Previously:

"Any bells ringing inside that head of yours?" Nick asked, noticing her frown.

She shook her head. She didn't look familiar at all. The face staring back at her might as well have belonged to someone else.

"No," she said, shoving the pot back towards Nick. "It's like I said; I'm a stranger."

Nick felt a bit of pity run through his mind for the girl as she lay down on the ground, her back facing him. He knew that hopeless feeling that she had; he and the other Gladers had all felt it; some of them still did every now and then.

"It gets better," he promised her quietly before closing the door and locking her in again.

The girl felt her bottom lip tremble a little at his words, and she bit it. Squeezing her eyes shut, she felt hot tears trickle out of the corners of her eyes.


She had a hard time getting to sleep that night, but she finally did. It was a dreamless sleep, and when the loud boom of the walls opening woke her up in the morning, she felt as though she had not slept at all. She rubbed her eyes and just lay there, staring up at the ceiling of the Slammer.

"Rise and shine, Greenie," came Alby's voice.

She only groaned tiredly in response.

Alby unlocked the Slammer door and offered her his hand. She gave him a curious look.

"Time for breakfast," he told her.

She raised an eyebrow as she grabbed his hand, letting him help her out.

"I get to eat real food today?" she asked, brushing herself off. "You guys aren't starving me anymore?"

Alby shrugged.

"You're gonna need some energy if you're gonna be working today."

"What? I thought I wasn't getting out till tomorrow," she said, remembering what Nick had told her.

"Nick was talking to the Keepers last night, and he decided to let you out early."

"Seems like someone's getting a bit sweet on me," she teased as she walked with Alby towards the kitchens.

Alby rolled his eyes.

"Don't count on that, Greenie. There's work that needs doing, and you're not doing us any good by laying about all day in the Slammer. Besides, your lesson's been learned, right?"

She almost didn't hear him; she was too focused on the wonderful smell of bacon wafting through the air.

"Huh?" she asked, pulling herself away from the thought of food. "Oh, yeah, totally."

Alby gave her a wary look as she walked towards the line forming in front of the kitchens. He wasn't sure if he trusted her yet or not.

She had almost reached the line when a hand came down on her shoulder.

"You go last, Greenie," Gally said, pulling her back. "Seniority and all that."

She wrenched her shoulder away from his grip, whirling around to look up at his smug face.

"Says who, blockhead?" she snapped at him.

"Says me, shank," he said, smirking a bit as he pushed past her to stand in line for his breakfast.

She balled her fists in anger at the boy. She made to follow him, but a another hand lightly grabbed her arm to stop her.

"Slim yourself, Greenie. You just got outta the Slammer. You wanna go back in already?"

She turned to see a shock of red hair and blue eyes staring at her.

"I wasn't gonna do anything," she said. "But it'd be nice to know why he's such a frigging jerk all the time."

Frankie laughed a little.

"Man, if you think that's Gally being a jerk, you've got another thing coming," he said. "He's only messing with ya. You're the Greenie after all."

"Yeah, and the only girl," she muttered, wishing right then that there were another female in the Glade.

"For now," Frankie said as they stood in line for their food. "Who knows? Next month we might get another girl Greenie."

"I hope," she said.

She shocked herself when she said this. Since when did she resign herself to the idea that she would be here for that long? She was already getting too comfortable here, something she had not thought possible. She pushed the thought away as Frankie talked to her.

She enjoyed the breakfast: crunchy bacon, scrambled eggs, toast with jam, cold milk. Admittedly, she had hardly listened to a word Frankie said. She had just been so hungry; she couldn't really blame herself for not being able to focus on anything else.

"So you're not gonna try to get into the Maze again once you've got your belly full, are ya?" Frankie halfway teased.

She thought about the question before shaking her head.

"Nah, I think I'll let Nick and Alby have the day off from bringing me food and escorting me to the bathroom," she teased. "I mean, it's not like I'd get very far. According to what I've heard, I seem to be on probation; Keepers'll be watching me like a hawk."

