst and the dumbest," he stated, joining Tess at the table. "I'm surprised Joel let you go it alone, but not as surprised as I am to find you were willing to go at all. I always thought you two were smarter than that."

"Maybe we're branching out," Tess suggested. She knew all too well that wouldn't fly for Bill. "Maybe the pay is good enough this time."

"Maybe you've finally lost it," he retorted. "Trust me, there's no pay that would be worth going out there, especially for you. You and Joel are the last people who would think otherwise."

"What does that mean?" Ellie asked several steps away.

Tess sighed, doing her best to keep her memory under control. She was losing patience, some with Bill and some with the world he feared, the world she was going back into again, even after…

"It doesn't mean anything," she said, trying to keep her focus on Bill. "Look, I'm in this. There's no turning back now, so there's no use having second thoughts. This is my decision, my job, and I know what I'm doing."

"Do you now? Even without Joel?"

That stopped Tess dead in her tracks. It was almost like Bill knew all of her doubts and was reading them out loud one by one. She'd done a good job of resisting the urge to punch or strangle this man before, but she thought she'd finally snap if this went on for much longer. She leaned both of her hands on the table and stared down to keep herself together. Bill had fortunately asked another rhetorical question and continued talking as he worked on his shotgun. "Let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, I had someone that I cared about."

Tess glanced up at him. His tone shifted suddenly and ever so briefly. She took the opportunity to read as much information off of his face as possible. "It was a… partner," he continued. "Somebody I had to look after." Bill finished and chambered the shotgun, and walked over to retrieve a second one. "And in this world that sort of shit is good for one thing. Gettin' ya killed. So, you know what I did? I wisened the fuck up." He brought the second shotgun over and looked her in the eye. "I realized it's gotta be just me."

Tess was uninterested in hearing any more. "Bill. This is happening with or without your approval, so let's just get it over with. Okay?"

She didn't care how much of her anger was seeping through her exterior now. This kind of tone was the only way to get Bill to shut up about most anything. That's what she needed now. Silence.

Bill loaded and tossed the shotgun to her. "Here," he said passive-aggressively. "Let's go 'get it over with'."


For once, Tess thought, Bill's paranoia had served him well. The side of town that he dreaded and never ventured into was about as bad as Tess expected, and she had expected something worse than usual. Hell, she never entirely knew what to expect when Bill described it. That much she had picked up on with his supply deliveries. Looks like I haven't learned much else.

The collective howls from the Infected horde pierced the air from the other side of the fence as Tess led Ellie into the house with Bill right behind. She flung open the sliding door and slammed it shut once they were all in, the Infected screaming still ringing in her ears. Her eyes and ears adjusted to the dim light and stillness of the house. Ellie caught her breath, looked awkwardly from Tess to Bill, then back to Tess, and said, "So that worked out well…" she started, her composure steady. Tess gave her a warning glare; Ellie immediately got the message. "So, ah, I'll go check out this side of the house."

She motioned to the side with a kitchen and door to the garage and walked over to it. Tess waited until she was far enough out of earshot before turning to Bill who was staring down at the ground, hands on his hips. "Bill?" she asked expectantly.

Bill splayed his arms out palm-up beside him. "Somebody had the same idea. They stole my shit," he said.

Tess wasn't in the mood for the obvious. In fact, she wasn't in the mood for most of what Bill had to say. "So what do we do now?"

Bill looked up at her, a fire in his eyes. "You oughta be thankful you're still drawing breath!" he blurted. "We had one chance at this and we missed it! Surprise fucking surprise, right?" Tess had to turn away to keep a level head. There had to be an easier way to do this… some way of explaining to him that this job… "And furthermore," he continued. "You can tell Joel, sitting comfortably back in Boston, that if he wants—"

In a sudden burst, Tess lost herself. "Don't you dare bring him into this!" she roared, spinning around and nearly charging him full speed. She saw Ellie shiver out of the corner of her eye as she walked away. "You don't know anything about this! Nothing about me! This is not about him! This is not about you!"

Bill wasn't even taken aback by her response. "I don't give a shit! You can take this job and shove it—"

"You don't know a goddamned thing about me! Do you understand me?! I will not…" Tess brought herself to a halt to notice that Bill's rage was gone, his eyes fixed on something behind her. Her eyes followed his and fell onto a decaying corpse hanging from the ceiling by a noose. She glanced back at Bill; he seemed to have fallen into a trance, staring up at the body. Tess waved in front of his face and gestured to the body. "You know this guy?" she asked.

When Bill's voice finally returned, it was soft and weak. "Frank…"

Tess shrugged. "And who is Frank?"

