"Shut up! Just shut up! I trusted you! Now do it!"

Spit flew out of my mouth while I screamed at Thomas.

I had no idea why I was acting like that. I felt like there where two Newts: one of them was yelling at poor Tommy, yelling that he had to kill me, and the second one was yelling at the other Newt to stop.

Thomas' eyes filled themselves with tears.

"I can't."

"Do it!"

"I can't!"

Thomas was shouting now, too, and I could nearly feel the despair in his voice. But no, the other Newt, the Crank, went on.

"Kill me or I'll kill you. Kill me! Do it!"

"Newt..." Thomas protested, but the other half of me, the Crank on top of him, cut him off.

"Do it before I become one of them!"

"I..."

"KILL ME!"

Then I could feel my eyes clear, and, for one small moment, the good Newt was in charge of the speaking.

"Please, Tommy. Please."

And Thomas, poor Thomas, squeezed his eyes shut and pulled the trigger.

"Newt. Newt, can you hear me?"

A voice pulled me out of my deep sleep, a woman's voice, familiar but strange at the same time. I had heard it before, but it was long, long ago.

I tried to respond, tried to say that I could hear her, but I couldn't.

By the time I had gathered enough strength to open my mouth, the cold, black water I was floating in, pulled me back down.

Everything went dark again.

The next time I woke up, someone else was talking to me: a girl, a young girl, maybe five or six years old.

Her voice was high-pitched, cheerful, and pleasant to listen to. I listened to what she said to me.

"...Mommy told me what happened to you, Uncle Newt," the little girl said. "She said that you were acting a little crazy, lately, and that you wanted to die. But Daddy and Grandpa saved you, and now you are going to be okay."

I heard her sigh.

"I hope you get better soon," she then said. "You look like a really nice person."

"Kelly, you coming to eat?" a woman's voice from farther away shouted.

The little girl - Kelly, probably - responded with "Yeah, Granny! Coming!"

I heard her run away, and I wanted to open my eyes so badly, but I just didn't manage to.

The sleep pulled me under water once again.

This time, the darkness didn't last long. That nearly made me feel happy; I hated to be alone, and the silence was on the edge of driving me crazy.

The voices of two adult men woke me up. One man sounded younger than the other, much younger. Maybe they were father and son, I didn't know.

The older man was talking to the younger man, with a friendly, deep voice, one of the friendliest voices I had ever heard.

"Daniel, can I ask you something?" he asked the younger man.

"Sure," Daniel answered. "Whatever you want."

"What exactly is the reason why you came with me to save Newt? I mean, he is no direct family of you."

I heard Daniel clear his throat.

"Well," he began, "actually, I do feel like he is my family. I've got Celine, I've got Kelly, but I also got you and your wife. You were there for me when my own family left me, and you feel like family to me. Newt is part of that family, too."

Damn, that was a lot of information. Let's see.

I made a little list in my head to get everything straight.

Daniel is no direct family of me. He is Kelly's father and Celine's... husband? That would make the older man and his wife Daniels parents-in-law and Celine's parents.

Yes, that made sense.

I only didn't know how I fit in this family. Maybe I wasn't even in this family.

I was the missing puzzle piece.

I suddenly felt extremely tired, probably caused by thinking too much.

I passed out for the fourth time.

When I woke up for the umpteenth time, I was alone.

That was very strange, because there had always been someone to wake me up before.

Did that mean that I woke up myself? Would I be strong enough to open my eyes?

That would be great. I had been looking forward to seeing something again for the past couple of days. I found that it was time to get some answers. I wanted to know where I was, who those people were who I always listened to.

Excited, I tried to open my eyes.

Nothing happened.

I tried again.

Nothing happened.

Panic started to flow into my body.

What if I was blind?

Or even worse... What if I was dead?

There was a time that I wanted to be dead, but that was definitely not now. I was too curious.

Okay, Newt. Focus.

Open your eyes.

Three, two, one, NOW.

I tried to open my eyes with all of my strength, and I could lift my eyelids for the tiniest moment. I caught a glimpse of wooden walls and bright light, making me curious enough to try for the fourth time.

This time, my eyes fully opened. I looked right into a bright lamp, causing me to immediately look away.

Too fast.

A sharp pain flashed through my head, and I winced. I rubbed my temple to get rid of the pain, and when I did so, I felt a bandage around my head.

Oh yeah. Thomas had shot me. Because I wanted to die. No, Crank-Newt wanted to die.

And I freaking survived it? What?

No, this couldn't be right. I had finally gone completely crazy, or I was dead.

I waited for Crank-Newt to shout something, to make me do something weird, but he didn't come. Well, then I was dead. That would explain the white light.

But half of me still didn't want to believe that I was dead.

As soon as the headache had gone away a little, I started to look around, but not moving my head.

There were wooden walls – I had seen them before the light blinded me – and the floor was made of the same material. The sheets on the bed where I was lying in were white, and my arms looked white, too, or at least very, very pale.

