The incinerator was the worst job in the QZ, in Joel's opinion. The idea that you were tossing fellow humans into the flames got old after a while, that much was true. Just a few days in the QZ would teach anyone that nothing was permanent in an apocalypse. You could be friends with someone one day, then the next you might be dumping them into the pit. It was the shoveling of the ashes after that really got to him, the dust lodged in your throat, and your nose and it was a smell that just never got completely out of clothes and hair. He worked alone, fitting in wherever there was an opening, trying to make as many cards as possible. The only person he had in the world was his brother Tommy, and even Tommy had left him.

While Joel had gradually succumbed to the hardness of the world around him over the years, finding the only way to deal with the horrors of the collapsing world was to bury all emotions and feelings, and become a hard, chiseled flint of a man, Tommy had hoped for better things, denounced the wickedness of the fend-for-himself lifestyle in the QZ, and had set out with some of the Fireflies. Joel kept in contact with his brother, but neither could be convinced to come to the other side.

It was dawn when Joel made his way outside, the curfew having ended a couple hours ago. He shoved his hands into his jacket pocket and made his way toward the town center, where he could see the smoke already starting to billow. The fires had already been lit and the trucks from the hospital would be arriving soon. He breathed deeply of the last fresh air he would have today, and fished in his pocket for the handkerchief he would wear around his face to block Cordyceps spores and ash. It was a warm day already, and he wasn't looking forward to sweating the whole day at the pit.

"Morning, Joel," a soldier greeted him, as he strode into the square where the firepit was already burning. Joel nodded, tying on his handkerchief, He wasn't a small talker, and any references to good mornings were long in his past. It would never be a good morning again, as far as he was concerned.

"Got a new group today," the soldier was saying to the other workers. "Ryan and Tess are going to handle unloading with Joel and Matt today. You four are on shovel duty, and those three are on fueling the fire. Focus, no slacking, we have a few extra trucks today, a group came in from Philadelphia, all infected. Get to it."

Joel had not seen a woman working the pit before, but as he studied what he could see of her over her handkerchief mask, he remembered seeing her in the gun shop a few times, usually categorizing ammunition or stocking shelves. Once she was part of the food distribution and he tried to remember her face at that time. He remembered a stoic woman, not beautiful by magazine standards, but steady, and rugged. He wasn't struck by her particularly for his own interest, but he had seen many of the soldiers eyeing her hungrily. There weren't many single women in the QZ and the few that there were usually had their own group of guys that looked out for them in return for favors. The disillusionment of the world to accept things it once found repulsive was a thought not unfamiliar to Joel, but one that he truly no longer cared about. It was just about getting through the day without dying, waking up every twenty four hours and doing it all over again. It was a penance, in his own mind, for the way he failed his daughter. Had he thought it through more, not pushed into enemy territory, just fucking ran when the soldier first saw them, maybe they could have made it.

Every day he thought of her.

And every day he tied on his mask and shoveled human remains in penance for ever caring about anyone.

And he promised he would never care again.

He had been unloading bodies for several hours from the hospital trucks, and so had the woman named Tess, working with the man called Ryan on a different truck. Joel was definitely a loner, grim, quiet, and didn't talk to anyone. They had caught each other's eye a couple times, and he could clearly see the weariness in her face, along with a determination that he truly understood. The determination to not fucking die. To not fucking care. It was a gruesome job, but it was life. Everything about life sucked now, there wasn't much cheer to go around. Fuck those Fireflies and their idea of looking for the light. What fucking light? The light of the flames that burned their fellow humans to ash?

Joel became lost in thought, and was not paying attention to his surroundings, just pick up a body, dump into the fire, over and over, until a sudden commotion broke his concentration. When he looked around, he saw Tess was on the ground, being pummeled in the face by a soldier. Ryan stood akimbo nearby, his face obscured with his own handkerchief, but he made no move to help. Joel grunted in frustration and stepped in, holding up a hand, and yelling, 'Hey, she's mine, she's with me, lay off, I'll handle it."

"Well, keep her fucking in line," the soldier bellowed at Joel. "When the truck needs unloaded, she unloads it. No questions, no smart mouth, no backtalk. Got it?!"

