EPIPHANY ✁ newt

4 , limited sanctuary

Before I could reply, another spell of dizziness blurred my vision and I stumbled backwards slightly. Trying to blink away the darkening edges of my vision. All I knew is there was no way I was letting myself pass out at that moment. The embarrassment would kill me before any gunshot wound could, but it seemed to be too late.

"Holy- bloody hell, you're bleeding." Newt said in a low voice, stepping closer to look at my arm.

"Oh, wow, yeah, I hadn't noticed." I said in a lighthearted voice, but immediately felt bad seeing the blonde frown. "Sorry- I didn't mean to be rude... just on edge." I tried to apologise - mentally cursing myself. Impressions, woman, impressions !

Newt shook his head, expression softening. "Don't worry bout' it. We need to find something to get that cleaned and bandaged up, though. Don't want the new girl dying on us within the first twenty four hours." he said with a small slime.

"It's okay, we'll find something as we walk. There's no point just standing here - thats not helping the wound. Please, continue your planning. It's a riveting listen, really." Minho chuckled at my words.

"So... whats your plan?" Newt asked Thomas, who had been speaking to Teresa in low whispers. "You... do have a plan, right?" he asked again, following Thomas's silence.

"Y-yeah." The brown haired boy replied in what may have been the most unconvincing voice I had ever heard.

Newt clenched his jaw, stepping closer to Thomas. "Well we followed you out here Thomas - and now you're saying that you have no idea where we're going or what we're doing?"

"Janson said something about people... hiding in the mountains. Some kind of resistance..." Aris piped in.

"The Right Arm." Thomas confirmed. "If they're really against WICKED, maybe they can help us."

Newt scoffed, looking from one boy to the other incredulously. "People? In the mountains? Mountain people? That's your plan."

Before the conversation could go much further, the boy who had introduced himself to me as Winston, called out to the group - he had walked a bit ahead, and was looking pointedly at something on the ground, crouched down. "Hey, guys... come here. Check this out. Minho, pass me the light."

Everyone closed in around him as Minho tossed the flashlight towards the boy, who pointed it to the group ahead of us, lighting up a few clear footprints leading even further into the misty darkness of the building we had broken into only minutes before.

"Someone's been down here..." Thomas said, and I had half a mind to yell 'no shit, Sherlock' but even though the saying had popped into my head almost instinctually, I had no clue of what it meant, and I didn't want to make more of a fool of myself by saying something stupid, so I kept quiet as we slowly walked forward. Upturned metal chairs lay everywhere, along with tables that people seemed to have left glasses on - as if just minutes ago they had been sitting right here to take a drink.

"Come on, open up." I heard Minho call from somewhere as I turned to see him and a few others struggling to get a door of some sorts open. The shutter soon gave way and revealed another room - this one full of even more tables, but along with that piles of clothes and wires leading seemingly nowhere littered the floor. Frypan picked up a lantern off one of the tables, and I was shocked to see it spark alive as he pressed the button on it.

Soon most of the group had light sources of some sort, and Teresa tapped me on the shoulder, passing me a small but strong flashlight. I smiled at her in return, pointing it to the ceiling. Thankfully there were no cobwebs, only dust piling everywhere. I would rather the others not see me against a spider of any sorts so soon. Gun's? I could handle. Small things that were fast and had even thinner legs? That was a whole different discussion.

"It really looks like people lived here." Minho finally said, picking up a jacket.

"Well where are they now?" Newt questioned, his accent recognisable even without me looking back to see who was speaking.

"Let's pack some of this stuff up. Take anything you think you may need." Thomas said, obviously not having an answer to Newt's question. "We'll split up, see if we can find anything else and meet up back here." he went on, as Newt threw him a flashlight. The group slowly dispersed, leaving only Teresa, Newt, Frypan and myself in the room.

Teresa started walking to the back areas where we hadn't yet explored, and I was about to follow her just as I heard a thickly accented voice call out. "Wait, Sephora, come here. There's a bunch of plastic water bottles here - can't use em' to drink so might as well put them to good use." he said.

I turned around, making my way back to where the blonde was standing. He had some bits of cloth in his hands, along with one of the water bottles. I instinctually reached out to take them from him, but Newt simply shook his head. Tilting his head towards one of the stools that surprisingly wasn't on its side.

"Sit down. I can help out if you want - its's a bloody annoying spot you got nicked."

I blinked, taken by surprise. "Oh. Sure. Thanks."

Walking over to the wooden stool, I pressed down on it with my good arm to make sure it would hold, before settling down on it. Peeling off my now blood soaked sweater, I was relieved to see my sleeveless top underneath was untouched by the red liquid. It was indeed a tricky spot to try and tie up, I realised as Newt kneeled in front of my arm once he'd helped clean the blood off, trying to stop the newly opened wound which had started bleeding as soon as it had been touched.

After five minutes or so, he had finally managed to get the gaze like cloth tightly around the gunshot wound in a way I hoped wouldn't be opening on its own anytime soon.

"Thanks for that, Newt." I said with a small smile as I stood up.

He shook his head, lips twitching up in a half smile. "Anytime."

"Hey, Seph, come back here a minute." I heard Teresa call from the depths of the room. I squinted towards where her voice had come from, but to no avail. So, slowly but curious to see what she had to say, I made my way into the darkness. Torch in hand.

The burnette was standing next to a bunch of mannequins that looked especially horrifying in this light. I noticed she had changed as she lead me towards a pile of clean looking clothes lying on one of the tables. "I thought you may want to pick out something to wear given the fact you had to ditch the shirt." She said softly.

I smiled, shifting through the top ones with my left hand. "I'd like that a lot, actually. Thank you." I decided to keep my black leggings as they seemed to be the most comfortable option - especially if we were still going to be running around the sand. But I picked out a black half-sleeved t-shirt and mint and black checkered shirt, going with stuff for the hotter weather of the outside. The shirt was immediately knotted around my waist, going there incase I needed it later. I had also slipped on a pair of black boots very similar to the part Teresa had taken.

Hearing a soft laugh, my head whipped around to face where the two boys were still crouched. Newt had his fingers on Frypan's face, smirking at him as the blonde gently turned the other boys head away from Teresa's and my direction.

Before either of us could comment on whatever was happening over there - a loud sound of some sort of machine made me jump, watching as lights above us sprang to life. I looked at Teresa, who didn't look too happy about whatever had just happened either. The two of us started making our way back towards where Newt and Frypan had stood up. I grabbed a small black backpack off the ground, dusting it off. Thankfully, nothing was in it, and I quickly started throwing whatever I could into it.

A few more of the metal water bottles, some rags of cloth that seemed like they could come in handy, and for some reason, a baton looking stick with an extremely sharp looking end. A strange, unsettled feeling took over my body as our small group walked out of the room, finding Aris and Winston standing there as well.

"Where'd Thomas and Minho go?" Teresa asked.

Aris shrugged, but just as he went to say something a blood curdling scream echoed from somewhere - along with racing footsteps.

"RUN! SHUCKING HELL - GUYS RUN."