Disclaimer : I do not own any character of (The Last of Us) TLOU is owned by Naughty Dog, but all the Oc character are from my invention.

Chapter 10 : When Trust Goes Wrong

*Four days later*

(with Joel)

"Tommy, what are you doing? Slow down!"

"Sorry, but you saw the news? We need to get out of town, as soon as possible."

"This is crazy - what the hell is going on? Did you see that explosion?"

"Daddy, I'm scared."

"Don't worry, baby, we're going to be fine... Tommy, watch out!"

"Sarah!... Sarah, baby, are you okay?"

"My foot hurts."

"It's okay, it's okay… I'll carry you... c'mon. Tommy, we need to move."

"This way, quick. We need to find a new way to get out of town, away from these people - follow me."

"This is just crazy - why is this happening?"

"Daddy?"

"It's okay, baby. We're going to get out of here soon... Tommy!"

"Fuck, there's so many... going that way. I'll distract them, and catch up - go... now!"

"Daddy, what happened to those people?"

"I don't know, baby, but we're going to be out of here soon, okay?"

"Stop right there!"

"Hey, my little girl is hurt... we just need help."

"I said don't move!"

"Please... we're not sick, we just need help. What are you doing, please... noooo!"

"Joooeeeell"

Ka-BAM!

"Noooooooo!" Joel screams at the sound, and opens his eyes desperately. He starts to gasp for air, as his heart is beating rapidly. He starts to look around, but it's dark, and he barely sees anything there. He's confused and in pain, not knowing where he is or what happened. He doesn't even understand why he just had this nightmare about Sarah, and heard Ellie's voice at the end. He tries to get up, can't, and then he hears a woman's voice.

"Hey, just breathe slow, okay, and calm down. We're fine here. I think that you just had a nightmare."

"Ellie?" Joel asks quickly, trying to see the woman beside him.

"No, it's Bibi… do you remember me?" asks the woman nervously.

"What the hell is going on?... What happened? ...and where is Ellie?" Joel starts to ask, more agitated this time.

"I'm so sorry, please forgive me... I tried to help you both, but it was too late. And before you do anything, just let me-" She is interrupted by Joel.

"The food, and those men… Oh, yeah, I remember now… you bitch! You drugged us, and then you brought those men to the cabin, and let them take Ellie with them. I trusted you when I shouldn't have, and Ellie did, too. And you… you just sold us out, to those people. Do you know what they're going to do to her?" Joel starts accusing her, more furiously.

"Please just let me explain... it's not the way you think. I didn't have any choice, and- urgg… urgg… please, I just tried to help you-" She can barely speak after Joel sits up and grabs her by the neck.

"Yeah, you didn't have any choice - people like you always say that. Those men have my Ellie, but don't worry, I'm going to find them and kill them all. But in your case, I can do that right now?" Joel tries to move more, but he feels a lot of pain and dizziness. He tightens his grip on her neck, trying to suffocate her with one hand.

"Urrg… please… she is … safe… they're not going to do… anything to her… I just want to… help you get her… back," Bibi starts to say, but Joel's grip is strong, and she starts to have some difficulty breathing. She is using her hands to try to get loose from Joel's grip, but her efforts are in vain.

"Yeah, and you want me to believe you now, right? You're going to pay for this, and when I find your friends, I'm going to make them-" Joel stops talking when he starts to feel dizzy again. Then he sees her put one hand in her pocket and take something out.

"They're not… my friends… and I know… where they are… I can help you… to find your wife… here," Bibi says, showing what she has in her hand.

"What did you say?" Joel asks while he moves his hand away from her neck and looks at the ring she's holding in her hand.

"I'm so sorry for all this…" She starts to cough while trying to speak to Joel. "I really am… you two were so nice, and-" She stops talking when she sees the sadness in Joel's eyes as soon as he takes the ring out of her hand and starts to look a it.

