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Another Love by WatchingTVbutItsFire
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
26 May 2024
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Summary
“Ugh, I wish I could drive,” she says, paying him absolutely no mind as she climbs into the passenger seat. “Riding down the highway with the windows down, blasting music.”
“Get caught in traffic,” Joel says. “Get a flat tire. Pay for a new alternator.”
“Yeah, yeah, you don’t even know. You have a car. You can go wherever you want. You have everything.”
Joel grips the wheel tight. Kids never have anything to worry about. Their whole lives laid out in front of them like a highway. Everything, everything.
Or:
Joel gets a contracting job at a school. Being around kids all day is bad enough--and then a brazen, foul-mouthed teenager keeps showing up at his work site. Joel doesn't care why she's sleeping at school instead of at home. He doesn't.Or:
The foster kid AU where Ellie's foster parents are the least of her problems.Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
27 May 2024
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this could either break my heart (or bring it back to life) by lkay09 for two_birds_alone_together
Fandoms: The Last of Us (TV)
25 May 2024
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Summary
Joel stops, all the muscles in his body locked up, the rifle half-raised and the barrel pointed at the knees of a mangy man with a thick neck and stringy hair. He’s got one hand locked around the back of Ellie’s neck, fingertips gripping hard enough that even from here Joel can tell she’ll have bruises.
His other hand is pressing a thin blade against the front of her throat.
He nods at the gun in Joel’s hands. “Drop it.”
(bad things happen bingo - knife to the throat)
Series
- Part 4 of bad things happen bingo
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
26 May 2024
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revery alone will do by marchflower for probsdeleteltr
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
18 Dec 2023
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“Hey,” he says. “Look at me.”
She does. His face is cast in shadow, lined with soft pearlescent moonlight, but his eyes are sharp and bright and glittering, dissecting. She feels like she’s being flayed alive, like every inch of her is being peeled open and left out to air. She finds that she doesn’t hate it. She knows that whatever Joel sees in her, he’s gonna keep whole, protect.
“I’m gonna be alright,” he says, that same firm tone he used in KC. “You don’t gotta worry. I’m okay.”
She breathes, “Okay.”
*
Somewhere between Kansas City and Wyoming, Ellie gets sick.
Series
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 15,941
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 47
- Kudos:
- 384
- Bookmarks:
- 106
- Hits:
- 6,277
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
19 May 2024
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“Please,” and if it were any other time he would hate the desperation that has leaked into his voice, “you don’t understand.” That’s my kid, he doesn’t add, the thought scraping him raw, unwilling to give voice to something that personal to fucking Marlene. He’d been fighting it since Kansas City, allowed thoughts of her as his kid in after Silver Lake, but then outside the hospital…
I’m supposed to protect her, and I’ve already failed her too many times. You can’t take her from me.
Please don’t take her from me.
“I do,” Marlene says softly, sounding pained. “Her mother was my best friend. I was there when she was born, Joel. I held her as a baby, watched her sneak out and get into trouble as she grew up. But I have a job to do.” There’s a moment of silence, tense hesitation, and Joel feels his chest crack in two before she even draws breath to continue. “And you’re too late - she’s already gone.”
(or, the fireflies decide not to jump straight to brain surgery, but they don't exactly want joel hanging around while they do their little experiments) (marlene is a goddamn liar)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
10 May 2024
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a real nightmare (completely aware) by lkay09 for stillboldlygoing
Fandoms: The Last of Us (TV)
26 Mar 2024
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Summary
“Joel.” His name slips from her without thought, just the utterance of it stinging her chest.
He jerks to a stop, turning to look at her in surprise. Ellie can’t blame him, she’s barely said a word to him in almost two years.
Ellie tilts her head towards Tommy’s house, blowing out a breath. “Don’t bother.”
He looks between her and the house across the street, hands fidgeting with the paper he holds. “There oughta be another option. You shouldn’t –” He cuts himself off, but Ellie knows what he was gonna say. Years of distance don’t mean that she doesn’t still know him as well as she used to.
You shouldn’t have to be around me if you don’t want to.
(bad things happen bingo - cradling someone in their arms)
Series
- Part 3 of bad things happen bingo
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
03 May 2024
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Summary
“Yeah but they don’t have the fucking balls to come in here after me, especially not if you’re here.”
“And what if I’m not, one day? I don’t live here you know, kid.”
“Ellie,” she corrects him, unaware that Joel already knows her name from the first night those kids were after her, “my name is Ellie.”
He waves her words away. “My point still stands.”
