ᯓᖭི༏ᖫྀ ELLIE WILLIAMS ⋮

Jackson had been having a lot of trouble lately.

Not among the townspeople themselves, but rather problems coming from the outside. Supplies had been dwindling for months, and ambushes on patrols had spiked alarmingly fast as if someone knew exactly where they were stepping.

Wherever they went, nothing was left behind; no cans, no scraps, not even footprints. Back in Jackson, too, they suspected someone had broken into the supply depot; food or ammunition would go missing overnight. It was really starting to bother Maria. And the worst part? Maria knew who it was. But she refused to believe she was still alive out there.

Ellie couldn't help but press the issue after she and Dina were nearly ambushed on patrol in Hoback, so she finally worked up the courage to ask Maria if she had any idea what was going on.

Maria denied it.

She said it was probably just a group of scavengers, nothing more.

But Ellie didn't believe her.

Then one day, while walking through the main building, she heard hushed voices coming from behind a door left slightly ajar. She recognized Tommy’s voice instantly.

"We can't keep pretending this isn't happening."

There was a brief silence.

"I'm not pretending anything,"

Maria replied wearily.

"Then look at me and tell me you aren't thinking the same thing I am."

Another silence.

Ellie stepped a little closer.

"It’s been the same pattern for months," Tommy continued. "The same places. The same routes. People wounded, but not killed. She knows exactly where we are."

"I know."

Maria let out a heavy sigh; Tommy spoke again.

"Tell me you haven't thought about her."

The answer took too long to come.

"It’s been years; it can't be her."

"Because you don't want it to be, or because you actually believe it?"

Ellie frowned.

Who was she?

"If she’s still alive out there, it means she wants to come back, and not exactly to our side, Maria."

Maria spoke as her chair scraped against the floor while she stood up. And that was enough for Ellie to understand one thing: Maria knew exactly who they were talking about. And whoever she was, she had been haunting Jackson like a ghost for years.

[...]

After that, Ellie tried to convince herself she didn't care.

It lasted exactly two days. Because once she’d overheard that conversation, she couldn't let the matter rest.

She started by asking casual questions. Of Jesse, of Seth. Of anyone who had lived in Jackson before she and Joel arrived. Most gave evasive answers, shying away from the past. Others simply seemed uncomfortable, while some pretended not to remember.

All she managed to gather were fragments, small pieces that didn't quite fit together. That the person had lived in Jackson; that the empty stable stall Ellie found upon her arrival was empty because the woman had taken a horse with her; that she had left while still young following a falling-out with Maria. Yet, she had been one of the best in town.

And no one seemed to agree on who she had really been.

Weeks passed. Ellie’s curiosity slowly morphed into something worse, perhaps an unhealthy obsession with finding her, a fixation she refused to let go of until she found more than just loose threads of the true story.

One afternoon, she found herself in one of Jackson’s oldest storage sheds, rummaging through boxes filled with dusty records, forgotten photographs, and documents that hadn't been touched in years.

She hadn't expected to find anything, but she did.

A crumpled, creased photograph, deliberately left behind amidst the stack of boxes. She recognized Tommy and Maria. And between them stood a girl, younger than she had imagined; perhaps the same age Ellie was now.

Ellie couldn't explain why she stared at that photo for so long. Maybe because, for the first time, the person behind the stories had a face. Or perhaps because the more she learned about her, the less she understood why no one wanted to talk about what had happened. By the time winter arrived, Ellie was already tired of chasing ghosts, yet there were nights when the subject cost her hours of sleep. The traces kept appearing: abandoned camps, recent campfires, and tracks that vanished before she could follow them very far. That morning, she found something different. An old ranger station showing clear signs that someone had been there just hours before.

And this time, she decided to follow the trail.

She ventured into the trees, ignoring the risk.

Bad idea.

A second later, a rope snapped taut around her ankle, jerking her backward onto the snow until she was left hanging a meter above the ground.

She struggled to break free, twisting and trying to draw the knife from its sheath, but a voice stopped her.

"Don't move."

Ellie froze, searching the trees for the source of the voice.

"Who are you?"

Silence.

"Who the fuck are you?!"

Then, a figure emerged from the snow. Young. Younger than she had expected.

And strangely familiar.

As if she had seen that face before. The blood rushing to her head made it hard to recognize the features, but when the girl tilted her head, Ellie saw it.

The same girl from the photo. The same girl she had been hunting, the one everyone knew about but whose name no one could say.

It couldn't be possible.