Now I didn't believe that I was dead, anymore, unless if the hereafter was a small bedroom.

I rubbed my head again, surprised about the fact that I was strong enough to raise my hand, trying to make the pain go away. Damn headache.

Then I suddenly heard someone moan. It startled me, because it sounded really close, and I thought that I was alone.

I moved my head very carefully in the direction where the sound came from, and I discovered someone else in the room, someone I hadn't seen before.

It was a girl, about twenty years old.

She was sleeping, with her head on her forearm, arms on the mattress. She looked like she had been kneeling next to the bed and fallen asleep while doing so.

Her long, blond hair was spread over the blanket, making golden stripes on the white cloth.

I wondered if this was Celine, Kelly's mother and Daniel's wife.

She didn't look like a mother to me, though. More like a sister.

I startled myself with that thought. Where did it come from?

But I didn't have much time to think. The sleeping girl next to me moaned again, shifting her head this time. I saw that she was about to wake up, and that was exactly what happened.

She rubbed her face with one hand, yawned, and looked up. Her eyes were dark brown, just like mine, and they were cloudy with sleep.

Then our eyes locked.

She frowned at first, and I wondered if I had scared her or something, but then a huge smile spread over her face.

"Mom! Dad!" she shouted over her shoulder. "Come here! He's awake!"

A sudden flash of pain went through my head at the loud sound, and I involuntarily winced.

Two people ran into the room, a man and a woman, surprised looks on their faces. They looked about forty-five years old, and I wondered if the man was the guy that had been talking to Daniel.

The woman was the first to speak.

"Newt?" she asked, carefully. "Can it be... Are you really awake, or am I just dreaming?"

I tried to say something, that it was real, but when I opened my mouth, the only thing that came out was coughing.

When I looked up again, I saw that the woman had clasped one hand over her mouth. There were tears in her eyes – from happiness, I guessed. I watched her mutter to herself.

"Come on, Lynn," she said to herself. "Get yourself together."

She breathed in, and breathed out, and then she looked me in the eyes.

She suddenly looked stricter. The mood change nearly scared me.

"Newt, I need you to be very honest, now," she said. "I know what WICKED has done to you. I know that they have taken your memories and left you with nothing. I just need to know: do you remember us?"

It took me a moment to search in my head for anything, anything of recognition, but there was nothing.

These people were strangers to me.

I saw three faces fall at the moment I slowly shook my head. I wanted to say that I was sorry, that I would do anything to remember, but I couldn't get any sound out of my throat.

It was silent for a while before the girl spoke.

"Newt," she said, her voice quiet, "I hate to be the one to tell you, but... We are your family."

A puzzle piece fell in its place, and I realized that it didn't really surprise me. For some reason, I had already assumed that they were my family.

The girl bit her lip, looking away for a moment, before she continued.

"These people are Lynn and Sam," she said, gesturing at the man and the woman, her tone uncertain, "your parents. I... I am Celine. Your sister."

Another puzzle piece fit. If Celine was Kelly's mother, then that would explain why Kelly called me 'Uncle Newt'. She was my niece. That would make Daniel my... brother-in-law.

I realized that I was staring, and I wanted to apologize, but I still couldn't speak.

Celine nervously giggled, shifting her feet.

"God, that was awkward," she said, looking away.

She turned to Lynn.

"I'll go get Dan and Kelly," she said to her. "Kelly's gonna go crazy. She's been here every day, waiting for him to wake up."

Lynn nodded, and Celine slipped out of the room. Now I was alone with my parents, and I thought that they found it more awkward than I did.

I understood it, though; what were you supposed to say to your son who didn't remember you?

Luckily, the awkward silence soon got broken by the sound of shoes clicking on the floor. Someone was running. Fast.

Less than a second after the sound had begun, a little girl dashed into the room. Her light brown hair was split in two small pigtails on top of her head, and she was wearing a pair of dungarees with pink flowers on it, making her look quite cute.

This had to be Kelly.

The second she saw me, a huge smile spread over her face.

"Uncle Newt!" she yelled, sounding very, very happy.

Before I realized it – goodness, that girl was fast – she had climbed on top of me and had her arms wrapped around me.

I didn't really know what to do, so I just sat there, doing nothing. I didn't think I'd ever been very well with children.

"Kelly, get off him!" Celine shouted from behind, half laughing. "Dan, lift her off him."

I heard footsteps, and the next moment, someone lifted the little girl off me. Holding Kelly with the other arm, the young man held his hand out. While I shook it, he introduced himself as "Daniel Storm. But please call me Dan."

I wanted to tell him my name, but then I realized that 1. I couldn't speak, and 2. he probably already knew who I was. So I just nodded.

Another sharp pain flashed through my head at that. I winced, realizing that I had forgotten the ever-present headache for a moment.

What has happened to me?