(modern AU where Ellie keeps finding her way to Joel's worksite)
Series
- Part 1 of alterations
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 56,826
- Chapters:
- 8/8
- Comments:
- 270
- Kudos:
- 1,868
- Bookmarks:
- 541
- Hits:
- 32,079
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
02 May 2024
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Summary
"Ellie wonders if teenage girls are supposed to be this full of rage, to have it simmer and ready to boil over at any time. She wonders if Joel was the same, if he’s carried his rage since he was her age. She wonders if it’s a relief for him to have the excuse to unleash it as violence."
Ellie adjusts to Jackson and family life while also being a teenage lesbian, which despite the apocalypse is still a challenge. At least Joel has been there.
(Ellie is a lesbian, Joel is a trans man. Surviving turns to living.)
Series
- Part 3 of Watch Me Bleed
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
02 May 2024
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a simple favor by flannelfeelings
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
11 Jan 2024
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Summary
Really, it’s just a stupid favor.
Joel Miller, owner of Miller Contracting, has zero goddamn reason to be substitute teaching a woodshop class at the high school in downtown Austin. It’s the absolute last fuckin’ thing he wants to do with his time, actually. He ain’t a fan of kids, especially not at the snot-nosed age of fourteen. In fact, he’d never be here in this classroom, not in a million fuckin’ years.
Until Bill died.
(when his mentor and friend passes away, Joel takes on a job he really, really doesn't want to do. - aka the joel and ellie finding each other in every universe teacher joel edition)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
26 Apr 2024
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o' brother, where art thou? by flannelfeelings
Fandoms: The Last of Us (TV), The Last of Us (Video Games)
14 Oct 2023
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Summary
Maria is standing beside a large row of diaper boxes. Well, standing might be the wrong word. She looks…hunched. One hand is wrapped around her swollen middle, the other is bracing her body upright. Her face is scrunched up like she’s in pain, and Ellie knows exactly what that fucking means this late in a pregnancy.
“Dude,” she says.
Maria startles, gasping a little and turning to look at Ellie with surprise.
“Sorry,” Ellie grimaces. “Are you-”
“Yes,” Maria breathes, voice strained. “I’m in labor, Ellie. Have been for most of the day.”(a pregnant maria gets stranded in the supply warehouse during a storm. joel and ellie are tasked with the impossible- delivering her baby)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
23 Apr 2024
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Summary
After Kansas City, Joel and Ellie agree it'd be safer if people believed they're father and daughter.
-----
“I don’t really get it,” she said, “but I trust you.”
Joel blinked down at her, wearing that same expression from last time: like he wished she didn’t trust him at all. But then he wiped it away and refocused on the road ahead of them, a long brown ribbon unspooling over the gently rolling hills. “I won’t let anything happen to you, Ellie. You know that, right?”
“Yup. Thought that was already established, given I trusted you to watch my back during the clicker swarm, but—” She shrugged. “You got me this far. I trust you’ll get me even farther.”
Series
- Part 2 of take on me
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
23 Apr 2024
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in the mornin’ when I rise by flannelfeelings
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
07 Aug 2023
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Summary
Being a dad again is like rediscovering an old shirt you thought was lost to the laundry forever.
Initially, for Joel, it felt too good to be true. See, there were these little moments with Ellie on the road where he felt small pieces of his old self start to slip through like insulation spilling from cracked drywall.
It started small, apart from the natural role of protector he had to establish due to being the only adult in their party. He’d grab her backpack straps just before she could step right into a ditch and brain herself on a tumbled over log. It was almost instinctual, somehow he just knew she was about to get hurt and his arm shot out without his mind being aware of the action.
Well, really, it devolved from there and he was pretty helpless.
(Joel finds his way to being a dad again after two decades of wandering)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
22 Apr 2024
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The next twenty minutes are fairly uneventful, Ellie sniffling incessantly while talking about the new kittens born to the cat that lives in the stables. Her nose starts to run again, Joel internally cringing. He’s almost forgotten how gross kids can be. Half-feral kids raised in post-apocalyptic military schools are no exception, it seems.
Or, Joel and Ellie have been in Jackson for three months now, and are still figuring things out. Ellie getting sick brings up old memories for both of them.
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
20 Apr 2024
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“What the fuck happened?” asked Ellie waking up.
“What’s the last thing you remember?”
“We were telling puns and then there was a grenade,” she said.
Nodding, Joel said, “That was the Fireflies. They knocked us out. I woke up. Marlene told me that they didn’t have a plan for a cure. They didn’t have a roadmap at all. Their plan was to kill you and look at your brain and see if it told them anything. And I know that you are willing to die for a cure. But the thing was, she was saying they thought there were cordyceps in your brain. If it’s in your brain, it’s in your spinal fluid. They don’t have to kill you to get that. They were idiots, and their only plan was murder. So, now, we have what research they did on cordyceps, we have all of their medical supplies and we are going to Jackson to see if they have any doctor or know where we can head to. I know you want to save the world; I believe you will. But them butchering you wasn’t the way to do it.”
