Before the Maze
"Newt?" Someone said. "Newt where are ya, man?"
"Stop calling me that!" He scowled without turning around.
"What am I supposed to call you then? Mr. Grouchy Face?"
Anger welled up inside him. The sixteen year old forced himself to calm down. "Forget it."
"We got two hours left before the Swipe. Sending us up in three." The boy told him.
"Thanks for the information, Minho." He responded. He turned off the TV and turned to face him. He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows.
"What?" Minho was puzzled. "What is it?"
"Want to do something before we forget it all?" He burst out.
Minho nodded. "Like what, Dustin?"
Dustin shrugged. "One last game or one last fun thing of some kind."
"Okay." His friend responded.
"Grant," Dustin went off track." I don't want to forget it. Any of it."
"Me either." His lifelong friend walked up and hugged him.
"Come on, let's go do something." Dustin said.
The two boys went up to the outdoor games room. They played pass with a football, then tag, then they just sat side by side talking. They only had fifteen minutes before the Swipe now.
"They said that in the Maze we will only remember the names they gave us." Minho said.
"Yeah." Newt nodded. "The bloody Swipe will remove everything else."
"When we escape, we're going into the Scorch." Minho revised WICKED's plans.
They both got up and Newt said, "Let's go tell our friends good bye, shall we?"
"I was thinking the same thing, dude." Grant chuckled slightly, obviously unable to find much humor for once.
They went to the main common room, where all of the other boys were giving their goodbyes and getting ready to go.
"Thomas." Newt said as he approached his friend. "See you in two years."
"See you, Newt." The tall boy hugged him.
They shook hands.
They heard the doors open and all of the kids went silent.
A man from WICKED, Janson, said, "Mr. Newton, you're coming first."
Dustin nodded. "Alright. It'll be a bloody honor to be the first to lose my memory."
"Follow us." Janson said. He and his fellow worker, a woman, led him to the room where the Swipe was to be performed.
They had him lay down on the metal bed in the center of the room. He was breathing hard out of fear and sadness of losing everything he knew.
"Relax." Janson ordered.
Newt was aware of Minho, Thomas, and Teresa coming to watch from outside the glass window. Out of corner of his eye, he saw Thomas wave. He gave a small, sad smile to them.
He looked up again just as he saw a metal mask lowering towards his face. He forced his body to relax although his mind couldn't.
The mask came onto his face. He heard things coming out of it and connecting into spots of his head. He flinched several times. He felt immense pain and emptiness as his memories began being wiped out of existence.
He felt a needle poke his arm and he began to feel sleepy. He let darkness take him as the liquid in the needle did its job.
The last thing he remembered was seeing his three friends' faces outside the window.