That thought popped up in my mind, completely randomly. I squeezed my eyes shut to prevent myself from getting lost in my thoughts.

Apparently Daniel had seen that.

"Let's go," he said to the other people in the room. "We need to let him get some rest."

Celine nodded, and she and my parents already started to walk away. I mouthed a Thanks to Daniel. He grinned in reply and left as well.

I was thankful for being alone. At least I had some time to think, now.

But, unfortunately, I couldn't do much of the thinking I was planning to do; I was already feeling very, very tired.

I didn't know how it was possible that I was so exhausted – I had been asleep for the past couple of days – but I couldn't think of an answer before my eyes fell shut and the sleep dragged me down into the darkness.

When I opened my eyes again, I saw that I wasn't alone anymore.

Daniel and Sam were sitting on chairs, next to my bed. Both of them had their eyes closed, so it took a while before Daniel looked up and saw that I was awake. He greeted me by holding up his hand.

"Hey," he said, grinning. "Good morning, I guess. Even though it's two in the afternoon."

I realized that I had lost all sense of time. What time was it when I woke up the last time? How long had I been asleep?

Daniel's talking had woken Sam up, too, and he stretched his arms sleepily.

"What's going o-"

He stopped abruptly when he saw that I was awake, again.

"Hey, Dad," I said to him.

Then I realized it.

I could talk again!

Okay, my voice was hoarse and it broke even on those two small words, but I was able to get sound out of my throat again! I hadn't been so happy since I had found out that I wasn't dead.

Now that I had spoken, for the first time in days, I couldn't stop anymore. A whole stream of questions came out of my mouth.

"What happened to me? How did I get here? Why don't I feel like a Crank anymore? How is it possible that I'm not dead? Is Tommy still alive? Can…"

Daniel cut me off, half laughing and half serious.

"That's a lot of questions for someone who has just woken up," he said.

I nodded, too curious to wait.

"Please, you can answer at least one of the things I want to know, can't you?" I asked, nearly begging.

Daniel looked down, the grin disappearing from his face.

"I can," he said. "I can answer nearly all of them. But I think it's better if Sam would do the talking, seeing as it was his plan, and he did most of it."

Sam nodded. He took a deep breath and started to talk.

"About a week ago, a friend called us. He had seen you, nearby Denver, and had immediately recognized you."

I remembered the Crank attack on the city. I had been with them, when they took Denver over.

"Daniel and I immediately went to Denver. We've been there for about two or three days, driving around, looking for you. We didn't find you, and we were just heading back home when Daniel spotted you, at the side of the road."

Sam sighed, looking away.

"Of course we knew that you had the Flare, but there had always been the hope that it wasn't that bad, that you weren't past the Gone yet and that you would recognize us. That hope was immediately washed away. You looked bad, really, really bad. And it became even worse when we saw the boy with the gun, jumping out of a van and walking towards you."

"Tommy," I whispered.

Sam nodded and went on.

"We watched as he talked to you, and you went mad and jumped in on top of him, and he eventually... shot you."

I heard him hesitate before he said the last two words, and I bit my lip to prevent myself from saying something.

"As soon as the van had driven away, we picked you up and went back home as fast as possible. We had the most luck in the world that Daniel happened to be an ex-WICKED doctor, and that we had the right stuff here. As soon as we got here, he laid you down on the kitchen table and sent everyone out of the room. I don't exactly know what he did, but he removed the bullet, and, somehow, he discovered that the Flare wasn't in your brain. It was gone, and it had never been there."

I felt my mouth drop open.

I have never had the Flare!

I have never been a Crank!

"W-what… How…" I began, but I couldn't get any more sound out of my mouth. I was too confused.

Apparently seeing that, Daniel started to explain everything.

"When I still worked at WICKED, I heard about plans to influence behaviour with the Swipe. They wanted to know how the other subjects reacted when one of them started to act as a Crank. It all was one of their Variables, Newt. It was all made up by WICKED. You're Immune, just like the others."

Somehow, my mouth dropped open even farther, at the same moment that the horrible feeling of anger streamed into my body.

I was furious at WICKED.

How could they do this to me? How could they do this to Thomas? He must think that he has killed me. How can he live with that?

I wanted to cry, scream, punch someone. But I didn't.

Instead of that, I closed my mouth and looked at Daniel.

"Well, that's... nice," I said.

No, I was lying.

'Nice' was a stupid understatement. It was great that I wasn't going crazy, that my brain wasn't going to be eaten away by a disease, and that I wouldn't die of that. But it made me angry at the same time.

WICKED was even worse than I thought.

It was bad enough to put children in a maze with half-machine monsters, force them to walk through the Scorch, and eventually make them fall asleep to face their greatest fears in their nightmares – at least, that's what happened to me – but this was by far the worst thing anyone could do.

I would have walked straight towards WICKED's Headquarters and thrown a bomb on it if I was sure that I could walk. And if I had a bomb. And if I knew where that damn building was.

