#And then I can dedicate an entire story venting about David

[2x4plank]

After the objectively saddest act in the game, we get a bit of a reprieve--both in terms of combat and feelings. This piece is gonna be real long.

Despite her chipper attitude, Ellie is still going through it. We get another moment when Ellie is like, "I want to talk about it!" And Joel is like, "No more sad shit. Boss up." Or however that Twitter post goes. He totally has a tramp stamp with that on it.

But God, how many more atrocities is Ellie going to have to witness until Joel allows her to be vulnerable about them? Girlie, you're forcing your coping mechanism onto your child.

Sidenote: Ellie is so fed up with these pallets.

Anyway, Tommy's Dam. I feel like Tommy and Joel keep up that brotherly attitude until they're alone together. It's not completely false: they're in an apocalypse and who knows when they'll last see each other. On the other hand, Tommy is embittered because he was a witness to Joel's horrible violence--his past life as a hunter. I like Joel, but I imagine that's quite traumatic for Tommy.

Sidenote: I feel so bad for Ellie being passed off to adults she doesn't know. When she has to go with Maria (who seems like a nice lady), you can see she doesn't want to. She's just real used to Joel.

Joel continues his emotion-swallowing crusade as he forfeits the picture of Sarah. I imagine Tommy is understanding of Joel's refusal, but probably disappointed that Joel is always hoeling his feelings up.

When they're alone with each other, they can finally show a bit of that dysfunction. I love how Tommy was ready with that, "Wasn't worth it!"

And then continues the trend of shouting matches being interrupted by calamity (see: Bill noticing Frank). Tommy can hold a grudge, because even when the dam is being invaded, he's still comes with that, "You still know how to kill?" Or something to that effect.

Next, we come around to the center point of this act: Joel learning that maybe not talking things over is a bad thing. Ellie suddenly has this bomb dropped on her that he's thinking of giving her up, and seeing as she was uncomfortable being away from him for a short amount of time, shipping her off like cargo is more than a little upsetting. So she embraces the horse girl within and rides off in a fit of rebellious rage. Understandable.

Now her new uncle and messy father must get her back, which is kind of a cool bonding activity. Anyway, Ellie and Joel pretty much lay their hearts bare in an argument. This girl is so afraid of being alone (or left behind, ha ha) after losing so many people close to her. Understandable. And Joel is just Joel, who is probably both afraid of letting someone else into his heart. I don't really have anything profound to say that isn't already said in the argument. Then it gets broken up by more calamity.

After they take care of the hunters, Joel has a long hard think on the ride back home, and decides to keep Ellie in his usual roundabout way: "Your wife kind of scares me." It's very cute. The electricity starts working so now Tommy's kids can watch Despicable Me.

Next act. The University of Colorado! Okay, so Ellie totally named the horse after one of the Savage Starlight characters. I'm betting on it.

I very much like seeing all of Ellie's first times. First time being in the forest, first time seeing a monkey. Cute.

I also love the notes from this act. I remember one small tidbit that some survivors wished another survivor a Merry Christmas, but the speaker is Jewish. It's very human to me.

The most curious thing in this chapter is that Firefly recording. If you play it in full from Joel's backpack, the dead Firefly mentions the Fireflies lack of success in the past. It kind of colored my viewpoint of the Fireflies in a negative light, and unfortunately, I never came around to liking them. We'll talk about that in the piece after the piece after this one.

Then Joel gets absolutely gored in the stomach (yikes! I hate stomach injuries), and Ellie is in for a world of hurt. Poor girl.

Addition: Ellie's command is really good here! I should've mentioned that, but her taking control when she has to was remarkable.

[ecotone99]

[SF] My first short story: "Blue Skies" (3000 words)

"What am I supposed to be looking at?" the Director asked.

"Just keep watching!" David said, practically bouncing in place with excitement. This was his greatest work, his magnum opus, and right then was the moment he'd been waiting for; a chance to finally present his "preposterous" idea to the department director. A fairy tale, is it? A ridiculous notion? Yeah, well not anymore.

