Thomas gripped his weapon so hard it hurt his fingers. Holding it out in front of him, he spun in a slow circle, searching the darkness between the trees. He’d dropped his flashlight and now picked it up, shut it off. He didn’t want to be a sitting duck and he didn’t want his eyesight to be worthless. Anxious for his eyes to grow accustomed to the dark, he continued turning slowly around and around, finger itching to pull the trigger again.
He couldn’t believe Randall was still alive. How had he survived out here? Survival aside, it seemed impossible that the disease itself hadn’t killed him yet. The Flare didn’t just drive you crazy; eventually it shut your brain down altogether.
He thought of the guards then. A wave of sadness and guilt crashed over him. The men were dead because Thomas needed to take a walk, like some overprivileged spoiled brat. More lives on his hands. How many more would there be?
His foot came down on a branch, broke it. The crack echoed through the night and he froze. His eyes had indeed gotten used to the darkness, the trees almost seeming to glow, their many branches silhouetted against the sky. Thomas didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, but he was certain Randall hadn’t gone far—his retreat would have made more noise. The Crank was close, probably following him.
Then Thomas remembered.
Teresa! he called out. Teresa! Randall attacked us. He killed the guards. I don’t know what to do. How can he possib—
Tom! Her response cut him off. Where are you? Paige says she’ll send someone out. Do you still have your Launcher?
Yeah.
Just stay there. Don’t try to make it back. Someone will be there soon.
Thomas thought he heard a noise to his left, swung his weapon toward it. Saw nothing.
Tom?
Yeah, okay. I’ll just keep turning in circles until I puke. Hurry.
Keep talking to me.
No, he replied. I need to stay focused. I know he’s close.
Fine, but call out to me the second something happens.
I will.
The dark forest loomed over him, seeming almost to float, the trees uprooted from the ground, stretching out. His senses started to play tricks on him. He kept seeing something out of the corner of his eye, kept thinking his own breaths were someone else’s. Finally he broke.
“Randall!” he yelled. “They’re coming! They know we’re here!”
No response. He didn’t know why he’d called out—Randall had no more capacity to reason than one of the trees surrounding him. His eyes had shown him past the Gone like no other Crank Thomas had ever seen.
“I miss the tasty treats.”
Thomas sucked in a breath. Randall spoke quietly, yet his words seemed to boom through the air. Thomas swung left, then right, then turned in a complete circle, his weapon held out before him.
“Randall!” he screamed.
Then something hit him, forcing the air from his lungs. It was on top of him, pressing his head and neck in a weird direction, driving pain like nails through his tendons and muscles. To protect himself he collapsed to the ground. He lost his grip on the Launcher. The strap dug into his neck as he reached for whatever had attacked him, and fingers found wet skin and greasy hair.
“Tasty,” Randall’s voice whispered directly into his ear.
Thomas screamed, twisting his body, struggling to get out from under the monster pinning him down. An arm slipped around his face, covering his mouth in the crook of an elbow. It smelled of sweat and rot; Thomas gagged. Randall squeezed, cutting off Thomas’s air. He managed to get his mouth open, bite down with all the might of his jaws. An acrid, sour taste filled his mouth.
Randall roared, a horrible sound that was far from human. He loosened his grip just enough that Thomas could twist out of the man’s hold, throwing elbows wildly, connecting with a couple. The Crank staggered backward as Thomas struggled to his feet, panic transformed to sheer adrenaline. He grappled for his Launcher, which had flipped all the way onto his back. He grabbed it, slung it around to the front of his body, got it in position.
He almost had it when the Crank charged him, scuttling across the leafy ground like a monstrous spider, leaping at the last second to crash into Thomas’s chest. It slammed the hard edge of the Launcher into his sternum, knocking the wind from his lungs again, and he fell to the ground, the Crank on top of him. Randall started pounding on Thomas with both fists like some rampaging gorilla, shrieking with every punch.
