This fanfic will be not a continuous story, but rather a collection of different vignettes in the same world. Connections between each story will be loose at best, and not all may tie into the game, but we at JSE will do our best to maintain the quality for each one. With this series, we want to try our hand at writing different types of stories within the same universe. Some stories will be grim and nihilistic, while others will be more optimistic and heartwarming in tone. The writing style will shift, as well. There might be a script or poem tossed in amongst the mix. So why don't we start and see how this experiment goes?

We will attempt to update with at least one story per month.

By Jack

The girl breathes in a silent, yet bountiful gulp of air. Her heart beats rapidly, assault rifle firing away in her chest. Beads of desperate, tensed sweat flow down her forehead. Her brown hair has been messily strewn about, strands dangling like lights hanging from the ceiling. Lights that may very well go dark, leave a house dead forever, if she doesn't play what little cards she has right. The maniac warned her that escape was futile, that this was his town she was playing in. But she still clung onto the hope that she could make it out alive. Even if it meant fighting her way out from the belly of the lion's den, through the merciless blow of an unfeeling act of nature, armed with nothing but a pocketknife and a steadily dwindling supply of revolver ammunition.

She could have made it. Her hopes had swelled to astronomical proportions, anxious as it was, as she had made her way through the town. As she trudged her way through the insurmountable gauntlet, eluding or dispatching the devil-men who sought warm veins and flesh to chew, the girl had focused on hope to push her through the challenges. To prevent herself from curling up and waiting for the monsters to come to her as she so easily could have done in her many, yet few years of life. So many times she could have done so. Curl up and die when her best friend was taken from her mere weeks before she began on this life-changing journey with the man. Curl up and die when the man had injured himself and she didn't know what to do. But she never did, despite all the chances she had at taking the easy way off this unkind, dark world. Hope to see the man, closest thing she ever had to a father, again. Hope to reach the fabled light at the end of the tunnel, the yellowjacketed guerillas spoken of in hushed whispers in the caged cities. Hope that all they had been through, everything she had done, would not be for nothing.

But her hopes nearly shattered, precariously teetering on the edge of the skyscraper over a sea of nothingness, when she had reached for the door that led out of the restaurant. The maniac had somehow found her, and he had knocked her gun away from her grasp. She had managed to fight her way out of his lecherous hands, but she knew that there was no chance of escaping. The disturbed journey that she and the maniac had taken since they first locked eyes in that wintry expanse would end here. But it wouldn't be easy. He was armed and much more experienced than her. Like her protector the man, he knew everything he was doing. Perhaps even better. All she had was a mere pocketknife now. And to compound matters, the maniac had set the restaurant ablaze. Dawdle too long, and the flames would consume them both.

Two times she had done it already, sneak up on him and plunge her blade deep into his flesh. Plunged it in as deep as she could. She knew that the second stab should have killed him. But the maniac showed no signs of relent, no weakening. With a sickening chill running along her shivering spine, she knew that like her, the maniac was driven by hopes. Hopes that held no pleasantness, only despair, for her. How many times will they have to play this sick game, cat and mouse, before one of them keels over? She creeps around the abandoned diner, carefully navigating over broken dishes lest she give herself away. He's started to hide, hoping to catch her by surprise, knowing that his loud footsteps give his location away. Hoping that she'll fall of the edge, lose herself to fear and pressure.

He taunts her, sounding more and more deranged with each falling grain of sand. The girl remembers that she bit the maniac earlier. Could the infection be spreading through his veins, consuming cells, as he stalks her right now? Run, little rabbit, run! He calls out from somewhere in the dinner. She leans against one of the dining booths, focusing her ears. She creeps slowly, past fallen bottles and decayed relics of an abandoned world. Her breath is cold, still in the burning world. She nears the kitchen. The girl cautiously crouches against the outside wall, peeking over one of the windows so delicately narrow in her manner. As she suspected, the maniac is crouched behind one of the grills, machete firmly gripped. He's cooing for her to come to him, to give up in exchange for an easy release.

