Maze Runner One-Shots

I'm Scared, Tommy

Newt was pacing around the map room anxiously biting his nails. Everyone else had gone to bed long ago, it was well past curfew at the Right Arm's camp. He looked down at the map they had been using to discuss everything, and then quickly looked away, pinching his eyes shut. He actually let out a small groaning whimper of frustration, trying not to let the tears that had been forcing their way up for hours now reach his eyes.

"Come on...just go to bed..." He told himself quietly. He took what must've been his fortieth deep breath in the last half hour. He hugged his arms to his chest tighter. The pacing didn't stop. His chest constricted more. His heart raced faster.

This was insane.

Everything that had happened the last few days was rushing back to him, and everything they'd been talking about doing in the next few days was hitting him conveniently at the same moment. And it was all insane.

They were talking about invading a force they hardly knew anything about. Thomas, again, wanted to run off into the unknown to fight yet another unknown. And Newt was with him, he was. But bloody hell that kid could be annoying with his seemingly never ending desire to fight everything he could, and couldn't.

And then there was everything that had happened before they got here.

Everyone they'd lost.

Newt hadn't had a second to really think about it, which in hindsight had been a good thing. He knew that if he thought about them too much, he'd break down, possibly irreversibly. They'd needed to stay focused, keep moving, keep level-headed. Staying level-headed and focused was something Newt did exceptionally well. That was why he'd been promoted to Alby's second-in-command so quickly upon their arrival.

Alby...

The memory of their fearless leader's fearful death shot to the forefront of his mind, and he saw everything all over again. All the movements, all the blood.

The blood. That sparked another memory, and it shoved Alby's horrific death away and replaced it with another horrific death.

Chuck's horrific death. At the hands of someone they'd known for a long time. Someone who they'd trusted. Maybe not always liked, maybe not always agreed with, but trusted nevertheless.

If anyone in the whole bloody Glade should be alive here and on their way to the Safe Haven, it should be Chuck.

Newt's throat closed up tighter, making him choke as he tried to inhale deeply.

Everything they'd done to get here...had it all been worth it?

That thought, that question, was what did it. Black spots danced in Newt's vision as he leaned against the table. The tears he'd been so valiantly fighting so hard to keep back finally stung his eyes. He pinched them shut again and pressed his hands over them in one last ditch attempt at keeping them in.

"Stop...stop..." He begged his body to cooperate and just walk back to the tent, get into his cot, and go to sleep. He was beyond exhausted. But not exhausted enough to sleep, evidently. It was a different kind of exhausted. The kind of exhausted where you've been feeling every kind of emotion for days straight with no time to process or even really feel them in any capacity until one moment where they all hit at once.

Newt leaned back against the table, pinching the bridge of his nose as his head began to pound hard, the dull pain making him nauseous. He groaned out of annoyance as much out of pain. God shucking damnit it hurt. Everything hurt.

Then he heard the voice.

"Newt? What are you doing in here? What are you doing up?"

He stood up straight immediately, swiping at his eyes.