Another moment of silence passed. She swore, if he was trying to shrug off his previous tantrum… "He was my partner."

It took Tess a couple seconds to understand, but when she did, it all came through at once. Bill's partner. The one person in the world he cared about, dead in front of him. Nothing anyone could do about it. The surge of emotions Tess had gone through earlier came back, catching her off guard and instantly drowning out her frustration towards Bill. The image of Joel's body, lying in his own blood on the tiled floor of the capitol building returned in her mind's eye. Everything that came with it had to be showing in her face, so she looked down.

Fortunately, Bill was still staring down Frank's body. "He's the only idiot who would wear a shirt like that," he said, approaching the body. Tess's only comfort was that he was feeling what she had suppressed up until this point. Whether he realized it or not, he knew how she felt.

The solace was momentary, but it was enough to get herself back together.

Bill drew his machete and severed the rope suspending the man, allowing his body to fall to the ground. Bill's eyes moved up and down the corpse, unable to look away like it had a hold of him. "He's got bites here, and…" He weakly indicated the areas with his machete.

Tess looked back at Frank, and then at Bill, who broke out of whatever spell he was in. "He probably didn't want to turn, so he…" Tess said, leaving Bill's thoughts to fill in the rest.

"Yeah..." The man nodded slowly and finally turned away. "Well… fuck him."

Though she had no way of telling what he would do or say next, she had a pretty good sense of what he wanted to do. But both of them turned towards an unfamiliar sound coming from the garage: a car engine sputtering. Tess jogged to the garage to find Ellie behind the wheel of a blue and white pickup with its hood up, giving the key a few turns. She looked to Tess and smiled. "Look what I found," she said, eagerly rocking in her seat. "It's got some juice in it."

Bill came in just behind her and walked around the front of the truck, staring into the engine compartment. "That's my battery," he said. "That fucking asshole." He sneered at the newly replaced battery and then slammed the hood shut. "Get out," he ordered Ellie. She stepped out and stood at Tess's side, hands on her hips, as Bill turned the key for himself a few times. "Battery's drained, but the cells are alive," he said, climbing back out again. "If we push it and get it started again, the alternator will recharge the battery."

Tess studied him as he walked back out in front of the truck. "Is that your guess?" she asked.

"Hey, you wanted a second chance?" he returned, gesturing to the truck. "This is as good as it gets."

Tess thought it over. Recharging the battery meant getting the truck moving again, getting it moving again meant they had a car. It was better than what they'd came here with. Ellie approached the car door again. "What are you thinking?" she asked.

This is as good as it gets. First time that's happened in a while. She turned to Ellie and said, "I'm thinking we push it out on the street and you get it started." Ellie nodded, climbed back into the driver's seat and closed the door, reorienting herself with the dashboard and pedals. Unlike Bill, she'd kept a level head through all of this and already proven herself with the bow and arrow. They had a long way to go from here, Tess knew, but what they had done together so far was at the very least noteworthy. "Hey," she said to her, leaning on the car door. "Is that gonna be okay with you?"

Ellie glanced at her and nodded again. "Yeah, not a problem."

"Good. ...You're doing well. This whole time, you've really…" Tess paused to search for the right words. "really done a good job. You should know that."

Ellie looked at her, this time, with an expression of warm gratitude, the same kind she had shown back at the capitol. "I won't let you down with this," she assured.

Tess nodded in return and backed away from the car. "Jesus, that's more of my stuff," Bill said from the left-hand corner, digging through a tool box. He stood up in a huff and began mumbling to himself again. "So what? You just… just gonna steal my shit and run off? Is that it, Frank?"

There was a sort of relief at scavenging for supplies once again, being able to fall into the routine she'd developed long ago in her earlier years. It allowed her to keep her mind off of those years. As she looked through the one other room of the floor, she came across a note left on the nightstand, signed by Frank. She skimped over it until she came across the words: I want you to know I hated your guts.

She stopped in her tracks. This was the only person Bill had feelings for, and now it was being thrown back in his face. Frank didn't seem to care for Bill at all by this point, and Tess could only imagine how Bill would take it. She considered not giving it to him, but then it was addressed to him and he likely wouldn't come back to this house on his own will. Even in spite of what it said, he had a right to know. That was something Tess could respect.

It was, after all, a rare commodity. At least Bill had closure. Tess would never know how her partner felt.


Bill parted with her the way she could have guessed, like many other things about him: cold and concise. With the way he'd reached to just about everything she put him through that day, she didn't even bother to offer some sort of consolation for Frank. From here on for him, it was all about tying up loose ends. Anything else that came near his little world could fuck off.

