Him || The Scorch Trials

Eight

She was pretty young, maybe six or seven. Andy was sitting next to her, a few years older than she was. But there was a woman there too; sitting opposite them in the shabby room. She wasn't sitting on a couch like Mara and Andy, she was kneeling in front of them, one of her hands rested on Mara's knee and the other sat on Andy's.

The woman was beautiful; she had long, thick hair and a strong structured face, but her eyes were drooping and her skin was pale. Something was incredibly wrong, there was a sense of sadness lingering in the air coming from all directions.

"You both know how much I love you," She sadly smiled, holding her hand up to Mara's cheek to wipe away a single tear. "And of course, I'll miss you both a lot. But this is best for you both, okay?"

"Are you one of them mum?" Andy asked, his voice was shaking and full of fear.

The woman looked over to him and nodded slowly as tears escaped her eyes. Mara wanted to speak, but every time she opened her mouth no words came out. Even though she was a child, she had an idea of what was happening.

"It will be okay. I'm going to stay here, but your father and Paige will take good care of you in America. I promise, nothing will happen to either of you. You'll be safer there."

Four hours ticked by alongside the pelting heat of the world, but that didn't faze Mara. She got her sleep, and it seemed to replenish her enough for a new day. Not surprisingly, she was the last of the Gladers to wake up, the sympathetic view from others had given them the decision of letting Mara sleep. The only downside was the soreness of her stomach which ached after all the running she had done before.

Minho woke Mara up just after the Gladers had finished breakfast and Newt had kindly saved her a share of his breakfast, which she took eagerly. It was a small apple, one of two Newt had, and it quenched her rumbling stomach slightly, but not completely. Just before she was allowed to eat Clint came over to double check Mara's bandages, and everything seemed to be okay. More blood had seeped through the cotton, but Clint said that was okay and left not long after.

Even though she was tempted to focus on the pain, she kept imagining the woman in her dream. That was her mum- her real mum- and she was sure of it. But the conversation seemed wrong. Andy had told her that their mum had run away, but the woman in her dreams was one of them. Her mum had been a crank, and that meant she was probably never going to get the chance of seeing her again. Ever. Another question racked Mara's brain; if Andy lied about their mum, what else had he lied about?

For a few minutes Mara sat in silence as she ate, watching the other equally silent Gladers prepare to leave. The heat had become pretty unbearable, something that no matter how hard Mara tried to ignore, she couldn't. It was full of anger and hate, sucking away the happiness she had felt before and drenching her entire body in uncontrollable sweat. A solemn feeling of grief hung over Mara as the thought of her friends came soaring back, with it came an aching pain; physically and emotionally. They had escaped the Glade, sure, but now they were in the real, harsh world, and Mara didn't know which place was worse.

But she still didn't know where in the world they were. She didn't know why they were there, or what happened after they had escaped the maze, and a part of her didn't want to know. That part of her had given up. Although, the other part of her was bigger. The other part was hopeful and slightly optimistic. Still, she couldn't help but feel disoriented; nothing seemed to fit together or make sense. Mara could hardly even remember when the last time she showered was, let alone anything else.

Once she had completely finished the apple, Mara tossed it the core to the side. The boys were pretty much packed and ready for the journey, but before they set off Mara at least wanted to know where they were going.

She noticed Thomas standing silently not far from her. He was looking up at the buildings in the distance, which was now beginning to look more like an abandoned city than a block of towers. Mara stood up and squeezed through the paths of busy boys, closing the gap between her and her friend.

When she reached him, Mara stood by his side. She looked out at the town and then at Tommy, who hadn't even flinched.

"That where we're headed?" She asked, nodding up at the city.

"Yeah," The boy nodded. "Doesn't look like much, but that's where we have to go. Then we're going up and over that hill." He added, pointing just past the buildings at a steep slope about the same size as the towers.

"How did you guys even get here? Out in the middle of nowhere."

"It's a long story." Tommy said, shrugging his shoulders as he slotted his hands into the back pockets of his trousers.

"I've got the time."

"Well," He began, turning his head and body to face Mara. "These shanks turned up after you... and they shot... everyone. All of WICKED. Then they took us, said they were going to save us. Took us to this place, gave us food, a bed, everything we needed. We went to sleep, and then everything went crazy again. Teresa was sent to a different room- separate from the rest of us- and she was talking to me, with the mind thing. Then she stopped, thought she was in trouble so I went to check but our bedroom door was locked. Had to break through it. Got through the door and turned on the light and... all the people that helped us. They were all hanging from the ceiling. Dead."

Mara wasn't quite sure how to react; that was extreme. The Gladers had seen so much death in such a short time span, she didn't know how they had dealt with it. She ached for her friends, but there were just a few of them compared to the amount of deaths the Gladers had experienced.

She pushed the grief from her mind. "That's unbelievable. WICKED, right? That's the only explanation."

"Yeah, it was them. We all rushed into Teresa's room pretty much straight after that, but she wasn't there. There was a boy there instead; Aris. He's over there somewhere." Thomas gestured to the group of Gladers, pointing out one boy.

Mara took one look at the boy; she had seen him in the group earlier but assumed she just hadn't known him. He had olive coloured skin and extremely short cut dark hair. His name rung a bell, something she had heard before but couldn't quite remember where from.

"He went to a maze just like us, but with girls. He was like the Teresa of another group." Thomas told her.

"But, that means that there are two mazes."

"Exactly. Took us a while to figure that out." Thomas paused for a moment, turning back out to the city. He looked run down, but he was determined as ever and Mara respected him for that. "Everything that happened with us happened with them, except you. They didn't have another you there. But the girl there like me... they killed her... like they killed Chuck." He paused again. "He does the mind speaking too, just like us. Found that out. But enough of Aris. Not long after WICKED told us how the shanks who saved us were fake, like hallucinations. This guy turned up and told us they had more in store, like you told us. There were no rules really, just that we had to go one hundred miles north to a safe haven in two weeks. We went through another flat trans- like the one for the Griever hole-, ended up in this shuck metal tunnel and got here. And that's that."

Mara sighed, trying to take it all in. It was a lot. So much had happened; death and destruction, torture and pain. She didn't understand how none of them had cracked under the stress and pressure of it all. It was all so much.

"That's... crazy. How are you okay?" Mara raised her eyes and waited for her friend's reply. The boy had gone back to staring out at the buildings ahead of them, but that one question turned his head to Mara. He locked eyes with her, but still gave no reply. "Are you okay?"

Thomas shook his head. "I'm angry. I'm really angry. They've killed so many people, they've done so many bad things. It's not okay." He voice had raised and he spoke with a strong tone. Mara agreed with him, every single word he said. She would've told him that, but she was interrupted before she got the chance.

"Come on, children." Minho threw his arms around Mara and Thomas, taking them both by surprise and throwing Mara off balance. He looked between the two of them until he spoke again. "It's time to go on a little adventure. Hansel, Gretel and the witch are re-united once again." He smiled broadly and turned the three of their bodies to the rest of the group. "Let's go."

And then they were off.