#but yeah idk. rubbing my chin staring at my screen like this -> 🧐

[bylertruther]

i desperately want to write some kind of (potentially the last of us part 2 vibes inspired [aka just gay, country, cozy, and gritty]) established monster apocalypse fic with slightly aged up characters but i can't make up my mind on whether i want to write ...

a season one-esque retelling in the sense that will goes missing and the party ignores the safe zone's rules to go off and find him + they run into a feral eleven who helps them but fails to mention at first that she comes from the colony tht took will and it's kind of like a prison break type of fic too but overall it's all about hope and new beginnings and waaaay too close calls and The Power Of Friendship and coming home and being scared but doing it anyway and many many Realizations of the homosexual variety

by|er are boy besties and have been ever since they met on the rusty rickety swings and it's very much Day In The Life Of Two Monster Apocalypse Survivors Who Are NOT Dating Seriously Stop We're NOTTTTT Hehe<3 until Shit Goes Down and Oh God Oh Fuck What The Hell And FUCK FUCK FUCK WAIT NO STOP PLEASE and oops what do ya kno eddie/bob/hopper/insert other influential mentor character here jus got fed to a pack of demo-dogs or something else equally as horrific by some rival group and the party is helpless to do anything but watch and so after they hold the funeral they go off to avenge them (aka SHUT UP yes it's jus a tlou2 knock-off basically maybe don't look @ me) + it's about the lengths you'd go to for the ones that you love, what parts of yourself you lose and find on the path to revenge, what it means to be alive vs actually living, making your own way in the world, how much you can change before you become someone else entirely, what it means to actually honor the ones you lose, and The Healing Power of Love of course

fuck the "will goes missing" trope all my homies hate the "will goes missing" trope, this time .....okokok maybe will does go missing actually BUT mike is right on his tail bc Over My Dead Body Will You Take My Best Friend Away From Me and maybe they get chased away far enough by whatever monster that they get lost because it's all in the middle of their settlement falling/being overrun and it's nighttime and they don't know what's happening everything was fine just thirty minutes ago wtfwtfwtf and they have to find their way back home and there's lots of hurt/comfort of the physical and emotional variety bc Everything Happens So Much and when have they ever gotten a break literally ever + it's about finding hope where it feels like there is none, "just hold on a little longer, okay?", learning what makes home feel like home, us against the world-isms, will gets bitten by a demo-bat or something and doesn't tell mike (don't worry he's immune lol) but mike soon realizes anyway bc will is shifting his weight weirdly and mike is Always looking at him (but not in a gay way bro i sWEAR bro we're FRIENDS We Are Friends now hold my hand pls), aka Paladin and The Cleric vibes 100% essentially jus two gay hooligans and their awful very bad no good week away from the camp

will and el aren't The Chosen Ones so the monster apocalypse happens anyway without them causing it but when will was taken away it was because his test results came back weird n brenner's team wanted to study him for Finding A Cure reasons but something goes wrong one day and they both make it out of the lab (& maybe word gets around to other settlements abt two missing teens n mike finds a poster while out and when he takes it back n shows ppl it just gets him looks of pity but not from joyce, the only other person that never lost hope). fast forward to feral will-el being a two man wolf pack that are just trying to find will's family wherever they may be now (will corrects her and tells her its their family btw and he's told her so much abt them at this point that it really does feel like she's known them her whole life almost bt she's secretly scared to hope that they're still alive even if she'd never tell him that bc she jus wants a family so much she doesn't want to be let down if they aren't) and this one is more of like ... A Day In The Life / Character Study type of fic bc they Do find the party (they break in somewhere to get supplies n there's so many monsters n the last time they all saw each other they were kids and will-el are covered up so they don't recognize each other n ofc will-el are bandits so they get captured and then yanno. they rip off will's face coverings and it's like Omgggg Surprise It's Me Aha Sorry I Bit You And Almost Took Your Knee Out And Hit You With A Metal Pipe Can You Please Uncuff Me Now Hehe<3). aka will-el find their way back home and now they have to figure out what home really is and how to reintegrate into society. it's about the ghosts of your past, reconciling what you knew with what's in front of you, falling back into old habits and having to learn new ones, falling in love all over again, mike waking up from the same nightmare he always has and going to will's room in the dead of night because he has to be SURE that this is real that will's actually alive that it really is him right in front of him and that he hasn't been taken away again and that this isn't just another dream within a dream, learning how to be a human being again, and it ends with someone's wedding ofc.