pairing: ellie williams x reader
info: second person pov, tlou au, wounds & blood, trauma, bitchy!ellie x bitchy!reader, enemies to lovers arc
TW: mentions of suicide, wounds, blood, trauma, and injuries
hi!! first fic ever im so excited. please don’t judge too harshly but i am open to tips and stuff about my writing (@fellow writers). this fic really is just the first meeting of ellie and reader so!
The crisp sound of your heavy-duty boots against the white, sometimes bloodied snow was a growing annoyance grating at the silence of the forest you’d been trekking in for what seemed like forever.
How were you not dead? You were sure the troop of cannibals you and your friends crossed paths with not so long ago would put an end to your trying life, if your purple-yellow front and gashed-up left leg had anything to show for it. But no, their leader decided to be a sadist along with a murderer when he left you to the harsh realities of your desolate America. Had it not been for these injuries, you’d still deem your reason for enduring on this godforsaken planet as burning and bright. An abandoned, rumoured haven somewhere in Wyoming, the very thing you and your now-dead group of friends left home for. Wisconsin gradually became barren of resources from the long-persisting cordyceps.
Every breath you took physically hurt you even more, the tender and sore pain from your abdomen a reminder of all the surviving you had to do. The weight of your crossbow and machete in your backpack strained your shoulders and added additional weight as well. Frequent thoughts of ending it all right then and there didn’t sound so depressing anymore. If anything, it sounded like freedom, putting the morbid details of the self-inflicted process aside. You don’t even know if you wanted Wyoming anymore; you’ve just been feeling like you had to get there. Helping yourself to suicide felt like an insult to everything you’ve sacrificed, everyone you lost. That problematic obligation you carried was the only thing that charged your weak legs to keep moving forward.
Did the cannibals seriously have to slaughter your horse along with your friends? You all could have worked out a compromise. One person in exchange for the rest to go free. You would have been happy to give yourself up because, seriously, your feet were killing you. Maybe then you could’ve at least sat down.
Then, over the sound of your own clipped breathing, a noise emerged. Thump. Thump. Runners. And it sounded like a whole lot of them. And fast, very, very fast. And very, very much headed in your direction.
Must they’ve intercepted and been provoked by the presence of the cannibals? Or were they chasing some other poor survivor like you? You concluded it to be a group of survivors, because even fools know that the possibility of a single individual running out the runners was near impossible, unless they had horses or working automobiles. Either way, you’re fucked. Because if those people get any closer to where you’re currently standing, you’ll soon be running alongside them to get away from the swarm of infected.
Quickly, you pull out your pistol from your back jean pocket and check how much ammunition is left. Damn it, you wasted almost a third of it on the cannibals. Looking around the forest, you bolt towards the most sturdy-looking tree and climb. With each branch you pull yourself towards, panic overwhelms you, shooting adrenaline up your tired limbs to go up faster.
Thud-thud-thud. The sound of running feet grows louder and you’re halfway up the tree. You slow down a bit, little relief washing over you as you internalize that there’s probably enough distance between yourself and the soon-to-be approaching horde. You climb up five more branches and sit yourself on the sixth. Then, you sling your backpack to your front and take out your crossbow. Now that you’re hidden, you thought that the least you could do to pass the time was help the survivors out. Just because you’ve lucked out doesn’t mean you can’t get involved. Plus, ever since your friends were torn away from you, you haven’t come across anything or anyone life-threatening. You don’t want to risk getting rusty on weaponry, albeit it has only been a couple of days.
You mount the butt stock of the crossbow atop your right shoulder, line your eye up with the scope, and lightly place the pad of your index finger against the trigger. You hold your breath. 1, 2, 3, … anytime now. The thump and thunder of feet, or hooves (?) against the landscape impossible to ignore now.
Next thing you know, five horses and riders approach your vision, although one horse’s saddle is absent of a person. This is it. Scare that one horse away from its herd, and they’re yours. You wait for them to approach you and find a gap of space between the horse and the others. You then shoot an arrow once they’re close enough.
But before it could even land on the patch of grass, one of the riders struck it away with a machete. They all stop abruptly. The rider holding the machete looks up into the direction from which the arrow came. Short, dark auburn hair in a messy half-up. Sharp green eyes and a scar on her eyebrow. Wow, she’s pretty. Before you could gush further, her face forms a scowl, and she reaches for her gun.
You raise up your hands and shout, “Wait!”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?!”
“I was aiming for that vacant horse!”
“You missed by a fucking mile!”
You turn around on the branch and climb down. As you go down, you hear her cock her gun; a sharp click sounds behind you just as your feet hit the dirt. “I just need that horse.”
“You think I care what you need?”
Okay. Screw you too then. “It’s an empty saddle. You’re being greedy.”
She leans forward over her horse’s neck, her eyes glaring at you with rage.
At this point, your leg is screaming at you from that climb to sit down and you’re starting to get annoyed, “Come on, put the toy away before you hurt yourself. I can barely walk, I have to get going, and I need that horse.” You lift your pant leg to show your gash.
One of the riders behind Ginger, an older man with long-ish hair pulled into a low ponytail and kinder eyes, speaks up with a southern accent, “Where you headin’?” As he speaks, he and his horse trot forward to be just as front as Ginger.
You turn towards him. And seeing his kind eyes makes you a little bit more soft-spoken than how you were just a second ago, “Some place in Wyoming. Me and my friends were headed there cause we heard of some safe settlement.”
His eyes lift a tiny fraction from recognition, “You know where it is exactly?”
“I’ll find out. And much faster with that horse.”
“Jesus Christ. You were gonna walk around clueless with that leg o’ yours?”
Before you could reply, Ginger interrupts your civil conversation, “Tommy, we don’t have time. They might be looking for us in a while. We can’t have them go out because we’re late. Because of her.” Seriously, what is wrong with this girl? You showed your leg, you told them your intentions. What more did she need? Her voice is so irritating. Swear to god, if she opens her dumb mouth again, you’ll—
“Hol’ on a minute Ellie. She’s hurt.” Your eyes dance between the two of them. Are they from Wyoming? Tommy speaks to you again, “Tell ya’ what. We were just about headed there. Ya’ can ride with us. Great place, great food, and they’ll patch up y’re, uh, injuries.”
Ellie’s grip tightens on her reins. Her gaze moves to your leg and shifts in the tiniest form of pity before her glare returns tenfold. “But you try anything, and I’ll shoot you.” Oh my god. Oh my god. You’re so close to marching up to her and matching her healthy leg with that gash that’s on yours. Could she not see how you’d be unable to go against them anyways if you did try anything?
You force your eyes away from them to start thinking of your situation at the moment. You stay planted on the ground. Could you trust them? What if they’re also cannibals? What if they’re just playing it up when actually they’re leading you to their place to chop you up and cook you? But then again, they sound like your best bet to safety. And you need to sit down. You really, really want to sit down.
Ellie groans with impatience, “You just gonna stand there? Fine. Then stay here and bleed out. Tommy, let’s go.”
You roll your eyes and retort, “Fuck you. I didn’t say I was staying. You all could be cannibals, and I’m not stupid enough to just trust you.” And yet, you walk towards the black-coated horse and swing yourself onto the saddle with a slight wince.