Chapter Text
Thomas looked down into the dark box and felt his heart beat faster than it had ever beaten before. His breath was uneven and shaky and he was trying his hardest to hold back tears. He felt the gun in his hand and clenched it tightly, it could all be over. He heard muffled voices and footsteps from all directions. He slowly raised the gun to his head and closed his eyes tightly.
“Thomas!” his head quickly spun around till he was facing the silhouette of a girl.
“Thomas… stop…please stop” her voice was echoing in his ears but he felt like he couldn’t hear a word. He knew her though, he knew that voice, that face, she was Teresa. He stared at her eyes, they were wide and red.
“What do we do now?” he spoke those words softly though he wanted to shout them. When she just stared back at him he actually did scream it “WHAT DO WE DO NOW?’ his voice cracked at the end and faded away to sobs.
“WE ARE GOING TO DO WHATEVER THE HELL WE CAN TOM, ITS NOT JUST YOU OKAY, THE WHOLE FUCKING WORLD IS A SHITHOLE AND WE CAN ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT”. There was a loud crash in the distance and the sound of gun shots filled the room. Teresa’s voice was soft now and panic flooded her face. “I can launch the box and shut the maze down; you’ll be protected till help arrives.” When Thomas started shaking his head she ran up to him and grabbed his shoulders, “Tom it’s you, it’s always been you. You’re the one that’s going to save us all.” She kissed his forehead and hugged him tightly. Thomas was about to say something when he felt a sharp pain in his neck. He quickly moved his arm to hit anything that was there but Teresa was too fast, she kicked him hard in the back of legs and he was now on his knees. Teresa hesitated when he fell which gave the perfect opportunity for Thomas to grab hold of what was on his neck. He felt a cold cylinder in his hands and broke it in his fist, liquid and blood seeped from his fingers. Thomas felt faint and knew exactly why; Teresa had just injected him with the amnesia serum.
He got to his feet and stumbled around a bit “why” was all he managed to say.
“God, Tom only half of it got injected…oh well it’ll have to do” she looked at him un-phased as if stabbing him with a needle was obviously going to happen’.” Just then everything went quiet there was no more footsteps and no more sirens blaring, it was all still. Confusion filled Thomas as he tried to piece everything together. Teresa just sighed “you can be so stupid Tom, this isn’t real and you’re going into that maze. I know it’s not how this was originally planned but you were talking about escaping and I, I just couldn’t let you do that okay. So I told her.” Thomas tried to say something but he couldn’t instead he looked at his best friend for the last time with betrayal crossing his face and tears rolling down his cheeks.
Then he felt her hands on him and her body forcing him back until he was falling, and falling, and falling. Until she was out of sight and so was everything else.
Did he ever stop falling? Was he even falling? How did he fall? That girl pushed him, yeah she defiantly pushed him. But who was she? And then Thomas’s mind went blank.
---------------------------------------------Earlier that day ----------------------------------------------------------
As Thomas was on his way to his office, he passed by the cafeteria and noticed out of the corner of his eye that they had chocolate muffins today. “Heck yeah” he said and walked through the cafeteria filled with mostly empty tables and chairs. He grabbed a napkin with the words WICKED labeled across it and helped himself to a muffin. “Jeez” he thought staring at the word WICKED on the napkin. “Do they really have to put it on everything.”
As he was walking back towards his office he saw that there was a cart with food and clothes on it. Probably for the box Thomas thought. He then got a sickening feeling , the same box that was supposed to transport him tomorrow. He shook it off as he unlocked his office door with a key card. His office wasn’t that spacious but Thomas liked it that way. There was a long desk facing some wall sized screens with 6 different boxes on them, each had a different view of the glade. At the end of the desk was Teresa already sitting in her chair getting straight to work, as usual. Thomas sat in his spiny chair and started wheeling around.
Teresa glanced up at him “you’re late” she said. “ theyhavthechoolmufffnnturday” Thomas said with a mouth full of muffin. Teresa just rolled her eyes as a response. “Hey check this out” he said “they even put WICKED on the napkins.” “Tom it’s always been like that.” “oh “said Thomas then paused “.. yea right.” Teresa shook her head then smiled “hey check out camera 4”.
Thomas looked at camera 4 and saw none other than Minho himself, getting ready for a run in the maze. “Niceee” thought Thomas as he zoomed in closer. He heard Teresa laugh next to him and say “you’re such a creeper.” “yeah well have you seen him Teresa like damnnn” Thomas responded. “I think newt is pretty cute” said Teresa as he popped up on her screen. “ahem” responded Thomas “Newt is extremely cute.” “okay well who do I get then Tom?” Teresa asked. “I don’t know ‘said Thomas “just not Newt or Minho” he watched Minho pick up what looked like a shirt and muttered “especially not Minho.” “Okay that’s not fair Minho is the hottest one there” she exclaimed. “uhh yeah I know that” replied Thomas. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh Teresa he’s changing his shirt oh sweet Jesus” Thomas watched as Minho was pulling his shirt over his head exposing his toned stomach. He was practically drooling when his screens went black. “What!” he yelled “nonononon go back.” He looked over at Teresa who had a cord in her hand and watched as she dropped it on the floor. “oops my bad” she said grinning. “I hate you, I hate you so much oh my god” Thomas said to Teresa as he picked up the cord and plugged it back in.
Teresa threw her head back laughing, a sound that filled the room. “You are honestly so rude and don’t talk to me” Thomas said as he got his cameras adjusted. Teresa laughed again and got back to her work obviously happy with herself. Thomas quickly looked around for Minho but when he realized he was probably running already he shouted “GODDAMIT I NEVER SEE HIM SHIRTLESS’ in frustration as he slapped his hand on the table. “This startled Teresa and she stared at him wide-eyed before bursting into a fit of laughter. “It’s not even funny Teresa.” But to Teresa it was hilarious. The rest of the day went by pretty normal and Thomas found himself extremely bored. He kept spinning in his chair as he looked up at the ceiling waiting for his favorite part of the day, when Minho returned of course. Just then he heard Teresa mutter “oh shit” under her breath.
Thomas spun around and faced his cameras. There he saw someone dragging someone else across the field. Thomas looked more closely at the camera and noticed it was Minho with Ben. “Whoa what happened” asked Thomas. Teresa was typing away on her computer and without looking up she said “I think that Ben was stung by a griever.” Thomas watched as everyone in the glade gathered around Minho and Ben and something dawned on him. These were real people. And this was their life. They didn’t ask for this they just got put into a stupid maze and were expected to know how to survive. He noticed Ben before and he seemed like a pretty nice guy to him. Thomas started to feel sick.
He thought it all wasn’t fair and in his mind he thought was WICKED really good? “Teresa, what if we could save them? What if we could stop this maze and escape WICKED? don’t you think we could?”