Just a forewarning that this chapter does get very violent and a bit graphic, so read at your own risk.

Giving up is hard.

But sometimes, going on is harder.

Chapter Thirteen

Many say that you lost all morals in this world, that you no longer knew how thin the barriers between good and bad were, because they were no longer that simple. Many believed that the lines were blurred between what was evil anymore or what was now just plain surviving. You couldn't blame an animal for trying to kill you, because animals can't reason. All they do is defend, hunt, and survive. We're not animals, though, but we sure act like it.

I don't remember how long I struggled in desperation, but it wasn't until the grunts of the men carrying me became all that I heard, because we were now too far away to hear the cries of the family I left behind. It wasn't until my throat felt like sandpaper and my constant kicking exhausted me even more did I fall limp in their grasps. I let my feet drag behind us, aggravating the men even more, and in turn they squeezed my arms so hard I knew bruises were already forming.

I was so utterly helpless, and even that was a mighty understatement, but I kept my expression stolid, because I wouldn't let these men have the satisfaction of seeing me weep anymore. There was a time for grieving, and this wasn't it.

"Pick up your feet," One barked, yanking harder on my arm. These weren't the Fireflies I knew.

I just let my feet lay in an awkward position on the ground.

"I said, move it."

I lifted my head and finally saw my captors' face. He was a pale man with piercing eyes and a few missing teeth. His forehead was creased as though he constantly wore a glare, the dark hair on his head matted with sweat.

"I don't take orders from you," I spat out coldly.

The man shot an amused look to the Firefly holding my other arm, before smiling sadistically down at me. He gave a deep chuckle that left unsettlement linger under my skin.

"Oh, but you will."

It happened all so quickly that my brain couldn't keep up with it. First a shove, then a kick, and lastly a round of cracking punches that gave me the taste of iron and a throbbing jaw. My hands were being pulled behind my back and the stiff material of a rope bounded them together. From there I was roughly thrown into the back of a truck and the light faded leaving me in pure darkness.

I curled up on my side, trying to focus my eyes, but it proved to be a difficult task when I could barely keep my consciousness. I was slipping fast, but I thought I heard movement by my head.

"Joel," I whispered, a funny thing to still wish in my hopeless, delirious state.

"Joel," I repeated, but this time it was much more broken. Before was hopeful, now it was devastating, pleading, empty wishes.

I was truly alone now.

"Oh, you're not alone, my dear, but I am not Joel, either." It was my captor's voice.

I bolted up so quickly it made my head spin. "Don't touch me, go away, don't touch me!" I was screaming and wailing hysterically, trying desperately to stand, all while pushing myself further and further from his voice.

"What do you want from me?"

I saw glimpses of his psychotic smile, his maniacal laughter surrounding me, enclosing me, suffocating me. And so it went on; scrambling, and spinning to follow the noise, whipping my head around faster than my feet would stumble, only to find nothing, because I could see nothing in this shadow that fell around me in more ways than just a literal sense.

"Stop it, get away from me, stop it!" Then it was gone.

It was as if it had never even been there. The laughter, the crazed face, it was all gone. Now just the sound of my ragged breaths, my choking sobs, and a loud cry of frustration, because it was never there to begin with. I worked myself up over nothing, because all of these tragedies that had piled over my head was finally cracking the foundation I had built to hold them.

Oh, God, why?

I crumbled to the floor, so sick of everything. Sick of being weak, sick of being hunted, sick of everything being my fault, because Hell would always find me and take everything down in its path to get me. Even Joel.

"I'm sorry," I murmur, because I know that it was a terrible thing to think, and I should use everything left of my diminishing hope to believe that Joel is okay, but I don't, because I know I won't be. I was selfish, and hoped that maybe if he was up there, then I would once again be with him when I reached that place, too.

I slipped off, hoping that when I woke up, things would be different.

"Get up."

I could feel myself being moved and my eyes shot open, immediately squinted by a bright light. My body was being dragged to the end of the vehicle by the men and my arms ached from being forced into the same position for so long. By the looks of it, I hadn't been out for long, because the town still looked the same and the sun was still high in the sky.

Could Joel still be close?

"Enjoy your nap?" One of the men asked.

I just shot glares at all of them in return.

"Sure hope so, you'll be put under some...Shall we say, tests today."

My heart dropped. "What kind of tests?"