She really meant it. Even if she did want to look around the Maze, she wouldn't be able to go very far without someone noticing.

"Good that," Frankie said. "If you end up getting yourself killed, I go back to being the newbie around here until we get a saner Greenie."

She rolled her eyes and shook her head, smiling just a bit.

"Oh, shut up."

Frankie laughed.

"You know, you still haven't told me your name," he noted.

She felt her heart sink at the comment. She hadn't told anybody her name. She still didn't know it.

Thankfully, she got out of the situation when Nick walked over to where they were sitting with another boy in tow.

"Enjoying your new-found freedom, I see," Nick said.

"I don't think being stuck in the Glade with you lot constitutes being free, but I'll take it over the Slammer any day."

"Glad to hear it," he said, a smirk playing at his lips. "Greenie, this is Winston. You'll be working with him at the Blood House today."

She frowned at the idea.

"I'm not gonna have to kill anything, am I?" she asked, the look of disgust evident on her face.

"You like eating it well enough," Winston commented, nodding to her empty plate.

Her stomach twisted when she thought about it.

"Just work hard, and the day'll be over before you know it," Nick said. "And who knows? Maybe you'll like the Blood House."

I find that highly unlikely, she thought, the disgusted look not leaving her face.

"So when can I actually bathe? I feel disgusting," she said, grimacing at all the dirt on her and her clothes.

"You look it too," Nick stated bluntly. "But you'll get a shower after a hard day's work. You have to earn those privileges."

"Don't worry if you smell," Winston said. "Won't be able to smell you over the Blood House anyway."

"Great to know," she muttered sarcastically.

"Well, you're done eating, so get a move on," Nick said. "Look after her, Winston."

"Good luck," Frankie said as she reluctantly stood up.

"Alright, Greenie, let's go," Winston said, spinning on his heel and walking away, the girl following him.

He led her to a barn near the Blood House. He showed her around for about a hour, telling her what went where in the barn, walking her outside to show her which pens held what animals, showing her where the chicken and turkey coops were. A black lab stayed right under them the entire time.

"Where'd the dog come from?" she had finally asked Winston.

"That's Bark," he had told her. "He's just always sort of been here. Pesky little thing sometimes."

"What kind of name is Bark?" she had asked, petting the dog.

Winston had only shrugged and continued with the tour. He wasn't a very exciting person to be around. In fact, he kind of creeped her out a bit. When he got to showing her where they sliced up the animals, he seemed to enjoy talking about it a little too much for her liking. And the idea of having to do that, or even watch it, made her feel queasy.

Luckily, that wasn't what she was doing just then. Of course, she didn't consider scraping up animal crap to be the highlight of her day, but she would choose it over cutting up animals every time.

After scooping the last pile up and tossing it into a bucket, she finally stood up straight and wiped some sweat from her brow. She hated this job. She looked around the Glade at all the other workers. Of course, there were a few people helping her with the animals, but not many. She guessed that other than being a Slopper, this was the job that hardly anyone wanted.

She looked longingly at the forest, behind which lay the West entrance to the Maze. If she could only just peek her head inside; she wouldn't go too far, just poke around a bit.

"Hey, Greenie!"

The girl closed her eyes and sighed, turning to a boy she had been working with.

"Quit klunking around," he said.

She motioned at the fairly clean ground around her.

"I'm done," she told him.

The boy grumbled something as he walked towards her. Yanking the shovel out of her hand, he then pointed to the bucket she had been shoveling shit into for the past thirty minutes.

"Then, take it to the gardens," he said, as though she were already supposed to have known to do this. "You think the plants fertilize themselves? And then, get back here; there's a gate that needs fixing."

"Isn't that, like, the Builders' or Bricknicks' job?" she asked.

"No, it's your job. Your job is whatever I tell you it is."

She narrowed her eyes, thought very intelligently about not saying anything, and then did so anyways.

