thinking of an au where maybe joel/tess get to jackson first like before tommy

maybe joel and tess meet ellie as a younger girl like age 5/6/7 and they become a lil family and head out of boston because the QZ is getting bad with things heating up between fedra and the fireflies

there’s no immunity situation but she’s in a bad way in boston, something with her family maybe being fedra or her being targeted in school. she’s been getting food and meds and love from joel and tess for months or maybe years. anyway, they get her out of there and decide to head out to someplace that tess has heard about through the grapevine, rumored to be a safe haven somewhere in wyoming

they go through some shit but they survive and they get there. and at the gates they’re told to wait to meet a woman named maria, who will apparently talk to them about the conditions of being let into jackson—turns out maria is maria simone, tess’s fuckin college roomates, soul-sister, sometimes referred to as “long-lost love.” her joel and ellie are let in and welcomed immediately, to the dismay of nobody because they all love and trust maria—besides maybe seth, but who cares. fuck seth

tess and maria catch up as she guides them through jackson, telling them about how her and her father had escaped to this place with her son after leaving a fucked up QZ, much like them. now her and kevin and hank are here trying to maintain some semblance of normalcy and safety for people here in jackson

tess and joel and ellie get settled in a house and for a week are two are just left alone to get eachother adjusted, which is surprisingly easy for ellie—by day three she has managed to find a way to pillow-sled down the stairwell without breaking her own neck, which to her means it’s definitely 100% safe. joel and tess find themselves slipping into the routine of parenting, and after maybe a month manage to consider themselves living in whatever “domesticity” means nowadays

joel finds himself desperately missing tommy, who left to join the fireflies five years earlier and hadn’t radioed him back in one. tommy and him hadn’t left off on good terms, but they’d always respected their promise to eachother to keep in contact at least once a couple of months—since tommy went radio silent, joel has always had the gut-wrenching fear that he was dead. when ellie came along, the dull, old ache pressing on his chest somewhat eased, distracted by the warmth of loving his child with tess

but now, in jackson, where he had more time and space to think—he found himself wondering more and more where the fuck tommy could be, if he wasn’t dead, which—maybe he isn’t? there’s a chance, isn’t there? one of jackson’s conditions was that nobody but radio patrol had access to contacting people outside directly, and he’d of course agreed for the sake of staying with tess and ellie—so who says maybe tommy isn’t also in a situation where he just can’t get to joel? he doesn’t say anything, but he hold out hope

then five years go by

ellie is now 10/11/12, and hands down the most mischievous little rascal anyone in jackson’s ever seen. one day when she’s out with her cousin kevin (how exactly he’s her cousin is kinda complicated, but that’s just how things are with the miller-servopoulos-simones)—or, technically, he’s out with her, because earlier he headed out on a solo patrol to check a trap near the south border-walls and caught her sneaking her way back from her secret toad pond. she knows she’s not supposed to go out there alone, and she usually doesn’t—but today kev was busy, and mom and dad were both out on a three-day group hunt, so even if she did get caught she’d have a couple days of free before they’d hear about it and get pissed off. she took her chances, and had made it out and back unscathed like always—except, of course, getting snuck up on by kevin maybe 15 yards from her sneak-back-in-point at the south wall (“yo, rascal, whatcha doin—?” “AHH, FUCK—!” “OW, ELLIE, shit—! it’s me, wait!! it’s me! don’t hit me!” “what the hell, dude!!! you scared me!” “what the hell, you! you know you shouldn’t be out here alon—!” “i was already on my way back—!” “were you goin out to see the fuckin frogs, ellie?? again??? i told you, it’s a short way but anything could—!” “oh, whatever, i was fine! and you were busy!” “i told you i’d be back in four hours!!! you couldn’t just wait four hours????” “no!!!! and you know that!!!!” … kevin sighs. he does know that.)

and so they’re bickering about something stupid like usual—whether sweet or regular potatoes are better, who’s scarier between joel tess or maria when they’re pissed, which is better between star wars or jurassic park; the usual—when they hear a pined groan over from somewhere near, low to the ground

guns go up. footsteps creep silently. even though ellie’s young and mischievous, she’s also one of the fiercest kids in jackson anyones ever seen. her and kevin approach a man on the floor in  disheveled, torn up, cargo wear, seemingly delirious judging by the slur of his words and the bloody headwound

“jesus,” ellie says, voice a perfect lil blended imitation of joel and tess. “the fuck’s wrong with him?”

“he looks half-dead. clearly dehydrated and sustaining multiple injuries,” kevin evaluates neutrally; his mother always reminded him to be careful and cautious around people that appeared to be hurt or sick, and to be especially frugal with his sympathy. at the sound of another small, pained groan, he raised his gun to point between the man’s eyes and stepped closer, subtly trying to block ellie. “yo, dude. you waking up?”

“you sound so lame saying that,” ellie comments, because of course she does. she keeps her gun and interested eyes trained on him but stands away carefully, and kevin finds himself feeling extremely proud of her. “who say’s ‘yo, dude’?”

“i do”

“exactly. only you.”

“shut up, you little punk. what am i supposed to say?”

“something cool, obviously. we gotta scare him! here, like this—,” she clears her throat and turns her full attention back to the guy on the group with the mustache, raising her gun between his eyes like kev as she regard him with a louder, commanding voice. “wake the fuck up, motherfucker! hands where we can fuckin see em! you try anythin, ill fuckin gut you, you hear me?!”

“jesus, dude.”

“what?? look! it’s working!”