"Got it, got it," Joel nodded quickly, appeasing. "I'll make sure next time, you have my word."

"You better," the soldier replied, giving the woman a parting kick with his steel toed boots. Joel reached a hand to help her up, but she didn't take it, choosing to get to her feet herself, spitting blood from a bleeding lip, and holding her side where she was kicked.

"You good?" Joel asked gruffly, rubbing a grimy arm across his forehead.

"Yeah," she grunted, watching the soldier pulling another man from the group over to unload the truck with her previous partner. "Guess I just lost my job, the fucker."

"You're with me now," Joel rumbled, jerking his head toward the truck he was unloading. "Unless you wanna go home, and not get paid today. Let's go."

Wordlessly, she shuffled over to the truck and worked beside him the rest of the day. They didn't speak to each other again until quitting time.

They went through the line to get their ration cards, and walked away into the milling crowd. "You good?" Joel asked once they were far enough away from the other workers. He paused, looking back, studying her face. "You need to get that cleaned up. You look like shit."

"It's nothing," she grumbled, starting to wander off, her head down. "Feels like shit," she muttered, barely loud enough for Joel to hear.

Joel hesitated, hands on his hips, looking at the dirty street at his feet, and made up his mind. "You got somewhere to go, somewhere safe?" he called after her.

She paused, silent for a moment. "I'll be fine, man. Let it go."

"Not what I asked."

"I'll be fine. I was staying with Ryan's group, but kinda lost that shit back there when I got kicked off his fucking team. I'll find a place."

"Come on," Joel grunted, walking away, hands in his jacket pockets.

"Where?" She asked, suspiciously, eyes narrowed.

"My place," Joel replied, not looking back. "You can stay down here if you want and take your chances with the fucking streets and rats that live down here, or you can come to my place and have a decent bed, and shower, and not have to keep eyes open in the back of your head."

"What do you get out of it?" She asked, a slight nervousness in her voice. He winced a little. It was a fair question. It wasn't uncommon for the male workers to let women stay with them to give them a safe place to keep off the streets where the lowlifes hung out, but it was always at a cost. A cost of something that was the only thing that the unlucky women had to give. His stomach turned slightly, and he called back, "I'm not that kind of guy, Tess. If you want a safe place to sleep, let's go. Curfew's almost on and you don't have time to go prowling for a place to go."

He continued walking, listening for her, and after a moment, she started following him. Down the alleys, through the shortcuts, and up stairs to his apartment in the middle of an abandoned building, she followed. It wasn't much of a place, but he would share it. Better than her staying on the streets and getting attacked or killed or worse. He had come across some old abandoned buildings in his time in the QZ and it was pretty clear what kind of horrors had gone on there. It was amazing how just a few years of chaos could descend humanity into its basest, vilest level of instincts. He was numb to it all now, but there was something about Tess that had poked at the soft part of his heart. Well he couldn't leave her on the fucking street, could he?

He unlocked the door, and walked in, waiting until she walked in after him, then he shut the door. She looked around for a moment wordlessly, while he went to get the meager first aid box that he kept in the kitchen, and a clean cloth.

"You. Sit."

She did not argue and sat down at the table, and he slid into a chair across from her, setting to work cleaning her bruised face, wiping away the dried blood. "You don't have to do this," she muttered, wincing as he wiped at her lip.

"Would you have rather I let that soldier beat your face in?" Joel's face was tense, his eyes reflecting a burning protectiveness that made Tess feel both safe and uncomfortable. He had morals, this strange man. He had immediately stepped in to help her, even if there was no reason for him to. He didn't know her at all, and she made it a practice to not get to know other people. Ryan had tried to extract certain favors from her when she had first joined the team and she immediately broke his nose, prompting the guys in his alliance to treat her like one of them. She could hold her own, on most days, but today, she had been vulnerable, weak, and she had paid for it with her blood.

"Earth to you," Joel rumbled, waving a broad hand in front of her face. "Hey."

"Sorry, was thinking," she muttered, looking away from those deep eyes.