"Technically, my job is whatever Winston says it is," she said, sounding braver than she felt as she stood next to the guy who was a good head and a half taller than her. "And you don't look like Winston to me."

He snarled. See, ever since she had gotten out of the Slammer and started to actually interact with the Gladers, she figured out really quick that a lot of them didn't like her all that much. She guessed that first impressions were everything, and she had managed to screw hers up royally. Well, at least there was Frankie. That kid was always nice to her.

"How about you either do what I tell you, or I bash your stupid skull in with this shovel?" he said threateningly.

Her common sense was telling her to just do what he said because there was something about him that made her believe he would actually do it and that the next Greenie would be scraping up her brains instead of pig shit. And with the same shovel that killed her. Now, that's irony. However, hadn't she already established what an idiot she was?

"Thought it was against the rules to hurt a Glader," she blurted out sarcastically, that little voice inside her head screaming at her to just shut the hell up.

The boy leaned closer.

"You ain't no Glader," he said. "You're a shank who thinks she's a princess and above all of this. And even if I do get punished for it, it'd be worth it to be rid of you."

She tried her hardest to match the angry stare he was giving her, but in all honesty, she was terrified of him. She wasn't nearly as brave as she pretended to be; in fact, she had a feeling that she was pretty much a coward underneath it all. Plus, that stupid little voice wasn't screaming at her anymore; it was now (quite annoyingly) telling her that he was right.

"You don't know anything about me."

It had not come out in the strong, caustic voice that she had intended. Instead, it was shaky and weak. The boy shook his head.

"I know all I need to know," he said. "Now, just do your job before I really do hurt you."

With that, he had turned away, and she stood rooted to the spot for a few long seconds. Blinking rapidly, she steadied her breathing and look around to see if anybody had been watching them. A few other boys had stopped their work, but resumed again once she had caught them staring. She took a deep breath and turned swiftly on her heel. She grabbed up the bucket and made her way towards the gardens, happy to have an excuse to leave the boys she had been working with.

"Hey, Greenie," Frankie said cheerfully once he saw her. "How's the Blood House treating ya?"

She halfway threw the bucket on the ground. Frankie raised his brow.

"That good, huh?" he asked sarcastically.

"I hate it here," she said, leaning against one of the garden lattices.

"Don't say that, Greenie," Frankie said, going back to pulling weeds. "It's only still your first day working. So you don't belong in the Blood House; you'll find your place."

She rolled her eyes, but Frankie didn't see.

"Don't you wanna get out of this place?" she asked, not quite sure how any of them were this content.

Frankie nodded.

"Everyday," he said. "But that's why we have Runners. And until they find a way out of here, we all gotta do our part. Besides, it's not so bad here."

She gaped at him.

"We're trapped here against are will," she said. "Of course, it's bad here. I mean, why are we even here in the first place?"

"I have a theory," Frankie said, furrowing his brow.

The girl shifted her weight to her other leg and stared at him curiously.

"Mind you, it ain't a good one."

"Well?"

"Prison."

She blinked.

"What? That's stupid," she said.

"You got a better idea?" Frankie asked.

"Well, yeah. We're being held captive by very wealthy psychopaths. Besides, we're just kids; what would we be doing in prison?"

Frankie took off one of his gardening gloves and raked his fingers through his red hair. He looked up at her, squinting because of the sun.

"Last I checked, anybody can be a criminal."

The girl looked anxiously back at the boy who had threatened her just moments before, and she shuddered. Frankie pulled his glove on and went back to work, smiling.

"I wasn't really sure about it at first. But then, you came up, slinging knives and throwing fists, and I thought, 'Yup, we're in prison. That chick's definitely crazy.'"

The girl rolled her eyes, but she smiled in spite of herself.

"All the more reason to get the hell outta here," she said.

"Greenie!"

She jumped at the growingly familiar, angry voice.

"This gate ain't fixing itself!"

Frankie chuckled under his breath, and she scowled at him.

"Have fun," he said as she walked back towards the farm animals.

