Him (Newt x Reader)

Chapter 10: The Truth

My eyes slowly blink open, trying to adjust to the light and the slight headache coming from the back of my head. Where the hell am I? It feels like I'm laying on dirt, which seems to be everywhere, except for the door above us that looks to be made out of branches.

I carefully sit up and find two figures in front of me, also stuck in this pit. Thomas lies asleep with his head in Teresa's lap, lightly brushing her thumb against his cheek."Good morning." She jokes while looking up to me, "Glad to see that one of you is up." I smile and put my hand to the back of my head, leaning against the wall, "How is he?" She looks back to him and continues the motions of her thumb, "He's been asleep this whole time. Not one word has come out of him."

I sigh and look above us to the makeshift door, seeing that the sun is barely making it to the middle of the sky, "How long have I been out?" I ask Teresa, who looks up as well, "About an hour." She answers, "We still have one hell of a day waiting for us."

A moment of silence goes by until a familiar voice approaches, "Well, look who's finally up!" Minho, Chuck, and Newt appear on the opposite side of the door and crouch down to see us. "How are you feeling, Y/n?" Chuck asks in a worried tone, "I'm a lot better, Chuck. Just a small headache but it's nothing I can't handle."

"Hey." Teresa suddenly says, and I look to realize that Thomas is finally awake. "You okay?" She gently asks him, which Chuck follows up with, "What the hell were you thinking?" Thomas realizes that other people are here and sits up to face them, leaning against the wall beside me, "What happened?"

"Gally's taken control." Newt briefly explains, "He said we had a choice. Either stay with him or get banished at sundown with you." Thomas tilts his head with confusion, "And the others agreed with that?"

"Gally has everyone convinced that you're the reason all this has happened." Teresa explains, "Or more so, the three of us." I suddenly feel the urge to stay in this cell forever, having the Glade against me for something they have no proof of is treacherous enough.

"Well, he's been right so far." Thomas confides, and I feel that I might as well be dead now.

"What are you talking about?" Minho asks from above.

"This place." Thomas begins, "It's not what we thought it was."

I furrow my brows, confusion taking over faster than when I came up in the box.

"This place isn't a prison, it's a test." Thomas reveals. I look to Teresa and see the same confusion plastered onto her face. "It all started when we were kids. They'd give us these challenges, they were experimenting on us. And then people started disappearing. Every month, one after the other, like clockwork."

"Sending them up into the maze?" Newt figures out, "Yeah." Thomas confirms, "But not all of us."

"What do you mean?" Newt asks, but Thomas doesn't answer right away, a sour look growing on his face as if he wishes the truth didn't exist.

"Guys, I'm one of them." Thomas starts, and my heart drops knowing what this means for Teresa and I, "The people who put you here, I worked with them. I watched you guys. The entire time you've been here, I was on the other side of it."

He looks to Teresa, who's already shaking her head in disbelief, "And so were you."

"What?" She whispers, "Teresa, we did this to them." She continues shaking her head as tears begin to paint her eyes, "No, that can't be true." Thomas doesn't answer her, instead I catch his eyes falling on me. "Y/n, you worked with them too." He pauses, "But you weren't with us."

Aside from already drowning in guilt and fear, I can't help but feel confused at his words. "What?" I question, "What do you mean? What did I do?" Thomas glances to the ground before looking back to me with pity, "Y/n, you created the grievers."

My entire world crashes down.

I created the grievers. Because of me, so many of these boys lost their lives and their closest friends. How are they ever going to look at me the same? I have more faith in the three above us, but their thoughts could be changing right now, they could be deciding that I'm the monster. Not the grievers. Me.

"What?" Teresa gasps, "That can't be right, Y/n would never do something–" Thomas cuts her off, "It is, Teresa. I saw it."

Confusion, anger, and sorrow swirl in my head, making the headache grow stronger. So many emotions and so many questions, I need to say something before I lose it, "Why did they send us up here then? Why do that if we were with them?

Thomas doesn't answer for a brief moment, looking to the ground and seeming to process everything he saw. "It doesn't matter."

Silence falls among us. The three of us processing a new history about ourselves while the boys above us haven't even said a word. Outside the cell, the distant noise of Gladers continuing about their day is all we can hear, which makes me realize that no one else knows the truth about Teresa, Thomas and I. The only people who know are the people right here, which gracefully takes some weight off of my shoulders.

The silence holds for another minute or two, starting to become deafening until Newt speaks up, "He's right. It doesn't matter, any of it." He pauses, "Because the people we were before the maze, they don't even exist anymore. These creators took care of that." I begin to notice some similarity with Newt's words; comforting and reassuring. "But what does matter, is who we are now and what we do now." He focuses on Thomas, "You went into the maze and you found a way out."

"Yeah, but if I hadn't, Alby would still be alive."

"Maybe, but I know that if he were here, he would be telling you the exact same thing. Pick your ass up and finish what you started. 'Cause if we do nothing, then that means that Alby died for nothing, and I can't have that."

No words are said for a moment, allowing me to realize that Newt's right. It doesn't matter who I was before this. What does matter is who I am now, and who I choose to be, and right now, I want to escape.

"Okay." Thomas begins, "But we got to get through Gally first."

Thomas glances to all of us, his eyes twinkling with something I've become far too familiar with. He has a plan, and even though it might be stupid, it's gonna save us.