In front of David and the Director was a white table with an empty hermetically sealed fish tank, about 50 gallons. On the top left half of the tank sat a black box that housed the magic-maker, as David liked to call it. A soft rumbling emanated from the magic-maker, like a little engine running, and a gentle hiss could be heard. Suddenly, a swirl of blue began to emerge in the center of the tank. Just a few wisps at first, like the smoke drifting off a cigarette, but as more and more appeared it rapidly began to coalesce. Then it snapped. Less than ten seconds after the first tendrils seemed to materialize in empty air, the entire tank was solid blue.

"Well I'll be damned," the Director said, wearing that little frown she made when she was impressed. Turning towards him, "what exactly happened here?"

"For lack of a better term," he began, "I dyed the air. I pulled air out of the tank into my magic-maker and turned it blue, then pumped it back into the tank. Something unexpected did happen though; the air wasn't dyed immediately. That's why we looked at an empty tank for so long before it began to appear in the center, and probably why it so rapidly changed once the reaction began."

"So you don't really know what happened?" Only it wasn't really a question, David was back on thin ice. If only he'd been able to test this on his own! His theories were solid and they obviously worked, just not quite the way he had expected. Why didn't it dye immediately?

"I have a pretty good idea," he lied. "Just need to run a few more tests, if I may." Couldn't she see how useful this tool could be if it worked properly?

"And how is this useful?" she asked, as if the thought had prompted the question.

"The first thing that comes to mind would be to study air currents. Currently we can use colored smoke with lights, but this would be so much more accurate. We wouldn't be observing a substance being pushed around by air, we'd be able to directly observe the air itself. I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this. Aero--".

"--pons," she said at the same time, eyes lighting up. "Aerodynamics? Sure, but I see this being weaponized." She sounded eager now. "Obstruction, distraction, isolation... this is good work David," she said, wagging a finger at him. "You will be commended. Get back to it." And with that, she left.

David's chest exploded with sensation; pride, joy, excitement, anxiety. Pressure. He had to figure out what went wrong. Well, not wrong, per se, just unexpectedly. He also had to figure out how to reverse the bluing, or at least dispose of it. Did the mass change? Does it behave differently now? So many questions!

Using a hose connected to the right wall of the tank, he linked it up with another identical tank sitting nearby. With the turn of a valve, blue air flowed from one tank into the other. As the blue passed from the first tank into the second, it became less and less opaque with the introduction of regular air. About halfway through the process both tanks looked like they had blue smoke in them. One could see through to the other side easily enough, but opaque tendrils occasionally blocked the view momentarily as they writhed about inside the chamber. It appeared that the blue didn't mix evenly with the air, it clumped together instead. Perfect. Time for a snack.

David gathered his jacket and tablet and made his way to the research center's food court, where he bought a sandwich and a Poptart. Eating slowly, he considered his experiment, asking questions only a scientist would think to ask and debating with himself. He decided the next step was to record the mass of the newly-blued air. Finishing up his meal, he began the walk back to the lab that he'd made so many times. Only this time, he was elated. It worked! It really, actually, frigging worked! For years he had dedicated all of his free time to research, determined to prove the Director wrong, and now it was finally happening.

Pushing open the door to his lab, he noticed something odd. When he had left, not half an hour ago, both tanks had been "smoky", but now only one was smoky while the other was completely opaque. That didn't make any sense though, he didn't put enough solution into the test to turn that much air. Cautiously, he collected a sample from the smoky tank to observe closer. For good measure, he also collected a sample from the opaque tank.

As he was finishing collecting the second sample, something blinked in the corner of his eye, imperceptibly fast. When he looked, to his absolute shock, he saw that the other tank was opaque now too. "Wha..." he started, not quite completing the word. He looked down at his first sample, the one from the smoky tank, and it was opaque now too! Dumbfounded, he made is way to a device that would allow him to take a closer look at the blue air. As he was fitting the sample into the device though, it slipped through his fingers to shatter on the tiles below. "Fuck."

Panicking, he grabbed every scrap of cloth he could find in the lab, extra lab coats, rags, and his spare change of clothes, and hurriedly stuffed them into every vent. Dashing out the door, he tore down the long hallways to the Director's office. A couple of the more curious decided to follow him, and by the time he got to the Director's office he had a small entourage of four others. With them behind him, he burst through the door.

