I hadn't realized that we both fell asleep in that helicopter. I guess we were both so relieved that we had found the right sutures that it caused us to formally relax. A single gunshot made us open our eyes. It wasn't Joel behind that single gunshot.
"Enid, we gotta get back to Joel!" Ellie cried, raising up quickly to put the kit in her backpack. "Oh shit, you're right." I say, quickly getting to my knees. I jump out of the helicopter first and into the snow below. Ellie jumps out next and landed on her knees. "Ellie!" I say, coming back to her. "I'm fine. I'm fine." she said, pushing herself back up to her feet. There was no time to waste; we had to get a move on.
We jogged down another corridor where an old record store was sitting in front of us. As cool as that sounds, we didn't have time to gaze around for any cool old music. Ellie jumped over a short wall and I followed behind her.
The second we get on the other side, the sound of both hunters and clickers filled the air. "Oh shit. Behind here." Ellie whispered, getting behind another short wall. I hide with her and let the fighting commence between the hunters and clickers.
"What's goin' on?" I ask in a low whisper, unable to see by the wall. "They're killing each other." Ellie replies in a low voice. Then, two seperate bows slid over to us and we instantly took them so we could do our stealth kills from afar.
I pulled back the string on the bow and it was in sturdy condition. "What the hell?" One hunter says. "Just relax." Another says quietly. Another yelled from the other side, indicating that there was at least three there.
"What the hell are we doing here? Who gives a fuck about that old man and two little girls?" the second man says, making me freeze. Ellie glances back at me with the same shocked look as me. The hunters know we're here.
"The sooner we find them the sooner we get outta here. Make sure this area's clear." the first hunter tells his friends. They told each other where to check meaning that it would give Ellie and I the chance to take them out one by one.
Ellie and I carefully crouch walked our way into the record store without those motherfuckers noticing us. My heart was beating out of my chest like a drum against my ribcage. These guys were gonna kill us if they found us. So we can't leave any of them alive.
I crept behind one guy who was wearing a dirty green winter coat with my knife drawn, the blade out. I use my strength to jump on the fucker and I stab him in the eye from behind. He, of course, yells out from the sudden pain but I quickly stab him in his throat with the blade pushed all the way in.
The guy gurgled from choking on his own blood before falling dead. I hear Ellie take out another guy by jumping on him and stabbing him multiple times in his chest. Since she was at the other end of the store, I couldn't see her from where I was at.
Just then, I see an arrow fly into the final guys head, killing him instantly. Afterwards, Ellie and I catch up with one another. "We're coming to get you Joel. These guys want a fight, let's fucking give them one, Enid." Ellie tells me, picking some bullets up from the guys that we just killed.
"Fuck yes. Let's stitch Joel up and then get the hell out of here." I reply, taking a few arrows from another dead guy. Ellie agrees with me on this. We've overstayed our welcome in this place. I didn't want to come here to begin with.
There was an air duct that was big enough for the two of us to crawl through. There was a trail of old blood on the walls and it went into the air duct. Ellie goes first with me right behind her.
"Agh, which way?" Ellie mumbles, trying to figure a way out of this. These were a long tunnel of mazes. We continued to follow the blood. It had come to a stop to a dead body just sitting at the end of the air duct. It had an arm missing; just like the hand that we saw back in the courtyard.
We moved forwards and head downwards into another clothing shop. We were both met instantly with clickers but were lucky to hide from them. "Anyone check in here?" a hunter says from a distance. "Oh fuck these guys." Ellie whispered. "Getting fucking tired of them." I say in a whisper.
Then, an idea sparked in my head. I did pay attention to what Ellie said about the infected and the hunters killing each other back there. I quietly picked up a stray brick that was where we were.
"Ellie, I got an idea." I tell her, having her turn around to face me. "What?" she said intrigued. "They don't know we're here. Let's throw the bricks or bottles to get them to kill each other?" I suggest. She quickly glances over the edge a small bit.
"Yeah, let's do it. Plus, it'll make things easier for us." Ellie said, picking up a brick of her own. With one more look, we toss our bricks over at the hunters. "Who the fuck did that?" one said. Then there was the loud sound of both gunshots and the snarls of the infected as they were biting the hunters. Everyone was dead except for Ellie and I.
"That was a good idea, Enid. With that technique, we'll surely make it back to Joel before anything else happens." Ellie says, searching around the store. "Aren't you glad that I'm with you? Surely you would never come up with that idea of your own." I replied, teasing her. "Oh hardy har." she chuckles, "Let's look around."
I do so by looking through some old drawers by one of those things where people would put money in for safe keeping. There was another pair of scissors, a quarter of a bottle of alcohol, and some single bullets for our pistols.
We then left the store and made it into another hallway where our way to Joel was right there in front of us. Unfortunately, that would be considered the easy way because it was blocked off by another one of those heavy metal gates. Neither of us could squeeze through it.
"So close. We need another way around." Ellie tells me. "How about through there?" I say, pointing up to some rubble with a ledge that we could climb through. "Okay, let's do it." Ellie replies, seeing the entry too.
I climbed up on it first to see what was on the other side. It was another store from the looks of it. I turn back around and help Ellie over. We drop down into the store.
The second we do, we ended up coming across a shit ton of infected. We let out a gasp at the amount on the other side of this store. The two of us crouch down immediately and hide behind a wall on the lower part of the store.
Just then, hunters also appeared through a sliding door. Ellie grabbed my freezing bare hand and pulled me back from view. I found another stray bottle next to my foot and I picked it up. Looking at Ellie, she was holding one too. We both had the same idea.
"Hey. What'd you guys find outside?" one hunter asks. "Not a damn thing." another says. "How do we know they're here?" a third guy asks. They were getting closer to us. "We walked around this entire place. There's horse tracks leading in, none coming out. They're here." the first guy replies. That's when we throw the bottles across the room.