Thomas couldn’t fight back against the wild creature attacking him. He thought of Chuck and Teresa and Alby and Minho and Newt. If he died now, he’d never have the chance to save them.
He forced himself to relax and focus. He closed his eyes and gathered his strength. As Thomas stilled, the blows had slowed. He took his opportunity. He lashed out with his right hand and grabbed Randall by the ear, twisted, and yanked the Crank’s head to the side. Randall lost his balance just enough that Thomas could thrust his chest out and kick him away. He jumped to his feet, backed up as he fumbled for his Launcher, got it, found the trigger, pressed it.
The static sound of its charge filled the forest as Randall ran at him once again. But a grenade hit the Crank’s chest, throwing him to the ground, and tendrils of white heat danced across his body as he convulsed on the ground, shrieking in agony.
Thomas ran to him, held up his Launcher like a club. He slammed it down into the face of the man who’d once been Randall. A sickening crunch cut off the Crank’s inhuman yells. Now the thing’s body twitched in a different way, as if its internal communication system had shorted out.
Thomas, heaving every breath, lifted his Launcher one more time and brought it down with all the strength left in him.
This time, the Crank went completely still.
—
Teresa found him kneeling next to the dead body, staring down at it, transfixed. A man he’d once known, a man he’d never really liked. Never liked at all, actually. But no one deserved an ending like that. No one.
She practically had to carry him to the transport. He was as dazed mentally as physically. Spent in every way. He planned to sleep for a week.
Teresa, he said with his mind on the way back to the complex.
Yeah?
After a long pause, he finally said it.
They’ll never find a cure.
231.12.13 | 6:11 a.m.
Thomas woke up before his alarm went off. He didn’t want to wake Teresa before she got a full night’s rest, so he forced himself to wait. He inspected his body, gingerly touching each bandaged spot in turn, wincing as he did. Time ticked by at a snail’s pace.
He’d given himself a full day to recover, gather his thoughts, and make a precise plan to convince Teresa. And with every passing minute, his resolve had strengthened.
The kicker had come in a conversation he’d overheard in the infirmary yesterday. Something about “bulb creatures.” Thomas didn’t hear much, but he was pretty sure it had something to do with the weird, glowing vats filled with veiny limbs and tumorous growths he and Newt had seen in the R&D lab. Creepy as hell.
Yet more evidence of what he already knew—WICKED would never stop.
Finally his patience ran out.
Are you awake? he asked Teresa.
Only three or four seconds went by.
Yeah, she said. No rebuke for waking her up, which was a good start.
Meet me at breakfast the second the cafeteria opens. Sit close, whispers only. He didn’t know how much WICKED could follow their telepathy and he wanted to make sure they didn’t overhear this conversation.
Okay. She was a woman of few words this morning—just fine by him.
Awesome. See you soon. He rolled out of bed and limped to the shower.
—
In the cafeteria, Thomas had found a quiet spot away from the few workers and subjects eating. He picked at his food as he waited for Teresa. He drank three glasses of water. He finally pushed his tray away, folded and unfolded his arms, shifted in his seat
. When she showed up, she skipped the food line altogether and came to sit next to him.
What’s up? she asked his mind.
“No,” he spoke quietly. “Just talk normal.”
They sat shoulder to shoulder, Thomas’s plate of eggs and bacon resting on the table in front of them. He had to get these plans off his chest. He leaned in close to Teresa and started whispering.
“Keep an open mind, okay? Hear me out, too, before you start arguing.”
She looked up at him, searching for a hint of what he was going to say. She nodded and looked back down at his food.
“Sorry, this is just really important to me. So…Look, I’m at the end of my rope, Teresa. The absolute end. The Purge, the lies, the cruelty in the maze. And I’ve heard enough things over the last few days to figure out that WICKED has plans for an entirely new phase of trials—in the Scorch—and who knows what else. Did you know about any of this?”