"So what should I call you? Got a preferred name?" Joel asked, dripping some antiseptic onto the cloth and wiping at the raw skin. She hissed and pulled away, and he reached out a hand, cupping it behind her head to keep her still. "Sorry, I know it hurts, it will just be a minute longer, almost done."

"Just Tess," she grunted through the stinging pain, eyes squeezed shut. "That's it."

"Joel," he replied, nodding once. "Just Joel. Nice to meet you, Tess."

"Likewise," she replied, still breathing unevenly from the pain. He dropped the cloth and snapped the first aid kit shut, glancing over her face again. "What? Is my face that bad?"

His eyebrows flickered upward. "It'll heal." he replied evenly. "Your ribs alright?"

"They're fine," she replied, instinctively wrapping an arm around her side. "Bruised, nothing's broken. It'll be fine in a few days."

He nodded, accepting her word. "Want some soup? Campbells chicken and noodle, nothing fancy, but at least you won't be hungry."

"I - I really shouldn't. I should go."

"Eat first, then decide if you want to go. Curfew's on and it's your game if you want to get your self shot." Joel stood and laid a hand on her shoulder companionably in passing. She flinched violently, and he half turned to face her, jerking his hand away, brows furrowed. She looked at his concerned face, then at the floor.

"Somebody done something to you to make you feel like you got to be all jumpy like that?" he asked flatly.

She couldn't meet his gaze, picking at a thread on her jacket. "Oh, you know how it is. Times are hard, some men act like they've never seen a woman before."

Joel's chin lifted but he didn't say anything else, simply moved to the kitchen where he was busy opening cans and heating the contents in a small pan. Tess walked around the small space, looking over everything, deducing what she could tell from the small space. Joel was a loner, without many hobbies, or Knick knacks, indicating he was gone most of the time. "You work a lot?" she called from the living room.

Joel grunted in the kitchen, a non committal answer.

She sighed. He was a strange man.

Joel brought two steaming bowls to the table, and sat down, dropping two spoons onto the table with a clank. "Your dinner, madam."

Tess smirked at his sense of humor and sat down across from him, taking down the soup eagerly. It had been some time since she had eaten something this nice, and Joel watched her for a moment, his eyes soft. "Slow down. There's plenty."

"This is slow," she muttered, examining a bit of chicken before conveying it to her mouth. "This is fucking good."

"I take it you don't get Campbell's very often."

"Nope," she replied, between bites. "Ryan's group was more into drinking and spending cards on drugs. Didn't think about me very much. So I had to take matters into my own hands if I wanted to eat. Had to start running supplies, but it paid well and I could eat."

"You're a smuggler?" Joel asked quietly, fixing her with an intense stare.

She gulped, cursing herself internally at how comfortable she had gotten with this man so quickly. Why the hell would she tell him she was a smuggler! That was a crime punishable by death. Her face paled considerably, and Joel had compassion on her, leaning his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers.

"I am too," he admitted. "Mostly in drugs and supplies. If you want to stay, we could be a team."

"How do I know I can trust you?" she asked suspiciously, eying him cautiously.

Joel leaned back, resting a chin on his palm. "Ryan gets his drugs every two weeks on Friday's, usually oxys, sometimes hydros, depending on what can be found. Usually whacks out on them the first night, then paces himself the rest of the time until he gets the next bunch. You never see the transactions because he always leaves the group during the offender hangings, or when the supply truck is being unloaded in the square. I know, because I am the guy delivering them. Deliver to some soldiers too, although they pay more and better cards. Those nights you are left to go hungry because he's passed out in oblivion, so you had to start going out on your own if you wanted to eat. You've managed to keep from getting caught, so you must be fucking good at it."

Tess's face lifted proudly. "You're fucking right."

Joel nodded, satisfied, returning to eating his soup. Tess had already finished hers, and he wordlessly pushed the kettle toward her. "Some left, eat it, no fridge, so can't keep it."

"But you-"

"Eat it," Joel replied, his tone leaving no room for argument. "If you're going to stick around, then let's get one thing straight. If I offer you something, take it. I offered cause I mean it. Non-negotiable."