A new thought popped up inside my head, and I looked up to the two men facing me.

"And what about Tommy?" I asked, unable to hide the worry in my voice. "And Minho, and Brenda and Jorge, and the Gladers? Are they still alive?"

I thought about the last time I saw Minho, Jorge and Brenda, in the Crank Palace.

Crank-Newt had taken control again, being mean and snapping at people, while the other half of me was scared as hell and prayed "Please, don't get eaten", and "Please, don't eat anyone."

I still couldn't believe that I had yelled at my friends, even pointed a Launcher at them. I was sure that bad things would have happened if Good Newt hadn't intervened in time and shot that weirdo with the greasy hair who thought that he was my friend.

Thank God that that guy didn't follow me when I ran out of the bowling alley.

I looked at Sam and Daniel, who were both frowning. Daniel was the first to answer my question.

"Well," he said, hesitating, "I only know that Thomas is in the WICKED Headquarters. I don't know about the others."

Now I was the one frowning.

Thomas would never want to be separated from his friends; he hates to work alone.

They must have some kind of plan.

Unless...

I heard the small voice in my head stutter.

Unless if he is the only one left.

No, that couldn't be true. The Gladers were survivors of the best kind. So were Brenda and Jorge. It was impossible that they were all dead.

"But... Why would Tommy go into the Headquarters?" I asked, confused. "What is he trying to do?"

Now Daniel looked at the floor, and I had some strange feeling that he was going to say something bad.

"My contact person, Zoey, called me this morning," he said.

I had to resist screaming that he had to hurry a little. I was impatient.

"She told me that Thomas is WICKED's Final Candidate. They need his brain to make a blueprint, which leads to develop a cure for the Flare. The operation is fatal, and Thomas..."

Daniel swallowed difficultly.

"Thomas is letting them do it. He is letting WICKED take his brain, and he will die."

The words startled me so much that I nearly fell out of the bed.

"What?" I yelled.

I couldn't believe it – Thomas who wanted to die? It sounded impossible, but Daniel claimed that it was true.

"Are you sure about that?" I asked him, probably sounding really desperate.

I already knew what he was going to respond, but I wanted to make sure that I had heard it right. That I hadn't imagined it, like I sometimes did when I had the Flare.

No, I corrected myself. When I thought that I had the Flare.

I watched Daniel look away and nod, confirming what he said earlier. After another moment of silence, he opened his mouth to say something, but it didn't matter what his words were, because they got cut off by a small girl's voice.

"Daddy! Daddy!"

Kelly came dashing into the room.

"Daddy, Zoey has called. She wants to talk to you."

Daniel stood up, offering me an apologetic smile, and walked out of the room. Sam frowned and went after him, leaving me and Kelly alone.

I looked away, feeling uncomfortable.

Shit, what do I have to say? How do you start a conversation with a little girl?

Kelly's high-pitched voice pulled me out of my thoughts.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

I looked up, confused. "Yeah... Why do you ask me that?"

"You look like you're hurt," Kelly replied, shrugging.

It took me a moment before I realized that my fingers were fidgeting at the bandage around my head. Strange, I hadn't even noticed that I was doing that.

Smiling at the small girl that was facing me, I let go of the white cloth.

"Yeah, eh... I'm all right," I said, but, for a second time, the conversation got interrupted.

Daniel hurled into the room, the phone still in his hand. He looked worried. I wondered what was going on.

"Kel," Daniel said to Kelly, "I have to go, now. I'll be back in a couple of hours, okay?"

"Okay." Kelly nodded. "Bye, Daddy."

"Bye," Daniel quickly responded before running away again.

Someone – I thought that it was Celine – shouted Kelly's name. The little girl waved at me before walking away.

I lay down on the cushion again, sleepiness making my head feel like it was filled with cotton wool.

I didn't know what was making me so tired – I had only been awake for less than an hour. Maybe it was caused by the wound in my head. Maybe it was because my brain had to handle too much information. Maybe just because it was everything at once.

I only knew that my system had been turned upside down.

And that I was falling asleep.

So I fell asleep.

The sound of a door slamming shut woke me up.

I sat upright, sleepily rubbing my eyes, and I wondered what time it was. Somewhere late in the evening, I guessed. It wouldn't be so silent otherwise.

That silence lasted for another short moment, before Daniel broke it.

"Celine!" he shouted. "Sam, Lynn!"

The sound of running people echoed through the house. Then I heard Celine gasp, followed by her relieved voice.

"Oh, my God," she whispered. "Zoey, I'm so glad you made it."

It took my just-awake brain a second to realize that she must be talking to Daniel's contact person. The person that told him about Thomas.

A wave of worry streamed into my body, but it disappeared quickly, because my sister dashed into my room.

"Newt," she said to me, "you need to come with me. Zoey, our insider in WICKED, is here. She's got news, and I think you might find it interesting."

