The Last of Us

First to Die

Chapter 1

The snow was coming down hard and fast for the two travellers when shelter finally came into view. It loomed large over them, somehow appearing less inviting than the blizzard raging on around them. They looked to each other, both thinking the same thing but both taking a different stance on the subject. In the end, it was the elder of the two that spoke first. The snow was crusting up his beard and the thick leather jacket pulled tight around him was doing sweet FA to keep out the bitter winds at bay and his hands were borderline blue. There was no point trying to hide his shivers and chattering teeth. They were both in the same position and yet still, his stubbornness was holding.

"Absolutely no fucking way!" The girl that was with him turned around, a look of annoyance on her frozen features.

"Joel, there's nothing else for miles around!" she protested, having to shout to be heard over the howling wind. "We can't make it back to Jackson like this! The sun's going down fast and we'd freeze to death before we built a shelter!"

"Oh, and this qualifies as shelter?" he snapped. "Look at it, Ellie! Half the roof looks caved in! It looks like there was a fire there!"

"Then there should be no problem with us starting one!" With that, she marched towards the door and went to draw her pistol. Even the grip was mercilessly cold against her skin and she expertly took cover against the doorframe as she saw Joel hurrying to catch up. The door was already caved in. Clearly this place had come under some kind of attack. But the damage was old. This had happened some years ago. That meant they had to be ready for anything.

After a few seconds, she shouldered her way in and slipped inside. She drew her switchblade from her back pocket and flicked it open, holding it in a reverse grip position to balance out the fact that she only had her pistol. The house was massive. She didn't know much about the house market from before the apocalypse, but this had to be what qualified as a mansion. That was okay. They didn't have to explore all of it. They just had to make sure there were no infected or spores in a room they could secure and find some canned food to tide them through the night. The storm would hopefully be over by then. If they had to trudge through even more snow and ice the next day, that was fine. Their only concern was not having to deal with the killer blizzard outside.

Luck was on their side and they found no infected or spores in the living room. It was a spacious area and there was plenty of furniture to secure the doors with. Ellie put her weapons away, pulled down the hood on her hoodie- the only small mercy of the otherwise useless protection of her torn up coat and thin fabric hoodie- and set her backpack down before stretching out. She walked over to the fireplace and took a look. The old gas fire had been ripped out. It didn't look like the gas line had been active there for some time. Only the cavernous alcove of the original fireplace remained. Perfect. Now all they had to do was find something that would burn. That shouldn't be too hard.

"Better check the chimney before we start something up." Joel reasoned as he clasped his hands together and breathed out into them to try and warm up. "Last thing we need is to find there's a wasp nest up there or something." Ellie nodded and grabbed the flashlight off her backpack, shrugging her jacket and hoodie off to manoeuvre more easily and aimed her light up there.

"I can't see shit." She let out a sigh and slid out, looking around for something to use. The room was very modern, but with a few old-timey touches that stuck out in a way that she couldn't decide whether she liked or not but was also certain that it didn't matter anyway since she didn't live there. But there was something in the corner that looked promising. "Hey, what's that? Can we use that?" Joel stopped trying to warm his hands long enough to see what she was pointing to.

"Well ain't that an unusual piece." His voice was little more than a frozen mutter. "That's a collapsible curtain hook. Yeah, that should work." Ellie didn't need any more encouragement. She walked over and grabbed it, working out how it folded down to get it into the fireplace. Eventually she worked out that she had to twist the segments rather than just pushing and managed it pretty easily before getting ready to angle it into position.

"Hey, how hilarious would it be if I jabbed this up there and Santa fell down in a plume of soot and ash and just looked at us both angrily just like 'Nobody. Saw. Anything!' and then just gets up and storms off?" Ellie laughed as she jammed the curtain pole up into the chimney and started probing around.

"You believe in Santa?" Joel asked dubiously as he sat down on the sofa in the corner and started furiously rubbing his hands together. "Oh god, I'm feeling my age now."

"One of the few things the places I was dumped in did was make sure we kids had a Christmas." Ellie replied through gritted teeth as soot started falling. She tried to avoid it getting in her mouth and wished she had something she could put over her face. Syphoning petrol was one thing but the one time she'd accidentally got soot in her mouth as a kid had been the single worst taste in living memory. It wasn't something she was keen to go through again. "They were all around before the Cordycepts so they didn't see why kids who'd lost so much should also lose their childhoods. It worked. To an extent."

"Huh." Joel murmured as he leaned back and started to relax. "That's actually kinda refreshing to hear." Ellie instantly picked up on the softness of his tone. Something was definitely wrong.

"Joel?" She rolled out from the fireplace as a torrent of soot came down and narrowly avoided staining her skin and clothes black as the ace of spades. She barely even noticed. "Oh, shit! Joel!" She ran over to him and grabbed his hand. It was beyond freezing. Quickly, she pressed two fingers to his neck. His pulse was low and sluggish. "Ah, fuck! Okay, what is there for hypothermia? Thinking on her feet, she ran over to her discarded jacket and hoodie and threw them over him. Next, she looked around for something that might burn. There were books in a bookcase in the corner. They would do the trick. She started grabbing them quickly, tearing pages out and bundling them in. Next, she grabbed what looked like an old cigar box. It was old and the wood looked brittle enough. The lid tore off pretty easily and she threw it in before discarding the rest of the box to cannibalise bits from later and packing the paper around it. Now she just needed something to light it with. "Come on, come on!" She ran a hand through her hair as she searched around for something that might work, pulling drawers out and rummaging through cupboards. "You have a fucking cigar box and no lighter?" Then a thought crossed her mind. Maybe there were matches in the cigar box. If that was what it was for, they would have needed something to light up with. But when she looked back at the box, she realised there actually weren't any cigars in it. It was a keepsake box. Among the discarded possessions that were inside, there was an old family photo. Ellie picked it up and took it out, turning it over in her hands. It was old and faded. She didn't recognise most of the people in there. It was a full family. A mother, a father and four kids. All of them were black and one of them was a four-year-old that looked somewhat familiar. Unfortunately the face was too faded to make out. But there was one face that definitely was well known to her. A scowling teenager standing off to the side of the rest of the group. The dots connected instantly in her head as the recognition came into pure, crystal-clear focus. The name that entered her head shocked her so much was the only thing her mind could process in that instant.

'Marlene?'

Author's Note: Hope you enjoyed the first chapter. Please feel free to review and let me know what you think.