It instantly got the infected's attention and they went after the hunters. Ellie and I listened as the fuckers were killing each other. Just as we wanted.
The infected were all down but a couple of the hunters were still alive. We both kill them with our arrows. "Okay, that's all of them." Ellie says. "Good. We need to get out of here." I reply, looking around for supplies. I find some bullets from the hunters as well as arrows.
There was a large gaping hole in the ceiling so we went up through there and was met with another garage door. I lifted up the door wide enough for Ellie to get through. Once she does, she holds the door open for me and I get through.
We were back at the same statue that held a bow and arrow pointed at the ceiling. It was a sign that we were going the right way. We took a left and were instantly met with a dead guy that had at least 6 arrows laying with him.
Ellie handed me three and she took three to hold us over. "Hey! I hear the fuckin' horse behind here! Help me get this open." a hunter says, his voice echoing. "Yeah, yeah. We'll get the door. You guys keep searching. I don't want to get ambushed." another says. Ellie and I glance at each other for a minute.
"Ellie, they're gonna get him." I whisper to her. "Oh man, we gotta do something. Fast." she replies, taking out her pistol and she reloaded it. "I got your back." I tell her, wielding my bow and arrow.
"Right, we stick together. No one's gonna get Joel while we're here." Ellie replies, taking me by my hand. Ellie takes one hunter down with her bow and arrow, making him fall dead instantly. "Get those kids and find the old man. I'll go for the door." the first hunter says, trying his damndest to bust the lock.
Ellie and I hugged the wall that was next to the edge and we both took out the fucker who was messing with the lock. We had to make it downstairs. There was no time to lose. "Shit! Those girls are out here! What about the old man?" a hunter yells. "I don't know. Keep an eye out." his friend says.
We made it to another room and hid behind another wall. I was trailing a bit behind Ellie and didn't hear anything from behind us. "There you are, you little shit!" a guy growls, running up to Ellie and I. I end up getting grabbed by the fucker with his arm around my neck. Ellie immediately hears this and comes to save me.
"Get off of her, you fuck!" she yells, stabbing the guy in the neck. He lets go of me and I back up with a set of coughs. "Are you okay?" Ellie asks me. "Yeah, yeah I'm good." I reply, crouching down.
"I'll take the door! You find those girls!" another hunter directs, hitting the padlock. We are then ambushed by two others, who were carrying molotovs. Before they could throw them, Ellie and I quickly moved out of the way just as they hit the ground.
I raise up with my gun and shoot the man in between his eyes, killing him instantly. Ellie takes on the other one with her gun. Afterwards we moved down a set of stairs while staying crouched because there were two more guys still down there.
Ellie puts a bullet into the fucker that was trying to break the padlock, shooting him in the back of the head. I take his friend out with my gun and kill him by shooting him in the eye. Those were the last ones.
"That's that." Ellie sighs, standing up straight. "Hopefully that's all of them." I say, looking around the plaza. "It better be. Let's get to Joel." Ellie replies, bending down to unlock the door.
Suddenly, a loud gunshot made both of us jump. Someone had shot at us. Ellie takes my hand and we hide behind a large crate. "Down there! By the door!" a hunter yells. "Fuck you!" Ellie and I yell in sync. I look at Ellie for a minute before reloading my pistol. "Fine, they want to do this? Let's fucking do this." Ellie says, making a run for it to get behind cover again. I don't hesitate to follow.
"Those girls are heading for the stairs!" Another guy informs. We got behind the stairs and kept out of sight. Ellie peeked from the corner and told me that she didn't see any guys on this floor which sent chills up my spine. "They might be upstairs." I whisper to her.
Ellie doubted that and threw a nail bomb out in the open. It drew the attention of at least 5 guys. When they got about 3 feet from it, the bomb exploded, killing every single one of them. "They're down here!" another guy yelled.
"Oh fuck." Ellie scowled under her breath"How many bullets do you got left?" "About 6. You?" I ask, holding my pistol tightly in my hands. "About the same. Let's show these fuckers who they're messing with." Ellie replied, determined to get through this. "I'm right there with you." I nod, ready to fight.
We got from behind cover and began having a shootout with the remaining fuckers, who were shooting at us. Our limited amount of ammo managed to kill every single one of these guys, including some infected that showed up at the last minute. There were a total of 10 men and 5 infected.
Once everybody was down, we started to pick up their left over supplies. With a huff, Ellie shouts, "That's it. If anyone's alive, don't even think about surprising us!" "If you do, you will end up like your fucking friends. You hear us? Yeah?" I shout, giving a warning to any ear who would be listening.
"Okay, I think we're good." Ellie pants, kneeling down to unlock the door. Once it was open, we immediately got inside and shut the door behind us. Joel was in the same position as we left him in.
He was still breathing which relieved Ellie and I. She takes the health kit out of her back pack and gets those sutures out. "You do this, Ellie. I don't know how this is done." I tell her, kneeling next to her.
"Okay, I've done this before. I'm kind of an expert-ish." she breathed, holding the needle and thread in her hands. I see that her hands start to shake a bit. She was nervous about this. I put my hand over hers to calm her down. "Just stay calm. You got this." I tell her softly. She looked at me for a moment and grinned some.
Ellie stitches Joel's wound up as good as she could get it. After that, I help her tie him down to a makeshift sled with blankets to keep him covered. We then tie him to Callus and mount the horse with Ellie in front. I stay behind her with my arms around her waist. We glance back at Joel for just a moment before looking at each other and give each other a nod. Then, Ellie gets Callus to move and we walk back into the cold, snowy outside.
We weren't out of the woods yet. Joel was still in dire need of our help. We're not going to give up on him. We can't give up on him.