Five minutes later, I was sitting on a chair, in the living room, with a cup of steaming tea in my hands.

Celine had helped me to come there, by letting me lean on her while I tried to walk. I nearly fell three times because I was feeling too dizzy to stand, but I was too curious to let that stop me.

Zoey Sonrisa appeared to be a friendly, young woman, around the eighteen years old. She reminded me of Harriet, one of the Group B girls, though Zoey had long, black hair in a ponytail.

I watched her, just like the four other people in the room – they had decided to let Kelly sleep –, as she sipped from her tea and, after putting her cup down on the table next to her, started to talk.

"Strange things have been happening at the Headquarters," she said. "It started this morning, when Thomas, our Final Candidate, suddenly walked in. Most of my colleagues were surprised – of course Janson had told them that he expected that Thomas would do that, but we didn't really believe him, because it took so long. Anyway, I knew that the Final Candidate would probably die soon, and I knew that you had one of the other subjects here, so I immediately called you. You guys know it so far, don't you?"

Everyone in the room nodded, as if they were listening to a teacher. The only difference was that everyone was sitting on the edge of their seats. I didn't think that that would ever happen in a maths class.

Zoey took another sip of her tea and continued.

"Well, the second weird thing happened a couple of hours later, when I heard someone say that they had decided to keep the Final Candidate alive. Chancellor Paige needed him. She expected an attack on the Headquarters, and Thomas had to get the other Immunes to bring them to a Flat Trans she had prepared for them."

"What do you mean, 'get them'? Weren't they all together?" I asked, and immediately bit my lip so that I couldn't say more. I didn't mean to interrupt her, but the question just flew out of my mouth.

Zoey looked at me – thank God, she smiled – and replied: "No, they weren't all together. WICKED kidnapped all Immunes and put them in the Maze."

I shivered at that last word.

Most of the fears that WICKED had shown me in my third Trial, were about the Maze. The fact that I also would have been there again if I wasn't at the Crank Palace, scared me even more than the fact that I actually thought that I was a Crank.

I nodded at Zoey – to show that I understood it – and listened as she went on.

"The Chancellor told us that all of us, except the guards, had to leave the building."

She looked away, her eyelashes hiding her dark eyes.

"We all went outside, but the guards stayed inside the Headquarters. They just should've fled when they found out that their weapons didn't work anymore, but they stayed, and now they're all dead."

"What do you mean? What happened?"

Celine and I had asked it at exactly the same time. It would have been funny if everything wasn't so serious.

Zoey looked up. She looked really, really upset.

"There were explosions," she said, her voice quiet. "I think it were bombs. There's nothing left of the building. The WICKED Headquarters is gone, just like most of my friends."

One single tear rolled down her left cheek, and I wished that I could do something to comfort her, but I was too worried to actually do it.

Instead of that, I asked: "And what about Thomas, and the other subjects? Were they still inside the building? Are they safe? Or are they..."

I couldn't speak out those last words.

What if they are dead?

What if all of my friends are dead?

Zoey looked me in the eyes.

"Most of the Immunes have made it to the Flat Trans," she said. "Only few died during the explosions. Teresa and five others."

Even though I was really relieved that my friends were safe, I felt sorry for Teresa. Of course, I knew that she had betrayed us in the Scorch, but she was actually the one who eventually got us out of the Maze. We would still be there if she hadn't triggered the Ending.

A new question popped up in my head, and before I could stop myself, I had already asked it.

"Where are they?" I asked Zoey.

I knew that she was having a heavy day – nearly all of her friends had died, she didn't have work or a home anymore – but I wanted to know as much as I could.

Of course I knew that I was being disrespectful. I just didn't care.

"The Flat Trans brought the Immunes to a place where everything is like it used to be," Zoey told me. "No Cranks, no Flare, the Sun Flares haven't been there. Only WICKED knew that it existed. We used to call it Paradise."

It also sounded like a paradise to me. A place where everything was like it used to be...

I nearly couldn't believe that something like that existed.

But Zoey had even more information, and she went on: "It only takes five hours to get there, but the route is dangerous – there are lots of Cranks on the way. And then there's the forest, which you can't get through with the car, and..."

But I didn't listen anymore. My brain was still at the first sentence.

It only takes five hours to get there.

I am only five hours away from my friends.

I didn't care about the danger or the Cranks or the forest. I stood up, struck with excitement.

"Well, let's go, then," I said, probably louder than I should.

I also didn't care about how stupid I must have sounded.

Sam, who had been silent for the past twenty minutes, also got to his feet and said to me: "Didn't you hear what she just said? It's dangerous. And it's the middle of the night. Unless if you want to volunteer as midnight snack for the Cranks, I advice you to stay inside."

My enthusiasm flooded away, and now I only felt ashamed. I sat down again.

"Yeah, I guess you're right," I muttered, not looking my father in the eyes.

