Chapter 12: Into the Fire

A/N-Remember when Devlin had those jars of human eyeballs in his office? Well... enjoy. :)

"Okay, we all know what we are doing, right?" Joel had reassured the both of them with the best hopeful facial expression he could muster. "Yeah?"

His plan was not much, hell if you can call it a plan at all. What they were supposed to do was make the trade, Carter for Claire and Rylan, and when the transaction was done, they would ambush them on their way back to their compound. It wasn't much, but they had to do with what they had. They just had to make sure that everything went over smoothly with Grant.

"Well I suppose so." Carter nodded as he adjusted himself in the chair, still bound by the duct tape. "He wants me alive, so I'm just worried 'bout you two bein' shot."

Ellie turned to the old cowboy and addressed him. "If you don't mind me asking, you barely know us, why do you-!"

"Sweetheart, I've been survivin' for a longer time than your old friend here and... I think seein' another girl die might just do me in, y'know? So, take that for what it's worth..."

"Tch... thanks I guess." Ellie smiled then looked to Joel. "This plan sucks..."

Joel sighed in agreement. "I know, yeah I know it does..." He then looked back to Carter. "Gonna have to be rough with ya, convince them we might kill you."

"Sure I can take a beatin' if that's what ya mean," Carter then threw out the idea casually. "Threaten to shoot off my trigger fingers, that'll really get'em riled."

"They must have really liked you in their group." Ellie noticed as she made her way to Rylan's backpack which lay haphazardly on the floor right now which she picked up and slung it over her shoulder. "How come?"

"Seein' as how I was the oldest among their ranks, they considered me a sorts of an adviser or go-to guy for them big operations. Where to hunt. Where to place traps, and so on in that fashion."

As Carter rambled on, Joel checked the front windows and cracked the shutter only to peer out of it for a second and then suddenly slam it shut. "They're already here!"

"Well shit."

Joel shushed the two of them with a silent gesture with his fingers and placed a finger to his lips. "Ellie, you get upstairs and-!"

*knock *knock* *knock*

"...you get upstairs and Carter and I'll handle things at the table."

"What?! But Joel!"

"Do it!"

Ellie reluctantly complied as she headed upstairs. And Joel's eyes fell on the still bound Carter who sat at the table, placing his fate into his hands. This exchange was going to go down now...

*thump* *thump* *thump* "I hope someone is home! Hello?"

There was no mistaking it, the gruff voices on the other side of the front door were that of Grant's bandits, and Joel could tell from the footsteps that thumped on the porch, there were at least two of them.

"Door's open!" Joel called out to him as he stood behind Carter with a gun to his head. "Come on in with our people!"

"Much obliged." He heard one bandit respond as the doorknob turned and the door slowly swing open.

It was bandit in a red bandanna who oddly carried a dirty white cooler, and he was accompanied by two more crew members, each armed with a rifle, and they filed in acting like it was a regular dinner party. Only the lit fireplace burning some logs and some light peeking through the closed window shutters were the only sources of illumination allowed within the confines of the cabin. The three 'guests' recognized the situation before them at the table and if they were worried at all, they did not show it.

"Where's the boy and the girl?" Joel angrily inquired, slightly unsettled to see that they were not with company.

"They're outside." The Red Bandit pointed his thumb behind him. "Now... why don't you hand over our old cowboy over there? Nice and easy..."

Joel scoffed at that request, there was bullshit written all over here, and he was sure everybody already knew it. But that was when Carter said in the quietest whisper he ever heard from him.

"...Can you take'em?..."

"...Think so..."

"...kill'em then."

Joel didn't have to be told twice, and he used one of his makeshift shivs to cut Carter's bindings around his hands, and he gave him his second pistol.

Not surprisingly, the three bandits raised their guns as well and aimed them at Joel, but the third bandit aimed his rifle at Carter's leg, most likely in an attempt to incapacitate him.