"Oh, you'll see in due time. You have quite the brain and body there, girly. We'd like to see just how far your immunity can go."

"You're sick," I spat. I felt like a lab rat.

"Oh, that's where you're wrong, my dear. We're trying to cure the sick ones here."

I just scoffed. I was so disgusted with these men. They were so brainwashed, thinking they were the good guys in this world, that they were the superior ones. Yet all they wanted was revenge. Revenge against me, because I had won their game so many times before. A constant game of cat and mouse, and they had finally lured me into their trap.

And I could just read the one thing they were so sure of all over their face.

That there would be Hell to pay.

"You keep on believing that," I already had it coming, why not get a little satisfaction from their anger.

"This one's got a little mouth on her, James." The man said, looking over to my previous captor.

"We can fix that," James replied smugly.

"Some light you are!" I was beyond angry. "I am the cure for mankind, and you treat me like I'm some sort of experiment you can do whatever you please with!"

"Shut you mouth!" James demanded. "Maybe if someone wasn't so hard to control, we wouldn't have to take such drastic measures."

"You don't deserve this. None of you! I am not someone that you can go decide their fate for!"

"Watch it!"

"You're no better than the infected!"

Crack.

"Not another word from you! You here me?"

"Fuck. You." I seethed venomously.

James pulled me off the ledge of the truck from my hair, pulling my ponytail so hard that I felt my hair would be torn from my scalp. "Do you here me?"

I could see the anger in his eyes, I could see the hate. He knew I was right, and he was having a hard time denying it. The poor bastard.

"Yes." I reluctantly uttered, because arguing would just earn me more and more punches.

From there I was roughly shoved forward, but didn't have to walk very far before we came to a large building with several stories. It was made of brick, and the windows were boarded up. Firefly insignia's were painted across the walls, and I thought it was a pretty stupid idea, considering that the Fireflies weren't on many good sides. The assholes were too proud, though.

James knocked a few times on the metal door, and it opened a few minutes later to reveal another Firefly. By the looks of it, they had been staying here for quite a while and there were six of them. I imagined they all split up on there way to track us down, just waiting for us to come across them.

Empty cans and glasses littered the coffee tables around the room, flies buzzing among them. The place had a much more rotten smell than what I would expect from the Fireflies, especially since they seemed to be used to a more luxurious way of living even in this unsanitary world. Then again, they probably didn't care to keep anything they used to work on sterile anymore, considering how much trouble I had caused them. The more painful, the better.

It wasn't as though I'd live to see diseases and illnesses that the equipment would give me, anyways.

"Why don't you just get this over with, huh? You've waited so long, what's stopping you?"

"Oh, you see, Ellie, you've proven to be a very strong little girl, both physically and mentally. We'd like to see just how strong you really are."

"What the Hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, don't worry. If we want to use this gift you have, we'd like to see how far this cure can go. In other terms, how immune you really are."

He couldn't mean- "You don't mean, you wouldn't-"

"Now, now, it's just for a bit of observation. We'd like to see what we're working with."

He started pulling me up the stairs, another man behind him, while the rest stood around the room completely content with themselves.

"I'm not some sort of specimen-You can't do this!"

"Struggling will just make it worse." The man didn't look the least bit disgusted in himself.

Once on the second floor he quite literally dragged me to one of the doors, that lead to a large room with a chain link fence set up around a good portion of the room.

"No, no, you can't do this!"

Surely he was going to at least untie me.

"No, you can't put me in there like this! You need me alive!" Panic was surging through me.

"Oh, we're keeping you alive, my dear. We won't let it get that far."

"No, let go of me, you can't do this!"

He was opening the gate, and I could hear the screech of the monster as though it was waiting for me this whole time.

"No, no, stop, no!" I pushed against James as much as I could to get out of the doorway, but he gave me a hard shove and I went stumbling into the cage.

My hands were tied behind my back, and my legs were shaking, and there's was absolutely no way out of here. The gurgling sounds of the runner only mere feet away from me and the low growls it let out brought me back to my senses. I didn't have my switchblade, my gun, not even my hands to defend myself. Just because I was immune, didn't mean I enjoyed being eaten alive.

I only had time to look around for a moment to see if there was anything I could use to defend myself before the runner was charging at me. Blood dripped from its mouth, pieces of skin dangling from its arms and legs, and it gave off a putrid aroma of rotting tissue.