Teresa shook her head adamantly, looking genuinely horrified. “I mean, I suspected something—and then the expedition to the Scorch, those barracks they built, the Flat Trans. But they haven’t shared anything with me.” She paused, shaking her head again. “Are you sure about what you heard?”
“Totally.”
“Sometimes they really do make it hard to believe in them, don’t they?”
Her reaction made Thomas feel like he’d cleared the first hurdle.
“Exactly,” he said. “I went to the Scorch. It’s horrible. And I’ve seen those bulby things they created in R&D. They’re like something straight out of a nightmare. It’s gotta stop, Teresa. All of this has to stop. I mean it.”
She didn’t respond at first, her emotions impossible to read. But when she finally spoke, her words had a slight tremor to them.
“What could we do, Tom? WICKED is too big. And whatever they’re doing, at least they have some justification for it.”
“The cure?” Thomas scoffed. “It’s never going to happen. I just don’t believe in it. After all this time and all this work, they don’t even have a preliminary treatment, no trial runs of drugs, nothing. All they do is get more vicious with their Variables, chasing this ridiculous blueprint they’re always spouting about.”
“Do you really think they’re sending them to the Scorch?” she asked.
“Yes. Don’t you?”
She sighed. “I guess I do.”
“Those are our friends, Teresa. Think back to the good times we had together. My God, if nothing else, think of them throwing Chuck into the Scorch, much less to the wolves in that Crank city.”
That seemed to really get her. Her eyes moistened.
“Even so,” she said. “What could we possibly do? The two of us against the mighty empire and all their guards and all their weapons?”
And now it was time to tell her. He gathered his courage and went for it.
“This is the part you need to hear me out on. First, we convince Dr. Paige to send us into the maze. We’ll convince her they need to shake things up a bit. But we make sure they send us in with our memories intact. That’s the key. We tell them they should let us do some serious analysis from the inside and we can report back. The Psychs would think Christmas had come again—imagine all the Variable possibilities. We can throw all our enthusiasm into it, really convince them we want this. Maybe we even suggest we go in for one month, then come back out. It doesn’t matter what we say, we just need to get inserted.”
“And then what?” she asked. At least she hadn’t outright rejected the idea.
“We make preparations before we go in. We get keys to one of the weapons rooms, or hide weapons near the maze exit. We do some research on Grievers, figure out a way to shut them down at the right time. Map out the closest town we can escape to once we get everyone out. Then, once we’re in, we’ll spend a few days convincing the Gladers what’s going to happen, make a plan, and go for it.”
“You make it sound so easy,” she replied. “For one thing, they’ll be observing our every move and listening to everything we say.”
“Then we’ll do a lot of whispering. A lot of talking in the dark, avoid beetle blades, whatever. They trust us, and that’ll be the biggest thing we have going for us.”
Teresa leaned even closer, found his ear. Her breath warmed his skin. “You really think we can just go into the maze and grab the Gladers and march out of there? Without killing a bunch of people? Getting killed ourselves?”
He exhaled. “I know it’s outrageous. But it’s worse to sit back and let this continue without trying to stop it.”
She sighed but didn’t say anything.
“Teresa, I’m pouring my soul out to you. It’s probably Chuck who’s finally pushed me over the edge. I love that kid so much. I can’t…I just can’t let WICKED keep hurting him. Not to mention the others. I can’t. Please, please say you’re with me on this.”
He’d never talked to her this way before. He’d laid it all out there.
She looked at him, her eyes weary. “You really mean it, don’t you?”
“Absolutely. Saying it out loud only makes me feel more sure.”
She was quiet then. Quiet for a very long time.
Finally she stood up. “Give me twenty-four hours to think about it, okay?” And then she walked away, leaving a very anxious friend behind.
—
In the end, she only needed about fourteen hours.
Thomas had spent the day making use of his free time. In between his checkups, tests, and observation time, he scoured his research tablet for any information on Grievers in the files unprotected by passwords. Stopping the creatures would be a huge factor if they were going to escape. There wasn’t much, but he did find a schematics copy of its biomechanical makeup embedded in a huge collection of miscellaneous information dated years earlier.