Joel looks at the ring while he feels some tears forming in his eyes. But he is not going to do that now, not in front of this woman. He needs to be tough; he needs to find Ellie and bring her back to him. He is not going to lose her like that, but first, he needs to know where those men took her, and the only person that knows that is in front of him. "Why do you have this? Did you steal that from her, too?" asks Joel, looking at her more furiously. Just thinking that this woman gave Ellie to those men - just for robbing them - gives Joel more desire to kill her right here, but he needs to wait.

"No, of course not. I found the ring on the kitchen floor before I had to get out of there. She must have dropped it before they took her," Bibi says while she puts one hand on her throat, as she's still gasping for some air. "And if you are asking yourself how I know she is your wife, she told me the night before all this happened. I noticed the ring on her finger and asked her about that when you weren't in the room."

"Fuck, she told you about that, and you- you just betrayed her? How can you do that? She is just-" Joel tries to stand up again, but the pain starts again, so he goes back down and stays sitting on the floor. He tries to stay calm, but all that is on his mind is Ellie, and what those men are going to do to her.

"Yeah, I'm not proud of that, but you need to know why I had to do that. Now try not to move so much... you hit your head when I had to push you off the cliff and you landed in the river below. The one I showed you 2 days ago? And believe me, we almost died from that - the water was freezing." The woman goes to the fire pit, takes a bowl with some liquid on it, and goes back to where Joel is. She is trembling when she offers Joel the bowl, not only from the cold but from what Joel can still do to her. Not like she doesn't understand his motive to do that, but if she wants to help them, she needs to stay alive. "Here, drink this. It's going to make you feel better, okay?"

"I don't need your help - at least not with this, but I need you to tell me where I can find her," says Joel, looking at the bowl, then at her. "Do you think I'm going to drink that after what you did? How do I know you didn't add some poison or drug in there?"

"Look, I know that I'm not the best person in this world right now. But I promise you that we're going to get them back. We need each other to do that, so why would I kill you or drug you? So you can be sure that there's no drug in that bowl... look, I will take a sip to prove it." The woman takes the bowl and drinks from it. "See? No drugs in there. Here, just drink it - it's something that my dad prepared... you will feel better after." Bibi offers the bowl to Joel again, but he just gives her a look, so she just puts the bowl on the floor close to him.

"What do you mean by 'get them back'?" Joel asks the woman in front of him.

"Look, I want to fix this, okay, but to do that, you need to know why I have to do this. I know that you think that I'm a bad person. And that you don't care why I have to do this, but I need you to understand?"

"Save your story for someone who cares, lady, I just need to know one thing from you: where can I find Ellie?"

"Well, I'm going to tell you anyway. Not everything I told you both was a lie... some of that was true. And the reason why I have no choice is because they have my son. Well, not exactly my biological son, but I've been taking care of him since he was two years old."

"And you want me to believe anything you say?" says Joel, looking at her.

"It's the truth. My mom was killed by infected when I was 18, so after that, it was just me and my father. One day, we found this woman at some abandoned town... she was wounded, and had the boy in her arms. She didn't tell us much, but she made me promise to take care of her baby. She said that the little boy was special, and that someday he would help this place to be a better one. We didn't understand what she meant by that, and she died the next day. So we buried her body and took the child with us. As the years passed, the boy thought that I was his mother, so I kept it that way. And when we found the cabin in the forest, and there wasn't anyone close to here, we decided to make that our permanent home.

"I thought you said that he was your brother, and that you never found him or your father after they disappeared?" asks Joel, trying to gauge her reaction.

"Yeah, I know I said that, but I couldn't tell you the truth at that time... but some of the things that I told you and Ellie were true. We all have secrets that we don't want to share, and I know that not all the things you told me were true either, so you can't blame me for that."

"Yeah, but we don't lie to people to fuck them up."

