Let's just hop right into this one since I feel bad enough as it is with what I put Kelle through.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything except the story twists and Kelle.
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-….*...- Chapter 22: -….*...-
-….*...- Her Sentence -….*...-
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-….*...-
-….*...-Three Years Ago-….*...-
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She hadn't expected her eyes to ever open again. And so, as challenging as it was, when her eyelids finally parted, she was soothed to see the familiar blue sea flow out in her vision. A brief moment of peace passed through her being as she allowed her ice-like skin to bask in the warmth given by the fiery ball of sun perched in the blue ocean.
But rather quickly, reality crashed upon the young girl with an unforgiving force very few ever experienced.
Kelle's small body began to ache. She felt as if she had been frozen for a thousand years, and her being was just now being warmed for the first time. Rough ground and sharp rocks scraped against her skin while she was hauled forward. Her senses slowly came back to her.
Rough hands had fistfuls of her crusty, burgundy-stained shirt within their grasp, using their grip to drag her limp figure across the earth. The lacerated muscles in her back burned and her whole left arm tingled with every sharp tug on her frame.
'How had she survived?'
The thought pulsed through her mind when she noticed she was back within the green of the Glade.
'Nick. George. Alby.'
"Al-" She coughs her throat coated in thick dust and grave emotions.
She's slammed into the ground again, the rough hands leaving her to cough out the dirt and weakly try to fend for herself.
"Alby?" She grits with a gravelly voice.
"Stand up," He growls.
She strains herself to look up at the boy standing over her.
"I said stand up," He repeats himself, his tone never losing its ferociousness.
She swallows dryly, the sun burning into her already fuzzy vision.
"Stand up, you murderer!" He screams, and she flinches.
What's left of her shattered heart stomped on by his harsh words.
Slowly rolling onto her side, her body weak and trembling, she places her legs and hands under herself. Cool wetness soaks her cheeks, her tear ducts clenching with the effort to release at least a small amount of the sorrow infesting her soul. Her legs, like two twigs fumbling in the breeze, barely supported her as she stood before the rage-filled boy. She cradled her left arm and kept her head bowed while her shoulders shook with silent sobs.
Saying 'Alby was furious with her' wouldn't even do his anger justice. The amount of wrath overflowing from his being was unmeasurable and so there was no way for anyone to put it into words.
And she felt deserving of it. She murdered someone- murdered her friend- her brother. She didn't expect anything less.
"Kelle." His voice wavered, making her lift her gaze to look at him.
His eye was bruised and swollen, his neck stained with the same color and his lip split. His arm was raised towards her, a familiar scarlet stained spear clasped within his white-knuckled fist pointed towards her own chest.
Her lungs constricted making it nearly impossible for her to breathe. She hadn't died in the Maze, mysteriously enough, but she still felt the taste of death present on her tongue.
"You murdered him," Alby spoke, his lips quivering.
She wept, afflicted sobs bubbling from her throat.
Tears of his own began to drip from his dark eyes as he continued, "Why?"
"He wasn't stopping," She cried, "I didn't want to lose you."
A moment passed.
"Just- Just kill me already," She whimpered, her body rigid and cold.
They stood in silence for a moment the only noise being Kelle's weepings.
"Kelle," He started, a new sternness developing in his voice, one that would stick with him for the rest of his life. A mark of a boy that was unwillingly forced into maturity, becoming a young man taking control of the situation.
"Because you've harmed another Glader, and survived a night in the Maze, I hereby declare you banished from showing your face to the Gladers ever again. You will live in secret away from them until we've escaped the Maze." He explains, the spear inching closer to her chest.
She stares at him, baffled at his new declaration, and the powerful way he's explained her punishment. She'd assumed he would kill her himself. She'd expected him to drive the very spear within his hand through her awaiting chest, ending her miserable life.
"Know you've been given your life as it is valuable to the task of escaping this Maze, and that you will never be forgiven for your actions of murdering George." he proceeds, inching towards her.
