𝗚𝗥𝗢𝗪𝗧𝗛, gally (tmr)

Chapter Twenty Two

An intervention with a WCKD train, a close call with a group of Cranks, and a series of explosions at the Last City's walls. Those were the events that led up to their kidnapping.

As they ran from the bombs targeted at them from inside the City, they were grabbed by the group of men they spotted earlier when they made their way towards the wall. Ada found herself being pushed into the back of a white van alongside Thomas and Brenda.

Before she could process a thing, the van had jolted into action, and they were sat with three of their kidnappers in almost darkness with no clue as to where they were going.

Ada went to talk to Thomas, who she could feel trembling slightly beside her, when she found that the breath had been sucked out of her lungs. She went to inhale, but there was nothing there.

A wave of panic crashed over her as she began to hyperventilate. Shaky breaths rattled her entire body as she cried out for help, her hands clutching her throat desperately.

She was having a panic attack.

Ever since arriving in the Scorch, there had been a weight of anxiousness just pressing down on her chest. Sometimes it was barely there, and sometimes it built up to extreme heights. It had never felt as bad as it did then.

Thomas' hands moved to the back of her neck and to her hair, keeping her head still and her eyes firmly on him to help get her breathing back into a normal pattern. To an outsiders perspective, it would've looked incredibly intimate. But to her, it only felt platonic.

"Just breathe."

As she desperately tried to calm her heaving breaths, a hushed whisper from one of the guards made her gently push Thomas' arms away from her and look to the source of the sound. When she did, she found one had placed their wrist on another, who had seemingly gone to calm her down. Her distraction seemed to aid her in her recovery.

The guard whose arm was being held captive - like they were being held captive, funnily enough - averted their gaze from her completely, snatching their arm back and folding their hands over their chest. It was clear, even with the masks, that they felt flustered. But that's not what Ada was focusing on.

Why did they want to comfort me?

As she shuffled back into her space beside Brenda, she focused her eyes on the side of the van, so that the suspicious guard was just visible in her peripheral vision. And sure enough, they were acting suspicious again. Now that it seemed like she wasn't looking, they were staring at her once again.

Although it was impossible to make out the person's face, she found herself still trying to look through their red tinted gas mask to identify their features. 

The rest of the journey was utterly silent. Brenda had moved her hand to the girl's shoulder, comfortingly, and she rested against Thomas too, to keep herself calm by keeping her friends close.

They eventually came to a stop, and to their surprise, the back of the van was opened from the outside. The guards inside hurried them out, before jumping out after them, and instantly moving to shun them into a small group.

They found themselves on an old highway road now turned into a civilisation. Ada could see people gathered in conversation, and washing lines hanging down, and she could faintly smell bread being baked. 

The kidnappers looked out of place from the rest of the calm surroundings. And although they were a great contrast from those just sat or stood chatting, no one seemed bothered by the gas-mask wearing men wielding guns.

She pushed all of that out of her mind as she looked back to her kidnappers, who were now focused on two more white vans skidding to a stop in front of them. She most specifically looked at the guard she found suspicious, but even he wasn't looking at her currently.