"Agh," I grunted, stumbling backwards and tripping over a piece of wood, sending me falling backwards harshly. I didn't have time to recover, or even stand, because the infected was already on me.

Its hands reached for my face, scratching it with its nail-like claws, and I tried to crane my neck so that my face was out of its reach. I put my knees to my chest and then kicked my legs out, trying to put as much space between the runner and myself as I could. He was dumb enough to keep pushing forward, and I was able to keep one knee pressed against its chest while my other foot repeatedly kicked it in the face and neck.

I thought I was winning until my knee slipped for just one moment, allowing it to put all of its pressure on top of me, its mouth getting closer to my neck, chomping down on its jaw over and over, hoping the next time there would be flesh in between its teeth.

I rolled over, and tried to stand as quickly as I could. Blood was pouring down my face from the scratches, and I knew if I didn't get out of here soon that I'd have a third bite to scar my skin.

I didn't even notice that the gate had swung open and James had walked in until the loud sound of a gun pierced the air and the runner fell limp on top of me. I quickly kicked it off.

I could barely breath. I was so frightened, so panicked that I leaned over and heaved what little contents had been in my stomach. I couldn't imagine what could get worse than the situation I was in now.

"Well, I'll be. Aren't you something else?"

"I hope you rot in Hell," I couldn't put how disgusted, how much I loathed those men into those words, but it was enough to get across the message.

"It would seem this one hasn't learned her lesson." James looked from the other man standing in the doorway.

"Ah!" I cried out as his foot stomped down on my stomach, effectively knocking the air out of me.

Tears filled my eyes, and I felt so desperate. "Kill me now," I struggled out.

"That would be too easy."

"Why are you doing this?" I couldn't understand anymore. They had their revenge, they took everything away from me. What more could they want?

"What did I do?!" I was yelling now, "What do you want from me-"

"Everything is your fault!" James silenced me.

"All your damn fault. If it weren't for you-"

The man cut off, and swallowed hard.

"If it weren't for you, Marlene would still be here."

Then it hit me, Marlene was still dead, and she always would be, and I wasn't the only person who cared about her.

"You loved her," I mumbled, my jaw throbbing, and blood streamed over my lips.

"And you took her from me!" He was starting to look a bit hysterical.

"I never wanted Marlene dead!" He was so unstable it terrified me.

"It's all your fault!" He looked to his right, and picked up the piece of wood I had tripped over, picking it up.

I let out a shriek of surprise. "No!"

He lifted it up, ready to bring it down on my head, too ruined to realize what consequences would arise.

I closed my eyes just as he started to bring it down, expecting a sharp pain to follow, but none came. It felt like an eternity of anticipation, but I cracked open my eyes, to see him, just standing there, plank now below his head.

I stared wide-eyed, wondering what he was doing. He looked deep in thought, staring at the floor, and I took this as a chance to run out of the cage, but the other man caught me around the waist before I could get far.

"Do you hear that?" James asked, and I stopped struggling, now listening, too.

"James, it's the smuggler!" A man's voice called from downstairs, and it was so loud it felt like he was standing right next to us. Or maybe it was the relief that surged through my veins at the sound of Joel's nickname, being the only thing repeated in my head.

Joel was here.

It was too good to be true.

"Joel! Joel!" I kept calling and calling until he heard me.

"Ellie?!" I wanted to cry it was so good to hear his voice.

The chance that I would be able to see Joel and Earle just one more time was enough to keep me going.

"Joel!"

My captor's hand clamped over my mouth. "Take her to the operating room, she needs to be taught to keep her mouth shut. I'll take care of this."

I kept yelling for Joel, trying to warn him, get him to know who he was dealing with, but it was all muffled that I could barely hear it myself. I was brought to a room three doors down from the one we were in, and despite the aches all over my body my adrenaline kept me kicking.

The room was similar to the other; tiled floors, bolted windows, same foul smell. It was a lot brighter from the generator giving electricity to the lamps, and a medical chair along with a small table where rusted scalpels and needles lay sat in the center of the room.

I looked around nervously, not sure of my options, being tied up at the moment. Yet it was as if my prayers were answered, for the man started untying my hands, but kept me in his grip even after they were untied. He pushed me into the seat, and I knew he just planned to tie my hands to the arms of the chair, but I thought quick.

