#once I get over the crippling self doubt it's over for y'all | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bearwithegg · 4 years

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EVERYTHING ABOUT US || Joel Miller x OC || Part 1

I had this idea for a hot minute and thought I'd share this with y'all 🥺 this is a SUPER SUPER fckn slow burn so y'all have been warned 👀👀👀

Lots of words! Gore and language!

PART 2

THEY weren’t sure what they had expected, the last thing they did expect was for her to run the way she did. A woman covered head to toe with blood, as if a bucket full of it had been dumped over her in some sick practical joke — she had her arms raised ready to give them what they wanted in an instantly recognisable sign of surrender, but at the last second she bolted. They had almost mistaken her for infected, the skin that wasn’t covered with viscus blood was stained red, her hair was no doubt already a darker colour but no one could tell with the amount of blood soaked through it.

As nimble as she may be, avoiding the gunshots, they would track her down eventually. She had scuttled away, like a wounded animal trying to avoid the inevitable cycle of life that would catch up to her.

Gunshots drew unwanted attention through the abandoned town, attracting a variety of infected like a moth to a flame. As intelligent as hunters may be, they didn’t think this one through once they had been swarmed by a horde of runners and the odd clicker.

It appeared that the cycle wouldn’t catch up to the woman as quickly as they anticipated, by them, anyway. No doubt she would make a tasty treat to the numerous infected lurking around the town — that is if other hunters hadn’t got to her first. That likelihood dwindled as she slowed her pace down, now hearing the shouts and rounds of fire through just a mere echo.

Fucking idiots.

The thought crossed through her mind, reminding herself why she had long abandoned firearms many years ago. It drew too much attention by both parties, those parties being Infected and Hunters of course. Both terrifying and formidable enemies in the current state of the world, but nothing was more terrifying than coming up against groups of people .

At least Cordyceps had the decency to regress a person down to their most primal instinctual need to kill, scavenge and survive. People did what they did, because they were bored or they just wanted fun and the world they lived in provided those sick individuals opportunistically.

This wasn’t going to be her final fight, throwing down with a bunch of Hunters while they pulled her apart for supplies, fun or meat. A person alone was terrifying, but nothing compared to a person who had nothing left to lose but one bittersweet and potentially fatal final wish.

“Oh, fuck me.” She hissed, ducking low behind the cover of a dumpster upon catching sight of more Hunters scrounging through the abandoned town. The location had been optimal for her, it wasn’t too far away from her own residence and had more than enough supplies for her to scour through. Of course, situations change.

Vastly outnumbered on both accounts, the pressure increased on her to find a way out by doing the least amount of work. Exhaustion had already set its course through her after a tiring altercation with several runners and a clicker, the last thing she needed was to misstep and be gunned down by a group of Hunters for the sake of it.

Five hunters… Three eastbound by the post office… Two preoccupied with a horde…

She drew a heavy breath, knowing her perpetually insulting luck there were bound to be more around the wooded area in the treetops. It wasn’t her first run in with snipers, and it would be an incredibly stupid oversight to not at least anticipate the possibility of them. Cornered in a dingy alleyway behind a dumpster, she needed to think fast, hard and smart about her next movements or she might as well die right here on the spot.

Backdoor access through the bakery and out onto the main strip would leave me vulnerable if deadshots saw me… rooftop would give me an advantage on grounders…

The window of opportunity was getting slimmer by the second, weighing out all potential options took time and time was of the essence. She was patient. Her family had always been patient. Rushing things made larger room for mistake and mistakes led to an untimely death, something she considered not too long ago but wouldn’t let it happen. Not here .

Reaching over her shoulder, she drew her crossbow, quickly and carefully counting her dwindling number of bolts left. Six . They weren’t all that difficult to make, no — but supplies had been thin for her and as if timing hadn’t been anymore… Taunting… Her trusted carpenters knife had long exceeded its lifespan after numerous skulls it cut through and crossbow bolts whittled.

It was now a matter of a simple waiting game, she had boxed herself into this corner and by god if she wasn’t going to make the best out of a shit time. The distant gunfire had since ceased, now the atmosphere merely filled with ambience and the occasional humane shout.

Today had been a shit show for everyone it seemed, not just for her - who was always prepared for the worst - but also for the Hunters, who didn’t anticipate one woman causing them so much trouble.

Regardless how grim it was panning out, she kept her eyes on all her openings as she crept forward in the alley, edging out just before hitting the street. Her head very cautiously poked around the corner, catching a glance at a target as they stopped in front of the bakery. Hand cupped to the window to get a better look at what contents remained behind closed doors.

She took her opening, raising the crossbow like it was muscle memory and firing off a bolt. The sound of it piercing through his skull still made her grimace, no matter how many times she heard it beforehand, the inherent action of killing someone in self defence or not was enough to add yet another internal weight on her already heavy shoulders.

As swift as the death was, she was even quicker crouching by the newly made corpse and retrieved her bolt. The over hanging rooftop of the bakery provided her enough cover if there were anyone in the trees close by, but what lie ahead was a naked street that screamed ‘risky’. It was a gamble, but not one she was willing to bet her life on.

That was until she heard more gunfire.

Her ears piqued at the sound, instead of the rain of bullets being followed up by the sound of the infected and inevitable blood curdling screams of their victims. These gunshots had been echoed by more, which meant she wasn’t the only person in town they were after.

East… They’re firing east of town… That should clear up the western area.

One glance up at the sky, noting the position of the now rapidly setting sun and a momentary pause in thought was enough for her to get her bearings. The least ideal situation would be if she were stuck here, at night time and twice — now three times the threat.