Joel had quickly flipped the dinner table on its side to provide a little cover, but it soon did little to help their cause as earsplitting shots were being fired.

*BANG* *BANG* *BANG* *BANG* *BANG*!

The cabin was filled with gunfire, nearly deafening the occupants with the sound of bullets and sudden yelps of pain. Joel had killed the bandit on the right who got shot in the chest several times, but suddenly he could hear the grunt of Ellie as she leaped from the staircase onto the back of the bandit on the left as she dove her switchblade into her victim's neck! That bandit however missed his intended shot because of her, and the bandit's rifle bullet unfortunately found its way through the wooden table and into Carter's stomach...

"ACK!" The old man exclaimed when Joel spun around the table and tackled the last center bandit to the ground.

In a frenzy, the red bandanna bandit grabbed a nearby log next to the fireplace and tried to smash Joel over the head with it, however Joel blocked it with his arm but not without some pulsating pain that came from that trauma and Joel used the same shiv he used to free Carter to slam the knife down into the bandit's throat, and the blood spewed out and gurgling filled the first floor of the cabin. All three bandits were now definitely dead...

"Shit..." Ellie wiped the blood from her face as the bandit that she killed slumped to the floor. "Is everyone okay?"

"Not really... *cough*! That might've been a bad idea... but oh fuckin' well..." Carter was clutching his bleeding stomach, he tried his best to stop the oozing red from ruining his favorite shirt but... y'know gut-shots. "God... this hurts..."

"Oh fuck..." Ellie quickly turned to Joel. "What are we going to do?!"

"Get somethin' to stop his bleedin'." He ordered her. "They said they were outside so..." Joel was about to check the window when his foot kicked the white cooler that the bandit carried.

Hesitant as to what was inside of it, Joel took the handle out of the dead bandit's hand and brought the opening up to waist-level He opened the lid and he immediately dropped it and jumped back. "Shit!" And the cooler fell to the ground and its contents rolled out of it.

"Jesus..." Joel could barely believe it as he tried to recollect himself.

Already decomposing, Claire's decapitated head settled next to the light of the fireplace. Her face was grey and lifeless, and her eyes were closed shut, but where the hell is the rest of her?!

Carter had crawled around the flipped table to see what had alarmed Joel and caught his breath. "Oh... goddamn, poor fucking girl... *cough*"

"Oh my god..." Ellie gasped as she came back with bandages and a bottle of alcohol to clean and wrap Carter's wounds until she witnessed Claire's head as well. "Claire..."

Joel pulled out a rag in his pocket and he used it to cover his hands as he gingerly and delicately picked up the young girl's head and did the only thing he could think of. ...He tossed her head into the fire, for some form of cremation and just so that they didn't have to look at her any more.

"At least she can be with Brad..." Joel mumbled as the flames wrapped themselves around her and began burning her hair and skin. The smell was just awful, so Joel moved over to the windows to open them up.

Joel looked out the window though as Ellie began to fix Carter up to the best of her abilities. "Don't worry, I'm kind of a professional with these things... kind of."

Carter grunted. "I don't doubt it."

"We got a problem. No... Goddamit no!" Joel watched as he saw a line of at least two dozen men stand a few yards away from the cabin. He dreaded when he recognized the odd mixture of bandits and Fireflies to his dismay. And of course there among them was the man he stared down whilst he was on that motorcycle escaping Jackson.

Commander Devlin stood behind three hostages on their knees with black bags over their heads and their hands were bound. Grant stood by his side with his hands on his hips, looking like he had made the best alliance ever. But shit... here we go again.

"What is it Joel?" Ellie inquired as she tied the knot of bandages of Carter, who still could not stand on his own. "Are there more fuckers outside?"

"It's the Fireflies, they're here." This was exactly what he was afraid of. They could have been long gone if... "They're working with the Grant fella, and they got hostages too."

"Here to change the world I assume...? argh!" Carter clutched his belly in agony.