"What is the meaning of--," she started. Seeing not only David, a mask of worry painted on his face, but four others all peering in around him, she began to look a little worried too.

"Director," David panted, talking fast, "there's been a contamination. We need to quarantine my lab and block all airways connecting it to anything else in the building or the outside. Remember that blue air? Well I had a sample but it broke and came into contact with the air in the room. I'm afraid the entire room might turn blue." There were several audible gasps from behind him.

Her face shifted from worry to annoyance. "I'm sure that's an overreaction, David. I mean, you didn't put the source material in the sample, did you? It was just the air that already turned. Does this mean you don't actually know what you're doing? Did you lie to me to get leave for a dangerous experiment?"

"No, ma'am, I didn't lie to you! In any case, it's not important, we need to contain this just in case. I haven't worked out how to revert the turned air yet. I don't believe it's dangerous to a person's health, but it would be impossible to see anything." With a sigh of exasperation, David let himself sink into a chair across from the Director's desk.

"Get up!" she snapped, and he hopped like it had had a pin hidden in it. "Tell you what, David, you can go home. We'll quarantine it for a day and see what happens, and I can't think of a good reason for us to pay you to be here. Can you?"

"Well, I could begin working--"

"No,” she said, standing up and leaning forward with her fists on the desk, “you will work on nothing else involved in this little project. I told you time and time again that this was not worth company resources, yet here we are cleaning up your mess. Go. Home." Looking over his shoulder at the cluster of goose-like watchers, which all began studying their feet under her gaze, she singled one out. "Alan," she called, making him grunt and visibly clench as if someone socked him in the stomach, "this is your responsibility now. Get down to David's lab and gather another few samples, then meet up with the rest of your gaggle here find a way to reverse the bluing."

He nodded and turned away without asking any questions, immediately heading for David's office. Apparently word had already gotten around of David's discovery. The rest of the group retreated, leaving him alone with the Director. He glanced at her, eyes indignant, and stalked out of the room without looking back.

He didn't go home though. Instead, he ran to catch up with Alan. "Please, before you open that door, come with me." Reading his face and knowing what he was about to say, he responded preemptively, "I know I'm supposed to go home but I don't think the Director is taking this seriously enough. We just don't know enough about this substance yet. Come with me to security, lets look at the cameras in the room. Make sure it's how I left it." Without waiting for a response, David strode off toward security, glancing back to find that Alan was actually following.

They walked in silence, Alan wasn't a talkative man and knowing he was disobeying the Director only made him clam up more. When they got to the security room David cursed, looking at the screen displaying his lab. The broken test tube had a perfectly round ball of blue floating above it, wisps of smoke around its edge. "That wasn't there when I left," he said, tapping the screen repeatedly, "we need to call the CDC or something." As he was watching the ball of blue hover a few inches off the ground, it snapped, becoming more than twice as large. It went from the size of a basketball to an over-sized beach ball. "Alan, head back to the Director's office and tell her what you saw. Don't mention me or the cameras though, say you saw it through the window on my door. Go!" Alan's face was composed when he nodded but the way he flat-out ran belied his calm front.

David sat down in the small security room's only chair to continue watching his lab. A short time later a siren sounded, indicating a lockdown. There was a crackle on the PA overhead followed by the Director's voice, "Attention, this is not a drill. The research center is going into lockdown. Please report to Conference Room A for further instructions. I repeat, this is not a drill. Report to Conference Room A immediately." He was glad Alan had been persuasive enough, but felt a weight in his stomach. This was not good.

David watched the screen for a while longer before making his own way to the meeting point. He had seen the ball snap again, consuming most of the table it was next to, and had a feeling it wasn't going to stop. On his way through the halls he saw multiple figures in yellow securing the exits. They had on full hazmat suits with shoulder mounted flashlights. Seems help had arrived.

Out of curiosity he changed course to his lab instead of the conference room and found the entire hallway blocked off, with multiple Hazmats clustered around his door. One noticed him and pointed, sending two others striding towards him purposefully. He crossed the barrier to meet them halfway, where they asked who he was and discussed the composition of the substance. After gathering what information they could they sent him on his way to the meeting point, chattering indistinctly over walkie-talkies. Before leaving though, David caught a glimpse of the window in his door. It was solid blue.

