⁺◟ PANDORAS BOX ! ⋆·˚ ❪ ✦♥ ❫
❛ chapter six ❜

⊹₊ ⋆ JOEL AND FINELY HAD SHORTLY FALLEN asleep once they arrived at their hideout, much to Ellie's dismay as she was forced to sit quietly staring out the window for the past hour, that was until she caught sight of Finelys open bag lying on the ground, and a wire dangling out of it.

She reached over very slowly towards the bag, her hand just about to grab it when a voice came from the couch. "Touch that bag and I will cut your hand off and feed it to Marlene." Ellie quickly scrambled back to her spot beside the window, sighing in annoyance and prepared to be bored again, but thankfully Finely rubbed her eyes and stood up from the couch, pushing the wire into the bag and zipping it up.

"You mumble in your sleep, you know," Ellie spoke up. "You and him," she nodded towards Joel who was twitching in his sleep. "I hate bad dreams."

"Yeah, I think we all do," Finely muttered, walking towards the girl. "What are you doing?"

"Just watching," Ellie replied. "I've never been this close, to the outside. Have you?"

"A few times but never as far as we'll be going," Finely replied, Ellie nodded in return.

"What's it like?" Questioned Ellie, but Finely looked in thought and she turned away, ignoring the girl so Ellie turned her attention to Joel who was still on the couch but awake and she continued. "Can't be any worse out there... Can it?"

"What on earth do the fireflies want with you?" Joel questioned curiously, a question Finely had been wondering also. But before the three could discuss anything further, Tess had returned and Finely was running towards her mother with open arms. "Hi, Finn," Tess smiled as she kissed her daughter's head. "Hey," she said to the others. "Sorry, it took so long. Soldiers fucking everywhere."

"How's Marlene?" Ellie was quick to fire at Tess and Finely honestly admired her loyalty.

Tess shrugged. "She'll make it," she then turned to Joel. "I saw the merchandise. It's a lot." She turned to Joel privately. "Wanna do this?"

Joel glanced at Finely and then back to Tess. "Yeah."

Tess nodded. "Let's go," she said loudly for everyone to hear. The group of four make their way into the generator room while Joel continues to fill the silence by talking to Tess. "Don't you think it's a bit strange that they're asking us to do their smuggling?"

"Why wouldn't she? We're great," Finely shrugged her shoulders with a grin making Tess chuckle before turning back to Joel. "Marlene wanted to do it herself. We weren't her first choice, or the second for that matter. She's lost a lot of men, beggers can't be choosers."

Tess, Ellie and Finely stood on the elevator while Joel worked on the generator and joined them. "Who's waiting for us at the drop-off?" Joel asked Tess and they started moving down. "She said there are some Fireflies that have travelled all the way from another city."

"You must be pretty important," Finely said as she glanced at Ellie. "You some big-wig daughter or something?"

"Something like that," Ellie replied awkwardly. "How long is this all going to take?"

"If everything goes as planned, we should get you to them in a few hours," Tess said. Joel put his hand on Finelys shoulder and gave her a pointed look that was telling her to behave and be careful. "Ellie," Tess continued. "Once we get out there, I need you to follow our lead and stay as close to Finelys as possible."

The Miller girl turned to her mother. "What? Why me."

"Because you're close in age, you can look after yourself and she'd probably be more comfortable with you than with Joel," Tess replied quietly.

They finally made it to the end of the tunnels and Joel climbed up the ladders first, pushing the wooden board aside to check if the coast was clear. "Hold on. There's a parol up ahead," he said as he saw a couple of military soldiers ahead, he waited a moment until they were fully out of site and then pushed the wooden board fully off. "Alright, we're good."

Joel offered his hand down for Finely to take and she grabbed it gratefully. Ellie was next to come up the ladders and just like Joel did for her, Finely offered her hand to Ellie. "Holy shit! I'm actually outside," Ellie gasped in excitement.

"This rain ain't gone do us any good," Joel said as they walked up and through an old rusty cargo container but the second Joel stepped foot out of it they were ambushed and he was hit over the head. "Dad!" Finely yelled but was quickly pulled back by her mother.

"Don't do anything stupid!" The guard yelled, pointing her gun at Finely who raised her hands. "Move. Turn around. On your knees." They ordered them until each of them complied.

"This is Ramirez at Sector Twelve. Requesting pickup for four stragglers." The woman guard spoke into her walky-talky while Tess tried negotiating with the man, but she was quickly shut up and he began scanning each person individually to make sure no one was infected.

Once the male guard was done checking Finely, he moved on to Ellie who the Miller girl noticed looked extremely freaked out and scared, and just as the guard scanned her, Ellie quickly took her pocket knife and stabbed the guard in the leg. Joel jumped at the man while the female aimed her gun at Tess, Finely quickly threw her knife into the woman's shoulder making her scream and drop the gun, giving Tess enough time to shoot her in the head while Joel finished off the other.

"Oh fuck!" Ellie scrambled away from the dead bodies. "I thought we were just gonna hold them up or something."

"What the fuck was going on with you?" Finely questioned as she noticed Ellie's line of vision going towards the scanner. Finely walked towards it but Ellie grabbed her arm and gave her a pleading look, but that didn't stop Tess from picking it up to inspect herself. "Shit."

She threw the scanner to Joel who looked at the flashing red light that read "POSITIVE" Joel looked at it in shock. "Jesus Christ. You're infected? Get the fuck away from her or I swear to god I will put a bullet in your skull and I don't care that you're a kid."

Finely's mouth opened in shock as she looked at Ellie and the angry but terrified look on her father's face as his hand reached for the gun. Finely pulled her arm from Ellie's grip causing the smaller girl to stumble back into the shipping container with the force. "I'm not infected!" Ellie pleaded.

"No?" Joel scoffed. "Is this lying?" he showed her the scanner before throwing it at her feet.

"I can explain!" Ellie said. "Yeah? Well, you better get a move on," said Finely as she aimed her gun at the girl. Ellie gulped, genuinely not understanding how someone with such an innocent face could be so terrifying. She quickly pulled her sleeve up, showing them all the bite wounds on her arm. "Look at this!"

"That's not proving anything," said Finely as she flicked the safety off her gun. "It's three weeks old!" Ellie begged.

"No. Everyone turns within two days," Tess said as she took to gun from Finely and pointed it at Ellie herself. "So you stop bullshitting!"

"It's three weeks! I swear." Ellie insisted. "Why would Marlene set you up?" Finely sighed and turned to her parents. "We don't have time to sit and argue about this," she said as she heard the guards in the distance. "Let's get away from here and if it's infected then it'll worsen."

"Yeah," Joel said as he saw a van drive towards them. He quickly grabbed Finelys hand, glancing at Tess and Ellie as he yelled.

"Run!"