Been thinking about potential conflict ideas for the last of us part 3. hear me out. (spoilers ahead)
It’s 3 years after the events of part II.
Ellie gets back to Jackson trying to get Tommy & Dina's forgiveness. Ellie lied to Tommy and said he killed Abby in Santa Barbara. Dina's mad at Ellie for leaving the farm. Maria (Tommy’s) wife was hesitant in letting Ellie back into the community given the past issues resulting in Joel and Jesse’s death and Tommy’s injuries which made them eventually divorce. Reluctantly she does with pleas from Dina who is still angry at Ellie for leaving the farm. Dina still hasn’t forgiven Ellie and doesn’t want her around JJ (Now 5 Years old).
Abby and Lev are dealing defecting from WLF & Scars. The Rattlers are disbanded after Ellie released the prisoners and shot up everyone at their base looking for Abby. We find out the Rattlers had a few former fireflies in hiding trying to restart the militia. Throughout the game we learn Lev is also immune like Ellie. While strung up at the beach Lev gets bit and didn’t turn.
Former scar new cannibal (a new faction from David’s group in Part 1) Lev’s mother (whom we thought was dead and made it off the island) tracks them down and kills him while the last of the fireflies are trying to develop a vaccine at a small clinic they developed not far from Catalina island. Abby kills her. Now with everything they need except a test subject Abby leads a small hunting party back to Jackson to kidnap Ellie because she is the only other person with immunity. This particular day Ellie and a new male character (who likes her but doesn’t know she’s gay) were out on a patrol.
The “new” Fireflies cause havoc. Burn the community to the ground thinking they’re hiding Ellie. In the madness they grab Maria, Dina, Jesse’s Mother, Seth, Tommy, and Cat (Ellie’s ex who gave her the tattoo). They hold them up in the center of town execution style asking about the whereabouts of Ellie. They force Cat to reveal Ellie’s secret that she’d been immune this entire time. After this information is revealed they kill her. The gunshot alerts Clickers, and other infected to the area causing a frenzy. In the chaos, Abby muscles JJ from Dina as ransom. Many are dead.
This new character and Ellie return to a burned down Jackson where the citizens are angry at Ellie. Maria excommunicates Ellie because Dina has already left (while injured) to go after her child. Tommy on his deathbed is angry at Ellie for lying about killing Abby when she didn’t. The townsfolk hate her for causing so much destruction every time she’s around.
Part 3 takes us on a journey of Ellie chasing down Abby to finally put the nail in the coffin. At some point Ellie and Abby will have to fend off the infected together (in a situation similar to Joel Tommy & Abby) and perhaps a few factions in the way as well. This brings an opportunity to humanize the two over a dad joke about Ellie surviving two bites, one from infected and one from Abby taking her fingers.
At the end Ellie must decide if she’ll kill abby at gunpoint in front of JJ and Abby’s baby from Owen or if she’d finally give her life “purpose” on the table and develop the vaccine to save a bitten Dina and restore society as a whole. This triggers flashbacks of Joel in the same situation and shooting Abby’s dad in front of her, then of Abby killing Joel then gun back in her hands.