The girl's angry coworker just led her to the pen that held the goats and sheep. There was a large board leaning against the wire fencing with a few cinder blocks holding it up. The boy removed the cinder blocks and the board to reveal a hole. He threw some wire, pliers, and gloves on the ground in front of her.

"Get to work, shank."

She sighed and bent down to pick up the gloves. Once again, she looked up at the Deadheads. Maybe she should just make a run for it. Get to the Maze and hide and wait till the doors closed before she started looking around. She thought better of it though. After all, she wasn't the fastest person in the Glade, and she didn't want to spend any more time in the Slammer.

As it turned out, fixing the fence wasn't as terrible as she thought it would be. No one was bothering her, she wasn't having to stand, and twisting the wire around with the pliers was actually cathartic in a way. And when she had finished, she took a step back and admired the fact that she had done such an awesome job.

Then, she went to go find Winston, and she honestly wished that she hadn't. She was now being dragged to the actual Blood House, and her stomach was already turning. It was now time for the part of this job that she doubted very seriously that she could handle.

She did even worse than she thought she would. As soon as Winston cut into that pig, she had to run out the door. Her stomach had lurched so violently that she was amazed that she even made it outside before vomiting. She could hear a few of her coworkers snickering, and she hated it here that much more. However, what she saw next, she hated even more.

She walked over to the fence that she had just patched up to find that the wire she had replaced had been ripped from the fence. Anger bubbled inside of her as she whipped around to face the Gladers working around her.

"Who the hell did this?" she demanded loudly.

A few of them looked up at her, but no one said anything. They knew; there was no way they had been working this closely and not noticed who had destroyed the only good thing she had managed to do all day.

"Didn't do too hot of a job on that fence, princess."

"You!" she accused, walking to her angry coworker from before. "You did this!"

"Don't know what you're talking about," he said

"You're a fucking liar," she said.

"I didn't touch your fence," he said, "but you need to slim it before I make you."

"Oh, you're threatening me again?" she asked, her voice getting louder as she spoke. "Well, here's a new flash for you: I'm not scared of you."

It wasn't a complete lie. As it turns out, sometimes the more pissed you are at someone, the less afraid of them you become. She was sure the feeling would return though if he actually hit her.

The boy rolled his eyes and turned to walk away. She moved to grab his arm.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!"

He quickly turned around and shoved her to the ground where she landed with a hard thud.

"Touch me again, and I promise, I'll hurt you next time."

"What's going on over here?"

She had never been more thankful to hear Gally's voice, though she highly doubted he would help her. She scrambled to her feet and brushed herself off.

"Nothing," the boy said.

"Like hell," she said. "I spent a good half-hour working on that stupid fence, and someone ruined it. And I'm pretty sure it was this frigging jerk."

"I didn't do it," he said, "maybe you should ask someone else."

She opened her mouth to say something, but Gally spoke first.

"All the animals accounted for?"

The boy shrugged.

"I can check."

With that, he left to count the sheep and goats, leaving the girl with Gally. He gave her a stern look.

"You need to stop picking fights. Next time, I'm gonna let him pummel you into a pile of klunk."

"I wasn't picking a fight," she said heatedly. "Someone ruined what I just worked really hard on, and I was just trying to figure out who it was."

"And you think it's him because?"

"Because he's an asshole," she said as though this were hard-hitting evidence. "And he's made it pretty clear that he doesn't like me. He's already threatened me twice today, and it's not even lunchtime yet."

"You may not have noticed this, Greenbean, but there are a lot of people here that don't like you," Gally said.

"So what? I'm supposed to let them run all over me?"

"No, I'm just saying, it doesn't exactly prove that he did anything. Did you see him do it?"

She let out a humorless laugh and shook her head.

"No, I was in the Blood House."

"There you go," Gally said. "You don't even know for sure it was him."

She opened her mouth but was interrupted once more, this time by the asshole's return.

"We're missing one of the baby goats," he said, and he gave the girl a harsh glare.