Meekly, Tess nodded, turning her attention to the remaining soup. Joel's face softened again as he watched her. "You're welcome to take the bed. I can take the couch. And you're welcome to stay as long as you want. It's just me, no one else around to bother you. Shower in the back. Not hot water, but its water."

Tess was eating slower now, as the edge had been taken off her hunger, and she considered. "I'll stay. Do you want me to work with you out there, and with the smuggling runs?"

"Works for me. Either one pays, and that's all I'm interested in."

"Deal."

He nodded. "Deal." He was silent for a moment as they finished eating. "You want to talk about what happened out there at the truck that got your face pummeled in today?"

She was silent for a moment, then turned her face away from him. "There was - there was the body of a kid in the truck. About seven or eight. I - I just couldn't pull him out and dump him in the pit. He was so young, so innocent. Just a fucking child."

Joel winced slightly. He hated those too, but they were just bodies. He wasn't throwing a living child into the incinerator. There was nothing he could do for them except keep the infection from spreading. So he had long ago stopped caring. His kid was gone, and it really didn't bother him if someone else's was too. Welcome to the shit show, world, where little kids die and never get a fucking chance to have a life and fulfil their dreams.

"First time working the hospital trucks?" he asked almost kindly. She shook her head, face averted.

"No. Just first time pulling out a kid. It - it was just a little boy, and for a moment..." her voice trailed off. Joel nodded once.

"You've lost someone then, somewhere along the line."

"Yeah." She turned to face him, taking a deep, steadying breath. "My- when the infection started, my husband and son became ill. We had tried to prevent infection if possible, but somehow, something went wrong and it happened anyway. I - I had to shoot my husband in the head, it was horrible." For a moment, her face crumpled slightly with emotion, and Joel swallowed hard, looking down at the table. It did something to him to see a woman cry, and he took a breath through his nose to calm his nerves. He hadn't killed Sarah, but he couldn't have imagined looking at that little face and snuffing out the light in those expressive eyes.

He didn't blame Tess for balking, but he couldn't find enough sympathy to tell her that, the cynicism drowning out all other feelings.

"I had to shoot him," she continued, a little stronger. "And my son, he was sick too. I had been out helping the neighbors board up their houses and when I came in, he came at me. Joel, I -" She squeezed her eyes shut. "I couldn't kill my child, Joel. I - I ran from him and locked him in the basement and fled. Started hiking, and ended up here in Boston. I - I just couldn't kill my son. He's probably still out there somewhere, probably a clicker by now, if someone hasn't killed him already."

Joel nodded silently. He understood. More than she knew.

"Well, I'm going to get some rest," Joel rumbled, standing. "Bedroom's through there, just kind of in the back corner there, there's no door, I'm sorry."

Tess laughed, a slightly hysterical sound. Joel was a good man, worrying about a door for privacy for her, in the middle of a fucking apocalypse. "Joel," she murmured. "Come to bed. It's better than sleeping on the fucking couch and I'm not fucking scared of you."

Joel's eyebrows raised at that statement and he shrugged. "Whatever the lady wants."

She rolled her eyes at him, and he realized he had missed this. Human interaction, banter. Maybe there were some damn bright spots in the world still.

They showered separately, and were tucked into bed merely a half hour later. Joel climbed in bed, scooting all the way to one side, letting Tess have the most of the bed. It was odd, this sharing a bed, after several years of being alone. Tommy used to share it with him, but once he left, it became Joel's bachelor pad.

"You lost anyone," she asked softly, staring up at the ceiling.

Joel's jaw clenched. "My daughter. The day the infection started in our town. Soldiers shot her when we were trying to escape because she had been injured. They didn't even try to see if she was alright. Just started shooting."

He fell silent, and for a moment, he thought she had fallen asleep.

Then from the darkness, "I'm sorry, Joel."

Joel swallowed hard, closing his eyes. "Me too."

"Thanks for stepping in today, and saving me."

"Welcome."

She turned toward him, a mere shadow in the darkness. "Joel."

"Yep."

"Goodnight."

He grunted a response, turning away from her onto his side.

He didn't do good mornings, and he definitely didn't do good nights.