He was in bed, studying the schematics for potential weaknesses, when Teresa called to him telepathically.
Okay, she said. I’m in.
He almost jumped out of his bed with excitement. Really? You’re on board?
For you. For Chuck. For our friends. I’ll help you.
Awesome. That’s awesome. Now we just need to convince Dr. Paige.
Don’t worry about her. I actually think she’ll love the idea of inserting us in Group A and Aris and Rachel in Group B. Let me take care of that part.
Really?
Really. I’ll meet with her first thing tomorrow.
—
Thomas stood in the observation room, watching a close feed of Newt as he ate his dinner by the big tall pole in the Glade. For some reason, he was alone. Maybe he just needed some time to himself. Maybe Chuck had talked his ear off all day—par for the course. But he sat there, taking his bites, chewing, swallowing, staring off at nothing in particular, deep in thought.
Thomas thought of Newt’s sister, Lizzy, somewhere off in Group B’s maze. Wouldn’t that be a thing, to save both of them?
“I’m coming for you, Newt,” Thomas whispered, so softly that no one could possibly hear him. “I’m coming for every last one of you.”
—
The next day, he got the official word.
Dr. Paige had approved the insertion of the Elites into the Maze Trials.
231.12.19 | 10:37 a.m.
Dr. Paige stood at the head of the table, with Thomas and Teresa sitting on one side, Aris and Rachel on the other. A few Psychs and technicians sat farther down, staying mostly quiet. But every once in a while, Dr. Paige shot them a glance for confirmation of what she was saying.
The plans for the Elites’ insertion had been laid out, and they were going over some final details. Thomas fought to maintain patience, to play along as if he had devoted his heart and soul to the things that were planned for them. But it was his intent—and serious hope—that none of it would ever happen.
“You can look up here,” Dr. Paige said, gesturing to a screen on the wall behind her, where a long chart full of information had been projected, “and see j
ust how many new and unique Variables our Psychs have developed surrounding this insertion. We’ve taken it far beyond your simple suggestions, Teresa. We see this as a golden opportunity—a catalyst, if you will—to stimulate many killzone patterns that we’ve never been able to measure before.”
Thomas had been squinting at the display, trying to get a read on any of the individual line items. But the words were too small. And then, at a signal from Dr. Paige, the screen went blank again.
She continued. “Even the first twenty-four to forty-eight hours will bring events to the Glade that have never been seen before. Events that will significantly disrupt what has become a routine there and spur many new emotions and thoughts. Subjects arriving on consecutive days, a member of the opposite sex arriving for the first time—we’re just really encouraged by the possibilities. So I have to give a lot of credit to Teresa for this idea.” Her smile beamed down on Thomas’s friend.
As for him, he didn’t care one whit that she was taking all the credit. The plan might have never worked if Thomas had approached them. None of it mattered anyway. As much as he’d once loved Dr. Ava Paige, he hoped that soon he’d never have to see her again. Or anyone or anything related to WICKED.
He looked at Aris, and then Rachel, both of whom seemed less than happy. They hadn’t spoken much lately, and he and Teresa were still trying to decide whether to bring them in on the plan. Things were complicated enough, with too many risks. But he also couldn’t imagine not telling them. Either way, he fully intended to save Group B along with his own friends in Group A.
“Thomas?”
He snapped back to attention and realized that Dr. Paige—along with everyone else—was staring at him.
“Sorry,” he said, shifting in his seat. “I kind of spaced out there. Did I miss something?”
She looked back at him sternly. “I asked if you had an opinion on the memory swipe.”
He felt a prickle of sweat, an uncomfortable warmth. “What do you mean?”
“It’s the one aspect of this insertion that still gives me pause. Every subject before you has had their memories removed, and it worries me to break the cycle of consistency. I wanted to know your opinion on the matter.”
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