“Good glory,” Brenda said. “Imagine what it was like down here when the flares actually hit.”
“You sure you don’t want to come with us, hermano?” Jorge asked. “We’re going to have ourselves quite the party.”
He and Brenda both laughed, but Thomas had a hard time finding anything funny about it. This place was terrible.
The Berg had landed surprisingly far from the Crank city, and the technicians Thomas was supposed to work with were gathering their things as if they intended to go in the opposite direction. He saw nothing that way but a wasteland, which made him more than a little nervous. He found himself anxious to head back to Alaska, and hoped the tests they wanted to run didn’t take terribly long.
Thomas shielded his eyes and looked toward the city. It appeared to be several miles away. Dirt and rust and shattered glass made up half of it. Ruined skyscrapers reached for the sky like broken fingers. It was hard to believe anyone could live there, even Cranks. Beyond the devastated city, mountains rose. The sun flares might have taken some of its plant life away, but the stone and soil seemed to call out, “We’re still here. What else ya got?”
Thomas tore his eyes away from the scene and saw Brenda staring at her soon-to-be new home.
“You sure about this?” Thomas asked. “You sure you want to go into that place?” He’d meant it to be a little lighthearted, but he knew how serious it was as it came out of his mouth.
“If we had a cure, a lot of people I love would still be alive,” she said, gazing unwaveringly into the distance. “People like my mom and dad, people like my brother.”
“I know, I know,” he murmured. “Believe me, I know.”
“That’s why Jorge and I volunteered,” she continued. “Not just in general, but for this.” She nodded toward the broken city in the distance. “I have to do my part.”
“Yeah,” he said.
Before he could add something nicer, Jorge yelled that his group needed to get going. He wanted to be in the city well before the sunset.
“Be careful,” Thomas said, trying to communicate with his eyes that he was sorry. That no one else should have to give up their life for this sickness. “Seriously. Be careful.”
“I will,” she said. “Hard to believe they’re going to bring your friends out here next, huh? Poor guys. Well, see you later, alligator.”
She gave him a feeble wave, then hurried after Jorge.
“Wait, what did you say?” he yelled.
She didn’t respond, running farther away.
He stared at her for a long moment, noticed the sands shifting beneath her feet.
“What did you mean?” he whispered.
231.12.11 | 4:40 p.m.
Phase Two.
That was all he could get out of the WICKED technicians he’d been assigned to. Phase Two. He asked each one of them about what Brenda had said, and those were the only words he got back. Other than things like Go ask Dr. Paige. It’s not my place to talk about it. I’m just doing my job.
But none of that mattered because Thomas knew exactly what was going on. He should have seen it long before Brenda let it slip.
WICKED planned to send the Gladers into this wretched place for another phase of trials. That was the reason they wanted to test the long-range monitoring of his implant technology—so they would know how effectively they’d be able to do it with the others once they were there. The lies just stacked up higher and higher. Things were even worse than he’d imagined. Far worse.
If there’d been the tiniest seed of doubt before, it was now gone completely. No matter what it took, Thomas was going into the maze to save his friends.
—
The Scorch got nastier with every step.
He walked with the WICKED technicians across the hard, dead land, gripping a towel beneath his chin. He’d wrapped the rest of it around his head to shield himself from the sun, which beat down on them, raining pure heat. The only relief was a breeze, though it covered him in sand as well. They were heading for some kind of underground tunnel where they supposedly needed to run tests and set up equipment. And now Thomas knew what for.
As he and the others trekked across the wasteland, he had plenty of time to think over his budding plan to save his friends. It could happen. It really could. He just needed to convince WICKED of two things—insert him into the maze, and do it without erasing his memories. For any kind of plan to work, he had to have his mind intact. Only then would he know how to get them out.
There were details to figure out. How, when, and where to get weapons. How to shut down the Grievers. Where to go if they did somehow escape the WICKED complex. But he had time.
It really could work.
He tried to stay that positive and kept moving through the desert.
One foot in front of the other. Sweating profusely.
On and on they went.
“Here!” the man leading the group eventually yelled out. The others crowded around him as he dropped to his knees, then felt around in the sand. He swept away a thin layer of dirt and revealed a metal hatch with a simple handle on top. It didn’t even have a lock to secure it—what were the odds of someone stumbling upon the tunnel entrance out here in the middle of a ruined nowhere?
A woman leaned in and took hold of the handle along with the man, and they heaved the covering up and open. Thomas stood on the tips of his toes to catch a glimpse over someone’s shoulder—a long flight of stairs disappeared into darkness below.
“Believe it or not,” the woman said, shouting over the wind, “there used to be a prison nearby. This was an escape route built by the cartels. We just adapted it for our purposes. It’ll be about another hour’s walk down there.”
She didn’t say anything else, just began descending the steps. One by one, the group followed, Thomas going down last.
—
It was a long, surprisingly cool, unsurprisingly creepy descent into the depths and down the endless tunnel that WICKED had commandeered. No one spoke much as they walked and walked and walked, but when they did, it was usually in a whisper that echoed like a ghost’s haunting call.