“where the fuck did you even learn—just stand back, okay?” kevin is a bit more serious now, looking down into the man’s now open eyes and finding himself struck stunned for a millisecond by a sense of strange familiarity. “hey, man, wake the fuck up. you with me? look here, buddy. just tell me your name, and what you’re here lookin for.” it was a familiar command he’d heard a hundred times from her mother, in a myriad of different contexts, but all with the same goal—direct interrogation

the man blinks at him, seemingly still disoriented, and winces as he moves to speak: “tommy. my name is tommy miller, and i’m lookin for my brother joel.”

for @clickergossip and @bumblepony and @liveandletcry23 and @bearrycool and @maddiesbooknook who i feel like are always writing stuff for or to inspire me 🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾

What are your ideas

SO

Wilbur played a game of portal blind, turning off his moniter and relying on the chat to tell him where to go and what to do.

It actually worked out pretty well. He managed to get pretty far. I think. Admittedly, I’ve never played portal.

But, to get to the point, what if- this was just How It Was.

Basically, and this is the entire premise atm because I literally Just thought of this but I am SO DOWN to expand this and if anybody else wants to chime in they can please feel free to talk to me about this sort of stuff-

Basically, Wilbur is blind. Actually, physically blind, and he can talk to... spirits (the chat). They aren’t all necessarily the spirits of dead people, but they’re spirits all the same. The spirits guide him around the test facility (or just wherever if I decide to not have this be a purely Portal au) by talking to him. If I decide to have this not be a strictly portal au he also has the ability, via the spirits, to create portals. He isn’t limited to talking to just the spirits that normally talking to him though. He can talk to the dead and nature guardians/spirits and the like that aren’t ‘the chat’.

I feel like this AU has a lot of promise. I just need to find a way to expand on it...

last 1. drink? Water 2. phone call? Johanna aka joey aka niglet aka enimem 3. text message? Peter aus Wien (i know she hates it but she still loves me) 4. song you listened to? Boys - Jeans for jesus (not a surprise, I kNOW) 5. time you cried? Last night??? 6. dated someone twice? Uhm... i don't think so? 7. kissed someone and regretted it? Kinda? 8. been cheated on? No 9. lost someone special? Yes 10. gotten drunk and thrown up? Well... yes favorite colors: 11. Blue 12. Grey 13. black in the last year have you 14. made new friends? Yes :) 15. fallen out of love? Ha, yes 16. laughed until you cried? yes 17. found out someone was talking about you? Aha yes 18. met someone who changed you? Deffo yes 19. found out who your friends are? Yes, yes, yes. 20. kissed someone on your facebook list? Not sure about this one general: 21. how many of your facebook friends do you know in real life? Uhm, pretty much all of them? 22. do you have any pets? nooo :(( 23. do you want to change your name? This is hard... I wanted to change it for so many years but now I'm just like fuck it idc 24. what did you do for your last birthday? Went brunching with a friend 25. what time did you wake up? 8 ish? 26. what were you doing at midnight last night? Sleeping as I'm a grandma you knkw 27. name something you can’t wait for? Our festival next spring. I Am SO Exited already woah 28. when was the last time you saw your mom? lol. Uhm. Like almost 2 years ago??? 29. what are you listening to right now? Jeans for jesus..... 30. have you ever talked to a person named tom? Yea; but it was yeeeeeears ago 31. something that is getting on your nerves? When girls are in a relationship and suddenly don't have time for their girl gang anymore like seriously 32. most visited website? Twitter 33. hair color? blond 34. long or short hair? Medium? 35. do you have a crush on someone? Hahahahahahahahhaha where do I start? 36. what do you like about yourself? My music taste! And that I'm doing something good for our city with working for Lauter. That I can steam a proper cappuccino with latte art on it 37. piercings? No. Not even my eas 38. bloodtype? Idk? (Should an adult person know this???) 39. nickname? Some people call me Pas but only like 3 or so 40. relationship status? single 41. zodiac? Cancer and feeling all the feels all the time, yup 42. pronouns? she/her 43. favorite tv show? Orphan Black, West World, New Girl 44. tattoos? 14 LOL 45. right or left handed? right handed 46. surgery? none 47. sport? i run to the tram station almost everyday? 48. vacation? i havent been to berlin this year and it's really bothering me so I need to go there soonish. 49. pair of trainers? What? more general 50. eating: hummus and avocado 51. drinking: water or wine 52. i’m about to: keep watching youtube videos of qcknd 53. waiting for: tomorrows event to go well (pray for aurelia and me pls) 54. want: to do: sleep, pls 55. get married? Nah 56. career? Uhm....öppis mit Medie. Like what I do fo Lauter is acutally my dream job but I'm not getting paid for it (yet) which is better 57. hugs or kisses? Hugs !! 58. lips or eyes? eyes, yes 59. shorter or taller? taller 60. older or younger? Depends, but usually older 61. nice arms or nice stomach? idk?? 62. hook up or relationship? Uhm... relationship I think 63. troublemaker or hesitant? Yeah it depends 64. kissed a stranger? Yes? 65. drank hard liquor? Oh yes 66. lost glasses/contacts? Yes! 67. turned someone down? yes 68. had sex on the first date? Yes..... 69. broken someones heart? Not sure about this one 70. had your heart broken? Yes. 71. been arrested? no 72. cried when someone died? As I'm crying like all the time, yes. 73. fallen for a friend? Nope do you believe in 74. yourself? Sometimes 75. miracles? yes and destiny 76. love at first sight? Hm... maybe? Idk 77. santa? Oh 78. kiss on the first date? Yes, why not? 79. angels? Uhm... yeah somehow? other 80. current best friend’s name: I can't pick one? But my closest friends are Karla, Alina, Joey (Enimem) and Lisa 81: eye color: mine? Blue-ish 82: favorite movie: vicky, christina, barcelona