"What are you looking at me for?" she asked. "It's not my fault; I fixed the hole in the fence just like you told me to!"

"Maybe you just didn't do as great of a job as you thought you did."

"That fence was perfect when I left it. I should know; I tested it myself," she defended.

"Enough," Gally said. "You, get back to work," he said pointing to the boy. "You, go find the goat," he said to the girl.

She gaped at him.

"What? This isn't my fault!" she said.

"Look, I don't care whose fault it is. I'm telling you to go find the goat, so you're gonna go find the goat. Got it, Greenie?"

"But I—"

"Go!"

She let out an annoyed huff and stalked off, going to look around the Glade for the missing baby goat. This was totally unfair. It should be that asshole looking for this dumb goat, not her. She was still convinced that he was the guilty one. It was a shame she had no proof. Even worse was the fact that when she walked past the kitchens, she could smell that Frypan and the other Cooks were already getting started on lunch. She needed to find that stupid goat and fast. There was no way she was about to miss out on lunch because of it. But hey, how hard could it really be to find a goat roaming the Glade?

Well, the answer was: harder than she thought it'd be. She had been searching for about fifteen whole minutes now. She had never really noticed just how big the Glade was, and right now, that wasn't helping her. Though, admittedly, when she went to search by the gardens, she had talked to Frankie for a good minute or two. In the cornfield, she kept running into Gladers who were working there that kept asking her what she was doing. If she had to grumble out the same answer one more time, she was going to scream. They all thought she was up to something, but of course, she couldn't really blame them. At this point, she kind of wished that she hadn't freaked out so badly when she had gotten out of the Box.

Out of the cornfield now, she sighed. Looking around, she brought her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun. Finally, she saw the stupid thing, grazing on some grass not too far from the Deadheads.

About time, she thought to herself as she headed over to where the small goat was.

Now, all she had to do was catch it, return it, fix the fence (again), and lunch should be ready by the time she was done. Simple enough, right?

Wrong.

The damn thing ran from her, heading into the trees. And she took off after it.

She wasn't sure how exactly she had managed it, but she'd caught it. She was now breathing very heavily, holding a baby goat tightly in her arms. A few twigs and leaves were sticking out of her hair at odd angles.

"I hate you," she said to the goat, and it just bleated in response.

She huffed, blowing a lock of hair out of her face. It was then that she noticed just how close to the wall she was. She could just make out the West door up ahead. She looked around anxiously.

I should go back, she thought to herself.

Then, she undermined her own good idea.

"It couldn't hurt to just look at it," she said aloud to no one in particular.

So with the baby goat still in her arms, she walked in the direction of the door. She was very excited, and her footsteps kept getting faster, anxious to just have one look into the Maze. However, when she got close enough, she stopped.

The entrance was huge. Looking into it, she felt very uneasy. It was kind of ominous with its towering stone walls and ivy and passageways leading left and right and straight ahead to who knows what. It was enough to deter her from actually going in.

In the distance, she thought she saw something move. Instinctively, she took a step forward, squinting to try and get a better look.

"Not another step, Greenie."

She spun around so fast, she felt a little dizzy. There, she looked into the faces of Alby and a stony-faced Nick. The goat in her arms bleated again.

"Th-this isn't what it looks like," she said, scrambling for the right words to explain. "I was just– I was looking for—"

"Save it," Nick said, and she almost flinched from the calm anger in his voice.

Alby walked towards her, grabbing her by the scruff of her neck and pushing her back towards the Glade. She had a feeling that she knew where she was going, and she was not ready to go back just yet.

She dropped the goat and it scampered off towards the Glade. She tried to push Alby off of her, but he only grabbed her arms.

"Wait. Wait, Nick! I swear, I wasn't doing anything! This is just a big misunderstanding."

Nick's cold stare did not falter as she pleaded with him.

"I wasn't trying to leave. Please, you gotta believe me," she said.

Not one single speck of emotion touched Nick's face as she searched it with her eyes. He only shook his head.

"I don't."