"We could go next morning," Daniel's voice joined the conversation, making me look up.

"Really?" I asked, getting a little bit of my hope back.

Daniel looked at Sam, who hesitated.

"Well... I... Maybe it's..." he began, but he cut himself off with a sigh. "All right, then. We'll leave tomorrow. But Lynn, Celine and Kelly stay here."

My sister obviously didn't agree with that.

"I'm coming with you, Dad," she said, her voice just quiet enough to not wake Kelly up, but still loud. "I'm not going to stay here, waiting for you to come back, and being scared that you won't come back."

Sam opened his mouth to protest, but then he stopped.

"Okay," he said, turning to his wife. "What will you do, Lynn?"

"I'll stay here to look after Kelly," my mother replied. Then she stood up, raising her voice a little.

"I think you'd better go to sleep, now," she said to all of us. "You'll be needing your rest if you want to head for Paradise tomorrow."

I guessed that we all agreed with that, because we all drank up the last bit of our tea – mine was cold as ice by then – and started to go back to our rooms.

Celine had to help me walk again, but it was easier now; it seemed like tomorrow's promise had given me some more force.

I was going to see my friends again.

That was the only thing I could think about, while I lied down in my bed, pulled the sheets over myself and, eventually, fell asleep.

"Newt. Newt, wake up."

A soft voice pulled me out of my sleep. When I opened my eyes, I discovered that it was Zoey's voice. She was sitting on the edge of my bed, and when she saw that I was awake, she smiled at me.

"Good morning," she said, tucking a curl of black hair behind her ear. "Slept well?"

"Hm-m," I replied, yawning. "What time is it?"

"Six in the morning," the dark-skinned girl said. "We'll be leaving in an hour."

Then her already dark eyes darkened, and she lowered her voice.

"Listen, before we leave, I want to say that I'm sorry," she said to me, not looking me in the eyes. "I'm sorry that I was part of that whole WICKED thing, and that I didn't do anything to stop it. I'm sorry that this all happened to you. I'm sorry about Lauren, and about everyone else who has died because of us."

I felt a tiny sting in my heart at Lauren's name. It was nearly a year ago that she died, and I still missed her a lot.

I didn't cry in my sleep anymore, and the nightmares had disappeared, but it still felt like a piece of my heart missed.

I realized that I had never blamed anyone for her death. I hadn't blamed WICKED, or the Gladers, or anyone else. I hadn't even thought of Zoey as a 'bad guy' when I saw her, even though she had worked for WICKED.

So I just smiled comfortingly at her, and said: "You don't have to apologize. You haven't done anything wrong."

She looked up, nearly as if she couldn't believe what I had said to her.

"Thank you," she said quietly. "That's... really nice, Newt."

My smile grew wider.

"You're welcome."

I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and put my feet on the cold floor. Carefully trying to keep my balance, I stood up.

A wave of dizziness hit me, but it disappeared quickly. I sighed, relieved that I was strong enough to stand; that made a lot of things much easier.

"Okay, eh..." Zoey's voice pulled me out of my thoughts. "You coming with me? Dan asked me to wake you up, because he has to check on your wound or something."

I nodded, and she jumped off the bed. After taking a careful step to test if I could walk – I nearly started to cheer when I found out that I could – I followed Zoey.

We made our way to the living room, where Daniel was busy packing the suitcases.

Zoey greeted him cheerfully.

"Hey, Dan," she said, grinning at him.

"Hey," Daniel replied, turning around. "Sit down," he said to me, gesturing at the couch.

Zoey quickly slipped out of the room when someone called her name, and I flopped down on the soft couch.

Daniel picked up a small, metal box from a table and sat down in a chair, so that he was sitting right in front of me. He started to untie the bandage around my head. When he was done doing that, he squinted a little, and smiled.

"It looks good," he said, bending over the metal box. He picked up a mirror and gave it to me.

When I looked at my reflection, I nearly dropped the mirror.

Shit, I looked horrible!

There were bald spots on my head – I remembered pulling on my hair for no reason – and my face was covered in white scars, which were caused by the many cuts I had gotten. There was a huge bruise on my cheekbone. My eyes travelled up, towards the place where I had pressed the gun against my head.

There, on my left temple, was a small bullet hole.

I quickly handed the mirror over to Daniel before I could drop it.

Of course I knew that I had been shot, I had been shot by one of my best friends, and I wanted it, but this was like a confirmation that it really had happened. I hoped that it wouldn't become a scar. Then I would be reminded of it every day.

Daniel smeared some strange-coloured salve on the wound and wrapped a new bandage around my head. Just when he was done tying it up, Kelly came dashing into the room.

"Daddy!" she shouted. "Mommy needs you. You have to help her making sandwiches."

Daniel smiled at her, that caring, fatherly smile that he only seemed to use around her.

"Okay, Kel," he said, standing up. After ruffling the little girl's hair, he walked away.