Biting the arm that was gripping my arm, I reached my other one over to the table, and after a bit of struggling, I had one of the scalpels in my hand. He whipped his arm around so fast that it knocked me from the chair and the scalpel out of my hand.

"You bitch!" He exclaimed, gripping his arm and stalking towards me.

"You're going to wish you had that cure now!" I told him, hoping the message that he was now infected would come across.

"You're going to pay. You have no idea how much trouble you've caused us." He spat coldly, ready to grab me, but I grabbed the scalpel from behind me and sunk it into his leg over and over.

When he had fallen to the ground whimpering, and I was sure he wouldn't be getting up anytime soon, I stood and bolted for the door. When I exited the room, it was deadly quiet. No yells, or footsteps, no moans of pain. Just my heavy breathing as I crept down the hall, my hand tightly gripping my only means of protection.

Had they gotten Joel? Wouldn't he be yelling for me? Wouldn't Earle?

I came to the stairway, and could see bodies and blood littering the floor, but no sign of Joel, no Earle, no James. No anybody alive.

I silently walked down the stairs, shaking and ready to throw up all over again, but I kept silent. When I reached the last step, I peered around the corner still find nothing, but a bloody mess.

Then arms came around me, and I screamed and thrashed, but a hand grabbed mine that held the scalpel, and that hand had a watch, and it couldn't-no it couldn't be.

"Hey, hey, it's me, it's me, don't worry, it's me."

"Joel?" I asked, turning my head to see his face. A few bruises covered it and he had a cut on his lip, but he was there and his eyes were warm and full of concern.

"Joel," I asked again, this time it was silent, and choked, but I couldn't help but break down.

"It's me, it's me, Baby Girl, it's me." He looked so relieved, and I felt so relieved, too.

He took me into his arms, and I gripped him for dear life, not believing he was here and okay, and that I might not be okay ever again, but right now all that mattered was him being here.

"He was going to, they put me in a cage...with a runner...I was tied up..."

"Oh, Baby Girl, they can't hurt you anymore." I knew by now Joel was feeling anger like no other, because he was shaking, and his eyes grew dark, but he just continued to hold me.

"Where's Earle?" I asked, and looking around, not seeing him there, the answer was loud and clear.

"Ellie..." Joel started, but I just shook my head, not wanting him to go on.

"No, he can't be, no, Joel, no," I howled in grief. I couldn't understand why the world was so cruel.

"I'm so sorry," Joel's voice was cracking, and I knew this was affecting him just as much. Earle fit, and now without him, things would feel empty.

"Why?" Why did the world hate us. Why did my "gift" cause more trouble than what it was worth?

He took my face into his hands, wiping away some tears, blood being smeared away as well. "Ellie, Ellie listen to me."

I just shook my head, too choked up to say anything.

"Ellie, listen, don't you worry, we're going to be okay." Joel told me, and it was just another lie, but I gave into the false comfort for once.

"We're gonna be okay," He told me, and we still had a ways to go, and more Fireflies to run from, and more nightmares to endure, and God, Hell to pay.

But we would lie to ourselves.

And we would be okay.

AN: Wow, um, hi, guys.

Woooo, that chapter was intense for me to write. To be honest, I really had to step out of my comfort zone to write some of those scenes, and almost didn't think I could do it, but I did. I think as a writer, it's always good to challenge yourself, and a write a bit over the line of comfort, because it helps you grow and improve, and see what you like to write, and what you don't. I have found that despite my love for writing a lot of emotional things, I also like building suspense. I'm very thankful that I'm able to experience that as I write this story.

Thank you all for your kind words throughout this story. It has kept me going and given me so much encouragement, and I really love hearing what you all think of my writing and this story.

I had a difficult time making this decision, but I knew from the start that I was going to kill off Earle, despite how much I love his character, and how much I will miss writing him. I even hinted a bit in my last chapter that someone was at least hurt when Ellie heard a cry of pain, but a lot of you and my friends ended up thinking it was Joel instead.

Things probably won't be light for a while in this story, but I'll try to keep the feels to a minimum, because these last chapters have been crazy intense, but I'm pretty sure Ellie won't be very stable for a bit.

Also, sorry this chapter is up a bit later than usual, I tried to get it out yesterday, but I was just feeling too sick to do anything. I'm feeling a bit better today, and decided I didn't want you all to wait any longer, so I hope it was worth it.

Please let me know what you think, and stay tuned for chapter fourteen.