Actions

Work Header

we've fallen (so far)

Chapter 6: Chapter 6

Notes:

hello ! it’s been a long time, i know. i’m not going to come back and promise a regular update schedule or anything, but i’ve been thinking about this story a lot and i finally managed to finish writing this.

i don’t know if anyone even still reads for this ship, or if anyone remembers this story, but in case you do, here’s the next chapter.

so, enjoy !

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

It’s almost midnight when Ellie comes skulking back into their claimed diner. Abby hadn’t realised that she’d even left the building (she hadn’t gone to check) but Ellie’s limping like someone just out of a fight. Warily, Abby straightens slightly from her slouch against the wall. 

 

“More fireflies?” 

 

Ellie squints at her. “No.” There’s an awkward sort of pause, then– “Infected. Over there somewhere,” She gestures vaguely with her hand, and Abby nods like it matters. It doesn’t. 

 

“You shouldn’t have left. They’re probably looking for us.” Us. Like they’re some kind of team. They’re not— it’s Abby and Lev, followed by a sizable gap and then Ellie. They’re not a team, but they are a collective that’s outnumbered as it is. 

 

Dropping her pack onto one of the torn seats, Ellie shrugs. “Better I die out there than here.” 

 

Abby chooses not to acknowledge that. Instead she folds her arms and does her best to pretend like she hadn’t been waiting up for Ellie’s return— really, she hadn’t been. She’d just been keeping watch, because Lev fell asleep a while ago. And anyway, she knew that Ellie would come back. 

 

There’s a rustle when Ellie sits down, and then— “Do you want me to keep watch?” 

 

Abby looks over at her. She can’t see much, just a pale face visible through shadows, a dim light reflecting slightly off a waterproof jacket. She shakes her head. 

 

“No way. You’d kill me in my sleep.” 

 

Ellie shrugs and lowers herself into the booth and out of Abby’s view. “Suit yourself then.” 

 

 


 


Lev doesn’t say it, but she sees it in the way his entire body relaxes at the sight of Ellie when he wakes. He must have been worried that she wouldn’t come back, and Abby doesn’t understand why. Something like worry prickles on the periphery of her thoughts— he’s getting attached and this
arrangement isn’t permanent and what if Ellie does just up and leave? What then? Will he worry for her? Abby knows the answer. 

 

They have a kind of regroup after a meagre breakfast, all three of them hunched in the shadows of the room. Abby clears her throat. “So we know they’re here.” 

 

Lev nods. “They’ll kill us on sight, I think. That lady was angry.” 

 

Ellie glowers at them, her fingers twisting into the material of her jacket. Abby glares like she’s daring her to say something, but Ellie chooses to ignore her. “So the obvious thing to do is to leave, right? There’s no way you’re getting close enough to reason with them.”

 

Abby leans back and raises her eyebrows. The floor creaks under her. “What, you think you’re just going to sneak out of the town?” 

 

“Uh— yeah.” 

 

Lev’s eyes flick between them, and he’s already about to intervene when Abby’s arm raises to point her pistol right at the freckles on Ellie’s face. Ellie’s face screws up in anger and Lev’s protesting already but Abby shoves him off her and doesn’t back down. “Like that’s going to fucking happen. We’re going to the fireflies. And then they can deal with you and this, ” she gestures around them, “—won’t be a thing anymore.” 

 

“Put the gun down.” 

 

“No.” 

 

“Abby, I think you should—“ 

 

“Not now, Lev.” 

 

“Hey! Put the fucking—“ Ellie cuts herself off and her outstretched hands drop. Abby watches, breathing hard. Her pale fingers move to fiddle with a bracelet around her other wrist and she clenches her jaw to stare past Abby. For a few seconds there’s only the sounds of their collective breathing. Ellie levels her with a steadfast stare. 

 

“The fireflies aren’t who you think they are. They’re a group of violent fucks who believe in a cure that doesn’t exist. ” 

 

It sounds fake. The words sound regurgitated, and reused, almost rehearsed as though they’ve been playing in Ellie’s mind for a while. Still— they have the desired effect. Abby huffs and lowers her gun. She ignores the tinge of regret she feels, and instead pretends to look for something in her pack. With her back to Ellie and Lev, it’s easier to speak. 

 

“Well, we’re going to find them anyway. So get used to it, because that’s the plan and it isn’t fucking changing.” 

 

Ellie laughs incredulously and Abby doesn’t turn around until she hears the retreating footsteps and the rustle of waterproof jacket material that sounds when Ellie drops into a seat. She murmurs to Lev, “You shouldn’t worry about her. She’s not—“ She shakes her head. “Don’t forget the things that she did.” 

 

Lev looks at her strangely. “I won’t.”

