She’s ushered to a lab, where she sees an Ophiocordyceps specimen beneath a microscope.
But that’s impossible.
“They cannot survive in humans,” she says.
Tess, Joel, and Ellie traverse a wrecked Boston.HBO
Using a pair of forceps, she reaches into the mouth of the woman.
What she pulls out are strands of hypha, as alive as the body is dead.
Whoever bit her is still out in the wild, as are 14 of her missing coworkers.
An Infected.HBO
This information greatly disturbs Ibu.
“We brought you here to help us keep this from spreading,” says her military escort.
“We need a vaccine.”
Anna Torv as Tess.HBO
She tells himwhat the epidemiologist told us last week: “There is no medicine.
There is no vaccine.”
All there is to do, she says, is “bomb this city and everyone in it.”
Her advice was eventually taken.
“Worked here,” she adds, “but not in most places.”
(By her telling, Ellie was bit three weeks previous inside an abandoned mall in the QZ.)
“It’s gonna happen sooner or later,” Joel portends.
Tess takes a softer touch with Ellie, but nottoosoft.
“Why are you so important to Marlene?”
she asks, clearly developing a theory of her own.
“Joel and I aren’t good people.
We’re doing this for us, because apparently you’re worth something.
We don’t know what you’re worth if we don’t know what we have.”
There’s Firefly doctors out west that want to examine her.
Joel isn’t just skeptical, he’s angry.
He’s heard this story before, but no vaccine has ever emerged.
Ellie is surprised there aren’t more Infected in the city.
She heard it was crazy beyond the QZ, with “swarms of infected everywhere.”
She asks about super-powered creatures that “explode fungus spores on you,” which gives Tess a laugh.
Tess squeezes past it in search of an alternate route, leaving Joel and Ellie alone.
He’s more comfortable talking about the amount of Infected he’s killed, which is “lots.”
“Is it hard, knowing they were people once?”
“Sometimes,” he replies.
Tess returns, taking them on a route around the blockage.
Ellie stops to look out at the ruined city from a balcony.
Below, hundreds of Infected are gathered, feasting on bodies.
She notices how their movements seem weirdly in sync, as if connected by some unifying force.
Tess says she’s correct.
Now they know where you are.
Now they come."
This new route forces them to cut through a museum.
Guns and flashlights drawn, the trio enters.
Whatever did this, Ellie realizes, is not your typical Infected.
Joel, less sure about the safety of the museum, leads them silently upstairs.
The building, though, feels like in as bad of shape as the fungus growing at its doors.
Thankfully, the window leading to their destination is just ahead.
Before they can reach it, though, a guttural rasp punctuated by an icky clicking pierces the silence.
Though blind, its other senses appear to be heightened.
It’s also stronger and more aggressive than the average Infected.
Joel fires off some shots, but it’s not enough to stop it.
Ellie hides as Joel and Tess run, leading the Clickers to other areas of the exhibit.
Joel, quiet as can be, reloads his gun and returns to Ellie.
Everyone emerges worse for the wear.
This concerns Joel, who worries this will be the wound that turns her.
Tess scolds him for his pessimism.
They make their way to the State House, but something is off.
The Firefly supply truck out front is abandoned and fresh blood paints the steps to the building.
Inside, there’s ample supplies, including weapons and gasoline, but the Fireflies are all dead.
It’s clear to Joel that one became infected and a struggle ensued.
“The healthy ones fought the sick ones.
And they’re no closer to getting the battery.
But Tess says she’s not going back.
“Our luck had to run out sooner or later,” she sighs.
Ellie calls it before Joel can she’s infected.
One of the Clickers clipped her neck, after all, and the wound is growing larger and fiercer.
It will consume her in short order.
Joel’s first instinct isn’t concern, but fear.
He reacts as if he’s been betrayed.
Tess contrasts her wound to Ellie’s, which is already fading.
“This is real, Joel,” she asserts.
“She’s f—ing real.”
She tells him that, despite the carnage all around them, it’s imperative he take Ellie west.
“Keep her alive and you set everything right,” she says.
“All the s— we did.”
One of the dead around them roars to life and Joel shoots it dead.
Tess knows time is short.
She begins tipping the drums of gasoline and dumping boxes of grenades.
“Joel,” she says, “save who you’re able to save.”
Joel, as unsentimental as they come, doesn’t hesitate.
He doesn’t even say goodbye.
She pulls out a lighter, but it won’t spark a flame.
An Infected corners her, gets close, opens its mouth as if to kiss her.
Living strands of hyphae reach from its throat and wriggle into her mouth.
And that’s when the flame finally strikes, setting the gas ablaze and producing an obliterating explosion.
Outside, Joel and Ellie listen to the shrieks of the burning undead.
Tess mentioned two names before sacrificing herself: Bill and Frank.