(Joel makes choices based not just on emotion but on medical knowledge that he has because Sarah's mother had cancer. Then we get a whole new story as they head to Jackson without secrets between them. This is an AU set before TLOU 2.)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
19 Apr 2024
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Summary
For the first time in decades Joel is eating healthy. As he and Ellie adjust to Jackson, Joel realizes maybe he wasn’t feeling awful just because he’d been growing old.
A slight hurt/mostly comfort, introspective story about the healing power of good food and the path of recovery.
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
17 Apr 2024
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On top of the world, looking over the edge by kiss_of_a_wave, Luxetrobur (kiss_of_a_wave)
Fandom: The Last of Us (TV), The Last of Us (Video Games)
22 Jun 2025
- Words:
- 181,021
- Works:
- 7
- Bookmarks:
- 22
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
17 Apr 2024
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Summary
In the month after their return to Jackson, Ellie and Joel are struggling to settle. Ellie is having a hard time adjusting and Joel has come with a reputation for dangerousness that means the town just doesn't trust him. Maria gets it, she's heard Tommy's stories, knows what he's capable of and has decided being civil for Tommy's sake doesn't mean she has to like him, but when Jackson is invaded, they are reminded just how brutal the outside world can be. It turns out when that happens, having someone dangerous on your side might just be the only way to get out of this alive.
Fixed the formatting and added to my Save Who You Can Save collection, ready for the finishing touches on a soon to be posted third part.
Series
- Part 2 of Save Who You Can Save
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
16 Apr 2024
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Summary
“Jesus, he’d destroy the world for you,” Jesse says with a laugh.
Jesse’s joke hits her like a gut punch from an angry drill instructor. Ellie can’t breathe for a second, but then a weight she didn’t realize she was carrying lifts off of her chest. Oh shit. Fucking shit. Joel had destroyed the world for her. And she thinks she might have known this whole time.
(Or: Ellie learns the truth about Salt Lake City and struggles with it.)
Series
- Part 2 of Jackson
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
15 Apr 2024
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Summary
“I thought you were gonna be mad at me,” she says, flicking her eyes up to him briefly before looking back to the snowglobe, giving it another shake, this one more restrained.
“I get why you wanna go out,” he says, sitting back. Apparently they’ll be having this little chat entirely in the hallway. “I’m not going to let you, but I get why you want to.”
She bites the inside of her cheek, thoughtful.
“You promise you’re not mad?” She asks. It’s not the first time he’s been asked this question. He’s pretty sure it won’t be the last.
“Promise,” he tells her. “Already forgotten.”
She looks at him then, a studying sort of look, and then she smiles.
“That’s just because you’re getting senile,” she says, like the little shit she is.
Perhaps he should reconsider letting her off the hook so easily.
(after settling in jackson, joel has to work through how to parent around issues from ellie's past) (aka 11k words of joel being the best dad in the business)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
15 Apr 2024
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patchwork by PenAndInkPrincess
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
18 May 2023
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Summary
Bolstered at finding that she can in fact do good work in the care and keeping of a Joel, she decides to expand her bag of tricks.
Unfortunately, there’s one area that she knows is most important in keeping Joel safe, in knowing that she can take care of him if she needs to.
It just happens to be an area that sends her into panic attacks of her own.
Medical care.
(in jackson, ellie can't stop thinking about how joel almost died because she didn't know how to fix him) (she decides to take steps to make sure this never happens again) (even if it means living in her own personal hell)
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
15 Apr 2024
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cyclical by PenAndInkPrincess
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
15 Apr 2023
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Summary
It’s a bit like trying on an old jacket, settling into Jackson. The general shape of it is familiar, even comforting in its own way, but there’s an adjustment period, a little breaking-in until everything fits like it should.
Well, it’s like an old jacket for him. The way Ellie looks sometimes, completely bewildered and turning to him for reassurance or clarification, he thinks it’s a bit more like trying on a Halloween costume for her.
Tommy and Maria had brought them their meals at first, and he’d at least been gratified to get some real food into her. After Silver Lake, she’d been off all meat for a long while, and in the hospital, exhaustion and pain had stolen what little appetite she’d managed to recover by that point. There’d been a little adjustment period here in Jackson, when they fell back on their routine of him taking bites of meat first to reassure her they were safe, but she’s slowly begun building back some flesh on her skinny little self, and it’s like he can feel a bit of his own restlessness settle with each plate of cheesy potatoes she downs with relish.
(settling into jackson goes well, giving joel and ellie their first taste of peace)
(and then someone sees ellie's bite scars)
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 14,252
- Chapters:
- 2/2
- Comments:
- 133
- Kudos:
- 1,927
- Bookmarks:
- 394
- Hits:
- 22,255
Bookmarked by unfinishedduet
15 Apr 2024