"Fuck... is Rylan one of the hostages?" She inquired.

"Yeah, the one on the right, he has his clothes, but the other two... oh no." Joel realized who they might be and his theory was confirmed when Grant and Devlin torn the black bags off their victims.

Rylan... and Tommy and Maria were at their mercy. All three of them were bruised and battered, and they were all held at gunpoint by either a bandit or a Firefly. Devlin then pulled out his megaphone and gave it to Grant and he aimed his now loud voice at the cabin's occupants.

"We apologize about the girl, she couldn't be saved, she was shot in the lung and drowned in her own blood." Grant explained. "We still have plenty of gambits to play with. So, why don't we get started?"

Tommy had piped up. "You ain't gonna get away with this!"

"Settle down Tommy boy." Devlin silenced as he took the megaphone from Grant and talked. "My name is Commander Devlin, acting leader of the Firefly Movement. And I'm going to make this really fucking simple... you will disarm yourselves of all weapons, and come out with your hands in the air. If you don't, your loved ones' blood will be on your hands... I promise you that!"

Rylan blurted out. "Ellie, Joel! If you're in there don't-! AH!" He grunted as he was smacked in the head by the megaphone. "Shit..."

"Fuck... fuck fuck fuck!" Ellie was in a panic. "What do we do? Joel?"

"I'm thinkin' I'm thinkin', I don't know!" His little brother and sister-in-law were out there as well...

Devlin smirked, looks like it was showtime. "Will you not comply? ...Alright." He then gave the megaphone back to Grant and stepped around Rylan so that they were face-to-face. Rylan was about to spit in his face when Devlin grabbed his neck and pushed him back until he was on his back lying in the grass!

"ARGH! Get off of me!" Rylan struggled to no avail, and then his gaze fell on the butterfly knife with a Firefly symbol on the handle. He flipped it around until the blade was revealed and he indefinitely pinned him to the ground.

"Boy... have you ever heard that the eyes are the window to the soul...?" Devlin chuckled as went on. "Well... I'm curious as to see what your young soul looks like, so why don't we open the window!?"

The Firefly Commander sloooooowly brought the blade closer and closer to his left eye...

A horrified Rylan began to yell as he tried to get away. "No! NO! NOOO!"

Devlin took his other hand and made sure he would stay still as he wanted this to be a clean removal. "Hold still boy, and give me your...!" And suddenly and violently, he drove his knife into Rylan's left socket, making a clean cut past the eyelid. Quickly twisting and cutting through the muscle and blood vessels around, Devlin pried the eye from it with a spray of blood which splattered both of their faces. "AAAAHHHH! AHHHHHHHHH! STTOOOPPPP!"

"Rylan!" Ellie moved to the window beside Joel as she watched the torture.

The Commander finally cut the last of the optic nerve and he pulled Rylan's whole left eye from his socket, drenched in red. A pool of blood remained on Rylan's face as he was in pure shock of the mutilation that happened to him. And the man got off of him and turned back to the cabin to present them his eyeball. "A keepsake..." The sick fucker grinned as he wiped the blood off his own face. "We can do this all night!"

"Kid. Kid! you alright? Wake up!" Tommy tried to nudge him and snap Rylan out of it. But his remaining eye already glazed over and he passed out.

"Please stop!" Maria begged her captors.

"Joel, we gotta go out there." Ellie declared. "We can't let this happen."

"Ellie, listen to me, they're gonna kill us and take you away if we do that." Joel reasoned. "If we go out the back and circle around-!"

"They'll die. And if we do anything else, they'll fucking die!" Ellie was almost close to tears now. "I can't live with that on me, no more..."

Carter groaned as he pushed the table on its right side and sat in one of the chairs. "What a crappy day..."

"I'll go out there myself, and you make a run for it!" Joel ordered as he made his way to the door, but Ellie intervened as she grabbed his wrist. "No! That's fucking stupid Joel! I'm not going anywhere!"

