The Misfire:Book 1 (Newt || A TMR Fanfiction)

16. Chubby Newbie

'Maya's PoV:

I was not expecting a shovel to be this heavy. I panted everytime I let it struck and bury in the ground.

After a couple days of healing from that nasty tree fall, I now found myself working at the gardens. I still had a back ache but it was bearable as long as I didn't carry any heavy stuff.

Newt was just watching me, with an amused smirk on his face. He was aware how much I hated to actually do work. Atleast Winston and Erin allowed me to just sit and slack around as long as Alby was not watching. On the other hand, Newt never tolerated my laziness. I grumbled and dropped the shovel. I hear Zart softly giggling from behind.

"Having to do work ain't easy, eh?" Newt crossed his arms as he approached me.

I exhaled loudly. "Shovel's heavy. And my back hurts."

"Really? Cause I saw you and Eric carry some crates this morning and you seemed fine."

"That wasn't me."

Newt's lips curled. "Hmmm. I wonder who could it be? There's only two girls in this bloody glade. And that definitely wasn't Erin. Maybe it was Jack, wearing your hair."

"Haha." I narrowed my eyes. "Very funny."

"Now everyone knows Winston lets you get away from slacking all the time."

"That's not true," I scoffed, offended, "I'm not a slacker."

"That's not what Frankie told me."

"Well that's because Frankie is just jealous," I blurted out aggravatedly, "Ugly snitch."

Newt looked even more amused than ever. "Really?"

"I told you, I'm better off as a s-slicer." I protested although I knew that Newt was aware of my intentions of convincing him to dismiss me from working at the gardens.

"Not happening." Newt shook his head. "Now, stop complaining and get back to work."

I stood still for a while. My eyesight became fuzzy for a second. I blinked my eyes several times. Something, like a stream of current, was flowing throughout my body. The strange surge was back. But now, it felt like I was hanging, or something was choking me while being suspended above ground. I glanced around wildly, before fixing my gaze on the forest.

"You ok?" Zart noticed my uneasiness.

I turned to Newt, dropping the shovel. "H-has anyone seen Stephen recently?"

Before they could even reply, I quickly scurried towards the Deadheads as fast as I could. I heard someone from the crowd of gladers I just passed by, call my name but I didn't look back. When I reached the place, I trembled, my knuckles clenched at the horrible sight.

It was Stephen, one of the builders, his body, hanging by a tree.

I covered my mouth in shock, staring blankly at Stephen's limp body, dangling by a rope. If I knew about this earlier, I could've stopped him. But it was too late.

I screamed.

After a few seconds, the gladers came rushing to where I was. As soon as they saw the dead builder, they started panicking and grimacing, still trying to make sense of what just happened.

"Somebody get a damn axe!" Dmitri shrieked.

I heard a loud thud and saw Gally, sprawled on the ground. Everything happened so fast that it took a while for everyone to finally realize what was going on.

Shivers ran across my body. It was the realization that each of us was battling against something that seemed escapable, unfortunately, not all of us managed to make it through the end. I looked worriedly at Newt and Erin, remembering how both of them also tried to end their lives.

~

At early noon, everyone was called in for a gathering, with the exception of the runners. Alby wanted answers but no one had them. They all said Stephen was just doing fine this morning, not expecting him to do such a thing. I couldn't concentrate during the meeting. My heart was racing, my brain felt like it was being fried and I wanted to throw up. The arguments in my head got so fast and so disturbing that my brain shuts down my body.

I felt sick, not only because of Stephen's corpse but due to the fact that his death didn't cause me any huge grief since I barely knew him. I did feel bad for Gally. Stephen was a builder and one of Gally's closest buddies. But I also couldn't explain why I keep getting this strange and unexplainable premonitions, being the reasons why I was always hesitant to admit.

"Maya," Alby began, "is there something you wanna tell us?"

All eyes were on me. I parted my lips but couldn't make up the words to speak. So I just nodded, swallowing the lump of sadness that was lodged in my throat.

"You found Stephen first. How?" His serious and deep tone made me more anxious.

The room was so silent I could hear my loud heart beating. I turned to Erin who was sitting beside me, silent, staying out of the discussion as best as she could.

"I just....I just felt like something, like umm, something was wrong."

"Can you talk like a normal person?" Gally demanded.

"Hey back off, Gally!" Newt suddenly snapped out which took everyone by surprise.

"Ya'll look like you're blaming me. I just felt something was wrong so I...so I went to the woods. And, and, and like what you said, Stephen was just alright this morning."

"How would you know, huh?" Gally replied, "You only talk to like 3 people here. Then you suddenly felt that something was wrong with Stephen?"

"So what are you implying, then?" Alby chimed in.

"It's just really suspicious. She's always the first to know when somebody dies."

"So you're saying she's in control of the deaths? Telling them to go kill themselves?"

"What?" I reacted, "Alby I would never do that."

"We need answers Maya. We need to know why you're so shady. Maybe that's why George wanted to-"

"Gally!" Newt shouted, "One more word, and I'm kicking your ass."

You're one of them! I heard George's voice in my thoughts.

"Who here thinks he was the last one Stephen talked to before he went into the Deadheads?" Alby asked, the boys just looking at each other, shaking their heads or mildly shrugging. At the back of the crowd, Dave slowly raised his hand, Alby signalling for him to stand.

"I'm not the last one he talked to," He began, "But I saw him at the Bloodhouse this morning, getting a rope."

"Did you ask why he was doing that?"

Dave shook his head. "But Alby, I wouldn't know. I thought he was gonna use it for a hammock."

I turned to Erin again, lightly nudging her arm. She looked at me blankly, obviously not paying any attention to what was happening in the room.

"It's a child." I whispered.

Before she could react, the siren blared.

The boys got on their feet and ran outside towards the box. Alby opened and jumped in once I caught up. I scanned and finally found the greenie, a chubby kid, curled up in the corner. When he looked up, he started bawling and panicking, making a huge and foul mess.

"Greenie just klunked his pants." Henry grimaced. Bastards started laughing, scaring poor greenie even more. Luckily, Erin arrived and helped the chubby newbie calm down. He was immediately brought to the showers. 

Maybe. Just maybe, this surge-thing was a gift. Or a curse. Who knows?