She cries impossibly harder, the tip of the spear pressing against her skin, driving her backward.
"And you will spend five nights in the Slammer," He finishes giving her one last nudge with the wooden weapon before her foot slips out from underneath her.
She tumbles back and down into a wide dirt hole.
Her brokenness seemed to pull her to the earth faster. While she fell, a certain part of her soul was broken. She'd lost the will to live. She'd lost the desire to breathe. And so, she was okay with what Alby had done to her. She felt deserving of it- she felt deserving of more- she wished that he had done more and ended her life.
So, numbing pain consumed her entire person when she landed on her wounded back with a loud thump that rattled her core. She allowed herself to suffer as the breath left her lungs, and daggers of pain thrust through her body. She didn't give any effort to do anything as she felt she needed a worse punishment. The dust flittered through the air following her shattered heart as it fell out onto the filthiness of the ground. And Kelle lied there, within the pit Alby had dug overnight, completely broken.
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-….*...-Present-….*...-
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"She survived being stung?" Newt inquired, in a soft voice after Alby finished his morbid description of their pasts.
"Yes," Alby grunted, "And she's the only one that's ever been immune."
While the thought of her surviving a sting was puzzling to the boy, Newt's eyes lowered, the reality of their pasts more than he imagined. He thought it would be bad, but that- that was terrible.
Taking someone's life was unforgivable, but under their circumstances, was there really any other option? Kelle saved Alby's life by killing George. If she hadn't done anything Alby would have died, and with Kelle, in an injured state, wouldn't have been able to defend herself very well making her have to kill him anyway. George wasn't immune to the sting, after all, there was nothing they could have done to save him.
And so, with all of these thoughts and conclusions, Newt was drawing in his head within the short silence that followed Alby's story, he readjusted his arm around Kelle, pressing her closer to himself. All of it proved his statement early even more to himself. She was a kindhearted human, always wanting to protect the people she loves. And given the situation, that's exactly what she did three years ago.
"We've come to terms with each other over the years, and she's proved herself to not be a threat anymore," Alby spoke breaking the awkward silence with his gruff voice, "but I'll never forget what she did."
Newt nodded. Not out of an agreement, but because he didn't want to say anything to Alby.
What could he say? That he believed what she did was the right thing to do? That all Alby's blame and hatred was misplaced? That there was no reason for him not to forgive her?
He kept his mouth closed for her sake. She clearly needed the sleep and he wasn't willing to get in between the two just yet. Even though he had only just met the girl, he felt an unrelenting desire to protect her. He wanted to chase her worries away, to make sure she was happy, and to somehow find a way to keep that genuine smile on her face.
And one thing was sure, Newt's view on Alby was slowly becoming sour while his relationship with Kelle became sweeter.
After a few moments, Alby's sudden movement, lifting himself from the floor, brought Newt's attention back to the present.
"Don't tell anyone, Newt," Alby says when he pauses in the doorframe to the Brit's room, his back to the boy on the floor, "It's in the past and doesn't need to be brought up."
"Alright," Newt mutters, lowering his head, waiting for Alby to make his exit.
The older boy's footsteps fade away, and so Newt curls himself around Kelle's sleeping frame.
Her body, fit, and firm, is somehow soft under his touch. He nuzzles the top of her head with his, rubbing her arm with his hand.
"I'm sorry, Kell," He whispers to her, although he knows she can't hear him, "I wish you didn't have to live through that. I hope something like that will never happen again."
His thumb finds the pink-dusted flesh of her cheeks and smooths the dried wetness of tears away, "I'm going to do whatever I can to keep you from going through something like that ever again."
He squeezes her closer to himself, for good measure, his eyelids feeling the weight of sleep press down upon them.
"Sleep well, Kell," he mumbles half coherently, "I'll keep the nightmares away."
And with that, his body succumbs to sleep, and both of them peacefully slumber on the floor of Newt's room.
Ugh, angsty feels :(