"You've only got one shot, literally." Carter interrupted them once more. "One of ya, take my rifle and shoot the bastard in charge. That's your best chance."

"Are you in any shape to shoot?" Joel asked him, to which he saw the cowboy shake his head and pass out into a bloody nap.

"Dammit, Ellie," He took Carter's sniper rifle and handed it to her. "Make sure they don't see ya. I'll go out there and draw him out then you put a bullet in his brain."

The redhead nodded and went to the window. The thing about this is they really did not have a lot of options. So maybe if they cut off the head of the snake then the body will die. "I got this. Just please be careful... if I lose you... I..." Ellie trailed off.

But Joel finished for her. "Me too, baby girl, me too." He smiled at her and headed for the front door.

"Perhaps some brotherly love will convince him." Grant suggested to which the Commander thought an excellent idea but then he had another even more entertaining one.

"How about you bring up the cage?" Devlin ordered Grant and two of his men and they knew exactly what they were talking about. "Oh?"

Grant had left down the hill as Joel stepped out of the cabin with his hands in the air, apparently surrendering. "I'm here! Don't shoot!"

Joel stepped off the porch and he walked towards the group of gunmen and the hostages to which he could hear Tommy and Maria protest. "No! Joel what are you doing?!"

"Nice to see you still have a shred of damn common sense." Devlin already had his gun on Joel, and he silently motioned for him to drop his backpack and disarm himself. "So Joel, how's your day been going? Fuckin' fantastic, I'm sure. One thing I've been meaning to ask of you..."

"Really? What's that?"

"Do you remember Marlene?"

"Of course I do." Joel started his conversation with him in an attempt to get him out in the open for Ellie to take the shot. "How could I forget?"

"Hmm... good." The Commander stepped forward so that he was in line with Joel and the cabin.

"Shit! Joel, you have to move!" Ellie cursed under her breath as Devlin was hiding behind Joel in the scope of the rifle.

"Let my baby brother and his wife go. The boy too. They've got nothing to do with this." Joel used this as a plea to hide his frustration and anger for this man. "I reckon we can still make this right. I'm sure we've lost enough people as it is..."

"You reckon?" Devlin chuckled. "...No, there is no amount of blood and flesh that could possibly outweigh the cure for the Cordyceps. Absolutely-fucking not!"

"What do you want me to say then?!" Joel yelled. "We are ALL survivors! ...And I found a reason to survive."

"Ellie..." Devlin snorted and spat on the ground. "That girl more important to you than the entire world?"

"She IS my world..."

...

...

*howl*

Devlin's frown then turned to that of an excited grin. He lowered his gun and stepped out of the way. "I'll be sure to tell her that before I cut her brain open..."

Tommy exclaimed. "Joel! Look out!"

So suddenly, a grey and black wolf ran past the group of armed men and the hostages. It snarled and barked as it ran past Commander Devlin, and Joel could only put his arms up in a defensive shield as Pepper tackled Joel to the ground and pierce her sharp teeth into Joel's left arm! "ARGH!"

The wolf had bitten down to the bone, and she tried to use all of her strength to tear at her victim, and also to reach her way to Joel's throat intending to rip that out and eventually devour him! But Joel was fighting back, he was kicking and bashing the wolf's nose and mouth, maybe he could get out it...

"Fuck! Oh fuck!" Ellie was snapping her scope from the wolf to a fully exposed Commander Devlin.

What should Ellie do...?

A/N- Decision Time! Let's really think about this. Who should Ellie shoot? One shot... Kill Pepper the Wolf to save Joel, or Kill Commander Devlin and maybe end all of this...

Joel could still get out of it and save himself, we've seen him get out of worse. But Devlin's a monster as it is... But would it work?

:) Review your votes, they may alter the events of the next chapter or not.

Will Carter and Rylan come out of this alive? Can they all escape and triumph? Stay tuned for the next chapter: A Stick and A Hard Place.