 

 


 

 

They leave the diner soon after that. Sun beats down on them— it’s harsh and unrelenting and Abby fucking hates it. She can feel the sweat on her back where the pack rests, the clammy warmth of her fingers where they curl around her gun. 

 

Lev walks up ahead with Ellie. He glances up at her periodically like he’s going to say something, and Abby wallows in relief each time he doesn’t. Ellie, for her part, is silent, until she meets Lev’s eyes briefly.

 

Abby watches as she smiles distantly, like she’s remembering something. Ellie gestures at Lev’s sunburned forehead, “You should look for a baseball hat or something. Sunburn’s a bitch.” 

 

“Baseball?” Lev says it in that voice he uses when he doesn’t quite understand what’s being said. Usually it would prompt Abby into explaining it carefully, not missing any details out because she knows how much Lev wants to know everything, and she knows how much he missed during his upbringing. Now though, it’s Ellie who takes a moment to think of an explanation.

 

“It’s a sport? We played it back in— uh, back in Jackson, with a bat and a ball. It was fun, but I was shit at it.” 

 

Lev files away this information and nods, “Okay. I’ll look for a hat.”

 

Abby refuses to give her a gun, because that seems like a bad idea on all fronts. But Ellie’s fast, so Abby’s pretty sure that even if they do get ambushed, Ellie’s likely to escape. 

 

They’re definitely exposed to an ambush, even as they move carefully behind buildings. Abby half suspects that they’re being watched right now, maybe through the scope of a sniper, or a pair of binoculars. She hates it, and she hates it even more when she comes up short on a plan to fix it. They have no idea about the whereabouts of the fireflies’ home base, so they’re kind of wandering aimlessly. 

 

Wandering aimlessly right into a pack of stalkers. 

 

Abby hears them first, high-pitched croaks and feet crunching in sand-gravel. She breathes out a curse and instinctively shoves Lev behind her. Her hand is already on her gun, and Ellie ahead of her has also caught on. She glances over her shoulder and motions to Abby and Lev, indicating for them to follow her. 

 

“Fuck,” Abby curses, but she can’t do anything except follow after Ellie’s already moving form. They creep into a shop with shattered windows and weeds twisting through floorboards, and Ellie stops to duck behind an overturned shelving unit. 

 

Lev peeks over the edge of it, his narrowed eyes catching sunlight and burning golden. His face is set like it had been in Seattle— unforgiving, and brave. “There’s five, I think.” 

 

She follows his line of sight to a crossroads where the stalkers mill about. They’re mostly gone to the cordyceps disease but a few of them carry memoirs of human life— one wears a baseball cap, funnily enough. Another carries a satchel that has become part of the infected creature, the fungus has grown over the strap. Ellie taps her fingers against her gun in thought. 

 

“We could take them out.” 

 

Abby glares at her. “Stalkers are loud fuckers. We’d be making ourselves targets.” 

 

“We’re already targets, in case you hadn’t noticed.” Ellie says, like Abby didn’t already know that they were walking around practically begging for someone to come and ambush them. 

 

Lev’s voice placates the both of them. “We’re wasting time. We should kill them. If the fireflies come then we could talk to them.” 

 

Sweet Lev, Abby thinks. Sweet Lev and his naivety in regards to the obvious fact that if they approach the fireflies they will most likely end up dead. Abby will admit, she’d been expecting a bit more from them. Some kind of blossoming camp teeming with people that all believe in a cure; a haven— for want of a better word —of good people that could help them. 

 

Abby clenches her jaw and her eyes flick to Ellie’s briefly, and she knows that with or without her say-so those stalkers are going to end up dead at Ellie’s hands. She might as well help out a bit. “Alright, whatever. But let’s make it quick.” 

 

She makes to vault their cover, but takes a half second to pause and look back at Lev. He’s poised to follow her. “Stay here, Lev.” 

 

He starts to protest but she shushes him with a glare, and he drops back behind the shelves. Ellie casts Abby an odd look, but then she’s moving quickly out of the shop. Abby hastens to follow. 

 

They stop together behind a car. “Silencer.” Ellie mumbles. 

 

“What?” 

 

“A silencer would make this so much easier.” 

 

And those words are the spark for a blaze of thoughts that stream without consent through her head— did you use a silencer to kill Owen? Nora? Mel? She squeezes her eyes shut because now isn’t the fucking time and in that millisecond Ellie’s already moved on to a car a few feet closer to the infected and Abby’s sick of this whole fucking situation. 

 

Still, she hurries after Ellie. 

 

“You go left, I’ll go right?” Like they’re some kind of fucking team. Abby scowls but agrees, and then it’s chaos. 