That was good enough for Tess. It was probably the last time she would see him anyway. That's how he chose to spend his days, and this was how she chose to spend hers. It was all about finding a reason to keep going, and itwas no one else's business but their own.

Tess rubbed her eyes while keeping one hand on the truck's steering wheel, keeping it centered in the open highway lane. She was way too tired. She knew she was when she let her mind wander into the philosophical, and she didn't like to give where she was in life too much thought, especially now. Though there wasn't much else for her mind to do. For as long as it had been since she'd done it last, driving was incredibly monotonous.

Ellie fortunately provided more of her trademark distractions. "Oh man!" she exclaimed from the back seat.

"What's the problem?" Tess asked, glancing at her in the rearview mirror. "Now that you're awake."

Ellie sat up and leaned forward, holding up an old, science-fiction comic book titled Savage Starlight. "This thing. I know it doesn't look like it, but it's not a bad read. Only one problem." She opened the book to the last page and pointed to the panel in the lower right hand corner. "To be continued," she read aloud and sighed. "I hate cliffhangers."

Tess had to smile at her innocent frustration. "That's how they get you to buy and read more," she explained.

"Yeah, well... I don't have the luxury of bookstores like they did then," she said, flopping back on the seat.

I'm not sure that counts as a luxury, kid. "Well, where did you get that issue, come to think of it?"

"Uh, back at Bill's," she said innocently. "I mean, all this stuff was just lying there. Didn't look like he was going to need it."

Tess shook her head, but her smile grew. "He's not gonna like that."

"Psh, he won't even notice."

"Ah, no, he'll notice," she chuckled. "Trust me, he notices everything out of place there. He's gonna hate you for the rest of his life."

"I think we were already at that point when we first met," she pointed out. "Besides, I think it's these babies he'll really be missing tonight."

Adequate willpower got Tess to look at what else Ellie had in her backpack. What she saw in the rearview mirror made her heart skip. Don't tell me... She glanced over her shoulder to see Ellie paging through a dirty magazine, one of Bill's. "Um, yeah, Ellie, about those, you... you probably shouldn't be looking at―"

"Whoa!" Ellie said, her eyes widening as she held the magazine sideways, allowing a poster to unfold from the pages. She briefly laughed in astonishment. "Wha... how... how the hell would you even walk around in that thing?"

Tess felt her cheeks redden, a million possible images running through her head, and tried to swipe it away from her. "Ellie please, this isn't good for you. I shouldn't be exposing you to this."

"You're not," she replied, not taking her eyes off the poster. "I'm exposing myself."

"Bad idea," Tess urged, dividing her attention now. "You should be exposed to other things first."

"And you should watch the road."

Tess looked forward again just in time to avoid side swiping another car abandoned on the road. She swerved hard enough to knock Ellie forward in her seat, causing the magazine to fall out of her hands and under the seat, much to Tess's relief. "Thanks for the tip," she said with a satisfied grin.

Ellie sneered at her. "Fine. Guess I'll just have nothing to do for the rest of the way," she said, climbing into the front seat.

"Why don't you try to get some sleep?" Tess suggested. "Unless you can think of something to talk about."

"Well…" Ellie considered topics for a minute, causing Tess to wonder if she would regret offering it. "How'd you get to be a smuggler?"

There was a question she actually hadn't thought about for a while.

"Let's see…" she began, unsure of where exactly to start, or where she wanted to start. "I've been at it for about... shit, five years now? That's at least how long I've been in Boston. I know met Joel not long after."

"And how did Joel―" Ellie stopped the question and went quiet, something Tess really should have seen coming. How did she not see the obvious pain in answering that question? Even after everything that had just happened, she had somehow let her guard down. "Sorry, I... I know, don't bring Joel up. Ever. I only meant…"

Tess felt some degree of guilt for her there. It wasn't her fault that Joel had come up. They'd both forgotten the three guidelines set for Ellie, two of which applied to Tess herself. "It's okay," she replied, unconvinced. "Just... try and get some sleep."

Ellie didn't need to be told twice. She sat back in her seat and rested her head against the side of the door. Her eyes stayed open for a while. Silence again. Tess couldn't decide if she felt more like Bill or Joel right then. Either way, she hated herself for it. Sometimes everyone needed to be reminded that some parts of the past shouldn't be revisited. Tess imagined the girl could understand that on her own. She was relearning the same thing she'd realized with Bill.

Bill couldn't be consoled, nor did he want to be. He just wanted to put it behind him and never see or hear of it again. Another part of him she could respect. That was the only way she could move forward, by looking forward. There was no sense in looking at what couldn't be changed, and that was the most haunting part about it. No matter how positive or negative it had been, the past was set in stone. There was no way to overcome it. Escape was the only option.