Kelly clasped her hands behind her back and looked down at her shoes; she suddenly looked shy.

I leaned forward, trying to look her in the eyes.

"Hey, Kelly," I said, nearly whispering, "what's wrong?"

A silent second lasted before she replied in a quiet voice: "You guys are all going away, and maybe you're going to die. I don't want it. I don't want to be alone."

She looked up, and I saw that her dark eyes were filled with tears. After biting her lip, she whispered: "I'm scared, Uncle Newt."

I didn't know what happened to me – maybe it was some kind of instinct that I didn't know about – but when I saw my niece like that, I couldn't help but pull her on my lap and wrap my arms around her.

She seemed so small, so tiny, as she rolled herself up to a ball and buried her face in my chest. Her whole body was trembling; I was sure that she was crying.

I felt like a crack appeared in my heart.

Kelly didn't deserve to live in a world like this, a dangerous, terrifying world. She deserved to live like it all used to be.

Suddenly, I got an amazing idea. I wasn't sure if her parents would be happy with it, but I thought that I could convince them.

"Hey, Kelly," I said, unable to hide my smile.

The little girl on my lap looked up.

"Yes?" she asked, her high-pitched voice sounding hoarse.

"How about coming with us?" I asked her, and immediately, her eyes lit up. "We could live in Paradise. All of us."

"Really?" Kelly asked, looking so hopeful that my heart melted.

I nodded. "Really. But I still have to ask your parents about it."

Kelly jumped off my lap, holding my hand.

"Come on, then," she said, pulling me off the couch.

"All right, all right," I laughed, letting her drag me towards the kitchen.

Celine looked up from her sandwiches when she heard us come in.

"Hey, guys," she greeted us. "How are you, Newt?"

"I'm fine," I replied vaguely. "Listen, I want to talk with you about something."

Celine frowned.

"All right," she said, "take a seat, I guess."

I sat down on the edge of the kitchen table, my hands fidgeting at the sleeve of my shirt.

After taking a deep breath, I blurted out: "I was thinking about taking Kelly with us."

Celine nearly dropped the butter knife she was holding in her hand. Daniel looked simply shocked.

"What?" he said.

That was when Kelly came in.

"Oh, please, Daddy!" she said, looking at him with big, brown eyes. "I don't want to stay here. I want to come with you guys, to Paradise."

I could see that Daniel was hesitating, and I added: "We could live there. All of us. Zoey said that it is the safest place in the world, didn't she? They probably have room for seven more people."

Daniel frowned; I was sure that he was thinking about the danger of the trip, and if he wanted to put his daughter in that.

"Well," he then said, slowly, "I guess it's quite a good idea. What do you think, Celine?"

My sister shrugged.

"It's better than coming back here and wait 'till the Cranks come to eat us," she said.

"Yay!" Kelly loudly acclaimed, throwing her hands up.

Then she unexpectedly wrapped her arms around my middle, making me smile widely.

"Thank you, Uncle Newt," she said, her voice muffled because her face was buried in my shirt.

I hugged her back and replied: "You're welcome."

The suitcases were packed in the car, we were all ready and we had been driving for over two hours before I even realized it.

There had been a lot more to pack now, because we were moving to Paradise, and we had to take everything with us.

I didn't have to help packing, thanks to my mother; she found that it wasn't good to let an injured work. Not that I was feeling that bad, but oh well.

We were lucky that Daniel's car was big enough for all of us and the suitcases. There were two back seats, and there was enough baggage space, so it all fit.

I was sitting on the back seat in the middle of the car, with Kelly and Celine on my left. My parents were sitting in the back, Daniel drove, and Zoey was sitting next to him to tell him where to go.

Not that there were much options; we had been driving straight on for the past two hours. The asphalt road kept going on like that for as far as I could see.

Everything was quiet. Too quiet, I thought. I wasn't used to this.

The dry ground on both sides of the road was empty, nobody was talking, and the only sound was the steady hum of the car's motor.

It was starting to make me fall asleep.

My eyes slowly fell shut and I drowsed off.

"Uncle Newt! Wake up!"

Kelly's cheerful voice pulled me out of my sleep. I opened my eyes and sat straight up; I had been leaning against the door while I was asleep.

I immediately noticed that we were standing still, in the shadow of a high tree. That was strange, because I hadn't seen any trees since we got out of the Glade – the ground was way too dry. We must be close to Paradise.

I remembered that Zoey had said something about a forest, but I still asked Kelly: "Why did we stop?"

"We're nearly there," the little girl next to me said, confirming what I already thought. "We'll have to walk from here."

I nodded, opening the door. Everyone had already stepped out of the car; they were sitting on the ground, their backs against the trees, eating a sandwich. We were at the edge of the forest, and the shadow was cool.

Celine came walking towards me and gave me a sandwich with cheese.

"Good morning, Sleeping Beauty," she joked, grinning.