There had been no indication of heavy set bullets being fired which meant her initial concern of snipers was completely futile, providing ill comfort for the dire situation. Just because one threat was out of the way didn’t mean she would get careless as she attentively crossed through town, keeping to the store fronts and near cover at any turn.

Nearing what was presumably a bar before the outbreak, footsteps were heavy across what sounded like old wooden floorboards. She peered in, seeing yet another target searching through the already empty ruins of the bar, much like the one beforehand, she dealt with him quickly.

His body landed with a decent thud onto an old table which looked as if it would break after years of wood rot and negligence. Unsurprisingly, the sheer weight crippled the furniture and with it, a rather loud noise. No doubt attracting nearby infected if they weren’t already at the gun show across town.

Not willing to die over one crossbow bolt, she continues her journey through town as the sun had now begun disappearing behind the surrounding tree line. If she didn’t get the fuck out of dodge soon, she’d be giving herself a one way ticket to an early death.

Keep calm… deep breaths…

She reminded herself, pushing back the overwhelming sense of anxiety that filled her. Stay calm, stay patient. Those two things alone are what got her this far into the end of the world, she’d be lying if she said that it didn’t at least provide comfort and some semblance of attachment to her family.

Pressing forward was a must, she was losing light and fast. Ideally she’d be out of town by dark but then again… patience was also a must. If she had to stay in the town then so be it, regardless if she wanted to do so or not, which seemed to be the most likely outcome as she crosses an open street with care.

It was hard to imagine what the street was like prior to the outbreak, of course there were some leftover remnants of what was, but it was still hard to think about life prior to the outbreak. She barely had any memories of living in normalcy, not being able to comprehend a life that was any different than patience, travel, adaptation and survive.

With yet another wary glance up at the sky, she made the executive decision to hole herself up in what appeared to have been a laundromat. Coming across these had been commonplace when travelling across the country as much as she had — that and it was the only building in town that had fortification, even if the wear and tear of the boarded windows indicated it’s been up since early in the Outbreak.

It wasn’t much, but it was better than waiting out the night in the middle of the street, there was one entrance and exit and she had no desire to rest until she was home safe.

‘home’

Sure, as much as a vacant house isolated in the forest could be home. No, home for her was not here.

She loaded a bolt into her weapon, placing it right beside her as she retrieved a small amount of food from her bag. Her eyes never flickered away from the entrance, similarly to how her ears never stop listening to the sounds outside of the building.

No more gunshots… lets hope they all killed each other .

A grimly optimistic thought, the less people alive the better for her considering she didn’t want to deal with it. As far as food went, whatever she cooked last tasted like shit yet didn’t deter the aggressively grumbling stomach from taking it and using it as essential sustenance.

Oh how she missed the finer things, what she’d do to kill for at least one can of soup. Minestrone to be more precise. Every grocery store, convenience store, abandoned market turned up nothing while she scoured each place top to bottom for one fucking can of Minestrone soup. Nada. Every. Single. Time.

A grimace pulled at her face, the incredibly chewy meat tasted bland and by the time she had bitten through down to the bone it was more fat than actual protein. She pondered on the way her food tasted like shit when a loud bang kick-started her adrenaline once again.

She crouched low behind the cover of a dilapidated washing machine, crossbow in hand as two sets of footsteps entered, followed by pained grunts that remained on the opposite side of the room.

“Think any more of them sons-of-bitches will come?”

It was a male voice, gruff sounding and exasperated. She could gather two things; he was injured and on the older side of life.

“Not likely… said they was after a woman, might be out lookin’ for her.”

Another male voice, younger sounding — both had accents, then again to her everyone had accents and she wasn’t keeping track. She had bigger problems at hand than to worry about accents and a complete comprehensive guide to what people sounded like from whatever part of this Country they resided in.

“Here’s hopin’ she don’t get caught then.”

With that she rose from her cover, crossbow raised. At least she was confident these two must have been the source of the secondary set of gunfire she heard not too long ago. Her sudden presence startled the two men, the non-injured and visibly younger of the two drew his pistol.

No words were said, but tension was high. She had an up on the two men, knowing that it was dark and more quiet than usual it wouldn’t be beneficial to either party if a loud gunshot alerted infected. Maybe if the other hadn’t been injured, it might’ve been different.

She wasn’t one for talking, not to people she didn’t know anyway— so that ruled out every person she had encountered in this apocalyptic hellscape. Despite this, she felt her intentions were conveyed clear enough through the stand off between her and the man before her.

“‘lright, you’re not gonna hurt us.” He was the first to break away, her intentions had been heard loud and clear even without the presence of words. He held his hands up, placing his pistol on top of a washing machine but never breaking eye contact with her. A remarkably unusual move on his behalf, that was made known by his injured companion.

“Tommy what the fuck are you doin’?” he hissed, clearly unnerved by his choice to drop his arms in the presence of a complete stranger who they’d never seen before.

Even though she was certain that the two men were much like her, seeking refuge for the night, she just couldn’t be too sure. She backed up until she was flush up against a machine and sat on top of it, weapon still raised, her eyes watching the too men like a hawk — more so now that she got a better look at the injured companion.

She was surprised at just how old he was, long grey hair and a beard adorning his face, he must at least be in his sixties… seventies maybe… poor old bastard…

“She ain’t gonna hurt us, Eugene…Reckon she’s just glad we ain’t hunters.” Tommy reassured, kneeling down to tend to the older man's leg wounds. He was indeed correct, she was most definitely grateful that they weren’t hunters but that didn’t mean she trusted them wholeheartedly.

Quinn didn’t trust anybody.

#joel miller #the last of us #imagine #joel x oc #the last of us imagine #original character #joel x reader #fanfiction

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