With no other options, he walked to Conference Room A. Well, tried to. The entire room was full to bursting with people standing outside watching and listening through the windows. The Director standing on the table waving her arms, assuring everyone that everything would be okay, it’s being handled and we can all go home soon. As this, a couple of Hazmats looked at each other and shrugged. Not a good sign. After everything that could be said was said, people began organizing themselves in the surrounding rooms and chatting in an attempt to pass the time.

A couple hours crawled by uneventfully when someone let out a squeal. Over a gentle roar of voiced concern and confusion, one person shouted, "The ceiling! Look at the ceiling!" Every head pivoted upward simultaneously to gape at what looked like tendrils of blue smoke wiggling around near the tiles above their heads. People ran, only to find the same occurrence in every other hallway and room. Within a minute of the initial squeal, every inch of air in the entire building was solid blue.

It was pandemonium. People screamed in fear and knocked each other over in their attempts to make their way to the locked doors. Not everyone had their bearings and some could be heard running the wrong directions, deeper into the solid blue building. The Hazmats began calling for quiet and calm over megaphones and slowly everyone began to calm down a little. "It's no different than being in pitch black," the voice said. "The Blue will not hurt you, just remain calm and we will get everyone out of the building."

Using the shoulder mounted flashlights, which did precious little, the Hazmats called for people to follow their voices and slowly ushered everyone out of the building and onto the grounds outside. During those uneventful hours when everyone was just sitting around, the Hazmats had erected a giant bubble around the building. It had multiple exits that looked like airlocks, and seemed like they had just gotten it all set up.

David did a quick check of himself and was surprised to see that none of the blue had stained his skin or clothes. Everyone else seemed to be doing the same, except for the few that were being examined very closely by Hazmats. After a while they must have determined that people were safe to leave, because lines formed at each of the exits, letting small groups pass through the special airlocks. David got in line and waited his turn. Each airlock cycle took about 2 minutes, and it seemed as though they pumped the air that made it in back inside the bubble, while also adding in fresh outside air, until the air in the chamber was only outside air and the people inside could leave.

Nobody was actually allowed to leave yet though, they were herded under a massive tent until everyone made it out. David was standing amongst the crowd, listening to an employee address the group from a podium, when the speaker suddenly looked directly at him and stopped talking, eyes growing wide in shock. Or possibly horror. The entire crowd then turned to look at David, a low rumble forming as they worriedly consulted those near them. Looking down at his arms, David saw he had an aura. Blue smoke hovered all around him, twisting and turning with no discernible pattern. Shocked, he looked back up at the crowd to find everyone had backed away from him. A scream sounded to his left, and he saw another blue aura spring up above the heads of the crowd.

"BACK INSIDE! EVERYONE GET BACK IN THE BUBBLE, NOW!" It was too late though, auras were springing up around more and more people, all over the place. Two came up right next to each other and when they touched the aura grew massive, engulfing four more people around them. Terrified, they all scattered, but the auras didn't. Instead of breaking apart, they grew and grew, enveloping half of the congregation. The auras of those who managed to keep out of contact with others' began to snap larger and larger, doubling in size every minute.

Watching, David could see pockets of blue throughout the clearing snap together, like magnets. Soon it looked more like blue with patches of clear than clear air with patches of blue. He was one that managed to keep from touching other auras, so he wasn't instantly engulfed and had to watch his handiwork.

It was out of control and nothing could be done to stop it. David felt hollow inside; this was on him. The world would die because of this. He started to hyperventilate. The world was spinning around him, even though everything was blue. He had a sharp pain running down his left arm; when did that happen? Clutching his chest, his knees buckled. Everyone he ever loved, everyone he ever hated, everyone he never knew. All of them. Dead because of him. He couldn't see anything, the entire clearing around the research center was a solid blue and probably growing. He thought he could hear people screaming, but it was like someone was turning down their volume. He couldn't even hear his own heartbeat. Something was in his mouth, something gritty. Dirt. He was on his face now. When did... When did that...

With nobody able to see him, much less help him, David died. It didn't take long for the Blue to spread worldwide, leaving the inhabitants confused and hopeless in an opaque but otherwise unchanged world.

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