 

Ellie takes down her two but Abby misses her second shot and by then the damn thing has scampered away, shrieking and clawing at the ground. Abby curses and starts to turn in a circle— peering into the long grass for any sign of danger. She shoots blindly, but the grass could have only moved due to the coastal breeze but it also could have been the stalker— was it the stalker? Ellie’s circling too, just behind her, but Abby’s not paying attention. She holds out her gun, murmuring, “Come out wherever you are, you little shit.” 

 

It does the trick. The stalker comes scrambling from the right and Abby hears Ellie’s cry of surprise, and she only manages to dodge in time for it to barrel past her. It stumbles, she hears the disruption of gravel, and she probably imagines Lev’s sigh of relief because he’s too far away for her to hear it. She spins round and fires three bullets through its grotesquely formed head area. Grim satisfaction overtakes her and she rights herself with minimal back pain. 

 

She turns to Ellie, her breathing coming fast. “We’re not a team.”

 

Ellie frowns. “Well that’s obvious.” 

 

“Stop acting like we are then.” 

 

To Abby’s irritation, Ellie seems confused. “I’m not doing that.” Abby scoffs and shakes her head, because Ellie’s far off the mark. 

 

“What are you fucking doing then?” 

 

Ellie shrugs— and Abby knows it’s a loaded question, because who knows what any of them are trying to do? She for one, doesn’t have a clue. Her purpose used to be to survive, then it was something to do with Owen, and since… well. Her purpose has been revenge for her dad ever since. That purpose was supposed to have been fulfilled and yet here Abby stands, with Ellie Williams looking for the Fireflies. What an absolute plot twist. The writers of her life probably crack up about it. Absolutely hilarious. 

 

Ellie shrugs. Abby had forgotten she was there, for a second. “I’m just trying to survive.” 

 

And then— and it all happens too quickly for Abby to fully comprehend it —something rustles and screeches behind her and Lev cries out, and there’s the thwip of an arrow slicing through air before a thump acts as a full-stop for the whole thing. She turns slowly, and Lev’s face is red in the sun and the infected on the floor is red with old blood and spores, her vision is red when she realises that she almost died. Again. 

 

Lev stalks towards them, his steps a childlike representation of the classic I-told-you-so. Abby was right to leave him in safety, he’s too young, but of course all he sees is a fight that he wasn’t allowed to join. Still, a small voice in her head muses, he’s seen worse. 

 

That’s not the fucking point. 

 

Lev deliberately puts his bow onto his back and shrugs like nothing had happened. “I told you there were five of them.” His words are simple, straightforward and unmasked. She huffs out a disbelieving laugh. 

 

“What would I do without you, kid?” 

 

He looks up at her. “Die, probably.” 

 

Abby ignores Ellie’s quiet laugh and instead nods sagely. “Probably.” 

 

 


 


By some miracle, the fireflies
don’t find them, and the three of them reach what seems to be a town centre before the sun sets. It’s a small place, but the cautiousness of their movement added with their lack of general direction involving Avalon makes their progress slow. 

 

The town centre consists of a central square that once would have been charming, but now is overrun by old banners that state the beginnings of rebellions that are long gone, and splintered tables and chairs from nearby restaurants sprawled all over it. An overturned parasol catches the breeze almost eerily— it’s faded red and white material blows slowly, almost as though it’s breathing. Abby can’t help but feel like it’s been a while since there was anybody here. 

 

She sighs, and stops walking. “We’re looking in the wrong place. They’re not going to be slap bang in the middle of the town. It’s too exposed.” 

 

Ellie ahead of her pokes at one of those old tables thoughtfully. She’s been less temperamental than Abby thought she would be. Maybe she’s resigned to the fact that Abby’s one wrong move away from shooting her. Still, it unnerves her, the way they exist within ten feet of each other without trying to kill each other. A year ago they hadn’t been able to exist in the same city without trying to murder each other. 

 

Ellie looks back at her. “Hiding in plain sight, right?” 

 

“No.” Abby shakes her head and eyes the apartment buildings that border the square. They’re all made with the same light bricks, stacked on top of restaurants and bars. Signs that probably used to light up and flash hang from under balconies. “No,” she repeats, “That’s too obvious.” 

 

“Maybe they want those people that want to find them to actually be able to find them.” 

 

“Like us,” Lev observes. 

 

“Yeah…” Abby trails off, wandering into the square. In hindsight, it was a stupid thing to do. She ignores her own feelings of trepidation and weaves in and out of rubble and remains of what was, but the footsteps she hears behind her don’t sound like the careful ones she expects to hear. 

 

Boots crack across the rubble, a throat clears, and then there’s the unmistakable click of a gun. 

 

“Don’t fucking move.” 

Notes:

well. i hope you liked it ? i can’t decide whether or not i like it.

as always, comment if you want to (i love them and i have missed them) and thank you for reading !