“Almost there,” a man named David announced, spooking Thomas. He’d become accustomed to the quiet, and the sudden voice jarred him from his thoughts.
“Almost where?” Thomas asked, his words bouncing back at him off the walls.
“There’s a Flat Trans up ahead that we installed on our last trip here. It’s finally ready to be activated.”
“A Flat Trans?” Thomas repeated. Was that how they planned to transport the Gladers to the Scorch?
“Yeah,” David replied. “Let’s hope it works, because that’s how we’re going to get back home tonight!”
Thomas almost stumbled when he heard that.
“You have no idea how much these things cost,” the man continued. “Before the Flares, only billionaires could afford them—there were even some governments who only wished they’d had enough money to get one.”
“WICKED’s that rich?” Thomas asked.
David laughed. “They don’t need to buy this stuff. They just steal it from billionaires who are too dead to care anymore. Or too Cranked past the Gone. Anyway, don’t worry, once it’s up and running, there’s nothing to be scared of. It’s a cool way to travel, that’s for sure.”
“Here we are,” a woman called back. She shined a light on a tall rectangular structure that looked like a large door to nowhere. Or, more accurately, a doorframe that was missing its actual door. A panel of controls, dark at the moment, was attached to the right side of the device.
David moved forward to stand next to the woman. “We’ve run every test imaginable. All that’s left is to turn the sucker on.”
Thomas stepped away from the WICKED staff as they pulled out tools and began doing their jobs. He didn’t know any of these people very well, so he felt like a total outsider. He went to the wall of the tunnel, just on the edge of the pool of light, and leaned back against the dirt and
stone. He folded his arms, watching the people go about their business.
A humming sound filled the air that made his bones rattle. A green glow lit up the control panel of the Flat Trans. The hum grew louder. He couldn’t believe that in a matter of minutes he was going to step through a magical wall of engineering and reappear thousands of miles away. It made him nervous, made him worry he’d end up scattered across the quantum universe, nothing but a galaxy of atoms and molecules that had nothing to do with each other.
A loud buzz made him stand upright; then a shimmering wall of staticky gray filled the space between the rectangular frame of the Flat Trans. It wavered, flashed into and out of existence a few times, then held steady. The soft, continuous pulse of its energy made the skin on Thomas’s arms tingle. He was really going to do this. He was really going to walk through that wall of power.
“All signs are steady,” David announced, looking at the display screen on the control panel. “Sending a test item now.” Then, like a kid standing beside a lake with a skipping stone, he tossed his flashlight through the Flat Trans. A few seconds later, it popped right back out and he caught it. He laughed. “Guess we’re good.”
“Who wants to go first?” a woman asked. “Thomas, how about you?” She gave him a teasing smile.
“Actually, yeah.” Not knowing what had come over him, he squared his shoulders and walked straight for the Flat Trans, trying desperately to show no hesitation or fear. He figured if there were any cause for concern, they’d stop him in the few seconds it took to walk from one spot to the other. But no one said a thing. A couple of them let out a whoop. One person clapped.
Thomas stepped right into the shimmering wall of gray.
231.12.11 | 9:32 p.m.
A plane of cold passed over his body, as if he’d stepped into a deep pool of icy water. But then it was over, as quickly as it took to step through any door. Several people waited on the other side, in a room he’d never seen before. Dr. Paige was there, as were Teresa and some others he didn’t know.
Teresa reached him first, pulling him into the tightest hug he’d ever received.
“Thank God,” she whispered into his ear. Then she said it again in his mind.
He returned the hug, feeling so much relief at her warmth that he trembled as he squeezed. He wanted to tell her about his plans for the maze, and this reception confirmed for him that he would do it soon. He’d need her help if he had any chance of pulling them off.
“It’s okay,” he said back to her. He noticed Dr. Paige looking at both of them like a proud parent. “Nothing bad happened at all. We were totally safe.”
“I know. I know,” she said, but she didn’t loosen her hold on him.
“Hey,” he said as gently as he could. “What’s the matter?”
She finally pulled away from him. “Nothing. Just…having you so far away. Made me nervous.”
“I missed you too.” A lame response, but he hoped she could see how he felt in his eyes. We need to talk, he said quickly to her mind. Soon.
“The results of your long-distance monitoring were very positive,” Dr. Paige said before Thomas could explain anything further. She stepped closer, beaming with a smile that looked forced. “Things are going very well overall, in fact. We’re making progress every day.”
Thomas nodded, his mind racing, thinking, If you only knew. He looked at the unfamiliar surroundings—it seemed like a huge dormitory, but nothing like the barracks at WICKED. He saw brick and plaster and wooden doors.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“A new facility outside headquarters,” she replied. “We’ve been pulling in volunteers for more research and needed a place to keep them.”
Thomas didn’t believe a word of that. Why would they have a Flat Trans linked to the Scorch if this place was meant to house research volunteers? Could it possibly have something to do with Phase Two and the Gladers? Either way, he had to make sure those plans never came to fruition.
“We have a shuttle heading back to the main complex,” Paige said. “There’s a lot of work to do.” She seemed to focus this on Teresa.
“How far is it from here?” Thomas asked.