She waits until his head is turned the other direction. The girl rounds the corner, into the heart of the lion's den. The maniac's back is to her. Maybe she's only imagining things, or is the lunatic giggling now. Taking one final desperate breath, she lunges and plunges her pocketknife into the front of his shoulder. He moans in agony, but to her horror he's choosing to go down like a bull. With ferocious strength, even with the blood dribbling down the tears and holes her blade has left in him, he tussles about while she grips him, trying to pull her knife all the way to his twisted heart. She gasps as he stumbles back and slams her against the edge of a table. Her spine feels as if it shall crack in two. For a few more tormenting seconds, as her body convulses with the pain of the impact, the maniac finally succeeds in breaking her grasp and he slams her down to the ground. Before he himself collapses, wounds taking effect at long last.

The world goes dark. All is quiet in the diner except for the gentle rustle of falling snow and the growling hunger of the widening pyre. The two bodies, the girl and the maniac, lie still. Unaware of the calamity that is brewing in the world around them. The screaming women, frantically ferrying their cannibal next-of-kin to shelter. The cries of the dying as the bullet of a rifle flies through their eye or as a hatchet presses deep into their throat. The man has awoken from his sleep. He comes for the girl. And he won't let anyone take his precious little girl from him ever again.

When the girl wakes, she doesn't know how long she has been out. All she is aware of is the dim glow of the intense fire a mere walk from where she is. The faint dash of white snow falling down onto her bare forehead. She doesn't know where the maniac has gone, or if he is even still alive. But she knows that it is only a matter of time before the flames consume what is left of the diner, and an even quicker matter when the remainder of the maniac's clan spot the flames and piece together the puzzle. It will be no easy solution to this logarithm, getting out of this snow-covered hell. Even as she pushes herself over, onto her knees, the slightest movement feels as if it needs the strength to climb mountains. In a brief glint, the girl sees fallen in front of her the machete. Could it be? Is her tormentor at last gone to meet whatever lies beyond? Groaning, the girl gathers all the strength she has. Fire fuels her muscles as she pushes herself slowly but surely to the blade. The girl crawls determinedly, ignoring the wailing cries in her joints with each inch she makes. She breathes heavily, grateful for each gulp of oxygen that rushes into her lungs. Each second that she remains alive.

Without looking, she can hear the footsteps approaching. Sharply tuned, the girl instantly distinguishes the footfalls of the enemy from friend. She's still too weakened from their earlier battle to do anything in time to stop the grunt of her tormentor as he drives as he drives the hard tip of his boot into her weakened body. Crying lightly, she falls flat to the ground. He laughs lightly.

I knew you had heart.

Y'know, it's okay to give up.

Ain't no shame in it.

The girl, both frightened and angered by his words, does not reply. The maniac doesn't deserve her time, the pathetic, cruel motherfucker he is. With mere seconds to catch her breath, fighting against a body that wishes to comply with his words, the girl pushes herself up and continues making her way forward.

With another laugh that almost sounds like acceptance, he speaks again. I guess not. Just not your style, is it? He kicks her again, this time in the ribs. Despite her attempt not to, she cries out lightly as the pain spasms throughout her entire feeling. The maniac must enjoy this. And before the horror can dawn upon her, the maniac is moving over her, bending his knees. He wants to make her see the futility of further defying him. He clamps strong hands, surging with raw strength, onto her.

You can try beggin'. He says to her, almost fatherly in his way of dispensing advice.

Fuck you. She may die, but she won't give him the satisfaction.

He angrily pushes her over, their eyes locked. His hands move to her neck, slowly adding more squeeze with each second that passes. To her revulsion, she feels another part of the maniac touching her. No, not just touching. Something wicked and ghastly pressing hard, throbbing, against her thigh. The hate in his voice is coarse and weighty.

You think you know me?

Huh?

Blindly, she flails her hand behind her. Trying to grasp the machete or anything that she can use to defend herself. Even as his hands start to tighten, she swears not to abandon hope.

Well, let me tell you somethin'

You have no idea what I'm capable of.