"Maybe, but they already killed my father, and I can't let them kill my boy. Maybe you're going to say that he's not my real son, so why do this, but to me, he is. I'm sorry I had to do this to you two, but like I said, if I didn't do this, they were going to kill my boy," says the woman with a sad expression now. She turns her head away and looks at the fire, just feeling ashamed of what she did. Joel stays quiet, looking at the woman. He doesn't want to believe her; she already lied before. But he doesn't have a choice: this woman knows where Ellie is. So if he wants to save her, he needs to work with this woman.

"Ok, what happened? I don't remember much, because of the drug. I just remember some men taking Ellie out of the house. And what is this place? It looks like a cave or something."

Bibi looks at him, surprised that Joel wants to talk to her. "It's an old mine. My father found it last year, when he was hunting. He thought that it was a good idea to keep this place hidden, to store some food and things we can use later, if something happens," Bibi starts to explain.

"So how do you know these people? And how did we end up on that cliff, where you said that you pushed me?" Joel starts to ask.

"Oh yeah, well, where do I start!... Well, I already told you that they killed my father and took my son. After they found me, they made a deal with me. They told me that if I give them food, and find people that they can trade off, they won't kill me or my son. So I have to do what they tell me, and they keep my boy with them."

"Wait a minute, did you say find people to trade them?" asks Joel, almost yelling.

"Yeah, they take people they find - especially young women - to trade them. But don't worry, I'm sure Ellie is going to be okay," says the woman with some confidence.

"OK?... I know this kind of people, and what they do to women - they sell them to be sex slaves. Do you know what they're going to do to Ellie now? This is worse than I imagined." Joel tries again to stand up. After hearing this, he needs to find Ellie as soon as possible. "We need to find her now, so stop talking and take me to them," says Joel with a hard voice.

"Whoa whoa… hold yourself right there - we can't do anything right now! The storm hasn't stopped yet, and you don't feel good, so it's going to be pointless to go out and-" Bibi stops when she sees Joel get up and move close to her.

"I don't care about all that, I need to find Ellie... NOW!" Joel yells at her.

Bibi gets up from where she's sitting close to the fire, ready to run if Joel tries to kill her again. "Look, there's too much snow out there to get out, but that is good for us, too. Their camp is like a day from here, and because of the snow, it's probably going to take more time for them to get there. And if they have a buyer for Ellie, that person is going to need more time to get there, too."

"That doesn't matter - they're going to rape her if I don't get there in time," says Joel, looking around for his stuff. "Where's my bag, my guns, and the horses?"

"They're not going to do that, so calm down. I managed to save some of your stuff, but they took the horses and the other things that were in the cabin, then they burned it down. But don't worry, I have guns and other stuff here that we can use."

"They took the horses, too?... So now, how are we going to get to them in time?" asks Joel, desperate.

"The storm is going to slow them down and because of the horses, they need to take the long way there. So that way, we can use my shortcut, and that can take us there faster.".

"You said that their place is two days from here, so how much time have we been in here?" asks Joel, more calmly this time.

"One day, but-"

"A DAY!... That means that they've already arrived at their camp."

"Like I said, they need to take the long way, because of the snow and the horses. Yes, they must be there by now, but even if they are, they need to wait for the buyer, if they already have one. So we can use that time to make a plan and get there. Also, they think that we are dead, so we have the advantage on that, too. They're not expecting us, so it's going to be easier to rescue Ellie and Liam," says Bibi, moving close to the fire.

"Liam… that's the name of your boy?" asks Joel, walking slowly toward the fire, too.

"Yeah, that's his name... well, the one I gave him. His mother never told me the name of the boy, even when I asked her. I don't know her reason for that, but that's okay with me, because it gave me the chance to name him myself."

"Look, storm or not, we need to get moving. I don't want Ellie to be with those men any longer than necessary."

"Don't worry, she's going to be fine. I told you that we're going to get them back, and we're going to do that. But we need to eat and rest and after that, I'll show you all the things I have, so we can think of a plan."

"Ahh, we don't need a plan, because I already know what I'm going to do. I will kill all those motherfuckers if they dare to put one finger on my girl," says Joel, now sitting in front of the fire with a serious expression on his face.