“Just a few miles by road. Less than two if you cut through the forest.”
He sighed in relief. “Good. After the Scorch, I really need a walk through air that doesn’t want to bake my lungs. You guys go on ahead—I’ll meet you there.” His legs ached from walking so much already that day, but he really wanted to be alone. And he needed some time to prepare his speech to Teresa.
“Well…we haven’t had many Crank sightings lately,” Paige answered, considering. “But it’s dark out. I tell you what. Take a Launcher and I’ll let you do it. And one of our guards. No, make that two.”
Thomas opened his mouth to argue but didn’t bother once he saw her face. It was too much to think she’d let him go alone.
A few minutes later, with two nameless guards assigned to him, he left the building.
—
“We better get moving,” one of the guards said. To his credit, he and his buddy seemed to respect Thomas’s clear wish to be alone, but they’d also been put in charge of his safety. “Getting late.”
“Is it true that you haven’t had many Cranks around lately?” Thomas asked him, turning his back to the new building, facing the woods and darkness.
“Yep. I think the ones around here have either died or wandered into the pits. But being dark and cold and all—I just think we should hustle.”
Thomas liked that the man hadn’t taken on the role of tough-guy guard. At least, not yet. And the other one seemed like a mute. “Okay, sounds good. You guys leading or am I leading?”
“I’ll be right behind you.” Mr. Talkative held up his Launcher and pointed in the direction of the WICKED complex, somewhere deep in the forest. Thomas had his own Launcher slung across his shoulders with a strap that dug into his neck. “That way I can see you and scan the forest at the same time. Xavier here will scout out ahead. That sound like a plan?”
Like he had an option. “Of course. Let’s do it.”
Without a word, the man named Xavier stomped through the brush and into the woods. Shivering suddenly from the chill, Thomas followed, the other guard right behind him.
—
A half hour passed, the forest silent and dark. Branches loomed over them, a canopy of countless wooden arms and fingers, barely visible in the starless night. The heavy silence hung in the air, broken only by the soft crunch of their footsteps in the fallen leaves. Thomas aimed the beam of his flashlight out in front him, every once in a while pointing it up and around, terrified he’d see some unworldly creature from a storybook. Yellow eyes, fangs, a ghostly apparition. He was spooked, and wished he’d just taken a ride with Teresa and everyone else.
An owl hooted so loud that Thomas jumped. Then he laughed, and so did the guard behind him.
“An owl?” Thomas said. “Seriously? I feel like I’m in a horror movie.”
“It’s creepy out here,” the man agreed. “Cranks or no Cranks. Kids had plenty of things to have nightmares about before the Flare ever came around.”
“Yeah.” Thomas searched the branches above him, looking for the owl. Sometimes he forgot that there was an entire animal kingdom out there that didn’t know or care about a disease called the Flare. The culprit was nowhere to be seen. Thomas continued walking.
The exercise had warmed him up a little, and his legs had loosened from their stiffness. He was relaxing, just feeling better about the day, when he realized he’d lost sight of Xavier up ahead. The man had made a turn around a huge pine tree, but when Thomas rounded the same tree, he couldn’t see the guard.
“Xavier?” he called.
No answer, no sign of him anywhere.
A sudden flurry of footsteps, crashing through the undergrowth, came thundering up behind Thomas. As he whirled around to see what it was, another sound flew through the air. Followed by a squelching, crunching noi
se.
And then he saw it.
The guard at his back had stopped in his tracks and dropped his weapon. Blood dripped out of his mouth. A long branch had been jammed into the side of his neck, its end—drenched in red—coming out the other side. As the man fell to his knees, Thomas saw who’d done it—the person still gripped the end of the makeshift spear with both hands, grinning at his prey, who choked for air.
The attacker looked up, straight at Thomas.
It was Randall.
231.12.11 | 10:47 p.m.
Randall didn’t look so well.
There he stood, battered and bruised and filthy, wearing several layers of ripped clothing. His face was crusted with dirt, his eyes were wild, and his hair was a mangled mess—the nightmare visage Thomas had worried about. But this was no storybook.
“Randall,” Thomas whispered, as if pleading for the person who used to be Randall to come back. But that man was no more. The Crank standing before him had passed the Gone a long time ago.
Randall said something unintelligible, then wrenched the spear out of the guard’s neck, letting the man finally tumble to the ground, the life drained out of him. He lay still, blood pooling on a bed of pine needles.
“Xavier!” Thomas yelled. Still no answer.
Trying not to make any sudden movements, he reached for his Launcher, slowly settled it in both hands, placed his finger on the trigger. Randall stood there looking at the gore on his own weapon as if he was pondering licking it clean. Then he looked back at Thomas.
“Once upon a time,” the Crank said, his words slurred but understandable this time, “I was a tasty treat. Tasty as can be.”
In a blur of movement, Randall sprinted for the trees, disappearing into the darkness before Thomas could do anything. He aimed the Launcher in that direction, pulled the trigger, heard the charge and the shot. But the grenade hit a tree and exploded in a burst of electricity. When it died out, complete silence enveloped the woods. No sight or sound of the Crank.