She finds it harder to breathe. The thing pressing against her is pulsing rapider, firmer as the maniac exerts more of his weight onto her. The girl feels cells in her brain go pop as the maniac squeezes the life from her. Her hand continues to grab around wildly. Is this it? As tears blind her eyes, the world around her loses color. In flashes, she reflects in mid-seconds. Escaping from Boston. Making her way through the deathtrap metropolis with the man. The tragic loss of their comrades after their final victory over the hunters from Pittsburgh. The dam, confronting the man about his past. Finally breaching the man's self-imposed wall, the two of them determined to find the Fireflies.

After all she has been through, it can't be for nothing.

As the strangulation reaches its climax, the girl feels light return to her eyes dimly as her fingers feel the firm grip of a round handle. Wrapping her hand upon it, the maniac is so distracted by his desire to play his twisted games that he does not see her lift it from the tile and swing it. The pendulum reversed, hourglass stalled, the girl is now on top as she lifts the machete in the high. He screams in terror, opening his mouth as if to beg for mercy. But the girl does not see him, for her eyes are closed, and as she brings the machete down there is no screaming to be heard.

Just the sound of flesh punctured by metal, the cracking of bones like the falling of skyscrapers and the mutilation of human complexion no different from the destruction of rotten fruit. Emotions overpower her. She blindly swings away, unaware that the maniac is long departed the realm of living. Blood stains her face, tears dribble from her closed eyes. She doesn't hear the footsteps approaching her. The man crying out. Ellie!

Stop, stop! He begs her.

The machete clatters as it falls from her grasp. She doesn't recognize his voice, nor the feel of his touch. In her emotionally-fueled terror, she mistakes him as another one of the maniacs that have overrun this asylum.

No! Don't fucking touch me! She screams at the man as she tries to break out of his hold. But he doesn't let her go.

Ssh. Ssh. He reassures her. It's okay. It's me.

Look.

Look.

Her eyes pointing downward, she starts to recognize the warmth of a fatherly figure as his welcoming hands warm her frozen, hardened cheek.

It's me.

She starts to tell him about the maniac, sobbing. He tried to

He hugs her, holding her against his chest as she cries. Oh baby girl, it's okay. It's okay.

Joel… she calls to him as he comforts her.

It's okay now.

At last, she opens her eyes. Staring not into the face of the maniac, but into the visage of the man. He whispers words of comfort, wiping away the blood and tears. He lifts her up, holding her closely to him. The two of them walk away, leaving behind a bloodstained machete embedded into the floor and the nigh-unrecognizable form of a carcass that was once human. Feelings carry them through this frozen hell, towards fleeting safety and the warmth of spring. Love, friendship, and a hope in hell.

The shepherd has reclaimed his lost lamb and he will never let her go again.

No matter what happens to them on the road ahead, the perils that they face and the hardships they endure, the man's promise is strengthened to unbreakable armor. He promises for himself. For the girl he is holding across the shoulder right now as they walk unwaveringly through blinding winds and chilling snowfall. And a final promise to the memory of her.

That he will never lose her again, never let go no matter what it will force him to do to the world that stole his lamb from him. The answer to him is clear, no more doubts about surviving in this cruel dark world. He has something to fight for until the day the world finally comes for him. On that day, where the red sun sets and the luminous full moon rises, there shall be the nightcalls of night birds and the rustling of water as fish swim downstream. Where he rides away with the sunset, never to look back. Where he ends up, he will erect a house. A safe house, with the amenities of a world eons ago reduced to specks to dust. The world where no infected, no bandits, no Gods, no masters walk. A world for him and his lambs. But until that day comes, the man shall live in this world as best he can.

They leave Lakeside behind, the silent hell left to eat away at itself. They have nothing but the road ahead to look forward to. And they continue to walk down that road, the man and the girl, despite all it has ripped from and thrown at them.

They may be the last of us in a world where savagery and selfishness have consumed all that was once pure, where inhuman monsters click and bloat in the darkness. Where authority has become a twisted, corrupted mirror of itself. But this is also a world where peace and beauty can still be found, where the precious few still fight to preserve and restore what once was. Where even the smallest moments of splendor are worth defying the reaper's scythe for just one more day.

It can't be for nothing.