I rolled my eyes at that. I didn't sleep that much, did I?

My sister and I sat down against the side of the car.

"Did I miss something?" I asked her. "I mean, while I was asleep."

Celine shook her head.

"No, not really," she replied. "We've seen only twenty Cranks or so. They were fighting over something next to the road. I don't think they've even noticed us."

I sighed, relieved. Apparently the universe had decided to let everything be calm today. I hoped that it would stay like that.

I took a bite of my sandwich, which was delicious, so I had eaten it up in five minutes. Everybody had finished their food as well by then, so we all stood up.

"Everyone, grab a suitcase!" my father commanded. "We'll have to walk from here."

I walked towards the baggage space and picked up an overnight bag. It was heavy, but not too heavy, so that I could carry it with me without too much effort.

When everyone had some piece of baggage, we started to walk.

Daniel locked the car, even though he didn't really expect that he would ever need it again.

The forest appeared to be darker than I expected; the leaves blocked the sunlight, making it quite hard to see where we were going. It went even harder after about half an hour, when a dark-coloured cloud shove in front of the sun.

It was going to rain.

I think we all knew that, but nobody said anything, trying to reach our destination before we got wet, but failing.

The rain began to fall only ten minutes later, lukewarm drops soaking our clothes and rattling on the trees' leaves. We kept walking, bent over the baggage to shield it from the water.

Every now and then, my foot slipped in the slippery mud on the ground, and I could barely hold my balance, but I kept going, like I was in some sort of trance.

The rain lasted for hours, hours in which the only sound was the ticking of the raindrops and the wet splatch-splatch-splatch of footsteps in puddles.

We kept walking.

It must have been late in the afternoon when we finally reached the end of the forest.

Everyone was tired as hell by then; Kelly could barely stand on her feet.

The rain still hadn't stopped, and our clothes were soaking wet. My shirt was sticking on my body.

The seven of us stood there for a while, catching our breaths, in the useless shelter of a tree, before my father asked: "So... What do we do now?"

I opened my mouth to reply, but I couldn't say anything, because I heard the sound of footsteps behind me. I spun around.

Someone was standing there, but I could only see the silhouette of that person through the rain. I heard a loud voice over the rushing sound of raindrops.

"Who's there?" he shouted. I was sure that it was a boy, around my age, and I also knew exactly who it was.

"Tommy!" I yelled at him. "Come here!"

I saw him flinch.

"Newt?" he asked. "What... How..."

He didn't finish his sentence and came running towards me. I didn't think I had ever been so happy to see someone.

As soon as Thomas had reached the dry place beneath the tree, I rushed towards him. I didn't know what happened to me, but before I even realized it, I was hugging him.

"Newt, what..."

Thomas pulled himself loose and looked at me.

I knew why he did it; he wanted to make sure that I wasn't a Crank, that I was going to eat him alive or something. When he realized that the madness in my eyes wasn't there anymore, his mouth fell open.

"How... Newt, why... Why aren't you a Crank anymore? Why aren't you dead? I thought..." he said, nearly tripping over his own words, but I cut him off.

"Let's just say that I've had a lot of luck," I said, "and that I'm really, really happy to see you."

The surprise on Thomas' face was nearly satisfying, though I meant everything I said. I'd had a lot of luck – I would be lying somewhere next to a road, dead, if my family hadn't been there – and the second thing was just true.

Thomas opened his mouth to say something, but I – how rude of me – interrupted him again.

"Tommy, why don't you get Minho and the others," I said to him. "Tell them to come here. I'll explain everything."

Thomas looked at me for another moment, then nodded, and ran off.

I watched him until he was out of my sight, knowing that all of my friends would be with me in only minutes.

SIX MONTHS LATER

Dear Dad and Mom,

The first thing I want to say is that your idea of going back home is a stupid idea. Yes, I know that you're homesick, and that you're very happy now at home, but you're missing so much! And we are missing you, too.

Anyway, it is great here in Paradise, but less great than when you were still here :(. Everyone is so happy here, especially Zoey. She seems to have a 'special love connection' (that's how she calls it herself) with Minho. All of Newt's friends are awesome, by the way, they are such nice guys! Kelly calls them all 'Uncle', haha. She loves them. I think Dan is a little jealous :).

And – BIG NEWS! – Kelly is going to get a little sister! (Please, don't freak out like last time. I felt guilty.) We call her Lauren. Newt has chosen the name, because of the love of his life, who passed away a while ago. That's romantic, isn't it?

Hope to see you soon! (You come to visit us, right?)

Bye!

-Celine (and the rest of us, too!)

Yaaaay! Finished another story!

This is why it took so long: it's quite a long story, and I didn't have much time to write. But I unexpectedly had time this weekend, so I could finally finish it!

So, what do you think of it? Please, leave a review, let me know if you like it or not and what exactly you like (or hate) about this story, so that I can use it in new stories!

Bye, have a nice day guys!